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soulmate-game · 4 years

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Part 2: The same prompt, but Siblings this time

Tim paused the video on his computer, the red figure on it in mid-leap off of a building. Be rewound the video, played it, paused again at the same time stamp.

No, his eyes were not deceiving him. The video was not doctored.

So what the hell was going on?

“Hey Timmie, find anything on that Paris situation Bruce asked you to look into?” Dick’s voice made Tim startle, nearly spilling his coffee all over the keyboard and possibly deleting his hard-earned research. Rescuing his lifeblood from certain doom, he hugged his mug to his chest and glared at his older brother for a second. Dick was not in the least bothered, used to this sort of reaction from the younger detective. Dick just grinned, leaning on the back of Tim’s chair and looking up at the images on the large computer screen above them. He whistled lowly, impressed. “You’ve made a lot of progress, nice! Anything you wanna share with me before the debrief tonight?”

Tim clenched and unclenched his jaw, weighing his options. Dick waited patiently, knowing that sometimes Tim needed a minute to sort through his rapid-forming thoughts. Finally Tim sighed, setting down his mug grimly.

“Actually, yes,” he admitted. Tim’s tense tone immediately made Dick stiffen, straightening up. His eyebrows pulled down, and he returned his gaze to the computer.

“Okay, that’s your serious voice. What is it?”

“I… need your confirmation with something,” Tim turned around and looked straight at Dick. And he hesitated again, because certain… past interactions with his eldest brother once again flashed through his head. The entire Bruce-is-alive and being threatened with Arkham interaction, to be specific. But Tim needed to know the truth, it was his fatal flaw he supposed. He couldn’t back away in fear of how Dick might react.

“Ohhhhkay?” Dick just grew more and more concerned the longer that Tim took to actually speak.

“So, just to recap. There are only four people in history who have been able to do a quadruple somersault, right?” Tim asked, knowing full well the answer. Dick, predictably, shifted and grew even more on alert at the inquiry. He knew that couldn’t mean anything good. His jaw clenched, and his hands formed tight fists. But Dick also remembered the Bruce incident with Tim all that time ago, and he didn’t want to repeat his mistakes. So he forced himself to take a deep breath, and shake himself away from jumping to conclusions.

“Yeah,” Dick nodded. “Me, my parents, and my sister,” he confirmed rigidly. Tim nodded, and then rewound the video on the screen again, nodding to show that Dick should focus on it.

“Okay. But watch this,” Tim suggested, starting the video again. Dick watched as the red and black-spotted heroine of Paris, Ladybug, zipped through the air and around buildings with her yo-yo. He watched as she let go, at a height that even a normal person could manage, and executed four perfect somersaults in mid-air before landing nimbly on the ground. Tim paused the video again, his eyes never leaving Dick’s tense face.

“It isn’t doctored,” Tim said, filling the silence and preemptively answering the questions he knew he would get. “I checked. Magic is involved, but Constantine and Zatanna both confirmed it would have no hold over basic physical abilities like flexibility or… gymnastics. Only specifically combat styles used by past Ladybugs can be transferred magically to the next Ladybug, not this.”

“Tim,” Dick’s voice was terrifyingly blank. “What are you suggesting?”

“Nothing yet,” Tim was quick to hold up his hands in surrender. “I’m still doing research. It’s possible, though extremely unlikely, that she managed to teach herself how to do that. You tell me, Dick, how likely is it?”

Dick swallowed, not wanting to say it but knowing he had to look at the facts. “... At her age? Next to impossible,” he admitted. “She could learn it, theoretically, as young as seven or eight, but only if someone who knew what they were doing taught her since she was about three.”

Tim nodded again. He knew those numbers, he knew where they came from.

“Then— and this is only a theory right now— we have what I think is the more plausible scenario,” Tim swallowed. This was the hard part. “Your sister was kidnapped after your parent’s death, but the body that was found wasn’t actually her’s. It wasn’t in a state to be physically identified, so—“

“I know what state it was in, Tim!” Dick snapped, forcing himself to take a few steps back and just breath. Even now, the image of a tiny body burned beyond recognition was burned into the inside of his eyelids, there to taunt him whenever he blinked or slept and let his mind wander in just the wrong direction. She would be… what, Jason’s age, now? She was seven… only seven, when their parents died and she ran off into the Gotham streets in despair. When she was kidnapped, as is what happens in Gotham.

When Dick was presented with a body he could not say WASN’T her’s a week later.

“The DNA…” Dick tried. “They said…”

“I know,” Tim’s voice was carefully soft. “But the records on your family’s DNA were all kept by the circus back then. The Talons had access to those files. It’s very possible they were tampered with. Switched. It wouldn’t be hard for them to burn your sister’s actual medical files and replace them with forged copies that had someone else’s DNA on them. The data of the girl who actually died.”

Dick closed his eyes, shaking his head. He didn’t want to hope, it would hurt too much if Tim was wrong.

Tim had been right about more unlikely things than this, a voice in the back of his head whispered. And yeah, that was true. But Dick was still too scared to hope.

“Finish your research, Tim,” Dick’s voice was strained with suppressed emotion. He couldn’t even look at the younger vigilante as he left the Cave. “Find out who Ladybug’s civilian persona is, and then we’ll talk.”

Tim could only sigh in relief when Dick was gone. That could have gone much worse.

—*—*—*—*—*

A week later, the entire family was gathered. This was the full debrief on the Paris case, rather than the progress update that they had had to do before. Research took longer than Tim had expected, he had years of data to go through after all. But he had come away with exactly what he had been looking for.

After running through the overall situation and where the fight against HawkMoth was at in the present day, Tim licked his lips and took a deep breath. This was it, the Who-Is-Ladybug part.

“I was able to get security footage of her detransformation, just one lucky shot from ten years ago, when this whole thing began,” he prefaced. “She was thirteen years old, and untrained as far as heroism goes, so it stands to reason she didn’t know yet how to be properly careful about transforming. This is that security picture,” he carefully put the enlarged picture up on the Batcomputer, as well as sliding a physical copy onto the table for everyone to pass around.

Dick didn’t even try to grab it, his eyes glued to the computer, expression unreadable. The picture was a little grainy, but most of the girl’s face could be made out. Pigtails, dark black hair that shimmered blue in direct light, blue eyes.

But it was the next picture that Tim pulled up that pushed everything over the edge.

“These are the official pictures of her that I was able to get from Paris records. This first picture is of her at the same age at the security footage, thirteen. The second picture is her now, age twenty-three,” Tim said, before the side-by-side came up on the screen. Tim’s eyes slid over to Dick, who was frozen in his seat, just staring at the images silently. He wasn’t even breathing.

“Dick?” Bruce asked, immediately noticing the behavior. His eyebrows furrowed. “Are you alright?”

Dick’s next breath came in with a shudder, and he clenched his eyes shut in a futile attempt to stop the tears that came out. He choked out a broken chuckle, shaking his head and giving out a lopsided, watery grin.

“Heh. Another point for Timmy being right,” Dick jokes weakly, rubbing at his eyes.

“What do you mean? Tim?” Bruce turned to the younger of the two insistently. “What’s going on? Who is she?”

“Currently, according to Parisian records, she is Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Tim told them. “More specifically, her full name is Marinette Gray Dupain-Cheng. Which I believe is what she chose to change her name to after she was kidnapped sixteen years ago from right outside Haley’s Circus, and illegally transported to France,” Tim clicked another button to bring up a third picture in the side-by-side. It was of someone who was clearly a younger Marinette, but in the very familiar costume of the Flying Graysons, standing right next to a twelve-year old version of Dick. “Because her birth name is Marie Natalia Grayson. Dick’s younger sister, who until now was presumed dead. But I was able to confirm that the medical records back then for Marie were forged, and the information on them could not actually belong to her. The body that was presented as Marie’s… was a red herring to hide that Marie was no longer in America at all.”

Dick’s sob-laugh drew everyone’s attention back to the first Robin, who was now silently, openly, crying. Nobody really knew how to deal with that, and the room descended into awkward silence as Dick tried to regain his composure a little.

“Marinette… Gray,” he whispered, chuckling again and shaking his head as he wiped at his cheeks. “That idiot… her ability with subtlety hasn’t gotten any better, that’s for sure,” he was smiling now, still staring at the pictures of Marinette on the screen. Of his beautiful little sister, all grown up and not buried six feet under like he had thought for far too long.

Because this was different from Hope. This was certainty. The face, the far too on-the-nose name, the somersaults, Dick had even noticed it in the way she swung on her yo-yo. The body memory from years of Trapeze, those little quirks he recognized as belonging to his sister that he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge. But now, all together, he could admit to himself that it was her. It was really her.

Could it be a clone? Maybe. Maybe. But that was why Dick snuck out to France the very next day, informing absolutely nobody.

Because he had a test that only the real Marie would be able to pass.

—*—*—*—*—*

"How did you- No, nevermind, I don't want to know, plausible deniability and all that,” the deep, unfamiliar male voice made Marinette squeak in shock, nearly dropping the phone in her hands. She leaned so far to her right that she almost fell over, but her nearly perfect balance (that only failed her when she was nervous or self conscious) kept her upright.

Her eyes darted down to her phone screen, where an app that Max had helped her create was opened. It utilized at least five hundred little fly-shaped drones that Markov managed and kept track of to scan the city for corrupted butterflies and recognize the level of stress or other negative emotions that civilians were experiencing. It cut down severely on patrol time that the crew had to do, making it easier for them to balance their hero and civilian lives and also allowed for them to arrive at the scene of Akuma attacks twice as fast as before— along with helping with the original purpose of catching evidence to use against Hawkmoth, of course.

Marinette straightened her back, smiling sheepishly and closing out the app. She had just been making a routine check, it had only been open for a minute. How had he managed to sneak up on her in that time? Only chat could do that anymore.

That is, until Marinette turned around the rest of the way and got a good look at the man. Her eyes widened— what was Nightwing, a vigilante from Gotham, doing there?

“I don’t see what plausible deniability has to do with anything,” she replied in easy, unaccented English. She might not speak it often, but she did stay in practice. Even now a lot of her fashion notes and thoughts were in either English or Romani. “It’s just a game app that my friend created,” the practiced lie flew easily past her lips, and she was able to even smile confidently and begin to happily ramble about Max’s (public) achievements like she would in any normal situation. “It is still in the test phase of course, but it uses virtual reality and mapping technology to create a treasure hunt sort of adventure game that people can do as they walk around. Like Pokémon go, but with real-time footage of the city— with people not included besides the game characters of course— and it rewards caution as well as keeping active,” she explained their cover story for the app happily. But Nightwing only smiled easily at her with his arms crossed, clearly not believing a single word.

“Ah— but that probably isn’t interesting,” Marinette purposely stuttered, turning her face into one of (surprisingly genuine) confusion as she looked at the vigilante. “What are you here for anyway, Monsieur? This doesn’t seem like—“

“I have a riddle that a friend of mine told me to ask you,” he interrupted, instantly putting Marinette on guard. She took a step back, eyebrows pulling down at the odd request. But still, she chuckled nervously and shrugged. She had to maintain appearances after all.

“Uh, sure..? Riddles are fun, in the right circumstances I guess.”

Nightwing beamed happily, nearly blinding the poor girl. “Awesome!” His next words came out in fluent Romani though: “If a Hummingbird ever gets lost, what kind of animal will track it down?”

Marinette’s mouth went dry, her shoulders dropping. Her mouth opened and closed, the shock of the question leaving her unable to even pretend she didn’t understand exactly what was said. Nightwing’s gaze grew more intense, yet his smile got impossibly soft.

Marinette swallowed thickly, and she took a deep breath before responding in Romani: “You shouldn’t— only one person—“

“That doesn’t answer the riddle, ma’am.”

Marinette’s confusion turned into a harsh glare. “He would never tell someone else to ask me that. What are you trying to play at, Nightwing?” She hissed harshly, still in her native language.

“Listen, Marinette,” Nightwing held up both hands to try to calm her down. It did the opposite, making her take another step back. “Batman and the rest of our team has been looking into the Hawkmoth security—“ Marinette cursed, clearly seeing where this was going. “— We believe he found out who Ladybug is. But, we also found signs that your real name is—“

“Shut up!” She yelled in English, fists clenched tightly. Luckily she had gone into an alleyway to check her phone, or else they would be attracting attention by then. Her eyes sparked with anger. “You don’t get to use that name. And if you’re so smart,” Marinette tucked her phone into her purse and scaled the wall next to her nimbly, perching on the roof as Nightwing cursed and began to follow her. “Then try to predict my moves, birdy.”

It only took a few minutes and crossed rooftops for Marinette to call on her transformation and pick up speed. She knew by then that Nightwing, and probably the other Bats too, already found her out. Not ideal, but manageable. Now she wanted to show him why he shouldn’t come into her territory and dig into her past and think he could get away with it.

Somewhere during the chase, more Bats appeared one by one. Judging by what Ladybug was able to overhear, they had come as soon as they realized where Nightwing had snuck off to.

That made Marinette pause from where she hid behind a sloped roof, in the middle of a call to her own teammates. Nightwing hadn’t come on his team’s orders?

Why the hell had he come, then?

She shook thought thoughts away, focusing on her plan. Paris was her city, and she would make sure the Bats learned their lesson when it came to sticking their nose in Parisian business.

“Bug?” The soft, concerned call came from her yo-yo and pulled her from her contemplating. Max, in full Pegasus attire, was frowning at her in worry on the small screen. She just shook her head at him.

“I’m fine, Peg. Just don’t like how this feels like Gotham ruining my life again,” she remarked sourly. “But I’m fine. Start plan We’re Not Kids.”

Max nodded, but rolled his eyes and muttered something that sounded like; “even though we made this plan when we actually were kids…”

A portal opened in the air a few seconds later, releasing Honeybee in all her gold and black glory. The winged hero zipped through the air, immediately putting team Miraculous at an advantage since team Bat didn’t want to actually harm them.

It took a glorious five seconds for Honeybee to paralyze them all before Tortoise dropped out from another portal and surrounded the temporarily paralyzed vigilantes in a dome shield that kept them in just as easily as it kept everything else out.

One by one, Marinette’s teammates dropped out of more portals until Pegasus himself joined them. Ladybug took that as her que to come out, leaping over her hiding place to land in front of her friends, who had formed a half-circle in front of the trapped dome.

“Vixen,” she called to the fox-themed hero, whose ears twitched before she straightened to attention. “Create an illusion to hide us. The last thing we need are any pictures or anyone asking questions.”

“Got it!” Vixen agreed easily, raising her flute to her lips. A short melody later, and their surroundings warped. To those inside the illusion, it seemed as if the world merely ended off of the rooftop they were on, into only blankness. Outside, that very rooftop appeared empty.

It was then that Chat Noir stepped up to take Ladybug’s side, his acidic green eyes scanning over the Gotham vigilantes trapped inside Tortoise’s protective barrier.

“You can release the paralysis, Honeybee,” his order was noticeably softer than Ladybug’s clear commands. It was obvious that he was the deputy in this situation, the flexibility to Ladybug’s iron leadership. That was when the red clad hero crossed her arm, resuming control of the situation wordlessly. The Gotham heroes briefly glowed gold as Honeybee let their paralysis begin to gradually wear off.

“Paris is my city,” Ladybug’s voice was at a normal volume, but came out with such auditory steel that it was clear she expected to be listened to, or she’d know why. “If I needed or wanted your help, I would have asked for it. Now, if you had come here normally to offer aid, then we might be having a different discussion right now,” her eyes narrowed further. “But you dug into my past. You violated my privacy. And Nightwing, you crossed a line,” she would have continued if the blue and black clad hero didn’t use his sudden ability to move to rip off his mask.

Marinette’s voice died in her throat, and for a while she thought she might be hallucinating. Those eyes, that face— she knew them. She knew them, because she saw them whenever she dared close her eyes. Because the dreams she had, the dreams that made her never want to drag herself out of bed because she wanted to believe those dreams were real so badly, always contained those eyes. And that face, though it had been much younger in her memories.

She stumbled, and only Chat’s presence at her side kept her from toppling right over.

“Bugaboo?” He asked frantically, distraught. She just shook her head dazedly, pushing herself back to her feet and away from her partner.

“I’m fine, Chat. Just…,” she assured her partner, but her eyes never left Nightwing. She licked her lips nervously, before continuing; “... Bluebird,” she whispered, making Nightwing’s eyes widen. Her brother’s eyes. “That’s the answer to the riddle, right?”

Slowly, a wide smile split his face before he began to laugh happily, despite Robin slapping Nightwing’s mask back on his face with a furious grumble.

“Ladybug?” Tortoise asked, stepping up to her other side cautiously. Seeing as they were all adults now, none of them had to worry about time or power limits anymore. “Are you..?”

“Release the shield,” she ordered instead of answering, her eyes clearly damp behind her mask. “I need to strangle my idiotic older brother for scaring the hell out of me.”

That made the rest of her team make their various exclamations of shock, but Chat and Tortoise stayed silent. Chat just put a hand on Ladybug’s shoulder in support, while Tortoise zipped his wide gaze back to Nightwing before sighing and releasing his ability.

“Only you, Bug,” the green clad hero groused playfully. “Only you.”

If Marinette Dupain-Cheng suddenly introduced her long-lost brother to her closest friends and family that same night, nobody voiced the coincidence out loud.

—*—*—*—*—*

Part 1: Romance

Part 3: Bio!Parent

#maribat #ml x dc #mlb x dc #dickinette #platonic dickinette #3-from-1 challenge

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thatsadorbsyo · 3 years

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😊 for the munday thing!

😊 for likable quality for a role play mun to have

I like it a lot when people aren't afraid to have their characters be wrong, look stupid, or behave in unflattering ways, when it would be in-character for them to do so. When it's clear to me that a writer isn't afraid to let their character be gullible, to double-down on an argument that they're clearly wrong on (and I'm not talking about, like, offensive stuff, I mean just stuff they're objectively wrong about that they firmly believe anyway), or to freak out in a way that maybe goes against the image the character is ICly trying to project, that immediately shows me that this is a writer who is willing to respond directly to what's in front of them rather than sticking rigidly to some sort of aesthetic that they're attached to. I just find that type of writer more fun to write with. Characters who are too cool to react to anything just aren't fun, in my opinion.

#the number one way to get me to cold approach you is if you have your character be gullible in a self-aware way

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kermitbread · 4 years

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putting this here too. it's been a while since I've written anything proper and I've finished this on someone else's computer (I make do lol)

it's also in my AO3 :) ok see ya

Caw, caw, caw.

It was now dusk, the air becoming cooler now that the sun was setting. Everything was silent, from the far away cries of birds up in the sky, to the sound of a swing being pulled back and forth by the children's playground nearby.

The clouds were almost covering the sky, letting the sun illuminate through with a pretty red-orange color. As the wind began to pick up a little, Nene could feel that it was going to get real cold any time soon.

The clackety noise of a bicycle made her turn around. Well, she should have known. Amane always took the same path home as her, and automatically that made them companions everyday.

He pulled the brakes, letting his bike go to a halt. "Didn't I tell you to wait for me, Yashiro?"

"You were busy with Astronomy club, and I didn't wanna bother you." She admitted. Knowing how busy he was ever since he got the position as president of the club, she didn't want to waste too much of his time.

He chuckled, shaking his head as he got off his bike and set it on its stand. "You're never a bother to me, you know."

Nene had to avert her eyes away from him, her grip on her bag's strap tightening. It's times like this that made her feel so… strange. Just being around him would probably make her heart explode, with all the nonsense he would say.

"Hey, Yashiro. Look up over there." Amane's voice guided her back to where he was pointing at. The clouds slightly parted, and she could see the outline of the sun slowly descending downwards.

"The stars are about to come out. I heard there's gonna be a lot out later on when it gets a bit more dark, cuz the clouds won't be in the way for at least a few minutes."

Stars. She didn't know why, but hearing Amane talk about the stars felt comforting, somehow. Seeing his eyes brighten up at the mere mention of them, it was always a welcome sight indeed.

Nene heard him walk up to her side, and unexpectedly take her hand. "Let's go over there a sec!"

"Amane-kun, I'm gonna trip!" She tried to stop the red grazing upon her cheeks, staring at their intertwined hands together.

It was really not fair how he had her feeling this way so much.

He only laughed, proceeding to pull her along to the playground, right towards the swings. Upon reaching the first swing, he let her hand go at last, and she couldn't help but miss the warmth they brought from the chilly air.

"We're not little kids anymore, you know." Nene smiled regardless, sitting on the swing beside him. Amane was known for being the mature one out of him and his brother, but that didn't mean he didn't have a childish side to him.

"Swings are still fun, though. Age doesn't really matter here." Amane grabbed the handles, stepping on the seat of the swing. It wobbled around, worrying Nene.

"You're gonna fall, get down from there."

"Don't worry! I'm used to this." He started swinging back and forth, but Nene couldn't help but remain worried. What if he fell and broke a limb, or even worse—

With one last push, Amane stopped the swing from moving, hopping off, arms up in the air. He turned to Nene with a big smile on his face. "Ta-da!"

"You're lucky you didn't hurt yourself. That was dangerous, Amane-kun."

"You need to relax, Yashiro." He went back to the swing and sat down properly this time, kicking his feet forward a little.

A comfortable silence followed between them. Aside from the sounds of the chain swings going to and fro, and Amane's feet kicking up the dirt below, it was just peace and quiet.

The sun was now near the lower edge, and the stars finally clearly visible right up the darkening sky. Nene looked back at Amane, and was rather taken aback by the sight before her.

He wasn't looking right at her, but he had his eyes up at the stars above. The setting sun illuminated his figure, and it pretty much made him look like some kind of extraterrestrial being.

In a good way, of course.

"Hey." He finally averted his gaze off the sky, turning back to her. "You think there's anything out there that's watching us right now?"

"You mean like aliens?" She asked, and he laughed, as if the question had sounded silly, which it was.

"Something like that, I guess. But have you ever wondered about the possibility that there's something out there, probably light years away?"

Nene hummed, making the swing she was on go back and forth a bit. "Not really. What brought this on, Amane-kun?"

The sun had since long gone, the moon now taking its place up the sky. She couldn't help but notice how Amane's face brightened up at the sight of the moon, and once again it was something that somehow gave her a strange sort of comfort.

She wondered if she did the same to him, in some kind of way.

"I want you to know… that I really really like you, Amane-kun!" The phrase hung around her mouth for so long, all she needed was a little push for it come out.

How would he react, though? Would he accept? Would he just take it for her as one of her jokes? Knowing him, he'd definitely not take it seriously.

Maybe it was best she didn't say that out loud. Not like this, anyway.

"It might seem weird if I tell you." He stopped kicking on the ground, letting the swing gradually come to a stop. Nene shook her head at that.

"I'm sure it won't! You can tell me."

Amane contemplated for a second, the both of them looking at each other intently. Seeing no doubt in her expression, he gave in, turning back to the moon.

"Remember the time we first met? Back in middle school."

Of course she did. It was an important day to remember, after all.

"Yeah." She answered, not really sure where this was going. The nightly air became a bit more chillier, and she rubbed her arm, trying to get herself to stop shivering.

"I found you sitting by that swing you're on, bawling your eyes out." Amane rose both hands to his face, making a mock-crying pose. He had to swivel backwards when Nene tried to shove him off the swing.

She huffed angrily, glaring at how he could only laugh at the whole situation. "For your information, I was suffering a terrible heartbreak that day!"

"Ah, yeah. That jerk of a senpai who turned you down."

"Are you bringing this up just to make fun of me?!" She couldn't see how anything good was coming out of this conversation.

"No, no, it's not like that at all." The teasing tone he had in his voice faded to something more sincere. One by one, the light posts around them lit up as the sky darkened more, and the stars popping up at every corner.

"It's kinda weird, but I was kinda glad you were there that day."

Red eyes blinked owlishly. At her confused expression, Amane let out another light chuckle, leaning himself forward so that his elbows were propped on his legs, head tilted at her.

"I believe there's something out there looking out for you, Yashiro. And I think that's what lead me to meeting you in the first place."

Ah.

Why was her heart beating so fast again?

"L...like a guardian angel? Don't be silly, Amane-kun. You out of all people should know that." Nene waved her hand at him, trying to dismiss his words and the fact her cheeks were beginning to turn red yet again.

He got off the swing, walking towards her and squatting down in front of her so that she could see him face to face. Something tells her he was being serious about this.

"How else would you explain this?"

"Eh… uh… explain what?" It was hard trying to get into eye contact with him without getting flustered about it.

"You, me. An unsuspecting couple of kids. We literally don't match up in terms of how we want to live our life. Yet, here we are." To further prove whatever point he was carrying across, he removed both her hands off the handles of the swing and led them to her lap, their fingers intertwined and all.

Suddenly it didn't feel so cold anymore.

"Something out there cared enough to let our paths cross that day. It knew I'd care enough to stay by your side. Don't you think so?"

She felt frozen on the spot, unable to do anything but watch him, as through the street lights, through the soft shine of the moon, he smiled.

"...yeah. Yeah, I do. I really do." Almost mindlessly she nodded. She had to be careful; she didn't know what she'd do if her heart had bursted from all of this going on.

"To be perfectly honest, I was also happy you came along, Amane-kun." Now her gaze turned shy, preferring to look at the ground below them than right at his eyes.

"You're annoying, you're a perv most of the time, and you never take anything seriously…" She had to grin a little when she could feel Amane grimace at those words, like he had been struck physically.

Finally gathering up her courage, she lifted her head back up, her smile directing to him. "But things probably wouldn't be the same if you hadn't sat there next to me and spoke like my life depended on it."

Here goes nothing.

Nene leaned forward, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek, and if you think about it, they were awfully looking like a princess giving her knight a reward for his duty.

Doesn't sound too bad, to be honest.

"So thank you, for heeding that call. Thank you for being there by my side."

Amane became a little flustered from the sudden act of affection, as he could only sit back up rigidly and nod. He had a silly little smile on his face, though, and that was enough to know what he was currently feeling.

There were so many words he wanted to say to her, so many things he wanted her to know.

"I want you to know—"

"Y-yeah." Was all he could muster out as a reply.

Nene giggled at his unusually shy demeanor, standing up from the swing and picking her bag up to her shoulder. "Well, it's getting dark out now. Let's go!"

To his surprise, she was the one who grabbed onto his hand first, and she was the one who was now dragging him along the path, smiling all the way.

That crooked, goofy grin of his came back, as he just let her lead him far away, never taking his eyes of her.

"—that I really, really like you, Yashiro."

#jibaku shounen hanako kun #toilet bound hanako kun #yashiro nene #hanako kun #yugi amane #hananene #amanene #anime #fanfiction #ao3 fanfic #i am incapable of writing angst #bc i just wanna commit not alive upon writing some #so i counter the sad with the fluff #yeah im weak for happy things lol

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halothenthehorns · 3 years

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TLTNL- SILVER AND OPALS

James took the book from Lily with a happy enough air. He was mostly hoping the first Quidditch game would come up soon, considering tryouts were already past and they needed to see the team in action of course.

Where was Dumbledore, and what was he doing?

"Thoughts I really don't think of too often, unlike Moony," Sirius rolled his eyes.

"You make me sound like a panting teenager," Remus grumbled. "Of course I wonder all the time where the leader of the Order is."

"Your ears really have been saved Harry," Sirius continued as if he hadn't spoken. "Used to come up at least once a meal what that man could be up to, and that's nothing compared to school."

"I take it back," James agreed. "We might not have ever noticed if he was missing from the staff table, but Remus would have flipped the castle inside out if he was missing for more than a day."

Remus' scowl increased upon both of his friends. Their jesting was in good nature, but it still rankled him they weren't wrong. It simply angered him more than anything how blind he'd been until days ago, how he'd refused to see any side of Dumbledore except his white beard until he had it shoved in his face he could be missing something.

His friends obviously knew that had been shaken. They just weren't sure what to make of that themselves. It should have been...a relief? That wasn't the right word either, because it was too sad how down he was now with no one to look up to in that same sense.

When James realized Moony wasn't going to react in any sense of the word he decided to keep going instead, deciding he'd been through more than enough today already, no need to push it.

Harry caught sight of the headmaster only twice over the next few weeks. He rarely appeared at meals anymore, and Harry was sure Hermione was right in thinking that he was leaving the school for days at a time. Had Dumbledore forgotten the lessons he was supposed to be giving Harry?

"I entirely doubt that," Lily sighed. "Though what else he is busy doing is beyond me."

Harry nodded his agreement, trying not to pretend he hadn't been panicking just slightly at the thought of being forgotten, left alone, again.

Dumbledore had said that the lessons were leading to something to do with the prophecy; Harry had felt bolstered, comforted, and now he felt slightly abandoned.

He wanted to laugh at his own thoughts, but his teeth were still rather gritted. He didn't want to see the expressions on those around him, either pity, remorse, or anything else for something of his past that just could not be changed no matter how much he'd wish for it, so was more than relieved when James continued without too much of a hitch in his throat.

Halfway through October came their first trip of the term to Hogsmeade. Harry had wondered whether these trips would still be allowed, given the increasingly tight security measures around the school,

"Nah, never seen the school get that bad," Sirius rolled his eyes at the thought. "The teachers are well aware we'd burn the place to the ground ourselves if they didn't let the students get some air."

"And that was the normal students, considering this lot went about it without permission," Lily snorted.

but was pleased to know that they were going ahead; it was always good to get out of the castle grounds for a few hours.

Harry woke early on the morning of the trip, which was proving stormy, and whiled away the time until breakfast by reading his copy of Advanced Potion-Making. He did not usually lie in bed reading his textbooks; that sort of behavior, as Ron rightly said, was indecent in anybody except Hermione, who was simply weird that way.

Lily started snickering away again at once, and Harry looked at her in exasperation, still wanting to demand just what was so funny he was missing? It certainly wasn't the same reaction from the Marauders, who looked more dumbfounded than anything this was how Harry chose to spend his time. Even if he'd chosen to pursue homework they'd have thought nothing of it, but independent study!

"You lot can't even really mock him," Remus pleasantly interpreted the almost constipated look on James and Sirius, "because I caught you lot doing the same thing with Transfiguration books so often I honestly thought you had split personalities."

"Yes, well, we had a pretty damn good reason," James huffed.

"So does Harry, he's catching up on five years worth of Potions that useless teacher couldn't have taught him," Sirius insisted, deciding to defend this for now, though no one in here was accusing him of anything.

Lily started laughing harder than ever, and James quickly kept going then, to Harry's relief.

Harry felt, however, that the Half-Blood Princes copy of Advanced Potion-Making hardly qualified as a textbook. The more Harry pored over the book, the more he realized how much was in there, not only the handy hints and shortcuts on potions that was earning him such a glowing reputation with Slughorn, but also the imaginative little jinxes and hexes scribbled in the margins, which Harry was sure, judging by the crossings-out and revisions, that the Prince had invented himself.

Harry whistled in surprise. "Hard to imagine a student inventing spells."

"I wouldn't be that surprised, we tend to experiment quite a bit in our years, far more than when we age and do things out of habit," Remus shrugged.

Harry had already attempted a few of the Prince's self-invented spells. There had been a hex that caused toenails to grow alarmingly fast (he had tried this on Crabbe in the corridor, with very entertaining results); a jinx that glued the tongue to the roof of the mouth (which he had twice used, to general applause, on an unsuspecting Argus Filch); and, perhaps most useful of all, Muffliato, a spell that filled the ears of anyone nearby with an unidentifiable buzzing, so that lengthy conversations could be held in class with out being overheard.

The first two weren't of much consequence, they were used regularly in all their years at school amongst the students and it was more likely this Prince had simply copied a spell he intended to practice. That last one however did catch them off guard, they'd never heard of that exact spell.

"That's really interesting, sort of like honing an Imperturbable Charm, except instead of directly forcing anything not to be around you, you're merely distracting them instead," James eyes were alight at once with the possibility of this.

"Glory I want to meet whoever got a nail on that spell," Sirius agreed enthusiastically, causing James' face to settle back into drawn confusion for that and Lily to start snickering harder than ever.

The only person who did not find these charms amusing was Hermione,

"No surprise there," Remus rolled his eyes at this continuing to be mentioned.

who maintained a rigidly disapproving expression throughout and refused to talk at all if Harry had used the Muffliato spell on anyone in the vicinity.

Sitting up in bed, Harry turned the book sideways so as to examine more closely the scribbled instructions for a spell that seemed to have caused the Prince some trouble. There were many crossings-out and alterations, but finally, crammed into a corner of the page, the scribble:

Levicorpus (nvbl)

Harry watched wearily as those around him frowned at the mention of that spell, one they hadn't used in quite some time. Before he even had a chance to ask, James gave a blustering sigh but explained, "you already saw that one in action, courtesy of me."

Harry's eyes flipped wide in surprise as he demanded, "you invented that spell?"

James frowned in confusion at Harry's leap. "Nah, did a Transfiguration paper for a sixth year Slytherin, he taught me this in exchange." He waited and watched Harry flip through the spells he'd seen his father use, only one of which was silent in the one time he'd 'seen' his father perform magic.

"Oh," was all he could think to mutter before waving him on. He still felt like there was some connection he was missing in this, even if he had latched onto the right memory for once for an answer.

While the wind and sleet pounded relentlessly on the windows, and Neville snored loudly, Harry stared at the letters in brackets. Nvbl., that had to mean "nonverbal." Harry rather doubted he would be able to bring off this particular spell; he was still having difficulty with nonverbal spells, something Snape had been quick to comment on in every D.A.D.A. class. On the other hand, the Prince had proved a much more effective teacher than Snape so far.

Lily had to fight very, very hard this time not to fall off the furniture in a fit of laughter, she knew that would be just too much of a giveaway. Thankfully she'd been in such a spirited mood for so long now, the others were just ignoring her still near constant stream of snickering, even though their annoyance continued to grow just what she found so funny.

Pointing his wand at nothing in particular, he gave it an upward flick and said Levicorpus! inside his head.

Then there was a scream.

"Well, it seems to have worked," Sirius said pleasantly.

"Wonder which of his roommates he snagged," James chuckled, he'd accidentally caught a random third year on his first try and this was bound to be funnier because Harry would know the bloke.

"Hopefully not myself," was all Harry could think to mutter.

There was a flash of light and the room was full of voices: Everyone had woken up as Ron had let out a yell.

"I half expected it to be Neville, you already mentioned him snoring and he hasn't had a catastrophe happen to him in ages," James chuckled.

Harry sent Advanced Potion-Making flying in panic; Ron was dangling upside down in midair as though an invisible hook had hoisted him up by the ankle.

"Revenge for him punching you awake over the summer," Remus got a good laugh out of that. "It happened so long ago he wouldn't even realize you'd still planned retaliation."

"Moony's favorite," Sirius sighed.

Harry yelled an apology, as Dean and Seamus roared with laughter, and Neville picked himself up from the floor, having fallen out of bed.

"Ah, well, I was half right," James's laughter continued, the easy mood flowing through the room making him continuing just had everyone chuckling even harder than they really should have been.

He groped for the potion book and riffled through it in a panic, trying to find the right page; at last he located it and deciphered the cramped word underneath the spell: Praying that this was the counter-jinx, Harry thought Liberacorpus! with all his might. There was another flash of light, and Ron fell in a heap onto his mattress.

Harry repeated his apology, while Dean and Seamus continued to roar with laughter.

Ron requested tomorrow, Harry just use an alarm clock.

"Now where's the fun in that?" Sirius cackled.

By the time they had got dressed, padding themselves out with several of Mrs. Weasleys hand-knitted sweaters and carrying, cloaks, scarves, and gloves, Ron's shock had subsided and he had decided that Harry's new spell was highly amusing; so amusing, in fact, that he lost no time in regaling Hermione with the story as they sat down for breakfast.

"Why?" Remus demanded, looking genuinely dumbfounded at this display. "He must know by now anything regarding that book won't entertain her."

Harry just shrugged, he hadn't been planning on telling her.

Hermione had not cracked a smile during this anecdote, and now turned an expression of wintry disapproval upon Harry, demanding if this was yet another spell from that potion book of his.

Harry frowned at her, calling her out on always jumping to the worst conclusions.

"It's even worse when she's right," Sirius huffed.

He agreed it was though, and she lectured him on just attempting an unknown, handwritten spell to see what would happen!

"She's got half a point," Lily couldn't help but agree now that some of their laughter had subsided. "That really could have been dangerous, or you may not have even known the effect at all until it was too late to understand something was wrong, may not even have had a countercurse ready."

Harry couldn't help but shift in unease, not at all enjoying the foreboding feeling he believed her.

Harry asked what made it so bad handwritten?

Hermione snapped that meant it wasn't Ministry approved,

"Gah!" Sirius clutched his ears in pain.

"As if we didn't hear enough of that last year, Hermione's really working to get on every one of my nerves lately," James agreed tartly.

She also concluded this Prince must have been quite a dodgy one, to be inventing spells to dangle people around, who put energy into that?

"I don't even think the Prince made up half those spells," James rolled his eyes. "I'm starting to wonder if he just heard about them and was trying to figure out how to do them himself." At least four of them so far had been common knowledge during his time at school, it seemed ridiculous one person had made up all of those and they'd grown popular in that same time frame.

Ron offered his twin brothers, while Harry pointed out his dad. He quickly fibbed and told Lupin had mentioned this spell once, but this last part was not true; in fact, Harry had seen his father use the spell on Snape, but he had never told Ron and Hermione about that particular excursion into the Pensieve. Now, however, a wonderful possibility occurred to him. Could the Half-Blood Prince possibly be-?

James tried to laugh, but the sound didn't really make it to full crescendo. Harry very obviously realized the answer to that one here and now, but what he wouldn't give to gift his son with something like this. His cloak often times didn't feel like it was enough to remind his only child he'd even existed, but he tried as always to shake off those thoughts.

Lily really was getting a handle on herself and almost entirely smothered the funny little noise Harry had the wrong parents influence for this book.

Hermione kept going past his thoughts, pointing out they'd seen this spell in action before as well, by Death Eaters during the Quidditch World Cup.

"That must have been an entirely different spell," Remus disagreed, "or at least a modified version of it. Levicorpus very specifically hoists one up by their ankle. That other bit of magic was much more..." he trailed off, not at all liking the words his mind offered up to explain such evil magic.

Flexible seemed to light for what those Muggles had suffered.

Ron came to his aid, saying this was different, those people were abusing the spell. Harry and his dad were just having a laugh, then he told Hermione she just didn't like this Prince because he was better than Hermione at Potions.

Hermione insisted it had nothing to do with that, even as her cheeks went red.

"At once proving her wrong," Sirius needlessly pointed out with his own eye roll. Girl needed to get a handle on her expressions. He only wished Lily were so easy to read, he still kept eyeing her and hoping any moment she'd slip and tell them who this Prince was, but aside from laughing at their ignorance he wasn't getting anything.

She insisted it was all just irresponsible what they were doing with the unknown of that book. Then she persisted Ron stop calling him Prince, like it's a title, he obviously wasn't a good person!

Harry deflected if she was getting towards him being a Death Eater there's no way he'd be boasting as a half-blood.

Lily let out a blistering sigh the kids had just so easily transitioned into talking about what she'd refused to see for far too long about this Prince.

Even as he said it, Harry remembered that his father had been pure-blood, but he pushed the thought out of his mind; he would worry about that later.

Hermione stubbornly went on with her point, Death Eaters couldn't all be pure-blood, there just weren't that many of them. At least some had to be half-bloods, pretending to be pure. It was only Muggle-borns they outright hated, they'd be quite happy to let Harry and Ron join up.

"Oh but of course, lots of parties would be going on during that," Sirius wrinkled his nose in disgust even as he joked of this.

"Deathday parties," Remus agreed with the same expression.

In Ron's indignation, he sent a sausage flying to hit Ernie Macmillan.

James snorted at the random insertion, and all the sudden memories of doing that with much more purpose.

Pointing out his family was nothing but blood traitors, and that was worse than a Muggle-born as far as Death Eaters were concerned!

Harry agreed they'd just love to have him around, they'd all be best pals if they'd stop trying to kill him.

"You mean that's not how you make the best of friends?" Remus mockingly demanded.

This made Ron laugh; even Hermione gave a grudging smile, and a distraction arrived in the shape of Ginny.

"Ginny's been doing that a lot this year," Lily chuckled in surprise while Harry was quick to smile again for getting off this topic, it was starting to give him a headache lingering on this.

She gave him another scroll of parchment with Harry's name written upon it in familiar, thin, slanting writing from Dumbledore. He thanked her, and then asked if she'd be going with them to Hogsmeade?

Ginny said no, she was meeting up with Dean, but would probably see them there.

Filch was standing at the oak front doors as usual, checking off the names of people who had permission to go into Hogsmeade. The process took even longer than normal as Filch was triple-checking everybody with his Secrecy Sensor.

Ron demanded why they were checking to see if they were smuggling Dark stuff out? Surely this would only happen when they were trying to get back in with it.

His cheek earned him a few extra jabs with the Sensor, and he was still wincing as they stepped out into the wind and sleet.

The three Marauders sighed heavily, more than making their point they'd laughingly demanded the same thing of Filch at one point or another, and received the same results.

The walk into Hogsmeade was not enjoyable. Harry wrapped his scarf over his lower face; the exposed part soon felt both raw and numb. The road to the village was full of students bent double against the bitter wind. More than once Harry wondered whether they might not have had a better time in the warm common room, and when they finally reached Hogsmeade and saw that Zonko's Joke Shop had been boarded up, Harry took it as confirmation that this trip was not destined to be fun.

"Fred and George already put them out of business?" James forcefully put a happy little spin back in his voice at the reminder of how murky business' were in this climate. He still hated all the reminders pouring back in now upon Harry's life.

Harry couldn't even begin to play along. Ginny had only caused a slight delay in an ever growing headache, which clearly hadn't been about the Prince, but his coming day, and this wasn't boding well.

Ron pointed, with a thickly gloved hand, toward Honeydukes, which was mercifully open, and Harry and Hermione staggered in his wake into the crowded shop.

They were immediately enveloped by warm, toffee-scented air.

Sirius inhaled deeply like he was trying to pull that scent to him right now, boy he missed his frequent trips to that shop.

Ron was just saying how they should stay in here all afternoon when Slughorn called out to them from behind. He had a box of crystallized pineapple in his arm, and was scolding Harry he'd missed three of his little suppers now.

"That toffee scent still worth it?" Remus muttered conspiratorially, as if Slughorn were here now and trying to wrangle the pair of his friends along once again.

"Nah, I'd have gone outside again already," Sirius agreed.

"Maybe come back with a few snowballs if he didn't take a hint," James agreed.

He insisted this wouldn't do, Miss Granger loved them!

Hermione helplessly said they certainly were-

"I can't decide if Hermione's lying to herself, or him," James snorted.

Harry defended he'd had Quidditch practice, when in fact he'd been scheduling these every time Slughorn had sent him a little, violet ribbon-adorned invitation. This strategy meant that Ron was not left out, and they usually had a laugh with Ginny, imagining Hermione shut up with McLaggen and Zabini.

All of the boys got a good laugh out of that, while Lily rolled her eyes. They really weren't that bad.

Slughorn said he expected them to certainly win their coming match then, with all this hard work.

"I already expected that," James smirked while Harry gave a nervous grin back. He really wanted this game to go without a hitch, it being his first one as captain.

He tried to offer Harry to come on Monday, he surely wouldn't be playing in this weather.

Harry said he had an appointment with Dumbledore, and Slughorn dramatically sighed he'd been foisted again. He threatened Harry couldn't avoid him forever.

"Try him," Sirius sniffed, they'd managed quite often in their years.

And with a regal wave, he waddled out of the shop, taking as little notice of Ron as though he had been a display of Cockroach Clusters.

"An insult on top of an insult," Remus groaned, as if Ron didn't have reason enough for his insecurity problems to be in his face.

Hermione added on even after Slughorn left that they really weren't that bad, they could be fun at times. Then she caught sight of Ron's face, and was suddenly very interested in the deluxe sugar quills.

"Subtle," Sirius drew the word out with a deadpan expression.

"I don't see why she doesn't just invite him along," Lily sighed. "Ask Slughorn if she can bring a friend, he'll say yes on principle, he can come along to one and see how they are. I'll doubt he'd want to go again after that," she finished with a grumpy look at the boys.

"After that first one she hadn't the chance," Harry reminded of his Quidditch practices.

"And I'd be even more cross with her, subjecting him to that!" James rolled his eyes good naturedly. They'd invited Remus and...well they'd invited their friends to one as well, and they'd taken to it as well as to be expected. Needless to say, there was a reason Slughorn only invited he and Sirius to the important parties instead of every one after that.

Glad that Hermione had changed the subject, Harry showed much more interest in the new extra-large sugar quills than he would normally have done, but Ron continued to look moody and merely shrugged when Hermione asked him where he wanted to go next.

No one wanted to linger in the shop after that, and instead bundled backup to head for The Three Broomsticks.

The bitter wind was like knives on their faces after the sugary warmth of Honeydukes. The street was not very busy; nobody was lingering to chat, just hurrying toward their destinations. The exceptions were two men a little ahead of them, standing just outside the Three Broomsticks. One was very tall and thin; squinting through his rain-washed glasses Harry recognized the barman who worked in the other Hogsmeade pub, the Hog's Head. As Harry, Ron, and Hermione drew closer, the barman drew his cloak more tightly around his neck and walked away, leaving the shorter man to fumble with something in his arms. They were barely feet from him when Harry realized who the man was, Mundungus.

"Oh joy," Sirius huffed. The last time this one had been significantly mentioned he'd dropped the ball and allowed a dementor to attack Harry. The end results weren't the point, this one wasn't a favorite of theirs no matter the good laugh he was worth from time to time.

The squat, bandy-legged man with long, straggly, ginger hair jumped and dropped an ancient suitcase, which burst open, releasing what looked like the entire contents of a junk shop window.

"Sounds about right," Remus snorted.

"Probably stole the lot," James agreed.

He greeted them with a most unconvincing stab at airiness.

"Wonder why he would be," Lily muttered. Harry really hadn't shown much inclination towards him for Mundungus to be anything other than passingly cordial.

He began scrabbling on the ground to retrieve the contents of his suitcase with every appearance of a man eager to be gone.

Harry politely asked if he was selling all this?

Mundungus snapped yes he was while snatching a silver goblet out of Ron's hands.

Ron had just begun to say how familiar that looked when Mundungus shouted ouch!

James startled hard in surprise, automatically trying to lean in closer to his kid in fear someone had attacked him. It was a natural reaction after all the threatening situations his kid had been in. Forcing himself not to imagine dementors swooping in once more upon his child, he kept going frantically because of that one simple word.

Harry had pinned Mundungus against the wall of the pub by the throat. Holding him fast with one hand, he pulled out his wand.

"Bloody hell, what did he have!" Lily yelped in concern, fighting with herself to jump in front of Harry and demand a reasonable explanation for this. His fierce expression wasn't giving much of an answer, clearly so outraged the words weren't coming to him, but she just knew it had to be a good one for him to be acting like this.

Harry pressed their noses together as he shouted that had been from Sirius' house! That had the Black family crest on it!

This was so far beyond the scope of the danger they'd been fearing, the burst of surprised laughter almost sounded like it had been punched out of Sirius. He still kept going though, his shoulders shaking with mirth even as his eyes landed shrewdly on his godson. "What a reaction."

Harry's anger didn't lessen at all for his godfathers careless way, keeping a focused anger on no one in here for the disrespect he saw in this act.

James cleared his throat uneasily before calling for his attention. "Really not seeing what you are here Harry. Sirius doesn't give a damn about that stuff, surely you know that."

"He nicked his stuff!" Harry spat, aghast now that no one seemed to be getting this. "It doesn't matter he wouldn't care, it was still his things!"

James still exchanged a puzzled look with Remus, who shrugged without answer. If he'd caught Mundungus doing that, he likely would have rolled his eyes and ignored the act, exactly for the reason Prongs had just said. They were things, they barely associated that house and anything inside it with their friend because Sirius himself put so much distance away from it.

Sirius decided it was best to just play this off for now though, it didn't really matter what his reaction would have been, but Harry's anger for it, and so he persisted, "well, the point here is Harry's finally giving Mundungus some revenge for bailing on him last summer, so whatever the reason, I say you keep going with it Prongs."

James shrugged and did just that, not doing a very good job of hiding his mystified expression.

Mundungus tried to protest, but Harry's hold only tightened as he demanded if he'd gone back that very night to strip the place?!

James winced hard at that line, swallowing convulsively and nearly choking on the spit. He had to remind himself it had already been months to Harry since this happened, where as he'd just heard the news days ago. He could hardly fathom speaking the words in a conversation yet, let alone Harry still casually dumping that pile of words no matter his temper.

Harry demanded Mundungus hand it all over, but with a crack, he disapparated.

Harry whirled on the spot, demanding to know where he'd gone.

"Not anywhere around there," Lily muttered. If there was one thing Mundungus was good at, it was weaseling himself out of those kinds of situations.

He kept shouting about that thieving-

Tonks appeared out of nowhere, her mousy hair now slick with sleet. She told him there was no point in his yelling.

Harry's anger only seemed to double as he howled, "am I really still being followed?!"

"Wouldn't surprise me," Remus frowned, a bit of reproach already boiling if Harry really took this out on Tonks, she didn't deserve it at all for doing her job. "What makes you think it went away?"

"Probably not though," Sirius quickly tried to defuse, more than happy to jump topics. "She said she was stationed in Hogsmeade, probably walking the area and the Hogshead is as good a place as any to do that, or maybe you just missed an Order meeting."

Harry just turned to grumbling and not acknowledging either of them, his hands still itching like he wished to pin someone where they stood.

When Harry groused what had happened, Tonks seemingly took no notice of the information but to say there still wasn't a point to yelling about it.

"Wouldn't surprise me if she knew," James gave an uneasy chuckle at the idea of her helping to pack it away instead of Sirius like they'd all laughed about at one point. Why did everything have to come back to haunt them with their jokes?

Then she told them to get out of the cold. She watched them go through the door of the Three Broomsticks. The moment he was inside, Harry burst out in further frustration about Sirius' stuff being nicked!

"So we gathered," Lily frowned in sympathy at him. She really was trying to understand why Harry was in such a temper about this, and she could sort of see it just being the principle of someone desecrating his godfathers house like that, but even then that wasn't a place Harry liked to think of Sirius in anymore than them. Sad maybe, depressed at the reminder of those things now in Mundungus' possession she'd understand, but where was this anger coming from? It was starting to wind her up as much as him for the simple fact she couldn't grasp what was bothering her child.

Hermione softly agreed, but also rebuked his shouting as people were staring. She told him to go sit down and she'd fetch drinks.

Harry was still fuming when Hermione returned to their table a few minutes later holding three bottles of butterbeer.

"I don't know why you wouldn't be, you're clearly not going to let this go," Sirius sighed, though he more than wanted to.

Harry demanded of no one couldn't the Order keep him in check? He shouldn't be able to steal whatever isn't nailed down!

"No," all four of them muttered. That really had been part of Mundungus' 'charm.' It wouldn't do to have a thief around who wasn't good at his job.

Hermione desperately shushed him now, looking around to make sure nobody was listening; there were a couple of warlocks sitting close by who were staring at Harry with great interest, and Zabini was lolling against a pillar not far away.

"Oh good, I needed someone to hex," James muttered for himself on that one, well aware Harry didn't partake in his personal feelings of venting, but he certainly was envisioning it right now.

She did agree she'd be annoyed to, someone stealing her stuff- Harry gagged on his butterbeer; he had momentarily forgotten that he owned number twelve, Grimmauld Place.

"All the more reason I would have laughed it all off, now it was doubly uncared for," Sirius sighed. "Least Mundungus would put it to a good cause, his own pockets."

Harry gave him a scandalized look and Sirius quickly raised his hands in surrender, deciding against pursuing the point.

He did agree it was no wonder Mundungus hadn't been happy to see him, that being his now. He still decided he was going to tell Dumbledore about this Monday.

"What exactly do you expect Dumbledore to do about it?" James asked curiously.

Harry just let his expression keep stewing without an answer, he didn't really have one.

Hermione seemed pleased he'd at least found a solution to get him to stop shouting, then demanded of Ron what he was doing. He'd been glancing around the room this whole time, but quickly muttered nothing when caught. Harry knew he was trying to catch the eye of the curvy and attractive bar-maid, Madam Rosmerta, for whom he had long nursed a soft spot.

"Most lads do," Sirius chuckled, "though I'd think he'd know better by now than to show as much in front of Hermione."

"Getting her back for ignoring him at breakfast that other day," James shrugged.

Hermione clearly didn't buy it, as she waspishly said 'nothing,' was probably in the back getting more drinks.

"Hermione's jealousy really is getting more obvious than ever," Remus chuckled, more than willing to play along and put that nasty business off their minds. "I'm wondering how long it'll take Harry to lock them in a classroom and force them to have it out."

"I was more waiting for them to get on with it, they'd never been subtle in the past about their rows," Harry rolled his eyes, but at least his words weren't as biting anymore, he was clearly calming down.

Ron ignored this jibe, sipping his drink in what he evidently considered to be a dignified silence. Harry was thinking about Sirius, and how he had hated those silver goblets anyway.

All four of them sighed as it registered Harry knew this anyways. It was maddening he wouldn't just spit it out and tell them what his real problem with this was, but he also had his teeth clenched again and wasn't looking at any of them. Weather he thought it was obvious enough or just didn't want to talk about it, no one was going to force it out of him when they'd rather it never be spoken of again.

Hermione drummed her fingers on the table, her eyes flickering between Ron and the bar. The moment Harry drained the last drops in his bottle she asked if they were ready to head back to the castle?

The other two nodded; it had not been a fun trip and the weather was getting worse the longer they stayed. Once again they drew their cloaks tightly around them, rearranged their scarves, pulled on their gloves, then followed Katie Bell and a friend out of the pub and back up the High Street.

Despite his hands still twitching in his lap and his face tightening more every second, they all thought he was still just on the topic of Sirius, it didn't occur to them a headache was forming again. That warning feeling deep in his gut was starting to bubble, this trip into Hogsmeade was destined to get worse.

Harry's thoughts strayed to Ginny as they trudged up the road to Hogwarts through the frozen slush.

"How random," Sirius chuckled forcefully, but was all for Harry's stray thoughts being shown rather than his lingering one.

They had not met up with her, undoubtedly, thought Harry, because she and Dean were cozily closeted in Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop, that haunt of happy couples. Scowling, he bowed his head against the swirling sleet and trudged on.

"I can see how that would bother you," James was quick to jump in and agree with this, making Lily wonder if she wasn't the only one feeling wrong footed in not getting a handle on Harry's real problem. "If I had anything resembling a sister I'd feel the same."

Harry was so startled to hear that coming out of his mouth he entirely lost his contrite expression and turned to him in surprise. He'd never contradicted when anyone said this because before now he'd really felt no reason to. This time though, he wanted to protest in disgust it was nothing like that, Ginny was far more of a friend to him than anything resembling a sister. He held back though, because he wasn't sure that was the right comparison anymore either. It wasn't like his friendship with Hermione after all...so what was the word to use for it? He was chewing on this so hard he hardly noticed the tempo of his headache increasing as his dad continued.

It was a little while before Harry became aware that the voices of Katie Bell and her friend, which were being carried back to him on the wind, had become shriller and louder. Harry squinted at their indistinct figures. The two girls were having an argument about something Katie was holding in her hand with her friend Leanne.

"Urgh, avoid this Harry," Sirius swiftly inserted. "Teammate she is, but you don't want to get in between her tiff with her friend. She'd think you're a right pig of a captain."

A trickle of sweat started forming on the nap of Harry's neck despite the freezing temperatures he so vividly remembered. He could no longer focus on Ginny, Sirius, or much of anyone right now except the very real pain of his head screaming at him to pay attention around the splitting it was causing his vision.

They rounded a corner in the lane, sleet coming thick and fast, blurring Harry's glasses. Just as he raised a gloved hand to wipe them, Leanne made to grab hold of the package Katie was holding; Katie tugged it back and the package fell to the ground.

At once, Katie rose into the air, not as Ron had done, suspended comically by the ankle, but gracefully, her arms outstretched, as though she was about to fly.

James froze, the feeling erupting in the room all around them. As Harry had just said, this was not in any way funny, but with a glance at his friends he tried his hardest not to immediately assume a Death Eater was around. This didn't have to be the panic inducing fear for life he was already latching onto with far too much practice...

Yet there was something wrong, something eerie. . . . Her hair was whipped around her by the fierce wind, but her eyes were closed and her face was quite empty of expression. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Leanne had all halted in their tracks, watching.

Lily's lip was already trembling, her face as white as the sleet in her mind during this depiction, she was fighting back the urge to shriek as loud as that wind. Even without Harry's ghastly face a mask of horror promising this should not be interpreted any other way, she knew, they all did, something was terribly wrong.

Then, six feet above the ground, Katie let out a terrible scream.

James startled to his feet without remembering to do so, his body trying to put him into action even as no spell truly came to mind. There was no answer for this, his eyes only staying locked on the words for explanation, even while the back of his mind was already offering up the horror of this happening to the rest of the kids, his Harry next any second.

Her eyes flew open but whatever she could see, or whatever she was feeling, was clearly causing her terrible anguish. She screamed and screamed; Leanne started to scream too and seized Katie's ankles, trying to tug her back to the ground. Harry, Ron, and Hermione rushed forward to help, but even as they grabbed Katie's legs, she fell on top of them; Harry and Ron managed to catch her but she was writhing so much they could hardly hold her. Instead they lowered her to the ground where she thrashed and screamed, apparently unable to recognize any of them.

Harry looked around; the landscape seemed deserted.

He told them all to stay here while he ran for help.

"No! You don't separate from them!"

Harry hardly acknowledged this, couldn't even have said who'd scolded him, his mind purely absorbed on the one goal of finding help.

He began to sprint toward the school; he had never seen anyone behave as Katie had just behaved and could not think what had caused it; he hurtled around a bend in the lane and collided with what seemed to be an enormous bear on its hind legs.

Before the guttural noise could even form, a snarl of anger or fear for Harry next running into yet another problem, James was still going in the same breath, though he really hadn't breathed since Katie began her 'flight.'

Harry recognized Hagrid in relief and quickly explained someone had been cursed!

Hagrid was in a panic at once, asking about Ron and Hermione?

A spastic noise thumped somewhere in Sirius' throat, a good old laugh about who Hagrid worried about more with the order of those names, but it never even made a flicker in his mind, to focused on every word Prongs was saying.

Harry corrected the right girl before leading the way.

Together they ran back along the lane. It took them no time to find the little group of people around Katie, who was still writhing and screaming on the ground; Ron, Hermione, and Leanne were all trying to quiet her.

Hagrid shouted at them all to get back, and then without a word, bent down, scooped her into his arms, and ran off toward the castle with her. Within seconds, Katie's piercing screams had died away and the only sound was the roar of the wind.

Lily was still shivering nonstop, her teeth clicking together as if that cold was permeating the air in here as well. This was what brought James back to the room, and he crossed it quickly to settle beside her, with her son on her other side. She tried to protest, but he ignored her as he kept going still on the same breath, even if it was coming out more strained every second for not giving himself a chance to breathe in between this mayhem starting out of the blue.

Hermione hurried over to Katie's wailing friend and put an arm around her.

She asked if Leanne could tell them anything more that happened. All she could sob was it happened when that package tore. She pointed at the now sodden brown-paper package on the ground, which had split open to reveal a greenish glitter. Ron bent down, his hand outstretched,

Harry startled out of his seat as well, nearly sending Lily and Sirius to the floor in his wild grab to stop this. James hardly noticed, locked as he was to the words to ensure Harry's intent went through to the one who needed it.

but Harry seized his arm and pulled him back, telling him not to touch it.

The breath of release escaping them all finally forced air in again. They'd all wanted to shout that from the moment Leanne had said the words, afraid Harry's natural curiosity would send him off to do this, but it had been locked in place until he showed he'd be doing otherwise, the opposite in ensuring his friend wouldn't suffer the same fate.

"It's cursed," Remus said flatly, as his mind finally spun back into processing things again.

"And a powerful one at that," Sirius agreed as he rubbed ruefully at his jaw, that was the kind of thing he'd expect to find in his mothers jewelry box, not some poor kid at Hogwarts possessing.

"What the bloody hell was Katie doing with it?" Lily demanded, her voice not anywhere near normal volume no matter how hard she tried.

"That is a very good question," James agreed, only managing the flat tone because he was still getting his breath back. He took one more cautious look at Harry, the idea of his son going through that nearly suffocating him all over again. It helped nothing Harry refused to take his seat, but began pacing the room, a deeply troubled look that he hoped had everything to do with his teammate being in these circumstances rather than remembering this happening to him next.

He crouched down. An ornate opal necklace was visible, poking out of the paper. He recognized it, that was on display in Borgin and Burkes when last he'd been, the case had said it was cursed.

Sirius snarled, fighting back the impulse to spit in disgust at how often that store kept being brought up recently. He made a mental note to burn it to the ground, and sadly that wasn't even in his top ten of things he had to do first.

Katie must have touched it. He looked up at Leanne, who had started to shake uncontrollably, and asked how they'd come across this?

Leanne explained that's why they'd been arguing. Katie had come back from the bathroom with it, and she'd been acting odd saying she had to get it to Hogwarts right now. She brokenly ended in further sobs Katie had probably been Imperius and Leanne hadn't even realized!

"There are more ways of bending people to your will then that curse, that one just tends to be the most powerful." Lily murmured to herself, the idea of it happening at all still causing her to want to scream any second. Why did this have to keep happening in Harry's life? She wished this was more boggling, but sadly in their time in school it wasn't unheard of for students to come across cursed objects, and cursing each other with powerful spells was a walking liability, and still her son kept managing to find the most oblique ways of emphasizing that in his life.

Hermione patted her shoulder gently.

Harry tried to find out more, if Katie had said who it was for, but Leanne said Katie wouldn't say. So she'd tried to take it away from her, and then- Leanne let out a wail of despair.

Harry hesitated for a moment, then pulled his scarf from around his face and, ignoring Ron's gasp, carefully covered the necklace in it and picked it up.

James shivered so hard the book nearly fell from his grasp. He understood why Harry was doing it of course, so no one else could unwittingly come across it, so someone like Dumbledore could investigate it. Reasoning obviously said Harry would be fine, so had Katie until it had been touched by skin and his son was clearly being careful of this. None of that fought off the compulsion to slap that away from his child this second, to be the one to do this instead.

He told his friends they'd have to take this to Madam Pomfrey.

As they followed Hermione and Leanne up the road, Harry was thinking furiously. They had just entered the grounds when he spoke, unable to keep his thoughts to himself any longer, he spoke aloud to Ron this must have been Malfoy's doing. This is what he'd bought that day in Borgin and Burkes.

"You're very likely not wrong," Lily passively agreed as she watched his hurried steps pick up in tempo, weather in agitation for being wrong or excitement of being right she really couldn't tell. "It does tie up rather well, but at the same time, it doesn't at all explain the conversation you heard between Borgin and Draco." The bit about being seen carrying it down the street sticking out most in her mind, this was easily something that could have been hidden away. Hermione herself had seen it moments later when she'd stepped in after Malfoy.

Harry just gave a jerky nod he'd heard her without adding anything, likely meaning he was still thinking hard about something else, or trying very hard not to think of something more likely.

Ron was hesitant of the idea, reminding this had happened in a girls bathroom, surely Malfoy wasn't in there.

"Like a bloke couldn't slip into the girls bathroom for a second," Sirius jeered, entirely sick of Harry's friends protesting something like this at every turn. "It's not as if it's got a ward on it to stop us!"

"An interesting query though, why the girls bathroom? If it was indeed Malfoy and not some isolated incident, why did it have to be a girl? Malfoy could have just as easily done this to any male coming along," Remus muttered, wondering if they were missing some significance in light of Harry's train of thought.

Before Harry could go any further, McGonagall came marching down the stairs to meet them. Harry quickly handed over the wrapped necklace. They were stopped by Filch at the door hurrying forward with his Secrecy Sensor,

"That's another thing," James said in clipped tones. "No matter the cursers intentions, there's no way that thing would have gotten in the school past Filch with Katie."

"Maybe she wasn't trying to get it back to the school, but headed to somewhere else in Hogsmeade with it." Remus offered.

"No, Leanne specifically said someone inside Hogwarts," Harry parotid, still pacing this way and that as his mind clamored to show him something he was forced to keep away, the movement wasn't helping at all.

"Someone inside Hogwarts who very likely wasn't actually inside the school at that time," Remus agreed. "Everyone in the castle was likely to be out that day," clearly thinking his theory still stood.

Harry didn't acknowledge him, afraid anything he said would only make his own mind worse.

McGonagall carefully passed the necklace off to him, telling him to take this to Snape.

They really were all in such a highly agitated state that hardly made a blip on their thoughts. If they'd thought about it at all, they would have said McGonagall herself, they just cared to much about Katie and whoever the target had been right now to think otherwise of who looked that thing over.

Harry and the others followed Professor McGonagall upstairs and into her office. The sleet-spattered windows were rattling in their frames, and the room was chilly despite the fire crackling in the grate. Professor McGonagall closed the door and swept around her desk to face Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the still sobbing Leanne.

The moment the door closed she demanded what happened.

Haltingly, and with many pauses while she attempted to control her crying, Leanne told Professor McGonagall how Katie had gone to the bathroom in the Three Broomsticks and returned holding the unmarked package, how Katie had seemed a little odd, and how they had argued about the advisability of agreeing to deliver unknown objects, the argument culminating in the tussle over the parcel, which tore open. At this point, Leanne was so overcome, there was no getting another word out of her.

McGonagall kindly asked her to go onto the Hospital Wing then, and she left.

Her expression returned sharp as she continued to the trio this all happened when Katie touched the necklace?

Harry described the rest in detail. Then he followed up if he could speak to Dumbledore.

She looked surprised, but responded he'd be gone until Monday. However, anything he had to tell the Headmaster could be said to her.

"I think you offended her," Sirius tried absently to put a smile in place, though nothing of this whole chapter had been funny at all.

For a split second, Harry hesitated. Professor McGonagall did not invite confidences; Dumbledore, though in many ways more intimidating, still seemed less likely to scorn a theory, however wild.

"I can see your point though," Lily said fairly, even if the same thing wouldn't have crossed her mind. No matter how open Dumbledore seemed to Harry, her son was still one of the few students in that school who would see him that way, everyone else had even less direct contact with him and would have gone to their head of house with this.

This was a life-and-death matter, though, and no moment to worry about being laughed at. So he blurted out his idea about Malfoy.

On one side of him, Ron rubbed his nose in apparent embarrassment; on the other, Hermione shuffled her feet as though quite keen to put a bit of distance between herself and Harry.

All three Marauders looked very snappy at that, with the firm belief they held that no matter their personal disagreements they wouldn't be showing that in front of anyone else. This was just insulting on Harry's friends part, far more than disagreeing with him in general when they wouldn't even play along with his idea.

McGonagall said that was a very serious accusation,

"He didn't accuse me?" Sirius went wide-eyed and innocent again.

Harry glanced up at him and gave an obligatory laugh, but only faked that this put him at ease as he sank down in the nearest seat, next to Remus. He was still rubbing hard at his temples, his eyes clenched shut and for all the world wishing he could sever his head to be rid of this constant pain.

Harry admitted he didn't have any proof, but also told her about what they'd heard over the summer.

Hermione cut in to remind Borgin had asked if he'd wanted to take a package with him, and Malfoy had said no.

Ron interjected he'd look like a prat carrying a necklace down the street.

"Both you boys really aren't keeping up very well with this," Lily shook her head at them.

"It had been months since that happened, not this morning," Harry mumbled in slight defense he hadn't recalled the exact words, even as much as he'd obsessed over them.

Hermione sharply reminded both of them it would have been wrapped up, that wasn't the problem. Obviously it had been something big and bulky Malfoy couldn't go around with.

McGonagall cut into their squabble, furious now at their accusation that held nothing. Hundreds of people could be in the same circumstance.

Ron muttered that's what he'd said.

"Congratulations Ron, now you're mimicking the book inside the book," Sirius pressed out an even more forced chuckle, growing heavily agitated this was getting harder every time.

In any case, Mr. Malfoy was not in Hogsmeade today.

"How would she know?" Lily muttered in confusion, that seemed more like something Snape would be aware of. The point didn't particularly matter she supposed, as she agreed with James' next words.

"Ra-drat," James sighed, there went his prime suspect.

"I wouldn't rule him out just yet though," Sirius still had a calculating look in place, still prepared to defend Harry's idea. "Crabbe or Goyle could have done this for him, if he is the one behind this." He really found it hard to believe Malfoy was very possibly up to something this year and then this happened without being connected.

Harry looked up sharply at him, but even this answer still felt a step off. Still, it did ease his pain somewhat, as always, to hear the conversation around him circulating, the true answer just beyond his reach but at least not festering as his dad continued.

Harry gaped at her, deflating, asking how she knew.

McGonagall explained he was doing a detention with her, as he'd failed to turn in two Transfiguration assignments.

"I didn't realize Malfoy's boasting earlier literally meant he wasn't going to be doing his work this year," Remus rolled his eyes at this inconsequential bit of information.

"Surprised he hasn't been paying someone to do it for him like all the other years," Sirius groused.

She dismissed them then, as she needed to go check on Katie.

They began climbing the stairs towards their dorm, and no matter how angry Harry was at the two for not backing him in front of McGonagall, he still joined in as they discussed who the necklace was supposed to go to.

Hermione said the most likely subjects were Dumbledore, Slughorn, or Harry.

Harry's eyes lit up briefly, he was so sure that was the right answer and the confidence nearly spurred him into words, but was cut off by Remus shaking his head while James had been listening the other two. "No, to all three. I'm still leaning towards it being a woman the intended target now. Why the girls bathroom, that part just makes no sense."

It had all happened so fast he'd lost his confidence with the exact same thought, back to muttering in squalor of the uselessness of his mind.

Harry disagreed with the last one at least, or Katie would have turned around right then to hand it to him.

"I might disagree," Lily hedged, twisting a strand of hair around her finger as she thought. "It really depends on the kind of magic placed upon her to force her doing this. If she'd been given the very explicit command to give this to you in your shared common room, she may not have even registered you behind her at all." Her focus came back though, and she shook her head sharply to dispel away that line of thinking. "Point is, though sound logic Hermione's using, we can't rule out anyone."

Harry could at least nod his agreement to that, though his eyes kept drifting out of focus like he'd struck gold and let it slip through his fingers all at once and for the life of him couldn't understand why.

He did wonder aloud why Malfoy had told her to take it into the castle at all.

Hermione stamped her foot in frustration Malfoy hadn't been in Hogsmeade today!

"Ooh, now we know we've got her in a temper," James huffed with a roll of his eyes, but did tell Harry, "you're being rather single minded with this though. You're causing just as much trouble not hearing others ideas and insisting on your own as they are ignoring yours."

"But you know I'm right!" Harry spluttered.

"Not really," he sighed. "I agree it's a very, very good chance, but it also never hurts to hear other ideas while you're at it. Could even somehow round back to helping your own on a completely different theory."

Harry crossed his arms and muttered defiantly, causing Remus to actually smirk in genuine amusement again. Harry sounded so like both James and Sirius with the grumbles he was using.

Harry moved past that, saying he must have an accomplice. Crabbe or Goyle, or any number of Death Eaters now he could call upon for help.

Ron and Hermione exchanged looks that plainly said, 'There's no point arguing with him.'

"That's as much as you can ask for at this point," Sirius sighed. "Letting you talk yourself out."

"Gee, thanks," Harry snipped.

The portrait swung open to admit them to the common room. It was quite full and smelled of damp clothing; many people seemed to have returned from Hogsmeade early because of the bad weather. There was no buzz of fear or speculation, however: Clearly, the news of Katie's fate had not yet spread.

"Give it a few hours," Lily sighed, knowing this wasn't the kind of thing to stay secret in the castle.

"At least until breakfast," James agreed.

Ron boosted a first year out of a seat next to the fireplace as he said

Remus snorted in surprise.

the whole thing wasn't done very slick at all. The curse didn't make it into the castle, and had a very low chance of doing so. Not very foolproof.

Hermione agreed with him, even as she toed him out of the chair and offered it back t the first year.

"I'll call that a small miracle she managed that," Sirius agreed, finally managing an easy laugh along with Remus for that random exchange.

It hadn't been very well thought out at all.

Harry agreed up to the point of saying since when was Malfoy a great thinker.

Neither Ron nor Hermione answered him.

"Glory, why is it always you," James groaned as he hastily snapped his chapter shut before anything else could happen.

Harry couldn't help but agree. His stance on Malfoy aside, why had it been him coming across this at all!

HPHPHPHP

Actually, despite the characters not, I do get Harry's little tizzy over Mundungus in this chapter. I'd have been just as outraged, as it's the principle of the matter Sirius was being stolen from. I hope I made it clear though that they just don't because they can't associate that stuff with Sirius, whereas that's really all Harry has learned to attach to his godfather, things. He barely has any memories with him. This is getting depressing, but I still hope you enjoyed on some level.

#Harry Potter #fanfiction #reading the books #HP #HBP #The Life That Never Lived #Marauders #James Potter #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #Lily Potter

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sanemreid · 4 years

Text

tehlikeli oyun. — self para.

( feat. the spawn of satan elliott langham )

After locking up the studio — which hadn’t happened until a good little while beyond actually closing up for the day from classes and lessons, not uncommon for her to be the last one out whether staying late because of business related things, or simply to take advantage of the serene atmosphere to work on routines. Tonight’s reasoning stemming from the former — she’d popped over to her previous home in Goldfinch to asses a few things before officially putting it on the market. Would there have been a better time in the day to do this ? Probably, however this week proved to be busy for a myriad of reasons, thus for her this so happened to be the best allotted free moment, at least just to do an initial sweep. Luckily enough too her sister was out of town for a job so it could really just be a quick pop in. Regardless if she didn’t have a current ETA on the when she'd have it up for sale, more than likely after the wedding, she still wanted to be sure in the case anything might’ve needed to get revamped, it could get done sooner rather than later.

Truthfully though the place was in fairly as peak condition as it’d ever been since she lived here, plus the youngest of the Bayrak clan seemed to have the same trait of immaculate upkeep. The basement was probably the only feature that may need attention, seeing as it’d remained partially unfinished this whole time. Making her way downstairs after grabbing a forgotten item from the move into the manor, the plan was to raid the kitchen before actually heading home, when a knock resonated through an otherwise steady silence, halted Sanem on the second to last step. Weird. She’d hadn’t expected anyone obviously, maybe it was one of Damla’s friends, but wouldn’t she have mentioned she’d be gone. Maybe it really was old Edith coming back to haunt her. Brows furrow with a slight perplexity before continuing her movements, this time towards the entrance, another knock came halfway.

Opening the door – not fully – she was first able to catch a glimpse of the figure opposite’s profile against the front light, more features coming into view as he turned. There’d been an indistinct familiarity that the dancer was now trying to rack her brain over, all the while as his own vision landed on her a grin spread over his features that unnervingly could only rival the Cheshire cat. ❝ Sanem, hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time, ❞ Beginning with a tone that was saturated with far too much pleasantry, especially in the way her name fell. He knew her and yet she didn’t or — did she ? ❝ Mind if I come in, it’s kind of cold standing out here. ❞ Words fly in one ear and out the other as she continued to search for how and where she possibly knew him. Then like the cogs of a machine did the wheels start slowly clicking things into place, it might’ve been almost a year ago, but deep within her memory did she place him, outside the courthouse when she’d waited for Allison after a case. When she first laid eyes upon none other than the ghost himself.

Elliott fucking Langham.

Second passes when the realization hits, that she’s immediately moving to slam the door in his face, but is stopped before it can happen, his hand catching and pushes it along with herself, essentially shoving his way inside. ❝ Now that was just rude, here I thought we could just have a little talk. Guess there’s no need for formal introductions either then. ❞

Fleetingly stunned; she stood her ground just a short distance from him, almost rigidly on guard, arms crossing tightly over her chest. Attempting to keep calm though that bubbling ire was igniting beneath her skin, while he appeared rather cool and collected. ❝ Not sure what we possibly have to talk about — not unless it’s how you decided to force your way in here, ❞ A pause as dark hues narrow. ❝ Or maybe, you wanna talk about how you’ve been stalking around, making ominous phone calls like some d-list movie villain. Otherwise I suggest you walk back out the door and all the way to whichever hole you slithered out from. Better yet, straight into the ocean, please do the world a favor. ❞

One corner of his mouth twitched upwards, as if he merely felt amusement in every syllable uttered, smugness radiating the atmosphere around them. ❝ They were certainly right about you — you know you should be a little more respectful to the people who are supposedly about to become family, in what, a couple weeks now is it. ❞ nonchalantly his eyes dart around the interior as he speaks, inspecting, or more probably scrutinizing. All she could do was scoff, no surprise in the slightest to hear Rachel and Christopher were in the mix in conjuncture to him. Contempt curls on his features briefly as his line of sight returns to her. ❝ You’re a smart girl.. well, enough that I’m sure you already know what, or who, we need to discuss. I’ve been very considerate with Allison, letting her have her fun with — whatever this is, but now my patience is starting to grow a little thin. ❞

Again she hears his voice but she doesn’t listen, at least not anything beyond her partners name rolling off his tongue, sending a bristling sensation down her spine as embers ignite into full flames behind her stare. If only looks could kill. ❝ Don’t you ever fucking say her name again, ❞ She spat venomously first, a warning while she took a step closer. It may not have been the best idea to create a smaller gap between them, but the more her emotional level steadily rose, the less better judgement crossed through her mind. ❝ Let me be as clear to you as I was to them, there is nothing for us to discuss, much less my fiancée. I don’t care what kind of plan you have cooked up, or how you think attaching yourself to Christopher and Rachel like a parasite is gonna help and I’m just assuming you’re here because they ran and told you how mean I was to them at the gala. You won’t be getting anywhere near her again, I’m sure you’re smart enough to understand that. But maybe not, I mean really how pathetic do you have to be to resort to playing these games— ❞ One by one the words cascaded away from her like lava towards his direction, hoping to slowly engulf and vaporize his existence.

Perhaps if she hadn’t been so focused on that, she might’ve caught the shift in his demeanor, to an extent her proclamation was working, maybe too well. It happened in the flash, before she could even react to Elliott’s movements, one hand reached out easily to clasp around her neck. While she feebly attempted to pry his arm away, he kept firm, sending her backwards till she was pinned against the nearest wall, wincing a bit as the back of her head made a thud. Sanem could feel his palm pressing against her trachea, though not quite hard enough to cut the airflow. Glint of fear was overcast by a grim determination not to give him the satisfaction of seeing. ❝ Has anyone ever told you, you have too much of a smart mouth for your own good. It’s cute what you’re trying to do but it’s only making things more difficult, and that’s over now. You really think you and that little dance studio are good enough ? I know what’s best for her I can give her the life she deserves. Allison is just a little confused, and I’m simply here to remind her of that, how good it was before, how we loved each other. ❞ Possessively menacing did he spit back.

Snorted laugh involuntarily erupts from her throat, humorless – mostly at least, because was he being serious, did he not hear himself right now ? Judging from the expression though he certainly wasn’t expecting to garner that reaction. ❝ You really are warped, ❞ Retorting against a partly strained voice. ❝ That’s not love, you sadistic fuck, that’s control. Of course you don’t know the difference... all you ever did and keep doing is hurt her, but you won’t have that power over her anymore. She is so much stronger and better than you know.. threatening me is only gonna make her hate you more.. ❞

Now; if just stepping closer had been a terrible idea, then antagonizing him was surely an even worse call — made evident by his grip squeezing harder as soon as the last declaration left her mouth. Was he just desperate or truly unhinged, both seemed the most plausible. Sanem never considered herself a fighter, not in the physical sense, in fact anytime her fight or flight response kicked in it almost always veered towards the latter. Nor had never found herself in this sort of situation before. Though in the same vein, she wasn’t clueless or weak, and if that’s the assumption he’d been under, the it was one on the list of mistakes made coming here. Adrenaline rushed through her system, induced by a mixture of fear and fury, between the belittlement that came from him and the Hawthorne parents, but importantly the negligent grief they all imposed on Alli.

There was a futile attempt to pry his hand away, so in a less than thought out, survival instinct way, she reached out to grab his face, digging her nails in, before wildly kicking out a leg that made contact with some part of his body. Less than graceful but worked to release her as he stumbled back with a harsh groan, gasping for a breath while in the process of commotion did her temple managed to clip against a shelf. Hissing and silently cursing her choice of décor momentarily. Glancing towards him with sharp intakes of air, hazardous ire still beamed off both, but including her tempestuous emotional state, it drove Sanem to ball a tight fist and strike it across his face. Did the connection send an ache through her hand, yes, but it was worth it still. ❝ Stay the fuck away from us ! ❞ Shouting at the top of raspy vocals before taking the opportunity had to go for her phone sitting in the living room.

She’d fully expected him to be close behind, but managing to secure the device her line of sight peered up, frantically glancing around to find no one. Scrolling through the contacts, in the back of her mind ebbed the notion that she should call the lawyer — knowing she would have to tell her no matter what — but aware of the frenzy it’d only send her in at the moment. Instead tapping the next name to flash in her mind, who’d luckily lived in this very neighborhood now, Lily. Shakily putting the phone up to her ear, she took tentative steps back towards the entrance, Elliott, for all she’d been aware, was gone, leaving just an idly open door, and affrighted Sanem, in his wake.

#( self para. )#/ translation: 'dangerous game'#choking tw #violence tw #/ *blurryeyes emoji intensifies*#/ it got a little longer than i anticipated #/ tbh if you wanna get to the good part just skip the first like 3 paragraphs lmfao

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abiik · 4 years

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4, 5, 6, 7, 11, 28, 29 + a, b, c, h for xingchen / 1-10 & 15-20 + a, b for zhi yin ?

aaaaaaa thank u for this jo!!!!! sorry this took so long!!! anyway this is. also very LENGTHY so im putting it under a cut <333333

xingchen

4. how easy is it to earn their trust?

it is actually very difficult to earn their trust, only because xingchen doesn’t allow people close enough in order to do so. the very few people who do have their hard-earned trust before the gang comes around is their remaining bio family.

5. how easy is it to earn their mistrust?

i wouldn’t say it’s easy for xingchen to suddenly mistrust you after earning their trust. they actually are the type to hold out for you for far longer than they probably should. while there are like, inklings of mistrust here in there, they’ll probably still trust you to watch their back in a fight and defend you against others who are like ‘xingchen maybe that isn’t a good idea :/’ they have a whole lot of hope & love for the world, though, & it's very hard for them to give up just anyone, especially someone who has previously earned their trust.

6. do they consider laws flexible, or immovable?

xingchen was raised that laws are immovable, so they’ve grown up knowing & believing this philosophy for most things. however, as they’ve grown older they’ve realized that maybe they aren’t completely sure about this. perhaps, it can be situational.

7. what triggers nostalgia for them, most often? do they enjoy that feeling?

snow. winter on the mountain triggers nostalgia for them. seeing the jade amulet & sword that belonged to their mother & the calligraphy set that belonged to their father but mostly snow. they do not enjoy the feeling. they will subject themself to it anyway.

11. how do they cope with confusion (seek clarification, pretend they understand, etc)?

it mostly depends on where it comes from or who they’re around and what they’re confused about. usually they’ll simply ask to clarify; there’s no use in going into a situation pretending like they know something & they all get themselves killed because of negligence and pride. but…. that pride is exactly what gets the better of xingchen sometimes and it’s fucking hilarious.

28. would they prefer a lie over an unpleasant truth?

xingchen would absolutely prefer an unpleasant truth to a lie. they would possibly mumble through it or deliver it stiffly/coldly so as to be detached from the unpleasant feeling, but at least you would know the truth.

29. do they usually live up to their own ideals?

hmm. this is... difficult because so much of xingchen’s ideals were crafted by someone else, expectations put on them by someone else. outwardly, it would seem so. for xingchen, i think that they would always feel as though they have not done enough, or that they could have done something differently; that there is always room for them to improve to become the most perfect version of themself. they’re very tough on themself and i think that it begins getting worse around the second youxiong arc & the aftermath of that & the entirety of new boot goofin arc :)

a – why are u excited about this character?

i love xingchen’s energy!! their thoughts and their feelings are something i love to explore as well as like, the way that they’d react to things bc their method is so different than zoe’s. im also excited bc, just. like. the outward perception of xingchen is so different when compared to who they are as a person, unfiltered and raw.

b – what inspired u to create them?

xingchen was the order in the chaos; that’s initially why they were created. the body of their character was this philosophy, to balance zoe, to mirror her. xingchen’s name was something that was conceived almost like, directly after this, and once again, it was a mirror to zoe’s birth name - xian, and the implications behind that. xingchen’s name was mainly chosen bc of the amount of stars that surround their planet: 4. so xingchen’s name & this idea of someone who completed zoe’s balancing act, who ordered the chaos, crafted the idea of a character that was, in a way, the juxtaposition of celestial and earthly (like zoe) but only slightly to the left, wherein even to zoe, this character would be someone you were in awe of. they always sort of felt like the human embodiment of a shooting star, moved by duty and the righting of wrong to come down to earth. xingchen & zoe are technically on the same spectrum, but they have different methods, and that’s what i wanted from xingchen. i wanted a character that did elicit this feeling of awe, because of how amazing, talented, attractive etc. they are, EVEN TO ZOE, but was also intensely stubborn and, initially, very stuck on this ‘my way, or the high-way’ sort of mentality. i WANTED xingchen to create conflict with zoe and zoe to create conflict with xingchen, bc i wanted it to be an opportunity for both characters to be taken out of their comfort zones by each other.

of course, other things, small images, inspired me further when creating a silhouette for xingchen: blue & white; white jade; the sunrise; loquats; clouds; snow on mountain tops; spring; music played on a guqin; ballet & figure skating; swan <3

c – did u have trouble figuring out where they fit in their own story?

hmm i did have trouble figuring out how i would involve them, or any of the rest of youxiong, into zoe’s story after the new boot goofin arc. sure she made off world excursions late in that arc after her recovery, but there wasn’t a lot & my mind was blank. i’m still looking to involve xingchen more maybe bc im not 100% sure on the whole roommates thing.

h – what trait do u admire most?

tbh how deeply xingchen feels things. they don’t communicate it often, it’s difficult for them, both verbally and visually, and sometimes even physically, but they feel everything so, so deeply and that’s. i just really love them a l o t.

zhi yin

1. what’s the maximum amount of time ur character can sit still with nothing to do?

yin can sit still for a moderate amount of time with nothing to do. she fiddles, though, with her fingers or with her clothes, even when she isn’t particularly nervous.

2. how easy is it for ur character to laugh?

it’s fairly easy for yin to laugh if she’s on good terms with you - & this is mostly everyone as she believes the best of everyone, that everyone is generally good.

3. how do they put themselves to bed at night? (reading, singing, thinking?)

yin usually starts by making herself - & cheng – something warm to drink & once she’s assured her brother she’s fine & sent him off to bed, she’ll curl up in bed & read about far away places or an interesting new techniques that she knows she’ll never be able to try until she passes out.

4. how easy is it to earn their trust?

it’s hard for me to gauge how easy it is bc yin DOESN’T trust most ppl. she’s the type of person who looks like she would be easy to win over, & she would be likable & sweet to u, but the only ppl yin is loyal to & trusts at the beginning are cheng, her uncle, and oddly enough, zoe. so like, while she does believe ppl are generally good, this doesn’t mean that she has every intention of falling victim to someone’s wrongdoings or intentions to harm people she cares about bc she trusted blindly on account of this philosophy. she’s cautious, but she doesn’t have this all-around anxiety like cheng, and she isn’t gullible like everyone intends her to be. for yin, i think it is like this: if cheng or zoe trusts you, she will trust you, but she will be cautious, and mostly look to them.

5. how easy is it to earn their mistrust?

i think in order to lose yin’s trust, you would have to lie to her. like, big time. or hurt her family.

6. do they consider laws flexible, or immovable?

yin is on the fence with this. with her uncle zhi as one of her mentors & cheng always looking out for her, laws/rules were immovable in order to keep her in a box & (in cheng’s situation) to keep her safe. however, their clan never actually taught them that rules had to be followed so rigidly (they follow a philosophy that one should achieve the impossible) that they were flexible, so i do think yin leans more towards flexible, but has anxiety about acting it out.

7. what triggers nostalgia for them, most often? do they enjoy that feeling?

making soup, walking on the docks, boating out on the river, practicing forms with cheng. yin does enjoy it, even if it is sometimes bittersweet.

8. what were they told to stop/start doing most often as a child?

stop daydreaming so much. (she wasn’t daydreaming) :)

9. do they swear? do they remember their first swear word?

yin doesn’t swear! not really

10. what lie do they most frequently remember telling? does it haunt them?

‘i’m fine.’/ ‘i feel fine!’ yes.

15. how do they speak? Is what they say usually thought of on the spot, or do they rehearse it in their mind first?

yin has a soft, pleasant voice. it’s almost like a whisper but its warm & sweet. she has the type of voice that if u were in a crowd, because of the tone of it, u might not be able to hear her even if she was standing next to u & speaking. her tone is always very sincere, or slightly teasing. she can stutter a lot when she’s excited or nervous. yin thinks about what she says usually, but sometimes she does pipe up & blurt what she’s just thought of on the spot. rarely does she raise her voice, but when she does, u know she means business.

16. what makes their stomach turn?

when she goes under. it’s an awful feeling of being disconnected from herself & not knowing what she did while she was out, & seeing everyone’s faces after, looking them in the eye after what she could have possibly done & them seeing what happens to her when she get ‘sick.’

17. are they easily embarrassed?

yes. yin is easily flustered, if that’s the same thing. she fumbles over her words in this case & will fiddle with her hands. crying is sometimes the result of being embarrassed too :) but i would rather not think about yin crying…

18. what embarrasses them?

usually anyone acting particularly brash, or flirty. when she, herself, makes a grand gesture on her own end, and it’s rejected. sometimes being reminded that she can’t cultivate while others can, that she’s a lacking heir.

19. what is their favorite number?

hmm three.

20. if they were asked to explain the difference between romantic and platonic or familial love, how would they do it?

yin might explain familial love as brushing her a-cheng’s hair out of his face & patting his head despite him being taller than her just to piss him off a little, nagging him until he rolls his eyes & does as she says, or finding a blanket tucked over her that clearly wasn’t there before after a late night of reading at her desk. she might explain platonic love as sitting with zoe on the docks with their toes in the water, zoe’s head on her shoulder & both of them spilling their hearts out, or sharing tea & poetry with xingchen for the first time, seeing them blush around the tips of their ears & having to stifle her giggles until they finally broke the tension with a laugh of their own. yin doesn’t know how to explain the difference of romantic love yet.

a – why are u excited about this character?

yin has so many different, like, facets & she’s really fun to think about. i really love thinking about her dynamic with zoe, but i especially love to think about her dynamic with others in the group & how she might get along with them & how their relationships will progress. she’s really sweet & is willing to help people out of the good will of her heart but still holds them at a distance & is like…disconcerting in a way, and that’s a character i’m pretty sure i’ve never had before, so she’s pretty new to me.

b – what inspired u to create them?

yin remained a mystery to me for so long, hence why her name is yin. she was like a little shadow. she remains a little shadow. a secret still. something i, and everyone, has yet to figure out. a dark spot with a gentle smile that stayed at zoe’s side. she’s the shadow in the pond that you arent too sure is a stick or a snake or not, but you keep creeping closer to anyway bc you think if it were a snake it would have made some move to get closer to you by now. and yin’s not a snake. she’s the turtle in this story. or a shell, perhaps. a lucky dark little tortoise shell. she can be a little scary at times, as the person creating her, and for the other characters interacting with her, but also she comes off as completely harmless. like a lake or a river wide and deep enough to swim in. yin has really just been fragments and pieces, little ideas here and there, that have come together to create a very healing, loving character that just has an overwhelming flood of love pouring out from her at all times.

there was also the idea, story-wise, of wanting to create a character that doesn’t become friends with zoe specifically bc of a shared interest/goal – yin doesn’t want to kill her uncle; she genuinely wants to be zoe’s friend. they do share traits & like. actual interests – they’re both family oriented, hence why yin wouldn’t want to kill her family – but yin isn’t zoe’s loyal-ass friend bc they have a similar moral code or bc they had similar goals & became close over the course of the mission etc. like jason, for example. the lotus is a big symbol for yin as well, which connects her directly to zoe, who is representative of the center.

ask me some q’s about my ocs!!

#h talks.#h replies.#jo #shrined #oc: xingchen #oc: zhi yin #oc asks #this is so long & it took so long JO IM SO SORRY #BUT !!! IT WAS ALSO SO MUCH FUN !!#SO THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!#<33333 #IM REALLY HAPPY TO SHARE #also thank you for waiting so patiently #i hope this is coherent enough & that i understood the questions ?? sjkjdkje #ANYWAY !! I LOVE YOU #long post /

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laventadorn · 4 years

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Part 1/2 I was wondering if you had any ideas/headcanons wrt Eileen/Tobias? JK doesn't really go into how they met, but given the little info he gives us its pretty clear the type of marriage they had. But, I was wondering why Tobias acted the way he did. Not that he needs a reason, but I love backstories. Do u have one for the Snapes? Personally, I sawa bit of parallel with how Seamus described how his muggle dad didn't know his mom was a which until after the wedding. I can sort of see...

I wrote one for my first HP fic, in fact! Heavily influenced by Jane Austen lmao

I would change some aspects of this now, but this was the version I dug up from my Ancient Writings:

(readmore, y u no work)

Eileen’s parents’ marriage was arranged, as many pure-blood marriages are. The Princes were a very old, distinguished line, but impoverished, while her mother’s family was relatively new, in a pure-blood sense, but wealthy. Her parents set up the marriage with Mr. Prince, who was rather older than their daughter, but she agreed to it. However, within a short time she was unhappy, since her husband, raised to frugality, was rather miserly and she was spendthrift; and being younger, she wanted to do a great many things that it was not in his temperament to agree to. When Eileen was about five or six, her mother ran away, abandoning her child and her marriage, eloping to Europe with a lover. Her husband was so humiliated and enraged that he forbade anyone in the household to speak her name ever again. He destroyed all evidence of her existence in the house—the possessions she had left behind, the paintings they’d had commissioned, even renouncing her personal house-elf. Even when he learned, three years later, that she’d died in conditions of poverty and hardship, it didn’t soften him toward her; instead, he only believed she had got what she deserved.

When Eileen was seven, he remarried, this time to a widow, one of the Blacks, who had endured a childless marriage of some fifteen years until her husband was killed rather stupidly trying to learn how to ride a dragon. She had no wealth, but Mr. Prince still had his wife’s fortune, and Mrs. Black’s impeccable bloodline meant more to him in any case. She and Mr. Prince were rather meant for each other, however: both were nip-farthings, both joyless and cruel, and both rigidly traditional. They believed in duty, propriety, and unstinting obedience from their children.

Mrs. Black, now Mrs. Prince, thought worse of the former Mrs. Prince than even her husband did. To her, a woman’s infidelity was the worst of vile sins, and she pitied her new husband for having married such a filthy whore. She was sorry that the former Mrs. Prince had left behind a little girl, since naturally the daughter of such a whore would turn out just like her.

But Mrs. Prince was determined to do her duty by Eileen. She raised her to be a proper pure-blood wife—dutiful, obedient, graceful and silent. She beat into her the importance of propriety, telling Eileen how vital it was that she give no one any cause to say how like her mother she was, however much she would surely have the same sort of base, wicked urges as that slut. She also impressed upon Eileen the necessity of marrying into a pure-blood family of stature, since her mother was a fine example of the rubbish that rose to the surface of bad blood.

Within a few short years, the new Mrs. Prince had rewarded her second husband with twin sons. These boys had the benefit firstly of being boys, always a plus in pure-blood families, as well as the added bonus of not having a piece of trash for a mother. The practice of favoring the sons over the daughters was standard in pure-blood families, but the sins of Eileen’s mother worsened her lot. Nothing Eileen ever did was right enough or good enough or proper enough in the eyes of her family; and at school she had no friends, since the pure-blood daughters of Slytherin were fully aware of her mother’s story and had been forbidden from associating with her. Eileen was not pretty, and her home life was too miserable to make her good enough company to compensate for her other defects. Her father pretended she did not exist, her brothers teased and tormented her, and her stepmother ruled her whole life with a fist of iron.

Eileen retreated into her schoolwork, into books and knowledge. In second year she did make one friend, a Ravenclaw named Constance Marlowe. Constance was a very tranquil person. Her mother was Muggle-born, and she would tell Eileen about her Muggle grandparents. Eileen had never met Muggles. Her father and stepfather loathed them, but they loathed Eileen, too, and loved her brothers and the pure-blood families who treated Eileen as if their cruelty was simply preempting every nasty thing they suspected she would ever do.

Then in fifth year, while visiting the sea shore on summer holiday, Constance drowned. Eileen went to her funeral, to which many of Constance’s Muggle relatives had come. They looked like regular people, although they dressed funny. After that, Eileen hated the ocean, but realized that Muggles were capable of human thought and speech, which her family had always led her to believe they weren’t.

When school ended, she returned to live at her father’s house, since pure-blood women of her family’s stature did not get jobs; they got married. But with Eileen’s reputation, her looks, and her father’s desire to spend as little money on her dowry as possible, she received no offers. Her blood was not even decent enough, balanced as it was by her mother’s betrayal. So for more than ten years, Eileen lived in her father’s home, a companion to her stepmother, an object of mockery to her brothers and the children they went on to have.

By the time she was thirty, everyone, even she, was certain she would never marry. Her stepmother even came to relax her restrictions, since she had kept Eileen wrapped so tightly out of a duty to maidenly propriety. A thin, unattractive thirty-year-old witch was not likely to be prey to any lascivious attentions or whims. Uncaring now of the reputation she had so viciously guarded, Mrs. Prince let Eileen out of the house for longer periods of time … although she might not have, had she known Eileen was visiting Muggle haunts.

On one of these jaunts, when she was about thirty-one, Eileen met Tobias. She had gone, in fact, to the seaside town where Constance drowned, perhaps out of a morbid desire to torture herself. He was there, too, trying to get away from his life for a bit, since he’d just gotten divorced.

He had married young when his girlfriend got pregnant unexpectedly. He’d done his duty by her, quitting school and going to work at the mill, but a few months before the day he met Eileen, his wife had sat him down and said she’d fallen in love with some other bloke, but she wanted to do right by Tobias because he’d always done right by her. She and he weren’t in love, hadn’t been since the very early days, even if they’d rubbed along together easily enough, and he said as long as he could keep seeing his girl, they’d be all right. So they divorced amicably, and she married the other bloke, who was a bit older and balding and sort of fat, but a jolly sort, which Tobias had to admit he was not. Lorraine’s new husband looked a bit like Santa Claus to Tobias, and he knew his daughter would like her step-father, if she didn’t already. And although as a young man he’d agreed to the marriage of necessity and had never really been bitter about it, happy enough with his wife and daughter for company, he had wanted more from his life than he’d wound up with at thirty-five: divorced, uneducated, in a dreary, pointless job.

As she was talking with him, Eileen realized she wanted more than anything to get away from her family. She realized how purely she hated them, as if the hatred ran through her blood. She decided to scandalize them utterly: packed up her marriage chest and ran away, to live with Tobias without marrying him, hoping to drive her father and step-mother both to an apoplectic fit, but at least one or the other if she could manage it.

So she and Tobias simply lived together for a while, until Eileen got pregnant. She had been guarding against this, but the magical world had an old wives’ tale that wizarding babies wanted to be born so badly that sometimes, you couldn’t stop them. When she told Tobias, he wanted to get married, and although she didn’t really, she didn’t want her child to suffer the ignominy of being the bastard of a whore. So they were married, very quietly, only Tobias’ ex-wife in attendance with her family. Not wanting to give birth to a daughter that would live the life she’d had, Eileen mixed a very Dark potion to ensure the birth of a son.

So Severus was born. She put an ad in the Daily Prophet, hoping her family would see it, in case it would give them an aneurism.

Before Severus was born, but when she was close to due, Tobias asked her if the baby would have magic. Eileen said, “It is likely, but he may not.”

“What happens if he doesn’t?” Tobias asked.

Eileen shrugged. “Then he doesn’t.” She wanted her son to be a wizard, but she was no longer in the magical world; a Squib child would not matter to her now. She had brothers; she was not even the end of the line.

It was impossible to tell if babies had magic, so for several years after Severus’ birth it was a moot issue. Eileen continued to work spells, because Tobias said he didn’t mind, he actually thought it was pretty interesting. And then one day when Severus was about four or five, he worked magic, and out of nowhere Tobias blew up at the pair of them. Eileen was so shocked she actually flinched away, because although she knew Tobias had a temper, he’d never turned it on her. Severus burst into tears. And then Eileen pulled herself together and reacted, rage and hatred boiling up out of her through her wand, and she turned it on her husband, the way she’d always wanted to do to her brothers, her father, her step-mother, the children at school, and she blasted him across the room and into the bookshelf.

Severus screamed. Eileen stood frozen, looking at Tobias’ unconscious body slumped under an array of books. She blasted them off him and found he was bleeding from cuts all over his front. She hastily flooed them all to St. Mungo’s, where he was swiftly patched up. Although the Healers gave her funny looks, they did nothing to her because she was a witch and he was only a Muggle, and there weren’t legal protections in those days for the Muggle spouses of wizards and witches.

Tobias wasn’t the same after that. Eileen didn’t know whether it was the shock of her turning her magic on him, or Severus’ own magic manifesting, or even the trip to St. Mungo’s, because his face as he looked around the hospital as they left had been haunted. After that, he began to drink more. Although he’d always had a few on the weekends and even more on holidays, he was soon never seen without a drink in his hand or the scent of alcohol on his breath. He wouldn’t tell Eileen what was wrong, and it was impossible to get anything from the mind of a drunk person; even trying it made one disoriented.

She expected him to leave them; expected to wake up one morning and find him gone, but for some reason he never did. They settled into a life where Tobias would go for days avoiding her and Severus, hardly speaking to them when sober, muttering when inebriated, with occasional outbursts of temper that Eileen would sometimes curtail, but at others simply weather out. As a young child Severus was at first frightened, then hurt, and once he grew older, resentful.

Once, when Severus was about seven, she did wake up in the middle of the night and find Tobias in Severus’ room, watching him sleep. Tobias was just drunk enough to be honest. He looked up at her with haunted eyes and said, “Do you hate that I can’t do it?”

“Do what?” she asked, bewildered.

“What you can do. What he can do. Do you hate me because I can’t?”

Eileen just stared at him. “Is that why you act like this?” He didn’t say anything, just looked back at Severus. “No, I don’t hate you. That would be like hating the sky because it’s blue.”

When he spoke, she almost didn’t hear him. “Sometimes I hate you, though. Both of you.”

It took Eileen much longer than it should have to understand what Tobias was really telling her: that he hated them for being able to do something he never would. He hated them for having the power of magic when he was only a Muggle. That look on his face in St. Mungo’s had been shock at an entire world he’d never guessed existed; and now that he knew of it, he also knew he would only ever be on the outside looking in.

But she had not understood this in time. She resented his drinking; he resented her powers; they resented each other’s resentment. And at the heart of it, they came to hate the other for a second chance that had turned to ash, just as the first chance had.

Eventually Eileen realized that the same barrier that stood between her and Tobias had blocked him off from Severus, and she simply quit trying to bridge it. She drew Severus into the circle of her magic, eschewing any acknowledgment of the non-magical world he was half a part of. She had always meant Tobias to show him that part, and now Tobias would not. She taught Severus about his magical bloodline, the House of their family’s allegiance, the world he would enter once he was old enough, the powers he would wield. Although she punished him if he looked in her books without her permission, she taught him hexes and curses and spells that would get him respected among his Slytherin peers, that would receive him the notice of families he would need to impress in order to gain entrance into the society that should have been his—both of theirs, had her life gone much differently. She raised him more as she had been raised, in a manner typical for pure-blood daughters: with strictness and not much indulgence, because she’d loathed the men her brothers had become, alternately indulged and ruthlessly punished as they had been, as the beloved sons of two cruel, cold-hearted people.

In teaching Severus about the world she had left, sending him off into the future he ought to have, Eileen realized she had never been happy in the world of magic. She had known the truth of that, lived it all her life, but never articulated it to herself. But she was not happy in the Muggle world, either; she did not understand it, couldn’t navigate it. It was too vast and unfamiliar for her even to know where to start. As she prepared Severus for Hogwarts, Eileen realized the only time she had been anything close to happy was in that seaside town when she had met Tobias, and she had believed, for a handful of days, that the future would be different from the past.

But it hadn’t been. Now Tobias was gone, and only Severus was left. And even though she had tried her hardest to make it otherwise, she realized that Severus was just as out-of-place as she had ever been; she, the daughter of a whore, the pure-blood wife of a Muggle with a wizard for a son. Severus was the child of two people whose lives had been wasted for them by others; sent as hardly more than a baby into the world of pure-blood politics with such a tiny arsenal of anything they would see as promise, in love with a naïve Muggle-born Gryffindor. If Severus wanted the Muggle-born, he would cut all his chances of entering good society; and if he got the Muggle-born, he would find himself in the midst of people who regarded his magic with jealousy and suspicion.

That was the true curse of the half-blood, she thought. You were always trapped between worlds that didn’t know how to claim you.

*Snape doesn’t have those uncles anymore cuz they died off somehow, and he doesn’t have contact with his dad’s first family. He doesn’t strike me as someone who has a large extended family he pals around with, although I’m sure they exist. I have 1 jillion cousins I know absolutely nothing about, not even their names.

#laventadorn's adventures in writing stuff

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anearthstruckalien · 5 years

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[ A hand is slowly extended towards the bright and rectangular object shining amidst the otherwise unfathomable darkness of the room; it was just a void now that the sickly red tint had (thankfully) disappeared. Slowly. Measuredly. Tentatively. But, he never opens it. Not at the moment he had envisioned in his thoughts because of properly opening it, his hand remains idly hovering over the point at which he could open it with one simple manuveur. Tension still runs high throughout his exoskeleton and now it’s reached the tip of his tail given how it’s curled in on itself ever-so-slightly. His mouth presses into a tight and rigid line and ultimately rather than moving any further, the pale alien simply casts his dull gaze towards the ground as though that would effectively calm and distract him from whatever it is that may be behind this door. He had never planned for this. He had never anticipated it. This was an event that had occurred beyond his calculations. It was never supposed to get this… complicated. What will happen next…? What will he be capable of doing based on what happens next?

The faintest of exasperated sighs is what ultimately escapes him in apparent response to his own internal set of inquiries, what should have otherwise been a greater travel of sound fundamentally absorbed by the darkness and thus leaving no further continuation of the sound in its wake. This is not the purpose behind his visit to The Place That Time Forgot, but all the same, the truth of the matter is that he is… afraid. Despite his best efforts he is still afraid. It might not show very well now because he’s in what one might refer to as ‘survival mode’, but something like this is among his greatest fears… or rather a precursor to it. He lifts his gaze up from the ground and down to his hands anew. If he’s still capable of doing anything at all, of thinking rationally and freely moving about his mind, then it has not happened yet. Not yet. But, it could if he doesn’t take action soon. Now his gaze is rigidly fixed back upon the door in the middle of the room before him. The truth is… that he’s also afraid of what he might find behind this door. He knows what is meant to be behind it (because even as he fears it, curiousity and a desire to find answers to critical questions exist within) but seeing what is there would either confirm the absolute worst to be undeniably true… or refute what he’s believed thus far in unforeseen ways.

Both of those possibilities would be difficult to process for different reasons. Possibilities that he may not be prepared for… and yet it is what he must do anyways. It is too quick. This is something that had never been meant to be touched. Something that should have stayed locked away until he could face it (no matter how horrible) if that day would ever come. This is the only progress that he’s made thus far in his current situation. And it was enough to get that disgusting part of him to ease off a bit (he simply knows it)… so it in turn, may be precisely what he needs to put this nonsense to an end. For good. Just like he had originally set out to do. He takes several breathes to calm himself down and thus push aside some of that which is clogging up clear thought to at least feel like he can do more despite the ultimately muddled state of his mind. Then, he resumes his earlier motion and draws his hand closer to the door so that it can be opened much like the high-tech doors lining the inside of his ship and with little more hesitation, he steps through the entry and into the next location… ]

[ The room that he finds himself in next may as well be the prior location’s precise opposite. It was bright. Uncomfortably bright but only because of the highly reflective nature of the room and some unknown light source hidden behind each facet. It’s cut like a crystalline system of caves and just as rough on the greyish-white ground below (that too somewhat reflective in its own way) and at first, that there’s nothing else in this room has the Psion thinking that perhaps there is indeed nothing beyond what he’s considered to be himself for the longest time. What a wasted effort. Soon would that thought be put aside however, because just as the Psion is about to turn to leave, something in the reflective surfaces catches his eye. Something that isn’t merely a reflection of his current form. Rather, one of the many duplicate images of himself seems to melt away like it was a trick of the light itself to that of the distorted variant which had been present in the other room. And before he can even properly react to that… yet another image on a different reflective surface repeats the prior process to give way to an image of himself without all the evident signs of damage to his physical form. And yet another morphs to something almost too idealistic to be true; what seems to be a younger variant of himself, as a child, and donning a scarf in the color which he hates so much though this red is a far more valiant take on it. It’s this latest one which causes him to take a step back out of instinct and for a singular dark blue void to widen a marginal amount, as though he cannot believe what he is seeing within his own mind. ]

‘What. On. Earth…’

[ A disbelieving shake of the head and another step is almost taken back, one that certainly would have been enacted were it not for his own refusal to display any further weakness, even within the unseen recesses of such a hidden place. The altered reflections (though visibly different in appearances) do not seem to be entities of their own so much as they are just that, altered reflections of himself. Everything he does is mimicked by the otherwise listless images scattered amidst crystalline formations. Cue another critical glance about the general area and then another sigh. Of course. He had been expecting something like this or least just that of the first two. The third was a complete surprise. After a moment’s worth of hesitation, he moves towards the more heroic-looking image as though innately drawn to it in an inexplicable manner. And ordinarily, this would be enough for him to call its truthfulness into question, but this is his mind and no matter how… –troubled he may be deep-down, that (a part of one’s Magicant) does not lie. A pause at just a short distance from it and he tentatively presses a hand to the reflective facet’s surprisingly cold surface.

Is that really… himself… –? It must be. This cannot be a lie. One’s Magicant never lies no matter how much one may personally wish to see otherwise. But… how… –? He thought that… he had thought that… it was just a dream. An impossible illusion perpetually out of reach from a monster like himself, an evil creature with an innate nature that indiscriminately drives it to warp and destroy when left to its own natural devices. If so… if this is truly himself, then it means that his nature isn’t what he thought it was… he isn’t just a hollow shell moved by the will of others, a corrupted Psion tool, or just the nightmare which had to be exterminated for the good of everyone... is he…? He shudders just a little bit, his right eye twitching in kind as though holding something back, before the Psion sharply turns away as if he cannot stand looking at such a bright image anymore. There’s an overwhelming build-up of something inside him and that something is powerful enough to block out the perpetual pain and nightmarish buzzing all on its own without any input from Giegue himself. It’s difficult to properly sort out what he’s feeling and what he isn’t because it’s just so much… but it is (with no small degree of certainty) some bizarre mixture of relief bordering on sickly happiness that he isn’t what he thought himself to be… that in the end, it wasn’t a complete waste of time for her to associate with him at all… and that of an almost hardcoded desire to reject such a conclusion because it just didn’t make any sense…

No. He frowns and shoves that later sentiment aside. Regardless of what his personal feelings are, it would be utter insanity to reject it in a place where truth about the self was meant to shine through despite one’s own perceptions of themselves. He casts another critical glance about the images anew and tries to think through what this means logically. If that more heroic variant is himself, the true self, then the others indicated must also be his true self as well. All of it is a part of him and perhaps even more depending on his own willingness to search. A vague blink as the overarching conclusion to this dawns upon him after more careful (and somewhat suspicious) thought. He isn’t inevitably a monster by nature, but rather a… very flawed entity just as capable of good and terrible things as any other neutral form. And just as importantly, all of this also means that he’s… always been himself this entire time. Despite his own condition… missing a piece and everything… he’s always been himself. The corrupted after-image has always been a part of him. It has always been with him along with those terribly corrupted and distorted feelings. It has always been connected to him; he had simply never wanted to acknowledge the fullest extent of all this. He had been more afraid of it than he consciously realized; it went far deeper.

A more direct glance at the corrupted image in all its oozing and grotesque glory and he practically pushes himself into an almost shambling kind of walk towards it with definitive intent in mind. It is himself. These are his feelings too and they have continued to exist within beyond the outcome of the second attempt. He is the nightmare. The Evil Power. The Universal Cosmic Destroyer. Giygas. Despair. Hate. Anger. Regret. Fear. And sadness. Those are all a part of himself, but it does not have to be all that exists and it most certaintly isn’t. Though unnecessary (given that what he’s about to do is more so about a state of mind, sentiment, and willpower than anything) pale hands gently clasp together in front of his physical form. If it truly was all that existed, then he wouldn’t have been capable of doing good things at all for its own sake. Of even doing these things for Maria’s sake based on his obligation to her which itself is undoubtedly rooted in how he feels about her. This is not an illusion. He is not an illusion. A deep inhalation of breath and (like many other times preceding it) a subsequent exhalation. His intentions have been genuine all along and though that alone doesn’t grant a cohesive understanding of who he precisely is as a person in full… it does give further weight to the hope that he could somehow be so much more despite everything.

His mind has now been stuck back into clarity and focus. An internal sense of peace has overridden all that bothersome noise. And now his sole focus is simply on doing something… anything to put a permanent stop to the trouble being caused by what remains after the second invasion of Earth, so that no one else has to get hurt and pointlessly suffer because of his own actions. As such, it seems that his efforts (this time around) are not in vain because he does feel something building up, the intangible turning into something that can transcend its limitations. Power. Willpower. Determination. An incredibly dense and bright concentration of energy. Far more than a star or even an entire galaxy for that matter. But certainly less than what he had felt from the Earth’s Power. It burns. But, not in any way that’s uncomfortable or emptying. And the phantom, it seems, can feel it too because suddenly the corrupted image stops being a direct mirror of himself and morphs into the real creature which tries to strike out at him like before…

… only for Giegue himself to move his own appendage (his left hand) towards it, sparking just a little with something unidentifiable by any current standards, and makes direct physical contact with little more than an index finger. At first nothing seems to happen, but a moment later, the corrupted after-image seems to fall off itself in a way. It’s like shedding a shell. An incredibly damaged shell distorted beyond easy recognition and one that ultimately falls apart in pieces as though it were as fragile as paper to reveal something else beyond it all. Or rather what it always has been beyond corruption. All that remains in its place is something pale blue in color and of indiscernible shape. He narrows an eye to study it for just a bit, though he already knows what it is, before reaching out towards it once again and allowing for it to disappear into himself. It has been absorbed and is now a part of himself once again. Now there is no more after-image and no further concerns about what it could do given that all of its terrible effects have long since ceased to be. He hears no message. No buzzing. And no further pain. ]

#.writingpost #.timeline: interuniversal interference #part 3 where a majority of the intended action for this occurs #man it's been over a year since this blog started and /finally/ something finally gets through to him--#--about that extremely distorted and negative (and really unfair/inaccurate) self-perception of his #it's only for this particular timeline for now because in the others he's hardly reached any kinda point where he can come to this conclusio #*conclusion

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fredyates1992 · 4 years

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Reiki Spiritual Energy Davie Fl 33328 Cheap And Easy Cool Tips

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Reiki Master Northern Ireland

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Japanese Therapy Reiki

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#Reiki Spiritual Energy Davie Fl 33328 Cheap And Easy Cool Tips #How To Be A Good Reiki Healer

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your-brother-crutchie · 7 years

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Anxiety

Race has terrible anxiety and has a panic attack every time he gets a vague message from Spot. Davey convinces him to tell him the next time he sees him.

Race and Spot met through Davey. They became friends pretty quickly and it didn’t take long for them to start texting each other nightly, spending hours in their respective homes just laughing and smiling over whatever stupid thing the other had said.

This was fine for a little while, however, Race had a pretty severe case of anxiety and when Spot starting messaging him things like:

Spot Conlon: Can we talk?

Before launching into a long winded conversation about how much he loved snakes, it meant that Race had been sent spiralling into a major panic attack for no reason.

Race loved talking with Spot, probably a little too much, he just couldn’t handle the vague and misleading text messages. They sent his anxiety into hyperdrive and Race had had more panic attacks in the couple of weeks that he’d known Spot than he’d had in the whole seven months before hand.

Spot Conlon: Can I ask a question?

Spot Conlon: I have something to tell you

Each of these had sent Spot off on completely mundane tangents but had sent Race on a thirty minute panic attack, each.

It took one of his flatmates to calm him down, usually Davey but occasionally Crutchie. Jack was never allowed anywhere near the situation. Davey, on the other hand, was incredibly good at calming Race down. His logical approach and comforting nature pulled him just slightly ahead of Crutchie’s general sunshine persona.

Pushing door shut behind him, Race heaved a sigh of relief as he slid down the back of it and onto the threadbare carpet. He knew that his friends wouldn’t be home for another couple of hours so he could mope behind the door if he wanted to.

Race loved hanging out with Spot, it was often the best part of his day, but it was extremely tiring trying to hide your crippling anxiety from a boy who wanted to illegally climb fire-escapes for fun. Also, Race refused to disappoint Spot. He was a little too in love with him for that.

Although Race had learnt to accept it, he didn’t exactly want to admit it too often. He certainly couldn’t, for example, admit it to Spot. In the midst of a panic attack, Race had blurted it out to Davey when he asked why he was having so many panic attacks all of a sudden, not even thinking about it yet regretting it afterwards. All Davey ever wanted to do was talk about Race’s little crush and help him get things sorted.

Race didn’t need to talk about it. He knew that, if he told him, Spot would hate him for it and that was enough to know that he would never tell him. Eventually, Race would just learn to get over it.

Lifting himself from the floor and grabbing a random juice carton from the fridge on his way to his bedroom, Race rubbed at his eyes as he scraped his feet along the floor. He knew that he probably shouldn’t take the juice cartons that Davey kept for when Les visited, but he was tired and they were the easiest thing to get his hands on. Also, people really didn’t appreciate how good those small boxes of fruit juice were.

He dropped onto his bed with a sigh, careful not to spill his juice as he placed it carefully on the bedside table and rolled his face into his mattress. Race was just about ready to sleep for a couple of days when he heard his phone go off from where it had fallen on the other end of his bed.

With a loud grumble, Race pulled himself up and onto his stomach to find his phone. He clicked the home button and froze, his breath locking in his throat as he saw Spot’s name come up, along with the words underneath it.

Spot Conlon: Call me

It didn’t take long before Race’s breath was passing through his lungs at about a mile a minute. Although the air kept flooding his lungs, he still felt like he was suffocating and there was absolutely nothing that he could do about it.

Race had dropped his phone immediately, scuttling backwards until his spine was pressed as tightly against the headboard as he could manage. Fingers still tingling as if the phone had sent an electric current through his body, Race shook like a flag in autumn. He couldn’t move. His muscles would not work.

Melting into a puddle of leaves, Race felt his entire body sink against the mattress as he simply lay there, riding it out until the end or until one of his flatmates came home.

Thirty minutes later, Race heard the sound of the front door sliding into its frame. Someone was home early.

There were footsteps in the living room for a second, only pausing once they reached his door before walking away. It was definitely Davey. Whenever Davey came home and Race didn’t come out to meet him, Davey would rattle around in the kitchen for a bit to give him time, coming into his room five minutes later to see if he was okay.

Recently, the answer to that question was a constant, ‘no.’ If he wasn’t pining after Spot, Race was having a panic attack about something that Spot had said.

Eventually, the footsteps returned and Race heard a soft rapping at his door. He wiped at his eyes furiously, only making them redder as he sniffled quickly and called for him to come in. He knew that he shouldn’t but Race didn’t like to appear vulnerable and wanted to hide his panic attack as best he could.

Which was not very well.

Davey pushed the door open slowly, brows folding in on themselves as soon as he saw Race’s face crumble, “Hey, are you okay?” Race knew that Davey knew that he wasn’t but the boy insisted on jumping through the hoops.

Joining him on the bed, Davey slid his arm around Race’s body and held him tightly against his side, calmly quieting the boy’s desperate, gasping breaths. It took a few minutes but, eventually, Race started to calm down. Although his breath still rattled through his lungs, it was not quite so violent.

The dark-haired boy scooped Race’s phone up and glanced quickly at the screen, seeing what Spot had said and allowing a sympathetic glance at his shaking friend, “Do you want me to call him and see what he wants?”

Race nodded quickly, pulling himself up and onto his knees as Davey used the fingerprint slot that Race had added for him to unlock the phone and scroll through the contacts.

As Davey lifted the phone to his ear, Race couldn’t help but think that this could be a mistake. What if Spot blurted something out that only he was meant to hear? What if Spot didn’t want to be friends with him anymore? Although Race would rather be with him, he’d rather be friends than nothing.

“Hello? Spot? It’s Davey. Race is just finishing a Mario Kart game with Jack, yeah, Jack’s home early today. He’ll be done in a second, was it important?”

There was silence for a moment as Race waited for a sign from Davey. Either he would wave him off to the bathroom to finish calming himself down for a minute or two or he would tell him that Spot never wanted to see him again.

Race knew that he was being ridiculous. He hadn’t done anything to make Spot angry but he couldn’t help but worry.

“Oh? That’s fine. I can stay on whilst Race beats Jack?”

Breath leaving him in relief, Race quickly bounded from the bed and into the bathroom down the hall, where he could pat his face dry. He could just hear Davey making idle chit chat as he made sure his breathing sounded normal, smiling slightly as he imagined Spot waiting for him on the other end of the line. Then he frowned as he imagined Spot waiting for him on the other end of the line.

Race hated speaking on the phone. He did it when Spot wanted to but it was one of those things that kind of freaked him out. It was like texting. You could say something and if they didn’t reply, you’d just be left standing there, unable to see their face or how they’d reacted.

Slipping back through from the bathroom, Race nodded to Davey and they cheered together. May as well make the story believable.

“Well, that’s Jack sent to lick his wounds for a few hours. You can have Race now. I’ll see you next week, Spot.” Davey smiled at Race as he passed the phone over to him, raking his eyes over him to make sure he really was okay before leaving him alone.

Race spent a little while making himself comfortable on his bed before taking a deep breath and raising the phone to his ear. He paused when he heard Spot humming, smiling softly as he breathed out, “Spot.”

“Race!” Spot’s enthusiasm was infectious and it didn’t take long before Race had a grin painted across his face in fat strokes of the brush, laughing as Spot just talked through all of the things that were going through his head. Most of which, by the way, revolved around his snakes or whether Race had found someone yet.

Spot had always been obsessed with Race’s love life. He always wanted to know whether Race was talking to anyone or seeing anyone.

“Race, are you playing with your hair?“ Laughter seemed to ring down the phone as Race subconsciously pulled his fingers free from his sandy curls, “Oh my gosh, Race, I can hear how flustered you are and you haven’t said anything! You’re so cute when you’re flustered.”

Spluttering suddenly, Race struggled to pull something to say together in a couple of seconds, “I’m not- um, I’m not flustered.”

Spot was impossible to read and Race hated it. How was Race supposed to distance himself from his feelings when the Brooklyn boy made comments like that? Quite frankly, it was shocking.

After another few minutes of casual chatting and Race trying to shut out any even vaguely flirty comments from Spot, the two boys hung up the phone. Race threw his phone to the other side of his bed again and flopped back onto the pillow from where he’d been sitting rigidly upright.

Looking up when his door creaked open, Race took in Davey slipping through his door and joining him on the bed. The dark-haired boy rolled his eyes as Race twisted to rest his head on his legs. A sigh escaped Race’s lips as he let his eyes drift closed when he felt Davey’s fingers running slowly through his curls.

Davey allowed the quiet to settle for another minute before speaking up, “Race, you’ve got to tell him. It’s not good for you if you have a panic attack every time he texts you.” When Race pulled himself up and away from Davey, the taller boy furrowed his brows and tried to reach out for him, “I know it’s not your fault but if you talk to him, you could ask him to be more careful with his messages so that you don’t get stressed.”

He knew that Davey, ever the diplomat, was, of course, correct but Race would much rather just leave it. He didn’t want Spot to leave because, whether he was willing to admit it or not, Race was a little too in love with him for his own good, “I don’t want him to think I’m dumb.”

Scoffing, Davey reached out and pushed at Race’s shoulder as he struggled to stop himself from laughing, “Race, you met him through me. If he can be friends with a Jewish grey-ace with a superiority complex, I think he can be friends with an anxious Italian.”

Once again, Race knew that he was right. Davey was alway right.

“Thanks, Davey.”

It was only a few days later when Race was at Spot’s apartment. Race had completely blocked out the idea of telling Spot about his anxiety and but was trying to keep it that way as they sat in silence, watching yet another Disney movie.

Although Race was trying to push the idea as far away from his mind as possible, he kept thinking of Davey telling him that Spot wouldn’t hate him for it and wondering about whether he could really do it. Unfortunately, this was only pushing Race further towards actually panicked as he kept glancing at Spot, who, as ever, looked as relaxed as anyone could when hanging upside down from a sofa.

It didn’t take long for Race’s breath to start coming quicker, rattling through his lungs without actually providing him any support. Race still felt like he was suffocating.

After a couple of minutes of this, a quiet moment in the film came along and the only sound running through the apartment was Race’s sharp breathing. Spot glanced across at this moment, frowning when he saw Race and pausing the film, “Race? You okay?”

Race’s face blossomed as the blood ran to his cheeks and his eyes widened drastically. He let his eyes lock with Spot’s before regretting the decision, knowing his terror was visible through his irises when Spot rushed to kneel on the floor in front of him, and trying to sink as far back into the sofa as physically possible.

Flinching violently as soon as he felt Spot’s hand on his knee, Race folded his arms in front of his face to hide himself from Spot trying to figure out what was wrong with him. He wanted to tell Spot. He didn’t want Spot to see it.

“Race? What can I do?” Spot’s voice was soothing but Race couldn’t help but associate with the reason that he was panicking in the first place.

As he sniffled slightly, Race tried desperately not to let on that his breathing was only getting worse as he could feel Spot getting closer, “D- Dav- Dav-ey.”

Race heard Spot leaving and sighed slightly, relaxing his arms so that he could see Spot finding his phone and calling someone through the gaps. He heard Spot asking for Davey and he heard the worry in his voice but he still couldn’t force himself to calm down.

It took about half an hour but, soon, Davey was by his side. Race cuddled into his side, burying his face into the boy’s neck, purely for comfort, as his breathing slowly returned back to normal.

Having never had much physical affection from his family when he was younger, it was really all Race ever craved. It didn’t mean anything but all Race ever wanted was someone to hold him and stroke their fingers through his hair.

When Race was almost asleep, completely wiped out but with his breathing back to normal, he caught Davey gesturing Spot over. The short boy came through from where he had been stood in the kitchen, watching nervously with his thumb nail between his teeth.

Davey gestured for Spot to sit down on the other side of Race before tipping him slightly, until he was cuddled into Spot’s side instead. After all, Race was far too exhausted to care that he was so close to the reason for his problems and the boy that made his blood flutter.

Speaking with his voice soft, so as to not disturb Race too much, Davey smiled tightly at Spot, “Give him a few minutes. I’ll make coffee.”

As Spot nodded, Race could feel his heart pounding in his chest and, suddenly, felt horrible for worrying him. However, he was far too spent to start panicking again, simply having to leave it as he felt Spot’s short fingers running carefully through his curls.

Race stirred when Davey came back, scooting along the sofa so that he was as far away from Spot as possible and accepting the coffee. He missed the connection with Spot already but he didn’t want to scare the boy, he knew that he didn’t really like physical contact anyway, let alone when people were around. It didn’t matter how well Davey knew Spot already, Spot wouldn’t be comfortable with him there. Taking the armchair opposite them, Davey took a long sip of his coffee before nodding at Race.

Waving his hand lightly over his mug, Race tried to prolong the inevitable by distracting himself. He winced at the heat of the steam hitting his palm before turning it over to examine the water droplets that had formed already.

“Race.” Looking up to see Davey nodding at him, Race sighed before setting the coffee mug on the side next to him and turning to face Spot on the sofa. He didn’t want to do it but he was going to have to.

He quickly took a deep breath before locking eyes with Spot and almost whimpering under his intense stare, “Right, um, so. Spot-”

“Yeah?” Spot interrupted him quickly, making Race jump and glance to Davey with a pained expression. He knew that Spot wanted to know but he couldn’t do this if he was going to keep interrupting him.

Sighing before continuing, Race fiddled with his fingers as he muttered the words under his breath, “Um- Davey thinks-”

“Race.” This time it was Davey interrupting him. He knew why but it didn’t make it any easier. If he was going to tell Spot then it had to be because he wanted to and he did want to! It was just a case of actually doing it.

Another sigh passed between Race’s lips before he steeled his expression and turned towards Spot one last time, sitting on his hands to stop himself from looking nervous and fumbling, “Um. I have- I have pretty bad, um, anxiety and, um, when- when you text m-e, it’s, um, it gets really bad.” He knew that he’d done it wrong as soon as he saw Spot’s expression crumble but all that mattered for the moment was that he’d got the words out.

When Spot continued to say nothing, Race started to think that he had, perhaps, ruined everything. He was beginning to panic that Spot was going to kick him out and never see him again until Davey interjected into the silence.

“What Race is trying to say is that, although he does enjoy messaging with you, he would appreciate it if you could consider wording your messages differently. For example, whenever I text with Race, I always make sure to involve the topic that I want to talk about in the question.”

Thankfully, Spot was nodding. He seemed like he was really trying to understand, which gave Race about a second of relief from the looming weight on his lungs, “Of course! I’m so sorry, Race, I didn’t know. If you still want me to message you, I can definitely change how I word things.”

Race couldn’t keep the blush away from his cheeks as Spot shuffled across the sofa to take one of Race’s hands in both of his. Although Race had larger hands and it was a slightly strange fit, all of a sudden it felt like nothing had ever been more comforting. He nodded quickly, not wanting to leave Spot hanging as he glanced up to look into his eyes.

The dark-haired boy sat across from them simply smiled before smirking and standing, taking his empty coffee mug and placing it in the kitchen. On his way back through, Davey paused behind the sofa, “Glad to have been of assistance, boys.” He flicked his eyebrows up at Race before laughing and letting himself silently out of the apartment.

When he had left, Race and Spot returned to cuddling on the sofa and watching the rest of the movie that had been playing before the whole situation had started. Race was barely paying attention to the film as he pushed his nose into the skin of Spot’s neck, smiling as the shorter boy held onto him tighter.

He frowned, however, when Spot leaned forward the pause the movie. Pulling himself up as Spot seemed to position himself across from him once again, Race raked his eyes over his friend for any sign of being uncomfortable with the situation. Spot knew that Race was interested in boys, he thought he was bi but that wasn’t exactly the case (Race had just been trying to keep females a possibility for his family, it hadn’t worked). What worried him was whether Spot had put two and two together and figured out about Race’s feelings.

“I just wish that you’d told me, Antonio.” That surprised Race. Not only because it wasn’t what he was expecting him to say but also because they never used each other’s real names. They just didn’t. Race didn’t particularly mind his first name but it still reminded him of his parents, who were the only people to ever use it. It was jarring to hear it from someone else’s mouth but Race had to admit, he kind of liked the way that Spot stumbled clumsily over the Italian name.

Pulling his knees up to his chest, Race tried to avoid Spot’s gaze as he considered his answer, “I thought you’d hate me.” He considered adding Spot’s first name onto the end before realising halfway through that he didn’t even know it.

He vowed to figure it out by the end of the week.

Spot merely laughed, pulling Race towards him again and squeezing him in a tight hug, “Oh, come on, Race. I’m friends with Davey!”

#newsies #sprace #rowan writes sprace #spot/race #spot conlon #racetrack higgins #davey jacobs #newsies fanfiction #fics #rowan writes

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onlinedogtrainercourse-blog · 5 years

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Teaching Your Puppy: Obedience Training Basics

For successful training, practice the following basic training steps with your puppy every day. Keep the workouts short. Your puppy considers everything as a game. So stimulate it by modifying what you learn. Run each command for about five minutes and come back whenever you can.

Practice in many different places (in the living room, in the garden, in the lobby or in the kitchen, even on walks) to get used to reacting in all sorts of situations. You can use the click technique to improve other aspects of your puppy's training, such as: B. to encourage him to stay quiet for the care and to get used to traveling by car.

Your puppy learns very fast and responds to love and affection as well as rewards. Obedience training will help you establish a lasting bond between the two of you and reward you with a happy and well-trained dog.

Table manners Restoring all your puppy needs is not a good thing. The more your puppy grows, the more you have to prevail. Puppies often choose meals as a battleground. But to come to him is a mistake. You need to make sure that you know that not all your inquiries will be answered.

Your puppy needs to learn that people around him, especially small children, can be somewhat unpredictable. However, you must accept that your unpredictable behavior is not a threat. You can help by mimicking the behavior of a child. Try to take a quick step towards your bowl and then drop it into a treat. Gently tap on it while you eat, or roll the toys nearby, anything that might distract you, but put a treat in the bowl to reward you for keeping eating. Do it now and then, but not with every meal. If your puppy is cold, growling or staring without conviction, stop and try again. If this is the case, it is best to seek advice from a veterinarian or a certified dog trainer.

Recommended Reading: Online dog trainer certification

Read the body language of your puppy. Dogs have always communicated with body language. This includes facial expressions, postures, sounds and flavors. Dogs use their mouths, eyes, ears and tails to express their feelings. By learning to interpret the body language of your puppy, you can interpret the intentions of your puppy.

Signs of aggression or submission. If your puppy feels brave or aggressive, he will try to get fat while standing with his ears upright and his tail upright. It will also push your chest and lift the hair on your neck and back. He could also growl and shake his cock slowly.

On the other hand, a devout dog will try to become small and behave like a puppy. In fact, an adult dog "scolds" a puppy but does not attack him. The template has the shape of a squatting side near the ground, the tail of which is deep but flexible. You can also try to lick the face of the dog or the dominant man. He can even roll on his back.

The tail of your puppy Most of us realize that moving the tail is a sign of friendship and pleasure, but the tail can also indicate other moods.

The normal way a dog holds its tail varies from breed to breed, but in general, a tail that is held back more than 45 degrees expresses alertness and interest.

If your puppy's tail trembles slowly and stiffly, it is an expression of anger. Keeping your back end means that your pet is scared. An anxious or nervous dog can twist its tail, but move it rigidly.

The eyes of your puppy When your dog's eyes are half closed, this is a sign of pleasure or submission, while eyes with big eyes can point to aggression.

In the wild, dogs look at each other until one withdraws or presents a challenge. You should never try to empty your puppy, especially if you are nervous.

The smile of your puppy Depressed dogs and some breeds, such as farmers, often open their mouths with a kind of armed "smile", and indeed it is a sign of friendship. But if the lips are stretched back to show the teeth, it's aggression, do not make a mistake.