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sp0o0kylights · 1 year ago

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Part Two / Part Three

Ao3

It's 8:45 am.

The Red Barn, which is neither red nor a barn, has been open since 7, catering to the early morning crowd with rounds of coffee and pancakes.

It was no Benny's, but given the size of Hawkins and the lack of alternatives?

No one was complaining.

They were all too happy someone had opened up another watering hole for the working class man (or lass, as Foreman Shelly will dutifully remind you) which meant the place was packed with both day and night shift regulars, passing each other in staggered waves.

It also meant Wayne was sharing the packed breakfast counter with a warehouse worker by the name of John Cheese on one side and Police Chief Jim Hopper on the other.

He doesn't mind it.

Wayne's a man on a budget thinner than his shoelace, but he's also a man who understands that small indulgences need to be made in life or you didn't truly live it.

This is how he convinces himself to get a coffee at the Barn after work everyday, reading the morning newspaper and chatting with the other regulars before he heads home.

Bonus, it gets him out of the rapid-fire franticness that is his nephew in the mornings.

(All the love in the world wouldn't change the fact that all that Eddie came with a lot of noise.

The kind of noise that was a tried and true recipe for a headache right after a long shift.)

As a trade off, Wayne went to bed early so he could wake up in time for dinner with Eddie.

It was a nice little system that worked for them.

A routine Wayne was reminiscing fondly on, when the pager on Chief Hopper started to chirp. With a sad moan, the man fished out a few crumbled bills and threw them on the counter, abandoning his coffee to trudge out to his truck.

This was not unusual.

Particularly recently, given they were but a scant few weeks past that whole mall ordeal. A fact all too easy to remember when one caught sight of the Chief’s still healing face.

What was unusual, was when he came storming through the doors a minute later, face now a furious shade of red with his hat clenched in his hand.

The energy in the room shifted, taking on something a little watchful as Hopper swept his gaze from side to side, like a dog on the hunt.

Judging by the way he stilled when he caught sight of Wayne, the latter assumed he found what he was looking for and could only pray it was the person behind him.

(He liked John, but Wayne had enough trouble this year and he wasn't looking for any more.)

"Munson." Hopper called, striding over and dashing all his hopes. There was a choked fury emitting off him, and given the way John audibly scooted his chair away, Wayne knew everyone had clocked it.

"Chief." Wayne greeted, inclining his head towards him.

Idly he wondered what the hell his nephew had done this time.

'So help me if he stole all the town's lawn flamingos and put them in that damn teachers yard again….'

Wayne didn't even get to finish his threat, the Chief was already next to him.

"Mind if I have a word outside?"

Dammit Eddie.

"Ah hell, what's he done now?" Wayne asked with a sigh, eyeing the coffee he had left morosely.

There was still almost half of it left and the pot had tasted fresh for once.

"What?" Hopper said, and then Wayne got to watch as the man ran through an entire chain of thoughts, each one punctuated by things like; "Oh," and "No. "

"This is something else." He finished, flushed and fidgeting, anger making him antsy.

Wayne stared up at him.

"Something else?" He repeated, not sure he heard.

"Yes, something else." Hopper snapped impatiently, before leaning forward, voice dropping low. "This doesn't involve your nephew, but we both know you owe me for how many times I've let that kid off, Wayne. That's a damn big favor I've been doing you and I'm calling it in."

If it were any other cop, it'd sound like a threat.

It was Hopper though. The same Hopper who Wayne had gone to school with.

They'd never been friends exactly, but they had been friendly and remained so. Even now, after Wayne had taken Eddie in, who’d gone on to be an undeniable pain in the local PD’s ass.

Hopper really did let the kid off easy.

Wayne really did owe him.

So he put down his coffee with a sigh, passed his newspaper over to John and stood up, motioning for Hopper to lead the way. Got into the Chief’s truck when he waved him in, and didn’t make a big fuss when Hopper tore out of the parking lot like hell was about to open up under them.

"Not a lot of the kids involved in the mall fire could be identified, but a few of them were." Hopper started, which felt nonsensical given the utter lack of context.

Wayne hummed to show he’d heard.

“Some of them got banged up more than others, and a lot of people wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t make it.”

A pause, Hopper white knuckling the steering wheel as he swung the truck hard around a turn.

“For certain people, those kids dying is the preferred outcome.”

A mix of fear and warning swopped low in Wayne’s gut.

"Jim." Wayne said, dropping the use of a last name because if any situation called for it, it was this one. "What exactly are you saying here?"

The Chief chewed on his split lip.

"I know you're smart, Munson. I know you, and plenty of others are aware that something's happening, been happening in this town."

Which was a hell of an understatement if you asked Wayne. Plenty of the upper classes might be able to bury their heads when it came to the military parading about and the flow of “accidents” they brought in their wake, but then, they didn't see all the other signs of trouble.

The absolute oddity that was Starcourt’s construction.

How it had been built using primarily outside crews and anyone who'd taken a singular look at the site could tell you they were building it weird.

Weird as in it looked like it would have a multi-level basement, and not what a mall should have.

Then there were the constant electrical problems. The backups upon backups that failed. The late night delivery vans headed out to the Hawkins Lab.

The things in the woods that kept spooking all the deer and the weird markings they left behind that unnerved even the hardest of hunters.

This didn’t even touch the Russian military that more than one reputable person swore was hanging around.

The very same Wayne himself had seen, on more than one occasion.

(And you couldn’t deny it; those boys were military. Past or present, it didn’t matter. They moved like a threat, and Wayne treated them like one, staying well clear.)

"Yeah." Wayne admitted. "I also know better than to stick my nose in it."

"That makes you a smarter man than me.' Hop complained under his breath, but the anger was self directed.

"The point is, there are some government types crawling around, doing shit they shouldn't be doing, and more than a few of them are in the business of making people disappear.”

This was absolutely not where Wayne had thought this was going.

Hopper took a breath. Than another.

A third.

It was starting to make Wayne nervous, in a way he hadn’t felt since a social worker had brought Eddie to him for the last time and final time. It was the feeling that things were about to shift in a way that would change the course of his life.

"Steve Harrington is sitting in my office right now, beat to absolute shit.” Hopper admitted.

Wayne gave him the floor to talk, letting him go at his own pace without interruptions.

“He's there because some of those government types finally figured out his parents are never fucking home.”

Wayne sucked in a breath.

"We both know his parents, Wayne. Harassing them to come back and take care of their kid won't work, and frankly, I’m beginning to think all the phone lines are tapped anyway.” He winced here, like voicing such a thing pained him, and Wayne understood.

It sounded a little too out there, a little like he was buying into a conspiracy.

Except he wasn’t. Wayne knew he wasn’t.

Jim Hopper might have been an alcoholic, a man living in pain and unconcerned with his own life, but if there was one thing he was solid for, it was shit like this.

He didn’t jump to conclusions. Didn’t believe the first thing people told him. Even at his worst, he did the work to see what was really happening, and made his decisions from there.

(Even if that decision was to accept the occasional bribe, or drive an intoxicated 13 year old Eddie home instead of hauling his ass into the drunk tank.)

“Harrington won’t admit it, but he’s got a hell of a concussion if not a full blown brain injury and he’s not reacting as well as he should to Suites trying to run him off the road.” Hopper continued. Angrily, he added, “Damn kid didn’t even come to me until they tried to break into his house last night.”

His fingers squeezed the wheel so hard Wayne heard the leather creak in protest.

“I’d take him, but my cabin is being renovated from…” He trailed off, heaving a sigh.

“A storm, so me and my kid are bunked with the Byers right now and we’re full up.”

Hawkins hadn't had a storm like that in years, but Wayne wasn't going to call him out on the blatant lie.

“I need a place to stash him for the next few weeks, until I can work with some of the higher ups sniffing around, and get them to call off their attack dogs.”

“And you want to stuff him with me.” Wayne finished.

“I know you don’t have the room.” Hopper admitted easily, stopping his truck at a red light and locking eyes with the other man. “But I also know you’ll be the last place anyone would look for him.”

'Ain’t that the damn truth.'

“You’re really gonna go this far for a Harrington?” Wayne asked, instead of the million of other questions leaping to the forefront of his mind.

This one, he figured, was the most important.

“He’s not his dad.” Hopper said, as firm as Wayne had ever heard him. “He’s not either of his parents, and he saved my little girl.”

Wayne hadn’t even known Hopper had another little girl, but he also knew better than to ask where the guy had found one.

It wasn’t his business, just as nothing else Jim was involved in, was his business.

Except, apparently, Steve Harrington.

“I’m gonna need my own truck if I’m takin' Harrington home.” Wayne said easily, instead of bothering to ask anything else.

If Jim said the kid was different than his daddy, then he was--because when it came to things like that, Jim didn't lie.

No point in it.

“I know. Just needed to talk to you first, without anyone overhearing.” Jim said, before swinging the police truck around and heading back to the Barn.

“I’ll stay in contact with you, and I’ll make sure Harrington pays you for the pleasure of your hospitality. Just--” Here Jim cut himself off, looking like he was struggling an awful lot with the next thing he wanted to say.

Once again, Wayne waited him out.

“Don’t let Steve fool you. He’s good at fooling people, letting them think he’s okay. Too good at it, and between the two of us, I have a real good idea of the reason why.”

A memory came to Wayne unbidden, of Richard Harrington and Chet Hagan, beating some poor kid in the highschool bathroom bloody. The grins on their faces as the poor guy wailed for them to stop.

How they almost hadn’t.

“Alright.” Wayne agreed.

Hopper swung back into the Barn's parking lot, and Wayne moved right to his own beat to shit truck, ready to follow Jim back to the police station.

He wasn’t a praying man, not anymore, but Catholisim wasn’t a thing that let you go easy.

He found himself sending up a quick prayer, fingers flicking in a kind of miniature version of the sign of the cross.

Considering his own kid’s history with Harrington, and the sheer small space of the trailer?

Wayne had a feeling it was needed.

#this has like t wo more parts #pre steddie #wayne as a BAMF #wayne and Hopper both as psuedo parents to Steve #ya'll are gonna have to put up with my weird ass jumping all over the place warm ups sorry lol #Gary's fourth piece is coming no worries #and then this will either take its place or the other one I have will #you CANNOT look me in the eye and tell me all the blue color workers arent aware shits going down #like 100% local crews took one look at starcourt and went what the fuck #nevermind you know the local power plant lol #and with demo critters running around its not like they were tearing through brushes and shit #your local hunters are gonna know somethings up #anyway #beat to shit Steve Harrington #my beloved #hes gonna show up busted to shit with a major grade concussion and Eddie is gonna shit himself #steve harrington #steddie #I spelled collar color and im not changing it #outsider pov #wayne pov #I will write the first person who knows where I pulled John from a prompt of their choice #catholic wayne munson #jim hopper

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ariichive · 6 months ago

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feeling touch

k. sakusa

sakusa was good at reading people. it was a skill that came with being a good volleyball player such as himself. knowing where to hit a spike, finding the perfect spot for a service ace, and understanding his teammates.

the ability even followed him outside of the court. sakusa found himself observing people everywhere. the couple on the train; the girl had a nervous look on her face as she clutched her stomach, often stealing glances at the man busy on his phone. pregnant. sakusa remembers thinking to himself. the same day, he watched a stray dog on the busy streets of japan circling a busy food vendor.

it was no surprise when the dog snatched food from the owners hands and ran off into an alley way, the curses of the owner blending in to the surrounding noise.

yes; this was all natural for him but not for most people. at least, to him in particular.

people did not understand kiyoomi sakusa.

he think it's his whole demeanor. sure, he might not be the most friendly looking, but he was still human with human normal reactions. he remembers one day after a dominant win against a damn good team.

interviewers flocked to him, fans were everywhere; it was overwhelming. there was nothing more he wanted than to go home, where he could relax after a long match and wait for you to come home from work.

home. he kept repeating in his head, making his way through the crowd. he answered questions simply if they were asked. he was almost through the seemingly never-ending pool of people, when a hand circled around his wrist. sakusa immediately turned around, yanking his wrist out their hand with swiftness. with a glare, he took a step back. a girl with a big number 15 on her shirt. oh, a fan.

"h-hi," the girl spoke in a high-pitched voice. like a dog whistle. sakusa nodded his head in a greeting, eagerly turning around to continue on his way. he wasn't the nicest when it came to fans, but if his fans were really genuine they would understand he did not appreciate being touched.

clearly, this girl was not so genuine.

she grabbed his wrist, again, this time with a bit more force. "w-wait!" sakusa sighed but stopped nonetheless knowing this could go on forever. she squealed when he stopped; his eye twitching. "can we take a picture? please?" sakusa couldn't deny there was a sparkle in her eyes and he feels as if he didn't take a picture her dreams would be absolutely crushed. while he wasn't big on social interactions, he wasn't exactly a monster. "yes, make it quick. please, do not touch me." he managed to mutter out.

the girl quickly stood next to him, a centimeter of distance between them as she whipped out her phone to take a selfie with him next to her. she pressed the button, a 3 second timer starting.

3...

2..

as soon as the timer hit 1, the girl quickly pressed her lips against his cheek.

fear and disgust immediately ran through his body as he shoved the girl, not caring that she ended up on the ground. "never come near me again, you disgusting shit." sakusa meant every word, and he probably would have said more if he wasn't so focused on getting out. pushing throw the crowd, he barely paid attention to the concern looks of bokuto and hinata. if he would've looked back, he'd witness atsumu angrily snatching the phone from the crazed fan.

home. he had to get home.

the journey home was a quick one, he had too much occupying his mind. as soon as he stepped into his safe space, sakusa made a beeline to the shower. a shivering feeling of disgust and guilt taking over him. with the amount of reporters around, you were bound to see the news. he can't believe another persons lips were on him; he could only imagine your reaction. would you be angry? disappointed? disgusted?

sakusa scrubbed harder at his skin.

when he was done in the shower, he still didn't feel clean enough. he had half the mind to go back in, let the burning hot water consume him as a whole. he would have, if it wasn't for the sound of the front door opening. his heartbeat picked up pace, he quickly dried himself and threw on a shirt and sweats. it'll be okay. he reassured himself as he stepped out into the open space of your shared residence.

as he made eye contact with you, he felt a pinch of fear crawl up his spine when you didn't hug him as usual or give him a kiss as a greeting.

you knew.

he felt an apology about to slip out his lips, the guilt weighing on his heart.

"i'm so sorry, omi... atsumu told me what happened."

you said an apology before him, leaving sakusa stunned. why were you apologizing?

noticing his lack of response, you continued. "atsumu told me what happened... i'm so sorry you had to go through that. i understand if you want space to collect yourself, i won't overstep any boundaries."

you understood how dire the situation was; noting how important it was to keep sakusa's feelings in mind. he looked shaken up when you arrived home, so you thought it was best to not add to his discomfort; hence the lack of physical greeting.

sakusa sighed, "..you don't have to apologize. it was my-"

"don't you dare say it was your fault!" you took a hesitant step towards him, and when he didn't move away, you hugged the tall outside hitter; he melted into your arms.

"the only person to blame is that crazy fan, it had nothing to do with you. nobody deserves that to happen to them."

sakusa bathed in the comfort of your words, finally finding the energy to hug you back.

"you're right, love. i'm glad to be home with you."

yeah, you knew this was his way of saying i love you. "i love you too! now let's find something to eat, you must be hungry after that game. ugh, i wish i could've gone! your highlights are trending, the ladies at work..."

he listened to you chatter away, a big smile present on his face.

sakusa wasn't hard to understand, it just took the right people to understand him.

bonus

"whaddya gonna do with this photo?" atsumu stared at the phone of sakusa's fangirl, a look of disgust and hatred taking form. he quickly deleted it as he went to her recently deleted album to ensure it would be gone permanently. he wasn't surprised to see her lock screen was a picture of sakusa, or the number of pictures she had of him in her photos. "oh you're not right in the head," he chuckled mockingly as he stared down at the girl, who tried to get up only to be pushed back down by bokuto. "oops, didn't see you right there." bokuto said almost robotically; everyone knew he was lying as he scratched his neck in boredom.

hinata eventually made his way over. "oooh, a fan?" to any onlooker, it would look like the hyper-orange-haired male had genuine, pure curiosity. but his teammates knew.

"yeah, a fan. huge fan of omi omi, hundreds of pictures of him in her gallery." atsumu said as he slung an arm around hinata's shoulders. he found pleasure in the embarrassed look on her face. she stuttered out lame excuses he didn't bother listening to. "hey, kou, shoyo, since she's such a big fan, why don't we show her an up-close play?"

"hell yeah!" bokuto cheered as he high fives hinata. the obsessed fan could only watch in horror as her phone was tossed to hinata, who bumped it to atsumu, who then set it towards bokuto.

bokuto, feeling a strong sense of defending his friend and teammate, spiked her phone into the floor with a loud cracking sound that echoed throughout the stadium. meian turned a blind eye to his team's antics.

atsumu took out his own phone, taking a selfie. he made sure the crying girl on the ground hovering over her broken phone was in the background.

[sent to (name) 6:48pm]

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lassieposting · 11 months ago

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I like to think that once things have settled down post-game, Tav will start addressing Astarion's critically low self-everything issues.

Like, this man's obnoxious, vain exterior is a paper-thin sheet of ice over a bottomless lake of insecurities and negative self-talk, and we see that the whole way through the game. He's been taught to believe that his only value is in his body. He'll bitterly call sex the only thing he's good for. He's shocked if you dump another companion for him, because he sees himself as having nothing to offer but baggage. He knows, in an abstract way, that he's attractive, but he doesn't remember what he looks like.

Perhaps one evening he asks what they see in him, and when they ask what he thinks their answer will be, he's stumped by the question.

And Tav decides it's past time to do something about that, because there is so much about him that is worthy of love.

Consider: Astarion rolling out of bed at like noon, padding naked to the bathroom to wash and style his hair, and catching sight of something tucked into the frame of the mirror. It's a sketch of him, one of Tav's, and beside it, they've scrawled the words you're beautiful. He grins, and traces the charcoal strokes with a fingertip while he brushes his teeth, because that's not a difficult one to believe, and he's touched.

But then he starts finding more little sketches, and more little notes. When he reaches for the book he's been reading, there's one tucked into the page he's dog-eared - a little caricature of himself, curled up in an armchair reading a giant book, captioned you're clever. He snorts a laugh, a little self-deprecating. Loathe as he is to admit it, he's no Gale, and he has brain fog more often than not. But...well, he did graduate law school and pass the bar once upon a time, so technically they're not wrong.

You're brave is resting on his pillow when he comes back from splashing his face in the bathroom one night, still trembling from a nightmare. His eyes well up when he spots it, and when he crawls into open arms and buries his face in Tav's clavicle he mumbles that he doesn't feel very brave at all. That's a hard one to accept, but they will keep telling him.

You care about me... is simply sitting on a dresser one day. Two little drawings with that one; in the first, he's bandaging a cartoonish bump on Tav's head. On the back, though...he recognises that image, Tav tied up and spitting rage at him through the night, lost to their Urges, as he kept watch. In smaller letters, his own words are reflected back at him: ...even when that's an objectively stupid thing to do.

You never gave up is in the medical kit kept under the bed, the one stocked with salves and oils for the bone-deep ache of two hundred years of consistent injuries. Tav will rub his shoulders for him if he asks, he knows that. But, well, two centuries of hiding any sign of weakness makes for a tough habit to break. He touches the reminder gently, as though it's fragile, and after a moment's hesitation, calls them in for help.

And on and on they go, dozens of little notes, a tangible list of things they love about him. Repeated, sometimes, some more than others, as and when he needs to be reminded of them. Often accompanied by little drawings that make him laugh or snort or cry - snapshots at how Tav sees him. His ridiculous bedhead. His unflattering blood-drunk expression, gawking into the middle distance, utterly lost in the sauce. The way his ears will sometimes twitch in his sleep. The Sexy Side-Lean pose he didn't realise he tends to do in doorways. His dramatic readings of appalling erotica.

And gradually, he begins to believe them.

#bg3 #bg3 headcanons #astarion ancunin #astarion x tav #astarion x durge #tav's drawings are either beautifully done sketches or chibis there is no in between

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writinginatree · 8 months ago

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Zombie

Relationship(s): Xaden Riorson & sister!reader, Bodhi Durran & Riorson!reader, background Xaden Riorson/Violet Sorrengail

Summary: You, Xaden's younger sister and a first-year rider cadet, acquire an undead dog. Now you just have to convince your brother and the Assembly to let you keep it.

Warnings: Set during Iron Flame (so spoiler alert if you haven't read it yet!), swearing, descriptions of (un)dead animals, mention of insects/spiders, brief mention of blood and a minor injury (on Bodhi).

A/N: This is very silly and self-indulgent; if anything doesn't make sense, just pretend it does.

You're so busy planning how you'll get your newfound dog into the house without anyone seeing, that you don't watch where you're going, and — just your luck! — almost collide with your brother as he steps out the door of Riorson House.

"Oh, uh, hi Xaden," you say, hoping against hope he won't see the dog behind you. It's a big, dark-brown mutt, and you really want to get it inside and patched up before having to argue about whether you're allowed to keep it. "Nice day, huh?"

Xaden gives you a look that says he's seeing right through your bullshit, and asks, "What's with the dog?"

Damn it.

"I found it. It's hurt."

You step aside the let him have a better look at the dog and the big hole in its skull that allows a view into the inside of almost the whole half of its head. The ear on that side is half ripped off, too, only hanging on by one corner. Xaden frowns at the dog as it sits down at your feet, rubbing the intact side of its head against your leg.

"Hurt seems like a bit of an understatement."

"Does that mean I can bring it inside and help it?"

"I don't think that dog can be helped anymore. Its head is mush."

"So? Look at him, he's fine!"

The dog stares up at Xaden, wagging its tail as if to agree with you. Xaden stares back — or rather, glares. You don't understand why, but he doesn't seem to like your new pet.

"That thing is dead," he says matter-of-factly.

"Uh... What?"

"It's dead," he repeats.

It doesn't make any more sense than the first time he said it. You would understand him saying something like this if the dog wasn't moving. Laying still on its side as it had when you found it, you had mistaken it for dead at first, too. But now the dog is as lively as can be.

"Don't be ridiculous, Xaden. How could it be walking around if it was dead?"

"How could it not be dead with an injury like that?" your brother counters.

"I dunno. But it clearly isn't."

How can he doubt that, when the dog is so obviously full of live?

"Was it moving when you found it?"

"No. He was lying in the dirt. At first I wasn't sure if he's alive, either, but when I touched him, he woke up. He's not dead, Xaden, he only looks that way because of the hole in his head. If we stitch it up, he'll be fine."

Xaden looks between you and the dog, a contemplative look on his face. "It woke up when you touched it, huh?"

"Yeah. Must have been sleeping or unconscious. You know, I think the hole in the head doesn't even bother him. I mean, I know he's not acting like you'd expect a hurt dog to. Maybe it's normal, do you think? Like, a natural deformity?"

"No, I don't think so," Xaden says slowly, still watching the dog with narrowed eyes. What the fuck is his problem?! "Hard to live with your brain literally leaking from your head. And look at the edges of the wound. If I had to guess, I'd say someone smashed his skull with a rock."

If you're honest, that's exactly what you thought at first too. And if someone really hurt this poor dog on purpose, you're going to find them and kill them.

"Well, maybe his brain is hurt just enough that he can't feel the pain anymore?" you suggest. Your brother might have a point in thinking there's something off about the dog, but it definitely isn't dead, no matter what he says.

"He can't feel the pain anymore because he's dead."

"Why do you keep saying that?! He's clearly fine!"

"No, he's not."

You try to object again, but Xaden cuts you off.

"Half his head is gone, kid."

Of course he has to call you kid now, just in case you forgot that he's older and smarter than you. Ugh. Can't he just admit he's wrong for once? Well, fine. If you can't convince him the dog is alive, then let him think what he wants. It's not like it matters, really.

"Whatever. Just let me keep him," you demand. "Please?"

"How many times, that dog is dead."

"No, he's not!" You have to fight the urge to stomp your foot like a child. Arguing with Xaden is like talking to a fucking wall, and twice as frustrating. "This dog is perfectly alive!"

"This dog is dead, Cadet Riorson," a bewildered healer tells you a little later. "Absolutely dead."

When you kept arguing with Xaden, he finally agreed to let you bring the dog inside — to let someone else convince you it's dead, as it turns out, and not to have its injuries treated as you wanted.

"But..." You gesture to the animal in question. It retreated behind you as soon as the healer let go of it, hiding with its tail between its legs. It looks not only scared, but also very much alive, if you ignore the gaping hole in its head. "How can it be so alive if it's dead?"

"Necromancy," Xaden says from where he's leaning in the doorway, like that explains anything.

You've heard of necromancy of course — the ability to reanimate the dead, an extremely rare signet. As far as you're aware it's been half a century at the very least since there's last been a rider who had it. But on the other hand, what do you know?

"You think there's a necromancer here?"

Xaden nods.

"But why would they revive a dog and then just leave him lying there? I found him all alone in the dirt, Xay! There was no one there!"

"You said you thought it was dead at first, didn't you? It only moved when you touched it?"

"Well, yeah. But what—?" You break off when you understand what he's implying. "You think I'm a necromancer?!"

You don't listen to your brother's answer. As he nods, you reach out to your dragon. "Rexus? Am I a necromancer?"

"Possibly."

"Possibly?"

"How should I know? You could be, that's all I can tell you."

"But it hasn't even been that long since you started channelling. Can my signet really be manifesting already?"

"Certainly. Some are faster than others."

Damn. Can it really be true? You suppose you might indeed be a bit of an early bloomer, and Rexus is certainly powerful enough that a signet like necromancy seems possible. You were alone when you found the dog — the dead dog, who's alive now. The only logical conclusion is that it was you who reanimated it. Still, it's hard to wrap your head around the idea of yourself as a necromancer.

"But I didn't even do anything!"

"Didn't you? Or did you just not realize it?"

You can feel his amusement filling your head. Sometimes you think you bonded the dragon with the worst sense of humor on the entire continent. Watching you struggle seems to be his favorite form of entertainment, and he never gives you explanations about anything, always telling you to figure it out on your own.

"You're extremely unhelpful, Rexus, you know that?"

Xaden snaps his fingers in front of your face, effectively ripping you out of the frustrating conversation with your dragon. "Are you even listening to me?"

"No." You look at the dog again. His head is tilted to the side, so you can't see the hole in it. He looks almost normal from this angle, but now you notice the strange glow in his eyes, like there's a fire burning behind them. Magic? "Rexus is making fun of me."

Your brother shrugs. "Isn't he always?"

Yeah, that's true...

"Hey, Xaden? If I'm really a necromancer and it was me who reanimated the dog, then it's basically mine, right? Sooo... I can keep it, right?" you ask, pouting at Xaden. The dog has sat down by your feet and looks up at your brother too, wearing an expression eerily similar to your own. "Please?"

Xaden crosses his arms and opens his mouth — judging from his expression he wants to say no, but you don't let him.

"Please, Xay! You know I always wanted a dog!"

And you know so did he. You're sure you can convince him.

"But not a dead one!"

"A dog is a dog. And he's alive, even if he's dead! ...Okay, that sounds weird, but you know what I mean!"

"You're a rider. You don't have time for a dog."

Well, at least he's not saying that riders aren't allowed to have dogs. Is there anything about that in the Codex? You doubt there've been many people who attempted to bring a pet into the quadrant, so maybe, if you're lucky, no one ever bothered to make a rule about it. But even if there is — technically you're all deserted. Surely you can be a little lax with the Codex while in the midst of outright revolution, right?

"Sure I do. And he's dead anyway, so it's not like— Wait, do dead dogs need to eat and pee? Probably not, right?"

"I don't think so," Xaden agrees, "but the house is already full to the brim with riders and fliers. We don't need a dog causing chaos on top of that."

"He won't cause chaos. Promise! He'll be the bestest, most well-behaved dog you've ever seen, I swear!"

Xaden glares at you for a few seconds, clearly running out of arguments. Then he shakes his head. "Okay, you know what? This isn't my problem. I'm not even in charge of you. Ask one of your direct superiors if you can keep it."

A grin spreads over your face. You won.

"Bodhi!" You run to find your cousin, the dog right on your heels without you having to give a single command. "Bodhi, I found a dog! Can I keep it? Please! Xaden says I can if you're okay with it."

"That is not what I said," your brother complains somewhere behind you. You ignore him.

Bodhi stares at the dog. "That thing has a hole in the head. I can see its brain."

"Yes. He's dead. But also not. Now can I keep him?"

"Why are you asking me of all people that?"

"Because you're my section leader. And you'll say yes. Right?"

To your dismay Bodhi ignores your question. "Uh, can we maybe focus on the question of why and how you got an undead dog?"

"I found it dead in the dirt," you briefly explain, jumping up and down impatiently. Why can't he just focus on the important things?! "Apparently I'm a necromancer. At least that's what Xaden thinks. So, can I keep it?"

"A necromancer? Wow, that's—"

"Bodhi! Can I keep the dog?!"

"Yeah, yeah. Sure, I guess. But—"

"Thank you," you squeal, pressing a kiss to his cheek before running off.

"Well, she sure has her priorities straight," Bodhi says behind you. You still hear Xaden agreeing, then you're out of earshot.

First of all the dog — your dog, you remind yourself with a grin — needs a bath. And you need to sew his ear back on, and maybe try to close the head wound, too. It might not bother him, but it's annoying to accidentally end up with your fingers in his brain when you pet him. There should still be time enough for a bath before dinner, the rest can wait until later. And when you're done, you'll try and find a collar, so you can put a name tag on it. First you need to think of a name, of course...

The next day you bring your dog to class, earning you more than a few stares from classmates and professors alike.

"What in Malek's name—?!"

"That's Zombie."

"Zombie. You called your zombie-dog... Zombie?"

"Yes, sir."

"Wow. Very creative."

"Thank you."

"That doesn't explain what that thing is doing in here, though. This is Battle Brief, not a dog-sitting club."

"He doesn't like to be alone. Mainly because he drops dead again whenever I'm too far away, I guess. I promise he won't bother anyone, sir, really."

Throughout the day, you keep having to repeat this conversation with every one of your professors. Some, like Devera and the lieutenant colonel, accept Zombie's presence without much fuss. Others insist you remove the dog from their classrooms. By the end of the day it's clear to everyone that a collective decision has to be made, and you're summoned to the Assembly chamber, Zombie glued to your side as always.

Everyone has their eyes on the dog when you step into the room, some with obvious distaste, others merely curious — not all of them have met Zombie yet.

Their meeting seems to have been going on for a while already, and you wonder what other more important things they've been discussing. Judging by how weary everyone looks, you probably don't want to know.

"So... The issue of Cadet Riorson and her dog," Ulices starts.

Seriously? Issue? Now that's an exaggeration if you've ever heard one. Zombie is not an issue.

"What do you even want with that thing?" one of the women asks with a sneer. "It's disgusting."

You crouch down and take Zombie in your arms, covering his ears. "Don't listen to them, Zombie. You're the best."

Xaden, sitting in the fancy chair that used to be your dad's, rolls his eyes at you. "It's a fucking dog. A dead one, at that."

"Dead dogs have feelings too! And anyways," you add, turning to the assembly member who insulted Zombie, "Xaden said I can keep it."

"Hold on, I never said that," your brother protests. "I told you—"

"To ask Bodhi because 'it's not your problem'. And he said yes, so now I get to keep it."

"I never said to ask Bodhi. I just said—"

"But Bodhi is my section leader and he said I can keep it, so—"

One of the assembly members clears their throat, and you both fall quiet. "Could you skip the argument? I don't want to sit here all day."

"Right. Sorry. But since Xaden already said I can keep Zombie," — you glare at your brother, daring him to disagree with you again — "I really don't know why I'm even here."

"You're here because some of us don't like to have a dead dog staring at them while they're trying to teach you," Ulices snaps.

Two others nod. "If you want to play with corpses, do it outside."

Xaden pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. "Just let her keep the damn dog. It might not be the worst way to train her signet, and she'll never stop whining otherwise."

"I don't think keeping it is the issue here," Lieutenant Colonel Aisereigh says. "And since it's Xaden's house it's up to him whether she gets to keep it in here or not, anyway. What we need to decide is whether she can bring it to class or not."

After some back and forth, they begrudgingly decide to allow it, on the condition that Zombie stays right at your feet — except during Emetterio's class, where he has to sit in the corner of the gym, and during flight lessons, for obvious reasons — and is absolutely silent so he doesn't disturb class.

"Now, this is under the assumption that the dog doesn't rot. I'm no expert on necromancy, but I think being reanimated should stop the decay. But if it starts to stink, it's getting thrown out, understand?"

You have no choice but to nod, and hope Zombie really won't decay. They dismiss you with another warning to keep the dog out of people's way.

From then on, you spend your every free minute practicing on Zombie. Keeping him alive and under your will comes to you almost naturally, but the farther he's away, the more energy it takes to do so. You work yourself to the edge of absolute exhaustion a few times trying to keep him reanimated from a longer distance, but your signet seems to grow stronger almost day by day, and it doesn't take long until you're able to keep him reanimated even when you're in a different room. Zombie's heartbreaking whines every time you bring him back after losing grip on your power and accidentally letting him drop dead are a great motivator. It still happens sometimes — during flight lessons, where you have no choice but leave him behind on the ground; when you're struggling with math or lesser magic and need all your focus for that; in your sleep — but you're getting there.

You're also getting curious for more. How many animals can you reanimate at once? Would raising a human from the dead be any different than an animal? Would they still have some form of consciousness, or would they be as mindlessly obedient as Zombie is? Will you ever be able to reanimate something as big as a dragon? How powerful is this signet of yours really? There's no end to all your questions, and Rexus is unhelpful as usual. 'Stop asking stupid questions,' he says, or, 'Don't even think of trying that, you silly girl,' or, his favorite, 'That's the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard.'

Then there's the issue with insects. Half of the times you kill a mosquito, it comes right back to life, without you meaning to do that. When you walk past a dead spider laying in some dusty corner, it suddenly comes alive and starts following you around until you notice and stop the power you accidentally let trickle into it. You're pretty sure you would soon have a whole army of dead insects trailing after you if you didn't constantly check for them and re-kill them — an idea Rexus, unlike you, finds absolutely hilarious.

Insects aside, you soon have a growing collection of undead pets. Zombie is the only one you keep reanimated at all times, always at your side; the others have to be content being dead when you aren't practicing with them. The two mice and one bird you have so far don't seem to mind. A good thing, because reanimating all three of them while also keeping up the flow of power into Zombie is far from easy — you don't manage to have them all moving around for more than a few minutes before you tire.

You always stop while you still have enough energy for Zombie; he's undeniably your favorite. Xaden told you it might be a better idea to practice with only the mice for now, and work your way up to bigger animals as you get stronger, but you refuse. Zombie hates being dead, and if you didn't keep him reanimated he would start to rot.

Your brother is away a lot, but when he's home, he's keeping a strict eye on what corpses you're allowed to bring inside. Your bird, for example, has to stay in the courtyard. Not just because Xaden thinks you'd end up wrecking windows and furniture if you let it fly inside, but also because of its advanced decay. How it can even fly with the way its wings are rotting off is a mystery to you, but it's fun to have it follow along during flight lessons, when you can focus all your energy on it, since Zombie is too far away on the ground.

One day when Xaden is away again and can't oversee your collection, you bring in another new pet. Unfortunately, you get caught by Bodhi.

"What have you got there?" he asks, stepping into your path with his arms crossed.

"It's, uh, a bunny?"

You clutch the living corpse closer to your chest, hoping to hide the state it's in from your cousin. Truth be told, it doesn't bear much resemblance to a bunny anymore. 'Pile of bones with a few chunks of rotting flesh and fur' would be a more fitting description. But dead animals don't exactly grow on trees, so you have to work with whatever you can get your hands on.

"You are not keeping that thing in the house."

"But—"

"No 'but'. We both know Xaden told you that you can only bring fresh corpses inside. If it stinks, it stays outside. And this bunny is the worst thing I've ever smelled."

You groan in annoyance. You knew that Xaden had asked Bodhi — as well as Violet and a few of your other friends — to keep an eye on you to make sure you don't drag anything too rotten inside when he isn't there, but you weren't prepared for them to take the task so damn seriously. The bunny does stink, you have to admit that, but you need to practice with something.

"Yeah, but—"

"No."

"But it's the only corpse I could find, and I need more to practice!"

"You can practice with it outside."

"Please, Bodhi, can't—"

"No."

"But—"

"Don't make me play the 'I'm your section leader'-card," he threatens. "If you don't listen to me I'll sign you up for all the worst chores."

"You're mean."

Bodhi shrugs. "Take that stinky thing back outside, then I won't have to be mean."

With a heavy sigh you relent. "Fiiine. But if you happen to find any fresher corpses lying around you have to give them to me."

"Corpses don't tend to just randomly lie around."

"I know. That's my problem. I'm just saying if you do come across any—"

"Then they're as good as yours," Bodhi assures you with a grin.

"Thanks."

You head back outside with the bunny. A glance over your shoulder as you do so shows you Bodhi is watching to make sure you actually take it outside. Damn it. Giving in, you take the bunny to the corner of the courtyard where you're also keeping your bird.

Bodhi makes true on his promise that any corpses he might find would be yours and brings you a dead rat the next week. You've got plenty of rodents already — they're the most common and easiest to find — but you suppose it's better than nothing. You wouldn't want to be greedy, and you're starting to run out of space, anyway.

So far, you've simply shoved the corpses into the biggest drawer of your desk — not the best idea, in hindsight. Since you're not keeping them constantly reanimated, the dead animals are starting to stink. As much as you hate to admit it, Xaden might have had a point when he insisted you're only allowed to bring fresh ones inside. Plus, as winter is descending over Aretia, the cold outside will keep them fresh longer.

Sighing, you decide it's time to relocate your collection — with the exception of Zombie, of course. He's as fresh as he was the day you found him, and will continue to live in your room with you.

"Get back here you little shit!"

You race down the hallway, the newest of your undead animals cradled in your arms, until you see Xaden and Violet coming toward you and quickly seize the chance to take cover behind your brother. He looks back at you over his shoulder, eyebrows raised in a silent question as a barefooted, pajama-clad and very agitated Bodhi comes to a stop in front of him.

"Bodhi stepped on my hedgehog and now he's acting as if that's my fault," you explain. "Can you tell him to fuck off, please?"

Amusement flashes in Xaden's eyes as his attention shifts to Bodhi. "How the fuck did you manage to step on a hedgehog?"

"It showed up out of fucking nowhere! I came out of my bathing chamber and suddenly that stupid thing was there, right under my foot. She sent it to my room on purpose, I know it!"

"Well, of course I did," you say, peeking out from behind Xaden. "But I didn't mean for you to step on it, I swear! I just wanted to show you that I've got a hedgehog now."

"Yeah, well, I noticed," Bodhi grumbles.

You giggle. Probably a bad idea, given his mood, but you can't help it when you think of what just happened. "You should have seen him jumping around on one foot and squealing," you tell Xaden and Violet.

Bodhi's scowl deepens, and he points a finger at you. "Just wait till I get my hands on you, you damn brat," he threatens.

Safe behind Xaden as you are, you dare to stick out your tongue at your cousin, who gives you another glare before turning and going back to his room while grumbling something about you being childish. There's a bloody footprint where he stood, which does make you feel a little bad for him. It really wasn't your fault, though. He should have watched where he was going.

You hold the hedgehog — who certainly didn't enjoy being stepped on any more than Bodhi enjoyed stepping on it — out to Violet and Xaden. "Isn't it the cutest?"

She nods. "Very cute. And it doesn't look dead at all."

"I know, right? It must have died only a few hours before I found it. Of old age, I think."

"You can tell how an animal died when you reanimate it?"

"Well, kind of. I can feel what they felt when they died, if they were in pain, hungry, warm or cold, stuff like that, and from that I can guess how they died. But it's not really exact. Maybe I'll get better at it eventually."

"Oh, I'm sure you will. It's already amazing how quickly you're learning to control your signet."

You smile so wide your cheeks hurt. Being praised like that by a rider as powerful as Violet is doing wonders for your ego.

"Where did you leave Zombie?" Xaden wants to know. By now everyone has gotten so used to the dog being glued to your side that people get confused on the rare occasions he isn't with you.

"He's in my room. I'm good enough to keep both him and the hedgehog under control from this distance now," you proudly explain. "If I go any further away than the staircase he'll drop dead, though. Unless I let go of the hedgehog, that is."

"How many of the animals can you control at once now? When you're in the same room?"

"Uh... All the ones I have. But only over a short time."

Xaden pets the top of your head. "You really are learning fast," he praises. "But what's the hedgehog doing in here, anyway? I thought you're storing all the corpses outside now."

"I am. I just wanted to show it to Bodhi."

A couple weeks later, you're sitting in the snow-covered courtyard with all your undead pets, letting them run in faster and faster circles as you lurk for your brother. When he finally shows up, your minions have him circled in an instant. Xaden is completely unfazed by your antics, merely rolling his eyes as your bunnies, rats, mice, hedgehog, horse and Zombie run around him, kicking up snow, your bird flying circles right over his head.

"I want a human," you declare.

Xaden blinks. "I'm sorry?"

"A human. For my necromancy."

"We just found you a dead horse a few days ago," he reminds you.

"That's boring. I want to know if I'm strong enough to reanimate a human yet. And what that'd be like."

"No."

"Come on! Please!"

"No."

"Why not?! Rexus thinks I'm strong enough to try it!"

"I'm not doubting that," Xaden says, "but just because you can doesn't mean you should."

You sigh, and let your animals stop running around him. They drop dead, except for Zombie, who comes to you to cuddle. In all honesty, this is exactly the answer you expected. You're well aware that disturbing the dead is frowned upon, that necromancers aren't supposed to use their powers on humans — not unless the human consented to it prior to their death. There's even something about it in the Codex, calling it desecration of the dead.

But how are you supposed to test the limits of your signet and grow stronger if you're not allowed to practice on anything bigger? Sure, the horse is a start, but it's still just a horse. And Rexus won't even let you ride it, because apparently that would be both insulting to him, and below your dignity as a dragon rider — emphasis on dragon.

You bury your face in Zombie's fur, inhaling the scent of the flowery soap you washed him with.

"Are you seriously sulking now?" Xaden asks.

"Yes. Will throwing a tantrum change your mind?"

"No. And you'll catch a cold if you keep sitting in the snow, so how about you try behaving like an adult for a change?"

"No." You cross your arms. "I'm bored."

"Lucky you."

"Are you really, really sure I can't have a human to practice on?"

"Absolutely sure. If you're so bored, go to the gym. You've been neglecting sparring practice over your necromancy."

You pull a face. He does have a point — though you're a good fighter, you can never train enough. But you'd rather work on your signet.

"None of the other first-years can keep up with me anyway."

That's a blatant lie — while you really are the best in your year, there are a bunch of other cadets strong enough for you to practice with.

"No one said you have to spar with a first-year. Meet me in the gym in an hour."

Your mood is instantly improved. You don't get to spar with your brother very often, and your chances of actually winning a fight against him are somewhere between slim and non-existent, but you revel in getting to try. Of course you know Xaden knows that, and is taking advantage of it to get you to stop bugging him for a human corpse. For the time being, you'll do him the favor.

Xaden side-steps the dead horse and heads for the entrance. "And don't leave your fucking corpses laying in everyone's way," he calls back over his shoulder.

You roll your eyes at the way he makes it sound as if you're a child leaving their toys laying around. Then again, he's not entirely wrong. You tap into the stream of energy from Rexus, directing it into the dead animals and letting them walk into a corner of the courtyard, where you let them drop dead again.

Rexus was surprisingly silent while you waited for your brother, but now he's asking you to come see him.

"I have a surprise for you," he says when you ask why.

"Did you kill someone for me to practice on?"

You're joking — mostly. With Rexus you can never be sure. He doesn't reply, but you can feel his amusement. When you reach your dragon, there's a brown heap of bloody fur laying at his feet. It almost looks like—

"Is that a bear?!"

"Yes."

"For me?"

"You wanted something bigger than a horse, didn't you?"

"So you went and killed a bear?"

"If you don't want it I'll just eat it," he says with a mental shrug.

"Don't you dare! You can bet your scaly ass I want it!"

You're already reaching for your power to try and reanimate the bear. This is going to be fun.

#xaden riorson x sister!reader #platonic reader insert #xaden riorson #xaden riorson x reader #fourth wing x reader #platonic #sister!reader #Riorson!reader #marked!reader

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dark-frosted-heart · 4 months ago

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Roger Barel Main Route - Blind Love Chapter 25 His POV

As usual, can’t guarantee 100% accuracy on this. I’m doing this for archiving purposes and you can probably find a better translation out there

As if time had stopped, the conservatory remained quiet and peaceful.

Moonlight filtered through the soot-stained holes of the ceiling, creating a soft halo around Kate’s hair.

I had brought Kate to the place where I hung out with Alec to show her a “certain something”.

Roger: Wait. I’m positive I left it around here somewhere…

I pulled out several folded sheets of paper from an envelope that was hidden under a flower pot.

Kate: …A letter.

Roger: Like I said, Alec left me a letter before he died. I really wanted to keep it close to me, but… I didn’t want to get stuck in memories.

I didn’t need that childish desire to get lost in memories when I had to deal with fighting against despair every day.

Kate: …You’ve already read it so many times that you don’t need it with you.

Roger: Huh?

(...How did you know?)

Kate: The letter. It’s wrinkled and worn.

I handed Kate, who had always been kind and showed concern for others since we met, the letter.

Roger: Hm

Kate: …Can I read it?

Roger: Since it’s you, I want you to read it.

I wanted Kate to know the secret I’ve been keeping to myself.

Kate: Thank you…

“To my little friend, Roger”—that’s how the letter started.

It then went on about how if anything happened to Alec, he wanted me to forget about him and the research on the Cursed he had done here. And—

“Hey, Roger. The world we live in is very cruel, isn’t it.

It’s full of things beyond our control and our hearts bleed out just by being alive.

But I also think the world we live in is beautiful.

The sky’s blue when you look up, the birds sing, and sometimes someone will find hope that’s like a miracle.

The world is cruel, yet endlessly beautiful.

That’s why the world is worth living in and fighting against despair for.

My dear little friend, you will no doubt encounter despair in the future. However, don’t let yourself be defeated.

Your life will always be beautiful.”

Kate looked up at me from the letter, her gaze sweet and gentle.

Roger: Those words saved me, and I’ve been living by them my whole life. With those words, I’ll be fine. I can fight against despair even when I’m by myself. I’m strong, I won’t be defeated, I won’t be lonely, I won’t let my soul rot, and I’ll fulfill my ambition. That’s been my mantra until I met you.

Kate: …Huh?

The way Kate blinked in confusion was so adorable that I found myself smiling.

I didn’t want to succumb to my curse, so I always repeated to myself “I won’t be a traitor” as if to fight against my “betrayal” curse.

However.

Roger: I’ve always claimed that I’d never betray anyone, but maybe I’ve…been betraying my own heart.

(Stubbornly saying “I won’t be a traitor” may have been a way for me to ignore my true feelings)

(I’m almost sure)

Roger: Deep down in my heart, I’ve been searching. For someone I could laugh with by my side.

(Kate became my dog, assistant, partner, and then lover)

Roger: Someone to chase after my ambitions with.

(Kate is with me now)

Roger: Someone to snap me out of it when I’m falling into despair.

(Like the time she yelled at me in jail, I think…No, I don’t think I’ll ever forget about it)

Roger: Someone to teach me that, even if love’s pointless, it’s the best.

(This unidentifiable feeling called love definitely exists between us)

Roger: That “someone”—there’s no one else but you, Kate.

(Kate, I don’t want anyone else but you)

Kate: …

Roger: …I won’t find anyone else in the world.

I loved how Kate looked when she tried to hold back her tears.

Roger: Pfft…haha. What’s with that cute face?

Kate: As you can see, I’m trying to hold back my tears!

Roger: A~ah, I can’t take you seriously when you’re barking like that.

Roger: Pfft…Alright, alright. Hang in there.

Kate: Please stop talking already…

Kate looked up, trying to stop the tears from pooling at the corner of her eyes. But—

Roger: Not gonna. I still got something to say to you. ‘Til now, I’ve been saying some pretty words with love, but… My main reason is that “I” enjoy being with you.

Kate: …

(“I” only wanna be with you. Until the day I stop breathing)

When Kate blinked in surprise, the tears she tried to hold back spilled out.

Kate: If you say something like that, then…waaahh~~

Any place where Kate cried cutely like this felt like the kindest, most peaceful place in the world.

Roger: With you, the world isn’t such a shitty place.

(Kate, I can’t abandon this shitty, yet beautiful world I live in when you’re in it)

(Even when against despair…I think that’s what makes this worth fighting for)

Kate: Roger…

Roger: Hm, what?

Kate: Roger, Roger, Roger!

Roger: What?

With her face still wet with tears, Kate jumped into my arms with everything she had—

Kate: Roger, I love you!

(...Yeah, I know)

(I love you too. I know because you taught me what love is)

Roger: A~ah, your face’s all wet. You really are so cute!

While holding Kate tight, I teased and spoiled her.

(A~ah, damn. I don’t think I’ll be content with life without her.

(Despair will always come after us because life isn’t kind)

(Because hope isn’t easy to come by)

(But still…)

Kate: Roger, you can keep teasing me all you want. You can bully me. You can do whatever. But promise me. That we’ll keep living together until the very end.

Roger: ……Yeah.

(Let’s give despair the finger and live together for as long as life lets us)

As if making a vow for the future, I stole a kiss from Kate and looked into her eyes.

Roger: I’m gonna push you around so much you’re gonna hate it. And that’s for life.

Kate: *sniffle*…Crying made me hungry…

(That wasn’t sexy at all. But maybe I’m crazy ‘cause I found it cute)

I couldn’t help but laugh when I felt this unscientific, but lovely feeling rise up in my heart.

Roger: Yeah, me too. Having you in my arms’ tired me out. So…

Kate and Roger: Let’s go eat.

—The conservatory was empty, except for the sound of laughter left behind.

Destiny, unrealizable dreams, incurable disease, war, poverty…

It just goes on.

This world’s a bargain sale of despair.

And it’s called “despair” because you can’t do anything about it.

However, that’s not something I’ll allow.

If you can’t overcome despair— then what’s the point of me, of us humans, being born?

That’s why…these days, we live our lives giving it the finger.

With the one we love.

#ikemen villains #ikevil #ikevil jp #ikevil translations #roger barel #ikevil roger #ikevil roger route

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profoundbondfanfic · 3 months ago

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"Can we get a dog?"

"Can we get a dog" by Trenchcoat_Paradigm Rating: General Audiences Word Count: 15.8k

Those 5 little words plague Castiel’s life. Every day since the ridiculously handsome man and his dog moved in across the street his son Jack has begged his father for a dog. But it seems they may have gotten more than what they bargained for when a small Miracle finds his way into their yard and luck truly falls into their laps. Or The one where Jack gets his dog and Castiel gets his man.

I think I’ll always be a little sad that canon didn’t give us baby Jack, so I’ll always read a fic with Jack as a baby, or in this fic’s case, a five-year-old. This kid version of Jack is so cute and very determined to talk his single dad Cas into getting him a dog, all thanks to the handsome stranger and his adorable dog who move in across the street.

At first, they only exchange a friendly wave or two when Dean takes Miracle for her walks, until one night, Cas gets an unexpected visitor on his front porch. I don’t want to give away the whole thing, but what transpires brings the two men closer, close enough to warrant repeated meetings at the park so Jack can play with Miracle, and helpfully, Dean and Cas can become friendlier.

I loved this fic because it’s clear both men are harboring major crushes on each other, even though the fic is only told through Cas’s POV. Dean’s never great at hiding his feelings, but having his helpful bestie Charlie show up and immediately know who Cas is is absolutely perfect and hilarious because we all know Dean’s been yapping to her about the hot dad across the street from his new house.

Don't miss this cute story!

#destiel #fic rec #10k to 30k #general audiences #au #modern setting #as parents #domestic #fluff #neighbors #Can we get a dog #author: Trenchcoat_Paradigm

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allthingsfangirl101 · 6 months ago

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Running Lines – Joe Keery

I was in the middle of a paper for my class when there was a spastic knock on my door. Slightly closing my computer, I got up from the couch and went to answer it.

"Joe?" I asked when I opened the door. "What are you doing here?"

"I need your help."

I gasped when he walked past me. "Oh," I said under my breath. "Okay then. Come on in."

I closed the door and walked back inside. Joe was pacing back and forth in front of my TV with his eyes glued to a script. I walked over and laughed when he bumped into me.

"What is going on?" I laughed.

"It's this scene," he sighed. I grabbed the script out of his hand and read through the scene he was freaking out about.

"Is this. . ."

"The scene where Keys records his confession to Millie," he sighed as he collapsed onto the couch.

"Okay," I said slowly as I sat down next to him. "Joe, you've done scenes like this before."

"I know!" He said, throwing his hands up in defeat. "But for some reason, I just can't get this right. That's why I'm here. I need your help, Y/N. Please help me."

"What do you want me to do?" I stuttered.

"Just listen," he shrugged. "And tell me whether or not it's believable."

"Okay."

He jumped up and started reciting his monologue.

"Now, from the beginning, Guys' behavior is much more complex than it should be, thanks to our code. But he's still stuck in Free City. He's still stuck in this life, this loop. And then, something changes. He comes to life. Why? And then I remembered. One of the characters from Life Itself was this guy that I nicknamed Lovelorn. And he was someone who was designed to never meet the right person. It was essentially the building blocks of the character. But he never stopped hoping that he would meet the girl of his dreams. So I had to base this girl off of someone and who better than the person that I was sitting next to every day? You. But then, one day, he meets you in Free City, and once he sees you. . . He can never be the same. He was supposed to feel doomed, but instead, he feels alive. Until eventually, he is alive. You changed him, Millie. You changed his code. And I think you can do it again. You brought him to life, Millie. And he was alive because he met the one person he'd been waiting for his whole life. And I had to make it realistic, so. . . I based it off of. . . You. The woman of his dreams. . . She was the same as mine. So she liked bubble gum ice cream and swing sets and she had this very cute but oddly specific habit of always humming this classic Mariah Carey track. Like all the time. She would repeat. . ."

I waited for him to continue, but he didn't. "Is that it?" I asked, my voice coming out soft.

"Yeah," he chuckled. "She turns the video off and runs to me outside a coffee place. So, how was that?"

"It was good," I shrugged.

"But was it believable?"

"Not really," I said dropping my voice.

"I knew it," he scoffed as he sat back down next to me. He looked down at his script and I wrapped my arms around myself when I got an idea.

"What if. . ."

"What if what?" He pushed.

"What if, instead of thinking about Millie, you think about someone. . . Real? Someone you genuinely care about? That way, the emotion is more likely to be real."

"That's a great idea!" Joe cheered. Suddenly, his face changed.

"What's wrong?" I asked slowly.

"I like your idea but there is something else I could do."

"Okay. And?"

"What if. . . I was thinking that if I was able to say this to someone, I might be able to get it," he explained with his famous Keery Puppy Dog Eyes.

"So I just have to sit here while you confess your love to me. I mean, to Millie," I corrected quickly. I cleared my throat before adding, "I guess so."

"Thank you," he chuckled. Tension suddenly filled the room as he grabbed my hands and turned me more toward him.

"Now, from the beginning," his voice was quieter this time, "Guys' behavior is much more complex than it should be, thanks to our code. But he's still stuck in Free City. He's still stuck in this life, this loop. And then, something changes. He comes to life. Why? And then I remembered. One of the characters from Life Itself was this guy that I nicknamed Lovelorn. And he was someone who was designed to never meet the right person."

I held my breath when he paused. The tension that filled the room earlier thickened.

He cleared his throat and continued, "It was essentially the building blocks of the character. But he never stopped hoping that he would meet the girl of his dreams. So I had to base this girl off of someone and who better than the person that I was sitting next to every day? You. But then, one day, he meets you in Free City, and once he sees you. . . He can never be the same. He was supposed to feel doomed, but instead, he feels alive. Until eventually, he is alive. You changed him, Millie. You changed his code. And I think you can do it again. You brought him to life, Millie. And he was alive because he met the one person he'd been waiting for his whole life. And I had to make it realistic, so. . . I based it off of. . . You"

My heart jumped into my throat when he leaned in and he whispered, "The woman of his dreams. . ."

I gasped when Joe gently pressed his lips to mine. My mind went everywhere as we kissed. It wasn't a fast or intense kiss. It was hesitant and simple.

"She was the same as mine," he whispered when he broke the kiss.

"That was better," I stuttered. "So now just imagine doing that when you film. . ."

I cleared my throat and tried to lean away from him. Before I could, Joe grabbed my face with both hands and brought his lips back to mine. This time, the kiss was different. It was faster, more desperate. It was as if we were trying to tell each other something. Joe slowly broke the kiss, causing me to let out a soft moan.

"Joe," I whispered.

"I'm sorry," he said with a weak laugh. "I was just. . . Saying those lines. . . And looking at you. . . It felt real. Is that crazy?"

"No," I said, my voice softer than I would've liked. "It's not crazy because. . . It felt real for me, too."

With a smile on his face, he reached up and tucked a piece of hair behind my ear.

"I never thought I'd fall in love," he whispered. "But then, I realized I was already in love. With you. I've been in love with you for so long, Y/N. Every romantic scene I do, I think of you. Every time I have to tell a girl I love her, I think about you. I always think about you."

I grabbed his face and pressed my lips to his. He smiled against my lips as he grabbed my waist, pulled me closer, and kissed me back. We let out matching giggles as he laid us down, him hovering over me.

We got lost in the kiss as we brought our bodies as close as we could without taking off our clothes. Joe broke the kiss and started kissing my neck.

"Oh Joe," I moaned. "I love you too."

"Say it again," he growled into my ear. He pulled away, only love in his eyes as he stared down at me. "Please, Y/N," he said, his tone different. "Say it again."

"You are my first love," I told him. "You are the only man I've ever loved. You are the only man I've ever wanted to love me back."

"I do," he said, not hiding his desperation for me to understand. "I love you back, Y/N."

"So you've said," I smirked. I grabbed his face and brought his lips back to mine. I let out a moan as Joe instantly pushed his tongue into my mouth and started exploring.

Suddenly, Joe broke the kiss and looked down at me. "Y/N," he whispered, "can I take you on our first date?"

"As long as we don't have to keep running through lines."

Joe smirked as he leaned down and kissed me again. When he broke the kiss he was still smirking.

"No promises."

#joe keery #joe keery imagines #joe keery free guy #free guy

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sukiipjs · 9 months ago

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✮ BLONDIE : PT 2

°:. *₊ ° . ☆ °:. *₊ ° . ° .•

↳ nick sturniolo x masc reader

↳ words - 1961

↳ summary - you’ve been having a hard time realizing and accepting the fact that you’re gay, and in love with your best friend. you try to ignore the feelings but that only makes everything worse until you can’t hide it anymore.

↳ contains - swearing, use of y/n, angst, crying, verbal fighting, idrk 😭 [READ PT 1 - PT 3]

↳ song - blondie by current joys

°:. *₊ ° . ☆ °:. *₊ ° . ° .•

°:. *₊ ° . ☆

days after and nick hasn’t texted me since. no more random tiktok’s, no more check ins, just complete nothingness now. i don’t blame him of course, i’d do the same if he was being as shitty as me right now. but honestly i miss those texts so so much, even if i rarely responded to him, or more so i miss the texts we had before all this stupid shit started.

but again, i truly don’t even know when it all started, it was so easy to just brush this off these feelings and whatever as a friend thing before and not think of it too much. why can’t it just be a friend thing now?

actually i think ive just accepted it all at this point though. i love him and no it’s not just a friend thing, it’s way more and it always has been way more. sure i might wish it wasn’t, but it is and i know it is and i cant just ignore it.

i’m not even trying to get rid of it anymore, i don’t have the strength for hiding it. honestly i think if i kept trying to get rid of it, it wouldn’t even work. obviously i still won’t tell him, or anyone, unless he pries it out of me. i know he doesn’t feel the same and i doubt he even looks at me as a friend anymore.

☆ °:. *₊ ° . °

i continue repeating my own sad cycle of doing nothing but staying in bed, hiding myself from the world… without nick. i still check up on his socials, being the weird stalker that i am and looking at all the story’s and snapchats he posted of himself, he looks just fine without me, of course.

i lay in bed, staring at my phone to avoid looking at the mess around my room. i scroll and scroll, starting to see a weird amount of videos of people taking care of themselves or videos of people ‘spring cleaning’.

i scroll away, i really don’t need to see people functioning completely fine right now, it’s like their taunting me, laughing at me. but the videos just keep coming back, haunting me, laughing at me. all i see through my scrolling cycle is random ass dog videos, cleaning and organizing videos, or nick edits… and that’s exactly what i need.

i let out a loud sigh, slightly rolling my eyes then rolling over to my other side, having my blanket wrap around me. i choose to just swipe off the app and throw my phone to the side of me before closing my eyes and just trying to get some sleep. that way those videos, my stupid feelings, and not even nick can haunt my mind anymore.

°:. *₊ ° . ☆

my eyes flicker open, the sun shining directly in my face and i finally decide to actually do something good for myself and go out for a walk when the sun and clear weather is still out, it’s been raining almost the whole time i’ve seen dying in my room alone.

i slowly move myself up to sit, leaning my back on the wooden headboard behind me and sitting on some pillows below that cushion me. i stretch out my arms in front of me, yawning and running my fingers through my hair to fix the shaggy mess.

i move myself off my bed, stand up then fixing my off center shirt and trying to flatten out a few wrinkles. i throw the blanket that covered me to the side and decide to just throw the shirt and pants that i wear off me -actually putting them somewhere other than on the floor too- i pick out a clean outfit, already feeling way less gross, it’s the small things that count right.

i walk out my room, not forgetting to grab my phone to come with me before going into my bathroom, splashing my face with water to get me more awake. i run my hands in my hair again, fixing it up with my mirror in front of me so i can actually see what i’m doing before grabbing some actual water giving myself something to drink other than dr pepper.

finally i walk out to go by my door, grabbing a light jacket and pulling it over my arms then putting on my shoes and heading out the door. i start off to go a longer way, turning the corner of the sidewalk. i feel all the small breezes on my skin as i get actual sun and nature.

i continue walking random ways, i just want to be out of the mess that i’ve been living in for so long right now. it actually feels nice to be outside, not sitting in a gross hole of dirty clothes and dishes.

☆ °:. *₊ ° . °

i walk, making my way around the neighborhood, my eye catching all the small colorful flowers blooming up and all the small brown squirrels scurrying to run up trees as i pass them. i remember all the times me and nick went out, running around the streets when we were younger. not thinking of anything, just being kids living a simple life. i wish it was still that simple.

as i walk, still obviously thinking of nick, i notice the sky above graying and clouds starting to cover up the sun, shit. i start to walk a little faster, hopefully being able to get home before it pours but as soon as i speed up, small water drops start to fall on me.

i grab the end of my jacket to pull it over my head, holding it over me to shield out the rain. the sides of my jacket block my view as i focus on the path i walk to my place.

i look down at my feet walking, trying not to get too wet as the rain pours more and more, bouncing off the sidewalk. suddenly i feel two hands place on me, pushing me back, “the fuck.” i mutter as i look up, gaining my balance on my feet again. “oh” my face softens as i see nick standing in front of me, his blonde hair damp and drops of water falling from his cheek. he stares at me, i can tell he’s mad and obviously i can tell it’s my doing.

“nick-“ he cuts me off quickly, slightly pushing against my shoulders again as i put my jacket down, wearing it normally, my head now getting pelted with rain. “no, i talk. what the fuck y/n. honestly what has been going gone, you’ve completely ignored me for weeks, you keep blowing me off and i don’t fucking know what i did and the only way i can talk to you about this is randomly bumping into you since you won’t even answer my texts?”

“nick-“ i sigh as i try speaking again but he pushes me back once more. his glassy eyes narrow and i see water pooling in them, i can’t tell if it’s rain or tears. “no! you’re my- you’re supposed to be my best friend and this shit isn’t cutting it y/n! just what is it! what is it. what did i do please just talk to me. if you hate me or something just tell me!” he shouts, his fists starting to clench as i wipe the wet hair in my face away.

“nick stop. you- you didn’t do anything i promise, i’m sorry okay” my voice croaks, i can feel the water pooling in my own eyes now. “then what is it! you can’t just block me out, out of no where.” i shake my head, trying to figure out how to say an actual explanation without saying too much. “nick i’m sorry!”

“stop apologizing! i’m not asking for that, i’m asking for an answer, please. i feel like shit and you haven’t even been there, i kept trying to talk and hang out with you but apparently you hate me now and never want to see me again, i get it!” he scoffs, staring me down as his eyes shut, tears dropping as he takes a breath before opening his eyes back up, wiping off the mixture of tears and rain.

“like i said, if you hate me or suddenly don’t want to be my friend, tell me. i truly, truly, don’t understand this shit your pulling and if you won’t talk now then when will we? you’ll just ignore me again so just spit it out now!” nick keeps rambling on and i just stare at him, seeing how hurt i’ve actually made him. i don’t know what to say, i really don’t.

i just want to shut him up, have him realize that it’s my fault and i don’t hate him. i cut him off as he continues to yell at me, “nick!” my voice feels weak as he shouts back, “what!” i stare at him for a moment, seeing those blue eyes i miss, those star earrings, his grown out roots and before i know it my hands go up to his face, pulling him in as our lips press together.

my hands hold him as strands of his hair poke my fingers, our noses slightly brushing against each others. i quickly step back, eyes wide as i realize what i just did, taking my hands back. “i-im sorry“ my breath is short before i turn around, running away from him to get back to the shit hole of comfort i’m living in to avoid what i just confessed.

i swear i hear him try to call my name but i ignore it, i can’t see him. what did i just do. i can’t even process any of this.

°:. *₊ ° . ☆

i finally reach my place again and i swiftly open my door and walk inside, standing as raindrops slide off of me, creating a small puddle on the floor below. i shake off my hair a little, flicking the water droplets off of me. i take off my jacket, putting it on a hook to let it dry as i take off my shoes too, leaving them by the door.

i wipe my face off with the palms of my hands, wiping off many of my tears that still fall. i walk over to my fridge, getting out another dr pepper then walking over to my couch, slumping down into it as i set my can down and wrap a blanket around myself to warm me up again.

i slowly slide to the side, laying myself down on the cushions. why the actual fuck would i kiss him? what that really the best thing i could do? he already hated me, i did not have to make it worse. i ponder in my head, genuinely trying to find a valid reason of why i just kissed my best friend that hates me. oh. my. god. i’ve ruined my life -not like it was already ruined- i’m never coming back from this.

i stare at the unopened dr pepper sitting on my coffee table, i try making myself reach for it but my arms don’t want to leave the warmth of the blanket i’m huddled in. i hear my phone buzz next to the dr pepper on, i also cannot seem to have my arm reach out to see who’s calling, i hope it’s not who i think but why would he even call me?

rain pelts out on my window, water sliding down the cold glass of it as i lay holding my blanket close to me, pulling the blanket over my eyes as they close, resting as i try forget about my phone continuously buzzing and the drink still on my table.

☆ °:. *₊ ° . °

taglist : @slutforchriss @mattsleftnipple03 @mattsdinosweater @ccolleenn @mixvchelle @leah-loves-lilies @sturn-wrld @redz0nez9 @cheriematt @freshloveforthefit @nickuniversity @whore4matt @txssvx @will-yummy @matty-bear @venusbabysblog @m0r94n

#chris sturniolo #christopher sturniolo #matt sturniolo #nick sturniolo #nicolas sturniolo #sturniolo triplets #sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo x reader #sturniolo smut #matt sturniolo smut #nicolas sturniolo smut #nick sturniolo smut #nick sturniolo x reader #sturniolo triplets x reader #matt sturniolo x reader #𝐬𝐮𝐤𝐢𝐢𝐩𝐣𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐬 𝜗𝜚⋆#sukiipjs #𝐬𝐮𝐤𝐢𝐢𝐩𝐣𝐬 𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝜗𝜚⋆

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twisted-tales-of-all · 6 months ago

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Until We Meet Again

Summary: Although San is left alone to watch the shrine after his friends move onto the next plane, he faces someone who reminds him of his past love. Pairing: Naga!Choi San x afab!reader Genre: Fluff, one-shot, event, rated PG Tropes: reincarnation, fated lovers Word Count: 3.5K Contains: discussion of death and past lives, sense of not belonging due to bullying/othering (essentially racism) A/N: Apologies for the lack of banner and poor editing. I've been in quite a slump recently, but wanted to ensure I finished up this piece for the spring event. Please check out all the other pieces submitted as well!

Although he's grown accustomed to the lack of visitors, San finds himself exceptionally bored as the cold weather melts away into the beginnings of this spring. Decidedly, he exits his usual post within the forgotten shrine for a walk in the nearby gardens. Despite donning his human form, people can clearly tell that he's different. Feeling everybody's judgemental looks, he tries his best to focus on the well-trimmed stylized bushes and the pruned bunches of flowers that dared to bloom this close to winter's edge.

"Mommy, why are his eyes like that?" A child asks far too loud for their mother's liking, who rushes away with them quickly.

With a sigh, San brings a hand to his temple. Immediately greeted by the cool touch of scales, he only grows more frustrated by the clear differences between him and the humans. Despite his intense respect towards the deity who made him their shrine guardian, he cannot help the feelings of resentment in giving him this specific form. So often, guardians get beautiful animal forms - cats, foxes, dogs - but his deity did not follow these typical choices. Instead, San got the powers and form of a snake. Thanks to various stories about evil snake monsters - Quetzalcoatl, Leviathan, nagas, lamias, gorgons, etc. - most humans steered clear of the shrine for fear of a malevolent deity.

Finding his attempt at a calming walk frustrating, San turns on his heel and heads back towards his home, unaware of the pair of curious eyes watching the whole ordeal. Unlike the judgemental glares of most people in the garden, you look on with an almost naive sense of genuine curiosity. You've heard stories of the guardian spirits of shrines, but this is your first time seeing one. Guided by your urge to learn more about the stranger, you secretly follow his path to the shrine. You witness him drop his human disguise to reveal a far more snake-like appearance before phasing through the closed panels of the shrine, disappearing completely from view.

After a few blinks to reassure yourself that you aren't in a strange dream, you head back to the garden as you think about how to meet him again. As you pass by the flowers he admired earlier, you notice the winter jasmines and smile.

"Elegance and graace; symbolizing good fortune." Repeating the text from a book you read on flower symbolism, you decide exactly how to approach the interesting snake man.

Carefully reviewing your notes over the next few days, you coax a flower away from its friends, thanking it for blooming beautifully to help you. You bring it with you as you make your way to the quiet shrine. Despite not knowing anything about the deity honored there, you respectfully perform a basic prayer to them. After, you feel the presence of someone - or, rather, something - there with you. Trying to hide your smile, you present the carnation upon the stone slab resting between you and the shrine.

"I don't know whether you know the meaning of flowers, but I think it must be fate that you were admiring the winter jasmines. I have a feeling you are similar to them: elegant and graceful. Even if nobody else can see you as anything but a monster because you look different, I refuse to judge you like that. If you'd please, I hope you accept this flower as a testament to my fascination of you. I'd like to get to know you more. Maybe a name, to start."

He doesn't greet you, but you pique his curiosity with your flower knowledge. Peeking through the shutters while hidden by invisibility magic, he commits your image to memory. However, he doesn't have to go searching for you like he expected, as you return to the shrine the following day. For the first time in over a decade, San opens the shutters, allowing you to see the representation of his deity.

Very androgynous, the long-haired figure stands there, dressed in an ornately decorated red and black hanbok. Next to them, a small dragon reaches the height of their knees, threatening whoever it may be. You study the visual, trying to locate anything that might identify what kind of god they are.

With the same intensity, San studies you, wondering whether you have ill intent in coming to the shrine. Today, as well, he remains hidden from you, but he quickly chooses a plant for you. Using his powers, he commands a breeze to drop the mint at your feet.

After a chuckle, you pick it up and question the choice, "This could mean so many different things. I wonder which you thought of when choosing it for me. Are you suspicious of me, or maybe openminded and interested in me? Or maybe you just think I'm a stroke of good luck! Have I healed your loneliness? Give me some more information here!"

Before he realizes it, a smile creeps across his face. Your knowledge and playfulness entice him. Moving out of view and lifting his invisibility, he walks out of the shrubbery and clears his throat to get your attention. As you turn, you're greeted by his human form once again.

"Nice to meet you. You don't have to put up that disguise, y'know. Just be comfortable; I'm not scared. Oh, I'm Y/N, by the way."

"How...? You- How are you so nonchalant about it?"

Tilting your head in confusion, you remind him of a small puppy, naive and trusting in a horribly untrusting world. He can't help but laugh, at your naivety and at himself for suspecting you of ill intent.

"You can call me San. That's the name Bo-in gave me when they took me under their wing."

"Nice to officially meet you, San. Is Bo-in the name of your deity? What did their powers entail?"

"Balance, mostly. Water to fire; earth to sky; shadow to light. Ensuring nothing overpowered its counterpart. They brought me and Soo-ah to their temple, teaching us and granting us our own powers after some time. When it was time for Bo-in to move on from this world, they knew that dragons would soon be hunted, so Soo-ah remained by their side while I stayed to watch over the shrine."

As he talks, his disguise slowly fades away, showing his growing comfort around you. He continues by explaining that Bo-in gave both pupils more unique creature forms than typical spirit guides. Although he doesn't mention why, you assume that it was another attempt to balance things out. From choosing one man and one woman, giving them names that balance, and bringing one while leaving the other, everything was truly done in the name of balance.

While you enjoy learning everything, you have to get home, as the sun has almost made its full path through the sky. As you say your goodbyes, you promise to return another day in the near future.

"Y/N," he calls after you've taken a few steps. "Thank you."

"Hm?"

"Just... thank you."

He'll never say it aloud. Never admit that you remind him of her. If he admits it, he'll have to acknowledge his feelings once again, after all this time. He'd have to recognize that he thanked you for returning to him and repairing his trust in humanity. That he can feel Bo-in looking down on him and smiling as everything goes according to plan.

"Y/N isn't Soo-ah." He says it aloud to convince himself and snap at his god for planning it.

When he rises the next morning, a bright red flower rests beside him. Since nobody has access to his magical abode, he immediately deduces it as a message from Bo-in. Wiping the residual sleepiness from his eyes and sitting up straight, San picks up the crimson petals to identify them. Camellia.

"Is this a joke, Bo-in? I only know two meanings behind the red camellia: love and a graceful death. What could you-?"

As it hits him, the words stop flowing. There's no way that's what they mean, right? But what else could this particular flower mean? Is it really a confirmation of Soo-ah's return? Hers is the only graceful death he can think of. Not to mention his love for her over all these centuries still holding strong.

The next time you go to meet San, you want to bring out another plant, but you can't figure out any that stand out, so you ask the local florist to choose a meaningful flower for you, essentially leaving the choice up to fate. When he comes back with a bright red flower that you don't know the meaning of, you find it quite a good match to your new friend, whose hair radiates a similar tone. Especially so after the florist explains that camellias are often used to symbolize overcoming adversity. After learning his story the day prior, you decide that this flower fits perfectly. Thanking him, you pay for the flower and begin heading towards Bo-in's shrine.

As you arrive, you're shocked by how grim the area feels. Usually bustling with greenery and a freshness in the air, you become overwhelmed by the thick, heavy air. Looking around at the bushes, it appears as if a tornado had focused its chaos upon the small pavilion. Dropping the flower, you rush to the shrine, tearing the shutters open and calling out for San.

"Quit your yapping."

Hearing a voice above you, you search the trees for a sign of him but cannot find one.

"San, come here. What happened?"

Plopping down behind you, he answers vaguely, "Bo-in is testing me."

With the momentum of the spin to face him, you nearly trip over your own two feet. Expecting to find his face at its normal height, you look around confused when that isn't the case.

"Down here."

You feel a light pressure on your foot and look down to find a red and brown snake atop it. Your gut reaction is to jump and kick it away, but you manage to stop yourself knowing that the creature is your friend.

"I can't change. Bo-in left me a flower, and, after a few hours, I felt my control over my powers weakening at a rapid rate. Now I'm here."

Squatting down, you hold a hand to the snake to bring him up to your level again. He wraps his scaly body around your arm, keeping his head near your palm. You try not to smile at his appearance, but it creeps through anyway.

"Laugh all you want." He huffs.

"I'm not laughing! I just think you're cute like this, that's all."

If a snake could blush, you're certain you'd see it right now. Tripping over his words and looking anywhere else but your face, San fails to respond to your comment. Your comment clearly flusters him, so you make a note to compliment him more in all of his various forms.

"So, what do we have to do to get you out of this form? It isn't some 'true love's kiss' type thing, is it?"

Although you were joking entirely, the silence that follows makes your heart drop a bit.

Eventually, he answers, "I sure hope not." Turning away from you and constricting more around your arm, he adds, "Let's try anything else before we assume that's the solution."

"You... don't have a clue?"

"No. Bo-in left the flower and then this happened. Nothing else. No clues."

Suddenly reminded of the flower you brought him, you look around to find it. He catches sight of its vibrant hue and everything immediately clicks in his mind.

"That's a camellia, isn't it?"

You hum in agreement as you bend down to pick it up, adding, "I didn't know much about it, but the florist told me that it's a sign of overcoming adversity. After hearing your life story, I-"

"That's the flower Bo-in left me."

"How strange. Do you think it means something?"

"Y/N." He pauses, and the emphasis in his voice sends a shiver up your spine, "That flower screams Soo-ah. It means perishing with grace, and symbolizes a strong, long-lasting love."

A strong gust blows at you, harshly ripping a few petals from their pistil. San carefully watches where they land, hoping for a coincidence rather than another part of Bo-in's scheme. Despite his wishes, however, each petal lands precisely in the center of the place it softly floats to the small pond, the shrine's entrance, and the zen garden.

"Water, earth, and air. With a flower as vibrant as flames."

Slowly, you approach the petal at the entrance. Looking in, there's now a cloudy but reflective surface in place of Bo-in's engraved likeness. Focusing on your reflection, you find a completely different image. Rather than you holding a snake, you see two people holding hands. You quickly identify San despite the longer dark hair and wedding-style suit, but you don't recognize the other figure who matches in an elegant white dress with red and gold jewelry. As you move, she moves with you, but this definitely isn't your own reflection.

"That's Soo-ah, isn't it?"

"You're Soo-ah, Y/N." Another booming voice responds before the snake in your hand gets the chance.

Quickly, you spin on your heel. There, just as androgynous as the carving, stands Bo-in. Despite the initial shock, standing there together feels normal. Comfortable. Familiar.

"It's like San says. Although your memories have been wiped upon reincarnation, you were once Soo-ah. Somehow, you were drawn back to this place despite my best attempts to keep you away. Therefore, as I promised you before approving the reincarnation, I will offer my explicit approval for your love. As a gift, I can also return your memories to you, should you want them back."

"Bo-in, revert this magic." Annoyed, San blurts out, interrupting the conversation. "I'd like to change this form again. It is awkward to stay like this while you both have physical human forms."

Despite the interruption, Bo-in appears unfazed, holding out a hand for San to slither onto. A dim light radiates from their palm and surrounds the small snake. Shortly after, San returns to a humanoid form. This interaction buys you some additional time to comprehend the situation and figure out how to answer such a difficult question.

Bo-in returns focus to you, "Have you decided, Soo-ah?"

A shiver runs up your spine, making you twitch from the discomfort. Although you understand that you're Soo-ah's reincarnation, being addressed by her name irks you. You haven't been Soo-ah in decades. You've been yourself all these years, not her. Meeting San was coincidental, even if there might've been outside forces influencing you to do certain things.

With this revelation, you decide, "I appreciate your offer, Bo-in, but suddenly acquiring memories from a past life feels like something that the human mind cannot handle. It'd likely send me down a spiral about my identity. I have to reject your offer."

A smile creeps onto Bo-in's face as you talk, but it's San who speaks first, "Man, you really ARE the same person."

Confused, your wide-eyed gaze hops back and forth between the two people in front of you. Neither cares to give any further context, and Bo-in confuses you even more by breaking out into bellowing laughter without comment. San quickly joins, and soon their laughs are too contagious to avoid. Although you can't pinpoint the reason for the laughter, it lightens the load in your heart.

Shortly after the laughter settles, Bo-in says goodbye and wishes you both luck. Leaving you and San alone, the air tenses again. You quickly go to apologize for not reviving Soo-ah's memories, thinking that may be why things feel awkward. However, before you can say three words, you feel lips on yours and hands cupping your cheeks. Your face heats up from the sudden affection, but you also melt into the sensation. You've been on your own for so long that you didn't realize how much you longed for someone to kiss you.

The interaction feels quick, but San pulls away with a heavy breath. The air is thick and warm between you, and you can't find the words to say after such a sudden interaction, but the silence that follows feels fresh, as if the kiss extended into the depths of your souls. When his breathing returns to normal, the silence finally breaks.

"I'd apologize, but I actually don't regret it."

You can't help but laugh. His confident aura lends to the cockiness of his comment, but he fully jokes. Despite his words, you know he's sorry for the sudden invasion of your personal space.

"Don't worry, San. I enjoyed it. You don't need to apologize."

"Okay, good. I mean, surely it must've felt like all those plays describe, right? Where you're swept off your feet by the man of your dreams."

Rolling your eyes, you refuse to give him the satisfaction of any answer whatsoever. Instead, you change the subject, asking him to adapt a little to the current culture. Although he finds current technology difficult to manage, you convince him to trade in the flower-passing messaging for a simple flip phone.

After suggesting that you'll be back next time with a phone, you give him a hug and take your leave. He kisses your forehead, and you think about it the whole trip home. You can feel the smile etched across your face. It's not just your lips either; you just know there's a twinkle in your eyes and more light on your full face. Although unusual, you rationalize it with the thought that it's simply because it's been too long.

It takes a while for him to adjust to the phone, but once he does, you'd be easily convinced that he never puts it down. Multiple calls daily make you glad you didn't teach him how to message people. Meetings become more frequent and in new places as you show him some of your favorite places. Slowly but surely, he begins adjusting to the lifestyle you've known.

Although he's had a few slip-ups, calling you Soo-ah a few times, he immediately corrects himself and apologizes each time. You understand that you likely resemble her in numerous ways, so you don't get upset. And, just as you intended by refusing your past life memories, San begins falling for Y/N rather than simply seeing Soo-ah in you. The name swaps happen less and eventually completely fade away. You feel it in his demeanor, too. Rather than being restrictive and apologetic about his feelings, his confidence soars, and his actions towards you feel fuller, more genuine and complete.

A few months pass; the next season comes. You barely even notice before San points it out.

"The colors of spring are wonderful, but there's a serenity that comes with the beginning of summer. Don't you think?"

Caught off-guard by the sudden question, you look around so you can respond. Expecting the cleanness that comes when all the flowers of spring fall to the ground and get whisked away by the wind, you actually find yourself stuck staring at a rarity. Once something unrecognizable to you, your eyes catch onto a camellia. However, this one isn't as striking as the red one from before. Rather, as if someone stripped the color clean out, this lone flower stands a bright white, still managing to stand out against the browns and yellows of the season's transition.

Shocked at your silence, San follows your unwavering gaze to the bush. When he catches sight of it, his eyes widen, and he curses under his breath. Even without knowing the specifics behind the various color meanings of this flower, something about the striking white feels haunting to you. You remind yourself that the flower means long-lasting, mutual love, but San's words ring in your head: it means perishing with grace. Is it a bad omen? Bo-In hasn't interfered since that day, so there's no way they'd speak to you now, right? Is it a warning? Are you overreacting?

"San..."

"They don't bloom this late. It shouldn't exist." Flatly, your boyfriend declares, a poorly-hidden concern painted upon his face.

Standing up from the bench, you approach the flower with San trailing a step behind you. Reaching out and touching it, the whole thing falls apart. Characteristic of camellias, the petals and sepals all collapse together at the slightest touch of your finger. With your arm frozen in position, you turn your head to the boy on your left, shooting him a concerned look.

Placing an arm around your shoulders, he files through a dozen statements to try and reassure you both that it's pure coincidence with no meaning. Even though you're certain both of you have worries in the back of your mind, you drop your arm and the topic all at once. Bouncing back into a happy state, you begin walking away and finally answer the question from earlier to segue into a new conversation.

"Summer really gives off that sense of a new beginning. Everything is changing, just like us. I think it's really appreciated in the cycle of seasons."

"Just like us... You're right. Here's to our new start with the season change."

#codn: spring24 #cultofdionysusnet #mfu-net #wonderlandnet #cromernet #kpop scenarios #kpop imagines #ateez scenarios #ateez imagines #ateez #ateez choi san #choi san #choi san scenarios #san scenarios #choi san fluff #choi san imagines #ateez fluff

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dmitriene · 1 year ago

Text

— lie to me.

summary: better a bitter truth than a sweet lie, but do you really think so? content: re6! leon x fem! reader tags: angst, nsfw, smut, comfort/hurt, mentions of alcoholism, confused relationship, sex partners, receiving fingering, unprotected p in v, marking, receiving oral. (let me know if i forgot something!) author's note: the work was inspired by the song and my love for the angst, i hope you enjoy it! please enjoy your reading) 🤍 (18+ warning)

᠌ ᠌ ᠌᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ « come on and lay with me / come on and lie to me »

᠌ ᠌ ᠌᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ ᠌ « tell me you love me / say i'm the only one »

his every appearance on your doorstep leaves hot marks on the skin and cold, which corrodes from the inside.

...

the blue haze of the day gradually rises to show the stars, at this time everything around seems to freeze, becomes quiet, as if silent.

there are fewer passers by on the streets, the roads are empty for hundreds of cars, more and more windows are lit up with light in the houses, and meanwhile the shadow falls on the streets, where only lonely lamps illuminate small islands around them, secluded corners between the tall buildings of the houses.

the night descends completely, the stars begin to shine like sugar spilled on black marble glistening in the sun, and the sight itself becomes truly desirable as your eyelashes flutter following your slowly rising gaze to the heavenly canvas to revel in its view, bending your torso forward to fold your arms on the balcony railing.

you take one deep breath to fill your lungs with cold air that prickly strokes your cheeks and makes you blush, biting your skin in small patches and provoking goosebumps as your eyes follow the familiar back riding a motorcycle, the noise of the engine is the only thing that filled the silence of the night streets and empty thoughts.

...

he appeared just as he disappeared, and you would compare him to a stray dog if he didn’t differ from it in one simple thing — the ability to stay next to you at least for a couple of moments longer.

his appearance on the threshold of your house in the middle of the night seemed an absolute routine, because you were the only one who allowed this event to repeat itself over and over again, filling the space with his intoxicating smell that provokes the mind to become cloudy, while your flesh burned under the touch of his hands, each touch of the fingertips left at the place of touch, a long feeling of weight that carved into your mind and remained there even after he left.

you knew what prevents him from staying with you longer, or maybe even forever — the horrors of what he experienced and the inability to forgive himself for what he was not guilty of turned him into the mess he was now.

Leon Scott Kennedy was no longer a cheerful young man who was ready to give everything to become a policeman and help people — now he was just a shell of past dreams and ideas, a broken agent who was doomed to devote himself to work for life.

the work was not hated by him being his full fledged choice — but it still made him suffer from a slurry vile of thoughts and nightmares, his heart was convulsively knocking on his chest and whining, remembering all the betrayals and fleeting feelings, and then drowning it all in an amber liquid alcohol, if only for a moment to drown out the whole stream of thoughts and mend the old wound.

but there were moments when even the most bitter taste and the most scratchy sensation in the throat did not help to shut up everything that was happening — and that's when he came to you.

...

you didn’t know what he finds in you and your personal space in the form of cozy apartments, but at the same time, he still appeared inside from time to time from the moment you let him through the threshold just to catch his limp body in your fragile hands.

your knees gave way slightly under his weight on your body, so that later he would wrap his arms around you and help you stand on your legs, while the whiskey on his lips spoke for all his words and actions in advance, his face buried somewhere in the crook of your neck, passing the herd of goosebumps through your body and projecting a slight heat on the face.

and in those sleepless evenings, nothing happened but his sleepy figure in your arms, your body lay calmly under his weight on the soft cushions of the sofa while his head rested on your chest, letting his soft strands of hair spread over you so that you could sort them with your fingers, watching how the once blonde hair became darker and darker, as if indicating a transition of personality.

this was his nightly visits to your apartment — the search for comfort and at least a few hours of sleep, because for some reason you helped him fall asleep without the need to empty all the kitchen shelves clogged with tart drinks, he only needed you, the feeling of your warm body under himself and the way you tremblingly stroked his head, every second emptying his mind of any nightmares and dark recesses of the mind, filling everything with warmth and a thread of hope.

a thread for which he was afraid to cling so as not to remain broken and abandoned again — therefore, as soon as he habitually wakes up, as soon as the first rays of the sun break through the canvas of the sky to realize where he is, he silently disappeared, not allowing himself to leave a note or disturb your sleep, the only thing that hinted at his nocturnal presence next to you was the fleeting touch of a thumb along your cheek, leaving a warm touch even after a long time.

...

and from that moment on, he begins to appear on the threshold more often, allowing you to frown at the sharp smell of alcohol in his breath and realize that you cannot push him away, a sense of responsibility and regret for this man arose in you, the realization that you were salvation for him — the last hope for which he clung was when he came to a state below nowhere.

you nervously purse your lips and let him come in, let him into your abode in order to help and show that here he can be himself — and he is nobody to refuse you, because he himself is pulled here by a pressing feeling between the ribs and uncertain steps to again pull you into strong hugs, but this time it's different.

he pulls you into a sweet abyss in which you did not even think to be, until his warm lips lay on yours in a hot kiss, the tip of his tongue caressed playfully in your mouth, allowing you to taste the subtle notes of the alcohol he once drank, while your fingers tremblingly squeezed the collar of his leather jacket, digging in and pulling him towards you almost animalistically, defiantly.

his hand wanderingly finds its way to the back of your head, only to tilt your head for his comfort — to cut off the possibility of turning while the tip of his tongue continues to play in the wet cavity of your mouth, his kisses are played from deep to innocent, trailing his tongue over your glossy and swollen lips, making you cling to him tighter and watch his eyes curve into the smile at the corners of his lips.

it was the first time you allowed yourself to succumb without a second thought to some completely new feelings, only to end up under him on the soft sheets of the bed, your spine bending in an arc as his tongue hungryly bites the skin between your thighs, watching how your tender body shudders while the sweetest moans pour from the lips, and no musical instrument can repeat this precious melody.

...

scarlet watercolor marks form under his lips on your skin, which will become a wonderful reminder of what happened, of how his fingers slide higher to cover your pubic tubercle with his palm, fingers quiveringly touching your once most intimate place — a small pea on which he then began to draw gentle patterns , projecting light whimpers to slip from your lips in a desire to feel more pressure

— «L-Leon! p-please»

one of your pleas in an almost suffocated tone of voice is enough for him to stop teasing you through the unnecessary fabric of your panties, prying them with his long fingers and pulling them off your wonderful thighs to replace them with his lips, he carefully spreads your labia while his tongue nervously traces the path on his lower lip before he is completely adjacent to your clit.

his tongue widens a small path from which you cling to his hair with your hands, while he gradually begins to move more sweepingly and faster, giving you incredible pleasure — because of which the pressure in the bottom of your stomach became almost unbearable, while he deftly sucked and caressed your clit with his tongue, making your legs tremble and hips buck up in anticipation of the heady release that soon took over, covering his lips and chin with your arousal as he helps you descend from the height of your orgasm.

and you again lie in each other's arms, his hugs are as tender and enveloping as possible, while he buries his nose into your chest and you still stroke his head in the same habitual way, only to mutter a pitiful hope

— «Will you stay till the morning?»

his hands are clenched on your body, and hot breath no longer touches your naked skin, and you know perfectly well what this means, but he only swallows nervously and speaks in response

— «Yeah, of course..»

L I E

...

cloyingly sweet lies are gathered on the tongue in order to eventually push off from the tip and let it pass from his lips with the intention of deceiving not only you, but also himself.

with the next sunrise there is nothing next to you that would remind of his presence, and even the side of the bed, ironically located closer to the door, colder than ever, because he left you even before the sun had time to appear on the horizon, silently taking him after his dim rays.

gradually, everything that surrounded you turned into a dark space consisting of viscous lies and as far as possible sincere caresses, the last thing you wanted to believe in — was his sincerity.

you allowed yourself to be deceived, fed on a lie at your daily leisure and held on to it with a death grip as if it were the only thing that allowed you to live, and one thought that this should end covers your heart in a lingering pain, and hot tears flow down your cold cheeks.

weakness covers the body, because your fragile soul is not able to withstand such a huge burden and slow awareness of the whole situation, which makes you curl up under soft sheets into a protective ball and cover your hot face with your palms.

for the first time in a long time, you feel the salty taste of tears on your tongue and hear your heart beating furiously, the blood is noisily walking all over your body while you try to calm down in vain, and now the crying becomes completely silent, because there is no more strength left.

...

and that's when lies become an endless cycle in which you both go hand in hand, his hot touches are all over your body as if in the form of red handprints, your skin is covered with scarlet buds of passionate traces, while a velvet voice rings in your ears, enveloping you with viscous deceit

— «I love you»

empty confessions become something inherent in him — he showers you with a quivering whisper at night and under the pressure of sweet passion swears love, while his tongue gently runs along your neck, scratching the skin with his bristle, and a light sob slips from your lips from how deep he is in your wet cunt as your lips find his and kiss him passionately, all just to soothe the uncomfortable sensation somewhere under your ribs, a desperate attempt to get through to your mind and tell you that this can't go on any longer.

...

tonight is the last night when his fingers leave marks on your hips from a tight grip as his head is thrown back and a hoarse moan escapes from his chest as you raise your trembling hips to sit on his throbbing cock in the next second in one smooth movement, uttering desperate whine.

you literally see how fireworks explode before your eyes, and the tight knot in the lower abdomen persistently reminds of itself after the moan of long awaited pleasure, you bite your lips almost to the blood, throwing your head back and showing your neck, which has long been covered with scarlet buds and teeth marks.

the body rises smoothly, feeling a slight pain bordering on a welcome wave of pleasure that makes your body goosebumps.

your head is spinning, and your legs are becoming cottony, so in order not to suddenly fall onto the bed, you grab onto his strong broad shoulders like a lifeline that will soon have to be cut off while your pelvic movements become faster and faster.

your movements are sweeping, the room is gradually filled with hysterical moans and erratic sounds, while he directs your hips with his fingers digging into your skin, half closed eyes as his cock forms a small bulge on your stomach because of which he bites his lip and emits a low growl.

crystal droplets of sweat, like beads, gradually began to appear on the skin, you frantically licked your lips, sugary from the shine, trying to keep in touch with reality and sharp jolts inside your sopping cunt, a wave of excitement curling up in a lump in the lower abdomen.

each deep push was a measured touch on your g spot, while his hands slid from your hips to your buttocks to grab them and start moving at an almost animalistic pace, hitting your kervix with every sharp movement, the sounds of slaps spread more and louder around the room after the vociferous moans while you whispered in unison

— «G-going to c-cum.. mngh, f-fuck, Leon!»

— «Good, so fucking good, cum, cum for me, sweetheart»

bitter oblivion hits with a sharp blow, indescribable pleasure from orgasm rolls in a continuous wave, making the walls of your cunt shrink around his cock and your legs tremble, the warm knot in the lower abdomen grows larger and at the last minute Leon can not stand it, throwing his head back and pours out hot ropes of cum inside your spasming cunt, painting your walls while panting.

...

and that's when it all ends, you've been painting a picture of your final breakup from the moment those thoughts started attacking you to the moment he walked out of your shower, encountering a slight tension in the room that made him feel the most uncomfortable, which made him clear his throat and pronounce slowly, pulling on the last element of the once removed clothes, a t-shirt

— «Everything's alright? You look tense»

you look at him with intense gaze, rubbing the bridge of your nose and facing a lump in your throat, no matter how much you had imagined this moment — it’s hard to look at his tired look full of desperate affection, but it’s even harder for you when you see the emotions on his face that change after your whisper

— «That's our last meet, Leon.»

he swallows slowly, looks into your eyes dully while his hand runs along his chin nervously, not knowing where to put his hands from the awkwardness of the situation while he silently nods, picking up a leather jacket from an armchair in the corner of your room and instantly leaving through the door, saying under his breath

— «I understand.»

from that moment on, everything around you calms down, he gathers and quietly disappears, so quietly that you don’t even seem to hear the front door in the corridor closing behind him, while your legs themselves led you to the balcony to see his figure disappearing into the darkness, cold wind prickles your skin, but you do not feel the desired relief, because you are mired in it even deeper than you thought, listening to the roaring sounds of the engine starting.

please, don't copy my works as your own, and if you want to post them somewhere else - contact me.

reblogs, likes and comments are very much appreciated, thank you for reading! ♡

#resident evil leon #leon scott kennedy #leon kennedy #leon kennedy x reader #leon kennedy x you #leon kennedy angst #leon kennedy smut #leon s kennedy #leon kennedy re6 #leon kennedy fanfic #leon kennedy fic #[ ✒️july writing ]#re6 leon #infinite darkness leon

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sentientcave · 10 days ago

Text

Mace of Bakes

Read on AO3

Contains: Non-canon character death (cancer mention), Reminiscing about the army and merc work, Mace deciding on a new path for himself, Community building through food, Self-discovery time for Mace. x Single mom reader (eventually, she's not really in this part) Basically fluff with some sad stuff at the start.

~3.6k - SFW

"Are you happy, Mason?"

His mama looked all wrong, laying in a hospital bed. Mace had never known her to get sick. He'd never thought that she'd get old. In his mind, she was still young the same age as when he left home. It startled him to realize that he was the same age she'd been when he left home. Thirty-eight.

She wasn't even sixty now. Too young to be laying there, all the warmth drained out of her skin, too young for her tightly coiled hair to be grey, too young to be dying.

He itched to get up and do something. Anything. But he'd already done everything he could think of. He'd brought her sunflowers, chocolate from that fancy little place down the block from the house he'd bought her the moment he'd been able to, brought her pretty stationary and a pen so she could write letters to her friends in shaky but still clear script. He'd even prayed. Gone to church and sat down in a pew and bargained with god. The world would be better with her in it, and him gone. If there was one thing he'd learned from his years as a soldier, it was that violence only begat more violence. Put down one enemy, and another popped up in his place. But people like his mother made things better.

She was no saint, of course— Hard to be, in her position, raising a headstrong boy furious about losing his father in some far off conflict he couldn't understand— but she was good. Patient. Dedicated her time to helping her community. Helped kids like him make better decisions than he had. She always picked up the phone when he called, no matter what time of day it was for her. Better that she live, and he die.

But god made no bargains with sinners, it seemed.

"Mason," she repeated, reaching for his hand. Her grip was weak. "Are you happy? Are you living the life you want?"

Was he? Did he even remember what it was to be happy?

The trouble with wearing a mask is that you become more of an idea than a person.

It had been years since Mace really thought about himself. He'd just been a kid, angry and afraid, desperate to get out of his home, out of his city. He was smart, but his grades weren't good enough to get any kind of scholarship. He was athletic, but he wasn't much of a team player, so there was no college team that wanted him either, no matter how big and strong he was already at eighteen. The army was just about the only thing he could use to drag himself up, so he gripped that uniform and held on tight, until his knuckles creaked with the effort. He should have known better, after what happened to his father, but maybe he just wanted to see something of his dad when he looked in the mirror.

(One of his drill sergeants had called him a fighting dog. Mace had grit his teeth and taken it, because as much as he wanted to bite back, it would just be proving the man right. And Mace would take a lot worse than that if it meant showing the whole damn world how wrong they were to dismiss him outright, to decide his fate before he'd taken his first step. But that was the way things were. The way they still are.)

But the thing about the army is that people notice when you're good at what you do. He'd moved from regular army to the rangers by the recommendation of that same sergeant. He earned respect. He'd joined an international task force and met someone who reminded him far too much of himself. Funny how someone from thousands of miles away could look him in the eye and see the things he thought he'd buried. Simon Riley, Ghost, more an idea than a person. And Mace put on that mask, same as Riley's, and they were like brothers.

Until they weren't.

Mace kept the mask though. And the lesson.

He left the army. Joined the Shadows. Joined the Jackals. Worked his ass off anywhere he went. He was efficient, brutal when he needed to be, bold and creative, one of the best.

And now…

Graves had offered him a spot with the Shadows again. But in truth, the soldier's life was wearing on him. He'd bled for his country, bled for money, bled for his homeland.

None of it had made him happy.

The words caught in his throat. "No. But I'll try to be."

"That's all I ever wanted for you."

Things got worse, and she didn’t get better, but he held her hand while she slipped away. Held it together to plan a funeral, shaking hands with everyone who came to pay their respects. It twisted something inside him painfully. All these people that knew his mother better than he did. That loved her, laughed with her.

Who would come to his funeral, if he died right there? A few old war dogs, if word got to them in time. He had few friends. No one would care about his passing the way they did his mother’s.

He stood in the graveyard for a long while after they buried her, staring at the gravestone. Kendra Ward, 1966-2024. She was the best of us.

It wasn’t enough. But what could be?

Her estate was easily settled. Mace still owned the house, on paper, and she didn't have that much else. No matter how much money he sent her, she didn’t like to spend more money than she needed to. He gave the house to his cousin Jessie, since she had four kids and a too-small apartment, gave the car to his aunt, let them split what little jewelry she had between them. He kept her wedding rings, and his father's, since she'd told him that she wanted him to have them, and he took some of the photo albums. He couldn't bear to look at them now, but maybe someday he'd want to.

He thought about staying. It was nice, for a few weeks, to spend time with Jessie's kids, get to know his family again. He'd thought it would be hard to talk to children, but it really wasn't, in the end. It was easy, because all he really had to do was listen, and let them win any games they played.

Still, there was another brother out there he needed to make peace with. One that wouldn't so readily accept that he had changed.

So he went to England.

He didn't expect to see Riley for a long while. He wasn't sure that the man lived in Manchester, if he ever even left base anymore. They'd both become the mask over the years. It wasn't easy to start being a whole person again.

He tried a few jobs on, but they fit like an off the rack suit. He couldn't stand the noise of most trades, didn't have any patience for customers or desk work. Maybe he could move out to the country and be a farmer. The thought appealed to him somewhat, although he knew deep down it was just the fantasy of the life that he wanted. He didn't particularly care for getting muddy, and he didn't know the first thing about animals.

He was walking home when he noticed the Help Wanted sign in the window of the bakery near his apartment (flat, as the locals called it). He liked the place, in part because Sharon, the older woman with graying curls that worked the counter reminded him a bit of his mother, and partially because the smell of bread baking wafted in through his window early mornings, and it was hard to resist the siren’s call.

The little bell above the door jingled pleasantly as he walked in, head nearly brushing the damn thing.

"Hi, honey," Sharon said with a smile, popping her head out of the kitchen. "We don't usually see you so late."

"I saw the sign in the window, ma'am. Thought I might as well ask you about it."

“Our baker quit in the middle of his shift. I’ve been running back and forth all day.” She pursed her lips, taking in the broad and tall expanse of him. “You’re interested?”

“Yes ma’am. Was a soldier for a long time, and I’ve been having trouble finding civilian work that suits. At the very least, I know I’d respect my boss.” He rubbed the back of his neck, feeling a bit sheepish. It wasn’t as if she had time to train a raw rookie, but… “Don’t know dick all about baking, but I’m good at following orders.”

Sharon thought about it for a moment. “Can you promise not to quit in the middle of a shift?”

“Figure nothing you throw my way could be worse than desert warfare.”

Sharon grinned. “No, we only do dessert warfare here.”

Mace barked out a laugh despite himself. He’d always loved a bad joke. “Got a bakery rival?”

“Of course. Where d’you think my baker went off to?” She shook her fist at the far wall, laughing. “You’re hired. Can you start now? If I’ve got to mop the floors after the day I’ve had… Well, I don’t want to. Better the young do the heavy lifting, yeah?”

“Can do, ma’am. Just show me to the mop closet.”

He wiped down the little cafe tables and stacked up the chairs so he could sweep, mopped the cafe floor, emptied the display case and bought the wire trays to the kitchen to run through the dishwasher. Sharon was portioning out dough and quickly shaping it and putting it into baskets. He watched for a moment, and then went back out to finish cleaning up the front of house.

When he returned again, Sharon beckoned him over. “Wash your hands well,” she ordered. “I’ll show you how to shape these loaves. This dough’s a little sticky, so you’ve got to be decisive.”

He did his best to mirror her movements. The dough was really sticky, but there was a slight resistance to it, and once he got the hang of the consistency, he was able to produce a ball that Sharon didn’t have to reshape a little before it was tucked into it’s little basket to rise overnight. Each one was better than the last.

It felt nice to use his hands for something productive. This wasn’t much like anything he’d done as a soldier, and it was a relief that he was still able to learn new tricks. That he wasn’t so busted up by everything he’d been through to do something good.

Each basket went on a tray with three others, and then onto a wheeled rack, and soon they’d filled two. Sharon covered them with a plastic sheet (to keep humidity in) and they slid them into the big walk in fridge.

There were a few more things to do, cleaning up the kitchen, but soon enough Mace was hauling the trash into the dumpster behind the bakery while Sharon locked up. She handed him a box of leftovers from the display case, which he accepted gladly.

He ate a chocolate chip cookie on his way back to his apartment, humming. That felt like the right kind of work. Busy enough, quiet enough, and he wouldn’t have to be the one dealing with customers. It was going to be a hell of a learning curve, but he liked the idea of being a baker. The sort of career that his mama would be proud to see him in

He ate a cold sandwich and several more pastries for dinner, then showered and went to bed early, setting his alarm for four am. He stared at the ceiling for a little while, arms tucked behind his head.

Yeah. This would suit him just fine.

The next morning had Mace out in the pre-dawn chill, waiting beside the bakery. He'd ended up watching a few videos on bread shaping while he ate breakfast, feeling a strange apprehension, like a student desperate to cram as much information as possible into his head before a big exam. He really wasn't qualified. He didn't know shit about cooking or baking-- He'd eaten mess hall meals and MRE's for the majority of his adult life. He knew what good food tasted like, but making it was a whole other beast.

He was pretty sure he'd gone into war zones less nervous than this.

Sharon waved at him when she turned the corner a little ways up the street. "Showed up after all, did you? The early mornin' didn't scare you off?"

"No ma'am. Said I'd be here." He followed her down the alley, hands in his pockets.

"An honest American," she said, faking a look of shock as she unlocked the door. "Never thought I'd see the day."

"You just dealing with tourists? Or do you have a vendetta I should know about?"

Sharon laughed. "Vendetta. An American woman stole my son away to Florida. I hardly see him now."

"I've got friends down that way. You say the word and I'll have them ship him back to you."

"Tell them to bring my grandkids too!"

Mace soon found out that Sharon was a great teacher. Funny, when she wasn't bone tired after a long day, and especially now that he wasn't a customer anymore. That polite customer service smile that he had gotten used to was replaced by a wicked grin, and she swore a blue-streak as she gave him instructions and gossiped. He learned more about his neighbourhood in a few hours than he'd found out in his months of living there.

Sharon's husband, Veer came in to open the storefront so Sharon could stay in the kitchen to train Mace.

"Had to take a week of vacation," he said when he brought two mugs of coffee back for them. "So you'd better be worth it! She makes me wear a beard net when I work the front counter." He winked at Sharon.

Sharon just rolled her eyes, her own hair totally secured by a bonnet. "You never wear the beard net, you just wear a mask."

"Perhaps. 30 minutes till open, anyway."

Mason started loading loaves of bread into the baskets that sat on the shelves behind the counter, and Sharon got started on assembling pastries. By the time he was putting out the last basket, the first customers were entering the store.

The display case filled, and then the sourdough for the next day mixed (Sharon said she'd portion and shape it closer to close), and the day was over before Mace knew it. He wasn't certain he knew what to do with himself for the rest of the afternoon (it seemed very strange to get off work by 1pm), but it seemed that he could stand to work on his baking skills at home too.

He went to the shops to buy everything he could think of to stock his cupboards, since they were rather bare, and made cupcakes when he got home, lamenting his lack of a piping bag when it came time to frosting them. They didn't look quite as impressive as he'd hoped they would, but they tasted pretty good-- One of the tips in the recipe's comments recommending "blooming" the cocoa powder with a bit of hot water seemed to be a neat trick. He wanted to try combining it with another tip about coffee bringing out the flavour of chocolate too.

Next time.

He cleaned up and made dinner, and offered cupcakes to his neighbours, feeling strangely shy. He was a grown man, he'd been shot more than once, but somehow knocking on the door of the college girls next door and the old man across the hall and the young mother by the stairs made him break out in a cold sweat, stumbling over his explanation. Why was it so much easier to kill people than offer kindness? There had to be something pathologically wrong with him.

(The part of him that knew he had to be kinder to himself too whispered a reminder that it was just unfamiliar ground. Hadn't his hands shaken the first time he held a rifle too? Hadn't he slunk off to puke his guts up and cry after the first time he'd killed another person? It was just so long ago that he'd forgotten.)

He outran the nerves that evening, as the sky turned dark, and put himself to bed early, ready to do it all again the next day.

The routine was good for him. Weeks passed, and he settled into an easy rhythm, waking early for work, joking with Sharon while he worked, setting himself up with a new project every other day.

(He would have made it every day, but while he was growing very fond of cooking and baking, he didn’t love doing the dishes.)

It gave him time to start going to the gym again, at least. He’d started putting on a little weight around the middle, which he didn’t hate. He kind of liked it, especially when he heard the college girls giggling and whispering about his dad bod. Still, he didn’t want to have to buy new clothes, and he wanted to stay in good shape, and he found he still really liked lifting weights, especially now that he did it for fun and not out of necessity. Even better, lifting weights meant that he got to eat more. So it worked out nicely.

His neighbours started talking to him more, everyone more than a little interested in getting on the list for receiving little treats. Everyone had sort of avoided him on principle before, unsure about the giant American loner that settled into their building, but now everyone knew him by name. They asked him for help when they needed heavy things moved. The girls down the hall asked him to make them a birthday cake (Which he was more than happy to do. He was getting better at decorating all the time).

The old fellow across the hall, Percy, turned out to be a veteran too, and he invited Mace out to drinks a few times with some of his old air force buddies, and he got to listen to the old men swap stories and complain about young people these days and the price of groceries (and drinking with old men was ideal, since he could still be in bed early enough to get plenty of sleep before work). The college girls were Morg and Corrie, and often Kailee, who didn’t actually live in the building but was there so often that she practically did. They were possibly the silliest girls he’d ever met, but he at least partially had to attribute that to the fact that he understood only about fifty percent of what they were saying at any time, between the giggling and the slang he didn’t understand.

They tried to thank him for the baked goods by inviting him over for dinner once. A valiant, but ultimately bland effort. He’d eaten worse, but not in a long while, and they spent half the meal flirting shamelessly. He made a promise to himself in that moment that he would never date a woman under thirty.

The single mother, Tammy, was a lot more sensible, but not as single as he’d assumed. Her friend that came over often turned out to be her girlfriend. The kids were funny, especially the younger two, who took every opportunity to talk his ear off about school and dinosaurs and some youtube video game streamer with a silly name. The oldest kid was in that awkward teenage phase of thinking his own interests were cringe and looking for a new identity that was cool. He seemed baffled by Mace, like he couldn’t quite connect the dots on why someone who looked and sounded like a soldier would be spending his free time doing favours for others and baking.

Mace wasn’t sure if it were his place to say anything, but he hoped the kid would come to understand that what Mace was doing now was a hundred times better than being a soldier. A thousand times more meaningful.

He felt like a new person. Born again, like the last twenty years could be chalked up to a bad dream.

(It wasn’t as if he were ashamed of it. Maybe he should have been. But he’d always been principled about his work. Not everyone agreed with his actions, he’d found himself down-barrel of a once friendly gun more than a few times. But that didn’t mean he would stop doing what he thought was the right thing.)

He was sure that this contentedness was what his mother had wanted for him. He wished he’d listened to her a long time ago.

Of course, as it so often happens, pleasant routines get shaken up. For Mace, it was on an otherwise ordinary day in late November, when Sharon was buzzing excitedly about her daughter moving home.

(Divorced, and with a three year old she would have to take care of all by herself. She’d probably come work the front counter, so Sharon could be in the kitchen more for the busiest season. Didn’t it work out so nicely?)

And the timing did seem good. Mason was glad for anything that would give Sharon more time off. He worried about her overworking herself, and she always complained about not seeing any of her grandchildren enough.

Still, he found himself stopping short, nearly dropping the tray of cookies he’d been carrying when he came out of the kitchen.

“Oh, wonderful,” Sharon said, grinning. “Mason, come meet my daughter!”

And you smiled at him, sticking your hand out. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Nice didn’t even begin to cover it.

Title Card made in Canva ~ Image Credits: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 ~ Dividers by @/cafekitsune

#Cave Writing #Mace of Bakes #Silly title but come on can you blame me #Baker!Mace #Honestly I don't like how some of y'all write him so I'm taking him away and putting him in the bakery and you can fight me outside about i #He is principled and smart and efficient in canon and I decided that he also loves his mama and is very polite to women #Have you guys seen how cute his VA is? Because you should go look at him for a long moment and then imagine him in an apron #Because that's what I did #Mace x Reader #X Reader #but reader doesn't show up till the end and she has canon poc (parents of colour) but if you want to imagine that she's adopted or somethin #you can do that #Sharon has a big heart she'd adopt kids in a heartbeat #Single mom reader #cod mw fanfiction #I always laugh when I slap that tag on like hello #How far away from the source material can we get before we're just writing original fiction

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rebelsandtherest · 2 years ago

Text

Home for Christmas

Words: 4,049

Summary: Matthew falls ill just before the family Christmas bash, and thinks he's missed the entire thing. However, once he hears that his baby brother is sick, Alfred concocts a bit of a holiday surprise. —— this fic is a little late, but Merry Christmas, everyone, and here's to many more!

Warnings: langauge, talk of family during holidays, nothing else that I can think of.

Author’s note: a belated gift to a dear friend, @draw-a-circle-thats-the-compass

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

For however many hundreds of winters Matthew Williams had endured in his home, be it in the warmth of an electric-heated home, or warding off frostbite in the untamed wilderness, he would never truly get used to the speed with which the solar night crept down from the pole. It was the dark especially that always sent spikes of dread into his bones, stealing away his warmth and setting pallor in his hands and feet, spreading chill upwards to his whole body.

This year, when he felt the frigid fingers of depression reaching through his chest with the 4:30 sunset, he mustered his willpower and on a spiteful whim bought tickets to Calgary. He had a seldom-used mountain cabin tucked away within the confines of Banff, and while he wasn’t sure the new park rangers still received the memo about him and his cabin during orientation, he was willing to invoke the Minister’s ire if it meant he could dust off his best skis and escape his mind on the slopes.

The cabin was just as he’d left it, and the radiators crackled their way to warm almost as soon as he turned them on. His wool blankets had a few new holes in them, but the quilts were warm and the fireplace clean, and he didn’t even have to replace any lightbulbs, not even in the groaning old icebox. His great snowy-white dog, Buddy, quickly found his favorite bear-fur rug and curled up by the fire, ready to dive into the snow alongside his human the next day.

It was only Matt’s luck that he woke up with a sore throat. He lived in denial for a whole day, basking in the perfect weather and flying down every slope he could get his skis on. But as the too-early sunset crept below the mountains, he began to realize he was swaying on his feet, and moreover, that he’d stopped sweating.

“Shit,” He huffed into his scarf. By the time he was back at his cabin, he could taste the fever on his breath.

Matt wasn’t sure what he’d managed to pick up on his journey westward, but whatever it was, be it cold or flu or covid or tuberculosis, within a few days it had him in a death grip and refused to let go. As he lie in bed, fever-dreaming his vacation away, the darkness grew and grew, and soon Matt felt himself falling into the well of despondency that refilled every winter.

Buddy kept him company, and he’d mustered the energy to call his Dutch beau, Jan, once or twice, but the fever had stolen his ability to tell time, and both times he’d spent about half of the call apologizing for waking him at two in the morning, and the other half repeating himself when Jan got lost in his feverish amalgamation of English and French. He had some anxiety-inducing number of unread text messages waiting for him in the corner of his phone, but reading was a doomed endeavor with his puffy, aching eyes. He watched whatever public tv stations still reached his ancient bunny-eared set, but ended up falling asleep nearly as soon as he sat down.

After some untold number of days, his fever broke, and while he was rationing the NyQuil he still had in his cupboards, he’d taken a full dose the first few nights after his fever and had been mostly comatose since. He’d been sound asleep on the couch one afternoon when his phone began to ring, buzzing loudly against the window sill just above him, until it vibrated its way fully off the sill and directly onto Matt’s head.

“Fucking putain,” he groaned and was shocked at how gravelly his voice came out. The offending device had fallen into his lap, buried somewhere in the folds of his blanket, still buzzing away. He fished it out and stabbed at the screen with squinted eyes, looking for the ‘ignore call’ button, but ended up hitting the ‘answer’ button instead. Only then did he see the caller’s name.

“...Mattie? You there?” asked Alfred from the other line. Matt sighed and sank back into bed, rubbing at the spot where his phone had hit, knowing it would be a lump by the end of the hour.

“Yeah?” he answered, trying to rein in his annoyance at being woken up.

“Holy shit bro, you sound terrible. Are you okay?”

“Sick,” Matt told him.

“Sick? I thought you were going skiing!” Matt closed his eyes, which made his head feel like he was spinning.

“I did. Skied. Got sick. Et voilà. ”

“Aww jeez Mattie. Do you think you’ll be good for our flight on Thursday?” Matt blinked.

“What flight?”

“...To London? Dad’s annual fussy Christmas bash, you know the drill.”

“That’s not until the 22nd.”

“...Matt, it’s December 20th.”

“What?” Matt’s voice cracked with his incredulity. “No, it’s… I got here on the 10th, it’s only been a couple of days, the 22nd isn’t until… I mean I don’t know when but it’s more than three days away.”

“Wait you think it’s only been—Mattie, how many days did you ski before you got sick?” Matt hesitated, embarrassed of the answer.

“One.”

“Oh my god,” Alfred sounded genuinely surprised, and it took him a moment to say, “ Matt, you’ve been sick for a week? And you still sound like this? You don’t still have a fever, do you?”

“No, it went away… I can’t remember.” Matt rubbed his face, and every inch ached. “Listen, it’s not December 19th, I swear, if you’re fucking with me–”

“Look at your phone.”

“What?”

“Look at the date on your phone.”

Matt did.

“Fuck,” he said, staring at the giant calendar date as though it would change if he stared long enough.

“Yeah,” Alfred’s voice was tinny away from his ear. Matt finally blinked and sank further under his blankets, and eventually brought the phone back to his face.

“You’re going to have to apologize to dad for me,” Matt said, “I thought it was… Jesus, I missed my flight back to Ottawa, shit.”

“Wait, you're still in Calgary?”

“Banff.”

“You didn’t leave the dog at home, did you?”

“No, he’s with me,” Matt could feel his voice getting more hoarse.

“Well that’s something. Man, you picked a helluva time to get sick, huh.”

“Apparently,” Matt wished he were comatose for all of this.

“Listen, slam some water—or gatorade, if you have it—and get some rest, okay? I know you’re feeding Buddy, but feed yourself too, alright?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Matt.”

“...I’ll try.”

“Good. Listen, I gotta go, but I’ll talk to you soon, okay? Don’t die.”

“I’m not going to die.”

“Glad to hear it. Gotta go. Love you, kiddo, feel better.”

Matt began to respond, but before he could finish, Alfred hung up. Matt watched his brother’s smiling icon disappear from the screen, leaving only the giant, damning calendar. Matt stared at it and sighed, heart sinking down through his bed and the cabin itself and into the frozen ground below. There was no way he’d be in shape to fly to Ottawa in the next three days, to say nothing of flying to Ottawa and then across the Atlantic to London.

Buddy, though far too large to be a lapdog, leapt up onto the couch draped himself across Matt’s body, crawling on his belly until he was able to nose the man’s chin, giving it a lick.

“Yeah I know,” Matt sighed, petting the dog’s soft ears and wishing it could make him feel better. “I guess I should tell dad.” The thought made his heart sink even further. “Uncle Alisdair was going to bring his homemade whiskey and everything. Even Aunt Bridgid agreed to go this year. But I guess it’s just,” Matt craned his neck to look over into his small kitchen. There was an old, half-empty bottle of whiskey and a small bag of miniatures he’d picked up while waiting on his flight. “…that, you, me, and whatever the fuck is left in the fridge. Merry fucking Christmas, eh?” Buddy whined, and licked Matt’s face again. He sighed.

“Yeah, me neither.”

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

December 22nd came and went, and by the 23rd, Matthew was less sick than he had been, but still far from healthy. “I imagine Uncle Rhys has already played referee to five fights by now, what d’you think?” He asked his dog. Buddy sneezed. “You’re right, maybe only four.” Matt tried to imagine it; Alfred and Dad, probably, Brighid and dad, certainly. If they were drunk enough, Zee and Uncle Alistair would fight about who was the better skier. Jack wouldn’t hurt a fly so long as he had a beer or cider in hand, though Alfred was certain to seek out arguments for sport—Matt really wished he could get his brother to understand that most people didn’t view arguments as fun.

In past years, he’d spent weeks complaining to Jan about the chaos that accompanied his family’s holiday’s reunions. Now, left alone in a cabin with nothing but his dog, whiskey, and his own thoughts, he realized that he missed it dearly, in the strangest way.

“I’m going to sleep,” he told his dog, who was practically asleep himself. “Hopefully until the New Year.”

It was an ironic cruelty that it was more difficult to sleep while sick than while healthy. It was as if his body was in a civil war over whether it needed to be asleep and miserable or awake and miserable. So, when Matt finally fell into a deep sleep, the half of his body that preferred to be asleep and miserable fought tooth and nail to keep him that way. Unfortunately, someone was trying to break into his house.

It was actually Buddy who finally roused him. Though the banging on the door was difficult to ignore, Buddy’s frantic barking was even harder to ignore. Head pounding, Matt rolled himself bodily out of bed, taking half of the quilt with him. He dragged it behind him, half draped over him, as he trudged to the door. Behind the old white curtain hanging over the door’s window, there was an imposing, human-shaped shadow.

“Fucking park rangers,” Matt groused, and glared down at Buddy. “I thought I told you to remind me to turn the lights off last night.” Buddy barked at him, and Matt sighed. “Listen,” he unlocked the door and pulled on the handle, “I’m allowed to be here, call your superintendent, I’m sure they’ll—Alfred?!”

“Finally!” beamed his brother, clad in a designer parka and what looked like a home-made toque, “I was beginning to think you were dead, which you promised you wouldn’t be. Can I come in? Fucking freezing out here.”

Matt stared for a prolonged number of seconds before he blurted, voice cracking: “Shouldn’t you be in London?” Alfred looked affronted.

“While my baby brother is on his deathbed in the bumfuck nowhere, Alberta? No way!”

“Banff isn’t bumfuck nowhere, and I’m not dying.”

“Banff isn’t, but this cabin sure is, and I’m glad you’re not dying, now can I please come inside? I’m freezing my nuts off out here.” Matt stood aside, still processing the sight of his brother in the flesh. Buddy’s tail was wagging wildly as Alfred came inside, jumping at the chance to sniff the newcomer, dancing happily around the American in a way he did for no one else.

“You should be in London,” Matt said again, head aching.

“I wasn’t about to leave you here, you dumb fuck, jeez, it’s freezing in here, too.” Alfred cast a look down at Buddy. “You let him live like this?” a singular, insistent bark. “Ah, that tracks. Never was good at looking after himself.” He looked up back to Matt, shedding his mittens and shoving them into his coat pockets. “Alright, kiddo, let’s get you packed.”

“Packed?” Matt’s voice squeaked, and he realized even the small amount of talking he’d done with Alfred was killing his voice completely, “Alfred, I can’t go to London, we talked about this–”

“Who keeps talking about London? Not me—we’re going to my place. Idaho!”

“Idaho?” Matt’s brain took a while to buffer. “Wait, at your—”

“At my ranch? Yup!”

Ranch was not the word Matt would have used; Alfred was as rugged a rancher as any rancher alive or dead, but he also had what Matt could only refer to as a Kardashian sense of luxury, and enough money to blend the two lifestyles together. Matt realized all at once the expense Alfred must have spent to abandon the family Christmas, travel north, and prepare his Idaho mansion for his company. “Alfred, you don’t have to, really—”

“Dude, cut the apologies, I’ve broken like, at least four international laws to park my cessna out back, so get your shit and let’s go. No arguing!”

“You what?!”

“C’mon, we’re wastin’ daylight!”

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

If Alfred weren’t already breaking laws north of the border for skipping customs, the FAA south of the border surely would’ve surely had complaints about the alterations he’d made to the rear seat of his plane. Where once there had been two passenger seats with requisite seatbelts and safety features, there was now a cozy, cot-sized bed with enough pillows and blankets for two king-sized beds. By the time Alfred had convinced Matt to “just get in the goddamn plane”, Buddy had already found the fluffiest pillow of the bunch and fallen asleep.

“Here, take this.” While the engines warmed up, Alfred leaned back to hand Matt a handful of gummies from the pilot’s seat.

“What is it?” Matt squinted at the candy.

“Delta 8 and melatonin,” Alfred said, replacing his specs with aviators and pulling on his headset. “Now make like your dog and sleep , kay? You look like you need it.”

Matt scoffed. “Thanks,” he said, and chewed the candy together. It was the last thing he remembered doing before Alfred shook him awake and gently informed him that they’d arrived in Bumfuck Nowhere—and it was actually bumfuck nowhere—Idaho.

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

Matt had visited Alfred’s Idaho Ranch-Mansion plenty of times since it’d been finished sometime in the late 90s, and the mountain drive from the airport to the wide-windowed lodge was an unexpected source of nostalgia of birthdays, holidays, and drunken benders past. Matt hauled himself to the window once the familiar hand-hewn wooden fences appeared, squinting against the blinding snowy paddocks until the first blanketed horses came into view. Matt couldn’t help but smile, maybe the first smile he’d entertained since falling ill. Alfred’s horse herd was made up of innumerable bloodlines, nowadays, but at the center of their pedigree was the blood of some sturdy old Morgans Matt had gifted to him during his civil war. Alfred kept a book that traced their sires all the way back to their Canadian forefathers, and seeing the newest generations never failed to swell Matt’s heart. As if sensing what his brother was looking at, Alfred said,

“Bonfire foaled twins this year—really late, too, October. I can’t remember if I told you that.”

“Really?” “Yeah, both little stubborn shits too, probably why they both lived. I’ve got them up at the barn to keep warm.”

“What’d you name them?” Matt asked. Alfred grinned, uncharacteristically sheepish.

“Pumpkin and Sweet Potato.”

“Alfred, you have to stop naming them after food.”

“What?! It was October! They’re cute.”

As they pulled up the house, Alfred was still defending his food-inspired horse name choices when Matt spotted something strange in the driveway.

“Who’s car is that?” He asked, eyeing the plain white SUV parked to one side of the massive driveway.

“Oh, I forgot about that,” Alfred bent down to peer at the car. “They didn’t all fit in the Bronco, so I had to rent a car for ‘em.”

“For who?”

“I’ll explain later,” Alfred said, shifting the car into park. Matt didn’t miss the small smirk his brother tried to hide. Immediately, a knot of dread formed in his stomach. “Let’s just get you inside and situated, yeah?”

Alfred didn’t have to explain, because the moment he unlocked the front door, the familiar sounds of pointless arguments flooded his ears.

“-bloody fucking ridiculous,” said the very drunk, very Dad voice somewhere deeper into the house. On the doorstep, Matt froze halfway out of his shoes and shot a look at Alfred, who responded by smiling a bit wider, all-american dimples peaking through

“Well how about I conquer you for a century or ten and then I can tell you you’re ridiculous, you bloated fucken Gobshite! Oi, Jackie, back me up on this!”

“Is that aunt Brighid?” Matt asked, eyeing Alfred again. The American busied himself with physically helping Matt out of his boots.

“I have some slippers for you just inside—watch your step.”

“Oh shite, I think I hear someone at the door,” said a much closer, much more Australian voice, “I’ll be just a minute there, one second!”

“ Alfred how the fuck did you—” The door swung open in a rush.

“Save me,” begged a younger, freckled, brunette version of their father. The white puff at the end of his Santa Claus hat jumped when he did a double take at Matthew. His green eyes lit up like Christmas itself.

“Matt!” He greeted, smile spreading wide as the sun. “You look like shite, it’s so good to see you! Oi! You angry cunts!” he shouted over his shoulder, “Matt’s here!”

“What?”

“Oh, thank Christ. Matthew, come tell this woman—”

“You’ll not drag him into this! The bairn’s ill,”

“Are they,” Matt looked over at Alfred, who was still smiling like a smug bastard. “How did you—you’re—” He looked over at Jack, “I thought you were in London?”

“What?” Jack seemed honestly confused, glancing between Matt and Alfred. “Did the Yank seriously not tell you—” he gave Alfred a look, and upon seeing his smug expression, scoffed. “London was a wash this year,” he laughed, “Happy Christmas, mate, come on in.”

“How’d you get here?” Matt reiterated.

“Like I said,” Alfred piped up, pushing Matt towards the doorway. Looking down, Matt realized that, in his shock, Alfred had been the one to actually remove his shoes for him, “they didn’t all fit in the Bronco, so most of them got here by the last Grand Cherokee Avis had to offer. Go on, we’re letting the cold in.” Before Matt could step fully into the threshold, Buddy had bolted in between his legs, tail alert and wagging, eager to see the rest of the family.

“Buddy!” A feminine voice cried, “C’mere you big baby, say hello to auntie Zee,” a series of happy yelps followed, accompanied by drunken laughter.

“Well the dog is here,” Uncle Alisdair said in his loud brogue, “where’s the rest of the circus?”

“We’re here too,” Alfred said, walking behind Matt into the main living area.

“Och, there they are!” “Matthew, so good to see you,” Father looked genuinely happy to see him, soft smile creasing his eyes in the way that reminded Matt of the happiest parts of his childhood. “Come here, let me look at you.”

“Matt! Croeso ! What’s your poison? Mulled wine? Whiskey? Cider?”

“The bairn is sick, Rhys—”

“Alcohol never hurt anyone on Christmas,”

“Mary and all the saints, how have you lived this long—”

“Come over here and give us a hug, you muppets!” cried Zee, spreading her arms wide, a nearly-empty bottle of wine in one fist.

Matt was frozen in place, still coming off his melatonin and wondering if he was feverish again. He was dimly aware that his jaw was hanging open as he took in the gaggle of family packed into Alfred’s living room—dad, both uncles, Jack, Zee, even aunt Brighid. There were twinkling lights hung all around the vaulted ceilings and reflecting on the tall windows, a fresh-cut Christmas tree lit in the corner with a haphazard collection of presents and duty-free bags piled below, punch and whiskey and wine and beer stacked in disorganized bunches along the nearby bar counter.

“—sure he’s alright?” Zee was asking, when his ears decided to work again.

“He’s fine,” he heard Alfred say, and a warm hand rested on his shoulder. “He’s just a bit surprised.”

“You’re,” Matt said, looking around at them all, and everyone went quiet to listen to him. “You’re not. You’re meant to be in London,” Matt insisted.

“Nonsense!” Alisdair spoke up first. “We go to London every year, it was old enough a century ago, time for a change of pace.” He ignored it when Arthur glared at him. “‘Sides, you brother Money Bags over here promised he would take care of everything, else your dad wouldn’t have ever let TSA so much as look at his Christmas pudding—”

“ Alisdair,” Arthur hissed.

“You didn’t think we’d leave you alone, did you? On Christmas?” Jack was completely earnest when he said it. Seeing his baby brother’s face, and the faces of his ridiculous, loud, chaotic family, Matt suddenly found himself with watery eyes threatening to spill over.

“The kid’s on a few drugs right now, give him a little bit to recover,” laughed Alfred, arm around Matt’s shoulders. “He needs some rest. Come on, kiddo, let’s go get you set up in your—” Alfred paused and looked at their little brother.

“Jack, did you get your stuff—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jack waved dismissively. “I moved rooms.”

“Awesome. Come on, kiddo, let’s get you in bed before you fall over.”

“We’ll be here when you wake up!” Rhys called.

“Unless we all have hangovers,” Zee amended, and she and Rhys laughed together. Alfred shook his head and led Matt to his usual room, the only bedroom in the house that had a heated bed.

“Upsy-daisy,” Alfred said, helping Matt up onto the cushioned mattress, pulling out the duvet before Matt sat on it and pulling it immediately over the younger man’s body up to his neck, cozy and warm.

“Hey, hey,” Matt hadn’t realized he’d let tears fall until Alfred was sitting on the bed beside him, brushing hair behind his ear and speaking to him softly in the way that had meant safe since he was a baby. “I wanted to surprise you, not incapacitate you, are you alright?”

Matt wiped his eyes, remembering his lonely cabin and the escape he’d been too sick to enjoy. Alfred’s house was warm and safe, and smelt of Christmas spices that harkened back to his earliest years. “Thank you,” Matt managed, gripping Alfred’s sleeve. “I don’t know how you—I didn’t think—” He sighed, feeling exactly how tired he was. “Thanks, Al.”

Al responded by wrapping him in a hug, warm and tight and safe and everything Matt needed to finally let himself rest. Over Alfred’s shoulder, he could see his dog sneak into the room, hopping up onto the foot of the bed.

“Get some good rest, okay? And don’t worry about anything,” Alfred said into his ear, bending down until Matt was lying back in bed. “We’ll all be here in the morning.”

“The fuck I did! It was your goddamned idea in the first place!” Alisdair’s bellow echoed down the hall and their brotherly moment broke so they could both whip their heads to the door to listen.

“My idea?!” countered their father, in the self-righteous tone that said he’d been at the rum punch a little too much that night, “The entire stupid thing was your doing, beginning to end!”

“You know,” came a third voice, “ I’m fairly sure that—” “Shut up, Rhys!” Shouted Alisdair and Father at once.

Alfred sighed. “Well, we’ll all probably be here in the morning. I’ll tell them to keep it down.”

“No,” Matt said, letting out a tired laugh. The bickering of his father and uncles blurred together in a familiar, lulling haze as sleep beckoned. “No, it’s okay. Merry Christmas, Alfred.” Matt was almost asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow, mind’s eye filled with twinkling lights and familiar smiles, morphing into pleasant dreams of holidays past. He was still just awake enough to feel it when Alfred bent to kiss his forehead and brush a hand over his hair.

“Merry Christmas, Mattie. It wouldn’t be the same without you.”

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pandulce135 · 1 year ago

Text

Singing in the Kitchen (Leo x Reader)

Note: I said I would do more of these. Don’s can be found on my master list. Leo’s was a bit easier to write fr. I also need you guys to know (If you’ve been keeping up with my doggo updates) I just gave my dog some real good scratches. I think I have a solid plan for Mikey’s fic so I can start working on that soon, too.

Warnings: not really proofread.

Word count: 1.3k

It had been a long day of fighting crime. Everyone was weary and in pain. Bones were aching and muscles were sore. So, as a group, you reserved the night for a well deserved movie night. You knew it would be something Jupiter Jim. It tended to be a crowd favorite within the Lair. Even your boyfriend couldn’t live without breathing in Jupiter Jim content. Leo had watched all of the movies with his brothers and even took time to read the comics.

You call him a nerd for it, but he always denies it, claiming that was Donnie’s job. It always made you chuckle.

During the trip home, the jobs were divvied up:

Mikey and April would set up the nest of blankets and pillows that everyone would nest in. Donnie and Raph would get the chosen movie and set up the projector. You and Leo were on snack duty. And Splinter was asleep, so there was no need to worry about taking the projector from him.

As soon as you entered the Lair, you broke from each other, heading to your respective destinations with a newfound determination. The walk to the kitchen was brisk. Heck, you and Leo could win first place in a speed walking contest with how fast you made the trip to the kitchen.

He was on snacks and you were on bowls. The way you two danced around each other made you both smile. The clattering of plastic bowls on the island was followed by the sound of chips being poured in. Until the popcorn.

“Hey, can you keep an eye on the popcorn, I really have to take a leak.” Leo looked at you, shifting his weight from one leg to the other. He was about to start doing the potty dance if he had to wait any longer.

You gave him a mock salute. “You got it, boss.”

Leo let out a hearty chuckle with a toothy grin to match as he left for the bathroom.

His smiles for you were always genuine and full of love. You couldn’t have asked for a better person to fall in love with. Sure, there were times when his cockiness got the best of him, but most of the time, he was down to earth. He was a reasonable person just trying to prove himself to both himself and his brothers. You knew you could put all of your faith in Leo and be fine, and you knew he appreciated the thought. He usually showed his appreciation through tight hugs and quick kisses peppered all over your face, all the while wearing a big grin while you giggled.

You didn’t know when you started humming the song that was stuck in your head on repeat. For the past few days, whether it be night or day, it was playing over and over, so you hummed the melody. And your humming turned into soft vocals without you even realizing it.

“Yeah, I’m broken like the rocks beneath my feet.

But the same is true for everyone I meet.

The shifting plates will carry us wherever they may choose.

But still, the earth will never move me like you do.”

The beeping of the microwave didn’t deter you from singing the song plaguing your mind for days. In fact, you continued to sing as you pulled the popcorn out of the microwave and shook it from the corner of the bag before placing another uncooked bag in.

“‘Cause you shape the edges of my life

In all the spots where we collide

Until stronger forces send us different ways.”

While you knew you were growing more passionate with your singing, you knew you had to continue to use your quiet voice. You couldn’t use your whole chest while singing this.

You grabbed one of the plastic bowls that were on the counter and pried open the bag of popcorn to pour it in. A satisfying clattering noise sounded from the bowl as the popcorn fell in and the buttery aroma filled the kitchen.

“One day you’ll leave me here alone

But I guess nothing’s set in stone

So I hope you hold me close until it’s time to go.”

You finished your vocals and looked up to see Leo standing in the doorway to the kitchen and you froze. Heat rushed to your face as soon as you processed the blue clad turtle standing in the doorway looking at you. How long had he been there? Why didn’t he say anything sooner? Why didn’t you notice him sooner?

In all your years of knowing Leo and his brothers, you had never once sung in front of them. Why? That’s embarrassing and terrifying to even think about. It’s asking a lot out of your self conscious self to fight evil beside the Turtles, let alone sing. You feel vulnerable when you sing, why would you subject yourself to that? You won’t.

Well, now you did.

Your thoughts paused as you watched Leo walk towards you. “If you wanted a hug, all you needed to do was ask.” His cheeky smile took over his features, eyes scrunched and teeth showing. His arms were outstretched and about to hold you until you stepped back.

“How long were you standing there?” You asked quietly, the heat on your face and ears still prominent. You felt like you could pass out any second now.

Leo was hesitant, fighting the urge to tell the truth or lie to make you feel better. You saw it on his face, they way his teeth stayed shut and his mouth pulled apart. He was avoiding your gaze, eyeing the time on the microwave instead.

“Leo…”

“Right before you began singing, you were finishing up humming a bit. You just sounded so good,” Leo whined as he moved closer to you with wide arms again. This time, you let him hug you and simply whined into his plastron. “Why don’t you sing more often?” He asked, leaning his his cheek against the top of your head.

This time, you hesitated as you planted your forehead against his plastron. “Isembarrassing…” You mumbled, but obviously Leo didn’t catch that, as he moved away slightly and shifted his grip on you so he was holding your waist.

“What?”

You only looked at his chest with a heated face now that there was a space between the two of you. “It’s embarrassing!” You whined, bringing your hands up to cover your face, but Leo quickly grabbed your wrists to keep you from doing so.

You watched through your lashes as he placed sweet kisses on each wrist, your face only heating up more, if that was at all possible. You whined again and threw your head onto his plastron, your forehead making contact with it. It was then that the microwave went off again.

“Babe,” Leo called when you didn’t attempt to move. “Babe,” he tried again. “Mi amor,” he moved a hand to grasp your chin softly to get you to look up at him. “You have nothing to be embarrassed about. You actually have a good voice. Some people boast about having a good voice but aren’t actually that good,” he cut himself off with a cough that sounded suspiciously like the name Donnie. You let out a soft chuckle. “You sound amazing, my love. Now come on, let’s finish up this popcorn and get back to the others before they come looking for us.” He smiled down at you, which you returned with a gaze full of love.

You moved away from him to grab another bowl on the counter while he grabbed the bag of popcorn from the microwave. “Thanks, Leo.” He began to pour the popcorn into the bowl. “I love you.”

He chuckled before taking a glance at your face that was looking up at his own. “I love you, too.”

#tmnt #rottmnt #writing #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #fanfic #teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the tmnt #fanfiction #x reader #leo x reader #rise leo x reader #leonardo x reader #leonardo hamato #rise leo

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nordic-language-love · 1 year ago

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Hello! I hope you’re doing well! I was wondering if you could give me some advice when it comes to furthering my language learning. I’ve been learning Norwegian on Duolingo for almost 5 years now but I feel like I’ve barely made any progress into actually learning the language. I’ve seen you mention that Duolingo isn’t the best way to learn a language, just on its own. What more can I be doing to actually learn Norwegian? I appreciate any insight you might be able to give. Thank you!

Hi there!

I actually think Norwegian Duo's not that bad, especially compared to other courses. It got me to A2 level without my really using any other resources! But of course, A2 is still only the top of beginner level, and from thereon out it's pretty ineffective on its own (although I still used it even at B2 level as a way to refresh vocab I'd forgotten or just do a little practice every day when I didn't have the time or energy to do anything else).

There are a lot of different ways you can study Norwegian. Here are some things I did (it's an essay lmao I'm so sorry):

1) Listen to Norwegian radio. You'll probably think I'm mad when you first try it because you'll probably understand very little other than the odd word here and there, but I promise it gets easier and you'll get used to the rhythm of the language in a way Duolingo doesn't prepare you for. Try to shadow the speakers (repeat what they say just after they say it. You don't have to know the words they're actually saying; just approximate the phonemes and the melody and the stress patterns. I promise you your pronunciation is gonna get SO good)

2) Take to Youtube. Check my resources list here for some links to channels that teach Norwegian.

3) Norwegian podcasts! I made a list of some beginner/intermediate-friendly ones (check the link in point 2). The plus with podcasts is you can slow the speed down to half-speed too. Again, don't be discouraged if it's difficult at first; just focus on the rhythm and stress of the language

4) Norwegian TV. You're gonna struggle at first but you need to struggle to improve, so don't be discouraged even if several months pass without you feeling like there's any improvement. Intermediate level sucks I'm afraid. Some shows I like that don't require a VPN (as of the time I'm posting this) are Fra bølle til bestevenn (it's got dogs in it), Hva feiler det deg (game show where normal people with internet compete against doctors to guess a patient's diagnosis), 113 (documentary following paramedics in Trondheim - try not to cry at the dialects), Klassequizen (quiz show with 10th graders, pretty A2/B1-friendly), Side Om Side (popular sitcom, sometimes the second-hand embarrassment kills me but mostly it's pretty funny) and Superkrim (did you know that crime stories around Easter time are a Thing in Norway? They make a new season of this one every year but it's accessible year-round, and the language is a lot simpler than a lot of shows, and it's pretty fun and a bit silly)

Note: subtitles are in Norwegian only, and half the time they match the nuance but not the actual words being said. I recommend trying to listen without them first, then listen with them, then listen without them again and see if you can catch a few more words.

5) Textbooks, if that's your jam. I recommend The Mystery Of Nils (you can jump straight to book 2: Mysteriet om Nils if you think you're ready. It's a bit of a jump but no point wasting money/time on something that you won't enjoy) and Norwegian Tutor (from the Teach Yourself series. The first few chapters will seem pretty basic but it's great at explaining nuances and prepositions in later chapters).

6) Read things in Norwegian. You can get short stories for beginner/intermediate level online, as well as read news articles (even if you can't read the whole article, just try the first paragraph). When I was about A2 level I would print things out and go through them just translating them, highlighting new words, words I'd encountered before but couldn't remember, words I could work out from context, particular grammar patterns and words I couldn't figure out and needed the help of a native speaker to work out.

7) Follow Norwegian accounts on social media. Here's a list I made earlier.

8) If you have some extra cash, investing in an italki tutor can be helpful. I've had lessons with a number of tutors so feel free to send me a message if you want help deciding which one to go with.

9) Keep a journal in Norwegian. Look up words you don't know and write them in a different colour. Maybe try to use words you learned that day and write them in a different colour too (even if by using them you're literally just writing "jeg lærte ordet «______» i dag. Det betyr ______")

10) You can also try creative writing. I started out by writing fiction largely in English but with Norwegian dialogue. I then moved on to writing short articles and then essays, then short stories and fan fiction.

11) You can try apps like HiNative and HelloTalk to find native speakers for language exchange. If you only know English though it might be difficult to find people because Norwegians typically speak really good English and aren't looking to learn/practice.

12) Listen to Norwegian music. Get on spotify and search "norsk (music genre of your choice)" and find some songs you like. Listen to them and pay attention to the lyrics. Then find the lyrics online and listen with the lyrics. Then try to translate the lyrics on your own. Finally, look up someone else's translation and see how close they are. Then try to learn the song and visualise meaning it with your whole heart as you sing along.

13) Practise speaking to yourself. It feels super awkward when you first start, but I always manage to get into the flow pretty quickly. You can have GT in front of you so you can look up things if you need to, or you can just write down words you don't know/couldn't think of as you go along, then look them up once you're done (I prefer this method; having GT in front of you encourages your brain to be lazy and not try to actively recall the information you need). Not sure what to write? Try my Speaking In 20 Challenge prompts.

14) Flashcards. I put this one last because really flashcards are only useful as a supplement to learning through other methods. They help to keep vocab fresh in your mind until you see it in context again (and it's the seeing words in context that's gonna cement the meaning in your brain. I've never heard anyone say "oh, I know that word because it was in my flashcard deck that I reviewed every night before bed", but I hear people say things like "oh, I know that obscure word because I watched cooking shows in my TL and the host said it aaaall the time" or "it's in a line from one of my favourite songs" a LOT).

Okay, that's it, essay over 😅 Hope I gave you some ideas! Best of luck with your Norwegian-learning journey!

#norsk #norwegian #ask

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