#scribbled this out like a madman in half an hour

[whaliiwatching]

pretend there are guards behind them

[rosewaterandivy]

Summary: it’s always the best laid plans of mice and men, isn’t it?

Pairing: s.h. x f!oc

W.C.: 5.4K

Warnings: gilded age!au, miscommunication, a comedy of errors/manners, society snobs, a masquerade ball mishap, arranged marriage, steve ‘down bad’ harrington, and a reader/mc who doesn’t have time for this shit - she was educated abroad, she went to Vassar with Miss Nancy Wheeler, okay?!, back on my iliad bullshit (i know, i know)

playlist | m.list

I. Coup de foudre

It’s a dreary December evening in Manhattan. The streets are damp and slick accompanied by the cacophony of hooves, equipages and carriages trundling down the way. Somber topcoats and fur-trimmed capes hide the tailored waistcoats of the men and ornate skirts of the ladies, as is to be expected with the current onslaught of weather. 

Small white flurries of snow that are sure to bring a swift end to laborious dinners and engagements at the club. And the man in the sleek black equipage himself is all too relieved about it— at least he would be released from the obligation of hearing his father’s friends complain about these upstart robber barons descending like a horde of locusts on Fifth Avenue.

A quiet night in his study would be a welcome distraction.

That is, if they can ever get home in this weather.

He can hear the whinny of the horses from up front and the soothing tones of the driver. The streets are probably close to icing over at this hour, making it difficult to find traction. 

Suddenly, the equipage swings quickly to the side and careens into something with a loud thud, sending its sole occupant straight into the door with a smack. He hisses lowly at the twinge in his forehead as the driver descends with a flurry of apologies.

He opens the door himself and steps outside before the driver can assist him. The white puffs of his breath speak to how quickly the weather had turned. He draws his coat closer and approaches the two drivers as they attempt to settle the horses.

“Gentlemen,” He greets, “What seems to be the problem?”

“Noting to worry about Mr. Harrington,” His man, Andrew, assures him, “The ice just snuck up on us is all.”

He nods taking in the damage, dents and scuffs on both vehicles but the horses appear to be fine. Reaching into his coat pocket, he brings out a small notebook and a pencil to scribble his information down for the other driver. Is about to tell the man to bill him directly when someone steps out from the carriage opposite.

The footsteps themselves are delicate and tentative. He tears his gaze from the driver’s, glancing back only to find a young woman emerging from the carriage. She’s holding her skirts in one gloved hand, shivering in the cold. 

“Is everything all right Jesse?”

Her voice is like music to his ears, melodic almost. And she looks like something stolen from a painting— bright and alluring.

The winter light is quickly fading, and the lamplighters were sure taking their time this evening. Her cape is dark, like his coat, but the split at the front reveals a purple skirt trimmed in demure black lace, signifying an exit from her period of mourning. 

Her man, Jesse, shepherds her back toward the coach, “Let’s get you back inside Miss, don’t want you to catch a chill.”

“Of course,” She says with a shake of her head, “How silly of me.”

And before Steve can embarrass himself in an attempt to introduce himself, she’s safely ensconced back in the carriage. Her driver returns and takes the paper from Steve, tucking it into his coat.

“Apologies gentlemen, but I must be on my way.” He pulls himself back onto the driver’s box, “Have to get the young Miss home to her brother’s, you understand.”

He tips his hat, and with a tug of the reins he’s gone.

Steve finds himself standing right where she left him, feet riveted to the very spot where she once stood. He must have taken a step toward her at some point, like an utter madman, probably startled the poor girl half to death.

Despite their disastrous non-meeting, he can’t seem to shake her from his mind. As if everything had been in black and white until she stepped down from the carriage and breathed color into his world, spring bursting forth at the sound of her voice. It sounds positively insane, even to himself, but if Robin were here, she’d understand.

Hell, she’d probably have a word for it too. 

Something French, inevitably.

“Mr. Harrington,” Andrew says, a hand tentatively resting on his shoulder, “Is something wrong?”

Steve blinks; a feeble attempt to clear his mind from thoughts of the mystery woman.

Andrew refrains from rolling his eyes, “Right sir, let’s get you home then.”

The journey back to the Harrington family manse was uneventful. The familiar brownstone facade came into view as Andrew swung the equipage onto the street outside the house. Luckily, the home was large enough that his late arrival wouldn’t be noticed. 

He thanks Andrew and watches as he takes off with the horses for the carriage house a few blocks away. Stepping into the house, he makes quickly for his study slipping through the door just as one of the maids turns down the corridor.

Steve shucks his coat onto a nearby chair and tugs off his cravat with one hand, the other pouring a healthy portion of bourbon into a highball glass. He downs the amber liquid too quickly, the burn welcome against his throat. 

After pouring another glass to sip from, he settles into a heap on a club chair by the window. Resting his jaw on a hand, he faces the glass panes, eyes trailing the flurries of snow outside, unsettled by the quiet of the street. His mind won’t stop racing, vacillating between kicking himself for not getting her name and hoping he’d run into her again, albeit this time under better circumstances.

Little did he know, that several blocks away a man was questioning poor Jesse about his whereabouts when a slip of paper was placed into his hand. He scans it quickly, face paling at the name scrawled there: Steven Harrington.

“How could you let this happen Jesse, really? The accident, I understand, but allowing my sister out of the carriage unaccompanied?”

“Sir, I had no—”

“I’ll not hear your excuses.” Christopher Fairchild balls his hand into a fist, the paper crumpling in his grasp. “You said he saw her, Harrington, that is?”

“Unfortunately,” Jesse admits, “I intervened as best I could and got her back into the coach. He seemed rather transfixed by her.”

His employer grunts, “Yes well, that is unfortunate. What if someone had seen her with that man, no chaperone in sight?” He turns to the sideboard and pours himself a drink, says with a scoff, “Not even out to society and potentially scandal-ridden.”

At this point, his wife, Marian, chooses to enter, having seen the young lady to her rooms and getting her settled for the evening. She places a tentative hand on his shoulder while Jesse trains his gaze to the floor.

“Darling,” She soothes, “Your sister is asleep as is the baby, don’t get yourself into a fit at this hour.”

He sighs as her palm moves in slow circles against his back and takes deep breaths. “Of course dear,” He sips from his drink and turns to her. “I just worry about her. All the work you’ve put into her debut and planning the ball.” Christopher places a kiss on the back of her hand, causing her to blush. “I don’t want it to be all for naught.”

She sighs prettily. 

“It won’t be,” Marian advises, “You’ll write to the Harringtons tomorrow and we’ll get this matter settled. And there won’t be a speck on your dear sister’s reputation, I’ll see to that.”

But, oh dear reader, where would be the fun in that? 

As we all know, the New York winter season is winding down rapidly, and do we not deserve something to keep us warm over the holiday? I would say so! 

So, in honor of her long-awaited arrival, let us give a hearty New York welcome to Miss Eleanor Fairchild! Fresh from the society of Paris and a graduate of Vassar along with Miss Nancy Wheeler, her debut this week is the talk of the town. 

Despite her indecorous brush with Mr. Steven Harrington, I am sure she will not have a shortage of suitors after the ball this weekend. 

But the question remains, my loyal readers, of who will take a shine to Miss Fairchild and step out from the long shadow cast by the Harrington name? 

Only time, and this weekly missive, will tell.

Morning in New York was startling and nothing like waking in Paris.

House maids, lady’s maids, and valets moving up and down the stairs, knocking on doors to air out the linens and draw the curtains aside to let the murky winter sun stream through. There was, of course, the soft babbling from the nursery as Gus woke from his repose, the nursemaid and his mother close at hand.

A sharp knock sounded from the door just as you drew the bedclothes closer to you, content to roll over and sleep through the gray morning.

“Bonjour mademoiselle, vous permettez?”

“Oui!” You say, curious at the chipper voice now opening the door, “Sorry, yes, you may enter.”

“Merci, mademoiselle.”

The girl, your new lady’s maid, softly shuts the door and turns to regard the room.

It’s certainly larger than what you’d grown accustomed to in France. But then again, most everything was in New York, especially so since you hadn’t returned to the city in well nigh on a year or more.

The room itself is well-appointed and elegant, Marian saw to that; soft colors and fabrics, diaphanous and frothy, a subtle nod to Versailles no doubt. You hadn’t had much time or energy to give it a glance last night, more inclined to have a late dinner, divest yourself of traveling clothes, and pass out as soon as possible.

The lady’s maid continues her silent assessment as another knock sounds from the door. She steps to open it and let in the housemaid.

“Good morning Miss,” She greets with a smile, her voice rounded with a warm Irish lilt. “I ‘spect you’ll be needin’ a fire this morning.”

You nod just now noticing the chill in the air. She busies herself with the kindling and sweeping ashes from the fireplace. The maids exchange a few soft words before she steps out to get the firewood from the Useful Man down the hall.

“Apologies,” You say by way of greeting, “But I don’t believe I got your name?”

“Oh, pardonne-moi,” the lady’s maid curtsies briefly, “Je m’appelle Marie.”

“Marie,” You repeat, “Pleased to meet you.”

“Moi aussi, mademoiselle.”

And from there, the ritual of dressing began. The house maid, Louisa, lit the fire and spirited you out of bed to air out the linens. At Marie’s suggestion, she also tackled unpacking the various trunks placed near the dresser and closet.

“These are fine frills Miss,” She smiled, her fingers delicately folding chemises and hanging skirts or dresses. “The Missus said your debut gown came all the way from Mr. Worth’s shop in Paris, is that true?”

A soft sigh escaped you at the memory, ivory chiffon and silk revealing the décolleté and arms, gauze and tulle providing a tempting illusion of bared skin. A full skirt with bustle that would skim the floor accompanied by a small train. With gloves and a fan to match, of course.

“Indeed, it is,” You allowed with a cheeky wink, “But I think Marie would have my head if I touched it before Friday.”

Marie, for her part, merely smirked and continued her preparations for your bath.

Across a few city blocks, a footman knocks on the imposing doors of the Harrington manse. The family butler, Campbell, just happens to be descending the stairs and takes it upon himself to open the door.

“Good morning sir,” The footman says with a bow, “Mr. Fairchild bid me to deliver this.” He hands over an envelope addressed to Mr. Samuel Harrington.

“Yes, well,” Campbell sighs, opening the door to let the footman in. “I’ll get this to him. If you hurry, Cook can scrounge up some coffee and a pastry for you. Just take the servant’s hall to the right.”

“Much obliged,” The footman says with a bow as Campbell starts up the stairs.

The handwriting on the envelope is neat, if a bit cramped. Must be the young Mr. Fairchild then, rather than his wife sending the correspondence.

Mr. Harrington’s study door is cracked open, the sound of papers shuffling to and fro on his desk as the butler enters. He briefly glances up to find Campbell, “Happen to know where I put those contracts, Campbell?”

“Perhaps the drawer on the left, sir.”

Mr. Harrington pulls the drawer open, “Right you are, good man.” And thereby loses himself to perusing the documents and thus ignoring Campbell.

“A letter has arrived for you sir,” He says stepping closer to the desk, “From Mr. Fairchild, it seems rather urgent. I have his footman waiting for your reply.”

“Hmm, well let’s have it then.”

He takes the letter from the butler’s hand and slips the blade of the letter opener under the paper. Retrieving the missive, he scans through it quickly, lips pulling down in distaste.

“See to it that Mrs. Harrington gets this,” He instructs, pulling out a new sheaf of paper and beginning his correspondence. “If she wishes to see my reply, she best be quick about it.”

The letter itself detailed the unfortunate meeting between Mr. Fairchild’s sister and Mr. Harrington’s only son. The man was understandably concerned about how it would seem should someone have happened upon them sans chaperone, as the young lady had yet to make her debut into society.

Mr. Harrington’s reply was cordial in an attempt to smooth things over— the Fairchilds, like the Harrington’s were of good stock, two families of the New York Four Hundred deemed to be unblemished and acceptable company by none other than the Grande Dame herself, Mrs. Astor. It wouldn’t be fitting for reputations to be sullied as the result of a simple misunderstanding.

As expected, Samuel’s wife, Amelia, swanned into the study seemingly in the midst of her morning toilette. Her hair was up, but she still wore her housecoat as her day dress had yet to be put on by her lady’s maid. Mr. Fairchild’s letter waved about in one hand, while the other pressed upon her chest as if to stop her racing heart.

“That boy of yours is going to give me heart failure.”

Samuel signs the letter with a flourish and lays his pen to the side.

“Oh, so he’s only my boy when he acts indiscreetly with the fairer sex, but he’s your son when he’s winning accolades at Harvard and breaking hearts abroad, is that it?”

She tuts and sits demurely on the divan, “Well, yes. Precisely that Sam.” She fans herself with the letter as her husband leans against his desk. “The social set have already written him off as a lost cause and we can ill afford a whisper of a scandal, especially now.”

Sam passes the reply to his wife and pauses, as if to choose his words carefully.

“Still moving forward with your plans to find Steven a wife then?”

“Of course, dear,” She answers brusquely, “There are many suitable ladies this season of decent breeding and passable looks.” She glances up and passes the letter back to him. “Your response is sufficient, send it off with the footman.”

Amelia rises from the divan and turns to leave. “Wake Steven and have a talk with him will you? I’ll send Maude out to the florist, he should write a note of apology for her to send along.”

“As you wish, dear.”

Amelia leaves just as abruptly as she appeared. Samuel sighs and furrows his brow, the inklings of a headache coming on. He taps his fingers against the desk and checks the time.

“Campbell,” He calls into the hall, “Have Calvin wake Steven and tell him to see my in the study.”

“Of course, sir.”

He takes a seat and settles himself behind the desk once more.

“And have Cook send something up? Coffee and breakfast for two.”

Awaiting the arrival of his son, Samuel Harrington turns and faces the bay of windows that look out onto the street below. He watches as Fairchild’s footman hops on the back of the coach and slides from his view. He contemplates his son’s options, admittedly there are few.

Such are the advantages and disadvantages in marrying a woman who’s as sly as a fox. It’s just a matter of out-maneuvering her; an entertaining and seemingly endless chess match that’s lasted even longer than their marriage.

But the silver lining in all this, he supposes, is that Steven Harrington, their sole child and heir, just so happens to take after his father in this respect, in that he’s crazy like a fox.

Funny how things work out, isn’t it?

As for the young Mr. Harrington, well, suffice it to say he had quite the morning. The newly arrived Miss Fairchild, however, had a luxurious start to her day (that is, if one discounts the pulling and pinning of hair, the tugging on of stockings and tightening of corset laces).

You joined your brother and sister-in-law in the dining room while another maid fixed a plate of breakfast for you; Pierce, the butler, stepped in to pour the coffee. You thanked them both and broke your fast, listening as Christopher and Marian discussed the events of the day.

“I’ll need to see to the accounts today,” Your brother said, turning his newspaper with a shake. “Everything should be in order before the ball this weekend.”

Marian nodded and sipped from her coffee cup. “I have some calls to make today, and thought Nell could accompany me.”

Christopher slowly lowers his newspaper and glances your way— don't feel obligated to do this, you haven’t been properly introduced into society yet.

Buying time, you take a bite from the flaky croissant on your plate and ruminate. In a way, both Chris and Marian are correct; you aren’t obligated to escort Mrs. Fairchild, nor would it be wise to turn down an informal introduction to those in Marian’s circle. She would, after all, be serving as your chaperone, and, along with your brother, introducing you to Manhattan high society on Friday at the ball.

Your debutante ball, to be precise.

At the time, Vassar was a welcome distraction and reprieve for being paraded around like a prize calf at auction. But then came the unfortunate illness and demise of your parents, followed by a year of mourning.

It would seem that your time of delay had finally come to its end.

After all, no one wanted a spinster for a bride.

Dabbing at the corners of your mouth with a napkin, you clear your throat and brace yourself.

“That sounds lovely, Marian. I’d be happy to escort you today.”

She smiles and makes to reply, but before she can open her mouth to do so, a knock sounds from the front door. Puzzled, the three of you glance at one another, clearly not expecting a caller at such an early hour.

Pierce nods to someone by the door, bidding him to open it. He quickly returns with a beautiful arrangement of flowers, only to set them to your right and hand you a card. Baffled, you take in the spray of purple orchids, white tulips, lemon geraniums, the sprigs of rosemary, and tucked away behind the hearty green stalks, the shy blooms of forget-me-nots.

Respect, sincerity, an unexpected meeting, remembrance, and affection.

“Well,” Marian prompts from across the table, “Who are they from?”

It’s only then that you recall the card in your outstretched hand. Slipping from your reverie, you thumb open the small envelope.

Miss Fairchild—

Please accept my sincere apologies for our run-in yesterday evening. I hope it did not startle you. I’ve liaised with your brother about the repairs, and in the meantime will give you use of my equipage and pray it will suffice. I also hope that you’ll enjoy the flowers and please know that they relay my deepest and most sincere sentiments.

Cordially yours,

Steven Harrington

P.S. Je vous prie d’accepter mes sincères regrets et ma sympathie à l’occasion du décès de votre proches.

For the remainder of the week, Steve was a bundle of nerves. He’d written the note as his mother asked and even went so far as to accompany her to the florist, managing to slip in a few blooms that complemented the arrangement nicely. And if his mother didn’t happen to notice the errant sprigs of blue or the lingering scent of rosemary, then so much the better.

What he didn’t anticipate was the lack of a response.

“It isn’t done,” Miss Robin Buckley reminded him on their promenade in Central Park. “Until she is out to society, her brother is no doubt keeping her under lock and key.”

“You could provide the introduction,” He points out petulantly. “You’re choosing not to in order to entertain yourself with my suffering.”

“You cad,” She swats at him with her fan. “And no, I cannot. There’s a reason I fled to France after my disastrous debut, as you well know.”

And thus, Steve resigned himself to pining for a woman who barely knew of his existence, while the eligible bachelors of New York bided their time until her debut at the ball.

“For what it’s worth,” Robin says carefully as they round a bend, “There have been many deliveries to the Fairchild House, but yours was the first.”

He warms at the thought.

“That has to count for something, I suppose.”

She grins, “It will.”

They continue to walk, grateful for the brief break in the weather and discuss the evening’s festivities: who will wear what, how many dances until Robin steps on someone’s toes, how ostentatious the new money Vanderbilts will be.

They exit the park, parting ways as their carriages await. Robin catches a curious expression on her friend’s face, both dreamy and apprehensive. She lays a gloved hand on his arm.

“À cœur vaillant rien d'impossible.”

Steve glances down and says with a playful smirk, “Qui vivra verra.”

On Friday afternoon, Marian and Marie carefully assess your gown while Louisa dashes to and fro with the pearls, no the diamonds.

“Sapphires? No, that would ruin the effect.” Marian muses and Marie agrees.

You, by the by, are seated on the bed in a chemise and loosened corset, bored stiff, as the two hem and haw over how to best display you for the ball.

Because that’s all this is really, an overblown dog and pony show in which you’ll be paraded around and shown off to great effect all to attract suitors. It was enough to make one queasy. God forbid a woman do anything on her own or without the approval of a man.

As if men ever did anything worth doing that a woman didn’t have to make right.

Having quite enough of their chatter, you shrug into a robe and pull its sash tight, toe on some slippers and make your way down the hall. At the end of the corridor, you spy the cracked door to Christopher’s study. He’s shuffling papers and muttering to himself as you slip inside.

“I think the accounts can handle themselves for the evening,” you say with a smirk, settling yourself on a chair by the window.

He chuckles, “I suppose you’re right, clever girl.” Sorting the papers into a single file, he looks up at you with a quirked brow. “Had enough of Marian’s prodding, I take it?”

You sigh and dramatically cast your head back, “That’s the worst of it— they haven’t even begun!” Warming at his familiar laughter, you continue: “If I’d known that this is what I’d be subjected to, I would’ve stayed in France.”

Chris studies you at that; your weary sigh, crossed arms, and face a mask. Can’t make heads or tails of if you’re serious or not. Is it too soon? Did you still need time to mourn Maman and Papa? But then your debut had been delayed so much already…

“Is that what you want?”

It’s a question you hadn’t expected from him. But suddenly you’re reminded that he’s your brother, the only family you have left in the world. The man who dropped everything and took the first ship bound for France to be with you at your parents’ deathbed. He had insisted you stay at the house in Paris until you’d recovered your own strength and sent Marian and Gus to keep you company while he saw to business at home.

And knowing him as well as you do, Chris wouldn’t ask something idly.

So you choose your next words carefully.

“I no longer trouble myself with wants.”

The lightest dusting of snow begins to gather on the windowpane. Soon enough, all of the city would look like a snow globe. A perfect winter wonderland for the evening’s festivities, and your favorite kind of weather— snow makes everything look softer somehow, muffles the sound, and blankets the world in swaths of pure white. Your mother adored snow, had somehow convinced you and Chris that she could smell when it was about to begin. And maybe that’s why you’ve taken a shine to it now.

Turning from the window with a small smile, you rise to exit the study and get ready for the night. Leaving your elder brother puzzling over your parting phrase.

Steve could hardly forget your first meeting, but seeing you that evening nearly eclipsed the recollection. Without a cape and no longer in the purples and grays of half-mourning, you were quite a sight to behold.

And he wasn’t the only one who thought so.

Several men from the club, Hargrove, Hagan, and Byers, were scattered around the room sizing up the competition just as he was. Somehow, Edward Munson had been granted an invitation— with his railroad money and lack of pedigree. Regardless of social standing, each eligible bachelor in the room was jockeying for position; who would be the first introduction, the first dance, did her eyes fall on him or the man to his left?

Steve was well-versed in this routine, he’d been to enough debutante balls to last a veritable lifetime. Usually, he’d enter and make the necessary greetings before grabbing a refreshment and picking a wall to lean on because god help him if he was going to actually dance more than the bare minimum required.

But in this instance, things were different.

Namely, that he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about you since that fateful night. Despite the lack of interest from you (which was to be expected, really), he couldn’t help but think of you fondly. Descending from your coach to check on your driver and the horses, shivering in the evening chill, voice soft and sleep-worn.

There was also the fact that his mother was hovering somewhere behind him. She’d oh so fortunately seen Mrs. Fairchild as she was making her social calls earlier in the week and had received an informal introduction to you. She’d said as much at dinner that day and ever since then, she’d been subtly laying the groundwork for a possible courtship.

And as much as Steve did not want to bow to his mother’s machinations, he also desperately wanted an introduction with you. So he sips his drink and observes the goings on around him his attention turning to the grand staircase as someone announces:

“Presenting Miss Eleanor Joséphine Fairchild, escorted by her brother Mr. Christopher Fairchild.”

The symphony starts up as you descend the stairs to polite applause on the arm of your brother, eyes demure and downcast, your subtly rouged lips pulling into a soft smile. And Steve can hardly breathe— it’s as if the world slowed and went fuzzy at the edges, everything and everyone falling by the wayside save for you.

Because you are positively incandescent; beautifully angelic in your finery and reminiscent of Venus emerging from her shell. He feels as if he’s been struck, a warmth radiating in his chest, and wouldn’t be surprised to find one of Cupid’s golden arrows lodged there. And Steve knows a little of desire, of wanton lust; he is, after all, a man of privilege in a world that caters to his whims. But while this feels reminiscent of that— the heat, the wanting— there is also, oddly, restraint.

All eyes are on you as your brother leads you across the floor, smiling politely at those assembled, eyes never staying on one person for too long. You’re playing nice, presenting an unimpeachable image of the demure lady, it wouldn’t be done to favor one gentleman this evening. In fact, it would send the wrong message entirely.

Everyone present knows this; it is a game often played in polite society, even if its ramifications are— how shall we say it?— best left behind closed doors.

“A lamb and her shepherd,” His mother says, voice pitched low for only him to hear. “Bo-Peep will soon abandon his charge, and that, Steven, is when you will make your introduction.”

It’s all he can do to school his features and recede into himself; eyes glassy and blank, face a mask. Polite and charming, affable even. And while his mother thinks she is being helpful, it’s hard not to believe she isn’t pouring poison in his ear. Half expects her to say something akin to, “Look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't.”

She doesn’t, and for that he is grateful. Instead, she melts away into the background and loops her arm through his father’s. And, sure enough, your brother does eventually leave your side only to be replaced by Mrs. Fairchild, who slips your wrist through a dainty loop of cream ribbon with a dance card and a small pencil attached.

The room stills, a pack of wolves lying in wait. Drinks are set aside, conversations cease; Amelia gives her son an unceremonious push forward, her gloved hand on his shoulder tipping him toward the inevitable. Steve nearly stumbles from the shock of it all.

Because in one moment he’s just another man in the crowd, an eligible bachelor at yet another ball prepared to drink the night away. And in the next, his eyes lock with yours, and he feels himself falling. It’s hopeless to fight it, this gravitational pull you seem to have over him; haven’t exchanged even two words, and he’s already in your thrall.

He can see your chest rise with your sharp intake of breath, eyes widening at his approach. Steve’s trying not to spook you, really he is. He thinks back to his favored horse, Balius, the clomping hooves and fierce breaths, tries to calm you in the same manner— a slow approach, a small smile, and soft words.

And while he would never bow to the stubborn dappled stallion, Steve does bow to you and says, “Steven Harrington, a pleasure to meet you officially Miss Fairchild.”

Your eyes light in recognition, of his name or him he cannot tell. But you curtsy all the same and offer him your hand, as etiquette dictates. He takes it gladly, marvelling at the fine fabric of gloves adorning it. His finger finds the racing pulse on the underside of your wrist, running along it slowly.

Another sharp intake of breath at the sensation, a heat skittering underneath your skin as his fingers loop around your wrist, your pulse thudding in their wake.

He opens the booklet and takes his time writing his name, well aware at the gathering of eligible suitors at his back. He’s loathe to release your hand and leave you to all of this, the wolves at the gate, but as much as he wants to whisk you away from what is sure to be an uncomfortable and tiring evening, Steve is required, as is everyone else, to play the game.

And Steven Harrington is playing to win.

Mr. Harrington—

It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance this past Friday, and thank you for your presence. I do hope the evening passed pleasantly for you and my apologies for not seeing to you more frequently, but other obligations, as you well know, prohibited me from seeking your company. Furthermore, I must apologize for being remiss in not offering my sincerest gratitude for the lovely flowers and the gracious use of your equipage. You are truly a generous man, and I am grateful for your friendship.

Cordially yours,

Miss Fairchild

P.S. Merci pour le sauvetage de Monsieur C—. Je n'avais aucune idée sur sa relation avec Mademoiselle C—. J’espère que vote intercession ne reflétera pas mal sur vous. Je vous suis redevable.

_

Steve’s postscript: Please accept my sincerest and deepest condolences on the passing of your parents.

Nell’s postscript: Thank you for the rescue from Mr. C—. I had no idea about his relationship with Miss C—. I hope your intercession will not reflect poorly on you. I am in your debt.

[foxglovecove]

Non-Regulation Lab Uniform

Late one night, one might argue early in the morning, Newt shoots out of bed with an idea. It’s dark in his small bunk and in his half-awake daze he grabs whatever clothes and shoes are closest. From his small fridge he grabs the liquid of the gods in the form of, he hopes, an energy beverage.

He takes a sip as he shuffles down the dark corridors. Yup definitely energy bevvy. Cherry, aka the best flavor.

He makes his way to the lab he shares with his arch-nemesis (and crush) Dr. Hermann Gottlieb, who is most certainly asleep like any reasonable resident of the Hong Kong Shatterdome at 3am.

Grabbing a stack of papers he’d been scribbling on all week, he throws them on the ground and proceeds to stare for the next hour, working and reworking his hypothesis.

For approximately 45 minutes of that hour he has a secret audience. Dr. Hermann Gottlieb, who has himself occupied this space since 2am, watches in awe. In horror. No definitely in awe.

He hasn’t seen this particular combo of garments since the Halloween Party last October when the madman combined it with a knock off costume version of the OG kaiju Trespasser.

He should not be staring.

He looks away.

It’s ok to be staring he’s not being rude, just looking. Newton wouldn’t be wearing that ridiculously scandalous outfit if he cared.

He tips his chair back just a little to get a better look. A little bit more. Just a little bit more.

Oh shit, there’s the floor.

And there’s Newton staring in shock at the sprawled out form of Dr. Hermann Gottlieb, mathematician, arch nemesis. Crush.

[raisethestake]

Tech x reader (NSFW) pt. 1/2

Excuse some of the crude language, I dont picture a relationship with Tech being overly romanticised so it felt weird to have especially eloquent and descriptive words for some reason 😂

Mostly fluff, gets more NSFW the further down you read. Enjoy!

(pt. 2 in development)

· I am a retired bounty hunter who gets employed by the Republic as a reconnaissance contact

· I was born on Ord Mantell

· I am quite paranoid, which makes me a great scout as I am always on the lookout.

· I am covered in piercings and tattoos

· Tech is also covered in tattoos

[reference 👇]

Meeting

· I work in 79's when I'm not on missions. This is where I was briefly acquainted with the Batch.

· I then got put on a mission with them about a month later.

· He is fascinated by my creative knowledge and wisdom. It is different than his own knowledge and while he's actually quite good when he joins me to paint sometimes, he struggles with conceptual ideas and prefers cold, hard facts.

· Me and Tech really hit it off with intellectual debates. I learnt stuff from him and he liked it when I asked for advice, but he also learnt about social and moral concepts from me.

· I am a trained night owl because I work in a bar, but i also enjoy the mornings, soaking in the peacefulness of either sides of the day.

· We are always the last 2 to go to bed, working in silence or having hushed conversations in the cockpit.

· Tech started to look forward to this undisturbed time with me.

· everyone noticed that I was Tech's new favorite person.

Flustered

· he was sat in the corner in 79's one night looking a litle distracted. I asked Hunter and Crosshair what was up when they were getting drinks. Hunter wasnt sure, but Crosshair said

· "he's hung up on someone and doesnt quite know what to do with himself."

· Hunter looked incredulous "who??"

· Crosshair's gaze went straight from Tech to me. I responded with a snort.

· he'd gotten onto Tech's data pad and seen mission reports filed by me. It looked like he was researching me, analysing my speech and thought process to be able to talk to me better.

· they asked me what i was going to do. I made a 'fuck it' face and finished my shift half an hour later.

· i came out with shots and offered one to Tech. "Come one mopey, we gonna dance?"

· as he stood up and shotted, "theres just something i gotta do first" and I took his chin and met his lips to mine.

· he got very flustered and started babbling about something in a low mumble. I took his hand and led him to the dancefloor.

· his dancing was a little awkward and self-conscious, but he was glad it was jazz so he didnt have to let loose to blend in. He was watching me intently the whole time. Me peppering him with kisses and him beginning to reciprocate, letting go of my hands to pull my waist in close. My arms thrown around his neck, we danced in an embrace.

· as we were around the boys all the time, we didnt get ample time to ourselves.

· Tech is NOT a morning person. He will stay asleep as long as time allows and is very grumpy. He will snap at people before he has his coffee.

· The boys warned me after we'd already slept together. I enjoy quiet in the morning anyway so I hadn't disturbed him.

· Morning Tech started to appear less often as having someone wake him up with neck kisses put him in a much better mood.

· we soon worked out that his main kink was love bites. It turned him on to see them during the day and know I was his.

· Tech is a madman. He clutters, scribbles on his walls, accidentally stays up late and tattoos himself.

· I slot into this well. While not as hardcore, I also tattoo myself and I am easy with the clutter. I am not the most tidy person but I like that I never feel guilty for it because he's worse than me.

· We are the lords of parallel play. We can sit in silence for hours. Tech tinkers, I do creative things, sometimes we sit and tattoo each other.

Good Morning

· we were on the Marauder after the rest of the boys woke up early to pick up parts in the city.

· I got up to make caff. Tech came in as I sipped and looked out the window.

· he made a cup and came to stand just behind me. I took his arm and wrapped it around my waist. He relaxed into it and rested his cheek on my head.

· I kissed his hand and he melted. He kissed my temple and made his way down to my neck, his hand moving to my hip. He stretched to set down his caff and squeezed my hips.

· i set my mug down and reached behind my head to stroke his hair. He pulled my pelvis into his as he added little licks down my neck and nibbled my ear.

· i turned around and our lips met. He towered over me as we backed against the wall.

· we jacked each other off at the same time until he lifted me up to curl my legs around his head and sat me on him.

· he began respectfully, but adapted as I encouraged him to go harder.

· i ended up turning round and he took me from behind. One hand reaching to rub my clit and biting my neck.

· he finished just after me.

· i had to brace against the wall to keep myself standing - weak in the knees. Tech twisted around and leaned his back against the wall. We looked at each other panting and chuckled before he took my hand and turned me around, sinking down to bring me ino his lap, where he held me and we kissed and talked.

· Tech is a sex GOD. I've had it good from bounty hunters, but never like him. He learnt everything about the female body when we got together to ensure I had the best time.

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

I've noticed that I'm much more productive during the first week of the month because I see each one as a new beginning, and I'm hesitant to make big changes in the middle because it feels like it won't count unless it coincides with some arbitrary milestone like the 1st. To try and reprogram my brain, I started keeping daily checklists of things I had to do and new habits I wanted to form, carrying the list and a pen with me everywhere I went so I couldn't forget. I accomplish so much more this way, but it has the unfortunate side-effect that I will forget to do ANYTHING unless it's on the list. God forbid I leave it behind somewhere... My dad is just like that, neurotically obsessed with his own daily lists which he scribbles symbols on like a madman (it looks like nonsense zodiac cyphers to me, but it apparently makes sense to him). That's a rabbit hole I don't want to go down, so as soon as I realized I was heading in that direction I had to take a step back and reflect on who I am and who I want to be.

I don't want my To Do list to become a crutch I'm dependent on to function like my dad, so I've started thinking of each item as a daily suggestion. Like, here's a bunch of things I can do instead of going on my phone all day; pick a few of them, when you think about it. Don't feel obligated to do them all, but if you find yourself checking your phone again and again like the refrigerator hoping something new will pop up, maybe check something off the list instead.

Some of these are starting to become second nature to me, so I don't have to keep reminding myself to do them.

I eat dedicated meals instead of grazing

I sit down and read for an hour or two, 50 to 100 pages

I go for walks, a few miles each day (note: I need new shoes because my unusual loping gait has caused the inside heel to wear away on both sides and expose sharp chunks of plastic which dig into my Achilles tendons with each step...)

I practice my left-handed writing, something I've wanted to do for years but never found the time for (you never know when you're gonna be in a horrific right-sided accident; it could happen at any time, may as well get out ahead of it)

I have three dedicated laundry days per week (two for clothes, one for bed sheets), so nothing piles up and I never run out of outfits

I've started crafting again, though I'm not proud enough of the finished products to post them yet. Maybe someday.

Baby steps. Once I get a job I'll have to readjust my priorities because most of my waking hours will be spent at work, but I hope my habits remain. If that means spending my few evening hours reading instead of browsing tumblr, so be it. I need to cut my screen time in half anyway.

[captainsophiestark]

Clouds

Percy Weasley x Reader

Masterlist - Join My Taglist!

Day Eighteen of Fictober!

Fandom: Harry Potter

Fictober Prompt: “You don’t see it?”

Summary: Y/N and Percy Weasley have been dating for about a year and a half, and Y/N's gotten used to Percy stressing himself out over school work and whatever else he's doing in his life. But with Head Boy responsibilities and finding a job on top of school work for their seventh year, will reader be able to convince their boyfriend to take a break before he snaps?

Word Count: 1,929

Category: Fluff

Putting work into an AI program without permission is illegal. You do not have my permission. Do not do it.

"Percy. Percy. Percival. Perseus. Persimmon." I sighed, watching my boyfriend with his head in his book. He didn't even glance up, not even for persimmon. I debated for a minute over what to do, but eventually I just smacked him in the arm. I'd exhausted every other option.

"Huh? What is it?" he asked, finally looking up. He blinked a few times, apparently trying to reorient himself now that he was back in the real world.

"I've been trying to get your attention for the past three minutes," I said. "You've been completely blocking me out."

"Sorry, Y/N.  I've been absolutely drowning in school work and I've had no time to do it with all of my Head Boy responsibilities. Not to mention all the time I've been spending trying to find a position with the Ministry for after we graduate..."

"I know, I've seen you tearing your hair out and scribbling away like a madman." I paused, but Percy didn't say anything else. He was staring vaguely off into space, looking like he was drifting further away by the minute. I put my hand on his, hoping to ground him a little with the touch. "Percy, listen. You clearly need a break."

"Y/N, I don't have time to take-"

"Percy. You are going crazy. And I don't mean that in a hyperbolic way, I mean you are literally losing your mind with every passing second that you stay cooped up in a corner of the Common Room or in the library or wherever else you drag your books with you. You need a break, or you're gonna snap completely."

I could see Percy getting ready to argue, so I jumped in again before he could.

"Your path to the Ministry is going to take, like, ten years longer if you have to recover from a mental break first."

Percy turned to me for the first time since coming out of his haze, sending me a look the clearly said Really? I just looked right back, daring him to voice his doubts. Finally, he gave a heavy sigh, then leaned back in his chair and a little bit away from all his books and parchment.

"Alright. I suppose a short break couldn't hurt."

"Yes!" I grinned, flopping back in my chair and quickly running through a list of activities in my mind.

"But no more than an hour!" he added after seeing my face. After seven years of being friends (and a year and a half of being more), he knew me well enough to see from a look when my brain was running wild with ideas.

"Deal," I said, grinning at him and pushing back from the table to stand. "Go put all these books back in your room and meet me down here. And I will find Wood and send him up to harass you if you're not down here in fifteen minutes."

****************

Percy made it back downstairs in ten minutes, probably because the threat of having to deal with Oliver Wood when he was already stressed was the best possible motivator. He still looked stressed, shoulders hunched and thoughts elsewhere as he came back down to the Common Room, but I expected that. The whole point was to help him relax.

"So, what are we doing?" he asked.

"It's a surprise," I said, taking his hand and pulling him towards the entrance to the Common Room. "Just trust me."

Percy smiled a little at that, following along with me as I pulled him out the door and through the corridors, all the way out onto the castle grounds. It was a beautiful spring day, and one of the first warm days we'd had since fall, and neither of us were going to waste it sitting inside if I had anything to say about it.

"Alright, here we are," I said, coming to a stop and dropping my boyfriend's hand once we reached the edge of the lake.

"Why are we here? There's nothing to do here."

"That's true, unless you have an imagination," I said, taking a few steps back from Percy and grinning. "Or, unless you're dating somebody with enough imagination for both of you."

Percy gave me a small smile and shook his head as I flopped down in the grass, laying on my back and staring up at the sky. I sighed deeply, letting all the stress flow out of me, then perked my head back up when I noticed my boyfriend wasn't doing the same.

"Percy," I said, looking at him and waving him over with one hand. "C'mon. Lay down."

"On the ground?"

I gave my boyfriend a look. "No, on the sofa over there."

Percy scoffed, but he came over towards me anyway. He still looked uneasy about the idea, but he still lowered himself down onto the grass with me, sitting criss cross applesauce with stick straight posture. I forced down a sigh as I sat up and fixed Percy with a slightly judgey stare.

"What?" he asked, looking honestly confused.

"For this to work, you need to actually lay down in the grass."

"I don't know, Y/N, I just got my robes cleaned-"

I didn't let him get another word out before I dove towards him and wrapped my arms around his waist, tackling him backwards into the grass. He wasn't expecting it, so he couldn't brace, and the next thing either of us knew we were laying flat out on the grass.

I looked up and grinned at Percy from where I was laying on his chest, and he couldn't help but smile back. He shook his head, but he was laughing (however subtly) as I rolled off his chest to lay next to him on my back instead.

Not many people could tackle Percy Weasley without an immediate lecture and loss of house points, and I took pride in belonging to that club. Especially since my boyfriend really needed someone to make him loosen up every once in a while.

"Alright, Y/N," sighed Percy, moving one arm to rest under my neck like a pillow and pulling me a little closer into his side. "You've got me laying in the dirt. Now what?"

"Now, we look at the clouds."

I sighed and stared up at the sky, watching the puffy shapes float across the gorgeous light blue expanse. I could see flowers and dragons and castles floating around, and it made me smile after just a few seconds.

It wasn't much longer than a few seconds before Percy started fidgeting next to me. He always had a hard time sitting still and doing nothing, but it got infinitely worse when he felt like there were other things to be doing.

"Percy," I said, not taking my eyes off the sky.

"Hm?"

"Relax."

He huffed, then shifted a bit on the grass.

"Sorry. I just can't stop thinking about all the things I still have to do..."

"So find something to distract you." I squinted up at the clouds, scanning until I found what I was looking for. "There. Look at that one."

I pointed straight up, trying to help Percy follow my line of sight to a fluffy white cloud that looked exactly like a duck.

"Where?"

"Right there. See? It looks just like a duck."

Percy didn't say anything for a minute, and a quick glance at his face showed me he was squinting at the sky and trying to follow my finger. He looked confused, and like he wasn't getting it at all.

"You don't see it?" I asked.

"No, I'm afraid I don't..."

"Well, that's alright," I said, snuggling into his side a little closer. "Tell me what you do see."

"They just look like a bunch of white blobs to me..."

"Well yeah, maybe the first time you look at them! But if you keep staring and just let your mind run wild, you can see all kinds of fun things! Come on Perce, just give it a try!"

"Alright..." He sighed, and I could tell he was trying to concentrate on the clouds just as hard as he'd been concentrating on his work. I shook my head a little, but I really didn't expect anything else from him. I was just glad he was so focused on something non-work related. "There! That one there looks like a quill."

His arm shot into the air to point, and I followed his line of sight to the only cloud in the area that looked a bit like a quill. It was still awfully close to work related for my tastes, but he was trying, and I wasn't about to be horrible to him for making an effort.

"I see it!" I said, laughing a little. I pointed too, trying to direct his attention to the next cloud over. "And look, that one's the ink pot."

"I can see that!" he said, sounding excited and happy. "Oh look, the wind's just blown that one into the shape of some parchment..."

"I bet the sky is writing an epic story," I mused, staring happily into the sky and resting my head on Percy's chest. I could hear his heartbeat, and the calm and steady pace made me feel perfectly relaxed and safe, despite all the stress of being seventh years and trying to find jobs.

"Maybe it's writing about us," he agreed. He kissed the top of my head and I sighed, tearing my eyes away from the sky and curling into his side. I closed my eyes, using him as my pillow, and let the gentle breeze and Percy's steady heartbeat carry me towards dreamland.

"I bet it is writing about us," I sighed, not opening my eyes. Percy started running a hand absent-mindedly through my hair.

"I need to get up soon," he mumbled, all of the urgency from earlier leaving his voice. "I can't ignore my work for more than an hour..."

"Mmm, come on Perce. Enjoy the day. You have the rest of your life to put your nose to the grindstone. The clouds are only going to look like this once."

"You're not even looking at the clouds anymore," he teased. I could hear the smile in his voice, and it made me smile too.

"It's still true."

Percy sighed, and my head moved up and down with the rise and fall of his chest.

"I suppose you're right. Besides, I can't bring myself to move you when you look so comfortable like this."

I hummed, smiling sleepily as everything around us began to fade. Percy's hand in my hair, the slight movement from his breathing, and his heartbeat in my ear were the last things I noticed before drifting fully off to sleep. He could be a complete stress case sometimes, and make me feel strung out just hearing about all the things he was trying to do at once, but moments like this made everything else worth it.

Laying here on the grass with Percy, it seemed like nothing in the world could go wrong.

[shadowdianne]

Alchemist Lena anyone?

There you go :P @waknatious

I wrote a total of six different scenes for this one but I ended up liking the third one best. And, well, I was also in the middle of tweaking a few details for my campaign so I took some of that as well into this xD

Hope you like it W

The flame of the candle burned bright but the stem was close to its mid-section, where Lena had previously scribbled down a bright black mark if only, she had muttered to herself while surrounded by beakers and metal frames that twinkled in silvers, so she had some resemblance of the passing of time. Fingers curling and then stretching as she tried to alleviate the faint pain on her joints and neck, she glanced at the splash of light that pooled around the candle, its scent not pungent but obvious if she dared to give her any attention.

Despite her trick she couldn’t quite remember how long she had spent glancing at the vial that had been handled to her last time the door of her laboratory -no, not hers, but who cared now for such a concept- had been opened by the man who liked to call her his sister despite the sinister gleam on his eyes and the promise of something far worse than a contract being singed to him about whatever she might find within the liquid’s secrets if she didn’t quite deliver. Standing as she tried to ease her discomfort, she eyed the books and diaries she had been used ever since she had eyed the enclosed vial she had been given: the wax of the seal verdant and unnatural as it now curled and crinkled. The symbol of the ouroboros had greeted her from the seal of course, just like every other vial ever given to her by him: the promise of something eternal that went beyond any family name or resemblance of normalcy that happened to exist beyond the tomb of her own making she now called “home”.

There had been very little on the books as she had soon found out, after her initial assumption that he must have made a mistake since the sloshing droplets had been as red as blood and holding a similar opacity. Because, as she had soon realized, while almost identical, the liquid wasn’t blood but something else.

“Replicate it.” He had said to her through clenched teeth and madman-like eyes and Lena had thought again on the slowly being distilled poison behind her other half-finished works that laid in wait for her to use it.

“I still need to finish with the alkahest recipe…” She had grabbed the vial, however, knowing that she wouldn’t be able to refuse its acceptance. What she had thought could be blood glinted once and she blinked, taken aback but curious.

“Doesn’t matter.” His voice resonated and brought her back to him with the promise of a slowly dragged out pain if she wasn’t fast enough. “This has priority, be fast.”

He had closed the door behind him just as he always did, as if he couldn’t get out of her presence quick enough. With an eye on the candle that had been new then, Lena had seated herself in front of her desk, starting what had become a veritable rabbit hole the longer she studied what, obviously, wasn’t blood at all.

It was the details lost to those who would blink too fast: she had become to understand. The liquid seemed to morph if she didn’t pay attention to it long enough as if changing properties just when she looked elsewhere. There was a chameleonic concept to it, as if willing to morph itself not entirely but good enough for her tests to come up contradicting one another, malleable, unusable. She wondered where he might had been able to get ahold of such substance but the answer came in the form of a memory of last week’s clops against the stone that formed the patio beyond the rooms and the veranda and the wooden details created specifically for the family whose money overflowed so many pockets. She had been looking into a recipe for a tincture at the time, darkness and rouge enveloping her as she liked to think herself as opposed to that dammed verdant green, she had heard the sounds of the horses, the rapid descent of someone else into the maze that grew from the manor on itself, like a fungi that just grew and took without expecting to be asked to give anything in exchange. She had closed her ears to the sound, as she had started to do after so many had lost their lives and had kept on working: glass prickling her skin, opening wounds no one else would be able to see.

If the liquid, she had realized, had seemed like blood and could have been treated as such the possibility that would better link to the theory could only be…

That it had been taken by someone capable of holding it inside, someone whose life-force might be as mutable, as strong, as the liquid itself.

She blinked back to reality and the present, her jaw set, her fingers grasping the back of her chair with force and ire. The droplets of light were beginning to become smaller: she would need to be careful with the flame; it would be hours before she could even think on asking for another one and the fuzzy edges on the corners of her eyes told her that it was the middle of nighttime already: the sun a line and the moon a smiling eye on an otherwise unreachable sky.

Moving closer towards the now open vial she scrambled for some remains of the wax, careful to put the bits into a copper spoon she then approached to the flame: a seal and a nap, a quick one, before he came back or send anyone else in order to know, to interrogate. She halted then, half-movement, as the light of the flame hit the liquid directly rather than in an oblique line as before, the sea of diamonds it created on its wake making it iridescent for a moment before they were gone. As if liquid sundrops, as if gold and lead.

“It reacts to light.”

Well, she thought, grim smile as she sat back up, tiredness and the plausible reality of being engulfed in darkness before the sun rose, that was something else.

And she had become much more curious if Lex’s “guest” was, indeed, human.

[lerbts]

The 8th Sibling

You smiled slightly at the sight of Vanya hanging out with not just Klaus and Allison, but Luther and Diego as well in the living room. It warmed your heart to see your so often neglected sibling get the love she deserved. 

You ignored the pang telling you to go join them and opted to hang in the shadows as you usually did. It wasn't that you were flat out ignored by the others; instead your ability just..wasn't helpful in combat. Until everything with Vanya happened. Luther wouldn't talk to you for 3 weeks after you refused to force Vanya into a manufactured calm. 

You'd always been closer to her than the others, save maybe Five at the time; like Hell were you going to betray her trust and manipulate her like that just because their neglect had forced her to such a frenzied state. Yours too though you tried to be there. 

You straightened a bit, and looked away nervously as Klaus brushed his fingers over Vanya's neck causing her to squeal. Your cheeks already starting to burn, you ducked your head and dissapeared as quietly as you had arrived, completely unaware of the perceptive eyes keeping watch of your every move. 

The next time it happened was family movie night. No getting out of that, typically squeezed between Klaus and Diego as you were but luckily the popcorn bowl was empty and you all but yelped as much as you swiped the bowl and were gone, your tiny frame letting you slip away as Allison scribbled at Luther's ear. 

A pop followed by a flash of blue you knew all too well and you willed your face to cool as you turned your back so you wouldn't have to face Five. 

"Why do you keep doing that?"

"Doing what?"

"...You know what. I'll spell it out if I have to but I guarantee you won't like it if your current state is any indication."

You barely held back your shiver at Five's smug tone but put your love of acting to good use as you put the kettle on. You'd need some sugary milk tea to get you through this shit and calm you down afterwards you could feel it. 

"I've got no idea what you're talking about."

You claimed innocently, and Five hummed from behind you as you grabbed a bag of microwavable popcorn and moved to cook it.

"Oh you don't?" 

Five stood in your path and you fought the urge to squirm under his scrutinizing stare. He'd always been closer with Vanya so why was he taking such an interest in you now? The defensive voice in you wanted to ask but the kindness you typically felt made you instantly tell it to shut up instead. You pasted on a vaguely confused smile. 

"Nope! I just need to put this in...one sec okay?"

You gently maneuvered your small frame around his and were relieved when he let you pass silently. You put the bag in and set the time without incident for 3 minutes and 30 seconds and when you went to walk past him again, squealed and hopped away as his nimble fingers squeezed your waist. Suddenly, as if by magic, you were red again. 

A smirk bloomed across his face as he seemingly got the reaction he wanted. 

"It is the tickling isn't it? I thought it was the bonding in general and I think that may be it to a lesser extent...but it's definitely the tickling itself that makes you so jumpy and flustered."

You went silent and refused to meet his gaze, leading to him prodding you verbally. 

"I'll be more direct. Why do you run away the second any kind of tickling-"

He blinked as you suddenly covered his mouth and you finally met his gaze, your own with a wild glint. 

"I'll tell you if you just please stop saying it!"

You squeaked as you realized what you'd done and scrambled away much to his amusement to where your tea was being made, pouring the hot water into your waiting cup and loading it with sugar to distract yourself.

"Even the word gets you? Are you like Klaus where it's a kink for you or...?"

The way your cheeks reddened further gave him his answer as did the way your shoulders slumped. Ah. That was why then. You were terrified they'd judge you. He barely withheld his laughter at the thought. As if. Every one of them had kinks or little flaws or insecurities. It was what made them all Human. 

He paused as you looked at him in hesitant curiosity. 

"K-Klaus has it too?"

He saw the question in your eyes and answered it, his smirk widening at the equally surprised and mortified look on your face. 

"Yup; he's a 50/50 Switch I'd say. I'm surprised I know that and you don't. Some days he's full ler, others full lee and most of the time he's happy to have either and gives as good as he gets."

He snatched the popcorn from the microwave as it finished beeping, opening it and starting to munch on it absentmindedly in amusement at how funny your reaction was to him. 

"Well...I wasn't exactly the closest with everyone. That didn't magically change when you left, y'know. But- why do you know all the lingo!?"

He quirked an eyebrow. 

"...Klaus confided in me one day. He was pretty high, probably doesn't remember it. He's always been a rambler though. Guess it's not too surprising." 

He looked you up and down and smirked as he noticed you shiver in response.

"Even if I didn't know the language- you're a 100% lee aren't you? You wouldn't get that flustered seeing others getting messed with if you weren't. You want to be the one getting tickled-" He placed special emphasis on the word now that he knew it bothered you and relished your flinch. "But you're too scared to ask for it. It's quite cute actually. Very in line with how you were when we were still kids. You never could ask for the things you wanted, or speak up. So…" He hopped off the counter with a flourish after putting the now empty bag aside. "I'm going to be a good big brother and help you out. Come with me."

He grabbed your hand after ensuring you weren't holding your tea mug and gently shoved you in front of the screen most of the others weren't watching anyway, mighty strong despite his younger appearance. 

"Listen up idiots. ______'s got something she wants to say." 

He turned to you expectantly with a mocking smile as you looked between him and your other siblings with wide, disbelieving eyes. 

Oh no way in fuck this was happening. 

Your eyes moved to both the stairs and the front door, weighing your chances but Five's clicking tongue made you stiffen and move your gaze towards him. 

"I wouldn't try it. I'll just teleport before you get far enough and then I'll show them. And I know you don't want that. Or...maybe you do. Either way; I'm not the kindest of our siblings in that regard so you may want to think twice before trying to get on my nerves. Just tell them."

"Okay will one of you please just say what's going on!?" 

Predictably, Diego was the first to snap, but the flinch you gave in response to his raised voice made him wince in sympathy. Whoops. 

Allison tried next, ever the mediator. 

"Whatever it is this is… I'm sure it's nothing bad right?"

You couldn't meet anyone's gaze now; Diego's loud proclamation had made you too cagey but you mumbled. 

"Define bad. It...d-depends on your perspective, I guess."

You risked a pleading glance towards Five, wishing a hole would appear to make you disappear. 

"Five, please you're literally killing me right now; this doesn't even matter okay? Can I please just go?" 

At your whining tone and childish reaction Five gritted his teeth in annoyance before he shrugged and nodded. 

"Yeah, alright fine you can go."

Your expression visibly relaxed but just as you took your first step, Five continued. 

"All she can't seem to say is that she has a tickle kink like Klaus and likes to constantly be on the receiving end instead of both like him."

You whirled to look at him with your mouth dropped open in shock, filter gone as betrayal fueled you.

"Five no-! You fucking little-"

You gritted your own teeth as he smiled in smug satisfaction up at you and clenched your fists with an upset huff, hating the way your eyes burned in humiliation.

"Y'know what? Whatever. It's not even fucking worth it.  I'll be gone by tomorro-AGH!" 

You shouted in surprise not having any time to wallow or finish your self deprecating words because suddenly Klaus was digging into your hips like a madman after tackling you to the floor and making you burst into giggles as you tried to weakly push him away in shock. 

"Wh-Whahahahay!?"

He rolled his eyes like it was obvious as he moved up to squeeze experimentally at your sides. 

"You may be the actress of the family; but I'm the only drama queen thank you very much. You're not going anywhere till I'm done with you!!" 

He cooed with a giggle of his own. 

"It's good to know anytime I'm in a ler mood I'll always have a cute little lee to wreck to oblivion."

"You always go red so easily…"

Diego's fond voice could be heard above you and you moved your eyes up a bit to see him crouching above your head as he traced feather light patterns into your underarms with his free hand as he held your hands down with the other. 

"To think you hid this from us for so long. Tsk tsk. Now we've got so much time to make up on...at least an hour a day."

Your eyes widened at that.

"N-No whahahay! I'd dhihihie!!"

He pretended to think before he smirked and traded out his hand for his knees letting both hands scribble into your exposed underarms. 

"Fine. A half hour a day then. Minimum. Final offer. Better hurry it's going fast...20 more seconds and it goes for 45 minutes…"

At his threat you cracked, reluctantly. 

"Okay okhahahay!! 30 minutes!" 

He smirked in satisfaction and his eyes lit up at the way you squealed when his fingertip accidentally brushed over your ear, focusing his attention there with manic glee. 

"Well now I know why you were always running away every time tickles came up." 

Vanya's sweet voice greeted you and you looked to your right to see her kneeling, Allison doing the same at your left. 

"You'd always run off, even when we were kids. I always thought it was too painful for you and it was probably that too but it also must've made you too shy to stand it."

She noticed your cute little pout at her vocalizing the word and her eyes glittered as she began ever so gently dancing her nails over your sides and ribs, Allison quickly mirroring her, though she didn't directly say anything to voice her approval; her actions spoke much louder anyway and you were sure you'd talk later. She wasn't as big on voicing her intimate feelings unless alone with the other person. Vanya had always been the merciful type and kept her knowledge to herself instead of tormenting you with it. 

And speaking of merciful…

You barely mustered a weak glare through your laughter and giggles as Five took Klaus' place straddling your waist, Luther easily holding your legs still with a single hand and scratching tentatively at your feet, clearly scared of hurting you while Klaus moved to your knees. 

Five's face screamed I told you so but you still managed to flip him off and stick your tongue out at him which made his eyebrows rise to his hairline before he made a show of rolling up his sleeves. 

"Aww you wanna be a little brat do you? After helping you confess your little secret and be accepted? Fine. But just consider I've y'know...done actual tickle torture to people. And gotten the info I wanted every time, might I add. So maybe think twice next time. Unfortunately… you've already sealed you fate for this session but hey; there's always tomorrow's thanks to Diego right?" 

And then you were screaming in laughter as he dug right into your hips, nailing every ticklish nerve possible and sending your body alight at the sensations combined from everyone. 

And eventually of course they pulled away at a stern look from Allison even as Diego patted you on the back and said he'd add the 15 minutes of time to tomorrow for you. 

It looked like you would be getting 45 minutes after all and as you were smothered in affection from your adoring siblings, each who loved and showed that love in different ways...you had to say you didn't mind nearly as much as you pretended to. 

[maatryoshkaa]

young god | chapter 7

chapters: | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11| 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | epilogue |

word count: 5.5k

warnings: mentions of mental disorders, foul language, graphic descriptions of violence, mentions of alcohol

description: from jisung’s psychoanalysis to the crime investigation, nothing seems to be adding up. jisung and hyunjin have an unpleasant first encounter, and a conversation with hyunjin’s grandmother leaves you with more questions than answers. hwang hyunjin wanders the streets like a ghost, and the police are hot on jisung’s trail.

watch the trailer here!

07| seeing ghosts

You unlocked the door to your apartment and stepped in, the space as dark and cool as a tomb. 

You made a beeline for your room and chucked your bag onto the desk, rummaging through your closet for a comfortable hoodie. With a relieved sigh, you flicked on your table lamp and let the warm glow soften the darkness. The sun had gone down during your walk home, the busy sounds of the city hushed by the chirping of crickets and the rustle of the evening breeze. Jisung had held your hand the whole time -- two or three of his fingers gently hooked around yours and lightly swinging back and forth as you walked.

He had waved you goodbye from the stairwell -- heart-shaped smile and all -- but even as you propped open your laptop and shuffled through your notes, the feeling of his fingers lingered on your skin. You felt the blood rush to your face as Jisung’s voice -- soft and achingly vulnerable -- echoed in your ears.

Promise...you’ll never leave me?

You slammed your notebook down with unnecessary force, violently shaking your head as if trying to fling the thoughts away. Damn it, y/n. Focus! The notes you had scribbled looked as if they were falling off the lines of the paper. With a deep breath and a light slap to your own cheek, you began typing them up.

Patient: Han Jisung

Age: 20

Memories and short bits of dialogue flashed in your mind as you read over the papers. 

Session One. 

Patient has undergone mandatory psychological evaluations in the past, in educational institutions. 

Mentions racing thoughts, rapid heartbeat, and possibly palpitations when in the presence of the therapist. **(May simply be conversational and therefore unreliable). 

Suffering from nightmares as of late; sleep problems. Appears uneasy when speaking about said problems. 

End of session.

You frowned. Straightforward enough. Slightly strange, if read out of context -- but nothing that stuck out in particular. Biting your lip and shrugging, you flipped to the notes from today.

Session Two.

Questions were focused on family and childhood. Patient looked 

Your fingers stalled on the keyboard, Jisung’s expression from earlier flooding your memory. How his eyes had widened like a deer in headlights’ when you’d asked about his family. And -- had you been imagining it? -- they way his voice had wavered when he finally answered. Frowning, you shook your head -- no, no. You were probably just overanalyzing things, right? 

Still, you found yourself typing out the one detail that had always been nagging at the back of your mind --

Patient looks upset at any mentions of family and childhood

At this, you hesitated again. You had barely known the boy for two weeks. There were things that Jisung wasn’t telling you about his childhood, that was for sure -- but wasn’t it normal not to know everything about each other yet? And it’s not like Jisung comes from a broken family or something, you thought. After all, he did say that his mother loved --

You froze.

Slowly, as if like a ghost was whispering in your ear, you felt an icy cold chill trickle down your spine, Jisung’s hollow voice echoing in your mind.

“My mother...like I said, she loved unconditionally. Patient, nurturing, kind...everything, well, you could ever want from a mother.”

Loved?

Past tense?

Your hand shot for your notebook and you practically ripped through the pages, looking for any other quotes you had written down.

“I don’t think my family was like everyone else’s.”

“My mother’s eyes were always so...loving and caring.”

Your eyes widened, a horrible sinking feeling in your gut.

“It sounds like your mother loves you a lot, then, huh? That’s so cute.”

“Y-yeah, she did.”

“Your father?”

“I wasn’t close with him. He was never...never around, so…”

What the hell had happened to Jisung’s parents? 

You barely suppressed the urge to bang your head against the table. Am I stupid? How had you not noticed what he’d been saying? What else had you glazed over and swept to the back of your mind?

You reached into your bag and pulled out your textbook, mumbling under your breath as you scanned the glossary. Mood swings. Nightmares. Anxiety. You’d read about this combination of symptoms before, hadn’t you? Sure enough, your fingers landed on the page you had been searching for.

POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER

The words glared coldly back at you as you read aloud, “Patients who suffer from PTSD are those who have experienced or witnessed a traumatic event in the past. Any mentions or reminders of this event can trigger the patient and send them into a distressed state. Symptoms include…” you felt a lump in your throat and swallowed thickly. “Nightmares, inability to concentrate, and an exaggerated startle response at any mention of the traumatic event.”

Your thoughts immediately wandered to Jisung’s sudden flashes between moods -- his bright, blinding smiles, easily swept away by the cold, stormy look in his eyes. How he sometimes seemed so far away, expression glazed and unfocused. And now, with what he had mentioned about his family…

Jotting this down with an increasingly uneasy feeling in your gut, you continued flipping through the textbook, skimming through familiar case studies and theories. Words leapt out at you from the pages and made your stomach turn: Abusive childhood. Case study: Jeffrey Dahmer. Psychopathy. Case study: Ted Bundy. 

You held your head, groaning, and slammed the textbook shut. Were you really looking at serial killer cases to compare your boyfriend with right now? If Jisung could see you, he’d probably think you were being intrusive and paranoid -- trying to diagnose someone just because a couple of symptoms matched up. You’d been lectured in class over and over again that it wasn’t your job to speculate and form baseless assumptions -- rather, that was exactly what made an irrational therapist, but...it almost felt like you were trapped neck-deep in quicksand. The more you tried to stop thinking about the secrets Han Jisung seemed to be hiding behind his dark eyes, the deeper you found yourself sinking.

It was nearly midnight by the time you finished the outline of your report, cicadas languidly chirping outside your window as you leaned back in your chair and yawned. In the end, you had included a bit of everything -- from the most harmless theories to the darkest case studies. Skimming over your notes warily, you shut your laptop and rolled into bed, completely drained. Speculations. That’s all they were -- it couldn’t hurt to write down all the possibilities, right? 

You shook your head before finally drifting off to sleep, a relaxed smile on your face.

What were the chances that Jisung was hiding anything serious, anyways?

────────

Bang Chan threw another shot of espresso down his throat, not tearing his eyes from his papers. His fingers were vibrating slightly from the amount of caffeine coursing through his veins, and he swore he could feel his heartbeat all the way to his toes -- but frankly, he couldn’t care less.

He’d received the crime scene files an hour earlier -- sketches, photographs, coroner’s report, witness statements. He’d spent the better part of the night arranging and rearranging them like a madman doing a Sudoku puzzle. Everything was fanned out now, his desk looking like a filing cabinet had exploded all over it. Cold cases, his own theories, even research he’d done on the side…

And yet not a single damn thing was adding up.

Every lead Chan had gotten had steered him into nothing but dead ends. He’d never seen anything like it -- the same type of killings, occurring within the walls of what was supposed to be the safest school in the country. They had occurred at irregular intervals at first -- a handful in one month, followed by a four month period of uneasy quiet before the killer had struck again. He could count the cases off of his fingers by now; Chan had read them so many times, raking through the files for even the slightest of clues.

First, it had been an arson in one of the health sciences laboratories -- one male student pronounced dead at the scene, ghastly chemical burns having melted away most of his facial features.

Then there was the body found hanging from the rooftop of one of the dorms, skull practically crushed from blunt force trauma.

The list went on and on, small details linking what had otherwise seemed like a spattering of anonymous murders. The killer was a pyromaniac, for sure -- more than half of the deaths were fire-related -- and might as well have been related to the Hulk or something, because the rest of the victims had been killed -- seemingly -- by bare hands.

Even Minho seemed reluctant to answer his questions, and Chan couldn’t blame him -- the sheer lack of evidence found at each crime scene was embarrassing. He could hear the coroner’s exasperated voice in his head:

“No fingerprints -- the killer probably wore gloves. No murder weapon, so no DNA to sample off of, either. Heck, there isn’t even that much blood spattering to analyze, Detective.”

That ruled out the usual causes of murders taking place in Miroh Heights -- drunkards who took a bar fight too far, crimes of passion, domestic violence. No, Chan shook his head, his brain feeling like mush slopping around in his skull and making him wince. They were dealing with someone much, much more complex.

Chan had a fistful of blond hair in one hand and a cup of nearly-empty coffee in the other. What was this killer’s M.O.? Serial killers almost always had a motive, and their victims usually had some things in common. Chan flipped through the victims’ profiles, gears in his head beginning to turn again despite his drooping eyes.

Na Jangmin, Victim #1. Cause of death: Smoke inhalation and respiratory burns. Chan remembered interviewing his classmates, and being surprised at how indifferent they had been about the supposed tragedy.

“He never saw us as his classmates, you know. He’d pick on the first-years like fresh meat. They say half of the new med students dropped out because of him.”

Interesting. He flipped to the next file, tapping his pen against his lip.

Park Beomsoo, Victim #2. Cause of death: cervical fracture and asphyxiation from hanging. Found nearly decapitated and swinging from the rooftop balcony of a dorm building. What had been interesting about this case, however, was the sheer amount of date rape drugs found in the man’s system during the autopsy.

“Rohypnol, mostly,” Minho had informed him. “Along with traces of GHB -- enough to cause brain damage for life. The man was likely already knocked out for good by the time he was hanged.”

This had been baffling until Chan had investigated further, and found out about the man’s reputation.

“He’d slip pills into girls’ drinks at the club,” one of his friends had told Chan, “and was proud of it, too. All he’d brag about was how many half-conscious girls he’s taken advantage of.”

Chan exhaled with a low whistle. That couldn’t be a coincidence -- the killer had to have known about Park’s disgusting habits. So the victims did have something in common -- although it wasn’t like any case he’d ever seen before.

None of the victims had been, per se, good people. They were, interestingly -- and revoltingly -- enough, monsters of another kind. They were people who wouldn’t be missed, simply because they were hated so much already.

Huh. A killer targeting killers. Interesting. But how? And why? Did the killer have some sort of fucked-up sense of justice?

He tapped his fingers anxiously. All his hopes lay on the evidence they had collected from the Yellow Wood attacks -- but the crime lab had yet to hand it over to his team. He grimaced at the memory of the body, whose head had caved in completely and rendered the victim practically unrecognisable. How could there not be a single trace of incriminating DNA from something so...brutal? And then there was Yang Jeongin, who, as far as he knew, was still in critical condition at the hospital. If only he would wake up, maybe Chan would finally get a lead…

Chan didn’t even notice the sun beginning to rise outside of his window until the first ray of morning light pricked at his eyes, making him blink in disoriented confusion. His burning pupils flickered to the clock. 6:25 A.M. Damn it.

He kicked his chair back and threw on a wrinkled suit jacket, stuffing all his notes into his briefcase before promptly stepping out of his office. Work never ended for Detective Bang.

Chan glimpsed his reflection in the shop windows as he made his way back onto Miroh Heights’ campus, running his hands through his hair in a feeble attempt to tame his bedhead (was it even a bedhead if he hadn’t touched a bed in 48 hours?). His eyes caught the familiar storefront of Glow Cafe and he immediately steered himself towards it. Wouldn’t hurt to grab himself a fresh cup of coffee, and maybe he could look at the crime scene again with fresh eyes.

The barista -- Hyunjin, was it? -- was scrawling something on the chalkboard sign propped outside, stumbling to his feet and brushing the chalk dust off his hands when he saw Chan approaching.

“All right, Hyunjin?”

Hyunjin gave a small smile that looked more like a grimace, his tired eyes wandering behind Chan. The detective didn’t have to turn to know he was staring at the spot Jeongin had been found -- the barista looked like he was seeing ghosts. Chan took a deep breath before plastering a reassuring smile on his face, throwing an arm around the younger boy’s hunched shoulders and steering him into his cafe.

“I’m gonna need you to make me a cold drip, kid, because I feel like dea--” he caught himself, clearing his throat awkwardly. No death. No death. “Like shit. I’m feeling like shit.”

But Hyunjin didn’t even seem to hear him, wordlessly making his way behind the counter and starting the coffee machine.

Chan watched him and sighed, pulling out a chair and collapsing over a table. Seconds later, the diner door swung open, the windchimes ringing brightly as two familiar faces walked in.

“Good morning, Chan. How’s--bloody hell, you look like death.” Woojin’s eyebrows shot up when he joined Chan at the table, looking the sleep-deprived detective up and down. Behind him was Han Jisung, backpack slung over his shoulder.

Chan grimaced and checked his reflection in one of the empty glasses. Sure enough, his eyes were puffy and ringed with layer upon layer of dark circles, and his mop of dandelion hair was at the point of no return. “To hell with it. What brings you two here this early in the morning?”

Jisung and Woojin exchanged a look before Jisung spoke up, grinning his usual sheepish grin. “I set my alarm way too early and couldn’t fall back asleep, so I went out for a morning walk. We bumped into each other, and were both in need of some coffee.”

Woojin nodded, pulling out a chair for the younger student. “I take it you’re here for the same reason, Detective?”

Chan grinned. “Guilty as charged, Captain. How--”

A sudden crash rang through the empty cafe, cutting him off. All three heads snapped up to see Hyunjin standing over a broken pot of coffee, glass shards splaying all over the floor tiles and the dark, bitter liquid seeping into the crevices. 

Chan jumped to his feet, holding his hands out. “Hey, you okay? Don’t move, I’ll get a mop. Uh, where do you keep your mops?” The detective’s voice trailed off when his eyes landed on Hyunjin’s face. The barista’s hands were still frozen in place, but his eyes were livid and staring straight at Han Jisung.

“Why the hell are you here?” Hyunjin was speaking through gritted teeth.

Jisung blinked. “Is...is it too early? Sorry, dude, I can leave if--”

“Why are you always interfering with the investigation? You were at the crime scene for no particular reason, and now you’re here again.” Hyunjin’s voice was getting louder and louder. “It’s pretty damn suspicious if you ask me--”

“You seem to be more of an interference than me,” Jisung replied, standing up abruptly. All childlike humour had vanished from his expression. “Rushing the investigation, hanging around the crime scenes despite not having an ounce of experience.”

“My friend is in the hospital, and nobody fucking knows why--”

“Jisung!”

All four men turned towards the direction of the voice, and saw you waving cheerfully through the window. Unbeknownst to the situation, you pushed open the glass doors and ran up to a bewildered Jisung, reaching up to ruffle his hair. “What brings you here?” You turned to Hyunjin. “Hey, ‘jinnie, I just thought I’d come early today, since I’ve been arriving late for the last couple of shifts. You know Jisung? He’s the blind date!”

You smiled at Chan and Woojin, who both nodded back but seemed at a loss for words, their gazes flickering between the two boys and you. Hyunjin’s face of confused shock mirrored Jisung’s, words finally spilling out of both boys’ mouths at the exact same time.

“This is your boyfriend?” “This is your friend?”

You blinked, taken aback at their raised voices. “I--yes? B-but--”

Hyunjin narrowed his eyes at Jisung. “So you’re the one y/n’s been talking nonstop about? Is this a joke?”

Your stared at him. “Hyunjin!” Your eyes fell on the shattered coffeepot at his feet and you yelped. “Holy frick, what happened? Hold on, I’ll get th--”

You were interrupted by Jisung shoving his chair aside with a loud bang. His expression wasn’t exactly angry, but you could see his fists and jaw were clenched so tightly they were shaking violently. “Fine. I’ll get going, then.” He looked to you, sighing. “See you later.”

You opened your mouth to reply, but Hyunjin cut you off. “No, you won’t.” 

Giving Hyunjin one last long, wordless look, Jisung strode out of Glow Cafe.

When he had gone, you turned on Hyunjin, fuming. “Hwang Hyunjin, what the fuck--”

“Do you really have to date him? Him?” Hyunjin threw his hands up in exasperation.

“Why on earth are you so worked up about who I date?” 

“The guy’s suspicious as hell, y/n! I have a bad feeling about him. And I don’t fucking like it.”

You sighed, reaching behind the counter for a dustpan and rag. Woojin took them from your hands and handed the rag to Chan to clean the spill, and you turned back towards Hyunjin. “Look, I know you’ve been shaken up lately. We’re all on edge, Hyunjin. Lashing out isn’t going to help.” You rubbed his back gently, and, despite his expression softening slightly, his brow remained furrowed. Exhaling slowly, you tried to change the subject. “Is your grandma awake? We should make sure she takes her medicine.”

After making Chan and Woojin a new pot of coffee, you and Hyunjin headed upstairs to the studio apartment where him and his grandmother lived. Here, the walls were made of old red brick, foggy panelled windows letting in weak strains of sunlight. Still, Hyunjin insisted it was cozy, the wooden frame bed his legs were too long for shoved against the windows, his architecture sketches and designs hanging from the walls. Down the hallway was his grandmother’s room, which Hyunjin paid much more attention to than his own -- keeping it as clean and comfortable as possible.

Hyunjin’s parents lived and worked abroad, leaving Hyunjin in the custody of his grandparents. The moment he’d gotten into Miroh Heights, he’d moved into the shop his grandmother had started, and had eventually also taken up the responsibility of storeowner once her dementia had worsened and his grandfather had passed away. Nowadays, she seldom got out of bed, Hyunjin being the only one taking care of her and keeping her company.

When you entered her room, Grandma Hwang was sitting up in bed, a newspaper in her hands. Upon closer inspection, you saw that it was the morning paper from two days ago: MURDER AT MIROH HEIGHTS, with the burnt-down flat on the cover.

Hyunjin quickly pulled the newspaper from her hands, tucking it away under his arm. “Don’t let her read the newspaper,” you remembered him telling you once, “I don’t want it to upset her. I don’t know why, but she’s started saying these strange things ever since the murders began. I don’t want her dementia to get worse.”

“Good morning, Grandma Hwang,” you smiled at her, patting her hand. She turned to you, looking as if she were staring straight through you. Hyunjin reached into her bedside cabinet for her medications. “Have you taken your medicine today?”

Slowly, the old woman shook her head, her eyes landing on the newspaper under Hyunjin’s arm. “Familiar…”

You frowned. “What’s familiar?”

She lifted a crooked finger, pointing straight at the burnt-down flat. “The old Han house...from years ago. So familiar. So...so long ago…”

Hyunjin and you exchanged a look. Are you sure she’s just rambling? You mouthed at Hyunjin, who nodded, but his expression was unsure. I’m gonna get her some water, he mouthed back, and disappeared from the room.

A few moments of silence passed as you watched the old woman, the soft morning glow smoothing out her wrinkles. Not being able to suppress your burning curiosity, you blurted, “Why--why is it so familiar?”

Her brow was furrowed in deep concentration but her eyes were blank slates, hands gesticulating meaninglessly. “Pastries...the pastries, need to deliver the pastries to all the houses. All the houses except the Hans’--” she shook her head wildly now, voice trembling. “No, no, not the Han house!”

You could feel your heart leap to your throat, a cold sweat beginning to form on the inside of your palms. Even if she was just rambling, like Hyunjin claimed, it made you extremely uneasy. “Why not the Han house?” You pressed, your own voice quavering slightly.

“Nowhere to go, my dear, nowhere, nowhere, went up in flames--” she gasped, hands clutching her face as she babbled. “So much burning, Lord help me...and...and everyone...burned to ashes...except for that tiny, little boy. Crawlin’ out--”

You heard Hyunjin clear his throat from the doorway, and the old woman’s voice faltered. He was holding a tall glass of water in one hand and shot you a look as he reached for his grandmother’s box of medications. You turned back, hoping she would continue, but her eyes were already glazed over with the fog of forgetfulness. 

As she swallowed her medicine, you turned to Hyunjin. “She was talking about...about delivering pastries.”

“Mm. Back in the day, when she still used to run the store, we did pastry deliveries,” Hyunjin explained, stroking his grandmother’s hand absently as she finished the glass of water. “She used to go door to door, around the neighbourhood, handing out baskets of them.”

You nodded slowly. “Was...was there ever a fire in Miroh Heights? A really big one, like -- like a house burning down.”

Hyunjin gave you a weird look. “A fire? The deliveries stopped around 13 years ago. I wasn’t there, you know. Whatever she told you, don’t listen to her. Her memories get all mixed up.” He saw your expression and frowned. “What? Did she say something weird?”

You bit your lip, but shook your head. “No. Nothing at all.”

────────

Jisung tore down the darkening backstreets, not knowing where he was going and feeling like the ground beneath him was spinning wildly out of control. Fucking hell. He had barely sat through his classes without losing it, the paranoia eating him from the inside out like a parasite. The air was cool and damp, the sky crammed with grey storm clouds knitting together ominously.

They didn’t suspect him, right? There was no way they knew it was him.

Imagine his barely concealed panic when he’d run into police captain Kim Woojin first thing in the morning. They’d talked about his major, the weather, everything but the investigation. And Chan -- the detective had greeted him just like he always had.

It was just that damn Hwang Hyunjin.

“You were at the crime scene for no particular reason...it’s pretty damn suspicious if you ask me.”

Bloody hell.

No, no, no. He couldn’t let them find out. Everyone knew Hwang Hyunjin had been showing the early signs of post-traumatic stress disorder from finding the delivery boy half-dead in a pool of blood. There was no way they’d take him seriously. 

He began limping as he wove through the alleyways, the foot he’d dropped the rock on still throbbing from the impact. He turned a corner briskly -- and slammed headfirst into a stout middle-aged man.

“I’m sor--”

“Look where you’re fucking going, punk,” the man screamed, the foul stench of liquor hitting Jisung’s nostrils and making him stumble backwards. The man was clearly homeless, judging from the state of his clothes and his matted hair. He must have wandered onto campus while the gates were still open. His milky eyes were squinty and he was swaying, an empty beer bottle swinging precariously in one hand.

Jisung lunged forward, ripping the bottle from his hands, and in one savage motion broke it over the man’s nose. The man howled in pain and Jisung raised the jagged glass again, ready to plunge it straight through the man’s open mouth -- he knew this motion well, he’d done it so many times he’d lost count--

But when he stared into the man’s bleeding eyes again, he saw a flash of your face. And he felt his entire body seize up, his arm stopping dead in its tracks.

You smiling at something he’d said. The way you’d hide your face behind your notebook when you were flustered. The smell of your hair when you hugged him tightly. The warm, familiar feeling of your skin brushing his when you ran your fingers through his hair--

The broken bottle slipped from Jisung’s hands, crashing onto the cobblestones. The man was whimpering, nose still spurting bright red blood. Jisung’s gaze flickered from one of his milky pupils to the other. Blind. He let go of the man’s tattered shirt collar, breathing hard as he turned around and did the only thing he seemed to know how to do.

Jisung ran.

Above him, the sky rumbled with deafening thunder before the clouds split open, sheets of rain pouring down on him as he stumbled down the streets. Blood was welling in his hands, crimson and sticky, and he wasn’t even sure whose blood it was anymore. All Jisung knew was that he needed to find you. He needed you by his side, to tell him it was okay, to say you would listen. To make him feel sane again.

He made it onto the main road and spotted a figure in the distance. Squinting through the rain, Jisung made out the shape of a taller man stumbling towards him. Before he could muster up the energy to turn away, the man had already reached him, hands shooting out to grab Jisung’s shoulders in a vicelike grip. Blood roaring in his ears, heart leaping to his throat, Jisung forced himself to look up.

It was Hwang Hyunjin.

Jisung immediately shoved his blood-soaked hands into his pockets, forcing himself not to yell when shards of broken glass dug and sliced into his palms. His mind was racing, running over a million possible things he could say. But Hyunjin didn’t even look down -- his gaze stayed on Jisung’s face, eyes glassy but narrowed.

Jisung realised with a start that the barista had been drinking. 

Hyunjin’s face was twisted into an expression of raw, tormented grief -- the kind of sadness that could only be felt when one was heavily intoxicated. “I s-see him ev’ry time I close m-my eyes,” he suddenly choked out, and Jisung didn’t have to ask to know he was talking about Jeongin. “His c-cold hands, the pool of b-blood, the poor kid--”

Jisung tried to wrench himself from Hyunjin’s grasp, but the barista didn’t budge. This was bad. He had to get out, had to get away, before Hyunjin sobered up and recognized him--

As if he could hear Jisung’s thoughts, Hyunjin’s grip on him tightened, the barista’s voice barely a whisper. “Who are you, Han Jisung? What are you hiding?”

Jisung felt his heart stop. “There’s nothing--I’m not hiding anything!” He stammered, feeling Hyunjin’s dark gaze bore into his own. The blood on his hands were beginning to seep through his pants, and it took all of his willpower not to cry out in pain. There was blood on Jisung’s face, too; he could taste it trickling into his mouth with the rainwater, but he could only hope it was too dark -- and that Hyunjin was too far gone -- to see.

Just as abruptly as he had grabbed Jisung, Hyunjin let go of his shoulders, looking like he was either about to cry or throw up. The taller boy pushed past Jisung, shambling down the street and disappearing into the thick veils of rain. Jisung watched him go, a sick, hollow feeling in his gut.

Above him, the rain began to fall harder.

────────

You woke with a start to a crack of thunder, eyes snapping open and your chest heaving. Your clothes were soaked through with a cold sweat. You’d had a nightmare after going to bed early, but any recollection of it was already beginning to fade away.

There had been a killer in your dream, covered in hot, crimson blood and surrounded by endless fire. Screams and children wailing echoed in your ears, but no matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t remember the killer’s face.

On your bedside table, your phone buzzed, sending your heartbeat into overdrive. Calm down. It was a dream -- just a dream. Shaking, you reached for your phone, reading the notification that had startled you. And just like that, you blood ran cold again.

DANGER

ACTIVE SERIAL KILLER AT LARGE

10:44 P.M. AN ATTACK HAS OCCURRED ON CAMPUS. POLICE BELIEVE THE PRIME SUSPECT IS THE PERPETRATOR OF THE MIROH HEIGHTS MURDERS. THE KILLER IS STILL ON CAMPUS.

MIROH HEIGHTS IS ENTERING LOCKDOWN.

REPORT ANY SUSPICIOUS PERSONS TO MHPD IMMEDIATELY. 

RESIDENTS STAY INDOORS.

You nearly dropped your phone, fumbling with it to check the time. 10:46 P.M. This was real. This was happening. Bits of your nightmare came back to you in hot flashes. A sudden burst of lightning and a rumble of thunder sent you burrowing underneath the covers, terrified tears beginning to form in your eyes. Pulling the comforter close, you pressed the Phone app and called the first person you could think of.

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

Be--

“Hello?”

You let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding as soon as Jisung’s familiar voice filled your ears. “I-I’m sorry,” you gasped, voice trembling uncontrollably, “did I wake you?” 

There was a long pause before Jisung finally answered. “No, of course not. Is everything alright?”

“I--I’m scared,” you mumbled, chewing on your lip. The sound of Jisung’s voice, and even his breathing, was already beginning to calm you down. “Did you -- did you get the alert too? There’s a s-serial killer on campus right now.”

Jisung’s legs had threatened to give way the moment he heard your voice, pressing his phone to his ear like a lifeline. Despite your voice sounding small and shaky, he felt his erratic heartbeat beginning to steady. He quickly skimmed over the lockdown notification, cursing underneath his breath. Shit. Breathing hard away from the receiver, he tried to sound as calm as possible when he brought it back towards his mouth. “Yeah, I just got it.”

Your ears strained, and you frowned -- you swore you could hear something that sounded like heavy rain coming from the other end of the line. “Are you...outside right now? Get home as soon as possible--”

“I’m home,” Jisung interrupted you, a small smile in his voice. “Bad service, yeah -- a lot of static. Probably the storm outside.” The lie tasted bittersweet on his tongue. His hair was drenched in water, dripping onto his face as he spoke. Even through the tinny phone, he felt a rush of warmth fill his hollow chest, the corners of his parched lips tugging upwards. He could almost see you curled up in blankets in your bed, hiding from the storm outside. 

No, he corrected himself with a pang, you weren’t hiding from the storm.

You were hiding from him.

Jisung unclenched his fists, broken glass falling from his palms and leaving half-moon shaped cuts in his skin. You’d called him the moment you felt scared. You had trusted him. Jisung felt the water droplets sting at his wounds, his hand feeling as though it were burning away. 

Who am I?

Was he the boy you loved, the one who made you laugh, the one who made you feel safe?

Or was he the depraved serial killer that sent everyone he loved running?

You heard Jisung clear his throat on the other line. “Listen, don’t be scared, okay? The killer, he -- he won’t hurt you.”

You laughed, just the sound making Jisung’s breath catch in his throat. “How do you know?”

Jisung tilted his head back, face to the sky, feeling the torrents of rain wash away the tears that had begun to well up in his eyes. With the hands of a wanted murderer, covered in blood that wasn’t his own, he pressed the receiver closer to his mouth, lips curling into a sad smile.

“I just do.”

[limenysnocket]

In The Dirt. . . Pt. I

Summary: Welccome to the life of a groupie. Booze, sex, drugs and violence follows you wherever you go, and wherever you go is with the band you're following. The Wilderpeople. You expected to be tossed around the group, but one landed his official dominance over you and made you his and no one else's.

Warnings: Immediate smut, swearing, smoking

Request: A bunch of people, but to name one-- @honorarytenenbaum

A/N: I'm actually quite excited to write this one... Don't be alarmed. There is a LOT of fucking in this series. Enjoy.

○●■○●■○●■○●■○

Your teeth clenched and you wiggled your hips, pushing his cock deeper into your soaked walls. He pushed against that one tender spot now. Your moans get louder.

"Told you, if you keep moving, it's only going to get worse~," Taika hummed and chuckled deeply, adjusting himself, then continuing to jot down whatever lyrics came to mind, just from the feeling of your tight pussy around him.

"Well, are you almost done? It's been almost an hour, Tai," you groan, burying your face into the crook of his neck.

"Mm... maybe. Got a few more lyrics," He hummed, resting his free hand on your ass, beneath the shirt he let you borrow with his band logo on the front.

"Taika, I need you to fuck me sooner or later~," you begged and moaned softly, adjusting despite what he says.

"I'm sorry. Who's Taika?" He said, tapping the end of his pen against the paper again, humming. You know exactly what he wants you to call him, and he's made you call him it since the first time he pinned you to a wall, got you on your back, spread your legs and pummeled you until your insides were sore.

"Excuse me," You said quietly, the sarcasm hissing on the tip of your tongue. "I meant, daddy~."

The sound of your sultry tone must have driven him haywire, because he quickly shot you a look, bit his lip and scribbled down lyrics so fast, his handwriting turned to chicken scratch real quick. He threw down his notepad and pen, over on his nightstand, then his hand shot to your hips.

"You're a real fucking piece of work, you know that?" He whispered, his eyes glancing down to look at his cock sheathed in your walls, just beneath the t-shirt.

"Well, if that's a bad thing, it's your fault for making me this way," You teased him without a second thought, but you should have kept quiet, because, before you knew it, he was harshly bouncing you up and down, fucking the life out of you.

The room filled with moans of his name, nickname or complete lust driven gibberish. The sound of skin on skin was obvious and it echoed along the walls, like it always did in any hotel room you stayed in with him.

He was in the middle of giving you a rough, deep hickey to replace the old ones, which were fading out and healing with a disgusting yellow tint, when the bedside phone started to yell at the two of you. You whined and Taika put a finger to his lips while he reached for the phone. "Keep going~. I'll make this quick~," He smirked, placing his now free hand on the back of your head and pushing your face into his shoulder to muffle the delicious moans escaping your mouth.

He picked up the phone, then clicked it on speaker, before returning his hands to your hips, just so he could make your hips go at a slower pace so the squeaks of the bed wouldn't blow your cover. The risk actually turned you on.

"What?" Taika huffed to the phone while staring into your eyes and moving you ever so slowly along his glistening cock.

"Sir, your manager is here to see you. He requests that you come to the lobby promptly and immediately," A snobby, male, hotel employee said through the phone. It almost made you want to snort in laughter. Yeah, good luck getting Taika to go anywhere when he's in the middle of a good fuck.

"How about no," Taika snorted back rudely and smirked, your body was trembling beneath his hands and it was driving him half crazy to not just flip you over and start going ham on your soaked cunt.

"Sir, I'm afraid that--," the employee started, but Taika interrupted them again, by grabbing the phone, saying a loud and almost cheery, "Aaaand we're done," then hanging up the phone.

You were still going at the slow pace he ordered you to go at, during the call, but, as it turns out, just that speed had ticked him off enough. You promptly found yourself on your belly, face pressed against the warm sheets and ass up in the air, like a stretching dog. A pair of hands gripped your asscheeks, then yanked you back to where a hot, hard dick filled you up to the brim. You moaned again, and that fueled the fire. Taika wasted no time on thrusting into you and pounding you until you were weak.

Things were just starting to get interesting, but his phone started to buzz on the nightstand. The screen lit up and partially illuminated the room with a white glow. Taika let out a snarl and reached over to pick it up, his pace unwavering.

"What now?" He nearly spat on his phone. His aggressiveness leaked into his thrusts and made you go wild. You would have been screaming for him, if you didn't have your face buried in the sheets.

"Tai food! There you are!" You heard the sound of Taika's upkept agent over the phone and you could almost feel Taika's cringe when he called him 'Tai food.' Taika hated that name with a burning, undying passion. The only person who he lets call him 'Tai' is you. "Look, man, I seriously need you to come down to the lobby right now. We have some serious business to discuss."

"What's wrong with you coming up here?" Taika grunted, continuing to thrust in and out of you like a madman.

"Do you know how much of a mad house it is with all of you in a room at once? I once caught one of you fucking a groupie on the dining table!" His manager complained over the phone, but it made you and Taika snicker through the pleasure.

"I said it to that dickhead worker and I'll say it to you," Taika hissed, his tongue swiping over his teeth once as his thrusts got deeper and slower for a brief moment for the benefit of your pleasure. "I'm not coming down to the lobby."

"Why not? You can't possibly be busy at this time of day!" His manager sighed.

"I'll have you know, that I'm balls deep in my favorite groupie right now and I'm about to make this. Little. Slut--" He paused between each word to give you a rough thrust that slammed the pleasure into your very core and made you scream his name, despite being on the phone, "--cum all over my cock. So, yeah, I am kinda busy actually. And I would like to be left the fuck alone. Buh-bye." Taika took no shit from the complaints he was getting and all the yelling. He simply hung up and tossed his phone down on the bed where it started to buzz consistently, his manager always being the one to call him.

"God, I love this pussy~. Such a tight little pussy~," Taika groaned into your ear almost breathlessly as he fucked away until your walls pulsed around him. He wasn't going to stop until he was satisfied. That's how it always worked, from the very first night. He was a hard man to satisfy, and that's why he always came back to you. He used to have more groupies, but when you came along, they slowly drifted away due to the lack of attention they received and you became his only one. Morning, noon and night, he got you whenever he wanted and took you everywhere. Whereas the other guys who were apart of the band had maybe a whole plethora of fans and about a dozen groupies in their midst, yet it was strange to see the main singer and guitarist, who had thousands of fans across the world, would only have one as his only. There must be something about you, but you just couldn't see it. Not yet, anyway.

He slapped your ass quite a few times and elicited moans from you're precious little mouth, where he had dumped his load so many times and down the throat where it disappeared. "Such a good girl for daddy, aren't you~?" He groaned and another slap marked its place on your ass. "You know, good girls cum for daddy... right now~."

Drool dripped from the corners of your mouth and your eyes rolled back. His delicious six inch continued to press against every sensitive area in you that existed and drove you crazy, to the point where you burst on him. You watched his eyes slide all the way down where his cock was sliding in and out of your hole. Your thighs glistened in the light of the cellphone and your body untensed and quivered. Eventually, you felt his seed paint your walls and start dripping across your folds. His grip on your hips loosened and the two of you were too busy basking in the euphoria of it all to really notice that the phone had stopped buzzing.

Another smack to your ass broke you out of your post-coitus state and you lurched up a little to look back at the man who just made love to you. "Hope that pussy isn't too sore. Might have to go for another ride tonight~," Taika chuckled, this time giving your bum a softer pat, then he plopped down on the bed, right next to you. He never was much of a cuddler after sex, probably because he must have learned early on to never get attached to a groupie.

Funny, because you were already so attached to him, you wouldn't be able to lose him, but, in his perspective, he could easily flick you away like a pesky Junebug and not even have to think twice about it. You didn't like thinking about this much due to the fact that it left a big, fat dent in your heart, when you did. It always ruined the mood for you, so now, you just stuck with whatever came to mind, besides that subject.

You heard the flicker of a lighter and your drowsy eyes looked up to see Taika working on a freshly lit cigarette. Your bum dropped slowly from the air, until you were just laying on your stomach, hugging the pillow as if it were him in your arms just then, and staring up at him, dreamily. The exhaustion was settling in. This was the second fuck of the day, and it was only 2 PM. You couldn't help but wonder if Taika had any more plans for you tonight, or if you were going to spend the night in his room again, or sleep out in the living room in the groupie pileup. Luckily, Taika hasn't made you do that for months and you've had the luxury of sharing a room with him since then, since he claimed that the other groupies were too dirty for his tastes and preferred you stay away from them, as well as the other bandmembers most of the time.

You briefly stirred and grumbled softly as someone knocked on the door. You nuzzled in under the covers and Taika groaned loudly, grabbing a pair of sweatpants off the floor and sliding them on, not caring that he was going commando. His hair was flying, looking like he had blowdried it and never bothered to comb it. It actually didn't look all too bad on him, but then again, there's hardly anything that looks bad on him.

You closed your eyes again as he opened the door and just listened to the conversation.

"Taika! My main man! Pad Tai--" Oh God, it's him.

"Don't call me Pad Tai or Tai food ever again. New ground rules are set and I want that in my contract, otherwise I'm dumping you," Taika put bluntly, leaning against the door to block you away from his manager's prying eyes.

His manager laughed for awhile, thinking it was a joke until he saw Taika's serious expression. You heard him clear his throat and continue on. "I think I got you a little side gig this week, for you and the boys," his manager went on, "you might like it. I heard it's a great place to pick up chicks."

Taika seemed disinterested and you could tell, just by the silence he expressed oh so well. "Fine," Taika breathed and took a drag from his cigarette. "Where's it at?"

"It's just on the other side of town! Real prestigious joint, I gotta tell ya! You and the boys'll have so much fun, and, hey! Maybe you'll expand you're groupie collection, huh?" You could hear the schmucky grin on his face and you knew he was leaning to try and peak at you, but you also knew Taika was constantly getting in the way.

"I'll think about it," Taika huffed, then slammed the door before the screw could say anything else. You turned over on your back and sat up on your elbows to see him running his hand through his curls and smoking the crap out of his cigarette. Once he saw you looking at him, he seemed to perk up and he walked himself right on over to you. He sat down on your side of the bed, just on the edge and caressed your cheek with the hand that wasn't cradling the cigarette between his fingers.

"Think you'll be able to attend the afterparty with me, babe?" He hummed, using the slang term 'afterparty' that just meant drinking with him on the balcony. You grinned and nodded as he took another drag. He grinned too, then leaned in. He parted his lips and soft smile wafted out like fog over a lake, and as he drew closer, it slipped into your mouth.

You had grown addicted to this, suckling on his nicotine flavored lip and you didn't think this was an addiction worth giving up. You didn't even know if this addiction was good or bad either.

[thewinedarksea]

the hell crossover

ft. arin and little knife vibing. tw: the ink mage, but mild this time. for the anon 💜

“Is he always like this?”

The girl stared blankly up at him, her silver eyes wide and glossy. Arin had been informed that she didn’t have a name. 

“You know.” He gestured vaguely to the chaos of the room and the tall, slender figure in the center of it. “This.”

They’d appeared in a halo of light and thick, choking smoke, boring a hole through several alternate dimensions and straight into the center of Conference Room B. A girl and a man, both magical, both coughing. In the two hours since they’d landed in the Bureau the man had insulted Director Li, Sub-Directors Romano and Fitzgerald, the entire janitorial staff, and the curtains. He’d also set fire to a table he disagreed with the look of and caved in half of the security department’s ceiling when officers had the nerve to try and arrest him for careening his way into a restricted section. 

He’d come to rest in the linguistics department, citing that the magical energy there was optimal for crafting a portal back to his own world. 

Arin had been informed that his name was the Ink Mage, and that not interfering with his work was of the highest priority. He was also a dick. No one had told Arin that; he’d worked it out for himself, right around when the Ink Mage had stolen his desk for “purposes of higher learning that a child like you has no business being around, why are you still here, get out of my way.”

He regarded his lost property mournfully. The outline of today’s work agenda was softly smoking, and his treatise on future tense verbs in Low Seelie had been tossed onto the floor to make room for one of the Ink Mage’s strange machines. Most of his plants had survived the invasion unscathed, but a shower of pale pink blossoms from an upturned hydrangea scattered the ground, and the yellow lady’s slipper orchid was cowering fearfully in its pot. 

“Worse.” 

The girl’s voice was low and colorless, whispering like water on rocks. She’d taken up residence on Nyssa’s desk, her legs dangling off the edge. Beneath a cloud of pale hair her face was expressionless, eyes empty as she watched the Ink Mage pace the length of the room. 

She put him, unexpectedly, in mind of the Unseelie. Arin had seen a procession of nobles once, when he’d accompanied Caym on an errand to the Court. He’d drawn back into the shadows as they approached, afraid they’d catch sight of him and decide he was more interesting as an eyeless corpse than another half-fae. They’d swept past in a river of flowing silks and ringing laughter, and the sight of their cruel, lovely faces still haunted him. There had been nothing human in their leering smiles, only a vast, towering nothingness peering out from the cracks in the masks. 

He felt the same pervasive sense of wrongness when he looked at her, all empty eyes and emptier expressions. Silence, coiled to the snapping point, clung to her like a fine shawl: a bone-deep stillness that promised bloodshed when broken. 

“It can get worse?” He felt a stirring of compassion for the strange girl. The Ink Mage’s hectic energy set his teeth on edge, made him want to burrow his head beneath layers of blankets until quiet returned to his life. If Caym or Tselel had contained half as much capacity for motion he doubted he ever would have bothered falling in love. 

“He’s not throwing things.” The girl tipped her head to one side, pale eyes trailing after the Ink Mage. “Or yelling, which means he’s not upset.” She glanced over at him. “You don’t want to see him when he’s angry.” 

“No, I can’t imagine I would.” 

Another beat of silence fell, tenser this time. For all his motion the Ink Mage worked in near total quiet, the only sound the harsh scrape of his pen as he scribbled runes across the floor and up the walls. Inky loops wrapped the thermostat and climbed the sides of his desk, spilling across the shiny surface in a dark wave. 

Arin squinted at the nearest line, trying to pick out the individual pieces of the twisting spell. The few sigils he could decipher pulsed faintly, meaning slithering just beyond his grasp. Pressure built behind his eyes the longer he stared. 

Across the room the Ink Mage flicked a hand. The runes crumbled to metallic ash, blurring the line into a haze of sharp peaks and sinuous curves once more. A headache pounded its fists against the walls of Arin’s mind at the intoxicating sweep of power. With an effort he ignored it, wrenching his attention from the strange magic. 

“So you’re his…” Arin left the question dangling, unsure of the proper terminology. The girl contemplated it for a moment, as if trying to seek out a hook.

“Apprentice.” A smile so faint as to be nonexistent quirked the edge of her mouth. “Or slave. Whore. Abomination. Depends on who you ask.” 

“I’m asking you.”

The girl blinked up at him and gave a suggestion of a shrug. The unease deepened. 

��Okay. So you’re his...apprentice.” He stumbled a bit over the word. Abomination suited his tongue better, but it was bad form to throw it at someone not half-fae, even if he did have the feeling that she wouldn’t mind. “Do you like it? Learning magic and stuff.” 

The girl tipped her head the other way. Light reflected off the strange silver sheen of her eyes, turning them flat and empty as a mirror. She didn’t answer. 

“No personal questions. Got it.” He picked at his sleeve, searching for a loose thread to distract from the situation.  “I have a friend you might like to meet. Well, not a friend. Ex-boyfriend. Stalker? 

“Anyways, he likes dodging questions too. I think he may be allergic to emotions, actually. Besides arrogance, of course. And anger. Also disgust. You know what, I’m going to revise my statement: he’s allergic to positive emotions. The point is that you should have a conversation with him. I think you’d get along.”  

Arin closed his mouth with a click, cutting off the stream of nervous chatter. More words rose in his throat and he swallowed them with an effort. The silence around the girl gaped, open and hungry, the urge to fill it nearly unbearable. He hadn’t seen quiet so weaponized since he’d walked out of Caym’s life. The urge to lock them in a room together intensified. 

“Girl.” The Ink Mage’s voice cut through the space. A stir of magic rose, dragging unpleasantly across Arin’s skin. It left a residue of blood in his mouth, the taste of copper clinging to his teeth.

The girl slid soundlessly from the desk, picking her way through the fields of ink to hover at the man’s side. Without a word she rolled up her sleeves, baring the battered skin of her forearms. The Ink Mage caught her wrist and began to scribble his writings across her wrist, heedless of the bruises already there. Blood welled in neat lines, dripping in crimson splotches onto the floor. 

Arin straightened, discomfort and anger warring in his chest. He wanted to punch the Ink Mage in the mouth. More, he wanted to call Tselel and have her punch him in mouth. And then maybe a few other times, in more deadly places. 

Don’t interfere, the Director had said. So he wouldn’t. He would be obedient, and walk away, and protect his job. With an effort he pushed down the rage, the clawing darkness that threatened to overtake him. Arin was good at closing his eyes and following orders. 

Besides, for all he knew, every mage in this strange other world wandered around turning their apprentices into living magic sources. 

“I’ll go make you some coffee,” he called. She flicked a look his way, the emptiness shaded with gratitude, another not-there smile touching briefly upon her mouth. “Don’t let him touch my plants.”

“Five sugars,” said the Ink Mage, right before Arin slammed the door. 

Most of the employees had evacuated the building in case the madman made good on his threat to blow it up, and so it was only a few members of the security department that watched Arin gather every offensive gesture he’d learned from years on the street and throw them in the Ink Mage’s direction.

Then he went to make coffee. And swear. Not necessarily in that order.

[404fmdminjung]

creative claims — jamjam

summary: the song provides no catharsis. instead — it’s just finished. warnings: none wc: 1826 (not including lyrics)

she sits in silence, and the world outside becomes a twisted and bellowing dark hole, no. a massacre of comments aimed and set to shatter and puncture wounds into any form of self-preservation that remains. a public figure meant to garner the public distates (and she starts to believe it’s her niche of marketing —  riling up clamor for the repeat of lies she’s been spoonfed. now, she’s choking on the aftermath.

they say that if you tell yourself you stop caring, you will. yet, she’s been this broken record player, a constant iteriation of ‘i don’t cares’ and ‘fuck yous’. reality hits: the saying was a blatant lie, and she’d been a hapless fool for trying to pretend in the decadent lies laced in honey — sweet to taste, the break of everything coming at all at once. tonight, she wields together what she learns to accept that perhaps, maybe.. she’d known all along and it was merely the journey lingering that kept her clinging on for so long.

first comes the opening of her first defense mechanism —  a near mockery of a laugh. laughter that breaches humor for each time she’s fallen through the cracks of his pretty smile, carved out. each whisper underneath tattered sheets, and the question of what rests across the horizon of their future. each lie, she swallowed whole — no repercussions nor standards that lead her inside the depth of doubt. instead, she believed each whole whole heartedly, now — she just feels like a fool.

all’s fair in love and war — no strings attached, no rules outlined and set in stone. no rules, yet she ends up breaking all the in-betweens.

a spectrum of black and white, hot and cold. no lukewarm waters to tread in, and boom goes seo minjung on the deep end. yet, all she wants to say is a fuck you once more. only this time, it comes from a source plucked heart heavy, and soul layered. they’re filled with hate, and she won’t fufill the mold they’ve set forth for her. and in the end — he didn’t win, not when she’s still playing.

because what truth resolves any remnants of the wound left over, she doesn’t care. limitations set on the cusp of freedom, the free-falling touches of love with no restraints. because as soon as it starts, it ends — before she falls into the devastation of the aftermath, all she wants is the complete melt of his last touch.

I need some sugar I need something fake What is the truth? I don't care We both know, there's a limit, it'll be over soon Before I cool down, completely melt me (Babe)

she feels like a madman, crazed by the fervor of the night. laughter that doesn’t stem from anywhere but her own misery — written in stone by the pen she holds. she writes each word for word down on the page, wondering if it was even worth each cover underneath the photographers in shy glances on the stage, or the covertness of it all when his life’s now all on display for the world to eat up — it spills back over, repetition rubbing salt into her wounds.

Cover it up, spill it on top, once again

but tables turned, she flips the coin inside her hand — all’s fair in love and war. and in her case, she’s still moving the pawns in her hands, each meticulous movement crafting the next move for the rest. because when her eyes close, and the chuckle breathes out the second hand slap to each of his gestures, there’s only one thing she wants him to know: it takes two to play a game. two to roll around in a ring of fire, only for one to get burnt.

it’s mere mannerisms embedded into her skin. each twist of her lips that curl into a smile in a haphazardly agrees to each turn of how life takes her. running full-force without another thought, and if she’d been given to stop — then perhaps, the droplets of realism would seep in, drowning her whole to rethink the entirety of it all. a heartless huff, and she’s glad he never given her the chance — only set her up for the end of it all.

Between people capable of knowing these things Isn't it just manners to pretend to fall for such lies? I don't care, I'll become a fool, let's try everything Don’t give me an opportunity to think it through

because each time when the nib of her pen digs deep into the paper, and she reminiscences of her red-stained lips smeared on his skin — she thinks of the i love yous, so sticky and sweet. a taste of that thrilling and addicting, never set to rot. what she wanted to hear, he gave her. what she wanted to feel, he set up. set yourself up for failure, and it comes full circle when she’s left alone in her room gliding each line and circle on the paper in front of her.

Tell me that you love me Say the pretty things smeared on your lips Sticky sticky, I’ll keep it pickled So it won't rot, for a long time

in hindsight, it’s just another form of catharsis.

however, in the moment — it’s just drunk off the hours of heartbreak and misery finding some sort of resolve inside bitterness and resentment. she crafts a story, where she’s the lead female for the first time — no care in the world, back to the baseline of what it means to be seo minjung once more. on top, no underhanded games, just the joker in her back pocket lingering around for the next play.

-

when she sees his face on tv, it’s a wednesday.

happy hump day.

no notion of time, but she still manages to keep track of each mark on her calendar and the ticks of minutes blaring at her phone. no call to gold star today, nor any recollection of a stage fuse has to present. time off, and it becomes a harder concept to grapple with as the time goes on. so, she naps for the remainder of the day — lounging around in nothing more than the barebones of her body barely clinging onto the over-sized t-shirt and the undies that fill her frame whole.

when she finally manages to wake up, it’s already night and the nocturnal lifestyle manages to stick it to her good — her hair pulled up into a messy bun, strands already coming down to frame her face. her footsteps shuffling over towards the studio (a free day, her brother’s taking care of her dog tonight).

it’s a recipe for what brings forth the lyrics written weeks prior — the feeling of feeling on top, when now, all she feels is the effect of being down in the ground.

no time for anything, she darts straight to her home studio, her mind still blank. the silence reaps in, and it bellows louder where the echoes boast into a cacophony of sounds her mind can’t handle. as for the fix? she presses her hands on the piano — a start of a heavy base as her eyes reel over the rest of the lyrics finished nights prior.

there’s no thought process nor perfect blueprint of how a song should craft. and maybe, if she were smarter. wiser. there’d been a staged production when her hands stumble to break the silence with something, anything.

so, she reverts back to a futuristic sound.

fixes herself up with the sounds of the steady drumline, and the mimicry of the metronome in the filters of the keys, humming to herself the tune of what she writes down. because if she can’t believe it now, then she’d be damn sure to make a show pretending like she is. her fingers press down into the keys, a melodious cancor of what she doesn’t hear as coherent in the moment — instead, she relies on the effects of the pedal, dragging down each tone to a sound. no coherency in the mic absent, it’s just the voice memos on her phone recording each and every ounce of her head shaking back and forth singing into clear air — if it can be salvaged, the grains will be left to the guide.

-

when she reserves a gold star studio room, seo minjung is in an one-tracked mind to nothing in her mind sans the thoughts of the song at bay, and the details she has written in her notes.

scribbled inside the rugged leather bound journal are half-assed arrows, and subtle cues — deciphering it all, is left up to her. yet, there’s still a grin and a bow when she walks into the studio for the staff to monitor each and every bit of the sound she’s been crafting in her mind for the past few days.

whether this becomes a song to fruition to make to the final cut of the album, she doesn’t care. for what it’s worth here and now, it’s full-on pretending that every ounce of her despair was exempt from the facade she placed walking through the halls. chipper smiles stretching too vast, it becomes eerie. a bit uncanny when it all fades the second she takes into the recording booth.

“i have a clear idea for the song.” she declares, headphones still resting on her shoulders. “i want the first introduction to the song to have an almost accapella effect — no backtrack. no base — i just want my voice.”

a thumbs up, and she settles the headphones around her ears. her eyes closing shut — the lyrics already etched into her memory. the first iteration comes angry, shouting with a full-on chest voice. the playback renders it useless when she shakes her head back and forth. “no, could i do another take?”

the second becoming too much of a head voice — too high and light for the game she wants to draw inside the song.

the third makes a hit when she rings together the airiness pulled at each dip of her words, and the rise of the next. her ears pick up on the playback, her eyes still closed to accept each detail she tries to comprehend — for now, it’s the take she accepts at face value, motioning her fingers onto the next line.

where she steps into the studio at eight in the morning, she doesn’t pack up her belongings and leave till the sun’s already beckoning in the horizon. when her eyes flit onto the clock, it’s four am — her voice raging near hoarse when she bows, eyes creasing as she apologizes for the overworked hours with little pay.

but the track is finished at the end of the day, her heart free — at least for now, sneakers scuffing the newly polished floors of gold star on the way out.

and it’s just that her heart no longer feels the malice held tightly, nor does it feel any liberation from the music flinging in the background. instead, it just feels like work finished and buried six feet under — no reckon of saving any trace in the end. rather, it lies inside her harddrive and whether it sees the speakers of gold star’s saving grace, she no longer cares.

it’s done, her heart is done. the days of feeling on top, done. because in the end, all it musters is the empty feeling being booted back to square one.

[cyrusharper]

when / after landfall where / the lobby of the highwayman’s rest with / open to everyone! 

when he was young, when the only frame of reference he possessed was an overactive imagination, his mama’s bedtime stories, and roi’s tall tales of the sea, cyrus used to close his eyes and create imaginary cities--they almost always rose up on some forgotten coast, with long stretches of soft sand to directly contrast england’s rocky shores that required boots, that froze over when the winter came, always buildings made of old stone rose up into sky, playfully taunting him with their vague notion of history, of containing something for him to uncover for himself. the streets teemed with people, eager to share their tales with him, eager to show him the treasures they kept close to their chests--always, he could feel the breeze of the far off desert he could never see but knew sat beyond his line of sight, of the constant sea like a heartbeat. 

he woke up with an ache in his chest every time, the longing for the imagined that plagues every child--but it never stopped him from sprinting down the stairs, where he would collide with his mama’s legs, where she would ask him without fail where he went last night. 

he tries to think of what he would tell her now, but he just keeps producing thoughts that are only half formed, severed of any connective tissue that might give them sense, might make them something he could hope to articulate. almost, but not quite. old, maybe not in a strictly chronological way. eden, but the snake keeps turning into fruit and speaking in a language that can’t be understood. off-axis. 

so this, he thinks as he jots each one in a neatly ordered list in the corner of the parchment he’d managed to charm out of the hotel manager, as though they are important pieces of information to be referred to later on in his research instead of nonsense, is the the undiscovered country. hotels with attendants but without guests that can be seen, streets without people, stores and bars with solitary keepers and without patrons--and the sea, constant as the heart in his chest. 

he huffs out a breath and shakes his head, before he sets the pen down and starts pulling at the roll of bread he’d been offered when he entered, inexplicably warm even though it has been sitting untouched on a plate for at least an hour now. it’s the first time he’s looked up from his work in just as long, and he can feel color rush to his cheeks when he notices that he is no longer the hotel lobby’s solitary occupant--that there’s a strong chance someone may have been watching him sigh and scribble like a madman. 

“as far as i can tell,” he says, as he clears his throat and sets the roll back on the plate. “there isn’t a single map to be found anywhere on this entire island. you can find silk and beads and enough grog to put you to sleep, but cartography is apparently where the line gets drawn.” he worries his bottom lip between his teeth, shrugs his shoulders. “you haven’t seen one, have you? or talked to anyone who has any sense of where we are in fuckin’ space? i can’t make sense of any of it.”

[valorxdrive]

Why did you sacrifice yourself that day at Hollow Bastion? Couldn't you of thought of some other way?

♕ -  Any words that aimed to drive the conversation fell short as such a personal stab. Was the question invasive? Not in his eyes, at least, how could his thoughts during a time viewed as one of his most selfless could be? Sora’s lips thinned as a heavy mind with an equally heavy heart could sweep back upon that life changing day as if it was a flick of the page backwards.

Royal red carpets that led up to the seething golden seething arcs of machinery and pipes. How the frozen faces of multiple princesses lingered like a crystallized epitaph; each of them drawn into timelessness with their stolen hearts all for the designs of a madman with a voice smooth as silk. The battle that day, a time where he teetered upon allowing himself to give up so close to the finishing climax as he’s stuck between Kairi’s glass coffin and the face of insanity that ensnared his best friend Riku like a plague. After that mythical, half-baked key had made a clutch at his heart, the overwhelming sorrow of that moment had almost devoured him. Eyes closed and fingers lifelessly splayed as he bowed before Ansem’s blade...

A voice had reached out to him.

A voice so familiar, loving and headstrong that it instantly burned the blankets of grim worry  away in a single instant. Hearing that call of his name had revitalized him at his darkest hour and forged an immeasurable strength that managed to surpass one of his most dangerous battles yet.

Beyond that? One key; the sort that could release hearts, became the sole answer amidst the intensity of knowing that Darkness bled from a portal and that Kairi was threatened by eternal slumber if he hadn’t. (To think her safe haven with his heart could’ve wound up her prison). A single hand reaches up and drifts along his chest while it’s all slamming back into his mind.

“You want to know the real reason?”

Back then it would’ve impossible to wrench this honesty from him. A realm of growth, feelings that made no sense, that begun to make sense while he became an awkward mess of limbs and a cat-caught tongue before the sight of her smile. Spending days alongside of her managed to eclipse even the sun in a brightness that couldn’t be rivaled.

”I can’t imagine a world that doesn’t have Kairi in it.” That’s all that had to be at stake for him to not think twice. Pumping alongside of his life’s blood would be a warm, swaying sensation that cradled his heart while a tender smile settles on his face. Such a fuel was kindled with the wealth of many memories of them growing up together. Hiding together when storms had them paranoid, sharing stories (that she read to him) in midsummer nights, down to the moment they decided carving stone scribblings of each other’s faces in a little hideaway was the best idea ever as small pearls among his precious treasure.

Days he wanted to see continue on no matter the risk.

“And I don’t want to. She’s one of the most important people in my life, and.. To see that smile continue on strong, I feel like there’s nothing I’d ever come to fear anymore.”

[blackberd]

Always Trust a Madman with a Plan (Part 1 of 2)

It all started with a simple game, and Jervis Tetch never saw it coming.

Enjoy!

~~~

“Alright, Valeska,” the guard outside the secluded cell called out, clanking his nightstick against the metal door. “It’s your lucky day, you get to make a request.”

Leisurely laying in his cot, Jerome grinned as the door was unlocked and pulled open. The pudgy guard waited expectantly with a hand ready at his holster. Jerome, still lounging, lazily turned to him, a lock of ginger hair sweepingly fell onto his forehead.

“Don’t tell me it’s my birthday, Chubby,” he said, mockingly puzzled.

The guard, unimpressed, smiled dryly. “If you ain’t interested, there are plenty o’ other inmates dyin’ to be bumped up the wait-list.”

“Now, now, Chubby,” chastened Jerome, making a show of getting up and exaggerating a deep stretch. “Have a sense of humor. Forty hours per week in a place like this can really make ya forget how to take a joke, huh? Try living here!” He released a screeching cackle and patted the guard on the back once he reached him.

Not many Arkham inmates possessed the power of laying a single digit on any of the prison guards without being hurled to the floor for attempted assault. Jerome knew this, too, and was careful with the way he exploited his strengths. He knew how to get to people, how to make them talk; he couldn’t deny the seamless witty charm he’d perfected to a fault. It was all a matter of unveiling their motivations, what made them tick. One thing Jerome learned over the years was that there’s a bit of bad in every good, and the bad had a habit of always outweighing the good when given the right push.

Chubby, for instance, was a respectable long-time prison guard whose name was, in fact, not Chubby, but something Jerome had long replaced with a nickname more suitable to the man’s physical appearance. Through mere conversation over the weeks, Jerome came to find out about Chubby’s spiraling down debts and child support payments. With a few pretty words, he’d convinced Chubby to write his name at the top of the wait-list with the promise of being rewarded a hefty sum of green dollar bills. With charm came cleverness, and with cleverness came powerful friends, and Jerome sure as hell valued them. Guards were always payed, and their loyalty never ceased to grow. In short, Jerome got what he wanted in the end. Always.

Money, Jerome rolled his eyes at the word as Chubby ushered him down a miserable hallway. It’s always money with these folks. They’ll fight claw and fang for it and then gamble it all away in one night, and still they call me the crazy one. Hah!

Jerome worked it all out years ago, long before he started trading money for special favors. It was easy, laughably so. He started his very own not-so-under-the-table trust fund at Arkham Asylum, the first of its kind, and people would be heavily in the wrong to assume it held the traditional definition of the term. It was anything but.

‘Fund me if you trust me!’, was his comical campaign, a funny little play-on-words which actually meant: Fund me or else.

Fortunately, half the prison inmates were so brain dead that they mindlessly payed their dues from earned wages month after month in hopes to stay clear of Jerome’s radar. In a way, they were buying their safety, because Jerome was not the sort of man you wanted breathing down your neck. What’s worse was when he had one of his loyal cronies do it for him while he casually watched with a mouth full of buttered popcorn. Those who didn’t pay up were often made into spectacles to alert others of the dire consequences that came to those who ignored the fund. Jerome never gave second chances. He ruled with fear, never mercy.

‘You had it coming, Dietrich, you sly dog,’ Jerome thought to himself with a slimy grin.

Guards, of course, knew about the fund though they never interfered. Why should they? They each had the chance to earn a wad of extra money should Jerome ever wake up with a favor in mind. It was a dirty game in which Jerome was always winning, and he just loved to win.

Chubby led him to a confrontational room with nothing but a metal table and a single chair in the center. After being shackled to the table with handcuffs, Chubby left the room and Jerome sat in absolute silence. His grin never fell, and his fingers tapped in time to the catchy tune in his head.

“Jerome Valeska,” a voice came from the speakers.

“Present.”

“In front of you is an envelope. Inside, you will find a Request for Property. Do you understand?”

Annoyed, Jerome stared into the tinted black window where he knew people were observing him from.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to write it all down for me in plain, simple words.”

“Jerome,” says the voice, exasperated. “This is no time to be funny.”

“It never is,” Jerome grumbled to himself.

“Unseal the envelope, carefully read our conditions, and state your request. We urge you to take this seriously because requests that violate our conditions are immediately vetoed.”

Jerome stopped listening the second he grew bored. With a suppressed yawn, he ripped the envelope open and unfolded the form within. He didn’t bother reading it.

“Boring, boring, boring,” he sang under his breath as he scribbled down what he wanted by using two little words with a chained pen. Only after he finished signing his name at the bottom of the form did he mentally unmute the voice that had been calling to him.

“Jerome Valeska!” it bellowed angrily. “We told you to unseal, not rip! This leads to an automatic rejection!”

Jerome pushed the pen away and shrugged. “Rip, unseal, they’re both the same to me. You people know I have trouble understanding, don’t you? You said so yourselves. Should’ve drawn me a picture to follow or something.”

“Did you read the conditions?”

“Yes.”

A short pause.

“Are you telling the truth?”

“No.”

A faint ruckus came from the speakers and some frustrated man kept ordering: “Get him out of there. Just get him out of my face. Fucking wasting our time...”

Chubby was let back into the room with a key to unlock the cuffs from around Jerome’s wrists. Sorely rubbing at the tender skin, Jerome stood to flauntingly bow at the invisible audience behind the window.

“Always a pleasure doing business with you,” he said amiably and followed Chubby out into the hall.

“Shouldn’t have done that,” Chubby reprimanded. “Would’ve done ya good to listen to them. That form’s going straight to the trash. You messed up, Clown Boy.”

Jerome, unrestrained, walked alongside the guard without care, as though the two were close buddies. With a soft hum, he smiled to himself. It was small, and people who didn’t know him would mistake it for his scar, but this was the smile Jerome wore when he knew something others didn’t.

“On the contrary, my fat friend. I’d say this is all going according to plan.”

And it was, because Jerome had written more than just his request on that form. He’d initiated a simple offer to the head of Unit Staff, a man who gave the final say in whether or not a prisoner’s request was accepted. Jerome couldn’t remember his name and thus dubbed him ‘Curly’; a mocking nickname, given that the head of Unit Staff was a bald man with not a hair on his shiny, shiny head.

Jerome knew that the form would be dismissed, but he also knew that Curly wouldn’t refuse an offer from a man known for keeping his end of the bargain. Curly, thanks to his severe gambling addiction, would adhere to Jerome’s request without having it bonded to a set of nonsensical conditions. Hilariously, there was no need for Jerome to do any of this. He could’ve been civil and read the forty-something conditions, and he could’ve lied and said that he did, in fact, read them. His request might’ve been peculiar, but it was certainly a harmless one. It didn’t oppose a single health or safety violation, but he had a reputation to withhold, and he, of course, wanted powerful people to be his friends, such as Curly the Bald-Headed Chief.

A Request for Property was typically approved within a few weeks. The request itself wasn’t delivered to the requestee until much longer than that. When it came to Jerome Valeska, however, his request was delivered to his cell the very next morning before breakfast.

Upon unwrapping the newspaper packaging, his eyes lit up fervently just as the toothiest, wayward grin spread across his face from ear-to-ear.

“Well then, a very happy birthday to me!”

~~~

(To be continued )

[patchwork-panda]

If A Moment Is All We Are (3/?)

TW (3): This chapter contains a mention of:

1) intrusive thoughts and suicidal ideation (Dazai dialogue). 2) fair amount of blood and physical violence in the form of guns, explosions and slashing injuries, as a "fight" chapter. 3) some descriptions of physical injury including broken bones and slash wounds. I tried not to let it be too graphic. Please proceed with caution.

For those who prefer AO3 format: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24121633/chapters/58072957

“Excuse me!”

The woman who now sat at the table, the one the old balding cop had vacated, looked up at me with a friendly, questioning gaze.

“Yes?”

I slammed my hands down on the counter, startling her into dropping her pen, and pushed my sketch of the green snake tattoo towards her.

“I need to make a report!”

“W-what sort of report?” she asked unsteadily, looking me up and down.

I could tell she was already evaluating my credibility but I had to listen to Detective Dazai. It was my only shot at saving Mrs. Yamazaki. I sat down in the same chair I had been in earlier and looked her right in the eye, my voice barely shaking as I gave her a slightly less nonsensical version of the story I had told her colleague earlier. When I finished, I got to my feet and bowed as low as I could.

“I’m not making any of this up and this is not a prank!” I exclaimed, head still bowed. “I, as a concerned citizen, am asking you, a member of the Yokohama Military Police for help. I’m begging you, ma’am: please, listen to me!”

“Okay, okay!” she exclaimed, waving her hands in the air as her colleagues turned to look at us. “I’ll listen to you! Please, sit down.”

Relieved, I sat. My legs were still shaking as I watched her get out a pen and a piece of paper and only when she started asking me for more details and slowly filling out her form was I finally able to breathe freely again.

It worked. I couldn’t believe it. That crazy detective’s advice had worked.

I was elated. I half-thought I was going to start crying with relief when the officer suddenly looked up and shot an anxious look out the window. Curious, I turned behind me and to my surprise, I saw Detectives Dazai (looking miraculously unhurt) and Kunikida passing by the station and going back across the street from whence they came. Seeing the recognition on my face, she turned to me with an odd look in her eye.

“Kusunoki-san,” she said, reading off her form. “Do you... know those two men? I thought I saw you talking to them earlier when I started my shift.”

“Not really?” I said, thinking back. “I mean, kind of? Armed Detective Agency, right? I actually talked to them about this earlier. Oh, but don’t worry! They insisted I talk to the police first before they got involved. They said that would be best.”

The officer looked contemplative.

“Yes, I would have to agree.” She frowned. “If they manage to solve your case before we do, again, my whole department would be completely humiliated. No, we can’t have that...”

She tapped her pen on the table as she thought to herself.

“Honestly, I have a few more questions I’d like to ask you, but I can’t ask them here.”

Once again, she looked behind her before motioning me forward, her expression grim. I scooted towards her in my chair, feeling slightly unsettled by the look on her face.

“W-why not?” I asked quietly.

“I know the man you’re looking for,” she whispered. “I believe he is a member of the Port Mafia.”

Not knowing who the Port Mafia was, I shrugged and her jaw hit the floor.

“You don’t know who the Port Mafia is?” I shook my head and she started laughing. “Wait, are you serious? What are you, some kind of shut-in? You don’t read the news?!”

As she sat there, laughing uproariously at her own joke, I twitched, trying to force a smile on my face as I waited for her to settle down.

“Oh, that’s a good one,” she sighed, wiping a tear from her eye. “Alright, let me tell you something about them since you don’t seem to know. The Port Mafia has been operating in Yokohama for decades. Decades. They have eyes and ears everywhere, perhaps even in this very police station. I want to ask you more but it’s not safe to do it here.”

She scribbled something down on a piece of paper and pushed it towards me.

“Meet me on the top floor of the South Pier Art Gallery in two hours. We’ll talk then.”

***

The rest had been a blur. I’d gone home, celebrated my win with a steaming hot bowl of ramen (topped with some of the veggies Mrs. Yamazaki had foisted on me) and watched some new seasonal shoujo anime titles to pass the time. Then, I took the train to the edge of town, found the gallery and blithely took the spiral staircase up to the top floor where they housed the stained glass window collection, not knowing what lay ahead. Not five minutes after I’d arrived, the young man named Akutagawa had appeared, killed the two curators lying on the far side of the room and blocked the way into the main entrance. When I ran for the fire escape instead, I found myself face-to-face with none other than Detective Dazai, who pointed a gun at me and instructed me to turn back around to face Akutagawa.

As I stood with my hands in the air, cold sweat running down my neck and my pathetic life hanging in the balance, I heard Dazai say something to me in a low, hushed voice.

“Sorry... this isn’t what I meant when I asked if you were doing anything later.”

As the memory of our encounter on the street floated back to me, something stirred to life deep inside my chest, something stronger than the panic that had been choking me since the start of this whole thing... It felt like anger.

“Is that right?” I asked. My voice was shaking but the words kept coming out. “You mean dates with you don’t usually end with somebody getting shot? What exactly did you have in mind then?”

“Oh? Are you interested after all?”

His tone was still light-hearted and flirtatious but I could sense his hesitancy; the gun against my skull pulled back just a fraction and for a second, there was hope. What if the gun fell away from my head entirely? Would I be able to make a run for it, make it back to my apartment in one piece? Akutagawa might try to rip my limbs off and I might still get shot at but what if I tried...?

Dazai didn’t say anything else; he was clearly waiting for my answer. I should tell him yes, maybe then he would feel less tempted to shoot me (why hadn’t he done so already?). However, something about the idea of spending more time in the company of this madman (that is, if I did manage to leave the gallery alive) was more nauseating than the smell of blood permeating the room.

“Not at all,” I replied coolly, “I don’t date guys who are two seconds away from blowing my head off.”

This time, it was Dazai’s turn to laugh.

“Well then,” Dazai mused, “Would it make you feel better to know I’d be joining you right after?”

I actually scoffed.

“What are you proposing, a double suicide?!”

“If you’d like.”

“You have a terrible sense of humor, Detective.”

I wasn’t sure if he could hear me over the deep growls coming from across the room. The monster coming out of Akutagawa’s cloak swayed slowly from side to side, clearly looking for an opening. Akutagawa hadn’t moved a muscle in some time but somehow this didn’t make me feel more comfortable. The sun was starting to set, the colors of the stained glass windows around us gradually darkening, making that cold, calculating gaze and quiet anger coming from the entrance more menacing than ever. Fruitlessly, I weighed my options again, looking around to see if there were any routes, any at all, that I could take to leave the gallery with my life. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find even one. I sighed, my shoulders dropping, that spark of hope fading with the last light of the sun.

“It was Dazai-san, right? Can I ask you a question?”

He didn’t answer, so I continued anyway.

“You talk about suicide so casually... You’re not afraid of dying?”

“Not really. It’s pain and suffering I’m afraid of, but dying?”

Dazai was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, he sounded peaceful, hopeful even.

“No. I think about Death so often that it’s as familiar as an old friend to me now. Finally getting to die... It would be comforting, almost like coming home.”

“Huh...”

Flashes of my previous life appeared before my eyes, from more recent to further back... Mrs. Yamazaki bleeding out, alone in her own darkened living room room. A young man’s body flying high into the air after an untimely collision with a speeding black car. The shadow of a burning building on the water’s edge, down by the pier, windows shattering as it was rocked by a sudden explosion...

And finally, an image of a ghoul, staring back at me from just outside my own darkened windows, with long, black hair cut in the same style as my own, drops of blood instead of tears falling down her cheeks, staining the fingertips she touched to them, the blackness of her pupils deep like bottomless wells... As I stared into my own haunted reflection that night, the night before I stopped going to class, I heard it—the darkness within calling out to me, the intrusive thoughts that tempted me to jump when I looked out through the windows of tall buildings...

I heard a distant roar. The shadow monster commanded by Akutagawa surged forward, jaws stretched wide and at the last moment, I turned my head to look Detective Dazai in the face. I smiled.

“I understand.”

Dazai stared at me.

“You do...?”

Without warning, an explosive force shook the gallery, enveloping me in clouds of thick, acrid smoke. I heard a crack and coughing violently, I looked down just in time to see the patterned floor below me give way, the cheap carpeting disintegrating beneath my very feet. There was no time for me to scream or think. I fell into the void below, my watering eyes catching one final glimpse of Akutagawa’s pale face, twisted in anger, as the darkness claimed me.

Wind rushed past my ears. I could feel myself picking up speed and I covered my head, wondering if tucking myself into a ball might mean less broken bones when I finally hit the bottom floor.

But I had stopped falling.

I was caught on something sturdy, with long, dense, wiry limbs. A tree? No, trees weren’t this warm... and they didn’t smell like gun smoke, books and ink...

“Got you,” someone grunted from just above me and I realized I’d fallen not onto a tree, but right into a man’s arms. I pushed my tangled bangs out of my face and looked up.

“Kunikida-san?!”

“I’ll explain later,” he gruffly, crouching down and setting my feet on the ground as the lights around us snapped back on. “We have to go, now! Can you run?”

No sooner had I nodded than he grabbed my wrist, his fingers closing over the fabric of my jacket, and tugged me after him, wasting no time in tearing off down the nearest corridor as soon as he was sure I could stand. Paintings whizzed by as we ran, abstract portraits blurring into colorful landscapes as we raced down the hall, my wrist locked in the detective’s iron grip. I could hear gunfire and yells, occasionally an otherworldly roar echoing from the top floor and I shuddered and pushed myself to run faster, to put more distance between myself and the beast making those horrible shrieks. As we ran past the spiral staircase to the corner of the central gallery, I abruptly realized the explosion had taken me from the top floor to the second—that much closer to safety...

Just when I thought my legs were going to give out, Kunikida abruptly stopped at the end of the corridor and I almost crashed right into him. His head jerked up and I caught a flash of green from the exit sign reflected on his glasses as he barked his next command.

“This way!”

I was brusquely yanked forward again, Kunikida’s long ponytail nearly smacking me in the face as he dragged me into a stairwell, the walls and steps narrow and lined with cement.

“We’re going down. Hurry!” he ordered, finally letting go of my aching wrist.

Ignoring the burning in my legs, I bolted down the stairs as quickly as I could, the tall detective hot on my heels as a crack echoed above us, like fireworks exploding in our confined chamber. Instinct took over and I ducked, throwing a hand over my head as I felt projectiles whiz past my shoulder.

“Get up!” Kunikida shouted and I obeyed, the sight of freshly gouged bullet holes on the wall ahead of me spurring me on. I was almost at the ground floor when I heard gunshots from very close behind. At once, I realized Kunikida was not with me and I whirled to see him several meters away at the turn, firing a small handgun up the stairs.

“Kunikida-san?” I called up, dashing back to him.

“Don’t come any closer!” he cried.

A sharp pain ripped into my cheek, tearing off bits of my hair and splattering my clothes with hot blood. I could feel the blood dripping down my neck in rivulets as I squeezed myself back into the corner and out of the way, a fresh hail of bullets raining down on us from above. I heard excited shouting; someone had followed us, their heavy footsteps pounding down the stairs—

“It’s the Port Mafia. You have to go!” Kunikida hollered, the echo of his voice nearly overwhelmed by the cacophony of more bullets firing into the stairwell. The impact scattered rubble everywhere and forcing me to guard my eyes.

“What about you?!” I cried.

“I’ll be fine!” he shouted. “Just get to the lobby, now!”

Red bloomed in the shoulder of his beige vest. He stumbled and pushed himself further back into the corner of the alcove, his bloodied hand reaching into his shirt vest and pulling out a small, lightly-bound olive green notebook. There was a determined look in his eye.

“What are you waiting for? Go!”

He ripped a page out of the notebook and I was suddenly blinded by a flash of green light. An enormous explosion rocked the stairwell and I stumbled to the ground as smoke flooded the air.

“Kunikida-san?!”

There was no answer. I pushed myself to my feet, staring in horror at the spot where he’d been.

“Kunikida-san...”

Was he dead? Had he died defending me?!

Frozen, I stood there, utter shock pulsing through me as my cheek continued to drip blood onto my blouse. But all too soon, the sound of footsteps began to pound down the stairs, snapping me out of my daze and I uprooted my feet, following Kunikida’s last order and made for the door to the lobby.

I had to live. If Kunikida was really dead, living was the only way to make sure his sacrifice was not in vain. Living meant I was saved.

Throwing my shoulder against the heavy door, I burst into the lobby. To my relief, a quick glance around the ground floor assured me that the lobby was deserted, with no security guards and no trench-coat-clad figures with guns anywhere in sight. Taking one last, regretful look behind me at the stairs, I immediately sprinted for the front doors.

“Hold it, Prophet.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a ribbon of black and red streak towards me. Before I knew what had hit me, something slashed deeply into my left leg and I hit the floor with a sharp cry of pain, the back of my thigh burning like it was on fire. I could feel the warmth of my own blood pouring out of the wound, pooling on the ground and soaking wetly into my ripped jeans. As I struggled to get up, I heard Akutagawa’s voice again.

“Surrender.”

Somehow, he’d gotten past Dazai and Kunikida. Or maybe the Port Mafia had already finished both of them off, giving Akutagawa a clear path to me... Gritting my teeth, I got up, staggering a little as I stood, my eyes meeting with Akutagawa’s cold gray ones. My legs felt weak. I could tell that I’d been cut very deeply but I continued running for the doors, adrenaline pumping through my veins as I made a bee-line for the dim light of the setting sun outside.

“Don’t ignore me.”

There was an unearthly roar and something hit the ground where my right foot had been barely a millisecond before, sending small chunks of flooring flying into the air as I dodged Akutagawa’s attacks. For one brilliant, shining second, I thought I was going to make it—my fingers brushed against the glass and metal front doors—

“Rashoumon! Higanzakura!”

Black and red wires tightened around my throat, wrenching me away from the exit before I could push open the doors and lifting me high into the air. I could barely breathe and I scrabbled against my bonds in vain, the skin of my palms and fingers stinging and bleeding with every attempt to pry the coils off of me.

What was this thing made of?!

Through watering and narrowed eyes, I watched as Akutagawa approached in measured steps, his hands in his pockets, that cold, impassive face coming closer with every passing moment.

“You run pretty fast for an injured girl, I’ll admit. Unfortunately for you, I was ordered to capture you. And I don’t intend to fail.”

The weight around my throat suddenly became crushing. Spots appeared before my eyes and I fought to stay conscious as the last gasp of air was squeezed out of me. Akutagawa’s ragged, darkened form faded in and out of sight.

No! I can’t die here...!

I clawed harder at the thing holding me, desperation setting in. I’d escaped him once before, I had to do it again...! Kunikida might have died for me and if I died now, Mrs. Yamazaki didn’t have a prayer. I needed to make sure she was really saved...! I needed to live!

I watched helplessly, my arms losing strength as another tendril of darkness grew out of Akutagawa’s black coat. Crackling with energy, its shape twisted to become flat and angular until I realized I was staring at an enormous scythe.

“Dazai-san guessed correctly. My orders were to capture you alive. However, whether or not you need to be completely whole was not discussed. I don’t think the boss will care if I cut off your legs. If I do that, you’ll never be able to run away from us ever again.”

“No...”

My voice came out as nothing more than a weak gasp. Unable to hear me, he drew the scythe back in preparation.

“Don’t!”

There were several loud bangs and the vise around my neck abruptly loosened. I felt a rush of wind above me as I fell through the air, shuddering as I landed on my injured leg, which buckled sickeningly beneath me, leaving me in a bloody heap on the floor. Rubbing my throat as I coughed, trying to bring fresh air back into my lungs, I looked up to see Kunikida, bloodied but alive and well, firing a small handgun from behind a large metal sculpture at Akutagawa. He had been forced to retract the demon and was instead raising it as a shield to defend himself against the blonde detective’s onslaught. His pale hand was spattered with red as he clutched at his shoulder, blood coursing down the back of his black robe and dripping at his feet.

I could barely believe it; Kunikida had saved me once again.

I watched him dive out of the way as Akutagawa sliced up the sculpture with his black sickle and duck behind another statue, firing constantly out of his small hand gun. Sparks flew as he traded blows with Akutagawa and he shot at Akutagawa until I heard the hollow clicking of his gun; he was out of bullets. Gritting his teeth, he flung it out of the way. There was another flash of green light and within moments, he was firing at Akutagawa again.

As they fought, I scanned my surroundings again, trying not to think about the amount of blood I was losing, wondering if any backup was coming. Kunikida was holding his own but with no one on the way, he couldn’t last long. I tried to pull myself to my feet and almost immediately slipped back down.

There on the floor, amidst the splatters of blood, was a soft layer of long black hair. It was all over the faux-marble tiles and as I brought my hand to my head, I realized that it was my hair—Akutagawa must’ve clipped most of it from my head when he tried to cut me in half. Looking back up to the main doors, I tried to stand on my injured leg and immediately regretted it.

“Shit.”

My leg was in bad shape; I could barely feel it and everything from the knee down was soaked in blood. Even worse than that, my breaths felt shallow and my head was spinning from anemia; I had to be close to going into shock and judging from the small pinpricks of pain, there were probably micro fractures in my bones. In spite of Kunikida’s best efforts to keep me alive, I had no clue how I was going to make it out of the gallery.

And then a flash of a different shade of red caught my eye.

Rolling towards me from the far side of the room, where the battle raged, was a bright red fire extinguisher. Parts of it looked damaged, and as I stared at it, I was struck by a dangerous idea. If I had no chance of survival, I could at least use my last moments well.

I scooped up the fire extinguisher into my arms and headed back into the fray.

“Kunikida-san!”

They turned to me just as I flung the pressurized device at Akutagawa.

“Heads up!”

All eyes in the lobby lifted towards the extinguisher as it flew through the air, seemingly moving in slow motion as it arced towards Akutagawa. Wordlessly, Kunikida raised his gun and fired once.

The atrium shook. Glass shattered and plumes of white powder filled the air, blanketing the statues in the lobby like snow. My ears rang; something was dripping out of them. The force of the blast must have knocked out my eardrums and I could feel myself flying backwards through the air. Without warning, I was propelled through the doors of the gallery entrance and I was awarded one glorious view of the outside, of the building bathed in a twilight glow, the very streets illuminated in flashing red and blue lights. I saw uniformed police officers swarming out of their vehicles, towards me, towards the wrecked building behind me...

And then I hit the sidewalk with a horrible crunch.

The last thing I saw before the darkness took me was a woman in black and white racing towards me where I fell, a golden butterfly glinting brightly in her hair.