#seriously there's a lot of wide open space here in town where you just kinda get melted

[jontheredrc]

there's a tree I sit under to wait for my ride to work, and...I gotta tell ya...they need to put in more trees tbh

[honeypiehotchner]

intelligence & issues (Hotch x Reader) -- chapter eleven

I’m backkkk <33 Enjoy!

Today’s chapter title comes from “Wildest Dreams” by Taylor Swift and honestly? That song is Hotch and Reader’s song tbh

Chapter Warnings: fluff! Crime scene stuffs, case stuffs, and Hotch is an asshole at the end (what’s new?)

Previous chapter || Fic Masterlist

Chapter Eleven: I thought, “Heaven can’t help me now.”

When you wake, you have a strange sense of Deja Vu. Hotch is shaking your shoulder again, only this time, you’re not in your bed.

“We’re landing soon,” he says softly, hand lingering on your shoulder, but you welcome its weight and warmth, forgetting for a moment that the rest of the team is on this jet.

“Mm, okay…” You bring the blanket underneath your chin, only this is when you realize it’s not a blanket.

You tilt your head down to look at the fabric, then lift your eyes back up to see Hotch isn’t wearing his jacket.

His jacket.

Oh my God.

He sees the realization on your face and smiles, but instead of commenting on it, he turns to start waking the others. As expected, Rossi didn’t sleep, but Reid is still quite frankly passed out. Emily, JJ, and Morgan are coming around, though, and upon seeing that, you scramble to get Hotch’s jacket off of you, catching Rossi’s eyes in the process.

“You were cold,” Rossi says with a shrug, and a smirk.

You shouldn’t be mortified, but you are.

After folding Hotch’s jacket over your arm, you wait until your boss is sitting back down to hand it to him with a raised eyebrow. “Thank you,” you whisper.

“You’re welcome,” he says, thinking nothing of it as he shrugs it back over his shoulders. When he sees you’re still looking at him like that, he adds, “You were getting goosebumps. Would you have rather I let you freeze to death?”

Is he making a joke? You wonder, with the corners of his lips tugging upward. You shake your head, saying nothing else.

No wonder you slept so soundly.

+++

Upon arriving at the local police station, you’re all met with the usual: desperate officers who want you to snap your fingers and find the unsub ASAP.

And, they always look pretty displeased when you admit that you need time.

You swear sometimes people think the BAU is made up of sorcerers who can see the future and not regular humans who are just trained to recognize and predict behaviors.

Regardless, they’re happy you’re here.

“I was shocked myself when I made the connection,” Sheriff Ansley says, nodding to the pictures of the other seven victims, with Nathan and Jonathan at the end. “Those others were so spaced out, we just… Oh, it sounds bad, but when you’ve got other problems coming across your desk, they can all blur together.”

“We understand,” you say, trying to be the comforting one here, even though you’re feeling more and more like time doesn’t exist and that you’ve entered a third dimension.

A few hours of sleep and jet lag can really do a person in. Especially with the added stressor of Hotch standing next to you.

“Morgan, L/N, I need you to come to the crime scene with me,” Hotch says, and your eyes widen the moment your name slips from his mouth. Is he trying to mess with you? You figured after covering you up on the jet, he’d make a conscious effort to be as far away from you today as possible. Just because Morgan is also coming along doesn’t mean much. Profilers aren’t dense.

“Prentiss and I will go talk to the victim’s family,” Rossi says, nodding to Emily.

Reid says nothing, too engrossed by the pictures and details tacked up on the board. Though, after a moment, he says, “I need a map of the town. Maybe the region. Yeah...the region.”

A little confused, Sheriff Ansely replies, “We’ll get that for you.”

JJ notices the confusion and says, “I’ve got it, don’t worry.”

With everyone focused, you pile into a vehicle with Hotch and Morgan up front (you purposefully sit in the back) to head to the crime scene. Sheriff Ansley leads in her car, and about two seconds in, you wish you would’ve thought to ride with her.

“You know I have to ask,” Morgan begins, a shit-eating grin on his face as he looks over at Hotch. “What did you get up to last night? Get lucky?”

Hotch looks ready to backhand his fellow agent. “No.”

Morgan keeps going. “Come on, Hotch, it’s about time you get some.”

“For now, I’ll stick to the case.”

Morgan huffs, giving in, which you think is for the better. But when Morgan turns his head to look out the window, Hotch catches your eyes in the rearview mirror.

You sink as far down as you can in your seat, biting the inside of your cheek to hide your smile.

+++

You have no clue what you were expecting when you pictured the outside of Jonathan King’s house, but it wasn’t this.

A few police cars are already here, their men having already gone in to look around, but not touch anything. A few cars look tiny next to the monster that is the mansion you’re looking at.

“I thought this was a small town,” you mutter, closing the car door.

“Jonathan’s daddy was the owner of the only car dealership in town,” Sheriff Ansley explains. “They were big money.”

“I can tell,” you shake your head. “Definitely don’t have houses like this where I’m from.”

The sheriff chuckles. “Yeah. Before they built it, this was a wide open field. Tiny house. Space for all kinds of animals. Had a red barn out there,” she points off to where a gigantic pool complete with a rock waterfall is.

You hum. “A lot changes for the worse sometimes when money comes in.”

She looks at you then, almost like she respects you a little more now. Which isn’t unusual. The sheriffs in small towns don’t exactly like having to call the FBI in for help. Some do it rather begrudgingly. It’s more often than not that you find yourself being the bridge between big city and small town.

“Any signs of forced entry?” Hotch asks the first officer he sees and they shake their head.

“Nothing. But this damn mansion is so big…” He trails away, looking around at it all.

“I understand,” Hotch sighs. “If you find anything, let us know.”

“Hotch,” you speak up, nearly tapping his shoulder, but you quickly pull your hand back. “If this unsub is a woman, then it’s likely there won’t be any forced entry.”

The sheriff nods. “She has a point.”

“How?” Morgan asks, eyebrows furrowed over his sunglasses.

“Seriously?” You deadpan. “Do you want me to demonstrate?”

He catches on, and drawls, “Go right ahead,” prompting you to shove his shoulder.

“Focus,” Hotch scolds. “I hear you. He probably let her in.”

“Did Jonathan have a reputation of being a player?” Morgan asks. “Take a lot of girls out on dates? Get serious with a lot of them but never marriage-serious?”

Sheriff Ansley nearly snorts. “Oh, yeah. He was the town’s bachelor. New woman every week. Swore every single one was The One.”

You nod slowly. “He must’ve picked up the wrong one, then.”

“Evidently so,” she replies quietly, leading the three of you into the house.

Hotch opts for looking around the house with the sheriff while you and Morgan go to Jonathan’s bedroom.

And he’s still lying there. Wonderful.

You nearly gag, but stop yourself. You’re never going to get used to this shit. At least there isn’t blood literally drenching the walls like that other case.

Moving on.

“Looks like it’s the exact same MO,” Morgan comments, idly checking the body for anything the officers might’ve missed.

You dig around on Jonathan’s dresser, drawers, nightstand, everywhere.

“This guy was seriously rich,” you mutter, picking up a few really expensive watches. Upon opening one drawer, you literally find a wad of cash. At least two thousand dollars, stuffed in between pairs of socks. “The unsub didn’t take this?” You hold up the cash to Morgan.

“She must not’ve spent time here,” he concludes. “Doesn’t look like she took any trophies either.”

“I can’t imagine why,” you say, then crack a smile. “So you’re on my side then, huh?”

He turns his head, eyebrows furrowed. “What?”

“It’s a woman.”

Morgan chuckles. “Yeah, kiddo. I’m on your side. This has woman all over it.”

“Kiddo,” you groan, tossing the cash back in the drawer. “Any clothes from the unsub lying around? I’m guessing she’s smarter than that.”

“Yeah, there’s nothing,” Morgan says, going into the bathroom. “The window in here is locked tight.”

“I really doubt she forced her way in,” you say. “He probably took her out on a date, brought her inside willingly, and didn’t realize until it was too late that he should not have messed with her.” You pause. “Does this place have security cameras? It looks expensive enough to have them. We should get Garcia to get the footage.”

You’re too busy rambling to see that Morgan has walked back into the room, only this time he’s eyeing you carefully.

You turn your head, raising an eyebrow at him. “What?”

“Listen, I know these guys were…” He gestures rather than saying it.

“Rapists?” You say tiredly, placing your hands on your hips. No need to be afraid of saying the word around you. You’ve heard it plenty and said it yourself more times than you want to. “What about it?”

“I just wanted to say I know how good it can feel to see someone like that taken down,” Morgan says slowly. “And then you feel guilty for feeling good.”

You set your jaw, hating he’s right. You’ve yet to admit it to yourself, though. Isn’t it wrong? On multiple levels? You’re supposed to catch the bad guys, not relate to them so much that you understand why they’re doing this.

“And I know it can also bring up some bad memories, but, I’m here for you,” he says, keeping his eyes on yours. “I mean that.”

“Thanks, Derek,” you whisper. “It does...kinda feel good, but...I know it’s the wrong way to do it.”

“Do what?”

“Make a difference,” you shrug. “If I killed Trevor, I’d be taking the short route. That’s why I’m here. To make a bigger difference.”

He smiles then, gently. “And you’re doin’ it. Trust me.”

You let yourself smile, too. “Thanks. Now let’s get back to work before boss man comes in here telling us to focus,” you mimic Hotch’s voice and tone at the end, making yourself laugh as you turn back around.

And that’s when you have the absolute shit scared out of you because Hotch is standing there, frowning at you. Oh, he totally heard that.

“Sorry, sir,” you murmur, knowing you should apologize while you’re ahead.

Thankfully, to save yourself from embarrassment, Morgan’s phone starts ringing. He pulls it out and puts it on speaker.

“Talk to me, babygirl.”

“All of our other victims? Yeah, they were accused of rape, too. Four of them were acquitted or blatantly dismissed, three of them with such short sentences it probably felt like a vacation.”

You roll your eyes. “Sounds about right.”

Hotch eyes you, but talks to Garcia. “Get us a list of anyone in this region that fits those same criteria.”

“Already done, and it is heading to JJ as we speak.”

Morgan shakes his head at how good she is. “Oh, and check and see if you can get the footage from Jonathan’s security cameras at his house. Y/N thinks he should have some.”

“She’s correct, I just found them,” Garcia says, no doubt through a smile. “I’ll send the footage over and start looking.”

“We should get back to the station and go over those names, see if we can narrow it down at all,” Hotch says. “Hopefully Garcia can get us something from that video.”

+++

Garcia gathers one thing from the video, but it’s not anything to do with facial recognition.

For now, it’s obvious this woman is a strong suspect because she’s the only one seen entering and leaving the house (she walked out right through the front door with her head down) in the window of time that Jonathan was killed. But...

“There’s not a clear shot at all,” Garcia says. “Because they’re… How do I put this? His lips are basically attacking her face and it’s a miracle they made it inside instead of just going at it against the door.”

Morgan snorts out a laugh, Reid (who is working on connecting the nine victims further) goes impossibly red, and Hotch shakes his head.

“Well, we’ve got a physical description now,” Rossi says, trying to see the bright side before Hotch loses it, you’re sure.

“Yeah, but it’s just a young brunette in a dress and heels,” Emily argues. “That’s nowhere near narrow enough.”

“Brown hair is actually the second most common hair color,” Reid supplies. “The most common is black, but they’re usually lumped together in studies. A recent one found that 84% of the world’s population has dark hair. But, of course, women are more likely to color their hair than men—”

“We got it, kid,” Morgan says gently, tapping Reid’s shoulder to get him to slow down.

“So,” you chuckle, “she has dark hair, which are the two most common hair colors.” Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a thought occurs to you. “Wait, can I see the video again?”

Garcia plays it again.

“Pause there,” you point to the woman’s hands. “See how she reaches for his wrist?”

“Where are you going with this?” Morgan asks.

It’s then that it occurs to you just where you’re going with this, and you try to hide your embarrassment.

“You can play it again.” After a few seconds, you get Garcia to pause again. “See? She tries to pin his wrists. She’s dominating. She’s the one in control there. See how his back is against the door, too? He didn’t start that way, she turned them around to get the upper hand.”

“So she’s confident,” Emily ponders.

“In sexual situations, at least,” you add. “Some women who are outwardly shy, but like to dominate in bed. It can be different for everyone.”

“So you’re saying we’re looking for a super quiet, shy woman?”

“Not necessarily. Given that she has had enough confidence to kill these nine men without anyone noticing, I’d be willing to bet she’s pretty confident now. It could be a newfound confidence, or she honestly could have always been this way. A lot of Dominatrixes are pretty confident outside of the bedroom, too. Maybe not in the same way, but they are. Just comes with the territory.”

“A territory you seem to know a lot about,” Morgan teases, poking your shoulder.

You scoff. “You wish.”

But your eyes find Hotch’s and you feel another rush go through you, all the way to your toes. You burn every single time you’re underneath his gaze. Averting your eyes quickly back to the screen, you try to shift in your seat in the least noticeable way.

It’s not like he doesn’t already know. If he seriously doesn’t know or at least have some suspicion, then you might suggest he get a new profession.

Redirecting the attention back to the case, Hotch turns to Sheriff Ansley and says, “We’re ready to give a preliminary profile.”

The team stands to head out to the main area. You and Hotch are the last two left, which you’re sure he did deliberately.

“You should take the lead,” he says, and you swear, your heart falls out of your ass.

“What?” You’ve never taken the lead on a profile in your life. Why would he just spring this on you right now? On this case, of all cases? Seriously?

He doesn’t change his mind. “I trust you to get all of the details right. And we’ll jump in when needed, but I want you to take the lead.”

You’re shaking your head. “Hotch, I haven’t—”

“It’s an order,” he says, voice firm. “Understood?”

“Yes.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Yes what?”

Bastard. He did it again. “Yes sir.”

And your jaw nearly ends up on the floor when he smirks, a quiet, “Good girl,” falling from his lips.

Damn him. Now you’re supposed to give the profile? How bad would it be to let Emily take over so you can jump Hotch in the nearest supply closet?

You never find out how bad it would be because Hotch walks out and thanks the officers for being there, and introduces you, giving you zero time to recover.

“Thank you so much for your patience,” you say first. “The unsub we’re looking for is, in fact, a woman, confirmed by some security footage that was recovered from Jonathan King’s home. She’s a brunette, average height, attractive, and she’s confident. She’s killed nine times and hasn’t been caught yet, so she’s likely to be gaining confidence.”

An officer raises his hand, so you nod to him. “No offense...but your description fits practically every girl in this town -- I guess, besides the killing part.”

“That’s what we figured,” you admit. “Unfortunately, this kind of unsub is the hardest to catch. They don’t stand out at all, they blend right in. It’s partly why they go so long without being caught.”

“But they’re not impossible to catch,” Rossi adds, helping you out with the annoyed officers. “This unsub has already killed twice in a week, which could be a sign that she’s beginning to devolve. When they’re in this state, they are easier to catch because they tend to get reckless and forget things, change patterns, which is what we need.”

“So we need to keep a tight lid on this for now,” JJ says. “The media isn’t going to cover this at all tonight because we need our unsub to believe she’s still getting away with it.”

Another officer pipes up. “If the news isn’t gonna report this, how can we keep people safe?”

It’s a valid question. It’s one that you always get when you decide to not have media coverage.

“Keep an eye out. And don’t take any women home,” Morgan offers.

But that doesn’t seem good enough, because the same officer says, “All due respect, sir, but asking a man not to do that is like asking him not to breathe.”

The amount of laughter and you got that right’s that you hear from the other male officers makes your stomach twist. Morgan’s small laugh makes you want to smack him.

“Well, try to refrain for a while,” you state plainly, bringing the focus back around. “If you can help it.”

Another officer says, “I don’t know if I can…” and clicks his tongue mockingly.

“Well, this unsub targets rapists,” you say loudly, placing emphasis on the word. “So if you aren’t a rapist, consider yourself safe and sound.”

That causes an uncomfortable silence to settle over the room, but you could care less. It should make them uncomfortable. It’s unfair that it’s something women have to just live with. It’s bullshit.

Emily and JJ share a look with you, the only kind women can understand. Makes you want a drink. And it’s not even late afternoon yet.

Rossi helps draw things to a close while Hotch practically stares you down. Not subtle at all. You feel it, and for that reason, you don’t look at him. But he’s hard to ignore.

Especially when he walks over and says, “I need to have a word with you,” and walks past you, giving you no choice but to follow.

Well, you could choose not to follow, but you’re not so sure you want to take your chances there. Not that the thrill of the idea doesn’t get you all excited, but now is not the time or place.

So, with your heart racing and your annoyance showing clearly on your face, you follow your boss to an office at the end of the hall. He’s waiting for you, already inside, and he doesn’t look happy.

What’s new?

He shuts the door behind you, his arms crossing over his chest again.

After a few moments of silence, you raise your eyebrows. “What?”

“Don’t be a brat,” he says sternly, causing your stomach to twist for different reason. “And don’t say what. You know what.”

You shake your head slowly. “I don’t, actually. That’s why I asked.”

He looks ready to absolutely devour you in the worst way possible, yet he doesn’t move. “I understand that after the case in your hometown—”

“God, why does everyone keep bringing that up?” You’re two seconds away from throwing your hands in the air like a child, but you stop yourself after the look he gives you.

“Because it just happened three weeks ago,” he replies, voice even. “And because it took a toll on you. That’s not something to be ashamed of, it’s just a fact.”

“You’ve never been up my ass about cases like this, not until you found out.”

“My knowing has not changed anything,” he says, and you think he might mean it. “And last I checked, this is your first case with a female unsub attacking rapists.”

You could punch him. You really want to punch him. “What’s your point?”

“I need to know that you can be objective,” he says. “I know you relate to our unsub. I know how easy it was for you to put yourself in her shoes. You did it almost immediately. I bet you knew it was a female unsub within the first few seconds of the debriefing.”

He’s right. Dammit. “And?”

“I need you to be on our side of this case.”

“I am!”

“Are you?” He counters. “If you knew who this unsub was, would you turn her in?”

“Are you suggesting—”

“Hypothetically.”

“Yes! For God’s sake, yes, I would turn her in.”

“Are you being honest with me?”

“What is wrong with you today?” You ask, crossing your arms over your chest. “If you have something else to say you might as well say it while we’re alone.”

He doesn’t move. Or say a single word.

So much for that.

“Look,” you uncross your arms, tired of fighting already. It’s exhausting on any normal day, but pair it with jet lag and it being between you and the man you obviously care for, and it’s a million times more exhausting. “Yes, I get where this unsub is coming from. Honestly, if it was legal and if there was a market for a job like what she’s doing, I probably would’ve gone into it instead of the FBI. But there isn’t. Because killing people is illegal. So I decided to go to the FBI to make a bigger difference— a real difference. Yes, I relate to the unsub. I get why she’s doing what she’s doing. But just because I get it doesn’t make it right.”

“Good,” he nods. “That’s all I needed to hear.”

You furrow your eyebrows. “I shouldn’t have even had to say it.”

The room falls silent.

Hotch sees it then, that look in your eyes. During the profile, it was all determination and confidence. When you entered the office, it was bratty and defiant. 

Now, it’s hurt.

That’s all he sees. And frankly, that’s all you’re feeling.

Since he doesn’t say anything else, you take it upon yourself to say, “Excuse me,” and join the team in the conference room with only one question on your mind.

Does he not trust me at all?

Next chapter

[lovely-necromancy]

A Cure for Insomnia CH.5

A scream shocks you out of your fuzzy thoughts. You look around and notice Connor sitting alert and looking like he wants to run down the hallway this very instant.

“Connor?” the head snaps to you immediately and before you can even question his presence in your home he jumps up and barks then walks in circles near the door.

Great a dog who has no sense of horror movie tropes. Since the scream did come from inside your house you should go find the person who made it and see what's wrong. Also maybe get clarification on why they're in your home. You aren't dead and are still in the same clothes so you figure you're alright around them. You follow Connor to where Toby is, in your kitchen staring out the window standing at a very odd angle. Like he caught himself before he fell backwards but hadn't bothered to get up.

“What's up....oh.” is all you can say as you see Chonk's head whip towards you and Connor before he books it for the tree line. Damn that fat raccoon can run fast, good to know if he ever wants to chase you down in the future. Which he might if you don't leave his slice of pizza out today.

“'oh' 'oh', that's all yo-you've got to say about a giant fuck-ing ra-mrrow- raccoon!?!” maybe thinking this guy was composed and unphased was a misconception, if seeing Chonk has put his world views in question.

“I mean he probably just eats a lot of pizza.” to put it simply you never gave much thought to the fat little trash thief, he was just fat and he existed. Visiting your home for the slice he deemed his every other week. Probably had other homes in Kepler he terrorized for the same reasons. God knows Leo would never put up with a raccoon trashing his store for his pizza. Or even his home for that matter.

“He's nearly half the size of Connor!” looking down towards Connor you tilt your head.

“Are we talking about with his legs or just his torso?” you could maybe see the size comparison with the dog's body but with his height it was a different matter all together.

Toby rolls his eyes before going and sitting down at the small breakfast table where he seemed to have found your fidget cube and had been well fidgeting with it. You take the seat opposite of him, it's weird having a guest over especially when you didn't invite them in. Well now that removes the chances of him being a vampire you suppose.

Perfect not a kidnapper, nor a vampire, and he's helped you out twice now. The two of you might well be on your way to becoming best friends. That is if he could get past this episode of yours.

“I still don't know what happened last night, but I'm done with the freak out.” you say as you idly pet Connor.

“...What?” he's squinting at you trying to get a read on how anyone bounces back from something like that so calmly in a matter of hours. Especially when he'd been checking up on you and Connor only to see you still staring off into space.

“Oh, uh... I have Autism. Isn't good for much but helps me rationalize events quicker and move past emotional and mental breakdowns pretty quick too.”

“Is that an Autism thing?” you shrug at his question as he jerks his shoulders forwards a few times.

“Probably more of a me thing, but I've read the trait tends to be more common in those of us who are neurodivergent.”

You hear a murmur of telling someone later later. Filing that away to take note of another day you stare at Toby who in turn stares back. This goes on for a bit, you couldn't even classify it as a staring contest since you are both still blinking occasionally. You aren't really sure if you should say 'thank you' first and then ask the man what he's doing in your home or wait for him to break the silence. But as you stare at Toby, into his eyes, you get the feeling this man is more of a zombie than anything else. The type to drag along and go at a snails pace rather than get into the messy bits in one go...ironic choice for comparison.

“Thank you for driving me home...but why are you still here?” you hear a huff of laughter?

“You weren't really in a position...” knuckles pop “to be left alone. What if you got back into your car again?” his eyes cut and there's a bit of bite to his words...it wasn't directed towards you, you can feel that much.

“Fair enough.” you glance at the stove and see the clock shine a little before six. “Would you like some breakfast” his neck snaps to the left triggering your own to snap as well, “or a ride home?” you finish asking.

“Can you make something for Connor too? Don't trust you behind the wheel yet.”

“Oh sure! What does he normally eat?” Perking up at the thought of the dog being off duty, that means actual pets!

“He-mrrow- normally gets oatmeal with some fruit or veg and anything raw I can find.” He finishes with a whistle for Connor's attention, and then a pointed finger flipping down in front of him. The dog trots over and sits down, while Toby takes off the vest you look through your cupboards to find the rolled oats you'd gotten as incentive to eat in the mornings before realizing you only liked them on certain days.

“So what does Tobias normally eat?” you call out as you look for some honey you know you threw in the cupboards.

“Anything really. I don't do slimy textures or anything watery.”

“Watery? Like soups?” Found a can of pumpkin, it's still in date too, perfect.

“Watery like...when you put too much water in oatmeal.” He nods when you silently show him the can of pumpkin asking if that'd be fine for his boy, who is sitting down drooling from his smiling face as Toby tussles his ears.

“Ahhh, thin watery got it.” You hear movement and a few grunts from Toby as you assume he tics, trying to ignore them so they won't trigger your own you look through the fridge. You suddenly take a deep breath, while looking for a meat in your fridge, and let out a shrill trill. Kinda sounds like a Togepi's cry from the cartoon. Shaking your head your eyes catch the eggs and turkey sausages you have.

“Will turkey sausage and eggs work for you two?”

“Never had turkey sausage but it should be fine.” he's leaning forward resting his head in his arms on the table as Connor lays by his bouncing feet.

You set the eye to medium heat and put the sausages on first, leaving three out for Connor. He is a big dog after all. You turned your focus on preparing Connor's oatmeal while the sausages cooked. It was kinda nice having company over even though the circumstances weren't the best. Your neck jerks to the side three times before pulling back. There's more on the way your neck didn't crack and your body doesn't let up until it does.

“So what disorder do you have?” You turn to give Toby a confused look you hope he can read through your mask.

“...I have a few..you want the list?”

“No, the tics. Lower level Tourettes or what?”

“Oh, they stem from my” head jerking twice to the side before cracking “there we go.” “Sorry, they stem from my Autism, at least that's the best I can gather without seeing a specialist. Virginia doctors suck big time.”

“Tell me about it.” that perks you right up, you knew you caught a transatlantic accent, it's pretty much the lack of an accent that gives Virginians away so easily. You already have two guesses on where Toby came from.

“I knew it, you're from Halifax aren't you?!” Since you've turned around to face him you see the exact moment his face drops. Eyes shocked wide open.

“How...did”

“Oh it's easy once you know what to listen for, in fact it was the total lack of any distinguishing accent or use of slang that gave you a way. A lot of people don't notice what they take from their communities linguistically speaking. And for us Virginians it's what we don't take. It's such a bland neutral midpoint it's why it had been so coveted during the radio era and while we might've lost the in-fluctuations as time went by, no longer needing them for our voices to be heard over various frequencies....am I talking too much you can tell me to shut up, really you won't hurt my feelings.” you give Toby a minute to process everything you've just said.

“Special interest?”

“mmm, more a...an interesting factoid.” you hope he registers your smile, hell you hope he doesn't think you're weird. You know how much you can be sometimes, especially when you info dump or overshare information. He manages to nod along with you before finding his voice again.

“Lemme guess NOVA?”

“Pfft, seriously.” you really need him to at least register the disgust on your face if he hasn't been able to read you before, “Listen the Beach isn't much better but I'd probably off myself if I was from NOVA.”

“A public service really.”

You both stare at each other before breaking into a fit of laughter. It's nothing huge but it does seem to put Toby more at ease you noticed. In the time it took you to make breakfast for all three of you you've found out a little bit more about Toby.

He's uncomfortable talking about his hometown, at least you assume, so instead he mentions that he recently came to town with his friends, Brian and Tim. Talks mostly about Connor and you learn he's to help alert Toby of his Tourettes when driving and he can even detect seizures with Brian. That's amazing, service dogs have sure come a long way! And you love hearing what a silly puppy Connor is off duty, it makes you smile. Toby in turn asks about you, and you are such a well of stories. You tell him about your family back on the coast, about your recent move to Kepler, give him a little info on Kepler to help him adjust to his stay, and even get on the topic of your extensive work with animals.

“Sounds like you were working towards being a trainer, why didn't you?”

Making a sound that sort of sounds like a jumbled 'I dunno', “Sort of don't like people that much. Dogs are fine, less complex and less likely to complain when you do something in a different way. But a trainer doesn't train the dog, they train the people.” You're placing Connor's food in front of him as he sits patiently.

It's quiet for a moment as you place a plate in front of Toby and set yours down as well. Not tense just quiet, it's very calming really. Until Toby ruins it.

“Thanks Connor.”

Like he's a voice actor who is over exaggerating the sound effects of a dog munching away at their bowl. Connor inhales harshly before diving head first into the bowl. The dog is ferociously tearing into his breakfast and you can't help the laughter that spills from you at his enthusiasm. Hands coming up near your face and shaking as you shift from foot to foot. It's a happy stim, cute dogs are of course a trigger, someone can complain later you're happy to see a happy excited pup any day.

Taking your seat and turning your attention to your food, you see Toby hasn't touched his own. He's staring at the plate with a furrowed brow, he glances up to you as you remove your mask. You feel a bit vulnerable to be honest.

“Oh is something wrong? Do you want something else?”  He's a guest who's helped you twice now the least you can do is make sure he leaves your home full.

It takes a moment but he gathers his thoughts to explain, “I have a scar...it's pretty bad.” he looks away from you.

You tilt your head not quiet understanding what he means, “Cool story, do you want me to look away?”

He stalls at this, you just keep throwing him for a loop since you met the other day. While he thinks on it you scoop some of your eggs on your spoon and into your mouth. Perfect texture and prefect flavor, today will be good.

Toby seems to have made his decision and without any show he takes his mask off to begin eating. You can see the scar he was talking about, and while the currently red and bleeding'?!' scar on the left corner of his mouth was bad it wasn't much compared to the gaping hole further up that side on his cheek. You can clearly see the even whiter, how this boy is so pale is beyond you, skin around the edges suggesting the wound was older and had started to heal at some point. But you could see most of the teeth on the left side of his mouth. You've never seen these teeth while they were still in the head. A skull or 3D model yea. But never a living breathing person's head. It's fascinating really, you hadn't even noticed that you finished your breakfast as you watched him eat, you were so enthralled.

“You know your lip's bleeding right?” eyes never leaving the boy's teeth as you see them grind down the eggs into the tiniest particles. Neat!

“Rwhatf?” the way he can talk with his mouth full without spilling it from the hole is fucking magic and you won't hear another word on it.

He takes a drink of water, again it doesn't spill. Then you notice the slight tilt of his head...oh he's had practice doing this. Impressive honestly.

“That's what you choose to comment on?” his eyes narrow at you're still gawking form.

“I'm sorry I've just never seen those type of teeth still in head, normally muscle and...and skin cover them. So this is really cool to see them in action!” gosh you're so damn weird. By his stupefied expression Toby seems to think so too.

“Plus the wound looks healed but the lips look fresh,” you get up and grab a few paper towels bringing them over to offer to Toby, “Not to mention it's bleeding and you haven't once wiped it.”

He doesn't reply as he takes the napkins from you and dabs at his scarred lip, looking back and seeing blood just as you said. He was right when he thought he'd been biting himself a few hours ago. He'd totally forgotten to check after getting you home.

“Well I don't feel it so I didn't know actually.” he just resumes eating as if this conversation didn't happen.

“Didn't, didn't, didn't” you get stuck in a loop for a bit before breaking out “you didn't feel it? What do you have congenital insensitivity to pain?” you ask incredulously.

“I haven't heard it called that since I got diagnosed.” still eating he looks at you through his long eyelashes.

This dude could not be a real person. You had to have been imagining your dream friend. Everything you learned about Toby was more interesting than the last...at least for you it was.

“Medical history podcasts are interesting.” you shrug, “should I get the first aid kit?” at his shrug you get up and go to your bathroom to retrieve the kit.

Coming back into the kitchen you catch Toby lowering your plates for Connor to lick clean. You don't see a problem with it but you will wash everything twice since the pup has slobbered on nearly everything anyway. When you don't say anything he lets Connor continue before placing the dishes in your sink.

“Such a big help” you say patting Connor's head as you pass him, “Yea I really am” Toby says as he sits back down. Propping his arm up on the table to rest his head on his knuckles, it was such a fluid and casual motion. As if he's sat at this table everyday of his life, like this was his home and you were his guest. Tied in with how comfy he is man spreading at your kitchen table you'd say he made himself at home just fine.

You smile and scoot your chair next to him first aid kit in between you on the table. Toby looks between you and the kit before leaning in closer for you to work. Grabbing the antiseptic cleaning towels you go to wipe Toby's lip when he flinches away. Probably faking to see your reaction.

“Oh, fuck off you have CIPA.” you laugh grabbing his chin to keep him in place. He rolls his eyes “And you're weird.” The vibrations feel weird against your fingers.

“I know.” you continue cleaning the small bite mark? Well he does have CIPA he wouldn't be able to feel the pain if he was gnawing at his lips. Would he be able to taste the metallic tang of his blood or were taste buds effected by the disorder too? You might need to do another deep dive on this, it just became relevant. Maybe an anxious tic, judging from the larger wound it could be possible. Wearing a mask must help to hide it but not not to stop it getting worse if no one can call you out on it.

“That wasn't an insult...” he says making you look up into his eyes as you dry the wound, “I know.” You smile down at him, knowing this time he can see it on your maskless face.

When you finished cleaning his wounded lips, you drove Toby and Connor back to their home. Which turned out to be the RV at the forgotten entrance of the forest. Toby had been a little wary you knew where he was talking about but seemed to shake it off just as quick when you mentioned hiking a lot and using that entrance because it was the closest to you.

He had put Connor's vest back on and hopped in the back with him. You noticed from the review that Connor's full attention was on you.

“This set up let's him focus on the driver, so he'll tell us if something will impede your driving.” Well that explains Brian's position the first time you four met.

Nodding you sync you phone with the car's bluetooth and pass it to Toby with spotify open.

“Rules of the road, passenger picks music.” you say simply when he questioned it.

He quickly clicked your last playlist. Probably either too lazy to find something or trying to get a better read on you. Music says a lot about a person even if not everyone thinks that way. And unfortunately for you this playlist screams mental illness and a need for therapy. But you have folk punk. So who needs therapy when you can just scream cry these lyrics.

Toby doesn't comment on it, either just totally apathetic or maybe he likes it. He's a bit of an enigma, he's open and honest for the most part but saves his opinions unless directly asked.

Even after making it to the RV without incident Toby tries to distract you for a bit and tempt you out of the car with the possibility of playing with Connor. As fun as the idea sounds and as much as you don't want to be rude, you're very tired and drained. Probably more from “hanging out” with Toby this morning than your actual episode last night. Plus you understand Toby's just trying to be nice and maybe ensure your safety.

“Could I maybe rain-check? I'm actually really tired.” you say with your most polite smile, though he can't see it through the mask  you know he sees the crinkle of your eyes.

“Sure, just get home safe.” you feel that's less about you, but you aren't sure what the hanging subject is. So cryptic.

“Yup,” you chirp, “See you later Tobias!” as you start to back out back onto the road you hear Toby say “ Later YN.”

Driving off you can't keep the smile off of your face. Toby's a nice guy, you hope you get to spend more time with him. And this time the thought isn't centered around also hanging out with Connor. Just about enjoying Toby's company.

Getting home and locking your door you strip your jeans and flannel, leaving you only in your muscle tee, and curl up in your unkempt sheets. You'll do laundry later, right now was time for a little nap.

[obsidianfr3sk]

Falcon in the Dive

Summary:  Piercing into the sky and higher, Ace thrived. The weak cowered, but the fittest, like him, survived. He didn't wait until the darkest hour, he didn't wait until they spring alive. He, with claws of fire, devoured like a falcon in the dive.

AO3

As my contribuiton to the Multifandom Gift Exchange 2020 (hosted by the wonderful @darkalinas and @scxundress), here’s a gift for my little sister and favorite villain apologist (?) @alecjamesartino. As soon as they told me I was your gifter... well, I was really happy!!! And then x’d I knew I had to write something about Ace and this song just... LIKE I JUST KNEW I HAD TO WRITE SOMETHING ABOUT ACE INSPIRED IN FALCON IN THE DIVE, ALL RIGHT???? I JUST ✨K N E W✨

Before y’all start reading xd I need to... kinda clarify something. So, I don’t know if you know, but I actually based all of my fics on this timeline made by @honey-hippie-harper and @healing-winston-pratt, and I kinda just started to create my headcanons from it. But, today I decided to throw all of them through the freaking window and base this fic on this timeline, made by my giftee:’))) She uses it for her fic Love and Anarchy (which you should totally read!). That said, this work has nothing to do with my other fics (for example, Rise of the Renegades or The Origins), I’m just experimenting with new headcanons:’)

Another important thing x’d On this fic I mention Leroy’s eyes turn green when he uses his powers and that Hugh’s eyes are gray instead of blue. This are not my headcanons, they’re actually from this drawing made by @healing-winston-pratt​. Go check it out and reblog it!!) 

Now... well, my dear little sister Alec, I hope you like this gift. I know how much you like Ace and the Anarchists, and I have never written anything about them (Begginings and Endings doesn’t count, it was from David’s POV x’d) so this was a complete challenge for me. But what kept me going was... thinking that I was doing this for you. And honestly, your timeline just gave me so much space to play with new headcanons and scenarios, so thank you for that:’)) Personally I consider myself someone with a extraordinary imagination, but you, Alec, left me dumbfounded (quedé dirían en mi tierra). You are so young, and brilliant, and adorably deathly that I just want to hold you and protect you from the the bad things that happen on this world:’) 

I’d say I love you but I’m akward so I’ll just say I’m really fond of you. I think you have a lot of potentential and I hope I get to see you become a wonderful woman. Felices fiestas✨✨✨ 

Knock in the doors, lock up the city,

track him down through this town,

and be quick about it... now!

How the devil can I ever prevail when I'm only a man?

I can never be duped by that scurrilous phantom again.

Year 0, month 0

“I thought you were going to be taller.”

Ace stopped looking at the chandelier hanging over his head to look at the woman to his right. “Sorry?”

“I thought you were going to be taller,” she repeated almost yelling.

“Fuck, Honey ...”

Ace turned to his left. “What?” Honey asked. “I’m just saying, geez.”

The young man's eyes went from dark to toxic green.

“Leroy,” Ace interrupted, “your chair is ... burning.”

Leroy removed his hands from the armrest of the chair he was sitting in, cursing underneath. There were drops of a greenish liquid coming from his fingers and the wood smelled like a burnt tree. As he did his best to clean up the mess he had made with his powers, Ace turned his attention back to Honey. “Did you think it was going to be taller?”

Honey tucked one of her blonde curls behind her ear. She was wearing a white coat with rhinestone as buttons; a group of prodigies had given it to her in exchange for allowing them to join their ranks. Ace had replied that it was not necessary to pay any kind of tribute and that anyone who agreed with the values of the Anarchists, could consider themselves as such. Despite this, one of the boys insisted on giving Honey the coat, because from the moment he saw it, he thought it was “fit for a queen”. That was the moment when Ace's theory was confirmed: Honey had a weakness for compliments and gifts. She accepted the coat with a smile and even defended the boy when Leroy muttered, “Ahem, simp.”

That was also the moment when he realized that Leroy's weakness was driving Honey out of her mind.

Regardless, Ace could tell that they had some kind of… appreciation for each other. The first time he saw them use their powers was when Honey sent a cloud of wasps to a group of cops who tried to get Leroy into one of their trucks and when Leroy burned the face of a guy who had grabbed Honey from wrist strong enough to make her scream.

Those two were powerful and loyal without falling into blind fanaticism. Ace needed people like that in his ranks.

The whole world needed such people in its ranks.

“I mean, yeah,” Honey continued. “I had heard so much about Ace Anarchy that… well, I have to admit I did build up some expectations.”

Ace fixed his gaze on Honey's feet. She was wearing heels. Obviously. “Why don't you get off those stilts and say it to my face?”

Honey burst out laughing right away and Ace too. He could even see Leroy trying not to smile before crossing his arms on his chest.

The three were on the seat of the cathedral, Ace sitting on the main chair where the priest who officiated the mass sat, and Honey and Leroy on the chairs to the sides, generally reserved for the seminarians who helped during the celebration. He had taken the table out of the way with his powers and stored it in a cellar, in case it was needed again. During those last three weeks that they had been using the cathedral as a base, Ace had given some speeches there. The light coming from the windows illuminated his face and the crucifix behind him made him feel a kind of power that he could not describe. Also, the main chair was wide, tall, and shiny. It would have looked like a throne if it were covered in some golden metal...

Stop it.

“I think no one else is coming,” said Leroy. “we better get out of here. These chairs are uncomfortable.”

“Use a cushion, like me,” Honey commented, proudly displaying the small cushion she had placed on the chair to make it easier to sit.

Leroy couldn’t look more disgusted. “Why would you put your ass on the same cushion you use to sleep?”

As his allies began to argue again, Ace put his arms on the sides of the chair, focusing on the immense doors of the cathedral.

As far as they knew, Ace was waiting for recruits. It was a fairly common thing to happen. Many prodigies (like the simp and his henchmen) had been flocking to the cathedral, seeking help, acceptance, or a chance to prove themselves worthy of being within Ace's close circle. It was a bit tiring at times, but at the moment he couldn't afford to turn them away without even bothering to see what their powers were. If he knew something, it was that no power could not be taken advantage of in some way, and if that way could benefit him, the better.

But at dusk, the chances of people coming to the cathedral began to disappear, because at night the city became dangerous. Thus, Ace knew that he would not receive any new potential recruits until the next morning, and he knew that his allies need to rest and eat something.

However, he also knew that David could be the one to walk through that door at any moment.

Ace was still furious with him. He probably would be furious with him for the rest of his life. David was a condescending, deluded guy who didn't bother to think outside the box for the good of those who were like them.

But at the end of the day, that guy was his blood (whoever he liked it or not) and he wanted to make sure he was still alive.

David Artino would never miss an opportunity to exercise his authority as an older brother and scold him for the first reason that crossed his mind. He could see him hiding like a mole in some hole in the city, losing his mind to the chaos that his younger brother was slowly planting in every corner of planet Earth.

However, he could also see him being killed in the street by an angry horde who knew he was a prodigy, or by a group of policemen who mistook him for one of the hundreds of protesters that had filled the city, and although the thought made him uncomfortable, it might be best if things stayed that way.

After all, if David went out to the real world, the world that was out there right now would probably kick him to the ground, take out his eyes, and eat them before stabbing him and letting him there to die.

Yes, things should stay that way. With Ace Anarchy alive and building the world as it must have been from the start, and with the Artino brothers dead, buried in a sealed tomb from which not even their souls could escape.

He was about to stand up when someone knocked on the door. Honey’s bees, which had been quietly resting on the church pews, began to buzz like watchdogs barking at the presence of a stranger.

Alec knew those four knocks.

Honey and Leroy suddenly fell silent and settled into their chairs almost unconsciously. Ace put on his helmet and then, with a wave of his hand, he slightly opened the cathedral door.

His hair was longer than normal. He recognized the same coat he was wearing the last time he saw him, but he had changed his pajama bottoms for faded jeans. He had a mysterious blow to the head and the deepest circles under his eyes he had ever seen. That, plus that unkempt beard, made Ace even more certain that, had he seen him on the street, he probably wouldn't have recognized him.

At least until he saw his blue eyes. David had unmistakable blue eyes.

“Good evening, fellow anarchist,” Ace greeted from his seat. “How can we help you?”

David gripped the door and frowned. “Alec?”

The bees buzzed louder and Honey turned to see him. “Do you know him?”

Leroy and his toxic green eyes seemed to ask the same question.

“You don't want to mention that name here,” Ace warned, ignoring his allies. “Seriously.”

David did not reply. Not that he expected him to. “Come in,” he assured him, nodding slightly. “Us Anarchists are willing to help any prodigy. We fight for all of them. Even for those who prefer to give in to the system that oppresses us in the first place. "

His allies fell silent. Ace knew he wasn't going to be wrong about them; they were fully aware that their opinion was not necessary at that time.

David's old sneakers squeaked on the marble floor of the church. The white shoelaces were stained with dark blood. “I… I looked for you everywhere,” he muttered.

“I didn't go anywhere,” he replied. “I was always here.”

He resisted the childish urge to ask where he had been, precisely because that was it. Childish. Something that only a kid would do.

And Alec James Artino, the kid, was dead.

David reached the first step of the altar and Ace stood up. “Don’t.”

His brother stopped before taking another step. He even stepped back and put his hands to his chest, as if his heart had ached at that simple word.

You see? Weak.

“I'm not here to take you anywhere,” he assured.

Ace gave a mocking laugh. “So?”

“I'm here to join you.”

The smile faded from Ace’s face. However, he did not interpret it as a sign of weakness, because immediately, he was able to recover from the blow and remain expressionless as his brother's gaze pierced his like stakes.

Even with him there, right in front of Ace, standing in the middle of the cathedral, he knew that David didn't belong there. He was not an Anarchist like them. Something was missing. Maybe courage. Maybe it was determination.

Perhaps what he lacked was that spark of life that rage gave when it started a fire in the depths of your gut.

So why bother?

Before the question slipped from his lips, the answer came to his head and it all made sense to him.

Ace was right. The day anarchy was born, the Artino brothers had died, but there was no one alive to bury them. The ghost of David Artino had spent days searching for his only remaining family, wandering around town like a beggar.

Because deep down, he needed him more than Alec had ever needed David.

How did he explain that the little brother he was looking for was dead, and now only the man he had become remained?

He knew how to explain it, but David was stubborn. Even if Ace chose the most appropriate words for the situation, he could never make him see things the way he wanted him to. At least not if he knew Alec was dead.

He did not know that in an ideal world, the only one still alive was Ace Anarchy.

It wasn't the perfect scenario, but the perfect thing about that scenario was that David didn't need to know that just yet. Alec's ghost could come out of his grave as many times as necessary and Ace could use that to his advantage for as long as he wanted.

That would make the ghost David very happy. And if David was happy and he could take advantage of that happiness, then Ace would be happy too.

Ace removed his helmet and laid it gently on his chair. When he returned his gaze to David, his eyes were full of tears.

He also tried to cry, but couldn't. Therefore, he decided to extend his arms and allow David to stumble his way to him, giving him the strongest hug he had ever received while stroking his hair and sobbing: “I missed you so much, my little nightmare.”

Alec took Ace by the arms and placed them on David's shaking back. “I missed you too.”

But he was lying. He wondered if ghost David was lying too.

He better not.

***

I wasn't born to walk on water,

I wasn't born to sack and slaughter,

but on my soul, I wasn't born

to stoop, to scorn, and knuckle under.

A man can learn to steal some thunder.

A man can learn to work some wonder.

Year 4, month 7

When it all started, Ace did not like to think of himself as a leader. At least not a leader like the previous ones. God, just thinking about becoming one of those who used to rule the world before he turned things around made him feel sick.

However, over time he grew tired of explaining to each of those who arrived, full of desire to prove something (to the world, to Ace, and themselves), that he was not a leader as such. Little by little, he started to ignore those types of comments and just let himself go with the flow.

At least until David noticed his unconformity with the matter and approach him to talk about it.

It was a couple of months after he arrived. Ace was saying his prayers before going to bed when someone knocked on his door.

Four times. As always.

He quickly crossed himself and muttered, “Come in.”

David came in, holding a candle and wrapped in a robe that "the simps" had given to Leroy (it hadn't fit him, but David was so malnourished that it was like the robe had been made for him.)

Ace put on his robe too. “How can I help you?”

David fixed his gaze on the figure of the Virgin Mary that Ace had on a ledge. “Were you praying?”

“Of course,” he answered, feeling a little defensive.

David scoffed. “Wow.”

“What?”

“I thought ... I thought you didn't do it anymore.”

Ace rolled his eyes and pretended to arrange the covers on his bed (they didn't need to be arranged, he was very meticulous about that matter). “How can I help you?” he repeated.

David finally took his eyes off the Virgin Mary and turned to see him.

It surprised him he still had bags under his eyes. He thought that now that he slept in a decent bed, ate decent food, and no longer had to go through the same stressful situations that he went through before, his face would start to look more youthful again.

Maybe the bags under one’s eyes were like expression or acne marks. They would always be there.

Just like experiences.

Then David started talking to him. A lot. About how he had noticed his discomfort when people called him a leader. About him believing that he shouldn't feel that way because being placed in such a position was completely expected and even natural for it to happen. (“Don't interrupt me.” “I wasn't going to.” Oh, but he was going to.) About if he really wanted things to work out, the world was going to need someone to guide it down the path of good, and David did not doubt that someone was Ace.

They spent several hours just ranting about it. There was a point where the two of them were lying on his bed, Ace covered by his red blanket and David tightly holding a pillow against his chest. The candle was getting smaller and smaller, and David had chosen to place it next to the figure of The Virgin Mary as if it had been lit for her from the beginning.

Only that there was a God who saw everything, and that God knew that the candle had not been lit for her.

Ace was staring at the wooden ceiling when David told him, “I could never be a leader.”

“Why?”

Obviously Ace knew that David could never be a leader, but he wanted to know why his brother thought that way.

David clung to the pillow tighter. He wasn't looking at the ceiling; he looked at Ace. Sideways, but he was looking at him. “I don’t know. I think it's just not my… personality. Even when the guys and I were out there doing the… protests and stuff, I never led any of them,” he explained. “I've always been more of a follower.”

Ace did not answer. Yet he hoped David would interpret his silence as a sign that he had agreed with him.

“But on the other hand, you... Alec, you are a leader.”

His jaw clenched when he heard his name. He had to work on it. “What makes you think that?”

“Because… seriously, why wouldn’t you be a leader?” He turned around so he could look at him and Ace felt obligated to turn to see him as well. Only that he decided not to. “People look after you. They know you are a leader and they follow you. See how much you've changed in a matter of weeks. Inadvertently, you have led people up to this point in history. No one had ever come this far. No one except you.”

Then, Ace couldn't take it anymore and turned to meet his brother's eyes. “But won't that make me like everyone else?”

“Everyone else?” asked a very confused David.

Because David never understood anything.

“Like all the other leaders,” he replied, trying not to lose patience. “Leaders who are corrupt and selfish and—“ His brother interrupted his monologue with laughter. Much to someone who had complained when he tried to cut him off in the middle of a ridiculously long explanation. “—What’s so funny?”

“I’m sorry,” David replied smiling. “It’s just… forget it.” He put a hand on his cheek and kept laughing underneath. “Alec, you’re not going to be like the other leaders.”

“And how are you so sure of that?” he asked a little louder than he wanted to.

David hardly seemed to notice. “Because you are not like that. You are not evil.” He sighed. “Now… there is the potential for evil everywhere, but the only way to combat it’s if more people choose goodness. If more people choose heroism. And you… you are one of those people. I am sure.”

And with those words, the candle extinguished, and Ace decided that it was time for both of them to go to sleep. He allowed David to stay the night. It was not like he had given any sign of wanting to go back to his room anyway. Ace spent most of the night awake, but not necessarily because his older brother's snoring kept him from sleeping.

What kept him from sleeping was thinking that maybe... maybe he was right. Maybe Ace did have to start taking the role of leader. After all, human beings were like that. They were always looking for someone to follow, someone they could cling to that would protect them in some way or another. That someone could be the parents. Older brothers. God himself.

But sometimes that someone was not looking for what was best for them. For example, Ace and David's parents never made the slightest effort to hide how much they hated their children. He was still a kid when his brother took him by the hand, put a coat on him, and told his parents that they were going out to the park. Ace didn't want to go to the park; he wanted to stay home to play with his wooden cubes, but David told him that if he went to the park with him, he would give him a surprise on the way home.

However, they passed the park and David went to a clothing and suitcase store that was near the dock where various boats full of tourists departed. On his way out, he bought his younger brother a lollipop and two one-way tickets to Gatlon City.

They never looked for them. Although if they had, he doubted they would have found them.

For a long time, Ace didn't fully understand what had happened. He just knew that he was never going to see his parents again. Regardless, it was not a thought that haunted him. After all, he hated his parents. And he didn't feel bad about it. Ace had David. David would never hurt him in any way.

At least that's how it was until he grew up. He grew up and realized that David had lied and stolen to get them out of Italy. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing; they would never have survived in Italy anyway. The bad thing was when David lied to him and robbed him for his own benefit. He lied to him about Gatlon's hate towards prodigies and he stole money from his savings when what he earned wasn't enough to pay the monthly rent on his apartment.

And then… there was God.

God existed. Clearly. It was one of the few things Ace didn't feel like he needed proof for. However… God hadn't always been there for him. God had been used as a weapon for hundreds of years to attack prodigies like Ace...

Yes, God was not going to save him. He wasn't going to save any of the millions and millions of prodigies that were counting on Ace Anarchy. God was not a hero.

But Ace could be.

So from that day on, Ace began to be the head in practically all the operations that the Anarchists carried out. Nothing happened without him finding out and approving it first. He recorded numerous videos and wrote dozens of speeches that they would use to spread his word around the world. Prodigies from all countries began to rise against their respective governments, and although some of them gave them what they wanted, the vast majority made the mistake of underestimating them and denying their more than reasonable requests.

Because, well, Ace didn't find anything outrageous about a bunch of people asking their governments to recognize their basic human rights.

Sometimes the prodigies of those places could take down their governments by themselves. However, on a couple of occasions, Ace had to travel to those places to give them a hand. They weren't too far away, so Ace could use his powers to transport himself there, and he still had enough strength left to turn the helicopters and tanks that they sent to try to finish him into unusable pieces of metal. There wasn’t a single place where he had not succeeded, and there was not a single place where people did not make him a symbol and call him a hero.

Not even a single one.

That was why he did not understand people who wanted to leave the trenches.

The first time people from the cathedral had explicitly told him that they wanted to resign were the Benitez twins, Fénix and Tritón. He was a water elemental and she was a fire elemental, who had fought alongside Ace and hundreds of other prodigies like him when they took over the government palace of their country and liberated the population. They were young but strong, like most of those who joined the cause. They spent a year and six months helping on missions that Ace, Honey, or even Leroy assigned them, and never received anything other than good comments from their superiors...

“Then why do you want to leave?” Honey asked them.

She, Leroy, the twins, and he were in what had been the bishop's office after he summoned them all to a meeting where they would assess the situation. Not because he felt a special affection for them; they weren't too different from the other people Ace had in charge of. He just wanted to know why and approve the situation.

Like he always did.

Tritón smiled charmingly at Honey. He and his twin sister had the same curly black hair, but she never smiled. “As we said before… it's nothing personal,” he replied. “Fénix and I were never mistreated here, but... we want to find our own way in life.”

Honey and Leroy turned to see each other. Leroy looked quite indifferent to the situation as if he wished to be in his lab, looking for new ways to finish burning his eyebrows, while Honey seemed quite suspicious regarding the true intentions behind Tritón's words and Fénix's deadly silence.

Ace stood up and looked out the window.

“Are you going back to Mexico?”

“Yes. But not to the same place we came from.”

“And how are you going to—“

“Stop overwhelming them with so many questions, my Queen,” Ace interrupted while turning around. “They are old enough to make their own decisions.”

Tritón sighed in relief, and Fénix didn't even look up to see him. “They had already packed their things, apparently,” and he pointed to the backpacks they were carrying. The same ones with which they had arrived at the cathedral.

“Yes, it's just… we didn't want to make a big fuss about our departure,” Tritón replied. “We want it to be respectful and press-free, please.”

That comment managed to make him smile slightly. “I see no reason to keep you as prisoners,” he said, addressing Honey and Leroy. “If they want to leave, they can.”

Leroy raised his only remaining eyebrow. “Can they?”

“They can,” he repeated. He turned slightly to continue staring out the window. It was a lovely day out there. “Wanting to look for something more than what we are capable of offering is a valid reason to leave.”

“Not that we’re filling like something’s missing here,” Tritón said. “On the contrary, we have never been more… blessed. We promise that we will always keep in mind all the things the Anarchist taught us. We will be on your side even if it is from a distance.”

Now it was Honey's turn to raise an eyebrow. “I don't know, this is too—“

“Excuse me, Queen Bee,” Tritón interrupted, “but ... we're in a bit of a rush.”

“An ally has promised to take us to the border in his truck,” Fénix said, speaking for the first time during the entire conversation. “He's going to pick us up in an hour and it's a long way to the meeting point.

Ace looked through the window to find David welcoming some of the prodigies who had come out to find more supplies for the cathedral. He pointed out where they were being kept and offered to help them carry some boxes up the stairs.

Ace had to go to check on that.

“Acey...”

“Take care of yourselves, Tritón and Fénix,” Ace said, heading for the exit. “Thank you very much for your loyalty. Let me show you the door.”

The twins looked at each other, immediately nodding slowly and leaving the room, walking in front of Ace, shoulder to shoulder, and muttering something. As they walked down the stairs, Ace was too busy thinking about the new shipment that had arrived to care about their conversation, until he tried to overhear them and realized they were speaking in Spanish.

They never spoke Spanish. Not in the cathedral. No one could have understood them if they did. What was the point of hiding something?

Unless they are hiding something.

He turned his attention back to the backpacks they carried. Yes, they were the same ones that they had brought the first day they arrived, but now they seemed fuller than before. And when Ace said fuller, he meant it. Those backpacks were about to explode.

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs. The twins kept walking as if they hadn't realized that Ace was no longer with them. Honey and Leroy caught up with him, while Honey was saying something about this situation making her babies (the bees) very nervous, and she knew that was a bad sign. Leroy replied that those "babies" should take a Xanax, but he didn't sound too convinced of his words either.

Fénix took his brother's hand and Tritón looked back, making contact with Ace's dark eyes.

The backpacks. The backpacks were too full.

Ace used his powers to rip them off their shoulders, at the same time he grabbed them from the collars of their clothes and lifted them like a mother lioness would have carried her cubs. The two cried out in shock but fell silent when they came face to face with Ace.

Neither of them said anything. Not even Tritón. They only held on tighter by the hand as Ace opened their backpacks, dropped their contents on the floor, and revealed that they were carrying, along with their personal belongings, tons of food and hygiene items taken directly from the cathedral warehouse.

The warehouse that David was supposed to watch.

“My bracelet!” Honey exclaimed. “That... bitch was taking my bracelet!”

A group of bees returned the bracelet to her queen. Honey thanked them in a low voice and immediately, her face was completely changed by her anger. “How dare you?” she asked Fénix putting a finger on her chest. “How dare you disrespect me like that ?! Is that how you were going to pay the man who was going to take you to the border!?” But Fénix didn’t say anything. Again. “Answer me!”

“More like how dare you!” Fénix suddenly yelled. Honey took a step back from shock. “How dare you take everything from people who have nothing!”

“Fénix... por favor...” Tritón whispered.

“Shut the fuck up, Diego!” she yelled at his brother. “Tell me, Harper! How do you sleep at night?” she kept asking. “How do you sleep at night knowing that you have helped destroy the world as we know it? How can you reason that what you’re doing is right?!”

“Eleonor! Eleonor, por favor!”

Fénix started to try to free herself from Ace's grip, but that only made Ace cling tighter to the collar of her blouse. “How dare you even think you’re the good guys?”

Then, she looked him dead in the eye and spat, “How dare you call yourself a hero, Alec Artino?”

Ace thought hearing his name was going to make him lose his mind. Yet some way or another, his face remained expressionless. Even when Honey slapped the shit out of Fénix and the bees began to fly around her, stinging every bit of skin that wasn’t covered by her clothes. He also remained expressionless when he heard Tritón yell at Honey to leave her sister alone, calling her a "pinche vieja bruja" in the process, or when Leroy (who didn't understand anything, but knew it wasn't a compliment) held both of his wrists to prevent it from forming a wave of water that would drown all the bees instantly. It did not cause him anything at all to hear the poison melting Tritón's skin, making him cry in pain, or Fénix yelling and cursing.

And he didn’t even flinch when he broke Tritón's neck. Or when he left Fénix alive just the exact amount of time for her to process what her actions had caused to the only family she had left before breaking her neck too.

Ace dropped what was left of the Benitez twins. The bees moved away from the body and returned to Honey as if they were children hiding in their mother's skirts after having been lost for hours in the market, and Leroy let go of Tritón’s wrists without saying a word. Ace looked around and realized that a big amount of people had watched the entire scene from a distance.

One of those people had been David.

At that moment, Honey's bracelet fell off her hands. Ace picked it up with his powers and Honey whispered, "Thanks, Acey". She tried to put it on, but her hands were shaking so much that Leroy reached out (reluctantly) to help her adjust the clasp.

She didn't take her eyes off the corpses. “Someone come pick them up,” Leroy ordered.

Ace pointed to the first group of people he encountered. “You,” he barked. The trio of anarchists trembled slightly. “You’ve heard Cyanide. Clean up this mess.”

He turned to tell Leroy and Honey to go with him to the office, but they had already made their way to Honey's quarters, while she was babbling about something insignificant and a cloud of agitated bees followed them. David was also not where he had last seen him, but found him turning his back on him and putting the supply crates in the warehouse.

The warehouse that was his responsibility. The warehouse that the Benitez twins had managed to steal from it without anyone noticing.

David couldn’t stay there. He would have to get him a new position, the sooner the better.

Being a hero was not doing things that everyone considered right. Being a hero was to be a revolutionary, one who was willing to make sacrifices to protect the people who were on his side. Especially when those sacrifices meant the death of traitors who only sought their own benefit, completely forgetting the rest of them.

To protect the people who were on his side. Not the enemy. Never the common good.

The common good was not something Ace believed in, because that would mean looking after his oppressors, and they had never looked after prodigies at any point in human history.

Why start doing it now that the tables have turned?

Perhaps those thoughts made him more than just a revolutionary. Ace was probably a visionary.

But did those thoughts make him a villain too?

***

And soon the moon will smolder,

and the winds will drive.

Yes, a man grows older, but his soul remains alive.

All those tremulous stars will glitter,

and I will survive!

Year 10, month 11

For a lot of people, the answer was yes.

Being a visionary was the same as being a villain.

No one had ever said that to his face, but Ace knew it was what they were thinking. He saw it on the journalist’s faces, who came from time to time to the cathedral to report the latest advances in some important mission or some notable event. He felt it in the air of the cathedral, where some of his allies bent down every time they saw him as if they were not worthy to look him in the eye. He felt it every time he looked at his brother's expressionless eyes, working in the basement that served as a workshop where he created weapons for the Anarchists.

However, none of those silent reproaches mattered to him. Ace knew what he was doing was the right thing. Even if that made him not fit into the perfect image society had in its head of what a hero should be.

Ace had learned that there were no heroes or villains. Not like everyone thought.

The world would one day understand it as well as he did. But in the meanwhile, he had to sit down and observe that embarrassing spectacle.

They had managed to fix the TV that was at the former’s bishop's office. The only channels that were still actually broadcasting anything, besides the same old shows over and over again, were the news channels. But then he decided to do it just when it was absolutely necessary, for example, when they lied or got too close to a truth the public didn't need to know.

After all, freedom of speech was a human right.

Leroy was sat on the comfy chair Honey always sat on when they were in Ace's office. David offered Honey his chair and she said that she expected no less from someone as chivalrous as him (“Definitely some men should start taking your example”), but then added he shouldn’t worry about it, Ace was surely going to allow her to sit on his desk. Ace didn't see why not. She even brought her pillow with her. She put it over the desk, at the exact place she was going to sit on, and had her eyes fixated on the TV like she were a little girl watching colorful cartoons.

They were broadcasting from the West Zone of the city. An Anarchist truck was on fire in the background of the image. The trio of prodigies that Ace himself had sent to exchange some weapons for medicines with the usual gangs they always trade with, were tied with a chrome chain as if they were animals. The sky was still blue, but the evening light made the clouds turn orange and illuminated the faces of the two figures standing at the base that held the statue of a man with a copper-colored helmet.

Ace had never seen that monument as an ode to himself. He didn’t even know it was there until David told him about it, after going out to the city to visit that girlfriend of his. It seemed that some prodigies had come together and built it on their own. They hadn't left a signature or a way to prove who were they, but they did leave a golden plaque that read: "Long live to anarchy".

To anarchy. Not him. He was just the face they had given it.

He thought that everyone would think the same, but apparently, that pair didn't see it that way.

Because again, apparently, that pair shared a single brain cell.

One of them had brown skin and his cape flapped in the wind. His entire body looked slightly translucent, probably due to the nervousness that caused him to have that many people looking at him. Ace had met enough prodigies to identify when their powers gave away their mood. However, most of the general public would not be able to know exactly what he was feeling, because a black mask covered most of his facial features and he was not saying a single word.

He was terrified.

Poor little thing… sure.

The other was blond and his eyes were full of courage. The more words that came out of his mouth, the more his cheeks turn red and the tighter he clenched his fists. He was also wearing a mask, but even someone less observant than Ace could tell exactly what he was feeling.

“…and now this!” he yelled at the crowd. “Now this statue! A statue in the middle of the city, as if having experienced firsthand all the misfortunes that his anarchist reign has brought to our lives has not been enough, now he wants to constantly remind us that he won. He won—” His voice cracked, and he tried to hide it by coughing. Honey burst out laughing. “—and he will keep winning until someone stops him!”

The boy in the cape put his hand on the monument. “You know what this reminds me of? It reminds me of loss.” He became invisible and within seconds, he was sitting on the statue's outstretched arm. “Because Ace Anarchy has taken away from us so many things—” He jumped off and fell gracefully onto the base again “—that he took our fear with him.”

“That’s why we are here,” the other continued. “We are fed up with Ace Anarchy and his government, and I'm sure you are too.” He took a deep breath and smiled at the nearest camera. “But we don't blame you if you still don't understand. There is nothing wrong with being paralyzed with fear. That is what Ace Anarchy has wanted us to do during these ten years that he has been in power. The good news is that there is a cure for fear, and that cure is hope.”

A young, dark-skinned reporter pushed her way through the crowd. Her microphone had a number five printed on it, and Ace recognized the channel immediately.

He had killed one of its journalists after she refused to stop digging graves. He had to do it; if she dug too much, she would surely have found Alec Artino's body.

After all, freedom of speech was a human right. Messing up with the dead was just a quicker way for you to end up like them.

“Georgia Rawles, for Channel Five,” the reporter said with a heavy breath. “I think we're all asking ourselves the same question about—” She tried to search for the correct words, but the time was running out and she couldn’t find it, so she sighed and just blurted out, “Who are you?”

Leroy rolled his eyes. “More reporters like her, please...” he mumbled sarcastically.

She handed the microphone to the one with the cape. For a few seconds, he was almost completely invisible, but the insistence of the reporter Rawles brought him back to reality and his voice did not tremble as his legs did when he said: “We are that hope.”

The other boy tapped Georgia Rawles’ shoulder and she swiftly passed him the microphone.

He never stopped smiling. “We are the Renegades.”

Georgia Rawles drew back slightly. He couldn’t tell whether her expression was one of horror or joy because right after replying, the boy smashed the monument to anarchy with a single blow and turned it into pieces.

They both jumped from the base before the monument could crash them. Dread Warden and Captain Chromium ran towards the city, without any reporter bothering to follow them.

Ace turned off the television with his powers, and for about five seconds, neither of them spoke.

“They're not good at picking aliases,” Honey spat out of nowhere.

“So that’s the problem you have with this?” Leroy blurted out.

“Dread Warden… that has nothing to do with his powers,” Honey explained as if she were explaining to a five-year-old why the sky is blue. “And Captain Chromium is too… cheesy to be a real alias. Are we sure they were serious when they gave their names to the reporters from the first channel that arrived on the scene?” She cleared her throat and said (trying so hard to imitate the voice of a teenage boy whose voice hadn’t change yet), “He won,” before burst out laughing again.

“How mature of you…” David muttered.

“Do you have something to say, brother?” Ace asked.

For a second, he thought that David would not answer him, as he had been doing lately whenever he asked him that question. However, this time he did not remain silent and turned to see him. Not in the eyes, of course. “Actually, I do.”

Ace leaned back in his chair. “Go ahead then.”

“I don't think we should take this lightly.”

Honey scoffed. “Who says we are taking this lightly? The invisible twink and his lesbian boyfriend hate us, so what? They’re not the first ones, like… get in line, girl.”

“Well, you don’t seem too worried about the whole situation, to be honest.”

“It's because Honey doesn't shut up about the names thing, right?” Leroy asked in a slightly teasing tone.

“It's just my marketing major talking,” Honey said, slightly kicking him, barefoot. “I know about branding and stuff.”

“You dropped out.”

She put on her left heel and kicked Leroy. “You too!”

David massaged his temple. Ace turned around in his rotating chair and looked out the window. The sky had turned the same color as the clouds.

“Alec,” David called him. “It seems like… they—the Renegades think of themselves as heroes, and… they see you as the villain. I don't know, they could be a real threat, you shouldn't ignore them.”

Ace really wanted to tell David to just go back to his workshop. What did he know? They were just a couple of children who had destroyed a monument, who hadn't even been able to reveal their true identities and hid the entire time behind their masks, like criminals.

They were not a real threat.

But then, the seventeen-year-old Ace Anarchy appeared on the other side of the window, challenging him to finish that sentence inside his head. The seventeen-year-old Ace Anarchy who had dismantled entire governments and liberated millions of prodigies simply by wearing that helmet and its powers.

And when Ace blinked again, it was no longer the dark eyes of his old self that were staring at him from the glass, but the gray eyes of Captain Chromium, with that smug and arrogant smile, that he used to charm the cameras moments ago, passing his fingers through his hair as if his life depended on it.

Ace couldn’t look away from him.

He resembled Ace, but it was not enough. The old Ace didn't smile at his oppressors and he didn't have an unhealthy obsession with his hair either. He did not seek to protect people to win their affection, because he didn’t care if people like him or not, he knew he was doing the right thing.

The old Ace was not a kid playing to be a superhero, because superheroes didn't exist in the first place.

When he blinked, none of them were there anymore. Just his present self.

He smiled at himself to regain confidence.

Ace had learned that there were no heroes or villains. Captain Chromium was going to have to learn it too, and soon. Ace was willing to be the one to teach him that lesson.

And he would, whether he liked it or not.

***

There was a dream, a dying ember.

There was a dream, I don't remember,

but I will resurrect that dream,

though rivers stream and hills grow steeper.

For here in hell where life gets cheaper.

Oh, here in hell the blood runs deeper!

And when the final duel is near, I'll lift my spear and fly!

Year 20, month 5

The main difference between Ace and his brother was that David always fled at the first sign of danger. Always.

When the boys at his school began to suspect that he was a prodigy, David skipped school for weeks, getting his clothes dirty enough to make it look like he had spent breaks running after a ball along with his bullies. When his mother slapped him with the hot metal spoon, yelling he would not eat dinner that night, they both hid in the closet of his room, while David hugged him tightly and sobbed, telling him he rather be dead. When his father came home from work a few hours later and almost killed him, David took them both out of that house and out of Italy.

He said it was because he knew that the next beating would be the last and that when he was gone, Mr. Artino was going to focus all his anger on Alec, who would end up having the same fate as David. He didn't want that for his little nightmare.

What he didn't count on was that if Ace had been in his place, he would have turned around and slammed the bullies into the concrete wall of the school. He would have endured hunger and weariness with dignity and would have killed his father before he could touch a single one of his hairs. Ace wouldn't have turned his back on his problems. Ace would have fought for himself, just as for twenty years he had been fighting for all prodigies.

And now this.

He always knew that David didn't have what it took to be an anarchist. He was too deep in his own thoughts to even make an effort to listen to him. Ace had decided not to bother to explain to him the whole situation because there was no force on Earth able to change his mind anyway, and he had much more important things to worry about.

They were both sitting in the tiny white dining room in the apartment where he, Tala, and the girls lived. Ace had arrived unexpectedly so she had put more water to boil because the one they had put in for breakfast had cooled down. She apologized for the inconvenience, but he assured her that there was no problem, she could take all the time she needed. David had a cup of cold tea in his hands. He had never lost that disgusting habit of biting his nails.

No, David was not an anarchist. But Ace never thought he was a traitor.

Not until now.

The kettle began to boil at the same time the baby cried from the other room.

Tala turned off the stove and Ace could tell she was debating between pouring his tea or going to see what was going on.

“Don't worry,” Ace said walking towards her, “I'll serve it, you go take care of your daughter. Would you like me to make one for you too? "

He knew he intimidated people, but Tala took it to another level. She looked at her feet the whole time, her hands were shaking and she didn’t even answer the question before running into the next room, where Nova was complaining about her little sister's cries.

Ace took another splintered mug from the cupboard. With his powers, of course. The place looked clean (they probably spent a lot of time cleaning for lack of other hobbies), but he didn't trust them. “I've always said it: Tala is a lovely woman,” he said.

David didn't even flinch.

He had never been good at hiding his feelings.

“How does she like her tea?”

“Uh?”

He put his hands behind his back and opened the jar where they kept the chamomile tea. “How does Tala like tea?” he asked again.

David finally came back to reality. “Oh… three of sugar. She likes to add three spoons of sugar.”

Ace tried his best not to roll his eyes. I see this wife of yours wants to give herself cavities.

By the time the tea was served, the baby had stopped crying and Tala left the room again, with Nova following her. “Uncle Alec!”

David and Tala turned to see her with a single exclamation on their lips.

No.

But they didn't say anything. It was too late. Nova was already hugging his legs and Ace was stroking her strands of poorly cut hair. “Good morning, Nova, how are you?”

“Terrible,” Nova replied in all honesty. “Evie has been si—“

“Tala, Alec made you some tea,” David interrupted suddenly.

“Oh, that’s true.” He levitated the cup towards her and couldn't help but smile when he saw her recoil as the cup approached her, wondering if this was how she would see the barrel of a pistol approaching her forehead. “With three tablespoons of sugar. Just the way you like it.”

For the first time, Tala looked at him. “I don't like my tea with sugar,” she said in a calm voice. She shot David a stern look. “I thought we have talked about it.”

David looked so... small and weak. “I forgot about it. I'm sorry.”

But that "I'm sorry" didn't sound at all like the "I'm sorry" someone says when the only wrong they've done is forgetting how their wife prepares her tea.

It was the "sorry" of a traitor.

It was the "sorry" that Ace was waiting to receive.

Then he held out the other cup. “I apologize, that was my mistake. Take this cup then. I don't like to add sugar to my tea either.”

Tala accepted the cup. She took a sip and Ace recognized that micro-expression of disgust as she felt the hot chamomile water touch her palate.

It didn't surprise him that she had lied to him. That whole family was full of liars.

Nova turned to see her dad, laughing as only a child could laugh. “Oh, silly papà…” she said, hiding her head in his uncle's neck.

David smiled almost imperceptibly and raised his arms slightly so that Nova could run into them.

It reminded him a lot of when he wanted Alec to run into his arms.

But, like Alec, Nova didn't go to him. She liked being in her uncle's arms. “Oh, silly papà” Ace repeated. “Silly, silly papà...”

And the imperceptible smile disappeared completely.

“What were you saying, Nova?” he asked. "Moments ago. Are you having a terrible day? "

Nova knew immediately what he was talking about. She wasn't too busy drowning in the bitter taste of her lies. “It's just that Evie hasn't stopped crying for days,” she exclaimed with a face of pure exasperation. “We have given her everything, but nothing calms her down, and I always have to—”

“Alec, I have to tell you something.”

David had stood up and his fists were clenched on the splintered table. His knuckles had turned white and his bushy eyebrows betrayed the real nervousness behind all that facade of sternness.

He was so pleased by the image that he didn't even comment on how inappropriate it was to interrupt a woman when she was giving her point of view on something, or when Tala took advantage of this seemingly distracting moment to snatch Nova from his arms.

That was the moment. David was going to ask for forgiveness. He was going to break as he had broken that night when they were hidden inside the closet and just as he had begged his abusive father before he smashed his head against the nightstand. He would tell him that he regretted betraying him and that from now on, he would agree with him on everything. He would accept that he had never been anything but a coward who escaped trouble at the first opportunity and would run into Ace’s arms one more time.

That was the time for David to choose Ace as the god to whom he would pray for mercy.

That was the moment.

But of course, it would have been too dangerous. Therefore, he was not at all surprised, when he looked down at his teacup again and blurted out, “Evelyn has been very ill, and… we have run out of options. You know I wouldn't bother you with this if it wasn't important, but I wanted to know if… you know.”

“If I could get some medicine for Evelyn?”

David nodded energetically. “That's right.”

Ace pretended to stop to think about it. He wanted to see the desperation in his eyes and wanted him to suffer at the thought that he might never get the much-needed medicine for his little daughter.

He wanted David to suffer in every possible way he could, and when he thought it was going to break, Ace replied, “I think I have a contact that could help us with it.”

“When will you—”

“And with that medicine, Evie is finally going to stop crying?”

Now it was Nova's turn to interrupt him. If he weren't so blinded by the pain he wanted to inflict on his brother, he probably would have had found the act of Nova being the one interrupting her father delightful.

Tala tried to hide Nova with her arms when Ace approached them, but it was useless because he used his powers to gently pull Nova towards him, making her laugh out loud at the feeling that the levitation caused in her entire body. “I assure you, Nova, that with that medicine Evie will stop crying,” he replied, brushing a lock of hair from her face. “But in the meantime, you have to help your mom and papà, and keep doing what you say you do to calm her down. Now… how do you calm down your little sister?”

“I put her to sleep.”

David threw down a chair and ran over to Nova. Ace felt like she had been snatched from his arms again.

Having the two of them there, side by side, made him more aware of how similar they looked. Although Nova had always been a perfect mix of her two parents, Ace was much of the idea that one could know a lot about a person by looking into their eyes.

Nova had the same eyes as her father, but without the golden details that gave away the stardust that David was able to manipulate since birth.

The fact that their eyes were very similar but not identical could mean a lot of things. Perhaps it was that Nova had the worst quality of her mother and the only prodigious thing inside her was the half of the blood that ran through her veins. It would be a shame. The world did not need the oppressors to continue to reproduce with the oppressed and to gradually extinguish the spark with their inferior genes each prodigy had. It was only one of the thousand ways in which they were slowly annihilating them.

However, it could also mean that Nova was not like David, but not in the sense of being or not being a prodigy. Maybe those golden sparks were actually that her brother's soul had been born rusty and that was what would never allow him to see the world as Ace did. Instead, Nova did her name justice and could symbolize a new beginning for them, much like the supernova that granted them their powers had been.

For a second, she saw Nova not as a child, but as raw and pure potential.

Did he know? Was David aware of how precious was what his rough hands were holding?

“She sings her to sleep,” he explained hastily. “Nova loves spending time with her little sister, and she loves carrying her. Whenever she cries she insists that we let her hold her and that always calms her down. It is like—”

“Magic?”

David hesitated. “Yes… magic.”

Nova played with the collar of her dad's shirt, thinking about God knows what, until something made click inside her brain. “Uncle Ace!”

“Yes, Nova?”

She opened her mouth to speak, but David silenced her with a severe look.

Ace offered Tala his help with washing the dishes before leaving. He assured them that he would be back as soon as possible and asked Nova to kiss little Evie goodnight for him. He gave Tala a quick (and unrequited) kiss on the cheek and a handshake to David.

The same hands that could have defended themselves from the abusers, that could have stopped the burning spoon before it slapped him, and those that could have wrapped around their father's neck before blood stained the old carpet in the room.

He decided that there would be no survivors. Not even the ghost of David.

David always ran from danger, but now he was the danger that could destroy what it took Ace years to build. Ace wasn't running from him. Ace noticed it, faced it, and defeated it.

Because, in the end, Ace Anarchy was the real danger.

***

Piercing into the sky and higher, 

and the strong will thrive.

Yes, the weak will cower while the fittest will survive

If we wait for the darkest hour,

'till we spring alive...

He had already been to the dome of the cathedral on other occasions. The first time he had done it, it was dark. The entire city was in lockdown and there was not a single light because Ace had managed to uproot the building that provided basic service to all the city. Then, he thought that maybe, just maybe, that night the sky would be so clear that he would be able to see the stars. And what better place for stargazing than the dome of the cathedral.

He was right. He could see every last star. Their light was not like the light posts in the parks or the lamps in his old room. Their light was energy, it was strength, and it was sheer power.

They were so present in the sky and seemed so close to his fingertips that he felt one of them himself. But he did not believe that his energy, his strength, and his power was similar to that of any of those stars; it would be like reducing himself to being something that he was not, so he could fit into a mold that he did not to fit in and please people who did not appreciate him.

And like that, under the stars and on the dome of that cathedral, the birth of anarchy was announced with the explosion of a supernova.

Ace Anarchy was a supernova. Ace Anarchy was born on that dome.

Now he wondered if he was going to die there too.

Hugh Everhart was in front of him. He didn't move a single muscle and he didn't make a single face, not even when Ace spat his name like it was a blasphemy. With one hand he held his spear and with the other, he clung to the piece of cloth that passed through his chest and that held a baby dozing on his back. He took a step forward, and Ace imitated him, too blinded by adrenaline to even think that this image was too good to be true and that Hugh Everhart would never give himself up like this, on a silver platter, and without his allies by his side, unless he didn't plan on giving himself up in the first place.

It was the worst mistake he could have made. And he didn't even notice it until he began to feel… that.

It was as if he was being absorbed. Someone ran their hands from his head to the tips of his toes, causing the feeling of lightness with which he had lived for so long to gradually fade away. The cars he launched, the walls, and the corpses he used as weapons against the friends and relatives of the dead were growing heavier and Ace had never carried the weight of the world on his shoulders. At least not that way.

Never like this.

The fire inside him was getting smaller, and smaller, and the only thing that seemed to remain was a single spark.

Ace stepped back, but Hugh Everhart kept on walking towards him.

There came a time when there was no more dome Ace could stand on and he fell to his knees.

For that thousandth of a second, he felt the presence of Tala and the baby behind him, looking at him with a deadpan expression. David's ghost, made of the same stardust that his fingers could manipulate, laid his hand on his shoulder and a tear, bright and white, fell on the fabric of his trench coat.

It was a pure tear, waiting to be paid for with another tear that was just as pure as the first one. But Ace had long since lost the ability to cry.

Hugh Everhart pulled the helmet off his head with such force that he backed away a couple of meters. The air swiped away the ghosts of his brother, his wife, and daughter, leaving only Alec Artino, with his knobby knees and messy hair, looking at him as the lost child in the middle of the battlefield that he was.

He ran towards him and wrapped his thin and fragile arms around him telling him that perhaps it was time to accept his own humanity.

Because… what is Ace Anarchy without his helmet?

His enemy readied his spear and Ace turned to see the boy asking the question, who was looking at him as if his mere presence was the answer.

What was Ace Anarchy without his helmet? Was he that weak child, with a stuffy nose and restless hands? Was he the man he saw in the reflection of his eyes, with a sloppy beard and deep dark circles?

Was he the ghost he would soon become?

Alec held Ace by the cheeks, with those bony little hands that were always cold, no matter how many gloves he wore or how many times David wrapped his around them and rubbed them to keep them warm.

And then he asked him, “How do you kill a god?”

The answer was what brought him back to reality and the one that made him realize, that it had only been a couple of seconds from the moment he fell to his knees and now that he was standing up, Alec’s ghost fading for the last time.

Because David and Alec Artino should have died completely since day one. In a perfect world, the only one alive was Ace Anarchy.

Someday, that vision of a perfect world would become real, and neither Alec nor David would be there to intervene.

Someday...

The only thing that remained inside of him was a spark, but even a single spark could start the biggest of fires.

How do you kill a god?

How do you kill Ace Anarchy?

Oh, my little nightmare.

You don’t.

And with that, he spread his arms and leaped straight into the flames.

...then with claws of fire, we devour like a falcon in the dive!

[tscmu]

- double unrequited

- the second years argued. a lot. youd think the lot of them were conjoined at birth. so it wasnt surprising when a girl came into the mix, and tore their hearts into pieces, huh?

w/c- 1717 pairing/s- atsumu x fem!reader, suna x fem!reader and a lil bit of osamu x fem!reader ;) genre- idk lmao but theres a lil angst ig warnings- secondhand embarassment, TINY mention of pornography, heartbreak a/n- THIS WAS SO FUN TO WRITE EHEHEH anyway my writers block’s kinda over????anyway read 2 da end for a surprise twist ;))) 

as the sun started to set over the small area of the hyogo prefecture, all was calm. birds chirped every now and then, flying through the cold skies, enjoying the october buzz in the air. trees’ leaves were littered over the pavement and roads, crunching whenever they were squashed by an oncoming boot. however, if you were to wander through the inarizaki high school grounds on that day, you would hear a buzz of arguing from a specific gym.

“for fucks sake! samu, help yer dear brother out here.. it's pronounced gif, not whatever this ‘jif’ crap is!” the blonde haired, tall setter of the volleyball team leaned backwards on the bench, staring at someone behind him. the latter was the similar looking, gray haired opposite hitter, who just rolled his eyes at the comment.

“first off, yer no calling me yet ‘dear brother’ again. you’re getting zip from me.” he said, taking a glug out of his bottle as the blondie yelped in shock. the slightly taller, brown haired middle blocker giggled to himself. “plus, its technically jif anyway, everyone just says gif because its what society projected onto us.”

“oh, shut up with all that logical bullshit.” the blondie rolled his eyes, standing up and slamming his bottle down onto the space that was left. “oi, kita, ‘s break over?”

“i mean, technically ‘s over whenever ya want it to be. just go spike some balls or something if you’re bored.. oh, hi!” the shorter, white-and-black haired captain slowed down talking, turning to look at the door. all the boys turned around shortly after him, staring at whoever was there.

as you stood against the door, your hair blowing slightly with the wind behind you, your face slightly sweaty having run all around the school, most of them were mesmerised. your face flushed a deeper shade of red after seeing all their eyes glued to you, and you laughed a little.

“oh, sorry, i’m trying to find the girls basketball gym!” you smiled, tilting your head a little. “is this volleyball? sorry, i’m new, i just got told to go to the basketball gym after school for the first practice, but i have no idea where i'm meant to be going!” you giggled slightly, making atsumu and suna go pink. “sorry for disturbing you!” you waved slightly, hopping back down the stairs up to the doors. however, you stopped after hearing footsteps and voices behind you.

“it’s oka-” kita started to say, before sighing, seeing what was happening before him.

“i’ll help you!” atsumu shouted after you, grabbing his jersey in case you were cold.

“i can show you!” suna also shouted, pushing atsumu out the way and grabbing his bottle.

“simps..” osamu and aran both said, shaking their heads as the two boys continued to shove each other.

“no, i will.” the former's voice turned serious, slowing down as they reached the top of the steps. suna frowned, and opened his mouth to say something else, but they both got distracted as they heard your mesmerising laugh again.

“you can both come, if you want, i really don’t mind!” you smiled, doing that little head tilt again. they both nodded instantly, before frowning at each other as soon as your back was slightly turned. “okay, so i’ve walked in on about ten other clubs..”

ever since that moment, it was just a competition of who could win you over. the rest of the boys had moved on, teasing them both for their pure urge to beat each other. all of the boys argued, but nothing was ever as heated as atsumu and suna’s debates. there was a new one every time they went to practice, from something as big as the death penalty to something as tiny as how much diluting juice you put in the glass before you add the water. it was stupid, but they‘d been like that for years now.

but with this argument, it appeared neither of them were actually ahead of the other, like it usually ended up.

suna went for a more romantic approach with you. offering to walk you home, waiting for you after classes, walks through random forest paths on sundays. it wasn’t what he was used to, he’d never paid that much attention to girls. they all seemed to fawn over the miya twins anyway. but it was when you seemed to pay genuine attention to him, it caught his interest. 

obviously he found girls attractive, but the girls he saw online were never the same as girls in real life. not even just porn or anything, even in romance films, they were all so secretive. he didn’t really have the charm either, so he found himself just waiting for a girl to make a move, and if she didn’t, he’d just.. give up. you were unique to him, though. it got to the point where you’d wait for him after class too, wait at the front doors for him to come out so you could walk home, texting him at 9 in the morning asking if he wanted to go on that one walk again you did about a month ago. it took him by shock a little, but he didn’t want it to stop.

whereas atsumu, on the other hand..

to be frank, girls weren’t a big deal to atsumu. he’d always had that blessing of girls fawning over him, so he’d never had to worry about ‘winning over’ a girl. but it hit him when he met you.. he was gonna have to fight for you, wasn’t he?

he visioned you as a more.. modern girl. he assumed suna would go more traditional, the man had no experience with girls, for god's sake. he basically assumed he would win you over.. who wouldn’t pick him over anyone? and so he started. he did with you what he did with every girl, midnight drinking on a random roof, random shopping trips into town, secret lunchtime conversations behind the school. he didn’t think much of it at first, why would he? you were just another girl he’d probably date for what, a week or so, then you’d dump him after actually realising what he’s like. he couldn’t picture himself settling down. but.. you changed him, in a way. he finally found something he wanted to work for.

what was the one thing in common with these stories though?

you never actually showed any form of romantic interest in either of them, throughout this whole ordeal.

so then, after what felt like years, two days before atsumu left for the training camp, they decided it was the day. the day to confess.

neither of them actually knew about the other's plans, it was just pure coincidence they saw this as the opportunity. atsumu because he could try to sweep you away with him to tokyo, suna because he could tease atsumu about it while he was gone. it was a good plan, on both sides., you had to admit, after hearing it a while later. 

“the fuck’re you murmuring for?” atsumu frowned, turning around to look at suna, whose head was in his hands.

“mind your business..” the latter muttered, murmuring under his breath again, making atsumu shake his head. he wasn’t scared, why would he be? you were bound to say yes, for the past few months you’d been spending time with him. you knew what he was like, as he did with you.

“eh, suit yourself. i need to find y/n..” he said, picking up his jacket.

“what? y/n? but i need to find her!” suna snapped back into reality, his eyes wide as atsumu glanced at him

“..yeah. well, you can speak to her tomorrow or something, this is important.” he said in a careless manner, starting to walk towards the door, but stopping short, seeing the door slide open.

“oh! hey, tsumu!” you appeared from outside, your faux fur hood tickling your neck as your beaming face came into the light from the slight darkness behind you. it couldn’t help but make him smile.. god, he couldn’t wait to call you his. suna, from behind him, felt himself smile too, you were stunning. “you ready?” you looked behind atsumu, but as he whipped his head around, he realised you weren’t actually looking at suna either.

“yeah, your place tonight?” oh. oh no. as atsumu realised what was happening, his mouth dropped open. osamu stood up from the bench, his jacket slung over his shoulder as he crossed past both suna and atsumu, kissing you on the forehead.

“you bet! god, my mum’s been so excited to meet you.. bye boys!” you waved at both suna and atsumu separately, going back to chattering to osamu.

“what.. the fuck?” suna said, frowning. atsumu joined him, still in a state of shock.

“yeah, what the fuck?” he turned around, mouth still open.

“oh, you didn’t know? they’re dating, have been for what, a month or something now?” kita smiled, while aran tried not to burst out laughing to his right. “during the christmas holidays, they hung out a bit. i think y/n came looking for atsumu, but he wasn’t in, so she decided to chat to osamu instead. did you seriously not know?” kita laughed a little, and atsumu’s shock turned to anger. ths, of course, made suna burst out laughing.

“what the fuck? no, what the actual fuck? how did i not know the girl i was in love with was dating my brother?” he looked around a little, looking for assistance, but all the boys were snickering at him.

“now i think of it, that was extremely obvious.” suna said, laughing more by the second. he was sad, of course he was! the girl he was falling drastically in love with had a boyfriend, and he had no idea, that would break anyone's heart. but.. this was extremely funny.

“fine, lets just go then.” atsumu humphed, dragging his feet as he walked to the door. “to be fair, she was looking for me. probably liked me more.” he said as they reached just outside the door, and suna shoved him into the wall. “oUCH! THE FUCK WAS THAT FOR?” he yelled, making kita chuckle to himself.

these idiots.

[nychwrites]

Winter’s Warmth — a Daichi and Michimiya fanfiction

Notes: I'm not good in writing fluff and this is my very first Haikyuu fanfiction, so I'm so sorry in advance if it's so-so 😂. I was experimenting with this, but here you go! 💓

Daichi Sawamura, class 3-4, Karasuno’s boys’ volleyball club team captain. Ever since they won the ticket to nationals, he’s been the talk of the town; girls here and there swooning over him and how he’s responsible, handsome, smart, and athletic in one.

What they don’t know, however, is that the Sawamura Daichi is also dense as fuck.

“It’s been a while, huh,” Yui Michimiya commented, gesturing to herself. “I mean, we never got the chance to talk after nationals...”

Daichi leaned against the window sill, arms crossed. “Yeah. How are things going?”

“Uh—the volleyball club seems pretty well ever since I retired,” Yui commented. “They’ve set their goals higher and the new captain is much more capable than me.”

“Don’t say that, you’re the best captain they can ever ask for you know,” Daichi replied casually, frowning a bit. Yui’s heart, however, started pounding like crazy.

The casualness between the two captains is something Yui grew up with. She’s used to being around him and the other third years in the volleyball club, not really minding that they’re, indeed, of opposite sexes. Besides, volleyball has always been the foundation of their friendship.

And well, her feelings for Daichi probably stemmed from that, too.

She knows to herself that she should’ve suppressed her feelings as soon as she felt it. It’s in Daichi’s nature to be caring and uplifting, knowing that he’s the volleyball team’s captain. However, some things just cannot be helped; best example, Yui’s situation.

I mean, what’s not to like about Daichi? He’s smart, athletic, caring, a huge gentleman, and selfless, although it’s nulled whenever he’s with his team—usually, his nagging side shows up instead.

Despite that, he’s an overall good guy. It’s a shame if nobody notices his good traits.

“Michimiya? You good?”

Yui snapped back in reality from fawning over Daichi. “Oh! I’m sorry, just thought of something,” she replied sheepishly. “So we’re graduating soon, huh...”

‘I haven’t even confessed to you,’ Yui wanted to add, but she couldn’t. Even if she tried, she knows she can’t. Even if she’s in her death bed, or if she’s in the highway to Hell. Heck, she’d rather die than to confess!

Ever since they’ve settled comfortably into the ‘friendship’ label, she can’t picture herself from beyond that. Sure, she fantasizes from time to time about being in a relationship with him, but she knows that with their current situation, that’s a bit of a stretch. She doesn’t even know if she’s worthy of being his girlfriend, even; she thinks that he’d rather date Sugawara or Azumane...

‘No. No more of the self-deprecation, Yui!’ she thought to herself. ‘At least ask him if he likes someone!’

With a determined stance, she slapped her cheeks as hard as she can, catching Daichi by surprise. “W-Woah! Are you really okay?”

Yui let out a heaved breath that she didn’t realize she was holding in and faced Daichi. “Uhm, S-Sawamura, do you, uh... l-like someone r-right now?”

Sugawara, who was just passing by, suddenly butted in with a, “Good luck, Daichi!” and walked away like it was nothing, leaving Yui confused and scared.

‘What did he mean by good luck?’

Daichi, on the other hand, was plain confused, both from the question and Suga’s sudden “good luck”. He considers Yui as a good friend, that he’s sure; but why the sudden question? And what the heck is up with Suga? Did Tanaka and Nishinoya cause ruckus again? Or, perhaps, did Hinata and Kageyama bother the vice president again? Or—

‘Ah, right. They’ll be in Ennoshita’s hands from now on.’

“U-Uhm, i-if you don’t wanna tell me, I’m fine with that,” Yui suddenly said, which snapped him out from his train of thoughts. He looked at her once more, and for the first time, saw her in a different light.

With a quickened heartbeat, he saw a different Yui Michimiya standing right in front of him; someone that wasn’t his “volleyball buddy” right from middle school. He saw the woman that she was now, with her beautiful short hair, soft, sparkling eyes, her cheeks flushed red and the sunlight reflecting down on her.

It was all too sudden.

“I-I’m sorry for asking!” she suddenly screamed, turning her body away. “I-I gotta go, b-bye!” With that, she ran away.

Daichi stood frozen, both from the shock at seeing Yui run away so suddenly and from the realization that he had.

“Oi, Daichi you stupid motherfu—“

“Suga, not too loud!”

Even with the noise his friends were making, Daichi’s head was still in the situation he was in a hot second ago. He suddenly realized the time when Suga would purposely leave him and Michimiya alone when they were talking, even dragging Asahi away from him—despite his confusion. His mind also wandered off to the time when Karasuno and Shiratorizawa played each other for the Spring Qualifiers, and how Michimiya gave him a charm. His reminiscence even took him as far back as middle school, when he and Michimiya first met and got closer to each other.

‘Why did I realize this just now?’

Those three years of junior year, and an additional three years of highschool. That’s six years in total. That’s how long it took him to realize that he, indeed, likes Michimiya.

“...chi. Daichi!”

“Huh, what?” he absentmindedly asked, turning to face his friends; a fuming Sugawara and a scared-looking Asahi, holding back the former.

“You idiot, why didn’t you run after Michimiya?!” Sugawara exploded, eyebrows knitted.

“S-Suga, give it a rest,” Asahi interjected unsurely. “You’re just asking to get bitten.”

Daichi casted a glare at Asahi, which made him flinch. Sugawara ignored the two, and placed his index finger in Daichi’s chest. “Everything that I hold from now on reeks of dumbass energy.”

“And everything that I look at is stupid,” he retaliated, staring down at Sugawara, who boldly stared back—even glaring. “Why’d you care, anyway?”

“For being a team captain, you sure are being careless right now,” the vice captain shot back immaturely, not wanting to back down.

“What’s that have to do with this?” Daichi asked in disbelief.

“Because! A leader has to be responsible and cleans up every mess being made!”

“We’re outside of the club! We’re graduating soon!”

“And so? That doesn’t deny the fact that you’re still Captain!”

‘Jesus, they’re like Kageyama and Hinata,’ Asahi thought, now letting go of Sugawara and standing in an awkward middle.

Asahi opened his mouth, wanting to stop their fight, but Daichi beat him to it and said, “It’s not like I’m not going to go after her, anyway. I’m just... thinking.”

“Wow, you sure are smart,” Sugawara commented sarcastically. “What, gonna think hard enough for her to magically run towards you?”

“Shut up,” Daichi growled, making Asahi cower. “I’m just... I wanna say the right words to her,” he added with a sigh. “I know... I’ve been dense and all—“

“That’s hardly news,” Sugawara butted in with a snicker.

“—but I think it’s about time I make it up to her,” Daichi continued. “I always had this gut feeling that she liked me, but I discarded those thoughts even way before I could even think about it deeper. And it’s not like I could ask her about it so casually, y’know?”

“But if you had the idea, wouldn’t it be better for you to clear it up?” Sugawara mused. “I mean, I’m surprised how you can disregard thoughts like that so easily. If it were me, I’d think about it for a week!”

“Oh, like how Shimizu held your hand?” Asahi perked up. “She’s really unpredictable.”

“Yeah, but she’s kinda like a sister to me now,” Sugawara immediately replied. “And I’m pretty sure she’s like the female version of Daichi. Unbothered by her fans.”

“Heard that,” Kiyoko spoke, suddenly appearing behind the three. “What’s with the serious talk?”

“Daichi’s got love problems,” Asahi explained. “Now, he’s conflicted about it.”

“Ah, no wonder why Michimiya look troubled earlier when I passed by her,” Kiyoko commented. She placed a hand on Daichi’s shoulders and demanded seriously, “You should go after her.”

“That’s what I’m gonna do, just dunno how I’m supposed to approach her,” Daichi said with a sigh, slumping his shoulder. “These things aren’t fit for ‘casual talk’ you know?”

“But you can casually cheer her up, can’t you?” Kiyoko pointed out. “That must mean a lot to her.”

“Yeah, but... this is ‘love’ we’re talking about,” Daichi countered. “It’s a gamble saying things recklessly and complacently just because I can expect something from her. I’ve only realized I like her a few minutes ago, but what if it isn’t en—“

“Just hearing you worry is enough proof that you’re sincere with her.”

They all fell silent when Kiyoko pointed that out, to which made her laugh.

“C’mon now, don’t start wimping out,” she said with a grin.

“Shimizu... I owe you a ton,” Daichi said sincerely, tapping her shoulder. “I gotta go, then,” he announced, turning his back on his peers. He started jogging away from them, raising a fist and grinning widely at his friends—his clubmates who stuck with him and the team for the past three years.

They raised their fists back, not minding Sugawara saying, “He doesn’t even know where Michimiya went.”

‘This is my last year of highschool, and it’s possible that we might never see each other again. If I screw this up, I’m done for,’ Daichi thought, repeating it over and over again as he combed through the entire campus and asking a few third years he could recognize. Eventually, his legs led him to gymnasium one, where squeaks and balls hitting the wood floor can be heard.

He slowed down his pace from a jog to a brisk walk, peaking between the open space of the steel door. He saw the basketball team with their passing drills, and on the other side is the girls’ volleyball team with their receiving drills. He suddenly remembered his own team, suddenly remembered the same determination they all shared even when it seemed like the whole world was against them.

“S-Sawamura?”

“Oh!”

Daichi almost tripped over the flights of stairs when he suddenly heard Michimiya’s voice from behind him. He had to subtly clutch his chest out of fear before facing her, and before he knew it, he had to clutch it again.

‘She’s so damn gorgeous.’

“Uh, hi,” Daichi greeted awkwardly. “I was, erm... looking for you.”

It was just one sentence; one that Yui heard a lot from Daichi over the past six years, but it had a different impact this time around. It was a cold February, and Daichi stood there in the warmth of his jacket and scarf, and the growing feelings he had for Michimiya that had seemed to triple each passing second he spent staring at her.

“O-Oh, what’s up?” Yui asked, trying to be casual, but her heart was beating loudly and frantically, as if it were going to pop out of her ribcage.

“This past six years... you always heard me out, I could confine to you whenever I had troubles—although often it was the other way around—and overall... you’ve been a big help. I don’t even know where to start because I’ve probably done a lot of awful things that seemed normal and right to me,” Daichi rambled. “I’m just—I realized something, you know? Something that’s a given, but something that I didn’t realize sooner.”

It was a cold February. The air was ringing and it was hard to breathe, layers and layers of cloth still can’t mask the coldness of two degrees Celsius and not moving for even a second can make you frozen solid. However, with each words Daichi spoke, Yui felt warm.

“Sawamura...”

“I like you, Yui... and I’m sorry that I hadn’t realized it sooner. I’m sorry for wasting six years,” he breathed out.

It was winter when Sawamura Daichi confessed his love to the person who has been in love for him for a long time. Compared to him, her love was way heavier, it was deeper and it was more intense. Suppressing it for a long time, then off to sending signals only to be ignored, then making efforts for him; Yui did so much for Daichi, not minding that it wasn’t possible even in the slightest for him to reciprocate it or to even notice it in the least.

But they’re here now, standing one meter apart and feeling the warmth of their hearts overpower the coldness of Japan. Until the very last minute, Yui was convinced that she doesn’t have a chance, as Daichi thought that he probably wouldn’t be given a chance.

But here they are now, with no gaps between them, bodies connected and pressed against each other gently, her slender hands wrapped around his back firmly and face buried in his chest, hot tears flowing down the sides of her eyes.

“Y-You dumbass...” she choked out, voice muffled, “W-Why...”

Daichi chuckled quietly, burying his head on Yui’s shoulder, gently caressing her hair. “I’m really, really sorry, Yui...”

“You don’t have to say sorry,” she replied back almost immediately. “Whatever you have to give, I’ll accept it wholeheartedly.”

“In that case, I’ll start giving you only the best, then.”

It was winter when Sawamura Daichi and Michimiya Yui finally, after six years, met an understanding and their hearts started to stand in the same path. For years, it’s always been Yui staring at Daichi from afar, only wishing to see him up close where they could walk away from that stranded spot together. When that day finally came, it wasn’t them walking away together; they stayed in the same stranded spot, hands clasped, leaning against each other as they send warmth to the other.

It was winter, but it didn’t feel too cold like the past six years. It was winter, and it was warm.

I hope you liked it! Hehe 💓

[overenthusiasticcartoonlover]

Snippet of Conceptual

   She and Chat Noir look at each other after they leave and touch down on a new rooftop, before just bursting into laughter. 

   "Did you see how worried they were? Did they really not take it as seriously before?" Chat Noir cackles, though it's more of a mad cackle, the heaviness of the situation getting to him.

   Ladybug leans on his shoulder, laughing mostly out of relief at being out of there, "No, they didn't. The city has had no clue how to deal with this, and well, we weren't even taking this as seriously when we were younger."

   Chat Noir rubs his eyes a bit, calming down some, "Yeah. Yeah, we didn't. At least you tried, but I just saw this as fun when I was younger. Several near misses later is when I started taking it a bit more seriously. I'd never really been free to do anything until recently, and that didn't help anything."

   Ladybug looks over at him, then just gives him a gentle smile, nudging his shoulder softly, "Hey, you and me against the world, right?"

   He looks back at her, giving a soft smile in return, "You and me against the world."

   She straightens at that, letting her shoulders relax and looking into the night, hope filling her for the first time in ages, "At least we have help now. Let's do identities. I want your phone number, so we can meet up and talk teammates, and I can tell you everyone I know that was compromised."

   Chat Noir makes such a soft, relieved noise, giving her an intense nod. 

   Ladybug grins back at him, taking his hand and pulling him off the rooftops, heading for an alcove on the rooftop near her house that she uses to detransform a lot now. She scoped it out earlier, and figured she'd be able to move them to her balcony to chat when they detransform.

   She gets settled in the space, then releases her transformation, her and Tikki having been working on wordless transformations lately. 

   Marinette looks up at Chat Noir and just smiles up at him, Tikki settling on her shoulder, "Hi, Chat Noir. My name is Marinette Dupain-Cheng."

   Chat Noir's eyes are wide, his pupils dilated and he seems a bit winded. Marinette worrying for a moment about his response, before he releases his transformation. When the magic finishes clearing from him, it's Adrien that's standing there, the boy just watching her, his voice coming out a bit chocked.

   "Yo-u're my lady."

   Marinette understands the feeling, almost mimicking his shock for a minute, before her lips start slowly spreading into a smile, until she just bursts into laughter, surging forwards to hug him, "You're my kitty! Hahaha! God, that actually makes so much sense, now that I get to see you outside of school more often."

   Adrien stiffens a bit at that, before slowly relaxing and hugging her back, his arms practically enveloping her, as he tucks his face against her hair, "Marinette. Yeah. I can definitely see it."

   She just pulls back and looks up at him, her cheeks turning a light pink, as she fights back new thoughts, "Well, I'm glad we already know each other. Come on, let's go talk on my balcony. All the kwamis are with Luiza right now, which is going to feel really weird depending on how long she has everyone for. I've gotten kinda used to having a bunch of kwamis just chilling around the room."

   She just climbs over to her balcony, Adrien following her after a beat, a laugh escaping his throat, "That's why you were so okay with leaving them with her. I was wondering why you'd trust her so much with everything without knowing her well, but you do know her."

   "Yeah. I trust Luiza a lot at this point. And how did you not know we'd be walking into Gaige's house? I've only been there twice, and I knew that door led into their apartment." Marinette looks back at him, just teasing a little.

   "Ah, yeah. I haven't actually been to their house since they changed everything. It used to lead to a stairwell that went all through the building, when I was, like, ten." Adrien gives her an awkward smile, his eyes turning sad, "I haven't actually gotten to meet the rest of Luiza's family yet either. I'm really only allowed out to class events with Luiza, and aerial manifestation practices. Father always schedules things after those practices to make sure I don't linger too long in the magic side of town, where he can't exactly come get me."

   Marinette winces a bit, moving to lean against the railing of her balcony, "Oof, I know we say it a lot, but you're dad is a little too overprotective."

   "I know, but at least that's how I know he loves me. He's just been a little distant since Mom died. I think he's scared to lose me like he lost her, but you guys are right, the way he goes about it isn't helping. I think Eliott and Luiza are actually helping him loosen up a bit. I know Eliott and Amelie have been trying to bully him into going to therapy." Adrien lets out a heavy sigh and moves to settle against the railing with her, looking over at her after a moment and giving a smile.

   "Yeah. I'm sure therapy would help. It'd be nice to see him start being better with you." Marinette looks back at him, bumping his shoulder softly, "Either way, my door is always open if you want to come over and hang out."

   "My lady, are you suggesting I sneak out of the house?" Adrien waggles his eyebrows at her, his lips quirked up in a smirk.

   Marinette snorts at that, pushing his face, "You absolute dork. I'm just telling you, you can hang out here. If you happen to sneak out to get here, then that's not my problem."

   Adrien laughs at that, moving to hop up on the railing, "Thanks, Marinette. You may regret that invitation though."

   "Yeah, probably." Marinette chuckles, moving to lean her head on her hand and look up at him, "Hey, I don't even need to get your number now. I already have it. Did you see who all was compromised? You know everyone."

   "I did, yes. Alya, Nino, Max, Kim, Luka, and Kagami. We already have Luiza as a teammate. Should we do identities with her? It'd make it easier for us to talk to her about enchantments without having to go to her house and risk being seen having a connection to her." Adrien kicks his feet a bit, hands on the railing.

   Marinette thinks on that for a minute, scrunching up her nose, getting just a bit distracted by the soft way Adrien's watching her, "Um, actually, that's a good idea with the new cloaking enchantments. Try calling me Ladybug."

   "Okay, Marinette. Marinette. Marinette. Yeah, no. It still works." Adrien leans back a bit, his eyes not leaving her.

   "Good. Thank you, Adrien. Adrien." Marinette gives out a delighted giggle, when trying to call him Chat Noir doesn't work, "Ahaha! I love these enchantments. I need to get Luiza to teach me enchantments. I've been trying with Maman, but her magic is so much different than mine, and I only visit Adalita so often."

   Adrien gives a soft smile at that, looking away from her for a moment, "Yeah. I really want to meet Adalita sometime. Los primos talk about her all the time in our group chat."

   "You guys have a group chat?"

   "Yeah. They all wanted to be able to chat with me, and I still haven't been able to see Lucie and Akash since the whole thing with Jackson. We'd invite Félix too, but Amelie hasn't exactly told him about magic yet. I don't know why. I just know I'm not allowed to mention it around him." Adrien shrugs, turning back to her and tilting his head, "Hey, do you have any cousins? I know you have an uncle and a few grandparents, but that's about it."

   "Oh, yeah. I have a bunch of cousins. They all live in China though, so we're not exactly close, and Papa is an only child. I think it's really cool that you've got close family though. I've always wondered what that's like." Marinette moves to sit on the railing with him, kicking her feet to get steady.

   "It used to be a lot nicer. I can't quite imagine not having them though. It kinda makes up for the lack of siblings." 

   "I bet." Marinette leans her head back and looks up at the stars, her mind still buzzing with thoughts, "If we do a reveal with Luiza, do you think we should do a reveal with the rest of the team, when we finally get one up?"

   "Yes, please. I really don't like anyone being left out of the loop. I do think vetting them first is a good idea, and maybe people around our age. I think I would also prefer they be magics, so they understand what we're talking about when we talk about enchantments and the like, but I get it if we don't have much choice." Adrien watches her lights for a bit, his eyes drooping a bit, looking kinda tired, "Sucks that Alya and Nino got compromised. Alya at least would be incredibly excited."

   "She would, but I barely trusted her with the miraculous in the first place, and she almost kept it after I told her not to. She's grown a bit since then, but she's still got some more growing to do. I want people that are more mature and can handle things delicately, if we come across some heavy situations, as is incredibly likely anymore." Marinette closes her eyes, humming softly to herself, "Alix is only one that really comes to mind from our class. I want her as one of our permanent teammates; I'm just not sure what miraculous yet."

   "Yeah, we should figure out when ones would be best for permanent teammates, so we can have Luiza enchant those first." Adrien kicks his feet a bit, "I hate to say it, but I don't know nearly as many people as you do, or as well as you do. Do you think anyone from our aerial group would work?"

   "Yeah. Honestly, I'd trust just about anyone from our aerial group, except for Cerise. I love Cerise, but I do not trust her not to keep asking me questions about everything, constantly." Marinette snorts.

   "Fair. How many teammates are we thinking? We've got me, you, and Luiza officially so far, and you want Alix, which would make it two extra so far." 

   "Six. We know for sure Luiza and I will be able to clear akuma, and I don't want to be blindsided by anymore mass akuma things, not to mention the sentimonsters. Six people that we can actually sit down and train with, plus you and me should be just enough to handle that kind of situation, and because we can train with them, I can have some of the extra teammates train to handle different kwamis, so we can change them around if we need certain skills. And that also will help spread the work around the team. 

   Luiza seemed pretty confident in making the rest of the miraculouses in the box heavily reliant on guardian permission, so I'm thinking we can put a bit more trust on the extra teammates." Marinette stretches out her arms a bit, "We can sit down with Luiza sometime this week and chat with her about it, once we tell her who we are."

   "Yeah, that would certainly help. I'll keep in mind who I think would be a good match too." Adrien gives a yawn, moving to lean on her shoulder, "I hate to leave so soon, Marinette, but I have an early photo shoot, and I'm really tired. Is it okay if I go home to sleep?"

   "Yes, of course. You don't need to ask me if you can leave, kitty. You do look pretty tired." Marinette leans her head on his for a moment, before hopping off the railing and holding out a hand to help him down, "I didn't expect to talk this long even. We can talk some more about this tomorrow. Can you tell your dad you've got a spontaneous aerial manifestation practice with Luiza tomorrow?"

   "Mmhmm. I'll text Luiza about it. She helped me enchant my phone my second practice with her, so he can't read my messages on the magic apps." Adrien takes the help down, rubbing his eyes and smiling at her, moving to wrap her up in a hug, "I'm glad to know it's you, Marinette."

   Marinette blinks a little at the affection, before just getting up on her tip toes to hug him back as best as she can, "Me too, Adrien. I could never have kept being her without you, you know?"

   Adrien just squeezes her softly, Marinette feeling a couple teardrops hit her ear, "Thank you, Marinette. I couldn't be him without you either."

   Marinette pulls away at that, looking up to see the tears in his eyes. She gives a gentle smile at that, and reaches up to clear away a couple tears, "You are the best partner I could've asked for."

   Adrien sniffles at that, eyes filled with vulnerability, before he just hides his face in her hand, his voice watery, "Thanks."

   Marinette just moves to softly bop his nose, "Mmhmm. You should probably head home and sleep. You really do look tired."

   He gives out a watery chuckle at that, giving her a gentle squeeze, before letting her go, "Okay. I'll see you tomorrow, Marinette."

   "I'll see you tomorrow, Adrien. Be safe on your way home." Marinette lets her hand fall, smiling as he calls out for Plagg, the kwami phasing up to them from her room, where she'd set out a snack for both him and Tikki, before she left earlier.

( Full fanfic on AO3 )

[darkhymns-fic]

Promise Me a Sweet Dance

Nobleman Lloyd only had eyes for the clumsy maid named Colette. But that just wasn't how things worked in Meltokio. Could he ever hope to get her attention anyway?

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters/Pairing: Lloyd Irving/Colette Brunel, Zelos Wilder, Kratos Aurion Rating: G Mirror Link: AO3 Notes: Written for Colloyd Week, Day 5: AU/Crossover day! I decided to go with a Nobleman/Maid AU I made with @frayed-symphony​ ! We're actually in the middle of making a mature doujin with that same concept that you can check out more here! This story takes place before the events of the doujin. 

--

“It’s simple, my most pitiful bumpkin. What you just gotta do is sell yourself! Allow me to demonstrate.”

Zelos would always go the extra mile to save his friend from disaster. And he did so with a generous sweeping motion with his arms, flicking back his braided hair, his dark frock moving as gracefully as his body. From seemingly out of nowhere, a red rose appeared in his right hand, illuminated by the rays of the sun. Then he finished it all off with a wink. “Soon enough, the hunnies will be falling all over you!”

No response. Nothing at all.

Zelos decided to do away with his professional winking, opening both eyes instead so that he could look clearly ahead. “Yo, Lloyd!”

The garden grove just in front of Zelos’ mansion was pristine, and a bit gaudy. A perfect quiet place to invite any of the proper ladies to tea, with its expensive outdoor furniture, the tables and chairs seemingly molded out of gold, with even silken umbrella above it to shade such ladies’ soft skin from the sun – but he had sacrificed those opportunities to instead train his best friend in the art of courtship.

And there he was, head on the white table, taking advantage of that expensive shade! If it weren’t for his fine clothes, he could have easily been mistaken for the gardener himself, sleeping right on the job. “Mmph…five more..”

Zelos’ eye twitched. He threw aside the rose, peeved that no one had even been around to see him do that amazing trick! “At least don’t drool on the stuff! That’s an antique!” He paused. “I think.”

Lloyd muttered right out of his stupor, blinking into the brightness of the sun when his head left the comfortable shade. “Muh…?” He rubbed at his eyes, yawning so wide it took up half his face. “Did ya say something?”

“I was giving you a lesson for the past twenty minutes! Have you really not been paying attention?”

Zelos never knew he could be heart-broken by such a stupid face, the guy’s brown eyes so wide in its innocence. “I thought you were just telling me one of your weird stories again…So I took a nap.”

“I’m not appreciated at all by you…”

Lloyd waved away his friend’s complaints as he stood up. “I already gotta go anyway. You can tell me more about uh, all that stuff later! I’ll even drink a whole bunch of coffee to make sure I’m awake.”

Zelos sighed. “Whatever. You know, if it weren’t for your old man and those clothes, you’d just be like any other peasant boy!”

Lloyd frowned. “You make that sound like it’s a bad thing.” His white jacket still chafed his neck at times, and the whole outfit felt too heavy to wear on a hot summer day! The cuff links sometimes weighed down his sleeves, and the silken fabric that sat just beneath his neck could feel suffocating, especially in the humidity. What he wouldn’t give to wear some looser clothes. The only thing he liked about his jacket were the red collar strips that extended from his neck, their edges inlaid with metal clasps. It was probably the coolest part of his stuffy outfit.

Zelos sighed. “Seriously…if you told me that you were born in a log cabin out in the boonies, I wouldn’t even be surprised at this point. Why don’t you just go play out in the woods if you want to so much?”

“Sounds better than being stuck in the palace all day…”

“Now that’s where you’re wrong, my young friend.” Zelos turned from Lloyd with extreme huffiness – an act that one could only achieve with practice. “Being in the company of Princess Hilda compares to nothing else…”

“I guess so if you usually just hang out with me all day.”

“I have other friends!”

This, Lloyd highly doubted. “Well, go find them! I’m leaving now!” And just as Lloyd was rushing off, ready to jump a fence or two as it beat having to politely walk through the upper streets of the city, Zelos whistled.

“Hey, hunny, didn’t forget about the party, did you?”

Lloyd froze in mid-step, the sun beating down on his thick jacket. He groaned, turning back to face Zelos. “I told you I don’t like those.”

Zelos was grinning. “Not like you have a choice, you know. All the important noble families have to be there.”

“That’s why it’s dumb.” At that, Lloyd’s frustration resurfaced, taking some of it out on the leering Zelos. “Everyone just talks down at me while I’m stuck inside that room for hours!”

“Ah, but you forget one important thing. A lot of pretty girls go to these.” The grin grew even wider, it was almost scary-looking. “This can be your big chance!”

“Ugh, they don’t pay attention to me anyway with you around.”

“Ha! I knew you were jealous. That’s why I was trying to teach you earlier! After all, picking up women is a professional art-”

“T-That’s not the point! I’m going for real this time!” And to make sure he’d stay true to his word, Lloyd used the table he had just sat on as leverage, stepping on its surface to use its height and vault over one of the fancy green hedges that lined Zelos’ garden.

“Lloyd! Don’t dirty my stuff like that! Barbaric!”

But Lloyd had been done listening, cutting through other noble’s gardens as a shortcut back home. His mind was swirling as he ran. Besides…I only want one person to pay attention to me…

--

Lloyd always avoided going in through the mansion from the front door. There were servants there, ready to open the door for him or take his shoes, or any other number of awkward things he didn’t want to endure. As he snuck across the lawn, crouching low to avoid any eyes, he eventually made it to his bedroom window.

The houseplants on its sill, ivy leaves reaching up for the sun, always let him know he was in the right place. The mansion was so big that he still got lost, especially from the outside where every wall looked the same. He didn’t want to make the mistake of accidentally jumping through the window of his dad’s room again.

With an energetic whoop!, Lloyd grabbed the windowsill and leaped inside with barely a thought. He at least knew what his room looked like! Kinda big, with his dresser pushed to the right wall and his bed near the back. There were also one or two wardrobes, but he only filled the second one with projects he had learned to make from a local craftsman in town. And maybe a few non-noble clothes here and there…

What he didn’t expect was to leap right into the maid who was busy cleaning up the space before him.

“Aah!”

Her cry of surprise was the only thing that warned Lloyd before he practically barreled straight into her. She had been kneeling somewhat, probably sweeping up the floor when he had just appeared. His legs wobbled as they tried to find their footing to avoid her, but then the maid stood up, apparently moving to the exact same place he had been retreating to.

“Colette!” he yelped before stumbling with her, both falling flat on the floor.

“Ow…I’m sorry.” The girl wriggled underneath the boy’s weight, her maid cap half-askew. Its ribbons were already entangling themselves into her hair as she shifted. “I messed up.”

Lloyd had to take a few seconds to get his bearings and lean up. His hands were placed against the floor, lifting his body with a groan. “Agh, how did you mess up though? I was the one that just crashed into you.”

From her position, Colette looked up with a smile. Her green maid dress was also now much more wrinkled, some of the front already covered with dust – or had that been from her dusting his room earlier? “Heh, well I was supposed to be finished with my shift today, but I took a long time cleaning things…I dropped the dustpan a few times so I had to keep re-dusting…”

“…Okay, that makes a bit more sense,” Lloyd said. He looked down at her with a grin, enjoying the sight of her smile, the way her braided hair unraveled from her cap slightly. He then noticed where his hands were, just a few inches from either side of her head.

Even then, it took him a long time to sit up, reluctant to leave her. She still smiled as he did so – maybe she had been too worried to tell him to move. “Er, anyway, I’m sorry too,” he said, standing up and reaching out a hand for her to grab.

Colette hesitated at first, then reached for it. He pulled her to her feet easily, eliciting a small giggle from her. “It’s okay, Master Lloyd. I’m fine!”

He scratched at his hair, the nervousness in his chest growing. “Just calling me Lloyd is fine…”

“Oh? But…it’s not right if I do that though, isn’t it? Or Master Kratos might get upset.”

He sighed. His dad would be a weird stickler for this stuff. “Guess so… Well, how about this? You can say all that master stuff when he’s around but when it’s only me, just call me Lloyd!”

“Hm, well if that’s your order for me to do so, then okay!”

“It-it’s not an order…” This hadn’t been the first time he had asked her to call him by his name, and he knew it wouldn’t be the last. He decided to give up. “Um, forget it.”

He looked again at her dress, its front red ribbons also a bit messed up because of their earlier fall together. “You know, I don’t really think my room is that dirty anyway. How come you stayed so late?” Usually Colette would leave by mid-afternoon, retreating back to the servants’ quarters of the home.

“Ah, I took a bit of time earlier feeding Noishe in the stables today.” Which meant that she had spent a lot of the time both petting and hugging the giant dog. “And also, I just wanted to give it my best! I know I haven’t been doing so well lately, so I want to prove myself!” At that, Colette stood up tall, confidence in her being. It made Lloyd smile. “Sorry, maybe this is a bit weird to tell you…”

“It’s not! I’m not your boss.” Lloyd gave a thumbs-up. “Just my dad…and uh, maybe by extension I’m supposed to be. But, just barely.” Yeah, that made sense.

She smiled back, looking brighter then he usually saw her. “Sorry, I hope Master Kratos will forgive me for last time.”

“Honestly, he should have dodged pretty easily from that pie you dropped onto his hair,” Lloyd recalled, remembering one time at dinner when Colette had tried serving the dessert. “And he wasn’t even mad, so don’t worry!” Even if his dad never really reacted to much in general…

It had just been one month since Colette had started working for the Aurion household, but she wasn’t like any other person he had known. She was flighty, she dropped her fair share of dishes, and she seemed like she would be better at handling weapons instead of a broom (remembering quite clearly when Colette had nearly socked him with the broom handle one time on accident – it had been strong enough to punch a hole in the wall). She was just different.

And he liked her a lot. He wished he could just tell her. Yet he wondered if there would be any point to it if she didn’t like him back. At least not how I like her.

Colette glanced toward the window Lloyd had jumped through earlier and stiffened. “Ah! It is getting late…I should go.” She bowed before him, then stopped in mid-bow to do a curtsy instead. That only made her feet confused somehow, for she began to wobble before she was done in either action. “Ah!”

Lloyd caught her just in time, one hand on her waist, while the other grasped her hand. “Careful! You don’t need to do that either for me.”

Colette looked shy then, glancing to the far-right wall. “If that’s what you wish…”

“That’s not-” he started, then stopped. His hand rubbed her waist, then let her go when he realized what he was doing. “Sorry. Um, see you tomorrow, Colette.”

Trying to right up her cap again, Colette turned to Lloyd. Her smile seemed more natural this time, less practiced. “Yeah…see you tomorrow… Master Lloyd.”

When she left his room then, shutting the big door behind her, Lloyd let out a long breath. He really, really liked her.

And he knew he couldn’t do anything about it.

--

Lloyd had completely forgotten all about the party until his father handed him the invitation, the paper dangling in front of his face.

“Your friend Zelos handed this to our doorman,” Kratos intoned. His neat and prim frock of white and grey looked too classy sometimes, along with his purple neckerchief. Though staring at that always made Lloyd’s neck itch. “Seems as if you’ve been avoiding these lately.”

“Eh, you can throw that away.” Lloyd leaned back up from his chair, seated at his antique desk that was already riddled with scratches and marks. Any other noble would have gasped at the sight of such needless damage. (Lloyd just liked to draw and he sometimes pressed the pen too hard on the table). He was dressed in much easier  clothes this time, a black thread-worn shirt and rolled up trousers while his noble outfit was thrown into the corner somewhere.

“It’s prudent for you to fulfill your duties,” Kratos continued, still holding the envelope high. “You have responsibilities.”

“For what? Watching Zelos get drunk again?” Lloyd turned away. “I’m good.”

“I’m not asking you, Lloyd.” And with that, Kratos let the envelope fall onto the desk. “You need to understand that you cannot always do as you please.”

“Argh, but what’s the point of these stupid high-class parties?” he argued. That’s all he and Kratos usually did. Ever since his mother passed, it had been hard to find much common ground with his dad since. “I thought you didn’t like those either!”

Kratos closed his eyes, shook his head. “It’s important to make yourself seen as reliable – relevant, even. The world does not cater to you for shutting yourself away.”

“I know that! And that’s not what I’m doing!” Lloyd turned away, refusing to look at either father or envelope. “I’m not like any of them. All they to do is talk down on me because of…”

Kratos’ eyes shifted. Lloyd recognized that look. A small warning. “Lloyd.”

But instead, Lloyd shook his head “Ugh, but you should get that! After all those people would say about mom! Why should we deal with all their stupid rules?” He stopped, held his breath. Dammit.

He didn’t hear Kratos say anything at all at first. He thought he’d hear a reprimand, a hard shouting of his name. Lloyd knew he had messed up by mentioning his mother, but when he turned back, Kratos was already walking off.

“I have to be at the palace tonight. Do what you will. You’re old enough to make your own decisions.” He turned down the hall, disappearing behind a corner, leaving the door open to Lloyd’s room.

Lloyd felt guilty and ashamed, as if he were a child. It was just frustrating. Everything was frustrating. But how could Lloyd stand there as everyone made blunt remarks about his mother being a commoner? How could he stand there and hear them talk so badly about both his parents like this? About himself?

The envelope stayed on his desk. He could just imagine Zelos’ smirking face as he handed it over. Ugh. Maybe he’s just trying to help…Maybe.

But why couldn’t he be just a normal person? Not this fancy stuff. Not this whole section of rules for a people that didn’t even care about anyone other than themselves. Why did he have to be a part of them?

Because if he didn’t then maybe… Colette would look at me. He blinked, wondering at himself. How…how did his thoughts end up there?

It was because she wasn’t working at the household today. Apparently, she had been called somewhere else. He didn’t realize how badly he missed her until now.

Taking the envelope in hand, Lloyd left his chair, reaching for his clothes. Maybe he did need to go. At least to get Colette out of his head.

Was this how Dad felt? he thought. Maybe one day, he could ask.

--

“Lloyd!! Bud! Hunny! You made it!” Zelos vaulted forward to grab Lloyd in a very touchy bear-hug. “The barbarian finally leaves his cave to join civilization.”

“Gah, get off me!” Lloyd shouted, shoving the guy away. A flock of women, dressed in high-finery, were standing just outside the great doors of the party hall, laughing at the scene before them. The building was reserved for such gatherings, looking close to a min-castle even to Lloyd’s view. Already he could hear the music drifting in from indoors. The same harpsichords, the same pianos and violins, all of them playing the same tune as last time…

“First off, rude,” Zelos said, wiping away the front of his coat. “Second, are you not happy to see me? Come on, let me show you the sights! And by that, I mean these lovely girls right here~”

Lloyd flushed slightly, which only made the girls laugh more. Half of them wore curls, and held fans to their faces. But something about their laughter also felt so biting. “I-I’m fine, I’m just here to stay for like a few minutes-”

“Aw, don’t be shy!” Then Zelos widened his eyes, as if hit by a lobbed Exsphere to the head. “Ohh, or are you trying to sneak off to meet someone? That’s it, isn’t it?”

Lloyd was now very, very lost to Zelos’ ramblings. “Huh? I never said-”

“Very proud of you! But first, you gotta at least drink up. Believe me, it makes the afterparties that much sweeter~” And with that same leering grin that made Lloyd’s discomfort grow, Zelos grabbed the boy’s arm, bringing him inside the building.

These places were always too big, always too full of people. Chandeliers were hanging above Lloyd’s, their lights so bright it made Lloyd blink. Much of the middle hall was wide, open for those who would dance with one another to the boring music, their high heels clacking against the polished stone. There were also dining tables in another corner of the grand room, laden with platters of turkey, beef stew, gravy and some other foods that Lloyd couldn’t pronounce too well.

This was probably the only thing Lloyd would like about a party, and he would have gone straight for the food if his route to escape wasn’t cut off. “H-Hey!” he exclaimed, his voice soon drowned out by the people milling around him. They were all dressed in clothes decked out in golden trims or frills, sewn with pearls or ribbons. Material as soft as velvet brushed against him way too closely when people introduced themselves to him, or Zelos mostly.

“A pleasure to see you! I’m the Earl of Sybak, and I wanted to speak with your family on possible expansion…

“I am of the Altamira Resort, speaking for Lord Regal Bryant! We have a few trading opportunities we would like to speak about with your father…

“Master Zelos! How cute of you to bring your busboy! You even dressed him up!”

Zelos was laughing so obnoxiously, Lloyd’s ears were hurting. “I confess, I do have a heart of gold. One must in these trying times.”

Lloyd tried to wait for an opportunity when Zelos and everyone else would stop noticing him. This eventually happened after about a half hour, and when he felt the time roll by, Lloyd carefully stepped away. Perhaps a few of the nobles tapped his shoulder, thinking he was just a more immaculate waiter that forgot his serving platter, but even these people, he eventually brushed off.

Well, at least there was food! Yet once he broke free from Zelos’ crowd, he nearly bumped into someone else on the way out.

“Uh, sorry!” he said reflexively, then took a moment to see who it was exactly.

Wearing small glasses perched onto a hook-shaped nose, the strange noble held a wine goblet in hand, swishing around the liquid as he spared a glance at Lloyd. He was strange because he has a weird smile, unlike Lloyd would usually see in people. “In a bit of rush are we?”

Beady eyes blinked behind those glasses. A wrinkle formed in the man’s forehead. “Ah, I recognize that family crest. Of the Aurion Household?”

Lloyd didn’t know who this person was, but his high-pitched voice wasn’t doing his ears any favors. “Er, yeah? Sorry, do I know you?”

A laugh, one that seemed piercing, yet no one around them both turned to look. Maybe this guy was a regular to these parties. “Oh, I’m just a humble man. Lord Rodyle. I once worked with your father many years back. Different times back then.”

Lloyd knew he wasn’t exactly the brightest, but he caught that particular word. “Worked?” he repeated back.

The man smiled, but there was nothing kind about it. “Of course, ever since that embarrassing incident, Lord Kratos has rarely spoken to us. Perhaps I cannot blame him.” A pause, just to make that strange smile on his face ever stranger. “All men have their weaknesses.

“What…what are you talking about?” Lloyd asked, knowing that to be a mistake.

The man called Rodyle hummed pensively, until he turned to the right, gesturing to someone. “Ah, just who I was looking for. You know more about the Aurions, don’t you? I’m afraid my memory is a bit rusty, hehe.”

Another man moved through the crowd, just past Zelos’ own bunch. This noble had eyes so dark they seemed to absorb whatever light passed through. His grey hair was slicked back neatly, with not even a stray lock out of place.

“Ah, that name… A name that’s fallen into disgrace.” The man turned to face Lloyd and whatever he had thought about Rodyle being unkind, it felt nothing compared to the feeling he got from this person instead. “And you are the offspring?”

Offspring? What the hell?

“…I have a name,” Lloyd said, voice low. “Give me yours and I’ll give you mine.”

The man chuckled, not nearly as piercing as his friend, but it slid through the air to settle inside Lloyd’s ears, like a serpent. “Amusing. But I suppose I must remember my manners. I am Lord Kvar, of the Asgard District. I happen to know this matter quite personally…and I know your name already, Lloyd Aurion.” He smirked.

Lloyd tried to not let the man’s voice get to him, especially as he addressed him that way. Even over a decade later, Lloyd could never help how the last name just…never fit him.

“Is there something you want from me?” he asked, even though his tone got just as low.

Kvar smirked, noticing it. “It just fascinates me. Ever since that one incident, I suppose it’s safe to say any business between our region and the Aurion holdings are null and void. I hold no more hopes on waiting around for the man to come to his senses.”

Lloyd was not liking where this was going. Zelos was still too busy talking with his hunnies to even notice that his friend was no longer standing next to him.

“But when a nobleman of his ranking goes for a lowly subject from my region, and does not even have the honor of giving me compensation, then I have the right to be a little peeved.”

“Oh, so true,” spoke Rodyle, sipping his wine pleasantly.

“And since that woman worked for me, it was only necessary I make sure to keep my reputation intact. She was quite willful for one of common birth, but that still did not save her from such frail, poor health.”

Lloyd clenched his fists. He had been so young when his mother became sick, but he remembered still. She had needed medicine, but the medicine had been locked in shipment in another part of the country, and once it could finally get through customs-

“It takes quite a bit of paperwork to get such valuable treatment. And with having such a busy schedule, I just simply could not find the time. The few clerical errors, I admit, did not make this easy, but important matters cannot be stopped for a lowly strumpet-”

“Shut up!” Lloyd shouted, then pushed this Kvar creep away from him. “Don’t you dare mock my mom!”

“Ghastly!” spoke Rodyle, one hand on Kvar’s shoulder, still smirking. “Is this how children are taught nowadays?”

“More like it runs in the family,” Kvar straightened, eyes narrowed. “That woman was the exact same way.”

Lloyd reached for his shirt collar, gripping it tight. “I said shut up!”

“Lloyd! What the hell are you doing?” He felt another arm grip his shoulder, making him loosen his hold on Kvar. Of course Zelos notices now. “Calm down!”

“Oh yes, take this boy away,” Rodyle sneered. “He just assaulted us after a friendly chat!”

Lloyd gripped his fists, marched towards both men. “I’ll show you friendly, you bastard-”

“Hey, enough!” Zelos pulled him back again, then smiled at the crowd that was slowly gathering. Even the music had stopped momentarily. “Just had one cup too many, nothing new here! Back to the festivities!”

“I didn’t even drink anything!” Lloyd argued, but Zelos was gripping his shoulder so tightly that it hurt. He moved him away from the crowd, neared to the back wall with its tall windows.

“Hey, I just saved face for you. You trying to ruin everything?” Zelos spoke in a whisper. “What’s your problem?”

“Those-” Lloyd gestured towards the direction of the men who seemed to have vanished. He saw other people instead; one man with unruly red hair and arms as thick as stairway banister, and a woman in high-heels that was with him, her eyes painted with dark kohl, an azure mink wrapped around her shoulders. They also briefly looked at him before turning away. “Wherever they are, those guys just started talking crap about dad and…” And are the reason mom is… He shook his head. “I didn’t ask you to help me anyway!”

Zelos sighed. “Hunny, you're giving me a headache.” He pushed Lloyd further towards the back of the hall. “Cool off in the kitchen. Have a couple of cookies. Just don’t mess up more than you have.”

“Why are you talking to me like I’m an idiot?” Lloyd said through another shove.

“Because you’re acting like one.” Any hint of the laid-back bachelor left Zelos’ voice. “Kitchen. Now.”

With that, Zelos patted his back then walked back to the main hall. Lloyd could already hear his loud voice greeting everyone again and apologizing for the interruption.

I’m always an idiot, aren’t I? Lloyd thought venomously. What did it matter anyway? I’ve never belonged here. Seeing a door ahead of him, he didn’t care where it actually led to. He reached for it, pushing inward. He just wanted to escape this suffocating party. This was so stupid…Why did I bother…

Then he heard a familiar yelp of surprise. “Aaah!”

Lloyd blinked, already moving forward with the door, unable to stop his momentum. “Colette?!”

This time though, there was a kitchen counter nearby, one stacked with an array of cakes, pies and other confectionary. The maid, Colette, leaned against it and caught herself. Lloyd did the same, though he was in front of Colette, hands reaching to grip the counter as he did so, leaning over her.

“Uh…” Lloyd blanked out, wondering what was happening suddenly.

“Lloyd!” She shook her head. “Sorry, I mean Master Lloyd! Sorry, I didn’t mean to get in the way…”

“You don’t need to call me- I mean, it’s not your-” He shook his own head in turn, still confused. “Agh, never mind. What are you doing here?”

“Oh…well, I’m working here for tonight.” She giggled. Lloyd noticed a few patches of flour on her cheeks, and some on the front of her chest too. “I was helping with some of the baking…and I was going to serve it too…”

“Wait, that’s why you’re not at home?” he asked. He finally had the sense to stop locking her against the counter and leaned back, hands slightly raised. “That’s cool… I didn’t know you could cook.”

“Oh, only for fruit pies and cakes,” she said happily. “They’re my favorite so I learned how to make those. Everything else I just sort of burn, hehe.” She clasped her hands together, fiddling with her flour-stained fingers. “How come you’re here, too?”

Lloyd looked away in embarrassment, his voice getting stuck in his voice. “Dad said I had to… But I think I just messed up things instead.” He sighed. “I’ve never fit in with these people. I should have just stayed home.”

Colette looked at him silently, still fiddling with her fingers. He mentally kicked himself. Now he was just making her uncomfortable. “Sorry, um, I won’t get in your way so I’ll just-”

“I think it was right, what you did,” she said, raising her head to him. “What those men said. About your mother… That was wrong of them.” She flushed, nervousness moving through her hands again. “I’m sorry.”

Lloyd stared. He wasn’t even sure what to say. But he tried to anyway to not let the silence stretch on. “Uh, th-that’s okay. But wait…I was like half the room away and the room is huge. How did you hear us?” He’d get it if she just heard him shouting but the rest…

“Ah, I just have good hearing. Like, really, really good!” She stood on her tiptoes, proud of her ability. “At least when I focus on it. I heard them speak awful things… I know people who’ve worked for them before, and they’re…very bad. Like, there’s this man named Remiel who I briefly served and-” She flushed again, bowing apologetically to Lloyd. “I’m sorry! I shouldn't have said that.”

“No, don’t worry! You’re right, they were total jerks!” Lloyd grinned, and soon Colette was grinning back, moved by his reassurances. “I think I was still pretty stupid for trying to punch them…but man, I wished I could have.”

“Maybe one day you’ll be able to!” Colette said in full support.

“Uh, yeah sure! If you think I can!” That was so nice. No one had ever cheered him for punching a guy before! “Thanks, Colette!”

She nodded again, smiling, but he saw she was hesitating in something, mouth partly open before shutting herself down.

“What is it, Colette?”

“It’s just…” Another furtive glance. “I lost my mother too. Because of an accident. Um, I was too young to really remember but…just…I wanted to mention…”

Lloyd's first thought was to reach out to take her hand, the one that she had clutched at her right arm. But he stopped himself, not wanting to seem creepy or weird. Instead he said, "It’s okay. I’m sorry about that.” He looked away to the shut door, where the party was still going, where the music was still playing.

Another nod, the silence stretching between them. Then Colette raised her head up to him, the shyness still there, even as she looked at him so plainly. "Hey...do you wanna go for a walk?"

Lloyd thought he was just hearing what he wanted to hear, and it wouldn't be exactly the first time that had happened. But Colette was looking at him earnestly, even with the flour of her baking still all over her. There was the urge to wipe that away, but still he kept his hands at his sides. It wouldn't be right, would it? For a nobleman like him to just start doing that for a maid, even if she was…

He ignored such thoughts and smiled brightly at her. "Heh, sure. Lead the way."

--

It wasn't the first time Lloyd had ever been out here in the backyard of the large mansion where the party was held. He had gone here a few times by himself, bored of the people, of the music, and eventually, even the food. But he had never gone outside with someone else next to him.

It was an outdoor garden, more simple than Zelos' own, and this didn't have any wooden stables like the one back home (where Noishe would sleep in), but there it did have a cobbled pathway, along with a small fountain in the middle. The falling water was the only constant sound in the stillness - if he didn't count his heart pounding between his ears.

"I like to go out and watch the stars when my shift is over," Colette said to him as they walked, her black dress shoes clicking over the stone. Lloyd saw the brightness of her white stockings displayed against the night, and hastily tried to move his gaze away. But luckily, she didn't seem to notice.

"I do too. My dad actually would talk with me about the stars a lot!" A pause afterwards, the brief warmth from that memory turning chill. "He, uh, hasn't done that since mom died."

"I'm sorry," Colette said to him, and it didn't sound just like a repeated condolence like he would expect. It sounded like she really meant it, like she always did with her apologies, as if she was the source for all of the world's troubles. “Did she also like the stars?”

“I think so…” Something about the way she asked him too made him want to talk more, especially with the stars overhead. And it seemed like she would want to hear it.

“I used to live with my mom before we moved here. At this old town called Luin. Though I don’t remember much of it… Dad would live there too. But then she got real sick and…we just moved here. Her grave’s still over there.” When was the last time he’d visited it? It felt so long ago. “So uh…I haven’t always been a noble person, but I guess I still was one because of dad.”

“I see,” Colette commented, thoughtful with her words. “He must understand how hard it must be.”

But…did he? Lloyd wondered about that. “It's okay… so, uh, have you always lived in Meltokio?" he asked randomly. They stopped in front of the fountain, their warped reflections within its depths.

"No, I used to live in a small village called Iselia. It's very different from here." She said so with a nervous laugh, but it brought out a redness in her cheeks that Lloyd couldn't stop staring at. "So much more people! And you can't see as many stars...but I still try to count them when I can."

"Count them? How do you count all these?" Lloyd looked back up the stars, remembering brief explanations of patterns and constellations. He wondered if his dad remembered that too.

"I just start from one end of the sky to the next! I never finish before I get too sleepy."

He grinned. "We should try counting them together. I bet we could get the whole sky that way!"

"Heh, really?" Colette looked over at him with excitement - until something tempered in her expression and she turned away. "But you're so busy. I wouldn't want to keep you."

You could, he thought, and managed to stop himself from saying it out loud. "It would be nice to spend time with you," he simply said, wondering if that was any better. "I mean, if you wanted to."

Colette looked like she was struggling on what to say next, even as a smile sprouted on her face. "I would, but… I don't know how to act around nobles. And they always say we shouldn't."

"Who cares what people say?" Lloyd tried not to let his tone get too sharp. It wasn't Colette he was mad at. "I mean...isn't that why you invited me out here?" Or did you just feel sorry for me?

Colette clasped her hands together, still sullied with flour. "I'm not as graceful or as pretty like the noble ladies though. I can't talk as well as them… and I can't even dance like they do."

"Huh? What do you mean about dancing?" That had felt out of place from everything else she mentioned. "Did you want to dance?"

Something from what he said got Colette blushing much more fervently. It rushed to her ears half-hidden by her hair, rushed to her neck where the collar of her dress was slightly unbuttoned. Did that happen when she was baking earlier? "I-I've always wanted to but never learned how."

At that, Lloyd grinned, index finger pointing at himself. "That's fine. I can teach you!"

"Oh! You know how to dance?"

"Well, not really. But how hard can it be?" He had seen enough of high-class dances to get the gist of it. Just hold hands and move your feet in a small circle. Simple!

Colette looked eager, and that only boosted his confidence. "Okay! Um, I'm not sure if I have the right shoes for it."

"Don't worry about it!" Lloyd reassured, then walked up to her. He couldn't let his nerves get the best of him now, even his heart still beat pretty fast. "Just give me your hand here...and uh, your waist?"

Colette tilted her head. "How do I give you that?"

"I mean, like, I can just…" So much for nerves, but then he let himself reach out this time, one hand holding against the small of her back. His other hand held hers, then raised them both up, outstretched and to the side. "Okay, I think this is how we start."

Colette's face was still very red, but she wasn't moving away. In fact, with her free hand, she reached out to grasp his shoulder. "I think… this is what I'm supposed to do too?"

"Y-Yeah! Good call." He swallowed, stood up straight with her, then...had no idea what to do next. Shoot, I never paid attention to this stuff before…

Colette waited patiently before letting her right foot move to the side. "Maybe we do this next?"

"Right!" Lloyd instantly agreed, following her direction with his own. But wait, he had heard about how he was supposed to be leading instead. After a while, he wasn't exactly sure who was leading who anymore, but they were going slow in their circles, just inches away from the fountain.

They did this for some time until he felt something heavy on his foot. "Ouch."

"Ah sorry, I didn't mean to step on you!" Colette said with another apology. "I was trying to catch up."

"Am I going too fast?" he asked. He tightened his hold on her waist. "Sorry, guess I'm not as good of a dancer as I thought."

"Ah no it's okay! I think you're really good." Colette didn't sound like she was just humoring him, at least going by how much she was smiling at him. The moonlight highlighted her braided hair, her cheeks that were still a bit stained with flour. "I'm happy you could teach me."

"Well in that case… there's other dancing moves we could try!" Because while it was nice being with Colette, dancing in circles was already getting a little boring now. "Like um...doing a twirl!" Now how would they do that?

"Oh, I know what you mean! I think you're supposed to lead the other person like this." At that, Colette stepped back and somehow used their connecting hands to motion him to move away.

"W-Whoa," he could only utter as he found himself twirling out slightly, his red ribbons nearly hitting him the face (that happened a few times before and it did actually hurt) then twirl back into the position they were in before, his hand on her waist again. "Hey, I did it!"

"Hehe, yeah!" Colette said back, so proud.

"Though I'm not sure if it was supposed to be me...but whatever!" Then he thought up something else. "What about this now?"

"What about wha- ahh!"

Lloyd dipped her slightly, like he would see Zelos do with one of the random ladies he'd take out. But Colette was shaky, nearly making Lloyd lose his hold. He spread out his stance slightly so that he could hold her with more stability. He probably looked awkward but luckily no one was around.

"I had you, Colette! I wasn't going to drop you."

“I know, I’m so sorry.” Colette looked up at him, one hand clutching at his shoulder more tightly. The light of the stars reflected in her eyes. Blue…“I’m…not a very good maid, I know…I mess up so many things…”

“What? That’s not what matters. And I’m the one that just started a fight not even five minutes ago.” Lloyd smiled at her, still holding her close, the sounds of the fountain still drowning out most sounds. “Besides, being a maid isn’t all you are.”

“Heh, yeah?” she giggled. Her braid fell back, towards the ground. If any closer, it would have dipped into the fountain water. Maybe he should pull them up now. “Thank you…for doing this with me. No one really looks at me as anything but a maid.”

“Well, they’re wrong then.” He nodded, getting a better grip of her waist. “You’re Colette.”

Her eyes grew softer, along with her voice. “And you’re Lloyd…just Lloyd.” Was she closer to him? The stars were brighter now. “And sometimes you’re silly…”

“Hey…where did that come from…?” he whispered back, but didn’t say anything more when her mouth pressed over his. Or his pressed over hers? Did it even matter?

What mattered though was that she was kissing him, the seconds passing as the sound of the fountain continued on in its constant dance.

It had been brief. He pulled back gently, finding his own blush reflected in her cheeks again.

“Ah…um…” Colette started before laughing nervously. “I didn’t…mean to.."

“You sure?” Lloyd asked, before once again leaning in, his hand pressing more against her waist, to bring her closer. “Because I think I did…” When did he ever become this smooth? But it didn’t matter because he was kissing her again and she was doing the same, noticing him… She sees me.

And maybe he should have noticed when the sounds of the garden changed. Because he could hear more clearly of the people inside the party, along with its music. 

It took him a moment to realize that meant that someone was opening the door to the garden from the house.

“Okay, bud, what part of just staying in the kitchen did you not get?! I know you're out here!" And there was Zelos' huffy whine, shoes going up the stone path. "You can stop moping now. Now let's get you back out there and-" 

A pause. Lloyd turned to see Zelos blinking within the muted lights from the mansion's windows, dumbfounded. “Uh…mingle?” A beat, mixed in with the chirping of crickets. “Why are you standing like you’re about to do a split?”

“Ah!” Colette yelped, her body moving again. “I’m sorry! I didn’t-!”

Lloyd tried to warn her. “Colette, wait! I’m gonna- whoa!”

He tried to save them both by reaching out to the fountain. But that was his first mistake. The rim of the fountain was too low, so he couldn't really grab at it at all. Instead, his forward momentum had only brought them both towards the fountain…

...until they fell right in it too.

The calm of the night completely crashed along with the furious sound of splashing water. The water wasn't deep, both already sitting up, their clothes drenched, along with pretty much everything else.

"Agh! Colette! Are you okay?" he asked while coughing up water at the same time. "I'm sorry!" He couldn't believe how badly he had messed this up.

Colette was seated across from him in the fountain, until her body started to shake. She must have been cold now...until he saw her smile. Wait, she was laughing?

"That...that was fun!" She said between fits of giggles. And for some reason, it only made him laugh too. 

"You have a weird idea of fun," he said back, even if he couldn't deny how much fun it felt like right now.

"And you're a mess!" she said pointing at him...then suddenly splashed him with more water!

"Hey! Well, so are you!" And then he did the same to her, watching as she tried to shield herself, her maid's cap drooping on her head. "Take that!"

Both were too busy playing that they had long forgotten about Zelos who stood there, confused and maybe a little irritated that they already forgot about him in the first place.

"You know what? Fine. Just have fun at your kiddy pool!" Witht that, he turned away. But both noble and maid showed no indication of hearing him, still busy splashing each other. He sighed.

"I guess he knows more than he's letting on," he said with a smirk, and left the two to continue their very weird way of having fun with each other.

[incomingalbatross]

Fic: Guiding Light

@foundfamilybingo fill (very belated) for the “Lost/Stranded” square, in the Gravity Falls fandom!

@awesomebutunpractical, this is for you. Thank you for waiting, and for generally being the fun and friendly Tumblr presence/mutual that you always are. It is late and I am tired right now, but I hope you like this fic. :)

Characters: Stan Pines, Soos Ramirez, Abuelita Ramirez Warnings/Pairings/Ratings: None, none, gen Length: approximately 2k words

Stan had given Soos the week off and now he was starting to wonder why.

Sure, it was the kid’s first week of high school or whatever, and sure this was always a slack week in the tourist trade and maybe he didn’t need another pair of hands, but geez. He hadn’t thought about the fact that what’s-his-name, the latest cashier kid, would be leaving too. What, was he supposed to do everything by himself around here?

Ugh, fine, whatever. He might as well close up and get some work done downstairs—at least he didn’t have any kids hanging around underfoot, getting in his way, right?

See, if things had gone the way he’d maybe kinda assumed they would, with Soos showing up whether he was paid or not to babble about his new High School Experience and generally occupy Stan’s space for hours…well, Stan wouldn’t be getting anything important done, would he? No.

So yeah, it was a good thing that it seemed like the kid might’ve finally wised up—here it was late Tuesday, after all, and Stan hadn’t seen a trace of him since Saturday, which was practically a record.

Maybe, Stan thought… Maybe after three years of this kid underfoot, being weirdly obsessed with Stan and the Shack, high school would be the thing that finally sent life back to the status quo. With Soos moving on to whatever teenagers did nowadays, and Stan in the basement, uninterrupted again.

Good.

Stan was just turning to the vending machine, still grumbling under his breath, when the phone rang. Ugh, after eight o’clock? What was it, a vampire telemarketer?

“Hello,” he barked into the receiver.

“Mr. Pines,” a quiet, softly-accented voice responded, “would you send my boy home? It is getting late, and he will need to be up early for his new school tomorrow.”

Stan grimaced, surprised and vaguely offended. “What? I mean, maybe if I had him, but I haven’t even seen Soos today. I toldja I’d give him the week off!”

There was a slight pause from Soos’s grandma. “He has not been at the Shack today?” she repeated.

“No…” Stan’s gut was starting to catch up with his ears, now, and that wasn’t a good feeling at all. “Wait,” he said. “When did you last see him?”

There was a sigh from the other end of the phone—a worried sigh. He’d never heard Soos’s Abuelita sound worried before. “This morning, before school. He texted me after school that he would be late home—I have given him a phone now, he is a big boy—and said then that he would be visiting your Shack.”

“He hasn’t shown up that I noticed,” Stan said slowly. “But…if he has a phone, why call me?”

“He has not been answering,” Abuelita said, and the bad feeling in Stan’s gut solidified into a block of ice, cold and heavy.

This was Gravity Falls. And the kid had gone missing. That was a bad, bad combination

“I’ll, uh, I’ll look around,” he said quickly. “I mean, maybe he’s just outside, or wandered in here while I wasn’t lookin’, or something. I’ll find him—I mean, it’s Soos. Where would he have gone?”

There were a lot of bad answers to that question, he knew—“gone” and “gone willingly” were very different things. But he shoved that knowledge deep, deep down, where it could panic by itself and not distract him.

From the hum Abuelita gave in response, she wasn’t much more reassured than Stan. But all she said was, “Thank you, Mr. Pines. Please make sure he gets home when you find him,” and her voice when she said it was a bit closer to its usual untroubled calm.

“Yeah, sure,” he began, but she had already hung up.

He dropped the phone and ran his hands over his face. “Okay, think, Stan,” he said to himself. “It’s Soos, he’s got some weird thing against lyin’ at all, let alone to his grandma. So if he said he was on his way here, somethin’ must’ve happened on the way…”

But that was too wide an area. It could’ve been at school—second day would be pretty early for the “lock ‘em up and leave ‘em” level of bullying, but heck, it wasn’t like Stan hadn’t seen it before. (Though that target had never been alone at school…) It could’ve been in town.

It could’ve been in the woods, and that thought made his gut twist more than anything. He told Soos the woods weren’t safe, but if the kid tried to take a shortcut or something…

He shook his head. “I can’t do this alone,” he muttered, and turned back to the vending machine.

—

There was a spell, in Ford’s dumb journal. Well, there were more than a few spells, most of them either bizarrely useless or straight-up dangerous, but this one had been…special.

A spell to “trace the threads binding your heart to others,” his brother’s stupid fancy handwriting read. When tested, it produced several strands of light emitting from my chest outward, in various directions, until out of my sight. And then he went on about the colors of the lights, because he was a nerd.

A warning, however! The entry concluded. This spell lasted only an hour (it was somewhat annoying to constantly have invisible-to-others lights around me during that period, honestly!), and once it broke I was unable to recast it. There may be a time limit in which it needs to “recharge,” it may be once per user, or there may be another component required for repeated use of which I am unaware. In any case, this is something to be aware of. (Although it is a largely useless spell, so I don’t foresee that being much of an issue.)

Stan gritted his teeth, reading over the instructions one more time. He could’ve tried it before—he’d thought about trying it before—but, well. There were a whole lotta factors that could keep Ford’s “thread” or whatever showing up for him, even if it worked, and if it did what good would it do him? He knew where Ford was, or at least how to get there. No point using something that might not even work to check that he was out there. (If he weren’t Stan would know, anyway.)

But he’d always kept it in the back of his mind, anyway, just in case. In case it became useful…or in case, one day, he just needed to try for evidence the Ford was still out there, that they were still connected.

He only got to use it once, after all.

“Well,” he muttered now, slamming the book shut, “here goes nothin’, Soos. This better work.”

He shut his eyes and chanted the weird gibberish words Ford had written down (seriously, how was this magic? He could make up better magic-sounding words than that). Then, cautiously, he cracked his eyelids open again.

“…Oh, wow.”

There was a whole tangle of multicolored lights coming from his chest, enough that it took him a minute to sort through them. He didn’t look long at any of them, though, mind focused on Soos.

There was a cluster of strings all stretching off in the same direction (towards town, he figured after a second), two bright red-and-purple strands dancing around each other and zooming south next to a couple fainter multicolored ones, a quieter but colorful string stretching east, and…

Oh yeah. That one was definitely Soos.

Stan couldn’t have said how he knew this one—almost the brightest one there, woven out of red and purple and yellow all mixed with traces of blue—was Soos’s. He just felt it, as soon as he focused on it; it felt like Soos, somehow, warm and confusing but good. Important.

Time to follow the trail, then.

—

In the end, with the help of these ridiculous magic lights, it was almost too easy. “Almost,” because Stan would never, ever complain about an easy win if he could get it, and also because he knew how bad the things that could’ve happened were. But still. It was a little anticlimactic to just follow the string to Soos and then find him actually sleeping against a tree in the middle of the woods.

Stan just stopped and stared at him, for a minute, because really? Here was Stan, charging to his rescue in the middle of the night (okay, okay, nine PM, whatever), when it wasn’t even a work day, and what kinda welcome did he get? A sleeping teenager!

He looked okay, though, so that was good. And the rope of light between him and Stan looked…kinda cool, maybe, now that Stan could see both ends. It disappeared into Soos’s chest, just like on Stan’s end, but the colors changed when they reached the kid. On his end, there was still red and yellow, but the purple gave way to green and there was a lot more blue there. Weird.

Eh, whatever.

“Soos, hey, wake up, kid,” he said, crouching down. He was tempted to yell it, just for entertainment points, but after dark in these woods that was probably not a good idea. Instead, he reached out a hand to shake the boy’s shoulder. “C’mon, time to go.”

Soos blinked his eyes open immediately, looking up at him with those stupid starry eyes Stan had always thought kids were supposed to grow out of. “Mr. Pines!” he cheered, throwing himself at Stan. “I got lost but I knew you’d find me!”

“Oof,” Stan grunted, falling back under the kid’s weight as he caught him. “Yeah, sure, kid, I only gave you a week off, not forever. What’re you doin’ in the woods anyway? Talk about a dumb idea…”

Soos shrugged, arms tightening around Stan. “I, uh, I don’t really know, Mr. Pines,” he said, sounding guilty. “I was on my way to the Shack, cause I wanted to tell you how high school was, but…then I heard singing?” He sniffled. “And I know you always say not to go into the woods, but the singing was really pretty and I wanted to get closer, and then I met these people and they were really cool-looking and I think they said there was a party? But, um, I don’t really remember that part too well. I just remember walking in the woods with them and feeling sleepy, but then they stopped? And they were all, like, yelling at each other about somebody being, like, ‘marked by the Great Protector’ or something, and then they left. And then I realized I was lost in the woods, but Abuelita always said when I was little that if I was lost I should stay where I was and wait for somebody to find me. So I sat down to wait, and then I was still tired so I guess I fell asleep.”

He paused, and then sniffled again. “I’m really sorry, Mr. Pines, that you had to come looking for me,” he said dolefully. “I was really proud of being in high school now and being, like, mature and stuff…but then I went and Hung Out With Strangers and tried to go to a Strange Party and I’m really sorry! Am I…Are you gonna fire me? Or make me take extra time off work?”

“Moses, kid, of course I’m not gonna fire you,” Stan blurted out. Freakin’ wood folk, thinking they could take his kid… He didn’t know what they thought they were talking about with that “marked by the ‘Great Protector’” stuff, because Soos wasn’t marked by anybody, but they were lucky they’d run off before Stan got to them.

“I might make you come back to work early,” he added, “so you don’t have time to do stupid stuff. But…eh, you’re not dumb. You know the drill, right? You made a mistake, big deal. Learn from it and don’t do it again, capisce?”

Soos hugged him again, and okay, they were approaching a limit here. “Got it, Mr. Pines, sir!” he exclaimed, almost bouncing, and Stan groaned as he got back to his feet. Kid was too enthusiastic to live with, seriously.

“Yeah, okay, good,” he muttered, pulling the teenager up. “Let’ get you home then. Oh, and Soos?”

“Yes, Mr. Pines?”

He fixed him with a raised eyebrow. “Whatever you think you saw or heard out here, that’s the kinda stuff that’ll make people think you’re crazy if you talk about it. Got it?”

Soos nodded earnestly. “I got it, Mr. Pines. I won’t talk about it to anyone, even the guys at school!”

“Oh yeah? You made friends with any one those guys yet?”

And they began trudging home, Soos happily rambling about his new school experience. And if the lights winked out, finally, just as Stan refocused on them in search of Ford’s, before he could settle whether it was there or not…

Well, that was okay for now, he figured. He’d used the spell for something else important, in the end.

[nancywheelxr]

Can I request angsty Steelatom where Ray has nightmares about hell (despite how optimistic he seemed in the show) and about Neron, and starts getting more and more anxious until he finally just breaks down during a mission, and the only one who can console him is Nate? I’ve just had this in my head all week, and I haven’t had the motivation to write.

Here’s the thing, Vandal Savage had been only one in a series of people sent to torture Ray.

Hell isn’t stupid. Neron isn’t stupid.

Day after day, or at least, Ray thinks it might have been days, it’s hard to keep track of time when there’s no sun, someone had come into Ray’s cell and--

Nope, no, not thinking about it.

“Get it together,” he tells his reflection in the mirror nearly every morning, floundering for a way to hide the dark circles growing beneath his eyes. When he drags a hand across his face, it’s trembling terribly. 

It’s becoming a habit, this waking up in the middle of the night, shaking and crying, phantom pains scratching at his skin and the last flickering images of his nightmare still vividly painted behind his eyelids, and it’s finally catching up to him.

Now, hours later, with the sun high in the sky and rural Connecticut stretching for miles and miles in every direction, Ray still can’t shake off the eerie feeling of wrongness, the quiet whisper of what if you’re still there echoing at the back of his head.

“You know what,” Nate says, adjusting his sunglasses and grinning broadly. In the sunlight, he glows. “This mission is exactly what we needed.”

Ray hums noncommittally. The buzzing of anxiety thrumming just under his skin.

“I mean, look at this place-- it’s idyllic!” Nate continues, gesturing the corn fields they’ve been tracking through, searching for anything whoever did the crop circles might have left behind, “kinda makes you want to say screw it and buy a farm, uh?”

Maybe. Ray can see why Nate would think that, but the hairs on the back os his neck are standing on end, and every time the wind blows, the corn makes a whooshing noise and each creak startles Ray. The feeling of impending doom is clinging to his shoulder too much for him to enjoy any of this bucolic heaven thing. “I don’t know,” he says faintly, “a little too Children of the Corn, isn’t it?”

Nate makes a face, partially obscured by his glasses. “Yeah, I guess it might be a little creepy at night,” he nods, but it’s distracted like his mind is elsewhere. The sunglasses are raised soon after. “Hey, you sure you’re good, man? ‘Cause you’ve been kind of quiet and no offense, but the bags under your eyes have bags.”

“Yeah, I’m fine, it’s fine,” Ray waves him off with a smile he hopes looks more genuine than the stomach-churning grimace that is fighting to break through. His heart takes the opportunity to accelerate its racing, drumming heavily on his ribcage, and for a second, something flashes in the middle of the green and Ray could swear, he could swear, it was the silver, metallic gleam of a knife-- raised, sharp, bleeding red on the stone floor, mixing with the grime and the dirt, and Ray is crying, the chains are biting on his wrists and ankles, and the wound on his side is burning, the adrenaline isn’t nearly enough to ignore the pain, and--

“Ray?” Nate is snapping his fingers in front of Ray’s face and his expression is twisted with worry, eyes wide and open, an easy invitation to read all his emotions displayed there. He looks like he’s been calling Ray’s name for some time now. “Hey, hey, you back? Where did you go? You spaced out--”

Nate’s voice is distant and stretched, like Ray is swimming in syrupy, the thick liquid filling his lungs and sticking to the walls, making it impossible to breathe-- seriously, Ray can’t breathe, his chest is beginning to ache with the need and his heart is racing too fast, it’s gonna burst out of his ribcage, and he still can’t breathe, and Nate is a fuzzy, distorted image fading in and out of focus in front of him, and oh god, Ray is dying, isn’t he? He’s dying and he’s going to go back to Hell, to that chair and the chains and the wounds that heal themselves overnight just to be inflicted again, and he can already feel the blade flaying his skin, piercing flesh and muscle, and this time there will be no reprieve, no Vandal Savage to play cards instead of torture, no, Ray is sure the demons will have cottoned on to that already, upped security since the last break out and Neron will probably watch and laugh--

“Ray!” 

His name echoes distantly--

“Come on, man, it’s fine, you’re fine, you’re not in Hell anymore, you’re here, and I’m here--”

Is that-- Nate?

“And we’re in the middle of goddamn Connecticut, and there’s honest to god crop circles-- remember the circles? We were gonna check that out, dude, come on.”

Crop circles-- Ray remembers that, Gideon had said something- aliens? 

“You and me, man. I’m here, I’m not letting anyone hurt you-- you’re not alone, Ray, please, we can go back to town and try that ice cream place you wanted, or go back to the ship and watch Star Wars-- starting from Episode 6, the way you like it--”

“But what about the circles?” Ray says, swallowing thickly and struggling to get his breathing under control, notices he’s kneeling in the ground even though he has no recollection of falling down. His vision, at least, is focusing once again and he can see Nate clearly now-- crouched in front of Ray, scared look on his eyes, and holding Ray up, holding him together as if he let go of Ray’s arms, Ray would scatter in the wind, turn to dust in this dusty road on a dusty town. 

“Oh, thank god,” Nate breathes, and pulls Ray in, clinging to him for dear life, and Ray enjoys the warm safety that comes with being enveloped so completely by Nate. “I’m not going to ask if you’re okay,” he whispers into Ray’s hair, “but do you want to talk about it?”

Ray clears his throat. “Not really, not now,” he amends. “Can we go back to looking for aliens?”

“Yeah, man,” Nate laughs and it sounds a little wet, a lot relieved. When he pulls away, his eyes are shining too bright in the sun. His smile is all sunlight, though. “We can go back to looking for aliens.”

It’s not case closed on this conversation, it’s putting it on hold, but for Ray is what he needs right now. The flashbacks are too raw, too high-definition on his mind for him to translate them into words without feeling like he’s speaking it into existence. 

Nate’s steady presence-- hand warm on his, soft voice grounding him to the present, solid body pressed to his side-- it’s enough, it’s always been enough.

“Nate,” he pauses, and Nate turns to look back at him, question on his eyes. Ray opens his mouth, exhales overwhelmed, “I--”

“Later,” Nate smiles, understanding and knowing, tugs him by the hand. I know, me too. “Come on, we’ve got plenty of ground to cover.”

[spaceskam]

the secret of happiness

ao3

Day 7: free day for @roswellnewmexicoweek

"We’re closed!”

“Oh, come on, just one drink?” 

Maria’s head popped up at the voice, smiling at the very sunkissed Alex that was coming her way. Instinct told her to run up and hug him, but she knew that they left off in a really bad place. She’d hate to put him off. But, still, he looked incredible. He was tanner than ever, his hair was longer, he’d grown into a brighter style, and he just looked lighter in general. Happier.

Happy Alex was good to see. After he’d caught her with Michael, he was fuming. She’d tried to talk to him, to apologize, but he just told her to leave. Then he disappeared for three months. Him leaving led to Guerin spiraling. Which led to Maria realizing she had missed a huge chunk of the story.

“Are you just gonna stare at me?” Alex mused, stepping up to the bar and holding his arms out for a hug. She went willingly.

“It’s so good to see you, Alex. You look hot,” she teased, grinning as she pulled away. Clearly, he was being friendly and she was going to welcome all of it.

“So do you!” Maria rolled her eyes.

“I look the same.”

“Yeah, but you’re always hot, I was just pointing it out,” Alex said, his smile bright and contagious.

“So, where have you been? We were worried. Kyle waited like two weeks to tell us you were alive,” she said, pouring him a drink. Maria let herself take him in a little deeper as he took the glass. His aura was shining bright with ease and hope and happiness. His outward appearance ran deep. She’d never seen him like this. She never wanted it to stop.

“California. A buddy of mine from the Air Force lives there with his wife. She’s a hotshot lawyer, so they own this big ass house on the beach. Let me crash for a bit,” he explained.

“Well, it looks like it was good for you,” she pointed out. He nodded, his smile softening.

“Yeah, it was. I needed to get away from all the bullshit. My entire life I’ve never had a free day and I came to a point where I was about to burst, so I took some time. I really needed it,” he admitted. Maria looked away for a moment. She was the one who tipped him over the edge. She was the one who added the cheery on top. The least she could do was apologize.

“Listen, Alex, about‒”

“No, don’t, seriously,” Alex said, holding his hand up as he looked at her with earnest eyes, “I’ve had a lot of time to handle it and think about it and I want to apologize for taking out my anger on you. And also for putting you in the middle. I still don’t like what you did and it still hurt me, but it was selfish and childish of me to act like you should’ve prioritized me over yourself, especially when you had so little information about me and him.” Maria’s shoulders slumped.

“No, Alex, I should’ve talked to you before I did anything,” Maria tried. Alex shrugged.

“Yeah, but still. I mean, we had barely spoken to each other in a decade and a few months back to being your friend, I expected you to just do what I wanted without explanation. All you knew was that we kissed once upon a time. I shouldn’t have lashed out like I did,” Alex said. Maria nodded, accepting the apology. As much as she felt like she was in the wrong, he had a point and she could accept that.

She’d lost her best friends all in one fell swoop. She knew Liz and Alex were dealing with shit, but she’d be lying if she hadn’t gotten angry over the years that she hadn’t been able to escape like they had. Her best friend died and she had to grieve alone. Her mom got sick and she dealt with it alone. She’d done everything on her own for a decade and she’d just wanted some selfish pleasure in her life.

She wasn’t guilty for being selfish, she was guilty for trying to take something that wasn’t her to be selfish with.

“Okay. You can be sorry for lashing out if I can be sorry for being dumb enough not to see that I was playing with fire,” she offered. Alex snorted with a grin but raised his glass.

“Cheers to us being 28-year-old babies.”

“Fuck it, cheers to that.”

They both laughed as they knocked back a shot of whiskey, making faces as it burned and laughing despite it. It felt nice to be with Alex again and be friends. She missed it. Even though she had Liz and was even starting to get along with Isobel and Kyle, no one was quite like Alex Manes. She was happy to see she hadn’t ruined it for good like she thought.

“Okay, okay, so tell me about California,” Maria pushed, leaning on the bar and watching as Alex bit down on his lip.

“I honestly didn’t do much,” Alex said and his nose slowly scrunched up, “Okay, I will admit I was a little slutty.”

“Good! You deserve slutty!” she cheered, laughing as he nodded earnestly. “Are you just gonna stand there or are you gonna spill?” Alex downed the rest of his drink before leaning forward.

“Okay, so, like, all the guys there are hot. Seriously, I thought I was going to die. And, like, 80% of the guys I hooked up with were dumb as rocks, but they were so, so hot,” he gushed, “There was this one guy I met who I actually tried to date for a little while. Dude asked me if I surfed and I was like ‘no’, and he’s like ‘oh I could teach you’, so I told him about my leg in hopes it would get me out of it. Go figure I’d pick the one guy in the world who specializes in giving swimming and surfing lessons to physically and mentally disabled kids and teens. And, like, how do I say no to that? He gave me this big ass speech about how the water gives them a type of freedom they don’t have on land, so I had to fucking go.”

Maria suppressed a laugh at the idea of Alex surfing. She couldn’t actually remember a time they had gone swimming as kids and he hadn’t screamed at them for getting his hair wet or messing up his mascara.

“Oh, yeah? How’d that go?” Alex tilted his head with that ’how do you think?’ look on his face.

“Awful. Horrible. I freaked the fuck out, embarrassed myself horribly to the point he had to apologize,” Alex explained, shaking his head through the smile. Maria pressed her fingers to her lips at the image. She almost wished she could’ve been there. “But honestly it paid off. Have you ever had sex on the beach?” Maria snorted loudly, shaking her head. “So much sand in so many places you don’t want sand, but, like, he was really good, so I don’t know how much to complain.”

“You’re ridiculous, Alex,” she laughed. However, she was really happy to see him like this. He didn’t seem so plagued by Michael Guerin. He had moved on, he was doing so damn good. She loved it.

“So, tell me about what I’ve missed,” he urged, putting his elbow on the counter and resting his chin on his fist all while batting his eyelashes.

With a soft laugh and a sigh, she told him, “I guess this is a good time to you that Guerin and I are over.” Surprisingly, he gave a soft smile.

“I know.”

Maria’s eyebrows pulled together. “Kyle tell you?”

“Uh, no, Michael did,” Alex admitted and, despite having just started talking about his sexcapades, this was the moment his cheeks decided to turn red, “He honestly did keep his distance though which I’m thankful for. He only texted me twice. First time to ask if I was okay, and the second time to tell me you two broke up and that he missed me, but he understood that I needed space.”

“And?”

“And,” Alex breathed out a slow breath, “I’m going to see him after I leave here.”

It took a few moments for Maria to process what she was hearing. He had literally just told her how he had moved on.

“Seriously?” Alex nodded. “What happened to being slutty?” He huffed a laugh.

“Yeah, I mean, it was fun and all, but all it really did was show me how much I love him,” Alex admitted and she would be lying if she said she didn’t gulp at that. “I would be hooking up with other guys and I would be thinking about him. He gave me the space I needed to find who I was outside of my father and outside of, well, Michael himself. And I still want him. The idea of him still makes me feel like I’m on fire and, regardless of what happens tonight, I want to see him so bad I kinda feel like I’m gonna explode. But I’m sure you get that, Michael is a lot to adore.”

“No, it wasn’t like that with me,” Maria said softly. She’d gotten a glimpse of how serious these two men in her life were about each other, but it always made her feel a little worse when she saw more into it. How did she go so long without seeing it? Somehow, Alex shrugged like it wasn’t that big of a deal. “Well, does he know you’re in town?”

“I texted him before I walked in and I’ve been too scared to check and see if he responded,” he chuckled. Maria reminded herself she was being his friend and not the girl who fucked his relationship and scoffed.

“Pull out your damn phone,” she insisted. Alex smiled and obey, laying the phone on the table for them both to see as he opened his messages.

Alex: I’m back in town. Can I come see you later?

Michael: Yes

Michael: Or do you want me to come over so you don’t have to drive after driving all the way from wherever?

Michael: Okay you can just come to me

Michael: Are you okay?

Michael: I’m texting too much I’m sorry but what time?

Michael: in my defense I’m really excited to see you

Michael: I’ll shut up can’t wait to see you ❤

“Jesus, should you really be keeping him waiting?” Maria teased. Happiness burst in her chest at the look on Alex’s face as he read over the messages. He deserved that. If that’s what made him happy, then he deserved all of it. “I want you two to be happy, Alex.”

“Thank you,” he said, but his eyes didn’t really leave his phone. “What do you think the heart means?”

“I think it means a man who once went on a rant about how emojis are the worst just sent you one, so you should take it as he’s trying,” she pointed out. He nodded slowly, biting on his lips before he looked up at her.

“Do you mind if I go?”

“I literally might throw you out. Go get your man,” she insisted. A wide grin broke out on his face and he reached over the bar to pull her into a hug once again.

“Thank you for this, Maria, seriously. I missed you.”

“I missed you too, Alex.”

Alex pulled away just long enough to press a kiss to her cheek before hopping off the bar. He somehow was even brighter than before. The effects of love.

“Let’s not pull away from each other again,” Alex said. She nodded in agreement and they said their goodbyes. He almost ran out the door.

Maria took a moment to really process how good it felt to have Alex back and happy and good. She couldn’t even find it in her to be confused or jealous or anything negative anymore. Alex was finally getting his love and, honestly, she felt confident that she would too. And, if she didn’t, at least she had her friends.

Turns out that’s really all you really needed.

[spacenerrrd]

Don’t Judge A Book By It’s Cover: Chapter 7

Sander Sides

Word count: 1916

Characters: Patton/Creativity, Virgil/Anxiety, Patton/Morality, Logan/Logic

Warnings: Nothing that I noticed, let me know if you spot anything

Summary: Logan runs a library in a small town, allowing him to share his love of books without feeling left out. His business partner and friend Roman helps by running the bright Disney themed cafe that attracts more people to stay for longer. The two clashing but somehow perfect match of a friendship went their days peaceful in their small community until one day a new pair of brother; Patton and Virgil, moved into town and showed the owners a new way of life.

Chapter seven: Content

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6

~~~

Sigh.

Logan let out a heavy breath as he looked up at the opening doors, expecting to see a certain dramatic man, but instead being greeted by a couple who he recognised had visited a few times. He gave them a friendly smile before looking around the rest of the library. He had opened at his usual time in the morning,but was confused when Roman did not enter at least 30 minutes after. Checking his messages to make sure he didn’t call in sick, he huffed as he got to work. Logan was counting his lucky stars that it wasn’t busy today, meaning he was able to go between doing his usual business in the library, hands out discount cards and apologise to the regulars of the cafe while answering any questions that visitors came up to him and asked.

About two hours later, Roman came rushing into the library, immediately going to his cafe and starting to set it up. He was a mess. Not even in his Prince outfit, hair a birds nest on top of his head which was a sign something was definitely wrong or not right.

Logan watched Roman run around like a turkey without its head as he got the chairs out and ready and getting the coffee machine started up. Observing him, Logan noticed that those were indeed the clothes that Roman went with when he went to give Virgil back his bag. (Logan doesn’t understand the need to change clothes depending on the situation as he believes formal is always the way to go, nor the need to get your friends to check your outfits to make sure it’s ok for said situation. But Roman did both, and he wasn’t going to tell him how he criticizes his actions, especially since Roman is his only lasting friend from school). Knowing this, Logan came to a conclusion and went up to the counter Roman was under, trying to fix the plug that fell loose. “Roman, did you sleep at Patton and Virgil’s house yesterday.

Thunk.

“Oh fuuudge,” Roman groaned, standing up while rubbing the back of his head. “How did you… actually, I don’t want to know how you know. But yes, I did.”

“Did you have-”

“Don’t even finish that sentence.” He held up a finger in warning.

Logan gave a single nod. “Sorry, I just assumed because that’s what two people usually do when they like each other.”

Roman sighed. “You’re kinda correct. In this sense, we were just… connecting. I learnt new stuff about him and then we all ate pizza and watched cartoons for the rest of the night.”

“Until you fell asleep?”

“Yes, which lead to me waking up on their couch late which is why I am late. The house was empty but I got a morning text explaining that they didn’t want to wake me since I apparently ‘looked adorable’ in the words of Patton.”

Logan could feel the fondness rolling off of Roman as he talked about Virgil’s text, which just made him give a small smile. “Well I’m glad you were able to have some quality time with Virgil, even if it did make you late for work.”

Roman face turned a shade of light pink, but his smile was wide as he started to serve the first customers of the day while Logan went back to labelling the new order of books.

—

“Hey-a Logan!” Patton exclaimed as he came up towards the librarian later that day.

“Greetings Patton,” He smiled back, turning back to stack his books and trusting that Patton will follow him.

“May I just say how lovely it was for Roman to drop by yesterday. I wasn’t expecting him too after what happened but my golly it made Virgil so happy to see him!”

“Yes, well I suggested it may of been the best option to at least return Virgil’s bag to him so he may attend school tomorrow with his work.”

“Awww, that it so sweet Logan! It really meant a lot to him, he was even more panicked when he realised he had left his work but I knew you would take good care of it.”

Logan nodded. “I take work very seriously and I understand how important it is. I would never let a student lose their work in this library.”

They both fell into a comfortable silence fell upon them. Logan walking around, placing the last of the new books into the shelves while Patton followed him, just a step behind. Eventually Patton spoke up, breaking it.

“Um… Logan?”

Logan turned around, giving his full attention to the smaller man in front of him. “Yes Patton?”

“I… I just wanted to apologise…”

“I don’t understand. You haven’t done anything wrong.” “No, not now… but when we first met…” Patton gaze stayed down, his hands fiddling with the sleeves of his cardigan that sat on his shoulders. “You had constantly asked me to call you Logan, yet I refused to… I realise looking back how rude that was of me and I should of listened to you and I’m sorry.”

Logan just stared at Patton for a few moments, completely bewildered. No one had ever apologized for something they’ve done to him apart from Roman. Although it got him irritated, he forced his emotions down about it because he was preparing to just power past it. But Patton apologized. He was told that his feelings matter and his chest felt like it was glowing even though he knew that was physically impossible but he didn’t know how else to describe this feeling.

“I… Don’t know how to respond… Thank you Patton.”

Patton’s face released the tension it was obviously holding as he waited for Logan’s response, a small smile flourishing on his face. “It’s no problem. You deserved the apology Logan.”

Logan returned the smile. It was small, but it was enough to make Patton’s grow.

“Well, I’ve got to keep putting these books back.”

“Oh of course! Let’s finish this and then we can do whatever else you have left!”

They fell back into their comfortable silence, Patton walking beside Logan as he finished off his work around the library. Both content as could be.

—

Virgil walked into the library cafe and took his usual seat. Could he really call it his when he’s only been coming here for the past week and a half?

‘Who is going to stop me?’ Thought Virgil has he pulled out his books. With headphones drilling music into his head, he got into his work with the comfort of the library environment helping calm his nerves about getting good grades on these assignments.

Roman, who had given Virgil space to do his school work, couldn’t help himself after an hour and made him a coffee. He slid it in front of the boy, a smirk growing on his face at the unamused look he got out of Virgil.

“I don’t remember ordering anything. What type of service is this?” Virgil asked, pulling his headphones down around his neck.

“Are you really going to complain about getting a free coffee?” Roman winking, getting a grumble out of the blushing boy. “Plus, I made this coffee extra special today.”

“That scares me.”

Roman gasped, hand covering his heart as he truly looked like an offended dramatic ass prince. “That is so rude! What would make you think that I would do anything bad towards the coffee?”

“Because knowing your taste, there’s goin’ to be so many sweeteners in where that my teeth will fall off just from this drink.”

“Just because you don’t have a sweet tooth doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy my taste in drink!”

Virgil rolled his eyes, putting his pen down to lift the hot drink up to his lips, the lips Roman were definitely not staring at. He took a sip, the drink sitting on his tongue for a second before he spat it back into the cup, scrunching up his face.

“Oh god dude, what the hell is that?” “Vanilla, one of the best flavours that add an extra sweetness to your live.”

“How dare you make my coffee vanilla. You know I like it strong and kinky.”

Now it was Roman’s turn to blush, his mouth hung open from him being speechless.

Virgil snickered. “Here pretty boy, take your poison of a drink.” He placed the coffee in front of Roman, who just silently picked it up and drank the coffee, still shocked about the comment. Virgil picked up his pen again, leaving his headphones down as he started to get back to work.

He tried to ignore how Roman stared at him, but after 20 minutes it started to get to him. He looked up, eyebrow raised.

“Why don’t you just take a photo? It would last longer.”

He smirked when he managed to make Roman’s eyes widen when he realised he had been caught. But his eyes widened and he ducked his face into his hands when he realised Roman was actually pulling out him phone.

“What are you doing?! Don’t take a picture of me!” “You’re the one who asked me too handsome,” Roman grinned. “Pleaseee, just one picture for me?”

Virgil grumbled some curses under his breath before removing one hand to flip Roman off. His other hand was covering his lower half of his face to hide his blush and his smile that formed by seeing Roman’s eyes shimmering when he looked at him.

Roman held his phone up and snapped a few photos for good measure, immediately setting Virgil as his homescreen. He couldn’t stop grinning even after he put his phone down, looking back up at the stunned emo.

“Thank you,” acknowledging his nervousness, Roman reached over the table and grabbed the hand that was just before expressing rude remarks and held it so softly. He didn’t mean his breath to hitch, but god was his breath taken away by the feeling of Virgil’s hand in his own. He could feel the calluses along Virgil’s hands, the unique bumps that displayed his dedication to banging those drums with such emotion. The way his fingers slotted into his own, no resistance to one another as they held hands.

“You’re!!! Holding!!! His!!! Hand!!!”

Alarm bells started ringing in Roman’s head as he pulled his hand back, his face turning scarlet. “I am truly sorry, I should of asked for permission to just touch you like that I just-”

“Ro.”

“-I wasn’t thinking I just saw that you were nervous-”

“Roman.”

“-and so I didn’t know what to do because I made you nervous and your hand was just there and so I just-”

“For the love of god, Roman shut up.” Virgil snapped.

Roman finally shut his mouth, eyebrows scrunched with worry as he stared at Virgil.

“Yes. You taking that photo did make me nervous. But mainly because I’m full of anxiety because that’s what I do. But… this…” Virgil reached back out and laced their fingers together. Although his face started to go the slightest bit pink and his breath went shaky at the contact of Roman’s impossibly soft hands, his voice was sure. “… this was ok…”

So they sat like that. Virgil got back to his work while Roman admired every detail of his face, every small movement to every reaction that just made him seem more and more beautiful. Hands staying together across the table.

Content, Roman took a deep breath.

Sigh.

~~~

A/N: I had no idea what I was going to do this chapter so thanks @tisithelittleelephant for your comment on one of my chapters that inspired a major part in this chapter :)

Next chapter

Tag list my dudes

@deathbyvenusftw​ @moonlightinwater​ @princeanxious​ @roman-is-a-gay​ @coffeekeyboardsss​ @ocotopushugs​ @thepoolofthedead​ @sanders-sides-things​ @angered-turtle​ @gayrobotalien​ @rebaobsessions​ @a-ghosts​ @catsandrandomness​ @fricksonsticks​ @v-blue-writer​ @hanramz-the-fander​ @your-username-is-unavailable​ @emphoenixcat​ @daughterofsomnus​ @anaveragegayfan​ @louisthewarlock​ @saro510-mp4 @6tick6tock6​ @nienna14​ @fandomsofrandom​ @notalwaysthevillian​ @thestoryoferissur​ @at-least-seven-pretty-potatoes​ @virgil-crofters​ @thatgaydemigodnerd​ @ijustreallylovesanderssides​ @221b-quote​ @bubblycricket @charlielgbt @why-only-have-one-fandom @jesjessode @thrown-out-pasta @athenashipsthings @tisithelittleelephant

[wirewitchviolet]

I hate that I hate MMORPGs.

Yesterday, on kind of a whim, I installed an MMORPG and played it for a couple hours, and I had the exact same miserable experience I always do, for the exact same reasons. Basically, everyone who has ever designed one of these suckers (with maybe a few rare exceptions) just fundamentally does not understand and actively undermines the appeal.

I’m not going to sit down and go through Richard Bartle’s whole player classification system, but personally, here’s some things I look for in a game, in general, and an RPG in particular:

I want to engage with fun moment to moment game mechanics.

I want to hang out and socialize with some friends for a bit.

I want to get lost in a character.

I want to go on some cool heroic quest.

I want to explore a world.

That last one is the only one I’ve ever really gotten out of an MMO, and honestly I’m really being charitable and only listing it so I can’t say things fail on every level.

Really though, an RPG can mean one of several different sorts of games.

We’ve got the traditional pen and paper sort. Maybe the mechanics are neat? Rolling dice is kind of fun in and of itself, I can usually improvise cool stuff to do, that’s fun. I definitely get to hang out with friends, since the game really can’t happen without a consistent group meeting up once a week or so and all. The sky’s pretty much the limit on character creation and depending on the group I can go fully in character all night, great. There’s a one-off cool big quest we’re all going on that’s just for us, rad. Probably some interesting stuff going on setting wise, but that depends.

If I’m playing an old school console RPG... I definitely get my big epic quest on, probably in a cool setting, the basic gameplay.... I personally kinda tend to like in a comfort food sort of way, but really as video games go it’s pretty lacking. And there’s no real getting lost in a character or any socialization at all.

And then of course there’s big open world games where I can probably lose myself in a character even without socialization because such games usually put way more emphasis on customizing your character and personal style stuff than anything, and be pretty aimless.

Now, MMOs tend to suck at, again, basically all of this. The basic game mechanics always tend to suck because, well, it’s massively multiplayer. There’s a bunch of other people, likely on garbage internet connections, people coming and going, people playing once a week for an hour, people playing every waking moment. So anything timing dependent is kinda shot and anything really competitive won’t work, and I mean there’s room to innovate, but you’re always going to be less appealing than games that don’t have those concerns.

Hanging out with my friends... there’s a few issues here and I’m going to revisit this point, but I think it’s important to stress that I AM NEVER GOING TO BRING MY OWN FRIENDS IN. When I can get all my friends together to play a game, we’re going for traditional pen and paper RPGs. That’s hard enough to schedule and we aren’t going to double up. I want to make friends in the game and hang out with them. And I mean, one of the big barriers to that is how scattershot the scheduling is. There’s a few easy ways I can think of to either determine which players are on the same schedule or to just ask upfront in some preferences panel, and just kinda consistently throw people together, but, I’ve never seen anyone really try for it.

Now, getting lost in a character and going on a big epic quest are... kinda tied together here. There’s a trend I think started with WoW, where MMOs are written with stories that would work just fine in a singleplayer game. I’m the big chosen hero from this tiny little village that maybe burned down, and I need to go tour the world and eventually go confront a big evil villain or 10.

But the thing is, everyone else around me is also the chosen hero, from the same tiny little village, with the same tragic backstory, pursuing the same subquests, facing the same villlains... who repop after for the next person. That just... doesn’t work. I can’t get lost in my character when everything the game is giving me to work with is also being given to everyone else. We all canonically have the same backstory and goals...

... and that’s not even getting into the MMO loop! In literally every single one of these games I’ve ever played, you start in area A, you do a bunch of filler quests for the NPCs who live there, they reward you, piecemeal, with a new equipment set, you put that on, you get sent to area B, and you just kinda meander through the whole world like that.

So essentially what happens here is that not only is everyone running through the same story, but time and space are interconnected in such a way that at any given point, all the people you can see are on the same story beat you are. That can be handy if you’re really trying to encourage partying up I guess, but it really just exacerbates the issue of everyone playing essentially the same character. I came here on Farmer Brown from Easterdale’s suggestion and I’m helping kill these bees. Which Farmer Brown also suggested to these other dozen people. Who are all dressed exactly like me, with the clothes they got from everyone else in Easterdale (except all the guys get full outfits while me and all the other women are in a bikini variation).

What am I supposed to talk to these people about? There’s immediate mechanical issues like, well, “want to party up to grind these bees faster?” but that’s really about it. And if I do meet someone who seems cool and want to hang out, it’s inherently fleeting. Because unless we happen to be putting in the EXACT same amount of play time, we’re going to drift apart. If you go to dinner and I keep playing for another hour, I’m a town or two ahead of you on the treadmill, we’re never going to see each other again.

Plus I mean, “I want to walk through a progression of wide fields slaughtering the same monster 20 times to earn a pair of shoes” is decidedly NOT on the list of things I want to do.

One way to get around this, which I have fuzzy memories was actually done by D&D Online, is to really formalize adventures into these discrete events you enter as a member of a party and complete together in a sitting. Desyncing still happens, but for a given play session you at least have a proper social experience instead of the standard one where you’re just talking to the people ahead or behind you on the minigolf course as someone waits for a hole to clear.

Here’s my thing though. I don’t honestly particularly WANT the big epic world-spanning quest. I seriously have hundreds of single-player RPGs to scratch that itch, and trying to match pace with other people just makes it stressful or obligatory. I want to hang out with a character and bounce off people. I don’t want to be an eternal wanderer touring the world, really. I want to find a cool place, settle in, and be a local. Have some neighbors. We have our own stuff going on. It’s nice to stop at the tavern now and then and catch up. Or maybe I run the tavern. Maybe there’s some regulars, some people stopping by as they pass through.

Setting things up to encourage this sort of thing can even involve less work than the traditional route. If you want people to generally stick around the same areas and keep bumping into each other, for, you know, the whole social aspect of things, you inherently need less sprawling map and monster designs. Just a couple cool cities worth hanging out in and the roads between them.

Just... have different goals to pursue, with different mission chains. They don’t even have to be super unique. If someone wants to get the master beast hunter achievement, killing every monster in the world, they don’t need a lot of writing. If someone wants to just run a cool tavern, all you need are some gather rare ingredients quests, and some kind of simple archetectural/business management bit of gameplay to focus on instead of the crappy combat. Maybe organically encourage interactions like when I order all this rare spiced rum to put on my menu it generates a caravan escort quest for someone else to get it to me.

Also let everyone play dressup right form the start! Don’t force everyone with the same time on the clock to wear the exact same shirt/bikini  top.

[holidaywishes]

It Had To Be You XXVII

Part Twenty Seven: It’s All Coming Back To Me Now

  Summary: After Casino Night, you start to look for a new place to leave so you can give Tyler some space. When he says he doesn’t think it really makes sense, you two start arguing.

  Warning: nothing really, maybe a bit of angst -- we’ll see

  Author’s Note: I’m sorry this took soooo long! I got a little distracted and went on a bit of a Freddie Bender -- honestly, I searched through so many GIFs and watched so many interviews that I think I’ve been dreaming of the Great Dane. Which meant that Segs kinda took a backseat lol. Anyway, I hope this kinda sorta holds you over until whenever the next part comes out -- which I have no idea when that will be

  P.S. I know the ending sucks, it was super rushed and my brain kind of malfunctioned. Plus, the bat signal thing was inspired by the asks I saw pop up on my dash

  P.P.S Right before I posted this, I got a notification that Ty made a story and my heart jumped. What a weird coincidence...

  Song Credit: It’s All Coming Back To Me Now -- Celine Dion

  masterlist

  You went with Tyler to the rink to say goodbye to Devin and it still hadn’t hit you until you saw him without his gear on.

  “You’re actually leaving aren’t you?” you asked as Devin wrapped you in a tight hug

  “Got no choice” he sighed

  “That’s too bad,” you said as you pulled away, “I was actually starting to like you…”

  “Ditto,” he jokingly pushed you and you pouted, “take care of Segs, (Y/N). Don’t let him get out of control.”

  “I’ll do my best” you laughed once more before he gave you a quick kiss to the top of your head and went on his way. You noticed him text someone from his phone and you realized that you may never see him again; he truly was becoming one of your good friends and he was one of the few people you could run to when you needed advice.

  “WHAT THE FUCK?!” Diana texted you

  “Hey, D. What’s up?”

  “Devin’s gone?”

  “He got traded last night”

  “Well what the hell?!”

  “I’m sorry I’m lost…”

  “Did you not know that we’ve been seeing each other?”

  “NO!?! I mean I know you guys hooked up at Ty’s New Year’s Eve party but I didn’t know anything was still happening…”

  “Well, it was. And then I get this vague text from him that just says ‘goodbye,’ I thought he was dying or something!”

  “Did you talk to him anymore about it? Ask him how he’s feeling?”

  “I mean yeah. He’s bummed. He loved playing here and he made friends on the team. But he’s excited to have a new opportunity with Anaheim”

  “Do you think he’s lying? I think he’s lying. But if he’s not then okay. He deserves to be happy. So, what are you gonna do?”

  “I’m not fucking moving to Anaheim!”

  “Okay, first of all, relax. Second, no one said anything about moving to California. You work here. You have a life that you can’t just up and leave. Devin understands that. All I was asking was whether or not you were going to try? With him?”

  “Long distance relationships are tricky. You of all people know that…”

  “My situation was different. Devin is not James. You’re not me.”

  “I know”

  “Do you like him? Do you want to give it a chance?”

  “I do like him. Like a lot. I would love for it to work out but I don’t know if I can be away from my boyfriend for as long as I would have to be away from him…”

  “Can I say something? Without you getting defensive?”

  “You can try…” you scoffed at your phone before you carefully crafted your message.

  “Your relationships have all been very… accommodating. You’ve dated guys who give up everything for you and you don’t have to make any sacrifices and you know what? The guys have all turned out to be complete idiots with no ambition. And now, you’ve got Devin. Who’s super sweet and funny and smart and mature for his age and full of ambition, who’s clearly driven. And you don’t want to give an inch?”

  “What if it ends badly?”

  “Then it ends badly.”

  “Wow…”

  “But at least you can say you tried. If you don’t try, it will both end badly and never start…”

  “UGHHHHH!”

  “Text him. I gotta go.” When she didn’t text you back, you figured she was talking to Devin so you went to watch Tyler practice a little before eventually calling it a day and heading home; calling Tyler to the bench to give him a quick kiss goodbye.

  “Ooooh, look at the love birds!!” Ben cooed and you blushed

  “Alright enough. (Y/N), time for you to go. Seguin, back to work!” Monty snapped and you did as he advised, slightly uncomfortable now at the stares the group was giving you. You waved shyly at Tyler and then gave a slightly more grandiose wave to the rest of the team before heading home, shaking your head to yourself. On your way back to Tyler’s house, you realized that you hadn’t actually started looking at places on your own; once you moved to Dallas, you just kind of moved in with Tyler.

  Yes. The two of you had talked about it and came up with boundaries and stuff but the house was never going to be yours. And it really was never going to feel like yours. And you wanted something in Dallas that belonged to you, so you could feel like you were your own person and not just something that belonged to Tyler. Two hours later, you’d looked at at least 20 Airbnb's, a few hotels and some apartments downtown and were seriously considering two of them, when Tyler popped his head over your shoulder.

  “What are you doing?” he said as he kissed your cheek

  “Looking at places. What parts of the city do you think are the best?” you replied, still searching your screen

  “I thought you were staying here?”

  “Ty, we talked about this. I was going to stay here until I found a place…”

  “We came up with boundaries. I thought that was enough? I thought that was our agreement?”

  “Well, sort of…” you closed your computer and turned to face him, “don’t you think we need some space though? Like this is your place. And that’s great. It’s awesome and I love being able to stay here..”

  “Great. End of conversation!”

  “But Ty, I need something for me. Something that’s mine”

  “Your job isn’t enough?”

  “What?”

  “I want you to stay here with me!” he started to shout and you could see the hurt on his face becoming more apparent, “You’re gonna end up leaving in two months to go back to finish your degree and then what? We go back to only seeing each other when I’m in town? Only talk when you don’t have an assignment? When you’re not working?”

  “Of course not! We’ll still see each other while I’m here and we’d Facetime or Skype or call or text when I go back…” you tried, rubbing his arm to calm him to no avail

  “I just don’t get it,” he got up from where he was sitting, storming into the kitchen with the dogs following at his heels, “why leave? Why don’t you want to be with me here?” The words stabbed you and your eyes began to brim with tears

  “I want to be with you. Here. Everywhere. All the time. I just don’t want us to get tired of each other…” you spoke quietly, getting up and walking to where he was, wrapping your arms around his waist, “I love you, Ty. Don’t doubt that for a second”

  “It’s a little late for that”

  “What?”

  “For me not to doubt it. I love you and I want you to stay and I thought that would make it clear how I feel about you. But you wanting to leave.. how am I supposed to think that you love me if you want to leave me?”

  “Because I don’t want to leave you, Tyler!” he scoffed at you, turning his body, forcing you to walk in front of him, “this is not me saying I need space or we should take a break. This is just me saying I don’t want you to think I’m --” He peeled his eyes from the floor to stare up at you when you stopped talking suddenly, curious about what you’d say next.

  “Think you’re what?”

  “Using you…?” you sighed and brought your hand to your forehead, rubbing it gently, “I’m not that girl, Ty. I don’t want you to think I expect something of you just because we’re dating. Or make you think we’re dating because of all the things you can give me. I’m not… god it sounds so dumb saying it out loud…”

  “You’re not a gold digger?” he laughed and your eyes opened wide at his words, you quickly nodded and he brought you in for a hug, “where is this coming from?”

  “I have no idea…” and you honestly didn’t. In the time you’d been dating Tyler, he’d never taken away your independence. The only thing he’d ever bought you was the dress and the shoes for the Casino Night. Everything else was yours. All the jewelry you owned, your favourite Kate Spade bag, your phone (and it’s accompanying bills) -- all yours. He wasn’t paying for anything. So you had no idea where this argument stirred from.

  “How about this? You honestly feel like you need a place of your own? Fine,” you cocked your eyebrows at him in concern, “but get somewhere close. So I can see you anytime I want.”

  “How close are we talking? Because you know I can’t afford this neighbourhood…” you laughed and you knew what was coming. A quick press of his lips to yours as his hands roamed your body, stopping where your ass met the back of your thighs

  “Then stay here…” he whispered against your neck, “we can do this any time we want. And you won’t have to waste any money. I won’t think you’re a gold digger. I’ll only buy you things if it’s a special occasion. Or if I see something and think of you.” His tongue danced across your skin as you sunk into his body and you got so distracted that you let out a raspy ‘okay’ and felt him smile against your chest where his lips were.

  A month later, you and Tyler had been living together in bliss and it felt almost surreal. You’d celebrated his birthday and yours in town; grabbing a drink at a bar and then he took you out dancing after much protest from you. You were frequenting the games as well when the team had home games and watching every game with some of the girlfriends at home when the boys were on the road. You were surprisingly at ease; living with a boyfriend after James seemed like an impossible idea and knowing Tyler’s reputation, even after you’d been with him for as long as you had, should’ve made you insecure but he always made you feel safe and loved.

  Until you noticed the ‘bat signal...’

  It wasn’t something you had even thought about before. Of course, you saw his stories when he would travel on the road, tagging the cities the team would be in, but you just thought he was counting down to when he got to see his dogs again. It wasn’t until someone forwarded you the Spittin’ Chiclets episode that you had even heard anyone call this his ‘bat signal’ and when you saw it again on his stories, you couldn’t help but think about.

  And now it was all you could think about.

[pipermasters]

Hide and Seek- Phic Phight

Prompt: Start and end the fic with the same sentence, the first time it's positive and happy. The second time it's chilling and foreboding. 

@quishaphantom

Sam couldn’t find Danny, and she’d been looking for hours. He was unfairly good at hide and seek.

Sam couldn’t find Danny, and she’d been looking for hours. He was unfairly good at hide and seek.

“This is impossible,” She huffed to Tucker. “He has to be cheating!”

Tucker snickered. “It’s your fault for choosing to play in the park- I warned you he was good.”

“No one is this good!”

“Danny is,” Tucker smirked, reclining in the shade of a tree.

Sam scowled, hand on her hips. She turned in a circle, scanning the crowded park. Danny wasn’t hiding in the playground- she’d checked twice. He wasn’t by the fountain, the pond, or the amphitheater; She was seriously beginning to wonder if he had snuck into the bounce house that was set up for some kid’s birthday party.

“My offer still stands,” Tucker teased. “I’ll find him for you- you just have to admit he’s the king of hide and seek!”

“You swear he’s not cheating?”

“I swear,” Tucker stretched his arms above his head. “But I also swear that as soon as I show you, you’re gonna feel like an idiot.”

“I’ve looked everywhere!” Sam cried. “Twice! If anything, I’ll be impressed.”

“Nah,” he disagreed. “You’ll feel stupid.”

Grumbling, Sam followed Tucker towards the part of the park populated by trees. She’d already spent too long in there looking for her friend; She’d even climbed the trees to see if he was hiding in the branches.

“He’s not in here, Tuck,” She assured. “I checked.”

“You didn’t check everywhere.” Motioning for her to be quiet, Tucker crept over to a log, an evil grin on his face. He jumped on the log, stomping his feet. A shriek sounded from inside before none other than Danny Fenton was scrambling out.

“Not cool!” He shouted, shoving Tucker playfully.

Sam stared at him. “You were in a log?”

“Yup.” Danny brushed dead leaves out of his hair.

“Told you you’d feel dumb!” Tucker laughed.

“Three hours,” Sam couldn’t believe it. “You sat there for three hours? Didn’t you get bored?”

Danny shrugged. “Not really- I was texting Tucker.”

“Tucker!” She snapped in betrayal.

“To be fair, I had no proof of he was here,” he slung an arm over Danny’s shoulders. “But I had a good idea.”

“Sometimes I think you two share a brain,” Sam crossed her arms, smiling.

“That’s what happens when you’ve been friends for 12 years!”

“12?” Danny verified the math in his head. “My God we’re getting old.”

“You’re in 8th grade,” Sam rolled her eyes. “You aren’t old.”

“In a few months we’ll be in high school,” Tucker pointed out. “Can we consider ourselves old then?”

Sam just laughed as she and the boys left the park to get lunch at the Nasty Burger.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------           Tucker couldn’t find Danny, and he’d been looking for hours. His best friend was still mortified over losing his pants in front of Paulina.

         “Dude, come on,” Tucker called. “It’s not that big a deal!”

         Tucker and Sam had been searching the town since Danny had run out of school, going ghost behind a tree and taking off. Now, Tucker was in Danny’s house, checking every hiding spot he knew of.

         Frustrated, Tucker pulled out his phone, dialing Danny for the thousandth time. He smirked when he heard his ringtone.

         “Rookie mistake, Danny!” Tucker followed the sound to Danny’s room; there was a shuffling in the closet, presumably caused by Danny trying to silence his phone. Tucker threw open the door, sighing when he didn’t see his friend.

         “I know you’re here dude, being invisible won’t work,”

         With a sigh, Danny appeared, sitting on the top shelf in his closet. It had been his designated moping spot in middle school- not that anyone else knew that was where he hid. Tucker had thought Danny had given up on hiding there, but obviously he was wrong.

         Pocketing his cell, Tucker climbed up to join him, squishing himself into the remaining space.

         “I’m amazed we still fit up here,” Tucker said lightheartedly. Danny said nothing.

         “C’mon man, it wasn’t that bad.”

         Danny scoffed. “I beg to differ. I totally blew any chance I had with Paulina.”

         “That’s so not true! We all know you never had a chance,” Tucker chuckled weakly as Danny glared at him with glowing eyes.

         “Not helping.”

         “Sorry.”

         “I hate these powers,” Danny moaned, burying his head in his hands. “They’ve been nothing but a curse!”

         “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

         “Why wouldn’t I?”

         “What about all the awesome stuff you’ve been able to do?” Tucker asked. “Dude, you can fly! Do you know how many people wish they could do that?”

         “It’s not as great as you’d think. If I don’t keep my mouth closed, I get bugs in my teeth.”

         “Okay, gross. But what about your other powers? You can turn invisible!”

         “As if I wasn’t invisible before!” the ghost groaned, hitting his head back on the wall.

         Tucker rolled his eyes. “You’re so dramatic sometimes. You aren’t cursed dude. You were given a gift- just like any other superhero! Think of all the people you’ve helped- people you’ve saved? Do you think they see you as a curse?” Danny said nothing. “Exactly.”

         “I still totally embarrassed myself today. Paulina probably thinks I’m some perverted freak!”

         “Well, actually, before Sam showed up, I think she was impressed!”

         “Really?” Danny’s eyebrows drew together in confusion. “Why?”

         “Dunno,” Tucker shrugged. “But I did see her tell off Mikey for laughing at you. Maybe you didn’t blow it after all.”

         With a smile, Danny reverted back to human. “Thanks Tuck. What would I do without you?”

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

         Jazz couldn’t find Danny, and she’d been looking for hours. He’d come home that day with another failed science test and was trying every way possible to avoid telling their parents. Clutching the test in one hand, she scaled the ladder leading to the roof- since getting his ghost powers Danny had been spending more and more time up there.

         Sure enough, Danny was laying flat on his back, staring vacantly at the clouds.

         “Hey Dan- “

         “Jazz, don’t,” Danny draped his arm over his eyes. “I really don’t need you to lecture me right now.”

         “Lecture you?” Jazz sat next to her little brother, reclining on her hands. “What makes you think I’d lecture you?”

         “You’re my big sister- it’s what you do.”

         Jazz smiled, nudging him gently. “Well it’s not what I’m doing now. I just wanted to talk.”

         “About what?”

         “Mom and dad.”

         Danny removed his arm, looking at his sister suspiciously. “What about them?”

         “Well, maybe it’s time to tell them about… you know…” Jazz glanced around, making sure none of their parents’ equipment was around to hear her. “Your powers.”

         “No!” Danny shot up, eyes wide with panic. “Jazz I can’t!”

         “Why not?” she set a calming hand on her brother’s shoulder.

         “Are you crazy?” Danny snapped. “What do you think they’ll say Jazz? They’re entire life is dedicated to hunting ghosts; Dad can’t go one day without talking about new methods of dissecting things molecule by molecule! And mom,” Danny shuddered. “I don’t even want to imagine what she would think.”

         “They’ll love you no matter what, Danny,” Jazz assured. “They just want what’s best for you.”

         “And you expect them to think that being a ghost is the best thing for me?” Danny scoffed. “They’d never stop trying to ‘fix me’.”

         “You don’t know that!” Jazz argued. “They’re worried about you Danny- being a secret superhero doesn’t leave a lot of room for normal teenage things. You don’t eat or sleep regularly, you’re falling behind on your chores, and your grades are slipping!”

         “I know!” Danny shouted, frustrated. “But what am I supposed to do about it? I can’t be normal and save this town at the same time!”

         “They could help with that too! You already borrow their stuff all the time- imagine if you worked together to create new gear!”

         “No!”

         “You’re being unreasonable! Are you really that scared they’ll hate you?”

         “Yes! No! Kinda!” Danny seemed to deflate, all anger leaving him. “It’s complicated.”

         Jazz paused, feeling her frustration melt away. Her brother looked so tired and lost. She wrapped an arm around his shoulders, pulling him into a soft hug. “Want to tell me why?”

         “Do you remember when the accident first happened?” Danny asked quietly. “When the portal exploded?”

         “Of course I do. Mom and dad were arguing all the time. Mom was so mad that- oh.” She trailed off as realization hit her. “You’re scared of them fighting again, aren’t you?”

         “It’s not like they don’t fight anyways,” Danny muttered. “But mom was so distressed, and she was so worried that there would be side effects, and knowing what I know now about Vlad and how he got his powers… I don’t know how they would handle it.” He groaned, glaring at the test in Jazz’s hands. “Of course, they might understand ghost powers more than another failed test.”

          Jazz glanced at her brother before shredding the test, the pieces blowing away with the wind. “What failed test? As far as I’m aware the teacher misplaced your test after putting in an incorrect grade.”

         Danny looked at her, shocked. “But… Jazz, that’s- “

         “Cheating?” She shrugged. “Given the circumstances I think it’s fair. C’mon, I’ll help you study for your retake.”

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

         Amity Park was in utter chaos. Buildings were in ruin, overturned cars burning in the streets. Civilians ran around in horror as emergency services did their best to calm the crowds. Parents and children cried out for one another, having been separated in the panic. In the midst of it all, Sam, Tucker, and Jazz were anxiously watching the road.

         The ghost attack had come out of nowhere, catching them all by surprise. Danny had been completely overwhelmed, even with support from his friends and sister. The ghost had dealt a particularly devastating blow, sending Danny through the pavement and into the sewers. The three had tried to follow, but police were already on the scene, keeping them away.

         The Fenton’s had appeared on the scene 10 minutes ago; they’d entered the sewer 30 seconds later. For 7 minutes the trio had heard muffed shouts and battle cries as various equipment sounded, smoke rising from the hole in the street.

         A minute later, Jack Fenton emerged, hoisting his wife after him; she proudly brandished a shaking thermos. Happily, they lead the crowd away, Jack making a point to brag in front of everyone who had ever doubted him. Determining there was no danger, the police marked off the area to be fixed as soon as the mayor sent a construction crew. They too left to celebrate with the Fenton’s.

         Tucker, Sam, and Jazz stayed, waiting for Danny to join them.

         At 5 minutes, Jazz got anxious; After 10, Tucker was starting to panic. When Danny still hadn’t appeared 15 minutes later, Sam jumped over the caution tape with a declaration of “Screw this, I’ll find him myself!”

         Sam didn’t find him after 15 minutes.

Tucker was still scouring the wreckage 30 minutes later.

         Jazz hadn’t found him after an hour.

         Twenty minutes later, Tucker had made himself hoarse calling for his best friend

         Twenty minutes later, Sam was searching by the light of her phone.

         Twenty minutes later, Jazz started to cry.

         Jazz couldn’t find her brother- he wasn’t laying on their roof.

         Tucker couldn’t find his best friend- he wasn’t hiding in his closet.

         Sam couldn’t find her hero- he wasn’t under a log in the park.

         He’s the king of hide and seek. He’s just hiding. He’s unfairly good at hide and seek.  

         Sam couldn’t find Danny, and she’d been looking for hours.  

[mtraki]

I’ve debated whether to post this or not, but I saw this subject as an ask for another writer and figured ‘why the heck not?’

It was a slow Wednesday night when the cowboy came in.

She’d never forget it.  She’d take the memory to her grave.  It was so surreal.  That stereotypical scene from all the old westerns spliced into the small, smokey space of the dive bar named The Dandy Bear Saloon: The door opened and in he came, boots thudding, spurs jangling, black hat tipped low over his brow, covering his eyes.  Everyone stopped and turned to stare-- all five of them, herself included.  She swore the old jukebox skipped, Bob Segar’s ‘Beautiful Loser’ (“a perfect lodger--a perfect lodger, a perfect guest”) playing quietly in the corner for the sixth time tonight.  It was Terry’s favorite and she was having a hard time with her mom and husband, again.

Immediately, the cowboy saw them staring, feeling the abrupt change in the air, and could sense the antagonism.  She’s sure only she could see the briefest hesitation in his stride as he continued toward her where she stood behind the bar.

He’d crossed half the distance with his purposeful, swaggering stride before she noticed the guns.  One revolver slung slow on his right hip, the other across the left side of his belly in a cavalry draw, rounds in the belt between them.  A bandolier across his body and over his right shoulder housed old brass shells for the double-barrel slung over his left shoulder.  At the same time, she noticed the smell.  That was the other thing she’d never forget: if seeing him had been surreal, it was smelling him that made the situation all too real.

He’d smelled like horses, and all things associated with horses, leather, and the inside of the men’s locker room at the gym the week the a/c had been out.

Dick and Roger were watching the cowboy warily, giving her looks she figured were asking if they should call the cops or if she had the situation in hand.  There were only five of them.  If this guy was a psycho, rolling in here with loaded guns, he could kill them all without having to reload.

But she didn’t think he was a psycho-- despite the way he looked, despite the way he smelled, there was something very lucid in his steely blue eyes flecked with green when he leaned his elbows on the bar, looking her in the face.

That was the other thing.  He looked her immediately in the face, deliberately ignoring the generous cleavage provided by a good push-up bra and neglected upper buttons of her blouse.

“Hey Tex,” She grinned at him, quelling her rolling stomach.  He stank like he hadn’t bathed in a year.

“Miss.” He returned quietly, his voice cordial, but his expression was controlled.

“You want something to drink?”

The emphatic answer led her to believe that his evening was going perhaps as well as Terry’s, “Yes.”

“Great.  I’m gonna need you to hand over the iron first, though, partner.  Before one of my off-duty cop regulars rolls in and loses his shit…”

“... Loses his what?”

She beckoned, “No, seriously, hand over your guns.  You’re scaring everyone.”

Turning his head, he looked at the four others.  Dick and Roger stared back evenly.  Terry was gathering up her purse and jacket to leave.  Oscar had his back to the rest of them again, smoking the last nub of his cigarette over his beer.  Obviously none of them were armed.  State law allowed licensed concealed carry, and Clark had a pump action shotgun under the bar just in case, but most people in town just didn’t carry.  The cowboy looked back her way and drew the off-hand revolver with his left hand, sliding it across the bar, grip toward her with one hand, drawing the other with his right to do the same.

They sounded like real metal, they looked real, and when she reached for one to tuck it under the bar, she noted the weight.

“Jesus,” She whispered, “it’s real…”

And loaded.

“Sure it’s real.” He answered quietly, unflustered, still looking her in the eye, though his gaze flicked toward the muzzle of the weapon, as if worried she might turn it on him.

Snatching up the other revolver, she ducked and stowed them under the bar, taking his shotgun-- also very real-- when he handed it over.  The weapons all showed signs of use, but nothing very recent, she thought.  She wondered what kind of insane convention he’d come from.  She wondered how he’d made it down the street without getting stopped by every patrol car.

“Great… So I can get those back to you when you leave, I guess… mister…?”

“... Morgan.  Arthur Morgan.”  He’d said it like he’d debated saying something else.

“Mister Morgan… Unless you’ll let me call you ‘Arthur’?”

“... Sure.”

“What can I get you to drink, Arthur?”

“Anythin’...”

“Don’t say that.” She grinned, jerking her thumb to the full shelves behind her.

“... Whiskey, then.”

“... You’re killing me, Arthur.” And she indicated the shelf of whiskeys.

“Christ!” He sputtered, staring at it as if it were some incomprehensible thing.

“Want me to…” But she didn’t finish her question.  He wasn’t looking at her anymore, he was looking over her shoulder, reading the labels.  She watched his lips move ever so slightly as he did so, and the blood ran out of his face.  She couldn’t imagine why.

“... You okay?” “... I dunno, no more…” Was his very soft confession, voice no longer steady, “... Can y’pour me somethin’?  Please…?”

“Sure.  You opening a tab--” She reached back for a bottle at random--Jack Daniel’s No 7-- and was turning around again when he put two large coins on the bar.  She looked at them, then looked him in his pale face and finished, “... What the fuck is this, Arthur?”

“Money…?” He seemed even more genuinely confused than she was, which only made her all the more uneasy, and therefore irritated.

For a moment, she strongly considered throwing him out or calling the cops-- or throwing him out AND calling the cops-- but then she exhaled slowly out her nose and slid the coins over to inspect them.  They were good sized silver coins, one side depicting a seated woman, the other an eagle with the words “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA” across the top and “420 GRAINS. 900 FINE.  TRADE DOLLAR” along the bottom.  The year for one was 1883, the other was 1875.

The smell was real.  The guns were real.  Maybe the money was real too?  And whereas two dollars in coins wasn’t going to cover what she’d been about to pour him, if they were real, they were probably worth a great deal more.

It was a weird night, and she’d been willing to gamble.

She poured him two fingers and slid the glass over, “I’ll open your tab.  Try that, see if you like it at all.  You mind if I send some photos of your coins to a friend of mine?”

“... What for?”

“To check their authenticity.”

“Authen-- you tellin’ me my money ain’t good here?!”

In her most placating-without-backing-down tone she said, “I’m telling you I don’t know.  Try the No. 7.” “... Check the authenticity…” He muttered, picking up the glass, “Will it take long?”

Pulling out her phone and setting the whiskey bottle down, she snapped a photo of the coins on the bar, turned them over and snapped another, then sent the images to Paul from the pawn shop two blocks down, who knew more about collector coins than she did.

“Nope.”

“... Is that a camera?” He wanted to know before shooting the whiskey.  Then he frowned at the glass. “... What kinda…?”

“Sure.” Shrugging she said, “You don’t like Jack?  I got Jim, Jameson, Makers, Crown, Johnnie, Wild Turkey… I could probably find some Seagrams for you somewhere…”

She went through the whole shelf without finding something he liked.  Meanwhile Paul was texting back that if the coins were legit, they were in fact worth good money, and that he knew a guy who could take a look at them for her.  Curious, she poured the cowboy two fingers of moonshine-- against her better judgement, really, and he announced that it tasted like something he was used to.

“I keep pouring you that, Arthur, it’s gonna be a short night for you and a long one for me.” “Ah…” He waved off her concern, but admitted he’d like to try the Jim Bean again.

She recognized he was drunk when he pointed at her arm and said, “... What’s all over yer skin…?”

“You mean my tattoos?”

“‘Tattoos’?” He echoed, as if tasting the shape of the word, trying to find out if he liked it or not, “... So yer a sailor?”

“What?”

“A criminal?”

“Excuse you?”

“Well you ain’t a princess…” And he grinned at her.

It was the nicest thing anybody had ever said to her, really.

“Only sailors, criminals, an’ royals-- or folk tryin’ t’copy royals have tattoos, I hear tell…” He explained.

She leaned on her elbows, running her fingers along the dark, twisting lines of ink on her forearm, “Well, Arthur, you heard wrong.  Lots of people have tattoos.  You probably passed three parlors on the way here.” “... Strange town you got here…” He confessed, brow furrowing as he fiddled with his glass.

“I guess.  Usually it’s pretty boring,” She raised her hand in a wave as Oscar stumbled out into the night, mumbling about his ride.

“Sure.”

The drinks had relaxed him and put some color back in his face, but she couldn’t help but think she was pouring whiskey for a deeply traumatized man, and that she ought to maybe be calling an ambulance or a police car instead.

“Think we better call it a night,” Roger said, climbing to his feet along with Dick.

Standing back upright, she went for the register, “I’ll close out your tab then.”

They shuffled out their payment-- Roger always paid with Visa, Dick always paid cash-- and Roger kept his eye on Arthur who paid him no mind while Dick leaned in toward her, eyes wide and serious.

“You gonna be okay here, Cat?”

She smiled and patted his arm with her other hand while taking his cash.  They were nice men, both of them with kids not too much younger than herself.  While they often came here together to get away from the noise of their respective houses, they still insisted on trying to quietly look after her.  Whether that was for sentimental reasons, or just to preserve the sanctity of their bar, she didn’t dare say for sure.

“What was that li’l thing…?” The cowboy asked her after the old regulars had left, leaving her alone with him at the bar.

“What do you mean?”

“That mean-faced feller gave you a thing… Din’t look like no money…”

“You mean his credit card?”

Waving his hand at her, Arthur pushed his glass forward, “... Credit from a bank?  With a card?  Can you buy drinks wit’ that?”

“Credit from a lending company-- Wait, okay… seriously.” She laughed at herself, “Arthur, what’s your deal?”

“Whad’ya mean?”

“It’s a good act, partner, but it’s gotten a little stale.  I’m about to close up the bar, so you’ll have to mosey on somewhere else for the night…”

“... Weren’t aware I was puttin’ on…” He sighed and shook his head, “...Y’know a place… a… a hotel or someplace?”

“Sure.  Two or three right around here, closer to the freeway.”

“... Freeway?”

“This is what I’m talking about Arthur,” She rolled her eyes, “You know what a freeway is.  Do you have some modern money to close out your tab?  I can take anything except a check…”

Frustration started to crease his brow, “Th’hell you mean ‘modern money’?”

“Money from this century, cowboy.”

His finger jabbed the bar wood with a thud by where she’d left the trade dollar coins, “These is from this century!”

Looking him in the eye, she was aware once again of the lucidity in them.  He was drunk, not crazy.  Or if he was crazy, it was a deep-seated crazy he’d operated all his life with.  He also thoroughly believed in the veracity of his words.

“... Arthur, no hotel is going to accept this money.  I can’t put this money in the register.”

“Why the hell not?!”

“Because it’s over a hundred years old.”

“What the hell is wrong wit’-- What are you playin’ at?!” His fingers scrambled a minute before he picked up one of the coins to try and read the date, squinting at it in the light and his drunkenness, “... Th-this says ‘1883’.  It’s only seven years old!”

“...Okay.” She said simply, blinking at him. “Forget the tab.  I’m closing.”

He watched her at the register as she closed out the log, swiping her own credit card to zero out the balance.  Clark was going to give her hell about it, but it was just easier.

She’d gambled and it was only right she paid for her losses.

Arthur was still watching her as she started to wipe down the counter for the final time of the night, so she looked at him.  “You need to go.”

“... Right.  Sure.  Thank you… for the drinks…” Unsteadily, he pushed away from the counter, turned around… and couldn’t seem to find the door again. “Um…”

“Oh boy… Come on.”

She walked him out, and he went docilely enough.  The Dandy Bear opened out into the alley, and he still seemed lost, so she pointed him toward the main street and stood there to watch and make sure he left.

He made it to the corner, almost swaggered into oncoming traffic, stumbled back and fell on his ass.  Cursing to herself, she hurried over to make sure he wasn’t hurt and to pull him to his feet.  She really should have called the cops earlier…

“Are you hurt?”

Slowly, in ratcheting movements of his neck, the cowboy looked at her, though his haunted blue eyes seemed to look past her.  He looked at the headlights of the next car coming through, at the buildings towering high above, and then finally at her again. “... My Lord…” He murmured gravely, “... This is Hell.  I’m in Hell…”

“Not quite…” She sighed.  “Come on.  Stand up.”

After getting him up, he took hold of both of her arms, his hands careful, as if he couldn’t trust his own strength, “... Get me outta here, miss.”

She knew that sentiment.  She knew that in her bones.  In the depths of whatever soul she might have.

Get me outta here...

That was how he ended up in her apartment, she figured.

It was a weird night.  She couldn’t explain her logic to herself, it just felt like something she needed to do.  It just felt right that she bring this crazy man home and dump him in her bathroom.  Her family always said she had a self-destructive streak.

He stared open-mouthed at the tile and porcelain, doing a bit of a double-take in the mirror on the wall.

“Get yourself washed up.  I’ll get you a towel.” She instructed.

“... What?”

“Please take a goddamn shower so you don’t make my place smell like death warmed over?”

“... Miss I…” He gestured at the room, then at her, “...I dunno what yer… tellin’ me…”

“...Okay.” She replied in an even tone, “Let’s take this slow, then… You need to wash.  So I’m going to let you use my shower.  Over there.” She indicated the shower stall with the curtain pulled aside, “The plumbing is pretty decent in this building, thank God.  So see this?  This turns the water on…”

She demonstrated, and obediently, water started coming out of the shower head.  Arthur stared at it, then asked, “... Somebody pouring…?”

“What?  No.  It’s the plumbing… The pipes in the walls… Is this seriously a conversation-- Nevermind.  No.  Nobody is pouring.  Look, you can control the temperature of the water that comes out.  This way for hot… This way for cold.  To turn it off, you just push it back in like this.”

“... It’s amazin’!”

“... Sure, cowboy.  Think you can handle that?”

“Sure, I guess…”

“Great.  I’ll find you a bar of soap and a washcloth because I don’t have the energy to try and explain shower gel…”

“... ‘Shower ge’--”

“Exactly.  What about shampoo?”

His blank look told her all she needed to know, “... It’s soap for your hair.  Comes in a small bottle.  I’ll bring you some.  Put it in your hand, massage it into your scalp, rinse it out.  You won’t need a lot.”

She paused, “... You do know how to use soap, right?”

He scowled at her, “Of course I know how to use soap, what do you take me for?”

“... At this point, I have no idea…”

He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.  She rubbed her hands together, “... Anyway, I’ll go get that stuff…”