#she feels so goddamn alone with everything she does rescuing people without asking for anything and suffering the consequences | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

erwinsvow · 4 years ago

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𝐭𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐞.

summary: he wasn't always alone. in fact, there was a time when levi had you.

warnings: angst, fluff, mentions/description of injury and patching up, levi needs sleep

author's note: been in the works for a while because i couldn't figure out what i wanted to do, but this takes place after levi & zeke's conversation and there will be an angsty part two, i hope everyone likes it! it doesn't really make much sense but bear with me :)

listening to: don't let me go

“I bet you’re not popular with the ladies. Don’t act like you know about someone’s feelings.”

He pauses, feeling his heart skip a beat.

“I know. And I was… popular enough.”

He lets his mind take him back, back a time before everything in the world was so messed up. When he knew what his responsibilities were, and when there were clear orders to follow. He can’t seem to recall when everything went straight to shit. It feels like it’s been a long time coming.

He knew he was screwed years ago, when he was trying to stitch up the deep gash on his shoulder by himself, sitting in his quarters with a bowl of warm water and bloody bandages. You had been helping the others, a traumatized recruit with a concussion and broken leg, courtesy of the fifteen meter that had overwhelmed him.

There were a few others too, especially a familiar face that seemingly always needed your assistance after a mission. He wondered just how many times the boy—because that’s all he is, a boy, and that’s all you are, a girl—could get away with the same old ruse.

Regardless, he wouldn’t be visiting you tonight. Never mind that the cut he’s trying to nurse by himself is nearly impossible to properly reach, and that he feels dizzy from consistent bleeding and lack of energy in his body. The alcohol he ingested to calm his nerves doesn’t really do anything, either, since there isn’t nearly enough of the stuff in his room to actually have an impact.

He’s going to crash soon, he knows, and even though sleep always evades him, he just wanted to get this wrapped up and lay down without making a bloody mess everywhere. He releases a deep breath he didn’t know he was holding. The very thought of you is enough to tense up every muscle in his body, and the idea of you being alone with that idiotic, improper recruit makes his fist tighten around the needle. Sewing himself up tonight is a lost cause. He finally decides a bandage, no matter how bloody it might become, will have to do.

He stands up, slowly because he doesn’t want to pass out from a head rush, when there’s a knock on the door. He groans a little too loudly at the sound of it. He doesn’t feel like talking to anyone tonight, especially in this condition, wearing a torn scrap of a shirt and blood trapped underneath his nails.

“Who is it?” he calls out harshly, wondering if maybe they’ll just leave if he sounds scary. The other scouts knew he didn’t like to be bothered, and wouldn’t have come unless there was an emergency. If it was Hange she would have barged in already, and he would have recognized Erwin’s heavy footsteps from down the hall. No, he knows who it is. He just wishes that he’s wrong.

“It- It’s me. Petra said you were hurt earlier and that it looked bad. I just wanted to make sure it was okay…” Your soft, hesitant voice trails off, and he knows how much courage it took for you to knock on his door.

What he doesn’t know is that there was no way you were falling asleep tonight without making sure Levi was okay, no matter how angry he would get at you for bothering him at night.

You’re bracing for that reaction when the door opens, but when your wide eyes meet his tired grey ones, you feel yourself melt and all the words in your head disappear. There’s only one fragment of a thought left, the fact that Levi’s bleeding, and a lot, at that. You don’t even wait for his permission to step inside, suddenly energized by anger and mumbling to yourself as you set down your supplies and rummage through them.

“What exactly do you think you’re doing?” he questions quietly. He tries to line his voice with steel like he always does, but the facade is fading with every passing minute.

“I have to clean out your wound, captain, before something festers. If you had told me about this, say, right when we got back, it would have been fine by now, but now I have to rush because you’re too proud to ask for help-” You still and silence yourself.

It was out of line to enter without permission, but this is something else all together. Caring too much is one thing, you know, but insubordination is not tolerated, especially not by Levi.

You pick up a clean needle and thin silk thread that you need to patch up the wound, while searching for the jar of boiled water you need to clean it out first. Alcohol would work too, and you can smell it in the air, but you can’t find the words to ask for it.

Levi’s hands are unusually still, you know because you always notice them, and it’s a stark contrast to the way you’re shaking right now. It’s strange, because you stitched up a handful of others earlier today, and you were completely fine. Even Gunther, who you had always thought was handsome and could make you blush with an off-hand smile, never incited this kind of reaction from you.

You’re silently praying that Levi doesn’t comment on the tremor, but since you’re about to dig a sharp point into his shoulder to tie the skin back together, it would be idiotic if he didn’t say something. You turn to look at him, but it feels like he’s not even there.

His head is hanging down, propped up by the single functional arm, as the other one continues to bleed. You know it’s painful and that he should be saying something, something that makes you stutter and stumble over your words like he always makes you, but he’s just silent.

“Well, get on with it then. If that’s really why you came here this late.” His voice makes you tremble even harder.

There’s so much you try hard at. You try to be the best soldier you can be, even though both you and your superiors know you weren’t meant for this. Sometimes you can fool your fellow soldiers, and the handful of people you can call your friends, and with a few years under your belt, it seems like it’s getting easier to live this life. But you know deep down that it’s not. The one person who always sees right through it is Levi, though.

It’s part of the reason why you’re such a damn mess around him, because there’s no reason to present a false veneer if he knows the truth. You’re not a real soldier, not a real fighter, and you’re more useful as a medic stitching people up than anything else.

And yet, it’s always him who saves you. Him, who makes sure that any threat in between you and the scout you’re trying to rescue from the brink of death is eliminated. Him, that keeps one eye on the target and one eye on your back just in case. And every time, every goddamn time you need to be rescued, he rescues you.

But now, with his head hanging low and any semblance of not knowing why he always saves you gone, it feels your chance to repay him has finally arrived. The shaking stops when you go to sit down near him. Maybe it’s the sudden rush of energy in your body, but you find yourself unbuttoning his shirt to remove whatever remains of the cloth.

His body tenses further, but he doesn’t stop you, and he doesn’t say anything. You’re as gentle and careful as you can be, and once you’re successful, you drop the mangled shirt on the floor. Taking the water, you pour it over the wound as Levi releases a soft hiss at the feeling, for which you’re apologizing before you can even realize the words have left your mouth. He doesn’t say anything, but his shoulder relaxing encourages you to keep going.

You take your time, trying to clean off all the blood you can. You think he’ll protest when you pick up his hands, and wash those too, but he doesn’t. It’s not until you run your own hand over his softly, squeezing the top of it because you don’t have any words to express the thoughts going through your mind, that he finally speaks up.

“Thank you.”

It’s so quiet, you could swear that you had imagined it. He doesn’t look up to meet your eyes like you wish he would, but a smile forces its way onto your face regardless. You focus on the hard part now; stitching up your captain and making sure your work doesn’t leave him with any scars. You focus on your technique, fingers working nimbly and mind focused on this, and for a short time, it doesn’t feel like you’re with your captain, your superior. It just feels like being there with Levi.

All the while, his brain is working overtime to figure out why you’re like this. Why you’re treating him so carefully and gently, when you have no reason to. He doesn’t pick favorites, and even if he did, you wouldn’t be anywhere near that list. You’re not the fastest, you’re not the most lethal, and in fact, he could count on one hand your titan kills and assists. You help people. You save people. But most of the time, you’re just recovering a half-dead soldier so that their body can be buried at home and not forced to remain out there, alone. You’re just there so that parents can have a grave to mourn at, instead of an empty tomb.

He doesn’t treat you better than anyone else, and most of the time assigns you more cleaning duties than the others. You always take it and never complain, something else that he always wonders about. He had come to the conclusion it was because he’s saved your life countless times, and the fact that he isn’t going to let up soon. So you take everything he gives you with a polite smile. And for some goddamn reason, he can’t get that smile out of his head, no matter how hard he tries. You don’t even know how you make him feel; like he’s special and that he deserves these attentions.

A particularly painful turn of the needle makes him flinch, and brings him back to reality. You’re apologizing again, murmuring how you’re almost done, but he doesn’t want you to leave yet. He lets his mind flicker over how you’re always apologizing, and how much he just wants to tell you that you don’t have to, not for anything. Not for having to come and save you, not for stitching him up, not for trying to fix him.

You let out a sharp breath once you finish, getting back up to fetch a dressing, but his hand grabs yours before you can get too far. Levi looks up, grey eyes full of an emotion you can’t exactly pinpoint, one you have never seen before from him.

“Will you stay a little longer?” And just like that, everything in the world seems to fall into place.

“Of course. Let me just wrap it up, first. I’ll stay as long as you want.” You’re surprised at yourself for finding the words so quickly, because your heart has never pounded so fast in your life. You fumble around, trying to find the right thing, hands shaking again, and you can’t seem to get them to stop.

You go back to Levi, wrapping the cloth around his shoulder and securing it around his arm, suddenly hyper aware of the feel of his skin. It’s softer than you had imagined it would be. Both of you sit in the silence for a while, your hand finding a place over his and rubbing soft circles on his knuckles with your thumb.

You want to say something, anything, but there aren’t any words that seem right. His fingers deftly work their way around yours, and you honestly wonder if he can hear your heartbeat or the blood rushing to your cheeks. It’s past midnight now, and you have a feeling dawn will be approaching before long.

“You should really sleep now. It won’t get better until you rest a little.” You’re speaking because his actions gave you a little bit of confidence, but he interprets it wrong almost immediately.

“Of course. You’d like to go now?”

“N-no! No, I just thought that, that you would be tired now. I can go if you want, I-”

“I don’t get much sleep anyways.” He doesn’t even mean to sound so dejected, but it comes out before he can stop himself. He’s spent too, too many nights laying awake, sleep ever-evading him, wondering how it might be to sleep besides you. Would he get some rest? Would he be able to close his eyes and not open them an hour later with a pounding chest? He can’t remember the last time he was able to fall asleep, and stay asleep. You don’t make any movement to get away, and he notices your hand twitch and wonders why.

You have to fight yourself internally to keep your hand down, and not wrap your arms around your captain as you process his words. Your heart feels strangely heavy at the thought of Levi laying awake, all alone, exhausted but unable to succumb to the ease of rest. He’s on guard, all the time, every minute of every day, and half the time he’s expending his energy on saving you.

You’re not confident, like some of the others. You never have been. But in this moment, you feel something rushing into your body and coursing through your veins, something close to confidence but slightly different. The feeling makes you release Levi’s hand and shed your sweater, and crawl into his bed. It’s almost exactly as you expected, and not nearly as soft or warm as your own. But you think about Levi sleeping soundly beside you, him peaceful and content, and it doesn’t matter how comfortable his bed is. You just want him to fall asleep.

He looks at you with a mix of emotions, surprise being mixed in with them. He hadn’t been expecting that, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t appreciate it.

You’re sitting under the covers now, waiting expectedly for something. A part of you fears that this wasn’t what he meant, or wanted, but your racing heart calms down a little at the sight of him coming in to get settled beside you. He releases a sigh when his shoulder hits the mattress, at ease finally, and so exhausted that every muscle in his body is about to give out.

He sleeps on his back, you note, before shifting your gaze to the ceiling quickly. You certainly don’t want him to notice that you’re staring, or that you keep fingering the soft sheets between your fingers to remind yourself this is real and really happening.

“Stop fidgeting.” His voice is quiet, and even, and stills you instantly. You finally lift your head to look at him, letting out a breath at how he looks. Eyes closed, almost peaceful, laying on his back with his hand resting right near you.

You’re not sure if it’s the confidence from earlier, or something new entirely, but you adjust the sheets to cover him more, pulling them and letting them rest on his chest. He doesn’t open his eyes, but you notice the way he jerks a little at the motion.

“Sorry, Levi,” you whisper, trying to remain as quiet as possible. You lay your hand on top of his, intertwining your fingers and letting your own eyes close. You can hear his every breath, the scent of his skin taking over and clouding your mind as every sense slowly focused on one thing; him. “Let’s sleep now.”

#this is probably the first thing i've posted that is in canon and it makes no sense but i really liked writing this #me: i wanna write dark content #also me: writes angst with fluff and calls it a day #levi ackerman #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman imagine #attack on titan #aot #levi x reader #shingeki no kyojin

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fatesdeepdive · 3 years ago

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Entry 50: Oops! All Supports Volume #8

The portal babies are going to be weird. Most of their Supports are going to come from the OAS entries. Add it onto the pile of close to thirty Birthright Supports I didn’t get to. Also, because this is Entry 50 and I hate myself, I’m doing twenty different Supports today instead of ten. God help me. I’m already a few days behind and this won’t help.

Support: Mana/Sophie

C: Kana manages to befriend Sophie's horse Avel, despite Avel normally being horrible.

B: Kana and Sophie see a burning building and Avel happily allows Sophie to ride him so she can save people.

A: Kana and Sophie discuss how Avel is loyal to Sophie, despite his assholeness, and will follow only her into battle.

S: Kana gets friendzoned.

Review: Not bad. Avel being a good horse when the chips are down is great. Also, this is the second time Kana’s been friendzoned. Poor kid.

Support: Corrin/Hinata

C: Corrin finds Hinata training. Corrin is surprised, because they heard Hinata was lazy.

B: Hinata beats Corrin in a duel, so Corrin runs laps to get stronger.

A: Hinata reveals that he trains so hard because he lost a fight to Takumi once and wants to beat him.

S: Hinata does the promise to protect blah blah blah I like you blah blah thing.

Review: Not necessarily awful, but very generic and lacking any spark to make it stand out.

Support: Mitama/Shiro

C: Shiro finds Mitama sleeping outside. He wakes her and she heads to her room so she can take another nap.

B: Shiro explains that falling asleep on a battlefield is dangerous, Mitama explains that she's ensuring she's fully rested for battle.

A: Shiro takes a nap outside. Mitama agrees to stop sleeping outside as much.

S: Shiro asks Mitama to be his girlfriend.

Review: Very shallow. Mitama is somewhat amusing, but other than that this is completely forgettable.

Support: Dwyer/Selkie

C: Dwyer is woken up by Selkie chasing a bird.

B: Selkie gurts herself climbing a tree. Dwyer, not wanting to ignore a not-ugly lady in distress, tends her wounds.

A: Dwyer tries to convince Selkie to stop hurting herself. Selkie drags him off to go frolic.

S: Dwyer decides to tend to Selkie's wounds for the rest of his life. Selkie decides they should get married and claims she planned this from the beginning.

Review: A fun, cute fluff Support.

Support: Azura/Saizo

C: Saizo tells Azura that she doesn't trust her because she's from Nohr.

B: Saizo injures himself protecting Azura. Azura tends to his wounds. Saizo notices a scar on Azura and Azura explains that some noble children beat the shit out of her when she was a kid. Again, who the fuck thought it was a good idea to bully the violent sadistic king's stepdaughter?

A: Saizo apologizes for forcing Azura to relive painful memories. Azura says he only has to say thank you and that she wants him to be her ally.

S: Saizo offers Azura a magic salve that can heal any scar. He doesn't use it because his scar is important and also HE'S A MANY MAN AND NOT A DELICATE LADY. Azura says she loves him despite the sexism.

Review: A very good Support that gives good characterization to both Azura and Saizo.

Support: Felicia/Takumi

C: Felicia runs into Takumi while carrying the laundry. Literally. Takumi grumpily helps her clean it up.

B: Takumi tries to yell at Felicia to be careful, she ignores him and talks about her hometown. Takumi insinuates there's a problem with how Felicia was raised and apologizes when she calls him out.

A: Takumi keeps an eye on Felicia to keep her from messing everything up. Felicia cries. Takumi praises her for being a hard worker.

S: Takumi asks Felicia to tell him about her village, because he likes her and she cares about it.

Review: Not bad, but could have had a bit more lore about Felicia’s village or had Takumi play a more active role.

Support: Kaden/Mozu

C: Kaden has a fatty piece of meat, which he doesn't want to eat because it's unhealthy. Mozu offers to cook the fat off. Kaden offers to split it.

B: Mozu makes a really good soup. She compares Kaden to a little kid for being impatient.

A: Kaden guts a fish, which makes Mozu think he's wise and mature. Sure, why not. Mozu says he's like a brother to her, because this game didn't have enough pseudo-sibling fucking.

S: Mozu says Kaden is everything she wants in a man.

Review: Overall, a fairly mediocre Support lacking a consistent throughline.

Support: Kagero/Setsuna

C: Setsuna is tasked with delivering important messages during a battle and forgets them, so Kagero is ordered to help Setsuna become a better messenger.

B: Kagero gives Setsuna sentences to repeat back to her. Setsuna forgets them immediately because she has the memory of a goldfish.

A: Kagero comes up with a better solution: babysitting Setsuna to make sure she doesn't fuck up.

Review: An overall decent Support. Although it raises one big question: who the hell thought it was a good idea to make Setsuna a messenger? They’re the real idiot in this army.

Support: Azama/Subaki

C: People have begun saying Azama and Subaki are training together. This angers Azama, who hates Subaki for pretending to be perfect. Subaki doesn't mind.

B: Azama goes on a hike and finds Subaki training alone so other people won't see him get tired.

A: Azama explains that the difference between them is that Subaki cares what other people think about him and Azama just doesn't give a shit.

Review: Overall a bit bland. Also how did the training rumors start? Part of me feels like this is an “oh my god they were roommates” scenario.

Support: Hinoka/Jakob

C: Jakob finds Hinoka training and praises her courage and fighting skill. Hinoka says she used to be trained in formal princess behavior, but through all that away to spend more time training. B: Jakob offers to train Hinoka in etiquette again. Hinoka ends up remembering everything anyway. A: Jakob explains that war is more than battle and courtly training is just as important. S: Jakob says he loves Hinoka. Hinoka points out how sudden this is, and Jakob offers to leave and come back later. They get together.

Review: Wow that romance came out of nowhere. They even point it out! Aside from that, this Support is very lackluster. It avoids all conflict by having Hinoka not have anything to learn and leaves Jakob without any development.

Support: Hisame/Kiragi

C: Hisame acts subservient and loyal to Kiragi. Kiragi asks him to treat him like a friend, similar to how Takumi and Hinata act. Hisame rejects this, saying Hinata should treat his betters with respect. Also they mention that Takumi and Hinata bathe together, which is interesting.

B: Kiragi says that they don't have to be master/servant just because their fathers are. Hisame suggests that they play shogi to become friends.

A: The two of them have fun playing shogi. Hisame acknowledges they're friends now.

Review: This one is interesting, analyzing that Hinata doesn’t really act like the retainer of a prince. Kiragi just wanting to be friends with Hisame is nice, and Hisame acting like an actual medieval person is interesting. I do wish this Support, and the game as a whole, had more analysis of class divides, though.

Support: Setsuna/Silas

C: Silas is attacked by an enemy archer. By an enemy archer, I mean Setsuna, who fell into a pit and fired arrows out to get his attention.

B: Setsuna does it again, almost injuring her fellow soldiers. Setsuna blushes while talking to Silas for...some reason.

A: Setsuna falls in a pit and accidentally kills a bunch of enemies while firing arrows.

S: Silas proposes. Halfway through the proposal, Setsuna falls into a pit. Silas rescues her and she immediately does it again.

Review: This is a fun Support. Setsuna being more willing to shoot Silas than ask for help is relatable. Setsuna taking out enemies by accident and wandering off in the middle of a confession is hilarious. Also, between this and the Kagero Support, I’m starting to think Setsuna is a liability.

Support: Midori/Shigure

C: Midori shows Shigure her herb garden. In the middle of it is a pretty flower bub that Midori likes.

B: Shigure helps Midori garden.

A: The flower blooms; Midori says it's a rare flower that is a symbol of happiness.

S: Shigure tells Midori to stay out of battle because he can't bear to see her hurt. When Midori refuses, Shigure instead vows to protect her throughout the war and after.

Review: This one had a surprisingly good S-Rank. I like the idea of Shigure being paranoid about his loved ones getting hurt because he’s already lost his entire village. Unfortunately, other than that, this Support is fairly bland.

Support: Asugi/Dwyer

C: Dwyer somehow manages to beat Asugi in a fight. Asugi challenges him to a rematch and Dwyer leaves to take a nap.

B: Asugi spies on Dwyer all day to find out how he trains. Dwyer does nothing but nap. Dwyer reveals that Jakob beat fighting skills into him as a kid so he doesn't have to train anymore.

A: Asugi challenges Dwyer to a baking contest. Dwyer forfeits before it even begins.

Review: Not bad. Dwyer completely shutting Asugi down out of laziness is fun.

Support: Hinata/Rinkah

C: Rinkah watches Hinata fight. She tells him it's a miracle he isn't dead, considering how sloppy he fights.

B: The two of them spar. Hinata is surprisingly powerful, but Rinkah matches him hit for hit. Rinkah decides to mix Hinata's moves into her one fighting style. A: Hinata and Rinkah fight again, drawing.

S: Hinata asks Runkah to take him to the Flame Tribe...as her husband.

Review: Fairly mediocre. I’ve seen a dozen sparring Supports already and this one lacks anything new.

Support: Jakob/Takumi

C: Takumi asks Jakob to help him train in secret. Jakob says no.

B: Corrin orders Jakob to help Takumi. Takumi snipes arrows off Jakob's head like William Tell.

A: Jakob tells Takumi that his need for others to recognize his skill is immaturity.

Review: Goddamn, Takumi. There are better ways to train than accidentally killing your sister’s retainer! Other than that this is mediocre; Jakob calling out Takumi’s immaturity is nice, but it isn’t built up properly.

Support: Caeldori/Hisame

C: Caeldori and Hisame are tasked with cleaning a shed together because they're the only competent soldiers. Caeldori brings up her respect for her father and Hisame changes the conversation.

B: Hisame explains that he doesn't respect Hinata because Hinata is a moron. Caeldori is disgusted by the idea of not respecting her father.

A: Caeldori apologizes for being forceful. Hisame says that he actually hates Hinata because he's jealous of Hinata's laid-back attitude.

S: Caeldori and Hisame get together because they're smarter than everyone else.

Review: Contrasting their differing views towards their fathers is nice, but the idea that Hisame is jealous of Hinata is ridiculous.

Support: Kiragi/Selkie

C: Kiragi and Selkie race through the woods and notice a group of suspicious men hanging around.

B: Kiragi saves Selkie from the men, who are poachers.

A: Selkie criticizes herself for being too trusting. Kiragi it wasn't her fault and that her kindness is one of her best traits.

S: Kiragi apologizes for allowing Selkie to be captured in the first place and asks Selkie to date him so he can protect her.

Review: Look, follow up to Selkie’s Paralogue! Kiragi being heroic is nice, but Selkie is a bit of a damsel in distress in this one.

Support: Fana/Midori

C: Kana has a sore throat. Midori's medicine doesn't work.

B: Midori tries new medicine. It still doesn't work.

A: Midori realizes Kana needs dragon medicine.

Review: That was a bunch of nothing. I think this is the shortest Support line I’ve read, and damn is it forgettable.

Support: Corrin/Hana

C: Hana is mean to Corrin because Corrin made Sakura sad by being kidnapped. Sakura isn't very smart.

B: Corrin asks about Hana's family, who are also Samurai, and says they apreciate Hana's ambition because they didn't have any when isolated. Hana mentions that her inspiration is her father, a samurai who prerished honorably protecting Sumeragi. Corrin says that dying in and of itself shouldn't be respected. Hana gets mad and storms off.

A: Corrin explains that Hana shouldn't throw her life away because it would make Sakura sad.

S: Corrin says he actually wants Hana to keep living because he has feelings for her. Protect eachother yada yada yada.

Review: I’m torn on this one. It gives backstory for Hana and at least tries to say something meaningful about dying in battle, but the C-Rank has Hana act ridiculous.

#fire emblem #fire emblem fates #fe 14

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ashintheairlikesnow · 5 years ago

Note

I saw you mention that Jake is a lightweight, so here’s me begging that we get some drunk Jake content at some point 🥺😭💞 or at least get to hear what type of drunk he is, it’d make my friggin day

CW: Alcohol use

Tagging @burtlederp, @finder-of-rings, @endless-whump, @whumpfigure, @stxckfxck, @slaintetowhump

Takes place after the Safehouse Raid. Also features a fact about Chris that was mentioned on his intake paperwork but may have slipped your notice at the time!

Addie doesn't drink and she doesn't eat meat, so when Jake wants to chill with something to take the edge off before he has to really buckle down to study - and a giant burger with fries - he has to do that alone.

Well, not alone - he's never alone here, and wouldn't want to be. Antoni is responsible for the burgers and homemade fries, Leila is next door at Naomi's house watching some TV show and laughter drifts out Naomi's window loud enough that Jake can hear it all the way through theirs.

Leila’s probably going to move out soon, and they’ve gotten word of a bonded pair of rescues that might need to move into the space Krista and Leila have left behind. Might not be much longer they have this particular group together.

Well... Antoni and Chris probably won’t go anytime soon. Antoni has shown no interest, and Chris... probably wouldn’t last long.

Nat's out at a group meeting, and Jake chose not to go with. He goes to fewer meetings, now, since the raid. He stays close to home, keeps his head down. Talks to a few people he knows really well, yeah, and meets up with the frat guy on campus for coffee and, like, talking shit out, but mostly Jake is pretty happy to just... stay here. Talk to the rescues, and Nat, and call his mother on the phone so she can disapprove of his life choices.

For now, Jake is eating, Antoni cleaning up from cooking, and Chris... Chris makes drinks.

"Did, um, did it for, for-for for Sir every day," Chris says brightly, as if talking about a trip to the zoo rather than the details of a daily horror. "Gin and, and tonic, cold as it gets without, um, without... being, being ice. Little, little bit of lemon, plus a, a, a a a twist of peel on the, the side. Or limes, he, he, he he he-he... he liked lime with gin a, a lot..."

"I don't like those, thanks, I don't even think we have gin." Jake puts his hands up in the air, smiling. He has a mostly empty Jack and Coke in front of him - second one, actually - and he feels mostly relaxed, a gentle warmth spreading through his shoulders and down his back. Less angry, and he’s angry all the time these days, not that he wasn’t before.

"Not a gin and tonic kind of guy."

Not like he'd drink the same thing as that goddamn asshole smarming up the fucking television anyway. The fucking Governor... Jake can’t even see him any longer, and unfortunately they’re going into an election year and the smug fuck’s all over the TV with his advertisements now. If Jake could just get ahold of that video of Chris... Jesus, he could end the Governor’s career, his whole life.

Maybe if he could find that video, it’d have some kind of identifying... something that could help them figure Chris out, more. His real name, whether or not he has any family... but no, the video had mentioned a legal guardian, and Chris - terrified and looking an inch from tears - had mentioned Aunt Jo, Joanne... Jake can’t figure it out. He’s missing something... something... important.

He hasn't told anyone else yet. Sooner or later, he'll have to. Chris first? Nat? Drive to an empty lot on the old factory district and scream to the fucking sky?

He hasn't decided yet.

He’d rather drink until he’s in a better mood, first.

"Well, well, well well well I trained Mixology, what do we have?" Chris asks, glancing back and forth between Jake taking a bite of his hamburger and Antoni leaning with his back against the counter, watching them with a slight smile in his slightly narrow face.

"You trained in-" Jake stops, his mouth is full, he needs a second. He chews and swallows, leaning on his elbow on the table. "You were trained to make drinks?"

Chris nods, green eyes locked on his, before he gives a little grin and bounces on the balls of his feet. "I, I liked those classes."

Jake and Antoni briefly meet eyes. Antoni shrugs. “Don’t look at me. I only took cooking classes and learned cleaning.”

“Well, maybe next you could make us something fancy you know how to do,” Jake says - the pride in Chris’s eyes, this is something he can do for them, is unmistakable and as uneasy as it makes him, part of him really wants to let Chris show off for once. “D’you know anything with vodka? Antoni keeps some in the freezer he thinks I don’t know about-”

“Don’t you dare,” Antoni says with a one-sided grin, pointing a finger at Jake. His barcode is visible in his T-shirt and jeans, in this one place where his arms can be bare without danger. Normally they’d have had it removed by now, but Antoni keeps refusing, not giving any reason. “I spent my money on good vodka, you don’t drink good vodka with anything but itself, Jasha.”

“Okay, okay. You’re no fun.” Jake pouts, a little, and Chris grins so brightly at the unfamiliar, rare expression of humor that Jake worries his face has to hurt. “I’d share my liquor with you, you know.”

“I don’t want it,” Antoni says primly, even sticking his nose in the air, and Jake laughs, shaking his head a little, picking up a fry and tossing it Chris’s direction. Chris catches it in midair and stuffs it in his mouth like it might disappear if he doesn't. “I don’t want your Jack Daniels swill, thank you very much.”

“My apologies, not all of us have your refined tastes.”

“Apology accepted.”

Jake throws a fry at Antoni this time, and he only ducks to the side, the fry landing harmlessly in the sink.

“You have terrible aim, Jasha.”

“You ducked! I’d’ve hit you right in you forehead if y’didn’t!” Oh, he’s starting to slur his words, pick back up the accent he’d had growing up, before he and his mom moved out here. Probably a sign he should stop drinking anyway - Chris made his Jack and Cokes stronger than he usually drinks them and being 6′3″ and made of muscle after working out since he was a teenager seems like it made him look like he can hold his liquor, but his liver never got that memo.

“Hey, Ant.” Jake clears his throat. “Antoni.”

“Yes?” Antoni grabs the bottle of vodka from the freezer, fogged and cloudy with frost, and slides into a chair, glancing over at Chris and patting the seat next to him, between Antoni and Jake. Chris grins and plops down into it so hard the chair creaks a little at the thump of his weight. He sits with his hands between his legs, palms resting on the wood of the chair, leaning slightly forward. It’s similar to and the opposite of his posture in the Contract Signing video, his eyes wide and bright, smiling slightly instead of crying, bouncing his feet off the ground in a constant blur of motion that allows the rest of him to be, largely, still.

“What do I call you?”

“What?” Antoni blinks, confused, popping the corked top off the vodka bottle and taking a swig straight from it, not even bothering with a glass. He’s a little less refined with every week that passes, a little more casual in the way he holds himself, the way he sits, in the way an odd lilt has begun to seep into his syllables, harsher R’s but drawn-out, softer everything else. Jake wonders if he’s witnessing some kind of grand experiment, some days, in what it means to recover yourself and learn that you are something else entirely, in a way you could never have anticipated, than what you were made to be.

“What do I call you? Y’call Chris, ah, Chrisha-” Jake trips over the diminutive, his tongue struggling against the unfamiliar phrasing, and Antoni grins, taking another drink. Chris’s fingers skip up to the table, begin to sneak their way to the last bits of Jake’s second Jack and Coke. Jake catches him at it and puts on a stern face, shaking his head, picking the glass up and finishing the rest, watered down by melted ice to nearly nothing, by himself. He sets the glass down, the remaining ice clinking against itself. “No, man, you’re not 21 and I’m the closest thing to a responsible adult in this house right now.”

Chris drops his hand back between his legs again, but his smile doesn’t falter. If anything, it grows wider. “Oh, oh, okay, Jake. Maybe next, next time?”

“Turn 21,” Jake says, pretending for the moment that he himself wasn’t sneaking cheap beer behind the bleachers with the other guys back in high school.

Chris is just testing, like always, but in different ways. Always testing to see if they’ll be like Sir in this way or that, learning about himself while he does it. Jake hasn’t let him down yet - and he has to hope he only ever lets Chris down in ways they can recover from.

“... and you call me Jasha,” He continues speaking to Antoni. “So what do I call you?”

“Hm.” Antoni thinks. “Ansha? I don’t know. I think...” His eyes go slightly distant, with the furrow of his thick eyebrows that suggests the pain that always comes with trying to consciously remember what was taken from him. “I think someone called me that once... Are we so close, you think?”

Jake shrugs. “I think so. Do you not?”

“I think we are, yes.” Antoni shrugs right back at him, then reaches out and pours a bit of the vodka over the remaining ice in Jake’s empty glass. “Jasha, what do I do if I don’t want to move out of the house?”

Jake blinks at him, taken aback. “What?”

“I don’t want to leave here. I like you, and I like our Chris, I would not want to leave him.”

Chris bites down on his lower lip - not the practiced little nibble of teeth against sensitive skin he learned to weaponize, but a genuine attempt to hold back the surprised ecstatic smile trying to take him over. “You, you, you you-you-you-you-”

“I wouldn’t,” Antoni says softly. He reaches out to squeeze Chris’s shoulder, once, Chris leaning heavily into the touch. “I would not leave you willingly, Chrisha.”

Jake glances at Chris, bouncing in his seat, his head cocking back and forth in a kind of rhythm, feet tapping on the ground. Eternal whirlwind movement, he’d doing cartwheels on the lawn if they were outside. He won’t sit for long, he’ll be doing handstands in the living room or twisting himself in pretzels, getting out the energy that races through his muscles in any way he can.

“I wouldn’t, either,” Jake says, thinking. He picks up the vodka Antoni poured for him and takes a sip - the vodka is weirdly smooth, runs down his throat with only the barest hint of fire. “Oh, this shit’s dangerous, isn’t it?”

“It is if you are you,” Antoni says, giving him a wicked little smile. “And not me.”

“Ha. Jackass.” Jake grins, to take the sting out, and catches the moment of worry fading from Chris’s face to be replaced with the smile he’s been wearing all along. “There's something I’ve thought about...”

“What?” Chris asks, cheerfully.

Jake looks at him, considering. Then he just shrugs on more time. “Nothin’. I’ll tell you later when I can talk about it without rambling all over the place. I’m too drunk for good conversation right now.”

“I, I, I liked this, this conversation,” Chris says, a little shyly. Jake bumps his foot against Chris’s under the table, and watches Chris toss his head with a smile, hair over his eyes falling to the side.

“Yeah,” Jake says, taking another drink of the vodka, watching Antoni drink straight from the bottle and Chris sip the glass of Sprite and grenadine. Chris has only had a few sips, but the more he drinks, the bouncier he gets. “Yeah, I’m likin’ it, too. Like family dinner, except y’guys already ate and everyone but Chris is drinking.”

He holds up his glass, and Antoni clinks his entire bottle of vodka against it, and Chris clinks his Shirley Temple, and the three of them laugh.

“To family dinner,” Antoni says cheerfully. “May it always include vodka.”

Jake blinks, hearing the soft dip of the v into a different sound, almost a w. Vwahd-ka.

“To family dinner,” Jake says brightly, tossing another fry to Chris.

“To, to, to, to to to family,” Chris says, soft and nervous, as if he expects them to correct him, demand he take it back.

“That one is better,” Antoni says, pitching his voice low, too. “To family, Chrisha.”

Jake has an idea, but it might not be as safe for Chris as their situation is now.

He’s got one more year of school, and then he’ll have the education he needs plus three years of shelter life under his belt, and maybe... maybe he can ask Nat to help him pull off the one big dream Jake’s allowing himself to have. Let her use that fucking blood money she keeps in a bank account growing in bits and pieces each year since she left WRU to do something that’ll piss those fucking human traffickers off royally.

Maybe... maybe he can take Chris with him, and Antoni, too.

“To family,” Jake says, louder than the other two, holds up his glass, and downs the rest of the vodka in one long drink.

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stars-are-just-ghosts · 3 years ago

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A World Full of Bullies, and the Four Kids Who Never Stop Fighting Them

This is a story about my four children and the small town they live in, a story about bullies and the people who stand up to them. Let me start by introducing the four of them. We’ll refer to them as the Sibling Mafia (this will be important later.) Each of them is as unique as the different parts of a harmony. They grew up closer than close. Best friends, siblings, confidants. They have their moments of disagreement, sibling rivalry, chaos. But there doesn’t go a day without them seeking out one another’s opinions and comfort. Theirs is a bond that can’t be replicated, or completely understood. The 17 year old, we’ll call her ‘Red,’ is the only girl in the bunch. She’s an artistic bisexual disaster (her words, not mine,) she’s riddled with equal parts anxiety and hope, and she holds her own like you wouldn’t believe (she’s surrounded by guys in her work, and out does them at every turn.) She’s five-foot-zero inches of kickass and love. And there isn’t a single person who can hold her back when she wants something. She’s had a rough several years, found herself beaten down to her most fractured level. But she fought back with every ounce of strength available to her and clawed her way back to the surface. She’s thriving. She’s scared. She’s dreaming of her future. (Her brothers have so often looked up to her, I think Red often feels like she’s surrounded by puppy dogs who would willingly battle-rush the world if it ever failed her.) The 18 year old boy, we’ll call him ‘Blue,’ has high functioning autism and social communications disorder. The world is full of lines he’s steadily trying to figure out how to cross without changing the flow he relies on. From working in the adult world, to trying to hold on to the childhood he isn’t quite ready to let go of, Blue still manages to find the space and time to be the big brother he’s always been. It’s the most important thing to him. More important than his love for just about anything else. That has always been his choice. There isn’t a single one of his siblings that he doesn’t love ferociously. And though his emotions are sometimes tumultuous, he always finds a way to make what he really feels known to those closest to him.

The 14 year old, we’ll call him ‘Purple,’ is a trans (female to male), bisexual, magnetic ray of absolute fricken sunshine. It’s impossible not to want to know more about him, to laugh with him, to share in his infectious well of joy. There isn’t a mean bone in his body, not a single inch of hatred in his DNA. From the moment he was born, he had a smile on his face. The world was his to make happy. And even though these last few years have been one hell of a confusing ride for him, he’s never stopped looking at the world around him like it’s something he wants to change for the better. The almost-11 year old, we’ll call him ‘Green,’ is a pint sized sarcastic ball of genius who doesn’t see just how important he is to the people around him. His comedy is endless, a shield to protect himself and others from the nastier things life tries to throw. He’s smarter than the average 11 year old, but refuses to jump ahead a grade or two because he ‘just wants to enjoy school.’ And though he likes to pretend that he can handle everything that comes his way, there are times when it’s easy to see how young he truly is. It’s those moments that his siblings are his anchor to an uncertain universe, the chains that keep his gravity from failing him. And they are the epitome of his best friends, his comfort, his home. Red, Blue, Purple and Green have a lot in common. From Red and Purple loving art and music, to Green and Blue loving video games, to all four loving DnD night. They love to adventure together, to share inside jokes, to create beautiful mayhem on a daily basis. They love to learn together, to forget to do their chores together, to ask the world to ‘listen, dammit’ -together. They also have trauma in common. Losses of those they loved, pains they’ve all had to feel, things a parent can’t protect them from... And there is so goddamn much I wish I could have protected them from. When Blue was in middle school, there was a boy, we’ll call him ‘Misunderstood.’ To him, Blue’s autism made him a prime target in the bullying arena. Like some other kids, Misunderstood would say mean things, call Blue names, make him momentarily feel like he would never fit into the world he so desperately wanted to be a part of. But what Misunderstood didn’t know was that Blue had a better world around him already, one that would come to save him when it counted most. One day in gym class, Blue was playing basketball with his friends. He tossed the basketball, and it didn’t quite go where Blue was expecting. It sailed at Misunderstood and hit him in the head. It didn’t matter to Misunderstood that it was an accident. All that mattered was this could be a perfect excuse for retaliation. He closed the distance on Blue and punched him in the head. He knocked him out. But in that same moment, Blue’s friends and sister ran to the rescue. They rallied around him, chased Misunderstood away. Protected their friend and brother, because they knew that was exactly what Blue would have done for them. Because Blue is the sort of person to give a stranger the shirt off his back if they really needed it. Something of which Misunderstood couldn’t see. Imagine my terror when I got a phone call from the police. It was a sobering sight to see police cars and an ambulance when I squealed into the school parking lot. There is no way to explain the feelings of helplessness and fury I was inundated with. You know, logically, that your children will break bones and get stitches and have broken hearts and nightmares and a myriad of other pains that are simply a part of life. And you also know, unfortunately, that bullies exist. You never think that anything like this can happen, until it does, however. That’s not naivete. It’s not denial. It’s the hope that the world might not just be as awful as you think it is. Knowing that world proved that hope wrong, even for a moment, makes you want to wrap your children up in your arms and never let go. But that’s not how life works. There isn’t an excuse for what Misunderstood did. But there are things to understand. I can raise my children to be good, caring, kind people. But I have no say in what happens in other children’s lives. Was Misunderstood being cared for? Did he have parents who gave a shit about him? Or was he neglected? Was he lacking the resources to explain and feel his emotions properly? Was his life hell, and he just needed someone to see? I asked myself those things, trying to understand. I even asked the other adults in charge of the situation. But because Misunderstood was a minor, I had no legal right to know. It turned out, in the end, that Misunderstood was expelled. His parents moved him to a different school district. And Blue was left with the question he always seemed to ask when another child chose him to target: ‘Why me, Mom?’

There is no why. Because, like I said, nothing excuses what happened. What I wanted him to focus on was what happened inside the event. And what happened was loyalty, love, friendship and the coming together of individuals to stand up to a bully. Now, at 18 years old and nearly six feet, Blue still has those friends. And he has the lesson they taught him, not the one that Misunderstood wanted to teach. And he doesn’t ask ‘Why me, Mom?’ anymore. He asks, ‘Why not me?’ as he now steps in when someone needs protection. Most recently, Purple, my 14 year old, has had to face bullying of his own. Purple didn’t come out till a year and a half ago, and the daily progress to being the person he wants to be has been beautiful and brilliant. But there is another boy, who we’ll call ‘Unwarranted,’ who has pulled out all the stops to make Purple feel panic, anxiety, terror. Back when covid was nearly past its first upsweep and all the schools were still closed down, Purple was desperately missing his friends. It was agreed, after a fair deal of hashing out the precautions, that he could see one of his best friends at the park. Purple hadn’t come out yet at that point, still struggling with what it would mean for all the relationships in his life. But the idea of seeing someone who he literally grew up with after being so long apart was too good for him to pass up. They met at the local park, a couple of other friends catching up with them there, and they hung out. It was supposed to be an innocent, happy time for a kid who only ever tried to make people happy. It ended in police involvement and kids being physically hurt. Unwarranted had shown up with two much older kids. But the part he played was entirely his choice as all three terrorized the younger kids, with words and with physical threats that ended with large rocks being thrown. One child was hit in the head. My child was hit in the side. Both of them ended up hurt. All while they were running to Purple’s friend’s house for safety. Unfortunately, there was so little we could do. It didn’t happen on school grounds, so the schools couldn’t be involved. The police couldn’t tell me much more other than they knew who the three bullies were, having been in trouble with the police before. And I couldn’t know anything else because they were minors. To protect my child, I couldn’t let him go to the park alone anymore. I drove him everywhere. I tried to help him forget. And over time, he did. Until the beginning of this school year. Purple started his Freshman year looking for new beginnings. He’d already firmly cemented himself in coming out, was totally authentic in who he is and who he wants to be. His friends are still his friends, completely accepting and loving him. And he tackled his first week of school with intensity and excitement. In the back of my mind, however, I had never forgotten what happened at the park. The mother in me held on to it, because I couldn’t take the risk that something worse could happen. I hadn’t been able to protect or avoid what happened to Blue. But maybe I could protect Purple. I got in contact with the new principal at the high school, explaining the situation and that I did not want Purple to be in any classes with Unwarranted. He vehemently agreed. Purple doesn’t have a single class with him. It’s worked out well. Or it did, until they passed each other in the hall. In that brief moment, when classes were changing and kids were hurrying through the halls, Unwarranted took it upon himself to pick right up where he left off. Except now, Unwarranted isn’t the same size as Purple. He’s over six feet, athletic, and knows how intimidated Purple already was by him. The result was Purple incoherent with fear. There’s a reason I have referred to all four kids together as the Sibling Mafia. Because if you hurt one of them, you hurt all of them. And there’s hell to pay. Red and Blue, who are both Seniors at the high school, heard about the incident almost immediately. (It’s a small town, so small school, and word travels fast.) They didn’t go to their next classes. They took Purple to the office instead, and demanded something be done. They wanted answers and a resolution, and they wanted it fast. I received a phone call about it all from the guidance counselor who was just gushing over the bond they all shared, and the way they’d rallied around Purple. But it wasn’t just Red and Blue who rallied. It was their friends. You see, if you’re friends with one of them, you’re friends with all of them. And in a place like this, it grows exponentially. So many people love Purple, and Red, and Blue, and Green. And it shows. The principal and counselor and school resource officer worked on a plan to keep Purple and Unwarranted from ever crossing paths. It was good. It was a start. Unfortunately, it did nothing for when the kids were walking home from school. Because Unwarranted decided to make prodding and inappropriate comments while walking behind him. Only, this time Blue and his best friend, we’ll call him ‘Orange,’ and two of Purple’s friends were there to do something about it. Because Unwarranted had a lot to say when he knew Purple was too scared to retaliate. (Red was with a friend, but was furious when she found out.) But being faced with the reality of a whole group who were more than capable of protecting Purple made him back right off. No fists were thrown. No one got hurt. And everyone made it home safely.

And Purple came to me, despite his fear and wariness, to ask... ‘What if something is wrong with Unwarranted? What if something happened at home to make him act this way? Maybe we can help...’ My response was to breathe. To stare at this kid of mine, because the compassion in those words made my heart hurt. Here was this boy who was obviously being terrorized by someone else, and all he could think about was making sure that bully was okay? I told Purple, ‘You have no idea how amazing your heart is.’ I told him, ‘I don’t know what might be going on with Unwarranted. And it’s wonderful of you to want to help. But you also have the right to be safe, whether you’re in school or walking on the streets. You have the right to have a happy learning experience without fear of being cornered in the hallways. For now, as much as I know you want to figure it all out, my priority is making sure that you are safe.’ He nodded, hugged me, and went about his day.

I read somewhere once that bullies are predators. They will go after what appears to them to be the weakest prey. Trying to stop a bully by teaching a child to stand up to them is like teaching the weakest gazelle to be stronger. The predator will not stop going after the weakest prey, it will only stop going after that target. But what if that target was never weak to begin with? Purple may not have the physical attributes of a football player or a wrestler. But he’s got something even better. He’s a wolf with a pack who would be lesser without his knowledge and love. And there’s nothing that pack wouldn’t do to protect him, just like there’s nothing he wouldn’t do to make their lives better. The Sibling Mafia extends beyond blood, it seems. Now you might be wondering, where’s the almost-11 year old Green in all this? Green came into the first three’s lives when Purple was a little under three years old. At that point, they were already bonded and closer than I could have ever imagined. But the second Green’s little wiggly self came home, the change was immediate and overwhelming. Not in a bad way, not even remotely. You see, that bond transformed. It grew, it solidified, it settled into a whole new identity. It somehow made them far more whole than any of us realized they could be. Because all three older kids had lessons to teach and love to give, and with Green they could do all that together. Without any encouragement from me, because kids don’t need to be raising other kids, Green grew up being the literal center of their world. And they all loved each other more because of it. Green is just a little guy. He’s small and skinny and scrappy, full of wit and genius that often leaves the rest of us wondering where he got it from. He looks at his siblings like he wants to give them the universe. And he goes through life like he might just give it a reason to wise up to the possibility of goodness if it tries hard enough. Nothing holds him down for long. Events, losses, physical injury. He bounces back so fast that the rest of us get whiplash.

But what happens when an event causes loss and physical injury at the same time?

Just this past week, the kids were walking home from school. Red has Senior release, which allows her to get out of school early most days. So it was just Blue, Purple and Green, walking with their friend Orange. In the past, there have been bullies. Two of which I have mentioned. But some never made it to the ‘something we really have to worry about’ stage. One of these bullies, particular to Blue, decided it was time to graduate to that stage in a very dangerous way. We’ll call him, ‘Mistake.’ Because what he chose to do was a big mistake on his part. The kids had made it to just before the opening of our neighborhood. They were on the sidewalk. They’d been carefree, joking, laughing, talking, when a vehicle suddenly sped its way toward them on the road. The vehicle had a passenger and a driver: Mistake. And as Mistake accelerated, one of them threw a full bottle of Powerade out the window as hard as he could. We’re fairly certain he was aiming for Blue.

It hit Green instead. At that speed, with that much force, something as innocuous as a bottle of liquid can do real damage. It was only sheer luck that it hit Green in the leg. If it had hit him in the head, we’d all be sitting in a hospital room right now keeping vigil. That being said, Green is small. He’s skinny. The impact to his leg was enough to damage the muscles in his thigh. You can see the impact point, a literal imprint of the bottle on his skin. The bruising is very clear. The recovery will be slow. The first thing Green did was cling to Purple. Orange and Blue yelled after the car, but it had sped quickly away. The boys managed to get Green home right away. I had been working at my computer. And the next thing I knew, Green is in my arms, incoherent and in pain, crying so hard his whole body was shaking. Calling the police was an easy decision. Trying to hide my instant and unbridled rage was so much harder. The police are treating this as assault on a minor. The bottle was collected as evidence. Green was evaluated by physicians and will thankfully make a full physical recovery. But the emotional damage seems to be much worse. Green is not himself. He’s clingy, he’s worried, he’s having nightmares. He doesn’t want to walk home anymore, even knowing his brothers and Orange are there to protect him. His birthday is barely a week away, and he is trying so hard to be enthusiastic about it. But the bruise and pain in his leg keep offering reminders. The idea of leaving school grounds without one of his siblings or me makes him panic. And the light of innocence in his eyes is that much duller.

It was a senseless, useless act. One that’s rattled us all.

Blue and Purple are blaming themselves, as though they should have been able to see it coming and protect Green. Red is angry that she didn’t just wait to walk with them, as though her being there would have stopped it altogether. Their grandparents, friends, teachers, counselors, and even random people I have never heard of are all up in arms. They want someone to pay. I think Green just wants to pretend it never happened at all.

To be honest, I want Mistake to pay, too. Because it doesn’t matter who he was aiming at, this was clearly assault. Clearly intended to do harm. And I’m tired of feeling like I can’t protect my children. When did the world become so cruel? When did parents stop teaching their children that kindness is not a weakness? When will I ever feel okay with sending my children out into such an unforgiving world? I know I’m angry. In fact, I’m enraged. But... I also still have hope. Green’s birthday is steadily approaching. The kids are doing everything they can think of to make him smile again, make him laugh, prove he’s loved and, most of all, safe. They’re using their hard earned money to get him gifts, to surprise him with a puppy they’re buying themselves, to give him his normalcy back. And I’m watching them hold on to each other through it all. Like they always have. Like, I hope, that they always will. The future is coming at them quickly. Red, Blue and Orange want to get an apartment together after high school. Purple and Green have decided they want to live together forever. And they’ve all decided that they have to make time, once a week or more, to be back under one roof. We live in a small town, but they’re going to move on outside of it. Because the world outside of it is big, and they are well aware of that fact. They want to tackle it in their own way, individually and together. They want to see where this life takes them, no matter what tries to stop them. And they want to share that journey with each other, and with anyone who wants to be a part of it. I never could have predicted how close those four amazing kids would become, or how much they’ve already changed the world just by being who they are. They’re my hope, you see. In a world where anyone can be cruel, they choose to be kind. They choose to be the example by which everyone around them learns what kindness is. Misunderstood, Unwarranted, and Mistake are learning about kindness, too. Whether they realize it or not. Because in their misunderstood existence, in their unwarranted actions, in their irreversible mistakes, the kindness of the Sibling Mafia seems to be far more powerful. This is a story about a world full of bullies and the four kids who never stop fighting them. One act of love, kindness, and hope at a time...

#bullying #hope #together #siblings #the world isn't as bad as it seems #parenting #children #kindness #this is worth the read #i promise

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lassluna · 4 years ago

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Swan’s Hourglass (4/?)

Emma Swan had a mission. Find a place to start New Hyrule, her kingdom apparently. It was her mission as Princess or Savior or whatever. It’s going terribly if she’s honest. No one ever gave her Princess or Savior lessons growing up. She really has no idea how to be a Savior. She doesn’t even really want to in the first place.

But when the Demon Ship kidnaps her son and she gets stranded on a strange island with only an old woman and peppy fairy for help, Emma will have to do what she has to do to rescue her son, even if that means putting a certain self-proclaimed pirate captain in his place.

Ao3 FFN

AN: Thanks so much for the support! This story would not be what it is without the lovely @spartanguard beta reading, @eastwesthomeisbest for providing that glorious cover art( Have you seen it? No? Go check it out!!!) As well as @cssns for giving me a reason to finally start posting this creation.

Chapter 3: Isle of Ember

The goddamn mountain is on fire.

Because of course it is. They couldn’t go to a regular island. The whole island had to be a giant death trap. It was the only island with a seer that could help her.

She wondered if someone just made this stuff up to annoy her.

“Come on, Swan, where’s your sense of adventure?” Hook calls, seeing her disgruntled expression. “I’ve been looking for the Isle of Ember forever.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “Some pirate; this was literally like a few miles away from Mercury,” she responded.

“You do recall that map is an ancient treasure and the whole glowing thing it did, right?” Hook responds. “This place was concealed.”

She sighs. Of course it was. Emma didn’t understand why she was even here, she should be out looking for that ship. It had found them so easily, why couldn’t they just…Emma didn’t know. All she knew was that the longer she spent away from her son, the worse she felt.

“Sooner we meet this psychic, the better,.” she says simply, looking away from the pirate.

“Of course, Swan.”

“You know it’s Emma, right?” she says, leaning into the railing of the ship.

“I have been informed. Swan just seems more fitting,” he replies, leaning against the rail. ”But what about this child the old bat mentioned before departing?” he asks.

“My son,” she replies. He has a right to know, and perhaps knowing what Emma stands to lose will remind him of how far she’s willing to go. “We were sailing on The Darling , a ship under Captain Wendy Darling and her brothers, when the Demon Ship appeared. My son, Henry went over to it. He thought he could take it; he thought we were right behind him. I heard him scream and tried to go and get him, but I fell overboard, that’s how I survived. It’s also how I ended up on Mercury Island,” she explains.

He nods knowingly. “We’ll find him, Swan,” he says. “We’ll find your boy.”

The seer’s house is surprisingly easy to find, especially with it being the only house on the island. It is small and wooden, which Emma finds to be a completely awful design choice, considering it sits at the foot of a not so dormant volcano which, according to Hook, occasionally spews out balls of molten lava.

However, when they get to the door, they find it in fragments, wood chunks everywhere, the small living room ruined with jagged claw marks and blood. It’s quite a lot of blood.

“Scorch marks,” Hook points out as he makes his way inside, “It looks like this seer fought back and managed to vanquish some of these creatures,” he observes.

“And the blood looks fresh,” Tink adds, although she looks like she’s trying not to look directly at it.

Emma just nods. “Then we should see if she’s still alive.” The claw marks seem to lead downstairs. “And I guess the basement’s a good place to start.” Because of course it’s the basement. It’s always the basement.

They hear something as Emma, leading the group, steps onto the basement floor. It’s a shriek and Emma only has seconds to move before a red monster jumps at her face. She swings her sword wildly, hitting the monster away from her. She curses as she sees it in the darkness, stunned but not quite done yet.

It’s bigger than the ones she fought on Mercury. And it’s not alone. She readies for it to jump again when Hook joins her in the basement, his own sword at the ready.

“You know, you swing that thing like a club,” he comments. “Perhaps some lessons are in order.”

Emma rolls her eyes. “Seriously?” she asks. “This is not the time for this, and I can sword fight fine,” she insists. He smirks at her.

“Darling, you wouldn’t survive two minutes in an actual sword fight. Would you like to see how a sword is actually supposed to be used?” he asks. She glares at him but says nothing as he steps towards the creatures. They eye him suspiciously, yellow eyes glaring at the sword.

They shriek before they jump, all at once towards him. Emma readies her sword to try to help him, but she has a gut feeling he doesn’t need her. He strikes the first one and ducks out of the way of the other two, letting them hit something with a crash. He turns, not even watching as the injured one bursts into ash, before giving the next two killing blows before they even recover.

Emma has to admit that he knows how to use that weapon; perhaps he was right about those lessons… He turns back around, putting away the blade.

“I could have done that,” she mutters, looking away from his smug face.

“But not as dashingly as me, love,” he snickers, looking around. “But are we sure there was a seer here? Perhaps she wasn’t home when the monsters broke in?”

She looks around and agrees; it just looks like a bunch of junk in here. She walks around the place, hoping for some kind of clue.

“Is it safe?” she hears Tink timidly call from the staircase. “I found a torch,” she adds.

“All good, love,” Hook calls. Tink glares at him as she emerges, the torch in her hand lighting up the room.

“How many times do I have to tell you? I’m not your love! Can you please stop with the pet names?”

One of the walls looks different from the rest, Emma realizes. It’s not as smooth, and it’s hollow.

“You really suck out the fun out of everything don’t you, lass?” Hook notes. “A few pleasantries among friends isn’t going to kill you.”

Emma feels along the wall looking for something, anything that can prove to her what she’s suspecting, that it’s not a wall at all. She tries knocking on it, and after a moment, she hears something.

“First of all, I have a name; it’s Tink. Secondly, we are not friends. We are two people with a common goal: help Emma rescue her son. Thirdly, pleasantries with you might actually kill me,” Tink says fuming at the pirate.

“Will you both shut up?” Emma snaps. They do. She knocks again. She can hear it better this time (without the needless talking.)

It sounds like help. “Hey can you hear me?” she says louder.

“Can I—“ Hook starts, but Emma shushes him.

“The monsters are gone; if you can hear me, know that it’s safe to open this door,” she says.

“ Is Kayto there? ” the voice says, muffled by the door but clear enough.

“No, just me and my companions,” she insists. “But we mean you no harm I promise,” she says gently.

“Kayto is the only one who can open the door,” the voice replies. “Please, you have to find my friend.”

She looks at Hook and Tink; she knows they’re thinking the same thing she is. The blood in the room—it was probably Kayto’s.

Emma considers telling this person that her friend is most likely dead and that there’s a good chance they’re going to have to blow the door down to free her, but Emma doesn’t have the heart to tell her that.

She doesn’t have it in her to leave someone behind, leave them to die. Or worse.

“Emma…” Hook says. He’s ready to tell her all the things she already knows.

“Ok. We’ll go find your friend.” Emma insists, giving Hook a look. “Will you be ok in there for a little while?” She asks.

“Yes, thank you. Thank you so much,” the voice replies.

Hook waits until they’re outside to comment. She’s thankful for that.

“You are aware he’s most likely dead, right?” Hook asks.

Emma doesn’t respond. She just trudges out of that place, looking around for some direction as to where to go. She needs to hurry if there’s any hope for this guy. She notices a blood stain and follows it.

“Swan, this isn’t going to end well,” he continues. She doesn’t need to hear it, she doesn’t want to. She doesn’t have it in her to hear how she should just leave this guy behind. “He’s lost too much blood. You and I both know that.”

She does, but Emma doesn’t care. She has to try. She just has to.

Hook grabs her arm and Emma snaps.

“Then go if you don’t want to look!” she nearly yells at him. He recoils sharply. “Go if you just want to leave this guy behind, see what I care; but I’m going to go look for him, I’m going to go find out for sure one way or another, so stay out of my way.” She doesn’t wait to respond, just turning back towards the path. A single goal in mind.

She hears Hook following along behind her. He doesn’t say a word.

Good. She thinks. She doesn’t need his smug attitude anyway.

The trail leads along the perimeter of the island. Monsters block her path but she makes quick work of them, mentally preparing for more snark and comments about how she fights. She doesn’t care if she wasn’t trained right; it’s working.

He still doesn’t say a word. Emma can feel his eyes boring into her, but she refuses to look at him. She doesn’t want him to say more things about how this guy was dead, more about how she’d fail, again.

She was a Savior who couldn’t save a goddamn thing.

“Hello?”

Emma jolts, feeling something on the back of her neck. She turns around quickly, nearly hitting Hook with her blade. He curses as he barely dodges.

“I know you’re mad, but you do still need me to sail the Jolly,” he says with a hint of a joke.

“Sorry, I thought…” she says, avoiding his gaze. She turns back around.

“You thought what, Swan?” he asks. It sounds crazy. It was this damn island, and a whole bag of issues playing tricks on her. “Come on, Swan—talk to me,” he insists.

She doesn’t want to. She doesn’t want to hear any more negativity.

“Doesn’t matter,” she mumbles. They keep walking. He takes up a position beside her.

“Something that didn’t matter almost made you take off my other hand,” he notes casually.

“I said I was sorry,” Emma snaps back.

“Can someone help me?” It happens again, a feeling in the back of her neck. She looks around, for something, anything to explain this…feeling.

“Swan? It’s happening again, isn’t it?” Hook insists, his arm grabbing hers. She tries to pull out of his grip, but he holds firm.

“Tell me what’s happening,” he says seriously. “I can’t help you if I’m left in the dark.”

She pulls away violently. “I don’t need your help!” she snaps angrily.

Hook’s eyes darken. “Bloody hell, I’m not him alright?” he nearly shouts, his body rigid. “I’m not whoever it was that left you, so stop thinking every word out of my mouth is me trying to leave you, or this Kayto, or this quest. I’m trying to help and your own stubbornness is what’s getting in the way.”

Emma blinks. “How—“ Hook rolls his eyes, taking a step closer to her, getting in her space and staying there.

“You have the look in your eyes of someone used to being abandoned. I saw it the moment we met, but your outburst earlier showed me how deep it ran. Tell me—they said they loved you and then they ran? They left you in some peril; said they thought you were dead, aye?” he asks.

It strikes a nerve deep in her core, leaving her rattled. She can’t find the words.

“Don’t think everyone is going to be the same. Don’t think I’m going to be the same,” he says sternly, gaze morphing into a smirk. “Trust me, love—you’ve never met a man like me before.” He adds a scandalous wink, making her cheeks turn red.

“Can anyone help me?” It’s louder this time.

“I keep hearing something,” she admits reluctantly, her shoulders sag. “A voice and it makes my whole body tense up, like something dangerous is near,”

He looks at her calculatingly, eyes tracing over her face. “Well…what’s it saying?” he asks. She’s surprised by his response.

“It's…asking for help.” She wonders if he believes her, or wonders if he’s just humoring her.

“Well…have you tried answering it?” Hook replies with a bit of a head tilt. “Offer it our assistance?”

Emma blinks in surprise. “You’re not serious.” Hook shrugs.

“Perhaps it can help us find our friend?” he suggests. “Can’t hurt.”

She turns around, trying to remember around where she heard it last. “Hey? Anyone here?” she calls.

Emma doesn’t expect an answer; she honestly believes she’s crazy, or sleep deprived, or both.

“Hello?” the voice calls again, almost as if on cue.

“Hey!” she shouts. “I’m here; do you need help?” she asks, looking around for anything out of the ordinary. She doesn’t see anything.

“Be friendly, Swan,” Hook encourages with a wink. Emma rolls her eyes.

“ Can you hear me?” it asks. She sees something flickering in front of her.

“Yes, I can.” It’s a blue flame of some sort. She looks at Hook; it’s obvious that he can’t see it.

“ Oh that’s fantastic; I don’t know what happened to me!” it says, pure relief in its voice. The blue flame seems to morph as he speaks

“What do you remember?”

“ I remember cleaning My Lady’s home, sweeping, and the door burst open. My Lady was downstairs organizing her supplies. I called out to her, and told her monsters were attacking; usually they aren’t so strong, they fear My Mistress. They don’t bother us out of fear of her wrath, but these...these monsters attacked. My Lady got into the safe room, but I had to stay outside to close the door and—“

The ghost trails off, as the blue shape forms a person, short and small in stature, dark hair and eyes but a kind face. He seems worried.

Emma comes to the conclusion quite quickly that she’s speaking to Kayto’s ghost; they were already too late.

“ I don’t know what happened to her. Please—you have to find her and make sure she’s alright!” he insists.

Emma smiles sadly; she doesn’t know what to say, what to do.

“Are they saying something to you, Swan?” Hook asks. Emma nods.

“Your lady is fine.” Emma tells the ghost. “She sent us looking for you. We can’t open the door; she said you were the only one who could.” He looks relieved. “She wanted us to help save you from the monsters,” she adds. “She’s very worried.”

He nods. “ Of course. The password is her name. Tell her to speak it without fear and the door will open.” She nods in understanding. She wonders if the ghost knows he’s dead, knows how to move on and not stay stuck here.

“I’m sorry we were too late,” she says. He shakes his head, looking peaceful. His form flickers, his voice getting quieter.

“ Don’t be. Will you tell her not to think sadly of me? Will you tell her I was not in pain? Tell her to have hope, the change we are waiting for has arrived.”

Emma furrows her brows in confusion. “The change?” she asks.

He doesn’t respond to her question, she can barely see him.

“ Tell her I’m at peace knowing that she is safe and that soon, she will not be alone…” The voice fades as the figure does, but Emma feels…she doesn’t know. She feels something was missing. She feels like he isn’t gone.

“Everything ok?” Hook asks. Emma shakes her head; it’s probably nothing but while it looked to her like this guy was finding peace, she felt nothing. Emma doesn’t understand what’s happening, but she feels like peace should feel different from fading into nothing.

It feels wrong.

“It’s nothing,” she says. “Nothing that matters anyway. Come on; I know how to free our seer friend.”

When they return to the house, Tink is sitting on the floor, chatting happily with the seer. Tink is surprised to see them. “Where’s Kayto?” she asks immediately. Emma glares at her silently as she wanted to free the seer before breaking the news. You should have someone besides you when you learn your loved one was gone.

However, the seer surprises her.

“ He’s dead, isn’t he?” she asks. Emma sighs.

“Yes, but I know how to open the door,” she says hopefully. “And I have a message from him,” she adds. Emma tells her what to do and she can hear the seer chuckle.

“ Kayto was always silly like that, making the passwords my name, or my eye color or my favorite flower,” she laughs. “ Lily!” she says sternly and without wavering. Without hesitation, Emma hears the gears shift and the door between them drop to the ground.

“Welcome to the other side,” Tink says, holding out her hand for the Seer, Lily, to grab. She takes it and Emma can see the woman’s face is filled with tears, despite having a smile on her face. Tink pulls her into a firm hug. “I’m so sorry about your friend,” she says.

“Me too.”

It takes some time to clean up as Tink takes Lily to her bedroom to rest.

“Something bothered you, before,” Hook notes as he picks up pieces of the broken furniture as Emma mops. “When you were speaking to the dead.”

Emma shrugs, wishing he’d drop it.

“Sorry I wasn’t perky,” she says dryly.

“Does that often happen? The dead telling you their last wishes?”

“Not that I recall.” He doesn’t respond after that, seemingly getting the hint that Emma didn’t want to talk about it.

They have the room mostly clean by the time Lily and Tink return from upstairs. She gets a good look at her now. Lily was dressed in dark purple silks, tanned skin with darker brown hair. She was smiling, but Emma could see the grief radiating off the woman.

“You came to seek my assistance,” Lily says simply.

She feels nervous all of a sudden, unsure if they’d made the right decision to come here.

“I um…are you sure you’re up for this?” Emma asks.

“You brought me Kayto’s last wishes; assisting you is the same as honoring my friend,” she confirms. “Tell me your—“ but Lily is cut off by the earth beneath their feet shaking.

“Bloody hell!”

Bloody hell is right. Emma nearly loses her balance due to being forced to hug the wall to keep herself standing. Tink falls back on her butt, while Hook’s hook makes a scraping sound in the wall as he tries to avoid falling.

The shaking stops almost as abruptly as it begins.

“Sorry about your wall, lass…” Hook says sheepishly. Emma glances at the jagged marks in the wall. “I have something to patch it up onboard,” he offers.

Lily smiles kindly in his direction. “Thank you, Captain. It’s been a while since the island shook like that; it’s not a good sign,” she admits. “But that is none of your concern.”

Hook quietly makes his way out of the room.

“Tell me your desire,” Lily says, pointing at a chair, now upturned besides the crystal ball on her table. “And I can take a glimpse into your destiny.”

Emma does as she asks; she’s not one to put much thought into ‘destiny’ and fate. She’s been screwed over by such thoughts before. But she’s willing to give it a try if it means finding Henry.

“I need to find the Demon Ship. There’s supposed to be something on this island that the Demon Ship wants. I need to know where it is,” she states.

“Many have come for this island’s treasure; none have found it.”

“Failing isn’t an option for me.”

Lily takes her hands, and places them on the crystal. “Close your eyes.” Emma expected it to be cold, but it felt like ice, sending a shiver down her whole body., She closes her eyes, trying to relax to let Lily work her magic.

“Mom?” Emma’s eyes snap open. She knows that voice.

“Henry?” she exclaims, seeing her boy in front of her. He looks the same—same clothes, hair rumpled and dirty, but same bright and hopeful eyes. “Oh, Henry,” she says pulling him into her arms. He hugs her close, burying his face into her chest. “Are you alright?”

He nods, “I’m fine, but I want to go home. Please come take me home,” he says, tears appearing in his eyes.

“I will,” she swears. “I’m coming to find you. I promise nothing is going to stop me.”

He nods. There’s a loud creaking sound, making Henry jolt to look away from her, in the direction she can’t see.

“Henry?” Her kid starts to fade from view, becoming translucent.

“Mom?” Henry says turning back towards her, looking panicked. “Mom!”

“I’ll find you, Henry!” But it’s too late, her eyes blink open and she sucks in a large breath, pulling away from the crystal and Lily. Her whole body is trembling.

“What did you do? Where did you take me?” Emma demands, her whole body is trembling and there are tears streaking down her face.

“It’s you,” Lily says in amazement. “You’re the Savior.” Her eyes widen with delight. Emma’s widen in horror. “I thought it was...You’re here to save the island, and defeat the evil.” Emma shakes her head.

Not this again…

“ The Island needs you; you’re the only one who can do it,” she says, standing to embrace her, but Emma avoids her touch. Why this? Why this again? “The realm needs you, Emma. You can save this island; you can save us all from this evil.” She shakes her head.

No. No. No.

“Are you sure?” Tink asks. “That she’s this Savior? What does that even mean?”

Lily turns to her. “The Savior was prophesied by my mother before I was born, to defeat a great evil, to restore balance. Now she is here, exactly when she is most needed. The Isle of Ember won’t last much longer.”

“Then it's a good thing she’s here,” Tink says with a nod. “I’ve learned not to doubt Emma. What does she have to do?”

“Why, climb Mt. Ember of course. Deep in the mountain lies a shrine to the Fairy of Power, but it’s been corrupted by evil—the same evil that has your child, Emma.”

They both look at her expectantly, like handing her responsibility for a whole island was a gift and not the burden it truly was.

“I don’t want to save anyone!” she exclaims loudly now. “I can’t do this. This savior you’re looking for its-its not me,” she insists. “I just want to save my kid. I just want Henry back,” she says in a smaller voice. “I don’t want to defeat some grand evil. I just want to go home!”

Lily and Tink look at her in surprise, or maybe it’s disappointment. Emma isn’t sure, so she doesn’t stick around to find out. She turns around and bolts for the door. She nearly trips as the ground shakes from another eruption, but Emma doesn’t care. She wants to run so that’s what she does. She just runs.

But with no destination, she happens to run right into Hook, quite literally as her body collides with his as he’s leaving the docks. Emma almost topples over, but Hook steadies her.

“Whoa, lass—what’s wrong?” he asks. Concern is written on his face, which is just great. Because if the pirate is showing concern for her then she must really be a wreck. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. She was supposed to find a home for her and Henry, not let him get kidnapped. What kind of a mother is she?

What kind of Savior is she?

“A bloody great mother, Swan,” Hook insists. Emma hadn’t even realized she had said any of that out loud. “What’s this about?” he asks; his hand is still on her arm, holding her steady, keeping her rooted to the spot.

“They want me to go there,” she says in a too small voice, pointing to the mountain. “They want me to defeat whatever evil thing has taken over. They want me to save this whole place and I-I just can’t. I’m not a hero, I’m not the one for the job. I barely know how to hold a sword,” she admits. Her knees tremble at the thought of going in there.

He doesn’t respond at first, but he doesn’t let her go.

“Does going in there help you save Henry?” he asks. It catches her off guard.

“I don’t know. She said the same evil that has Henry is in there, but he’s not here, he’s…lost.” She knows in her soul that he’s not here; the vision—it felt darker, colder. He was scared; he wanted his mother.

Hook nods. “But going in there lets you weaken that evil, right? Help you find your boy?” She nods. Emma hadn’t thought of it that way; all she heard was another mission, another thing she’s expected to do because she’s the only one who could and she just…she shut down.

But if it’s for Henry…

“When it comes to your son, Swan—well, I’ve yet to see you fail.”

She turns to look at him, watch his eyes, his expression. He’s telling the truth—he believes in her and that feels…odd. A strange warmth settles in her chest.

“Do you really mean that?” she asks in a soft voice, frightened of ruining this feeling.

“I don’t say things I don’t mean.” He says like it was nothing. Maybe it was. Maybe for people not raised how she was, being believed in was normal. “You’re bloody brilliant.”

Emma feels something in that moment; something precious and new. She felt like she could do anything if he kept looking at her like that.

“Besides,” he says, “How can you fail when accompanied by yours truly?”

“You're coming with me?”

“What else do I bloody have to do? Trust me, Swan,—I wouldn’t miss this for the world. Besides, perhaps you’d accept a sword lesson or two on the way?”

#Swan's Hourglass #Captain Swan #cssns 2020 #Legend of Zelda AU #CS fanfics

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mor-beck-more-problems · 4 years ago

Text

Friendship Fail || Morgan & Luce

TIMING: Current

LOCATION: Downtown

PARTIES: @divineluce & @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Morgan isn’t leveled up enough to access Luce’s backstory.

“I’m heading out for the night. See you tomorrow, Ulf.” Luce said as she locked up her workspace and headed out the backdoor of Ink Inc. Her wrist was killing her from the extra hours she’d put in today, but whatever. The bills were piling up and she needed to get a handle on them before she was drowning in debt. That was the bitch of life in White Crest, wasn’t it? Knowing that there were forces beyond your control, that there were people trying to murder and torture and control other people at every turn, that ghosts were out here possessing people, that love potions were fucking people up and on top of it all? She had goddamn hospital bills to pay.

“Fuck.” She muttered, rubbing the back of her neck as she stepped out of Ink Inc and began to head towards Soul. This had been her routine for the past few weeks-- extra hours and long days at Ink Inc followed by drinks at Soul followed by crashing for whatever sleep she could snag. Wash, rinse, repeat. Throw in some sleepless nights, a cat trying to smother her in her sleep, and researching how to get ghosts to fuck off… it made for a great time. Luce caught a glimpse of herself in the windows of one of the storefronts and winced. She looked like shit. “Christ.” She sighed. As she continued down the sidewalk, she noticed a small familiar figure walking across the other side-- Fuck.

Morgan was desperate to get back into the swing of things. Deirdre was back to being herself, the semester was underway, and even if the fairy rings wouldn’t be gone for two more months, the broken pieces of her life were starting to hold together. Enough so that Morgan even delighted in late night runs downtown for forgotten goods. Normal, manageable levels of chaos. That is, until she saw Luce coming out of Ink Inc, looking more sour-faced than she had even at Bea’s birthday party.

“Luce...?” She called. “Hey!” She waved her down and jogged quickly across the street to catch up to her. “How’s it going?” She asked. “Are you doing okay?”

Luce did her best to try and hurry away without looking like she was outright running away, but fuck. For fuck’s sake. After the conversation she’d had with Morgan online, she didn’t want to deal with the woman at all. She didn’t want her pity, didn’t want her weird invasive questions, didn’t want to have to deal with any of that. She was doing just fine on her own, no matter what other people thought. She was fine. Or at least, she would be with a drink in her hand. “I was.” She growled, her tone testy as she continued down the street. The bar was only a few blocks further, but fuck, it had never felt so far away. Casting a withering look at the woman, Luce made an offhand gesture to try and get the woman to just fucking… go, “Leave me alone, Morgan.”

Morgan slowed down. She didn’t know what Luce was running from or what was weighing on her so bad, but she could feel the ugliness of it rolling off her. “Sorry I happen to give a shit and be concerned,” she said, stopping short as the witch rebuffed her. “What is your deal? Why are you--” Like this, she wanted to say. She stopped herself frowning, and asked instead, “Did I...do something piss you off that I’m not aware of?”

“Yeah, sure did.” Luce replied brusquely, though the words were a lie. Morgan hadn’t done anything, not really. She was just being her weird… fucking good vibes, hippy bullshit self. And yeah, Luce knew that wasn’t all there was to the former witch. She knew some of the baggage the woman carried with her, remembered that jarring lack of sensation, had felt the pain of existing as a soul stuck in the husk of a body that had once been hers. But, Morgan was determined. And, worse, Morgan knew Remmy. Cared about Remmy. Wanted nothing but the best for Remmy. And for some fucked up reason, thought that Luce could be that for them. “I just got done with a 6 hour session and was trying to go the bar. Instead of that, you’re here, bothering me. Do I really need more of a reason to get annoyed with that?” She replied.

It only took Morgan a few seconds to consider this. “Yes. Yes, I do,” she said. “Because all of this--” She gestured vaguely at Luce, “Is a little disproportionate to everything we have going on here. And I get it, if you’re looking for an outlet and need an easy target, you’ve had the shittiest time and none of it’s fair, but a head’s up might be nice. Or, you know, cut a dead girl a break and pick someone else or, I don’t know, actually say what it is that’s actually got you so upset!” She held her arms out, gesturing to all the nothing that Luce acting like an angry time bomb was helping. “This might be wild, but there are people here for you. I’m here for you, Luce. Or I would be if you let me.”

If she let people be there for her. Luce let out a derisive snort and shook her head. That was what had gotten her into this mess, wasn’t it? She’d tried to help Bea, tried to protect Nell, tried to rescue Remmy, tried to save Nadia, had done so much to be there for people that she’d forgotten why she’d cut herself off from her family in the first place. It never made things better. Doing things, helping people, it only made things worse. It dug a deeper hole, one where people thought that asking about your feelings would suddenly make everything better. “I don’t want your help. Go help Remmy. Or, better yet, stay in your own lane and worry about your own shit.” Luce growled, all venom.

“Then what do you want, Luce?” Morgan asked, softer now. “And I don’t mean your angry teenager nonsense, I mean, really. What is it that you want? Because the last time we talked, it seemed like it wasn’t all that hard to get. You just have to ask for it and believe that you’re worth more than whatever your mom or whoever else told you. You...you can just say, Luce. The world’s not gonna fall down or turn its back on you or mock you or whatever else you think is gonna happen. And, you know, even if it did, then fuck the world! Try again anyway! We have one pathetic life here, so why not?” She held her gaze, exasperated in all her sympathy. She’d tried this whole routine a few times before and it always fell apart. She wasn’t the kind of person who could commit to giving up or walking away unless someone made her. But she didn’t think that made much of a difference. Shutting your life away when you were hurt only made you lose more than you already had, and Morgan didn’t want that for Luce.

“I want you to leave me alone, Morgan.” Luce insisted as she continued down the street. She didn’t like hearing this, didn’t like being forced in a situation where she couldn’t just delete her words, or go offline. Having Morgan here, talking to her, yelling at her in her face? It was too fucking real and she didn’t want that. At the mention of her mother, though, Luce’s blood froze and she whirled around, anger in her eyes. “Don’t talk about my mother.” She warned the woman. She didn’t want to fucking think about her mom. What she’d done, to her, to her sisters. What the entire fucking coven had done to them. The night she’d been cast out-- yes, she’d been prepared for it, had known that the consequences for what they’d done were coming. But, it still felt like she’d lost a limb, like she’d lost a piece of herself. The coven had mattered to her. Beyond Ink Inc., it one of the few places that she felt as though she was contributing to something that mattered. And now she didn’t even have that. “What I want doesn’t fucking matter-- there’s shit that needs to get done.”

“I’m sorry,” Morgan sighed. It looked like she had guessed right about at least one of the things bothering Luce, but of course it was a sore spot. She held up her hands in a half-hearted truce. She wouldn’t go there; not explicitly, anyway. “But what you want does matter. Of course it matters. You matter, Luce. You matter as much as anyone.” She risked a tentative step forward. “And whatever you need to get done--” And stars, she had no idea what that Luce needed to get done. She’d never done half the things the Vural girls had done, had no idea how to move forward from the kinds of losses and twisted paybacks they’d faced. She’d never had enough family or love to need to. But she’d been tired before, and desperate, and angry. She had woken up mornings to see nothing but the endless, screwed up grind against odds she couldn’t beat and people who didn’t care. For all she knew those times were only a fraction of what Luce had to deal with; how could she not feel for her? “You don’t have to be alone. And I don’t believe you really want to be. People want to be here, they want to listen. I want to listen, because you’re my friend and I care about you. But if you won’t talk to me, at least...pick someone? Trust someone. You’re worth it, okay?”

Irritation and anger burning hotly in her veins, Luce glared at the woman, crossing her arms and holding her ground as Morgan took a step towards her. “Cut the fucking “you’re valid” special snowflake bullshit.” She growled. Morgan was patronizing her and she didn’t fucking need it. Or want it. “You think I don’t want to be alone? Well, joke’s on you because that’s exactly what I want. I want to be alone, in my cabin, away from all of this shit.” She said before moving forward, attempting to brush past the other woman. But, as she pushed forward, her shoulder collided with Morgan’s unyielding, solid arm. “Christ!” Luce swore, shaking her already sore arm out. Fucking zombies. “Fuck off. You’re not my fucking friend. Go find someone else to play bleeding heart with.”

“First of all, if you really wanted to be alone, you wouldn’t have so many friends to lose in the first place,” Morgan said, putting out a hand for Luce to keep her distance, lest she hurt herself or rip off the last of Morgan’s patience. “Second of all: you can be as pissed as you like for as many shitty reasons as you like, but you do not get to look me in the face and tell me I’m full of shit. You don’t know my whole story either, Luce, and you do not get to decide that I’m playing some game or lying to you just because what I’m saying makes you uncomfortable. Just because I don’t cope with my suffering like you do, doesn’t mean I’m not for real.” Morgan didn’t raise her voice. She had a fist around her temper and was determined to keep it steady. But Luce had finally succeeded in making her angry and Morgan couldn’t swallow it down. “And I am your friend. Maybe you’re not mine, I can live with that, but you’re not going to re-narrate my feelings for me to fit your forever-alone scheme. Because you’re not. You’re just not. What on the mother’s earth is so awful or scary about that?”

“I don’t have friends-- I’ve just got,” Luce paused, not sure how to explain her situation. Her sisters, they were blood, they were family. That much made sense in her mind. But, Remmy, Nadia, Ulf, Ariana, hell, even Erin? They weren’t friends. “Obligations.” She muttered. Yeah. Obligations was the best way she could put it. They were all people who didn’t deserve the hand they’d been dealt and she had a way to try and make things right. But, had she even done that? The situation with Remmy was weirder than ever, Nadia was still… not Nadia, Ulf had been distant, Ariana had still lost her sister, and she’d burned all her bridges with Erin. Because that’s what she did. She burned her bridges while she was still on them. Christ. “Fine, you’re for real with this. Whatever. Doesn’t mean I have to listen to you.” Rubbing her shoulder, Luce glared at the woman. “It’s not scary, I just don’t fucking want people.”

“If that’s really so true,” Morgan said, as evenly as she could, “Then why do you bother with people in the first place? Why is there even anyone to push away, Luce? If you really didn’t give a shit about anyone, I don’t see why you’d give anyone the time of day, especially Remmy. So, what is it? Why do you think you shouldn’t get to have people? What’s the worst you think is going to happen? Because whatever it is… Stars, Luce, you’re not a bad person.” Morgan deflated, shaking her head at Luce. “You get to have people, no matter how bad things get. Why is that so hard to believe?”

Because she was fucking stupid, that’s why. She’d left the comfortable isolation of work and her home and somehow, she’d managed to get wrapped up in all of this bullshit of people and obligations and other people’s fucking feelings. Luce swallowed and shook her head. “Fuck off. I know I’m not a bad person, but I’m not a fucking good one either. And I don’t--” She clamped her mouth shut and shook her head. “Fuck off with this shit. Get out of my way, Morgan.” She said, knowing that there was no real way she could get the woman out of her path. The zombie had undead strength on her side and Luce couldn’t do much about that.

“You don’t have to be good to deserve people who care about you, Luce,” Morgan said, as if it were obvious. “No one does. There’s no good enough coupon that unlocks the magic friend-having door or the ‘no bad things happening to you anymore’ door. You just...you already do.” She shouldn’t have been surprised at this.She had struggled to explain it to Remmy and Deirdre enough times before. But Luce… she had so much love around her just waiting to be taken, a whole cosmic abundance, Morgan couldn’t get her head around why on earth she’d turn her back on it so stubbornly.

“What the fuck do I have to say to get you off my goddamn back?” Luce growled, her irritation and a strange, creeping sense of… fear? Was that fear that she felt? Christ. Why was she afraid? Because Morgan was here? Because she was asking these questions that Luce didn’t even ask herself? “You know what comes with “friends” and people who want “relationships” from you?” She said, making aggressive air quotes with her hands. “A whole lot of bullshit that involves this. People trying to get into my head, trying to figure out why I do what I do, trying to make me open up. And I don’t fucking want that. I don’t want people to fucking--” Luce paused and shook her head again. “I spent five years perfectly happy and away from everyone else. And that’s what I’m going to do once all this shit with Nadia and Erin and Remmy is taken care of.”

Morgan couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “Well, yeah,” she said simply. “Of course that’s what it leads to. That’s what relationships are all about. That’s just how it is being a person. But it’s not a bad thing for someone to know you. I mean, what’s the point if no one ever does?” She tried to find Luce’s gaze, some signal of what fear she was clinging so desperately to. “What are you afraid of happening if someone actually understands something about you? Those people you mentioned aren’t going to run or turn you away. There’s no reason why you would be anything less than accepted, Luce. There just isn’t, okay…? Tell me you at least know that, huh?”

Luce glared at the woman, lips pressed tightly together. It’s not a bad thing for people to know her? Oh fuck off with that. If people knew her, if people understood what was going on in her head, what she thought, how she felt, how fucking… confused and scared and absolutely out of her depth she was, they’d know exactly why she pushed them away. If people saw the full measure of who she was, they’d know exactly how inadequate she was. And that was the scariest part: someone knowing her, knowing her completely? If they left, that worked just fine for her. But, if they didn’t? That’s what fucked her up the most. “I’m not afraid of what they’d do. And if they left, hell, that’d be even better.” She retorted. “I don’t give a shit if people accept me.” Because they wouldn’t. They couldn’t.

It took Morgan a few moments to figure out what Luce was really saying. It was so antithetical to everything she’d spent her life craving and against every desire she’d stupidly nurtured headlong into disaster. Luce wasn’t afraid of rejection, she was afraid of...acceptance? Was that so foreign to her that she wouldn’t know what to do with it? Morgan’s face fell as she considered this. “Luce…” She breathed her name gently. “It’s not a bad thing if they do. The world won’t collapse if you’re loved for who you are. It’s okay. You can let them. And if it really doesn’t matter that much to you--” She shrugged, knowing that for whatever reason, it did, it had to, “Why not? What the hell, right?”

The way Morgan said her name pissed her off, like she’d figured something out. Luce’s eyes narrowed. “Get the fuck out of my way, right now.” She said, her hands growing hot with barely restrained flames. Her hands closed into fists at her sides, smothering the blue flames that had begun to lap at the skin of her palms. Not here, but not to Morgan either. As much as the other woman was pissing her off, she couldn’t just light her problems on fire. She’d learned that the hard way. “You think you can bait me into telling you shit? Not happening. Not fucking happening.” She snarled. Morgan didn’t get to know her. No one did.

Morgan could tell that she wasn’t getting through to Luce. Maybe she was the wrong person to be saying this to her. Maybe Luce was so scared, she really did conduct her life to make sure that no one got close enough to convince her. Something wasn’t adding up, but maybe Morgan didn’t have enough variables to make it work. “I’m not baiting you, Luce,” she said. “I don’t know who lied to you for so long that you think everyone who gives a shit about you is running a con, or lying, or doesn’t understand what they’re in for, but that’s just...not how it is. Stars, Luce, you should at least know me enough to figure that part out.”

“Get out of my face.” Luce repeated. She didn’t want to hear about whatever the fuck Morgan was trying to say. “I don’t care how you see the world or what you think I should do. I do what I want. And right now, I want you to leave me alone, I want to get a drink, and I want to pretend like I don’t have to deal with all the fucking bullshit in this town.” She said shaking her head. Because she did. She had to fix shit before she could get back to her cabin, go back to trying to figure out how to harness the strange magic that brewed within her, and go back to being alone. That was all she wanted.

Morgan watched Luce walk away. Her name rose up from her stomach, burned the roof of her mouth, itching to be called out. But if Luce couldn’t understand her five seconds ago, she wouldn’t understand her now. Morgan would have to give her the night to herself before she could even try talking again. She let her go, deflating and turning back toward her car. Sooner or later someone had to get through to Luce. They had to. Right?

#friendship fail #wr luce #wr chatzy #wr luce chatzy #wickedswriting

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lovecomedy · 5 years ago

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Fanfic recommendations nobody asked for

Those are my favorite wincest fic ever, just because. They are all complete. I’ll add the summaries together with my own two cents.

Consider the Hairpin Turn by cherie_morte. 27K Words

AU of 6x22: Sam's wall has shattered and the memories in his mind have splintered. When the Sam who remembers Hell tells him to go find Jess and be happy, Sam knows he can't stay while Dean needs him. But when the Sam from Hell says that Dean is already there looking for him, Sam leaves his memories of the pit behind to find him.

What he finds is a life he doesn't remember: a house that he shares with his brother (and has for years), a law career he thought he'd left behind at Stanford, and a relationship with Dean he never dreamed he could have. Life is almost too good to be true, at least until Sam begins to hear his brother's voice calling to him, begging him to wake up.

This is my favorite fic of all times. It’s beautifuly written. The way that it narrates Sam’s trauma of Hell is what keeps me coming back for more . Honestly it should be published as a book. Don’t worry, it has very happy scenes and there’s a happy ending

Welcome to the Neighborhood by ImogenPortchester. 2K Words

Dean thinks the new neighbors are interesting, but all is not what it seems.

Super short. Super heartbreaking.

Fics by leonidaslion

I mean first off, just read everything written by leonidaslion

Sing Your Hymns Like Angels In Defeat. 32K Words.

And Lucifer Fell for a second time with the burning brilliance of a star. The Flare shone in his wake, and darkness fell upon the land ...

Dean goes blind, and I love how it describes Dean’s stuggles with it. You feel like you’re blind with him. Really, really, REALLY well written. Should probably also be a book

Fumbling in the Dark: Love Advice For the Romantically Impaired. 72K

True Love really is blind...

It’s basically a character study of every single episode of the first 5 seasons, with a wincest twist. Slow burn. Holy shit, is it a slow burn.

Just Say My Name. 3K Words

Dean turns into a complete and utter nympho. It takes Sam a while to notice the difference.

Funny, lighthearted and porny

Hush. 2K Words

Motel walls are thin...

Discovery!kink. Sam and Dean try to have quiet sex while John is in the other room. At least, Dean is trying

Sam Winchester and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. 15K Words

Sometimes, you just shouldn't get out of bed in the morning ...

Fics by fleshflutter

Dark Side of the Moon. 20K Words

Cursed!Dean is deaf and blind. Sam deals.

The incestuous courtship of the antichrist's bride. 48K Words

Sam is trying to become the Antichrist in order to save the world. He has a small army of angels and demons, he has an adoring cult, he has a work of prophecy by Jack Kerouac, and he has Dean. Things are going pretty well until he accidentally signs Dean up as his Beloved Consort, a role that requires sex with the Antichrist on an altar. And that's when things stop going pretty well. Also, the soundtrack to the Apocalypse sucks.

I don’t like crack fics, but goddamn this one is FUNNY. You can tell a lot of thought was put into this freaking masterpiece

Captured by the Game by rivkat. 54K Words

AU. Azazel has given his favorite son a task: worm his way into the confidence of a hunter. It sounds simple, but Dean Winchester just might be more than Sam can handle.

It wasn’t real by NaughtyPastryChef. 1K Words

Sam is trying to explain to Dean where he was when Dean was stuck in purgatory. It starts with "I hit a dog" and then, suddenly, inexplicably, they both know exactly where Sam was.

Wonderful explanation for that arc in season 8 nobody can stand. Plus, time travel, which I’m always a sucker for

Backseat of My Brother's 67 Chevy by NaughtyPastryChef. 1K Words

Extended scene from "Baby". Dean's feeling proud of Sam's hookup until he hears that Sam tried to give that waitress his number. Uncharacteristically, he lets Sam force him to talk about it.

Bury My Old Soul, and Dance on its Grave by dreamlittleyo. 2K Words

Dean knows how far he can push Sam.

Antichrist!Sam and Consort!Dean. Codependent winchesters. Yeah

Graveside Blues by hunenka. 3K Words

He uses his body like a blanket, like a shield.

I like how protective Sam is of Dean here, and it deals with something I don’t see a lot such as the jealousy he would have of Dean’s bond with Amara

own it by orphan_account. 6K Words

But he's never going to be able to burn the image of Sam cradling one hand around the perfect curve of Dean's face, dropping the other to the cut of Dean's hip (made for fingers and tongues to trail down, to taste), walking Dean backward until Dean is flush against the wall and Sam is flush against him. This is something that can't be denied.

John finds out. Explores the wonderful trope of both Sam and his father being possessive of Dean, and being very antagonistical to each other. Dysfunctional family yay. Also very porny

Fics by astolat

Punxsutawney. 9K Words

* astolat thinks any plot worth doing is worth doing TWICE

This is the Mistery Spot plot, but a little different. Sam AND Dean wake up to the same day over and over again. So they talk.

Kings and Queens and Jokers, Too. 4K Words

"Yeah, you boys nailed that trickster real good," Bobby said, dry as dust.

People are acting weird around the brothers. Can’t really say anything else without spoiling it. Listen just do yourself a favor and read it.

options. 500 Words

Decisions, decisions.

Short and funny. Little bit porny

Desired. 2K Words

He hadn't even known about any of this himself until Sam found it, figured it out for him. He hadn't known how it was going to be.

So, smut. They have a better time when Dean is the one who asks for it

Rockabye Sammy... by AnotherWorld3111. 1K Words

Sam can’t sleep, so Dean tries to help.

Sam keeps hallucinating Lucifer. Dean is worried and protective of him. Porny

We Know Each Other As We Always Were by mickeym. 45K Words

In 1941, while the world is at war, Sam Winchester falls in love with his brother. They're young, they're in love, and in spite of the hardships of life around them, the world is a pretty good one for them. Until Dec. 7th, 1941, when Japan launches an air attack on Pearl Harbor, sending the US to war against Japan. Dean Winchester feels he needs to join the Army; needs to help fight the good fight and help save lives. He promises he'll return, but can he keep that promise?

GAH this is so romantic! It’s an AU, but I feel like they’re very in character. It feels like a novel

For The End of My Broken Heart by Wickedtruth. 59K Words

Dad's disappeared and Sam's left to pick up the pieces of his broken brother. Post Devil's Trap AU.

Very codependent Winchesters. Also John finds out.

here at the end of all things by remy (iamremy). 40K Words

AU from Season 12 onwards. The British Men of Letters win in the USA, and slowly manage to establish their bases and authority over the whole country. They also capture Sam Winchester and keep him prisoner for eleven months, experimenting on him regularly before wiping his memories so that he has no idea what has been done to him.

Even after Dean rescues him and they begin planning to get revenge once and for all, the niggling doubt at the back of Sam's head remains -- what did they do to him? Why won't his anxiety get better? And what is it that he's missing?

Ok you got me, this is gen. But the whole fic feels like a (good) Supernatural episode, it’s so realistic and canon-like. The relationship between the brothers is just like the one we see on the show, meaning desperately codependent and wincest in every subtext.

Fics by deadlybride / zmediaoutlet

What I like about @zmediaoutlet is that she takes the time to write everyone in character. It’s always as canonical as possible and it feels real

femme. 4K Words

Rummaging around the internet, Dean finds a kink he hadn't seen before; Sam explains, and demonstrates.

I love feminization, but unfourtunately there’s only one fic that does it right, and it’s this one

gratification. 2K Words

It's not a compulsion. Dean just likes it.

breña. 1K Words

Sam and Dean wait, knowing what's coming.

The night before Sam jumps in the box

not the good things, nor the bad. 20K

Dean wavers in a grey area between being taken and giving in.

Part of it started with the kinks series, but you can read this just fine without the other parts. It deals very beautifully with Dean’s thoughts regarding his bond with Amara and his sexuality

DeMille Has Nothing On Us by HandsAcrossTheSea. 13K Words

"Hey Dean - wanna film it?"

This is part of the Those Hazy Days I Do Remember series, but you can 100% read it as a stand-alone, no problem. Sam and Dean film each other and this has that season 1 vibe, of just two brothers on the road. It’s slightly OOC, just because of how touchy-feely they are. But that’s something I sometimes wish we could have on the show, anyway

How many floors to realize by Lazy Daze. 26K Words

AU from the end of It’s A Terrible Life, in which Zachariah decides to keep stringing them along a little while longer, because damn if they aren’t somewhat entertaining, right?”

Rabid by i-am-therefore-i-fight

Beautiful!! I love @i-am-therefore-i-fight‘s take on demon!dean. It’s different to what we’re used to. This fic is very angsty but has a happy ending

Bitten by a True Believer by kermiethefrog. 3K Words

“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean says. Flashes him a wicked grin, charcoal-eyes. The way he spreads out on Sam’s mattress, bare and offering himself up like Holy fucking Communion, drums heat under Sam’s skin, and he’s never sure if it’s arousal or anger when he’s faced with the demon. “Show me a good time, big guy.”

Another demon!dean fic. I like how even as he is a demon, he is still desperate for Sam’s attention

The Time Traveler's Brother by AmyPond45. 54K Words

Dean's life is turned upside down the night his mother dies. But that's also the night a mysterious grown-up version of Dean's brother first appears in his life. While Dean grows up, "Old Sam" is often there, especially when Dean's father isn't. As Dean learns what the future holds, he begins to question everything his father has taught him about who he is and what he is supposed to become. Can Dean find a way to save his little brother from his own future?

This is based on The Time Traveler’s Wife, which is my favorite book. Don’t worry, you don’t have to have read it to understand this fic

need against need against need by dollylux. 5K Words

Jack spends his first night in the bunker with Sam and Dean. (Jack POV)

Don’t worry, Jack just watches and ponders about the Winchester’ realationship

the centre cannot hold by orphan_account. 6K Words

Sam does not remember; Dean does. All Dean can do is watch, and mourn.

But then Castiel becomes God, and the world starts to break at the edges (and maybe that isn't a bad thing.)

It kinda becomes a character study, while the brothers deal with what happened during the Soulless!Sam period

The Last Temptation by bccalling. 1K Words

When Sam tells Mary about all the things he and Dean get up to in the dark, Mary wants in, and Sam sees his opportunity to make Dean’s every fantasy come true.

Mary shows up. Porny and very sweet

Angels and Demons by OhWilloTheWisp. 9K Words

AU angels and demons are animals. Sam was not happy when his owner, Ruby, left him boarded at a kennel. He was even less happy when he discovered an angel in the same facility. But his encounter with the angel will end much differently than anyone would have guessed. He may have never expected his mate to be angel, but now that's found him he won't let anyone keep them apart.

Sam and Dean are kinda like animals here but there’s nothing sexual. It’s very sweet and romantic. Anna/Ruby in here as well

#wincest #fic rec #leonidaslion #fleshflutter #astolat #full house of wincest #bottom!dean #zmediaoutlet

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starman-john-tracy · 4 years ago

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Radiation Poisoning | Chapter One

by @starman-john-tracy and @asteria-star

In which John Tracy gets exposed to uranium and nearly dies, The Hood is evil, and Star generally freaks out a lot.

[Chapter Two]

It's a straightforward kind of situation, as their kind of situations usually go. John's been up in the Comm sphere three hours now, monitoring the reconstruction of an old, 2040s satellite. No rescue call yet but John was grim faced and bleak as he reported to his brothers that it was only a matter of time, and that when things go wrong in space, things tend to go wrong fast - so it's best to be prepared. It's not far out from Five though; he and Star can handle anything that might arise, but Alan downstairs has got Three idling on Standby just in case.

Speaking of Star, the station's resident jailbird is making her way up from the galley, a plastic, lidded mug of hot tea and a bagel in hand - because lord knows John-beanpole-Tracy doesn't have the sense to go get such things for himself when he's all mission focused like this.

Star is bored, and John is busy. She knows this, but she also knows it’s been too long since he’s eaten, and he’d been awake before she had, so she was well within her rights to start working her way into his space. The 2040s satellite gives Star the creeps, and she’d much rather it be over and done with so they can go back to their usual menu of natural disasters and idiot brothers… things she can help with… things that don’t mean disaster if things go tits up.

“Oi, John,” Star calls into the Comm Sphere, hovering in the doorway. “I have food and tea, which you are going to eat. You wanna do it up there or are you gonna come down here?”

His head turns toward her, surprised to find an invader in his little bubble. His hair, that's grown out a little longer than he usually keeps it, bounces around his head in the OG. It's been a busy week.

"Ah, thanks Star." He flicks a schematic away, long fingers dissolving it into blue particles, evidently of no more use to him. Like this, he seems as much a part of the sphere as his floating blue holograms are. "We've got some suspicious activity around the station. I've been unable to find an official statement or licence for its reconstruction, though my readings have had two heat signatures working over there since 1400 Eastern Standard."

Not many people have the funding or means to re-build a space station for the fun of it though, so it seems likely that it's a perfectly innocent endeavour. A lot of the old, 2040s materials the station was originally built with remain a cause for concern though. Especially as John hasn’t been able to identify the boarders to find out if they have a licence to handle them safely. It's easy to see why him suspects something could go wrong. The GDF have been alerted, but Colonel Casey has yet to get back to him about it.

Pressing his worries down to focus on the present, John kicks off the side and glides gracefully over to Star like it's nothing, taking the tea mug with a warm, grateful smile.

Star pulls a face at John’s suspicion, relinquishing her hold on the tea and food absently, as if the news had put her on autopilot. She knows where the other brothers are, and where they themselves sit in the universe, and it is an undeniable fact that if something were to go wrong -under suspicious circumstances or not- she and John would be the next closest people to go and help. Star has a love-hate relationship with space rescues. On one hand; sure International Rescue is there to save everyone, but on the other… this isn’t a natural disaster or an accident. If anyone is dumb enough to be out of atmosphere, that was their call. She’s definitely gotten better at space, several spacewalks now tucked under her belt from various repairs (including the infamous one in which John broke his arm) and the general sightseeing she let the red-headed astronaut drag her on from time to time. If she was being honest, she’d do it any time he asked, if only for the way his eyes light up, in awe of the stars.

“John, that is the exact opposite of what I want to hear up here,” she moans, peering over his shoulder at the glowing red-orange-yellow of two people in a sea of cold blue. She tears her eyes away to give John a once over -dark under-eyes and too long hair and all. “What exactly are you worried about? What could go wrong?”

"What would I do without you?" He jokes, "I'd better stay up here and keep and eye on it," he takes a large mouthful of tea, eyelashes fluttering as the caffeine hits his system. "Mmmm, perfect."

“You’d starve,” she tells him, not for the first time. And it’s true.

John gives her a more amused hum, already leaving the lidded mug floating in OG beside him so that his hands are free to card through his schematics. The bagel makes its way to his mouth, though it almost seems like he forgets it’s there as he plunges his fingers back into the world of glowing blues and green and lines and data and the little triangular logos that warn him about everything going on in the world, anything that could be a situation. There’s at least a hundred of them, and it’s a quiet day. Just because a situation has the potential to turn dangerous though, doesn’t mean it will.

So it’s strange that John seems to have fixated on this one.

“Unclear.” He rolls his shoulders back, unconsciously trying to relive some of the tension in them. “I have a…” His nose wrinkles, unhappy, “Mm, don’t tell Gordon, I don’t want to confirm his squid sense thing, but I’ve just got a feeling about it, is all.”

John is the last Tracy who’d ever run on pure feeling alone, but a Tracy’s a Tracy and all of them have good instincts, at the core of it. Squidsense or otherwise.

He grabs the tea mug again, eyes still scanning the screens, for something to do with his hands more than anything.

Star chews on her lip while he takes a drag of the tea and finishes his mouthful of bagel and- John is looking at her. Star see’s the red-flashing warning in his Comm Sphere before he does, moments before what could only be an alarm starts blaring through the speakers.

John reacts like lighting - it’s perhaps the fastest she’s ever seen him move. One jumble of holographic letters gets shoved out the way and another one is pulled up in its place, then another, then another, all in rapid succession. He skim reads everything so quickly that it makes Star’s eyes hurt, and then he’s discarding his tea and the rest of his bagel in favour of grabbing his helmet.

Star is still hovering, watching him with her mouth opening and closing like a landed fish, searching for words her brain can’t seem to catch before they skitter away. In the end, she settles for swearing. John reaches for his helmet, and Star is suddenly very aware that she is (as usual) not in her uniform, the cool recycled air raising goosepimples on her arms and legs, bare of her pyjamas.

“We’ve got a situation.” John announces to whoever he’s got listening, brusque and professional, “Eos, update Tracy Island for me will you? Me and Star are gonna take the gear and go EVA to…” He pauses for a second, and the actuality of things seems to catch up with him, “Uh... you ok with that?” He checks, looking back over his shoulder, as if he’s suddenly realised that she might not want to go out there, to a dangerous, unknown station right in the middle of bloody open space. At some point, he seems to have gotten so accustomed to having her at his side, he’s started taking it for granted. He looks guilty about that.

“It’d be good to have two of us out there,” He backpedals, worried she won’t agree to come with him, “You know, for if either of the workers on board have been injured, or if they become hostile. I mean, I don’t think they’re up to anything legal… but if they’re in danger then, well, we’re International Rescue, right?” He says, like everyone possesses the same mad heroism the Tracy’s do. He shines her one of those sweet, spaceman smiles of his for good measure, though he’s got no idea how goddamn effective those really are. Boy doesn’t know the power he wields. “Our scanners picked up some kind of explosion over on that old space station,” John goes on, “it looked pretty severe and, if these readings are right, she’s still got a belly of old, radioactive fuel that could be a problem. It’s definitely not the kind of stuff we want leaking out into orbit. Could pose a threat to everyone up here.” He says, like that’s the reason she’d go with him.

He’s really impressively oblivious to the fact he needs someone looking out for his ass.

It’s right then and there that Star comes to the realisation that she much prefers it when John doesn’t ask. Following blindly is easy, going along with whatever half-baked plan he’s got in his head to make sure it doesn’t end in tears, or at the very least, John comes out of it alive. Star’s good at that, the sudden appearance of a disaster, a problem that needs to be solved, and she can ride her way out of it on a wave of adrenaline, sarcasm, and the need to make sure John’s dumb ass is alright. It’s an expectation that is relatively easy to live up to.

Choice, though… that is something else. Star doesn’t understand what’s flashing across the screens, but it is an awful lot of red and urgency and its

space

. She doesn’t know if there will be artificial atmosphere in the station in need, or if it will be little more than a dead hull haunting the universe like a ghostship, but she can’t even think about it because the empty expanse of

nothing

between it and them makes her want to curl up and hide. The rabbit-fast thudding of her heart in her chest threatens to choke her, but it doesn’t matter.

There was never really a choice. She’s not ever going to leave John alone.

“What kind of a question is that,” she murmurs, trying to force a full breath of air into her lungs. “What do you think I’m going to do, sit here and watch?”

“I just need to…” Star gestures to what she’s wearing. “I think I’m going to need my spacesuit.”

John barks out a laugh at that, startled and sweet, and he’s smiling as he waves her away.

“Thanks Star. Suit up, quick as you can.” He’s already running a pre-flight safety check of both his and Star's Exosuits, “Make sure you grab a full O2 tank.”

While he’s waiting for her he discards multiple alarms and pulls up the schematics for the station they’re hopping across to. Screens show a large portion of her aft hull blown open and the fuel tanks are giving off enough cosmic background radiation to confirm his theory that they're probably leaky. John checks his tool belt, finding the small, compact welder securely in its place, ready for use. He doesn’t anticipate any problems sealing the tanks back up, just as long as whoever’s on board over there allows him to do his job. Hopefully they listen to reason. If not… well that’s what he’s got Star for, right?

Star shimmies into her spacesuit, still reluctant about owning the damn thing, despite the fact it clearly comes in handy. She keeps her NASA shirt on underneath, soft and too big which probably means it's actually John's, but he’s long since given up trying to reclaim his clothing. From across the station, she can hear John talking to EOS, professional words sprinkled with tolerant laughter that manages to rub Star’s already prickly temper up the wrong way. But she’s ready in no time, standing in front of John covered neck to toe in the strange wetsuit looking spacesuit, her helmet tucked under one arm. The oxygen tank was already sitting with the suit when she put it on, the little dial as close to ‘full’ as it was going to get.

“Anything else you need me to bring?” she asks him, noting his little stash of tools. It makes her feel strangely naked, like she’s forgetting something. She coaxes her head at the screens behind him. “Anything I should know? About what we’re walking into?”

John runs his eyes over her speculatively, considering. She looks small and skinny in her spacesuit, all nobbly knees and elbows and even the deep, navy blue sash doesn't help bulk her out like John's does for him.

Instead of the thick stripe of sunny orange John's got, Star's is thinner and flatter, with a different method of strapping around her littler torso. It's a much lighter, easier thing to carry around but still, like John's toolkit, it has enough pockets and pouches for anything they might need: pressure resistant emergency suit patches, super strength glue, a small medikit and a whole bunch of pliers and zip ties and thingamabobs and there's even a small hammer, tucked into a zipped seam opening. She's not got the same wires and solder and electronics communications gear that John's got, her design is far more streamlined - stripped to the essentials.

"Here," John tosses her three small grapple pack cable cartridges, knowing just how bad it can be to run out mid EVA and have no way to propel yourself across the void and wanting to prevent that for her.

Star catches the packs… barely. Her fingers are clumsy and uncoordinated in the confines of her space suit. She can see what John is doing, always stocking her up with the tools to escape, but he doesn’t know about the knife she’s got tucked away in an extremely reinforced pocket of her sash, the pocket she tries to keep conveniently turned away from him as she stands patiently and lets him check her over. She just hopes he’s prepared himself as well as he has her.

He spares a second to safety check her suit seals and helmet, but they have little more time to spare and so he's pushing off the floor of the Comm Sphere and gliding up toward the hatch for the Exosuit assembly rig, talking as he goes.

"The station is an old Xz197 craft, decommissioned following the Global Conflict after the upsurgence of the green energy movement. There's no place in space for nuclear energy these days." He smiles warmly down at her as the assembly rig snaps the pieces of the Exosuit on around him. "It was deemed far too dangerous for them to send anyone up to clean it out, which begs the question, why is it inhabited now, and what are they doing aboard when I can't seem to find any kind of permit for them to be there?" It's clear this has been bothering him for hours, but without a good excuse for Colonel Casey, like an explosion apparently, he could do nothing but watch.

Star raises an eyebrow at that, waiting as John gets himself into the exosuit. Her breath makes a little circle of condensation in her helmet, a constant reminder that she’s alive in her peripheral vision; that space hasn’t gotten her yet.

‘And how would you feel about me bringing a crowbar along?’ She asks, and it’s only half a joke. She’s a barely useful second pair of hands in a repair situation, being half decent security is the least she can do. ‘I’m assuming you’ve got some kind of scanner, so we’ll be able to tell what’s radioactive when we get out there? So we’re not flying blind?’

Star grew up with criminals, she knows whoever these people are, their cooperation is unlikely. It brings her heart rate back down to a reasonable level. People, she can deal with, she can protect John from.

Before she knows it they’re in the airlock, and Star has never hated EOS’ voice more than when she is counting down the door opening. Then, just like that… what Star has only ever been able to think of as freefall into the great unknown.

John quirks a ginger brow at her, uncertain if the crowbar thing is a joke or not.

“If you think we’ll need one.” He concedes, though he’s fairly certain there’s no such thing onboard. “Scanner’s on your wrist,” John takes a moment to demonstrate, sliding two fingers along the black panel that takes up half the length of the back of his forearm, so that it lights up with schematics. “I’d never leave you to fly blind.” A quick flick of his wrist to the left and the jumble turns into a simple meter, green at the moment, though with the potential to rise through the traffic light to a bright, alarming red, the more radiation is detected. “Don’t worry,” He tries to reassure, “Our suits will protect us as long as the radiation level doesn’t exceed the dark orange. And we won’t be over there long enough for that to be a problem.” He sounds very certain about that. A simple in-and-out rescue.

As if anything for them ever stays simple.

#under the cut for length #wanted to add this to the John blog bc i like having everything together in one place #and bc i like to think we made some good words together hehe #This is ongoing but really fun #RadiationRPwithStar #thunderbirds #thunderbirds are go #if anyone was wondering why i'm behind on Snow Blind this is why XD

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queenitn · 5 years ago

Text

So... there's a difference between rescuing someone, helping someone, supporting someone and taking care of someone.

Yes, I'm doing it again.

Look, there's no one in the MCU I adore more than Steve, but Steve is not a nice guy.

He's a good man, but not a nice guy.

He's grumpy, sassy asshole ("Neighbor")

Bucky? Now that's a nice guy. A good man and a nice guy.

That's not actually related to what I'm getting at, but whatever.

My point is this-

Is it just me, or does Steve really not even try to take care of Bucky at all, even once?

Yeah, he rescues Bucky on more than one occasion (Azzano), helps him (Civil war), supports him (when he chooses to go into cryo again in Wakanda).

He never takes care of Bucky.

And that's fine.

Because Bucky, despite overall showing a much more proactive approach to his own recovery (though not always), never once seems to want to be taken care of.

In fact, he does the opposite.

He finds things to take care of.

He takes care of himself. He takes care of his journals. I know it seems insignificant because they're just inanimate objects, but the fact is that he clearly put in a lot of effort in them (like a nerd). Then he takes care of those goats.

And that brings him happiness.

Yeah, we're all human, we love someone giving us some TLC. We all need comfort. But not everyone needs it the same way. For some people, being taken care of, being comforted and cared for means someone taking care of them, even just in little ways.

But hey, it's not the same for everyone. Some people do find more comfort, more peace, in being the caretaker. In having someone trust them so completely. In the satisfaction of knowing you made someone feel good.

And can we stop pretending as if that's any less valid in terms of self care and recovery?

Bucky is Steve's damsel in distress. Bucky is definitely fabulous.

Bucky loves to take care of things. Just look at the goddamn movies.

Fact- we need to stop automatically associating the so called "damsels in distress" with the role of a bottom/sub.

Because they really don't have any connection.

I mean, it doesn't really matter in the end. I'm bi and I am all for switching, all the way.

But this bugs me. Because this is an aspect of the actual canon that is going largely unexplored. And fandom is all about exploration.

Another thing that I noticed.

Steve? He's gonna live and die never asking for so much as a hug. But the people closest to him do make an effort to take care of him somehow (Bucky convincing him to live with him, Natasha's "I didn't want you to be alone")

Because Steve does need it. He's not really naturally a very nurturing guy. He takes care of people because it's his responsibility, his duty as Captain America. Because he was given the serum and now it's his job to be strong for everyone else.

But he doesn't seem to find any joy in it.

The one notable time when Steve was taking care of someone (as opposed to helping or supporting them), was after the Lagos incident with Wanda. He's probably pretty protective of her, she's the youngest Avenger at that point right? But he's still not getting anything out of it himself.

That's the point. Steve, for all his Daddy beard and authoritativeness, finds no comfort in taking care of others. He can probably go his entire life (very miserably) without ever having anyone else take care of him, but if he can bring himself to accept that comfort...it's probably gonna be the balm he needs.

Bucky, even after everything, does find comfort in taking care of others. He actively seeks out things to look after.

Put them together and bam.

There you have it.

My Dom!Bucky/Sub!Steve argument. Again.

#steve rogers #bucky barnes #bottom!steve #top!bucky #captain america #marvel #avengers #free mama bear extraordinnaire Daddy!Bucky

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ma-sulevin · 5 years ago

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We’re finally done! It’s officially the last chapter!

I want to thank everyone for supporting me through my first attempt at writing in the FC5 fandom. I don’t know why I decided to start with a novel-length AU idea, but I did, and it’s done, and I’m so happy I did it.

I want to extend an extra-special thanks to @chyrstis who has commented on and shared every single chapter. Your comments gave me LIFE through this whole process.

Pairing: Sharky Boshaw/Female Deputy Rating: E Warnings: Canon-typical violence, but nothing particularly explicit I don’t think Word Count: 4338, chapter sixteen of sixteen!

Read it on AO3 instead and say nice things.

---

The official diagnosis, six weeks later, after the National Guard and the feds and the EPA and the fuckin’ news crews have come and gone, is mass drug-induced hallucination.

That’s it.

That’s the whole reason.

Mattie knows there’s more to it, knows there was something special behind it all. She’s the only one who remembers so much, the only one who can clearly describe how it feels to drown or be strangled to death, the only one who spent so much time listening to the black white black and the Voice.

She’s the only one who heard the voice except for Joseph, and he never fucking shuts up about it, even from the relative safety of his prison cell in Missoula, and so she’s never ever ever going to fucking bring it up.

Not to Staci, who smiles and teases her with just a little less energy than before, acting like he doesn’t remember the details of what happened to him in Jacob’s compound, but affected by it all the same.

Not to Joey, who smiles less often, who still curses every time someone brings up a Seed, who says it’s a damn good thing the National Guard showed up when they did or she would’ve hunted John down herself.

Not to Whitehorse, who is the quietest of them, whose sole moment of lost temper was immediately on returning to the station when he grabbed Nancy by the arm and threw her out into the parking lot, who has started offering Mattie hugs and pats on the back when it looks like she needs them (basically all the time).

Certainly not to Burke, who left without sleeping the next day, who she hasn’t seen since.

And absolutely not to the state therapist who brought two big suitcases and moved into the Hot Springs Hotel, only to have to drive into Falls End every day because no one would go into the Henbane yet.

She’s not trying to get involuntarily committed.

If she’s going to be committed, it’ll be on her own terms, and only when she needs it.

And she doesn’t need it, not yet.

She’s seen as something of a hero around the county, receiving free drinks from Mary May and free food from everyone else. People stop her to say thank you, and Boomer always runs up to jump on her if he happens to be nearby with Rae Rae.

That slows down too, as the days pass and things go back to normal, and only the people most involved in her fight against the Seeds look like they’re thinking about her bleeding for them when they look at her.

She starts looking at property listings online.

It’s not like she’s ever going to get fired now.

It takes the full six weeks — two weeks of paid leave, four weeks of being back on the job — for Jude to show up at the station. He has coffees for everyone and a look of grim determination on his face.

Staci sends a furtive look at Whitehorse, who feigns disinterest, and then accepts the coffees with a quick peck on the lips, and then Mattie hands Joey five dollars because she thought it would take longer.

(Mattie wins the five dollars back from Staci later when he owes her for Mary Mary bringing Joey lunch.)

She takes to visiting Jerome after services on Sundays, not quite ready to start going to church again, but craving the kind of spiritual guidance he gives so easily without making her feel like she’s going to hell no matter what.

She visits the Ryes, takes them baby gifts, receives hugs from them both, listens to Kim complain about how she was technically pregnant an extra two months until the memories start to fade and then are erased by Carmina’s abrupt appearance into the world.

She visits Grace, visits Jess, drives up to look at the abandoned Veteran’s Center, with its inhabitants arrested and its weapons cache seized, and thinks if she burned it to the ground, no one would turn her in for it.

Every night she goes back to her apartment, every night she goes home and puts a little food out for the stray cat and thinks about taking one of the sleeping pills her therapist recommended and gets in bed without opening the bottle, every night she curls around her pillow and she cries.

If the bombs had fallen that night she was with Sharky, before she snuck out without saying goodbye, if they had fallen first thing that morning before the sun came up… she would still be with him. They’d be together, in his bunker, alone but together, probably high as fuck and burning through their condom supply.

The world would be over, but they would be happy.

It’s selfish.

It’s so selfish.

But she misses it.

She misses him.

The therapist makes it eight weeks in Hope County before she packs up and goes back to Missoula. She leaves a recommendation for a virtual office, and Mattie puts the card next to her unused pills, but she thinks she overhears Staci telling Jude he’s going to set up regular appointments.

She gets Joey’s tattoo artist’s information from her and starts to look at phoenix tattoos on Pinterest, the blank space of her left forearm mocking her without its tally marks.

Mattie makes it nine weeks before she breaks under the strain. She makes it through nine weeks of emptiness, of loneliness, of the crushing feeling of how any moment could be her last.

Is this how she lived before? Was she ever so aware of her own mortality, or did she go through life acting like she was fucking invincible until the fact of it was actually shoved in her face?

She wakes up with the sun on her day off. She showers. She shaves. She conditions and blow dries and styles. She puts on a dress and grabs a sweater.

And she drives to the Henbane, up the hill, and to Sharky’s trailer.

He’s standing outside when she parks her car, an unlit cigarette in his mouth and a bucket in one hand. He looks over at her from under the brim of his hat and dumps another handful of… something… on the ground, then holds the bucket in front of him with both arms wrapped around it.

“You said you wasn’t gonna arrest me for any of that shit I did!”

Mattie freezes in place, halfway across to him, and just stares.

He stares back.

“Does it look like I’m on duty?” Her voice come out higher-pitched than she means it, incredulous and not sure if she should start laughing or not. “Does Joey ever show up like this to drag you to the station?” She kicks one foot out to the side to emphasize the skirt she’s wearing, and his gaze immediately drops to the bare expanse of legs he can see.

“Uhh--”

“What are you even doing right now? What is that?”

“Uhh.” He looks down into the bucket, movements a little slow like he doesn’t want to look away from her skin, then he stares like he forgot the question. When he looks back up, she can tell his eyebrows are drawn tight together. “Sawdust.”

“Sawdust?”

“For the gasoline spills? I’m tryna… clean the place up a bit?”

They stare at each other as silence falls again. It stretches until it’s uncomfortable, and then it snaps.

Mattie bursts into tears. Not little ones, not anything cute or delicate, but big, ugly sobs that wrack her whole body and make her start to curl in on herself as she starts to shake. Her voice rises in an involuntary wail that she tries to muffle with her hands, but she can’t quiet it any more than she can stop it.

The tears overwhelm her, and so does Sharky.

There’s a dull thump of the bucket hitting the ground and then he’s in her space a half second later, his arms around her and one hand cupping the back of her head to pull her close. She presses into him, head tucked under his chin, and grabs the soft material of his hoodie for dear life.

The sharp smell of kerosene lingering deep in the fabric makes her cry harder at first as half-foggy memories burst into full clarity in her mind.

Climbing into his lap to sleep in John’s ranch, high and bruised and happy.

Kissing him for the first time behind the Spread Eagle after he arranged a private place for her to relax after rescuing Joey.

Drinking with him up at the PIN-K0 radar station and resting against him as he joked with Hurk.

Falling into his arms after she escaped from Jacob, shoulder dislocated, starving and sick. Healing and growing stronger, tucked safe against him, under him.

Feeling happy and safe and loved and protected with him.

Feeling home.

She doesn’t realize Sharky’s murmuring to her until her sobs have calmed into tiny gasping breaths and her tears have dried on the faded words of his hoodie, she doesn’t realize he’s whispering that it’s okay and he has her and she’s safe until after her body has already realized it.

She’s safe.

“You’re okay, shorty, I got you,” he says, voice barely audible with his face buried like it is in her hair. “Fuck, I missed you. Please stop crying.”

She lifts her chin so her nose is pressed against his throat. “I’m sorry.”

He draws in a shaky breath and holds her tighter until he exhales. “What for?”

“Waiting so long to come back home.”

His hands are shaking harder than she’s ever seen them as he pulls away enough to cup her face. He stares down at her, studying her, and she lets him just hold her like that even as he blinks his own tears out of his eyes.

“Dep, do you… are you saying you still… love me?” His voice is shaky and wet, those beautiful blue eyes red around the rims. It sounds like he’s forcing the question out, like part of him is trying to keep it inside where the answer can’t hurt him, but the bigger part of him is too goddamn hopeful to not ask.

She squeezes him tighter as she speaks, the words somehow hard to get out even after everything they’ve been through together, even after finding him in her arms once again. “Yeah, baby. I still love you.”

He squeezes her tighter, almost tight enough to hurt even though this time she doesn’t have any lingering injuries to make the pain sharp, but he doesn’t pull away to kiss her or to look down at her.

He’s not ready to let her go.

“Okay, but, like--” he pauses to take a deep breath, and Mattie braces herself for an emotional stream of consciousness from Sharky. “I know you know, ‘cause I told you before, and also ‘cause you’re a cop, but, like, I’m on probation, and I got this rap sheet that’s a mile long, and not all of it should be on there but I can’t really help that now, and I know the sheriff don’t like me, and I don’t want you to get in trouble at your job--”

She’s heard enough. She wiggles out of his grasp and grabs his face in both her hands. He cuts off mid-sentence and stares at her with his mouth still open like the rest of his thoughts will come out the second she takes her hands off his skin.

“Sharky, babe, you don’t -- I don’t care about that. I knew all that, and I love you, and I’m here, and we’ll figure out how to work it out, okay?” He nods. His mouth closes. “I want to at least try. I couldn’t live with myself if we didn’t try.”

“Really?” His voice cracks, and Mattie’s self-restraint does too.

She pulls his face down to hers, and he goes willingly, leaning so far into her space that she finds herself leaning backwards, resting her weight in his arms. She throws her arms around his neck and holds on for dear life as his lips press to hers and his heart beats against her chest.

It feels just the same as she remembered. It’s warm and comforting, safe, and she can’t help but smile as his goatee scratches her chin. He still shivers when she tangles her fingers in his hair, and he still licks her lower lip after he nips it, and he still holds her as tight as he can.

Some things are new, different now that their circumstances have changed so much. He smells like his cheap shampoo instead of gasoline, and he tastes like cinnamon toothpaste instead of cigarettes or beer or coffee, and there’s no stench of bliss or lingering injuries or far-off gunfighting to ruin the moment.

It’s just like it was, but somehow… it’s better.

They break apart when their kisses begin to taste like salt, and Sharky wipes the tears from her cheeks, then he kisses her forehead.

“Oh, my god,” she breathes, eyes still squeezed shut. “I love you.”

He moves like he’s going to wrap her up in another hug, but he scoops her into his arms instead. She shrieks, considers lashing out, and then bursts into laughter instead.

He’s beaming at her when she wraps her arms around his neck for stability, then he starts carrying her up to his home.

“I love you, too, shorty. I’m glad you came back.”

He has to put her down on his porch to get the door to his trailer open, and she grabs his free hand as he does. It’s just like their first time together, when she held his hand to keep him from losing his nerve as they walked to the house he’d gotten ready for her, but this time, she’s just tugging him through to his bedroom as fast as possible.

He follows her, of course he does, laughing a little at her eagerness, and she winks at him over her shoulder.

He grabs for her as soon as they’re near the bed, wrapping his arms around her waist and letting one hand dip down to her ass to squeeze through the fabric. She smiles as she lets him pull her close, lifting up onto her toes so she can reach him better to accept his next kiss, this one a little harder than the one they shared outside, a little hungrier now that they’re definitely not going to be seen.

Why did she wait so long to come out here?

What was she trying to prove to herself?

Guilt creeps up on her, distracting her from the feel of his beard on her face and his tongue against hers, and then his hands pull her attention right back to him as they start to pull her skirt up so he can get his hands on her skin, still on her ass.

Sharky swallows the little noise of surprise she makes, moaning back at her as he squeezes and lifts and encourages her to lift one of her legs to wrap around his thigh.

“Oh, fuck, I missed you.” Sharky breaks their kiss because he can’t bear to be silent for another moment, and Mattie takes advantage of it by leaning closer and kissing the base of his throat. “Oh, my god. Do you know how many times I fuckin’ jerked it thinkin’ about you showing up here like you just did?”

She wiggles herself free of his grasp and pushes his chest so he sits down hard on his mattress. “That all you missed?”

She waits for his answer, trying to hide her smile, hands on her hips.

He blinks once, then grabs for her again, trying to pull her down into his lap. “No, fuck no, I missed everything about you.”

She kicks off her shoes and climbs onto him, hovering a little over his lap on her knees so she can tug at his hoodie to make him take it off.

“Like what?”

He pulls his hoodie off, and she rewards him by resting her weight on him. He bites his lower lip and groans; he’s already hard.

He buries his face in the crook of her neck, and speaks against her skin. “I missed you bossin’ me around all the time,” he says, and then leaves an open-mouthed kiss against her throat. “And how you always actually listened to me.” Another kiss, this time on the underside of her jaw. “And how you were always putting your cold fuckin’ hands in my shirt.”

She laughs and does just that, sliding her hands under the collar of his tank top to rest on the warm skin of his back. He shivers good-naturedly and noses her sweater to the side so he can find a good patch of skin under her collarbone to latch onto.

“I kinda missed always having hickeys,” she says, rocking just a little in his lap to tease them both, telling the truth even though she wouldn’t admit it to anyone else. She liked having the little reminders of Sharky when they were apart, the little bruises that showed she had someone who cared about her as much as she cared about him.

Sharky makes a little grumbling sound that sounds like he wants to talk, but he doesn’t release her skin as he focuses on sucking a mark that will last, and she laughs again, delighted.

He finally releases her and admires his handwork before looking up to meet her gaze. “You always laughed a lot when we were foolin’ around, but not like, at me, you know? Just ‘cause you were havin’ fun. I missed that too.”

She moves her hands to cup his jaw, holding him still so she can memorize the expression in his warm blue eyes. “I love you so much.”

He beams at her. “I love you more.”

She kisses him again because she doesn’t know what else to say, doesn’t know how else to show him how she feels.

The relationship they built while fighting the cult together was too strong to fade away like the physical pains and sharp-edged memories of the horrors. It feels now, wrapped up in each other, that they’ve never been apart and will never be apart again.

She drops her sweater to the floor and yanks off Sharky’s top, desperate to feel his skin against hers. He only lets her move enough to remove clothing and then grabs for her again, not willing to let her get very far away at all.

He flips them, finally, when she starts trying to get at his belt, turning so that she’s flat on his mattress and he’s kneeling over her. He ignores her reaching hands and slides his hands up her legs, smooth for the first time he’s touched them, then back down, then up again all the way to where her panties rest on her hips.

“That’s ni— oh, fuck.” He pauses with her panties half down her thighs, exposing how she’s shaved herself completely for him. She didn’t know if he’d prefer it or not, knows he absolutely doesn’t care if she’s completely hairy, but it felt good to take the time to follow her old routines. “Fuck, yeah, okay.”

He flips her skirt all the way up and leans down without any other words leaving his lips to cover her slit with his mouth.

He’s just as enthusiastic as she remembers, and she shrieks as his tongue presses into her. It’s wet and messy and eager and so Sharky that she can’t do anything but hold on with her fingers tangled in his hair and her heels digging into his back. He groans against her, feasting on her, eyebrows drawn together as he focuses all his energy on giving her the most pleasure he can.

His beard burns her sensitive skin, wetness drips down the curve of her ass and onto the back of her dress, and Sharky’s fingers press little bruises into the flesh of her thighs as he holds her still.

It’s so good, it’s too good, and it’s wonderful, and if this is how it’s going to be the rest of her life she might just die for good with his head between her legs.

What a fuckin’ way to go.

She wails as she comes, pulls Sharky’s hair and kicks his back by accident, and then she laughs a little hysterically when he tries to keep going like he did their first morning together.

“Stop, fuckin’ Christ, Sharky. Holy shit.” He stops right when she says, sits back on his knees and beams down at her, proud of himself, face flushed and beard wet, stupid gold chain still around his neck because he never takes it off. “I love that you love that so much, but if you want me to ride you again, you’re going to have to quit it.”

His mouth drops open a little as he sucks in a deep breath, the flush on his cheeks darkening dangerously, and then he’s twisting around in obedience to flop on the mattress next to her. He opens his belt and wiggles his jeans down over his hips as Mattie pushes herself to her feet so she can drop her dress with her sweater and grab a condom from the pile she remembers, and then she turns around to see him watching her with one hand tucked behind his head and the other slowly pumping his cock.

She watches him right back for a minute, taking in the red and orange ink on his forearm, the twisting of the muscles there making the flames look like they’re dancing, the burned skin on his shoulder and chest, the hair across his pecs and stomach, the little bit of tummy he sucks in when he sees her looking.

“This what you did waiting for me to come back?”

He nods at her, pumping himself a little harder as he keeps waiting. He doesn’t look back up at her face, apparently unable to drag his eyes away from her breasts, her stomach, her bare thighs still glistening when she takes a step forward.

“Here.” She tosses him the condom and climbs on the bed as he rolls it on, then crawls over him on all fours as he watches her with wide, fond eyes. “Ready, baby?”

“Fuck yeah,” Sharky says, voice a little too rough to be as bright as it usually is. He puts one hand on her ribs and holds himself steady with the other so she can sink down on to him, and he moans aloud as she does. He doesn’t look away from the sight, and she doesn’t look away from his face, and as soon as he’s hilted inside of her she’s leaning down to kiss him.

He tastes like her, and she licks it from his mouth as she starts to move on still-shaky legs, fucking him nice and slow so she can drag it out. He can’t stop touching her, running his hands over her thighs and hips, ribs and breasts, into her hair that’s so much softer than it was in the bliss for her access to proper conditioning treatments, across her neck and down her back to start the process over again.

The drag and slide inside of her is exquisite, beautiful, a feeling she’s missed these long weeks, and she can’t stop kissing him even when her face starts to burn. She fucks him a little harder when his groans grow louder, feels sweat beading along her hairline and dripping down her temple before Sharky kisses it away.

“Sharky, baby, you feel so good,” she says, cheek pressed against his, trembling as his fingers tighten on her hips and he thrusts up into her like he can’t help it anymore. “Gonna make me come again.”

His groan is deep in his chest, his next thrust a little harder into her, knocking off her balance so she falls against his chest with a high, breathy giggle.

He wraps his arms around her and holds her against him, using his leverage to start really fucking into her. She giggles again and holds onto his shoulders, nuzzling against his cheek as she just relaxes her body and lets the pleasure grow inside her, listening to his deep groans.

She loves how loud he is when they’re in bed together, how willing he is to let her know how good she’s making him feel.

“Yeah, just like that, I love it, I love you, c’mon, baby…”

His hands tighten and she revels in it, in the bright spots of pain under the pleasure, and she presses her face against the scar on his shoulder and cries out, long and low, as she comes on his cock.

He follows her over the edge immediately, like he was just waiting for her permission, his moan half muffled in her hair as he curls into her. She shivers and clenches around him, tight, pulling another low moan out of him, and she sits up a little and laughs because otherwise she might cry at just how goddamn happy she feels, finally, finally, after everything.

Sharky beams up at her, eyes half-closed and sleepy looking, and tucks a loose curl behind her ear.

She kisses him, soft and slow, still smiling, and then moves to stretch out on her side next to him. She waits as he gets up to throw out the condom, then he comes back and gathers her into his arms.

He kisses her forehead. “Now what?”

She shrugs and nuzzles at the underside of his jaw. “We just take it one day at a time, I guess.”

He makes a sleepy, grumbly noise deep in his throat. “Mkay.” Trusting, loving, beautiful Sharky. “I love you.”

She presses herself as close to him as she can. “I love you too.”

#sharky boshaw #sharky x deputy #far cry 5 #oc: mattie covington #x: burn like a star fire

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liw-the-melancholic-apple · 4 years ago

Text

How it may have gone - Humble Beginnings

A fic taking place in the marauders era. While the political climate seems to head to a conflict, James, Sirius, Remus and Peter are still just teenagers. Dealing with typical teenage problems.

But this year their little group grows. Who would have known that more prefects would be a good thing?

Masterlist

Eight: New Year, new me III

We nearly missed breakfast. As the very last student we walked into the Great Hall to grab the rest of the Sunday buffet. None of us looked truly alive but the adrenaline of sharing a secret and the excitement of maybe running into Crick had us all on edge.

The Potter-posse was nowhere to be seen when we sat down and dug in but waited for us on the steps when we walked back into the foyer. They weren’t the only ones, though. Magnus leaned against the wall and waved Chloe over, Toby standing next to him. My heart dropped. Hopefully they would talk about something completely irrelevant and not me or Crick.

“I hear you’ve become quite the ladies’ man!”, Nica bellowed messing up Pettigrew’s hair.

“So, you told them”, he looked at me.

“Yep.”

“Everything?”, Remus asked cautiously.

“Yep!”

“Then we finally get to brag about our heroism! Killed me that we couldn’t do that yesterday!”, Potter cheered and pulled us all into the snowy courtyard, telling the story from his perspective – it nearly sounded creepy the way he described how Crick tried to kiss me – and giving all the girls sufficient time to ‘oooh’ and ‘aaah’.

“And that is how us noble men saved the fair lady”, he ended.

“I’m so proud of you, James”, I applauded him. “You haven’t even exaggerated that much.”

“Hang on, did you just call me James? Are you feeling alright?”

“Yes, I am. I just figured after you have rescued me from a truly uncomfortable situation and provided shelter for me, it would only be a token of my gratefulness and respect to use your first name.” That wasn’t completely true. Not a lie necessarily, but not the truth either. I had decided to call Sirius Sirius and I had decided to not tell any of the girls that I knew he lived with the Potters. So, I had to come up with a reason to call him by his first name and this was the best I had. Besides, I was grateful. And I did respect all of them.

“Honoured!”

“Does that go for all of us?”

“It does, Peter, if you’re okay with it.”

“Absolutely.”

“Won’t change anything for me, I guess. You already call me Remus all the time.”

“I could go with Remus John. Or Rems.”

“Remus is fine, thanks.”

“And obviously the honourable man who took a hit for you for will be referred to by his given name”, Milla cleverly directed the conversation towards the question we all had. To be perfectly honest I hadn’t thought about what Sirius might have done to get punched by Crick until I retold the story but I now really wanted to know. I was properly shocked to hear that their conversation had gotten physical but Sirius had made a point of not telling me what he did to get his bloody lip. When he pushed Crick away from me he was calm and calculated, but I reckoned Crick would have not punched him without provocation.

“Obviously”, I answered.

“Why did he punch you?”, Blair asked quickly.

Sirius extinguished his cigarette.

“Why does it matter?”

“Because a) we don’t know Crick to be violent and b) we didn’t think you would take it without striking back”, Blair answered.

“I didn’t ‘strike back’, he sarcastically stretched the last two words “because I figured Cricket was already feeling like shit.”

“Okay, and how did you get that busted lip?”

“I said something he didn’t like to hear.”

“Come on! What did you say?”, Nica whined.

He still wouldn’t look at me. Not once since we’d been out here. Now, he hesitated to answer, scuffing his feet. I was sure that he would have normally used his soul-seeing eyes to get my approval or okay but he didn’t.

“I really don’t think it matters.” He abruptly walked through us, bumping into Remus and Milla and went back to the castle.

“What the hell?”

“He’s been weird recently”, James explained. “Don’t focus on that too much. Reckon he’ll be back to normal in no time.”

“You know what he said, right?”, Milla bat her doll eyes at Remus, frowning in the cutest way possible. Stellar performance.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that!”

“But I’m really curious! And Jette feels bad about it.”

Remus looked at me. “You do?”

“Of course, I do. Felt bad about all of it. Feel bad about all of it. I didn’t want my naiveté to cause anybody any harm…”

“For the one thousandth time: Not your fault”, Peter said, stern face and voice.

“Just tell them, man”, James demanded. “They’ll be bugging us about it anyway and he’s just being dramatic.”

“You tell them.”

“Fine! Cricket kept going on about how de… Jette – feels weird to say that –“

“I know. We’ll all get used to it.”

“… how Jette was a tease and did all of it on purpose. He got really angry. Sirius told him to calm down and asked whether he honestly believed Jette would do that. But that didn’t help and Cricket got even more furious and called you some nasty names, apparently”, James said, head turned to me, face apologetic.

“Sirius said something along the lines of: “No wonder she doesn’t want you if that’s what you think of her. You don’t deserve her. ‘And that was the last straw and Cricket hit him.”

I stared at him open-mouthed.

“He didn’t!”

“You saw the lip Milla, it wasn’t there before he took Cricket away.”

“Not what I mean. Crick didn’t really call her a slut, did he?”

“Sirius didn’t give us the details. But something like that I’m sure.”

Not only did he get beat because he helped me out. He also got beat because he defended me. I had expected him to have told Crick that I wasn’t worth the drama. Not that he didn’t deserve me. Good thing I told him that people didn’t give him enough credit when he still talked to me. I hadn’t given him enough credit. Not by a long shot.

“Has he gone mental?” Nica’s yelling got me out of my head and I closed my mouth. “He’s known her her whole life, he knows that she’s as much a slut as skunk!”

“Thanks, love. But he was really upset. I don’t think he meant it.”

“Sounds like you haven’t talked to him yet”, Peter found.

“Not since New Year’s.”

“Your decision or his?”, Peter asked on.

“Both I’d say. I don’t even know where to begin and he probably still hates me. Jonas said he’d calm down but I doubt it. Couldn’t wait to get away from me after Dad dropped us off at the station.”

I heard their voices shouting and arguing before I even entered the foyer. I knew that it was them before I saw them.

“Are you really that thick!?! Of course that’s what she’d say. As if she’d admit to it!”

“You know her! As if she’d ever do it!”

“Why would Crick lie?”

“He doesn’t on purpose, you idiot. He’s hurt. He’s overreacting.”

“So, you’re taking her side? You think what she’s done is okay?”

“Not falling for someone who fell for you? Yeah, that’s okay!”

“What about her leading him on?”

“Mer-lin! She didn’t! Or did you see her do that?”

Magnus fell silent for a moment to think whether he had and I used the opportunity jump in between them.

“Chloe, you promised me you wouldn’t argue about it. Please, just agree with him and be together and be happy.”

“He thinks you kept Crick on the hook for kicks!”

“So, what? I really don’t care, Chloe. I know that Crick hates me. I expect him to convey that to his friends. Magnus is a good friend. He believes what Crick says. Just agree with him and be done with it.”

“But you didn’t do that, Jette!”

“Chloe, please! I don’t need to ruin anybody else’s January. Crick’s fuming, Sirius’ got a bloody lip, Jonas is all awkward. You two will not fall victim to this goddamn drama! As soon as Crick doesn’t give me looks of death anymore, I’ll talk to him and try to clear it up. Until then I’m perfectly fine with Magnus and Toby wishing the Dragon pocks upon me as long as you’re still his”, I vaguely gestured at Mag. “girlfriend.”

Not waiting for an answer I pulled her with me by her arm, leaving Mag and the rest of our friends behind. I dragged her into the common room, made her promise again that she would not argue with Mag over me and went up to my dorm. I was not perfectly fine with Magnus and Toby wishing the Dragon pocks. I hated it. Just like I hated Crick looking at me in disgust. Just like I hated Sirius not looking at me at all. Just like I hated Jonas avoiding me. Just like I hated keeping secrets from and lying to my friends.

I kept hating all of that for the next three weeks. Because for those next three weeks it all stayed the same. Mag and Toby were mad at me, Crick looked at me like I was some disgusting insect, Sirius ignored my existence, Jonas avoided me and I had to keep secrets from my friends. In order to not keep lying to them, though, especially after they noticed that Sirius ignored me and asked me about it, I became quite the loner.

In the beginning I made up excuses to head back to the common room after meals and smoke at the terrace instead of going with the rest. But by the second week I didn’t say anything anymore.

I had volunteered for all the things in the prefect meetings and taken on more nightshifts than I needed, just to have excuses to get away and be quiet a lot of the time. To keep busy and alone in the weekends I hardly did any of my homework through the week, so I had to do it then. The time I gained by that on week nights I spent either reading in my bed, chatting to Felix or writing to my parents. Actually, for the first time since homesickness-stricken first year I wrote lengthy letters home. In the first one I had explained what had happened with Crick and all the consequences. Turned out that Mr and Mrs Cricket had heard all of it from Jonas on the first of January and informed my parents immediately. They told me to keep my head up and hope for the best.

The second one was only addressed to Dad. Although I thought that he had told Mum all about Sirius but I didn’t want to feel the risk. I asked him what his pretermitting me meant and how I should deal with it. He said he didn’t know. That I should probably ask him that. Assure him that I was his friend. Stuff like that.

The only good thing that came from all this heartache was that Chloe and Magnus stopped arguing when I disappeared into isolation. I didn’t really know why but I was happy about it. Those two were meant to be together. But I loved Chloe for being on my side.

“Protego!” Joe’s Tarantallegra didn’t hit me. We were going through the common defences and counter jinxes in Defence against the Dark Arts.

“Locomotor Mortis!” He reacted well too late and his legs got locked in their current position. I gave Joe a moment to think of the counter jinx but he gave up quickly and shot me a look.

“Mitterio”, I waved my wand at him.

In his next attempts he threw arrows and ropes at me which I easily countered with two Impedimenta-spells before I had him laughing on the ground and disarmed.

“Very nice, Miss de Witt, very nice. Go on like this and your practical OWL should be a walk through the park.”

“Thank you, Sir.”

Joe had used Professor Horton’s interruption to throw the Pimple jinx at me and it worked but hardly long enough to even register. “Finite Incatatem!”

“Oppugno!” I pointed my wand at my empty bag first and Joe second but his Protego worked out this time.

“By the Sirens, Jette, give me a break”, he huffed, smiling, clearly impressed with himself.

“Sure.”

“Miss de Witt” Professor Horton came over to my desk. “You know that there are extra points in the practical exam for conjuring a Patronus, don’t you.”

“Indeed, Sir, I do.”

“Why don’t you give this a read while Mr Fox catches his breath. I think you’ll find it understandable and not too challenging.” He handed me parchment with instructions and illustrations on how to produce a Patronus.

“I think you’re more than capable of getting those extra points. At least for conjuring a non-corporal one.”

“Thank you, Sir. I appreciate it.”

I studied the illustrations first. Nothing overly complicated. Hold out the wand in front of you, arm fully extended. Once your Patronus had materialised you could direct it with your wand to wherever you wanted it to be. Simple enough. On to the instructions.

“To conjure a Patronus one has to focus all positive energy into the spell. This can be done most effectively when thinking of a happy if not the happiest memory one has. It seems important to note that said memory mustn’t be tainted by melancholy, sadness, nostalgia or any other negative feeling. Alternatively one can manufacture a happy scene in one’s head. In this case the scene should be imagined to every last tiny detail, including the voices of present people, every leave in the background and the position of the sun and the cast shadows. One needs a vivid imagination to conjure a Patronus with such a thought. Once the happiest memory is fully formed before one’s inner eye, the wand is raised to stretched arm and the charm’s formula Expecto Patronum is spoken. This is the very moment the memory needs to be visible, audible and felt as this is the moment the positive energy is concentrated into the spell. If the memory was strong enough and the caster concentrated enough the Patronus will now appear, either in corporal or in non-corporal form. The corporal Patronus is the strongest of Patroni, capable of providing protection against most offensive spells and very capable of keeping a dementor at bay. Corporal Patroni take the shape of whatever creature best represents the caster’s personality or values. A non-corporal Patronus manifests as silvery dust or mist and is a weaker version of the charm. While lesser attacks can be successfully avoided, not all offensive spells can be warded off. Furthermore, a non-corporal Patronus can sometimes be useful against dementors but not always. A Patronus is directed to defend by pointing the wand at whatever danger one finds oneself in.”

I read the parchment several times while Professor Horton took it upon himself to partner up with Joe. A happy memory. The happiest memory. I took a moment to concentrate.

The ceiling was a dark purple, pink clouds spattered upon it, the moon already visible, the sun not yet fully disappeared. It was breathtaking. I took next to Milla holding her hand. Behind us were four huge tables, filled with students of all ages. Crick sat at the second from the left, wearing a yellow tie, Tristan to his left, Jonas to his right. He had smiled and given us a thumbs-up when we had followed Professor McGonnagal through the path in the middle of the Great Hall. The closer the professor got to the letter S on her sorting list, the harder Milla and I squeezed each other’s hands. Since August we had assured each other that we were too similar and too good friends to be sorted into different houses. It was impossible. Then, again, we saw a set of twins with the last name Brown be sorted into two Ravenclaw and Slytherin respectively. Twins were probably as alike as possible. “Scribe-Anderson, Milla!” A last squeeze, then I let go of her hand. She walked up to the chair calm and collected on the outside but I knew that she was going just as crazy as I was. The hat was placed on her and fell silent. Milla mumbled to herself, pulling her forehead in wrinkles. “Hufflepuff!”, the high but enormously loud voice yelled through the hall. Crick’s table applauded and stood up. Milla smiled in relief, grinned at me and took her seat between Tristan and Crick at the yellow table. Part one of our plan had been a success. We wanted to be in the same house as all the Crickets. They were like brothers anyways and we wouldn’t be fully alone in the quest to navigate the terrifyingly big castel. Part two of the mission was to get me into Hufflepuff as well. Milla had done her job. Now only I could screw it up. I got more nervous by the minute watching the T’s, U’s and V’s all take their seat on the little stool and getting sorted. “de Witt, Jette!” She didn’t pronounce my name right. She’d said Dooit. Whatever, I thought, more important matters to attend to. I hoped I looked as cool as Milla when I walked up to the little podium but I doubted it. Professor McGonnagal gave me a surprisingly warm smile, then the Great Hall disappeared when the big hat fell over my eyes. “Interesting, interesting. Both parents Hufflepuffs, but grandparents in Ravenclaw and Gryffindor… A strong need for harmony, for companionship. You don’t like being alone.” I shook my head. I didn’t. “Your friends are important to you. You’d let nothing ever happen to them, hm? And I see a strong sense of justice in you. Of tolerance. A need for equality. Will you do the best you can in your classes?” I nodded. Of course I would. This was the coolest thing ever. I wanted to do well and learn as much as humanly possible. “Well, then, I think it’s safe to say that you’re a HUFFLEPUFF!” My face lit up. Hufflepuff. Like Milla. Like Crick. Like Jonas. Like Tristan. I would be with my family. Thank Merlin. I jumped off the stool and skipped over to the applauding table, got pulled into a hug by Jonas and high-fived by Tristan. Milla beamed and pushed Crick away so we could sit next to each other. “Told you everything would be fine, Libby, haven’t I? We’ll be best friends and siblings for the next six years. Nothing will ever get between us, I promise”, Crick said when he offered me some pumpkin juice. I believed him.

I concentrated hard on that feeling lightness and joy and relief when I had been sorted in the only house that was a real option for me. I raised my wand, took another moment and said the spell. Absolutely nothing happened. Nothing of interest, that is. I realised that my eyes had started burning and a lump had built in my throat.

He’d promised nothing would ever come between us. Seemed I wasn’t the only who lied. I fought back the tears and forced myself to regain my composure. The last thing I needed right now was a nervous breakdown in front of 30 students.

For the fifth time I read the instructions on the parchment. The memory mustn’t be tainted by melancholy, sadness, nostalgia or any other negative feeling. Should have taken that into account. With the state I was in at the moment every memory that had Crick in it would be tainted by nostalgia, melancholy, anger, despair, the urge to yell at him and longing for better times. No chance to cast a Patronus with a memory that starred him.

That basically knocked out at least 90% of all my memories. Crick had been a constant in my life just like Mum, Dad and Felix. Or Milla. What was left? A couple of holidays my family had taken, none of them bad but none of them the happiest memory either. Those were out. I loved going on holiday but the feeling I had when I knew I was going to sleep in the same room as Milla and eat every meal with my ‘brothers’ was practically unbeatable.

Head on my desk I ignored the shouting and laughing around me, trying to find a memory that would come even close to the one that had just nearly made me cry. Was there any.

“Look out!”

“Protego!” Pure instinct. I heard the scream and felt a little breeze and conjured the protective invisible wall without even thinking and before I had looked up. No thirty centimetres in front of me on eyelevel floated a chair, legs pointed at me. Who was so stupid as to throw chairs at their friends? “Finite Incatatem.” The chair fell to the ground with a lot of noise that was even louder because the entire class had stopped duelling to watch me get impaled by dumb piece of wooden craftsmanship.

“Impressive display of reflex, Miss de Witt. And impressive execution of the protection spell. 20 points to Hufflepuff.” He addressed the rest of the class. “Take note. This is excellent defence and a guaranteed “O” in your OWL exam. This kind of quick thinking and self-preservation is at the core of your lessons for Defence against the Dark Arts. Now, don’t stand around! On you go and practice.”

Chloe and Blair came over.

“Wow. I knew you were good but I didn’t know you could do all those spells in your sleep”, Blair grinned at me. I weakly smiled back. It had been forever since we’d had an actual conversation. My self-inflicted isolation hadn’t given us many opportunities.

“Thanks, mate.”

“I thought McAllen would blind you!”, Chloe gasped. “Idiot! If you don’t know how to use the goddammn spell, then don’t.” She quickly punished him with a very disapproving look. He still stood frozen in place.

“Poor thing”, Blair found.

“Oi, McAllen, I’m fine. No hard feelings, okay? Just practice with pillows for the time being, yeah?” He looked at me in shock. I smiled as warmly and reassuringly as I could manage and he slowly unfroze.

“Shit, de Witt, I’m sorry, man. I meant to use the jacket.” Well, he would not apply to the auror offices any time soon, that was certain.

“It’s all good. Don’t sweat it.”

“He’s got you on Patroni?”, Chloe asked, my parchment in hands.

“Yeah, but it’s gonna take a while before that’ll ever work.”

“I don’t think so. You’re excellent at Defence.”

“Be that as it may, most of my happy memories have Crick in them. So, not exactly untainted…”

“Still no progress on that front then?”, Blair rubbed my back while she exchanged looks with Chloe. They were worried. Of course they were. They were good friends and had more than just noticed that I kind of fled the room whenever they entered.

“Nope. He still looks at me like I’m the love child of a ghoul and a mountain troll.” Chloe snorted. “Charming picture.”

“He’ll come around. Mag’s already coming around to the idea that you might not be an evil bitch but just an unobservant naïve little thing. And if he does, so will Crick.” A flicker of hope lit up in my heart.

“That’d be great”, I admitted.

Horton shooed them away to get back to duelling and I looked back down at the Patronus instructions. What other really good days had I had? Moments of pure delight?

The first thing that came to mind was the last Saturday before Christmas break. No worries, a snowball fight, a couple rounds of quidditch and some sneaking around in secret passages before going to a glamorous party. That was a really good day. But before I really had chosen a still from that day to use as an inspiration for my Patronus, I realised that it would be just as useless as the memory of my sorting. Negative feelings. Sirius had been with us that entire day. Sirius who wouldn’t look at me, who wouldn’t speak to me, who decided I didn’t exist. Sirius who had moved in with the Potters because his own parents had raised their fists to him, and probably their wands. Sirius who didn’t want anyone to know. Sirius who seemed to think I wasn’t trustworthy.

That memory would never work as an untainted happy one.

Alternatively one can manufacture a happy scene in one’s head. In this case the scene should be imagined to every last tiny detail, including the voices of present people, every leave in the background and the position of the sun and the cast shadows. One needs a vivid imagination to conjure a Patronus with such a thought.

A vivid imagination I had. The nightmares that had tortured me ever since the new year had begun were proof of that. I was either chased down the forest path between Marlow’s Creek and Godric’s Hollow by Crick yelling all kinds of insults at me and grabbing me; or I stood in a dimly lit room with black and green walls watching two faceless figurines with shrieking voices fire spells and jinxes and curses at Sirius who lay on the floor screaming in pain, begging for them to stop, blood all over his face.

In that second dream I was never able to move. I couldn’t help I was absolutely useless and just watched Sirius scream and sob in agony. A mind that can come up with such twisted scenarios had to be capable of imagining a detailed happy scene. Maybe I should give that a go.

“Okay, wands down!” Horton yelled and restored the class room to its usual state by a wave of his wand.

“In the next lesson we’ll continue. I’d like you all to hand in a three foot essay on your strongest and your weakest offensive and defensive spells, then. I’d like to do some individual work with each of you in the next weeks. Class dismissed!”

I packed my bag in record time and rushed to the front table to hand back the parchment.

“Oh, no, keep it. Use it to practice. I’d love to see you conjure a Patronus in that exam.”

“Thank you, Sir. I would, too.”

I pushed the parchment in my backpack and walked out the classroom and to the staircase without taking notice of my surroundings. That had become my new routine. If you don’t see your friends waiting for you, you can’t feel bad for ignoring them.

I entered one of the secret passages the boys had shown us to make it to lunch without having to navigate all the first years that would block the staircases and was about to illuminate my wand when I heard voices and froze in place.

“I cannot believe that it’s just the Crick-thing. Why would she run from us if she has trouble with him?” Blair.

“We all usually came as a combi deal. I mean, for the price of one Scribe-Anderson you got three Crickets and two de Witts. And she definitely saw me talk to him a couple of weeks ago.” Milla.

She was right. I had seen her and Crick talk and laugh in the common room that day. They seemed like nothing had changed between them and I didn’t want to ruin that. It had been the last drop. When I saw that I decided to keep to myself for a while.

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Nica.

“Maybe she doesn’t run from us, maybe she runs from Crick. Crick, who usually comes with a free Milla. Milla who usually comes with a free threepack of friends.”

“But we’re not always with Crick.” Chloe.

“She should know that her chances of running into Crick are like zero when we’re with James, Remus, Peter and Sirius.” When had Chloe switched to using their first names?

“That’s why I said that it’s not just Crick. Since the break Sirius and Jette don’t talk, haven’t you noticed? They used to have those little private conversations all the time an now they don’t even say hello.”

“Remus says that they were gossiping about him and me, when they did that whispering thing. They tried to get us together. Maybe now that we actually have a date there’s no need for that anymore.”

“Even if that’s true, why would they stop talking all together?”, Blair asked and I imagined her imitating McGonnagal’s inquisitive look. An art that she had perfected.

“I bet something happened over break”, Nica commented.

“A lot happened over break”, Chloe shot back.

“I mean something neither one of them is telling us. Maybe they had a fight, maybe they snogged. But something happened I’m telling you. Otherwise she wouldn’t dodge every single human being she knows.”

Touché, Nica. That was nearly spot on. I suddenly felt bad eavesdropping on them and backed out of the passage to take the crowded stairs. At lunch Felix had saved me a seat and I joined the lively discussion he and his friends had about the next quidditch game: Hufflepuff-Ravenclaw. It would take place the weekend after Valentine’s and wasn’t that far away anymore.

When I got up to go for a smoke I passed the girls who had changed subjects and were now planning their day in Hogsmeade. Milla would finally go on that long awaited date with Remus in less than 24 hours and the rest wanted to spill their Christmas money. I had homework to do and thirdyears to tutor. Besides, I was to work the nightshift on Sunday and needed to rest up for that. None of my friends had bought that story but they also hadn’t succeeded in changing my mind.

I was dying to find out whether Milla and Remus would get it together and I would have loved to spy on them in Hogsmeade but everybody would be in the village, from Crick to the Potter-posse and I didn’t need that.

I would have a quiet day in and then interrogate Milla about hers as soon as she got back. While in my head thinking, I didn’t notice where I was going and was rather surprised when I found myself in the courtyard, cigarette in hand. ‘The might of routine”, my mother would have said. I looked around myself. Nobody in sight that would pose a threat to my fragile peace of mind. I inhaled the smoke and instantly the tension in my neck loosened up a bit.

Eyes closed and head rotating I must have stood there for a couple of minutes.

“It’s alive!” I jumped at the voice.

“Hansel, Gretel and the ginger bread house!! You scared the hell out of me, Peter!”

“And it speaks.”

While I had tried to calm down and not be a nervous wreck my friends had obviously gone on their after-meal-date. All of them looked at me. All of them but Sirius.

“Of course it speaks. It always has”, I answered, trying to not sound panicked.

“Thought you’d had enough of us, now that we’ve become noble heroes. Thought maybe we weren’t interesting or exciting anymore.”

“Oh, shush. You know that’s not true. I’m just under the weather from that whole… you know. I’m still as charmed and fascinated by you as ever.” I blew James a kiss. It felt good to be here with them and talk nonsense. I had really missed that over the last few weeks.

“Good. Good. That’s good.”

“Horton has Jette doing Patroni now. As the only one in the whole class”, Blair said proudly, obviously trying to keep me with them by engaging me in the conversation.

“Nice!”, Remus raised his hand for a high-five. “How’s it going?”

“Pretty badly. Turns out most of my happy memories involve Crick and when I think of him I’m not really capable of concentrating my positive energy.”

“Well, that’s just insulting!”, James bellowed.

“How much fun have you had with us, hm? Most of your happy memories should include us, not that sulking baboon.” I smiled.

“I have a lot of happy memories including you, but I’m afraid they’re not as powerful as… I don’t know… first day of school or when I got my first broom. He was there for all of those things.”

“Fair enough.”

“If you need help with the charm, though, I’m sure Sirius would help you out. He got an impossible score on his OWLs last year because his Patronus was perfect. Should be worth a try to learn from the best”, Peter suggested. I hesitated for moment. Sirius had still not recognised my existence. Then I decided that I enjoyed conversations like these and being surrounded by my friends too much to live in isolation because he had a problem he didn’t even tell me about.

“Would you mind helping me out? I mean I’ll give it another go and look through my diaries to think of a good memory but if that doesn’t help could I beg you to take pity on me?” I hoped it sounded sarcastic like usually. Hoped it showed him that we were friends. But he stoically watched the ivy on the other wall and exhaled smoke.

“Sirius? Would you mind?”, I tried again, now a little louder. Still nothing.

“I’m asking you a question.” I was audibly irritated. No, I was fuming. I had done nothing to deserve this childish punishment.

“By Merlin’s Beard, Sirius, we all know that you can me hear me. If you can’t stand the sight of me, fine, but at least have the decency to tell me no.” No reaction at all. Like I was a bird chirping in the distance.

“This is ridiculous, do you realise that? I’ve done nothing wrong! I was just there. I didn’t even ask the stupid question. That was my dad. And he only made small-talk, he was being polite. The one who actually told me – no him! – was Euphemia and I doubt that you neither can nor should be mad at her, because she had no bad intentions whatsoever. But the one person you can’t blame for anything is me, Sirius! I was just there! And I didn’t know what she would answer, how could I? If I’d known I’d just left that damn kitchen. I didn’t know, though.

And I don’t see why you need to pretend that I don’t exist. It doesn’t make sense. What have I done to deserve that, huh? Nothing. It was obvious you didn’t want me to know and so I pretended I never did. But you had already decided that I wasn’t worth your time or attention anymore.”

“Oh no, that’s what this is about?”, James cut me off.

“I didn’t even think of that”, Remus commented. “Never realised it was news to her.”

“What d’you want me to do? I’ve already tried pretending it never happened, I’ve tried avoiding you – at a high cost, by the way because that meant I had to avoid basically of my friends – and counting this very interaction I’ve tried asking you to not shut me out.

And I’m done trying! I’m done sitting around alone. I’m done feeling absolutely terrible without even knowing why. I’m done with the nightmares and I’m done lying to my best friends. And that doesn’t mean I’ll tell them what I heard but I will answer their questions and I will be around, so you’ll have to deal with it! Okay?” Of course I didn’t even get so much as a flinch.

“Okay. Great. Glad we talked about it. Now who has a light that works?”

Peter lit me up, eyes darting between me and Sirius.

“Jette, I’m so sorry. I didn’t realise you didn’t know. If I had I’d straightened this one out weeks ago.”

“It’s not your fault, James.”

“It kind of is.” James aggressively dragged Sirius away from us and started quietly shouting at him. Remus hugged me.

“Tell me he is not the reason you kept away.”

“Well, him and Crick. Hard to avoid the both of them without avoiding you.”

“He’s an idiot. And so are we. It didn’t even register that it happened.”

“Again, not your fault.”

“What is even going on?”, Milla asked, hugging me. “What on earth was this all about?”

“Not my story to tell, Milla.”

“But…”

“ It’s his business and he obviously wants no one to know. I might be done attempting to be his friend but I still have principles.”

“Did you say nightmares?” Peter had sat down on the stone bench and didn’t even look at me.

“I honestly don’t know what I said, Pete.”

“Do you have nightmares because of it?”, he rephrased his question.

“That doesn’t matter. What matters is that you all have not yet gotten rid of me!”

“I think it matters.” Peter got up and joined James and Sirius who were now standing at the staircase to the owlry, both gesturing a lot with their arms, obviously arguing.

“Will nobody clue us in?”, Chloe wanted to know after a while.

“All of this happens and we don’t get to know why or how?”

“Jette’s right. It’s not our place. He’ll come ‘round.” Remus absentmindedly played with Milla’s hair, before he joined his friends.

Under normal circumstances we would have all freaked out about that little gesture of intimacy and affection but there were other matters to attend to.

“I mean you could’ve just told us that something was up if you didn’t want to spill a secret”, Blair started but the bell rang and they had to get to their second to last Astrology class. I stayed behind staring at the doors to the foyer. Then I looked back at the boys, all engaged in a very passionate discussion.

#marauders fanfiction #marauders era #james & peter & remus & sirius #james potter #remus lupin #sirius black #peter pettigrew #original character

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minaminokyoko · 4 years ago

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The Old Guard: A (Disappointed) Spoilertastic Review

I hate 2020.

For many reasons, of course, but there is this particular nastiness it seems to have, like it’s getting revenge on us for our past and current sins.

And the Old Guard feels like part of that revenge.

I haven’t read the graphic novel, so please understand the following review is based on the film alone. I was on board with getting to see my queen and girl crush Charlize Theron kick some ass and rock that bangin’ brunette pageboy haircut that only she can and yet what this movie gave me is a raging case of 2020. This concept isn’t anything new or original, but it should have been a walk in the park. It has solid actors and a simple premise.

So why was it total bullshit?

I’m so angry. I’ve said before how certain movies feel like someone had all the ingredients to make a hot, delicious pizza and yet when they combined them, they came up with Brussel sprouts somehow. This movie is a lazy mess. It has about a handful of decent moments, but overall, it’s negligent. It doesn’t care. It doesn’t care to show you its potential. It’s just a tired, by the numbers, dull action movie that’s wasting the talent that it managed to gather together. Maybe that’s why I’m so mad. It’s clear that this could have been fantastic, but the apathy in the writing turned into a grey, flavorless bore.

Sigh. Let’s swing the ax already and get this over with.

Overall Grade: C-/D+

Spoilers ahead.

Pros:

· I signed on for Charlize Theron and at least I got what I wanted, which was her kicking ass but still giving us a few soft moments of vulnerability. This is why I will follow this woman to the grave. Charlize Theron is one of my favorite actresses because she’s so good at showing what women are capable of as characters. She has such a wide range of acting skills, giving us a cold, bitter woman but at the same time showing hints of inner kindness and strength and love. This movie barely has many redeeming qualities, but she’s by far one of the best parts. The movie knows it, as she is the only one we really get to “know” over the course of the film.

· Joe and Nicky are the only other characters providing any warmth or emotion in the film. It’s badly needed. I was so let down that they didn’t show Nile’s introduction to the team because, to me, I got the sense that Joe and Nicky are the heart. They seem in touch with their emotions and not as cynical and hardened by their “immortality” as Andy. They seem to still care about helping people, even at the cost of themselves, and they could have been such a strong anchor if the movie invested more time in them. Both actors are solid and believable in the roles and it’s a pity they weren’t given more to do than to be the victims who needed rescuing.

· The action, for the most part, is solid. It’s pretty average, though. Nothing surprising. It’s the moves you’ve seen if you watched John Wick or Atomic Blonde, so keep that in mind.

· The effects are solid, particularly for their healing factor. It’s smooth and polished looking.

· What little bits and pieces we see between teammates is likable. They seem genuinely fond and protective of each other and it’s not in focus enough, but when it is, it’s nice.

· The soundtrack is pretty good.

Cons:

· Lack of explanation. Look, I get it. You don’t want to load your entire movie up with exposition, but it’s very simple and easy to pace it out. You don’t have to dump it all in one spot, or if you do, then you can simply be strategic about it. Most good movies also know how and where to integrate the exposition and story into sequences where the characters are performing an action so that you don’t notice the exposition as you have something visual to distract you and keep your attention while you’re watching the movie. The Old Guard doesn’t care about all your questions. It just thinks you should accept whatever it jams down your throat, no matter how goddamn unbelievable it is. They explain so little of what’s going on to Nile that after the halfway point, you might as well throw up your arms and forget everything you wanted to know about the group. They answer nothing at all, yet expect Nile to throw in her lot with them for however long she’ll be alive. What’s frustrating is that you have solid actors who could pull off the emotional angles of the hard decisions they chose to make as semi-immortal beings. It pisses me off that they don’t explain anything because the motivations are what make us all care about the characters. For instance, why become soldiers? No one said they had to fight for humanity, especially since they JUST heal wounds. They aren’t super fast or super strong. They could have very easily simply acquired wealth over the centuries and used that wealth to invest in things that help people. Why do they have to be fighters? Oh, right, because it’s cooler.

· Lazy writing. The number of plotholes in this thing, due in part to lack of explanation, is stunning. I mean, it’s just so goddamn fucking lazy. It doesn’t care about its own material. It just needs to get from Point A to Point B by taking the most shortcuts possible. I can’t handle how little the movie cares about its own content. I can go point by point for laziness. We can start with how no one wanted to ask Nile ANYTHING after she came back from the dead. They just got mad and scared, but they didn’t say anything when she was still on the military base. What the actual fuck is that? And they just left her alone afterward, expecting her to follow orders? Uh, that’s not how that works. Her friends would be asking her a billion questions and the medics would have asked her even more questions than that. She wouldn’t just be walking around of her own free will, especially not in this day and age where science is obsessed with figuring out the why of humanity. They’d have kept her locked up and started examining her the second she healed the neck wound. And that’s just right off the cuff. Don’t get me started on her five second “I don’t want to march in your parade” bullshit that is just so clearly the second act breakdown moment to have the hero come back and save them in the third act schtick. How is Nile somehow calling out Andy for killing those men in the church when she was LITERALLY a Marine, who is TRAINED TO KILL BAD PEOPLE???? That made NO sense. But again, this movie doesn’t care. It doesn’t care about fucking anything. Booker’s betrayal was painfully telegraphed and it was also another plothole, as Andy has been alive for thousands of years and would have felt that the weight of her gun would be off without its ammo. She also would’ve checked her rounds before going in hot. Then there’s even smaller details, like it being broad daylight when they’re brought into that lab and then they have a shootout but there’s NO ONE on the streets when they leave, but then they leave and THEN all the people magically reappear. Go fuck yourself. This movie is an insult to average intelligence. It just expects you to open up and swallow every bit of its bullshit over and over again, squandering its own potential. It’s so infuriating.

· Cliché placeholder dialogue. The dialogue is so unimaginative that I’m pretty sure a bot wrote it. You can tell beat for beat what’s going to happen fifteen minutes before it happens on-screen. The movie really does not think much of its audience. It doesn’t have a unique take on pretty much anything at all, which is a crying shame, really. There are plenty of juicy angles for character and action that they could have gone for and didn’t.

· Not enough time is spent getting to know anyone except for Andy, and even she is given drive-by characterization. Nile is a huge loss. As a black woman, I am always dying to see black women in science fiction/fantasy stories because there is a severe lack of representation. I was hoping Nile would get a bigger stake in everything, but she’s just a chess piece. The movie doesn’t delve into her life, her wants, her needs, basically anything at all. They mention her family repeatedly, but they don’t go into detail to make you care and understand what a loss it is to leave them behind. It’s especially shitty when her bonding with Booker could have been a great emotional moment. Their origins line up well. She could have had conversations with him, arguing that she should be allowed to tell her family or at least say goodbye, and Booker could share his own tragic backstory with her to explain why it’s better for them to remain solitary. Then his betrayal would have hit even harder. Then Nile would have felt personally betrayed. It’s so ridiculous that there is all this set up of pain and interesting backstories that the movie just flatout ignores. Especially Quynh. Quynh ’s story will haunt me for the rest of my days, personally, but even that was left as an untied thread. It’s clear from that pompous ending that there’s either already a sequel planned or in progress, but personally, this movie let me down so hard I hope it doesn’t happen. Not unless a much better filmmaker and writing team comes along. Quynh’s untied thread is a blatant show of how they still think they deserve your time after showing you how little they care about their own material. They introduced the idea and then abandoned it without fully exploring what it meant. It’s clear that her horrible fate is painful to them all, so not giving it the adequate time to be explored is just even more insulting to the audience.

· Lack of imagination. For instance, we have some Mark Zuckerberg-looking villain spouting the same tired dialogue from the idiot villain in the Venom movie. There also is no creativity in the action. We could have done some fun things utilizing their healing factors during fight sequences, but there’s not much to them. Just standard punches and kicks and headshots. Then there’s the boring dead wife betrayer guy who is inexplicably left alive after accusing said cartoony villain of murdering them. He has ALL the information to take to the CIA or FBI or just ANYONE IN GENERAL IN INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES and they just bop him on the head and leave him there??? This movie doesn’t have a single original thought. It’s just regurgitating other clichés from much better movies.

I wanted this to be good. I wanted a break from 2020, but it’s clear that this year is unprecedented in how terrible it can get and how it doesn’t want us to enjoy anything. I wish I didn’t have to say these things about this movie, but I do. I honestly don’t think it’s worth a watch and that people should avoid it. It’ll inevitably do well because people don’t have anything better to do, but that’s still a shame. I’m so disappointed in all its wasted potential and I always will be.

Kyo out.

#The Old Guard #movie review #film review #spoilers #spoiler alert #Charlize Theron #new movie #new release #Netflix

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yiangchen · 6 years ago

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post 6x02 bellarke (4,346 words).

okay, so a few things. first, i wrote this after watching 6x01 and 6x02 when they were leaked, so i hadn’t read the 6x03 synopsis to know that the only ones going back to the ship were bellamy, octavia and echo.

also, yeah i’m well aware that there’s going to be a rave, not a ballroom dance, but in this fic, it’s a ballroom dance.

lastly, this is not in any way realistic in terms of what i really think we’ll get this season for blarke. i have hope for /something/ this season, but definitely not all of this.

oh, and one more thing! if you want to cry, listen to “happiness does not wait” by olafur arnalds on repeat while you read. hope you enjoy!

tagging @traitorwhoyoulove <3 because she wanted to be tagged!

don’t go, you’re half of me now

It took ten stitches to close up the wound on Bellamy’s leg. Clarke felt each one of them even though it wasn’t her skin being pierced.

Now, she sits on a chair beside his bed in the infirmary. Neither of them have spoken a word to one another since it all went down, but after a long while, Bellamy is the first to speak.

Before he thinks better of it, he reaches out to brush his fingers along the bruises that mare her neck. He swallows. “I’m so sorry, Clarke.”

Her eyes flutter shut, staying closed just a moment, even once he’s dropped his hand. “At least you weren’t in your right mind. I was when I—”

“You were trying to stop me from going after Murphy,” Bellamy cuts in, brushing her off. That isn’t something she should feel guilty for. If anything, he’s grateful she slowed him down to save Murphy. The guy hasn’t exactly been empathetic. It’s admirable that she still instinctively rescued someone who hasn’t been giving her the light of day.

But that wasn’t all that Clarke was referring to, and so she shakes her head, the guilt setting in and making her eyes water. “No,” she says, soft. “Not just that…”

Bellamy doesn’t have to ask what she means. He can still feel the contact her hand had made with his cheek weeks ago. “Clarke…”

Her bottom lip trembles. Part of Bellamy wants to reach out to steady it, and he instantly feels guilty about it.

Another traitor who you love.

“I know you said you weren’t mad at me,” she says, tears in her eyes now that make her voice waver, “but you should be.”

Bellamy sighs, shaking his head. “The only thing that I am is confused.”

“Confused?”

“You called me every day for six years, and then you left me to die in the fighting pits.”

“I’m so sorry, Bellamy.”

“I know you are. I’m not asking for an apology, Clarke.”

“Then what are you asking for?”

“An explanation, I guess. I don’t know…”

Clarke sighs. “I was just so scared.”

A muscle in Bellamy’s jaw starts working at that. “It was more than that.” He brings a hand to his cheek, where she slapped him.

Clarke’s eyes fall away from his. “You broke my heart,” she admits, not looking at him.

It’s since been mended, but he’d asked for the truth, and the least she can do is give it to him.

Raven, Echo, Murphy and Emori are my family.

Sometimes, she still fears he doesn’t see her as family too, but then she looks at him, sees his lips part, and he’s looking at her in that soft, broken way he does, and she knows.

She’s one of them. She never stopping being one of them. And though the others hate her right now, Bellamy doesn’t. He’s still here, right by her side, making sure she feels included, caring for her, looking out for her. All those things tell her she’s part of the family. And if not theirs then his.

“Clarke…”

She finds herself lost in his pained, watery gaze. “It’s okay.”

“Nothing about this is okay, Clarke.”

“Maybe not,” she amends. “But I know something now that I didn’t then.”

Bellamy’s heart nearly stops. Does she know that he—?

“When you promised me you’d keep Madi safe, you meant it.”

Bellamy releases a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Oh.

“You kept her safe, advised her, and I know you would have done the same had I listened to you.”

Bellamy opens his mouth, closes it. “Why didn’t you?”

Clarke swallows.

“I raised Octavia pretty much all on my own, so trust me, I get feeling like you’re the only one who can protect them, Clarke. But...did you really think I hadn’t thought things through? That I wasn’t going to protect Madi with my life?”

“I didn’t know what to think, Bellamy. I wasn’t really thinking at all. I didn’t know you anymore, and it was like—” Her eyes water further, voice breaking suddenly. “It was like I couldn’t breathe.” She shakes her head. “I couldn’t breathe.”

“Clarke…”

“You had always meant safety to me, and in my panic, suddenly you didn’t, and I just couldn’t breathe.”

Bellamy reaches for her hand. Clarke’s eyes flutter closed.

“And now?” he asks softly.

She opens her eyes into his, head cocked to the side. “Now what?”

“Do you feel safe with me?”

Clarke’s lips twitch with a watery smile. “Yeah. Of course.”

“You sure?”

Clarke nods. There are a lot of things she’s not sure of, but Bellamy isn’t one of them.

“Ms. Griffin,” a voice says then, breaking them from the moment. She turns to see a nurse approaching them. “Our leader has sent for you.”

Clarke nods again. Before leaving, she turns back to Bellamy. “I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Be careful.”

Clarke smiles at him, a closed-lip one that has his eyes softening. “I will,” she says, and before she loses her nerve, she leans in to press a kiss to his cheek; a silent apology, a promise of never again, and an I’ll see you later all in one gesture.

She means to move away the moment her lips leave his cheek, but she lingers. His eyes have fluttered closed, and he’s making no move to pull away. She means to. She really does.

But then his nose brushes hers and her forehead presses to his own, and she just gets lost in his warmth. In him.

And she swears she hears him whisper her name, soft and just for her, before someone clears their throat from behind them, and Clarke instantly pulls back.

It’s Raven. She’s got her arms crossed over her chest and an angry glare in her eyes that has Clarke needing to get the hell out of there.

“I’m um—” Clarke fumbles with what to say, flustered as she backs out of the room. “I’m gonna go.”

And then she does.

Bellamy just swallows, and when he finally finds the courage to look at Raven, he winces.

“What the hell did I just walk in on?”

“She just,” he brings a hand to the back of his neck, nervous, “came by to check up on me.”

“So have I, and I’m not planning on kissing you.”

Bellamy sighs. “Raven—”

“I’m gonna go check on Murphy. Echo’s on her way to see you now.” Raven heads for the door, stops a moment to look back at him. “You know, your girlfriend.”

Bellamy averts his eyes, a muscle ticking in his jaw. When he looks back, she’s gone, and as he waits for Echo, he knows he’s screwed.

Burying his feelings isn’t something he can do anymore. Even when he’d tried in the past, he knows he must have been so obvious—the boy who unapologetically wore his heart on his sleeve. Though that part of him has been missing these last six years, there was a day he felt a faint glimmer of who he used to be return to him. Uncoincidentally the very same day that Clarke returned to him. He remembers feeling like he could finally breathe again, like his heart was beating for the first time since he lost her—since he left it behind with her on Earth.

And maybe he should known what that meant, but he didn’t. Not until now. Not until a few moments earlier when he’d been breaths away from kissing her, knowing without a doubt, that she loved him too.

He tries (fails) to ignore how cold he feels in Clarke’s absence. How his heart doesn’t beat quite as easily. How it feels weaker.

Clarke Griffin isn’t just another traitor who he loves.

She’s the woman he loves more.

…

Bellamy doesn’t want to go.

When he hears that they have to attend a goddamn ballroom dance, he just does not want to go.

“They’re trying to get us to let our guard down,” he tells Miller as he adjusts his tie in the mirror. Yes, you heard that right. A tie.

Thirty years of his life Bellamy went without wearing one, but here he is. It’s one of the many things he’s doing and already regretting. Bellamy could (should) have stayed with Echo, but Miller had wanted to make up for lost time, and Bellamy didn’t want to turn down the opportunity, but part of him knows this is also because he needs space to think about...things, and he is decidedly not acknowledging that for the time being.

Miller arches an eyebrow at him. “They’re not the Mountain Men, Bell.”

“No,” Bellamy agrees, running a hand through his hair. “But they remind me of them.”

“Just try to relax.”

Bellamy sighs. He can’t.

When Clarke came back from meeting with Russel, their leader, she’d had more questions than answers. He hasn’t had the chance to really talk to her about it alone, neither of them sure how to be around each other after what almost happened, but he knows her, and when she’d said the people here are happy, between the look on her face and the way in which she said it, he gathered she had only been trying to convince herself of that.

He gets it. Monty found this place for them, and she wants so badly for this to turn out to be everything he thought it would. That they can live the life he wanted for them. Bellamy wants that too, more than anything.

But he just can’t shake the feeling. There’s something off about these people. More than the eclipse-induced psychosis they’ve been subjected to. Even just wearing their clothes has him on edge. The party is meant to make them feel safe, and that’s exactly why he doesn’t.

“You ready to head out?” Miller asks.

With one last look in the mirror, Bellamy runs another hand through his hair, feeling guilty that the nerves in his stomach have nothing to do with his girlfriend and everything to do with his best friend.

“Yeah,” Bellamy nods. “Let’s just get this over with.”

…

The first time Bellamy sees Clarke in a dress quite literally steals his breath away, and he swears for just one moment, he really does forget how to breathe.

(Okay, maybe it’s not the first time. He has seen her in a dress before, but that was different. Then, she appeared before him as a grounder. As someone he couldn’t recognize. Now, she’s just Clarke.)

And she looks beautiful.

It’s not so much the dress—a simple navy blue halter—as it is her, with her strikingly blue eyes and the way her blonde waves frame her face. He’s never seen her look so herself. So Clarke Griffin that it has his heart thumping against his ribs.

Just then, she catches his gaze from across the room, and Bellamy knows she already caught him staring at her, slack-jawed, so there’s really no point in trying to pretend he hadn’t been.

But he does anyway.

That’s when Echo appears before him, and he feels another pang of guilt at the smile she sends him. His heart is still beating furiously, but it’s from Clarke and not her.

“Hey,” he sighs, knowing what he has to do. “Could we go somewhere and talk?”

Before she can answer him, they’re swept up in the first dance of the night.

After, he tells himself. Just get through the dance.

Only that proves to be quite difficult when they switch partners midway through the song, and suddenly, Clarke is in his arms.

From the look on her face, he guesses she hadn’t expected that he was the face she’d be met with either.

“Hey, princess,” he manages after a moment.

Princess. Clarke ducks her head in a laugh. “You calling me that because of the dress?”

He gives her a look that says you know why I’m calling you princess, amusement in his eyes that make her heart beat a little faster, her chest a little warmer, but that isn’t what he says, and the words are out of his mouth before he can stop them.

“You look perfect.”

Clarke’s lips part at that, and his do too when his brain catches up to his heart, realizes what he just said.

It doesn’t help that with his leg still injured, he’s not the best on his feet, and they’re far closer than they should be, so she can keep him steady, but now she’s too close. Too warm.

Everything about him is so fucking warm. His gaze, his hands, his breath.

And she just wants to be warmer, but he can’t be the one to do that. He’s not hers to have like this. Before she knows it, her eyes are watering. His brow furrows in concern instantly and that really doesn’t help either, so she runs, flees the room.

But of course he follows because he’s Bellamy, and it just upsets her further.

“Clarke,” he calls after her. It’s just the two of them, out in the hallway.

She turns to face him, exasperated as she shakes her head. “What?”

Bellamy’s chest rises and falls with a breath.

The six years he spent without her he’d learned to use his head, but she’s back now. She’s back now and he’s realizing more and more that she brings out who he used to be: the man who acted on impulse, with his heart.

He opens his mouth, closes it.

It has her eyes watering and his heart breaks. He reaches out to her, against his better judgement—because it’s Clarke and he just really can’t fucking think when he’s around her, never learned how—and she pulls away from him.

Don’t.

She doesn’t say it, but it’s clear in her watery gaze, how her bottom lip trembles, and she walks off before he can say anything. His heart screams at him to go after her, but this time he doesn’t follow, just watches her go, hands in his hair.

…

Clarke doesn’t say goodbye to Bellamy when he and the others head back to the Eligius III ship, but she does watch him go—long enough to see him turn back to look at her.

(And it just breaks her heart further.)

…

Bellamy breaks up with Echo that same night when they stop to set up camp for the night.

“You said nothing would change.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What changed, Bellamy?” she presses. He swallows, and Echo just nods. “You never told me.” At Bellamy’s furrowed brow, she explains. “That you were in love with her six years ago.”

“Because I didn’t want to be,” he admits, voice thick with the memories. “Losing her almost killed me. I didn’t want to talk about it.”

“You thought she was dead for six years, Bellamy.”

“Time did nothing to ease the pain.”

Echo doesn’t often cry, but he swears he sees the firelight glinting in her watery eyes. “I thought I did.”

You were just a distraction. He doesn’t say it—would never say something so cruel—but it’s the truth, and they both know it. They were over before they began.

The fire is warm, but Bellamy has never felt colder.

…

When Bellamy returns to Sanctum, he can hardly get to Clarke fast enough.

He was told she was in the art studio, and that’s where he’s headed now, practically sprinting through the halls—well, as close to sprinting as his leg will allow him—but when he reaches the door, suddenly it dawns on him what he’s come to do, and the nerves set in. It takes him a solid few minutes to gather the courage to knock.

“Clarke,” he says when he does.

She doesn’t answer the door, but he hears her call his name in question from somewhere inside. “Bellamy?”

“Yeah, it’s me.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Hey, um, there’s something I need to talk to you about. Can I come in?” A beat, but she doesn’t say anything. “Clarke,” he says, the excitement building in his chest now starting to fade into worry.

“I’m working on something at the moment. Can it wait?”

“I…” Bellamy falters. “I guess, but Clarke—”

“What do you want from me, Bellamy?” she asks suddenly, exasperated.

“You,” he says, without hesitation.

“I—what?”

“I broke up with her, Clarke.”

He can practically hear her heart pounding. “Why?”

Bellamy huffs out an incredulous breath at that. “Because I want you...” he sighs, leans his head against the door and allows his eyes to flutter close, “Only you.”

There’s a long pause before her words break his heart. She sniffles and he knows she’s crying, but what he doesn’t know is that she has her forehead pressed against the wall too, eyes closed. “It’s too late.”

“Clarke,” he says, voice breaking on her name.

“Please just go.”

She’s begging now, further breaking his heart, but he does what she asks and goes.

…

Clarke didn’t mean it.

Telling Bellamy it was too late had been one of the hardest decisions she ever had to make, and she didn’t mean it, but she had to.

She knows now that love isn’t weakness but a strength. That he makes her strong. She knows she’ll always be safe with him, but she fears that he won’t be with her. Leaving him to die is easily her biggest regret, and she of course doesn’t intend on doing it ever again—because she knows now that he cares about her too—but she knows, and has known for some time, that she can’t always save the people she loves.

She couldn’t save her dad, or Finn, or Lexa. All of them are gone, partly because of her. The best thing for Bellamy right now is to let her go before he gets too close and it gets him killed. She doesn’t think she could take that.

So, she told him it was too late for them when everything in her—her heart—screamed at her to just let him in. She told him it was too late for them, so he would let her go.

But Octavia is certainly not helping with that. As soon as the word spread about Bellamy’s breakup with Echo, she just couldn’t help herself.

They’re all seated around the fire now. Murphy and Emori are cuddling against a log, Clarke beside him (aside from Echo, he’s the only one that has let up on verbally attacking her), and Madi at Clarke’s side. Across from them are Bellamy and Raven, and much to Bellamy’s annoyance, his sister, who (to Bellamy’s further annoyance) is wasted.

Bellamy has only had two or three. He’s slightly buzzed, and it’s certainly not enough to take the edge off.

“I mean, we all saw this coming, did we not? He let me send the woman off on a suicide mission.”

That does it, and Bellamy rises to his feet, storming away. He’s not just going to sit here and listen to this.

“Where are you going, big brother?” she calls after him, the nickname stopping him in his tracks. His shoulders tense up.

He exhales sharply through his nose, eyes closed. “Anywhere but where you are.”

“I was just about to tell a story,” she goes on, and Bellamy knows that she’s smirking without looking at her. “Starring you and me.”

He turns and glares at her. He was right. The corners of her mouth have settled into a smirk, eyes taunting him. “Octavia,” he warns.

She turns her attention away from him, gaze landing on a certain blonde. “And featuring one Clarke Griffin.”

Bellamy’s eyes widen. “O—”

“Did Bellamy ever tell any of you the real reason why he poisoned me?”

“Octavia, please.”

“Actually, Bell,” Murphy cuts in, “I’d like to hear this story.”

Bellamy rubs a hand over his face.

“Anyways,” Octavia slurs, and Bellamy shuts his eyes. “There were a lot of things I did to piss Bell off. First it was the fighting pits. Then it was marching my people into sand storms with razor blade winds. Obika. Banishing the devil—or wait, sorry,” Octavia laughs, shaking her head. “Bellamy’s ex girlfriend. I get the two mixed up sometimes.” Madi snorts at that and Clarke sends her a look that has her covering her mouth. “Anyways, where was I…?”

“Echo’s banishment,” Emori fills in, reluctant.

“Right.” Octavia sits down her cup. “Executing the defectors. The worms—”

“Can you please just get to the goddamn point?” Raven cuts in.

“I was about to, but I really do appreciate the enthusiasm. We’re about to get to the good part.”

At that Bellamy’s eyes find Clarke’s, and he swallows, but he can’t look away. Neither can she, even once Octavia goes on.

“All those things made Bellamy angry, but he didn’t do anything that would risk my life. So, what would you all guess changed his mind?”

“The war,” Murphy says. “He had to take you out so it’d be safe enough for Madi to come into power.”

“He didn’t do it for me,” Madi says. “Indra was initially supposed to be the leader in Octavia’s place. Not me.”

“We’re getting off track here,” Octavia says. “Poisoning me had nothing to do with the war. Not really. Of course, I’m sure that was part of the reason. To save you guys,” she motions drunkenly in Raven, Murphy and Emori’s direction. “But he never would have poisoned me if it hadn’t been for something else.”

Everyone just stares at her blankly, brows furrowed, except for Bellamy and Clarke who are still looking at one another. Bellamy because he knows and Clarke because she just can’t figure out what the hell is going on.

Hey, I know this is hard, she had said to him, but she was willing to destroy the last survivable land on Earth just to win a war. Not to mention kill the people we love.

And he had nodded, agreeing with her.

He lied.

Bellamy lied.

“Or rather, someone else.”

Bellamy swallows again.

“I planned on sending the eggs of the worms into the valley to take out Eligius, and Bellamy and Clarke thought they could stop me. Only they thought I was sending the worms, not their eggs. So, when I found Cooper dead in the room where we kept the worms, I knew it was Bellamy and Clarke that got her killed, planning on framing her for letting the worms out accidentally, but when I found them, I only had Clarke arrested and sentenced to die, thinking I could use it as leverage to get my way. If I had power over her life, Bellamy would never stand against me again, but I underestimated him. Because that’s exactly what he did.”

Clarke’s lips part at that, eyes watering.

Octavia turns her attention to Clarke, and it draws Clarke’s eyes to her. “For you.”

Clarke’s chest rises and falls with a breath. If only she’d known. She’d have known sooner how much he cared. She’d have never left him.

“Not just another traitor who my brother loves, as I’d said to him,” Octavia goes on and Clarke’s eyes widen, “but the traitor he loves more.”

Bellamy runs a hand through his hair. Clarke feels like her heart is about to burst from her chest when she finds the courage to look at him again and he’s still looking at her.

She hesitates a moment, then rises to her feet and slowly makes her way over to him, gradually picking up the pace with each step until she’s right in front of him. She opens her mouth, closes it. A watery breath of air escapes her—one that sounds a lot like a sob and nearly a laugh at the same time—and then she’s taking his face in her hands and kissing him, soft but sure, and a little desperate too, but she doesn’t care. Not when he kisses her back instantly, just as desperately, bringing his own hands up to cradle her cheeks.

Clarke pulls away all too soon. “I want you, too,” she breathes, for just him to hear, and she’s close enough to feel his breath hitch. She presses her forehead to his, voice nearly cracking when she says, “It’s always been you.”

Bellamy sniffles. “But you said—”

“I lied.” Her lips twitch with a watery smile. “We’re even now.”

Bellamy’s responding weak laugh has something warm swelling in her chest. Something that she hasn’t felt for some time now. Hope.

And she realizes in that moment that he’s never letting her go, but maybe, just maybe, that’s okay.

Because she’s never letting him go either.

“Technically, you’ve lied more than once,” Bellamy reminds her.

“Well, I never lost faith that you’d come back to me,” Clarke says with a smile, brushing her nose against his and leaning in to kiss him again. “So, hopefully that makes up for it.”

“It does,” he murmurs, just before meeting her halfway.

Clarke’s heart beats with those three words. She thinks back six years ago, when she’d told him to hurry instead of how she felt. She thinks back to each day he was gone. Each day she regretted never having told him.

“I love you,” she says.

Bellamy pulls back to look at her, and he has that closed-lip smile on his face, the one he reserves just for her, when he says it back. “I love you.” The adoration in his eyes has a smile breaking out on her face. “I love you so much,” he says again, softer this time.

Clarke is about to kiss him again when Octavia’s voice interrupts the moment. “My work here,” she slurs, swaying on her feet as everyone laughs and watches her start back towards the capital, “is done.”

Clarke leans her forehead into Bellamy’s chest, laughing, and he wraps his arms around her, pressing a kiss into her hair.

Somehow, no matter what is going on with Sanctum, he knows that with Clarke in his arms, solid and warm and his, everything is gonna be just fine.

#bellarke #bellarke fanfiction #post 6x02 #s6 #the 100 #the 100 spoilers #my writing #canonverse

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redrobin-detective · 5 years ago

Text

I’ll be your hero (whether you want me or not)

It’s Izuku’s birthday and goddamn was I mad craving the chance to write more post-TLWA Deku as a licensed quirkless hero so here we go.

XxX

Izuku charged forward, ducking under the swinging arms coming his way with practiced grace. They attacked him lazily, as if they couldn’t be bothered to give him anymore effort. Normally he’d be willing to stand his ground and engage, bare his teeth and show them how dangerous he could be but he has more important things to worry about now. So he let Kacchan, Uraraka and Todoroki, the more popular quirked heroes take care of the thugs up front while that idiot quirkless kid who actually went through with getting a hero license snuck past. After all, someone had to rescue the hostages.

“Hey what are you doing-” a guard asked but Izuku cut off his stupid question with a uppercut between his ribcage, forcing the air from his lungs. Once he knew the man wouldn’t yell, Izuku grabbed ahold of his shoulders and pulled him down for Izuku to knee him in the face. Hard. He set the criminal down and quietly ziptied him before moving on. Using tricks drilled into relentlessly from Aizawa-sensei during high school, Izuku slunk through the halls, clinging to the shadows and getting the drop on any other criminals he came across. Most were taken down before they even knew they were under attack. He couldn’t help the slightest smirk that crossed his face as took down three more, not too bad for the quirkless Deku who’d never amount to anything. If only his four year old self could see him now.

As soon as he stepped into the next corridor, he smoothed out his predatory stance and smiled at the hostages hovering in the corner. It wasn’t the wide, beaming smiled Yagi-san used to single-handedly beat back the dark. It small, gentle, slightly crooked and full of confidence and humility. “You’re alright now, I’m here to help,” he said, making eye contact with everyone in the room. “I’m going to get you out of here. Is this all of you? Are any of you hurt?”

A few of the adults looked over his shoulder a little anxiously, as if waiting for some stronger hero to bring up the rear and help them. It wasn’t unusual and it happened so often that Izuku barely even felt the twinges of annoyance and inadequacy anymore. Nine total, five adults and four children the youngest being about seven years of age. Not the best group to get out of a sticky situation but he’d beaten worse odds.

“Iida,” He said into his comm, “I have eyes on the hostages, there’s nine of them, a mix of adults and kids. Tell Shou and Kacchan to really light the place up, we’re going to need plenty of cover.” He looked back at people gathered around him. They were scared, not just of the circumstances but of him, worried that he wouldn’t be enough to get them out. To be honest, Izuku had the same fears, had them every time he left his house in uniform. But he’d promised Yagi-san that he would continue on his legacy, One For All or not. Considering he was only 20 years old and ranked #76 on the Hero charts without a quirk or major backing sponsor, he thought he was doing pretty damn good.

“Understood, we await your signal,” Iida said with a clipped voice with the sound of explosions going off in the background before signing off.

“Alright, we’re going to get out of here and we’re going to do it together. I’m sure you all know I don’t have a quirk but I want to know yours, tell me your names and quirks and I promise I will everything possible to get you all out safely.” Introductions given, Izuku directed them outside the shelter of their room, retracing the steps he used to get in. They passed some of the guards who Izuku had dispatched earlier but not all of them.

“Toko-chan, can you see anyone coming?” Izuku asked quietly. The girl, about 13 with no eyes on her face placed her hands on the wall and listened.

“Uh I hear some commotion a bit behind us, they’ve found out we’ve escaped. No alarms yet b-but people are coming this way,” she whimpered out drawing her hands back away from the wall. Her mother pulled her into her arms and the rest began to fearfully murmur to each other.

“Hey,” Izuku said authoritatively but with a soft voice. “We knew we wouldn’t get out without them knowing. This is what we talked about, nothing has changed but I’m going to need you to keep your courage up a little while longer.” There’s a creak and Izuku grabbed a few of his throwing knives. “Hasagawa-san, barrier!”

His knife slipped through just before the gym teacher’s barrier went up. The thugs spikes bounced harmlessly off the mental shield just as he was pinned to the wall by his clothing. A nod of his head and the barrier dropped, Izuku slammed his fist into the man’s face. He went limp and Izuku let him slip to the floor. A woman appeared from around the corner, slamming her hands down on the ground causing layers of stone to appear blocking off their exit.

“No way out now hero, hero,” the villain said with a sarcastic drawl. Izuku hunched his shoulders faking left but darting to the right, snapping out his staff to swipe at the woman’s feet before slamming her face first into the ground. He stood up, staring at the obstacle in front of them and quickly reformatting his plan.

“Deku to Uravity, I’m going to need you to meet us near the entrance I went through, we’ll need your support to get out,” he said into the comm before turning back to the group. “Come on, you’re doing great. This is just a little setback, we’re almost there,” he encouraged, shooting the others a smile. He was pleased to see a few smile back. “Uravity, are you in position?”

“Does Tokoyami wear a black cape?” Ochako teased in-between breathy pants. “Do you even need me or do you just think I need the ego boost?”

“I’ll always need you, gravity girl ” he couldn’t help but grin, the light flirting coming naturally despite the fact that they stopped dating before they even graduated. But some habits died hard but not friendships thankfully, those were a lot sturdier than awkward teen romances. “Nakano-san, I’m going to need your skills. I’ll take care of Mako-kun,” he said reaching out and gently taking the youngest boy’s hand leaving both his father’s hands free.

“My sonic waves aren’t really controllable, once I start I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop,” the man said nervously.

“I know,” Izuku said gently even as he was aware of the yelling approaching them. “That’s why Uravity is close by to catch any debris that falls. Entropy and Explosion are outside causing enough chaos that no one is going to be looking at us.” Another smile, “we can do this.”

The man nodded and the closed his eyes as the stone walls he leaned on trembled furiously. Izuku steadied himself on the adjacent wall before launching himself at a particularly vulnerable crack in the wall, giving them an opening. He began scooping the younger kids through the opening as the roof began to loose integrity.

“Ocha-”

“Got it!” he heard his best friend shout as she bounded around, slamming her hands on parts of the building before they could fall on any of the civilians. “Always got to make a big scene don’t cha?”

“I’ve got to make up for my lack of quirk somehow,” he quipped back, handing Mako-kun back to his father. “Todoroki, Kacchan, make sure a path is cleared on the eastern side we’re moving civilians. Iida I’ll need you to escort them out, ‘Chako and I have company.” He stood in front of the hostages, activating the portable shield on his left arm as fire was thrown their way, “Now Iida!”

“Come now, I will lead you to safety,” Iida said appearing out of nowhere.

“But what about Deku-san,” Izuku heard Ishii-san say.

“Midoriya taught me a long time ago that there are very few things he can’t accomplish when he’s got that look in his eyes.”

“This is just my normal face, Iida,” Izuku countered, going after a few thugs Ochako had floated and slamming them down to the ground with his bo.

“Exactly,” Izuku could hear the smile in his friend’s voice as he began to shepard the civilians away. “I leave the rest to you two.”

“Oh we won’t be long,” Ochako grinned, rolling her shoulders and felt a rush of affection go through him. He had the best friends and the best life in the entire world.

XxX

“Explosion!” one reporter shouted to them as they wrapped up, “what’s your opinion on the decriminalization of quirk use in self-defense?”

“It’s about damn time now shut up and let us do our damn job,” Kacchan snapped, keeping his back to the reporters as he ensured all the villains and civilians were accounted for.

“Ingenium! how did you get the hostages out with all the fighting going on?” Another asked from the crowd.

“As I said earlier,” Iida said tersely, “Deku was the one who found and safely retrieved the hostages. I only got them out of the line of fire while he and Uravity fended off the other criminals.”

“Deku, do you feel your career has suffered since you left the Two Heroes agency run by #1 hero Explosion and opened your own smaller agency?” Another asked and by the way Kacchan’s shoulder’s twitched with agitation, he’d better answer first.

“Red Riot is doing an amazing job taking over my role as partner and I’m proud of the work my friends and colleagues are doing at the agency I helped build,” he politely reminded. “I decided to focus on a different aspect of heroics and I’m happy with what I’m doing at One For All Heroics along with my continued quirk advocacy work.” The questions went back to the other, bigger heroes, asking about their love lives or alliances leaving him mostly alone despite all the company. But he didn’t mind, not really, not anymore.

Because he really was living his best life. He was saving people like he always wanted, he had the best friends in the world who saw his value and gave him the respect he’d earned over the years. Deku might not be a household name like All Might, might not have an impossible quirk passed down the generations but he did believe in the peace started by another quirkless man. He was Midoriya Izuku, he was hero Deku and he was here to help whether or not the world was ready for him.

#fic: the long way around #sorta #boku no hero academia #god I've been thinking about tlwa today #how much i wanted to write my post-yuuei story #and so I just did #I wanted some action #and a chance to show a bit of my thoughts on how Izuku and some of the others progressed post-tlwa #In my proposed sequel Izuku isn't nearly this happy #but this is set beyond that storyline where he IS happy #hes content with what hes accomplished and doing his best to carry on the spirit of true heroism toshi passed onto him #i jsut still love quirkless pro hero izuku so goddamn much

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calcetineys · 5 years ago

Text

Hayden sees it, what it is to have all that power, and not an ounce of control.

Hayden meets Tracy when the older girl is asleep, but she doesn’t realize this at first.

No one did.

Still, Hayden feels that she sees much of what Tracy will later show herself to be. Because Hayden’s first response is to get her out of the classroom, in case there actually is a fire. It seems like the decent thing to do, but it’s more than that. Tracy had been hunched over, looking pained and Hayden hadn’t wanted to leave her there, though she obviously didn’t belong in that class.

She probably should have been scared. She was, she can admit, because what she saw, the broken desk, the tears in the other girl’s clothing, the clawed hands and feet- didn’t make sense. She didn’t realize it at the time, but that was her introduction to the supernatural world.

In the moment though, she saw someone that needed help.

No.

That’s not quite right.

She saw someone that needed someone to take care of her.

It’s not an unfamiliar concept to Hayden. She had to learn to take care of herself earlier than most. It had become ingrained in her, was a part of her even before this paranormal mess. Her first instinct is to do what’s needed to keep her sister, herself and then whoever else might come next, safe. In that order. She could trust Valerie to put her first, that’s how they operated.

It didn’t often occur to her to resent that dynamic.

But right then, Val was safe because she wasn’t there. Hayden herself was fine, because she was able bodied and able to get herself out of the building.

So that left whoever else might come next.

The fact that Tracy dies seems, for a long while after Hayden finds out, small and far removed. Hayden’s used to hearing about deaths, though Val isn’t much for shoptalk. It’s just a reality of living with an officer of the law. She feels a moment of something close to sadness, because the other girl was so young.

What’s surprising though, is that Val doesn’t seem to know about Tracy’s death. No one in the Sheriff’s department does, though it happens the night of some kind of altercation at the station (so the official report says), though she heard about it from the Sheriff’s son. He hadn’t meant to tell her, but Stiles Stilinski is as loud as he is callous, and hearing about the dead girl spoken of so- insensitively just reminds Hayden of why she and Stiles aren’t friends.

She files away the use of the phrase ‘lizard girl’ for later. For later, when she had the capacity to think about how her arm had somehow healed from claws during the walk from the classroom to the bathroom.

Mason, for all his poor judgment that led him to being friends with Liam, is actually a decent person, so no, Hayden doesn’t mind letting him into the club.

That aside, she starts to regret it when his friend spills all the drinks she has to sell and then tries to make up for it with a few crumpled singles.

Remind her never to do anything nice again.

But she wonders, in a quiet voice that won’t leave her alone, if she even needs to worry about the money anymore. If her body even needs the medicine anymore. Because try as she might, she can’t forget the pain of those claws, nor the moment the pain faded. She can’t let it go.

She’s not good at letting things go.

Liam insists on paying her back, because he has a strange complex about settling debts. Though she says that she doesn’t want his money, doesn’t want anything to do with him, it’s not so much his mistakes that make her uneasy. It’s the way he tries to take care of them.

Tries to take care of her problems.

It plays out like a movie, where the misconceptions are replaced by understanding, and she doesn’t like it. She doesn’t like the way he’s not the inconsiderate asshole she’s always made him out to be. She doesn’t like the way he’s actually kind.

She could deal with all that though, if it weren’t for the goddamned way he tries to take care of her. Because that’s not something she could handle. She’s long past the time when she had someone do that, and it was one of the hardest things she’s ever had to accept. She can’t go back to that time, or that mentality.

And she doesn’t want to.

It gets worse when Liam’s insistence on helping her collides with all the strange things that she’s unable to ignore and unable to accept.

All with a stupid glow stick.

Liam tries to explain, and she doesn’t want to hear it, because it makes sense. She doesn’t want her world to change anymore than it already has. She doesn’t want to let go of the way the world made sense.

And then Liam throws all that out the window when he morphs his face into that thing, and when Hayden punches him, it’s one part fear and one part resentment.

Hayden accepts Liam and his alpha’s help, mainly because she can’t exactly not accept the fact that three strange figures just chased her down, or the fact that she now has claws of her own.

Scott is the eerie definition of a do-gooder, but he reminds Hayden of Mason’s innate goodness, so it’s not as hard to let him help her as she would have expected. She’s not an idiot. There’s no way she can handle this on her own. But she doesn’t want them to handle this for her. She also doesn’t want them to help her because of the way Liam’s started to look at her.

The idea of a pack, like they’re actual animals, is all kinds of weird. But if that’s what she needs to survive, fine.

She’s just not going to base her membership on someone else’s romantic ideas.

It doesn’t help that she doesn’t feel the same way.

Because Liam may be kinder than she thought, but she doesn’t feel that way about him. She’s quick to put a stop to it, and Liam responds with, “Oh. I- I mean, that’s…okay? We’re still going to help you.”

She can see why Mason is friends with him.

Hayden understands the struggles that come with taking care of other people. That doesn’t mean she’s happy about the phrase ‘somebody has to be the bait’ being targeted at her.

But she has bigger issues to deal with, because this is so much bigger and darker than she ever expected. Because she understands that few people are as willing to try like Scott, and if he feels those measures are necessary…

So instead she focuses on the fact that she doesn’t have her medicine.

With chimeras dying without fail, she’s not taking any chances.

It probably doesn’t matter when she ends up being the bait, without them even catching their prey.

She wishes she could block out what the Doctors do to her, but she knows she’ll remember the pain, the fear. Fear that doubles when Zach tells her what her death will look like. He looks like death himself, and there’s nothing she can do when he gets dragged away from their prison. She can’t help him.

She can’t help anyone.

Then there’s Theo, with what she’ll later think of as impeccable timing, and he’s breaking down the electric fence to free them. Everything is fuzzy from there, because whatever the Doctors had done to her is really making itself known. She’s in and out on the ride back, and then she’s laying on a couch in a place that seems vaguely familiar, but Liam and Scott and Mason and Malia are there, so it’s okay, right?

It’s not okay, not when she starts bleeding mercury.

Her first thought is of Val, because this will kill her. Then she realizes she’s going to die. And it seems obvious, but she realizes just how much she doesn’t want to die. She thought she understood that when she had her kidney transplant, and everyday that she worked and worked and worked to pay for her medication.

But with that, there was always the chance of survival.

That’s gone now.

Hayden wonders what to do. She thinks about going to Scott, but there’s this fear in her that he won’t be able to help, not with this. And if Scott McCall, savior of Beacon Hills, can’t save her, then who can? She feels like a child, hiding under the blankets so the danger can’t find her. But that’s not the point of it, really.

It’s so she can’t see the danger.

She doesn’t want to know that Scott can’t help her. But… oh, she doesn’t want to have to take care of this anymore. She wants someone to come in with a brilliant rescue, and she’ll deal with her shifting worldview, because she’ll still be alive to have one. She wants Val to be the only strong one, to protect her. She wants her parents, like she hasn’t let herself admit except in the quiet moments where she looks around their empty home and asks why?

She wants someone to take care of her.

But there’s no one that can.

So she does what she always does, and she does it herself.

But there are some things that no one can take care of, and this god-damned nightmare is one of them. Hayden feels it, the dying, and she’s so angry. She wants to scream and scream and scream, because she’s fought to live for as long as she can remember, fought to breathe through losing her family, through losing her health, through trying to rebuild both.

She wants to pull Liam close, so he’ll hear her when she tells him to give those damned Doctors all the hell they’ve unleashed on this pit of a town, but she’s so tired. And Scott and his aren’t ones for revenge. Where’s Stiles when you need him?

She’s so angry because everything has been stolen from her, and they’re hers. Her life, her health, her agency- hasn’t she done enough to keep them? She’d suffer through this hell mouth of a town if only she got to keep them.

But it’s not an option.

They try, to at least keep her life for her. Everything gets hazy, but she’s aware of someone new, someone with a soothing voice and practitioner’s hands, and Hayden wonders who they’ve called in to help her. She doesn’t bother telling whoever it is that it’s useless, because she doesn’t want it to be useless. She doesn’t want to give up the only thing she has left.

But eventually, it’s clear to her that she’s about to lose everything, and the only thing that’s going to be left of her is Valerie. And she wants to hold her, to be held. She knows it’ll be hell on her sister to see her die, but it’ll be even worse for Val to know that she was alone.

And if she can’t have anything else she wants, she at least wants the one constant she’s ever had. She wants to know there’s one thing that hasn’t been taken from her…

When she wakes up, it’s not to Valerie or pain, which is what she’s used to waking up to whenever her health fails. She’s not at home, or the hospital. For some reason, she’s outside, slumped against a tree stump.

And she’s alive.

Because of the boy standing in front of her, telling her that he’s her alpha, and that they’re coming with him. She’s alive…

She goes with him and the others like her.

He takes them underground. Hayden realizes at some point that the boy is Theo, but he seems different. She’s not sure if it’s because everything seems different, or if it’s just him. She feels like she should be upset that everything has changed again, but mostly she just thinks about the fact that she’s alive.

It keeps her from questioning what happened. Why Theo’s not with Scott anymore. Why he’s building his own pack. The answer comes readily either way, when Theo explains that he’s the first of the Dread Doctors’ experiments, the first success.

So.

Stiles was right. A lot of things make more sense now.

Theo tells them that they’re a pack now, and that nothing is more important than pack. Hayden’s not sure how much of his speech she believes, but she knows that he’s the reason she’s alive. He’s the one to pull off that brilliant rescue she’d been hoping for. He’s the one that managed to do anything. The fact that she doesn’t quite trust him, that nothing about this situation feels right, it doesn’t matter so much next to that.

Well, one thing makes her feel normal enough, and that’s talking to Tracy. Maybe it’s just because she hadn’t known the other girl well before they both died, but Hayden feels more like herself when they’re together, like there was something that had potential in her previous life that still has that same potential now.

That’s probably not a good sign. Because she’s looking at Tracy while Tracy’s staring at Theo.

Hayden’s feelings aside, oh, that’s just such a bad idea for Tracy to have.

Especially when Theo doesn’t look at her except to give her orders. Oh, he makes it look pretty, sure, but they’re orders all the same. Hayden wonders what Tracy was like before, that she takes so easily to what Theo gives her. It’s sad, because what he offers isn’t even the scraps of real emotion.

No, oddly enough the closest he’s come to showing that is when he left the morning after he brought them back, saying something about running an errand.

Hayden can’t bring herself to care where he actually went.

Valerie is furious when she shows up at home again, and Hayden’s too tired to argue, or to do anything but hold her back when Val crushes her in an embrace that makes Hayden feel almost alive.

She knows it’s not her fault, but guilt still weighs on her chest at making her sister worry. But… it’s still better than Val watching her little sister die. And Hayden’s going to make sure she never has to.

Still, dragging her along on her shifts is unnecessary, considering Val is a Sheriff’s deputy. It doesn’t exactly scream safety. She thinks maybe Val is just afraid that she’ll turn around and Hayden will be gone.

It’s a valid fear, if only because it’s what Valerie has had to live through.

So she stifles her sighs and goes along with Val. And Hayden thinks she’s got herself oriented to this new life.

And then she’s being chased by a giant, shadowy monster.

Of course.

She listens to her sister and runs.

And runs and runs, and somehow she escapes. She thinks she should tell Theo, because isn’t this something he’d want to know?

Be angry at not knowing.

Theo’s idea of pack bonding is… unsettling. And so much about this situation is already unsettling. Hayden feels something in her gut twist as Tracy gushes about Theo helping her ‘get closure’. Hayden knows herself well even to enough to admit that she can be petty when she’s angry, but what Theo helped Tracy do is not getting closure.

Hayden may never have been friends with Stiles, but they’ve always understood each other. Because they knew what it is to see their only family risk their lives every day. What it is to watch the only person they have leave for work and wonder if they are going to come back.

So yes, Hayden has always understood some part of Stiles, even when first meeting him and being put off by how much he talked, and the strange things he said, and his insensitive way of looking at the world. And she means insensitive. He had years on Hayden on having a family member on the force, and he’d become desensitized to the violence, the death and the suffering.

She wonders now if he was that way even before.

She doesn’t think he’s a bad person, but he was calloused against the pain, and part of Hayden shied away from him because he was everything she didn’t want to be and everything she thought she would become. She looked at him and saw a hard shell with nothing but fragility and raw emotion underneath and she didn’t want to be like that. Because once that shell broke, it broke and there’d be no other defense. No, she wasn’t opposed to having her own shield, but under that, she’d be hard under that too.

Hayden finds another disturbing similarity between herself and Stiles as she looks at his interactions with Theo. It seems Corey isn't the only one that's invisible, not when Stiles never looks away from Theo. Because the way he looks at Theo is what Hayden imagines she looks like when she looks at Tracy.

Theo doesn’t realize, and she’s not surprised, because her ‘alpha’ is becoming unhinged, paranoid and distracted by his pursuit of power. Hayden knows a sinking ship when she sees one, and this ‘pack’ is not going to survive intact.

Not when most of its members are power hungry and already drunk off what they can do already. She sees it in every act of aggression Tracy is more than happy to commit at Theo’s suggestion, in the way his eyes glimmer, the way he smiles as Tracy and Josh slip further and further from the people they once were. Hayden sees it, what it is to have all that power, and not an ounce of control.

Theo’s better off in that regard than Tracy, but he’s slipping too. At the very least, he isn’t able to actually do anything about the Doctors or the Beast. He doesn’t know how to handle Scott’s pack, and he can’t even see that one of its members is looking at him the way Stiles is. She can’t blame Theo, because whatever Stiles is feeling doesn’t look like much. It’s not pretty, or gentle or tender, and she can already tell that he’s not going to try to save Theo, because Stiles sees what she sees.

They both know how this kind of love ends.

#what? another one? two in a row?#oh hey look I gave my sad boys a break #sort of #fic #hayden romero #tw #a sprinkle of steo in the background

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