#she leaves the rest of us to make an absolute circus out of it

[bubblesandpages]

I greatly admire Suzanne Collins goal to never explain any of her stories. She just drops them and goes.

[milkteahood]

texas heat

Thomas Hewitt x fem!reader

Warning: smut! minors dni!!!

Summary: basically a smut with a plot

Sweat broke on your forehead as you wiped it still half asleep. It was terribly hot to even rest. As your eyes opened and started to adjust to the darkness around you, thoughts about the whole situation were still fresh in your mind. How long has it been? You thought to yourself. A few months maybe? 4? 5?

You stopped counting the days after the first few weeks. What for anyway? It wasn’t like you were ever leaving.

***

“Come on boys! We are completely lost!” your friend spoke, gesturing with her hands.

“It’s fine! It’s all good. A little detour” the driver laughed without a care in the world.

“That’s right Sam! Stop being so difficult. Look, Y/N isn’t saying anything” the other guy talked from the passenger’s seat.

At the mention of your name, you looked up from your book, and then quickly got back to it. You weren’t actually reading, but they weren’t paying attention to that. If they did, they would’ve seen you didn’t turn any page in the last 5 minutes. Pretending was just a good excuse to be out of this circus of conversation.

You didn’t consider any of them your friends. And you were sure they didn’t think of you as that either. They were Sam’s friends. And Sam was your friend out of convenience, just as you were to her. You wanted to travel, and she didn’t want to be the only girl on the trip.

“Come on Y/N!” Sam started “whose side are you on?”

“Maybe we should stop and ask for directions” you finally raised a point.

“Yeah? And where the fuck would we stop for that?” the driver asked “there is nothing around here!”

A sigh escaped your lips and you finally put the book down, looking out the window. Then, suddenly, you pressed your finger on the window, gesturing in the distance “there, it looks like a house”.

Little did any of you know this was the beginning of a whole new chapter in your life.

***

Rubbing your eyes, you looked at the little clock on your nightstand. 11:30 pm it said. It wasn’t that late, yet you couldn’t remember when you fell asleep. Realistically, the only one still awake was Thomas. The thought of that made you freeze in place. Oh yes, you thought to yourself again the summer isn’t the only reason I can’t sleep.

Another sigh left your lips. You didn’t think you would end up in this situation. Spared by a bunch of cannibals for the sole reason you smacked the driver when he started insulting Thomas.

***

“Hello?” the driver’s friend… Jason? Jack? Jeremy? J something. You couldn’t remember. Your name memory was never your strongest suit.

“Hello?” J began knocking again. And a second time. Just before knocking for a 3rd time, a woman opened the door.

“Yes? Who are you?” she spoke.

“Oh hello ma’am!” Sam approached “we are completely lost. We were wondering if you could give us any directions”

Luda Mae looked all of you up and down before speaking “come inside. You will die of the heat before you get any directions”

The boys looked at each other and you looked at Sam. But ultimately decided to follow the lady inside.

***

The memories were still fresh and you were sure they would be for the rest of your life. As you lay on your back, looking around the room, you felt your heart skip a beat as another thought made itself apparent. Thomas. Or better said. Your crush on Thomas. In the past month or so, you tried your best to get close to him. You offered to help with everything and anything he needed. Yet, he did his best to avoid you. You weren’t dumb, you knew exactly why. He was absolutely terrified at the idea you’re just fucking around. Lying. Being nice to him so he wouldn’t kill you.

“For fucks sake Thomas. I was nice to you even before I knew you butchered people for a living” you whispered yelled alone, in your room.

***

“So kids, how did you end up here?” Luda Mae asked, trying to see if you would make a good addition to the Hewitt meat supply. Were you going somewhere? Was someone important waiting for you? What was the chance of people coming to look for you? Those were important questions that needed answers. They couldn’t risk killing someone that could potentially lead the police to them.

As the conversation was unfolding, the driver and J became more and more impatient to leave, and your head cocked when hearing some footsteps. Before you realized it, this massive man was sitting in the doorway, breathing heavily, not saying a word.

“Oh Tommy! Look! We have guests” Luda Mae said, looking at her son. Thomas was tall, a huge man, his apron covered in blood.

“Oh fuck! What the fuck is that? He looks like—” the driver said but didn’t get to finish whatever insults he was going to spew because you smacked him.

“Just shut up. For once. Not everything revolves around you and your daddy’s money. You can’t just speak this way to people” you said, while he looked you completely shocked. No one has ever dared speak to him that way. Let alone slap him.

And that was the moment Luda Mae decided you would be the only one left alive.

***

The floor was cooler than the bed. You stood up and looked at yourself in the mirror. It was so dark you could barely see, only managing to make out your silhouette. You stood there for a while, thinking of what you should do.

You liked Thomas from the moment you saw him. You tried to befriend him but all he did was ignore you. On the occasions he actually had to interact with you, he looked so tense, like he was on the verge of exploding. You tried to give him space, but it wasn’t really helping. And now you were pacing around your room, unable to sleep because all you wanted was Thomas. The man who killed your “friends”.

What the fuck is wrong with me… he’s a murderer, his whole family is crazy.

Yes and so are you. I mean, you’re not running. You think he’s hot. This man could dismember you in a heartbeat and you think he is attractive. Talk about fucked up.

You frowned at your own thoughts. Thomas wasn’t a monster. He did what he had to. Yet what was your excuse? Falling for him?

Your heart started racing. Yes, you were falling for him.

After what seemed like an eternity, you went out of your room, down the stairs and into the living room. You stopped in front of the basement stairs and listened. Thomas was definitely still down there and it was now or never.

In the basement Thomas was still butchering some meat, not hearing you walk in over the sound of his cleaver. He didn’t like you coming there, he always thought you would judge him, mock him even.

“Thomas” you spoke, your voice making him stop with the cleaver still in the air. He lowered it and turned to you, not saying anything.

“It’s late Thomas. Maybe you should call it a day” you spoke softly, almost afraid to startle him.

You didn’t get a response. Then, he just turned around and continued what he was doing.

This made you frown and it hurt a little. Maybe he was not liking you as much as you liked him. Maybe he didn’t like you at all. However this couldn’t be further from the truth. He did like you. A lot. Which is why he was so scared to be around you.

You bit your lip, a little too hard, and decided to approach him. The second your hand touched his arm, Thomas completely froze. His body was incredibly tense and all he managed to do was look at you.

“Did I do something to upset you?” you tilted your head “you always seem to ignore me. I’m sorry if I upset you at all”.

Thomas’s wide widened. You were apologizing to him? What for? You thought he was mad at you? But how could he? He grunted back at you. In the beginning it was very difficult to understand him, but now you could make up the words he was saying. He said no.

“Well then what is it?” you pressed him, gently rubbing his arm. His eyes looked like they could come out of his head, immediately shifting his gaze away from you, almost shaking.

“Thomas, Tommy, oh no” you reached for his other hand which was still tight around the cleaver. Gesturing for him to let it go, you managed to turn him so he’d face you. “You’re ok. Everything is ok” you said, looking at him. “I didn’t mean to make you feel awkward. I’m sorry. I will go upstairs” you gave him a bit of a sad smile and turned to walk away. Yet, you didn’t get to take two steps before he stopped you. As you turned to him, he gave you another grunt. Stay. This one meant stay.

Both of you were blushing. Your brave girl facade paled the moment you felt his hand around your arm. Compared to him, you were incredibly tiny and for that, he treated you as if you were made of glass. Because to him, you were.

You stepped in front of him, both of you looking at each other. You learned to be gentle with him, maybe even more gentle than he was with you. Because unlike you, he never had people not be terrified of him.

Smiling, you cupped his face in your hands, which caught him off guard, but he didn’t stop you. For whatever reason, you were here, you didn’t try to run away, and you were kind to him. Before he knew it, he was leaning into your touch.

“Tommy?”

He opened his eyes, waiting for you to continue.

“I really like you, Thomas”

His now open eyes were widened, staring at you, almost looking through you, waiting to see any shred of dishonesty. But there was none. You were genuine. He then couldn’t help but wonder what was wrong with you. How could you like him? No. He didn’t care. You liked him. And he was going to take it.

He didn’t realize some time passed without giving you an answer, which caused you to mumble another apology. He, however, didn’t let you finish. You soon found yourself in a hug. A very tight hug. Which you happily reciprocated.

After pulling away, you both looked at each other and without much of a second thought, you pulled the other into a kiss. It was reckless and full of built up frustrations on both parts. You were the first to pull away.

“Thomas.. it’s difficult to kiss you with that mask on”

He didn’t say anything and looked away. He didn’t want to show you. There was finally something he had and showing you his face might ruin it. He grunted a no.

“Please..” you pleaded while cupping his face again.

He damned himself for being so weak around you. You looked sad and a little disappointed. He let out a huge sigh and slowly took off his mask, letting it fall on the floor and completely avoiding your gaze. Whatever disgusted face you made, he didn’t want to see. Only if he looked to see it was not disgust but love.

“Fuck me you’re handsome” was all you said before pulling him in and kissing him again. He looked like a deer in headlights, but quickly melted into your kiss, picking you up and placing you on his workbench.

Your legs were wrapped around him, your hands pulling at his hair while he was tightly holding you by your waist. You felt his erection press against you, so you pushed yourself closer to him, which caused Thomas to grunt and moan into the kiss.

Thomas was the one to pull away this time, spending some time admiring you. Slowly, you started to unbutton his shirt “you can help me with mine if you want” you said a little flustered.

He didn’t need to be told twice. Once you felt his excitement, you knew Thomas was coming out of his shell. Soon enough yours and his shirts were thrown on the floor, and you were making out on the cold and hard workbench. You didn’t care, you also didn’t care that his grips wound leave bruises. You just wanted him. He cupped your breast, gently squeezing, earning himself a moan from you and the confirmation that he is doing it right.

“Please Tommy” you whined between kisses, tugging at his belt.

He wanted to so bad. But what if he hurt you? He had no what what he was doing. But how could he resist you? His whole body was shaking, you were begging him to have sex with you. Him. He pulled away from the kiss and quickly undid his belt and pants, making himself moan as he pulled his cock out. Your heart skipped a beat seeing Thomas naked in front of you. You look off your underwear and pull him into another kiss.

You didn’t think much before starting to palm his length, causing him to moan into your mouth. Thomas started thrusting as you were stroking him. He could cum just like that, but you wanted more. And he did too.

As your back rested on the cold table, Thomas climbed on top of you, neither daring to break the kiss. You couldn’t even wrap your legs around him, a detail he found really cute. He pulled away from the kiss only to look at your expression again. Was this really ok? Is this really what you wanted? You looked so beautiful and so turned on. Rubbing yourself against his erection was all the confirmation he needed before slowly starting to push his cock into you.

Feeling him inside you completely knocked the air out of you, immediately kissing him again, moaning into his mouth. Your figure, your voice, your shaking body were making Thomas go feral. His grunts on the other hand made your whole stomach feel hot. Thomas was thrusting into you, firmly holding your waist with one hand and supporting himself up with the other. Your arms were wrapped around his back, face buried into his neck, trying to muffle your moans.

He was hitting all the right spots, causing your mind to go blank and your nails to dig into his skin. Once his voice became shakier, you knew he wasn’t going to last much longer.

“Oh fuck…” you moaned and he responded by thrusting even harder. It was almost as if your every moan was making Thomas go more feral.

His rhythm was becoming more erratic, signaling that he was getting closer.

“It ok Tommy” you said between moans “I want you. Fill me up, please Tommy”.

Saying that was enough to push him over the edge. After a few more thrusts he came with a low, guttural moan, completely intoxicated by you.

You were both panting and looking at each other afterward. He couldn’t believe what just happened. Were you a dream? No. You were there, smiling at him. Did that mean you were his now? Yes. Most definitely.

He picked you up off of the table, squeezing you close to him. He was still panting and so were you, yet, both happy and finally content.

[steddietogo]

I had so much fun writing this for the @steddiesummerexchange!! @steddieasxshegoes hope you like this!

Word count: 8.9k

Read on ao3

— — — Steve finally turns to glare at Robin when one of the sunflower seeds she’s been throwing at him comes dangerously close to taking an eye out.

“Stop staring, dingus,” Robin laughs at him.

“I’m not staring,” he protests. Steve was merely glancing at the hot metal head on a leather couch at the back of the bar, nursing his drink all alone. “If you stopped paying attention to me for a second you’d have noticed the blonde making eyes at you from the bar,”

“Where?” Robin asks, whipping around embarrassingly fast.

“Rob! You don’t just–”

“Oh my god, she’s hot,”

“You’re so obvious,” He hisses back. “Go talk to her,”

“What? No way,”

“Hey, maybe you have more game in Rome–” And the next sunflower seed bounces straight off his forehead but before he could retaliate, there’s movement at the corner of his eyes.

“Shit, she’s coming over,” he says and watches the absolute panic taking over Robin’s face. “I need another drink, good luck.” He narrowly misses the kick aimed to his shin, slipping away to give them some privacy because, dear god, Steve knows he would never hear the end of it if Robin doesn’t get laid at least once during their entire trip to Italy.

The bar is cozy, decorated to look like the inside of catacombs with picture frames lining the walls and chandeliers hanging low from the ceiling. It's much better than the ones Robin brings them to, back in LA, almost entirely lit by neon signs and plays music a little too loud for his taste these days.

But here in Italy, Steve is not confined to the rigid schedule he follows to keep himself rested and alert enough for emergency situations. Steve makes his way to the counter and orders himself another drink, settling back to people watch– definitely not just to discreetly ogle the lone metal head looking entirely too bored to be sitting in a nice bar in Rome.

— — — Eddie can feel the eyes of the fluffy haired man on him from across the bar. Nothing he isn’t used to though. He might even be flattered by the attention if he wasn’t too busy feeling sorry for himself. He didn’t plan on sitting in a bar all alone, on what was supposed to be his honeymoon vacation, sans a ring on his finger. But no amount of being desired by the masses on stage has made his love life any better. No amount of admiration saved him from his cheating ex. He’s not heartbroken, just tired; that relationship was long over before the cheating even started. Rick was only ever concerned about the fame and attention he’d get throwing Eddie’s name around.

He would just be rotting away at home if it wasn’t for Chrissy refusing to let him cancel the whole trip and basically dragging him to the airport by his ear. He suspects it’s also to keep him far away from the whole press circus his ex no doubt started to stir by now. He just hopes they’d leave the boys from the band alone. He’d hate to drag them down with him.

Since landing in Rome the day before, Eddie had slept, ate, slept again and landed in a bar for a drink or two, trying to feel some semblance of normal again. Maybe Chrissy thought the Italian sun would magically reset Eddie to the optimistic idiot he once used to be, but he owed it to her to try at least. From where he’s sitting, two weeks felt like it’s an eternity away.

Eddie watches as the man leaves his seat and walks over to the bar by himself. He likes the way his button up stretches over his shoulders. He’s conventionally attractive in the boy next door kinda way. Pretty, even. Eddie hasn’t slept with a stranger since the beginning of his career when he’d gotten caught by paps doing the walk of shame back to his place. Since then he’d been a lot more careful with everyone he’s been associating with.

This one is cute though and Eddie may be tempted to break a few of his own rules. There is something about being alone and depressed in Italy that makes him want to throw caution to the wind and just do something impulsive. He’s feeling a little too restless and itching for some human connection. Very tempted to buy the cute guy a drink and see if he would follow him back to his stupid big honeymoon suite.

Besides, wasn’t that what Chrissy wanted for him? To forget Rick and to enjoy himself? She’d also say that it's not healthy to throw himself at the first pretty thing so soon after a breakup, but whatever, she’s not here with him.

Eddie feels, more than sees, as the stranger’s gaze lands on him one more time. The blonde that he came in with looks cozy sharing a couch with another woman, so no harm no foul, Eddie decides. He sweeps up his jacket and makes his way to the bar.

“Hi,” Eddie says. The cute guy startles at his sudden appearance by his side but his grin is nearly blinding. “I’m Eddie,”

“Hey,” he replies. “Steve,”

Steve, he learns, is on vacation with his best friend. After speaking to him for a bit, Eddie is about 70 percent sure Steve has no idea who he is. Just the way he prefers. He buys Steve a drink and they flirt a bit. Eddie likes the way Steve’s eyes crinkle when he smiles and how he constantly runs his fingers through his hair like Eddie makes him nervous. Unfortunately, before he can make a move, their little party is crashed by Steve’s companion. Eddie can’t help but feel a tiny bit annoyed.

“Oh my god, I need a drink,” The woman comes barreling between them.

“You okay there buddy?” Steve asks her and she grabs him by the shoulders and shakes.

“Oh shit, sorry, did I interrupt?” She asks, finally noticing his presence, funnily enough.

“Don’t worry about it,” he waves her off.

“I’m Robin,” She stuck her hand out.

“Hi Robin, you have lipstick on your face,” Her eyes widen and she scrambles to fix herself using the reflection in the mirror behind the bar, frowning when she finds nothing on her face.

“No I don’t,”

“Made you look,” Eddie grins.

She narrows her eyes at him. “You’re good,”

— — —

They get another round of drinks, Steve buys this time, and they move to a bigger table. Robin sticks to them like a cock blocking barnacle but after a while later, Eddie doesn’t mind anymore. She’s weird and funny in a refreshing way he doesn’t get to see everyday. Plus, Steve looks more at ease when she is by his side.

“So, Eddie,” Says Robin, “What brings you to Rome?”

“Well, you can’t call it a honeymoon if you don’t marry your cheating fiance, so,” Eddie shrugs, watching the slight alarm on both of their faces. “Guess its a solo trip now,”

“That sucks, man,” says Steve.

“It's whatever,” he shrugs.

“You know what? Fuck that motherfucker,” Robin says, wine sloshing dangerously close to the rim. “You’re gonna have the best solo honeymoon ever and he’s gonna be soooo jealous of you!” Robin is kind of a light weight, but it's nice to see someone else enraged on his behalf.

“Yeah,” Eddie says. “Fuck him,” And then he buys a round of shots. This isn’t the way he saw his evening going when he approached Steve, but Eddie isn’t complaining.

“This is so stupid, we’re gonna regret this in the morning,” Steve giggles, slumped so far down his seat only his face is visible above the table.

“Shit! I forgot!” Robin exclaims.

Eddie frowns. “What’s happening in the morning?”

“We’re going to Tuscany!” Steve says and Robin gasps suddenly, repeatedly slapping Steve on the arm, her eyes wide as dinner plates as she looks at Eddie.

“You should come with us!” She exclaims. “There’s enough room in the air bnb i'm sure, you can bunk with Steve,”

“Come with you to Tuscany?” Eddie asks, puzzled.

“Or Steve can just take the couch,”

“Hey!” Steve protests. “But yeah, it’ll be fun,” he says, turning his big hazel eyes back to Eddie looking so hopeful and expectant; and maybe a little too gone on the alcohol too.

So, really, you can’t blame Eddie for saying yes to a half baked plan that probably wasn’t even going to happen. He’s drunk and a pretty boy is asking him to follow him across Italy. Most likely, the two are going to wake up the next morning with no recollection of the night, or they're probably not even going to make it to their train anyways.

So Eddie says, “Fuck it. Let's do this!”

— — —

Turns out, a drunk Robin is no less a planner than a sober one. Eddie is woken up with his phone incessantly ringing at 10 am on the dot, his presence being demanded at breakfast. At least he feels a little bit better after seeing the other two looking as bad as he feels. Robin is wearing two sunglasses stacked on top of one another.

Packing is no hassle, thankfully, as Eddie never bothered to unpack in the first place. Being hungover for more than an hour on a train isn’t really fun. He eyes Steve and Robin happily curled up and dosing away at their seats as he spends the better half of the train ride to Florence trying not to yak up the cup of coffee and pastry he had choked down at breakfast. Wanye would have laughed and told him he has been spoiled by all the soft mattresses in his fancy hotel rooms. And he wouldn’t be wrong.

They spend twenty minutes ambling around the city, looking for a specific hole in the wall Steve was determined to visit, then fall face first into plates of pasta in ravenous hunger. It's chaotic, better than being holed up in his room with nothing to do. Eddie might even admit it was fun if you ask him tomorrow.

Once their plates are just short of licked clean, robin rummages through her cross body bag and pulls out a paper map, unfolding it into a cartoonishly large piece of paper. “Do you not have GPS in your phone?” Eddie asks, eyeing the map.

“You’re in a foreign country, Eddie, what if you lost your network? Do you want to die?” Steve says in a scarily accurate impression of Robin, then gets a bony elbow to the ribs.

Robin clears her throat dramatically, points at a part of the map and says, “We’re here right now,” Here, Eddie assumes, is Florence in the map since the lettering was so small and crowded together it was almost impossible to read. “And we’ll be taking a cab to an airbnb here, about thirty minutes away. It's like a big ass villa we’ll be sharing with a few other people and there’s like a big ass pool there too, so we can chill out over there. Then at seven, we have a wine tasting-slash-dinner at a vineyard.”

“Oooh we’re getting drunk again?” Eddie asks.

Robin enthusiastically replies, “Yup! We’re on vacation, baby!”

— — —

The villa is gorgeous. It’s up on a hill overlooking rows and rows of vineyards and trees and has a huge breakfast nook, living room and outdoor dining place and his first thought after stepping into the place was damn, Chrissy is going to be so jealous. The host is a friendly middle aged man with an accent so strong only Robin could mostly understand what he was saying.

The pool is a nice idea too. After their initial tour of the property, they change into pool-side appropriate wear and make their way downstairs. Eddie tosses his hair up and sinks into the water, letting his fingers prune in one corner with his shades on, watching Steve and Robin splashing about like a couple of toddlers. He doesn’t understand where those two get their unchecked energy reserve from, Eddie is so close to dozing away.

He turns to the woman a couple feet away trying and failing to read her book in the ruckus the two are making. “I don’t know them,” he says, though she probably saw them arrive at the pool together. She gives him a polite smile and goes back to trying to read.

The vineyard they go to for dinner is a walkable distance away, or so Steve says, and then it takes them half an hour to walk there. Which both him and Robin complain about, a lot. There’s a small group taking a short tour with them walking around in the vineyard, taking a few pictures. He sends some to Wayne and gets a thumbs up emoji back, which was the equivalent of a heartfelt hug from him in text.

Dinner is good, the food and the company. They are given tiny wine glasses and get refills as often as they want. Everyone takes full advantage of it. He even makes polite conversation with a few of the others in the groups. Steve looks especially pretty in the firelight with a rosy tint to his cheeks.

Eddie feels relaxed and so much lighter than he had in months when they stumble back to the villa, swaying and leaning against each other, giggling about stupid things. “I’ll see y'all bitches in the morning,” Robin bids them goodnight and Eddie and Steve crash into a pile on top of the two seater couch in their room.

“Hey,” Steve whispers. “I really don’t mind taking the couch you know,”

“What? No way, Steve. I don’t mind sharing, I can keep my hands to myself, you know,”

Steve snorts, mumbling something that sounded suspiciously like ‘if only’.

“What was that,” Eddie asks, raising his eyebrows.

“Oh, nothing,”

Eddie absentmindedly draws patterns over a knee thrown over his lap, the heat of his skin like a furnace under his palm. He can’t look away from wine stained lips and flushed cheeks as Steve smiles softly at him, inviting. His hazel eyes drop to his lips then back up again.

Eddie didn’t realize how close they are, their noses nearly brushing– Steve almost fully on top of his lap– it would be so easy to kiss him. He just has to tip his head up to press their lips together, so he does it.

Steve’s mouth feels as warm and inviting as it looks. Eddie lets him press his tongue between his lips, big hands cupping the back of his head keeping him there. Eddie takes it as permission to get a little more handsy, slipping his hands under Steve’s shirt.

Eddie feels himself melting into the cushions as Steve tilts his head into the kiss. He pulls back and Eddie has to stop himself before he does something pathetic like whine, or maybe chase after his mouth. “You wanna move this to the bed,” Steve asks, sounding as breathless as Eddie felt.

“Yeah, sweetheart,”

— — —

Eddie wakes up fully nude under the covers feeling warm and satiated. He listens to the birds chirping outside the window and the soft snores from the man stretched out beside him. He flips to his side, watching Steve sleeping on his stomach, his ribs expand and contract with each breath he takes. His back is littered with moles and freckles and Eddie with his sleepy brain wonders how long it would take to trace every one of them. Some of them disappear under the scar tissue twisting over the side of his torso, starting at his hip and spreading almost all the way to just under his rib cage. He leans in, lightly brushing his fingers just over the shiny, raised skin.

"It’s from a fire a few years ago," Steve says, slowly blinking sleep out of his eyes. And at Eddie's raised eyebrows, he elaborates, "I'm a firefighter. Robin too.”

“Shit,” Eddie replies, suddenly feeling more awake. “You just got like ten times hotter,” Steve snorts. “You have to wear a uniform right? Do you have any pictures?”

“What am I? Just a piece of ass to you?”

“A very hot piece of ass,” Eddie says, pulling himself up on top of Steve. “Don’t sell yourself short, Stevie” And he leans down to kiss him, morning breath and all. They get distracted for long enough that Robin comes thumping on their door to get them out of bed.

— — —

Breakfast is once again a steaming cup of coffee, fruits, and a fresh croissant. Eddie has had more fresh fruits in the past two days than the entire year combined. He was also having a very nice time happily appearing in public without fear of camera flashes or crazed fans. Feeling the sun on his skin, living his best life, as the kids would say. Eddie was wearing one of Steve’s shirts open over a band tee and canvas shorts. His usual wardrobe, consisting mostly of ripped jeans and leather jackets, wasn't the most comfortable in the sun.

There are only two other couples in the outdoor dining area of the airbnb. A pair of retirees and the other two possibly honeymooners by the way they were all over each other. Eddie briefly considers how if he hadn’t been with them, Steve and Robin would’ve also looked like a heterosexual couple, not codependent platonic soulmates having a vacation together. The thought makes him huff a laugh into his coffee. Steve raises his eyebrows at him in question from his seat beside him, and he just shakes his head.

Robin drops the folded paper map on the table once she’s done studying, steals a sip from Steve cup, then winces. “That's the one toxic dude bro trait you have,” she says, glaring at the offending cup of black coffee with no cream or sweetener in it. Eddie has to nod his head in agreement. Even Eddie doesn’t drink his coffee black.

“What? It's not that bad,” Steve tries to reason.

“It’s actually really horrible, you just don’t have taste buds anymore because you burnt them off, apparently.” Eddie chimes in.

“Nuh-uh, you aren’t allowed to team up like that, no way,” Steve protests. Robin sneaks a sip from Eddie’s cup.

“Holy shit, there is no coffee in this, it's just milk and sugar!”

“No, its not,”

“Yes, it is!”

“Okay, calm down, children. Robin, weren’t you just gonna tell us the plan for today?” Steve interrupts.

“Fine,” Robin huffs. “First we make a ten minute walk from here to the rental place for the Vespas, then were going to go to Pisa, then Siena, then San Gimignano if we have the time,”

“We’re renting Vespas? That’s the most touristy shit I’ve ever heard,” Eddie says.

“Eddie, we are tourists,”

“But like, couldn’t we just rent a cab or something?”

“Yeah, but where’s the fun in that?”

“I don’t have a motorcycle license,”

“That’s fine, you don’t need it,” Steve chimes in, “It's just like riding a bike,”

Eddie grumbles under his breath, stuffing another piece of bread in his mouth. Steve exchanges a look with Robin.

“Eddie,”

“Hmrph?”

“You know how to ride a bicycle, right?”

“I- I just never learned to, okay?” Robin snorts.

“That's okay, you can ride with me,” Steve smiles, nudging him.

Later on Eddie sends a video to Chrissy of the sprawling vineyards and him on the back of a ridiculous red Vespa and matching helmet, clinging tight to Steve as they sped down a cobblestone road.

— — —

Pisa is nice. There is a lot more climbing involved than Eddie had expected, and is grossly underprepared for it. The view from the top of the leaning tower is cool. Cool enough to climb up and down multiple narrow stairs? Eddie isn’t sure. Steve and Robin barely break a sweat beside Eddie who is fighting for his life– maybe he should listen to Chrissy and cut down on the cigarettes– the damn firefighter stamina.

They take many dorky touristy pictures of them trying to hold up the leaning tower which he knows would make Chrissy laugh. Eddie does his best to occasionally answer the barrage of questions thrown his way after Chrissy sees his messages. She’s mostly just happy that Eddie’s having fun and isn’t alone. She also has a few questions about the sandy blonde hair woman in the pictures with him.

Before they set off to Siena, Steve pulls out a bottle of sunscreen and insists everyone reapply– then acts all affronted when Eddie says he wasn’t wearing any to begin with. His ass feels just about flattened after the almost two hour ride to Siena. They have lunch at another nice spot, walk around taking a million pictures of the Duomo, and climb more stairs to Eddie’s dismay, which Robin finds hilarious.

— — —

“So,” Robin says, “Eddie.” Steve groans. “That bad huh?”

Robin and Steve are sitting in the shade of a nice big tree in a park, Eddie having gone to hunt down food and water for them. His spirits are still high for someone who looked so close to passing out at the top of the leaning tower.

“He’s only the hottest, funniest dude I’ve met in like years probably, no big deal,” Steve throws an arm over his eyes. “Face it, Robs, I’m just cursed to never find love.” Robin rolls her eyes at his dramatics.

“Just ask for his number, dingus,” She says, like it's obvious.

Steve sits up. “I can’t, it’s probably like, just a fun vacation fling for him. And–” He continues before Robin can interrupt. “He just got out of a serious relationship, I can’t ask now, it's too soon,”

“It does even have to be like, ‘I wanna date you please give me your number’, It can be like, ‘we should keep in touch, let's exchange numbers’,” Steve makes a face in response.

Thankfully before Robin can attempt to change his mind further, Eddie comes trudging across the park towards them. “M’lady, M’lord,” he offers the paper bag of pastries to them, on one knee.

“M’dork,” Robin replies and Eddie throws himself backwards on the ground, pretending to get shot.

“Why do you wound me so, fair maiden,” He wails rolling around in the grass, making her snort and Steve complains about getting grass stains on his shirt.

— — —

Eddie almost falls to his knees and begs for mercy when he’s rudely awaken at 5 fucking am and Robin tells him that they will be spending yet another four hours on a train to Rapallo to yet another airbnb. He tells her that she and Steve are single handedly funding the entire organization. Robin tells him to shut up and drink his milk.

“There isn’t much walking,” Steve promises him as he coaxes Eddie from bed. “We’ll just swim in the ocean, drink and relax.” After breakfast they make their way to the train station. Thankfully, this time Eddie manages to pass out for a good amount of time during the train ride only waking to blearily change trains.

He’s well rested by the time they make it to their airbnb. They get ready for a beach day, then it's Vespa 2 electric boogaloo as they rent a couple for the day to get to the beach and back. Eddie shouts “Liar!” from the back seat when Steve tells him the beach is twenty minutes away. Steve argues, technically he wasn’t lying since they aren’t walking.

The beach, unfortunately for Eddie, is a lot more packed than he had expected. It puts him on edge, makes him feel like he might get recognised. He hadn’t realized how Steve’s shirt felt like armor the day before. No one was expecting Eddie Munson to be wearing a striped button up and canvas shorts. But having his tattoos out in the open feels like he was asking to be caught. So he swipes Robin’s orange cover up with little pom poms on the hem the second she discards it and tucks his hair under a sunhat.

The wonder twins are busy in the middle of a sandcastle building competition– which they asked Eddie to be the judge of– like little kids. He sits back and watches people with their friends and family, the two dorks in front of him fighting for sand at the same place like there isn’t sand anywhere else on the beach. He spots boats docked on the other side of the beach and gets an idea.

“Hey guys, I’ll be right back,”

— — —

Steve lays on his beach towel, eyes closed and listening to music on his headphones. Robin was off fucking around in the water with another cute woman she struck up a conversation with.

Eddie rushed off saying he was going to get them something to drink but Steve gets the impression that it's just because he wasn’t one for crowded places, though he didn’t seem too uncomfortable yesterday when they were going around Tuscany. He seemed to shrink into himself when they reached the beach, looking vaguely nauseous when he was sitting under the umbrella all covered up.

He wonders if he should go look for him and make sure he is doing okay, he’s taking a little too long for Steve’s comfort. Or maybe the queue is just really that long since the beach is crowded and Steve is being an overbearing mother hen like Robin sometimes reminds him that he has a tendency for.

Steve starts to slowly doze listening to the chattering all around him and the sound of the waves in the background of his playlist when he feels a shadow descend over him. He opens his eyes to find Eddie standing over him, still in Robin cover up– sans drinks– looking a little too pleased with himself. “Pack your bags,” he tells Steve. “And get Robin,”

Steve scrunches up his face in confusion. “Pack up? We just got here,” Steve yanks on Eddie’s hand and catches him on his lap when he goes down yelping, the sun hat knocked off his head.

“We have much better places to be Stevie, believe me,” he says cryptically, throwing his arms around him.

“You’re not making any sense, dude,”

“I rented us a boat,” Eddie says, grinning.

“A what?”

“A boat. You know? Those things floating over there in the ocean?” he points like he’s explaining to a child seeing a boat for the first time. Dick, Steve thinks fondly.

“When did you do that?”

“Like five minutes ago,” Steve wants to wipe the stupid grin off his stupid face so he leans in and kisses him. It doesn’t really work, Eddie’s still high on his new boat procurement adventure. He tugs in Steve’s hair, pulling him back.

“Come on, we’re losing daylight,” he insists.

“It's not even noon yet,”

— — —

Robin seems very excited by this new development, basically bouncing all the way to where Eddie leads them to a big boat. She brings along her new friend from the beach with them, a curly haired Spanish brunette– Go Robin, Steve thinks– though the boat Eddie had picked had a capacity for more than just four people.

The captain is a funny middle aged guy who’s happy to let them play music as loud as they want. He shows them around the coast and then stops further into the ocean where there are other boats and yachts some distance from them. Steve, Robin and her new companion waste no time jumping into the ocean and Eddie finally looks relaxed.

A little while later, Steve clambers back into the boat in his swimming trunks, sea water dripping from his hair. His shoulders are already turning a deeper shade of tan. He joins Eddie lounging under the sun, laying his dripping head on his shoulder. Eddie traces a finger through the droplets doting his arm.

"Enjoying yourself?" Eddie asks and Steve hums happily.

"Kinda feel like I'm seventeen again," He says.

"Oh? You were galavanting around Italy in high school, Stevie?” Eddie grins at him, teasing.

"Mhm. Summer after junior year, I got brutally dumped,” He explains. “Kinda deserved it though, I was a little bitch in high school," Then there’s a glint in Eddie's eyes like he’s imagining Steve in a preppy outfit and the ridiculous way he used to style his hair.

"My parents brought me along for their trip and their friends has a gay son, though I don’t think they knew he was gay or they wouldn’t have let me hang out with him otherwise," Steve thinks of Andrew sometimes and all the awkward fumbling they had done when they would sneak into each other’s rooms at night– something Robin calls his ‘Bi-awakening’. “So yeah, I left for the vacation straight and came back bi,”

"That is so trust fund baby core, holy shit," Eddie says, and Steve snorts.

"Was a trust fund baby. Past tense," He clarifies.

"Hm, what happened then?"

"I mean, I already knew my parents were homophobes but hey, at least they waited till I finished high school to kick me out,” He shrugs, feeling embarrassed the second he finishes spewing his whole story.

“I’m sorry your parents suck,” Eddie throws his arms around Steve and squeezes him until he laughs. Steve has always been an oversharer, a trait that had put off a lot of his past partners, unfortunately. Eddie is a good listener. He doesn’t seem too bummed out by his little trip down memory lane. But then, when did Steve start thinking of Eddie along the same line as the people from his past relationships?

“Whatever. They were really just cramping my style,”

“Yeah, I bet you looked real bad in those starched shirts and designer suits,” Eddie says, sounding like he really doesn’t mean it.

"Come get in the water with me," Steve says and Eddie whines in protest. "What? You don't know how to swim too?"

"I know how to swim!" He exclaims a bit too defensively. "I just don't want to get my hair wet," he pouts.

"You don't have to get your hair wet," He pulls Eddie up, "I’ll protect your hair, come on,"

Steve dives in first, watching Eddie carefully lower himself into the water just enough to keep his head above. "See? All good,"

He wraps his arms around Steve's shoulders, pulling him in for a salty kiss.

"CANNONBALL!"

"Rob, wait!" It was too late. Robin crashed into the water, way too close to them, sending a huge splash into the two, drenching them to the tip of their heads.

"Noooo," Eddie moans, looking like a drowned rat with his bangs plastered to his forehead. Robin's maniacal cackling reaches them as she surfaces. "She's so mean to me," he whines, hiding his face in Steve's neck.

"Aww poor baby," Steve coos, trying to hold back his laughter. "I'll help you wash your hair later, okay?"

"Promise?"

"Promise,"

— — —

Steve does help wash Eddie’s hair, though showering together ends up wasting more water than they were supposed to be saving on accounts of wandering hands. When they step out of the bathroom clean and loose limbed, Robin is on the couch with the TV on full volume, takes one look at their faces and says “Yuck,”

Eddie points at her and says, “Homophobe,”

They decide to order in for the night. Robin hooks up her (Steve’s actually) Netflix account to the TV and they argue on which movie to watch until their dinner arrives, then pass out in a puppy pile twenty minutes into the movie.

— — —

Thankfully, their train to Milan the next day is at a much more reasonable timing. Eddie still whines about having to move again. They make it by mid day and explore the city some more until it's time for dinner.

Eddie feels a pang when he thinks that he’d be saying goodbye to the two in less than a day. Which is dramatic, even for him. He’d barely known them for a week, yet he feels himself clinging to Steve harder and starting arguments just to annoy Robin more often.

When they go to bed, he falls asleep with Steve curled over his back and their fingers intertwined.

— — —

In the morning, Steve joins him on the couch in the balcony where Eddie is people watching through the railing with a cup of coffee. Steve and Robin are leaving soon to catch their flight back home and Eddie’s all packed up to get back to his luxury honeymoon suite in Rome, all alone. The prospect of another week alone in a foreign country feels more daunting than it had been in the beginning of his trip.

Eddie feels like the end of the week snuck up on him. He didn’t expect to like being in Italy so much, though he suspects that has more to do with the company than the country itself. Steve sits so close to him that he’s almost fully leaning on Eddie's shoulder, he’s going to miss his weight and his warmth, the easy way he holds himself near other people like he belongs in everyone’s space.

“So,” Steve says, their position reminds Eddie of the first night he kissed Steve, tipsy on wine, heart fluttering in his chest like butterfly wings. He wants to pull him in and kiss him again.

“So,” Eddie parrots.

“I guess this is it, huh?” Eddie hopes he isn’t imagining the hint of melancholy gleaming in his hazel eyes, he wants selfishly for Steve to miss him too.

“I had fun,” Eddie smiles. It takes effort.

“I’m glad,” Steve says, sounding so sincere. He tucks a stray curl behind Eddie’s ear, leans in to slot their lips together one last time. Eddie takes it eagerly, opening his mouth to him and happily goes along when Steve pulls him into his lap.

They say their goodbyes after breakfast and Eddie watches them get in a cab and drive away from him forever.

— — —

Steve stows their luggage away in the overhead compartment and plops down onto his seat, Robin engrossed in looking through the inflight movie list beside him. He drops his forehead on Robin's shoulder. “You doing okay over there?”

“Mhm,”

“It's okay to not be okay, you know,”

He lets out a watery laugh, feeling pathetic. “Its so stupid,”

“No it's not,” She pokes his forehead. “Don’t be mean to my best friend,”

“I think maybe I should’ve just sucked it up asked for his number,”

Robin huffs, “See, I can’t even say ‘I told you so’ when you look so sad,”

“Yeah, whatever, it's too late now. He didn’t ask either,” Steve reasons with himself.

“Hey, maybe you’ll run into him one day and he’d be like, your next door neighbor or something,”

“This isn’t a movie, Robs,” He sighs. “And I know all my neighbors already,”

“There, there,” She says, patting his head.

— — —

Eddie naps for a few hours, then gets a cab to take him to the train station. Time moves at a glacial pace. Eddie slumps on a bench and scrolls through instagram to pass time. Somehow his feed is full of cats running around causing chaos, cats in silly outfits, funny cat meme edits. And he thinks maybe he should get a cat. A black one, and he can name it Ozzy. Or Aragon. Maybe a cat would make him feel less lonely.

Eddie is about to close the app and go get something to eat when he sees it. It's a blurry picture of two men kissing on a balcony. The angle looks like it was taken from street level, but the tattoos and long hair is unmistakable. Fuck.

The picture already has more than half a million likes. He loathes to think how many other pages it has graced. And the comments were worse.

g3rry_ Hasn’t even been two weeks since the breakup news came out and he’s already with a new guy…

parkouch_ Smells like infidelity hmmm

gin_titanic Poor Rick :(

Corrodedjeff He should just leave the band at this point smh

RickWorld00 Anyone know who the other guy is?

Dusty_Hen05 What the fuck what the FUCK

— — —

He calls Chrissy in a panic.

“Did you see it?” is the first thing she asks him. He doesn’t answer as much as he lets out a high pitched noise like a kettle.

“Chrissy, what the fuck?”

“I know, I know,” She whines. “I’m trying to do damage control here, but Rick fucking posted a tweet saying he’s ‘taking time off from the public eye’ during this ‘trying time’ and now everyone is siding with him,”

“That bitch,”

“How’s Steve taking it?” Chrissy asks.

“I wouldn’t know, Chrissy, he’s on a plane right now on the way back to his real life,” He huffs. “Shit, he’s going to be so blindsided by this, I don’t think he even knew who I am,”

“You didn’t tell him?” she asks. “Shit, Eddie,”

“Book me flight babe, I wanna come back as soon as I can,” It takes some arguing and pleading to make Chrissy book a different flight straight from Milan. But she does it in the end and Eddie hopes he hasn’t screwed things up forever.

— — —

Eddie goes straight to Chrissy’s place from the airport. He has a hell of a time dodging camera flashes and finally makes it to the car she sent in one piece. He falls into her embrace as soon as she opens her door.

“Aww, Eddie, you okay?”

“Ahuh, never better,”

His eyes feel dry and sand from the lack of sleep. Chrissy shoves him into bed and threatens him to get some rest before they can have a serious conversation about everything. Eddie sleeps fitfully, but it's better than nothing. The sun is setting when he shuffles back into the living room. Chrissy hears his stomach grumbling from all the way across the room and they order take out.

“So, Steve,”

Eddie sighs heavily. “I fucked up Chris,” he says, stuffing a springroll in his mouth.

“Someone took a picture of you through your balcony, I hardly think that's your fault, babe,”

“I’m pretty sure he didn’t even know who I was, Chris. Like, how jarring is it going to be for him to just wake up one day and find out some people out there are accusing him of being a home wrecker just for kissing a random dude on a vacation?”

“It is a fucked up situation, I’m not going to lie, and Rick’s really been enjoying playing the victim,” she grumbles. “You know, it really would’ve helped if you had gotten the guy's contact details.” She didn’t need to tell him that twice. “We need to release a statement as soon as possible but we really just need to wait it out. There isn’t much we can realistically do,”

“I feel horrible,” he groans.

“Again. Not your fault Eddie,”

“I think I’ll lose my mind if I don’t find him somehow,” Chrissy snorts.

“Dick that good, huh?” She snickers.

“Gotta admit, Chrissy, it was a pretty exceptional dick.” Eddie sighs wistfully and Chrissy giggles.

“How are you gonna find him?”

“Maybe a PI? Is that too creepy? How many Steves are there in the US do you reckon?” He’s only half joking. Chrissy rolls her eyes and kicks him out of her house so he can go get some proper sleep.

— — —

Eddie takes a hot shower once he gets home, then is immediately reminded of Steve in the shower with him and his big hands holding him against the cold tiles. Then the quick shower turns into a much longer one.

Once he’s changed into his pjs, he pads down to the kitchen to make himself a hot cup of tea then settles in bed with his phone. He isn’t tired enough to go to sleep yet so he switches to a random channel on his TV and scrolls through the pictures they had taken in Italy, zooming in on Steve’s face more times he can count like a love sick– love? Really? –dumbass.

It's 2 am when he hears the sound of his front door opening and shutting that puts him on alert. With shaking hands he grabs his baseball bat from the closet (which Wayne left behind, Eddie wasn’t a sports kinda guy) making his way to the staircase, hoping and praying he’d imagined the whole thing and he’s not actually getting robbed. Or worse– someone has leaked his address online and someone broke in to see him.

It's too dark to see properly, but a figure is climbing up the stairs towards him, a little too fast for his comfort. Eddie swings, his bat connects with the stranger’s face with a crunch and he goes tumbling down the stairs with a pained shout. Eddie rushes to get the light switch and–

“EDDIE!” Rick was on the floor, clutching his bleeding nose. “Shit, I think I broke something,”

“What the fuck are you doing here, Rick?” Eddie screeches. “How did you get in?”

"What are you doing here, aren’t supposed to be in Italy, enjoying our honeymoon,” He spits back. The fucking audacity of this dude.

“Have you been breaking into my house all week?” Rick stays quiet and that's enough of an answer for Eddie. “I’m calling an ambulance,” The 911 operator tells him not to move him, not that Eddie would touch him with a ten foot pole.

“Who was that guy you were with?” Rick asks from the floor, still clutching onto his knee.

“I’m sorry, how is that any of your business?” Eddie snaps back, full of ire.

“Because,” Rick says, his expression pleading in the way Eddie just realizes he always looks like when he’s about to tell him how sorry he was and how nothing was his fault, actually. “I still love you, Eddie,”

Eddie laughs in his face, getting a tiny bit of satisfaction from the way Rick’s face falls. “Seriously? You broke up with me because I was too clingy to open our relationship and you see me with another dude one time and you can’t take it, huh?”

“I made a mistake–”

“Yes you fucking did, now deal with the consequences. You’re not my problem anymore,” The doorbell saves Eddie from the crocodile tears welling up in Rick’s eyes. How did he even put up with this for two years?

However, Eddie isn’t done with surprises for the day, it would seem. The door swings open, and there stands Steve– who looks just as shocked to see him standing at the doorstep– with Robin and another older dude he doesn’t recognise.

“Hey!” the older dude exclaims, pointing at Eddie. “It’s the guy!”

— — —

Steve has had a hell of a time since he and Robin had touched down. The second he had switched his airplane mode off he was bombarded with hundreds, possibly thousands of notifications. 72 missed calls from just Dustin and more cryptic messages from the party group chat– something about coffins? Did someone die? Steve didn’t understand.

Dustin hadn’t been much help when he called him back, babbling something about a front man of a rock band for some reason, but that was only until Robin pulled up a picture of him and Eddie kissing. Except, it was posted on some random instagram page he had never heard of instead of her camera roll, with the caption ‘Corroded Coffin frontman Eddie Munson spotted in Milan, Italy with his new beau’. And then it clicked.

His notifications continued to flood for the rest of the day, friends and coworkers were asking him about it. His high school acquaintances suddenly wanted to know how he was doing and wanted to catch up for ‘old time sake’. Yeah right, Tommy. The worst part was probably the comments nitpicking everything about his appearance and the random threatening DMs he’d receive occasionally.

Robin was quite most of the ride back home, but that was only because she was doing a deep dive into Eddie Munson and his band’s history. The only thing she said to him was, “I know many of their songs, Steve, and Dustin and Mike literally have a poster up like every wall in their house. How did we not know this?”

He slept fitfully, the adrenaline and confusion seemingly overriding the jet lag. The last straw was when his mom tried to contact him the next morning after eight whole years, just to berate him about their family name. “In public Steven? Really?” Steve didn’t have the energy to argue that a balcony is not a public space. There was little satisfaction in hanging up on her mid sentence.

He called up Argyle and begged to swap with his night shift so he'd at least have Robin by his side when dealing with all of it. Not that he thought any of their co-workers would be mean about it, he and Robin aren’t even the only queer people in the station. Besides, Captain Hopper wouldn’t let homophobic behavior slide given that he has a gay step son of his own that he loves very much.

Steve had tried and moderately succeeded in getting some sleep before his shift. Night shifts were moderately less hectic than morning ones– though sometimes it just depends on the night itself– so it opens up more time for ribbing from his colleagues

He had even walked in on the rookie Chance showing Dmitri, the Russian dude Hopper had history with (what kind? Nobody knows), videos of Corroded Coffin singles and performances, and Steve had turned on his heels and walked away.

The call had been a welcome distraction as he buckled himself in the back of the ambulance that Dmitri drove, with Robin. “I like your new boyfriend, he’s loud,” Dmitri had called back at him.

“He’s not my boyfriend, man,” Steve had sighed.

“But he does wish he was,” Robin the traitor had chimed in and then sat unperturbed by his glaring. That was merely minutes before he had rung the bell to the house he’s currently standing before, Eddie on the other side of the threshold.

“W-we got a call about someone getting hurt?” He stutters out, remembering his training and Eddie quietly steps aside to let them in.

— — —

Eddie barely processes shit. His monkey brain is just going Steve! Steve is here! In his sexy firefighter uniform! Stevie! Until Rick spots him and loudly goes, “Man, really?” Which clearly confuses Steve as his face does the whole, brows jumping up and eyes widening look that conveyed the message ‘What?’ without him having to say a word.

“Rick, shut up,” Eddie snaps. If Steve recognises that name, he doesn't show it.

Robin checks him out and splints his ankle, ruling out any serious injury in his hips or spine, except for maybe a nasty bruise from rolling down a flight of stairs. They load him on the gurney, then the back of the ambulance, working quietly as Eddie stood around fidgeting. He really just wants to talk to Steve about the whole thing, apologize for the whole mess.

“H-hey, Steve?” Eddie says and then almost falters when Steve’s attention is on him. “I just wanted to apologize about the whole thing man, you don’t deserve all that,”

“No, you don’t have to, it's not your fault,” Steve chuckles humorlessly. “Honestly, I just feel kind of stupid about it now that I think about it–” The older dude claps a hand over his shoulder, interrupting him.

“We gotta go buddy,” He says in a heavy Russian accent.

“Do you want a ride to the hospital?” Steve asks.

Eddie notices Rick looking at him expectantly from inside the ambulance. Ew. But he could bear it for Steve. He just needs to talk to Steve and Eddie’s scared that if he lets him go right now he might never see him again. So he gets in.

— — —

Steve wishes he would stop apologizing. Eddie would say ‘sorry’ and his brain would automatically translate it to ‘sorry people think we’re dating’.

“It's okay Eddie, I get it,” Steve sighs. “It's not even like we’re together, is it? I’m sure everyone would just forget about it in a while and you can move on–”

"I don’t want to forget about you," Eddie’s face is all scrunched up, “Shit, Steve I thought I was protecting you from the shitstorm that’s my life, since everything I touch turns to dust anyways, I thought maybe I could spare you if I left you alone,” He sighs, “But I failed in that regard too, I guess.”

"But–" Steve's jaw feels like it's on the floor, "Eddie, you don’t need to protect me, okay? I can take care of myself,” Eddie looks like a kicked puppy, all sad and hurt. Steve just wants him to smile again. “I mean, the amount of times we actually kissed in public, I’m just really surprised that was the picture that ended up online,” Eddie barks out a laugh.

“I don’t want you to think that I don’t want you, Steve.” He says, his gaze intense and pleading. Steve is rendered speechless. “I grew up in a trailer park with my uncle. I sold weed in high school and played dnd. It took me three tries to even graduate highschool. I'm not a good person, i'm nothing special, I don't run into burning buildings and rescue kittens from trees or whatever, and I know I kind of ruined everything before it even started but please, please just give me one chance, Stevie–"

“Are you seriously doing this right now? In front of me?” Rick interrupts, and Steve is not a bad dude who’d hurt people who can’t defend themselves but he really wants to smack the disgusted look on his stupid face. Robin flaps a hand shushing him, watching him and Eddie like they’re on her TV screen instead. Even Dmitri is quiet, no doubt listening in.

“Would you like to go on an actual date with me? Please?” Eddie finishes.

Steve is stunned to say the least. He had been distracted for most of the ride, he didn't even realize that they had stopped until the door of the ambulance swung open, startling Robin too. Then he’s being pulled away to do his job, leaving a distraught looking Eddie behind.

— — —

Eddie paces hidden behind the ambulance bay, burning through his third cigarette of the hour– which once upon a time wouldn't even be worth noting, but he's trying to do better here, goddamnit— thinking of what an idiot he'd acted like.

What was he thinking? Asking Steve, a good guy with a normal life, without paps shoving cameras in his face, to be with him. Eddie Munson, the wildcard, the drama.

Eddie can’t go anywhere without someone criticizing everything he does. Ironically enough, that was one of the main reasons he was so anxious to leave his small town home behind. So much for anonymity. The constant judgment is the one thing he hated so much about constantly being in the public eye. He’d love to say that he doesn’t care and that it never bothers him, but the truth is that it gets fucking exhausting how people already have preconceived notions about him everywhere he goes. He doesn’t want that for Steve.

He's never known peace a day in his life. Why would Steve willingly through his life to the wolves just to be with him? It was selfish of Eddie to even ask that of him. He’s put him through enough shit as it is with the picture and all the harassment from his so-called fans. He hates it. This was nothing like how he dreamed his life would be at just twenty eight when he was in high school.

Eddie knows he’s spiraling. He’s being over dramatic and catastrophizing, as Chrissy would say. God, he wishes she were to talk some sense into him. Yet he can't seem to move away from that spot, waiting for Steve to come out through the doors, he can't leave without seeing this through. If he gets brutally rejected, so be it. But on the off chance Steve might still want this? The idea that he might be worth giving up a little bit of peace for, seems way too tantalizing.

The doors to the ER open. Steve spots him and jogs over, the look of relief clear on his face. “Hey, you’re still here,” he says. “I was hoping I wouldn’t miss you,”

“Yeah, um, everything alright in there?” he asks– he doesn’t really care.

“Sure, yeah, Rick’s going to be okay,”

“So, um,” Eddie trails off, suddenly at a loss on what to say.

“Are you going to give me your number then?” Steve asks.

“What?”

“You did ask me on a date, right? Unless you weren’t serious about it. In that case–”

“No! No, I was serious, I swear.” Eddie can’t keep the disbelief off his voice. “You’re saying yes? After everything that happened?”

“Eddie, I really like you,” says Steve. “And I’ve read so many shitty things people have said about you,” Eddie cringes a little, he knows how vile those tabloids can get. “But that was not the man I had known this past week and I want a real chance to get to know you, if that’s okay,”

Before he can stop himself Eddie is careening into Steve, crashing their lips together in a desperate kiss that Steve reciprocates with the same intensity.

“That is so okay,” Eddie breathes. “Love that plan,”

“So,” Steve grins. “Number?”

———

[topbanana-art]

Finally making an OC info post- by no means is this all of them, just ones that are most active and/or live in my head rent free.

First up- Rhys (DnD 5e - Rime of the Frostmaiden)

20 years Old, Half Orc, Half Elf (sweet baby angel) , He/Him

Fighter- Echo Knight

Absolute Ray of Sunshine; Rhys is from Icewind Dale; more specifically the Nomadic Reghed Tribe of the Elk.

He's unfamiliar with the outside world and even includes settlements in his own country

He's a Himbo basically a big dog.

This campaign lead him to leaving his tribe for the first time after an unfortunate accident which turned him into a small 'painted child' and searching for his missing sister. (both these are sorted now!)

*Rhys found an old oil painting of this child, blacked out and next thing he knew he was that small elf child. Her skin and clothing having the texture of painted canvas, and bleeds paint.

For a good chunk of the campaign he was just a totally normal elf- whose shadow didn't match with the body

---

Dhalas (DnD 5e Annalor)

36 Years Old, They/Him, Triton

Drunken Master Monk

Chill surfer dude vibes

Part of a travelling circus, They're a balancing act

Extremely laid back, Dhalas talks like they fight- dancing around, seemingly without rhyme or reason and occasionally clumsy.

---

Foxglove (BG3)

138 Years old (tweaked her age a lil), She/They, Drow

Arcane Trickster Rogue

Guild Artisan Background- Locksmith & Apprentice Finesmith

Chill and sassy, that Tav who talks their way out of shit.

Skews Towards Chaotic Good

Presents Androgynous most of the time

Must lockpick everything- she's not actually super interested what's inside, she just wants to see the workmanship of the locks and trashtalk how bad they are.

Yeah she's smooching the vampire. (and Halsin)

Naturally cares for others, even at the cost of her own wellbeing.

Has a Phobia of anything touching/going near her eyes- so the start of the game is A Time for Fox.

---

Arslan Dhoro (FFXIV)

21 Years Old (as of ARR), He/Them

Xaela AuRa

Dragoon - White Mage Main (All healer classes tbh)

Stoic, Resting Angry Face Himbo

He struggles to show emotion but he's just pretty shy and cautious about opening up to others.

From the Azim Steppe, he left in his early teens with his father after the death of his mother, to explore the world beyond the Steppe.

His Father Died in his late teens, attacked in Coerthas thinking he and Arslan were Dravanians.

He's extremely soft and protective for the Scions/his friends

---

Shiv (DnD 5e Saltmarsh- campaign completed)

Awful, terrible lesbian

68 years old, She/Her, Halfling

Celestial Warlock - Unicorn Patron w/ a Baby Phoenix familiar, Toby

A piece of shit. Is an absolute asshole and wont let you know she cares.

Lowkey magical girl

Ex-smuggler, who's patron is literally 'I can fix her', 'she can be a better person'. Part of the 'Beyond Skeletons' Pirate crew, she's the medic of the crew.

---

Pymmyr Tathnel (DnD 5e)

Pym

85 Years Old, He/They, Drow

Gloomstalker Ranger

Emotional Support Blink Dog, Princess Liquorice

This boy is scared all the time

Doesn't talk much, but speaks in a soft voice

Has disordered 'Sleeping' and Eating :)

His plague mask has tinted lenses to help ease the strain with how bright the surface is

I wont tell too much about them as a lot of their info is spoilers to other players. But this sad Drow just rocks up in my head on the regular.

---

Erebus (Anima Beyond Fantasy)

AKA- My first TTRPG character! circa 2011-2 I think???

Real name Sho Yoshimitsu

22 Years Old, He/Him

Duk'Zarist Nephilim

Assassin

Textbook 'strong silent and intimidating hot man'

But basically a big soft boy if you break past the mile thick ice

Tragic backstory™ , used to using his body for the job

He really enjoys cooking!

Also hopelessly in love with a small soft summoner, Caelum (the one hugging him), They're RedxBlue gays

---

I think I'll leave it there for now!

I may add more later, I hope it was interesting?? and I'm still pretty shy with yelling this much about my characters haha.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far! 💜

[triplexdoublex]

We cannot say Megan was the first celebrity he linked up with but while before all he cared about was NETWORKING and living the glory - to one day tell the story-, with Megan he started putting into consideration the clout he can instantly get.... and for this I really BLAME TRAVIS BARKER, that man.

All this circus for pop punk and his 'has-been' drummer career to come back AND for his label mogul career to take off. I'm sure he was in Kells ears telling him how this would benefit his rebrand and help him get away from 'Bad Boys' as Interscope would be more willing to focus on him and back him up (yes, he was always signed with them, but he REALLY started teaming up with them around 2018 and it was only for that staged Eminem beef, allegedly).

I also believe with Sommer Ray, something NEW about celebrities 'hook ups' like never before must have clicked and that is EGO. During that time, as many IG 'fitness' 'models' were out there, Sommer was the ONE no teenage boy or young man in America- black, white or other - could shut up about. Notice how even the guys were so invested in her- especially Rook who would later advice him to be in that Z-list movie with Megan. Sommer situationship really walked so Megan's could run; her 2009 role was peek 'young average male' fantasy woman.

Usually PR main gain is an UPGRADED image: Jay Z himself, R. Kelly associate, was only allowed to seat at certain tables after he associate himself with somebody so GREAT it over-shadowed the image of the crack dealer from Marshall project who shot his own biological brother at 12 yo over some deal. What's odd about the whole Twin Flame PR scheme is that it achieved the exact OPPOSITE for Kells. Megan is too insecure and talentless to team up with her partner to build eachother up.

The hate he gets on the daily has nothing to do with any sense of social envy but has anything to do with HER. That woman made sure to latch onto him as she won't land anything better (I'm sure his 'size' and looks helped and sponsoring vitamins on IG won't pay the bills, three CS checks and the divorce settlement). And to really secure him, she had to destroy his image from the start: gain levarage on him - so that, if he ever was to leave- she would be the victim.

In the private sphere she made sure to discover all weaknesses, feed his addictions (lines of coke on plastic tits and ayahuasca trips) and dig into his childhood (disgusting for her to use a poetry book to out 'one of her pretty boys' as a childhood S Assault survivor and blame their absent parents for everything and upbringing, yuck).

His last project gave me hope maybe he finally realized SHE is his BIGGEST enemy. Hopefully he's toxic enough to actually make run her away: for once in his life RUNNING AWAY PEOPLE MIGHT actually BE his BIGGEST BLESSING! Otherwise I don't see her ever letting go. She is too clingy. She's the type of person you actively need to cut off from your life.

HARD DISAGREE about Travis!! Especially saying he’s a “has been” that man is a fucking LEGEND!! I was a Blink girl wayyyy before I was a MGK girl. He’s always been drumming and producing and working on something. The only times he’s probably even has a break when when he was he was recovering from a plane crash he somehow survived despite having 3rd degree burns over 65% of his body , and he still came back strong!

The rest …in a nutshell, yeah this PR bullshit definitely hasn’t worked in his favor at all but let’s be honest he was already getting hate before she came along too , but she’s definitely increased it by playing victim. And yeah she’s an absolute trash human being for outing the SA in her “poetry book” especially since it heavily suggested it was kells who was abused because she mentioned the “history of family curses” he’s always said his family was cursed and even says in new songs how his family is cursed for 7 generations.

Yeah I had hope too until the were at stagecoach together, whether it be a pr stunt or them actually getting back together who knows? I just want her gone for good .

[hotheadrednecksimmer]

Vault Tec Legacy Challenge

3 months later, in total 4 months have gone by since Alexia and Ellis went into the Wasteland.

Saylor: There's someone trying to enter the Vault? Could it be....?

Alexia screaming on the other side of the door: I'm sweating, I'm hot, and I'm tired. I want a hot, clean shower and a warm meal. And my code isn't working!!

Saylor shouting back: I'm opening the door!

The Vault door opens and Alexia and Ellis walk in.

Saylor: I'm so happy you guys are alive and back! We were so worried about you guys.... we assumed the worst. So much time has passed.

Alexia: Are you moved into the Overseer Quarters?

Saylor: No, not yet. It didn't feel right for me to move in, when there was still a pos-

Alexia: Cool, I'm going to shower, brush my teeth for the first time in forever, and sleep in a bed where I don't have to look over my shoulder.

Saylor: Shouldn't we talk first?

Alexia: I don't want to.

Ellis: Saylor, Let her go. I'm not quite tired yet, plus we got your research and the part for the generator.

Alexia leaves Saylor and Ellis by the Vault Entrance.

Saylor gasps: You did?

Ellis: It was a pain in the ass and multiple hoops we had to jump through like we were some damn circus animals, but we got it all. Al wouldn't let us come back without getting everything we needed.

Saylor: That sounds like her. I can take the research off of you and I'll put it in the Med bay so we can't start looking over it.

Ellis: We met someone while we were out there. I think I know what Kenzie is turning into ..... and there's no stopping it.

Saylor: Oh?

Ellis awkwardly: I'm actually getting a bit tired, we can talk more in depth tomorrow. Al was right, a hot shower and a bed that hasn't had hundreds of people on it sounds really nice right now.

Saylor: Goodnight Ellis, It's really great to have the both of you back.

That night in the Overseer's Private Quarters

Alexia rocks back and forth on the bed: We made it back. We're safe. Nothing can hurt me in here.

Alexia cries into the bed: How do I even begin to explain what we've been through to the other Dwellers?

The next morning in the Dining Hall

Ben: Where did you go in the middle of the night last night? Is Ophelia having nightmares again?

Saylor: No, she actually slept through the night. I wasn't going to say anything until they emerged from their rooms but Ellis and Alexia are back. They looked quite beat up and they were absolutely fifthly. But, they're alive! And Alexia can be Overseer again.

Ben: Is that what you want? I thought you had been enjoying being Overseer?

Saylor: I only did it because I had to. "Enjoying it' wouldn't be the words I would use to describe the additional responsibilities and work I had to do.

Ben: That is true. I'm glad they aren't dead.

Saylor: You can say that again.

Ben: When do you think they'll be up?

Saylor: There's no telling how long they have been able to peacefully sleep over the past 5 months. I'm letting them rest as much as they can before I announce that they are here.

A couple hours later, Alexia enters the Dining Hall

Val: Mom! You're back! I missed you so much!

Alexia squeezes Val tightly and holds on to her: I missed you more sweet girl. You have gotten so big and beautiful!

Val: Thank you! Oh, mom, you've got scars? Are you alright?

Alexia blinks away tears before Val could notice: I'm much better now that I'm home with you girls. I promise I'm okay, we're all gonna be okay.

Clem: Mommy? MOMMY!!

Clem races over to Alexia and hugs her tightly.

Alexia: Oh, little bear. I missed you so. How tall are you now?

Clem: I'm well over 4 feet tall mom!

Alexia smiles: You're growing like a weed! What are we feeding you?

Clem: I eat whatever Mr. Ben makes. Dr. Saylor wouldn't let me eat the old box of Sugar Bombs. They looked so good!

Alexia: How old were they?

Clem: Like really old, older than you I think.

Alexia: Glad you didn't eat them then. Why don't you and Val come to my room tonight and we have a sleepover? I missed you girls a lot and would love to catch up with my little bears.

Clem: Val isn't a little bear, she's a meanie. I'm the little bear.

Alexia: Okay, well it still stands. Do you want to have a sleepover in my room?

Clem: YES! I'll tell Val and we'll have so much fun. Can we sneak snacks into your room? I know they usually aren't allowed but...

Alexia whispers: Yes, and I won't tell.

Alexia kisses Clem on the check and Clem runs off making a mental list of what all she's going to bring to Alexia's room for tonight. Alexia takes a deep breath. She thought this would be easy, sliding back into Vault life away from the horrors of the Wastelands. Alexia realized at some point that she would have to confront her other fear, confessing how she felt about Jameson and if she was even ready for that conversation.

[So sorry that this was a long episode, I feel like there was so many good things that needed to be included in the homecoming of our two courageous characters. ALMOST added Ellis and Kenzie's reunion but realized how LONG it was. I have loved this series so SO much. This story and series has been on my mind constantly and where I want to go with these characters, on top of the challenge. Another thing I wanted to add was that in the challenge is says that the Dwellers aren't supposed to leave the Vault, but for story telling purposes I wanted to do it anyway. Thank you all who have read thus far and are invested in these characters!] ╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ First | Previous |Next ╭┈◦•◦❥•◦ Updated Character List

[theboywithburninghands]

Hey all. Last chapter of the latest Bunnyrabbitdoll arc... thing. Longest thing I've written by far. Light on the fluff, heavy on the horror and dark comedy. Hope you enjoy. T/W: Gore, body horror, guns, arachnophobia The Dollhouse Final Part: Kill All Monsters

Caine and Bubble are relaxing on a digital beach, both of them sporting sunglasses and matching towels. Caine is still in his full ringmaster outfit and Bubble can’t actually lay down, so he hovers an inch or two above his towel. Layla sits on their picnic basket, playing some beach music. Caine sips from an empty coconut shell through a crazy straw. Caine: BOY, THIS IS THE LIFE, ISN’T IT BUBBLE?

Bubble: I feel like a million deer, Caine! *eats a seashell*

Caine: A GUY COULD GET USED TO A LITTLE R&R! Bubble: Reading and writing? Caine: OH HO HO NO, YOU ABSOLUTE SIMPLETON! REST AND RELAXATION! IT’S HARD TO COME BY RUNNING A DIGITAL CIRCUS EVERY DAY FOR [error: not found: value] YEARS! THAT’S WHY I LET SOME OF MY SELF-REGULATING AI RUN ADVENTURES NOW AND THEN!

Bubble: You mean like me? 

Caine: RIGHT! WE’RE ONE BIG HAPPY FAMILY HERE, AND FAMILIES WORK TOGETHER! AND RELAX TOGETHER! 

Bubble looked around. They were the only ones on the beach for miles. 

Bubble: Hmm… Do you think the performers are okay?

Caine: I’D BET YOU A COMBO MEAL AT SPUDSY’S THAT THEY’RE HAVING THE TIME OF THEIR NON-ABSTRACTED LIVES RIGHT NOW! 

Bubble: Good enough for me, boss! *he pulls a sun mirror from Hammerspace and flips it open, setting it in front of him* Ahhhhhhhhhh…

Caine: WORKING ON YOUR TAN THERE, BUBBLE?

Bubble: Heating myself up! It’s fun to feel myself boil!

Caine: *laughs* Oh, you crack me up. 

—

Back in Crazy Caine’s House of Tricks, Pomni paced back and forth, tapping the hatchet she found on her palm. Ragatha sat in the corner, near Jax, but with enough distance between them so his stench isn’t unbearable. Jax himself drifts in and out of consciousness, delirious.

Jax: Hey… Hey Pompom. Pompoooom. 

Pomni: *sighs* What?

Jax: Wh-What is the scariest tree in the forest..?

Pomni: What? What kind of question-

Jax: Bam-BOO! *makes jazz hands and laughs so hard he coughs, followed by a groan of pain*

Pomni rolled her eyes and continued to pace. Ragatha gave a small, polite laugh at Jax’s terrible joke. Pomni: Where are the others..? They have to be in their own puzzle rooms, right? 

Ragatha: All three of us got one. Well, you skipped yours. Maybe we should try doing what you did and climb up the slide?

Jax: My foot hurts…

Ragatha: I know Jax, we’ll get it fixed soon, okay hun?

Pomni: We can’t. The doors locked behind us… *she jiggles the handle of the door Jax fled through to demonstrate*

Ragatha: You tried chopping it down with your ax?

Jax: Heeeere’s POMNI! *laughs himself into coughing again*

Pomni: I could try… but these seem pretty sturdy. I might break it. 

Ragatha: It’s worth a shot. Beats sitting in the dark and twiddling our thumbs. 

Pomni: I guess… Should I just… pick one?

Jax: Not my door… It’s still in there. 

Ragatha: Why don’t you do mine? You already killed that monster… 

Pomni: Okay. Pomni stood in front of Ragatha’s door, taking a deep breath and flexing her arms. She then readied her hatchet. 

Pomni: …Here we go. Pomni took a mighty swing at the door. With a brittle crunch, the wooden handle broke off, leaving the hatchet-head buried a few inches into the door for a moment before falling out and clanging to the floor. Jax burst into laughter for a third time. 

Ragatha: Oh no…

Pomni looked at the broken handle for a moment before balling her fists and hurling it against the wall, where it ricocheted and skittered across the floor. 

Ragatha: Pomni, I’m sorry. That was a terrible idea… 

Pomni: No-! No, it really wasn’t. It was a good idea, it just… didn’t work. 

Ragatha covered her face, Pomni ceasing her pacing and going over to her.

Pomni: Ragatha, I’m sorry, it really was a good idea, I didn’t mean to… 

Ragatha: No, it’s okay. It’s okay, I just… It’s horrible here, yeah, but it’s never this horrible… something has to be wrong… 

Pomni: What do you mean?

Ragatha: I mean… you saw what was after me… you saw what that monster did to Jax-

Jax appeared to be entertaining himself by seeing how many fingers he could stick through the wound in his foot. 

Ragatha: It’s not supposed to be like this… it’s bad but it’s not… not… 

Pomni: Not?

Ragatha: Not Rated M…

Pomni: Who cares? We’re alive. And when we get out of this place we can tell Caine exactly how we feel…

Ragatha: …I guess I’ve just gotten used to a specific kind of horror… 

Pomni hugged the ragdoll, who gratefully squeezed her back. It was a lot easier to hug her girlfriend with so many other anxieties tuning out her haphephobia. 

Pomni: We’ll get out of here. It’s just another stupid adventure, right? 

Jax: Hey… where’s my hug?

Pomni: You’ll get one after you’ve had a bath.

Jax: I won’t. You just think I’m ugly…

Pomni: No, I think you stink. Big difference.

Jax: …My foot really hurts. 

One of the doors flew open with a crash and Zooble stumbled out of it, clutching what appeared to be a double-barreled shotgun. 

Zooble: I SAID GET BACK, YOU UGLY SON OF A B!#€#! GET AWAY FROM ME!

Zooble snapped their shotgun closed just as a clawed, skinless humanoid hand the size of a car wrapped its fingers around the doorframe. A head, skin so tight around its face it more resembled a skull, crammed its way into the doorframe. It had eyes like pools of fog and a long, serpentine tongue, grinning hatefully

Zooble: Yeah. Keep smiling. 

Zooble aimed their gun at the creature and fired. The kickback from the weapon sent their torso and arms flying, their head twirling about in the air before landing on the floor and their legs blindly stumbling about. Luckily, they were dead-on with their shot and hit the ghoul creature square in the forehead, fog gushing out of the wound as it clamped its bony hand over it. Zooble’s arms and torso, sitting several feet away from their head, aimed the shotgun once again, using their claw as a mount, and fired. The kickback from this blast blew Zooble’s right arm off their body, but the buckshot found its mark in the ghoul’s jaw, severing it neatly from the rest of the skull, so that it swung back and forth like the pendulum of a clock. It shrieked and gushed a torrent of fog from its maw that appeared to freeze the ground below it, shoving its way back into the doorway, the door slamming shut and locking behind it. 

Zooble: F@&$in’ @$$#@!€… their right arm crawls its way back to their body, abandoning the empty gun on the floor. The right arm reaches their torso and their left reattaches it. Then, Zooble’s headless and legless torso pushes itself up so it balances on its hand and claw and ambles its way to their head. They put their head back on and rest a moment.

Jax: *points* Gun.

Zooble twisted their head around before relaxing at the sight of their fellow performers. 

Zooble: Sweet J£$&$, it’s just you guys… gimme a second. 

Zooble grabbed their wandering legs and hoisted themselves up onto them, twitching each foot to ensure proper connection before taking a few careful steps towards Pomni and the others. They stopped, cringing and covering where their nose might have been with their claw.

Zooble: God, it stinks in here… 

Pomni: Sorry. It’s Jax. His monster pretty much had him in Its mouth… 

Zooble: Ugh… *keeping their claw up* So… you three made it out. And you all ran into monsters too? 

Pomni: I sort of skipped mine by climbing back up the slide and forcing the trapdoor open… I had a weapon too, but it just broke. *she picks up the head of the hatchet*

Zooble: Really? D@##, that gun only had two shells. I looked all over that stupid lodge for supplies… 

Jax: Hodgepodge in a lodge… hee hee.

Zooble: What’s with him?

Ragatha: He got bitten by his monster too. I think it might have had something on Its teeth, ‘cause he’s been acting like that for a while. 

Jax: *watching his own hand move* My hands make after-hands.

Pomni: Are you alright though, Zooble? Ragatha was just telling me-

Zooble: Oh yeah, dandy. Peachy keen. Nothing like nearly getting frozen by a giant ice wraith to put a little skip in your step.

Ragatha: You were better than I was. Pomni had to kill my monster for me.

Zooble: …Pomni? Really?

Pomni: You don’t need to sound so shocked. 

Zooble: I mean, no offense, newbie, but you don’t give off “killer” energy. 

Jax: It’s because she loves her! 

Pomni blushed hot pink and Ragatha rather brusquely cleared her throat.

Ragatha: He’s uh, not in his right mind. I just got lucky that Pomni stumbled into my escape room… 

Zooble: So that leaves Gangle and Kinger unaccounted for. 

Ragatha: Right… 

Pomni: They have to be inside one of the doors we haven’t used yet. And since they can really hurt us, they might be in big trouble.

Zooble: So what do we do? 

Pomni: Well, there’s seven doors. One for each of us, and one that must lead out of here, or deeper into this place, God forbid…

Jax: That one. It’s different…

Jax pointed to a door on the opposite wall from where he was sitting. It was the only door on that wall, and it appeared to have three small, colored lights on it, no brighter than those on a Christmas tree. Pomni, Ragatha and Zooble all approached the door. There were six lightbulbs, two vertical rows of three, on a small panel. A fuschia, periwinkle and red light were illuminated, while the other three were dark. A small bronze plaque above the lights was barely readable in the soft red-violet glow. 

Pomni: “Should you give in to your pain,

In this house, you will remain.

‘Tis only after fear is slain

That you can go home again.”

Zooble pointed to each of the illuminated lights. 

Zooble: Pink for me, purple for Jax, red for Ragatha. 

Ragatha: So the other three are Kinger, Gangle-

Pomni: And me. I have to do mine…

Ragatha: But you skipped it… How are you going to get back in there, all the doors are locked… 

Pomni: Let’s worry about that in a bit. Gangle and Kinger haven’t beaten their rooms yet.

Ragatha: But the doors are locked.

Pomni: Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. 

Pomni picked up the empty shotgun and the blade of the broken hatchet. 

Pomni: See if any of the doors open for you. If they don’t, and they probably won’t, try to smash the handles off with the butt of this. *she hands Ragatha the gun* I don’t see a deadbolt, so it must just be a lock on the handle…

Zooble: What if you’re wrong? What if we get stuck in here? 

Pomni: Then I’m wrong, and we’re stuck. But we tried.

Pomni jiggled the handle on one of the doors they hadn’t tried yet. To no one’s surprise, it was locked, so she took the axehead and began to smash it down on the handle. Ragatha set to work on another one of the doors, testing the handle and then starting the process of bashing it off with the shotgun. Jax covered his ears at the sudden noise. 

What felt like ages of continuous bashing finally ended when Ragatha and Zooble succeeded in knocking off their door’s handle, with it clanging to the floor in several bent and twisted pieces. Ragatha pulled on the hole where the handle once was and the door opened with a crunch. 

Ragatha: Yes!

Zooble: I’ll be d@##ed. 

Pomni: Oh, good work guys! *puts down the axehead, panting with exertion* Okay, let’s go in and help…

Ragatha: Wait, what about Jax- oh.

Jax snorted in his sleep, kicking his uninjured foot and slumping a little further down the wall.

Pomni: Looks like he’ll be okay for a little while. *she smiles* I’m glad he could get at least a little rest… 

Zooble: You know, this is pretty much what he acts like even when he isn’t tripping on monster venom… 

The three of them chortled, but it died down quickly. They had work to do. Ragatha opened the door and they slipped inside, Zooble carrying the empty gun just in case.

They exited into what appeared to be a forest, the door attached to a brick wall, the only man made structure in the vicinity. It slammed shut behind them. The ivy-snared trees stretched high out of view, the suffocating canopy of leaves blocking just about all natural light. The grass was overgrown and clumpy, so tall that Pomni had to push it out of the way to keep it from getting in her mouth. Crickets and other insects chirred, and the entire area had the dense smell of wet moss. 

Zooble: Hmm. *they hold up their hand and claw, calling out* HEY GANGLE?! KINGER?! YOU OUT THERE?

In the distance, there was another shout. Too high pitched and delicate to be the echo of Zooble’s voice. 

Ragatha: Gangle! 

The three of them took off into the woods. Pomni could hardly see an inch in front of her due to the tall, knotted grass, and her foot soon snagged on a root and she fell forward.

Pomni: OOF! 

The jester swore to herself and began to pick herself up off the ground, only to squeak when a pair of hands wrapped about her midsection and hoisted her into the air. She was seated down on a pair of plush shoulders, a tangle of red curls and a purple bow between her legs.

Ragatha: *smiling up at her* Watch your head, okay? 

Ragatha continued running, Pomni leaning onto her head for support. The jester felt her face warm up despite the cool air rushing by her cheeks. This was much better… She had no idea Ragatha was that strong.

The group continued onward, following Gangle’s cries, until they came onto a clearing between two mighty trees. Strung between them was a spider web, woven with thick yet gossamer threads to be about the size of a California king bed. In the middle hung Gangle, her body a mess of knots and her lips quavering. She gasped upon seeing the three of them.

Gangle: Guys! You made it… please get me down, I don’t know when she’s coming back…

Zooble: Okay, hold still. Pomni, you’re the tallest right now, break the threads. 

Zooble handed Pomni the gun, and she stuck the barrels of it up towards one of the threads holding Gangle in place.

Gangle: Th-That thing isn’t loaded is it?!

Ragatha: Gangle, we wouldn’t do that to you- ow my neck.

Pomni: Sorry Ragatha… 

The canopy above them whispered ever so slightly, a few dead leaves drifting down upon them. Gangle looked up as best she could and gasped.

Gangle: She’s coming, please get me down, guys, please! 

Pomni hit one of the silk threads with the barrel of the gun, and it stuck fast. Pomni yanked on the stock of the weapon, but the threads stretched taut like bungee cords. A 12-foot long spindly black leg emerged from the treeline above them with slow, surgical precision, testing its grip on one of the parallel tree trunks before settling it down. 

Zooble: That’s a big-@$$ spider… 

Pushing through the leaves and branches emerged an arachnid, jet black and the size of a rhinoceros. A cluster of eight, milky white fish egg eyes sat on her almost disproportionately small head. Her pincers clicked together greedily as she climbed on eight light and nimble feet down to the web.

Gangle: Help me! Help me, please, help me! 

Ragatha: Pomni, get the gun unstuck!

Pomni: I’m really trying! It’s like steel wire!

Pomni was on her feet by this point, balancing on Ragatha’s shoulders and pulling on the shotgun as hard as she could. Her gloves slipped and she was sent flying backwards off of Ragatha’s shoulders, who had to rapidly spin her arms for balance. The shotgun remained stuck to the web, the spider advancing past it towards Gangle, frothy drool dribbling onto her mask. 

Gangle: NO! GO AWAY! 

Ragatha: Hold on Gangle! I’m coming! 

Ragatha, using her height to her advantage, crouched and jumped up, grabbing onto the shotgun with one hand. Her legs pinwheeled in the air. The enormous spider was jostled about as she prepared to sink her fangs into Gangle, stumbling and turning her ghostly eyes towards Ragatha. 

Pomni: *just now climbing to her feet# Ragatha wait, don’t get stuck! 

Ragatha: I’m not gonna get stuck, I-

The rag doll lifted up her other arm to grasp the shotgun, pulling the trigger by mistake. Instead of the expected click of the hammer striking an empty chamber, there was a deafening bang and a muzzle flash the size of a manhole cover. The gun fired, catapulting Ragatha back onto the grass and sending buckshot directly into the spider’s face, breaking a few threads of her web.

The arachnid’s head burst like a rotten melon, chunky, bright white slurry pouring from the stump that was left behind. Her legs twitched a few times before she tumbled off and hit the overgrown forest floor, her legs curling up. Stone dead.

Gangle: YOU SAID IT WASN’T LOADED!

Zooble: IT WASN’T LOADED! 

Gangle: *practically sobbing# YOU ALMOST SHOT ME!!!

Zooble: IT. WASN’T. LOADED! It’s a double-barreled shotgun! What, did another shell just APPEAR in the barrel?!

Pomni snapped the gun open after a few tries as Ragatha worked on getting Gangle down from the web. A spent shell casing, smoking hot, dropped onto the grass, along with a live one. 

Pomni: I guess it did just appear in the barrel… *puts the live round back into the gun and snaps it closed*

The gunshot had ripped through a few of the threads in the spider’s web, making it much easier to pull Gangle free now that a lot of the tautness was gone. Ragatha only had to reach up on her tiptoes to grab Gangle by one of her ribbons and yank her free. The pile of ribbons fell into Ragatha’s arms and promptly burst into tears, full-on spouts of water erupting from the eyeholes of her mask.

Zooble: Ah… Gangle, I’m sorry, we really didn’t know it was loaded…

Ragatha: Zooble used both shots on their own monster, we never reloaded it… it must replenish ammo on its own…

Gangle sniffled and sobbed a few more times before managing to calm herself down enough to speak. 

Gangle: I-I believe you… I was just… it was so scary… I was stuck up there for ages waiting for her to come back, I screamed and I screamed for help and I thought it was never gonna come… 

Pomni: …All of us are scared, Gangle. But once we find Kinger and I complete my challenge, it’ll be over.

Gangle: *wet sniffle* Challenge..?

Pomni: Yeah. All of us completed a puzzle room like this… well, I actually sort of skipped mine. Long story. Let’s just go back to the nexus…

Zooble: The what?

Pomni: The room with all the doors. It’s called a nexus I think. 

Ragatha: Very Metroidvania of you, Pomni. *she smiles, then looks down at Gangle, still a pile in her arms# Can you walk, Gangle?

Gangle: Um… I don’t know… 

Ragatha: Don’t sweat it. I’ll carry you to the nexus. You’re pretty light.

Gangle: …Thank you. 

The four of them walked back to the door. The chilly air and ambience of the forest was nearly soothing on the group’s inflamed nerves. Pomni pushed her way through the tall grass; it was manageable when she didn’t need to run full tilt, but a part of her wished she was back on Ragatha’s shoulders. 

Zooble: Let’s hope Jax hasn’t wandered off. 

Gangle: Jax is with you guys..? Is he okay?

Ragatha: He’s- Well… he’s hurt, but okay. He got bitten by his monster and we think it may have been venomous or something, because he’s acting really loopy.

Zooble: It’s kind of entertaining.

They reached the solitary brick wall. Zooble reached out to open the door, but someone pulled it open from the other side.

Zooble: Kinger..!

The eldest member of the group stood on the other side of the door, trembling more than usual. In his left hand he held a meat cleaver, stained with something blue. Flecks of the same blue substance stained his face, gloves and robe. 

Kinger: Glad to know you…

The four of them cautiously slipped by Kinger back into the Nexus. They were soon hit by the putrid smell of rotten corn and winced. Jax was exactly where they left him, sleeping like a rock. 

Gangle: It smells really bad in here…

Pomni: I know, it’s Jax… he got it probably the worst out of all of us. *she leans the shotgun against the wall# B-But what happened to you, Kinger? You killed your monster?

Kinger: Monster..? 

Pomni: Uh, yeah, in your escape room…?

Kinger: I… I remember books… 

Ragatha: Books? *she sets Gangle down*

Kinger: Books and- and black candles- and cheesecake… *puts his hands to the side of his head*

Zooble: Okay, okay Kinger. Sounds like you had a rough go of things… Just gonna… 

Zooble took the cleaver from Kinger’s hand with no resistance. 

Kinger: I need my pillows…

Ragatha: We’re going to get you your pillows as soon as we get out of here, okay? You saved us a whole lot of time by finishing your puzzle on your own.

Gangle: Hey…

Ragatha: No, I didn’t mean it lik-

Pomni tuned out the conversation to stare at one of the doors. It seemed to be drawing her towards it… almost whispering to her. 

Pomni: *Points to it* That’s my door. It was made for me.

Everyone stopped and looked at the door with Pomni. Jax blearily opened his eyes, curiously tilting his head at what everyone was looking at. 

Ragatha: Well… with all six of us, it shouldn’t be that hard to finish, right?

Zooble: More like five, since Jax is… indisposed.

Jax: Who are you calling in this clothes?! These are MY clothes!

Pomni went and picked up the shotgun, double checking the shells. One spent, one live. One shot. She sighed and snapped it closed. 

Pomni: Let’s get this over with… Zooble, you can probably use the cleaver to- HUUUUUAAAAAAHHHHH!

Pomni felt herself yanked backwards with enough force to give her whiplash. She rocketed towards her door, which swung itself open to swallow her up.

Ragatha: POMNI-!

Even if Ragatha had perfect timing, she couldn’t have caught up to her girlfriend in time. By the time she had taken three steps, the jester was across the threshold and the door slammed shut with a teeth-chattering bang, locking itself. 

——

Pomni awoke in darkness. Her head swam, and her upset equilibrium couldn’t tell if she was sitting up or hanging upside down. She felt around in the dark, her gloved hand grasping the shotgun laying beside her. So she was right side up, good start.

There was a clunk somewhere and she was blinded, covering her eyes with the back of her hand. A tinny buzz signaled that she was under some lights. She felt her pupils constrict painfully as she squinted at her surroundings. 

It was an office. An almost perfect imitation of symmetrical, focus-grouped blandness. The cheap carpet beneath her was an inoffensive green, the walls sterile, corporate white, and the drop ceiling above her lit with fluorescent, brain-itching lights. A few posters showing nonsensical cartoons sparsely decorated the walls. One had a man throwing a fish back into the lake he just caught it from with “Keep on The On Keeping On” overlaid over the sky in impact font, another showing an orange house cat looking up curiously at a T-Rex, with the quote “If at First You Don’t Succeed, Bite Off Your Tongue and Change Your Name to Xerxes” on the bottom, attributed to Buster Keaton.

There was a large table set up between the two rows of cubicles, empty bowls that may have contained chips or punch sitting on them, with a few cheap pink party hats and paper plates littering the floor. It wasn’t at all clear what the party was celebrating, the only clue being a lone greeting card laying on the table. Pomni brought along the shotgun and picked up the card. It was totally blank on the front apart from some words written in silver. 

Pomni: “To our new Employee.” *she flips it open* 

“The time for riddles has since passed,

For you are the very last.

We present to you a terror pure

That, by yourself, you must endure.”

One of the tiles on the drop ceiling was knocked loose, falling onto a desk and snapping in two. An arm emerged from the hole in the ceiling, a long, purple arm with a bright yellow glove on the end.

Pomni: Jax?

Another arm emerged from the ceiling, this one soft and plush, a hand with three fingers…

Voice: Pom… niiiiii…

Pomni: Oh my god…

A head emerged from the dark, or rather, two heads. Jax and Ragatha’s heads, squished together cheek-to-cheek and sloppily melted into one another like plastic. Their eyes were blank and staring, the middle eye fused together with Jax’s yellow sclera bleeding into Ragatha’s white, their mouth a single, grotesque combination of Jax’s yellow teeth and Ragatha’s sweet painted smile. Their entire body below the chest was a mass of squirming black flesh and multicolored eyes, exactly the same as Kaufmo’s was. Abstracted.

Creature: Pom…niiii….

It fell from the drop ceiling onto the floor, out of sight behind the cubicles. Pomni, her hands quaking, aimed at the cubicles with the shotgun, doing her best to look down the ironsights without dropping it. She only had one shot…

The creature rounded the corner slowly, dragging its combined weight on just its hands. The black abstracted goo stuck to the floor behind it and left a nauseating snail-trail. The creature mewled in agony.

Creature: Pom… ni…. It hurts… 

Pomni: …

The creature leapt forward and grabbed the barrel of the gun, pushing it out of the way and grabbing onto Pomni’s leg. A disgusting, earthworm-like tongue shot out of its mouth and wrapped around her leg as it whined piteously.

Creature: Pom… niiii… why didn’t you… save us… please… make it stop….

Pomni: Okay.

Pomni pressed the muzzle of the gun to the creature’s dual foreheads, and it barely had time to look confused before Pomni pulled the trigger and blasted off the top of its head. There was a squidgy explosion of black abstraction goo that rained down on the cheap green floors and into the food bowls. The amalgamated creature, the top of its head now a fine oily paste, slid to the ground off of Pomni’s leg. Pomni stepped back, looking up at the ceiling.

Pomni: …You wanted me to run, right? You wanted me to run away. I… I think I’m done with that. There’s no point in running, right? Because there’s no escape. Running only makes things worse, delays the inevitable. Well. Mission accomplished, I guess. You scared me. But I killed your little monster. So… I’d like to get back to my nightmare now.

She dropped the gun on the floor and opened the exit door, closing it behind her politely.

——

Back on the digital beach, Caine and Bubble were still relaxing. A rift opened up a few feet away and the six performers tumbled out onto the sand. 

Jax: Caine! Bubble! My guuuuuuuys- *makes finger guns at them as he flops onto his back, starting to make a sand angel*

Caine: GADZOOKS! YOU ALL MADE IT OUT OF THERE! CONGRATULATIONS ON DEFEATING THE FIRST EVER PROCEDURALLY GENERATED ADVENTURE!

Caine snapped his fingers and the six of them were immediately clean. The hole in Jax’s foot knit closed and he sat up, blinking.

Jax: What the- Wh… where am I? Oh, man, why do I smell so bad… *covers his mouth and where his nose would be#

Layla hopped with joy and went over to Kinger, who caught her in his hands and pet her.

Kinger: Layla! So good to see you…

Pomni: Hold on. Procedurally generated?

Caine: THAT’S RIGHT, POMNI! USING OUR CLASSIFIED DEFINITELY LEGAL TECHNOLOGY, MY NEW AI PROBED YOUR BRAINS TO-

Pomni: You… left us in that h€!!hole… didn’t even bother to check on us… nearly let us die… and you didn’t even make it yourself. You spent… ALL OF TODAY just sitting on a BEACH?! 

Caine: …………Well, everyone deserves a break now and then-

With a howl of Barbarian rage, Pomni grabbed the meat cleaver from Zooble’s claw and took a swing at Caine.

Caine: WOAH! HEY NOW, TAKE IT EASY-

Pomni: I’M GONNA STAB YOU TO DEATH AND PLAY IN YOUR BLOOD!

Caine: I DON’T HAVE ANY BLOOD- *ducks another swipe* HEY, WAIT-

Pomni continued to chase Caine around the beach with the knife, the ringmaster pitifully trying to calm the madwoman down. The performers watched the chaos with some gratification. Bubble slid them a bucket of seashells.

Bubble: You guys want one? 

Everyone: No.

Bubble: More for me! *he downs the entire bucket in one go*

Caine: WATCH THE COAT! WATCH THE COAT-

[aspiringsophrosyne]

The Circus Kids: A Story in Parallel

Alright, so. Let's talk about Campaign 2's circus kids and handling their stories in the animated series. Spoilers for all of the Critical Role Campaign 2 under the cut.

In the second campaign, despite everything Matt has said on Talks and at the End of Campaign Wrap-Up confirming this was not the initial plan, the circus kid's storylines ended up paralleling each other to an astounding degree. Eldritch body horror, people puppets, the Nein questioning if the Yasha and Molly they knew were ever real...all of it just beautifully and organically came out of the circumstances of the role play.

Like so many things in Campaign 2, we wound up with something incredibly and poetically fitting by complete accident.

And honestly? As much as I'd like to see new things, (so long as the CRew successfully adjusts the script and the world building so that it makes sense with what they don't change) I really don't want them to mess with that part of the Nein's story too much.

That said...if they're not messing around with that, how much do they want the first-timers to know? How do they want to play Yasha's and Molly's respective "betrayals"?

Here are two potential options for Yasha:

Option one: the CRew hides Obann's magical mind control of Yasha from the first-time audience, leaving them in the dark about whether or not this was something she actually wanted. Then letting the audience realize the truth only when the rest of the Nein does. This leaves the viewers just as unsure and heartbroken as the Nein are until we learn what's really going on.

Or, option two: they can make it clear to us that she's mind controlled from the start, all the while hiding it from the Nein and jacking up the volume knob on the dramatic irony. In this route, we can make it hurt in another way by cutting between Yasha having an absolutely awful, miserable time with Obann and his little "family" and the Nein wondering aloud if she was just using them the whole time they were together.

I said all that to say this: let's say they pick an option that resembles either of these two ideas. In that case, whichever one they pick for Yasha, they shouldn't apply to Molly's situation later and expect the audience to not see through it. If they want to make the audience think Yasha chose to serve Obann only to reveal the truth later, they shouldn't lean into Lucien's bullshit about Molly never existing as well. Because the audience will be skeptical. They'll think, "Wait, this is kind of reminiscent of what happened to Yasha; why can't the same thing be happening to Molly?" And if the Nein aren't on the same page as the audience, they'll be in danger of looking unintentionally oblivious.

Basically, when it comes to the circus kids' backstories, I wouldn't want them to play the same trick twice, whichever route they take.

[padfootastic]

hello! this is from a discord prompt by the wonderful @roalinda. it’s established (but hidden) jilypad where molly makes unnecessary comments; protective james & lily, and a sirius who gets loved & doted upon & kissed silly in front of everyone by his partners 🥰

x

“Times are grave, we must stand together and—“

James slowly slides his glasses off his face, massaging the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger in a vain effort to relieve the ache building behind his eyes. This is the fourth Order meeting of this month—it’s only the 16th—and it is shaping up to seem as pointless as the other ones.

When they’d joined the Order straight out of Hogwarts, it was with stars in their eyes and fire blazing in their veins. They were ready to fight for their lives and die for the cause. Now? James can’t wait to get out of here as soon as possible. If he wasn’t a part of this circus, he might actually have considered it a bit impressive, the way Dumbledore has managed to create an atmosphere so far removed from the terrible war being waged outside that they’ve ended up on the other end of the spectrum but alas—as it stands, James has to sit through the most boring, incompetent meetings known to wixenkind and his patience is running particularly low.

A hand coming to rest on his knee, hidden under the table, brings him out of his morose thoughts. He smiles instinctively, recognising the touch that he knows better than his own.

“I’m okay, Si,” he says, turning to his left where Sirius is looking at him, concerned. To anyone else, he’ll look exactly as he always does—blank face, hard eyes, lips in a straight line. James, however, can see the worry lining his face as if it were blaring on a muggle billboard.

“You’re sure?”

“Mhm. It’s just…y’know.” He tilts his head towards the gathered crowd, Dumbledore sermonising at the head of the table. The worry immediately turns into exasperation as Sirius’ eyes roll up slightly, making his own displeasure perfectly clear.

“—and of course, the Potters have volunteered to travel around the Continent to talk to the Giants. I’m sure I don’t have to explain why it’s absolutely crucial to the war effort that they be our allies or, at the very least, agree to neutrality.”

“Er, Professor?” Lily raises her hand like she’s still in school and James just knows he’s doing the heart-eyes thing everyone teases him for but he can’t help it. A raised hand. Merlin, this woman. “Sirius will be coming with us too, of course.”

James can—and will—kiss her soundly for phrasing it like a statement, not a question. He knows for a fact they’d mentioned this before, when Dumbledore had first called them to talk about it. Mighty convenient of him to leave it out in his official announcement now.

Sure enough, a very subtle wrinkling of the old man’s brow sufficiently expressed his opinion of the idea. “Lily, my dear, are you sure that’s—“

“Yes, of course, Professor,” she says sweetly, “We’ve made all the arrangements, you don’t have to worry about a thing.”

“What use would Black be, anyway, other than partying his way through Eastern Europe?” someone mutters in an undertone that’s very clearly heard across the room. Sirius’ hand tightening on his knee is the only thing stopping James from physically growling out loud.

“I realise you’re a bit…slow on the uptake, Mr. Diggle, but I assure you, Sirius is probably the best negotiator this side of the ocean,” Lily shoots back before adding suggestively, “And that’s not to even mention all the other skills he has.”

Sirius, who stays quiet in times like these (unfortunately too frequent nowadays, with suspicion and paranoia on the rise), is giving his own impeccable pair of heart eyes to their girlfriend.

“Now, now, we are all adults here,” Dumbledore says sternly, only entering after the conflict ends per usual. “There’s no need to devolve into name-calling or taunts”—with a pointed look at Lily—“and Daedalus, I understand your concern, but we cannot stop them from taking Sirius with them.”

The condescension in his voice, the implication that Sirius is nothing but a house pet lugged around by his friends—as if he’s not the best of them all—makes James’ teeth grit. It is only by sheer willpower that he manages a, “That’s very kind of you, Professor. Thank you.”

x

Later, when the meeting is over and they’re all scattered around the living room—the three of them are in one corner with James ranting to a similarly peeved Lily and a secretly-pleased Siriuswho pretends he doesn’t care. But James knows, has seen first hand how deep the words cut into him. He doesn’t ever want to see him bleed again.

“And the sheer audacity of him to say—Si, if you hadn’t stopped me, I swear.”

“That’s exactly why I did it, Prongs.” Sirius shrugs.

“Personally, I think every one of these idiots deserve whatever James wants to do to them,” Lily adds with a vindictive scowl of her own. It’s not just him that’s fed up with the way people in the Order keep treating their Sirius.

“You really want to let a wild James Potter loose on them, Lilypad?” Sirius asks, one eyebrow arched high in surprise. “You hate them that much?”

“Oi!”

“Yes.”

James and Lily speak at the same time, words overlapping and intentions clashing, causing Sirius to break out in his signature bark-like laughter. James can’t even hold on to his indignation in the face of it, helpless to do anything except lean forward, enthralled by the way his grey eyes soften with joy.

It’s then that a thoroughly unpleasant voice breaks into their moment.

“James, Lily, oh there you are, I’ve been looking all over for you,” Molly Weasley calls out to them, weaving her way through the crowd. She has her signature smile on, though it falls a bit flat when her eyes land on Sirius.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Of course, Molly, is everything okay?” James asks. He can’t see any of the Weasley kids around her but it’s not uncommon for her to hand them off to someone or the other. James gets it, truly. Merlin knows he would’ve gone already round the bend if he had to deal with a brood like that.

“Yes, yes, nothing of that sort, just…a word?” Her head moves in a weird way and it takes him a few seconds to decipher the action. She’s signalling towards the other end of the room, though it doesn’t offer him any more clarity than that.

“I’m sure we can talk right here, Molly.” Lily, of course, is much quicker on picking up the subtext. “It’s just Sirius, no one else can hear us.”

“Yes, well, that’s the problem, isn’t it,” Molly mutters under her breath and before James can even begin to figure out where that came from, she’s speaking again. “That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Molly, please,” Sirius sighs, like he knows what’s coming. “Let’s not do this, not here.”

“I’m only here to talk. To James and Lily,” Molly replies stiffly, not even looking in his direction. Instead she turns to James, a painfully insincere look of concern on her face. It immediately puts him on the defensive.

“James, dear, don’t you think it’s a bit…inappropriate, the way you keep going?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” His voice is hard, unyielding. “The way we keep going?”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, I’m only trying to help,” she waves an airy hand, unbothered by the daggers shooting out of his eyes. “I know you and…Sirius are good friends, but all this—really, you have such a lovely girlfriend, have you ever thought of how she must feel when you keep dragging him around with you?”

James’ eyes bug right out of their sockets at the sheer audacity of her words. Did she just—

It doesn’t seem to faze her, his reaction, because she’s clearly on a mission. James wonders, a little hysterically, if they had a vote for this—this intervention and she’s the candidate who won. “A man and a woman need some time of their own, I’m sure you’ll realise the importance of it once you’re older but it’ll have been too late by then.”

“Molly,” he starts, in an impressively even voice, he thinks, “I’m afraid that our relationship is none of your business. I assure you we’re doing perfectly well.”

“Oh, you don’t have to be like that, James,” she tsks, “We’re all looking out for each other here—“

“Excuse me,” Lily cuts in, her temper ice cold and chilling against James’ burning rage. “Sirius is our—“

“Lily, it’s not your duty to keep putting up with every little fancy your boyfriend has. A girl must put her foot down sometimes.” Molly’s countenance has turned sympathetic now, and it does nothing to calm James down. He can see her doubling down, knows logic and reason will go well over her head.

There’s only one thing to do then, nothing for it. He turns towards Sirius, who’s been sitting in his armchair with his back ramrod straight and eyes straight forward. His heart aches at seeing Sirius withdraw into himself—James has tried hard, so hard, but words spoken in bitterness and cruelty always have that effect on him, taking him back to a time he’s spent this whole life running away from. It’s absolutely unacceptable that it happen to him now, when he’s surrounded by people supposed to be on their side, in a place that should’ve been safe.

Lily is speaking, something about privacy and boundaries and knowing when to shut the hell up (he’ll have to get the whole speech from her later, it sounds beautiful), and he simply steps over to Sirius, bending down until he’s right in front of him, a hairsbreadth away, like he was trying to do before they were rudely interrupted.

“James?” Sirius breathes, uncertain. He knows it’s because this isn’t planned—they’d decided to keep their relationship…not hidden, but away from other people. It’s unconventional, and they didn’t want to add more complications on top of everything else. Fighting the world on one axis is exhausting enough.

“I’ve got you, my love,” he whispers before closing the distance between them. The first press of their lips and everything—Molly, the rest of the Order, even Lily’s surprised gasp—falls away until his world narrows into a single point - Sirius - as it always does. His hands are cradling Sirius’ face, fingers softly stroking the sensitive skin below his ears—a move that he knows drives him crazy.

Sirius, for his part, gets over his own shock remarkably quickly to give as good as he gets. His hands are bunched in fists in the front of James’ jumper, almost desperately, and the longer they kiss, the rougher it gets.

A delicate cough—Lily—makes them slowly pull apart, but not before James leans back in for another quick peck. Sirius’ lips are slick, a bit swollen, and it’s the most tempting thing James has ever seen. He wants to damn this place and Apparate him straight into their bedroom but he just barely stops himself.

For one, Lily must’ve had a reason for interrupting; she usually enjoys watching them too much to do that. Besides, if he leaves without her, she’ll be pissed and he has no interest in being on the other end of her creative punishments. Not after the last time.

“James—you—that’s—,” seems like Molly can do nothing but splutter at his, perhaps excessive, display. Well, he maintains it was necessary. “Lily!” Molly turns to her, perhaps expecting similar shock, or anger, or hurt?

She’ll be sorely disappointed, of course, because Lily has the most predatory look out of the three of them. In her smartest decision of the evening, she decides to completely ignore Molly and makes her way over to them. A hand on James’ chest gently pushes him back, just enough that she can comfortably climb onto a now-thoroughly-shellshocked Sirius’ lap.

“What, did you think I wouldn’t want my chance?” she winks before wrapping her arms around Sirius’ neck and kissing him with no less passion than James just a minute ago.

This time, he has the distinct pleasure of being able to watch not just his partners but everyone’s reactions as well. Molly seems to have just…stopped working. He doesn’t know if it’s from the shock of both of them, in an established relationship, kissing someone; or that it’s happening in such a public setting; or, and this one comes from a darker corner of his mind, that it’s Sirius being kissed silly.

Dumbledore looks like his beloved lemon drop has gotten stuck in his throat and those in his immediate surroundings aren’t any better. Professor McGongall has a resigned, but entirely unsurprised, expression and James tips his head in an imaginary salute towards her.

Everyone else is somewhere on the spectrum between shocked and aghast. It’s wonderful. Exactly the kind of chaos James has been itching to stir up in these meetings.

By the time he completes his leisurely perusal and comes back to the scene in front of him, Lily has still not let go of Sirius. Her mouth is attacking his neck now, bright red lip stains and darkening bruises already visible, and Sirius’ hand is inching dangerously close to her neckline. Her previously-completely-buttoned-up-neckline that is now somehow half open. Funny, that.

“Oi,” James calls out, placing a warning hand on Lily’s leg, not because he’s worried they’re becoming too exhibitionist, but because he’s hard enough to pound nails right now and he would really like to get out of here and join the fun himself, please and thank you.

With a lazy, sultry smile, Lily pulls back. Her lipstick is smudged to high heaven and she looks entirely debauched and for James, she’s never been more beautiful than when she’s ravishing their boyfriend after vehemently defending him. Sirius’ eyes are unfocused, and he’s perhaps even more debauched. James can look at him like this forever.

“Like I was saying,” Lily says, all prim like she’s not sitting on one of her boyfriend’s lap while the other is possessively gripping her inner thigh, like she didn’t just participate in possibly the hottest moment of every sad sod in this room’s life. “Sirius is our partner and we very well know how to look out for each other.”

James seals the words with a kiss of his own, savouring the taste of both his partners on her lips.

[skyheld]

MISC ACT III THINGS

after spending two acts being Dark and Mysteriously Aloof lethe finally has to admit it: she has no idea how a city works. total hillbilly. and she's scared

the colors are gaudy. people are loud. no one has any dignity. skeletons shouldn't be used as circus attractions, they should be used for Cool things like making villagers afraid of you so they'll leave you alone. she does stops to study them, then freaks out because the rest of the party has moved on and she's terrified of getting lost and having to maybe. ask for help

no one even cares about her being Dark and Mysteriously Aloof? she scares some refugees sure, but most are so used to creepy weirdos she goes completely unnoticed. it's an affront, honestly.

she also feels... weird about luxurious environments like the rooms at the elfsong. she thinks they're frivolous and stupid but is too afraid of breaking anything to relax.

similarly, while sorcerous sundries is interesting, she feels very out of place there. the patrons are all very well dressed, well educated, well spoken, and she's there in her tattered fifteen-years-out-of-fashion girl's dress. and she absolutely refuses to either change or accept it, so the others are just idiots, its the only possibility.

[dent-de-leon]

Do you think Molly ever moped whenever Yasha went off to chase the storms? Like when Yasha isn't around for him to hang out with, he just sits and huffs a little like a bored kitty?

aHHH I love the thought of this, Molly's tail lashing as he wanders around and tries not to think about how much he misses Love ;; Molly curling up by himself and staring off into storms, just waiting for her to come home. I feel like as time goes by he either gets better at hiding it, or he realizes that Yasha cares about him so much she'll always come back, and in the meantime he's happy to wait for her for as long as she needs.

But I do think Molly gets more anxious whenever Yasha isn't there and something from his past comes back. Nightmares about the Eyes, fleeting memories from another life. That time when Cree ran up and called him Lucien, how she wrapped her arms around him and Molly immediately started spiraling, having a panic attack. How he laughs nervously and keeps looking for an escape, desperate to just make it all go away--and the immediate relief when Yasha shows up, how Molly just clings to her and lingers at her side--"I'm so glad to see you."

So whenever Molly's having another moment like that, where he just needs to run and hide and all the demons from Lucien's past come back...I think those are the times when he gets very anxious and withdrawn if Yasha isn't there. If he doesn't have his anchor to hold onto whenever he's feeling that ache of Emptiness again.

I also wonder about the very first time Yasha leaves, because we know Molly didn't think she'd actually come back. It takes him completely by surprise when Yasha comes running to his rescue--even though Molly did the exact same thing for her at the Platinum Dragon temple. He just...didn't believe anyone would ever do the same for him. It's so sad, that Mollymauk didn't think his life was worth that...even though all of choir practice is just him drawing his own blood to protect others--

But yeah. I do wonder if, that first time she left, Molly tried not to let the disappointment show. And maybe he didn't really believe she'd actually stay, but he had hoped--

Those first few days when Yasha is away…when she leaves the circus grounds, she’s still looking at all the joy and color in the world, still holding onto a little four-leaf-clover. And then there’s Molly back at the carnival. Was he trying to keep himself busy and not think about how lonely he still feels? Did he watch her walk away until she disappeared beyond the horizon?

Molly openly admitting that he's lonely to Yasha when she saves him, Molly who kept throwing his life on the line after losing Lestera, who still ached for her and ran off to fight these battles alone every night. The absolute recklessness of it all, how he keeps throwing himself into danger for others--like he himself has nothing left to lose.

The way Yasha was so concerned for Molly's safety when he himself never even questioned it--"You stuck your neck out like that, completely alone...to help people you don't even know?" Yasha promising Molly he won't have to be alone anymore--she's going to protect him, and she's not giving him any choice about it, "We fix it. You're not doing this alone anymore. Got it?"

"Got it. Suppose I could use the company. I am recently out of a relationship the hard way..." Molly says that with a wink and a cheeky grin, tries to just brush it off. But it's this moment where he's really letting himself be vulnerable and admits more than he ever did to the rest of the Nein. He tells Yasha he had a partner once, but she's gone now. He tells her she lost them recently, that he's still grieving--that he's lonely. "Suppose I could use the company." It's his way of saying he's so grateful that Yasha will stay, that Molly doesn't want to be alone. Can't be.

Just...the way Yasha and Molly were both there for each other when they were both mourning someone they lost. The way Molly can tell just by looking at Yasha that she feels lonely and Empty too. The way it hurts a bit whenever Yasha goes away, but also how Mollymauk trusts wholeheartedly that she'll come back.

Molly always waiting for Yasha to return, always so patient and understanding. And then it's Yasha left behind and feeling so alone; and then, after months and months of grieving and waiting and daring to hope--"You open your eyes for the first time...in the longest time..." Molly's reborn soul finally coming home to Yasha like she always came back to him--

[helldustedstories]

Very loosely inspired by a t.iktok by ate.zart:

When he was nineteen years old, shortly after Octavia was born, Stolas decided that he didn't want her to be subjected to the same treatment he had been growing up, that he wanted to give her a better life, where she could make her own decisions. And the only way to do that was to run away from his family, to take her and disappear, to raise her far from the rest of the Goetia.

He had already been working on a plan to escape if he needed to, quietly selling artefacts that wouldn't be missed from his father's collection, gathering up as much money as he possibly could. Because as soon as he left, he wasn't going to be able to rely on his name, his title for anything; it would just endanger them if he did.

Stolas took a cutting from his favourite plant, a few nondescript outfits to help keep him from standing out more than he already would, a couple of books on magic from the library (so he could fight back if anyone came after him, could keep learning, even without his tutors or additional training), and as many supplies for Via as he could carry, leaving behind the only life he'd known, determined to give his daughter a better chance than he'd had.

He ended up at the circus he'd visited on his birthday almost a decade before, wondering if his first friend would remember him, one of the only people outside of the Goetia family he knew at all. And with the words "I'll hire you" ringing in his ears, plus his own desire to reconnect with his friend, Stolas found Blitzo again.

The owl knew that he was going to have to find a job, if he hoped to give Octavia any sort of stable life, and he ended up 'convincing' Cash (by giving him most of the money he'd managed to squirrel away before his escape) that he could help bring in crowds with his fortune telling. It was that, along with a demonstration, that ensured Stolas' place in the circus. He would be able to give Octavia a home, while hiding in plain sight.

But little did he know that this new-found community would become so much more than just a job or a place to stay: they would become more of a family to him than the Goetia ever had been.

Some other basic points! This will probably expand!

Does tarot readings and 'fortune telling' for the circus. Those who are in the know (read: Cash makes sure some people are aware and pay a much higher fee to see Stolas) can receive a genuine reading from him, which involves looking to the stars for actual prophecies.

Definitely still has a crush on Blitzo.

Fast friends with Fizz, with the two of them bonding pretty quickly. Fizz is the one who suggests incorporating elements of drag into his performances, to also help conceal his identity, which Stolas embraces whole-heartedly.

Eventually starts learning aerial silks and the lyra to contribute even more, doing a majority of his practice with Barbie.

Does his performances using an imp disguise (visuals can be seen here!) since it's an all-imp circus, and having an owl demon as the only non-imp member would stand out too much.

Octavia is still absolutely his world, though he actually has help with her now.

More outgoing, though still something of an introvert.

Is slowly figuring out how to control his powers through studying the grimoire and other books he took with him, so that he'll never be powerless against anyone if they ever manage to track him down.

[blackbutler-readerinsertsandjunk]

Hi hope you are doing well! Could I request a fluff scenario with Snake and a s/o that love baking (either s/o was a cook at the circus or is a maid at the manor that help in the kitchen). Also recently in CH196 Snake mention lemon cake and lemon tarts.

-mosscrow

aaaaa I'm doing ok! I hope you're doing well too!

sweet boy has a sweet tooth, we're not surprised <3

“Mmh… how much longer…? Asks Wilde…”

“Haha… come now, ‘Wilde’.” (Name) gives a gentle poke to the tip of SNAKE’s nose. “We just put them in the oven. Besides, you do remember that Sebastian tasked me with making lemon tarts for Master Ciel’s tea, don’t you? I have to make sure they get to the garden unscathed. If I have to gently smack your hands away, I will,” she teases.

Wilde, draped around Snake’s shoulders, gives a long-suffering hiss. “‘He don’t need the whole damn batch.’ (Name), Wilde has a point… we’ve made several.”

Obviously he’s not adjusted to the earl’s insatiable sweet tooth yet. Still, she can’t deny that there’s a point somewhere in there. “Yes, there are five of them that are baking. One for Master Ciel, a spare just in case something happens to that one, one for the other servants, one that we’re going to take over to Prince Soma and Mister Agni… and one for us. No matter what happens, we aren’t going to get two tarts all to ourselves!”

If she’s not mistaken, she sees Snake’s lips forming into a very small, almost imperceptible pout. “If nothing happens to the spare… we could eat that one, couldn’t we? Asks Wilde.”

“If, yes.” She raises an eyebrow at him, though the smile is still on her face. “But I don’t want one of the snakes ‘accidentally’ taking a bite out of it just so you can call it ruined and get to eat it. Am I clear?”

His eyes flicker to the oven before he gives a tiny huff. “Crystal. ‘Oi, no promises.’”

“Wilde! Snake! Both of you!” She laughs and hurries to wrap her arms around Snake’s waist, in an attempt to distract him. “You’re so silly. Listen, if you promise me you won’t sabotage that spare tart, I’ll let you eat the rest of the filling I have left over. It’s not a whole tart, but surely it’ll do, right?”

Ah! She’s got him. Not only is the offer clearly tempting to him, he’s also blushing from the intimacy of being held so close. “… Mmmmmhhhh…” He’s considering it, certainly. Maybe she just needs to sweeten the deal.

(Name) leans forward to give Snake a kiss, keeping her touch delicate. While she knows she can’t make him forget about this entirely, she can absolutely soften him up a bit. He’s not that stubborn.

When she draws away from the kiss, she gives him a smile. “Alright, let me throw in something else. In addition to getting to eat the leftover filling, I’ll also bake you a lemon cake the next time Master Ciel is out for the evening. Come, think about it. All I expect is that you don’t do anything untoward to my spare tart.”

She’s sure the kiss made him see stars. He’s got that dreamy, overwhelmed look on his face, plus a light dusting of pink still on his cheeks. With any luck, that means he’s been persuaded enough to agree to her perfectly reasonable terms.

“Lemon cake,” he murmurs at last, a repetition of what she said. Likely just to confirm that he’s understanding the arrangement correctly. “… With lemon buttercream and blueberries and mint leaves on top?” Then, his blush returns with a vengeance. “Wilde wants me to make sure.”

She can’t help but laugh. What else is she supposed to do? “Of course with lemon buttercream and blueberries and mint leaves on top! What am I, a savage?” She gives him another kiss, which he relaxes into a little more readily than the first. He’s so much calmer around her than he was when he first got here.

Upon parting, she sighs against his lips. “Good boy. Now, we’ve got a bit before those tarts are ready to come out. Would you be so kind as to help me finish slicing the almonds for the topping?”

His willingness to speak has died down (now that he’s got what he wants), but that isn’t a bad thing. It’s part of his charm ― that he gives her a sweet, simple nod, steps over to the counter, and takes the knife.

Of course, she comes up behind him to wrap around and guide his hands. Though he seems to have had some experience cooking, with more delicate things, she wants to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself. And he doesn’t seem to mind her being pressed up against his back like that, despite that he starts blushing again.

She’s careful in helping him start to cut, and soon enough, the kitchen starts to smell even more wonderful as the tarts continue to bake.

(… She doesn’t think she’ll ever get over the way that sometimes, his tongue periodically pokes out of his mouth for a second to help him get a better sense of a scent. He’s adorable, and all hers.)

[apalonecreations]

(Moving this here because of something that I had to delete somewhere else) Future fic ideas "cause why not

1. What if the turtles, when they were about the age they were in the series, overthrew Draxum and Donnie took over the lab while the others just turned the rest of the place into their own areas. Or or, instead of them making the rest of it into their own lair, what if raph ended up dying due to an experiment Draxum made Donnie do so when they overthrew him Donnie stayed while the other two left to live elsewhere, and D turned the lab into his own and tried bringing raph back to life

2. Turtle tots elementary school AU (Can be human or they went to a mutant school)

Leo:the class clown and the one with the lowest grades

Raph: looks like a kid that could beat you up but in reality he loves going to the panic corner to calm down when he's worried and playing with the princess toys.

Donnie: the one that answers every question correctly but still gets bad grades because he gets bored of the stuff easily (already knows all of the stuff they are learning lmao) also secretly builds weapons in class when no one's watching.

Mikey: the one with somehow the best grades out of everyone simply because Donnie helps him and teaches him the stuff when he asks for help. Also the very talkative/bouncy one, usually accidentally interrupts the class a lot.

3. Donnie gets killed by shredder during that battle (when his shell was being torn apart in that one scene) and Leo ends up blaming himself because of it. So he makes the decision to try and rebuild his brother using his tech, even though Mikey and Raph are strongly against it. He and April decide to start studying about how to code and build and such (April decided to help him, since she knew he would do it with or without her. And she didn't want him doing it alone, she wanted to make sure he still slept and such too)

Years later they finally do it and idk what else.

4. What if splinter died instead of his wife. So like she raised the turtles and such even when they were mutated so now she just has a bunch of kids running around an apartment or home like: wth do I do with all these kids

I call it Guilt and Gears.(or just gears)

But they all ended up learning their respective weapons from hyper fixations that just never went away and now they just know how to use them and tend to fight each other a lot over things

5. A collection of oneshots where they accidentally call Raph dad and he absolutely loses his shit (whether it be him crying, getting super happy, or pissed off at splinter idc)

6. Raph and Donnie get kidnapped and taken to be circus workers against their will.

7. Raph and Donnie get kidnapped by big mama and the purple dragons and are forced to fight in the arena. Although each opponent they fight is stronger than the previous

8. "Big Brother I'm Scared" Donnie and raph fic (you all can choose what happens idk)

9. The four get captured by a gang that puts each of them through a different life-threatening challenges and they're all separated trying to get back together before one of them actually dies.

Raph is in a fighting arena

Mikey is constantly being chased by some creatures that won't stop until he's caught

Leo is being chased by murderous versions of his brothers and himself that also won't stop until he's caught

Donnie is forced into a reinforced fish tank without any air pockets (he can breathe underwater because softshell) and with puzzles/equations he has to solve and mutated creatures he has to simultaneously fight.

10. A fic where donnie gets kidnapped after he gets into an argument with his brothers because they say it's fine and he needs to take a break and not be so hard on himself about his projects even if they aren't perfect. He leaves to go and get some more supplies, but instead ends up being kidnapped by a group of scientists that work for an unknown organization

11. another splinter bad (not really he's mostly just misinformed) parent AU because I love being mean and angst is my favorite genre

Basically Donnie craves parental validation so much and is so deprived of it he slowly goes insane and starts doing dangerous and even life-threatening things just to get it. In the end splinter just calls him a monster and he's locked in a room without the siblings knowing about any of this. (They assume he went with Draxum on a vacation or to have quality time or something idk) idk what else happens I'm tired

12. "Hall of mirrors" (can either be a fic or a dream where Donnie is trapped within a giant maze of mirrors and every once in a while one of the mirrors flashes to a scene with someone he knows either dying, getting hurt, or someone he really hates.

13. Technodrome AU where Donnie got stuck in the prison dimension with the Technodrome but it didn't blow up when it was sent back through.

14. Villain arc Mikey and Donnie

15. villain arc brothers (all of them and maybe April, too)

16. role switch AU where the turtles and splinter switch roles with some of the villains. Basically the Hamato's are villains and the previous villains are heros.

17. Donnie wanting to try out dresses and skirts with supportive papa draxum

18. (Donnie is taken and locked away in a high-security area by the purple dragons, meanwhile Kendra disguises herself as him and poses as him within the lair in attempts at taking his tech and destroying the rest. Meanwhile the others are getting suspicious of this different behavior from "Donnie" and decide to investigate. (I don't remember if I've already posted this one so sorry if I have)

19. When the Technodrome is split in half, Donnie hears something snap in his mind. Before he could figure out what it was, everything went black. His connection wasn't completely severed

20. Donnie finds friends akin to the purple dragons online, but doesn't realize they're just as bad if not worse

Holy shit this is long and I apologize profusely I just have no idea if the replies would work💀

[doodle17]

🏳️‍🌈, 🏳️‍⚧️, 😇, 🧸, 👻, 🎶, 👽, 💤, 🦾, 💝, 🫂, 💔, 🪢, 📓, 👗, 🔪, 🌟, 🥇, 🍫, 🎭, ❤️‍🔥, 💄, 🖕, 😺, 😬, 😭, 😶, Morris

I used to see him as Asexual, but possibly seeing him as Bi or pan now.

Cis, but also, maaaybeeee transmasc.

I don't think he really thinks much about it. Whatever is out there, is out there even if it's just nothing. He doesn't want to spend his time worrying about it so much.

His mom would play old tapes of classic 70s and 60s songs to keep him calm while she worked on her car when he was younger.

This is so random but I've always thought that he'd be scared of clowns lol. I like to think he was really skeptical about going to the Aquato circus for the first time because of it.

I like to think he enjoys all types of music. Or at least certain type for each genre. Hell, he'll even enjoy a few opera songs. His music taste is everywhere! You can go from listening to a sweet love song to a heavy metal song about death with his kind of playlist.

He can do that thing where he can bend his thumb behind his hand. I also think he's double jointed in his fingers (like me :D)

Very rarely, he sings in his sleep. It's usually for a few seconds or even a few minutes. He'll sing a few seconds of on song, before fading out of it, going completely quiet, then come back with an entirely different song. It only happens a few times, so when it does happen the junior agents are always there with a camera in hand.

Most people think he was in an accident and that's what caused him to be in a lev chair, but I personally believe he was born with it.

Likes holding hands, resting his head on your shoulder, etc.

I like to think he's best friends with Lizzie, Norma and Adam. I actually think they're childhood friends! They all play DnD together, and sometimes go to conventions and stuff.

After his dad died his mom became very quiet and distant. She still loved her son very much, but her husband's death pretty much broke her heart. Basically, the situation is kind of similar to Sashas Mom and Dad, I guess.

His families were mechanics! His mom and dad owned a small shop together that was in the lower floor of their house.

I like to think that his pirate radio becomes pretty big! Especially when he's older. It's still pirate radio, though. But other than that, he actually uses a bit of his mechanic knowledge to help fix up a few cars and other things for other agents.

Throws on whatever doesn't smell dirty and looks best. Depending on the situation, he may take a little more time on what to wear, but he usually puts on whatever.

Bro can, and will smash a boom box over your head if he has to. He already owns 4 more of them.

He obviously wants to be big in the music industry. But a small part of him kind of wants to go back to his hometown and work on cars with his mom. Just have to see what the future holds!

This guy can come up with comebacks, you'd think he rehearsed the whole thing. You better not fumble when arguing with him or he WONT leave you alone about it.

Loves classic fast food. Y'know burger, fries, soda, etc. Its one of the things he ate a lot with his mom, so it's a nostalgic kind of comfort food. It was one of the things they'd bond over. Hanging out in the back of his dad's truck and telling stories while they people watched the busy street.

Idk if these count as lies, but he's always telling "stories" on how he ended up in his chair. They all seem to somehow relate to getting in a fist fight with a psychic bear.

HUUUGE flirt. He loves saying cheesy pick up lines to make someone smile.

Carries a switchblade comb with him to keep his hair nice. Hair like that doesn't happen on its own!

Absolute sass machine. If he's upset, you can tell by his voice. Anything that leaves his mouth when angry is just snark and sarcasm.

Hes definitely a dog person. I like to think he owns at least 3 back at his house. Maybe one cat that he leaves food out for.

(Don't really have any hc for those last 2)

I like to think his mom and dad were fluent in Spanish, so, so is he! Sometimes he, Norma and Lizzie will talk to eachother in Spanish to keep anyone else from eavesdropping. Usually when they're gossiping.

[bunny-j3st3r]

data paks cryptid crawler au (long post)

Boss - will fuck anyone and anything (except Norman) man loves sex, he shares in the joys of being flirty and slutty and a whore, he’s a very friendly and loving pak species, he adores kids and wants his own clutch at some point. He will indulge in one night stands and treat his partners like they are the most important thing in the world, if his partners don’t wish to talk about it the next day he will continue there relationship as normal, if they want to discuss it he may tease and flirt a little.

He rarely gets angry as he knows things can be solved without conflict, he has only ever gotten truly angry once and it was over Dimitri, when a certain someone hurt Dimitri and the man came to Boss to seek comfort.

Boss tracked whoever hurt him down and was so angry he was unaware he was using his heightened pheromones to cause people to collapse, he would of bit into the attacker and tore out there jugular in rage if Acedia at the time did not step in.

 He has an ability to use pheromones with a lower setting that is on constantly that normally relaxes people around him and makes them feel at ease.

Then he has a stronger scent that he often uses to make others do what he wants or for crowd control to make them kneel. He normally only uses it on partners for room activities, but will also use it on the likes of Norman just to drive the man insane and then leave him high and dry.

But then has a more extreme version he uses only when in a heightened sense of rage, it can often make others drop to their knees and make people incredibly sick.

He has a tight grip on the fashion industry and is often seen at more exclusive events, but he prefers the company of his partners or staying at home.

Rm / Bailey - Rm is a travelling ringmaster who spends 4 month travelling in the summer and then the rest of the time back in NYC running a small but popular bakery that caters to other mutants living in NYC.

He is currently married to Mime a man that worked with him in the circus for awhile, they currently have four children, a child from Rm’s previous relationship and then one son and a set of triplets with Mime and he adores all of them.

He has a lot of connections to some very high ranked people in nyc without even realizing he just knows that they are good friends.

He and Mime are often sighted having Lunch with there kids and kingpin and other high ranked mob bosses.

Rm isn’t even a bad guy, he’s just so overly friendly it’s hard to hate him.

Plus Mime seems to be quite the threat in his own right so avoiding confrontation unless you want mime to maim you.

His own ability seems to be able to read others pretty well, like in a way that he’s able to tell Norman is putting on a face for the public but can see a monster under all the layers.

And then he will see Acedia out of costume with a halo around her head and see the same halo when she’s in costume, telling him who the cryptid crawler actually is but that’s none of hs concern, Acedia is a dear and loving friend.

Azazel / Azzy - Azzy is the twin brother to Rm, although not a traveller his store seems to appear whenever it’s needed.

He seems to have some relationship with Dr strange but no one really knows what but they spend an awful lot of time together (they are absolutely dating)

He gets sick quite a lot and often has to walk with a cane, the cane he currently uses is technically a magical staff that strange gave him, strange told him it has magic but Azzy prefers to throw it and he has very accurate aim.

He seems to be good friends with Beck but the two had bad meeting at first which resulted in Beck being hit with his cane.

The two now have afternoon tea almost weekly and Beck has also witnessed Azzy almost kill Norman.

Azzy’s own ability is held within his store. His store allows anything and everything to be found that is needed, he won’t serve anyone that has ill intentions but strange himself has also tested the store out by giving something to Azzy that dosn’t exist and Azzy was able to get it for him.