#so I don’t trust fondant either

[boneless-mika]

Kind of want the Disco cake for my birthday and I don’t even like cake with jam

[leossmoonn]

could i please request a stefan fluff where the reader is like spanish or smth, but she speaks ij english with everyone. and her and stefan are dating. so one day she gets upset over smth so she starts ranting in spanish and stefan can't understand a thing. and he's like "oh- ok-" even though he didn't understand anything. if not thats ok! have a nice day!!

have a nice day too <33

masterlist

pairing - stefan salvatore x spanish speaking, fem!reader

type - fluff, angst

note - i put the reader as a spanish speaker and not just spanish, so it could be more inclusive :). and i'm so sorry that this is so bad. i couldn't come up with a better plot like i wanted to, but i hope you enjoy anyways!

warnings / includes - language, kissing, food and alcohol mention, cute couple stuff, you getting upset (duh), kissing, stefan trying to be supportive but also being really confused lol. you all are like in your late 20s for this lol. for those who aren't spanish speakers, i will put translations in little text under each sentence/paragraph

————

"Sí. Bueno, lo retomaré más tarde. Gracias," you hung up the phone, setting it down with a smile on your face.

["Yes. Okay, I will pick it up later. Thank you."]

"Hey, who was that?" Stefan come over to you, wrapping his arm around your waist.

"That was Lucas's friend. He was able to get the cake and the cupcakes made early!" You squealed, jumping up and down in his arms.

"Oh, that's awesome! Looks like Caroline won't be bugging you anymore," Stefan chuckled.

"Oh, I know. Man, am I happy to finally get this party planning over with," you sighed, turning around and leaning against the counter.

You smiled as you came face-to-face with your boyfriend. You hung your arms around his neck lazily, twirling the hair on the nape of his neck with your first fingers.

"Tired?" Stefan raised a brow, settings hands on your hips.

"Exhausted. And to think the actual party is tonight," you chuckled. "Well, that's the easiest part, right?" Stefan asked.

"Yeah, watching over twenty-to-twenty five eleven years olds is easy," you rolled your eyes.

"You'll have help. Caroline, me, Bonnie, Ric, Elena, Matt. Even Damon has volunteered to watch them!"

"Or lure them in a back corner and fed on them," you scoffed. "Hey, Damon's a lot of things, but he is not a child-blood-sucker," Stefan defended.

"Awe, you're defending him. How cute," you booped his nose.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. We are goals. Or whatever the kids are saying these days."

You giggled at his words, turning back around as you heard the front door open. You looked to see Caroline, Bonnie, and Elena carrying the twins, a bunch of presents, and at least five boxes of pizza.

"Damn. I wish you guys bought me this many presents!" You exclaimed.

"Oh, shut up. We give you a bottle of champagne and you're already over the moon," Elena snickered.

"Well, what can I say? I'm a simple gal," you grinned.

"Hey, Stef, can you help, please? Put these next to the window sill," Bonnie ordered as she was carrying most of the presents.

"Yeah, of course," Stefan nodded. He ran over to her with his vampire speed, picking up the presents at lightening speed and laying them out in towers.

"Thank you," Bonnie sighed. "Yeah, no problem. Hey, why didn't you just use your magic to carry them in?" Stefan asked.

"I need to save my energy for the kids," Bonnie explained.

"Whoa, Whoa, Whoa. I didn't know we were letting the world know our secret," you frowned.

"We aren't! They're just a bunch of kids. Plus, we can just compel them to forget. Josie and Lizzie really want to show them tricks, too," Caroline bounced the twins in her arms.

You looked to the two girls who were giggling and smiling. You sighed, "Fine. Anyways, guess who was able to get the cake and the cupcakes."

"Oh, my God! You?" Caroline gasped. "Yep. Call me Santa Claus 'cause I just delivered!" You grinned.

Elena, Bonnie, and Stefan cringed at your joke.

"Not your best work, Y/n," Elena shook her head.

"What! Hey, that was pretty good," you frowned. "You'll get 'em next time, babe," Stefan smiled, going over to you and patting you on the back.

"Okay, you guys are just jealous because you're not as funny as me," you scoffed.

"Oh, yeah, we're jealous all right," Bonnie smirked.

You opened your mouth to retort back, but your phone started ringing. You looked at the Caller ID, seeing that it was your brother, Lucas. You gave them all a death glare, picking up your phone and going into the other room.

"Hey, amigo, what's up?" You asked.

"Uh, bad news, chica," Lucas sighed. "Oh?" You raised a brow.

"Yeah, turns out that Darryl can't make the cake or the cupcakes today."

You opened your mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Your eyes were wide as saucers as you thought of what to say.

"Y/n? Please say something," Luca begged.

You turned your head, your face screwing up in guilt and anger as you saw Lizzie and Josie playing with Bonnie and Stefan. You turned back and focused on the conversation you were having with you very trusting brother.

"¿Qué quiere decir Darryl no puede hacer el pastel o cupcakes?"

[What do you mean darryl can't make the cake or cupcakes?"]

"I mean that he can't make them. Do I need to explain to you what those words mean? And why are you speaking in Spanish? Afraid someone will —"

"En realidad, lo soy, Lucas. Dios, eres tan poco confiable. ¡Y ese amigo tuyo! Espera, ¿podría recuperar mi dinero?"

["Actually, I am, Lucas. God, you are so unreliable. And that friend of yours! Wait, am I going to be able to get my money back?"]

"Um… probably not. But it's okay, I'll pay you back!"

"Ah, ¿cuándo? ¿Después de sacar dinero del fondo universitario de su hijo? ¿O se lo van a pedir a mamá y papá esta vez?"

["Oh, when? After you take out money from your child's college fund? Or are you going to ask mom and dad for it this time?"]

"Hey, don't blame me! Blame Darryl. All I did was hook you up with him!"

"Y probablemente sabías que era un gilipollas mentiroso y que robaba dinero. Llámame de vuelta cuando seas capaz de no mentirme, ¿sí?"

["And you probably knew that he was a lying, money-stealing asshole. Call me back when you're able to not lie to me, yeah?"]

"Wait, Y/n, I-"

You hung up the phone, throwing it on the chair next to you. You groaned quietly, the bridge of your nose burning as tears welled up in your eyes.

"¿Cómo puedes ser tan est��pido, Y/n? Confiando en él después de todo lo demás que ha hecho. Estúpido, estúpido, estúpido!"

["How can you be so stupid, Y/n? Trusting him after everything else he's done. Stupid, stupid, stupid!"]

Stefan, who was throwing up Lizzie and Josie in the air, heard your mutters in the other room. He frowned and put the girls down, promising them that he would be back in a second after checking up on you. He walked into the next room slowly, putting his arm around you lightly.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

You jumped at his voice and touch, sniffling and wiping the tears from your face. "Y-Yeah. Just some um, family stuff."

"Want to talk about it?" Stefan asked.

You sighed, turning around to him. His hand intertwined with yours, squeezing it for support.

"It's just… Lucas. He's just so… jodidamente molesto," you sighed. "Él simplemente no piensa en otras personas y las consecuencias. Quiero decir, trata de ayudar, lo que es agradable, pero siempre termina por pagar dinero a la gente, o termina por tener un ojo negro."

[“He is just so… fucking annoying. He just doesn't think about other people and the consequences. I mean, he tries to help, which is nice, but he always either ends up owing people money, or ends up having a black eye.”]

"O-Oh, yeah," Stefan nodded, his brows furrowed as he tried to understand. But you were speaking so fast and with so much anger, he barely picked up a word.

"Y como su hermana mayor, sé que probablemente se supone que voy fácil con él, pero es un hombre crecido. ¡Debe saber estas cosas! Ugh, sabía que debería haber ordenado a ellos como, Target o algo, pero el amigo de su “aparentemente” es capaz de hacer diseños realmente lindos y hacer arte fondant en tiempo récord, así que tomé mis mis oportunidades. ¿Y adivina dónde estoy ahora?"

[“And as his older sister, I know I'm probably supposed to go easy on him, but he's a grown man. He should know these things! Ugh, I knew I should've just ordered them from like, Target or something, but hsi friend "apparently" is able to do really cute designs and make fondant art in record time, so I took my chances. And guess where I am now?”]

"Right, right. Wow, I'm sorry, babe, I —"

"Ciento cincuenta dólares cortos con dos niñas que van a estar tristes cuando no consiguen su pastel de sirena barbie y cupcakes con temática de Minecraft. ¡Argh!"

["One hundred and fifty dollars short with two little girls who are going to be sad when they don't get their Barbie Mermaid cake and Minecraft-themed cupcakes. Argh!"]

You stopped your rant when you noticed Stefan looked at you with a confused expression on his face. You thought for a moment to yourself, beginning to laugh at yourself as you realised you were speaking in Spanish.

"I'm sorry, Stef. I didn't realise you couldn't understand me."

He smiled and shrugged. "No worries. At least you were able to get it all out, right?"

"A little. When I punch Lucas, I'll be able to get it all out," you grinned.

"That's my girl."

————

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[descendantofthesparrow]

Encore - POYW - Harry Hook x reader - part 23 - finishing touches

=

You hummed around your fork as the creamy buttercream hit your tongue, looking down at your lap that held your aunt's tablet as you looked over the concept art your aunt had made for your wedding cake.

They ranged from sheet cakes with black and red swirling designs to four-tiered cakes with black and silver designs with red roses decorating the top and bottom tiers.

“these are all so pretty, I have no clue which one to choose” you sighed, setting down the fork next to the crumbs of your once existing sample cake, you and Harry had decided on the flavors a bit ago, chocolate raspberry truffle cake with raspberry glaze and chocolate buttercream and angel food with light vanilla buttercream.

Tonks, your aunt, laughed and held her hand out for the tablet, you leaning over with it and placing it in her hand “that’s no problem if you can't decide right now, there's no rush since your wedding isn’t till…have you decided when you’ll get married?” you paused at her question and shrugged, you honestly didn’t remember if you and Harry had decided on a date, almost everything was ready and set.

The place, the décor, the flowers, the bridesmaids, groomsmen, junior bridesmaids, and groomsmen all chosen, their clothes and accessories ready to be of use. the flower girls were chosen and their clothes ready, the place where you would have the reception at was chosen, the food at the reception was chosen, who was going to marry you and Harry (FG offered to marry the two of you, being the one to originally separate you she wanted to officially bind you together as an apology), who was going to give you away (your aunt), the archway you were going to be married under was designed, Evie said your dress and Harrys suit was ready, the guest list was long since completed, all that was left to do was chose the cake design and decide the time and day to get married really.

“not sure yet, I’ll ask Harry the next time we talk about wedding stuff” you smiled as Tonks gave you a grin and flipped through her cake designs again.

“im sure you’ll pick the best day, now pick a cake” she slid the tablet back over to you. You picked it up and scrolled through the designs again.

You finally decided on the four-tiered cake with white fondant and silver piping designs, with black borders and red roses swirling from the top to the bottom. “great choice, now I think you have a final dress fitting to get to~” Tonks teased, standing to give you a hug and waving you off as you walked into the back to go through a portal to the descendant's universe.

You stuck your key into the storage room door lock and turned it, the portal opening behind the closed door. You swung it open and stepped into the shimmering light portal.

A moment later you stepped out into Evie's starter castle, calling out to her to let her know you were there “Evie!! Im here!” you heard her call back to you from the greenhouse turned office and you made your way over to her. “so I heard that my dress is ready?” Evie spun in her chair, facing away from the light purple dress she was working on, and nodded with a bright grin.

“All ready! Harry's suit is done too but I’ll have him come by later, try it on!” she dashed over to one of her movable dress wracks and plucked a gorgeous white dress with billowy sheen sleeves, a plunging sweetheart neckline, and a long sheer train that flowed from the back. “here you go! Now go go! I want to see the finished product on you!” she squealed, jumping in excitement as you took the dress and went to go change behind the changing screen Evie had installed a while ago for her costumers that came personally to her office.

It took a minute or two to get into the dress, with all the fabric but it was pretty easy to figure out how to put it on. Finally, you zipped up the back and picked up the skirt, and stepped out from behind the changing screen.

Evie gasped and clapped erratically “O M G it's perfect~!!! You look so amazing!!!” you let out a small laugh and let Evie lead you to her standing mirror, gasping at your reflection.

(yes im showing the design again im so damn proud of this dress i want it for my own wedding if i ever have one)

It was exactly the way you had designed it, from the small gems decorating your neckline to the white sapphire waist overlay “Evie, it's perfect” your voice cracked, pure happiness overwhelming you “it’s exactly what I wanted, and dreamed of”

“thank you so much for trusting me with it (y/n), and it's beautiful because you designed it too, you have an amazing eye for fashion” Evie giggled, holding onto your shoulders and smiling at you in the reflection of the mirror. “you are going to take Harry's breath away on your wedding day”

You laughed again, wiping the tears from your eyes and turning, wrapping your arms around Evie and hugging her tightly “thank you so much Evie” she hummed and hugged you back.

“you’re welcome (y/n), it’s the least I could do for all I've done” you raised your brow and leaned back, about to ask her what she meant before you remembered she had helped Mal kidnap you to have FG transport you back to your world.

“Still, thank you” you patted her arm, twirling back around and admiring the dress again. “I love it so much.”

“im glad” Evie sang, walking back over to her desk and continuing on the dress she had paused working on when you walked “so is everything almost done?”

“yep” you chirped, spinning and grinning to yourself as the skirt and train flared around you. “it’s all done actually, all that’s left is for Harry to try on his suit and for us to pick a day and time”

“oh, the archway is finished?” Evie asked, looking over her shoulder at you. The archway that you and Harry would be married under would be installed on your new ship for your wedding, but you and Harry had gone through a billion designs before finding the perfect one, and it had just been finished building and all it needed were its white and red roses decorating the main top boards.

“yep, Harry and I approved the final work two nights ago, we’re basically ready to get married at any point now” you turned and walked back over to the changing screen, unzipping the dress and letting it fall down your arms. “again, just need to pick a day”

Evie clapped her hands in glee “oooh I so excited, honestly, I think im more excited for this than I am Mal and Ben's wedding” you laughed loudly at that.

“Really?” you tilted your head out of the screen, raising your brow at Evie “why?”

“I don’t know” Evie sighed “something about it being more…private? And it’s really just going to be personal friends and family with some extra people, right? it just feels a bit more intimate than their wedding which is going to be broadcasted across Auradon”

You hummed, yeah you were glad you didn’t have to deal with all that for your wedding, and your wedding, hopefully, also would have Carlos actually there, he had mentioned that the day of Mal and Bens wedding was the day of his very important-you can't miss it or you’ll fail the entire year-finals test for veterinary school.

Ben and Mal had tried to reschedule their wedding so Carlos could attend but unfortunately, everything was all set and both were unable to move the date. They promised they would have either Jay or Doug record everything for him so he could at least see the wedding “personally” instead of on the news, he would be there for the reception but he would be missing the ceremony.

“what month are you thinking for it?” Evie wondered aloud, the hum of her sewing machine overpowering her voice a bit.

“im thinking either late spring or early summer? So May or June. I don’t want it to be cold as all hell but I don’t want it to be so warm everyone's sweating?” you shrugged on your shirt and zipped up your boots, stepping back out into the main area of Evie’s office with your dress in your arms “honestly I dunno, I’ll talk to Harry tonight about it, we're having dinner at my place.”

Evie nodded at that and stood, taking your dress and hanging it back up on her rack. “awesome, welp, we’re all done here! So” she waved her hands at you as if casting a spell “why don’t you get back to…whatever you were doing or needed to do after you were done with this” you laughed and nodded, spinning on your heel and walking out of Evie's office, waving her goodbye as you stepped out into her kitchen.

“kay, bye Evie!”

“bye!”

-

A couple of hours later and you were in your kitchen stirring up the mashed potatoes as Harry checked on the tri-tip. “think it's ready yet?” Harry turned to you, nodding his head at the oven.

“just check it with the meat thermometer, if it's 145 degrees it's ready” Harry nodded, putting on some oven mitts and taking out the tri-tip, sticking the meat thermometer in, and grinning.

“145, we’re ready” you nodded and turned off the heat for the gravy, and uncovered the cheese biscuits.

“Okay, ill cut it up and you can take the veggies out of the microwave and pour ‘em in the bowl thing”

You grabbed a carving knife and a large fork, transferring the tri-tip to a cutting board and slicing it up. You worked in comfortable silence to finish your prep for dinner, the only heard was your knife against the meat and cutting board and the soft music playing on Harry’s Bluetooth.

“ready!” Harry called, getting out two plates and setting them on the counter, walking over to you and kissing your cheek “thank yeh for helping me make this darling”

“you’re welcome Harry” you hummed, setting down the knife and fork and walking around Harry to get to the plates “plate up! And let's eat!”

After filling your plates with tri-tip, mashed potatoes and gravy, cheese biscuits, and corn, your dinner was ready to eat. You and Harry sat down at the counter/kitchen window and clinked your sodas before digging in, Harry dancing in his seat a bit as he bit into his food.

“good?” Harry just hummed happily, and nodded, picking up his biscuit and bobbing his head as he bit into it. “good.” You laughed slightly and dug into your own food, humming as you bit into the tri-tip “good job on the tri-tip, it’s fucking bomb” Harry grinned and his ears turned red.

“Thank yeh, Uma taught me how ta season steak a bit after the barrier came down.” You laughed again and pulled out your phone to text Uma.

“well she's a damn good teacher, it’s fucking bomb” you sent a quick text to Uma telling her that she needed to teach harry more cooking stuff and she sent back a wink and a thumbs up.

“soooo” you and Harry spoke in unison, stopping to look at each other and laughing “okay okay” you waved your hands around “me first” Harry laughed a bit and nodded, leaning on his fist and watching you “so, twice today I've been asked when we’re getting married and-I realized I don’t remember if we talked about it, like, at all” Harry snorted.

“aye, Evie, Uma, an’ CJ asked meh the same thing, and yeah we’ve…never talked about when we want ta get married” you and Harry shared an ‘oh shit’ smile and you shook your head.

“well, when Evie asked me about it the first thought that came to my head was early summer or late spring, so like, May or June?” harry hummed and tapped the counter with his fingers.

“huh, May actually sounds good, um, weekend or weekday?” you lifted your feet and rested them on the sideways beams of Harry's stool.

“mmm, weekend? Mostly everyone will be free on the weekends” Harry nodded, and took another bite of mashed potatoes “maybe a Saturday?”

“sounds good” Harry mumbled through his food, swallowing it and taking out his phone, opening his calendar and scrolling up to May “um, so we have the 1st, 8th, 15th,22nd, and the 29th for Saturday’s”

You leaned closer to Harry and set your chin on his shoulder, examining the calendar on his phone “how bout the 22nd? That way it’s not too soon for anyone's schedule and not the direct end of the month” Harry smiled and nodded in agreement.

“that’s perfect, May 22nd it is, that’s when we'll get married” Harry pressed a kiss to your forehead “I can't wait for that day, my love”

“I can't wait either, I tried on my finished dress today and I just wanted to show you immediately, it's so dang pretty~!” you squealed, grinning as Harry chuckled at your enthusiasm.

“and I can't wait ta see you wearing it, I can’t wait ta see yeh walk down the aisle towards me and I can't wait ta call yeh meh wife” you forced down the burning in your nose and eyes and wrapped your arms around Harry, burying your face in his shoulder. “and I can't wait to call you my husband, and love you for the rest of my life” Harry hugged you back tightly, pulling you into his lap and pressing his cheek to the side of your head.

“I love you so much (y/n)”

“I love you too Harry”

-

“finally! I was wondering when you two were going to pick a date, I've kept my calendar open just in case you two decided to say ‘fuck it’ and get married on a whim.” Uma waved her hands about as she ranted, and you hid your smile behind your glass and took a sip of your (drink)

“Yeah, guess we can also finally print those invitations now too” Uma hummed at that and set her cup down, tilting her head at you.

“well, the guest list is all done, right? So it won't be that much to do” you shook your head and took another sip of your (drink).

“Nope, just the design, and then printing, and everything will be ready to go, Harry and I already called Ben about using his private docks for the wedding because that’s where our ship is and he’s all for it” Uma nodded, moving forward on the table and resting her chin in her palm.

“so, next month, you and Harry get married~” you giggled in excitement and danced in your seat a bit.

“yep, hard to believe it's been almost a year since we got engaged, I feel like it's only been a month” you wished wistfully, a dreamy smile on your face “when I arrived on the isle, I never thought that Harry and I would even meet, then all of a sudden I was a part of your crew.” You and Uma shared a reminiscent smile, it had happened oh so long ago, all the way back in 2017 after D2 had released, and now it was 2021 and you were engaged to Harry freaking Hook, Uma was one of your best friends, Gil the other best friend, and you could travel from your world to the descendant's world.

It was like a dream come true, and if it was just a dream?

You hoped you would never wake up.

-end of part 23-

I know these wedding planning parts are lowkey kinda boring but really im just trying to set up the wedding part(s) (if it seems like im dragging everything out pls tell me, I don’t want to bore yall)XD which is soon! It'll probably be posted on May 22nd and considering I've been posting like, once a month (im sorry lol), the next chapter may possibly be the wedding chapter but IDK~!!! But anyway thank you all for reading my dumb Harry Hook x reader that I started back in 2018 so it been like, more than two years since I posted the first part and for some reason yall liked it and asked for more??? Which like, my writing fucking sucked back then, so why the fuck did yall like it? XD

Anyway, just saying again that I will be making rewrites of part of your world and reprise, encore I’ll leave alone since I think it has okay writing, I might re-edit the first couple parts if I cringe enough at em but otherwise, encore will be left alone while the first two parts of the series will get rewritten. I will leave the original versions up but again, new versions coming after I finish encore.

Thank you! - R.Sparrow

(oh! also I designed the invitations~

pretty~ okay im done!)

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[merakiui]

So you know that subtle rivalry hinted between Theo and Nine, like especially about the piano and stuff? I've seen their mini rivalry in personal stories too, but like I think it's pretty funny, cause the calm, peaceful Nine with the cool and collected Theo. What things do you think they would "fight" over? If you do small stories, like maybe a small story over it??

(Absolutely! Their relationship on the AFTER L!FE website says both of them believe the other has “ulterior motives,” which is definitely interesting. I ended up writing a small story/oneshot for this, and I hope it was good enough in terms of what they would “fight over.” Theo and Nine are so fun to write for when it’s in this format.)

Cake (Nine and Theo)

The manager is like cake, Theo thinks as he walks down the hall, a few documents held securely in his gloved hands. Everyone wants a piece of their time, but there’s only so much to go around. I guess it makes sense. They’ve always been sweet when it comes to the Reapers in the 14th Department.

Cake has an expiration date, as does any food. Along with that, it’s messy. Perfect frosting, fondant flowers, and a moist sponge that gets all over silverware and on clothes. Nevertheless, it’s a dessert for any celebratory occasion. Theo knows a lot of the Reapers can be compared to cake. Take innocent Ell and his happy-go-lucky personality for example. If he were a cake, he’d be the most overbearing slice of sugar. Such a simple cake is an insult, though. If you’re going to indulge in something unhealthy, at least make it overly presentable so you won’t have to fuss over the consequences of such a treat in the near future.

But Theo isn’t interested in cakes that have basic layers. He’s much more intrigued by those that have stacks of unique combinations, such as pineapple, vanilla, and even coconut. Each layer can be carefully picked apart, and every flavor dissected before his blue eyes. People are like cake. They’re either sickeningly sweet or spoiled with a rotten attitude, and they fall victim to their own natural expiration dates with the course of time. They can be broken down and devoured as easily as one does to a slice when they’re hungry. More importantly, their ingredients are always different. Opposing backgrounds, conflicting lifestyles, and even the people with whom they associate. When mixed together, it creates a person who holds their own morals, judgements, and rules based on the cards they have been dealt.

Perhaps that’s why children are so territorial when it comes to snacks; they believe it’s their right to be granted the best treat. In a group of three, who is most entitled to the last slice of cake? The two warring sides or the one unknowingly trapped in the middle? Sharing is cast aside in favor of getting the final piece. No one wants one-third of something. You can’t have one-third of a person. But Theo’s not of that age where you assume the world will be given to you on a silver platter. He knows when to choose his battles and when to surrender.

He knows when to savor every bite of cake he can get.

Theo almost drops the files he’s holding when he hears the upbeat staccato being played in rhythmic succession on the piano. That piano. The piano he should’ve found with the manager. If only they’d asked for his help. If only Nine hadn’t ruined it by impressing them with his dexterous talent. If only—

“You’re amazing, Nine!” the manager praises, a grin on their face. “I wonder if the other Soul Reapers have any sort of musical talent, too.”

“It’s nothing special,” he says, politely deflecting the compliment as easily as one discards a slice of moldy cake. “But I’m pleased you enjoy it, Manager.”

Of course, Theo thinks bitterly, drawing his lips into a thin line. Nine’s playing for them again.

“Can I try?”

Nine nods, sliding over on the bench to make room for (Name). While they tap certain keys at random intervals, sheepishly attempting to knit a comprehensive melody, Theo looks on in dissatisfaction. It’s Nine who senses the presence of a third individual, and he cranes his neck to confirm his suspicions.

“Oh, Mr. Theo. A pleasant surprise seeing you here.”

“You’ve been playing a lot lately. Won’t Nyang Lead Manager get angry if he catches you slacking off?”

“He doesn’t have to know,” (Name) says, rescuing Nine from any criticism Theo might have at the ready. “Besides, the day’s been slow enough.”

His heart sinks when he notices the bento boxes, evidence of two meals that have been thoroughly consumed. One for (Name) and one for Nine... They ate lunch together, and now they’re on the piano—the one he should be playing—acting completely chummy. Why? he thinks, his mind attempting to wrap itself around the concept of work relationships. Why are they so close?

His instincts tell him it’s all part of Nine’s master plan to have you to himself—to take all of the cake and leave nothing but crumbs for the others. It’s so selfishly enraging. Luckily, Theo has reason to stay in the spotless storage room. He sets the files on the lid of the piano, nearly swiping the bento boxes out of the way. There was more than enough room, and Nine doesn’t miss the calculated abruptness in Theo’s actions.

“Hm? What’s all of this?”

“Reports from this week’s patrol shifts,” he explains in a matter-of-fact tone. “I was told to bring these to you for review.”

“Right! I forgot about that. Thanks, Theo. What would I do without you?”

Just as fast as it sank, that familiar cardiovascular muscle skips a beat. Sneakily, he eyes Nine to gauge his reaction. The calm Noctu Reaper is staring right back, a partial smile gathering at the corners of his lips. If a pastry chef adds poison to the meringue of his cream horn and it incapacitates an unsuspecting customer, is he at fault? Does the issue lie with who sold him the poison? Were his intentions outlandishly harmful or driven purely by revenge? In this situation, who would be the chef? Theo’s certain it must be Nine. After all, he’s infecting you with a skill that should be reserved only for him. Playing the piano has always been his speciality. Nine is just a copycat baker whisking all sorts of notes in hopes that it produces a suitable tune.

His talent is poisoning the chances Theo has of impressing (Name) with his flawless playing.

Like a garden that’s been infested with weeds, stripping its sprouts of their needed sunlight, Nine has planted ugly hemlock.

“Is everything all right?” Nine questions, seeming concerned at Theo’s stretched silence. “Mr. Theo?”

“Everything’s fine. I’m flattered you’d worry about me.” Despite the fact that Nine’s older and that Theo ought to respect his seniors, he can’t bring himself to willingly trust the Reaper who’s been stealing the manager’s heart with his dexterity.

(Name) pops up from the seat at once, startled to have caught sight of the time. “Sorry, Nine. I've got to supervise Day and Kati’s cleaning shift. You can never be too careful with those two...” As they grab their empty bento box and the pile of documents, exchanging serene farewells with Nine, Theo opens his mouth to say something.

I’ll go with you, he wants to add, and yet the words evade him.

The manager turns to address Theo, a radiant beam in their expression—the sight of a flower that has wilted once and sprung back to life with a little bit of water and sunlight. “There’s a book I found that I think you’ll like. I’ll lend it to you if you’re interested. Let’s talk more next time, okay?”

His heart just about flips into cardiac arrest. How can his manager be so mindful and generous despite the minimal conversation they’ve shared? Such a gesture is sweeter than any cake the other Reapers may resemble.

“Let’s,” he echoes, watching as they make a swift exit. And suddenly the once dusty, overcrowded storage room becomes a haven. Observing it from his angle, he realizes just how much work the manager and Nine have done in terms of cleaning. That could’ve been a task suited to him. Now it’s as though you and Nine have started meeting up periodically in this room.

Nine rises from his spot on the bench, gingerly closing the lid over the piano keys. “Is there something on your mind?”

Theo raises a brow. “Nothing in particular. Why do you ask?”

“I was only curious. You seemed quite attached to the manager’s reactions. Though that’s just a speculation of mine. Please forgive me if I assumed incorrectly.”

“Well, I don’t want them to disapprove of my work.”

“I understand. You always do your best, Mr. Theo, so don’t let the pressure of appeasing Manager weigh you down.”

“I won’t. Thank you for your concern.” His words are hollow��lacking a soul—but he delivers them anyway. A faux cake needs no decorations if it’s role is not to be enjoyed. It’s merely a placeholder in his acquaintanceship with Nine. Stale enough to be recycled for future use, but also courteous in case of an emergency. “Then, I’ll be taking my leave now.”

Nine bids him a professional goodbye, friendly against the powerful tide of passive-aggressive distrust Theo’s built up. The disarming Soul Reaper closes the lid of his bento box, listening to Theo’s even footsteps as they grow distant with each passing second. He isn’t a fool, and neither is the picture-perfect Reaper in the Day Team. Something’s amiss. Anyone would be able to recognize the tense atmosphere that has ensnared the storage room in its vicious maw. Nine isn’t a stranger to formulated schedules. Ever since (Name) asked to meet him in the storage room for a few coveted minutes of listening to him play, Theo’s been in the distance, looming like a shadow in a child’s nightmare.

His finger taps at the colorful plastic while the gears in his brain turn. Nine doesn’t know Theo well enough to make any rash claims, and he certainly wouldn’t say any of that outright. Perhaps he just doesn’t know how to approach others, or he might want a chance to practice on the piano. If that’s the case, it would justify his lingering near the storage room. Nine has noticed the pattern, though. Theo’s always there when the manager observes his skillful fingers dancing across the keys. He’s never there for anyone else.

“I suppose anyone would think it’s an ulterior motive,” Nine murmurs to the empty air. “I’m not too sure.”

Green-eyed monsters don’t have blue eyes, so what does that make Theo?

Said Soul Reaper waits outside the door of the storage room, pressed against the wall with his ears alert and his mouth shut. To be blunt, Nine’s taken too much of the cake, and Theo’s not going to allow that. Crumbs are messy, and he despises messes. For a moment, the darker side of his thoughts conjure other messes. Crimson messes. Accidents that involve choice words and measured actions. Everything should be exemplary for a delicious result. But there won’t be any cake if he’s lacking the ingredients. The only recipe that makes is regret with a side of loss.

Theo slips away from the wall, quietly moving in the other direction. There are many layers to Nine that he must separate for intense study. The closer he gets to the center, the more personal he’ll get. And if the perfect cake involves a book, a piano, and the layers of a certain someone, he’s willing to forsake cleanliness.

Nine is there in the doorway wearing a faint smile as he witnesses Theo leave for a second time.

Something is definitely amiss with Mr. Theo.

[maybecoolwords]

The Flirt..

Summary: Bucky Barnes is obliviously flirting with a stranger while you, his girlfriend, are sitting a few tables away from him.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes × Reader

Word Count: 1 310.

Warnings: The use of the F word. If there are anymore warnings you think I should add, please don't hesitate to tell me.

A/N: Hello beautiful people, I've been gone for a while, writer's block sucks, but I'm back. I hope you guys enjoy this little drabble. BTW, GIF IS NOT MINE.

"Y/N , got a visual on the target yet ?"

A cup of steamy coffee on your table, on the side of a still warm chocolat cookie. In beautiful pastel colors, the mini table goes well with the aesthetic of the little french café. A breathtaking view of the infamous Eiffel Tower is giving you one of the most Paris "experience", as well as the many flower shops surrounding the beautiful coffeeshop, spreading garden-fresh scents you're absolutely in love with.

You're back on the field again, after only a few days of rest. It seems to you that bad guys just can't give you a break and probably won't any time soon either. So to say you're tired is more than just a simple understatement. Add to that the fact that you've been sitting on this same chair for the past half hour which isn't exactly cheering you up, especially since all you've been doing is watching people. Stakeout missions are the absolute worse.

Steve's voice is what got you out of an other case of lost-gazing. His voice shows just how bored and tired he is. And you can't really blame yourselves, having woken up early after another late night can take a toll on anybody, except for Bucky who seems more energetic than you've seen him in the past few days.

"Nope, not yet." You responded to Steve's earlier question as you took a sip from your still steamy cup of coffee to hide the movement of your lips.

"Buck ?" Asks Steve again.

No answer.

"Bucky ?"

Nothing again.

You're starting to get eaten up with curiosity. It's not like Bucky to just not answer his best friend when he calls his name, especially on a mission like this one. And it's not like you could just turn around and look directly at his table because you might blow your covers if you do that.

But the suspect is nowhere to be seen - yet. So you do a quick recon of your side of the little coffeeshop before you look Bucky's wa-

Wait.

No.

Effing.

Way.

It feels like your eyes are decieving you, so you scrunch them a bit to really make sure you're not watching your boyfrind casually laugh at something someone said. And not just someone, a very very handsome man is sitting in the same table Bucky has been occupying for the past hour and talking to him like how a man would talk to his date. A charming smile very much on display, biting his bottom lip and eyes very much lost in Bucky's.

You're no Black Widow, but you do know when a person has the fuck-me-look in their eyes. And Bucky is unmindfully enjoying this.

You look back down to your cup of coffee, playing calm and collected to not draw anybody's attention to you, when you really want to strangle that oblivious boyfriend of yours.

You sigh before you pick your cup of coffee to take a sip and say:

"Guys, we have a problem."

"What is it now ?" Sam answers, obviously even more irritated at this stake-out mission from hell.

"Bucky might have turned off his ear piece and is completly lost in a french boy's eyes."

"What ?"

"He is what now ?"

It was like you just woke your two baby-sitters from an eyes-wide-open nap. Both of them expecting a little "the waitress brought me the wrong order" type of problem coming from you, since you tend to be a bit overdramatic in anything you do in life.

But it's not the case.

"Yeah, I'm literally looking at him right now, laughing at the hot dude's jokes.." It's no surprise that you're not frantic or losing your chill right now, if anything, you're cool about the whole thing. You trust Bucky, and you know how oblivious he gets at times when people flirt with him. Especially now that a hot and handsome french man is obviously swooning over Bucky's bluer-than-the-sky eyes and his beautiful smile while Bucky is probably thinking about learning french to impress his new friend.

"Wait, did you just say hot ?" Sam asks, most probably smirking.

"I just told you my boyfriend is unintentionally cheating on me right now, and all you're concerned about in me calling a dude hot ?"

"Guys, I can literally hear you right now." Bucky finally seemed to have finished his apparently more-important-than-the-mission talk and turned his ear piece back on. You look over at him to see him sitting alone, looking like a snack, back in his Winter-Soldier-but-friendlier-persona, as you like to call it.

"Guys, can we focus back on the mission, now ?" Just like always, cap's bored but still authorative voice cuts the conversation short. A conversation you'd gladly have with your boyfriend if it wasn't for Sam's meddling.

"Red Wing got a hit on one of the costumers that got in a few minutes ago. Umm, brown hair, red shirt and blue jeans." Sam announces.

"Oh my god."

"What now ?"

"That's the dude Bucky was flirting with-"

"I was not flirting with him, Y/N." Bucky's irritated voice cuts in.

"Where is he now ?" Steve asks, seemingly done with this petty argument before it even started.

"On the back alley."

"I'm moving in now." You say before you throw a ten euro bill on the table and quickly walk to the back alley of the little café, thinking: Why does there have to be a back alley involved?

"I'm right behind you." Bucky says before you feel him, indeed, walking behind you.

"Oh don't you have another hot dude to make out with this time ?" You tease him, leading him towards the kitchen door. Bucky was about to comment on your little remark, if it wasn't for the confused glares coming from the staff working in the tiny kitchen. The beautiful sight of croissants and chocolate cookies, however, is what you're mostly seeing, thinking how you'd kill for one right now.

"Nous sommes désolés mesdames et messieurs, ça ne va pas prendre longtemps." Bucky apologetically says to avoid the irritated glares everyone is sending your way, as you both pass the counters.

"I forgot you can speak French. But I definitely just got a reminder how that makes me feel." You say before reaching the back door.

"Babygirl-"

"Okay gross, we can hear you, or do you need a reminder about that too ?"

"Thank you Sam, always ruining everything." You sigh.

The door leading to the back alley is locked, typical. So you move to the side, allowing Bucky -who doesn't hesitate- to do his thing: breaking the lock.

You find your target, with a surprised look on his face when he first spots Bucky reaching for his gun. In a swift quick move you kick the dude in the stomach before he drops to the ground and lose his grip on a briefcase he's holding, before threatening him to not move. His partner in crime, or in this case, his supplier, froze in his place watching the whole thing unfold. Ugh, amateurs.

"Quick catch." You hear Sam say after he and Steve showed up.

"That was the easiest thing I've ever done." You retort to Sam's comment.

"Okay, showoff." Bucky chuckles.

"Don't you have another bad guy to flirt with ?" Sam asks, trying to pull the conversation to Bucky's earlier shananigans.

"For the last time, I was not flirting with him."

"To be honest I would've done the same thing." You say, moving towards Bucky and propping your arms on his shoulder allowing him to place his hands on your hips. All while thinking about all the champagne and chocolat fondant you'll have when you go back to your hotel room.

"Wait, what do you mean?" Bucky asks, genuinely curious about what you meant, with his typical "jealous" frown etched on his face.

"I'm just saying, if a handsome guy just randomly approaches me I would definitely start flirting with him and laugh at everything he says just for the hell of it, without thinking about my boyfriend who is conveniently sitting just a few tables-"

"Okay , fine I get it." Bucky finally gives up. "And I am still adamant on the fact that I was not flirting with him."

[nate-santos]

Friend or Dough || Nate & Orion

TIMING: Early January LOCATION: Fondante’s Inferno PARTIES: @3starsquinn @nate-santos​ SUMMARY: Rio comes to get some late night sweets CONTENT WARNINGS: Just sweet fun!

It was long past dark by the time that Orion finally left the Scribrary. A glance at his phone as he hiked through the woods to get to the closest parking lot where he could pull the car up told him that it was just past two in the morning. He weighed his options. He could drive back to the house and try to scrounge up some food. This late in the night, that wasn’t exactly ideal. But the late hour didn’t leave many options either. He was more than familiar with the Fondante’s Inferno than any normal, sane person probably should be. One perk of living with his nightmare of a family came with a seemingly endless allowance that allowed him to divulge in any sweet tooth craving he had. Now, he didn’t even want to know how much money he had dropped at the bakery since he had moved out on his own. He had a bad habit of dropping in at late hours and ordering in bulk to keep at the Scribrary as his own personal self serve buffet.

By the time he got to the bakery, it was inching closer and closer to that three in the morning deadline, and Orion rushed into the shop in a hurry, out of breath and already offering apologies. “Hey! I’m sorry. So sorry. I don’t mean to keep you any later than you’re already here. I was hoping to get here before you closed.” He tried perusing the leftover goods as he rested his palms on his knees and tried to catch his breath. There wasn’t much that wasn’t good at this bakery, ran by a guy around the same age and wildly more successful than himself clearly. Luckily, the guy seemed incredibly nice. “How’s it going tonight? Busy day?” At almost three in the morning, it wasn’t any surprise that Rio found himself as the only remaining customer in the place. But he always recommended the place to others and hoped that during normal hours the place stayed busy.

Late nights didn’t bother Nate. Sure, it was his shop and he could set the hours, but late at night, the town seemed to become a more peaceful place. Plus he never wanted to alienate the previous owners’ regulars, even if he never seemed to have what they were looking for. The usual “after bar” crowd had just finished filtering out and Nate looked at the clock. Three was coming on quick and he hadn’t seen his most regular regular yet. His brow furrowed and he set about sweeping up and cashing out the register, happy to be alone for a bit. Easing his way back into the storefront had been harder than anticipated. More than one of his usual customers had apparently shifted in his subconscious to be more monstrous than friendly and it was difficult to focus when the old woman you’ve known your whole life was staring at you with glowing red eyes.

Like a tornado, someone rushed into the shop, breathlessly looking over the day’s last fresh pastries. Nate spun on his heel at the sound of the door, nearly tripping over the dustpan he’d just dropped, only to feel relief wash over him like a tidal wave. “Orion! Hey!” He propped the broom against the counter as the rush of adrenaline eased its way through his body. “You know you never have to apologize for keeping me late, you’re my best customer,” he laughed, prepping a few boxes for whatever the guy picked out tonight. “Not so busy, mostly just pick ups and stuff. But not too shabby.” It was more than a relief to say that Orion looked entirely and perfectly normal. Regular human, no scary teeth or hands or scales to be seen. “What’s keeping you out so late?” He asked, already putting a few of the older pastries in a box.

Nate was always a friendly face, and someone that Orion was especially happy to give business too. It was only a plus, or to go too far into a pun, the cherry on top, that the food was incredible. The two had found a sort of easy groove with each other. Rio showed up at odd hours and bought way too many baked goods at once and Nate was incredibly friendly about it and even seemed to specifically make things that he knew Rio liked. The latter of which had not gone unnoticed by Rio, who was especially thankful. “Oh I’m sure that’s not true. I’m sure there are plenty of other good customers that show up during like… normal people hours.” Rio laughed nervously, never quite sure how to properly accept compliments. “Besides, you make it very easy to want to come back.” Deflecting with his own compliments was usually the best line of defense that Rio had. “Oh you know. The usual.” Rio shrugged, trying to think of exactly what the usual was. He hated lying, even to people he didn’t necessarily know very well. “I get caught up in an assignment or studying and end up staying too late.” That was about as truthful as he could be to someone that didn’t know about the Scribrary. “Wanted to make sure I stopped by before you closed though. Wouldn’t want to miss out on whatever you came up with today.”

Nate chuckled as Rio perused the goods. “Sure, but boring people come at normal hours and what fun is that?” It was a joke, but Nate wished it was true. What he wouldn’t give for all his customers to actually be normal again. His smile flickered for only a moment before he was back to his jovial self. Something about Rio always brought this side of him back to the forefront. It was like the accident never happened and he could joke and have small talk without the fear that now always lingered in the back of his mind. “Speaking of,” Nate said with a glimmer in his eye before racing to the back mid sentence. “I’ve got something for you to try!” He called, rummaging through boxes to find the new recipe he’d been playing with. Carrying it gingerly back out to the front as if it were some precious heirloom, Nate presented the tarts to his patron. “Chocolate blueberry tarts with a hint of lime. I know it sounds weird, but seriously.” Nate made the chef kiss motion with his hands. “Maybe these will help get you through the late night study sessions.” He could tell there was probably more to it than just studying late, but Nate didn’t like to pry. If people wanted to let him into their lives, they would. It never did any good to try to force your way in, especially when it’s really none of your business.

Unwrapping one of the tarts, Nate held it up for a little cheers. It was customary at this point for them to try some of his new creations together and while they weren’t all winners, they were usually still pretty darn good if he said so himself. Nate was a little apprehensive about this batch, given that he’d been low on yeast and had to dip into his bread delivery box to make the crust, but it couldn’t actually be sentient, right? That was just a marketing gimmick. “Cheers! To late nights and delicious sweets!”

Orion laughed with Nate, ignoring that there probably wasn’t anyone in town more boring than Rio himself. Sure, terrifying and arguably exciting things seemed to happen around him. But those all seemed adjacent to the hermit that Rio actually was. At least that’s how he wanted to be. Between the hunter heritage, the supernatural library and the part where he may or may not have murdered his parents he felt like he should be a lot more interesting than he actually was. “Well I can’t say that I’m not super boring. My book bag is filled with like twenty pounds of random history books and autobiographies. But I appreciate the compliment anyways.” Nate got sidetracked quickly, rushing into the back. Through the doors, Rio could hear him search until he pushed back out into the main area holding a tray of what looked to be some kind of tart or pastry. Rio’s face brightened, but he didn’t react until Nate actually named the sweets. “Oh my god. Did you say blueberry? You’re a god send.” Rio clapped excitedly, swinging the book bag off of his back and dropping it onto the floor with a heavy thud. Nate had always been open to asking Rio’s feedback on some of the new creations. When it came to sweets, Rio was practically a raccoon. He would eat just about anything Nate offered, and he usually ended up liking it. Though Nate must have picked up on how much Rio loved pairing blueberry in his pastries. “My two favorite things!” Rio raised a tart in the air before biting into it. The odd trio of flavors may have sounded strange, but the combination blended perfectly and Rio released a happy sigh after two more bites to finish the thing off. “Holy crap that’s so good. Thank you for sharing this!” Rio licked his lips of any leftover chocolate before speaking again, “The bread tasted a little different this time. Good, just different. Is it something new?”

Nate had always felt like Rio was a kindred spirit, and tonight was no different. “I don’t think that’s so boring,” he replied before taking a bite of his own tart. Nate loved his historical books, even if it seemed a bit lame at times. Biographies were some of the most interesting stories out there. “You know the saying, Stranger than Fiction?” He smiled, taking another bite. Man, he hit it out of the park with these. Nate closed his eyes for a moment, letting the flavors sink in. Baking was one of the few things that brought him complete and utter peace and this flipping tart was no different. He’d really have to make more of an effort to find his secret bread admirer, ‘cause this batch of yeast had done wonders for the recipe. “You really like it?” He asked through a mouthful of blueberries. He could always trust Rio to give him an honest review, but it seemed more and more likely that the kid was gonna enjoy anything he gave him. “I tried a new type of yeast,” he answered, his face falling a bit. “Can you really tell?” Sudden insecurity gripped him, pausing his glut fest mid bite. No...something else was gripping him...Nate’s eyes traveled down to the half eaten tart in his hand that seemed to now be grabbing his hand back. “U-uh...O-Orion?”

“I think you’re one of the few then.” Orion laughed, thinking on how many people would find something like reading biographies incredibly boring. Even if they knew the subject was supernatural. Luckily, Rio had found quite a few friends that appreciated his lackluster hobbies. Even if they themselves didn’t find it super interesting, they never held that against Rio. In fact, it came in handy sometimes. “Real life is definitely a lot weird than anything a fictional book could sell me.” Rio agreed, unsure how much Nate actually knew about how weird real life actually was. But now wasn’t the time to fall too deeply into that. Right now, he wanted to focus exclusively on enjoying these ridiculously good sweets that Nate had brought out to try. “Of course. It’s hard not to like something you make.” Rio admitted, savoring another bite before he tried to answer Nate’s question. Admittedly, Rio didn’t know if the enhanced senses included taste. But he knew that he had always been pretty good at picking out individual flavors. Plus, he actually tasted the flavoring in la croix. Apparently that wasn’t normal. “Oh uh- yeah it’s nothing bad. I’m just sensitive to-” Rio’s bad excuse for an explanation was cut off when Nate said his name again. Rio met his confused look and glanced down at his hand, the tart that was on it seemed to be… moving. And sticking onto the man’s arm. On instinct, Rio flung his own tart onto the ground and slid away from it. “Um. What is that?! Nate drop the tart!”

Talk about stranger than fiction. Nate’s eyes went wide as dinner plates as he begun trying to flick the tart off his hand, his heart racing. “I can’t! I can’t get it off?!” All thoughts of how pleased he’d been to hear how much Rio had enjoyed his baking had dissipated, thrown out the window by tiny dough hands. “Get it off me!!” Nate flung his hand as hard as he could and the little tart thankfully flew off, landing with a dull smoosh on the counter. Apparently this act had betrayed their very existence as the half eaten tart was joined by the four untouched pastries. Gracelessly, they each sprouted a foot or a hand or an arm, limping around the counter with surprising speed. “What the heck- I’ve made a monster!!” Nate grabbed for a weapon, coming up with only a flour covered rolling pin. Better than nothing. He slammed it at the tiny monsters, wondering if Rio even saw these things too or if it was another of his hallucinations.

Orion was hopping back and forth from what foot to another, frantically waving his arms as he tried to figure out what the heck was going on. Nothing about monster bread had ever shown up in any of the Scribe books that he had read. Why hadn’t monster bread shown up? The passing thought that Rio would need to write his own entry only vaguely crossed his mind before he pushed it to the side to move beside Nate after he got the tart detached from his skin. The other tarts were starting to move now too, pieces of the bread morphing and extending into shapes resembling limbs. “What the-” Rio mumbled, trying to think of what could have possibly caused something like that. Nate grabbed a rolling pin and was smacking at the counter now while Rio stood back and stared at the man in a daze. “Be careful!” Rio finally yelled when he broke from the daydream. “How the heck is this happening right now?"

Judging by Rio’s reaction, Nate wasn’t the only one who could see the little creatures. At least that was a small relief, though the moment quickly faded as a tart-monster leapt off the counter, launching itself directly at Orion’s face. “Look out!!” Nate jumped back, slamming his rolling pin down on another tart, catching its little, deformed leg and flattening it. “I don’t know!! I- what are these things??” Panic swelled up inside him and Nate wondered if this is what people meant when they always said “oh yeah, anything can happen here in White Crest,” as if crazy nonsense like this occurred all the time. “I used- a new- yeast!” It was the only variable. When the delivery message said it was sentient, Nate didn’t take that literally. “Ah!” He yelped, jumping back from a one armed little tart that was eliciting what would arguably be an adorable sound as it attempted to tie Nate’s shoelaces together. “How do we make it stop??”

A piece of evil baked bread launched itself at Orion, but before he could move to swat it away a rolling pin swung down and smacked it midair. “Uh- Thanks” Rio stared at the splattered bakery item on the ground, still managing to slowly move as it slowly puffed itself up. “Great question. I wish I had a better answer.” He couldn’t help but think back to the watermelons that had tried to kill him and Skylar. Why was food so hell bent on murdering people in this town? Regardless, he made a mental note that he needed to try to look into an explanation after this. Not that now was the time to be scheduling study sessions. “New yeast. Right.” This was literally monster bread. Jesus Christ. “We uh-” He paused to consider their options. Hitting the things didn’t kill them. If they could piece themselves back together he wasn’t sure cutting them up would either. “Bake them? Like uh- for a long time?” Rio suggested, sliding forward and using his heel to stomp on a piece of bread trying to… trip Nate to death? Rio still wasn’t clear on their motives.

Nate had once been an athletic guy, never on the baseball team but he’d play in the yard with his brother all the time growing up. Never in a million years did he think any of those skills would come in handy regarding keeping him and his friend safe from literal murder bread. Every gremlin they smacked down or flattened seemed to immediately rise again and Nate cursed the gifted yeast. What a sick joke! “Burn them?” Nate’s face fell. Sure, it was probably their best option at stopping the things once and for all, but it hurt his baking heart to think of intentionally burning his newest recipe, especially when it had originally gotten such a glowing review from Rio. He wanted to cry, but was instantly derailed as he tripped over his shoelaces. “Ok - but let it be known I hate that I have to do this,” he whined, kicking his shoes off as quickly as possible. “Preheat that oven and turn it all the way up!” He pointed at the small convection oven behind the counter and began to try and pile all the little monsters up on a baking sheet.

“Noted!” Orion yelled, darting forward and vaulting over the bakery counter. He chalked it up to mostly dumb luck plus a decent amount of his own training that he had jumped and slid across the counter so easily instead of tripping and falling over it instead. Growing up, his body had always been quick to remind him that strength and agility didn’t fix clumsiness. Then again, adrenaline seemed to help his body work without relying too much on the anxiety frying his brain. He made his way to the oven, swatting away a piece of tart, an actual thing he actually had to do right now. This town was exhausting. Rio spun the dial of the oven, turning it as high as it could go. Another tart launching itself at Rio, grabbing onto his clothes and crawling up his shirt. “Ew, ew, ew” Rio repeated to himself as he slapped aimlessly around his body until he finally got hold of the baked good. He pulled it off and tossed it into the oven. It had only just begun heating, but Rio shut the door and made his way back to the counter. Couldn’t a two in the morning bakery run just be normal?

Trying to keep all the struggling tarts on one single surface was proving more difficult than Nate had imagined. Luckily Rio seemed to have gotten to the oven and though it wouldn’t be nearly hot enough just yet, they could at least start chucking some of these monsters in. “Here! Catch!” Nate flung the baking sheet up, attempting to toss the little beasts through the air and towards the oven, his eyes moving from his target only momentarily when he stomped down on a spare piece of dough that had fallen off. Abandoning the sheet, Nate started grabbing the few tarts that were left and started throwing them like it was the bottom of the ninth and his life depended on it. “Ok, last one then slam that door shut and pray this works!!”

As far as life dangers went, Orion didn’t think that creepy living bread made the list. Still, the idea of something he had just taken a bite out of was alive and moving was beyond unsettling. Rio heard Nate call out and he looked over in time to see a pan being flung in his direction. He darted forward, grabbing onto the pan and moving back over to crack the oven open enough for him to dump them inside. Before long, Nate had started chucking the bread in Rio’s direction. Rio grabbed what he could, dropping them in and bending down to scoop up any that he missed. Finally, Nate was done. A quick glance around told them that they had grabbed all of the remaining pieces that could be seen. Rio left the oven closed, resting against it to make sure that it stayed closed. The little monsters didn’t seem particularly strong, but he wasn’t ready to take any chances. He didn’t look at the window into the oven. He didn’t want to see them against the glass, trying to get out. Bread or not, he had no interest in watching something that moved get burnt to a crisp. “So uh… this was pretty weird, right?”

Nate deflated against the counter, wiping off a few crumbs from his face. “Weird is an understatement, I think…” He dropped his head onto the wood, his cheek squishing against the cool surface. “I don’t- I’ve never...have you??” He couldn’t even begin to describe what he’d seen. It didn’t make any rational sense. As the adrenaline poured out of his body, no longer needed to keep him in defense mode, Nate felt himself sink to the floor like a puddle. To say this was the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him might be a lie, but this wasn’t like when he looked at some people around town and they looked like horrific monsters. That was a hallucination, something wrong with his actual brain. These...Rio had seen these too. Nate looked up at his friend. “What would do something like that?? How is that r-real?”

Orion refused to take any pressure off of the oven door. He didn’t think the now crisping pieces of living bread had the strength to open the door, but they were also all stuffed in there together. He had seen enough gross horror movies to know that weird things like that could combine together and grow in size or something else equally awful. His plan was to keep this door closed until the things in there looked like charcoal. Only problem was that he didn’t actually want to look to see what they looked like. “No. Definitely never seen anything like that. That was a first.” He really thought that he had reached some sort of imaginary wall in terms of being surprised by supernatural creatures. Good to know the bar could always be set higher. “So judging by your reaction I’m going to guess that your bread does not do that on the regular?” Surprisingly, Rio found himself almost amused by the situation. For someone who was constantly freaking out about everything, Rio was a bit confused by his own reaction. Though he supposed in the grand scheme of things, the bread wasn’t nearly as deadly as most of the other things that Rio got attacked by. “That honestly makes me feel so much better about how often I eat here. I was about to be a bit worried.”

Nate almost laughed, running his hands through his hard. “No...no randomly coming to life is usually not on my menu.” He scooted up to his knees, peering over the counter at the oven. From here, it didn’t look like there was any movement within, but Nate was glad that Orion seemed to have the same thought about not leaving the oven door unattended. He cracked an exhausted, waning adrenaline smile. “Why, you think I should add it? I think they’ll be a crowd pleaser!” It was impossible not to make light of what had just happened. It was just...entirely ludicrous. Nate half expected himself to be dreaming. “I don’t normally make a habit out of using random ingredients...but…” Nate shoved himself to his feet and started rustling through a drawer, pulling out a neatly folded piece of paper and handing it to Rio.

“CONGRATULATIONS. We heard you like to BAKE. A friend has subscribed you to WEEKLY DELIVERIES of SENTIENT BREAD. Please ENJOY this PAINED SOURDOUGH BREAD STARTER. We look forward to sending you more SENTIENT BREAD. We CONGRATULATE you.”

“I got this about a month ago and...well this is the yeast I used to make those tarts...this is just a joke, right?”

Orion laughed sarcastically, emitting a sigh as he still struggled to capture his breath. This hadn’t been particularly exhausting physically, but the whole ordeal had drained him. It didn’t help that it was the middle of the night. “Yeah I uh- think it’ll get a real rise out of customers.” Rio cringed at his own joke and made a mental note that puns probably weren’t for him. He grabbed onto the piece of paper that Nate offered and read it over multiple times. What the heck was this? And who would send it? And why were there so many capital letters? “So someone sent this to you? I guess… as a joke?” Rio didn’t find it particularly funny personally, but to each their own. Admittedly, the bread hadn’t exactly been dangerous. At least, not that they had seen. Maybe this was all some sort of weird prank? Fae could be particularly mischievous, maybe this was all some elaborate ruse? “I mean, if it is a joke I don’t really get their sense of humor.” Rio laughed nervously and scratched at the back of his head, “But I guess it could be? Maybe you shouldn’t use anymore of it though?” Rio tossed the note onto the countertop and sighed again. What a night.

Nate couldn’t help but snort at the pun. Maybe it was the adrenaline, maybe he was just losing his mind, but making jokes right now felt like the right thing to do. He slumped against the counter, his head resting on his hands. “I don’t think it was so funny either...but also I didn’t think sentient bread was a real flipping thing.” His brows furrowed as he glanced behind Rio to see how crispy the critters were getting. “I’m definitely not gonna use any more of it.” He looked up at Rio sadly. “Please promise me you’ll keep eating my desserts...I promise they’re not all animated and trying to kill you.”

By some miracle, the box that Nate had packed for Orion had survived the chaos and was left mostly untouched by the creepy bread. He could see it on the counter  Looking through the box, Rio laughs slightly and closes it again, leaving it on the counter. After what felt like an acceptable amount of time, he finally took a step away from the oven, slowly pulling his arm away and ready to press up against it at any moment. But he didn’t have to. There was no resistance against the oven door. Whatever those things had been, Rio didn’t think they were going to be moving anymore. “Don’t worry. It’s going to take a lot more than some living bread for me to give this place up. Your food is too good.” He grinned, but there was a sigh behind it. The late hour was finally catching up to him, the adrenaline finally wearing off. “But if you don’t mind, I think I’ll go ahead and pay for my stuff and head out. It’s pretty late. And I wasn’t expecting… that.”

Nate ran a hand down his face and looked at the oven apprehensively. Rio stepped away and nothing came crashing out, thankfully, but the baker wasn’t ready to turn off the heat just yet. “Oh good,” he breathed with a sigh of relief. “Of course! Of course, actually y’know this one’s on the house. I uh...consider it a promotion for trying my last new delicacy ever.” Nate slid the box closer to Rio and grabbed a broom, setting about clearing up what he could before he left for the night. There was no way he was doing his full closing checklist, not after the attempted murder via baked goods, but he could at least get some crumbs up while he waited for those things to get even a little more crispier. “Seriously,” he led his friend out, flipping his open sign to closed. “Thanks for being here...I can’t imagine dealing with those things by myself. And I swear to never use mysterious baking supplies ever again.” Now he just had to figure out where he put the rest of that tearful pumpkin...

[javierchvez]

winter bakin’ | jovier

pairing - javier chavez & @jojohood

time - sometime around winter break

setting - the kitchens

summary - javier and jojo make cookies for the holidays

The best part of Christmas was the baking. At least that was Javier’s opinion in previous years. This year he had something even better to look forward to, and that was baking with one of his favorite people. She might not be the most adept baker, but it was still nice to have company in the kitchen. And Javier couldn’t have asked for better company than Jojo. Grabbing the last of the ingredients, he gave her a quizzical look. “Now, the only question is…” he trailed off as if to build suspense as he reached into the drawer. It wasn’t anything that needed the suspense, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t fun to make it sound like a much larger debate than it was. “Do we want to do snowmen or the traditional gingerbread man?” Though he was asking for her opinion, he definitely made his own known by nodding his head slightly towards the former.

Jojo wasn't exactly what anyone would call the most festive person, but that didn't mean she hated the holidays. How could she, when her home back in Sherwood always went all out for them? It just meant that while she admired the holiday lights and decorations and all that stuff, she didn't usually participate in any of it firsthand. She especially didn't if it had anything to do with cooking or baking, but baking holiday cookies was a fun excuse to hang out with Javier. Not that Jojo needed an excuse -- almost without her even noticing, Javier had become one of those rare people that she knew she could hit up to talk about anything, at any time. And she must like him a lot if she was here, ready to try making cookies for the first time. "Hmmm..." Jojo said outloud as she struggled to tie her long, wavy hair back into a ponytail or bun to keep it out of the way from getting burned or something like that. She considered saying gingerbread just because she knew he wanted the other one more but she ended up going with, "Fuck tradition! Let's make some tiny snowmen!" With that, she finally wrestled most of her hair into a ponytail that stayed and she wiped her hands on the side of her pants. "So, Chef Chavez, how do we start this thing? Because I'm not kidding when I say the extent of my baking knowledge is those tv competition shows."

Javier could hardly contain his excitement when she agreed with him. He honestly would have been okay with either cookie, he just liked the way the snowmen looked and the fact that they had more icing on them than the gingerbread men. “Seriously, don’t even worry about that. That’s what I’m here for,” he said, trying to make her feel better about her inexperience with baking. “I can show you what to do. It’ll all be fine, trust me.” He’d shown plenty of people how to make things. Okay, maybe not that many people, but he was sure that he could teach Jojo a simple sugar cookie recipe. “So first, we’re going to pour flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl and use this to mix it together.” He handed her a whisk as he spoke, with his other hand setting out the measuring cup to measure out the mentioned ingredients. “And while you do that, I’ll get the butter and sugar going in the mixer.” Javier waited until all the dry ingredients were properly measured before moving on to beat the butter and sugar together and tossed her a reassuring glance. “See? So far so good. You have nothing to worry about.”

"Worried? I'm not worried," Jojo lied through her teeth in the most teasing tone she could manage. She wasn't used to the part of liking somebody that made her insecure that they'd think less of her if she proved herself talentless, but at least Javier was nice about it. He was nice about everything, and besides, it wasn't like cookies were even that hard of a recipe to not fuck up. "And I do trust you," she admitted with a sigh. It was weird to say those words and even weirder to mean it, but it felt like a good kind of weird. "Alright, let's go!" She rubbed her hands together before taking the whisk from Javier and nodded. It sounded simple enough. Just mixing together weird dry powders. And whisking itself was easy enough to do, even without paying too much attention, which was good because the best part of this by far was getting to watch Javier. Even when he was doing simple stuff like beating butter and sugar together, it was kind of sexy; he was just so casually confident in the kitchen. "Right? I don't want to jinx myself but I think I might be a whisk master already. Do you ever just eat the sugar-butter mixture by itself? Because that looks good!"

Before he had been grinning at getting to do the shape he wanted, but now that grin turned into something softer; it wasn’t everyday that Javier was told that someone trusted him. Not that he’d ever do anything to make him untrustworthy, but he wasn’t naive enough to assume that absolutely nobody had preconceived notions regarding the VK’s. Although he’d never accuse Jojo of being like that. After all, if she thought something, she would say it. She was definitely not the type to say one thing and mean another, and maybe that was why he’d appreciated the comment so much, although really it wasn’t that big of a deal. They were only making cookies, not a whole lot of trust was needed in the subject, but it was still very much appreciated to be heard. And he also appreciated the enthusiasm she exuded even while doing something she had said time and time again she wasn’t good at. Javier laughed when she called herself a whisk master and peered into her bowl, a playful gasp leaving his lips. “Wow, that’s the best whisking job I’ve ever seen. And that’s coming from me.” Her question gave him a slight pause, a look of guilt spreading over his face briefly. “Uh, yeah, but no judging me! I only did it the first time I made cookies over here because, well, it was the first time I’d made cookies with fresh ingredients. And I do not suggest eating just butter and sugar. It’s kind of gross.”

Jojo rolled her eyes but couldn't help but smile at Javier's surprised gasp; joking around in a kitchen together was annoyingly just as much fun as the lame people in romcoms made it seemed, and she kind of hated herself for actually puffing up a little bit at his playful compliments. Maybe it was too late for her and she was officially a fool with feelings. She'd think about that later, though. Right now, she had a handsome and hilarious boy to mock. "Um, permission to remain unjudged denied! I can't say I don't get the temptation though. It looks freaking tasty." She looked down at the mixture and then over at Javier with mischief twinkling in her eyes. "Hey, are you one of those cooks that gets weird about people sticking their fingers in your food?" she added, sticking a finger out menacingly towards the butter and sugar bowl. "Do you dare me to taste it?”

“I just told you it was gross and you still wanna try it?” Javier asked, laughing as her finger neared the mixing bowl. “I’m not one of those, no, but like I said, I really advise against it.” He made sure the mixer was off before tipping the bowl towards her. “But if you really want to do it, be my guest. Just don’t blame me when it’s the worst thing you’ve ever had. I warned you it was gross.” He had to admit, even though there wasn’t much baking being done and more messing around, he was having a great time. It was always a good time with Jojo, no matter what they were doing. “I’m about to add vanilla, egg, and almond extract though, if you’d rather wait. We’re almost to dough and that tastes a lot better than just butter and sugar.”

For someone who had never been in any relationship before and had only really seen successful ones, Jojo really had a bad habit of waiting for the other show to drop, and so she kept expecting Javier to get annoyed that she delaying their progress, or that she was just goofing off, but it felt more and more like waiting for something that wouldn't come, and that made it easier to be herself. "Yeah! You can't call something gross and honestly not expect me to try and test it out," Jojo snickered. She loved self-imposed dares and trying new shit out, and this felt like a good opportunity to do both of those things. She considered waiting for a moment so she could have the full dough experience as Javier suggested but then she just shrugged. "I'll try it when you get it all doughy too but I'm too curious right now!" Her finger swiped the edge of the mixture and scooped some up. "Cheers," she laughed,  popping it into her mouth and keeping eye contact with him the whole time. The taste wasn't as bad as she had been expecting and she covered her mouth with her hands as she laughed. "Dude... is it bad that I liked it?"

Sure, he’d definitely had worse tasting things on the Isle, but this was gross more so because of texture than anything else. Just watching Jojo eat it made him grimace, remembering his reaction the first time he’d tried the mixture. It was not at all the one she gave him now, and Javier couldn’t help but snicker. “I mean, everyone’s got different tastes?” He responded, reaching for the next set of ingredients to add to the bowl. “But I’m telling you. Nothing's gonna beat the dough. I know they say you shouldn’t eat raw dough because of the eggs and what not, but it’s still amazing. I could sit and eat an entire bowl of it, honestly. Who needs actual cookies when the dough tastes a little better?” After adding in the vanilla and eggs, Javier added the dry ingredients, setting the mixer to low and letting it do its thing. “So, thought about how you wanna decorate your snowman? Do we want royal icing or would you rather use fondant?”

Jojo felt even more like smiling at the look on Javier's face; he looked absolutely aghast, and it genuinely cracked her up that she could gross him out a little bit. And then he laughed and it made her laugh, and her heart felt light. She was still getting used to the fact that somebody's emotions had such sway on hers, but it felt so good right now. "I love raw cookie dough, man," she laughed. "I'd eat it all day, but I guess I wait until they're real cookies. That's the Christmassy thing to do, yeah? And I'm not sure. How are you going to decorate yours? Not that I'm planning on copying you, but you're the kitchen genius here! I'm not even sure I know what fondant is, actually, except that the cooking shows say it's hard to use. Which of those is more fun to lick off? I vote for the best licking experience!"

“You have no idea what fondant is? Wow, I really have failed to teach you anything,” Javier sighed exaggeratedly and shook his head. “But at least you know it’s hard to work with, and honestly it doesn’t taste great. It just makes decorations look better. Especially when you’re trying to create a scene or build something. Royal icing it is, but don’t expect it to come right off when you lick it like regular frosting does. As for how I’m decorating… I’m not sure. I guess I was just gonna do a regular old Frosty type snowman. Boring, huh?” He was really glad that they’d gotten the chance to do this, especially since she’d always said she wasn’t any help in the kitchen. It was nice to have someone other than his sister or dad in there with him, and someone he could really joke around with like they had been. Javier really felt a connection with Jojo, and it made him really happy to know that she hadn’t gotten sick of him yet. He hoped that day wouldn’t come for a long, long time, if it ever did come. For now, though, they had cookies to worry about. What the future held for them could wait; besides, it was much for fun to live in the present with her. “Ready to roll it out? You wanna do the honors?”

"It's not my fault you look hot when you're explaining kitchen stuff," Jojo complained, fake-fanning herself as if he was too sexy at this moment to even stand. "It makes it hard to listen to you when I just wanna kiss your face." She was good at saying bold stuff like that over text but in person, it made her blush a little and she let herself listen about the icing instead. "Eh, some people say boring. Some say classic. Me? I say boring," she joked, "but it'll taste delicious for sure." She nodded when asked about rolling out the cookies and she excitedly took the roller to the dough, ready to show her stuff. "You're not going to get behind me like a guy in the movies to 'show me how it's done', are you?" Jojo jested, her strong forearms making quick work of the dough.

Javier “looking hot” was something he was still getting used to; the only time he thought the word described him at all was in a literal sense, not an attractive sort of way. He scoffed lightly and rolled his eyes, muttering a “yeah, right” as he busied himself cleaning the area while she rolled out the dough. “You know, I kind of thought you’d say that,” he joked, moving the ingredients no longer needed out of the way to make room for the icing. Egg whites, vanilla, and confectioner’s sugar were pulled out instead, and measured carefully into a new bowl for the standing mixer. “Wow, do I really come across as that kind of guy?” Javier snorted, trying and failing to feign offense. He traded his expression for a small pout, adding on, “I didn’t think you thought so little of me.”

Jojo was very familiar with the sort of reaction Javier let out when she called him hot -- honestly, it was the kind of reaction she always had whenever anybody complimented her looks. She was convinced she was the worst looking in her family and just sort of weird-looking in general, but that was different; Javier was actually hot, super fucking hot. She'd thought so even before they started whatever this was. "It's true," she sighed, but otherwise let it go as they started preparing the icing and she licked her lips in anticipation for tastiness. Jojo giggled at his false-offense, raising a brow at him. "Maybe I just wanted to get you behind me," she quipped, shrugging a shoulder. "But seriously though, no. You're the least 'that kind of guy' I've ever met. It's why you're my favorite."

‘You’re my favorite,’ wow. Javier hadn’t expected to hear those words or have the kind of reaction he did; he could feel his cheeks warm as a smile tore across his face. The only people he’d been the favorite of were his father and sister, and that didn’t have nearly the same effect on him as hearing it from Jojo. “Favorite, huh?” he echoed teasingly, or at least that’s how he meant to repeat it. He was sure it didn’t come off quite like that with his cheeks still tinted with blush. It probably came off more like a schoolgirl laughing a bit too hard at a joke her crush had just told, which truth be told did describe how he was feeling at that moment a little bit. Giddy, giggling to himself in a slightly idiotic manner in response to something his crush said. Javier cleared his throat to compose himself a bit, busying his hands with the icing that was quickly coming together. “And if that’s what you really want, I guess I can show you how to pipe the icing onto the cookie. Have you ever used this stuff before? It’s kind of fun, a little like coloring if I’m being honest. Just draw a border around the area you want to ice and then fill it in,” while he explained, he separated the icing into several bowls so they could color it for whatever accessories their snowmen would be wearing. “Is the dough ready to cut and bake?”

[gottawriteanegoortwo]

Meanwhile - Remus and Virgil

After seeing  posts about where Remus and Virgil were in the new video, I decided to throw my hat in the ring. Ignore the fact I've never written Virgil and have written Remus once before and we'll be fine! The only mention to the video is something we all already knew (Thomas went to the wedding), so it’s entirely spoiler-free! However, Remus may be viewed as sympathetic in this, so I’ve put part of it under a read-more so it’s easier to scroll past.

Word Count: 937

-

It started with a kidnapping.

Of course it did. You couldn't expect anything less from Remus. He had Virgil hoisted over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, cackling like a cartoon villain as he made his way to a quieter corner of Thomas' mind. It was normally the area the Dark Sides lurked, but it was not as far from the area the Light Sides occupied. With Virgil’s own space somewhere in between those locations, Remus hadn’t far to go to complete his dramatic getaway.

"Remus, can we just - could you put me down?" Virgil's squirming didn't do him any good, nor did his protesting. "Thomas is going to the wedding today. He needs me -"

"Nope!" Remus sang, dumping Virgil onto a worn couch. "Weddings are fun! I'm not gonna have you wind him up and think of all the worst-case scenarios. Then that means I'll be there too and I'm trying to keep out of trouble this month so that’s a no-can-do, bozo." A poster was lifted out of nowhere to reveal Remus was two days short of getting another gold star on his behaviour board…. Whatever that meant. The chart disappeared as Remus flopped onto the couch beside Virgil. "Besides, you've been so… you lately. Why don't we have a day out? You and me, just like old times. What do you say?"

"I don't have a choice in this, do I?"

"Nope. I even brought your spider pet!" Remus tilted his head forward to reveal a familiar critter exploring the mass of curls. Virgil's suspicion faltered slightly with a sigh. 

"Alright, fine. Only because you didn't threaten me."

-

It was true that Virgil was wary around Remus, but it was also true that the pair used to be close when they were both Dark Sides. This was something resting on Remus' mind, as nearly all the activities planned were ones they used to do. A grand, fairytale-like story was created based on ideas doodled onto a page. They sat on the couch and fixed each other's makeup, idly gossiping about Thomas' friends. But it went further than that. Remus changed into something less royal and 'borrowed' Virgil's old hoodie so they could bake. With no sign of eyeballs or questionable substances, Virgil could surmise this was an attempt to find something new, yet mostly stress-free. And yet... 

"How do I know this isn't a distraction tactic?" accused Virgil, putting down the mixing bowl he had been stirring. "You could be pulling me away to keep me from helping if Thomas -"

"Whoa whoa. Chill out, tater tot." Remus shushed Virgil by putting a finger on the other’s lips. "The only distraction I'm doing is keeping you busy so you don't start stressing while Thomas is at the wedding. You know how you get when Thomas is surrounded by large crowds."

"Stress relief… That's all?"

"That's all."

That wasn't what Virgil expected to hear at all. He had no reason to trust Remus, but did he have true reason to doubt the moustached twin? The day they had so far was a nice relief. While the Light Sides had accepted him and were getting to know him, Remus had the upper hand of already knowing all of that. As they prepared the batter and set it to bake, Virgil kept quiet. His mind was clouded with uncertainty. Whether Remus noticed was debatable, but he kept the mood alive by talking about whatever absurd topics (within reason) crossed his mind. 

"Hey, Virgey." A light nudge from the dark creative side. "Don't want you going all gloomy like a storm cloud on me. Is something eating you? Like how millipedes crawl along the corpses of others and-"

"It's fine!" Remus pulled back at the abrupt snap. "Look… I'm just confused, okay? Why do this? Is it really to help me, or are you actually up to something?" Virgil braced himself for the revelation of plans. He didn't expect Remus to sit on the table and slump forward with a sigh. Even his moustache seemed to droop a little.

"I've missed you around. Sure, I'm not alone, but it's been different without you hanging around. And seeing how you are around Roman and the others…? I wanted to see that side of you. Just once. Not in a setting with Thomas, just… like this." The confession hung in the air for several long moments, before Remus was nudged.

"You could have just asked to hang out. Would've been less suspicious than kidnapping." At long last, there was a smile on Virgil's face. Maybe they could finally enjoy the day without stressing on either end. Remus decided to gamble this with a light bump back.

"But where's the fun in that? You know how I love making a dramatic entrance! If I can't go out and have some fun, when - ack!" The smug counter was interrupted by Virgil pushing him so hard that Remus fell off the table. Before Virgil could panic about hurting the other, Remus let out an almighty cackle that descended into a laughing fit he couldn't recover from for nearly a minute. It was only once Virgil offered a hand up that the laughs tapered out.

"Oh… I've missed this! We must hang out more often. Like old times."

"Like new times," Virgil corrected. At that, the timer went off to indicate the cookies were ready. "Might as well see how they turned out."

"Ooh, yes! I have some fondant all ready to go. We can decorate them!" Remus draped his arm around the other side's shoulder as they resumed working on their baked masterpieces.

[oikaw-ugh]

hELLO DARLING since you shipped me with akaashi the other day im suddenly feeling really soft for him now LOL so can i req a fluffy scenario with him? could be a date, cooking or just cuddling idk but i trust your writing so 😌😌 ty darling muah

Hello, Soph, this took a while HAHAHAHAHHA. BUT WORRY NOT, I'M HERE.

This might get crazy so here we go!

Soph and Akaashi baking cake! (Soph x Akaashi)

a/n: I actually searched for a recipe but I hate it when there's no visual presentations so I went to YouTube and got sidetracked and before I knew it, I was jamming to Gurenge :))) 💓

Also, I'm sorry if I switch from first person pronouns to second person pronouns. I'm so messy 🤧

Pairing: Soph & Akaashi

You're definitely the one with the upperhand here! You know the basics of baking and so, Akaashi seeks for your help in baking a cake.

OF COURSE YOU'D LOVE TO! I MEAN, WHY THE FUCC NOT-

So! You tell him to buy these, bring that, and you'd be more than willing to let him borrow your oven and other equipment!

Even your love

Akaashi: *that small smile with his brows slightly raised* Thank you, Soph :)

Your heart: 🤧🥺💓🥰

So, Akaashi goes to your place the next day with this huge ass eco bag.

Soph: Akaashi? What's inside that?

Akaashi: The ingredients you asked me to bring.

And then you faint because Akaashi literally brought a pack of salt when you'd only need a pinch of it.

Soph: Akaashi, we only need two sticks of butter.

Akaashi: I had to make sure. We might need more when it comes down to it. *Placing a dozen sticks on your table*

Okay, we can't blame Akaashi. He has spent his three years of youth deciphering Bokuto's random switches on court. Of course, he learned the habit to become prepared at all times.

Okay! So the ingredients are neatly placed, and now you tell Akaashi to wash the bowls, can opener, spoon and whatever (I'm sorry I don't bake, I'm not sure with what you use).

Soph, I feel like you have the tendency to be silent when it feels awkward. So what happens when you leave her with a naturally silent bean?

It becomes awkward. Duh, Leia.

Well, for a while. Not until Soph slaps the mosquito on Akaashi's cheeks.

Take note: Your hands have flour on them.

Akaashi: 👁️👄👁️

Soph: Ah-I'm sorry. There's a mosquito and I-

Akaashi slapped you back but lightly.

Soph: 👁️👄👁️

Akaashi: Now we're even.

That was actually his poor attempt on making the atmosphere lighter. Isn't he cute?

ANYWAY! You're currently mixing the sugar and butter together while you tell Akaashi to crack the eggs.

Soph while holding the mixer: Akaashi, the eggs-

You see him cracking an egg on the spot and you also saw how small pieces of eggshell went to the eggs as well.

Akaashi: I'm sorry. Let me do it again.

He breaks another and the same thing happens.

Akaashi: I'm sorry. This will be the last. I'll do it right this time.

It happens again

You on his 4th attempt: ;))))

Soph: Akaashi, we can just get rid of the shells using fork :))))

So precious ✨✨✨

So! You switched places. You mix the wet ingredients while Akaashi mixed the dry ingredients.

You both took this opportunity to talk about each other. At first they were light conversations. Like, Akaashi sharing his experience with Bokuto or Soph sharing stories about her part time job.

No one knew it'd turn into deep conversation about life, unknown, and death.

Akaashi, dramatically staring at the tray as he smear butter on it: It just fascinates me how capable we are and yet, there are things we can never achieve

Soph, holding the batter: Same. Like, I used to want to become a fairy or a mermaid but I can never be one.

Akaashi, looking at you: :)))))

Anyways! After placing the batter into the oven, you both went to your living room.

My instinct tells me you either watch documentaries or anime series!

You're definitely introducing Akaashi to different vids and Akaashi's just there staring at you as you passionately explained why Kakegurui and Attack on Titan is a child-friendly anime.

Soph: Attack on Titan is about family and trust.

Akaashi, listening intently: *nods*

He'd just let you press the videos that catches your attention, really. He doesn't care of what videos you two are watching as long as you like it.

But when you start pressing on Crocodile vs. Praying Mantis, I'm sorry Akaashi had to stop you.

If you both get bored with watching videos, I feel like you switch to playing board games like Monopoly or something.

Soph landing on Akaashi's lot: 👁️o👁️

Akaashi: Pay the $795 rent.

Soph: Akaashi, I believe we can settle this in a different manner.

Akaashi just looks at you as you 'sneakily' hand him a couple of your 5 dollar bills.

When you both get tired of playing board games, I think you go back to talking again.

Honestly, just jumping from one activity to another.

But when the cake is done, you can see how Akaashi expresses his excitement.

His eyes are wide and although he isn't speaking, you can see how he's biting his lips as he look at you take the cake from the oven.

The two of you: Wow.

You frost the cake (assuming you've made the frosting) and Akaashi just stares at you like a child.

You'd get so conscious you couldn't help but point it out: "Akaashi? Is something wrong?"

Akaashi would just shake his head while giving a soft smile, "Don't mind me. I just like looking at you. Go on."

Heart? Throbbing. Hotel? Trivago.

Finding the cake plain, you suggested you should put food decorations like flowers or starts or something using gumpaste/fondant.

Akaashi: You can make those edible flowers? 🥺

The genuine shock? My heart is crack!

I don't know how to end this but the end game is, you both wrap the cake and stay at the living room for a while as you ate snacks, probably listening to a song you introduced him or watching YT vids again.

And when it starts to get dark, Akaashi bids his goodbye formally. Like, bowing in front of you even though it's not necessary.

Or slightly informally. As he went near you to give you a peck on the cheek as he ruffled your hair before leaving.

[dustedmagazine]

Dust, Volume 6, Number 10

The Slugs 

September seemed to be the month when all the records on endless delay finally got kicked out the door, COVID or no, ready or not here we come. We’re deluged with music, some recorded before the world changed, some clearly cooked up mid-pandemic. There are a lot of covers EPs, lots of solo material, lots of home-made lo-fi, lots of benefit comps, and who are we to complain? Better, instead, to reach for the headphones, load up the hard drive, pile on the LPs and do some listening. Here’s some of the stuff that caught our attention, as usual ranging all over the continuum, from traditional to edgy and experimental, from silly pop punk to enraged death metal to bookish electro-acoustic improvisation. Contributors this time out included Jonathan Shaw, Patrick Masterson, Jennifer Kelly, Bill Meyer, Derek Taylor, Ray Garraty, Tim Clarke and Andrew Forell. Happy fall.

Amputation — Slaughtered in the Arms of God (Nuclear War Now!)

Slaughtered in the Arms of God by Amputation

Given the degree of smugness that accompanies utterances of the phrase “Old School Death Metal,” it’s frequently instructive to listen to some. Right on time, the misanthropic bunch at Nuclear War Now! has delivered some seriously Old School sounds to our digital doorstep. This new compilation LP gathers both of the demos of Norwegian knuckle-draggers Amputation, along with a contemporaneous rehearsal recording. Likely the resulting record will be of principal interest to fans of Immortal, the long-running, on-again-off-again Norwegian black metal band that Amputation would morph into in 1991. The songs collected on Slaughtered in the Arms of God have some additional musicological significance, as they document the sounds of 1989 and 1990, transformational years in Norway’s metal scene. Mayhem and Darkthrone tend to get most of the attention, for reasons both good and bad; and like Darkthrone, Amputation made death metal before transitioning to blacker, more brittle sounds. The music on Slaughtered in the Arms of God is muddy, thudding and thick. Perhaps that’s the result of the primitive recording tech the band used, likely of necessity. But through the murk (and to some degree because of it), you can hear the influence of Stockholm’s fecund death metal scene, especially Dismember’s earliest stuff. Scandinavia’s metal currents run deep and dark. Whether that means that Old School Death Metal is intrinsically a good thing is a different matter.

Jonathan Shaw

 Anz — Loose in Twos (NRG) 12” (Hessle Audio)

Loos In Twos (NRG) by Anz

I love the idea of listening to DJ mixes of original or all-new material; it’s probably why I still value, say, Ricardo Villalobos’ Fabric 36 so much. Manchester’s Anna Marie-Odubote, aka Anz, has been doing just such a thing annually since 2015 and really went wild with spring/summer dubs 2020, which compiled 74 tracks into nearly an hour and a half of new music. That would’ve been more than enough amid all of this (imagine me gesturing around vaguely), but “Loos in Twos (NRG)” on the venerable Hessle Audio imprint is an equally formidable, decidedly tighter release I played a lot at the start of September. Three club-ready tracks here break down acid, jungle and footwork, and while all three are heady breaks, the looped vocals and bongo of “Stepper” make it the one for me. Get those feet moving digitally now so they’re comfortable once the vinyl arrives in early October.

Patrick Masterson

 Ashes and Afterglow — Everybody Wants a Revolution (Postlude Paradox)

Ashes and Afterglow drops pop punk melodies into deep buckets of fuzz, lets them bubble and bob to the surface before shoving them under again. The band is mainly the output of one Luke Daniel, who appears to have been in other band called Sea of Orchids, but neither outfit has left much of an internet trail. And sure, this is the kind of thing that could easily get shuffled under; it breaks no moulds. And yet shuffling “To Take a Look at the World,” has a heart-worn resonance, Daniel’s voice echoing in reverbed hollow-ness against surging tides of guitar noise. “My Yesterday Girl” churns a little harder, with a bright, pop-leaning sort of hopefulness hedged in by seething feedback. It’s not bad, but it never hits a melodic vein the way that similarly inclined artists like Ted Leo or Ovlov or Tony Molina do, and it never pushes the noise over the top, either. Neither pop nor punk but somewhere in middle.

Jennifer Kelly

 Ballister — Znachki Stilyag (Aerophonic)

Znachki Stilyag by Ballister

A cake is still a cake, whether you put chocolate frosting and strawberries or white icing and a fondant roses on top. And while they don’t all taste or look exactly the same, a Ballister album is still a Ballister album, and the first Ballister album in three years does not mess with the recipe. Dave Rempis (alto and tenor saxophones), Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello and electronics), and Paal Nilssen-Love (drums and percussion) still trade in a particularly hard-hitting form of total improvisation. The changes are ones of emphasis — Lonberg-Holm sounds like he’s using a wah-wah pedal and deploys some especially slashing feedback tones, there’s a bit more space in Nilssen-Love’s intricate beat configurations, and Rempis left his baritone sax at home — and of location. Znachki Stilyag was recorded during the fall of 2019 in Moscow, Russia, which may explain why the big horn stayed at home. But the ones you hear still cut and thrust with broadsword force and rapier precision. This is a cake you can trust.

Bill Meyer  

 Vincent Chancey — The Spell: The Vincent Chancey Trio Live, 1987 (No Business) 

Vincent Chancey likely isn’t alone amongst his peers in feeling exasperated by folks singling out his instrument as uncommon or unusual to jazz. It’s a form of damning through faint praise and one that feel

s even more lackadaisical with any time spent with his music. Chancey plays the French horn and he’s plied it in settings as diverse as Sun Ra Arkestra, Lester Bowie’s Brass Fantasy and Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra as well as gigs supporting Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It’s unclear whether the trio documented on The Spell was a working concern, but that hardly matters given how well bassist Wilbur Morris and percussionist Warren Smith gel with their convener. Spread across two sides of an LP, the concert recorded at a New York City art gallery covers four pieces, two by Morris bookending one apiece from Smith and the leader that stitch together very much like cohesive suite. An unadvertised surprise comes with Smith’s ample application of marimba alongside a regular drum kit. Recording quality isn’t optimal, but Chancey’s rich, rounded, phrases gain extra gravitas through the sometimes-grainy acoustics. Woefully underrepresented in the driver’s seat discographically, his acumen as both improviser and composer is easily vindicated by this limited edition (300 copies) release.

Derek Taylor 

 Che Chen — Tokyo 17.II.2012 (self-released)

Tokyo 17.II.2012 by Che Chen

Nowadays Che Chen has earned a measure renown as the guitar-playing half of 75 Dollar Bill, and all the praise is earned. But before that, he played a roomful of instruments in the True Primes, Heresy of the Free Spirit and duos with Robbie Lee, Tetuzi Akiyama and Chie Mukai. The through-lines to all these efforts is a willingness not to play things the way their supposed to be played, and a gift for supplying the right resonance in any setting. Since 75 Dollar Bill is a New York-based band made for social occasions, the COVID-19 lay-off has been especially hard — so there’s no better time to see what’s in those hard drives in the closet, right? Chen has released this solo concert from 2012 via Bandcamp. In Tokyo for a brief layover, he played amplified violin at a party held in the basement of someone’s apartment building. The amplified part is important; dips and swells of feedback count as much as in this 25-minute performance as the fiddle’s bright, plucked notes and rough, bowed tones. Chen moves purposefully from one mode to next, taking time along the way to savor the room’s lively acoustics.

Bill Meyer

 Jeff Cosgrove/ John Medeski/ Jeff Lederer — History Gets Ahead of the Story (Grizzley Music)

Odds are that even the estimable William Parker would be surprised by the prospect of a William Parker cover album. But that’s essentially what History Gets Ahead of the Story is as organized and realized by drummer Jeff Cosgrove. That the project is the province of an organ trio only adds to the potential consternation quotient. John Medeski officiates the Hammond B-3 console and saxophonist Jeff Lederer, doubling on flute, completes the combo convened by Cosgrove. The latter’s connections to Parker stem from a trio he was part of with the bassist/composer and pianist Matthew Shipp that disbanded in 2015 after fruitful collaboration. Parker’s personage and music left an indelible mark and the seeds for the present album were sown. Collective creative license doesn’t get in the way of soulful, energizing renderings of such staples as “O’Neal’s Porch,” “Corn Meal Dance” and “Wood Flute Songs,” but troika also cedes time for a triptych of strong originals that align aurally with their dedicatee’s inclusive tone world sensibilities.

Derek Taylor   

 Derelenismo Occulere — Inexorable Revelación (Le Legione Projets)

Inexorable Revelacion (FULL LENGHT 2020) by Derelenismo Occulere

This sounds like a rehearsal gone wrong. In the time of the COVID pandemic, Neo Apolion, a guy responsible for the music in this Ecuadorean duo, recorded a demo and sent it to the band’s vocalist Malduchryst with a message to do with it whatever he wants. Malduchryst took his band partner’s words all too literally. With complete disregard to the music he began vomiting a noisy, messy mass of screams to a microphone (has he never heard of a black metal with no vocals?). If it sounds totally batshit, you can rest assured that it is. This is what makes Inexorable Revelación actually great black metal. When a lot of metal bands these days are just Backstreet Boys with leather jackets on and with guitars, Derelenismo Occulere care about only fury and mayhem. Their Argentinean mix man Ignacio only adds more chaos to the album. The only flaw this tape has is that it is 15 minutes too long.

Ray Garraty  

 Whit Dickey — Morph (ESP-Disk)

Morph by Whit Dickey

Drummer Whit Dickey and pianist Matthew Shipp have been recurrent partners since the early 1990s, when they were both members of the David S. Ware Quartet. It’s fair to say that each man is a known quantity to the other, and that one of the things they know about each other is that they might still be surprised by the other’s playing. Dickey’s retreated from time to time in order to revise his approach, and while Shipp has often threatened to quit recording over the years, he has never stopped working or evolving. This double disc combines one duo CD and another that adds trumpeter Nate Wooley to the pair. Wooley’s done a number of dates with Shipp in recent times, but he and Dickey were musical strangers before they entered Park West Studios in March 2019. Without Wooley, Shipp and Dickey seem very free and trusting of each other, transitioning with dreamlike ease from abstracted gospel to sideways swing to restless co-rumination this the ease. The trio seems more considered. The trumpeter dips quite sparingly into his extended technique bag, favoring instead linear statements that instigate fleet perambulations from the pianist and more supportive, less overtly dialogic contributions from the drummer. Both sessions work, and their differences complement each other quite handily.

Bill Meyer

 Dropdead — S/T (Armageddon)

Dropdead 2020 by Dropdead

Yep, it’s that Dropdead, the Providence-based powerviolence band that hasn’t released a proper LP since 1998 and was on a long hiatus through much of the 21st century. Since 2011, Dropdead has put out a string of splits, with heavyweights like Converge and Brainoil. But a whole record? Maybe the unrelentingly shitty condition of our political and economic conjuncture motivated the four guys in the band (three of whom have been affiliated with Dropdead since 1991) to write the 23 burners, rants and breakdown-heavy hardcore tunes you’ll hear across Dropdead’s 25 minutes. It’s a welcome addition. Bob Otis’s voice doesn’t have the shredding quality of days of yore — but that ends up being useful. You can hear the lyrics, and they’re drenched in venom and righteousness. The rest of the band hasn’t lost a step. Pretty impressive for a bunch of guys with that much grey in their beards. That said, they don’t pull any intergenerational, “we’re-older-and-wiser” moves. This is still music that wants to collapse boundaries, between stage and mosh pit, between races and genders, between species, even. Not so much class positions: “Warfare State,” “United States of Corruption,” “Will You Fight?” Late capitalism’s depredations still bear the principal brunt of the band’s anger. Things have gotten worse, and Dropdead respond in kind. They may be a lot older, but they’re even more pissed off.

Jonathan Shaw

 Fake Laugh — Waltz (State 51 Conspiracy)

Earlier this year, Kamran Khan released his second Fake Laugh album, the charming, playful Dining Alone, which made its way into Dusted’s mid-year round-up of favorites released in the first half of 2020. Khan’s third album, Waltz, is a very different beast, featuring just piano, vocals and the odd keyboard texture, casting his songwriting in sharp relief. Undoubtedly created in this stripped-down way out of lockdown necessity, it’s hard to listen to these wistful, melancholic songs without imagining where Khan’s knack for colorful arrangements might take them, given the chance. (As a tease, closing song “Amhurst” offers up a shimmering electronic melody and some sighing synth chords.) There’s no doubting Khan’s way with a tune, and his naked vocal, though occasionally showing strain, suits the mood. It’s understated and undeniably lovely, yet Waltz feels like a minor release for this talented artist.

Tim Clarke

 David Grubbs / Taku Unami — Comet Meta (Blue Chopsticks)

Comet Meta by David Grubbs & Taku Unami

In the 23 years since Gastr Del Sol fell apart, David Grubbs has done many things that don’t sound much like his old band with Jim O’Rourke. And Taku Unami has worked in such varied settings and ways that the most persistent quality of his engagement with sound is its ability to induce question marks and ellipses in any train of thought intending to decode it. So, it’s both remarkable and delightful that this record, the duo’s second collaboration, sounds rather like parts of Gastr Del Sol’s Upgrade & Afterlife. The foundation rests upon the way two guys who can and do play intricate guitar duets make subtle use of other elements — creeping acoustic piano, humming synthesizer, urban field recordings — to make music that thickens atmosphere and accumulates mystery with such subtlety that you don’t notice it until you’re in it.

Bill Meyer  

 Guided by Voices — Mirrored Aztec (Guided by Voices Inc.)

I know, I know, it’s another Guided by Voices record, the fifth since 2019, but hear me out. Pollard is still tapped into the fuzzy, rackety, melodic sap of the rock and roll universe, and he has only to knock his hammer a few times against the gnarled tree of life to extract more of what sustains us. Shorter version: he can do this all day, every day, without any noticeable let-up in quality. So, let us celebrate another batch of Who-like power chords, of rumbling drums and monumental bass thuds, of melodies that curve out delicately like spring’s first vines, then thicken into thundering climaxes and triumphant refrains. Let us give thanks again for inscrutable lyrics that drift off into poetry then pull back in the most ordinary artifacts of the spoken word. “I Think I Had It. I Think I Have It,” crows Pollard in a voice that has been blasted by time but come out more or less intact, and yes, Bob, you still do.

Jennifer Kelly

  Edu Haubensak & Tomas Korber — Works for Guitar & Percussion (Ezz-thetics)

The celebrated Wandelweiser aesthetic serves as a loose overarching impetus for the four interpretations of compositions by Edu Haubensak and Tomas Korber that comprise Works for Guitar & Percussion. Classical guitarist Christian Buck and improvising percussionist Christian Wolfarth ply their instruments through pairing and isolation. Essayist Andy Hamilton describes context by delineating a distinction between music (based in the language of tones) and soundart (which is non-tonal) and placing the duo’s interpretations in the opaque border between these realms. Repetition and timbral disparity frame Haubensak’s “On” while Korber’s “Aufhebung” applies scrutiny to microtonal diversity and temporal impermanence. Wolfarth fields Korber’s “Weniger Weiss” from behind snare drum, trading recurring stick rolls with varying segments of silence that compel ears accustomed to Western musical structures to consciously fill in the blanks. Haubensak’s solo “Refugium” finds Buck bending two closely tuned strings in an extrapolation of an Arabic maqam that feels tenuously connected to the form, at best.

Derek Taylor 

 Inseclude — Inseclude (Inseclude)

Brad MacAllister of CTRL and Blue Images and Benjamin Londa of Exit have been working in the darkwave and chillwave scenes for several years and their first album as Inseclude is a long distance collaboration that mines the darker side of 1980s alternative and electronic rock. From Pennsylvania, MacAllister sent musical ideas to Londa in Texas who added guitars, lyrics and vocals to produce a set of songs that are well made and enjoyable if largely unmemorable. There are a number of contemporary bands doing similar things — Hamilton’s Capitol and Manchester’s Ist spring immediately to mind — taking the Cure, New Order, Sisters of Mercy template and why not? Unfortunately, the passage of time and the law of diminishing returns have led to overfamiliarity with this style of music that makes for easy and perhaps unfair comparisons. When they stretch themselves, Inseclude’s songs do hit. “Sondera” and “Failing To The Pulse” carry some real menace with the juxtaposition of wide-angle synths and paranoid vocals but elsewhere the pair seem held back by a restraint and lack of bottom end that diminish the impact of some pretty decent songs.

Andrew Forell

 Kvalia — Scholastic Dreams Of Forceful Machines (Old Boring Russia)

Схоластические Грёзы Силовых Машин by Квалиа

Krasnoyarsk sits on the banks of the Yenisei river in southern Siberia and is known both for the natural beauty of its surrounding landscape and for its primacy as an aluminum producer. Local musicians Aleksander Maznichenko and Aleksey Danilenko reflect the latter on their new five track EP Scholastic Dreams Of Forceful Machines, an icy, metallic collection of post-industrial clang pitched somewhere between Einstürzende Neubauten and early Clock DVA. Their machines are forceful but cranky, rusted, near obsolete. Maznichenko keeps the thrum of turbines is steady but the drum machines lurch and thump, the keyboards whine and scream, the Russian vocals protest their obstreperous charges. Danilenko’s bass is post-punk elastic skipping amongst the raining sparks hinting at a will to dance with his mutant riffs. They sound like they mean it and the result is a terrific EP full of fire, fumes, steam and sweat.

Andrew Forell  

 Mezzanine Swimmers — Kneelin’ on a Knife (Already Dead)

Kneelin' on a Knife by Mezzanine Swimmers

These songs circle around noise-crusted, repetitive beats, the drumming stiff and mechanical, the riffs chopped to short bursts, the vocals woozy and distended. “Sexy Apology” reiterates a three-note keyboard lick ad infinitum, as main Swimmer Mike Smith drawls the title phrase, similarly on repeat. Yet within this unchanging structure, chaos erupts in detuned keyboards, miasmic feedback and corrosive noise. It’s hard to say whether these songs are too tightly organized or too loose, a bit of both really, and yet, get past the headachy thud and there’s an unhinged psychotropic transport. No one ever said that kneeling on knives would be comfortable.

Jennifer Kelly

 Mosca — The Optics (Rent)

Mosca · The Optics [RENT001]

Part of the initial wave of neon-infused dubstep hedonism surrounding the Night Slugs camp at the turn of the last decade, Mosca’s Tom Reid has since survived on the strength of a regular slot behind the decks at NTS and sparingly deployed releases on such renowned labels as Numbers, Rinse, Hypercolour and Livity Sound. “The Optics” debuts his new Rent imprint, conceived as a way to get out music that doesn’t fit in elsewhere. (Originally, this was to be an a-side for a coming AD93 release, but as he says, “There's only so long you can keep a track with a baby crying in it back from the masses.”) Supposedly inspired by the Under the Skin beach scene, the five-minute track immediately throws you off with a dub-heavy shuffle and metallic, alien sounds that zoom around the mix. The main thrust of the melody arrives around a minute in, and gradually the sounds close in on you. There’s bells, birds, a baby crying and then, just when you’re feeling completely stressed out, it all falls away; a driving jungle rhythm carries you the rest of the way. Deeply satisfying dance from a head who hasn’t lost his way.

Patrick Masterson  

 Prana Crafter/ragenap — No Ear to Hear (Centripetal Force Studio/Cardinal Fuzz)

No Ear to Hear by Prana Crafter / ragenap

When Robert Hunter, the poet who wrote lyrics for the Grateful Dead’s “Dark Star,” “Ripple,” “Truckin’,” “Terrapin Station” and many other songs, died in late 2019, long form psych musicians Prana Crafter (William Sol) and ragenap (Joel Berk) mourned separately but simultaneously. The night he died, both took solace in improvised music, which didn’t so much evoke or represent Hunter, but captured some of their feelings about his work and their loss. When they talked, soon after, they found that both had made lengthy open-ended meditations on the same person. Those two extended pieces make up No Ear to Hear. Prana Crafter’s entry, “Beggar’s Tomb,” is weighted and slow moving, building gradually from simmering drones into towering edifices of feedback and dissonance. Although performed largely on guitar, the sound is filtered through gleaming effects and layers into astral strangeness, a mystic’s trip through mental interiors. ragenap’s “Nightfall” also takes shape slowly out of looming sustained notes and black velvet quiet and sounds that scratch and vibrate at the edges. A solitary acoustic guitar takes up space at the forefront finally, carving a hesitant melody across the hum. The tune turns fuller and more agitated as it progresses, adding layers of feedback and distortion. Neither of these pieces sounds much like the Grateful Dead, and of course, neither has any sort of lyrics. I doubt that anyone, hearing this album for the first time would say, “Oh yeah, Robert Hunter.” And yet inspiration works in strange and, in this case, fruitful ways. You can enjoy this even if you don’t like the Dead.

Jennifer Kelly

 Raven Throne — Viartannie (Chroniki Źmiainaj Ciemry) (self-released)

Viartannie (Chroniki Źmiainaj Ciemry) /The Return (The Chronicles of the Serpent Darkness) by RAVEN THRONE

These Belorussian black metal veterans are true materialists. On their seventh album, they show that nature is a social construct, not something given. And boy, their nature is not a loving mother. Unlike many metal bands convey nature via field recordings, Raven Throne craft their ferocious sounds with guitars and drums. Aren’t these as natural instruments as stone and wooden sticks? The atmospheric black metal subgenre has been contaminated by pop and folksy metal so that it’s hard to maintain a truly evil sound, while still bringing the atmospheric elements into it. Raven Throne pull it off. This is how darkness should sound.

Ray Garraty  

 The Slugs — Don’t Touch Me I’m Too Slimy (2214099 Records DK)

Don't Touch Me, I'm Too Slimy by The Slugs

The Slugs are an exuberantly lo-fi punk pop duo out of London who bash and thump and shout short, acidic ditties about being female, in a band, under assault and under the weather. Liberty Hodes, who is also one half of the comedy duo A Comedy Night that Passes the Bechdel Test, plays a jangling, forceful electric guitar, while her Phoebe Dighton-Brown bangs away in brutal simplicity on the drums. Both sing, sometimes in unison, sometimes in rough harmonies, occasionally in slashing counterparts. (One chants “Feel sick/can’t be sick” while the other rolls out mellifluous “ah-ah-ah-ahs” in “Feel Sick.”) There is a charming, unstudied quality to their music, which is a bit too smart and biting to be primitive, but nonetheless eschews frills. It’s hard to pick favorites—the whole EP is over in five tracks and 11 minutes—but “Pest” is giddy fun, with its slouching, battering guitar-drum motif and slacker choruses. The shout along chorus of “Don’t touch me! I’m too slimy!” is the best thing on the record, hitting a rebellious, unwashed spot of resonance in the work-from-home era. Second best, the gleeful tirade about sleazy male promoters in “Girly Gang” (“Give you all the gigs if you touch my wang”), which builds in round-singing euphorias until it ends suddenly and a la Jane Austen in matrimony (“Married in a dress by Vera Wang”). People are comparing the Slugs to the Shaggs, but that’s just short-hand for banging away anyway without all the training. The Slugs are smarter, slyer and more autonomous, and if they sound a little rough, that’s exactly how they meant to sound.

Jennifer Kelly

Tobin Sprout — Empty Horses (Fire)

Empty Horses by Tobin Sprout

Blessed with one of the finest names in music (alongside dEUS’s Klaas Janzoons), Tobin Sprout is best known for being part of the Guided by Voices line-up that created classic albums such as Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes in the 1990s. Though Sprout’s subsequent solo output has been a steady stream compared to Robert Pollard’s deluge, Empty Horses is his eighth solo album. In it, the now-65-year-old ruminates faith, mortality and American history atop a spare, country-tinged backing. There’s a deep ache to many of these songs, the kind of emotional weight that manifests in pointedly low tempos, sparse drum parts that hang behind the beat and vocal performances that are almost uncomfortably intimate. Running to a succinct half-hour, with many of the songs clocking in at just a couple of minutes each, Empty Horses confronts demons seemingly too pernicious to overcome. Yet, when the music becomes more expansive — such as the graceful pedal steel of “Breaking Down,” the woozy modulation of “Antietam,” or the biting fuzztone of “All In My Sleep” — Sprout sounds like he may be on the verge of making a much-needed breakthrough.

Tim Clarke  

 Son Lux — Tomorrows I (City Slang)

Tomorrows I by Son Lux

Son Lux’s songs embed unsettling sounds in deep wells of silence, finding disturbing textures in string sounds, electronics, percussion and the fluttering soul falsetto of founder Ryan Lott. Tomorrows I, reportedly the first of three related albums, has a quietly dystopian vibe and a moist, echoing unease that might remind of you Burial’s classic Untrue. A brief, looped, keening violin motif punctures the opening cut, “Plans We Made” with all the threat of Bernhard Hermann’s shower music for the film Psycho, while Lott trills haunted phrases about being afraid to let go. “Undertow,” near the end, brings in a whole string quartet to swoon dissonantly, as a knocking beat (drummer Ian Chang) sounds like a body being dragged across the floor. “Just waiting for the undertow,” sings Lott in the dread empty spaces between, in arias of muted desolation. Minimalist and menacing and mesmerizing.

Jennifer Kelly

 Ulaan Janthina — Ulaan Janthina (Part 1) (Worstward)

Ulaan Janthina (Part I) by Ulaan Janthina

Steven R. Smith contains multitudes, and Ulaan Janthina is the latest manifestation of his mutating musical self. This release exemplifies three aspects of Smith’s practice. First, he likes to make beautiful things. Hard copies of this tape come in a custom-oriented box that contains tinted photos, shells and printed communications as well as the cassette. And he’s project-oriented. While other iterations have been devoted to an Eastern European vibe, or guitar noise or a virtual ensemble sound, Ulaan Janthina results from a decision to work primarily with the keyboards in his house. It’s a winning strategy, since his synthesizers, organ and harmonium all benefit from the grittiness of Smith’s recording methodology, and his spare playing style makes his melodies stand out quite starkly from the background atmosphere. Like the name says, this is part one of the Janthina (named for a genus of sea snail that makes its own floating platform — not a bad metaphor for the survival-oriented independent musician) venture; a second, similarly packaged cassette is pending from Smith’s Worstward imprint soon, and a future release is already planned by Soft Abuse records.

Bill Meyer

 Various Artists — Spr Blk: Liberation Jazz and Soul From the '70s and Beyond (Paxico)

Liberation Jazz and Soul by Marcus J. Moore

Author Marcus J. Moore (late of The Nation but also found everywhere from Pitchfork to WaPo) has a book on the way in October, The Butterfly Effect: How Kendrick Lamar Ignited the Soul of Black America. In advance of its release via cassette devotees Paxico, Moore cobbled together “rare and somewhat familiar” Black music from his own crates. “These are the kinds of songs I play when walking through New York City or driving through Maryland,” he says in the release. What that means for you is a two-sided mix that burns slower on the A and gets more percussion-heavy on the B. Leading off with Doug Carn’s fittingly titled “Swell Like a Ghost” and featuring jams from Willie Dale, Milton Wright, Ronald Snijders and other lesser jazz, soul and funk lights, it’s a revealing mix that will no doubt pair well with that fall reading you’re about to get going on.

Patrick Masterson 

 Vatican Shadow — Persian Pillars of the Gasoline Era (20 Buck Spin)

Persian Pillars Of The Gasoline Era by Vatican Shadow

Dominick Fernow is hugely prolific, and most folks with ears tuned to the densely churning worlds of noise and industrial music will be familiar with his abrasive, unsettling output under the Prurient moniker. Fernow’s releases as Vatican Shadow are fewer in number, and more attuned to ambient, even melodic movements and textures. That’s sort of odd, given that the Vatican Shadow records thematize and explore Fernow’s obsession with the history of the Middle East, especially post-9/11 collisions of Western military force, Islamic traditions of resistance and the tactics of terror used by both sides. Relaxing stuff, that ain’t. Consistent with the larger project’s tendencies, Persian Pillars of the Gasoline Era claims an interest in the CIA-coordinated Iranian coup (MI6 helped out, too, those imperial scamps) that deposed Mohammed Mossadeq, installed the Shah Reza Pahlavi and inaugurated some of the principal tensions that have shaped the last half-century of world history. It’s unclear how Fernow’s pulsing, shimmering, sometimes juddering synth sounds are meant to represent or otherwise engage that history. For sure, record art and song titles summon all the right semiotics, sometimes with an interesting edge. But “Taxi Journey through the Teeming Slums of Tehran” sounds more like a malfunctioning MP3 player than a taxi or a “teeming slum” (can we all be done with that phrase now?), and “Moving Secret Money” is pleasantly trance-inducing, rather than insidiously evil. Musically, it’s quite good. The packaging seems to want strike other notes. Maybe that’s the point — too many folks are too busy consuming quietist pop to bother with the grind of the political. But is this the intervention we need?  

Jonathan Shaw

[unhinged-positivity]

submitted by @danse-or-farkas

I give unto your judgement a snippet of my Fallout 4 fanfic ‘Time Later To Put Things Right’ where Deacon and the Sole Survivor have a very serious chat. “It’s a surprise. You’ll find out when it happens.”

“Not trusting me?”

“Trust nobody.” Nate let the slyest of smiles creep into his face, some of the tension leaving his body.

“I don’t know how I feel about surprises. Its like a stripper in a giant, novelty birthday cake. Its either great or its Hancock doing it on a dare.” Deacon was grinning under the helmet, Nate could hear it in his voice.

“And that was a mental image I shall take to the grave, thank you very much.” Nate looked up from his pipboy long enough to give the blank front of his helmet a mock look of disgust.

“It was like a skeleton wrapped in overcooked steak, only it was oiled up and gyrating seductively at me.“

ok so first off what’s a fallout, never heard of her, and there’s even four of them? yeesh that’s too much responsibility for me to handle

as is this magnificent piece of fiction (?) (i hope). It’s got everything. A charming protagonist. An abundance of fondant. A misplaced Deacon. It’s a recipe for success, undeniably, I am sure during the course of the story Nate will come around and appreciate the ingenuity of bringing together the sweet and savory, dessert and bacon, seduction and disgust-- all mixed together in an oily dream called Hancock.

I don’t know this Hancock but he sounds like a true connoisseur of the finer things in life, the reader should under all circumstances trust the judgement of this catholic clergyman who has never told a single lie in his life, I’m sure, and has never pranked a single soul on this planet.

Especially not Nate.

Poor Nate. Maybe a trip to the confessional is due, I’m sure someone can help. wink wonk

[olicitysecretsanta]

uncanny valley (pg, 1972 words, Bratva AU)

A very happy and hearty post-finale (because I refuse to say “farewell”) Olicity wish to this wonderful fandom, and especially @nikscaroline​, who asked for jealous/possessive Bratva!Oliver. I haven’t written a lot of him in that space, so welcome to this AU (inspired in part by this image, which I’ve been hanging onto for, oh, a year or so? Thanks for the great prompt to finally use it, Irvane!)

By @effie214​

Summary: In aesthetics, the uncanny valley is the relationship between the degree of an object’s resemblance to a human being and the emotional response to such an object.

© Pawel Piotrowski

  The bite of the Boston winter is not unlike that of Russia. 

What’s unfamiliar to him, however, is the light he sees when he lays eyes on her for the first time. It’s not from the waning colors of the mid-December sun as it sets, nor even the light emanating from behind her in the room in the second house from the right in Fall River. He doesn’t see the blonde hair that he’ll catch wisps of in the corner of his eye as she eliminates his blind spot entirely; doesn’t see the blue eyes that will look up at him at first in fear, then in meditation, and finally in a trust that shakes him to his core with a chill more biting than any snow could ever muster. 

He does not see the hands that the Bratva have tracked here, to Felicity Smoak and her ridiculous boyfriend, as they nearly – and, he’s sure, unintentionally, but if there’s anyone who knows that all roads to each hell, for there are many, and their devils multifaceted, it’s Oliver Queen – brought down one of the outfit’s most brilliant money laundering schemes through fake student loan payments and “donations” to various colleges and universities. He does not see the fingers that will shake first as he enters her house unannounced, the ones that will scratch and claw and tear at him the way fear will do the same to the soul he thought he’d buried in the South China Sea when she stupidly – brilliantly, for even in her folly, she will be his guiding genius – pushes him out of the way of a bullet aimed for a heart that, were it still there, would by that point belong to her. He does not hear the voice screaming into the silence for help, the one that sounds like his from so many last chances ago, lost in the echo of the waves and a recoiling gunshot. He sees nothing, feels nothing, hears nothing of this place; only knows the emptiness Anatoly has trained him to be in order to survive. He is as empty as a valley, but as he stands in the darkness that knows his name better than he does, he looks up to that light, and the shades of grey fall from his eyes as he sees the stars that he will come to understand reside in hers – not of fancy or fantasy, but of unshakeable strength even the hardest men he knows will cower beneath. He sees a precipice, a choice he’s somehow going to be given even as he plans to take away hers. He somehow sees something that shakes him from his stone: she in her uncanny nature will breathe him back to life, and he gasps against it; not the salvation, for no person – even as important as she will become to him – will ever give him that, even in the wee small hours and the tiniest sighs of hope. No, he does it because he knows – somehow he just knows – she will make him man again, instead of the many mistakes he is built of. In his old life, the one built on so much promise and so easily parted with, it had been easy to turn Judas; run from the things he was too small for. Even as he’s been warped and weathered like storm season on the island, even as he has been laid bare and barren as the Siberian winter, alone because there is no strength found in numbers, only vulnerability, somehow he looks upon her and see the Atlas to his Sisyphys, the one who will roll his truth and all their consequences up a hill of his own making. 

He cowers in that already towering presence, palms burning not from frigid temperature but from the feel of her waist in his hand as they work undercover, the pink silk of her dress crinkling easily beneath his possessive hand as she tries to charm their latest mark to get her into his study, when the jealousy becomes too much and he gives into the basest of instincts to tell the world she’s his. His ears sing not in the winter wind but with the forgotten feeling of calmness that slides down his being with her voice in his ear, the only one he trusts – a partner, even if he cannot say the word. It will start first with short, angry reminders of her nut allergy, then with clipped efficiency as she talks him through his missions. A surprised, soft “thank you” that will come when he brings her a cup of coffee every time he refills his own mug as she runs search programs and he reads the results; the adorably offended laugh that unintentionally escapes her when he effortlessly makes an omelette for her at three in the morning after she goes through almost an entire dozen trying to do it herself; the gentle, soothing words as she prays in Hebrew that he doesn’t know but understands all the same – even if it terrifies him to realize one night during Passover that he’d kept his eyes open and on her the entire time, enchanted by her face lit by flames of her belief instead of the ashes of his own aftermaths. 

  His eyes tear not because of the plea he’ll see in hers when the Bratva captains try to make him think Interpol has struck a deal with her so he’ll banish her long and far enough that they can take her out, because they don’t trust her as Oliver does – with the life he only thinks might be worth saving when he hears her tiny sigh of relief when he returns each time from wherever he’s been, to that place called home that he hadn’t even realized was there until he walks into her upstairs office and she does the same to his life, changing everything – and she stands toe to toe with him, manicured, brightly colored fingernails poking him hard in his chest as she screams with as much volume as she’ll do in mere minutes when she calls out for help that will not come that she’d never give up on him, no matter how much he’d already given up on himself. “You are not alone,” she’ll spit vehemently, “And I believe in you.”

His lips are chapped not from the night as it settles itself in navy over him, but of the future memory of finally pressing his mouth against hers in a hungry revolution, a shot across the bow and the one that will restart that heart she saved, a resolution that they are in this together, even if they have no goddamn idea what this even is. 

No, by then they’ll know: by then, he’ll have told her to go, in as quiet and heartbreaking and shaky voice as she’ll ever hear from him, that he refuses to make her a regret. Coward that he’ll be until she reminds him that the only easy day is yesterday, words that will propel him forward into a future as unknown as the destination has always been, he won’t be able to look at her when he tells her he’s sorry, that he’ll get her out, that this was a mistake. He’ll turn only when her hand finds his face, not in the slap she’ll give him when he tells her to stop getting in his way, but instead bringing him forward; bringing him to her light. “You may have forced me to leave, Oliver, but I’m choosing to stay.” She’ll shrug, those slim shoulders that hold up his world moving so easily as his lungs cannot in that moment. “There’s really no choice to make.” 

(He’ll want to fall into bed with her then, claim her and let her know he’s hers as much as she’s ever been his, but then he spots the red dress and heels she buys during a girls’ day out with the medic called Sasha – because Felicity Megan Smoak not only ends up getting the Bratva to do her bidding rather than the other way around, but makes sure to prove time and again to anyone in her sphere that she’s both hellbent and heaven-sent – and though he’s sure to the very heart she put the beat back in that the evening will end up with a grenade launched from a rooftop across the street from the restaurant, the only explosions that happen are in those wee small hours he looks so forward to now are the best ones either of them can even fathom.

They’ll fall into bed time and time after that, fall into each other and three words that should be so easy to say, especially given his increased time around her verbosity, but they don’t come until she’s elbow deep in flour, has butter on her nose and there’s what’s supposed to be fondant on the ceiling when he walks in on her in the kitchen where she’s told him about her bubbe’s latkes and he about Tommy and Thea and where they’ve hashed out his moving from an enforcer to a kapitan – as they try to relive and also rewrite the narrative of the story they’ve both found themselves and the best parts of each other in – trying to make him a birthday cake. 

They’re not so hard to say after that; in a world of fools and falsehoods, she truly is his felicity. When she looks at him in utter disblief, instinct driving her “you don’t…”, this time it is he who finds the words quickest: “Don’t ask me to say that I don’t love you.”)

He stands still against the New England quiet, the same kind that will not just echo but follow as they run from their pasts but with each other, hiding from the outfit and her father and Cooper Seldon; as she pretends to be someone else, working in a Tech Village under a carefully built and maintained identity, only herself when they are together; when they share a tiny last egg over a candle on its last millimeter of wick, and when they cuddle together under a blanket on a mattress on the floor as they disappear into a dingy Hong Kong walkup and the only thing that has ever felt like safety. He is unmoving against it, the way they’ll both be in the darkest hours, first when her tears belie her loneliness, and when his deeds catch up to him in his dreams.  When she forgets who they are, or supposed to be, or something in the middle, he’ll kiss the top of her head and say, “I know who you are. Whether you’re in a ponytail or those terrible khaki pants, you’re the one thing I believe in.”

When they sit on a plane on their final forged passports, hand in hand with fingers adorned with rings bought with cash in suburban Vancouver, slipped over still-brightly colored nails and now healed knuckles and with whispered “for better or for worse” and “I’ll go anywhere with you” inscribed in the metal as the flight attendant welcomes them to Starling City, because they have decided – chosen, that holiest of holies – this mission to save his city in the same way they’ve saved each other. “Because this is what we do,” she whispers as they touch down and she presses a kiss against his shoulder. “Because this is who we are.”

He’s not met her yet, but she’s already under his skin; more a part of him than anyone or anything else. 

He knows going in he’s not ever going to let her go again.

The beauty of it is, as he takes that first and ultimately final step, toward her door and their shared destiny, he also knows she won’t, either. 

fin 

[rpdrficexchange]

New Traditions (Sashea) - Peridot

A/N: Merry Christmas folks! I wrote this for the lovely roza @leljaaa for the @rpdrficexchange 2019! Feel free to leave any feedback here or over at @artificialperidot :) Hope you enjoy!

To Roza: Merry Christmas darling! I’ve never written Sashea before but I gave it my best shot and I actually really enjoyed it! I hope you enjoy this little coffee shop au with a festive twist, and that you appreciate the little theatre references I just had to sneak in there for you. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas angel!

Shea’s heart was in her throat.

Fingernails dug into her thigh. A strong arm was held firmly around her waist, binding her like a rope. The words he said in her ear blurred into nothing.

This was it.

This was the last straw.

She was done. She had to leave. She was going to leave, right now.

She felt a kiss on her cheek as the hand around her waist clenched tighter.

Fuck no.

Shea pushed him off and slapped him in the face, and ran away as fast as she could.

She heard him call after her.

But there was no turning back now.

***

Sasha was one of very few odd people who actually didn’t mind working on Christmas.

Now don’t get her wrong, she still loved Christmas. She loved the coloured lights, buying gifts for others, the Christmas carols, even the cold weather - it reminded her of her home in Russia. And of course she missed spending Christmas with her loved ones, but she didn’t mind waiting just one more day to open her presents and eat her turkey. After all, that meant her family had two Christmas Days, and she didn’t mind missing out on one of them.

Christmas was actually one of Sasha’s busiest working days. She owned a quaint little café in the middle of New York City, and it was usually the only place open for miles on the 25th. Her café was her pride and joy. She was so happy to be able to create a safe space for everyone who entered through the door, and let them forget about the outside world for a little while. Each detail of the café had been hand chosen by her, from the books on the shelves along the walls to the different coffees and teas they served.

She had spent a few years (and probably too much money) designing it in her own vision. Clean, white walls with bookshelves, wooden counters, glass tables, low hanging neon coloured lights, and brightly coloured chairs, in magenta and bright yellow and electric blue. She wanted to create a comfortable, welcoming space for artists in New York like her, of which Sasha knew were many.

The colourful chairs had since been wrapped in silver tinsel, and the coloured lights set to reds and golds and greens to create a warm, festive atmosphere. Besides Sasha busily working behind the counter, the café was desolate, just as she had expected. She had a few loyal employees, but she would never expect them to work on Christmas, even for double the pay. And, she never expected anyone to come into the shop on Christmas either- even those who didn’t celebrate Christmas usually didn’t want to face the snow and ice. Though, Sasha still prepared the usual cakes and pastries if any customers did decide to brave the cold, as well as some festive treats (gingerbread and shortbread and Christmas cake) which she would likely bring home to her family at the end of the day, having remained untouched.

Instead of busily serving customers from behind the counter as she usually would, Sasha had a new task on Christmas, one that made missing the day with her family all worth it. Every December 25th she would spend her morning kneading and stirring and creating the most magical Christmas desserts and cookies and cakes, complete with fondant icing and Christmas decorations. Sasha wouldn’t necessarily call herself a baker, but she was most certainly creative, and so she made use of her creative streak to invent a multitude of new sweet creations, and had received some pretty great reviews in the past. She would use up all the ingredients she had in the café making as many treats as her brain could come up with, each new addition as delicious as the next.

Whilst they were in the oven, she’d start her next task- wrapping as many shoeboxes she could. The café collected empty shoeboxes from their customers from the beginning of November, and thanks to their generosity, easily over one hundred would be donated. Then, using a combination of customer donations and her own money, Sasha would buy gifts to put in each box – warm clothes and bath products and blankets and sweets and toys for children.

Once everything was wrapped and baked, Sasha would gather each present and dessert and load them into her car, before driving down to the local homeless shelter, where she would stay until midnight. She would hand out her gifts to all of those who gathered there for a warm meal, and serve her cakes and cookies and pastries, which everyone loved. She would talk to them and sing carols with them all evening, and had formed a close friendship with the staff and the homeless people over the years for her generosity.

She wanted to make sure that everyone had a good Christmas, and give back to the community that had done so much for her over the years.

And this Christmas was no exception.

Sasha was busily kneading a lump of dough for her mince pies with her flour covered hands and absentmindedly humming to ‘Hark the Herald’, when she heard the shop door open. She jumped a little in surprise, and turned her head sharply to see who was the source of the footsteps that were headed her way.

Sasha hadn’t expected anyone to come into the café on Christmas Day.

Especially not a woman dressed as an elf.

Especially not a women dressed as an elf who was crying her eyes out.

To say that Sasha didn’t know what to do would’ve been an understatement.

She approached the counter, her running mascara staining the green collar of her shirt with black smudges.

“Uh… can I get a black coffee, p-please?” the girl muttered in a weak, shaky voice, as if she was on the verge of crying again.

Sasha stood silently for a second, eyes wide with utter bewilderment. She could’ve laughed at the sight of the poor girl – she’d never seen an elf with such little Christmas spirit. But, that wasn’t Sasha’s nature, so instead she started making the beverage, giving her time to think about what to say.

She handed over the drink and collected the girl’s money with a small smile, trying desperately to comfort her but not having a clue how to. The girl muttered a quiet “thanks” and turned to leave the store.

Sasha knew she couldn’t just let her leave.

Not on Christmas.

“Hey,” Sasha called out, “how would you like some company while you drink that? We could sit a while, talk?”

The girl wiped a tear from her eye and smiled hopefully. “Um, okay. Thanks.”

***

The pair spent the next hour or so talking to each other, losing track of time. Sasha had laid a table and made two hot chocolates with marshmallows, one for her and one just in case her new companion wanted something sweeter than her coffee. Free of charge, of course.

Sasha learned that the girl’s name was Shea, and that she was originally from Chicago, but moved to New York 3 years ago to study fashion design at college.

Sasha could’ve said how ironic this was considering her Elf costume, but she bit her tongue.

Besides, Shea still looked pretty good in it regardless.

“Then, after I graduate, I wanna design costumes for Broadway shows,” Shea continued on.

“That’s awesome! I used to do loads of theatre when I was younger,” Sasha reminisced.

“Same! I was such a theatre kid!” Shea laughed fondly. “I played Heather Chandler when we did Heathers in my senior year of high school.”

“No way! Heathers is one of my favourites!”

“Me too!” Shea exclaimed. “Fuck, I got to see Falsettos with the original Broadway cast a few years ago and it was honestly the highlight of my life.”

Sasha’s jaw dropped. “I am so jealous!”

Shea laughed and looked down, her dimples and the creases by her eyes forming a beautiful picture that Sasha never wanted to unsee.

And there wasn’t a single tear in her eyes anymore. Shea’s sadness seemed to be forgotten, at least for now.

Sasha tried to convince herself that she was looking for traces of teardrops in Shea’s eyes, but who was she kidding. Shea has the most warm, welcoming eyes Sasha had ever seen, eyes that drew her in and sparkled under the Christmas tree lights and allowed Sasha to catch a glimpse of the fiery soul that lay behind them.

She couldn’t help but stare. Although she had just met Shea, she was sure that she wanted to stare into those eyes for more than just an hour.

Sasha shook herself back into reality, now quite aware that she had been staring for a little too long. Embarrassed, she quickly tried to draw attention away from her staring.

“So, Uh, what stopped you from pursuing the whole acting thing?”

Shea shrugged. “I don’t know… I always wanted to do it, but people kept telling me it was unrealistic.”

“People like…”

“Mainly my boyfriend,” Shea mumbled. “I mean, my ex-boyfriend now.”

“Ex-boyfriend?”

“Yeah, I…. I left him today, actually.”

“Is that you were upset earlier?” Sasha asked.

Shea bit her lip.“Sorta… I just felt bad doing it on Christmas.”

“Don’t feel bad! I’m sure he probably deserved it anyway,” Sasha said, shaking her head.

“Trust me, he did,” Shea scoffed. “He was a dickhead.”

Sasha smiled and met Shea’s eyes for a second, before she quickly glanced away. “Um, can I ask why? It’s totally okay if you don’t wanna talk about it and I get it if you-“

“No, no it’s fine, I’ll tell you, don’t worry,” Shea replied, a sad sort of smile forming on her lips. “In all honesty… he was a jerk. He would, um, try and control my life, and what I wore, and what I did and stuff. Even today he was being a control freak. We both work part time jobs at Macy’s, as Santa’s helpers, and I had booked the day off to spend Christmas with my family, and he was still working and he, uh, he wasn’t too pleased about me leaving him on Christmas. So, uh, he changed my work schedule to make sure I was working on Christmas and didn’t tell me.”

Sasha felt her heart rate quickening. Oh my God. “Fuck, really?”

“Yeah. At first I thought he just didn’t wanna spend Christmas without me, but really, he just wanted to show off to his friends who took their kids to see Santa Claus. He didn’t even get me a gift.”

“Shit,” Sasha said in disbelief. “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“It’s fine, I guess. I’m so done with him now though,” Shea said through gritted teeth. “I tried to talk to him earlier, to tell him how I was feeling, but he didn’t listen. He just started flirting, playing it off as if it was nothing. And then he was grabbing me, and I slapped him and ran off.”

“Fuck, Shea.” Sasha furrowed her brow and bit her lip until she tasted blood.

Shea pursed her lips and inhaled sharply. “I know, it was really fucking bad, Sasha. I’m never going back. I don’t wanna see him ever again.”

Sasha genuinely couldn’t believe what she was hearing. This girl had been through hell and back, and yet was still able to articulate everything so perfectly, and Sasha felt priveleged that she trusted her enough to tell her story.

Sasha wished she knew the right words to say. She wished she could rewind time, reverse what happened to Shea. She wished that she could make sure that it would never happen again. “You’re so brave for leaving him. So brave. I’m so proud of you.”

She saw tears start to well in Shea’s eyes, before her face crumpled and she allowed her emotions to come out. Sasha grabbed the girl’s hand across the table, squeezing it tightly and trying to show her how loved she was, how she didn’t deserve any of this shit.

Shea allowed the tears to flow, each wave of emotion overflowing her senses, until she calmed down and started to feel okay. She wasn’t sure why she had allowed herself to be so vulnerable in front of Sasha. Something about her made her feel safe.

Sasha’s fingers remained interlocked with hers as her breathing began to slow, and she saw a smile creep back her Shea’s face.

“Sorry,” Shea eventually murmured, “for getting upset and shit.”

“Don’t say sorry. Emotions are healthy,” Sasha smiled sympathetically.

A weak smile appeared on Shea’s face as her rising chest settled and she was back in control.

“Well, I guess if that shit never happened I never would’ve ended up coming here,” Shea chuckled, the final tear rolling silently down her cheek before being flicked away. “You’re the only place open on Christmas for miles. Except McDonald’s.”

“McDonald’s doesn’t count,” Sasha scoffed, a sarcastic eyebrow raised making Shea giggle.

“Shhh, Ronald will hear you!” Shea exclaimed, before the two found themselves in fits of laughter.

“Well, I’m certainly glad you came in,” Sasha smiled.

“I am too. I’m really glad I met you, Sasha.” Shea beamed, the twinkle of sadness in her eye fading to a spark of hope. Sasha stared for a little longer than she probably should have. It was so easy to lose herself in her kind eyes.

Snapping back to reality, Sasha quickly glanced down and cleared her throat. Damn it. Shea must have noticed her staring that time. She’d need to be more careful about that.

When she dared to glance back up, Shea’s eyes were waiting, staring back into hers. Fuck. There was something so special about this girl.

No. Sasha had only just met this girl, they barely knew each other, and she had just broken up with her boyfriend for Christ’s sake.

This wasn’t happening.

This was crazy.

But maybe, Sasha liked crazy.

Maybe it was the fire in Shea’s eyes, or her fingers still interlocked with Sasha’s, or even her dumb elf costume that gave Sasha the confidence to say what she said next.

“So, uh, if you have no plans for Christmas anymore, then maybe you could stick around and help me with a few things.”

Shea smiled. “I’d like that.”

***

The next few hours blurred into clouds of flour and the sweet smell of gingerbread, as if Shea had stepped into Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory for the first time. Sasha was grateful for the extra pair of hands around the café to help her prepare for the evening, but even more grateful for the company. Being with Shea was always exciting, always fun, and Sasha somehow felt at ease around her. The empty café was now renewed with a sense of Christmas spirit, with a cacophony of laughter and Christmas music and the whirring of whisks filling the air around the two. Shea’s terrible Christmas had been long forgotten, and instead filled with candy canes and sugar and sweetness.

Shea didn’t have a clue how to bake, so whilst Sasha handled the difficult parts, Shea was set the task of decorating the gingerbread men, which she did with glee – she gave each biscuit a name and a different outfit and told Sasha made-up stories about each cookie character, making the smaller girl giggle. There was something infectious about Sasha’s laughter. God, she was adorable.

Once Sasha had seemed their collection of baked goods satisfactory, they began on their next task - wrapping. Shea felt more in her element here, given her experience with fabric, and so set off on a mission to show Sasha how amazing her wrapping was. She covered her first shoebox with glittery gold paper and streams of ribbons and bows, as if the present was fit for Broadway itself. She proudly handed it over to Sasha with a nod, before glancing over at Sasha’s gifts. Each one was precisely wrapped with crisp, neat folds, tied up with a flourish of ribbon. Not to mention the fact that she had wrapped 7 boxes in the time it had taken Shea to wrap one.

Upon noticing Shea’s gawking, Sasha laughed time herself. “It’s all in the math. Wrapping is essentially geometry,” she said, curling a length of ribbon with her scissors. “I like your wrapping more though. It’s more fun!”

Shea smirked. Damn. Smart and nice? Did Sasha know how perfect she was?

Shea knew alright.

***

The sound of a chorus of voices singing ‘jingle bells’ poured out from the homeless shelter, which was buzzing with life and activity. It had been decorated in rainbow-coloured fairy lights, a beacon of hope and magic in an otherwise dark and cold December night.

The two girls walked through the double doors side by side, arms bundled with seemingly endless wrapped boxes and silver tins of desserts. They were greeted by friendly faces and handshakes and hugs from volunteers and homeless people alike, thanking them for contributing to their Christmas.

Shea was sure she hadn’t understood the meaning of Christmas until now.

They began handing out the gifts along each row, Sasha offering hugs to those she had gotten to know over the past few years. Seeing the genuine, heartfelt reactions of those who appreciated such simple gestures as shoeboxes and cakes made Shea’s heart soar. For the first time in a long time, she felt alive.

Maybe it was Sasha who made her feel alive.

She couldn’t really tell.

After an evening spent singing carols and eating Sasha’s Christmas desserts, the two left arm in arm.

“Hey Sasha,” Shea said. “Thank you for all of this. For saving me.”

Sasha beamed. “You make it so easy.”

And thus began Sasha’s brand new Christmas tradition.

She would still go down to the homeless shelter and bring her desserts and her gifts. Of course.

But now, she would bring Shea with her too.

And now, they both dressed as elves on Christmas.

[prettylittlebrownskingyal]

Cakes for Every Occasion 💫

{Gen. Batfamily Fic.}

Happy Birthday, Sep!! @nxxttime I've only been your mom for a month but if anything ever happened to you, I would kill everyone on this site and then myself 💗💗💗 Here's some silly bat-people baking a cake for Tim since I can't bake one for you!!

“What exactly are you doing?”

Damian leans over the once pristine granite countertop to watch Stephanie fiddle with a measuring cup and a bag of baking flour. The entire area surrounding her is akin to a baking war zone; flour and egg shells combine in a mixture of white powder and yellow clumps across the counter, leaking onto the floor and escaping across the room in a trail of footsteps that lead to the fridge and back. As this is her third attempt at….whatever she’s been trying to accomplish, Damian takes pity on her. She’s going to have to face the wrath of Pennyworth for destroying his kitchen.

“We— ” Brown says, wholly confident in her words. “ — are baking Tim a cake.”

“Right.” Damian nods, catches himself and stops. He cocks his head to the side. “Why are we doing that? What did he do to deserve cake?”

Steph pauses in her struggle to get a whisk through the lumpy mixture in the bowl she holds, swearing crudely under her breath. “It’s a “congrats you lived cake,” because he almost died yesterday and we’re glad he didn’t”

“Well, I don’t know about you but I could—”

“No, you can’t. Don’t spew that shit to me, babybat. You were the first one at his side when he went down.”

“No. I wasn’t-”

She remains irritatingly sure, hands at her hips and lips pulled into a smirk. “Yes. You were. You yelled at me to get out of the way. And then you yelled at Alfred for not letting you see him. And then at Bruce for telling you to calm yourself.”

“That doesn’t mean anything.” Damian watches her crack an egg into the bowl, cringing as she lets a few more bits of shell fall in.

“It means somewhere deep, deep down inside that demon body. Real deep. You have a heart,” she points her whisk at him. “And in that heart, you love and care for your big brothers. Enough to never want to see harm come to them.”

“If I did, would I be letting you bake something that could potentially give Drake salmonella poisoning?”

She snorts. “Oh, you aren’t actually going to let me cook this. I was just waiting for you to get annoyed enough to do it for me.”

He fixes her with a scowl, a perfect imitation of his father’s clenched jaw and cold, shark eyes. Still, she’s unfazed, remaining jubilant with a wicked grin attached to her features. He slides across granite into the kitchen, scooping a handful of her dreadful flour/eggs mixture and lobbing it into her face before she can protest.

“Clear this up. Get me fresh ingredients and do it quickly.” He snaps his fingers, “Oh and Brown….you have something on your face. Right….there.”

He leaves her fuming amidst her culinary disasters and wanders off to his room. Damian doesn’t flounder in the face of Brown's irresponsibility and neither is he about to let her make assumptions about him and win. He conjures up his plan quickly, one that’s subtle enough for Drake’s liking and still bougie enough to fulfil Stephanie’s celebratory inclination.

Luckily for him, Jason answers on the second ring.

“Demon.”

“Death-breath.”

Jason’s voice is thick with sleep, but it brims with more concern than annoyance. “What’s wrong?”

“We’re baking a cake for Timothy. Brown—”

“Wait, Steph’s baking?"

"....yes."

"Don’t even let her near the oven, I’ll be there in fifteen!”

Todd makes good on his word and arrives quickly, apron in hand and a stern gait ready for Stephanie's pleading pout.

They decide on a black tea cake with honey buttercream icing because Jason remembers Tim cramming down a tray of cupcakes in those flavours at a gala a few weeks back. Preparation is relatively easy with him around to delegate and Damian makes his best effort to not pick fights with either of them.

Or at least start as little fights as possible.

He just tries his best not to commit murder, how about that?

Jason carries most of the heavy work while Damian is given the smaller, intricate tasks. Steph gets to mix things, which brings her immense satisfaction for some reason.

They're just about ready to place two separate cake pans into the oven when Alfred waltzes in. He stops in the doorway, walks out and then back in again.

"I was quite sure my eyes were deceiving me for a moment." He intones, "How astonishing to find the three of you in one room doing something productive rather than choking the daylights out of each other."

"We can be nice when we want to, Al."

"Yes, Master Jason, it appears you can. Shall I bother to offer my assistance or can I trust that you have this under control?"

Steph drops a handful of dishes into the sink with a startling clatter that draws a glare from Jason. She waves a hand in Pennyworth's direction, "We've got this."

"Considering that you're involved, Miss Brown, I think it would be wise to place Master Damian in charge of this venture."

Which is to say, he's making it Damian's responsibility to ensure that Brown doesn't blow up the kitchen. Again.

Damian huffs. "Funny you assume that I wasn't already spearheading this."

Alfred clucks his tongue and leaves them be after he watches Jason place the cakes into the oven with careful concern.

The buttercream proves easier work than the cake. While Todd and Brown argue over measurements, Damian rolls out bits of fondant to make a miniature version of Red Robin. It's tacky and sticky at first, but eventually he gets the hang of it. Cutting and shaping to his liking until he has a refined figure of his brother's subset Robin costume laid out before him.

"Hold the bag still."

Brown tuts, shaking the piping bag a bit to prove her point as Jason scoops in the smooth frosting mixture. "I am holding the bag still."  

"You know," Jason begins, a tiny smile pulling up at the corners of his mouth. "The icing is my favourite thing."

"Really?......I'd have to say pyjamas for mine."

Damian snorts violently. He's joined shortly after by Jason's barking laughter.

"What?" Steph cries, affronted. "What's so funny?"

"I meant icing is my favourite thing about baking. Not my favourite thing in the whole world."

"You really are a spectacle when you're running on little sleep, Brown."

"Fu— "

"What are you guys doing?"

Tim captures their attention from the staircase. He's groggy eyed and limping. The bruises across his face are still so fresh that it makes anger burn in Damian's stomach.

Stephanie reaches him first, takes him by the arm and gently helps him down the last few stairs. She's wearing her best grin, all dimples and sugary sweetness.

"We're making you a cake!" She informs him.

Jason sets the full piping bag into a large cup before surveying Tim. He's wearing just a hint of amusement as he adds, "A 'congrats you didn't die cake,' to be specific."

Tim's face does something funny. He gapes his mouth open and closed like a goldfish for a solid minute, enough time for Brown to cycle through all seven stages of grief with her eyebrows.

When he speaks again, his voice is a broken whisper. "You guys….you didn't….I can't believe you. I don't know what to say."

"Where are your manners, Drake? Say 'thank you' at least."

"Thanks, Dames." He grins, winces at the pain that comes from jostling his bruises. "Oh, hey. Is that me?"

Damian steps back from his tray to let Tim survey his handiwork. A surge of pride sparks in his chest at his brother's clear surprise, it almost makes him feel a little closer to normal. As though they were a regular family, as though they weren't waging war against the world's darkness in their spare hours.

Trapped in his thoughts, he finds himself being shaken to consciousness by crushing hug. Tim's all knobbly bones and awkward hands that make him feel impossibly small. But it's nice, even though he would never admit it.

"Get off me you big lug!"

"I actually can't believe you guys did this. For me. I really can't."

"It was Brown's idea."

"Yeah but, Jason and Damian did all the heavy lifting. I'm just here to take credit and wreak havoc."

Jason laughs, throwing an arm around her. "So basically what you're always here to do."

"Exactly."

They end up eating the cake warm out of the pans, using spoons to scrap the icing out the piping bag. Bruce finds them a cake and half in, offers them a distracted grunt before stealing a tablespoon of sugary buttercream before slinking away.

"I'm never eating this," Tim promises Damian as he pulls his fondant figure towards him, snapping a few quick pictures. "I'm going to save it forever and everytime you're mean to me, I'll remember this and be ok."

"See, this is why I rarely do anything nice for you."

[imagine-loki]

Wedded Bliss

TITLE: Wedded Bliss CHAPTER NO./ONE SHOT: Chapter 39 AUTHOR: MaliceManaged ORIGINAL IMAGINE: Imagine Odin determined to find Loki a wife in a misguided, though somewhat well-intentioned attempt to ‘mellow him’. … RATING: T NOTES/WARNINGS: Still alive! Sorry about the delay; I’ve been very busy and stressed, then just tired af. It happens.

_______________________________

Loki seemed thoughtful as he escorted Edith to her chambers when they finally decided to call it a night, though instead of leaving her at the door, he followed her inside, earning a questioning look. “What did Munnin want, back there?”

“How should I know? I don’t speak bird,” Edith giggled.

Loki shook his head. “When you touched him, did you not feel anything?”

“Well, yeah, but doesn’t that just happen with them?”

“Not without reason; it is a byproduct of the manner in which they communicate,” he explained, “Munnin communicates in images; did you see anything?”

“Not really.”

Loki frowned a bit. “What happened earlier, with the wine? I know you were not drunk, nor are you clumsy enough to knock that cup down by accident.”

“Oh, that. I’m pretty sure someone was trying to poison me. Probably the same person I felt watching me most of the night.”

He blinked. “You… And when were you planning on telling me this??”

“I dunno; tomorrow?” she shrugged, “I could maybe use a hand narrowing down a suspect list.”

“‘Narrowing down a’… Edith, you should have told me immediately,” he scolded.

“I’m not helpless, Loki,” she replied sharply.

“I know you are not, but this is not Midgard. There are some things here you have no defence for; I do, and you are, ultimately, my responsibility.” He held up a hand to forestall the retort her expression showed was coming. “I am not trying to dismiss your abilities. You are a royal guest and, technically, my betrothed; if something happens to you, it would have far more consequences than hurting me and upsetting my entire immediate family. What does it say that Asgard cannot even protect her guests in her own palace? You need to tell me these things.”

Edith frowned, not having thought of it from that angle. “Fine. I’m sorry,” she said somewhat grudgingly, then thought for a moment before adding, “Calling for backup is a last resort.”

“Edith-”

She shook her head, silencing him. “Rule four: ‘Calling for backup is a last resort’,” she explained, “The more people involved, the harder things are to contain.”

He walked up to her and placed his hands on her waist. “I can respect that, but if you cannot trust me to work from the shadows without detection…”

She ran her hands up his arms and laced her fingers behind his neck. “That is an excellent point,” she said leaning up on her toes to peck his lips, “Won’t happen again.”

He smiled slightly before stepping back. “If Munnin was not showing you anything, he may have been taking something instead,” he reasoned.

Edith hummed. “Probably the face of the guy who served me the tainted wine.”

“You remember what he looked like?”

“Of course; I remember what most of the staff I’ve met look like,” she said as though it should be obvious. She arched an eyebrow at his slightly surprised expression and crossed her arms at her chest. “Mom taught me to never dismiss the staff anywhere. They’re people, just like anyone else, they deserve that much courtesy at least.”

Loki had the presence of mind to look a bit chastened; given what he knew of Edith and what she had told him of her mother, he shouldn’t have been too surprised. “Well, it is a good thing, then,” he said, clearing his throat a bit, “He’ll be easier to find that way.”

“Yeah, well, that’s tomorrow’s problem, maybe; right now I just want out of this dress and into my bed,” she said, trying to stifle a yawn, “Mind giving me a hand? I didn’t expect to be back so late, and I told Anna and Gunhilda not to wait up.”

He chuckled as he motioned for her to turn around. “Those two will likely miss you when we go back to the tower,” he said as he began unlacing and unclasping where needed, “About the rest of those rules…”

“Nope.”

“Worth a try.”

****

In the morning, after breakfast, Edith found herself scolded by Odin, Frigga, and even Thor for not telling anyone of her suspicions the night before, to which she half apologised and explained again how she’d been taught to try to deal with problems herself before involving anyone else. Odin confirmed that Munnin had indeed gotten Edith’s memory of the man who’d delivered the poisoned wine, to Thor and Frigga’s surprise, as they hadn’t even thought it possible for the ravens to have a connection like the Allfather’s with anyone else.

“So, who do you think could want you dead?” Thor asked.

Edith snorted. “You mean besides pretty much every Lady of this court?”

“Now that’s not entirely fair; some of them merely want to see you suffer,” Loki chimed in cheerily, causing Edith to choke on the sip she’d just taken.

“Loki,” Frigga scolded, though the smile on her face quite ruined the effect. He merely grinned and she shook her head with a slight laugh before returning to the matter at hand. “I would discount Lady Agneta; she is a spoiled brat and a dedicated gossip monger, but she does not have the spine for assassination. Same with Ladies Inge, Sigrunn and the rest.” She thought for a moment. “Well, perhaps excluding Erna, what with the carriage incident.”

“There’s also the chance it is someone else entirely,” Loki added, “Quite a few of the Counsel are not too happy with our betrothal.”

“Grumbling is as far as they go,” Odin dismissed, “They know better.”

Loki frowned but said nothing in reply. “In any case, our return to Midgard today will either delay or hasten the search for the guilty party.”

“But find them, we will,” Frigga said resolutely.

They discussed things a while longer, getting as much detail on the events as Edith could provide, then dispersed to their various duties. Thor followed after Edith and Loki to the former’s chambers, wanting as much time with them as he could get in before they left once more.

“You will return for mother’s Nameday, won’t you?”

Loki gave him a Look. “Of course we will; I rather like living.”

Thor raised his hands in surrender. “Only making sure.”

“Geez, Thor; keep this up and we’ll start to think you miss us,” Edith teased as she packed her things.

“I did not even notice you were gone,” Thor scoffed.

“Naturally,” Loki drawled.

The three exchanged looks then burst out laughing. Once Edith was done packing, and had bid farewell to Anna and Gunhilda – who, as Loki had predicted, were more than a little sad to see her go – the trio went in search of Sif and the Warriors Three, who tried to convince them to stay a bit longer until Edith explained the team’s tradition of spending New Year’s Eve together. They then rode to the Observatory, where Heimdall awaited them his usual stoic self.

“Well, I suppose this is farewell for now,” Thor said, clasping Loki’s shoulder, “It was nice to have you home again, brother.”

“Norns; you are not to start crying now, are you?” Loki asked with mock horror, causing Thor to shove him back, making him laugh. “We will be back soon enough.”

“And you know, visits work both ways…” Edith added pointedly, earning a slightly embarrassed laugh.

“True enough,” Thor admitted, “I will make the time.”

“Damn right, you will,” Edith retorted, standing on her toes to hug him, earning a chuckle from the god as he leaned down to make it easier for her and hugging her back. With a final wave to Heimdall, who nodded in return with a small smile, the pair were sent on their way back, Edith stumbling a bit as they landed. “Yep, still hate that.”

Loki chuckled, helping her find stable footing again. “It really does get easier with time.”

“Liar; you just want me to get careless.” That got a laugh. She looked around, noting the lack of a welcoming committee. “Well, either everyone’s out…”

“Or we are about to be ambushed,” Loki finished.

They walked inside, keeping their guard up, and asked JARVIS where everyone was, though the AI’s answer was vague at best which told them that Tony was up to something. They first stopped by Edith’s room to drop off her bag then made their way to the common floor and from there to the kitchen, which was were Loki sensed the others were. The moment they walked in a popping sort of sound was heard a split second before what appeared to be a craft store’s worth of green and gold glitter blasted Loki from every direction, with Edith getting quite a bit as well as she was right behind him.

“Surprise!” a highly amused Tony cheered as he and the others popped out from behind the counter, where a large cake with green and black frosting and decorated with fondant replicas of Loki’s helmet sat, “Happy – belated – Nameday! And that is a useful tradition, by the way; hard to end up giving your kid a dumb name if you have to think about it for ten extra days.”

“Tony; getting off track,” Steve interrupted with a roll of his eyes before turning to a bemused Loki, “The glitter was Clint’s idea, by the way.”

“Wow, Cap. Wow.”

“We couldn’t celebrate with you then, so we figured we’d do it now,” Natasha explained with a small smile.

Loki’s bemusement gave way to stunned silence as he looked between them all. He felt Edith lace her fingers with his and looked down at her; with a giggle, she brushed glitter off his face before leaning up to kiss him, earning a few wolf whistles he couldn’t help laughing at.

[happyhollow-mellowmarsh]

Lesser Lovecow || Nico || Trial 2.2 || Re: Kashmir, Monty, Nya-o, Kit, RIP Attn: Monty or Nya-o

Nico, upon being called out, gave Monty an utterly withering look. Dude, can’t a boy make out with his girlfriend in peace? Of course, there were no real harsh feelings, but now he worried that Aisling would be self conscious or something like that. He hoped she didn’t associate their relationship with murder. He really didn’t need that.

“As Monty Dew helpfully pointed out, I was in the library with Aisling before he arrived, from about midnight to 1 am. I’m not the smartest guy, though, and I don’t remember if the step ladder was there at the time. Sorry. The black marks were, but Talie promised that’s unrelated, and Kit pretty much confirmed that, since it was done several days ago. I didn’t really interact with Khoa. He’s blind as hell, so I assumed he couldn’t see us.”

The reveal of that there was another murderer among them caused him some extreme distress.

“I don’t wanna be that guy, but, what you’re saying suggests someone here, someone still living, has killed someone before. That’s seriously messed up. Do you guys… Know who that is? I’m sorry I don’t want to pry but...”

He wanted to trust these people, he wanted to believe they were good and kind, but one of them killed a girl in her pajamas. Had they planned to go after her the whole time? Was she a random target? That was highly concerning.

“I’m gonna be real. I was probably the last person to see Caroline alive aside from her murderer. I was in the kitchen trying to make a butterfly cake for Aisling. Any of you could have seen it. I was almost done with the fondant… I was there from about 1:30 to the time I got alerted to the body being found. She was the only one I saw during that time, so, yeah…

“In regards to the hoodie and the pants, there’s no way either would fit me. Maybe in height, but I’m too big to fit it. I think that height does matter though. If Blakeley saw someone wearing something too small for them, a lot of their arms would be showing, unless they were wearing long gloves.”

He squeezes RIP’s hand back. He’s got you, little buddy.

“Nobody thinks you’re lying, RIPley. We know that you wouldn’t. That does bring something up though, given the murder, it’s likely the killer is someone who hasn’t had their secret spilled yet.”

At Kit’s words though, he became a little distressed. “Mind if we do a breakdown of the alibis of the people who fit the size requirements?” He is not a smart cow.