#so yeah….. honestly i have no idea how she’ll respond to that!

[revolutionarygirlmerlin]

WHY DID I DO THATTTTTTT

[harmless-variety-of-garden-snake]

So this is 5k words. Didn't mean for that to happen. This is for BuckTommy Fluffebruary Day Sixteen: Didn't Know They Were Dating AU. This is the one fill that doesn't take place in the same timeline as my other fills and is set in some nebulous period between 405 and 409. So Buck knows about Daniel. Jes-Yun isn't born yet. You can also read this on AO3 here. Tagging @bucktommyfluffebruary

They meet one night when Maddie is asked to cover a shift at the last minute and Chimney begs Buck to step in for a karaoke trivia thing he'd been invited to. When he arrives at the bar, Chimney is sitting with two big guys at a table. One of the guys introduces himself as Sal, and he seems cool enough. The other guy is Tommy, and he's definitely really cool.

“My girlfriend's brother is stepping in for her,” Chimney explains.

“H-hey,” Buck says, waving awkwardly. “I'm Evan. Buck. Evan Buckley.”

It's the least smooth way he's ever introduced himself in his adult life, but he keeps wondering what the hell Tommy's diet and exercise routine is. The guy is massive. He's so warm, though, when he shakes Buck's hand. Literally, because his hands are radiating heat, but he also smiles with his whole face instead of just a polite tilt of his mouth. Buck finds himself smiling back and ducking his head when Tommy lets his hand go.

“Wasn't your girlfriend the secret karaoke weapon?” Sal asks.

“Yeah, but this guy's the secret trivia weapon,” Chimney says, clapping Buck on the shoulder. “You said science and history always gets you, right? Here's your solution.”

Buck flushes and shrugs when Tommy's eyes sweep over him. “I hope I can help.”

He settles in for a night of karaoke trivia, and he's not much help on the pop culture stuff. But there's an entire series of questions themed around popular animals at the LA Zoo, and Buck gets all of them. As he answers, Tommy's blue eyes stay on him, and Buck finds himself answering with more and more confidence. When Celestial Bodies turns out to be the next category, he's quick to answer everything he knows instead of waiting politely for everyone else in the group.

By the end, the Worst Responders (Sal’s idea) win the night, and they sit with a pitcher of beer, their pride, and a Visa gift card each. When Chimney goes to take a call from Maddie and Sal gets up to use the bathroom, Buck suddenly doesn't know what to say to Tommy.

“That was pretty amazing, Evan,” Timmy says, raising his glass.

Buck opens his mouth to correct him, but instead he clinks their glasses and says, “Not so bad yourself, Tommy.”

Tommy's eyes dip as they both take long drinks of their beer, and Buck hopes he doesn't have something on his chin. He wipes it with the back of his hand just to be on the safe side.

“Man, I can't believe you can fly,” Buck says, settling back into his chair. “That's so cool.”

“Well,” Tommy says, the corner of his mouth lifting in a half-smile, “I need the aircraft to fly.”

Buck makes a face at him. “Yeah, I know, but it's amazing. I always wanted to learn. When I was traveling, I'd end up on these tiny planes sometimes and always thought it would be fun.”

“I could maybe show you a few things,” Tommy says, resting his elbows on the table. “My rates are pretty competitive.”

Buck’s reply is cut off by Chimney plopping down next to him.

“Heard a girl talking about you,” Chimney says, nudging Buck and nodding back toward the bar.

He glances but doesn’t really see anyone specifically looking at him. He figures she’ll find him if she’s really interested. His focus goes back to Tommy, who is sliding a coaster around under his finger and smiling to himself a bit, but he doesn’t look all that happy. Instead, he’s just sort of…resigned.

“How competitive?” Buck asks, and Tommy blinks at him.

Tommy looks between Chimney, Buck, and something behind Buck before his eyes settle back on him. “We can figure something out. Honestly, I don’t usually charge friends. Except Sal.”

“For what?” Chimney asks, frowning at his phone screen.

“Thought I might take up flying,” Buck says, shrugging.

Chimney snorts. “Yeah. That’ll last. This kid’s got more hobbies than anyone I’ve ever met. Dude, I think someone stole my credit card number again. Hold up, I gotta call my bank.”

He disappears again, and Buck looks over his shoulder to see Sal is talking to a pretty girl at the bar, and she glances at Buck. When she sees him looking, she smiles shyly before looking back at Sal. If she’s the girl Chimney was talking about, she is pretty cute.

“I don’t have a lot of hobbies,” Buck says, turning his attention back to Tommy. “Well, kind of. I have a lot of interests, I guess. Which, yeah, is kinda weird, but I like the idea of flying. So I would absolutely be down to learn, and I’d be happy to pay for the fuel or your time or whatever. It’s like learning a superpower.”

Tommy smiles and slides his phone over. “Go ahead and put your number in.”

Buck does, noticing that the contact name is already filled in as ‘Evan,’ and he doesn’t bother correcting that either.

By the time they all leave, Buck has Tommy’s number in his own phone and realizes he forgot to get the girl’s number.

–

Flying is so cool, but Buck thinks Tommy might be a maniac. He’ll do maneuvers that don’t feel like they should be physically possible, and then he laughs over the headset. It’s terrifying and amazing, and Buck is flushed and breathless by the time they land on the tarmac at Harbor Station.

“That was awesome!” he says. “Okay, yeah, I owe you a beer. A dozen beers.”

Tommy takes off the headset and smiles. “How about dinner?”

Buck smiles back, though he feels like he’s still trying to catch his breath. “Yeah, okay. I could do dinner.”

–

Micelli’s is nice, and they’ve apparently got good beer and good food. Buck finds out that Tommy’s half Italian on his mom’s side, which explains a lot about his looks. His nose is so regal from the side, and Buck’s found his eyes tracing its shape more than once. His mom was first generation, so Tommy was practically raised by a bunch of older Italian women and his grandfather until he was in high school.

“So when you say the food here is good, you know what you’re talking about,” Buck concludes, and Tommy nods. “Alright, I believe you.”

“What about your family?” Tommy asks, and Buck shrugs. “You don’t have to answer that.”

“No, they’re…fine,” Buck says, shrugging again. He still feels raw when he thinks about his parents. “They’re, uh, back in Pennsylvania. Except Maddie. I think we’re British? Just sort of, uh, WASP-y? But I don’t really know a lot about my family.”

Hell, he knew even less than he ever realized.

“I don’t know a lot about my dad’s family,” Tommy says, and it feels like he understands based on the way he says it. It loosens some of the anxiety that had been building in Buck’s chest. “Scottish, Irish? Something like that. But I never looked too hard. Italians, though, you’d be hard-pressed to find a family that doesn’t want every generation to know every story and legend and the name of every town everyone was ever born in.”

“Family recipes?”

Tommy snorts. “I have a box of them. I’ve been trying to transcribe them just in case something ever happens to them, but there’s so many.”

Buck shrugs. “I could help.”

“Yeah?” Tommy looks surprised at his offer.

“Yeah, I’m kinda good at that kind of stuff,” he admits. “Plus, hey, I wouldn’t say no to learning some new recipes. I feel like I’m finally really getting the hang of cooking. Maybe I can even teach Bobby a thing or two.”

They start talking about the 118, and Buck is surprised at just how different it used to be. From the sound of it, Tommy was really different. Sal, too. And then Tommy felt like he was able to get a new start at Harbor.

“I just didn’t want to die in a closet, you know?” he says, and Buck tries to parse what that could mean. “I wasn’t out at the 118. Everyone thought I was straight until, I don’t know, my last month there? I finally told them right after my transfer went through.”

Buck blinks, realizing he’d somehow totally missed that Tommy’s gay. He realizes his silence could be taken for discomfort and panics. “Th-that’s great! I’m glad you were able to do that. It’s hard. It’s a hard thing to go through.”

“Yeah,” Tommy agrees, smiling softly. “Well, it’s actually just…freeing. Once you get past actually saying the words.”

“That sounds amazing,” Buck says, sighing. It does. The idea of feeling free has always felt like something he’s been looking for. Being at the 118 is the closest thing he’s ever found to that, but he wonders if it feels the same.

Tommy hesitates and starts to say something, but then their server arrives to take their food orders. Buck forgets to ask him what he was going to say, because he starts second-guessing what he was going to order and leans across to ask Tommy about one of the dishes. When Tommy leans in to look at where Buck’s pointing on the menu, his forearm presses against Buck’s and radiates heat the same way his hand did when they met, the same way his whole body did when he'd hugged Buck after their flight and when they met outside the restaurant. He wonders if it's a natural thing for him or if it's his muscle mass that does it.

“So you do like mushrooms?” Tommy asks, and Buck nods. “Yeah, you'll love that, then. But save room for dessert.”

“Okay,” Buck says, unable to keep himself from ducking his head and smiling as Tommy confirms with the server that Buck is getting whatever the hell it was Tommy had pointed to. He hadn't been paying attention.

–

He loves Tommy’s house. It’s got books and movies and records crammed into every available shelf in the living room, and there are cool old tiles in the kitchen and bathrooms that Tommy’s never going to touch even when he updates the rooms.

“Kitchen’s next, but I did a lot of the hard work with the electrical and plumbing already,” Tommy explains. He goes to a cabinet above his fridge and reaches in for an old cigar box. When he stretches for it, his shirt rides up and Buck blinks at the strip of skin that’s exposed. He suddenly feels guilty for staring and forces himself to look at the view of Tommy’s backyard from the window above the sink. “Here they are.”

Tommy sets the box on the counter and flips it open. Inside are old recipe cards, torn out recipes from magazines and ads, swooping writing on yellowed paper, and what looks to be more than one recipe torn out of cookbooks.

They’re killing time before a movie that’s playing at the theater by Tommy’s place, but Buck wants to dive into the recipes and figure out what it was that his family liked or what was important to them, what they held onto across generations, and which ones made little Tommy love desserts so much.

“Can you tell who wrote them?” he asks, carefully turning over a recipe card for some kind of soup made with lentils and sausage.

“Some of them,” Tommy says, leaning over and looking at the card he’s holding. “That was Prozia Camilla, I think. She always wrote her Bs really weird.”

“What’s that?” Buck asks, looking over at Tommy. He realizes he’s close, but it’s not making him uncomfortable. He feels a little warm, but it’s not from discomfort or embarrassment. The heat might be on in the house, or it's just Tommy being a human space heater. “Aunt?”

“Great-aunt,” Tommy clarifies. “Aunt is zia, uncle is zio—pretty easy. Nonna, Nonno–grandma, grandpa. Cugina, cugino–cousin, female or male. You add pro for great-aunts and -uncles, bis for great-grandparents. There’s one that’s in a baggy from Bisnonna Valia, I think she wrote it down when Mussolini was in power.”

Buck carefully picks through the box until he finds it, and he doesn’t take it out. He does inspect it, though. The paper is translucent and faded, the ink a brown-ish color. “What’s it for?”

“Canestrelli. It’s kind of like a shortbread cookie.”

He likes how Tommy says the words in Italian, the way his mouth shapes the vowels and kind of rolls the Rs but not really, the syllables he emphasizes a little differently than the way Buck probably would if he read the word from a page. He’d asked Tommy if he spoke Italian, and he sort of did. He mostly just understood it, but he sounded like he knew it whenever he said any of the words.

“These are amazing,” Buck says softly, rubbing his thumb along the edge of the paper inside its protective plastic. “Is it weird that I wish I knew them? All the people who wrote these down.”

When he glances at Tommy, Tommy’s looking at him and not at the recipe anymore. “No,” Tommy replies softly. “I don’t think that’s weird at all. They would’ve loved you.”

Buck grins. “Really?”

“Definitely.”

He flushes happily at the thought, even if Tommy’s just being nice. When he sets the recipe back in the box, the alarm on Tommy’s phone goes off.

“I kind of want to just look at these,” Buck admits. “But you said the movie’s really good.”

“Evan, it’s Casablanca,” Tommy says dryly. “It’s literally one of the greatest movies ever made.”

“Well, then I guess we have to go,” Buck teases, closing the box and handing it over to him.

When Tommy puts the box back, Buck’s eyes dip to his ass this time. It’s really a work of art. He wonders what kind of squats he does.

–

Buck’s a mess.

“You didn’t tell me it would be sad,” he moans as he snacks on the last of his popcorn on the way to Tommy’s truck. He’d driven, because it was easier than trying to find parking for two cars near the theater.

“A lot of the best romance movies are,” Tommy says. “But I don’t think it’s that sad. He loves her, and he knows she’s going to be happy. It’s not like Ghost or Moulin Rouge or Brokeback Mountain or anything.”

“I’ve never seen those,” Buck admits. “How can it get any sadder?”

“I mean, one of them could’ve died.”

Buck sighs. “Yeah, I guess. But—can you imagine finding the person who makes you feel like that and having to watch them walk away with someone else? People don’t realize how awful it feels to just be left behind.”

He realizes he’s projecting a lot onto a movie that’s eighty years old, but it does suck. Buck would know.

“Sometimes you just want to be the one people will stick around for,” he mumbles.

Tommy bumps their shoulders together gently as they walk. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Buck smiles and bumps his shoulder back. “You say that now.”

“I can’t imagine wanting to leave you behind if I could help it, Evan.”

The way he says it makes Buck’s heart thud in his chest, and for a moment he’s worried about another blood clot. He looks over at Tommy, who’s looking at him, and he smiles.

“Thanks,” he says softly.

Tommy puts an arm around his shoulder and squeezes him close for a moment before they get to the truck. Buck gets into the passenger seat and considers the few kernels of popcorn left. He wonders what Tommy’s favorite happy romance movie is and what it’s like, what he likes about it and the characters, if he identifies more with one than the other.

“So that’s the best romance movie?” he asks instead.

“I mean, that’s subjective, right?” Tommy says, turning on the truck and pulling away from the curb. “I think it’s pretty close to being the most objectively perfect one, yeah.”

“Is it your favorite?”

Tommy considers the question for a moment. “It's up there. It changes, honestly. I really like Love, Actually, but Princess Bride and Moonstruck are amazing, too. Casablanca is pretty perfect, though.”

“Thank you for inviting me,” Buck says, smiling. “I did like it. It just, y’know, made me a little sad. Also, I didn’t realize that whole ‘Here’s looking at you, kid’ thing was a reference. I’ve heard so many people say that and thought it was some idiom I never learned.”

Tommy snorts and shakes his head. “I swear, I will expand your knowledge of movies.”

Buck normally doesn’t really care. He doesn’t have the same attachment to movies that a lot of his friends have, but he likes Tommy showing him things. The flying, the restaurant, the recipe box, the movie—maybe Muay Thai? He knows Eddie does it. Buck’s never really had an interest in it, but Tommy had offered to teach him and Buck had twirled his pasta around his fork and said he’d be interested because nothing sounded cooler. Now that he’s seen the set-up in Tommy’s garage, it would be kind of awesome to have one-on-one lessons and then go inside to make old family recipes.

He looks over at Tommy as he drives, and he notes that Tommy seems as at ease behind a wheel as he is doing anything else. He had also seen the car lift in Tommy’s garage, currently empty but awaiting a Chevelle he’d had his eye on that needed work, and he wonders if he’s always liked cars.

As he watches, he also realizes that Tommy’s side profile is pretty perfect. It’s not just the nose, it’s his entire face. Tommy’s a really handsome guy.

“Evan?” Tommy asks, sounding amused.

“Yeah?”

“Are you okay?”

Buck slides down in his seat a little, feeling caught out for some reason. “Yeah. Sorry.”

Tommy slows to a stop at the light and looks over at Buck. He smiles and squeezes Buck’s wrist briefly, his huge hand almost engulfing it. He doesn’t understand how someone his height can be so big. With his free hand, he reaches over and picks up Tommy’s hand, manipulating the digits until they’re flat, and he presses their hands together to compare the size. Buck’s never met someone with bigger hands than his who wasn’t at least six and a half feet tall, but Tommy’s fingers stretch a little further, his palm is a little broader.

Then Tommy turns his palm just a little and curls his fingers until they’re between Buck’s, and Buck curls his fingers, too. He smiles and looks up at Tommy, who’s looking at him intently. It makes Buck’s heart pound again.

A car honks, and Tommy startles a little. He laughs to himself as he continues driving toward his house, both hands back on the wheel, and Buck feels his hand close around nothing, feeling empty.

–

Tommy is walking him to his car, even though it’s parked right in front of his house. They’re talking about the next series of movies the theater is showing—old noir stuff, some of which Tommy’s never even seen.

“That could be cool,” Buck says, putting his hands in his jacket pocket so he won’t reach for Tommy’s hand again. It would be weird. “We can see when our shifts line up.”

“They do them all in two month blocks,” Tommy explains wryly. “So that’s going to be a lot of calendar checking.”

“We can always share them to each other,” Buck points out. “Figure out other days we can do stuff.”

Tommy’s eyes look between Buck’s, down to his chin, and back at his eyes again. “Like what?”

Buck smiles and shrugs. “Anything. I mean, we’re kind of the perfect bar trivia partners. We can go around town and hustle all of them out of their gift cards and small cash prizes. But I really do want to help you with the recipe thing. You really think your family would’ve liked me?”

“Evan, do you have any idea how likeable you are?” Tommy asks, leaning his shoulder against Buck’s door.

“Hey, you’re pretty likeable yourself,” Buck says shyly. “You’re kind of the coolest person I’ve ever—”

He doesn’t get to finish, because there are two fingers under his chin and a pair of lips on his. For a moment, he freezes, because Tommy is kissing him. That should be weird. He’s never had a male friend kiss him on the lips unless it was during Spin the Bottle or under mistletoe, and those were always pecks or done with some reluctance on their part. But he can feel Tommy start to pull away and wants anything but that, so he brings his hand up to Tommy’s shoulder and keeps him there while Buck kisses back.

Tommy’s lips are soft, though his stubble is a little scratchy, but Buck doesn’t mind it. He really doesn’t mind it.

“Was that okay?” Tommy whispers when he does finally pull back.

Buck nods and his eyes drop to Tommy’s lips, which don’t look any different than they did a minute ago, but now he knows how they feel against his. He still has a hand on Tommy’s shoulder and brings his other one up to cup his jaw to keep him still when Buck goes in for another kiss.

It feels better than okay. It feels like a real first—well, second now—kiss. He feels like an alarm bell should be going off somewhere in his head, but all he’s getting is a need to feel more of him, to taste more of him.

They’re kind of making out against Buck’s Jeep, and Buck is definitely going to need to talk to Hen about this. If he likes kissing a guy just as much as he’s liked kissing a girl—hell, more than he’s liked kissing some girls—what does that mean?

Tommy pulls away again and presses their foreheads together. They’re both breathing hard, and Buck wonders if Tommy will ask him to come inside.

“I meant to take this a lot slower,” Tommy says. “You seemed…new. I know Howie doesn’t know, but does anyone?”

Buck wonders if he’d missed something in their conversation. “Know what?”

“That you’re—” he gestures between them. Then he pulls back more and searches Buck’s face. “You are, aren’t you?”

“What?” he asks again, feeling very slow. He doesn’t love the feeling, but he's also still really stuck on the feeling of Tommy's lips.

“Wait, are you?”

“Oh, my god, Tommy, am I what?” he asks, laughing.

“Into guys?”

Buck blinks. “I don’t—I’ve never really thought about it?”

Except for that one time in Texas, but he knew that he came off as flirty sometimes when he didn’t mean to. That hadn’t been TK’s fault. Hell, TK was gorgeous and a really good firefighter, and—oh.

“Oh,” Buck says, raising his eyebrows. “Huh.”

“Are you okay?” Tommy asks, searching Buck’s face for something. He’s not touching Buck anymore, which kind of sucks.

“Yeah.” He looks at Tommy and smiles. “Yeah, I’m great.”

He is. He really is. It’s a little bit of a shock, but he’s pretty sure he’ll be fine. Well, he might need to talk to Hen and Maddie and Bobby.

Then it hits him—Tommy walked him to his car. While the sun was up. In a good neighborhood. After the movies. He’d done the same thing after Micelli’s, after they’d flown, and he’d hugged Buck every time. It had felt good and warm and safe. But Tommy always walked him to his car.

“We were just on a date, weren’t we?” Buck says slowly, then counts. “Like, our third one. Wait, did you take me flying for our first date?”

“I thought I did,” Tommy says, his brows raised. “Did you really have no idea that I was asking you out?”

Okay, yeah, Tommy had said they should go out sometime before they’d left the bar the night they’d met, and Buck had agreed and Tommy had grinned. It had been really distracting.

“Huh,” he says again. “Wait, you waited until our third date to kiss me?”

“I thought you needed me to take it slow,” Tommy says, leaning his elbows on the hood and burying his face in his hands. “I thought you were new to this.”

“I mean, I am,” Buck points out. The way Tommy’s leaning makes his ass pop out a little, and his jeans are tight enough that they definitely qualify as date jeans. “Maybe not that new, actually. It’s normal to check out a hot guy’s ass, right?”

Tommy looks at him incredulously. “Evan, how would I know what straight guys do? I’m a Kinsey six.”

“Right,” Buck realizes, though he’s still not clear on the second part. “What’s a Kinsey six?”

“It’s a scale for sexuality. I’ve never actually been attracted to any women.”

Buck frowns. “Really?”

He’s found a lot of guys attractive, because that was just a thing Buck could see as a person with eyes. Hell, one of the first things he thought about Connor was that he had a killer smile. Then he had followed him to Los Angeles. From Peru.

“Oh,” he realizes, pulling out his phone and looking up ‘Kinsey.’ “Two? I don’t know, actually. I’ll have to think about it.”

Tommy huffs out a laugh. “You’re not, I don’t know, mad?”

Buck frowns and puts his phone back in his pocket. “Why would I be mad?”

“A lot of guys get mad when another guy kisses them if they weren’t really expecting it.”

“That doesn’t make sense. You can just tell someone you’re not interested.” His eyes flick down to Tommy’s mouth. “Or figure out that you are.”

“Are you sure—”

“You should come over so I can cook you dinner,” Buck says, suddenly wanting nothing more than to see Tommy in his loft and at his table. In his bed? Yeah, probably. “Saturday?”

Tommy smiles. “You mean tomorrow?”

Buck thinks about it. “Yeah. Tomorrow.”

When Tommy kisses him again, Buck wraps his arm around his shoulders and spreads his hand over Tommy’s side. Tommy moans softly against his mouth, and Buck’s lips part further so he can tease his tongue against Tommy’s lips.

“Jesus, kid,” Tommy breathes when the kiss breaks, and it sends a bolt of heat through Buck’s belly. So, yeah, definitely guys. Guys are good. At least one is.

Buck’s phone goes off, and he reluctantly checks it. Maddie’s due pretty soon, so he can’t ignore his phone just in case it’s her.

It is, and Buck answers quickly.

“Maddie?” he says before mouthing an apology to Tommy. “Are you okay? Is the baby—”

“Buck,” she says. “Are you still coming over for dinner?”

Oh, right. The reason they’d done the matinee show for the movie. Buck’s supposed to be having a sibling dinner with his sister. He’s now late for it and feels like a dick.

“I am so sorry, I forgot. I’ll be there in twenty, twenty-five minutes? Do you need me to get anything on the way?”

“If you could get me enough garlic bread to fill your car, I’d be so happy.”

Buck snorts. “I can get some. Maybe not that much. But I’ll stop, just turn the oven on. I’ll see you soon, okay?”

“Okay!” she says brightly. “Bye.”

“Bye,” he says, hanging up. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize what time it was, and I did actually forget. I got, uh, distracted.”

Tommy smirks. “‘Distracted’?”

Buck swallows and nods, his eyes going to Tommy’s lips again. “Yeah.”

“God, you’re adorable.”

He’s never had a guy call him that before. He likes it.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Tommy says. “When do you want me over?”

“S-six?” Buck says, feeling himself sway toward Tommy like they’ve got magnets in their mouths. “Five. You start early on Sunday, right?”

“So do you,” Tommy points out.

“Oh, yeah,” Buck says dumbly. He goes in for another kiss, but it’s quick. Tommy pushes him back gently with a hand to his chest and nudges their noses together briefly before stepping away. “Bye.”

“Bye, Evan,” Tommy says, smiling and going toward his house.

Buck fumbles with his keys before he finally unlocks the Jeep, and he watches Tommy until he goes inside. It’s a thing he’s always done on dates. When Tommy waves before heading inside, Buck waves for a long time until the door is closed.

“Fuck, okay, garlic bread,” he says, turning the Jeep on. He grins the entire way to the store.

While he walks through Ralph’s, he also looks for stuff to use for the dinner he’s going to make for Tommy. On their date. Their fourth date.

Buck knows he’s standing in the middle of the baking ingredients aisle and smiling at his phone like an idiot. He knows that he’s going to spend half of his Saturday trying to perfect some kind of dessert. He knows he can’t wait to see Tommy and that he’s felt that way every time he’s seen him since they met.

[mochelisgf]

CHAPTER ONE —

ᰔ — pairing: morgan cheli x oc (mar williams)

ᰔ — word count: 1600

ᰔ — warnings: none rlly, little flirting and mentions of drinking, partying that’s about it

ᰔ — links: character list, fanfic masterlist

ᰔ — story masterlist

ᰔ — authors note: hiii we are back :3 juju storyline is starting to appear….jealous mo storyline? Anyways so the first 3 chapters for this fic are already written and have been uploaded to Wattpad, so if ur feeling impatient then u can read ahead on at @m0cheli on Wattpad, hope u enjoyyyy and let me know if there’s anything that you want in future chapters or u have any blurb ideas of mo and mar 🩷

The first thing Maureen hears when she wakes up is the door to her dorm opening and two familiar voices echoing throughout the main area.

You’d think her first instinct would be to cover her ears and groan in tiredness, but no, her first instinct is to jump up. If Georgia and Renee of all people are up and lively……then what time was it?

Immediately jumping up and grabbing her phone she checks her alarm ‘snoozed’. snoozed?….maureen doesn’t even remember the last time she’s snoozed her alarm, oh god she looks a mess right now.

And just as she’s about to turn her phone off, a notification catches her eye. It’s a email, from the office in charge of the dorm unit building – confused she clicks on it, her confusion deepens even more when she reads

‘Sometime within the next 2 weeks, you will receive a roommate in replacement of your last. Please contact us if you have any other information’

…..what the fuck—

The music is blasting. The smell of weed, liquor and sweat floating throughout. And her first sentence is

“Oh my god I can’t believe I let you guys drag me to a frat party – on campus. I thought we were supposed to go to club rio, what the fuck” Maureen whines, dragging the k in the last word

“Dude calm down, being at a frat party is the last thing you need to be worried about. What you need to be worried about is how you haven’t gotten pussy is 3 months– ” ree smirked out

“oh that’s so unnecessary, you know unlike some people, I actually have a life and a job and shit to do–” Maureen responded

Georgia sighed deeply, rubbing her forehead before saying

“Okay no. Y’all need to calm down or seperate, I don’t know but all I know is – mar you need to go and talk to people, and no I’m not referring to the people you share classes with. Talk to a girl or a guy and most importantly have fun okay, I’m gonna go bye” making a salute pose before heading into the crowd.

Maureen stands awkwardly, looking around hoping that she’ll see someone she notices – anyone really, just wanting to get away but needing an excuse; that doesn’t last very long when she hears a squeal come from beside her —

“Kayla!!! Oh my god, where have you been” ree asked as she smiles widely — ree’s friend — kayla responds equally excited “Hiiiii, i've been around, ugh im so glad you were finally able to come —”

She interrupts herself as she look on the other side of ree, her eyes landing on me “And youuuu must be Maureen, ree mentions you all the—”

“Kayla!” her cousin proclaimed, embarrassment flooding her face; and Maureen in response snickers. “Oops….well uh me and the girls haven’t been here long, but you can come chill with us if you want” kayla responds

Ree turns around and looks at the girl standing beside her “Mar?” she says, giving her a look of desperation — and i mean who am I to deny my cousin? “Yeah that’s cool” Maureen says, giving an awkward smile.

Kayla, Maureen and Renee make their way to the other side of the room, stopping along the way to get drink — her cousin, who turns around to meet her eye tells her –

“dude you really need to take more…you days, you need to loosen up, we’re at a party. Act like it.” A smile sitting on her lips as she hands her the cup filled with – honestly she doesn’t even know

“Yea, okay sorry” she says, accepting the cup and taking a sip – her face scrunching up from the taste — Maureen has always had a problem with apologizing, doing it when there's no reason to, but I guess that’s what happens when you're a people pleaser.

Finally pushing through the crowd, the trio makes their way to a more closed off area, sitting there are a big group of girls, everyone engaged in their own conversations whether they were the ones explaining it or listening.

Kayla walks fully in the room, leading us in. The first one to notice us is kk — i’d never met any of the girls on the team but kk – everyone knows kk, if you don't know her on the court you’ll know her from tiktok videos that pop up on your for you page randomly.

“Hey kayla girly pop!” is the first thing the girl says, everyone in result turns – conversations stopping abruptly.

Kayla moves closer towards me and ree, putting one of her hands on our shoulders “Guys this is Renee – my roommate's friend and her cousin Maureen! Mar is a law major – crazy right?” she says, a smile large on her face

And just as abruptly the noise ended; the noise of welcome started.

Some time has passed by; Maureen, ree and georgia – who later rejoined the two are all tired out from dancing and singing, voices raw and broken – the bright blue lights and smoke floating in the room making their heads and eyes hurt.

Maureen gets up from her seat and turns slightly towards the two girls “hey I’m gonna go get another drink, want anything?” both girls shake their heads no and so Maureen smiles slightly before walking off

She makes her way to the built-in bar, a taller man behind the counter – obviously hired, looks up at the girl and smiles signaling a ‘hold on a minute’ before finishing the drink he was making and handing it to the man that sits across from her.

“What can I get for you, pretty lady?” He says with a kind smile

Maureen smiles back “umm what’s like…the weakest drink you have?” Maureen doesn’t drink very often, and when she does she usually sticks to 2-3 drinks max. But after the news of her getting a replacement roommate and the amount of stress she’s just been in recently, lord knows she needed a night of complete freedom.

The man responds back “don’t worry I got you” and starts making her drink – he gets to the second step before she realizes what he’s making – a ‘vodka soda’ – exactly what she needed right now. He finishes the drink quickly and serves it up to her.

And so Maureen sits there, by herself, slowing sipping on her drink and scrolls on her phone – snaps a pic or two of herself and when she near finished she’s about to call the nice bar man over when –

“Hey! You’re Maureen right?” A voice beside her says. The voice sounds like the most…..calming thing she’s ever heard, like silvery and comforting and just a little bit raspy. Maureen immediately turns around, wanting to put a face to the voice and comes face to face with – someone she’s never met?….

Obviously Maureen’s face says what her voice isn’t and the girl chuckles slightly in realization “I’m Morgan, I play on the girls basketball team. I wasn’t there earlier but the girls told me that Renee and her cousin had joined us, just wanted to properly introduce myself, you know without all the drunk idiots surrounding us.” she says, her voice slowly fading in embarrassment and her cheeks turning a light pink when she realizes she’s began over talking

“Oh yeah, they told me a few of you were missing! Nice to meet you, I’m Maureen – which you already know but um….you wanna sit?” I suggested, gently tucking my hair behind my ears. “oh yeah I’d love to, thanks” she accepted

We sat there for who knows how long, just talking – shy and wandering looks but everything about this girl felt genuine – the way she actually seemed interested in what Maureen had to say, how they’d only known each other for an hour and a half and she felt like she could tell her anything.

“So I’m like ‘what are you talking about, the reason the boy became what he was isn’t because he was born like that but because of the horrible living conditions he had to live in and the lack of – ”

“Marrrrrrr i'm tired, let's go home.” The girl hears, as she turns around and sighs deeply, ree laid out on the bar counter. She turns back around facing Morgan – her face displaying obvious annoyance. Morgan in reply smiles slightly, her head tilting down slightly before she gets up out of her chair

“Do you need help?” is the first thing she asks – no, first thing she’s said in almost 20 minutes as she was previously listening to me talk non stop about something she’d known nothing about

“No i should be okay, I gotta go find my other friend and then get them both home, thank you for asking though that was kind” Maureen says also getting up from her seat, having to slightly look up to the 6 foot tall girl and her deep brown hair down that’s laying softly on her shoulders and her big beautiful brown eye –

“Um I don’t have my phone on me right now, but how about I get your insta from Paige tomorrow?” Morgan asks, wanting permission before doing so,

Maureen fiddles with the top of her skirt and responds back “Yeah that’s cool, I’ve gotta go now, so I guess I’ll see you later then?” reaching up to give Morgan a hug, and she feels the girls hands hug her mid back before they separate, both of their cheeks red and hot.

As Morgan is walking away, Maureen sighs deeply before collecting herself and helping her cousin up to her feet

“Hey so, where did you last see Georgia” –

— INSTAGRAM —

liked by morgancheli, juju watkins, georgiaeous and 83 others

mrwilliamsss club classics

view all comments......

jujuwatkins yk u lookin a lil too fine i mighttt have to fly you out idk

— mrwilliams idkkk u might have to

georgiaeous she may be hot but she's secretly a loser!!!

— mrwilliamsss i don’t know how to respond to that ngl

morgancheli So like... Hi 😊

— mrwilliamsss Hey 🤗

r3neewilliams you post too early

— mrwilliams just say your sleep routine sucks! Hope this helps

[sykesandskittles]

CHAPTER 15

Harlow

I MOVE through my day in a kind of haze. I popped by Talia ’s class at three– and even stayed for the entire lecture–but she never showed. I went as far as questioning her professor after class, but she hadn’t heard from Talia at all.

My worry for Talia is climbing higher by the second, and I wrestle with the idea of going straight to the police. No one from the school is responding with the appropriate amount of urgency—not Ms. Ramirez, not security. But Noah warned me not to go to the police, and until I can ask him why, I’m going to heed that warning. For now.

At the end of the day, I return to my residence hall. I stopped by Talia 's room on my way in, and there was no answer. Not surprising. I mean, I half-expected no answer, but it still ties my stomach in knots. I glance at my phone and note the time. I have a little while until Noah shows up to take me to some kind of get-together.

I don’t even care what this get-together is. I’m trying to look at the bright side. If there are other people there, then I can use it as an opportunity to ask around about Talia .

When I open the door to my room, Emily is sitting at her desk, working on her computer. As I shut the door, she half-turns in her chair and smiles at me.

“Hey,” she says. “How’s it going? Any news on your friend?”

I toss my backpack next to my desk and plop onto my bed with a sigh. “Nope. I’ve left a message for the Undergraduate Dean. And I’ve talked to security, but no one is concerned. Apparently, students up and leave all the time.”

Emily swivels in her chair and turns to fully face me, her delicate brows drawn together in concern. “Is that something you think she would do? Just…up and leave? I mean, honestly? I know you don’t want to believe she would just ditch you, but is it a real possibility?”

I pause on that thought. After a second, I shrug one shoulder. “She seemed upset yesterday morning, so…I don’t know, maybe? But without her phone? That part is really weird.”

I don’t tell Emily about my gut feeling, because I know it’s going to sound crazy. This dark feeling has been sitting like a bolder in my chest since finding her phone in the sand. Like, Talia ’s been taken. Stolen from me.

Emily leans back and thinks for a second. “What about her parents?

Maybe they know something?”

I bite my bottom lip. “Yeah, I don’t want to worry them.”

“It’s your only option at this point. I think they’d probably rather know, than not,” she says with a shrug.

It’s a fair point.

I pull out my phone and search for her mom’s number. I’ve had it programmed into my phone for years, but never needed to use it. With a deep breath, I hit ‘call’ and immediately put it on speaker. Talia 's mom picks up on the second ring.

“Harlow ,” she says cheerfully. “How are you, babe? Everything okay?” God, I just love Talia 's mom. She’s always been warm and affectionate towards me—everything my own mother never was. I hate to kill the

happiness in her voice, but I’m doing this for Talia .

“Um, hey, Mrs. Langley,” I say, my voice shaking just a little. “Um, I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m worried about Talia . I haven’t seen her since yesterday. She hasn’t been back to her room, and I’ve asked around, but no one has seen her…”

Then I tell her about finding her phone on the beach and all the steps I’ve taken to contact the campus powers-that-be. When I’m done, the other end of the line is silent.

After about ten seconds, I speak up, afraid we may have gotten disconnected. “Hello?”

“Oh, sorry. I’m at the grocery store. Um, yeah, you know I wouldn't worry about it too much, hon. She’ll turn up.” There’s a complete lack of concern in her voice that floors me. “This is her first college experience, and I’m sure she just lost track of time. When I was a freshman, I’d disappear for a couple of days here and there. I was usually holed up with a cute guy.” She laughs at that last part.

“Um, I….” I don’t even know what to say. Mrs. Langley has always been a bit liberal parenting-wise, but I wasn’t expecting this level of nonchalance. “Okay. Can you let me know if you hear from her, and I’ll do the same?”

“Sure, hon.”

When we hang up, I let the phone fall to the bed in complete disbelief. I glance up at Emily, who was listening to the entire conversation. “That was weird, right?” I say. Honestly, I’m beginning to think I’m going crazy. No one seems concerned, except me. “Is it me? Am I overreacting?”

Emily’s brows pinch together, and I can tell she’s being careful about what she says. “No, you’re being a good friend. Buuut,” Ah, there it is—the part where she’s trying to be careful. “...if her mom isn’t worried, then I don’t know, maybe just give it a couple more days?”

I push out a breath. “Yeah. I guess.” I glance at my phone again. Thirty minutes until Noah picks me up. I dread seeing him again–because every time I’m in his presence, I feel a little out of control, and I hate that feeling.

But, I don’t know, maybe tonight will be a good distraction.

“Noah is picking me up soon, so I guess I’d better get ready,” I say, getting up off the bed to walk to my desk, where I have all my makeup laid out—it’s not a lot. Just foundation, eyeshadow, mascara, and lip tint. I'm pretty low-maintenance as a rule.

“So what’s going on with you two, exactly?” Emily asks, turning around so her back is to me. “The entire school, and I mean everyone, even the professors, are talking about you guys.”

I roll my eyes as I dab on a thin layer of foundation. I’m almost out, and I can’t afford to buy more, so I use it sparingly. “Why, though? What’s the

big deal? He’s a manwhore, right? Doesn’t he date all kinds of girls? That’s the impression I get anyway. That he’d fuck anything with a pair of tits.”

“Yeah, I don’t know,” she replies. “But I’d be careful with him. I’ve heard he’s into some pretty dark stuff.”

I turn around to face her, but she’s running a highlighter across some text in her textbook. “What do you mean?” I ask.

She shrugs but doesn’t look up. “That group of guys…I mean, they’re bad news. They’re gods on this campus, and they get away with everything. I’m pretty sure they could murder someone, and the university would happily look the other way.”

Yeah, I’ve heard they’re gods around here, too. But getting away with murder? “No way. Stop.”

Emily glances up at me then. “Are you kidding? Their families pump so much money into this university they practically own it. Their names are on all the buildings. Their money pays three-quarters of the salaries around here…”

I blow out a breath. “Well, it doesn’t matter. Once I find Talia , I’m cutting all ties with Noah.”

I’m even considering transferring to another school once all this Talia drama is over. After the year I’ve had, this stress is too fucking much. Nothing is worth risking my mental health–not even a full scholarship to one of the best schools in the country.

Nothing.

I’ve worked too hard to get back to a place where I can even get out of bed in the mornings. And if I’m being honest with myself, my mental health is still pretty fragile. It wouldn’t take much to throw me back into an emotional spiral.

“Breaking ties wouldn't be a bad idea,” she says. “But I wouldn’t get too attached to the idea of freedom. Noah doesn’t seem like a guy who just lets people walk away—unless he’s the one to walk away first. That’s what I’ve heard, anyway.”

I sigh. “Yeah. ”

I turn toward my dresser, and sift through my drawers, looking for something to wear tonight. I don’t have any clean pants, so I opt for a long skirt, graphic “fuck the patriarchy” baby-T (it feels appropriate), a short- waisted jacket, and sneakers. Easy. Casual. I have no idea what kind of get-

together Noah is taking me to, but everything here in Southern California is casual—so it’s a safe bet.

By the time I’m dressed, and I have my makeup freshened up, it’s a little past eight o’clock and my phone is blowing up. Several texts from Noah light up my screen.

I’m downstairs.

At the curb.

Are you coming down?

Don’t make me come get you.

With a huff, I type out a quick text.

Omw ffs.

This guy is so high-strung. Jezus.

I don’t even bother taking my wallet. If I need money, then Noah can fucking pay. I didn’t ask to tag along. I was ordered to attend, so he can pay for my shit. Besides, I have my credit card on my phone—so if I’m really in a pinch, I can use that.

“Okay, I’ll be back at some point tonight,” I say to Emily .

“Have fun,” she says. “Try not to worry about Talia . Her mom is probably right. She’ll turn up in a day or two.”

“Thanks, “ I say. Not worrying about Talia is going to be next to impossible, but I’m going to try and shove my concerns away—if only for the night.

As I walk out the door, before I shut it, I twist and poke my head back in. “If I’m not back by morning, I’m telling you right now, something is wrong, and you should absolutely worry.”

Emily laughs. “Okay. Got it.”

I click the door shut and suck in a breath. I feel like I’ve been doing that a lot lately–just trying to catch my breath.

Noah is downstairs, his car parked as close to the building as possible.

He’s leaning against the shiny sportscar—I don’t even know what brand it

is. That’s how clueless I am about cars. And with no visible logo, all I can be sure of is that it’s probably very expensive.

As I walk up to the car slowly, I take a second to admire Noah’s physique. I’d never admit this out loud, but he’s pretty fucking hot. He’s wearing dark jeans that hug his muscular thighs and a black t-shirt. His arms are crossed over his chest, his sculpted biceps pulling at the sleeves.

He must work out. I can’t imagine when he’d have time—what with all his lying around being worshipped. That must be very time-consuming. But it’s clear he finds some time for the gym.

“Hey,” I say when I’m within a few feet of him.

He moves to the passenger-side door and opens it for me. “I said eight.” “And I said I didn’t want to come.” I slip into the passenger seat. “So I

guess neither of us got what we wanted.”

With a low growl, he shoves my car door shut and walks around to the other side of the car. In the two seconds I’m alone in the car, I close my eyes, and again, take in a deep breath.

Somehow, I can already tell—tonight is going to be a shitshow.

WE DRIVE in silence for about five minutes, before pulling up to a parking lot behind a nondescript building, painted black. Honestly, if the parking lot wasn’t packed full, I’d assume the building was abandoned.

We pull around the end of the lot, where a valet is waiting. Noah cuts the engine then pulls something out of the center console and hands it to me. “You’ll need this.”

I glance down at my own fucking face. It’s the photo from my school ID. But this isn’t a university card. This is a driver’s license with all of my correct information—with one exception. My birthday is the same, but my birth year is three years earlier, making me twenty-one.

I glance up at Noah. “Uh, where’d you get this?”

It looks legit—completely real. It shouldn’t surprise me that Noah would have access to fake IDs, but damn. This is sophisticated.

He shrugs one shoulder, as he opens the driver’s door. “I know people. ” Yeah, wow. Okay. I guess that explains what we’re doing tonight. And, that doesn’t thrill me, because, by nature, I’m a rule follower. Walking into

a bar or club with a fake ID makes me twitch. But I’m not even going to lie–after the last couple of days I’ve had, I could use a stiff drink. Or three.

And the idea of being in a public space with Noah is pretty appealing. Because, with other people around, shit can’t get too crazy, right? And unlike ExU, he can’t own everyone inside this club. I hope he can’t, anyway.

Noah tosses his keys to the valet and comes around to open my door. His car is really low to the ground, so he offers his hand to help me out. I ignore it, though. I’m sure it doesn’t look very graceful, but I use the open door to haul myself out of the bucket seat.

Noah lets his hand fall with a scowl, but he doesn’t say anything. He leads me up to the plain black building. There’s a bouncer just inside the door, and we hand him our fake IDs. He glances at them, shining a flashlight over mine, then he passes them back and waves us by. “Welcome back, Mr. Rush,” the bouncer says.

Noah doesn’t say anything, but he does take my hand, and guide me through the busy club. It’s dark, and loud techno music vibrates off the walls.

Unconsciously, my fingers tighten around Noah’s large hand. He’s warm, and strong, and gives me an anchor amid the chaos.

Most of the people here are our age, and I wonder if the fake IDs are just a farce. I mean, the club owners have to know that most of their patrons are under twenty-one. But if we can present convincing IDs, then I guess there’s plausible deniability on their part. Either that or they just don’t care. Money is money, right? And what's the likelihood they’re going to be raided? The gamble is worth the gain, I guess.

Noah leads me to a table, where his friends are all assembled— Nick, Jolly, and Nicholas. Their table is off to the side, a bit, so it’s a little quieter here, thank goodness.

There are also several girls sitting with the guys. Two blonds are draped over Nick, and both Jolly and Nicholas, have brunettes perched on their laps. Both are beautiful with long hair, short dresses, and perfectly manicured nails.

I feel a bit underdressed, which pokes a huge, gaping hole in my theory that Southern California is always casual.

When we walk up, Nicholas holds his hand up in the air. “Yo! Noah, my man. You finally fucking made it.”

One of the other guys, Jolly, reaches over and fist-bumps Noah. Then his icy gaze darts to me, and on instinct, I stiffen as his eyes slide over me critically. I can practically feel his disapproval, and I can’t help but feel like he’s expressing what everyone else in the group is feeling—they’re just less obvious about it.

“Oh, hey, Harlow !” a voice chimes from behind me. I turn to see Wyn teetering up on a pair of high heels, six very full shot glasses in her hands. As she walks, alcohol sloshes over the lip of the tiny glasses.

The second I see her, relief washes over me. At least there’s one friendly face here. I reach over and grab a couple of the shot glasses from her hands before she ends up spilling them. I set them on the table.

“Phew! Thanks,” she says, setting the rest of them down.

The guy I met at the party yesterday, Nathan, comes up behind her, his hands also laden with shot glasses.

“Hey,” he says, handing me and Noah each a shot. I take it, and he passes the rest around. Noah throws his back immediately, then takes my hand, and guides me to the booth-side of the table, where there’s space for us both to sit down. It looks like the group may have deliberately left these spots empty for us—just another sign of deference to their campus king, I guess.

I scootch into my spot, trying not to spill my drink, and Noah slides in next to me, cadging me in between him and the wall. He slings his arm around me, tugging me against him, and again I stiffen. This is literally the last place I want to be. This feels like a den of vipers, and I’m smack in the middle of it.

Noah dips his head, and whispers in my ear, “Relax. Take your shot.

It’ll help.”

I swallow, and do as I’m told, tipping my head back quickly to slam the shot. It’s straight whiskey, and it burns a path down my throat. I lurch forward, and cough, and as I struggle to breathe, Noah takes the shot glass from my hand.

Everyone around me erupts into a riot of laughter.

“Dude!” Nicholas laughs, holding his stomach. “Did you see her fucking face? Oh, man, that was funny as hell.”

Jolly is also laughing. “Holy shit. Noah selected a girl who doesn’t

drink. What are the fucking odds?”

Noah is just leaning back, amused by this whole scene. Fucking assholes.

“I drink,” I say defensively.

“Oh, shut the fuck up,” Wyn says to the guys, tucked up against her boyfriend, Gabriel. He doesn’t seem to be drinking, but there are a couple of empty shot glasses in front of her. I guess she already drank hers. “You guys are such assholes. So she doesn’t drink like a fucking fish. Why is that so funny?”

She glances over at me and rolls her eyes, secretly apologizing for their pig-headedness. Or if not that, then at least, commiserating with me.

It doesn’t escape my notice, though, that she’s the only girl to speak up. The others are just sipping on their cocktails, silent. Almost like they’re non-player characters in some kind of game. It’s fucking weird. But the vibe I’m getting is that even if they did speak up, they’d be quickly silenced.

Wyn doesn’t seem to give a fuck. She’s beautiful and outspoken, and the guys just seem to accept that about her. She definitely stands out from the crowd, and I can’t help but admire her for that.

Nick reaches over and pulls her against him—tearing her out of her boyfriend's arms. They both laugh, but Gabriel doesn’t look amused.

“Yo, don’t you have a consort floating around somewhere?” Gabriel says angrily. He pulls Wyn back toward him, throwing his arm back over her shoulder.

Nick just laughs, and there is a woman sitting next to him—I wonder if she’s the girl he chose last night?

“Whatever,” Nick says. “It’s just funny because I don’t think Noah has ever been with someone so…” His judgmental gaze flicks over me. “...wholesome.”

Okay, wholesome isn’t bad, generally, but the way he says it makes it sound like a cardinal-fucking-sin. Like anyone who isn’t wearing a short skirt and three layers of makeup is a boring chick who isn’t worth their time.

“I’m not all that wholesome,” I spit back. “I’ve been through some shit.”

I don’t know why I care what these assholes think of me, but I feel compelled to defend myself. The last year has been hell, and after all that, if

there’s anything I’m not, it’s wholesome. It changed me in ways I’m still struggling to come to terms with.

Nick sobers a bit, and a flash of pure vitriol sparks in his eyes. “You know what, I bet you’re right. I bet you have a cruel streak in you. I bet behind that innocent facade, there’s a viciousness that even you have difficulty facing in the mirror.”

Everyone in our group has stopped talking, and all eyes are on me, waiting for me to respond, but I can’t seem to find my voice. His dark words have paralyzed me. I can tell by the look in his eyes, and the conviction in his voice, that he believes what he said. That I’m vicious.

Oh, he has no idea just how vicious I can be.

[kwonzoshi]

I had this idea, and I HAD to dot it. It may not be good, but yeah here is a blurb of an AU:

Simon sighed, staring at his phone. He probably should’ve blocked Wilhelm by now but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. He stared at the texts they shared, and as usual, an ache built in his chest. Simon didn’t know why he even replied, all it did was make things worse.

Simon didn’t even know how to respond to the last text, so he didn’t. He put his phone down on his bed, rubbing his hands over his face. He laid there for a moment, hands still covering his face as he replayed the messages in his head. There was a soft knock on his door. He lowered his hands and glanced over at his sister, Sara. 

“You okay?” she asked, quietly entering his room and plopping down on his bed next to him. 

Simon sighed, “I honestly don’t know,” he said, sitting up and laying his head on her shoulder. “I keep re-reading our messages and I hate it but what he’s saying makes sense. It just sucks that I’m the only one dealing with any consequences.” Sara laid her head on top of his, taking in a deep breath as she listened, “He hurt you, Simon. That hurt doesn’t disappear just because he has a duty to the crown. Whatever you choose to do, I’ll support you but it’s also okay if you just do nothing. It’s your choice.” She placed her hand on her brother’s knee, gently giving it a pat. 

“He told me he loved me,” Simon confessed, lifting his head and turning to look at her, “before he left, and all I said was ‘I hope you have a nice Christmas’. Who does that?” He groaned, covering his face again.

“Really?” Sara asked, brows furrowing. “Do you think he really does?”

“I don’t know…” he sat back up, locking eyes with her. “I feel like if he did he wouldn’t have made the statement and left me to handle it all alone. I mean people still stare at me when I go to the grocery store.” 

“You think you’ll ever be able to forgive him?” She asked.

Simon shrugged, biting the inside of his lip. He really didn’t know and he wasn’t going to figure it out today. “Wanna go bother mom? See if she’ll make us some cookies or something?” Sara nodded, smiling as she stood, reaching out a hand. “Maybe we can convince her to make tres leches?” She wiggled her eyebrows. Simon laughed, taking her hand and following her out of his room, putting the whole thing in the back of his mind. 

Several days later: 

Wilhelm’s POV:

Wilhelm laid in his bed as he stared at the last message he sent, which Simon didn’t grace with a response. He’d been going back and forth on what to do. All he wanted was to be with Simon, but he fucked up. He did the one thing he told Simon he wouldn’t do and he regretted it as soon as he did it. He ran his hand through his hair in frustration, switching to the photos app and looking at the few photos he had of them. He broke the trust they had and that was going to be hard to fix, but he needed to do something.

He ranted to Felice about this whole situation and while her advice was solid, he was still scared. His brother died tragically and now his family felt it was stuck with him as the crown prince. Any mistake he made, big or small, put him in deeper and deeper shit with the royal court. He was under the microscope even more than before. No matter what he did, he was never going to be seen as suited for this role, he was never going to be Erik, so why should he let them ruin the one thing that’s ever made him happy in his entire life? 

Meeting and loving Simon was life-changing, and losing him because of something he was forced to do, was devastating in ways he couldn’t put into words. Felice told him to follow his heart, and his heart was Simon’s, there was no question about it. He stared at his favorite photo of them, caressing the phone. At that moment, the decision was made, he sat up and opened Instagram. He began typing without giving it a second thought. Once finished, and posted, he stared at the post for a few moments before sending Simon a message.

Simon’s POV: 

Simon made his way onto the bus, showing the driver his pass before making his way to a seat in the back. He was listening to music to drown out the chatter and city noise, when his phone vibrated. He glanced at the notification, his heart racing as he saw that it was from Wille. He took a deep breath, opening it. 

His brows furrowed in confusion as he switched to instagram, clicking Wilhelm’s profile. His eyes narrowed slightly as he saw the most recent photo, clicking it. His jaw dropped and his eyes widened in shock.

His eyes filled with tears as he read that caption and after a few moments, he responded to the post with the three words he wished he’d said before Christmas break. He stared at the post in disbelief a moment longer. He… confessed..Simon thought as the tears cascaded down his face. He switched back to his messaging app:

Simon stared out the window and wiped his tears away, a giant smile on his face. He didn’t know what would happen next but at least he could trust that Wilhelm was going to be right beside him through it all.

He didn’t have a single doubt about it.

(Part 1 of ??)

[plaexus]

I am not gonna try to convince anyone of jmj being real bc honestly what do we know and beyond, the people that have doubts, what would take for them to be convinced they are real!? They won’t come out given the industry they’re in and their current A lister status so anything else can be written off as either not solid enough or fanservice. If they were to playfully call eo girlfriend no one would believe them, everyone would assume they are trolling. They wont post pics kissing or doing anything like that so honestly what would make believers believe? Even if they were to be confirmed to be living together, spotted holding hands, etc etc, everything could be explained away by long term friends and members… like you wont ever get explicit confirmation.

At the end of the day, we will never know, but it all comes down to how each one of us understands and looks at friendships, relationships, flirtations and crushes. Jmj might do sth that for sb is incredibly lover coded bc they only do that with their so, but for others is bestie coded, bc they do it with their bffs. That doesn’t negate anyone’s experience, everyone perceives them differently.

Jm is a playful and affectionate person and ofc she’s gonna show those traits with other people that she’s close to as well. So yea she’ll hold other girls’ waist, however what to me is telling is the shyness and awkwardness that sometimes comes along with jiminjeong’s skinship in public. You’ll never see jm second guess so much with aeri or ning or other female idols she’s close with (ry i guess).

https://x.com/_bluustar/status/1918279134276722982?s=46 moments like these are also pretty much jmj exclusive territory and i agree with that anon, the vibes that jmj emit when they do live vs other duos are very telling bc there’s only one that makes you feel you are third wheeling and we all know which one it is.

Also only talking about jm isnt fair, it’s a two person thing and there is little doubt in my mind mj favors jm the most. https://x.com/whtkmj/status/1917589525137850788?s=46 look at how adorably she gets nervous when jm teases her or how she searches for skin contact while being playful. Jm is the only member she’s posted on her ig, and she’s done very intentional things (like saying she will never get tired of blue while mentioning jm, posting her back to back when everyone was talking about the 2yu collab, going on weverse and responding to a random fan saying she liked karina too…), not to mention her so very obvious puppy crush on jm when they were rookies and how “jealous “ she got when she didn’t have her full attention…

Obviously none of this will help you be convinced they are real, but trust they have the least platonic relationship ever possible. I have no idea what labels they have with eo, but the way they look at eo, flirt, behave with one another leaves me very little doubt that there are feelings beyond deep appreciation as friends.

yeah, we'll never know the full extent of their bond. and ultimately, it doesn't matter what the truth is. we should be able to enjoy (and be respectful about) shipping them no matter what. i ship jmj not because of any particular piece of "evidence" we have of them, but because of the constellation of overt and subtle ways we see them just care for each other. because of that, when we don't get a particular form of affection from them (e.g. lovestagrams or them mentioning each other on bubble or wevere), i have a whole lot of other things to anchor my shipping on (e.g. tender and charged gazes, the mutual downbadism, etc.). i think hinging one's evaluation of jmj's bond on any single specific thing is a disservice to how great of a ship they are. people would say "oh they're not all that" or that they're fs or whatever when there are dry spells. but real jmj fans get them because of the greater picture painted by their entire history together (known to us)

[forevfangirlwrites]

I have an idea for hthf. So, Percy comes to set so often that like the security guards know him by name and he starts like helping out with little things that the crew needs done like maybe he like cleans up a spill or something, and then he gradually starts to doing more until he’s like fixing things for them, and Annabeth doesn’t realize he’s doing it until they take a break and he’s like “I’ll be there in a sec, I have to do this for bill.” And she’s like “Bill?? The assistant?” Maybe it’s cringey. It made more sense in my head. Love all of your work!! Take care of yourself!! ❤️❤️❤️

Percy tries not to be the annoying boyfriend who constantly shows up to his girlfriend's workplace and makes himself a nuisance.

But she always lets him know he has an open invitation to stop by and honestly, sometimes he can’t help but miss his girlfriend. (Especially if she’s had long days back-to-back and been coming home too late for them to really have quality time).

So he shows up to the set because even though she’ll be busy, it’ll be the most he’ll have seen of her in the past three days.

As always, he makes an effort to blend in with the background so as not to cause problems, and watches Annabeth as she goes over something with the director.

Her blonde hair is in a ponytail for the shot, giving him a clear view of her face. A pang runs through his heart at how tired she looks, even though he knows part of that is the styling.

But even then, he knows how long her days—

Someone bumps into him breaking his train of thought and he looks to the right just in time to catch a mic stand about to fall to the ground.

The guys who had been carrying it, along with an amp, lets out a sigh of relief when Percy catches it.

“Sorry,” he mumbles. “I didn’t see you there.”

Percy smiles back. “No worries, that was my intention but I didn’t mean to get in the way. Let me help you with this.”

The guys gives him a once over before shrugging and nodding for him to follow so Percy trails behind him carrying the mic stand.

They come to a stop at the far side of the set, away from the main action filled with a bunch of other equipment.

“Nico!” A woman calls as soon as they each the area. She’s holding a clipboard and surveying the floor. “Can you get more props from the van, anything marked with a green sticker.”

Nico, he’s assuming is the name of the guy, doesn’t respond, just sets down his things and takes the mic stand from Percy to set it down too.

Then he turns and starts to walk back leaving Percy standing there awkwardly for a second before he runs to catch up with Nico.

“Hey, did you want more help?” Nico stops short, clearly surprised to still see Percy there. His dark eyes once again scan him in a way that makes Percy feel a little scrutinized. “You’re Annabeth’s boyfriend?”

It always surprises Percy when he gets recognized since it so rarely happens that he probably does a bad job of hiding the surprise.

Unintentionally his eyes flick back to Annabeth, still in a serious discussion. “Yeah,” he responds, turning back to Nico. “I just came to watch but I really don’t mind helping. I feel bad for causing trouble.”

Nico raises an eyebrow at him but begins to walk again, nodding his head to indicate Percy should follow.

After a moment of silence, he speaks up. “You haven’t caused trouble.”

No maybe not, but Percy always feels a little out of place at a set.

“You ran into me cause I was in the way,” he responds as they step outside.

Nico shoots him another side glance. “You’re weird.”

KEEP READING ON AO3

A/N: thank you for the prompt! It was super cute (not cringey) and I hope you liked how it turned out and sorry it took so long for me to get to it! Thanks again!

[matt-imagines-popcorn]

Could I request some Sakura romantic headcannons

Hell yeah of course! tbh I didn't know too much of her outside of her design so researching more about her was such a treat! Thank you for the request!!!

Being in a relationship with Sakura [Gender-Neutral! Reader]

Back when Sakura first started her journey, when she was younger, she didn’t peculiarly care about relationships. Of course, it’ll be nice to be in one! Don’t get her wrong! It just wasn’t her top priority at that moment. Now that she's older, and a bit more mature, it became something she thought a lot about. 

However, Sakura is still very much oblivious to the whole flirting deal - she doesn’t catch on immediately, but when she does oh man she feels embarrassed! She can’t handle it!!! It's a double edge sword for her - she enjoys it but at the same time, she has no idea how to respond aside from getting flustered. It’s cute though. 

PDA isn’t too much of a big deal to Sakura - oftentimes she will grab their partner’s hand without a care in the world and sometimes even gives them a quick smooch on their cheek! But that's the fairest she’ll go on it, since she can get quite flustered about it. (However, she has no problems with her partner being more affectionate in public!)

If you are as interested as she is in the sport of street fighting, she’s more than happy to teach/spare with you and fully supports you if you want to enter fighting tournaments - just don’t forget about her! Though if you only want to watch her that's fine too! You’re her #1 fan!

If she knows that her partner will be at her tournament she looks for them in the crowd - once she spots them she’ll yell their name, shaking her arms around and jumping about - much to your embarrassment. If she wins she’ll run right towards you the first chance she gets and spins you around, the burst of spirit may even be enough to make her smooch you. 

Ideally, the perfect date with her would just have to be fast food - of course, she’s not going to object if you have a more romantic date in mind - but Sakura, especially more now, is deadbeat tired most days and honestly, simply chatting with someone is enough to satisfy her. 

Reblogs are greatly appreciated!!!

[authordanielleforrest]

Fated Mates of the Drakoan: Episode 13

Van latched onto Davin’s arm the moment they started walking, holding him back so they could talk, a talk Davin had been avoiding all day. 

To make matters worse, he could physically feel every foot of distance separating them as Jess got farther and farther ahead. It felt wrong, and he wanted to close the distance, but Van wouldn’t be budged.

“Do you have any idea how bad your timing is?” Van said, his voice barely raising above a whisper.

Davin laughed. Yes, he knew, but there were just some things in life you couldn’t control and this was one of them. He wished he could have just pretended it didn’t happen, that he hadn’t caught her scent, but Drakoans weren’t built that way. They’d developed entire classes of medications exactly because there was essentially no controlling themselves once that instinct kicked in. So when it had happened to him, he’d tried. He’d honestly tried, but he’d barely been able to think, and the moment he’d let down his guard, he’d succumbed. “I’m sorry.”

Van sighed, a compassionate expression crossing his face as his voice softened. “You could have told me. I’m your friend, Davin.”

“I know,” he said as a lot of the tension drained from his body. They’d been friends for years. They’d risen up the ranks together. If he’d been thinking, he would have told him.

But then he frowned. His memories were a bit murky, but he could swear he remembered specifically saying “mate” early on. It had been under his breath, but hadn’t Van asked him about it? His brain gnawed at the memory like an old bone, but with most of the day a hazy mess in his recollection, he wasn’t entirely sure.

Van sighed, drawing Davin’s attention and keeping him away from another thought spiral. “You can’t take her with you everywhere. You realize that, right?”

A part of him instinctually reeled back, but it didn’t have the same sway over him that it had earlier in the day. Slowly, he responded. “Yeah. Of course.”

Van shook his head, looking a little bewildered. “And yet you wouldn’t leave her behind. She’s safe at home, Davin. She’s safer there than anywhere else.”

Davin flinched, then his ire rose like a tsunami, and he snapped. “She’s safe with me!”

“No, she’s not,” Van barked back, getting in Davin’s face before seemingly remembering himself and pulling back to recover his calm. He took a deep breath, then continued. “We have no idea what’s going to happen. We have no idea what’s out there. But if there is a threat, it’ll probably encounter us first, and as long as she’s with us, she’ll be in danger if that happens.”

“It’s… not that simple.”  

Jess was far enough ahead now that he could think more clearly, her scent not clouding his mind. He knew rationally that Van was right, but he still couldn’t bring himself to be separated from her. A desperate part of him kept insisting that she was only safe with him, even though he knew intellectually that it wasn’t true. He could feel the pull of it, the urgency, the agonizing need that wouldn’t let go. “I just… can’t.”

“You can,” Van insisted, turning to face him. “You must. Davin, it’s for her own good. Hell, it’s for the good of the entire planet. The faster we finish our mission, the faster her life can return to normal.”

“And the faster we go home.” That thought was like a kick in the chest, knocking the air from his lungs.  

The faster we finish our mission, the less time I have to convince her.

He was supposed to go home, to Koa, when all this was done. Would Jess want to come with him? He wasn’t sure. He needed time, but his conscience ate at him for even thinking that. Giving himself time meant leaving countless humans in desperate situations. He couldn’t do that, could he? He couldn’t be that selfish, could he?

That’s not me.

It can’t be.

I’m a good man.

I’m a good soldier.

“Exactly. The only reason we’re here is to support Earth. Once she’s on her feet again, our jobs are done.” Van sighed. “I know that doesn’t sound the most appealing to you right now, but it’s our reality, Davin. We don’t have a choice.”

Davin shook his head, still not quite ready to give up even though he knew it was wrong. “I just need time.” The protest was weak, even to his own ears.

“Would it make any difference?” Van said, his voice gentle.

“What?” He looked up at Van, who was giving him a compassionate expression that made his heart lurch in his chest with emotion. That was not the expression of a supportive friend. That was an expression of condolence, of empathy and grief. “Don’t,” he snapped out in desperation.

“Davin…”

He shrugged Van’s hand off and started stomping away, disgusted with even the look of his friend right now. “No.”

“Davin!” Van barked. A moment later, his hand latched onto Davin’s arm, this time yanking him backward. Once Davin was facing him once more, this time completely stopped, his voice dropped to barely a whisper, while Davin fumed back at him. “You can’t control her actions. You can’t make her want you. You know how this usually goes on Koa. She doesn’t even have the benefit of our background, our knowledge. She can’t possibly know what’s going on.”

“She does,” he said through gritted teeth. “I told her.”

“And she understood? Do you think she really understands? Do you think it’s even possible that she could understand?”

A chill ran through him at Van’s words. They were the things he’d been trying not to think about. He’d been trying not to think about how often biological matings were rejected on Koa, telling himself that was cultural, that it wouldn’t happen here. He’d tried to tell himself that she would understand. And he’d absolutely refused to think of the future.  

But Van wasn’t letting him live in that little bubble anymore, that fantasy world of his own making. He was determined to bring him back to the real world, a world where people were without power, possibly without food and running water. A real world where anarchy was only a breath away. His mission was vital to ensuring that Earth returned to normal, that life here was returned to its former glory. He didn’t want to hear that, though. He didn’t want to think about it because it made the things he was feeling right now a hindrance and morally bankrupt.

What’s worse, his feelings, this mating, were actively hurting his mate. This was her home. If he focused on her, her home would continue to be without power. She would have to live in a world under constant threat of falling into chaos. How long would she survive like that? Months? Weeks?

“Davin?”

“I shouldn’t have let her come with us.”

“Yes. I know.” Van nodded. “She only came because you refused.”

“What?”

“She only came because you refused. Although, I’ll admit, I didn’t figure it out the very moment she offered, but it became pretty clear she was trying to get you to do the right thing.”

Davin sagged, the statement gutting him. “So she didn’t even want to come with us. She’s potentially risking her safety because I’m a useless ass?”

“I wouldn’t go that far, but yeah.”

He shook his head as pain bloomed, nearly suffocating him. “I have to let her go.”

“Yeah.”

Every part of his body felt locked in place, like it was unwilling to admit the truth. It took great effort to slowly relax each muscle. He unclenched his hands, his arms, legs, torso, and finally his jaw. “I don’t want to,” he said, a final plaintive cry before defeat inevitably dug its sharp claws into him for good.

Van shifted his hand, gripping Davin’s shoulder comfortingly. “I know, but it’s the right thing to do.”

#

Jess tried to ignore the fact that Davin and Van were behind her, talking quietly together like two teenage girls sharing gossip. It was a bit awkward, and she really wanted to be closer to Davin, but she suspected the two needed time to talk. She’d only just met him, but she was certain something wasn’t quite right with him. You didn’t get to be someone as high up as a commander without a certain degree of professionalism and discipline, discipline he seemed to completely lacking in since meeting her.

Because of our mating.

She couldn’t say she completely understood the mating. She could feel it, but it seemed simultaneously awe inspiring and baffling. How could two species that had no evolutionary common origin click so well together? How could a biological quirk of one species affect another completely unrelated one? It was so weird, but also fascinating.  

And why was it that she could literally feel every foot of distance between them, like a string tugging on her belly button? She reached down, touching the spot in question. Though, she supposed the sensation wasn’t that distinct or specific. It was more like a nagging thought in the back of her mind, foggy but annoyingly persistent.  

She glanced back. The others were now over a block behind her, and she stopped. Van had his hand on Davin’s arm, and they were talking intensely. Then his hand moved to Davin’s shoulder and all the energy oozed out of the conversation.  

Something just happened.

She wanted to smile in relief at the tension finally breaking, but she didn’t quite feel relief in that moment. Instead, her gut churned with anxiety like whatever had just been decided wasn’t good for her. She didn’t know why she felt that way, but she did, so she turned around and started moving toward the shuttle once more. It wasn’t that far now. In fact, she could see the first glimpses of the trees in the distance. It would probably be just another couple blocks.

Jess picked up her pace, eager to get this over with and put some distance between her and whatever decision those two had made. She focused, instead, on her surroundings. They were in a quiet neighborhood filled with boxy brick homes. Most had cars parked in the driveways, possibly never to be used again because the government had been dumb enough to launch nuclear bombs in their moment of desperation.  

What had they been thinking? The whole point of nuclear bombs was not to use them. They were a threat, the ultimate threat, but she couldn’t imagine anyone other than a psycho actually considering putting them in play.

And how many did they use?  How much of the world had been affected? Had it been an accident? Had just a single bomb detonated too low, causing this mess? But then, why wouldn’t someone have come to the rescue by now? If it had only been one bomb, wouldn’t other countries or FEMA or something come in to provide support?

Wait, Van had said they couldn’t reach anyone on Earth. He’d mentioned the satellite grid being knocked out, but that shouldn’t have knocked out all communication, right? There should have been back-up systems, maybe radios or something. Those satellites hadn’t existed back when the space program had first started. Whatever they’d used, it would have been slower, most likely, but they definitely could have tested that out in the time between the power going out and them coming down to Earth to investigate. Did that mean everyone was affected by the EMP?

Holy shit.

Jess slowed as a chill ran through her, her stomach churning anew.  

How the fuck are we gonna come back from this?

She looked around herself, at the quiet street that got more eerie the longer she thought about why it was so quiet. Ordinarily, it wouldn’t be this quiet. There wouldn’t be so many cars in the driveways. There would be people out socializing, going to bars or game nights. There would be people working night shifts. There would be lights on, people watching late night shows or streaming their favorite movies. People would be online playing video games. It would not be this dark, this quiet. There should be lights pouring out of windows. She should be able to hear music or conversations drifting on the warm summer air.

Instead, there was nothing. It was almost as if the world had ended, and she was the only one left. That chill from before ran down her spine, and she picked up her pace, jogging as she finally stepped onto the grassy park lawn. Pretty quickly, she spotted the shuttle. It stood out like a sore thumb in the sea of green, and she beelined for it.

It took only moments before she was slowing directly in front of it. She stopped and turned around, spotting her companions in the distance, even farther away than before. She had to wait for them to catch up.  

When they finally arrived, Davin wouldn’t look at her, so she turned to Van.

“So?”

“We were talking.”

She smirked. “I could tell.”

“We think you should go home.”

She paused. Her knee jerk reaction was to protest. She’d just arrived, after all. It seemed ridiculous to just turn back around and go home, but then she turned to Davin. There was a bit of a defeated air to him, but seeing him now also made her remember why she’d come in the first place.

To make him do the right thing.  

“You’re okay with this?” She watched him closely, looking for any signs that he would act up again, but this barely looked like the same man. There was no outrage this time, but he also didn’t look happy either. Honestly, he looked miserable. She was tempted to comfort him, to pull him into her arms and rock him back and forth until he was in a better mood, but she was afraid that might set back their progress.

“Yes,” he finally said. He looked at her for a brief moment, but that moment was enough. She could see the struggle in his eyes. This was not an easy decision for him, and she resisted the urge to smile.  

Jess kept her face composed, but inside, she was practically jumping up and down, and she blamed it on the mating. She didn’t want this to be an easy decision for him. She wanted him to struggle because this was a struggle for her as well, and she didn’t want this to be over so soon. Though she had no way of knowing where this would go, she did want it to go somewhere, and she hoped, when all this was said and done, that he would come back to her.

“And you’re just going to continue with your mission? You’re not going to come after me?” She had mixed feelings as she spoke those words into existence. She wanted him to come after her, but she knew he needed to stay away. Earth needed him, after all, and she just wasn’t selfish enough to ignore that.

“No.” He shook his head jerkily. “The mission comes first.”

Jess nodded slowly, surprised by the slice of hurt that flared up when he said those words, but she shoved it down ruthlessly. She’d already decided on this path. She had no right to be upset. The mission was more important, she reminded herself. If he were an American soldier, she would want him to put the mission first when he was on active duty, wouldn’t she? She wouldn’t want his head to be filled with her, putting him, his team, and his mission at risk, would she? “Okay,” she said finally. “Well, good luck. I hope to see you again soon. Stay safe, Davin.”

They both paused for a moment, neither of them willing to turn away.

I should walk away.

It’s time to walk away.

“Should I walk you home?” he asked, looking off into the night, then back at her.

An awkward laugh snapped out of her, and she shook her head. “No, I think that would be a bad idea.” 

No, they needed a clean break, and this seemed the best time for it.

Davin nodded, accepting her decision and taking a step back, as if he needed that physical reminder not to follow.

Jess turned, putting her back to him. Those first steps were hard. She could feel that imaginary string stretching with each step, and as she started walking, she could also feel their eyes on her. It was a feeling that never quite went away, not even when she unlocked her front door and went inside. It was both comforting and creepy.  

Was it just her imagination, though? Was walking through the empty night just playing tricks on her mind?  

Or was it wishful thinking? A part of her kind of liked the idea of Davin being there to protect her if some ne’er-do-well jumped out of the shadows, but he’d told her he wouldn’t. He’d essentially promised. Would he break a promise like that?

She honestly couldn’t believe he would. Though she barely knew him, she’d already formed a picture of him in her mind that was both honorable and kind. She couldn’t imagine someone like that going back on their word or stalking behind someone in the night without their knowledge.

And yet, that idea plagued her as she walked quietly upstairs and settled into bed. She couldn’t quite escape it as she stared at the ceiling, willing herself to sleep. The popcorn texture formed patterns over her head as thoughts swirled in her brain, tormenting her with possibilities, both good and bad. By the time she finally succumbed to exhaustion, only one remaining thought was floating through her mind.

Do I even want him to keep his promise?

[miracleweaponhunt]

Miracle Weapon Hunt Chapter 25: Vannana Castle

Hello, dream world.

Roxanne was once again trapped in the world of her own mind. The light figure began darting around the space around her, finally having the words “YOU’RE NOTHING.” rattle in her mind with such intensity that she was forced to the floor. The being slowly faded into nothingness as the tendrils started erupting around her, forcing her to sink to the ground.

“What is going on back there?” Freyja asked quickly. It was the first thing Roxanne heard when she came to besides her own screams.

“It’s just night terrors, relax.” Julian replied casually, trying to shoo away Willow who was clearly freaking out at her guest drooling all over her floor out of nowhere.

“Drain the saliva…sit her upright.” Julian mumbled to himself, setting Roxanne up on the airships couch.

“And she’s fine?” Willow asked.

“Yeah, this just happens.” Roxanne nodded as she tried to adjust to being alive. “I just have really weird nightmares sometimes, no big deal.”

“It’s shocking how used to it you get.” Cassandra added, barely looking up from the book she was reading. Something about proper interiors for large spaces. Sounded kind of boring, honestly.

“Interesting.” Freyja said emotionlessly, with Willow glaring at her from behind. “Regardless, she’ll have plenty of time to recover now that we’re here.”

Cassandra looked out of the airships window, and they were approaching the Vannana Grand. A giant metal wall hiding a small ocean, and in the centre was the main hub of houses and shops, with the castle in the middle of it. And away from the main landmass was what seemed to be a few smaller islands. They flew over the chilly looking people dressed in winter coats as the airships lowered to the top of Vannana castle.

Julian could instantly see his breath as he left the airship, the chill somehow making its way through his incredibly worn-out clothes.

“I missed this place so much.” He mumbled sarcastically to nobody in particular.

“You get used to it.” Willow said as she walked out in just a grey hoodie.

“You’ll be inside for the most part, I wouldn’t worry.” Freyja said calmly. She looked around her ship and saw two airships parked inside. One from Ropear and one from Sandala.

“Ah, the first arrivals.”

They descended a staircase into the top floor of the palace where all the rooms were. Calming blue walls and doors upon doors upon doors.

“So which is gonna be my room?” Roxanne asked Willow.

“Well, this part is for me and my siblings, guests sleep on the floor below.”

“I’m sorry, your siblings?” Cassandra asked. “The whole floor?”

“Yeah. My mom has eight husbands and twelve other kids, we need a lot of space.”

“I’m sorry, eight husbands?”

“If I remember correctly, it’s a cultural thing.” Julian added. “It’s meant to signify the peace between the grands or something.”

“Right on the money, mister Julian. Also, one of my sisters has a massive crush on you from your hero days, so just watch out for the Ropeara looking one, got it?”

“Understood.” Julian sighed, already looking exasperated.

“And speaking of the other kids, here’s Donal.” Willow said, picking up the toddler crawling around under the watch of a butler. “Two years old, second youngest, half Saoloran.”

“Aw, how’s it going little guy?” Cassandra asked as she lowered herself to his level. Donal responded by pulling her hair and refusing to let go.

“Okay, let’s not…ow…pull at…ow…our…Willow, why is the toddler so strong?!”

“No idea.” Willow replied, tickling him in the hope he lets go, which luckily worked.

“He a wielder?” Julian asked.

“No clue, got two that are for sure, though.”

“Sounds right.” Julian nodded.

“Willow, can you hand me Donal?” Freyja asked as the kid was handed to her “Downstairs?” Freyja said over the phone. “Understood, I’ll get them to you.”

She hung up and started soothing Donal. “You three know Kazumi Wado? She’s here in the dining room, go meet her.”

The three descended yet more stairs into the bottom floor. They were looking at the door out to Vannana itself, but they had to go to the dining room, which a servant politely told them was on their right.

In there was a dining room with calming blue walls and a door leading into the kitchen, alongside a large fish tank with very large looking fish swimming inside it. There were one long wooden table in the middle, alongside about twenty smaller circular tables. It was on one of these tables that four people were seated. One was Kazumi in all her glory, wearing a bright yellow t-shirt and jeans, eating with Nuria and a short man who must be her son, as well as a larger well-dressed man who must be her husband.

“Excuse me, we’re the Miracle Scouting Group.” Julian said quietly with a quick tap on the shoulder.

“Hm, what’s that?” Kazumi asked, turning around so quickly that the fish in her mouth went down too quickly, making her have to force it down with a few self-inflicted punches to the chest.

“Oh, so you are.” Regaining her regal composure just as quickly as she lost it. “How’s my axe doing?”

“It’s doing pretty good.” Cassandra confirmed calmly.

“Excellent, excellent.” Kazumi replied. “Now, there’s one issue I need to deal with if you’ll let me.”

“And that would be?” Julian asked.

“Oh, that would be the citizenships, right?” Roxanne asked.

“Correct.” Kazumi replied with a finger snap. “If I can just go to my room and get the papers, that’d be great.”

Kazumi left to get them, and the three sat down next to Nuria.

“So, you three are the protecters, huh?” Nuria asked.

“We are.” Cassandra replied as they sat down.

“Excellent, how’s that going?”

“About as good as it can, I guess?” Julian replied. “All that’s happened so far is a broken leg, so we’re doing better than we could be.”

“And you must be the best one here, seeing as you were with the Battlestorms.”

“I…was with them, yes.” Julian nodded slowly. “We’ve parted ways for a while now.”

“Were you with them before or after they stopped that attack on Gurut?” Her son asked.

“After. A lot after.” Julian said. “Anyway, how’s the fish? Must be good here.”

“I’ve always been of the opinion that Saoloro is where to go for fish instead of here, but it’s not that bad here either.”

“Wow, that’s a take.” Julian said quickly, darting his eye back to the door Kazumi left from.

“So, you must be Willow’s date.” Roxanne said to Nuria’s son. “So uh, what would your name be?”

“Javier.” The boy replied. He was pretty normal looking, with a small afro, black rimmed glasses and a red flannel shirt, like something you’d find anywhere instead of the textile hub of the Skies.

“So I’m guessing you’re excited to date Willow, huh? She is certainly…something special.”

“I guess.” Javier nodded, looking more confused as he finished his meal. “I’m just here as a favour.”

“Oh, right.” Roxanne ended the conversation, joining Julian in staring at the door for Kazumi. And as if by magic, she appeared holding three documents in her hand.

“Okay, if the three of you would sign here to let you keep the axe, that’d be great.”

The three members signed their documents and were officially crowned as citizens of Sandala.

“Woah, I’m like…a person now.” Julian said cooly.

“Also, the cameras were still on during the invasion. I’ll let the generator theft slide.”

“Look…I mean…scouting groups don’t really get many resources, so we just kind of.” Cassandra started.

“Off brand scouting ship, we know.” Javier said. “I’m honestly shocked you guys didn’t get shut down.”

“It’s because they made the Battlestorms, I think.” Nuria replied.

“Yeah, that’s it.” Julian nodded. “Got a couple grants from the Lux, but the bosses wanted more, you know? Then they got murdered by the legion.”

“What’s this about the Lux?”

Julian turned around to see Freyja and Willow standing near them.

“Nothing in particular, we were just discussing the scouting ships.”

“The glorified kidnapping schemes?” Freyja asked.

“Yeah, those ones.”

“Well, it seems the other members of the Lux Congregation won’t be getting here until later, so now it’s up to me to train you in acting in the presence of royalty.”

The three all looked towards Willow, who shook her head defeated.

“I tried to stop her, but you’re all stuck here.”

[quibbs126]

This is the other kid I wanted to do today, her name is Wild Pepper Cookie

So originally, her name was Dark Pepper, in reference to black pepper, which is what’s used in pepper shakers, and that’s what Werewolf has in his dough (this was before Peppercorn came out), and of course, the Dark part is there because Dark Choco. But at some point I changed it to Wild Pepper, though I don’t remember why, and I guess it just stuck or sounded better (though now that I think about it, Dark Pepper could still work fine)

I’ll just show black pepper:

Anyways, so I had always planned on making her hair short and black but putting the little pepper bits in, and that’s what I did. I also wanted to give her a big fluffy cape, like Werewolf and Dark Cacao, but I don’t think I made it fluffy enough

As for the purple eyes, to be honest I just didn’t want to make her eyes red, since I feel like I do that too often with my Dark Choco fankids. But giving her blue eyes would make her look too much like Werewolf, so I made them purple, though not the same dark purple as Dark Cacao

I’ll be honest, other than the dark parts of the colors, I just sort of slapped something together with her outfit. I asked my friend for advice on the colors, but she’s halfway around the world right now and it’ll be a while before she responds, and I thought the colors looked fine enough, so I just decided to post as is. Though if she gives me better ideas I’ll edit this with new colors

And honestly, same goes for the outfit outside of the cape, I just sort of threw something together

I swear, that’s my biggest problem with these guys, I never know what to make them wear, and I usually come up with something I don’t find that great

Anyways, so why don’t we just talk about Wild Pepper?

So she’s a little girl living with her dads. I imagine they’re living around the woods or something, as they just want a quiet life. She loves to explore the woods and find bugs, as shown in the sketch, often watching them and playing with little animals she finds. She usually comes home a mess from her explorations, but it’s all good. She’s a very friendly and energetic child, and she’d probably ask a lot of questions to random strangers she meets. She’ll also help out around the house if need be. Her parents love her very much

Anyways, so I’m sure you can see in one of the sketches, she has a wolf form as well, however it’s more of a shadow than a normal wolf. I basically was trying to mix together Werewolf’s wolf form and Berserk Dark Cacao. When she first did this, it definitely scared her parents, as they weren’t sure what would happen. Though fortunately, she’s relatively harmless like this, just a big shadow pupper. I think she turns like this when she sneezes, but I might change that. I was also considering the idea she can teleport short distances in the form, but I’m not sure why or if I’ll keep that. But I want her to have shadow-y powers

Also as you can see, I don’t know how to design werewolves. Her design will probably change

But also, speaking of her wolf form, I had the idea that while it’s harmless now, as she grows older, the form only grows stronger, gaining lightning powers as well over time (also, her shadow eyes eventually shift to red instead of white). Not only that, but the form grows huge, much bigger than Werewolf’s ever got. And over time, as it grows stronger, she has less control over it until one day she loses control and basically goes berserk. Though if I’m being honest, I’m not sure I want to keep it. I like the idea in principle, but also I feel like the culmination is just too similar to Werewolf’s whole backstory, and she’ll just be another him

But yeah, I think that’s all I got for her, I hope you like her!

[valkyurii]

It's kinda funny the way the game emphasises how nerfed Malenia is. You talk to Gideon and he suggests she may be dead. You meet Millicent right at the Haligtree and she implies Malenia has lost her sense of self. You enter the boss room and she's still in slumber. Her prosthesis isn't attached. The game's like, "This swordswoman hasn't picked up her sword for years." Finally finally when you defeat her, the game says, "Oh btw her Rune is also nerfed. It's only working because of her spirit."

It’s the game trying to trick us into thinking she’s not going to be a threat lol

“Don’t worry this demigod is well past her prime, she’ll be a push over I’m sure” then we meet her, she stands up, tells us she’s never known defeat and then proceeds to show us exactly why that’s true. But you’re right though, the game does pretty much tell us she’s not quite what she used to be. Which makes sense when we look at what happened in Caelid.

She was all but ready to throw her life away to bring down her opponent. A huge sacrifice on her part too as she unleashes the rot, the very thing she’s spent her whole life suppressing, to try and turn the tide during the fight. She only partially succeeds (she immobilises her target, but fails to kill him) and is then rendered unconscious for the next god knows how long. In that time the rot advances and begins to do more damage to her mind and body. So yeah, by the time we find Malenia she isn’t exactly in a good state. She fights us regardless, but she isn’t that eager to engage with us. Most of the time we have to make the first move. She can be a little slow to respond and approaches us with caution and bides her time. And even though she remains a huge threat to us and puts up a good fight, we still manage to bring her down, causing her to bloom once more. I know a lot of people think she does this on purpose because she’s losing to us, but to me at least it looks more involuntary than anything. She gets knocked out and right at the last second the rot brings her back and transforms her. I don’t think people realise Malenia isn’t truly in control of her life and never really has been. Her whole life has been dictated to by this outer god. The rot isn't some gift she was given, it’s a curse that wants to consume her. Not something she can call upon whenever she feels like without there being dire consequences. Not only to the people around her but also to herself.

Sorry I’m ranting now and kind of going off topic. But yes, post shattering most of the demigods have been nerfed in some way and Malenia is no different. Would honestly love to have seen what she was like before the shattering. There are some mods out there like Ultimate Malenia and Impossible Malenia which might give us an idea how strong she could be. Obviously these are only mods that are designed to make her more challenging, but even still she’s more aggressive, faster and relentless than before. Think Malenia but on steroids and that’s pretty much what you’re facing. Also just got to say that even though she’s considered a terrible boss who’s just so unfair and so terrible, people are still out there trying to find ways to make her more difficult. Malenia’s boss fight really changed up the game and even though folks will complain like fuck about her they still go back to fight her. Considering she’s an optional boss that you in no way need to fight, for a lot of people she becomes the highlight of their runs. Sure for some they only go fight her out of sheer stubbornness and spite and because they want to ‘put her in her place’ and all that bullshit. But taking the weird incels out of the equation I’ve noticed that more and more people have actually started to enjoy her fight. Even for people like me who have fought her hundreds of times, I still get a rush from the fight because she’s just so fun. She keeps you on your toes and personally I think this change that she’s brought to the game is a good thing. It’s a nice change of pace. Obviously I can’t speak for everyone but I love learning these fights and Malenia took me the longest to learn and was by far the most satisfying and rewarding fight I’ve had in one of these games in a long time.

Okay now I really am just ranting off topic. Sorry, anon 😅 Thanks for the message though, I hope you are well!

[itsclydebitches]



I know the season isn't even out yet but just looking I'm already breaking out in hives. It feels like its overcompensating: "Step right up, ladies and gentlemen we got talking animals, magical cats, a land of candy and absolutely no concern for the main plot! Is this distracting enough for you? Do you like all these bright colours and shiny new things? You've heard of a filler episode, right? Well, get ready for a filler season! Welcome to the next season of rwby, everyone!"

For me personally, the frustrating thing is that I like all these ideas on their own, but I don’t think they’re working for RWBY, especially right now. You want to do an Alice in Wonderland inspired arc? It should be bright and colorful and weird! But that all severely undermines the horror of our previous Volume, so maybe don't do that after the Everything of last season. You want your characters to have the time and opportunity to develop, focusing on introspective questions instead of the action-packed main plot? Sure, go for it, but maybe not at the height of the series' conflict, nine years into the story. I want to shove a basic plot diagram at the writers and point out that they’re interrupting a steady climb towards the climax with... this. There’s a reason why they’re filler episodes, singular, separated events that provide a needed break from the action without derailing it completely. A whole season---especially one that’s shorter than is now average and coming late---is a serious problem for RWBY's pacing and, frankly, makes it look like the writers are stalling while they figure out how the heroes can win when the story has done nothing to prepare them for that monumental challenge. Either that, or we're stretching RT's flagship story out as long as possible. Insert the plea not to pirate here.

And I know, I know, the Volume isn’t out yet and trailers can be misleading, but I’m honestly concerned that there’s nothing here about the main conflict. I have no doubt that the characters will come out of this experience having #LearnedSomething (whether we end up agreeing with their development is another matter entirely), but the trailer makes it seem like it will be a generic confidence boost (Ruby reasserts her desire to help people as the hero), rather than a concrete step towards defeating Salem. There’s no mention of the Relics, the Gods, magic they can use as a weapon, no hint that she’ll improve her silver eyes, or that what’s happening in Vacuo will be anything more than a pre-Volume 10 cliffhanger. What questions does the trailer/the events of Volume 8 imply that Volume 9 will tackle?

Will Ruby regain her confidence after this tragedy?

Will they find Jaune?

Will they regain/reforge their lost weapons?

Will they make it home?

What does all this equal? A reset. The trailer presents this as a Volume where the girls work to get back to exactly where they were at the end of Volume 8: back in Remnant, back with their weapons, back together, back fighting Salem, back to their confident selves. If the only goal is to get home, then yeah, this is literally filler. This entire Volume may exist not to forward the story proper, but to provide a lot of fluff content (like the humor) until what little plot there is gets them back to where they were 2+ years ago. Now, the writer in me DOES expect them to come away with something that will forward the plot, simply because I can’t imagine crafting a whole Volume that doesn’t, but the lack of insight into what that might be---do they meet the Gods? Get new powers? Learn a secret about Salem??---is one of the reasons why I think this is a badly constructed trailer.

And as I mentioned in a separate post, I really do find the lack of action to be odd. Someone responded that RWBY is more than its action sequences and yes, of course, but RWBY is, first and foremost, a combat show. I already laid out the ways previous trailers highlighted the girls’ battles that Volume (even if it’s only those in the first few episodes) and if you look at ANY ‘Best Of’ list, you’ll find nothing but the fights. When you think "RWBY" do you really picture the silly humor in between the fights...or do you think Nevermore, Apathy, Qrow vs. Tyrian, RWBY vs. Paladin, Ironwood vs. Watts, the White Fang, the Hound, etc. Beyond the combat being the most memorable of all RWBY's content, RWBY simply doesn’t exist without its fights. I don’t mean that in a “Monty originally created it to choreograph cool battles, but it’s grown so much since then” way, I mean it in a plot-focused “Our story is about a group of girls going to school to learn how to fight, and they fight grimm, and they fight an extremist group, and then they fight an immortal witch, and they fight her goons, and sometimes they fight each other, and the strongest fighters fight with magic, and when they’re not fighting they’re doing adjacent fighting things like training, taking care of weapons, traveling to the next fight, engaging in politics avoid fights but oops, that failed so now they're fighting again” way. Remove the combat from RWBY and all you’ve got is a disconnected collection of domestic moments/jokes more suitable to a drabble collection than a professional story. RWBY might have a non-combat framework that helps hold it together, but that doesn't mean that combat isn't still 99% of the story's focus and the draw for the audience.

All of which is just to emphasize that if our trailer is a) not giving us any conflict beyond “Get back to where we were in Volume 8” and b) not highlighting the combat that RWBY is built on, then it really does feel like filler in a literal sense. I know we made jokes about this a year back, but right now Volume 9 feels like RWBY’s beach episode. No, not because of Jaune landing on an island with a bunch of girls, but because, like the classic beach episode, our trailer presents this as an interlude where the primary plot remains fairly static and the characters engage in activities that contrast their normal routine. Here’s Haruhi and her friends leaving the host club behind to hang in a water park until they go home. Here’s Team RWBY leaving Remnant to explore a Wonderland until they go home. I know we need to wait to see what the tone of the whole Volume actually is, but even the humor of the trailer feels filler-y to me. In that---as you say, anon---it seeks to distract the audience all on its own, rather than occurring naturally among more plot-focused moments. (Like, for example, Weiss bemoaning the fact that she's never going to sleep again while they try to figure out how to help Mantle). Filler episodes often ignore the plot (and its accompanying worries) to make space for the lighthearted character interactions. Now here come the butt jokes, arm tug-of-wars, and purple raccoons.

Clearly the Volume will at least be tackling Ruby’s doubts---something I SO want to go well---but if the tone skews too lighthearted... yeah. Filler. Honestly, if the Volume does fail to sufficiently engage with Volume 8’s tragedies, I fully expect the fandom to start talking about how the girls deserved a fun, wacky Wonderland trip after everything they've been through, the same way we got a strong cry that they needed to rest in the mansion with tea while the rest of the Kingdom was falling to grimm. Potential filler will likely be seen as something earned by the protagonists (as if they were real people with real needs), rather than a writing mistake.

[darthnell]

Hii dude!! Apologies for taking so long to respond, and thank you as always for your words ahhh ♥️🥺

LOL im glad u like my sentences :D they just. Emerge. And crush my heart too ;-;

The setting of this chap is so important to me ;-;

THE PROMISE SCAR IS ALSO RLY IMPORTANT TO ME.. ive had this last chap set in the brain for the majority of the story but the promise scar part 2 was a later development and when i cane up with it i was like ohhhh. I need to sit down ;-;

HA yeah Percy’s dad. Sucks 😭 the only few times hes shown up in the fic is to ruin semi-private gatherings and then proceed to get kicked out of said semi-private gatherings.. haha.. vens dad gave percy additional daddy issues but ven is also gonna give percys dad additional child issues LMAO.

Aha yes i Do love imagery.. it had to be just a little bit nasty, i cant resist making things gross apparently LOL.

The last few lines are also rly special to me ive had them down for a While as well ;-; (i think it was pretty helpful overall to have this very last scene and last lines already plotted out to look forward to when i was in the earlier stages). “Trembling like a chihuahua with barely contained emotion” WAHAHAHA I CAN VISUALIZE THAT RLY WELL FKFKDK..

WAAH IM SORRY I MADE YOU CRY IN THE BATHROOM OUPS 😭😭😭 if it helps, i cant listen to that song when im driving bc then i will start crying as well and thats Unsafe 💀

Ofc re: shoutout ! I had a lot of ppl to thank ;-; and ur enthusiasm for the story is so so appreciated always 🥹♥️

Statistics<3 i am a nerd about so many things this is how i show it didkdkd.. the end and the beginning yeah (‘: they rhyme… (for better or for worse). Worse as in. Venatrix and co have a Long way to go before trying to break free of this cycle. When the victims of a tragedy perpetrate the same violence that was enacted against them.. clenches fist..

Playlist !! :D id been keeping it secret because. The way i listen to music is extremely literal so i consider a lot of those songs spoiler-y

Yeahh ofc charcoal is ok 🥺 hes just a little guy!!

Hehe yes epilogue fic + april surprise… i have Many plans >:D (seriously though u should see my planning docs its kinda ridiculous)

Bro i cant believe its finished either, its still so unreal to me ;-; WAAH U WANNA PRINT IT.. ;__; …though like. Same NDJDJD.. im highkey planning to get into bookbinding simply so i can Make myself a copy of this thang. No idea how long thats gonna take but idk maybe i can try to post updates abt that on tumblr? That would be neat :0 …i still gotta format my docs correctly for it (and also. Since i am 100% going to be So extra about this im gonna have to design the chapter art and cover art and pick fonts and—)

Ohh man you are so sweet my dude 🥺🥺🥺🥹♥️♥️♥️ it’s really incredible to know that I can have such an impact on someone out in the void through just my writing, like honestly insane ;-; i really do love every comment you’ve left and hold them close to my heart, and your fanarts too WAAUGH 🥺🥺 really so awesome dude ♥️♥️♥️✨✨ thank YOU so much 🫶🫶

“Good luck with the trauma” HAHA she’ll need it for sure, poor thing 😭🫶 bye for now venny ♥️ (opens my epilogue doc to see her again >:D ) Thank you again friend !!!

Chapter 70: Pyrrhic Ashes

But if I can't let go Will you carry me home? Can we celebrate the end? I'm asking for a friend.

[krmy2386]

Second Fiddle (Part 2)

Bob Floyd x Reader (Rooster’s ex!)

I love this Gif!

PLEASE DON’T STEAL!!!

Warnings: none, fluff

Part One:

https://krmy2386.tumblr.com/post/692509027551313920/second-fiddle-part-one

Bob sat in the Admiral’s office.

He didn’t regret attacking Rooster, not at all. His only regret doing it at work. Because now he is stuck in Admiral Simpson’s office instead of checking on Y/N.

He honestly didn’t care what punishment the Admiral gave him. Hell, he could discharge him for all he cares. He just wants to get back to Y/N.

“Floyd,” the Admiral broke Bob out of his thoughts, “How’s Y/N?”

Bob was stunned. Did he not see the blood bath in the hangar?

“Sir, about what happened with Rooster-.” Bob tried to explain.

“I didn’t ask about that.” Cyclone stopped him. “As far as I’m concerned, Lt. Bradshaw ran head first into a jet rather hard and suffered an injury. Now, how was Y/N?”

Bob’s heart sank to the floor at the mention of Y/N. “To be honest… She’s heartbroken, Sir. They broke her.” Bob felt himself get angry all over again.

Cyclone nodded, “Then it looks like you need to Fix her.”

Bobs head shot up. He tried to form words but couldn’t.

“I’ve noticed your attention for Y/N for several weeks now. Today proved it.” Cyclone was protective over Y/N, she was practically his daughter. He knew Floyd was the one she needed. The boy proved he cared about her. Now he just needed to admit it.

“Go check in her. Tell her. I’ll make sure no one bothers you two this weekend.”

Bob shuddered at the idea of spending a whole weekend with Y/N.

“Do you think she’ll feel the same? Love me the same as him?” He asked.

Bob was terrified. Her break-up was still new. What if she rejected him? Or got mad at him?

“There’s an old saying Floyd,” Cyclone said, “‘It’s better to play second fiddle, then not be in the band at all.’ Now go.”

Bob nodded and rushed out of the office.

————————————————————————

Y/N woke up alone. She was incredibly thankful to Bob for taking care of her.

Y/N would be lying if she said she didn’t feel anything for for Bob. She thought he was handsome and she knew he had a big heart. She enjoyed seeing him most out of everyone when the team would hang out. But she never really spent time alone with him until today. And maybe it was all of the emotions, but she definitely felt something.

Y/N hadn’t checked her phone at all since she called into work. She was hoping to avoid any drama. Judging by the number of calls and messages, drama still found her even locked away at home.

She decided the safest person to call was Maverick.

“Hello?” He answered.

“Hey Mav.” Y/N replied, trying to sound chipper.

“Y/N? I’m so glad you called! Are you okay?” Maverick asked.

“I’m fine.” She said, less confidently.

“I know that’s a lie kid.” Mav responded.

“What happened at the base? I have like 50 messages.” She asked trying to change the subject.

Mav sighed, “There was an altercation at training today.”

Y/N chuckled, “Isn’t there always?”

“No, Y/N. This wasn’t the usual cocky dogfight. Bob attacked Bradley.”

“What?!” Y/N screamed. “Is he okay?”

“Rooster will be fine.” Mav tried to assured her.

Y/N sighed, “I meant Bob. Is Bob okay?”

Maverick was shocked, “Um.. yeah? I mean his knuckles may be a little bruised but he was definitely the winner.”

Y/N groaned. “What the hell were they fighting about? What did Rooster do now?”

Maverick laughed, “You can’t honestly tell me you don’t know what they fought about. Y/N that boy loves you. Both of them.”

Y/N quickly responds, “Rooster doesn’t love me, Mav. At least not like he should.”

Maverick signed, “I’m so sorry he hurt you Y/N.”

“Thanks Mav. Does everyone know?”

“Yeah. Bob did a number on him. Took three of us to pry him off.”

Y/N was shocked. The same sweet caring man who just a few hours ago made her a snack, carried her up the stairs, and tucked her in bed, attacked Rooster because of her.

————————————————————————

Bob sat in his car outside of Y/ N house. He was shaking with nerves. He would have to tell Y/N that not only had he beat up her ex-boyfriend, but also that he was in love with her.

Then Bob remembered what the Admiral told him. He knew he would regret not telling her, he would regret not at least trying. So Bob took a deep breath and walked to her door as confidently as he could, then knocked on the door.

He just kept saying to himself, “It’s better to tell her. It’s better to tell her.” Until she finally opened the door.

Y/N was actually glad to see Bob at her door. She just hung up with Maverick and she wanted answers.

“We need to talk,” she told him before he could say anything. He nodded and walked in.

Bob started, “Y/N”

“Why would you attack Bradley?!” Y/N interrupted. “What were you thinking?!”

Bob just stared at her. His mind went blank.

“He hurt you.” Bob said shakily.

Y/N scoffed slightly, “I’m well aware of what he did to me. But, you could’ve been hurt or gotten in serious trouble! You can’t do that the team needs you!”

Bob signed, “Y/N, I’m so sorry. I know I shouldn’t have done that and I let my emotions get the best of me. But… there was something in me that just had to make him pay somehow. I know it’s awful, but he didn’t deserve you! I just… I love you… and I couldn’t take seeing you so sad. And he’s the one who made you so sad.”

Y/N started to tear up. “I understand Bob.”

Then she took a deep breath, “And I have feelings for you too.”

Bob’s swore his heart stopped.

Y/N continued, “But PLEASE, don’t fight because of me again.”

Bob cupped her face in his hands. This was his chance.

“None of this, not a single bit, is your fault. You didn’t start this. I will fight for you as many times as I need to. Because I love you! And if you’ll let me, I can love you more then he ever did.”

He pulled her in for a kiss. Bob put his heart and soul into that kiss because he knew this might be his only chance. He expected her to kick him out at any moment. But, she didn’t. She didn’t pull away, she didn’t stop him. She kissed back.

In the year she was with Rooster, Y/N hadn’t experienced anything like this kiss. In the few moments she had spent with Bob, she knew he would love her how she deserved. And that she would love him back just the same.

Finally the two pulled apart.

Bob was the first to speak, “I know I’m not him. But I promise to love you, and care for you, as long as you’ll have me.”

No more second fiddle for either of them.

Thank you for the encouragement❤️❤️❤️

@rosiahills22 @callsign-joyride @luckyladycreator2 @3tabbiesandalab @flashyourgreeneyesatme @t-rexs

[acourtofthought]

How do you think Elain and Lucien will get together? I see some theories about them healing and taking care of Spring, but I can’t imagine Elain will jump at the opportunity to be around him right now. It’s so difficult to theorize since we don’t have her POV :/ For all we know she wants to jump his bones every time she sees him 😌🤞

And I don’t see Gwyn and Azriel as friends to lovers (I know it’s a popular theory about them). Seems too easy and sorta bland and I can’t see SJM writing it. I don’t think she likes her endgame couples to be on good terms right off the bat. I wonder what kind of conflict she’ll introduce between them.

I agree with you on both accounts!

The line in ACOSF, where Elain declared she was part of this court and would do what it needed stands out to me a lot. I know E/riels believe that means Elain feels she belongs in the NC but I actually think it's hinting at Elain doing whatever she needs for her family and what is in the best interests of them and their court, regardless of where she ends up.

And I think her book is going to end up with Rhys finding a reason for her to leave the NC to do something that would in fact help the NC and would then put her in the path of Lucien. Or....Elain herself could decide that what would best benefit the Night Court is a marriage alliance with Lucien. One of the major plot points of SF was the NC plotting for Eris to believe he might have a shot at a marriage between he and Nesta which would be important in securing a lasting alliance between the NC and Autumn. We know that was never going to actually happen but the idea of it was put into our heads, that a marriage alliance between courts would have it's benefits. So it's possible Elain will have come to the same conclusion and realize that marrying Lucien would help secure alliances for the Night Court, what with his ties to Spring, Autumn, Day and the friendships he's made across other Courts.

Considering SJM herself admitted to loving marriage of convenience tropes and we've yet to see that actually happen in any of her books, this would be the perfect setup for it. Not to mention any arranged marriage trope always ends in a HEA for the characters who do fall in love.

And it finds a way around Elain refusing to interact with Lucien. I feel like she'd keep that charade going for a long time out of stubbornness alone but if she found a reason to put that stubbornness aside to help out her sisters, I think she'd do it.

And I do agree about Gwynriel. Their current friends to lovers setup seems too much like E/riels current situation and honestly, Gwyn seems too sassy and Az too aggressive to have them be a soft and gentle get to know you from start to finish.

(next paragraph contains TOG spoilers) -

I realize Gwyn has a bit to overcome before she's to the point where she can be intimate with Az and I don't doubt that they'd go slow in that area however she's still got a bold personality despite what happened. And I don't see them just being oh so sweet and gentle until that happens. Rhys was SA too yet he still maintained his snarky, somewhat pushy ways with Feyre. So I imagine SJM will come up with a scenario where Gwyn has a reason to be at odds with Az. Maybe he'll respond poorly when her heritage is revealed since he's got a history of having issues with certain groups of people (those in Autumn, the Illyrians). Maybe she'll call him out on his past with Mor (SJM doesn't do female MC fighting female MC over a male drama but she has shown instances where the female calls out the male for his past with another (i.e., Yrene when she called Chaol out over Nesryn and Celaena).

But yeah, I feel like friends to lovers would not only be out of character for SJM in general but wouldn't make sense for Gwynriel as they've been written.

I do think their interactions in SF were important to establish a foundation for Gwynriel. It was a setup where he wasn't instantly smitten by her and where he was to witness her ability at protecting herself so he didn't develop savior / protector complex with her and where she was able to develop a level of comfort around him. But eventually I do think we're going to need to see a little fire between them and a reason for Gwyn to call Az out on his bad behaviors.