#sometimes grief hits so hard you prefer to feel guilt but that's not how it works

[linipik]

what is there to regret if I will still miss you?

[blzzrdstryr]

Signed in blood

Yandere!Zhongli x Yaksha!gn!reader

Wordcount: 2541

CW: Yandere themes, mentioned violence and death, unhealthy power dynamics

Long before Liyue’s borders had been established and the harbor bloomed into the prosperous city that it is today, the Geo Lord, Rex Lapis gathered all lesser deities and spirits dwelling in the current nation’s territory and concluded a contract with most of them, ensuring the protection of his country and people. Some of them signed a contract out of fear before archon’s power, some did it for mutual benefit and some out of gratitude and deep reverence. You are in the latter category, a simple forest spirit that was saved from the distorted monsters left after the archon war by his grace and power alone.

It was a simple day when you felt an enormously malicious energy surrounding your green abode, and soon they showed up, killing intent and will of dead archons seeping out of them. You were fast and agile enough to dodge creatures' hits, which couldn't be said about the others. Your fellow spirits and animals with whom you were sharing this forest soon fell victim to the perpetrators' attacks. Dark energy entered and desecrated the lands, poisoned the waters and even possessed the bodies of your old friends.

You were running away, fatigue finally catching up to you, despite the inhuman nature and you soon fell to the ground. There were a myriad of thoughts and feelings reeling inside of you - grief for your now dead friends and home, anger at the monsters and most importantly frustration with yourself. You aren’t human, not a single part of you is, so why were you so weak and helpless, unable to do anything as you left your loved ones for slaughter and massacre?

Guilt and shame washed over you, as you allowed tears to burst free - you were bad, you were disgusting for not doing anything, not helping anyone. Monstrous roars and growls got closer, a promise and a threat of what will happen to you. You closed your eyes, accepting the imminent end and bracing for the upcoming pain. And then the most unexpected thing happened - the earth underneath you vibrated, tremors knocking the beasts off their feet, as a tall basalt pillar rose from the ground.

Soon the stranger appeared, ending the monsters in one swift and elegant slash of his spear. He donned an otherwise simple white attire adorned with golden threads, with a long ponytail showing from the hood, but the most eye-catching details were piercing amber eyes and the glowing patterns all over his body of the same colour. You forgot how to breathe for a second as you watched your unexpected savior - he was beyond handsome, possessing the kind of beauty that would have mortals blushing and stuttering.

He then looked around, finally noticing your sprawled form. “Are you all right?”he asked, his tranquil and calm voice tinted by the shadow of concern and lending his hand. “I am”, you sputtered out and took an outstretched limb, feeling infinitely clumsy and ugly, face heating up from embarrassment. “That is good”, his voice despite still possessing the same serenity took a warmer tone.

As you learned later, you were saved by one of the seven remaining archons, a lord of geo. Filled with shame for your dishonorable escape and gratitude for your unforeseen salvation you signed the tightest contract with Rex Lapis - a blood written pact.

Unlike the contracts mortals establish, a contract between two immortal beings lacks the parchment or ink or a signature, they use magic and techniques that echo directly into their soul, preventing even the possibility of the terms' violation. Blood written pact binds to the vital essences of one, an ancient magic flaring up once the contractor intends to break the agreement, stopping and warning them of what's to come once they do breach it.

Your blood sizzled and boiled as you pledged your life to Liyue, magic singing in your veins and resonating with your soul - Rex Lapis saw the potential in you to be a great warrior and designated you to serve him as one of the yakshas, so you obeyed, training your body and spirit to withstand the endless calamities you no doubt will have to face. One day, after a grueling training you almost gave up, but forced yourself past your limits. I must redeem myself and repay Rex Lapis, you thought, gritting your teeth and taking a battle stance again, and then a miracle happened: a blue glowing orb materialized in the air - a vision bestowed by the hydro archon.

Sometimes you still reminisce about this moment and recite the oath you gave back then - I pledge my life to the protection of the Liyue nation and the will of Geo Archon, Rex Lapis for all the centuries to come.

Soon, you ended your training and started to protect Liyue just like other four adeptis all of whom were also saved by the Geo Lord. For centuries you five defended the nation as it bloomed and grew into something that you couldn't even imagine. And even after centuries of slaughter as your karmic debt started to slowly eat you from inside, slowly, but surely devouring your sanity by the smallest pieces you always found strength to move forward by recalling your first meeting with Rex Lapis, reverence before your God and guilt before the dead driving you further and further.

With time a dull, yet constant pain made its way into your bones. Sometimes it would make your eyes fill with unshed tears, sometimes wake you up in those rare times you slept without nightmares, sometimes it made your hands tremble, almost dropping the weapon in the middle of the battle. You couldn’t suppress and endure it like Xiao does, letting out a pained whimper here and there, yet you still upheld your duty to the Liyue. It almost felt like routine, until two awful events happened: the death and defection.

The fear and hatred of all those who fell victims to your weapons were slowly seeping in your minds, driving you mad with bloodlust. It all happened so quickly: you were watching out for other demons as Bonanus and Pervases were patching up Alatus after the intense battle, while Bosacius looked at the other front, weapons ready, and then Bonanus lashed out, aiming for Xiao's neck. The anemo yaksha quickly darted to the side, but the weapon still grazed the copper bird's neck, his blood forming a quickly growing pool underneath. You had to put the bloodlusted yaksha yourself, something inside of you breaking as you did so - it was one thing to stand against hordes of demons and monsters and it was another to kill your friend.

You couldn’t talk or look into the eyes of the other two after that, despising yourself for yet another failure - first your forest, then your friends, you were helpless to save anyone. And then Bosacius left, you had no idea where he vanished, but these two events prompted Rex Lapis to visit both you and Xiao, as yakshas shrinked in numbers from five to two in less than a week.

You kneel before the Geo archon when you notice his tall figure between the ancient trees - unlike Xiao, you prefer to live in the woods, the familiarity of nature reminiscent of a home you once lost. Your Lord ushers you to stand up, his face solemn and grim.

“[First]”, he starts, exhaustion evident in each syllable: "For centuries you protected my Harbor, and despite turbulent times passing you still uphold your duty. I find that admirable".

Your eyes go wide and you turn your head, unable to receive such high praise from your God, you feel your cheeks heat up at the compliment, acknowledgement of your hard work, and even constant pain or the death and disappearance of your colleagues became less serious of the issue for a mere moment.

"I am not worthy of such praise, my lord, I am only doing my job, fulfilling the contract", you deflect, looking at him again. Archon's eyes crease a little and a small frown appears as you say "contract", yet he quickly wills his face into an impassive mask.

"I suppose I made a mistake when I asked you to be my yaksha back then, I have misjudged your worth ", he continues, voice becoming distant and strangely tense, as he reminisces about the days long past, amber eyes looking both at and through you.

"My lord, I…", you start and then stumble over the words, unsure what to say next. Is this his way of telling you that you're bad at your job? You cast your head down, eyes lowered in shame, hands that spilled adeptus' blood trembling and burning. "I am deeply sorry for letting you down in that way, I will do my best to redeem myself from now on” .

A warm hand touches your shoulder, squeezing it slightly in a comforting manner. His palm is warm and firm, comforting in its steadiness like a tall cliff standing proudly against the raging tides, indestructible and reliable.

"You have no reason to apologize for this. Something like this would inevitably happen sooner or later, you have no fault in the events that occured. I suppose karmic debt would drive one of you insane eventually".

He sounds calming, reassuring, like a parent soothing a child. You still don’t lift your head to meet his gaze - you’re too guilty and unworthy to do that. There are no words you can speak now, not when you have been so thoroughly destroyed by your lord’s kindness - how can he look at you and see someone innocent?

“No, I meant that all those centuries ago, when I first met you I didn’t discern the gem hidden in the crude ore” he adopts reminiscent tone again, his hand now moving on your shoulder in slow and steady rhythm: “I knew I wanted you to be by my side, I didn’t know who I wanted you to be though. I needed time to understand my own feelings and the way I viewed you, and then I needed some more time to accept those sentiments”.

“What sentiments, my lord?”, you ask, finally looking up to him, brows slightly frowned in confusion and curiosity - it’s rare to see the Geo archon talk about his inner workings so openly, as he usually prefers to keep a cordial distance or masterfully redirects the conversation into a completely different direction.

“Over the years, as you protected my nation and my people, I finally understood it”, his hand shifts from your shoulder and now he cups your own two palms in a firm yet gentle hold: “I cherish you, [First]”.

The sudden declaration leaves you stunned and speechless for a good minute: you look at your god with wide eyes, mouth opening several times like a fish out of water. A myriad of thoughts and feelings go through you: confusion, disbelief, inferiority.

“I… That is very sudden for me to… learn about your affections”, you finally utter, forgetting to add respectful “my lord” at the end. Your voice comes off as small and hesitant as you say so. Rex Lapis doesn’t seem to mind your confusion as he takes a second to collect his own thoughts.

“The yaksha title I have burdened you with takes a toll both on your mind and your body. I severely miscalculated, so I want to redeem this mistake”, he sounds regretful now, one hand moving to caress and cup your face. You go stiff, still overwhelmed by the whole conversation. “I can free you from your contract if you decide to become my life companion”.

“But, my lord, it’s so sudden I can’t just..”

“Hush, I won’t pressure you into an intimate relationship right away. No, we will wait and learn about each other and once you will be comfortable enough to let me enter your life and your heart we will marry, uniting our fates with a contract that shall never end”.

You lower your head again, but this time in contemplation instead of guilt and shame. What do you feel for Rex Lapis? Admiration - he is a powerful deity, capable enough to flatten mountains and raise new ones with a single slash of his spear. Gratitude - he was the one that saved you and sheltered you, until you grew strong enough, he gave you a reason to live when you had none. Respect - he is a capable leader, smart enough to build a foundation and guide people of the most magnificent nation in Teyvat.

You feel no love for him, not the kind of love he wants anyway. You know about his patience and how affections sometimes take years to finally mature and bloom, but the thought of spending decades, maybe even centuries in hopes that one day you will reciprocate is nauseating to you.

How do you feel about it? A part of you wants it - it’s an easy way out to get rid of the pain, of the fear and bloodshed, of the death that clings to you at every waking moment. You remember how you spend most of your nights sleepless, drowsiness leaving you the same second you dream of blood and carnage and massacre. You remember your whole body throbbing and burning on especially bad days, when even Remedium Tertiorum can’t do its job. You remember crying and gasping for air after the weight of the slaughtered gets too heavy for you to handle.

You almost say yes, out of these reasons alone, but you stop yourself - you think of Xiao, of how lonely he will become once you leave. You think of heartfelt smiles that mortals gift you with on those rare occasions you have to save them. You think of the slaughtered spirits before whom you still have to atone to.

“I am sorry, my lord” You look him straight in the eyes, bracing yourself for the words you are about to say: “I can’t match your feelings, nor can I accept your offer, not now at least”.

Amber eyes lose their warmth in the instance, the comforting aura he was exuding earlier replaced by the weird tension between you two. Looking at this image, you suddenly remember how ruthless Rex Lapis can be on the battlefield as for a fraction of the second he looks at you as you’re an enemy.

A horrible pain shoots right through your body, and your short scream follows. You fall on the floor, gasping for air, deaf and blind from the overwhelming pain. Geo archon quickly takes your form, carrying you to your sleeping place, as you try your best to breathe and not cry.

“It must be a blood pact acting up, the magic must have taken your refusal as disobedience to the contract”, he says once the agony lightens, enough for you to focus on the conversation, “you did pledge your life to my will”.

You try to half sit on your elbow, to look him in the eyes and say something other than the pained groans and whimpers, as his next words instill a sense of quiet dread in you:

“I hope you will rethink and take back your words out of your own volition, [First]. I would hate to order you to”.

[harfanfare]

When your Prince Charming arrives || First Years x Reader

What if someone from RSA seemed to be your dreamed lover?

Ace Trappola

It isn’t easy to make Ace seriously worried, about something that wasn’t caused by his friends, wanting to get revenge on his poor—as they defined them—jokes.

From the first sight he knew, that a boy, who “accidentally” bumped into you, was a danger. Some kind of.

He seemed just… too perfect: tall, muscular, with beautiful hair and natural charm, charisma. His clothes complemented the colour of dark as cosmos eyes, and his manners were impeccable. Ace started doubting that even Vil Schoenheit himself could point out anything to him, but he wouldn’t bet on his arm.

With each trait, something was pushing Ace away from the boy more and more.

If he hasn't paid much attention to him, then you definitely did. By the time the day was over, you managed to tell him ten times how he helped you get up—"You fell because of him," Ace replied while rolling his eyes—and characterized the boy verbally, so that no teacher would complain about not enough words on your opinion essay.

“Agh, enough-!” Ace got upset when, even while playing cards, you didn't talk about anyone else but that handsome hero who helped you get up faster than Ace did. He got up from the floor. “Marvel at him in his face! He will certainly want to hear all these compliments in person.”

He stormed out of the room before you could stop him.

His arms were shaking once he got out of the dorm, to the Rose Maze. He emanated with anger and grief; he swore to himself, that he will kick this guy from RSA the time he sees him. Though he wasn't sure... would you be mad at him...?

“Wait, Ace!” you had to run as fast as you could to catch up with the boy and bump hard into him. You hugged his waist tight, worried that he would run away as soon as you loosened your grip. “Sorry. I really didn't mean to upset you.”

Ace turned around to see your eyes. The corners of his mouth quivered before twitched into a weak smile.

"It's alright," he said, but his voice slowly cracking. “The better one wins, right?”

"Of course," you tightened your embrace so that your cheek was pressed tightly against Ace's body. “I won't be with any guy who can't destroy a chandelier with friends.”

The boy took a deep breath before finally wrapping his arms around you.

The warmth he felt from you and the one inside him caused a strange feeling in his stomach and chest. He didn't know exactly what he felt, but he didn't mind at all.

“Out of my advantages, you chose this particular one?” He said, his face showing a mischievous, a bit mocking, but still friendly smile. "I guess it was at the top of such a long list as ‘Advantages of Ace’"

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎‏‏‎ ‎

Deuce Spade

Deuce didn’t know what feeling was responsible for twisting his stomach, once he saw you and a boy from RSA, introducing him to some NRC classes.

Does his dark, rebellious side finally want to see the light of day?

Not as much as he wanted to hit that boy, he’d rather preferred to take you somewhere far away from him. From everybody.

“Someone's jealous!” Ace laughed when Deuce told him about his worries.

“Again, why did I come to you with this...?” The dark-haired man sighed, placing his hand on his hair and tightening it tightly. "You really think I'm, uh, jealous?"

“And not?” Ace tucked his hair back, laced the fingers of his hands together, and blinked several times. “Oh! My hero!” He said in a squeaky voice. “I will have to give up my lovely Deuce for you because you helped me up. A~aah!”

Deuce snorted and slapped Ace on the forehead. He fell onto the bed. The redhead burst out laughing as he looked at the nervous, sulking Deuce.

“Go Deuce,” he said, sitting down on the bed, still with an amused sparkles in his eyes. “Fight!”

Without waiting for any further words of encouragement, Deuce ran out of the room, towards the school. He went through all important, busier spots in the school before he found you in the cafeteria.

Of course, with that RSA guy.

He felt his body tighten like a tight string as you spotted him between the heads of the other students and waved at him.

"This is Deuce, my boyfriend," you introduced the boy to your dinner companion, and the dark-haired man looked away. So what if you guys were dating for months? The title "boyfriend" always made his heart run wild. “And this is [Boy's Name], a student from RSA.”

"Nice to meet you." Deuce reached out his hand and squeezed the boy's hand. He did it with such force that you could almost hear the crunch of bones and a soft gasp as the student jerked his hand away. “Now, I'm so sorry, but I have to take [Name] with me.”

He felt a twinge of guilt as you walked away, and the RSA boy was massaging his hand. However, now-not-yours prince charming will definitely go to the nurse, and on the way, he will surely run into one of the most beautiful students in NRC. It’s always like that in fairy tales.

You have to fight for your true love, right? They both have to find and keep the love of their lives.

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎

Epel Felmier

Just give him a chance, and he'll definitely try to kick that fop in the knee so hard he won't get up again.

"Fight fire with fire," Vil advised him during their usual dinner at Pomefiore. Even though Epel had said nothing about his worries, Vil could still sense a depressive aura from him that was definitely ‘not beautiful’.

The Pomefiore leader was also not very happy with the arrival of some students from the RSA. But until they were more beautiful than he was—not that anyone like that existed—their presence did not irritate them that much.

Of course, you didn't forget about Epel—you felt so drawn to your new acquaintance's aura that you sometimes lost track of time, but you make sure not to skip your meetings.

He felt like a pawn in a game of chess, not a player. He was attractively dressed, and now standing next to that RSA boy who had attracted your attention all too often. He took you with him a lot, that one day he almost offered to take you with him to the RSA. It would only require some paperwork, wouldn't it?

“[Name]” Epel turned to you, his voice trembling with anxiety and anger. He took a deep breath but didn't feel any cooling down. “The final decision will always be yours. But I want to say something about it here.” He pointed at the visitor and glared at him.

He felt a sudden need to straighten his hair and his clothes as silence fell around him. All the witnesses waited for his next move, and even though no one was saying anything, he felt like he was the new hot topic of gossips.

He went over to you and locked you in a hug as if he didn't want to watch all those onlookers.

"I know you may not believe me, but I really am not sure if he can bring you the happiness you expect," he blushed here. “I-I mean… I don't know if I can offer you a life only filled with happiness you want, but… I will try… So, uh, please don't go with him…!”

“Huh? There's no way I'm going with him,” you said, tearing away from him. "I'm addicted to apples and a certain apple boy, and I won't survive without this combination."

Epel breathed a sigh of relief, feeling his cheeks flush with shame, and memories of words that even sounded too serious for him.

Even though he felt terrible in this elegant garment, he couldn't think of it as his feelings exploded in his body.

Ah, yes. He couldn't want to love anyone else that much.

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎

Jack Howl

Jack never wanted to stop at anything other than "true love".

When you two started dating, he saw no other way than planning his future with you... But this RSA guy was never included in your plans.

"He's joining us," you told your new friend, pointing at Jack. He had his arms crossed and he was at least a head taller than the boy, so the boy had to raise his chin to see Jack's ears. “He offered to help us with cleaning.”

"Ah, yes," [Boy's Name] cleared his throat, trying to remain indifferent. He felt overwhelmed by Jack's presence and Jack made no effort to make it easier for him. Because what was he supposed to do? Squat down so that he doesn't feel trapped like surrounded by tall rocks? "We'll definitely need someone strong."

Everything went very agile and neat.

Even if you and the RSA student previously thought it would take a long, long time, in half an hour you managed to do more than you were allotted to. Maybe it's because your loved one didn't allow too long conversations between you and [Boy's Name]?

It would certainly have been hours if the two of you were left for each other. Ideally, a lot of time to make another appointment, exchange phone numbers, cancel your joint vacation plans with Jack and change your school, right?

“Thank you for your hard work” you put the broom in the storage box. Cleaning with magic was definitely simpler and easier, but as long as you can clean, magic can feel a little sloppy while comparing the cleanliness of rooms.

"Thank you for your hard work," [Boy's Name] replied, dusting his hands of the fluff. "Maybe... you'd like to go together, just the two of us," he stressed the last words, "to the cafe?”

"I'm sorry," you smiled apologetically. You looked at Jack who was just coming back and started walking towards him with a smile on your face. “You may not see it, but this one needs a daily dose of hugs because later he will be very sad.”

Jack silently denied as he turned his head to the side out of intimidation as you hugged him tightly.

… For moments like this, the existence of people like [Boy's Name] is needed.

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎

Sebek Zigvolt

“We need your assistance, [Name]” just after taking the left corridor, Sebek appeared in front of you and a student from RSA. The green-haired man had a stoic expression and his hands were behind his back, what made him seem much more composed than he thought himself. There was so much going on in his head that it would be easier to talk about what he wasn't thinking about. “It's urgent.”

Without further ado, he grabbed your wrist, knocking the RSA student's hand off your shoulder. He gave him a frightening look before he turned on his heels and you and you walked far, far away from this place.

"Hey, Sebek," you broke the silence that had been with you since you stepped out into the uncrowded corridor. “Something happened?”

“What do you mean?” He replied in a gruff voice and picked up the pace.

"For example," you panted, trying to keep up with him, "you're almost crushing my hand."

As if on cue, Sebek immediately let you go, doing it as quickly as if he had touched hot coal. With a surprised look, he glanced at your wrist, which turned slightly red from his tight grip.

"Ah, uh, forgive me," he muttered, rubbing his temple. "I still feel sick to see that human from the Royal Sword Academy."

“You mean [Boy’s Name]?” you asked, and Sebek made a face at his name. For him, this boy will always be "human" in the worst tone and sense of the word. "Some have described him as ‘so sweet that he is so bland’”

“It suits him.”

“You don't like him too? Too cute by Diasomnia standards?” you guessed jokingly. “Or were you jealous, hehe?”

“T-that's not the point!” He growled, feeling his face flush red. You looked at him in shock, now sure, you guessed it, and Sebek felt even more exposed by it. "It's just that this human looked at you so... so strange! I didn’t not like this.”

"There is a way," you said, smiling frivolously at him. “You can invite me to tea and vice versa, and then we will not see him anymore.”

[holylulusworld]

Her substitute (1) - Need you

Title: Her substitute (1)

Summary: Once you were her best friend. Now her widower seeks shelter in your arms.

Square Filled: Cordell Walker

Ship: Cordell Walker x fem!Reader, Cordell Walker x Emily Walker (widowed)

Characters: Stella Walker

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: angst, language, mentions of loss of a loved one, grief, unrequited love, smut, protected sex, scared of feelings, guilt, sneaking around, secret affair

A/N: This is partially an AU. Cordell didn’t go undercover. Emily and the reader’s boyfriend died together on their way to Y/N’s birthday party. And the reader is Cordell’s partner for the sake of my story. His partner from the show will have an appearance either way.

Word Count: 1,7 k

Created for: @walker-bingo​

Her substitute masterlist

2021 Walker Bingo masterlist

Divider by @firefly-graphics​

Once upon a time life was good to you, great even.

Life was all you ever dreamed of. Until. One day. Your world exploded.

One day your best friend, the woman you considered family, and your boyfriend got killed after you tried to arrest an unforgiving man. You and your partner lost the people you love on the same day.

While you tried to pick up the pieces and put your life back together, Cordell preferred to despair, and to use you as an outlet for his pain, grief, and frustration.

He can be gentle and cruel within a heartbeat.

Emily was the love of his life but Jason was just someone you spend your days with to fill your empty life. Sometimes he calls you cold or heartless only as you gave Jason’s belongings to the Salvation Army after one year of grieving. 

Cordell can never know the reason for your fast recovery…he can never know…

“I need you—“ it always starts with these three words, followed by a desperate look and his hands. God his large hands reach out for you to touch, caress and grope. “Baby Girl.”

“We talked about this, Cordell,” you weakly press your hands against his chest, shaking your head ever so slightly. “I can’t do this. We are partners and she was my best friend.”

“Didn’t stop you from fucking her widower not six months after she got killed,” here we go. The sweet and desperate Cordell is gone, replaced by a blank nerve wanting to hurt and drag you down. “Only as you got over Jason like he meant nothing to you doesn’t mean I can just stop grieving.”

“Then why do you come here to fuck me?” he takes off his cowboy hat, nervously playing with it. “Cordell, we shouldn’t do this. It’s no good for you or me. What if your kids find out?”

“All I can think about is to have you underneath me, pinned to the mattress and my cock so deep inside it hurts,” he drops his hat, steps over it to grasp for you. “I want you, baby girl.”

“Shit—” pinned to the wall seconds later you find yourself falling for your best friend’s widower all over again. It’s not a secret you were in love with Cordell before Emily even met him. He just never showed interest in asking you out and when Emily came into the picture, you backed off like the good friend you were.

“Say you need me,” he buries his face in your neck, inhales your scent deeply. “Baby girl, tell me that you need me and that you want to feel me.”

“Cordell, fuck baby,” you whimper his name, ignore the guilt eating your soul up once again. All you can focus on are his hands grip your waist to hoist you up, holding you midair until you sling your legs around his waistline hands cradling his face to kiss him deeply. “I need you.” It’s not a lie. You always needed him; he just didn’t know it.

“I need you too,” he kisses you fiercely, almost desperate to forget all the pain and his empty bed at home when he tugs at your clothes or moans your name. “Give in, baby girl.”

You are a mess, both of you. While you let Cordell strip you bare, not just your body but your soul and heart, he pants, moans, and whines on top of you.

It doesn’t take long for him to slide into you and pin your hands above your head to make sure you know this isn’t love-making.

Two sides of the very same coin hit you where it hurts the most. Every. Single. Time. He doesn’t take his time to be gentle and loving. Its raw, unadulterated lust driving him into you.

“Fuck, baby girl,” he watches your lips part and your eyes dilate when he starts to move his hips. “Look at me.” It’s a command you follow immediately. He holds your wrists pinned to the mattress to make sure you can't touch him gently. “Good girl, always so good for me.”

“Cordell, you need to—” his lips kiss your protest away, force moans and tiny whimpers out of you. “Please.”

“Just tell me you need me as much as I need you, Y/N,” he finally says your name, not baby girl, and you nod, ashamed you let the widower of your best friend fuck you like a whore on cheap sheets.

“I need you,” you choke the words out, looking away, not wanting to hold his gaze when the familiar burn is back, the one pushing you violently over the edge only to leave you hollow in the end.

“Look at you, so responsive,” his hands finally let go of your wrists to roughly cup your breasts. His thumbs toy with your nipples leave them hard and throbbing. “Those tits, so pretty,” he dives in, suckles one nipple into his hot mouth to push you closer to the edge.

He moves slow, deliberate, plays your body like an instrument. You are in trance, only feel his body press yours to the mattress, mind blank once again.

Another deep thrust makes you moan his name loudly. “Fuck, I’m gonna cum,” you grasp for his shoulders to bring Cordell closer to your heated body to hold him, even if it’s only for this fleeting moment. “Cordell.”

“So tight and warm for me,” his hands grip your thighs to spread you wider. He loves to watch his huge cock disappear in your pussy, the one only he owns. “You take me so well and deep, baby girl.”

You cry out in pleasure, back arching off the bed when his cock hits that spot taking your breath away. His large hands cup your ass, squeeze it tightly.

Cordell holds himself inside your body, stops moving to feel you clench tightly around his thick length. Just staring down at you.

“Cord, what’s wrong?” you whimper breathlessly. 

“Just wanted to feel you cum before I fill this cunt up,” his pace becomes brutal after your orgasm.

He moans, eyes glued to your face as he tries to pretend you are only a warm body he can use, a toy to fulfill a primal need, not the woman he could fall for…

“Oh—” you watch him move on top of you, memorize his features, the way his hair is glued to his sweaty forehead, and those obscene veins in his arms, popping out. “I want you to cum, let me feel it, Cordell. Fuck me.”

“Fuck, you—shit Y/N,” he groans, hips jerking violently before he allows himself to let go. 

When it’s over he rolls off you to dispose of the condom, already looking for his clothes on the floor.

You have a routine. He comes to your apartment, convinces you to let him fuck you, and leaves you alone and cold moments after your high.

Tonight, you wrap yourself into a sheet and turn around to not watch Cordell hastily put his clothes back on. You would give the world for him to stay the night, but you know he will leave soon.

As usual, you take deep breaths to hide the tears forming in your eyes. “Thank you,” he says, and you feel like a fool all over again.

“I got a job offer in New York,” you casually say. “Do you remember? I always wanted to be with the FBI. Three years ago, they didn’t have a position for me, but last week, I got a call.”

“Oh—” is all you get. You can hear the ruffling of clothing, and then the door opens. “You should take their offer. Being my partner is a dead end. A girl like you shouldn’t stay a Texas Ranger,” the coldness in his voice breaks your heart.

“Yeah, maybe I should,” you clear your throat while you try not to cry. “I will call them on Monday. Have a great—” the door closes before you can say another word. “Figures…”

“FBI?” Stella blanches. “You want to go to New York to work with the FBI, Y/N?” she cries. “You can’t leave me too. Why is everyone leaving me?”

“Stella bear, nothing is decided yet,” you sit next to her on the steps, patting her thigh. “They called me two weeks ago, and I just thought I should at least fly to New York to talk to them. Don’t you think?”

“I don’t know,” she sniffles. “What did dad say? You are his partner, Y/N. He needs you,” you sling one arm around Stella’s shoulders, hiding she just added another crack to your fragile heart. “We need you. You are family to us. Mom loved you.”

“I loved your mom too, Stella bear,” giggling at the awful nickname Stella leans her head against your shoulder, and you feel the guilt overwhelm you once again. If only the girl knew you are banging her father. “She was my best friend and your dad is my friend too.”

“Y/N?” Cordell walks toward his house with long steps. “Is there an emergency? Do you need my help? It’s Sunday.”

“Your mom invited me for dinner, and I met Stella in town and drove her home. If you don’t want me here, I understand,” you try to keep the sadness out of your voice.

“Grandma wants a family dinner, dad,” Stella grumbles. “If I must spend time with my lame brother and you, I want Y/N to join us. At least she’s cool.”

“Cool?” Cordell smirks, glancing down at you. “I remember there was a time when she had braces and was a shy little mouse.”

“Y/N shy? I don’t believe a single word, dad,” she nudges your side. “Right, Y/N. You never were shy.”

“I hate to admit it, but I was a little shy. Your mom helped me break out of my shell and become the woman I am today. I miss her,” you sniff, watching Cordell sit next to his daughter. 

“Emily, she always talked about you. How you helped her get better grades,” Cordell says. “She loved you too, Y/N.”

When you sit at his table half an hour later, watching Cordell with his family you decide your last encounter was the last time. You won’t risk messing his family up even more...

“We can’t do this again, Cordell,” you sigh when he leans in your doorframe, that look in his eyes again. “I told you after the dinner with your family we should stay only friends.”

“Y/N, we are friends but—” he cups your cheek with one hand, thumb swiping over your lips, “I need you, baby girl…”

>> Part 2

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[vimeddiart]

Strangers

Patron-voted fic of my D&D beeflings! Read the previous comic and the first comic for this series for context!

On AO3

Clang.

Clang.

Clang.

The zinging cadence of his hammer hitting a new blade usually tempers his fraught emotions and lessens their intensity. The rhythm and beat usually calms him, the heat of the furnace and the steady drip of sweat as well. Except his heart thunders on and his breathing remains irregular and his eyes sting—not from stray embers or errant drops of perspiration—and his agitation grows.

It grows so powerfully that he miscalculates and swings his hammer much too harshly, breaking the blade he was trying to fashion which frustrates him further and he throws down his tools with a clatter, pressing the gloved heels of his hands to his brow.

Lazlo.

Tuhka releases a trembling breath.

Barely a day had passed since he had regurgitated all of the regret and agony of his childhood friend’s death right into said friend’s face before gracelessly fleeing, the bitter taste of tears still on his tongue and Lazlo’s look of resounding disbelief haunting him even here in the safety of his forge.

It wasn’t fair.

Why must he have been forced to carry the burden of grief and guilt for so many years? All those moments of remembrance, thinking of a friend—the only one he ever had— ripped away from the world much too soon, endless nights of pain and suffering, wishing he’d been taken instead...and for what? Lazlo was alive. Had been for perhaps as long as Tuhka had grieved his loss.

How much hatred—or worse, indifference—must Lazlo have harboured to fail in seeking Tuhka out...to reassure him, to reunite with him, to talk with him. They had been family.

Tuhka wrenches off his gloves and tosses them to the side, stalking towards the entrance of his smithy for some air, unable to concentrate anymore on his craft. His hands shake when he grasps the wrought iron gate.

A sound distracts him for a moment, one that carries over on the salty evening breeze that cools the sweat of his brow. Gravel crushed underfoot. It’s gone in an instant and even with his sharp hearing, Tuhka strains to listen for something further, ears swivelling in the hopes to catch it.

It doesn’t take too much investigation to track down the source of the sound once he decides to; a dark figure perched somewhat dejectedly on a boulder that offsets a scenic cliffside path Tuhka often takes to clear his head.

“You didn’t waste your grief, if that’s what you’re bothered about,” the figure says.

Tuhka’s breath leaves him in a rush as he’s met with a familiar blue gaze. He feels pulled forward by some invisible thread and settles himself on the far edge of the same boulder, leaving a bit of distance between them.

Lazlo sighs, drops his head into his hands. “When you left that day and never came back, I...believed you’d abandoned me, that you’d made good on your promise—”

“That was a child’s threat, I never meant to—” Tuhka began, needing to explain despite the betrayal he felt, still very fresh, that had upended years of mourning.

The other tiefling shook his head, dropping his hands away from his face and letting them fall to his lap. “I made a terrible decision, I paid for it,” the spectral left hand twitches and Tuhka notices it properly for the first time, heart squeezing despite everything and mind filling with more questions, “and I...went away for a long time. I didn’t think to look for you...I thought you despised me.”

He releases a mirthless laugh. “I don’t think I would’ve found you anyway. I’d have been looking for someone...quite different.”

Tuhka swallows hard. “I’ve...probably grown a bit since you last saw me.”

This startles a small, but real, laugh out of Lazlo, even if it does sound a little wet.

After a pause, Tuhka gathers strength from the stars and attempts to keep his voice steady. “That day...I went back for you. I did. I wasn’t going to, I was about to start a new life away from those bloody mines and I was so angry with you that I hoped you would stew in them forever...but then I remembered you wanted to get out just as desperately as I did and we swore to do it together so I went back to fetch you.”

Tuhka didn’t dare raise his eyes to Lazlo’s face, staring intently at his own hands grasping his knees even though the image was beginning to waver and blur.

“It was snowing and freezing and I walked through it without stopping, thinking that I would see you soon and whisk us away to a better place, until I saw the smoke from over the hill and I knew you’d gone ahead with our plan without me,” Tuhka let out a shuddering breath, “they said you got crushed in the tunnel along with that bastard foreman. Don’t remember much of what happened after that...just that I’d gone to fetch you and came back empty-handed.”

Tears flowed freely, despite previously believing he had run out of tears to shed. From the corner of his eye he noticed Lazlo wipe his face with a pure, white square of cloth.

“Told you the truth though…” Tuhka continued, after a none-too-discreet sniff, “mourned you like a piece of me had died. Couldn’t think of much else for a good few years,” He runs a forearm over his face roughly and finally turns to Lazlo, raw and exposed, “I would’ve looked for you in a heartbeat if I’d known you were alive. I would’ve.”

Lazlo lets out a sound like an animal in pain, fresh tears rolling down his cheeks that he no longer tries to wipe away. “I didn’t know...I didn’t know— I mucked up my plan and ending up losing everything, I— I was trapped for years without knowing how much time passed, I was...I was isolated from the outside in a way you won’t be able to understand but you must believe me, I never wanted to lose you—”

That final crack in Lazlo’s voice is what forces Tuhka to move closer and wrap an arm around his shoulders, mumbling soothing words until the sobs that wrack Lazlo’s frame subside. It reminds him of when he was younger—and much smaller—when Lazlo would do the same for him after a tumble, a run in with the awful foreman, or when overcome with a sadness he couldn’t understand, much less explain. Lazlo would have been there to comfort him, always.

As if hearing his thoughts, Lazlo lets out a tremulous sigh. “...Tables have turned, hm?”

Tuhka makes a tentatively amused sound in response. There is a whirlwind of emotion to wade through, but he can take this moment just to experience how real and solid Lazlo is. That he’s back.

“A right pair of bellends we turned out to be,” he ends up saying.

“Quite.” Lazlo sniffs, but there’s a small, albeit watery, smile on his lips as he straightens out of Tuhka’s one-armed embrace, and Tuhka tries not to let the empty feeling that remains affect him too much.

Something that has been niggling in the back of Tuhka’s mind takes on more force and the reason finally dawns on him.

“You sound different.”

Lazlo finishes wiping his face with a fresh, white handkerchief and makes a noise, muffled by the fabric.

“Yes, ah...I trained out the accent I used to have and replaced it with a new one.”

Tuhka blinks. “What’s wrong with your old accent? That’s the accent I have! I got it from you!”

“I needed to, ah...move in higher circles of society and I couldn’t very well sound like a common miner, could I?”

Tuhka opens his mouth to argue, a nostalgia for their juvenile arguments filling him in a split second, but Lazlo interrupts, “You know, we don’t have to speak Common if you’d prefer.”

They fall back on Infernal so naturally that Tuhka has to swallow a lump in his throat and keep the waver out of his voice. He never thought he would have this again. He’s a little rusty and out of practice but that doesn’t seem to matter in the moment—it’s like they’re back in the mines, speaking their language out of earshot of the foreman, making plans for the future in a world that was all dreams.

Tuhka tells Lazlo how he adopted Ooria (and not the other way round as she claimed to recall) and how she had helped him find his true self. He tells him about his work, his smithy and how he made a home on this cliff by the ocean. He doesn’t talk about the painful things, like crying himself to sleep every night for years from missing him, or the search for his adoptive mother who was now lost.

Lazlo talks about— what Tuhka suspects is— superficial milestones, his expertise in identifying gemstones, the places he’s visited and the night skies he has lain under and commemorated on his skin. Tuhka notices the glittering constellations peeking out of Lazlo’s clothes and his heart thumps, wanting to ask what made them special enough to wear permanently but he stops himself...still feeling like a stranger. There’s an undercurrent of darkness in Lazlo’s vague statements, of secrets untold, and Tuhka is slightly surprised by a keen disappointment that bubbles within him at not being trusted with them.

There’s a lull in conversation, an impending finality that Tuhka does not appreciate. He refuses to remain a stranger as well, which prompts him to realise that he hasn’t even properly introduced himself yet.

Feeling bold, he holds a hand out in the human way. “Tuhka Turunen.”

Lazlo’s gaze lands on the proffered hand and then flickers up to Tuhka’s face, seeming to weigh his options. He breathes out a laugh and leans forward, ignoring the hand to press his forehead slowly but firmly against Tuhka’s in customary tiefling fashion. An echo of the greeting they shared when they first met as children.

“Lazarus Astrophel,” whispers the tiefling formerly known as Lazlo.

Tuhka smiles. “Nice to meet you, Lazarus.”

They part and Lazlo—Lazarus—clears his throat, “My close acquaintances sometimes call me Laz. You may do so, after all we’re—” a beat of hesitation, “—old friends.”

His vibrant blue eyes are on Tuhka, almost as if expecting him to disagree. Tuhka doesn’t.

“Laz,” he says, smiling, “lot less likely to get mixed up with that.”

The sea breeze sighs around them, ruffling hair and clothing. Tuhka watches as Lazarus gets to his feet.

“It’s late. I should be going.”

Panic flickers through Tuhka. “You’re leaving?”

“I have business in town for a day or two, I’m staying at an inn there...The King’s Cushion?”

Tuhka nods, recognising the name. He gets to his feet as well, unintentionally towering over Lazarus.

“Stars...I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to that.” Lazarus grimaces.

“You’re welcome to visit,” Tuhka blurts out, trying to keep any semblance of desperation out of his voice and getting the impression that he failed, “you wanted to commission something, we can talk about that whenever you like.”

After a moment of confusion, Lazarus’ expression clears. “Ah, right, yes, that was what got us into this mess in the first place, wasn’t it? Yes,” he smiles, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

This time when he leaves, it’s with a lot less anger than moments after their first confrontation only days ago, and with a promise to come back. They had once shared everything, even their deepest desires. Now, after fifteen years apart, they’ve become completely different people—the fact that Lazarus came here, willing to talk, making promises to return even if there’s a chance he may not keep them...it’s a start. And that will have to be enough for now.

Tuhka sits back down once Lazarus has vanished from sight down the path and gazes up at the same stars he had begged night after night to return his best friend to him.

He thanks them for listening.

[bonny-kookoo]

Hunt (JJK x Reader) 🐾🔞💜☁️

🌸 Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Reader

🌸 Genre: ABO Au!, werewolf AU!, Hybrid/Shifter Au!, Angst, smut, romance

🌸 Warnings: fighting scene, usage of guns, graphic descriptions of violence, grief and guilt, subspace, omegaspace (is that a thing it’s a thing now), Dom!Jungkook, Sub!Reader, Alpha!Jungkook!, Omega!Reader, oral (M Rec.), thigh riding, mutual masturbation in a way, non penetrative sex, praise kink, prima smut, biting, scratching, choking in a way, chokehold, manhandling, brat!Reader, handjob (m. Rec)

🌸 Summary: he was your alpha, and he’d always look after you. Even if that meant he had to hurt you.

Jungkook loves you dearly.

That much is clear to everyone who has eyes inside their sockets, with how much he fusses over you daily, always concerned about your well-being. His presence is never far away from you, and if so, he makes sure to call and text as much as possible to make sure that you're alright. It's natural really, not only as your alpha, but your mate as well.

You're just so delicate, he can't help but want to hide you from the world around him. He knows you're capable of being by yourself- he doesn't doubt that at all. It's just that he's naturally a very caring person already, and all of that had just been amplified by your bond that you now shared. He was yours, and you were his; there was no better way to describe it.

"Jungkook?" You ask, turning around as he suddenly snaps his head up from where his butt is resting against the kitchen table, deep in thought as he snaps out of them to reply with a hum. "Did you stare at my butt again?" You question accusingly, putting your hands on your hips as he can't help but smile. You try to look mad, intimidating maybe, but you're just so cute that he can't help it.

"And even if I was, what's so offending about that?" He throws back, smirk on his lips as you simply huff out a breath, turning back around as you continue to watch the cooking ramen in the pot, smell already invading his living space as his stomach groans a bit. "When can we eat?" He whines out, and you shrug your shoulders.

Jungkook likes to appear manly and strong to everyone, like he can do anything and everything, yet he sometimes acts more like an overgrown man-child. He also hates strong smells, doesn't really wear cologne but rather likes the smell of when you do his laundry (It has to be you he once stated, not because he wants to come off as sexist or anything but it always smells different when he does it, even if he measures everything the same way you do, he can't explain it either), or when he uses your bodylotion. He doesn't care much about his hair or his clothes, but he prefers oversized and soft fabrics, even though you can spot him in a button up sometimes. Jungkook can be a little difficult sometimes too- He sometimes sends out mixed signals just to get frustrated when you don't understand what he wants. He loves everything in order, but tends to leave his things all over the place too.

Long story short, living with Jungkook is never boring.

You're not so simple either, however. Its a well known fact in the pack that no one should get on your bad side when Jungkook isn't around- the alpha seemingly having tamed you whenever he was close. Because whenever he wasn't, you weren't all bark no bite- you didn't bark at all, you just went straight for the throat. Now, you weren't a bad person at all. You just were a bit more straight forward. Confidence was something you had in a healthy amount; you knew who you were, and that you were, at the end of the day, no ones slave. You didn't back down, even if it seemed pointless- and no one wanted to mess with you in all honesty. The pack loved to pick on you, when Jungkook was around, because there was nothing you could do about it. They did shit their pants though once he'd leave.

Just like now.

Jimin came up behind you, intentionally scaring you since he knew you had bad hearing on your left side, making you yelp and hit his ribs with your elbow out of reflex. "Jimin you fu-" But Jungkook cleared his throat before you could finish your sentence, teeth gritted together in a silent growl as your eyes glowed at the older pack beta, who simply grinned.

"Jimin, cut the shit. That was unnecessary, apologize." He grumbled out, as the beta simply sighed, mumbling a sorry you took with a smirk that earned you a smack on your behind. "Stop looking so smug Omega." He throws your way, sounding upset, but you knew that he didn't mean it.

"I'm feeding you all and this is how you thank me." You dramatically sigh out as you turn off the stove as soon as the food was finished, when Jungkook snaked his arms around you from behind, dipping his head down to kiss your bonding mark.

He humms. "Hm, but I thank you enough in other ways?" He says, and Jimin makes a gagging noise as he closes the fridge.

"Not in the kitchen!"

'Catch me loosers!' You send out, as your paws hit the ground underneath you, Jimin and Taehyung hot on your heels as they take on the challenge you proposed. Taehyungs form hit your back hard, sending your rolling over the grassy grounds as you snap playfully after his fur. You get a bit of the fluffy hairs into your mouth as you sneeze, making Jimin join in on teasing you as he pulls on your tail with no intention to hurt you. Jungkook however, sees that different as he rams the beta off of you, growling loudly to warn him.

'Killjoy!' Jimin snarls out at the alpha as the wolf in question runs after him after he took off running, knowing all too well how to get on the younger once's nerves. Taehyung meanwhile got thrown over by your smaller form, jaws snapping at him as he keeps his head low, squeezing his lanky form out from underneath you, running straight into Hoseok, who'd joined in on the fun. Namjoon was on his way, lazily jogging towards you with Yoongis short white form behind him, as a shot rang through the air, scaring and scattering birds out of the trees as all motion holds instantly.

Taehyung stands up as you shake your fur, instantly searching for your alpha which wasn't far away and nudged you with his large head, providing comfort as if to tell you that he was there now, there was nothing that could hurt you. Namjoon and Yoongi were still, everyone's ears on high alert as you look out for any sort of motion or giveaway from where the shot came from. This was peacefull ground; established after the great war between Humans and werewolfes, back in 1993. Hunting was illegal here, and an absolute taboo.

Yet it seems like that didn't stop anyone today.

And just as Namjoon is ready to tell them to go home, a loud yelp rings through the air, as your head throws itself back to inspect the dart in your leg, instinctively trying to pull it out without much luck. Jungkook instantly tries to help you, Jimin and Taehyung making their way towards you as well as another shot rings through the air, successfully scaring everyone as a group of black clothed and masked men dart towards them with weapons ready. You run off, Jungkooks voice clear and demanding in your head, but you can't make out the words as a second dart hits your leg, throwing you off balance as you violently fall to the ground, rolling over the branches and dead leaves as Jungkooks almost falls as well trying to stop. Theres a shot just barely missing his leg, and the only instinct your omega seems to have left is;

Get away from him. Don't let them get to him. They want us.

So you run off to the side, leading them down the tight woods as you hear them follow you. There's the sound of yelping, angry barks and violent teeth as they seem to fight off whoever was behind you. But you can't stop.

You almost fall into the pond next to you, before actually stumbling and wetting the side of your face and body, hardly making it out as you stumble and fail to gain good footing.

'Omega, stop-' Jungkooks voice rings, but you simply move around, ears close to your head as you snarl at him. He's never seen you like this; at least not directed at him, or his pack. You'r eyes are wide open, glowing with a cold yellow color yet your pupils barely leave space for the color to show through properly. Mouth wide open, as you growl at him, the hair on your back is raised in defense. You look like you want to attack, but not out of pure aggression- the way your tails was tucked underneath you, and your lowered body posture showed him what was really going on.

You were terrified.

'Omega, it's me, they're gone.' He tries again, takes a step, but you only snap at him, at Taehyung who tries to get close as well. You're not letting anyone close in this moment, and he watches with worry as the darts color your fur red with the way you'd pulled and scraped them around on your skin. He's surprised you haven't managed to break the needles off yet. The soft and sweet omega he calls his mate is absolutely out of her mind, and he knows that. His alpha inside of him begs him to discipline you, to bring you down, to help you get back and out of this mindset, but his human brain can't make the decision- because it would mean he'd have to fight you. And he knew who you where, how you'd react. You wouldn't just throw yourself down like some puppy because this was his omega; his omega, which would never back down. Not even to him. 'Please-' he tries, but Yoongi cuts him off.

'Jungkook, if you're not bringing her down I will.' He starts, and the alpha instantly turns around at that, snarling at the beta standing next to his leader, who looks determined as well. 'We can't leave her like this, you know this-' He starts again, but he's cut off as Jimin chimes into the argument.

'You can't ask that of him Yoongi! That's his mate!' He yells out, defensive posture unwavering as you cower back, ready to book it as Jungkook has to make a decision. Fast.

So he does.

He wants to cry the moment he feels his teeth break the skin of your scruff, as he desperately tries to get you down, tries to force you to submit, to calm down, but you wiggle and squirm, and twist around in his hold that he looses it for a moment. He snaps after your leg as you try again to run off, a painful shriek escaping you that cuts his own soul like paper his skin, but he has to keep you. He can't let you go, he can't loose you, he can't leave you like that. So even when you claw at his face, scratching his throat as you get your leg out from between his jaws, he doesn't let up. All his packmates can do is watch, as he bites again and again, breaking skin and exhausting you to the point where you finally let him. He's got his jaw around your throat now, barely grasping, but holding firmly as you huff out harshly, eyes still unfocused. You're absolutely out of it at this point, eyes hazy and glazed over as you finally come to a still stand.

He slowly lets off, careful and ready to go in again at any sign of more defense, but you're still.

Eerily so.

For a moment, everyone is quiet as Jungkook can't do anything but stare. The way your chest still moves proves to him that you're still alive, but at what cost? Only now does he notice the iron taste on his tongue, and he wants to throw up so badly that he starts to swallow hard. Would you be okay? Would you forgive him? Would you understand? He had to do it. He knew it, but the view in front of him made his stomach fill with guilt. Yoongi slowly comes closer, helping Namjoon to put your small body onto his back as everyone slowly makes it back. He starts to walk as well, but can't help looking back.

The grass stained with your blood, seeping into the pond close by.

He's fussing over you like a newly crowned mother of a hundred pups.

Constantly making sure your blankets are properly tucked in, moving your joints every day so that you wouldn't become stiff, and listening to the doctors advice with maximum focus. The men responsible for the attack are facing trial, and he'll have to join everyone in court today, but it doesn't matter to him as he still spends his last minutes before they drive off at your side, fully dressed in a suit, determined to get justice for what happened.

You don't move, but they have told him you'd come around soon enough- a friend, Jin, will take care of you for him while he's gone. He can't do anything but look at you breathe, as he still sees you as the most precious and most beautiful thing in the world. A knock on the door snaps him out of it, as Jin stands, a small smile on his lips. "They're waiting." He simply says, and Jungkook nods, slowly standing up after kissing your forehead. "I'll keep an eye on her." Jin says as Jungkook walks past him, ready to go downstairs.

The rest of them are waiting downstairs already, as they slowly get into the cars, driving to the next fight.

But this time, they'll fight without teeth.

Two days later, Jungkook is sitting at your bedside again- or more like, sitting at your feet, spooning rice from his bowl into his mouth without much interest as his eyes stay unfocused. It's been like that the day before as well- He'd eat with you, take a nap, shower, take another nap, eat dinner, and fall asleep for the night. He's barely truly sleeping though, every small crack outside waking him immediately, the past still haunting him whenever he tried to rest. He can't imagine what would happen to him if you were to stay like this- or maybe even worse. He'd thought about it, several times, but he always chokes up, always immediately tears up at the mere possibility of you not spending your life with him. This was so unfair.

He sighs as he gets up, feet hitting the cold laminated flooring as he doesn't bat an eyelash at the temperature biting into his soles. He simply shuffles towards the bathroom like a puppet, simply tending to his bodies need to relief itself, as he doesn't notice the way your eyes move behind your lids.

And as you open them, its dark.

Not quite, as the opened window lets the moonlight in quite nicely, drowning the room in a silver light, your eyes adjusting comfortably. The air was fresh, crisp and cold, while your body was cozy underneath the covers. It was just perfect, just how you and Jungkook always liked it- the fresh and cool temperature of the room giving you a reason to cuddle closer, hold each other tighter. You stretched your legs, hissing as a cramp bites at your legs, but it soon settles, after a few seconds. Sitting up, you feel like a headache is close- the pain present but bearable, as if you'd taken a nap for too long. Your eyes burn a little, and you can feel some bandages underneath your clothes, making you wonder what had happened.

And then it hit you.

From the moment of the shot, to the way Jungkooks cries echoed in your head, his pleas and apologies over and over, as you try to process everything. At least you haven't hurt him, you thought to yourself.

You notice him as he stops at the door with a gasp, eyes wide open and lips apart, as they slowly come to terms that you're actually awake. He tilts his head downwards, before he slowly closes the door, walking towards you as he lets himself fall to his knees, a sob escaping him as he throws his head onto your lap. He's vulnerable, but oh so happy at the same time to know that you're gonna be fine. You're up, you're conscious, you're back- and he's too overwhelmed with that reality to keep his composure.

So he cries, violent sobs shaking his shoulders as he holds onto the blankets for dear life, state only worsening as you run your delicate fingers through his locks. He slowly looks up at the touch, searching for any hint of fear, any form of anger or betrayal sent towards him for hurting you like that, but he only finds your warm smile, comforting eyes filled with love, and his tears roll down his cheeks as you take his head into your hands. You don't say anything because there's nothing needed to; and he simply leans into your touch like it's the first time he's ever received such a kind gesture. There's no alpha in him in that moment, no strong Jungkook who's confident and overachieving. No, in fact he looks so young that your motherly instincts shout at you to comfort him, to soothe his cries and dry his tears. Whatever pain he's feeling, you're craving to take it away.

But when the door opens again, after Jimin and Taehyung push too much against the wood, he snaps his head back around to look at them. "Never seen the kid cry that much." Yoongi scoffs with a playful but genuinely happy smile, as the rest snickers- you along. And even though he loves the sound that leaves your lips, he suddenly begins to pout, before shifting. His large wolf form curls up at the end of your feet, and you whine, getting no reaction from you but a tilt of his ear that signals he's still having your attention.

"No, kookie, come here." You whine pitifully, and it takes a moment, before he shuffles closer to you, laying his large body next to you as he somehow still lets only his back face you. "Are you mad?" You ask, and he simply huffs in embarrassment, and you laugh, as the pack leaves you alone, glad to know you were back again. "That's okay." You humm, cuddling his large body as you fall back asleep.

It's late when you both return from your dinner with his pack, the now shared apartment you both got yourselves feeling cozy to you, since it held both of your scents perfectly aligned. It was your safe haven, a place you could both be yourselves as much as you wanted to, without any interference of the world. Surely, it was a bit weird and it needed time to get used to, but you both eventually made it work.

"Do you think we should lay carpet in the living room?" You casually ask as you take off your jacket, while Jungkook slips out of his shoes.

"Hm." He hums, before he takes a look at the living room area. "Maybe? Would that be better?" He asks, and you lean your head to the side, now out of your shoes as well as you walk towards the open kitchen.

"Maybe. I mean I like soft carpets, and because the sun shines in through the windows I thought it would be nice to have a soft floor to lay on for a nap or something." You casually explain. Jungkooks heart swells as he walks after you, holding your body from behind as he walks like a penguin to your destination, making you giggle. "What now?" You ask, and he simply nuzzles into your neck.

"Nothing." He replies with a grin. "It's just nice hearing you talk about things like that." He explains, running his pointy canines over your shoulder where he'd exposed the skin by pulling on your sweater sleeve. "My omega want's to make our home cozy. I like that." He humms against your pulse point. "Always so caring. So thoughtful, so sweet, my sweet baby." He almost dreamily cooes, as you suddenly try to wriggle out of his grasp. He catches on quickly, holding you tighter so you can't escape as he chuckles at your struggle. "Where you going baby?" He asks with amusement, as you huff.

"Nowhere because you're- ngh- you're yah!" You bark out, and his eyes grow more daring as he notices your behavior. You don't truly want to get away from him, as your body language tells him an entirely different story of what you're trying to bring across. Its a facade- even as you nip at his arm, biting the skin without hurting him as you kick your legs now, and he growls lowly.

"My baby's being a brat now?" He rumbles out, and you scoff again, trying to catch him off guard by hitting your head backwards, trying to push him away, but he only chuckles, one hand holding your body against him while the other moves higher to your throat now, holding your head tilted backwards against his shoulder. "Hm.. I actually wanted to watch a movie, but I think I'll have a different form of entertainment tonight." He says, as his hand tightens, not to choke, but to restrain, as he slowly sits down with you, forcing you with him on the floor as his hand lets your upper body loose, immediately grasping your wrists in his hand, while still holding your neck. You struggle for a good while, and he waits, until your eyes meet.

He can see the golden color of them, warm and hazy as they swim with pure emotions. You're finally submitting, your headspace blurring your thoughts as you become limp, making him smile at you. Once you're free, you turn around immediately, ready to go for his pants as he stands up, holding your neck as you obediently follow him to the bedroom, imaginary tail wagging in excitement on what's to come. "Look at you my baby." He sings out, voice low and soft as he addresses your kneeling form in front of him, hands on his thigh as your chin lays atop of it, closing your eyes when he runs his palm over your head. "Such a sweet little darling I have there." He opens his fly, shedding his pants as he throws the button up over his head, letting his erection free after his underwear is discarded as well. You quickly follow him, shedding your own layers of clothing as you sit in front of him, waiting, as he holds his hands out. You instantly shuffle forwards, nosing at his cock as he hisses at the contact, carefully guiding his length into your mouth as you close your eyes, tongue gliding over the salty skin in sinful patterns that make him groan out in pleasure. He lets his head fall back as his hand stays in your hair, muscles tightening and relaxing at the way you stimulate his nerves and senses, the room filling with your scent as he thinks he's on could nine.

He pulls your head away from him, making you gasp out as his eyes focus on the obscene strand of saliva still connecting your lips to his tip. He guides you upwards to sit on his muscular thigh, your hands holding onto his shoulders as he helps your hips move, gaze never leaving your form as you breathe heavily in pleasure. "Such a good girl." He praises, and you mewl in fondness at the praise, making him grin at you, his length throbbing from the view he has. "So good, look at you, getting yourself off on me." He continues, pushing you down harder and forcing you to faster as your breasts start to sway enticingly in front of him. "Hm? Use me darling, I'm all yours." He cooes, eyes hooded as he watches you fall apart, furrowing your brows as you concentrate on the pleasure. He suddenly hisses out when your hand moves away from his shoulder, suddenly finding his leaking cock as your soft hand wraps itself around it, desperate to give him pleasure back as well. He groans, and you let your forehead fall onto your hand on his shoulder as he growls deeply, the entire situation too much for him as his fingernails scratch down your back, making you arch it as he leaves hot marks on his way down, gripping a handful of your butt in his palm, as you bite down on his neck. It's the sound of wet skin running over skin, your hand jacking him off, groans and whimpers from you and him, and it's stuffy as the air around you takes on more and more of your smell, but its so perfect.

You whine and gasp as you finally come undone, desperately running your fingers over the skin of his length as you make sure to give it attention as well, smiling as you feel his hips trust into the air, muscles contracting as he spurts his cum onto your hand, groaning out a long sound as he lets himself fall backwards onto the bed. He breathes heavily as he holds you close to him, you bodies sweaty and spent, but happy and content none the less.

Jungkook loves you dearly.

That much is evident to anyone who has eyes inside their sockets.

It could be just how well you fit into his life, how perfectly you align with his pack, or how you care for him in a way only you could. With you, he feels safe, comforted, home- he doesn't need walls and a roof to feel like he's in his own safe haven.

"Jungkooks coming!" Jimin shouts in victory, making you turn around with wide eyes as you spot him walk into the living room. You sneeze as he walks past you, sitting down next to you as he slaps Jimins hands reaching for your snacks with a challenging gaze. The older beta pouts, but doesn't argue as he leans back, watching with amusement as you cuddle up to Jungkooks side, almost crawling onto his lap as he puts an arm around your middle "Heh, big bad omega is all cuddly" Jimin challenges as you get ready to throw the pillow closest at him, but Jungkooks palm takes it out of your hand, diffusing the situation as the beta across from you snickers in triumph. Jungkook however smirks, yawning innocently as he suddenly gets up.

"Oh, I think I've forgotten something in the kitchen." He casually says, getting up to leave you two be as you grin dangerously, while Jimin begins to sweat nervously at the mere prospect of being alone with you.

"A-actually It's late, I should probably leave!"

  And both, Jungkook and you, laugh.

[hobidreams]

june 1868.

but trust is a fickle, fragile thing.

pairing: joseon king!yoongi x reader genre: angst words: 1.2k contains: historical au, character death. historical context: “mama” is the korean equivalent of “your highness” & the proper address for a queen. a/n: this drabble is sponsored by a donation to Black Lives Matter.

moonlit throne index. this is drabble five. start from the beginning?

In the long decade since the night you swore utter allegiance to the crown prince, you have done everything within your grasp to uphold the heart of the commitment you’ve made. Even as the prince becomes a king, even as beloved companions submit to the passage of time, and even as the adolescent declaration of obedience itself matures into instead a steady, affectionate support, you keep your word on all but one occasion. But it is this exact decision, this single withheld secret, that shifts both your worlds irrevocably.

“You must tell my son that it is a common illness. A simple recovery, and nothing more,” the queen had commanded you on a somber day in winter the year before as you knelt beside her bed, wiping blood from the corner of her pale lips.

“Daebi-mama.” Your voice broke on the last beat. “How long have you been hiding this?”

“Please.” Though her elegant fingers were weak, she covered your hands with a warm, pleading palm. “He doesn’t need any more distractions. Not now. Especially not ones that don’t have… simple solutions.” She squeezed then, with what strength she could muster, silencing all your protests. “If you want him to succeed - don’t tell him.”

And so, you hadn’t.

But while you agreed with the queen’s intentions, you continued to fight against the inevitability in a way that only you could. The last six months have been a frenzied haze. You blistered your feet scouring the markets, begging foreign traders for rare or sometimes strange ingredients that you could incorporate into draughts. You sought documents written in symbols you did not recognize, paying translators to parse out a phrase or even a glimmer that could help. You can’t even remember all the nights that you spent brewing, steaming, straining until the sun came over the horizon. But with each subsequent draft you secretly delivered to her bed, the queen only grew weaker.

All of this, you kept hidden from man you cared for most, justifying the guilt to yourself whenever he inquired after his mother.

But now. Now, when the king is staring with unblinking eyes at the pure white cloth draped over his mother’s body, you find that you don’t know a damn thing about what’s right anymore.

You feel splinters in your chest as he takes one unsteady step towards the bed that you stand beside, hands folded in an act of repentance. His mouth opens, then closes, not a single noise passing between them for a century-long minute. All of your instincts urge you to turn away and allow him private space to grieve, but that’s your own cowardice at being faced with his sorrow, manifested in the quiver of his lip. You must put him first. You must be his witness, his pillar, even when your own heart tightens with grief.

“Mama.”

He stumbles forward, feet clamoring over each other until he’s close enough to draw back the cloth, just enough to expose her face. His short, forcibly-suppressed exhale hits the wall. Yoongi jerks his hand away as if scorched, lets it hang numbly at his side. It’s with an indescribable expression that he takes in the familiar, softly wrinkled eyes. The pink lips that were so often curved in a warm smile. The arms that were generous enough to encompass an entire nation, but never neglected the ones closest. “Mama,” he says, voice still so tight as he takes another unsteady step, as if he needs to be closer. He’d seen her just last night. He had left her alone, and now—

It’s when his knee knocks against the hard wood, when he can truly go no further, that he plummets to the stark floor and a lonely sob rips straight from his throat. Goosebumps shoot up your arms at the noise, the visceral howl and all you can do is watch as Yoongi breaks with a shuddering gasp, “Mom.”

In this moment, it’s not a king that kneels before you, but a son. Someone’s precious child, with no one to stay strong for any longer and so he throws the entire mask away. Lets the tears finally overflow, staining the bedsheets with salt and heartache before he crumples them in a weak fist. Yoongi cries like he has never done, not since he was old enough to learn how much the word responsibility weighed on his head and how many millions of lives his body, not him, is worth. A stray tear falls on the queen’s cheek and his red-rimmed eyes follow how it rolls down her face as if she weeps at the thought of leaving him too, and he cries. He just cries, with the delicate perfume of plum blossoms fast fading around him.

Uselessly, you wish you could do something.

You wish you could have found a cure, a miracle or anything that could have bought him more time, even if it was only for a season more, or a single day. Really, it’s your own failure. You remain so fucking inexperienced, even after all these years. You should have told him. You should have tried harder. And it’s this shame that makes you reach out for him before you can think better of it, wanting nothing more than to hold him to offer a whisper of comfort and to say he’s not alone.

But when you touch him, he startles. Shifts back. Shifts away from you and you think he gathers the pieces of his crown and stitches them back together before you even have time to blink.

“Jeonha—”

“Su-uinyeo-nim.” He cuts you off with the deliberate use of your full, formal title. He’s never called you such before, preferring your name during the weekly reports you made to him. The words feel sluggish on his tongue as if he thinks, as if he knows, you don’t deserve the role too. You find the strength to meet his watery, but no less intense stare, and hear him carefully ask— “Did you know?”

He doesn’t need to elaborate. Your fingers, lingering just an inch away from him, freeze and falter. Crumple into themselves, because you can’t give him the answer his darkening eyes say he hopes for. Or maybe that’s just you thinking too highly of yourself in his heart.

“Did you know?” He presses again, tone a little higher, voice a little more desperate.

But language is your next failure, and he is left to take your silence for the admission of guilt it is.

“Get out.” He stands, hovers protectively over the bed as if you are the danger, the outsider. “Your services—and you—are no longer required for her. You’ve done more than enough.”

Your legs shiver as you sink into a bow, quick. “Y-Yes, jeonha.”

Then your slippers are slapping against the hard floor, feet aching from the pace with which you flee from the suffocating room. Your chest burns with the want to scream that you loved her too. That you wanted to tell him so many times, almost did with a slip of a tongue, but wanted to spare his already overtaxed mind. That you tried your damned best but you just couldn’t save her, and so you lost her. And from that last glimpse of him through the closing door, hunched over alone and silently breaking, you know that you’ve lost him too.

[sardinesandhumbugs]

“Why didn’t you say h-how bad it was?” for Ratty and Rat Sr

A/N: This is what I get for asking for angst I regret nothing XD Welp, one angsty boi coming right up ;) (This does focus on Ratty and Rat Sr, but I threw in a bit of Badger. For good measure.)

Want to request a prompt? Find the list here!

x

The Rats keep busy in the weeks following Toad Senior's death.

It isn't easy; winter was already on its way before the accident and the boating season has long since passed for the year, but they try all the same. Their doorstep is flooded with animals dropping by with condolences disguised as coincidental convenience and, although Ratty is sure his father would prefer to grieve in peace, the door remains unlocked. And so the bitter days pass in a blur of proffered meals and sympathy cards and pitying looks.

Mr Badger is the exception.

Mr Badger has been a familiar face in the riverbank home for as long as Ratty remembers, yet now his presence is more frequent still. Unlike the Riverbankers, he visits not with home-cooked meals, but with drinks; not with sympathy cards but reminiscences of half-forgotten memories; not with pity but with grief.

By now, Ratty knows well the stench of grief. His home is stifling with its cloying, claustrophobic scent, a parody of the death it follows in the wake of, but the grief of Mr Badger is quite another beast compared to the tired mourning of Ratty's father. There is a desperation to it. A terror of things slipping from his grasp, a grief that does not simmer but burns.

During such visits, Ratty leaves them to it. Their sorrow feels private, two friends gravitating towards one another in the absence of the third who had once shone so brightly, and he is out of his depth in the decades-old friendship.

"Plus Mr Badger is always so... austere," Ratty says in one of his visits to Toad Hall. He sits along the jetty, feet hanging over the water while Toad – already Toad, no longer Toady – fumbles with the newfangled camera that is perched precariously close to the edge. "And I know he's having as hard a time of it as anyone," Ratty is quick to add, lest his words be taken in a thoughtless light, "but it's just... I don't know. The way he looks at me sometimes, it's almost with..." Grief? Pity? "Guilt."

"Guilt?" Toad echoes from the recesses of the camera. Parts of the contraption that should probably never see the light of day lie scattered across the pier. Ratty knows better than to question this mechanical biopsy. "Whatever for?"

Ratty catches a metal screw before it rolls off into the river. "I don't know," he says. Grief, he could understand; pity, he could tolerate; but the guilt unnerves him in a way almost akin to fear. "And I'm not sure I want to."

In the end, he has no choice in the matter.

In the end, he wishes he could claim he was surprised, but the truth has been a monster caught out of the corner of his eye for months, flickering in odd, tell-tale moments. It lingers in the simple cold that has tarried too long in his father's lungs. In the laughter that turns to coughs and the bouts of sleep that never leave his father rested. In the harried grief of Mr Badger.

Ratty knows there is something wrong with his father, but he clings onto the belief that death could not be so cruel as to strike twice.

It could not, he tells himself as his father's fur dulls and his eyes dim.

Even death must have its mercy, he pleads as he gathers the half-drunk tea from his father's shaking paws.

Even it must see that this household has borne its burden of grief, he rages as his father shivers beside a roaring fire.

He stares at the towel, bloodied from his father's latest coughing fit, and his world shatters.

He stands in the too-hot kitchen with paws shaking, so alike his father's and yet so not, and holds out the damning evidence between them. "How long have you known?"

"Ratty–"

"How long?"

He doesn't mean to shout, but his voice echoes off the walls and the evening chorus outside falters for just a moment.

His father sighs, and now Ratty can hear the tell-tale rattle in his lungs. Is it louder than yesterday, or does it only sound that way because he is listening for it? "It's been worsening since spring."

"Since..." Ratty takes a steadying breath. It doesn't work. He turns his feet to pacing the room, ignoring the heat of the room that crawls beneath his fur. "All that time spent pampering to Toad's ego, managing his fads, when I should have been focusing... when you knew..." He halts that thought, drifting too close to the current of grieving anger within. "Why didn't you say how bad it was?"

"I didn't want you to worry."

Ratty swears, for once not caring at the raised eyebrow it causes. "Well, I'm worrying plenty now."

"There's nothing you can do about it."

"How can you be sure?" Ratty demands. "We could – there must be something – someone – medicine or doctors or help that can... that might know–"

His father's paw curls about his, bringing him to a sharp stop before he can circuit the stifling room again. "There isn't."

"But how can you be sure?" And then it hits him, that strange living grief that has scared him for so long. "Badger." For a heartbeat, he wants to rage at the injustice of it all, of Mr Badger knowing the truth all this time while he – while his father's own son – must find it in a blood-soaked towel, but then he sees the fatigue in his father's faded eyes and understands, even if he does not entirely forgive him. Grief has haunted this house enough from Mr Badger alone, and Ratty can only imagine the weight from him alongside would bury them all.

He sits, perched on the arm of a seat while the world around him settles into a new, unfamiliar future. "How long do you have?" he whispers.

"Badger thinks I'll see Christmas," his father replies. He smiles. "We must be thankful for small mercies, mustn't we?"

Ratty thinks there is nothing merciful about it at all.

[lady-tortilla-chip]

Any zukaang headcanons?

Ask and you shall receive! :D Sorry it took me a couple days to write this, lol. I ended up having quite a lot to write so uh, buckle up. XP

1. Zuko and Aang get together because Sokka couldn’t watch the pining anymore. Though for Aang it wasn’t pining so much as waiting for Zuko to come to him. In contrast Zuko pined loudly for Aang. So Sokka, who was tired of it couldn’t help opening his mouth one day and expressing his frustrations over it. (I have alternative versions of how they get together, this is just mah fave thought atm. Let me know if you’d like to see those alternatives tho!)

2. Zuko deeply enjoys meditating with Aang, though typically their sessions are just Aang meditating while Zuko simply watches him. He enjoys the way Aang’s whole body loses every bit of tension and how peaceful his expression gets. Aang usually teases him about it but Zuko doesn’t mind as much as he claims.

3. When Aang gets a bit taller than Zuko he immediately starts cracking jokes about it. Zuko doesn’t really care all that much about their new height difference, though sometimes it surprises him to have to glance up rather than down, and he does occasionally return the sarcasm and sometimes even likes to demonstrate how inconsequential that height difference really is. ;)

4. Aang’s favorite thing to do when he’s not busy and doesn’t want to meditate is sit and braid Zuko’s hair. It was something he’d started doing soon following the end of the war. The first time he did it Zuko was confused and not quite happy about it. Though he dealt with it because then Aang wouldn’t interrupt him while he was trying to work. Eventually though, Zuko came to deeply enjoy having Aang’s hands in his hair and the braids he styled his hair into.

5. Aang insists on teaching Zuko old Fire Nation dances and Air Nomad dances! Zuko is not happy about it at first. The only dances he learned were the stiff formal ones expected of him to learn as a prince. He remembers hating every second of learning them and the music to which they were traditionally danced to was boring. But....Aang seems so excited at the prospect of getting to share such fun parts of both their cultural histories with him and he just can’t say no. So, he goes along with it. And...he does deeply enjoy watching Aang demonstrate for him. The movements, particularly for the Air Nomad dances, are fluid and beautiful much like the bending style. It’s incredible to watch and makes him feel somewhat connected to the Air Nomads through Aang.

However, watching is one thing. Mimicking said beautiful and fluid movements, is another. Zuko hates it. At first. It’s frustrating for him to screw up the steps and while he knows Aang’s not going to mistreat him like the person who had taught him the formal dances, he still doesn’t like failing. His frustrations lighten though with every bit of history Aang shares regarding the dances and their meanings and eventually he starts having fun. And the smile Aang flashes at him when he finally does a half decent job of mimicking him makes any other frustrations disappear as easily as they came.

6. Zuko and Aang both work with Azula through her rehabilitation. I have a very specific idea about how this works but I’m not going into all of that right now because it would be....long-winded. Lol. But during that time Azula becomes especially fond of Aang and even gives Zuko a serious shovel talk when Zukaang become a couple. With Aang she just tells him to take care of “Zuzu”. What she doesn’t say is that she’s, in her own way, happy for them.

7. Zuko and Aang travel back to the Air Temples together at some point before Sokka got them to work out their relationship. Aang is excited to show Zuko his home but it’s bittersweet for both of them. Zuko because of the intensely visceral realization and understanding of Aang’s loss that he has upon arriving. Something that had never quite connected for him was Aang’s status as the last Air Nomad with the fact that he’s also the Avatar. In his head those two parts of Aang became nearly separate entities. But being in Aang’s home, listening to him talk about his childhood, brings these two facts about who Aang is crashing together. And Zuko has to really deal with the reality of all that. Before, the Air Nomad genocide was merely a fact of history that virtually everyone knew. The horror of what Fire Nation had done to the Air Nomads had worn away with time even to the rest of the world. In the Fire Nation particularly, they were all taught it was a victory. A conquest. The first of many.

Zuko was taught no different. So seeing Aang standing among the remnants of his culture and the utterly empty spaces of his home, wearing the saddest smile Zuko’s ever seen on his face while retelling stories from his upbringing...it fills him with so much guilt and anger and grief for Aang he nearly suffocates with it. He nearly cried. He nearly shouts. But that is not his right. He doesn’t get to cry and scream over the injustice. Because the loss of Aang’s people was directly caused by Zuko’s family. So all he can do is lend an ear to everything Aang tells him. Soak in every word and remember every tale. Because Aang won’t accept the amount of apologies he wants to express.

That’s not hard though, because he’s glad to hear all about the true history there. And while Zuko listens he recalls every time he’d belittled Aang’s people and their beliefs, can’t help wanting to apologize to them all. So he does, quietly.

Then there’s Aang who’s most recent memory of being there was when he’d found Gyatso’s skeleton. A memory he imparts to Zuko later during their visit. Once again the reality of what he lost, and everything that was taken from him, hits him. He’s not sure he’ll ever stop being surprised at the utter quiet in the temple, or the emptiness in its halls, or sheer lack of life that used to abound. But he’s glad to have Zuko there, who listens intently as Aang tells him all about the temple and the wonderful people that had once resided there.

8. Aang inspires Zuko to become a vegetarian. When Zuko found out people ate turtleducks he was shocked and horrified. Then Aang brought up the fact that all meat was originally some kind of cute animal. Zuko was never able to eat meat again. Sokka hates Aang a little bit for it because he likes meat and the traditional Fire Nation dishes that featured it were some of his favorites. Now, it’s rare for meat to be served when he comes by and that is a tragedy he hasn’t forgiven Aang for causing.

9. Aang is not a fan of the servants. They’re fine as people it’s just...he doesn’t want to be served. At first, it was funny. Their insistence to “help” entertaining because they were just so SERIOUS about it. But eventually he grew tired of it and prolonged visits to literally anywhere else were appreciated for the break away. Zuko thinks it’s hilarious and even subtly reminds the servants to be extra caring towards the Avatar because he simply works too hard.

10. Even when Aang grows taller than Zuko, he prefers sleeping with his back pressed to Zuko’s chest. He likes aligning their scars, likes imagining himself as a shield against any further harm to Zuko’s front, and sleeps better when he’s held firm in Zuko’s arms. Zuko, while he didn’t say as much and teased Aang for his reason, likes the position because he likes being in place to protect Aang’s back. He didn’t before and though Aang doesn’t hold any of that against him, he still feels the need to make up for that in every way he can.

[specterchasing-a]

Coming Clean || Eddie & Bex

TIMING: Wednesday, June 23rd

PARTIES: @inbextween​ & @specterchasing​

LOCATION: Eddie’s Apartment

SUMMARY: Eddie finally has a chance to tell Bex the truth.

CONTENT WARNINGS: Internalized homophobia tw

Two days ago, Bex’s heart stopped beating, and today Eddie planned to break up with her. He would understand if she ended hating him, he kind of did too. Not for being gay, but for involving her in his repression-fueled fantasy. Building a relationship where denial served as a linchpin would have been a lousy decision no matter what. Doing so with Bex, an incontestably wonderful girl with too much already on her plate, placed him on the leaderboard for the world’s biggest scumbags. The more he thought about it, the more Morgan’s worst-case scenario sounded like a pipedream.

As per usual, he picked her up at the docks not far from where they shared their first kiss. Eddie tried not to think about that night at the karaoke bar as she settled into the passenger seat, but failed immediately. If divine punishment existed, it was probably reserved for guys who dumped girls that liked them enough to kiss them in front of an audience. He wondered how the people who cheered them on would feel if they could see them now. Shockingly, the imaginary crowd didn’t help calm his nerves.

“Hey,” Eddie squeaked as he gripped the steering wheel so tightly it turned his knuckles white. “Good to see you.” He put the car in drive and navigated them towards the road. The song playing from the car’s speakers faded into silence before the next one kicked off. Eddie didn’t recognize it until the vocals chimed in.

Now I’ve had—

Eddie hit the radio’s power button and plunged them into awkward silence, now certain he’d been onto something with his theory about divine punishment.

She could do this. Bex took in a deep breath as she waited on the bench by the ferry, where she always waited for Eddie. It gave her the perfect view of the road, as far down as the sharp turn left that took you away from Amity and towards Downtown, as well as of the ocean, reaching out beyond the horizon. Ever since she’d found out about Mina, every body of water reminded her of her. It was just another of many things that did. And then the guilt would start. Especially because today she was meeting with Eddie. 

She didn’t know what he wanted to talk about, but it was something big and probably serious. And so she’d put on her best “I'm Fine!” face and made sure her smile reached just enough of her eyes when she saw Eddie’s car pulling around the corner. She couldn’t let the nothingness consume her, she knew that, but forcing it felt wrong and raw. She could fake it, though. She was really good at faking being okay. She’d done it for twenty years and sometimes she forgot she might not need to do it for another twenty. 

The car pulled up and she waved at him, like she always did, before straining to lift herself from the bench. Her heart pumped loud in her chest and she put a hand over it to calm it down. “Hey,” she said gently, smiling, “thanks for picking me up, like always. I-- feel like it’s been so long since I’ve seen you.” Was she supposed to hug him? Kiss him hello? She didn’t know and it felt wrong, when she’d just kissed Mina a few days ago. She slid into the front seat. “Are you doing-- okay? With-with everything?”

All in all, Bex seemed like she always did. Eddie couldn’t fathom walking away from what she’d been through without losing himself altogether, but it would have been a mistake to underestimate her resilience. He appreciated that she didn’t greet him with affection. It would’ve only made what he needed to do more difficult.

“Uhm, well,” Eddie stalled after her question. ‘Okay’ wasn’t how he would describe his current state, but he preferred to avoid introspection. Other people had it worse, Bex included. He didn’t need to pile his problems on top of hers. “Yeah, all things considered.” His anxiety slowly began to ebb as they picked up where they left off. Even now, Bex managed to have a soothing effect on him.

“How about you?” Eddie glanced over at her as he drove. He needed to make sure she was stable enough to cope with a break-up. Otherwise, he’d need to suck up his reservations about playing the role of her boyfriend a little longer. “I mean, we don’t have to go into it if you don’t want to, but I won’t lie and say I’m not worried about you.”

“I’m--” Bex started, but she didn’t know how she was. “--dealing.” It was the closest she’d get to the truth, for now. She didn’t want to lie to Eddie, but she couldn’t tell him the truth, not yet. Her pain was just hurting other people, and she needed to not be that for him. She owed it to him. If she was just using him for safety, she owed that to him. She hoped one day, he’d forgive her. She gave a brief smile. “It’s a lot, but I’ll be okay. I have Morgan and Mi--” she paused, “--my other friends.” She licked her lips. “I have people.”

The car ride wasn’t exactly a long one, they’d made it so many times. From the ferry to Eddie’s place, but it felt like ages. “I know you’re worried, and I-- I won’t tell you not to be, because I know that’s hard right now. But don’t-- don’t think you have to focus on me. I don’t know how well you knew-- everyone. Everything.” 

Eddie hoped he counted as one of the people Bex felt she could rely on, but recent evidence suggested otherwise. When it came to sharing her feelings or even being open about how she spent her time, he clearly didn’t register as someone she was comfortable confiding in. It stung, but Eddie harbored secrets too. It would be hypocritical to expect Bex to lay out the truth for him when he couldn’t offer her the same candor.

“I only met Adam once,” Eddie said quietly. He knew Bex’s comment referred to more than the recently dead hunter, but it was hard not to think about him specifically. “He saved my life.” Nervousness gave way to a sinking feeling in his chest.

“I’m worried about everyone right now, but especially you and Nell. I guess that’s the price of caring, I don’t really have a say in the matter.”

Eddie pulled into his apartment building’s parking lot and came to a stop in his usual parking space. “I know you hate it when I do this,” he said, looking at Bex. “But I’m gonna open the door for you.” With that out of the way, he exited the car and circled around to the passenger side to make good on his word. 

“The elevator’s been out of order since its brief stint as a portal to hell, so we’ll have to take the stairs,” Eddie informed Bex as he held out his hand for her. “You think you can manage that, or is it human-crutch time?”

Bex didn’t get why everyone kept saying that. They were worried about Nell and her, but Bex wasn’t the one who had lost someone. Bex wasn’t the one who had been trapped in a hell dimension for over two weeks. Bex wasn’t the one who had died. She didn’t say anything, just shook her head and smiled sadly. “I’m so worried about Nell,” she admitted quietly, “but I don’t know how to help her. So I’m just-- focusing on what I can do, and who I can help.” They pulled up to his building and he parked and she reached for the handle, when suddenly he was announcing he’d get the door.

She didn’t have the heart to argue and just nodded. “Right, okay. Just this once, though,” she agreed, watching him walk around and open it. She pulled herself out, standing up. Her body didn’t hurt as much as ache, now that the healer had done his work and made things less-- painful. Maybe that wasn’t quite the word, but it was close enough. “I can walk! Honestly. No leg injuries this time.” Just heart palpitations and a burn that rose up every time she moved too much.  It still felt like asking him too much. “Lead the way.”

Eddie refrained from offering his opinions on Nell’s situation. The only help she could be given was confidence in her safety net. Friends and family being there for her would ease the pain, but nothing would rid her of it completely. Adam’s death and the grief it brought her would be something she carried for the rest of her life. Over time, she might learn how to have good days again, but reminders would wait around every corner. Grief, after it introduces itself, never leaves for long.

The two of them traversed the stairs in silence while Eddie’s anxiety returned in full-swing. After three flights, he opened a door that led to a long hallway of apartments. His eyes lingered on Alfie’s as he led Bex to his own. He made sure Silas knew not to be around for today. An imaginary audience was bad enough.

Bucket rushed to greet them at the front door. As per usual, he showed how bad of a guard-dog he would be by not barking. Eddie picked up the Pomeranian currently shaking with noiseless excitement and kicked the door shut with his heel.

“So,” he ventured. His mouth felt uncomfortably dry. “You thirsty, or anything?” He hoped she was. Eddie would take any excuse he could get to prolong the inevitable.

Bex followed him up the stairs and slunk behind just enough to let her expression fall for a moment. Keeping up her facade felt harder now, for some reason, when she couldn’t quite access the feelings inside of her. She just wanted to not think about any of that stuff, she wanted to think about other stuff. Better stuff, happy stuff. She perked back up as soon as they were at the door, inside, and she gave a gentle smile. “I, uh-- no, not really,” she answered, shaking her head. She really just wanted to get this over with, whatever it was. She didn’t know, how could she possibly know? She’d been bad to him lately, and she felt increasingly more guilty about it, the longer they stood there. 

“So, what was it that you wanted to talk about?” she asked, moving further into the apartment. She’d found comfort here in a lot of ways, but something felt as if it were sitting in the room with them, and she assumed it was whatever Eddie wanted to talk to her about. “It seemed pretty urgent.”

Eddie’s hope collapsed when Bex tackled the elephant in the room. “Right, that,” he said with a sigh. He lowered Bucket to the floor and attempted to steel himself. Whatever it was that he said to Morgan when the two of them acted out this very scenario was now completely inaccessible to him now. Eddie’s heart pounded loudly in his ears while he tried to piece together a new script.

“Before I say anything else, I want you to know that I really do care about you and… that I’m sorry,” Eddie began, crossing his arms over his chest as he spoke. Words weren’t coming to him easily. Every thought in his head sounded disjointed and scared. He decided to approach the situation as if he were ripping off a band-aid. “I’m gay, Bex.” Eddie couldn’t bring himself to look at her. “I knew that when we got together, but I didn’t want it to be true and I thought dating you would, I dunno, fix me, I guess.” His lips pursed. “I’m sorry,” he said for the second time.

Bucket plodded over to Bex and she bent down to pet the excitable dog, looking up at Eddie. He looked nervous. And he was looking at her strangely, and then he was apologizing. Oh, was he breaking up with her? She shouldn’t have been relieved. He provided something for her that she needed-- normalcy. Protection. But that was selfish. That was so selfish to think. She pulled her hand away and stood up, tilting her head. He wasn’t looking at her anymore, he had more to say, and then-- “Oh.” Oh. Eddie was...gay. That-- made sense. It made sense. It really did. How hadn’t she seen it? How hadn’t she known? Probably because she still had a blindfold down over her own eyes, buried herself deep in that closet. It was safe back there.

“You’re-- oh.” No, no, she needed to say something else. Not just Oh. She needed to say something else. “That’s-- wow. You’re--” Me, too. She wanted to say, but the words made her heart seize. Was this how Eddie had felt? Bex was a coward. “I-- I’m sorry. I didn’t know. But I-- I’m happy for you. Really! I am. I’m glad you could figure that out, I’m just sorry I--” she wasn’t sure what she was sorry about, she just knew she was sorry. “Didn’t realize. It’s...it’s okay. That you knew, before.” He wanted to be reassured, right? She shook her head and walked towards him, holding out her hand. “Hey,” she called to him, “I’m not mad. This-- this was really brave of you. Really. I’m glad you told me. I don’t want to make you live a life you’re not happy with.”

Bex’s initial reaction caused Eddie’s heart to stall in his chest, but the words that followed replaced terror with confusion. His gaze slowly found hers. An apology was the last thing he expected to hear her say. Instead of hating him, she almost sounded relieved. With all she’d been through, he guessed that made sense. Their relationship never seemed to offer her much comfort, so its ending only meant one less thing to worry about.

When she offered her hand, Eddie gladly took it. “You’re… sure it’s okay?” He didn’t know why he asked that, her answer didn’t have the power to change anything. “Thank you, Bex.” Eddie gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “Really, I can’t tell you how grateful I am for everything you’ve done for me, but… especially this.” A tentative smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “Does this mean we’re still friends?”

Bex gave a small laugh, a genuine laugh, the first time in days, but she laughed and it felt good. “Yes, Eddie, I’m sure,” she shrugged, “not sure my answer would be able to change how you feel, how you are, anyway. And I wouldn’t want it to. You-- all I want is for you to be happy. You know that, right?” She hoped he knew that. She squeezed his hand back. “No need to thank me, really. I’m just doing what should be done, what any friend would do.” What she hoped her friends would do for her, when she finally could be safe about it, too. If ever. “Of course we are. We were friends before we were-- you know, whatever this was. We’re still friends.” 

She tried to keep herself stable, as she looked at him, and she realized her last line of defense was falling. If she had to go home and tell her parents that she was single again, what was to say they wouldn’t just give up on her right then and there? Her smile soured. “Are you...okay? About all this?”

Eddie’s smile grew and lost its nervousness. The longer Bex spoke, the more his anxiety melted away. He still had a long way to go before the truth about his identity stopped being something he lost sleep over, but having people in his life accept and even support him made it easier to stomach. “That’s all I want for you too,” he softly replied.

He took a deep breath after her follow-up question, not noticing the way her smile suddenly seemed less genuine. “I think so,” he said with a nod. “Most days are pretty up and down in regards to this particular topic, but… I’ve got a lot of people in my corner, it seems.” Alfie, Morgan, Silas, and now Bex. So far, everyone he told responded positively. “So, yeah, don’t waste time worrying about me. I’m gonna be just fine.”

[thegoodgayshit]

Luz’s mother really doesn’t want to send Luz to camp. She knows once she leaves, there is no going back. But Luz has a knack for getting into trouble, and one day she stumbles into the same type of people her mother would have preferred she avoided. After helping Luz dissolve her high school bully into dust, Eda and Lilith know right away that this kid is just like them - a child of the gods. So Luz hops on a Pegasus and heads to Camp Half-blood, where she embarks on a dangerous quest that makes her both friends and enemies... and she might even save Olympus along the way.

Chapter Thirty: The Brazillian Business Man and his Silk Suit

Luz stood there on the edge of the mountain screaming out for Amity until her throat was raw.

She hadn’t seen where she landed. Beneath about twenty feet below her, there were piles of rocks and some shrubs covering the base of the mountain. Luz hadn’t realized just how deep the tunnel to the cave ran. The portal had been so deep inside the mountain, it was like they hadn’t climbed it at all.

Amity was down there somewhere. Luz kept hoping, praying, that any moment now she was going to climb out of one of the bushes, call out to Luz that she was okay, and they would meet outside the mountain.

That hadn’t happened.

But she kept screaming. Hoping. Praying.

“I don’t understand,” Hestia mumbled from right behind her. Now that the tremors had subsided and the portal had been shut down, she was more willing to stand near the edge next to Luz. “This shouldn’t have happened.”

Luz felt anger rise in her chest so quickly she couldn’t help but spin around on her.

“Of course it wasn’t! She wasn’t supposed to die! Amity always is the one who sacrifices everything for everybody. Couldn’t she for once get to share some of that burden? She deserved better!”

Hestia seemed surprised by her outburst, and Luz knew it wasn’t a good idea to scream at goddesses, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Amity was gone.

“That’s not exactly what I meant,” Hestia said slowly, thankfully deciding not to take what Luz had said personally. “I meant that she is not the hero in the prophecy who is supposed to die.”

“What do you mean supposed to die? Nobody was supposed to die!” Guilt was beginning to eat its way up into Luz’s chest. She’d promised Amity things would be different, that maybe the prophecy was misleading. Now she finds out that wasn’t true?

Was Amity the wrong one? Even if she was, would Luz be able to handle Willow or Gus dying in her place? She didn’t have to ponder those horrific thoughts for much longer.

“Luz, you are the hero whose life ends.”

Luz was stunned into silence, her whole body freezing up.

“What?”

Hestia is watching her with careful eyes. They were so much warmer now that she’d been freed and Belos had fallen. She seemed to glow, her whole body illuminating a soft sheen. The healthiest nine year old she’d ever seen. She also shimmered with a sort of power, one that made Luz feel weird about looking down on.

But she was hooked onto Hestia’s words, desperate to understand. Hestia’s bright amber eyes flickered between Luz’s own brown ones, searching for something.

“It cannot be Amity who dies. It was her prophecy that foretold a death, but her hands would only bear the weight of the journey. You, on the other hand, are the most important piece to the puzzle. The escape.”

“It takes four…” Luz murmured softly, remembering her own prophecy, and Hestia offered a little smile.

“Yet I only saw two of you here today.”

“Willow and Gus, my companions… they’re fighting off the demigods,” Luz mumbled under her breath, running a hand through her hair. Luz might be a little dense sometimes, but she wasn’t stupid. And right now she was wracking her brain trying to figure out what was going on. “They bought us time to come down here and save you. And… and we did. And Amity’s gone. The prophecy lied!”

Hestia shook her head. “Luz Noceda, you’re quest is not over.”

“No, it’s not.”

Luz turned her head to the sound of the new voice, and at first, she clenched her sword, worried that she had a new enemy to fight. But this… this wasn’t an enemy.

It was a man, with deep chestnut coloured skin and wavy dark brown hair that was styled neatly on the top of his head. He had a chiselled jaw, and a clean five o’clock shadow covering his face. His eyes were light brown, and as Luz examined him closer as he slowly walked towards them, she noticed that there was a tiny slit in his thick eyebrows.

He was wearing an expensive-looking, slim-fit, dark blue silk suit, not dissimilar to the color of the one Luz wore to the fake prom, which already felt like eons ago. In his hand was a winged staff, with two real snakes curling around the ends of it. A Caduceus.

She would have known who he was without her new knowledge of the Greek Gods. Her Mami had always talked about him this way. A very successful businessman from Brazil, who'd she only met because he was vising the country on a work trip.

Her father, Hermes.

If Luz wasn’t so wired with grief, anger, and exhaustion, she might have been excited to meet him.

The messenger god was walking slowly towards them, towards Luz, and for a moment, she saw what looked like hesitance cross his face. It infuriated Luz. He’d been gone for her whole life, never bothering to show up or be there for her, and he chose now to intervene? Now to make his grand appearance?

A week ago, she would have felt honoured. Now, it felt like a slap in the face.

“Hello, Luz.”

She wanted to scream. To whip out her sword and slash Aletheia right across his face. But Luz didn’t have the resolve she wanted. She was upset, hurt, and heartbroken. She didn’t want to be angry at a father who’d never been around. That felt like an overreaction. She didn’t want to overreact. She just wanted Amity back.

“Hola, padre.”

It was colder than her usual tone, and Hermes didn’t miss it. He winced, and Luz felt a tiny twinge of satisfaction in her gut. He didn’t deserve to feel comfortable around her.

“I… know how you must feel about me,” he said quietly, “and I don’t blame you for it. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” Luz echoed, her eyebrows furrowing in disbelief. “Sorry doesn’t cut it! I’ve been on this quest with just my friends without your help for almost two weeks. I’d been alone my whole life before coming to camp. Now Amity…” her voice breaks, and she shakes her head. “You should have been there. You should have helped me!”

“I have done my best to aid you on your quest,” Hermes insisted, gesturing to the sword in her hand. “I guided you to Peleus’ sword, the first key to the mountain. It’s the same one I enchanted centuries ago for him. I granted Aphrodite’s chariot great speed to get you to Indiana. You asked me to bless your throw in Orpheus’ manor, and I did just that.”

“You left my Mami,” Luz said through gritted teeth, even if her brain was buzzing with new information. “You left me to grow up with her alone.”

“Your mother is a strong, brave, and dedicated woman,” Hermes said with a nod. “I wanted to be there for you, but it was not my place to do so. All demigods must grow up alone, without the guidance of their goldy parents. And you are special, Luz. I could not interfere with the prophecy.”

She looked down at her now-battered white shoes, which had been brand new when she’d first come to camp. She wanted to argue with him. To go on and put Hermes in his place for being an absent father. But she just didn’t have the energy to argue with a god.

Hermes stepped forward, reaching out to her. Luz didn’t push him away. He settled his hands on her shoulders firmly.

“Luz, look at me.”

She looked up and blinked. She’d been wrong about his eye colour. They weren’t brown, but a deep bronzy hue. They were narrowed in a determination she thought was familiar. As she looked on, she realized why. It was not dissimilar to the look Alador had given her right at the end of their one on one conversation.

“"Por favor,” he pleaded, “déjame ayudarte."

Luz swallowed hard. She wasn’t sure how she felt about her father, but at the very least, she owed this much to Amity to do her best to finish the quest they’d started, even if she couldn’t.

“Okay. What do I need to do?”

Hermes was quick to step back and give Luz space, this time turning to Hestia, who Luz had completely forgotten was standing there.

“The portal will not be closed until we can make sure Belos will never be able to activate it again. His soul has reappeared in Charon’s office, just as it did the first time he died. He will be taken across the River Styx for trial, but he had prepared for something like this. His portal is on the outskirts of the Underworld, between the Fields of Asphodel and the River Acheron. Instead of wandering past the line with the dead, he will take a secret passageway back to the portal, and will try to open it again from the inside.”

“That makes no sense,” Luz retorted, “we’ve freed Hestia. The portal just can’t reopen without her.”

Hermes nodded, “you’d be right, usually. But the portal was able to fuse with the mountain and lock in Hestia’s hearth. She could be on Olympus, or on the moon, and it still wouldn’t matter. Her divine essence has fused with it.”

“Okay, so how do we stop the portal from reopening?”

Hestia and Hermes shared a look, and reality hit Luz like a truck.

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry, Luz. But you’ll have to be the hero one last time,” Hestia said softly. “The portal must close.”

And Luz agreed. Amity had fallen down a mountain for this. For all of this to be over and done, and for Belos to never be able to hurt any demigod ever again.

“I’ll do it. I’ll go to the Underworld and close the portal.”

Hermes’ mouth twisted into a smile, something between pride and amusement. “It won’t be easy. You’ll have to get past Belos and his army. But I’ll help you in every way I can. You won’t be alone.”

Luz’s brow furrowed. “What, you’re coming with me?”

“Not quite,” he replied with a chuckle. It was deep and grizzly but also somehow soothing and gentle at the same time. “The Olympians cannot cross into Hades' realm without his consent. But I am not just the god of travellers, you know. I am the god who guides all travelling souls to the Underworld. I did not just come here to guide you, Luz. I came here with a message. There is a soul the pantheon has agreed to spare if you complete your quest and stop this portal from bringing the downfall of Olympus.”

Luz's heart started to race. Did he mean…?

Hermes reached out and placed a hand back on Luz’s shoulder. This one was much gentler than the last, firm grip. It was almost fatherly.

“Amity is not a casualty of this prophecy, Luz. The two of you must destroy the portal from the inside, and stop Belos for good. You’ll find her waiting in line to be judged. But a warning: she won’t be the demigod you once knew. Many in the Underworld need to be reminded of who they are.”

Luz wasn’t worried about that. Amity was the strongest person she knew. When they were together, they were unstoppable.

“She must hurry,” Hestia muttered, rubbing her palms together. It was a weird gesture, she was moving so quickly it looked like she was trying to catch a flame between her hands. “I can already feel my powers weakening.”

“I can’t go without telling Willow and Gus,” Luz said, preparing to turn and sprint back up the mountain path from which she came.

“You must! We are out of time,” Hermes said with a shake of his head. “It takes four to escape, and release goddess caged”. They have their own role to play in allowing the portal to open, and guarding it while you’re on the other side. And… they will need to recover Amity if her soul is to come back with you.”

Luz hesitated. She’d come so far with their help, she couldn’t just… leave.

The hand on her shoulder gave a comforting squeeze. “Luz, por favor, se nos acabó el tiempo.

I will stay here, and guide them while you are gone. I swear it on the River Styx.”

“As will I,” Hestia said with a nod. “I swear it.”

Luz took a deep breath. She needed to get a grip. Besides, after all this, what was one more quest to the Underworld to stop an evil demigod from taking over the world?

Easy peasy.

“Okay. When we find the portal, how do we close it?”

“You will need this,” Hestia said, and Luz realized that she hadn’t just been rubbing her hands together for nothing. In her hands was a tiny flame, and she extended it out to Luz. “One touch with this on the portal and it will open for you and Amity to walk back through. When the power of my hearth has touched both sides, I will be able to use it to burn the connection between us. The portal should fall apart.”

Luz was a little nervous to take the flame, but she was surprised how easy it fit in her hand. There was no burning like she thought, but rather a warm tingling sensation right in the middle of her palm. After a moment, it shrank and shifted into an ambered coloured plastic lighter.

“A warning,” Hestia added, and Luz glanced up at her tone. “Only a living soul may harness my hearth. It is yours and yours alone to carry.”

Luz nodded, gently setting the lighter in her pocket. “I won’t give it to anybody else. I promise.”

“Then it’s time,” Hermes said, and Luz tilted her head to look up at him. “I must allow you to pass into the Underworld. Are you ready?”

More than she would ever be. She shrank Aletheia back into a ring, letting it rest onto her finger. She was going to go down there and bring Amity back if it was the last thing she ever did.

“I am. So, how do I get there? Are you going to lend me a flying chariot?”

Hermes laughed. “Not exactly. Take my hand.”

He extended it out for her, and Luz took it. She was surprised how soft it was for a god, but then was somehow equally surprised when he gripped it tightly, not letting her go. His other hand came down to the front pocket of her shorts, the opposite on to where she put the lighter, and he slipped something inside.

“I need you to look at me and not look away. This won’t be pleasant, but it’s the only way for a living soul to travel through the Underworld unscathed.”

Then, Hermes started to glow. At first, it was oddly beautiful, his whole body lighting up golden around the edges of his suit, like a picturesque model of a Bloomberg business magazine. Then, it got uncomfortable, and Luz was squinting, and she knew right away her eyes were starting to burn as it got brighter and brighter.

It was bordering on painful when her head started to get woozy. “Dad, are you sure this won’t kill me?”

The last thing she remembers is his soothing, deep-throated, chuckle. “Well, I've never done this before, but even so I'm fairly confident it will work.”

The burning got so bright she couldn’t see anything but white, and her whole body tingled like she was burning alive without the excruciating physical pain that should have been paired with it.

Then, there was nothing.

[zodiyack]

Speeding Cars

Requested by anon: Hello I wanted to ask if you could do a Tommy Shelby x reader angsty song!fic based on the song speeding cars by walking on cars. Also thank you in advance and if you can't no hard feelings.

Pairing: Thomas Shelby x Female!Reader

Warnings: Angst, swearing, cheating, mentions of abuse

Words: 2,164

Song: Speeding Cars by Walking On Cars

Key: Lyrics = Bold + Italic, Memories (and sometimes emphasis) = Italic

Taglist: @captivatedbycillianmurphy, @stydia-4-ever, @matth1w, @redspaceace, @simonsbluee, @jenepleurepasbaby, @peakysputain, @fandom-puff​, @darling-i-read-it​

Masterlist | Peaky Blinders Masterlist

So if I stand in front of a speeding car, Would you tell me who you are, what you like? What's on your mind, if I'd get it right? How I love that no one knows. And these secrets all that we've got so far, The demons in the dark, lie again, Play pretends like it never ends; This way no one has to know

He loved her, so Polly understood his pain. The family had recently told him about Y/n’s betrayal. How she never actually loved him. And even if she had, he had to give up his love for her to be with another woman. It hit him. Hard. But she understood his need for space.

At least, that’s what she imagined he was going through.

In reality, Tommy was going through the downfall of their relationship. Y/n had actually loved him, confessed her betrayal one night. Though his reaction was not ideal, expected- yet not ideal, he loved her nevertheless.

She came to him, just the other night, and fessed up the newest information. Her employer offered a deal; Tommy take the man’s daughter’s hand in marriage for peace, or their war would continue. Accepting would mean he, the employer, would no longer be a threat to the Shelby family, but it also meant Tommy could no longer see Y/n, as that would be crossing him.

His palms slammed down on the wooden surface of his desk, splinters piercing through his soft pale skin. The water in his eyes formed into droplets, splashing down on the papers in front of him.

“You don’t love me, do you?”

“That’s not what I said. And frankly, I believe I should be the one to ask that, of you!” The hurt in his voice made Y/n wince. “You’re playing the victim, after telling me you work for my enemy. How wonderful.”

“I understand, Thomas, you’re hurt-”

“Hurt is an understatement. I... I’m letting my family down by falling for you. I’m putting everyone I love at risk, because I was dumb enough to fall for you.”

His angry ranting continued as he paced the room. Y/n felt her own anger bubbling up to the surface before she finally snapped. “You think you’re the only one with that problem? I hadn’t intended to fall for you, but in the end, I did! I fell for you and I don’t regret anything besides working for that... that.. that dick!”

Tommy’s head snapped upwards, finally noticing the tears that streamed down her cheeks, how red and puffy her eyes had become. Her expression showed him just how genuine her confessional outburst was.

“You mean that?”

“Of course I mean it, Tommy. I would give anything to be able to live a normal life with you. No enemies, no living in fear of your life or my own, just a normal life.”

He hesitated, breathing slowly as he processed the information. Tommy scoffed at himself before walking over to Y/n and pulling her flush against himself. “I love you. I know, we’ll have to talk about this in the morning, but for now, I need you to know that I love you.”

“Promise me.”

“Promise you what?”

She pulled away slightly, looking into his eyes, “Promise me you’ll never forget me. If I betray this man... I could die. So, remember me. Whether I run or die. If I run, and the man forgets about me or dies or... so on, promise you’ll look for me?”

The silence that began to crawl it’s way into the room haunted Y/n. She held a breath, fearing the worst of his response before- “Do you even have to ask? How could I ever forget a woman like you?” A smile formed upon his lips, a chuckle following suite.

Even the half smile would have slowed down the time, If I could call you half mine, Maybe this is the safest way to go.

We're singing, Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya. This is the safest way to go nobody gets hurt. We're singing, Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya, You go back to him and then I'll go back to her

So if I stand in front of a speeding car, Would you give your little heart? Say the word? Due to just me and you, This way everyone will know; 'Cause these secrets all that we've got so far. The demons in the dark, lie again, Play pretends like it never ends, This way no one has to know

Tommy excused himself from a conversation with a friend of his wife’s, following something only he seemed to see. It had to be. He was certain. His heart began to pound in his chest.

Only a week ago, he’d married the daughter, gained mercy for his family, and broke his own heart as well as Y/n’s. He really wasn’t in love, despite convincing his wife and the people who’d attended the wedding. Deep down, his heart belonged to the woman he know held against the wall.

His lips traveled up her neck, hand gripping her thigh against his waist. Kissing was the only thing they’d done that night, but her hesitance told him something.

“Is there anything you’d like to tell me?” He mumbled against her jawline, the tingle-like tickle causing her to giggle softly.

“We have to stop this.”

He stopped, smile dropping from his face, and pulled away. “What do you mean?”

“Thomas.” He pulled away, allowing his eyes to scan her features fully. Though the light was dim, he could see every detail. The seriousness they held made his heart drop. “You have a wife. Her father... my employer... he found someone for me. Not my choice, as I would love to continue this... he just...”

“Knows you love me.” Tommy’s eyes fell to the ground, realization hitting him as he finished her sentence. “I understand.”

“Re-remember your promise?” Her words caught his attention once more, “Even though this is the way to live...don’t forget me. We can find a way to push through this.”

“You’re right.”

“I love y-”

“You made your point. I have to forget about you. This is the way to live. And if I still have you on my mind, it won’t seem real.”

“Tommy-” Y/n’s hand came to his cheek slowly, but he pushed it away. “Tommy, don’t do this-”

“No.” He scoffed, chuckling mockingly. “You tell me to give us up, then you tell me not to. Make up your mind, Y/n. Either risk our lives so we can be together, or be a coward and give us up.”

His words hurt her, stabbing her with figurative knives, until she put up the same emotional barrier she held when they first met. “You’re being just as much of a dick as he is. Maybe you should give us up. Cause I would really prefer not going through being under his influence again. So, this is goodbye, Mr. Shelby.”

Her shoulder bumped into him as she walked away. He didn’t miss the redness in her eyes, the way her voice struggled- like she was holding back. Making sure to break in front of him.

And she was; as soon as she left the back doors of the building, her eyes began to pour, just as hard as the rain over her head. Her fiancé waited for her at the front of the building, smoking his cigarette and laughing with his friends.

He was not the best of partners, and neither were the people he chose to spend his time with. She debated, truly, whether she should run back to Tommy, tell him just how bad their choices were, but she was too late. He spotted her, stubbing out the stick, and walked over, grabbing her harshly and announcing their leave to the group of men he had previously been chatting with.

Even the half smile would have slowed down the time, If I could call you half mine. Maybe this is the safest way to go. We're singing Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya, This is the safest way to go nobody gets hurt. 

Their attempts of straying from each other were useless. Tommy found himself realizing quite a bit that night. How unwise and cruel the words he used were, how he couldn’t ever try to pretend he loved her.

It wasn’t until he found his wife cheating on him with the man Y/n had married, did he realize they were both fucked over. The employer knew full well of his daughter’s status in loyalty, as well as the man he forced Y/n to marry, yet the grief they both went through from being split gave him a lot of amusement.

But he still wouldn’t let Thomas divorce her, or Y/n her partner. They were stuck, and Tommy didn’t like it one bit. Neither did Y/n. The bruises on her skin were hidden by her long gown, but revealed by the wind. While he was thankful for the sudden topic of discussion, he was beyond angry for obvious reasons.

“What happened.”

Her sharp inhale and slight jump cued Tommy in on her surprise to see him. He saw her eyes light up but dim down when she realized who she was talking to. “Tommy...we shouldn’t be conversing.” 

They began walking, perhaps for a disguised conversation, or for the sake of avoiding being in the same spot- where anyone could hear. “Did you know?”

“That our spouses were... yeah. I found out, confronted him...”

“Is that how you got those?”

Her eyes widened. “Thomas- you can’t... you weren’t supposed to see that.”

“Yes, I’m sure I know that, but I did. And I’d like it if you told me what happened.”

“You really want to know what happened? The day you... the day we stopped seeing each other, he grew upset, thought I was planning an escape and slapped me. That was the only time he’d done something as fiancés. However, when I married him...it just got worse.”

His heart panged with guilt, anger, and so many mixed emotions. He wasn’t sure if he liked it or not; emotions stripped away from him when he stopped seeing Y/n. “I could kill him, you know. I’ve got friends-”

“Yes, but then your wife’s father will go after me, your friends and family, as well you.”

“He wouldn’t know.”

“Really?” She chuckled, “Yes, yes. The man who managed to get the Thomas Shelby to fear him would surely never notice a planned death, in which the mighty Tommy set up to get the love of his life back. If she even is that.”

“You are.”

Y/n stopped walking and turned to face Thomas. “Tommy...”

“I know, we must not see each other. I’ve got that part engraved into my brain due to my eternal hatred for it. Just- please, Y/n. At least spend one last night with me?”

The way her e/c orbs flickered away from his made him lick his lips out of nervousness. He hadn’t been this anxious since he was a teen. “Thomas- you know the answer. The least I can do... is this.”

He was about to ask her what she had meant, before her palm lifted to his cheek, her lips touched his, and his hands darted to her waist out of memory. They stayed there for a moment, wetness beginning to travel their cheeks, mixing together where their faces touched.

She pulled away, giving him one last pained look, “Goodbye, Thomas Shelby.” Then, just as they both feared, she walked away. She didn’t give him a chance to say it back, for a reason Thomas knew and clung to.

They wouldn’t let it be their last goodbye.

We're singing, Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya, You go back to him and then I'll go back to her

So if I stand in front of a speeding car, Would you tell me who you are, what you like? What's on your mind, if I'd get it right? How I love that no one knows. These secrets all that we've got so far. The demons in the dark, lie again, Play pretends like it never ends. How I love that no one knows

Advertise my secret- I don't really need it. I know you can feel this, So advertise my secret; I don't really need it. I know you can feel this; So advertise my, Advertise my secret

The distance was too much for either of them to handle.

Y/n took it better than Thomas, clinging to their previous meeting, the softness of his lips bringing a red hue to her cheeks every time she thought of it, and the feeling of his smooth skin against her palm sending shivers down her back.

Tommy, however, was hellbent on getting her back. Their kiss was enough to send him over the edge, to find a way to get her back into his arms. He thought of many tricks and loopholes, but none ever played out successfully in his brain.

So he tried to drag Y/n into it.

He nudged her harshly, “Tell them. I could care less.”

“But I care. It could get us both killed.”

“Say that you threatened me with it.”

“Threatened you with the fact that I slept with you a number of times the week of and the week after your wedding? Yes, what a wonderful thing to tell the man who has the trigger at the ready. Tell him that I slept with his daughter’s husband despite, oh- you know, his daughter getting married to him.” Her sarcasm was painful.

“I’m trying to think of ways for us to be together, Y/n.”

“Maybe there isn’t one! Have you ever thought of that? Maybe- maybe fate’s keeping us away from each other for a reason. Maybe we just aren’t meant for each other.”

Tommy leaned against the wall, chuckling to himself.

“What?”

“Nothing...” He lit his cigarette and brought it to his mouth, still chuckling. “Just... fuck fate. I say we write our own destiny.”

The line brought a smile to Y/n’s lips.

“So, any luck?”

“Nope. I’m still working for the bastard.” She frowned, snatching the cigarette from his lips and placing it between hers. “How about you? Think you can take him?”

“Not currently. He’s clever, I’ll give him that, but clever doesn’t beat the Shelby’s. ...He thinks it’s fate, ya know?”

“What’s fate?”

“That he’ll be the downfall of the Shelby family.”

“Well...” She handed him back his cigarettes, “fuck him. And fuck fate.”

Her smile fell. She shoved past him and walked down the hall. He could hear arguing, voices belonging to Y/n and her husband, before the clacking of shoes returned. Y/n and her husband walked past Tommy, her husband sneaking a not so sneaky smirk to Tommy, in a rush.

The door slammed shut and that’s when he noticed it. The paper that had fallen from Y/n’s pocket. Words out of his view until he picked it up. The rushed handwriting returning the grin to his pink lips.

“Fuck fate.”

We're singing, Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya, This is the safest way to go nobody gets hurt. We're singing, Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya. You go back to him and then I'll go back to her

If I stand in front of a speeding car, Don't know who you are, Don't know who you are...Heya heya heya heya, Heya, heya heya, You go back to him and then I'll go back to her

[superemeralds]

OH WOW thank you for answering so fast!! I wanted to ask because in my opinion, Shadow is written kind of... poorly.. at the metal virus arc :c and I love how you characterize Shadow!! I was wondering, if you could, how would you have written him in it?

okay so this got. RAELLY long. it’s under the read more.. hhaaa... get ready for rambles.

before i start on what i would love to see different, here’s a few things that i really liked about his characterization in idw:

shadow being persistent about what he thinks is right, being very straightforward and strict in wanting to execute his ideal

the way he stepped down and let sonic try his way instead of being stubborn because sonic made a very good point. Shadow wants to be fair, and if he of all people deserves a chance, then so should eggman. kind of ties back to maria also, which is a nice nod to have considering it seems like modern writers for sonic usually treat the ending of shth as “ok she never existed to him anyways”

i like that he uses his GUN affiliation to his advantage to do good and help people (even if by rouges account he does it because he doesnt want to deal with zombots)

he has great devotion to make sure the truck is safe and peole get a chance to get out, giving (according to the comics anyways) more than 100% of his power dealing with hundreds if not thousands of zombots alone

I like that there’s a nod to shadow being insecure about his status as ultimate life form, and he is tempted to get infected just to prove to himself he really CANT get sick and he really IS a perfect being. He struggled a lot with the high expectations that were laid upon him, the expectations he’s laying upon himself.

I like how he had a great sense of shock and defeat when he realized that he DID get infected. It’s very true for him to be thrown off by it, get a little careless due to shock. its natural. it’s good.

his “i told you something like this would happen” towards sonic in the beginning of #19 is justified. He hates that he was right, he always is, and he wishes he wasnt. he could’ve prevented this, but its too late now. then later he risks getting infected with the metal virus, and he DOES get infected. He suddenly wasnt right anymore. This sense of irony... it’s probably one of the reasons he has trouble to concentrate on the fight. it’s a nice parallel. IDK if ian intended it to be this deep, but that’s what i read into it.

(i also want to point out that i like that herms gives everyone slightly diverse “skin”-tones. like diverse undertones. im still peeved they are all pretty pale but its hoenstly a nice little nod)

okay so here’s what i think could’ve gone better:

I feel like shadow being the one to drive the truck into the city is a reference to 06, where he is driving around in various vehicles. That in itself is nice, and i think shadow is a person who prefers to do things himself if there’s a lot at stake (which there was a lot of peoples lives) but i also think that he would think of himself as a powerful shield. He would rather be the one overseeing the battlefield insread of being the designated driver. He knows he was created for the frontlines, and he is someone who knows he can survive the front lines. He is not a sacrefice tobe made, he is the one who will make sure that no one else has to sacrefice themselves. Shadow should’ve been on site from the very beginning. Where is the rest of GUN anyways? Those low level humans should make an effort to protect the life on their planet.

Shadow did absolutely NOT use 100% of his pwoer to protect the truck. He could EASILY have done more. He can lift trucks. He could use chaos blast. He could easily have prevented just faling victim to the zombots so easily.

As mentioned above it kind of DOES make sense for him to go down easily due to being infected, but I think this was the wrong time to let him get infected. I think he wouldn’t let his guard down and carelessly touch a zombot. He would not give in to the temptation to test his limits like this if there was not a greater cause. I think he would easily break if someone he cared about (other than sonic) fell victim to the metal virus. This is something that would get him emotional, to get careless. He knows sonic can outrun the virus, but rouge can’t. Amy, Tails, Knuckles, Vector, all of Sonic’s friends can’t outrun the virus. There’s a big chance that he is immune, there’s a slim chance he is not. But even with that slim chance, he knows he could outrun it, just like sonic. Losing someone he cares about to the virus would remind him of his superiority, of how fragile life is and of his responsibility to protect life itself. Any restrait would be gone. He would be driven by guilt and anger at himself, that he could’ve done better, that he HAS to do better. It’s something that spirals him totally out of control. It’s something that would make him want to prove to himself that he has the ability to fix it all. because it’s all his fault.

this is honestly something that is so important. he feels responsible for this, because he did what was right and gave sonic and eggman a chance. In his mind, sometimes the right hting to do is the wrong thing to do, because sometimes only wrong actions get you to the right goal. he is a gray character like that, and i think it’s not shown enough. his regret and guilt don’t surface enough so that anyone who is not as invested in the character would be able to read it out of #19. there’s a lot of stuff going on inside shadow in this issue and its just. not enough time to unpack it all. this whole deal of him getting infected was too rushed. (as mentioned above i wouldve preferred he get infected a little later or under other circumstances)

I think shadow is aware of his responsibility as living weapon to not fall into the hands of the enemy. he has learned what it means to be manipulated, he learned what it means if he was used as a weapon by an enemy of life on earth. he does NOT want to be used as an object of destruction ever again. He would RUN. even if hesitant, but his emotions would make him excell even in that. he would make sure he’d run faster than sonic. he’s want to make sure that he’d give 110% and cure himself, something sonic couldn’t do.

the way he would go down in my mind is him excerting himself. He would absolutely reject help. he would prefer to not have any contact with anyone at all. For one because he feels guilty and he doesn’t want to deal with that emotionally, also because he doesn’t want anyone to see him in this state of weakness. He absolutely would loathe the idea of anyone being able to see him go down and surrender to the enemy. He would absolutely exhaust his entire energy reservoir building barricades and being the sole and only front line protecting evacuation efforts from a distance, to make sure that they have enough buffer to escape, should he fail.

shadow is someone  who is rash and has a tendency to boast his strength, but he also is someone who tries to consider any and all possibilities, no matter how painful they are to admit to his pride. he will shove them to the back of his mind, but they are still there. and if it COMES to those scenarios, he will have a plan for them. only if unpredictable things happen, or things that shake him emotionally, he would lose grip.

also in all those talks abt things shaking him emotionally, i dont mean that other people who arent his friends are not important to him, its just that friendship has a bigger impact on people. i think that should be pretty obvious, but since people like to misinterpret shadow id like to make sure people understand that i think that shadow values all and every life on the planet. he griefs over random deaths as much as his friends, it’s just that it hits more personal. mostly because he thinks... of himself as someone who always protects, but never has to be protected.

shadows relationship with himself is complicated. he thinks very low of himself. he pretty much hates himself. but that is because he thinks oh so highly of himself. he is perfect, ultimate, unbeatable, unstoppable, immortal, immune.... he expects all this of himself... even though he knows that it’s not true. it’s the one thing that he knows of himself. The one thing he feels that he could maybe achieve if he tried hard enough, and of course he is never trying hard enough; and at the same time he is trying so hard. He gives 300% and yet he still feels like he halfasses everything and he still feels like he could do better. On the outside he presents it with his strict edgy persona, that looks down on everyone. but really he feels so small. most of all towards sonic. sonic is so so tall compared to shadow (pun intended).

he looks up to sonic so much, because he always manages to go out of hisway to do what is right. even if it meant risk, even if it meant weakness. Sonic, the guy that easily could just get killed and hurt and not recover. the funny jokes dude that never thinks more than a single step ahead. This boy is out there risking his life for the life of this planet on the front lines and he shows not a single care about his own safety, always putting everyone else before him. shadow envies him. he really really does. thats why he values his opinoin. thats why he listens to him and even steps back from his OWN ideals, something he would do for only VERY few people, because of course shadow is always right. this is referenced in various sonic games (sa2 most of all,shth,sth) and in sonic x (yea its not canon but like. They Really Got His Character).

ADDING SOME RAMBLING AFTER ISSUE #33 RELEASED

[wykart]

Oneshot fic where I try to piece together Thirteen’s character post spyfall part 2, and extend the episode’s final scene. (read on ao3)

The Promise

She stands, bathed in blue, with three pairs of eyes boring holes into her back. Inquisitive eyes, reproachful, skeptical. Dissatisfied. She thinks that’s probably fair enough. 

Behind her, the ship puts on a pale imitation of its usual golden hue – which is partly her fault, because the strength of her anguish resonates within the temporal engines. The ship mourns with her. It had been her home too. 

She’s taken on more than she can handle; three humans – she hasn’t had to deal with that many at once in a long while. It’s exhausting, because behind her back, they talk. They conspire. They formulate attacks in the form of questions and furrowed brows. It’s her against them, and it has been for a while now. Her against them; how had it ever come to this? Friends or enemies? She’s always found it difficult to tell the difference. 

It would be easy, perhaps, to drop them back on Earth, waltz off with a grin and a lie through bared teeth, and never return. She’s done it before. 

But the promise she made claws at her, raging at her behind pale eyes. Eyebrows; with his lined face and harsh expression – easy to intimidate, with a face like that. Easy to lie.  She craves that mask of lines, that icy stare. Maybe if she still wore that face, they wouldn’t ask so many questions.

He wanted to die, old Eyebrows had, and she’s starting to think that maybe he had the right idea. “Be a Doctor,” She had promised, but she doesn’t feel like the Doctor anymore. It all just feels like a game. 

And what was the rest of the promise? Never be cruel, never be cowardly... oh, but she is a coward – she’s been afraid of the dark since she was a boy, and she’s been running for – how long? About three thousand years, half of her assures (more like four and a half billion, the other half answers). And – though this is harder to admit – she is cruel. She’s crueller, colder, older. Be a Doctor, but the Doctor is a lie. Now more than ever, she’s hiding behind a title. For the first time, stranded without her friends, marooned in history, the cruelty had boiled over, and she’d found that she was full of so much of it that it scared her, but she couldn’t stop it from spilling out. At least the Master knows he’s cruel, he revels in the fact. She is something worse, because she’s convinced herself that her cruelty is some sort of justice. Some sort of twisted kindness, because the rules of time are not hers, and she is just a traveller. Walking away, in Montgomery and the Punjab, leaving a young boy to burn and a horde of innocent creatures to starve, that was cruel, but it was necessary, because sometimes she loses. Because the rules of time were never hers. 

Wiping Ada’s mind should have shaken her, it should have reminded her of  pleading eyes and words of power; Donna, Clara, Bill. But it didn’t. (If you ever stop, I think the universe might just go cold). And what if I go cold, she asks no one, what happens to the universe then? 

Always try to be nice. This one, she has down to an art. She can’t remember ever being nicer. She’s bubbly and hopeful and sweet - at least, when her friends are around. When she’s putting on a show, because the Doctor is a lie. Even when she’s cruel, she’s sweet. She’s nice. All wicked smile and steely eyes, teasing. A trickster’s stare. It was fun, at first, the youth, the constant movement and chatter and quirky quips. It was fun, because they didn’t question her. She revelled in their awe and their reverence in a way that filled her with sour guilt. She kept herself mysterious, confident, infallible. Vague. She stuck to the rules, when her friends were around. No weapons, no interference. Hasn’t she already seen where breaking the rules can get her? She is just a traveler; not a god or a monster or an impossible hero. Not anymore. She’s holding herself in, but the shell is too small. Jagged edges of her past jut through the edges of her silhouette, so she keeps her friends distracted. She keeps them moving and she never stays for tea, because the quiet is when questions are asked, and linear time makes her head ache and her fingers twitch. She’s hooked on the adventure. The lie. (It is Clara, she answers an old question, weary, it is like an addiction). 

Never fail to be kind. But she was always failing. She’s told her friends who she is, using empty words robbed of their usual pride and significance. Her voice and her manner had been waspish, impatient. Cruel. (There, happy?). Their unending curiosity, their kindness, it grated against her in a way that told her she was becoming something awful. She holds them, her new best friends, at arm's reach, and never closer, because she knows what happens when she lets herself get too invested. 

Oh, and never tell anyone your name. Well, that’s one promise she can keep - because everyone who can understand the cadence of her true name is dead. Killed by the only other person who still knows it. She will never be able to tell anyone her name again. 

Laugh hard. She’s done all sorts of laughing.  Triumphant exclamations of wonder, because she’s just a traveller, and everything is new to these dark eyes, everything inspires hope. Belly-clutching, strained reels of laughter when her friends are cracking jokes. When they’re travelling, never stopping, never still. The real sort of laughter comes when she’s alone. Low, cruel chuckles to the enemy that roil in her gut, that make her feel alive. Wind whistling through newly spun blonde hair, cold air against new bared teeth, old tattered clothes hanging loose as she shed the one she was before. It was a good feeling, intimidating. Darkness biting through the nice. 

Run fast. She’s faster than ever. She’s running so fast that she can barely keep up with herself. Hands always moving, fixing, tweaking, tinkering. Mouth running off at a hundred miles an hour spouting tidbits and anecdotes that even she isn’t sure are truth or lie. That night on the train, she had hit the ground running, and hasn’t stopped since. Not until she’d taken a trip home, and she’s stopped dead in her tracks. All the adrenaline she’s been running off it gone, now. All she has is anger. 

Be kind. And that’s the most difficult part of all. Nice is just a show you put on to the people around you, and pretending is easy. Kindness is deeper, and difficult to fake. Difficult, especially, because she can feel him – the Master – in the back of her mind like an itch, gloating. The ghost of a laugh, bright and spitting and maniacal, because this is exactly what he wanted. Where he is, that dark, dead dimension, the walls are thin. He can see her. Exiled to an unknown dimension, foiled and hopeless and alone, he’s still won. Laughing. Gloating. (Why would it stop). He tore apart the life she’d been building, ripped away the veil to show a glimpse of her true face; to her friends, and to herself. And she hates him. She hates him so much she wants to scream. Who is he but a reminder that it can never, ever stop. The grief and the running, and her, growing colder by the moment. A snarl twists at her face. She’s all anger, prowling, body wracked with energy that makes her want to break something, break him. The thought only makes him laugh harder. 

“Doctor?” A voice that doesn’t come from inside her head. A voice without the bite of the telepathic. Simple, human. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

It’s Yaz. The Doctor turns, blinking against the golden light of the console and its amber pillars. Graham and Ryan stand under its canopy, concern knotted through their features. Yaz is closer, because she’s the only one who’s brave enough. Her eyes are wide and dark and kind. The sort of kind she hasn’t been in a long while. 

“Yeah, I’m okay. I’m just tired, it’s been a long few days.” Five days, five planets. No trouble, just relaxing. She did it for them rather than herself, because her ideal vacation involved a lot more running and danger and mystery. Instead of sickly sweet ice cream and soft golden sands, she craved blood and ash, the slick oil and grease of weathered machines, the smell of fear and panic. The calm and emboldening feeling of being in charge, weaving together a solution, saving the day and bounding off on the next adventure. The past five days have been hell, because hell is quiet. Hell is being left to your own devices and thoughts and left to stew out in the sun like the the rocks baking on the shoreline by her faded luxury deck chair. Decaying. And all the while, his laughter, echoing inside her skull. 

“Doctor?” The voice tries again, impatient. 

“Hmm?” She murmurs, absently meandering back towards the console, looking for something to tinker with. Something to do with their hands to make herself look busy. Behind her back, she feels them shifting, casting glances at each other that speak a thousand words. Inwardly, she sighs. Friends or enemies? 

Graham is the first to venture forth. “Look, I, err, we” – he amends, and nods pass between her friends, still behind her back – “we’ve been meanin’ to ask you something.” Of course it’s him, the most skeptical. She sees the way he looks at her, the way he worries. It’s true that she prefers the company of the young, because the young haven’t yet had the chance to learn what old eyes look like. They don’t recognise those eyes in her. “Why are you travelling with us, I mean really…” Because you were there. You were human and you were there and I was lonely, she doesn’t say, because that would be cruel.

“Yeah, and who are you? We’ve tried asking’ so many times but you always dodge the question.” Ryan cuts across, emboldened. She turns around, away from the nothing she was doing with her hands. She stares at them and tries to look nice, but fails to look kind. 

“‘Cause we’re putting’ our metaphorical foot down, Doc,” Graham says, with a hint of a smile. Keeping it light. “We’ve been talkin’, and we think, if we’re gonna keep on travellin’ together, we should get to know who we’re travellin’ with.” There was a time when they wouldn’t have dared. They were so caught up in the adventure and so scared that it was going to end that they would never have asked her that question, not when she’d been so adamantly obvious about dodging it. They were afraid to lose her, but now, they know just how much power they hold. Her against them. They know she’s lonely, that she needs them just as much – maybe more – than they need her. Running from grief, from abandonment, from boredom. Human problems. Simple reasons. The other reason they are asking now is, she knows, because they’re afraid. She slipped up. All that time carefully calibrating the ultimate TARDIS experience; controlled, self-contained adventures, and never to those voluminous corners of the galaxy where the people knew her name; in reverence or in fear, because she’s just a traveller. Now they know that she can make mistakes, that she has a history, old enemies. It scares them, because they wanted, needed to believe that she was infallible. It made following her seemingly arbitrary and ever-shifting rules all too easy. Now, suddenly, travelling is difficult. Scary. Real.

“Not that we don’t want to keep on travellin’ with you,” Yaz assures her with that officer calm. “We just think we’re entitled to know a bit more, seein’ as you know us so well.”

“And I don’t mean some made up words that don’t mean anythin’ to us” Ryan says. Gallifrey, Kasterberous, Time Lord – what did any of that mean to them? Nothing, especially when her voice had been so cold, deflated, deflective. Trying to make them feel guilty for daring to ask. “I mean, why are you runnin’?” What a question... Of course, he doesn’t realise what he’s asking, the gravity of it. Boredom or exile or fear – or a mixture of all three. (And why, he asks, with his eyes, not his mouth, because he can’t quite articulate the feeling, why do we trust you?) It had been going so well. In her head, the Master laughs some more, and she doesn’t know whether he’s really there or if she’s imagining it. 

“And who were you before we met you?” Yaz asks, eyes softening, begging her. “Who were you before that night on the train?” It’s the final question that makes her muscles seize up and her eyes go cold. It’s what makes the anger bubble to the surface and the laugher break from background noise to a shrill cackling inside her head. She had been a white-haired scottsman, and she made a promise. A contract, and she’d broken every clause. 

“Why should I have to tell you?” She snaps. Maybe the ferocity should surprise her, but it doesn’t. Cruelty is becoming normal, for her, something that’s always lurking there, just below the surface. Yaz steps back from her stare, shocked. “I’m just a traveller, didn’t I already say, I’m nobody. Isn’t this enough for you?” she pleads, and he laughs. “Aren’t you having fun?” a different angle, because they can’t deny that. It’s been fun, it’s been lighthearted. It’s been good.  “Why can’t you just let me be this?” her voice comes in strangled, breaking gasps, because there isn’t just cruelty under the surface, there’s grief as well. “Why can’t you just let me leave it all behind?” The ship rages beneath her; lights flashing, sparks spitting, crystalline pillars spiralling with blue and harsh red. It casts them all in shadow. The remnants of her voice rings out in the hollow space, the ship whirring back into silence, echoing her, understanding her like none of her new friends ever will. 

In the silence, Graham hums, his mouth folded into a line. Ryan is staring at the ground, chest rising and falling with subsiding panic. Worse, though, is Yaz, because she’s staring right at her. There’s no fear in her eyes, just kindness and a twisted sort of satisfaction. Her face says ‘I was right,’ and in her cruellest moment yet, the Doctor hates her for it. 

“I’m sorry – I…” she knows what she has to do, and all her previous faces are looking at her in disdain. In disgust. Shut up, she swats their images away. They aren’t her, not anymore. The Doctor is a lie, and she is just a traveller. “Yaz, I’m really, really sorry,” she whispers, voice like silk. Beckoning. The girl can’t resist. 

“I know, it’s okay,” Yaz smiles, walking forwards. But the Doctor isn’t apologising for what she said, instead, she’s apologising for what she’s about to do, because she won’t get the chance after it’s done. More faces; Donna, Clara, Bill. Ada. She ignores them, and takes comfort in the cruelty of the act. 

The Doctor reaches out, and Yaz leans in to her touch, thinking that she’s offering comfort. The Doctor places outstretched fingers against her temple and searches her mind. As she sifts through her timeline, the act pressed into the space of a moment, it occurs to her that she could pick apart the strands of her memories and pluck out the parts that don’t fit. The doubts, the fear. The time she spent in that horrible dimension; lost and alone in the endless forest. She could make her better. The ship hums a dissonant note; a warning, and she realises that she isn’t quite that cruel. Not yet, anyway. She only takes the past minute. It’s barely a touch upon her mind, barely a dent, so she stays conscious. Yaz sways for a moment, dizzy, while the Doctor strides over to the two boys. They aren’t paying attention. They’re talking amongst themselves in low, harsh whispers. Behind her back. Her against them. 

There’s a moment when they notice her purposeful steps clanging against the metal floor, and they look up. They see her expression; flat and cold. Unyielding; and their eyes flash with fear. Graham opens his mouth to speak, but before he can, she raises both hands towards their heads. She takes Ryan in one hand and Graham in the other; outstretched arms reaching, the pads of her fingers running over the surface of their thoughts as their eyes brush closed. She could take back the memory of the Master, the panic on the plane, the bone-burrowing fear of being on the run - but she doesn’t. She thinks she will regret it later, when she’s grown a little colder still. 

In their moment of confusion, time rewinding, she takes her position at the top of the stairs. The blue light on her face feels right, it feels honest. She waits for their eyes to open and adjust, once again trained on her back, and she walks away before they can pose their carefully constructed questions. She leaves them standing under the fading gold of the console, sharing those transparent, conspiratorial glances, forming a new plan to get her cornered. Her against them. She makes a new promise, and the promise is this; they can never know. You are nobody. You are just a traveller. 

The Doctor is a lie, and they can never know. 

[sparkythehappygiraffe]

i don’t wanna be lost

So after all of our GIVE JASON EMOTIONS shenanigans, this kinda wrote itself. I won’t pretend it’s good, but I enjoyed myself lol.

Anyway, here’s the fic on ffn if you prefer

Summary: When Jason's past comes back to haunt him, he is forced to deal with the emotions he's been ignoring for years. Luckily, he doesn't have to do it alone. (Title from Lost by Montell Fish)

~

It was another average day at the antique shop.

The Odyssey Historical Society had just brought in a few boxes for Jason to appraise for them and he was in the back of the shop, getting ready to open the first one.

Jillian was lingering in the doorway between the front and back of the shop. She was supposed to be at the counter, but the shop was empty and she was curious about the boxes.

Jason opened the first box and started carefully sifting through its contents.

"Looks like old war gear," Jillian said distastefully.

He pulled out a helmet. "From the Vietnam War," he said, brow furrowed.

"How do you already know that?" She asked.

Jason shrugged, but his voice came out a little quieter than usual, "I used to study this type of stuff."

"Ugh," Jillian groaned. "U.S. troops shouldn't have even been in Vietnam. All of those soldiers were literally killers. They did such awful stuff. It's a stain on U.S. history."

Jason dropped the helmet back into the box and forcefully closed it. His chest felt tight, his breathing, shallow. "Can we not talk about this," he said through gritted teeth.

"Why?" Jillian asked, confused. "Don't tell me you're actually a Vietnam War supporter. The people who died there died for nothing. It was such a waste of a war. I thought you were good with history, Jason. You should definitely know about that."

Jason didn't respond. He was breathing heavily now. His hands were starting to shake. When he tried to stand up, he knocked his chair over, sending it crashing to the floor.

"Jason what's wrong?" Jillian reached out to put a hand on his arm, but he shrugged it off.

"I–I'm fine." He could barely speak. He felt like the walls were closing in around him. Everything was blurring. The lights seemed so bright they were blinding. His eyes were burning and watery. He staggered toward the door to his office. He tripped over something on the floor and stumbled into the wall.

"Jason?" Jillian asked again.

Her voice felt so loud. Like she was pounding on his ear drums with drumsticks. "Just stop!" He heard himself yell. He didn't even realize he was doing it.

Finally, he opened the office door and made it into the room, slamming the door behind him. Hands still shaking, he fumbled to pull his cell phone out of his pocket. It took a few tries, but eventually he dialed his dad's number.

"Hey, Jason!" his dad answered brightly.

So loud.

When Jason didn't answer, Whit immediately sounded more concerned. "Jason? Son, are you there?"

After what felt like an eternity, Jason finally made his lips move. "Dad, I need you," he said softly.

"Are you at the antique shop?" Whit asked quickly.

"Yeah," Jason croaked, unable to elaborate.

His knees buckled underneath him and he sank to his hands and knees on the floor. He must have dropped the phone, but he didn't really notice. He felt like a weight was slowly crushing him to the floor. It was crushing his lungs so he couldn't breathe. It was crushing his head so he couldn't think. All he could hear was Jillian's voice: "All of those soldiers were literally killers," repeating over and over in his head.

Jerry wasn't a killer. He wasn't. He would never.

~

Whit rushed into the antique shop.

Without a greeting, he turned to Jillian. "Where's Jason? What happened?"

"He's in his office," she said. "I don't really know what happened, one minute we were looking at some war memorandum–"

"Memorabilia?"

"Yeah that. One minute we were looking through the stuff the historical society dropped off, the next he was yelling at me and he shut himself in the office."

"What kind of war memorabilia was it?" Whit asked.

"It was from Vietnam. Dumbest war in history."

Whit bristled a little. "Is that what you said to Jason about it?"

"Well yeah, I mean that's pretty common knowledge."

Whit sighed heavily. "Jillian, have you ever seen the war memorial in McAlister Park?"

"No," she said hesitantly.

"Why don't you go take a look at it?" Whit suggested. "Read the names on there carefully."

"Okay, but I don't–"

"Just go, you can come back in a little while."

After Jillian left, Whit tapped lightly on the office door, "Jason?" he called softly.

The only response was the sound of a muffled sob.

Whit carefully opened the office door. None of the lights were turned on. Jason's phone lay on the floor, as if tossed carelessly to the side. Jason himself was curled up on the floor, shoulders shaking as he cried.

Whit knelt next to his son. "I'm here, Jason," he said. Tentatively, he placed a hand on Jason's back. When he didn't flinch away, Whit rubbed slow circles there, like he had when Jason was sick as a kid, staying quiet for a long time.

After a while, Jason rolled over to face his father.

Whit's heart broke to see the despair in his son's eyes.

"I– I don't know what happened," he whispered. "I didn't think I would react that way."

Whit nodded. "Sometimes grief hits when you least expect it. It can be over the smallest thing. But it is normal."

"But I've seen so much," Jason said, voice cracking. "Something so small shouldn't be able to take me down like that. I was trained to be better than that."

"Jason, you're not undercover anymore," Whit sighed. "The way you've been living for so long… it's okay to be honest again."

Jason nodded, but he found it hard to take comfort in that.

~

That night, Jason sat alone at a bar just outside of Odyssey. He shouldn't be here. He had been dry for months now. But after the day he'd had, he didn't know what else to do.

He had waited until his dad was asleep and then snuck out of the house like some guilty teenager. It wasn't the first time. He wished he could say it would be the last, but he knew he'd be lying to himself.

He'd started drinking when he was undercover as the Stiletto. At first it was just a drink here and there while he met with contacts in random, grungy bars where no one would give them a second look. He had quickly realized how much he liked the numbness that a couple of drinks brought. It made him feel like maybe he was doing the right thing after all. It's not like he had wanted to go back to his life as an agent, but somehow he always got sucked back in.

When he drank he forgot his guilt. The guilt of living a lie day and night for months at a time. The guilt of leaving Odyssey and never looking back. The guilt of leaving Tasha to think he was dead. But he also felt guilty for drinking. So he drank to forget that guilt too.

Eventually, the alcohol didn't work like it used to. He could drink the night away and never feel the light numbness that he desired. He didn't even enjoy drinking anymore, but he did it anyway.

One night his habit caught up to him. He was on a mission, but decided to drink a little beforehand. With his senses dulled ever so slightly, he had missed every warning sign in the book. Next thing he knew, he was waking up tied to a chair.

After his escape (though he didn't make it out unscathed), he had quickly worked to curb the habit he had created. By the time he moved back to Odyssey, he was back to only drinking occasionally. He wanted it to stay that way.

But then there were nights like tonight.

He knew he would just lay in bed staring at the ceiling for hours if he tried to go to sleep. He would be thinking about Jerry. About all of the times he had failed Jerry. How he had wanted to become an agent to be like Jerry, but instead he had become a liar and, very nearly, a killer.

Jerry wasn't a killer. He wasn't. He would never.

Out of habit, Jason had sat at a spot along the bar that gave him a good view of the door. Each time it squeaked open, he instinctively looked up. Once an agent always an agent.

He had just finished his first drink when the door squeaked again and he looked up to see just about the last person he expected.

He and Connie made eye contact almost immediately. They both froze, equally surprised to see each other. Connie sheepishly made her way over to sit next to him at the bar.

"Wasn't expecting to see you here," was all she said.

"I could say the same thing to you."

She sighed. "I shouldn't be here."

"Me neither," he replied.

Neither of them moved.

He turned to look at her, "so what brought you to this fine establishment at midnight on a Wednesday?" he joked.

She laughed a little. "It's about the only place a girl can just sit alone after 10pm without getting strange looks. And I would know a lot about sitting alone."

Jason raised an eyebrow at her.

"I went on a date tonight," she explained.

"Ah," he said, finally understanding. "Was it that bad?"

"No," she said after a moment. "But it wasn't good. It wasn't a good fit. I'm starting to think I'll never find a good fit."

"I know how that feels," Jason muttered.

"I mean all I want is a good Christian guy with some common interests. It shouldn't be that difficult."

"Try looking for someone with common life experience," Jason said sardonically. "It won't get you very far."

Connie laughed.

The bartender brought them each their drinks.

Connie and Jason fell into a comfortable, but heavy silence. The silence of two close friends who had mourned together more than anyone should ever have to. Friends who understood each other's pain and loss and loneliness more deeply than most.

~

When they'd each finished their drinks, Connie spoke up again. "I heard about what happened earlier."

"Yeah," Jason sighed, looking down at his drink.

The look of shame on his face made Connie's heart feel heavy.

"Jason, look at me."

For a second, she didn't think he would respond, but finally, he turned his head to face her.

"It's okay," she told him. "It's okay to feel that way. It's okay to fall apart sometimes. To tell someone when you feel like you're going to fall apart. You can talk about how you feel. To me or your dad or even Eugene. You have friends, you know."

Jason looked back down into his empty glass. His lips were pressed tightly together. His eyes were shining and watery when the light hit them. He took a deep shuddering breath.

Connie put a hand on his arm as Jason started to cry. She quickly pulled out enough cash for each of their drinks and left it on the bar.

With a hand on Jason's back, she gently guided him outside.

When the brisk night air hit her skin, she turned to look up at Jason's face. Tears were openly falling down his cheeks now.

Without warning, Jason enveloped her in a hug. Pressing his face into her shoulder.

She held him tightly and for a while they just stayed there. Standing outside of a bar that neither of them wanted to be at. Thinking about things they wished they didn't have to think about.

Eventually Jason released her from his embrace and wiped at his face with the back of his hand. "Sorry," he muttered.

"Don't be," Connie said firmly. He looked down at her and when they made eye contact, she realized they understood each other better than either of them had realized before.

A cool breeze blew between them and Connie shivered involuntarily.

"Let's go to my car," Jason suggested.

Connie followed behind him and got in on the passenger's side.

Jason started the car and cranked up the heat.

For a while they sat in silence.

"I'm so hungry," Connie finally said.

Jason laughed. "Me too."

"Where should we go?" Connie asked. "We can't go to our houses and everything's closed by now."

Jason thought for a moment. "Let's go to the shop, we can stop at the 24-hour gas station for snacks on the way."

Connie giggled, "let's do it!"

She felt so warm and happy sitting in the car with Jason. She knew some of that feeling was from the alcohol, but that wasn't the only reason she felt this way. She hadn't just spent time with friends on a late night in ages. Most of her friends were married and they all had jobs and responsibilities to deal with. She hadn't done something this spontaneous since her last picnic with Penny and Wooton; and she certainly hadn't been out this late since one of Penny's painting parties back when she still lived at the house.

They stopped at the gas station and bought a ridiculous amount of overpriced junk food. By the time they left the store, Connie was laughing so hard she was getting a stitch in her side.

Jason parked his car behind Whit's End and they hurried to unlock the door and bring their bags in before anyone saw them (not that there was anyone else in McAlister Park at 1am).

They turned on the lights in the kitchen and dumped their stash of snacks out on one of the counters.

They ate and talked, Connie laughing a little too much and even Jason being sillier than usual. They talked about everything from the important to the trivial. Connie told Jason about the woes of raising a teenager. Jason told her about a big auction he would be going to the next weekend. It felt nice.

Eventually they decided to bake some cookies. Connie knew she wasn't thinking straight at all by that point. Her low tolerance for alcohol combined with the exhaustion of staying up so much later than usual was making her act goofy.

At some point, Jason accidentally dumped flour everywhere, including all over Connie, and instead of getting mad like she would normally, she just laughed even harder.

They kept baking, but by the time the cookies were out of the oven, they had both decided they were too full from the junk food to try them.

When they both started yawning, they headed to the office, continuing to talk softly as they drifted off.

The last thing Connie heard before she fell asleep was Jason's low voice telling her about some mission he had been on once, but his sleepy, mumbled words were too difficult to understand.

~

Jason woke up disoriented and groggy. He looked at his phone: 5am. Then he remembered where he was.

He quickly hopped off the couch he had fallen asleep on. He and Connie were in the office where they had been talking until they fell asleep. He must not have been asleep for long, but if he didn't hurry up and get home, he wouldn't make it back to the house before his dad woke up.

He glanced over at Connie who was peacefully asleep and sprawled across the desk chair. Her head was hanging at an angle he was sure would give her a neck ache for the rest of the day and her mouth was hanging open just slightly.

He decided to let her sleep until he was ready to leave.

Jason hurried downstairs to survey the mess they had made in the kitchen. There was a sheet of cookies sitting out that he only vaguely remembered baking. He picked one up and tried it. Immediately, he gagged and spit the cookie back out. He had no idea what was in it, but it was awful.

He scraped the rest of the cookies off the sheet and into the garbage. He washed dishes, wiped down counters, and swept the floor. He took the trash out and then went back upstairs to get Connie.

She was fast asleep on the desk chair, flour still clinging to her cheek. He reached out and gently wiped it off with his thumb.

"Connie," he whispered.

No response.

He reached out and shook her shoulder gently, "Connie, wake up."

She stirred, grimacing as her eyes slowly peeked open. "Huh?"

"Sorry to wake you up, but we have to go if you want to be home before Jules and Jillian get up."

That woke her up. "What time is it?" She asked, quickly standing up and running her fingers through her messy brown hair.

"Ten 'til six."

She gasped, "we still have to go get my car."

He nodded, "let's get out of here."

They shut off all of the lights and locked everything up, just as it was before they had gotten there.

The sun was beginning to peek over the horizon, the sky slowly changing from dark blue to purple to pink.

Jason wished they had more time to stop and enjoy it together, but they didn't have a second to spare.

They hopped in the car and Jason drove as fast as he dared back to the bar.

When they got there, he and Connie paused, neither of them really wanting to go home.

"Thanks for this," Connie said. "I really needed someone who… understands."

Jason nodded, smiling a little. "Next time we want to, you know," he tilted his head toward the bar. "We should hang out again. Without the alcohol."

She smiled, "Definitely. Call me any time."

She opened the car door and climbed out. "I mean it," she said before closing the door. "Any time."

He watched her walk to her car, get in, and drive away.

For some reason, he really hoped he would see her later that day.

When he got home, he unlocked the door and crept in as quietly as he could.

"Morning, son," his dad's voice called from the kitchen as he reached the bottom of the stairs.

He froze. "Uh, hey, dad."

"Getting some early morning fishing in?"

Jason walked into the kitchen. "Yeah," he said, but it didn't sit right with him. "Well, actually no."

Whit raised an eyebrow at him.

Jason sighed. "Dad, I need to talk to you about something. I need help."

[ibijau]

Second to last instalment of the Bad Timeline, and seeing how original timeline LXC deals with this :D

BIG WARNING for suicide, blood, major angst, and implied violence against animals. 

The first few days of hiding in Cloud Recesses had been the worst ones. 

Xichen had been consumed with rage and grief and sheer betrayal over what had happened. He had known that Jin Guangyao was not all that he seemed, events had opened his eyes to that long before Wangji and Wei Wuxian barged in with the mangled body of his first love. But he had never imagined that his friend, his sworn brother, the man he'd trusted above any other, would have fallen so low. 

Huaisang’s own betrayal had been rubbing salt into the wound.

Of course, being manipulated into stabbing Jin Guangyao had been a shock… and there could be no doubts about that manipulation, not once Xichen had had some space to think about it. He knew what his husband was like when he lied. 

And yet, he could have forgiven this.

He could not forgive that Huaisang had never said anything about Mingjue’s death. That he had allowed Xichen to remain friends with the man who had so cruelly murdered the man he loved. That he had never trusted Xichen after all, no matter how much Xichen had tried to convince himself otherwise. Or had Huaisang thought that his husband had been an accomplice in his brother’s death? Xichen had pushed so much for Jin Guangyao to play Cleansing to Mingjue, he’d wanted so badly for his best friend and his lover to get along again. Huaisang would have been excused for suspecting Xichen.

But then, it meant everything between them had been fake. It meant Xichen had never become as good at reading through his husband’s acting as he had believed. All that affection and tenderness, those moments of happiness, the way Huaisang melted at the first sign of gentleness… could he really have pretended about that? And if so, what did it say about Xichen that he had taken all of it at face value, so desperate for closeness that he’d fallen for those lies?

By the end of his first month in seclusion, most of Xichen’s anger had calmed.

It was replaced by guilt.

He had failed Mingjue by trying to force that friendship with Jin Guangyao, by refusing to see the warning signs. Mingjue had told him that Jin Guangyao was dangerous, but he hadn’t listened, hadn’t wanted to judge too harshly someone who was so hardworking, who had risen in spite of difficult origins.

Maybe he had failed Jin Guangyao as well, by not seeing how life in Lanling Jin was changing him. In spite of all evidence, Xichen still believed that his sworn brother had been a good person once. Perhaps all this tragedy could have been avoided in Xichen had just known how to offer help the right way. Jin Guangyao too had suffered from his efforts to maintain the friendship between him and Mingjue. Who knew if he would have turned to murder if they had just been allowed to drift away from each other.

Above all, Xichen feared he had failed Huaisang. They were married. They were cultivation partners. They were friends even, or so he had thought. And yet, Huaisang had never come to him with what he had found out about Jin Guangyao. He had preferred to take revenge alone rather than to share anything with his own husband.

How to blame him, when Xichen had failed to protect those he loved before.

Somewhere near the end of the second month of seclusion, Wangji came home, Wei Wuxian trailing behind him.

Xichen, at first, refused to see him, just as he refused to see anyone. Guilt was harder to wrangle than anger, it ran deeper, it was more insidious.

But when Wangji insisted and returned several days in a row, Xichen gave in. His brother was not one to come knocking on his door without good reason.

Wangji was the same as ever. He sounded worried when he inquired after Xichen’s health, but when his concerns were dismissed, he simply went straight to the reason for his visit.

"I discussed your marriage with uncle,” he explained. “Gusu Lan can afford to repay your dowry, should you wish it." 

Xichen stared at his brother, trying to make sense of what was offered. Then, at last, it hit him. 

He could divorce Huaisang. 

He would never have to see him again. After everything that had happened, it should have felt like a gift, a blessing from the heavens. A kindness to both of them, when their marriage had turned out such a failure. 

Instead the thought was more painful than the betrayal had ever been.

Huaisang was a liar, a manipulator, a murderer, a monster whose crimes were no lesser than Jin Guangyao’s. 

But he was also Xichen's husband. He was a man who had opened up to Xichen over the years, letting him see parts of him that no one must have seen since his brother's death. They had laughed together, run their sect together, been happy together. Xichen refused to believe it had all been faked. Nobody could have been acting so perfectly, so consistently. Something had been real 

And whatever his crimes, at least Nie Huaisang had never committed them for personal gain, but only to avenge a brother he adored. The means had been questionable, but the intentions were honourable.

Besides, even though he had never known how far they ran, Xichen had long known there were deep shadows within the man he loved. 

And he still loved Huaisang. 

That thought shocked him, just as he had been shocked when he had first realised he felt that way. 

Even after everything, he still loved that odd little man he was married to. 

Even after everything, he did not want to lose him.

Xichen looked at his brother, and smiled in the polite, controlled way he had learned to do in unpleasant situations.

“I am very grateful that you would offer this,” he told Wangji. “But that will not be necessary. I need time alone at the moment, but unless he asks for it, I have no intention of separating from my husband.”

“Hm. He hasn’t asked.”

That lifted a weight from Xichen’s shoulders, freeing him from a tension he had not realised he was holding. After everything that had been revealed, Huaisang could easily have asked for a divorce as well. Nobody in the cultivation world would have blamed him for rejecting a husband who had been so close to his brother’s murderer. If Huaisang hadn’t asked for it, there might still be hope.

Xichen knew some of their relationship had to have been genuine.

Feeling a little lighter, his smile turned more sincere.

“I hear you’re married as well now?” he asked his brother. “Eloping, at your age… that’s not very serious, Wangji.”

Wangji smiled, unapologetic. He looked happier than his brother had ever seen him, and Xichen felt another weight leave his body. Even if Huaisang and him did not manage to reconcile, some good would have come from this disaster.

A little after the four months mark, Xichen felt ready to face the world once more. The guilt had not fully eased out, and the anger still returned sometimes, but he was growing too restless to stay in Gusu.

He thanked his uncle and brother for letting him stay this long, for respecting his need for isolation.

Then, at last, he left for Qinghe.

He left for home.

-

It was oddly pleasant to fly to the gates of the Unclean Realm at sunset and greet the guards. They all seemed very happy to see him again. Xichen realised the opposite was just as true. After ten years there, Qinghe Nie had become his sect, even if something of Gusu Lan stuck to him. 

This really was home. 

"Our Sect Leader will be glad you're back," one of the men said. "He's been moping around like a lost soul since he returned with…" 

The other guard elbowed him sharply in the ribs. Xichen pretended not to notice. 

"My husband can be a little dramatic," he agreed, feeling both guilty and pleased that Nie Huaisang might have missed him. "I hope he has not neglected his duties too much, or I'll have to scold him. Do you know where I might find him?" 

He expected to be directed to the gardens or the aviary, unless Huaisang had gone for a trip. Xichen would not mind waiting a little. 

"He's in his room," the first guard explained, glancing at his comrade who shrugged. "He's been there since early afternoon. He gave orders not to bother him for a few days, even if guests came, but… Master Lan, I don't think that applies to you." 

"Yes, go ahead and knock some sense into him," the other agreed. "He's been moody lately, it will be good for him that you're back." 

Lan Xichen thanked them for the information, and crossed the gate. It worried him a little that Huaisang would decide to isolate that way. Even though his cultivation had improved over the duration of their marriage, he did not think Huaisang had ever made efforts to practice inedia so far. Hopefully he was not pushing himself too hard. 

In spite of the guards’ hints that Huaisang appeared to have missed him, Xichen felt a growing tension seize him as he walked toward his husband’s room. Anxiety, he guessed. He hoped that Huaisang would want to see him again, that the guards were not mistaken, that he had made the right choice in coming home. Even if they could not reconcile, at least they should talk, there was so much they had never told each other. They needed to talk. They would talk. Xichen would not leave Qinghe until things were finally clear between them. He would…

It was only when he arrived at the door of Huaisang’s bedroom that Xichen realised the odd feeling he’d had since stepping inside that building might not have been nerves alone.

He could feel intense resentful energies coming from that room, strong enough to nearly gag him. Whatever was going on was so powerful that it should have been noticed by passing disciples and servants… but nobody ever came near Huaisang’s bedroom without his permission, and if he had specifically requested to be left alone…

Overcome with fear, Lan Xichen hurried to open the door.

The stench of blood hit him immediately. No surprise there. Several animals laid on the ground, some of them still twitching and agonising.

Xichen barely noticed them.

His full attention was on a pale shape on the floor, surrounded by words hastily scribbled in blood.

A naked man, his wrists and throat slashed open.

Xichen shouted as he ran toward Huaisang, falling to his knees in the pool of blood and pulling the body in his arms. It was still somewhat warm, but growing colder with each passing second.

“What have you done?” Xichen cried, holding his husband close. “A-Sang, I was coming home!”

Xichen could feel no heartbeat, not breath, but still tried to regain enough control of himself that he could share his energy with Huaisang in a desperate attempt to save him.

“I was coming home,” he sobbed. “I was coming home.”

The body in his arm did not react.

Xichen cried harder, never letting go, never giving up his attempt to heal his husband.

“I was coming home.”