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iridescenthor · 3 years

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slow march

pairing; tasm!peter parker x reader

genre: sorta a lil angst, fluff, pining, friends to lovers

warnings: strong language

au:/ requests are open y’all in case you’re interested in sending anything in :)

Your phone screen lit your face up in a fluorescent hue, and as much as it was burning - you couldn’t bring yourself to tear your eyes away from the video playing itself to you. You couldn’t make out most of what was happening, but it was already pretty obvious what was happening before the lens. Someone had stumbled along the wrong person to mess with - and at the complete wrong time as well. It never took long for Spider-Man to chase down trouble, and it was quite usually a quick victory for him as well, no street criminals could ever match his abilities.

Many citizens of New York didn’t really know how to feel about the amateur crime-fighter yet. Sure, nowadays he was helping the little guy as some would say - he was doing his best to make the streets of his city a little safer. But many were still wary, especially considering how he had started out. The police department had called it a personal vendetta he had against men with shoulder length blond hair, and you would have been the first to agree that revenge was never a good enough excuse to go after anyone like that who crossed his radar.

Until you met the boy. Boy, you say now, because there was no way he was more than a year or two older than you. Sure, he was extremely intelligent - more intellectual than almost anyone you’ve ever met. But he had the humor of someone younger, the wit and hatred for the world that could only be held by a teenager.

It had been a late October night when the hero was quite literally thrown through your living room window. Your mother had screamed and your father had pushed you both behind him as the spandex-clad vigilante stood and shook off the glass lodged into his suit. Across from your building, a large lizard mutant thing hung from the opposite fire escape ladder, gripped onto the railings with his bloodied claws and glaring harshly into your apartment as he waited for his opponent to show himself again.

The blood on the creature’s claws, you soon realized, had come from the deep gashes woven into Spider-Man’s chest. Your father scurried backwards, in an attempt to pull you and your mother into the kitchen and away from the danger zone as the vigilante stood with a sway to his step. He looked around in a panic at the damage made to your windows and living space and glanced back at the three of you before rejoining the battle. “I’m truly sorry about this, I know a guy - I’ll send him over!” Before he swung out the window and lured the dangerous lizard away from your family.

He’d visited later that night, and you never thought your own opinion about someone could change so drastically from just one conversation with them.

“You know, my father’s not very thrilled about the damage done.” You raised an unamused eyebrow at the boy after opening the window to let him in.

“I just came back to apologize, I didn’t quite get to earlier.”

“You did.” You confirmed. “You don’t really know a guy, do you?”

You swore that even with the mask covering his face, you saw a small smile quirk up the corner of his mouth. “Of course not, but I gotta appeal to public somehow after flying through their window.”

You laughed, and you didn’t know why you’d let him into your bedroom, or why you were engaging in a conversation with him - but you were. And he was a little mouthy, sure, but nothing like the heartless, vengeful criminal the media had made him out to be in recent months. Before you could make a snappy comment back at him, you remembered the creature’s bloody claws and the gashes in the boy’s suit earlier that night. “You’re hurt.” You observed, eyes raking over the cuts still showing in his chest. They weren’t nearly as bad, some type of quick-healing mechanism must be apart of his powers, but he was still in danger of a nasty infection if they weren’t cleaned out properly.

That’s how your friendship began. He didn’t like talking about himself, what his life was like outside of his secret Spider identity - you assumed that he was just too paranoid that even the slightest of details would give away who was really behind the mask. But you did like talking about yourself, and he liked having someone patch him up after putting himself in imminent danger for hours on end each night.

You both made quite the team, and quite the pair of best friends. Because not long after he crashed through your window, your weekly chats while you patched him up before he swung off turned into nightly visits - when he didn’t need any medical care, he had just been craving your presence.

Months passed and soon spring was upon you. The weather was becoming less harsh and snow was falling less and less. 12 on the dot, and a knock echoed into the darkness of your room. You smiled giddily, throwing your legs over the side of your bed and leaning over to flick your lamp on. Your parents were fast asleep by now, and you’d been sneaking your web-slinging best friend into your bedroom for months now without raising any alarm from them.

You slid the window open as quickly as possible and stepped back to watch as he slipped through. He had a few cuts, nothing too serious that really needed attention - but there was one across the left of his chest right below his collarbone that looked like it was at least going to need some disinfecting.

“Boo…” You frowned. The friendship had started out with you catering to his wounds, sure, but you cared about him a lot more now than you did the first night you spoke with him. You hated the nights when he walked in with even the slightest bit of a serious injury.

He scoffed mockingly and rolled his shoulders as he moved around you to plop down on the edge of your mattress. “I told you to stop calling me that, it’s disgusting.”

You rolled your eyes, crouching down beneath your desk to retrieve the first aid kit you had on hand for nights like these. “Well maybe if my self-proclaimed ‘best friend’ would at least tell me the initial of his name I’d have something else to call him.”

“Spider-Man.” He grumbled, looking at you pointedly.

“Too formal.” You threw back at him, kneeling on the bed next to him and pulling out the cotton pads and disinfectant spray.

“Spidey.” He said it in a joking way, and you looked up at him with a quirked brow.

“You want me to call you Spidey?”

“Never call me Spidey.”

“That’s what I fucking thought.” You mumbled, leaning forward to grab the edge of the suit and pull it down away from his neck enough so you could have access to the wound. You reached forward, grabbing his - actually weirdly attractive - hand and moving it to the material. “Hold this back for me please.”

“If you wanted me to undress on your bed you could’ve just said so.” He remarked in the same casual fashion he did every time. And just like always, your face lit up in a red flush and you quickly leaned forward to begin working with the cut so he wouldn’t have the time to notice.

“I could call you Spider-Ling.” You whispered, in a lame attempt to change the subject. He snorted, throwing his head back in a laugh filled with disbelief.

“Where’d you even come up with that?”

“It’s your new nickname, came up with it myself.” You grinned cheekily.

“Don’t call me that ever again.” He shook his head, shoulders still bouncing softly along to his quiet laughter.

With his wound all patched up, and you both completely talked-out for the night, he moved to make his way towards the window. You watched him go, a sad feeling of melancholy washing over you. Would you ever know his name? Would you ever see his face? You wanted him in so many ways, ways that you couldn’t even begin to dream of, and you didn’t even know the simplest things about him. What did his friends call him? What was his closest friend’s name? Where did he go to school? What happened to him that gave him the abilities he has? You didn’t know, he’d never told you anything. He was too much of an anxious person to risk any of that leading back to his true identity.

So you settled. “Spider-Ling?” You called before he crawled out. He groaned and turned to make a sharp comment back at you about the ridiculous nickname but you beat him to it. “What’s your favorite color?”

He paused, the eyes of his suit narrowing in confusion as he titled his head at you. “Huh?”

“Your favorite color.” You repeated like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “What is it?”

“What’s yours?” He threw back at you just as quick. You frowned, he was diverting the question.

“Yellow.” You answered softly, sitting down on the bed and beginning to lean over to shut off the light.

“Interesting choice.” He teased light-heartedly. “Blue.” And the window shut and a gust of air sounded as you assumed he swung off. It took you a moment to comprehend, but when you did your eyes shot open in pure surprise. Blue. It was blue. His favorite color was blue, and he’d told you something about him.

You didn’t think it was possible to fall for the ominous Spider-Man anymore than you already had, but everyday it was weighing on you more and more. Every time he slipped in through your window in the dead of night to listen to you talk about anything and everything, every time he would interrupt your rantings to tease you about how you never stopped talking, every time your eyes would linger on him just a moment too long - it was like everything made sense.

You knew close to nothing about the boy under the mask, but you knew there was no other part of your day that you looked forward to more than the moment that knock sounded into your bedroom. You knew that you both could keep up a conversation with each other like there was no tomorrow, banter flew back and forth between you both and you never ran out of things to say.

But today would be different. Today, you’d be hatching a plan. If there was one thing you knew about your ominous boy, it was that he couldn’t hide a strong emotion. Anger, stress, sadness. If he didn’t feel the same way, you’d know by the end of the night. If he did, well, you hadn’t gotten that far. While he knew close to everything there was to know about you, some days you felt like your closest friend was still nothing but a stranger to you.

The night went normal, he swung by after patrol, ate some of the food you saved for him and spun in circles on your desk chair while you lounged on your bed. “Hey Blue?”

“You know princess, I wouldn’t have told you my favorite color if I had known it would have led to another unbearable nickname.” He leaned his head all the way back to lean against the back of the chair as he continued spinning. Princess. A nickname he started calling you because you had been upset about a small trivial problem one night, you honestly couldn’t even remember it now, and he had started calling you that to tease your quick temper when things didn’t go your way. Some nights, you let yourself pretend he was calling you by the name in an endearing way instead.

“Deal with it. Can I tell you something?”

“Jesus, when will you ever run out of things to talk about?” He was teasing and you glared, grabbing your slipper from the ground and throwing it at his head. He caught it before it hit him and grinned sheepishly at you through his mask. “Kidding, kidding. You know I love listening to you talk. Tell me anything.”

A small flush rose to your cheeks. “I know how you are. I know you want to work in seclusion, and we’ve never really talked about this kind of thing before. But you’re my friend, I’d even go as far as to call you my best friend and-“ His shoulders stiffened, he knew where this was going. “I’d never pressure you into it, or ask you to do something you aren’t ready to do. But if one day, you ever decide that you do trust me enough, I hope you’ll decide to at least tell me your name.”

He knew it was coming. He’d been coming to your room almost every night without fail for a good five months on end. Eventually you’d get tired of the banter about nicknames, eventually you’d want to know who was behind the mask that knew close to everything about you.

He examined you for a moment. His gut was screaming at him, screaming that the one thing he promised to never do was reveal his identity. But there was nothing more he wanted in that moment than to rip off the mask and kiss you, tell you his name, what happened to him, what happened to Uncle Ben, and why he felt like it was his responsibility to hunt down the man that did it.

You were beginning to regret ever having said anything. He was sitting in silence, the chair had stopped spinning, his shoulders were still tensed up, and he was just staring at you. The mask prevented you from reading his expression. He could be contemplating his next move, but he also could be glaring - angry at the thought that you’d even bother to ask him to reveal such a piece of information.

He spoke, his words cut the air and you felt time stop. Your heart was practically beating out of your chest and your eyes widened to the full extent that they could. “Peter.” It was a whisper, like he was afraid that just by saying it out loud the entire city would be able to hear. “My name is Peter.”

Your jaw had fallen and you quickly gathered yourself as he stood and began making his way to the side of the bed you were sitting on. He sat next to you, examining the emotions your face was broadcasting to him. “Hi Peter.” Was all you could mumble. You didn’t think he’d do it now - you weren’t sure he was going to do it ever. But he did, and you loved the way his name rolled off of your tongue. Just when you thought it couldn’t possibly get any better, he leaned forward and grabbed your hand.

You furrowed your eyebrows at him as he pulled your hand up towards his face. “What are-“ The words caught in your throat and all the air in your lungs escaped dangerously fast when he placed your hand on the hem of his mask. You gripped it immediately, scared that if you didn’t take action your mind would catch up with you and you’d wake up from some sick dream where you’d made this entire interaction up.

You didn’t move to pull it off, your eyes locked with the whites of the mask looking for any and all confirmation from him that this was what he truly wanted. He read your mind, nodded his head, and sat stiff as he prepared for the inevitable disappointment that crossed your face when you found that he was not in fact some smoking hot hero - just a nerdy teenage boy who snuck into a lab and was bitten by a radioactive spider.

You took a deep breath and pulled it over his head, dropping the hand with the mask into your lap. You wished you hadn’t taken that breath, because you immediately choked on the air in your throat when you locked eyes with the sparking brown embers staring back at you. “Holy shit Spider-Ling.” He immediately glared in mock offense and sat back away from you.

“I thought I told you not to call me that.”

“And I thought I told you that my biggest fear was spilling all of my deepest darkest secrets to a boy for months on end only to find out he was the hottest loser to walk this planet.” For the first time since, like, ever, it was his turn to flush red and avoid your gaze. He hadn’t expected that at all, and though he still felt the regret in his gut, he couldn’t help but be relieved that you’d finally been made aware of who he really was.

He didn’t say anything, just stared at you for a few moments as you took him in. His dark hair laid in shags along his forehead and his lips were curved into the tiniest of smiles, and you couldn’t help but fall even more head over heels at the way his eyes crinkled when he did so. You both were silent, and as if some kind of idea sparked in your heads simultaneously, you both quickly moved forward to mend your lips together into one. You raised your hands, grabbed his shoulders and pulling him as close to you as possible.

He reached one hand up, cupping your cheek in the gentlest of touches as his other hand held up his weight so he could fully lean into you. It was sweet, and tender, and everything you could’ve ever dreamed of. His lips were unbelievably soft and moved against yours like you both were created specifically just to kiss one another. He pulled back, barely, and just for a moment, to whisper, “God I’ve wanted to do this for so long.”

You grinned and let out the tiniest gasp of a laugh and moved your hand up to his neck to pull him back towards you. “So keep doing it then, Peter.” You just wanted to test his name out again, it fit him all too well.

He loved it, he loved every second of you saying his name and feeling your lips against his own. He didn’t know how he had ever been content with how things were with you before this moment, and the regret in his gut telling him he shouldn’t have told you turned into nothing but regret that he hadn’t told you sooner.

“Anything for you, princess.” This time, you didn’t have to pretend that he was saying it in an endearing way. The way he was kissing you like he’d never be able to get enough of you told you everything you needed to know, and everything you’ve been dying to hear.

#andrew garfield x reader #andrew garfield #the amazing spider man #tasm!peter x reader #tasm!peter parker #andrew!peter fluff #andrew!peter parker x reader #andrew!peter imagine #tasm!peter parker imagine #peter parker #mcu #spiderman no way home #andrew garfield no way home #peter parker imagine #peter parker x reader #friends to lovers #pining

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moonlit-sunflower-books · 3 years

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creating sympathetic villains

[@/moonlit_sunflower_books on ig]

hi everyone! today's post is about creating sympathetic villains, because let's be honest, the antagonist is the best part of any story /hj. a sympathetic villain is essentially one whose intentions are understandable, but whose actions are not. i hope this post helps!

disclaimer: i am not a professional writer and everything here is based on personal experience and opinion. i am always open to respectful discourse and constructive criticism!

give them reasons

and i don't necessarily mean a tragic past. give them genuinely sympathetic reasons. maybe they want to save the world by burning it down. maybe they want to wage war on the politicians that have denied them life. maybe they want to secure peace for the people in their country, if they're a ruler. or maybe they've been denied and ignored their entire life and just want to be recognised.

whatever your character's motivation, it should be something that the reader can sympathise with.

give them a past

yes, we all love characters with a tragic backstory, but don't stop at 'their parents were killed when they were young' or 'their girlfriend betrayed them and now they're a bad person' (yes this is me attacking the shadow and bone tv show no im not sorry). any character's backstory should have depth and reason to it.

take loki from the first avengers movie, for example. he's a sympathetic villain because we have seen him before in thor movies and we know his relationship with his adoptive father and brother. he was constantly pushed aside and watched his mother die in front of him, neither of which could have been fun. and his relationship with thor is a really strong dynamic that makes the viewer want him to get something out of the conflict.

his past gives him context and reason and the depth of it makes him seem like a character rather than a symbol, which made it easier for the viewer to sympathise.

give them humanity

make your antagonists funny. make them awkward. make them bad at flirting. make them walk into a grocery store and not understand how the self check-out works. i understand the appeal of having an all-powerful fantastical being be the villain, but if your aim is to create a sympathetic one, it's important that they are shown to be human because that's what allows the reader to relate to them.

i know i'm using all marvel examples, but if you take hela from thor: ragnarok - she is undoubtedly the evil antagonist, but she's funny, for goodness sake. also cate blanchett is gorgeous but that's unrelated, i just had to point it out.

they are not morally gray

there is a very important difference between a morally gray character and a sympathetic villain. a sympathetic villain is one who is, undoubtedly, a Bad Character - they just have understandable motives. they do the wrong things for the (arguably) right reasons - or their reasons have been corrupted by events and/or people, causing the reader to sympathise with them.

a morally gray character, on the other hand, often has the wrong reasons and justifies them anyway. they do a combination and Good and Bad things, unlike the villain who does solely Bad things.

helene aquila from an ember in the ashes is morally gray because she makes hard decisions in the face of crises and is often on the opposite side from laia and elias. she's arguably a good person with hard luck, and circumstance drives her to make questionable decisions that play on her mind.

the darkling, however, is a sympathetic villain, and i'm going to elaborate on this much more now.

case study: the darkling

okay before we get started: i am NOT a darkling apologist and i do not think any of his actions are excusable. but the fact that so many people on this hellsite think he's a good person just proves how well leigh bardugo created a sympathetic villain, and i'm going to explain how i think it worked. and yes, this has shadow and bone spoilers.

the darkling is grisha, and through his lifetime he was hunted and therefore hiding and living in perpetual fear (his past). he wanted to create a safe place for the grisha to live and thought the only way they could be safe was if they were feared (his reasons). he also supposedly fell in love with alina (although his is arguable) and that could be seen as his humanity.

rule of wolves spoilers: the end of the rule of wolves where he agrees to make a sacrifice for the good of ravka also gives him some amount of humanity.

all of the above make the reader sympathise with his intentions and are probably smitten with ben barnes' face which makes it easier. however, literally none of his actions are excusable. he manipulated teenage girls, kissed alina pretending to be mal, literally bound her to his power with an amplifier that completely eliminated her agency, created creatures that blinded his own mother and cut off one of his students' arms, and attempted to expand a physical darkness to take over the entire world. excusable? i think not.

his initial desire for safety is what the reader sympathises with. but the darkling uses that as a jumping-off point to go completely off the rails and essentially lose any sense of boundaries or limits on even his own power, which undoubtedly makes him the villain. not a single one of his actions are excusable.

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yandere-dark-cupid · 4 years

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Yandere alastor from hazbin hotel if that is ok?

It's okay, T.Angel.💜❤💜

Yandere Alastor:

Yandere type: Charming, Possessive, Violent, Manipulative, and Sadistic

How you guys met can end in many different scenarios. Maybe you're a citizen of hell that caught wind of Charlie's hotel; and decided to go there for the false humanity that's called "redemption", Maybe you're a desperate human that's facing the harsh, ugly hardships of life and made a foolish decision to summon the all powerful 'Radio Demon' since you heard he can make deals and can be of assistance for your rather tough life, or maybe you're some type of poor creature that was chosen ( by the man himself ) to be a certain Deer demon's prey. Whatever it is,...Babe..Honey..Sweetie, Darling, ANGEL....Please do understand..you are Totally, Royally FUCKED the moment he's noticed you.

Like I said, the moment Alastor has met you; it's all over. But you don't know that yet. He's already twisting gears in his mind to make you HIS. That being said; Alastor is going to put his Smooth, Charming persona on, to sway you to him. So at first instinct you're gonna fear him ( believe you're gonna, it's natural ), but to me I believe you're going to be drawn to him in away. And Alastor knows he has that affect on people ( he's also smug about it because it'll be easier on his part/ but harder on your part ). So he knows you're going to be his in no time. All he has to do is use his natural charm on you and it won't be long before you fall for him, but if you are hesitant or resist his charm he'll have to amp up his charm even more ( and possibly intimidate you even more ) to get you to comply to him.

Then after that, the outcome all depends on you. If you fell for him then, congratulations you just saved your self from a kidnapping ( but the kidnapping will be used later though ). If you didn't fall for him by now ( which is kind of weird since you should have, he made sure of it ) and you're still hesitant and is still too afraid to acknowledge only other feeling other than fear..well...all I just got to say is....I hope you like getting chased down and kidnapped by a psychotic, homicidal bambi. Just to get this straight T.Angels; even if you do fall in love with him and pledge yourself as a loyal partner, he's still going to kidnap you. It's just going to take longer ( but that's if you do fall for him ). Never forget Alastor is naturally a possessive creature, and as a yandere it only gets worse.

Once Alastor has kidnapped you, escaping is the equivalent of the impossible. A little reminder that Alastor is an Overlord from Hell, a powerful one at that. It shouldn't be to no surprise that he has connections, many of them. But if you do some how managed to escape his heavy secured manor ( I believe he owns a manor, it's my own little headcanon ), then ooooh booy I hope you like games; because ready or not here he comes, because Alastor has came out to play. It's like a sick game of hide n go seek with a murderous deer, Cat and mouse, Predator and prey. Yes he has connections, but he's one of the small handful of yanderes that won't use his connections(... Yet ). No, Alastor wants you to think you got away or has a chance of getting away. He thinks it's so cute on how you are holding to that little bit of hope, so he can rip it away and tease you after towards. Then after that the real "fun" will begin.

By "fun" I mean punishments. Takes great joy and pleasure in that you think you could escape him. But he takes even greater joy and pleasure into giving you the penalty afterwards for attempting to escape. At first he'll go easy on you ( this was your first escape attempt after all ), he'll chip away at your confidence and self-esteem. And it will hurt you mentally and maybe emotionally, and when pain ( from you or anyone, but mostly you ) comes pleasure to Alastor. We all know Alastor is a Sadist ( EVERYONE KNOWS ALASTOR IS A SADIST ), so while he's punishing he'll with most disturbing "happy" smile on his face ( No wait, he always has that smile on his face ). Now if you escape a second time, expect to be not only talked down but to be smacked around too. Now first escape attempt he went "easy" ( if being easy means having your confidence and self-esteem being cut down to nothing in a slow painful process, then yeah Alastor has been going easy on you ) on you, so on your second escape attempt he will get physical with you ( and not in away you want it ). If you're bold and try to escape the third time, you will be hit around radio/ microphone cane ( thing ???) and talked dow too. Now if you're still bold and still think that you have a chance of escaping.. Oh... Oh Angel, May the Lord above have you in his good graces and may he have mercy on you, because Alastor on the other hand; will NOT in 6 rings of hell will have mercy on you. You see on your fourth FAILED escape attempt, Alastor will get.... crafty. It'll be like your first failed escape attempt all over again, but instead of him just searching for you by himself; Alastor will use his Demonic powers too ( and at that moment... You.Are.Fucked Angel ). Now to those that know, Alastor powers revolves around shadows, portals, tendrils, and deals ( or as we know of right now ). So when When Alastor puts that out to play, it's basically the equivalent of one man hide n seek ( If you know what that is, give yourself a pat on the back ). But this time Alastor will give you a 1-2 hours head start. Once your time is up, he and his shadows will come looking for you. And It's hella scary. But like I said before Alastor likes to take his sweet time and make you think you got away or have a chance of getting away. And as time pass by agonizingly slow, you know Alastor is still out there looking for you and like to take his sweet time. And since you've been with Alastor for a while or at least for some time to know him, you know Alastor will take his time and get himself railed up. So basically the more time you spend away from Alastor from escape, the more eager Alastor is to punish you. So Once Alastor has found you and like I said he's getting crafty with with this punishment; Your mind will be broken down into nothing, you'll be tossed around by his tendrils, and thrown into a portal and Alastor will let his shadows handle you. Not only that but He ordered them to leave a few marks, as a reminder to never cross him and never leave him.....

So after all the failed escape attempts and being mind broken and having your spirit broken, the molding process will begin. It was fun; having you run away, hunt you down, and break you down to nothing. It was truly adrenaline filled and it kept Alastor's blood pumpin. But in the end every yandere would want a seemingly docile submissive darling. And surprisingly Alastor is no different. And now that you know that you are his and only his and your place is only by his side; Alastor is going to praise you. You're finally being the good little Darling your supposed to be. Not only that but Alastor is going to shower you with love and take you places. Ooooh he can't wait to take you to his radio station, or to go out dancing, or OR maybe he'll take you to the hotel to see his friends and colleagues. But beware, you may have this new found "freedom"; but Alastor has a sharp eye on you. And to be completely honest with you, part of the reason why Alastor has given you this "freedom" is to mock you and wave it in your face. So in hindsight, you're still trapped with him. And if you are not truly broken and take this new found "freedom" as an option to escape, the game will start up again and Alastor will happily break you for REAL this time. You are his after all, ain't ya?........

Bonus ✨✨✨:

Since Alastor is both Aromatic and Asexual, that won't stop you from being in a relationship. In fact, the both you will be in a queer platonic relationship. So you guys can still be together. Alastor will love to plant kisses on your hands, hug you ( though he'll have you in a possessive, and almost bruising grip ), and over all be close to you. ( Since I don't know where Alastor is on the Aromatic and Asexual spectrum, I'm playing it safe and trying to keep it as platonic as possible. )💜💚💜💚

Like I said before Alastor would to take you out dancing, and will love to do the swing with you. So if you're a darling that specializes in dancing or just like dancing, saying Alastor will be happy is an understatement. He'll be absolutely ecstatic! He'll just love to dance the night away with you ❤💃❤

Another thing I said, Alastor will take you to his Radio station. And with him being a Radio host he'll ask you opinions and sometimes questions. Alastor will like to have a talkative darling or a darling that likes to ramble on certain topics. To some it may come of as weird or annoying, but to Alastor he sees it as cute and charming ❤📻❤

We all know Alastor is a Overlord from hell, and one of of the most powerful out there. So if you think someone will help you, you are dead wrong. Once everyone knows your the property of the Radio Demon, no one will much even look at you. If anything they'll avoid you like the plague, So they know your off limits and knows what's good for them. So no one would dare or has the balls to go against Alastor, anyone with a brain would know what's coming to them if they do. But If someone was brave and kind enough to help you ( more like ignorant and naive ), they are the equivalent of a dead man/ woman/ person. If you watched the pilot episode, you saw what happened to Sir Pentions the same thing will happen to them; just far more worse. So you might as well kiss that help good bye Angel( that's if you get help that is ), because it won't last long. 💀💀💀

Sorry your ask took so long T.Angel. But I hope it's to your liking. Well until next time my Little Tainted Angels, see you soon ~💜❤💜

#yandere hazbin hotel #yandere Alastor #hazbin hotel #Yandere

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anika-ann · 4 years

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WINSoD - Pt.2

We Move Together...

Type: series, soulmate AU series (part 1, part 2, part 3)

Pairing: Steve Rogers x reader Word count: 2400

Summary: In which Steve might get a bit tipsy and jealous in a sweet way.

A/N: As adertised, What I’d Never Say or Do (Had I Been in My Right Mind) is only refered to as WINSoD. Also - enter Age of Ultron ;)

Warnings: mention of superntural creatures, alcohol, language, briefest mention of death, journalists acting like jerks

Part 1 (previous chapter)

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The press conference was a thing from nightmares. You did not enjoy all the flashes of cameras; you were not Tony freaking Stark, all charming and witty when over a hundred reporters stumbled through the doorway of the huge conference room. No, you could only manage to be sassy and fun within a circle of your friends. Which you found yourself in anyway, but boy, the presence of the others was still very much apparent and they were the ones asking questions.

Even Bruce had been forced to come, much to his dismay, but him and Clint were for some reason left out when it came to the poisonous questions, their duo considered only unwilling participants of the whole plotting for and against the poor soulmate pair of you and Steve.

You truly envied Thor who was off to Asgard once more. And while you wouldn’t want to be in Bucky’s shoes, you sure as hell wished you could sit this one out as he did, the public still not aware of his existence safe for one priest who had helped him to find his way to Steve.

It was ridiculous. The tone a question was asked with was enough to distinguish whether it was aimed at you and Steve or at someone else. Hell, when it came to you and Steve, they didn’t even bother asking, just stating the facts instead.

“Such a long recovery. That must have been horrible, especially with amnesia involved, wasn’t it.” (Yes, shockingly. What is it to you, huh?)

“Such luck you were able to remember, isn’t it.” (Luck had nothing to do with it. God’s sister has.)

“You must be angry with Captain’s team too, aren’t you.” (No, they are the best, you idiot, this whole thing is a stupid lie.)

“I am sure you’re willing to share your story since people were grieving for you in such a worship-like way…” (…fuck you.)

In reality, you tried to word your indignation towards this herd-like aggressivity aimed at the Avengers and the blatant pity for you rather carefully, speaking of hardship but justified, and yes, you were very lucky indeed. They didn’t need to know just how much.

Steve received a pretty similar set of questions, but they were more of anger and questioning whether the team was still able to function after such a betrayal that nearly ended up tragically. Steve was surprisingly convincing in his act of a disappointed teammate and friend and expressed hope that they would be able to continue to exist and cooperate, his team slowly earning his trust back.

“Have the outcome had been different, my reaction would be too. But the love of my life is here with me and that is what matters. I cannot begin to say how lucky I am to have her back and I thank God for that every day.”

You bit your cheek so you wouldn’t laugh at the private joke and smiled at him instead, earning a whispering wave of ‘awww’ from the crowd and a blinding mess of camera flashes when you gathered the courage to lean in and kiss Steve’s cheek chastely. The reporters went absolutely nuts.

Tony and Natasha on the other hand had to face the stoning. Seriously, there were being personally attacked, questions dripping venom. But they clearly had more experience and knew how to answer without the cunning reporters being able to twist their words into something else, much to the vultures’ dislike and annoyance. Duo Stark-Romanoff fought back and very effectively.

It filled your chest with pride, having friends capable in so many ways. They were so freaking badass.

It made the whole experience more bearable; that and Steve’s hand always touching you, grounding you and reminding you that never ever he would let you face the wolves alone.

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You all knew that a public apology and trying your best to deal with the press somehow wouldn’t be enough. Well, you had hoped it would, but hadn’t quite believed, expecting to have to more in near future.

You were right, of course, which was why you were currently dressed up (or dolled up, as Steve loved to say, because you were his doll, after all) and forcing yourself to leave the elevator once it would stop, with Steve by your side.

“It’s gonna be alright,” he coaxed, knuckles brushing your cheek tenderly, planting a soft kiss to your temple, too worried about smudging your lipstick despite Natasha’s earlier reassurance that it wouldn’t smudge under any circumstances as she had thoroughly tested.

You tried not to think about that kind of testing and clearly Steve felt the same.

Instead, you gazed into the cerulean blue with a drop of green of his eyes, not convinced. He was being sweet and all, which you appreciated, but in reality, he had no way of knowing it would be alright. Mostly because Tony went all the way and invited all the important people who could influence the public opinion as much as rising stars of whom he felt could influence the public in the near future.

So next to a senator and a group of big-shot businessmen, there would hang out a pair of lawyers sticking for the little guy and right next to a supermodel, there would be a girl starting a new food bank. Thinking about it, it was a funny parallel to Steve and you by his side, except you weren’t doing any good, unlike them. Not that you would say that out loud.

To be fair, the Avengers decided to spice thing up a little by revealing Bucky Barnes being alive, very slowly leaking his story of a brainwashed soldier. Funnily enough, in a shadow of your big reveal, his own went rather quietly.

People were so freakin’ weird.

“I guess I’m gonna survive…” you murmured, ignoring the icy shiver that ran up your spine at your choice of words. Steve’s gaze seemed to turn distant for a moment before coming back to you, some of the strength he had been trying to project into you disappearing in the wind because of the painful memory. “Sorry. That was-“

The emotion no doubt twisting his gut caused his inhibitions to fly out of the window and his lips captured yours in a searing kiss that took your breath away. You melted against his muscular frame that seemed to engulf you completely, his calloused fingers grabbing onto your bare shoulders, digging in a bit deeper than necessary.

Your head was spinning with the passion displayed so openly and in the back of your mind, you registered that the elevator stopped, but before you could get to the idea of thanking Tony’s AI, your brain got side-tracked when Steve shamelessly licked into your mouth and backed you into the railing by the wall.

Feeling the familiar heat pool in your lower abdomen, sending sizzling heat through your veins, you instinctively gripped the lapels of his suit jacket when his lips retreated to give you a chance to breathe in.

Who needed breathing anyway?

He grinned against your mouth, the little shit he was, and one of his hands guided your head to a tilt for better access. You most definitely whimpered at that as his body trapped you against the wall completely, not leaving an inch in between.

Feeling him this close would never get old and you thought you might burst by the time his mouth moved to your left ear, keeping you in place while his hand moved from your shoulder to trace the line of your dress, slipping between the high slit of your dress to caress your thigh.

“Watch your mouth, doll. Or I’m gonna have to do exactly this to shut you up every time you don’t,” he whispered and your ragged breath caught in your throat when the perfect comeback popped in your head – a reasonable one, surprisingly enough.

“I bet the press would love that.”

His fingers flexed on your leg and his teeth very carefully nibbled on the skin of your neck, causing your heart to skip a beat.

“Don’t care about the press,” he growled lowly, sighing as if in pain when he slowly pulled back, leaving you clutching the railing so you wouldn’t fall as your legs turned into an uncontrollable wobbly mass. Then, as if he wanted to ruin you completely before the night even started, his lips were graced by a soft smile, his eyes twinkling. “I care about you.”

“And you call me trouble…”

He had the nerve to wink at you and thank the AI for the stop he never explicitly asked for.

“My pleasure, Steve,” Jarvis hummed, sounding amused and self-satisfied.

Your soulmate gentlemanly offered you an elbow to lead you out of the cabin.

“Shall we, my lady?”

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In all honesty, the party wasn’t that bad, mostly because it wasn’t just to celebrate your resurrection, but also retrieving a sceptre Thor’s brother had used during The Battle of New York.

You wouldn’t go as far as saying you enjoyed the evening greatly, but you had met several interesting people of which only few had weird questions regarding you; however, weird questions when showing up in public was an everyday occurrence.

You finally truly understood why Steve was happy you treated him like an equal (most of the time anyway).

Every single original male Avenger and Sam and Bucky made sure to dance with you as well as with Natasha and for a good measure, when the song got the right beat, your favourite redhead dragged you to the dance floor for a friendly dance; needless to say Natasha was much better at spontaneous dancing than you. Steve assured you about the opposite by a kiss and a rather filthy promise as soon as you shared your thoughts on your lacking skills with him.

Actually--- yes, you might even say you enjoyed the party very much, uncharacteristically for you, considering the insane number of people attending. The penthouse was way too full, but here you were, sipping on your third glass of champagne, listening to Thor’s colourful narrating regarding Asgardian battles. It wasn’t that you were interested in battles, no – it was the man himself creating suspense and gesturing wildly and making the whole clutch of listeners breathless.

“Careful with the admiring, doll,” Steve whispered to your ear, his arm sneaking around your waist out of nowhere, nearly making you jump out of your skin. “I might get jealous.”

Giddy from the alcohol, you turned your head and brushed his lips with yours.

“We did establish I’d marry Thor if you weren’t an option, didn’t we?” you teased lowly, catching the wink Thor sent your direction as if he heard you despite your hushed voice. It wasn’t flirtation; no, it felt more like mischief, as if he was being your wingman, which he excelled at apparently, because Steve might get little possessive if the grunt by your ear was anything to go by. “As if you didn’t know I only have eyes for you.”

“Just eyes?”

“Why, Captain, are you implying something?”

“Maybe.”

“Of course, my heart is yours as well,” you smirked at him, making his somehow annoyed and pleased at the same time. You leaned even closer. “And everything else.”

“Alright, but what about that hammer of yours? I mean, I saw people swinging around Captain’s shield – though not as skilfully – but no one uses your weapon. Why? Is it that heavy? Are you the only one strong enough to… keep it up?” one of the women asked, apparently more than a little tipsy, judging by her implication.

Gee, she had no inhibitions. Were you being like this now? You really hoped not…

“Well, my lady, that is a very complicated matter…” Thor started, clearly pleased by that question.

“Dance with me again,” sounded softly at your ear and your lips automatically curled up in a smile.

“Whatever makes you happy, my love.”

Steve grinned as he swiftly got rid of the glass in your hand and was already pulling you away by the time you noticed the envious or the amused stares of your companions.

“Green’s not a good colour on you, Steve,” you hummed incidentally, earning an actual pout. “This is adorable though. And I’m not gonna complain about you getting a bit handsy more often.”

“Trouble, doll.”

“I love you too.”

“I do love you. I’m sorry if I got annoying. It’s just… ugh. Thor. You got this look in your eyes and I just-”

Oh.

You sometimes forgot Steve could be as self-conscious as you were. It made your heart ache and yet grow with fondness for your soulmate.

“No, Steve. I might get starry-eyed, because of course I do admire him. It’s easy to get captivated by his stories or his manners, just look at the crowd around him. But you… there’s something about you… that strikes me right here.” You tapped over your heart pointedly. “You know me through and through and yet here you are. You must know I’m yours and still – you treat me every day like you’re courting me and at the same time, we’re comfortable with each other and--- yeah, that. Thor is great. But you’re everything. You’re mine.”

“I’m yours,” he confirmed, brilliant eyes shining, the drops of Asgardian liquor he had consumed adding to the glow. “And you’re mine.”

“Meant to be…” you cooed, happily giving in to his lips when they found yours again for a short moment. You barely realized you stopped in your steps as the slow song had made you only sway. You whispered into his lips then, unbothered. “Plus, I bet you could lift that hammer and keep it up too if you tried.”

His rich laughter filled your ears and he spun you both in circle, planting a kiss on your forehead. You already planned on how you’d get him a custom-made mug with a little hammer on it, reading ‘I am worthy’ or something like that. You were sure he’d love it.

Yeah, it was an amazing party.

Here was a funny thing though; when you had already been confronted with the fact angels and God existed, you should have known blasphemy was a thing.

So, naturally, as you had said ‘I guess I’m gonna survive…’, you should have known there would be a thick chance that you wouldn’t.

That was the first thing that flew through your mind the moment something burst through a wall as if it was made paper thin and not metal.

The second thought? Oh shit.

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Part 3

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Thank you for reading!

Like I said, chapters of this fic will be less chronologically tight. Buuut, you’ll see ;) Also, sorry it took me so long.

#fanfiction #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers soulmate #soulmate au #steve rogers #captain america #captain america x you #captain america x reader #captain america imagine #steve rogers imagine #avengers #a:aou #mcu #marvel #captain america soulmate #winsod #anika ann

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welllpthisishappening · 4 years

Text

On This Night and in This Light (3/3)

Emma Swan knows she’s pretty good at what she does.

Helping the magically afflicted and affected find jobs in this realm isn’t the most glamorous thing in the world, and, sure, there’s a lot of paperwork, but she figures she’s helping people and that’s the important thing. It’s structured. Calm, even.

Until. It’s always until.

Killian Jones shows up with his stupid smirk and his tendency to lean against the door frame in Emma’s office and his distinct lack of magic. Or knowledge of what they’re really doing at Mills Personnel. Everything kind of goes off the rails after that.

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Rating: Teen

Word Count: 6.5K of magic and eventual happily ever after

AN: There’s some magic here. Some kissing. Some curses. And happily ever after, of course. Thanks for reading along with this little distraction from the legitimate stress of the real world. You guys are all an absolute delight.

Also on Ao3 if that’s how you roll || Or start from the top

—-

“Are you good?” Tilting her head up to meet Killian’s vaguely crinkled forehead and passably confused expression, Emma almost regrets the question she didn’t plan on asking. That’s the problem with him. And them, at least in the abstract sense.

Words tumble out of her without much thought to their meaning or collective, if not slightly metaphorical, weight. Defenses she’s spent a lifetime cultivating feel as if they’ve crumbled at her feet, which is impressive since she’s laying down, but the metaphor still checks out and Emma keeps asking questions.

Without being wholly afraid of the answers she’ll get.

“Be more specific,” Killian murmurs, and her heart does something stupid. Skips a beat. Sparks her magic. Threatens to leave her glowing in the tangle of sheets she’s absolutely stolen in the middle of the night.

“Just—I mean with everything.” Nosing at her cheek, Emma can practically hear Killian’s smile. “‘Fraid that’s not any more specific, my love. But if we’re going to speak in the abstract before coffee—” “—Oh, we should make coffee.” He kisses her cheek, that time. “Then I am exceptionally good.” “Pretty vast adverb.”

“Well, you asked a very broad question. But I stand by my answer, particularly when you’re not wearing any clothing. Why, am I giving off not-good vibes?” “Maybe lame ones if you keep using the word vibe in actual conversation. I just—I don’t know, wanted to make sure, I guess. Working for Mills isn’t exactly the height of luxury and it can be a weird place, and I...we never really looked at apartments for you, because we can do that if you want to, but—” Stumbling over the words, Emma wishes her hands were free. She’d like to wave them around. Use them as a distraction to whatever has settled on her face and in the pit of her stomach, and this wasn’t really the plan. Granted, the plan occurred while she was overly exhausted and reeling a bit from rather large emotional realizations, but telling him the truth about absolutely everything is suddenly a bit more daunting in the light of day.

And they haven’t even had coffee yet.

Killian’s hand moves. Faster than Emma’s entirely ready for, his fingers brush a strand of wayward hair away from her eyes and then he’s kissing the bridge of her nose and pulling her against his chest and—

“This was not my plan. In some great expectation for my life, I’m not sure I could have ever imagined this is what it’d be like. But,” Killian adds, as soon as Emma’s magic shifts into something far closer to dread, “if all of this ended with your freakishly cold feet waking me up every morning, then I can’t be very upset about it.”

Swooning pre-coffee can’t be advisable. Emma’s heart doesn’t care. It flips and flops and does that possible explosion thing again, and she’s a little concerned the force of her smile will have adverse effects on the paint in her bedroom.

“You don’t think Mills is weird?” “Do you?” Emma shakes her head. “Nah, no questions for questions. This is—” “—An inquiry?” Her shoulders slump. Under the blankets, and she’s really got a shit ton of blankets. “I don’t know, Swan. Mills is...a place, a job. One where you work, and that’s mostly why I’m interested in continuing to work there. Should I not be thinking that?” The last few words come with a bit of understandable concern and maybe a hint of frustration, and she should have said something earlier.

It’s very frustrating to realize how much smarter the part-time cricket is than Emma.

She hopes he’s enjoying his job, too.

“My feet aren’t really that cold.”

Killian scoffs. “I promise, they are like little ice cubes attached to your legs.” “Lucky you’re here to provide external heat, then.”

Burrowing her face closer to the crook of his neck, Emma gives herself a moment to relish in that warmth, like he’s some sort of personal sun or a battery or another bit of science she doesn’t understand and David always likes to say that science is just explained magic. Emma wonders if it works the other way, too.

Magic is something that simply hasn’t been explained yet. No rational reasoning, or anything except the kind of gut feeling that can change everything.

“I am,” Killian says, and it probably isn’t meant to sound like a promise. “Are you good?” Dots of light appear behind Emma’s eyelids every time she blinks, trying to come up with an answer that won’t send him running and she doesn’t know what she’ll do if he runs. Energy prickles at the tips of her fingers, curling around either one of her wrists and lingering in the slight bend of her left elbow because at some point her left palm has flattened itself against Killian’s stomach. “Mills can be kind of weird,” Emma mutters, trying to pick her words more carefully now. “And that’s...there’s a reason for that, and a reason I started working there and—” A phone starts vibrating.

Loudly enough that it also immediately falls from the nightstand it was charging on, and keeps buzzing around on the floor. Killian sighs.

“Hold that thought.”

Emma wishes she could. But her hands are already back underneath the blankets, and she’s all too aware of how bright they’ve gone in the last few seconds and the state of Killian’s shoulders make it obvious he’s not all that pleased with whatever he’s being told. “Yeah, yeah, I can—I mean, it’s like twenty blocks the wrong way, but—God, yes, Scarlet. I can come back for a few minutes.”

He doesn’t bother to plug the phone back in, and for like a solid half second Emma gets distracted by the lack of clothes before her eyes fly up and Killian’s sighing again and the weight in the pit of her stomach grows.

“Coffee later?” Emma blinks. “Sure. Is everything ok?” “No idea, just that Scarlet said he had to talk to me and it couldn’t wait and—” Killian shrugs, fingers finding the back of his neck. “I probably won’t be that late, but if Regina asks—” “—I’ll tell her.” Something tugs at the back of her mind, a warning Emma can’t place, but she can sense a lie with almost startling accuracy and she knows Killian isn’t lying to her. She just can’t figure out why Will would lie to him.

Halloween’s not her favorite day.

People assume all magical and mythical creatures thrive on this one day of the year, but more often than not Emma finds that it’s just another busy day when those same magical and mythical creatures come out of the metaphorical woodwork in droves to get jobs. And sure, some of the rumors are true. There are certain times when the fabric between realms can be a bit more flimsy than usual. Both midnights, for example. Eleven-eleven’s another big one. So, teenage girls had that one right, at least.

And yeah, ok, Halloween also means Regina bakes half a dozen apple pies for the whole office, but when the whole office is already overrun by inquiring applicants, Emma can’t find it in herself to be very excited for a dessert she only kind of likes.

She’d never admit that to Regina.

Self-preservation instincts, and all that.

Plus, days like this are always cold. Fraught with that certain nip in the air, and leaves that crunch under Emma’s boots. Only to also get stuck to the bottom of Emma’s boots, and she has to twist her wrist to get rid of her leaf-based trail on her way to her paperwork-covered desk.

The same one David’s leaning against.

“You tell him yet?”

She missed one leaf. Figures. Emma never even went trick-or-treating as a kid. Halloween’s a sham. “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.” “Sure you don’t. It’s dumb that you haven’t yet.” “Voice your opinion a little louder, please.” “Nothing is going to happen,” David says, but Emma barely hears over the sound of sudden and complete disagreement that scratches its way from the depths of her soul. Maybe Halloween makes her a little maudlin, actually. She can’t believe she didn’t get to tell him. “It hasn’t yet.” “Why are you jinxing things like that?” “There is no such thing as jinx, and c’mon, if you guys can get through today with a hundred magically unemployed people, then sky’s the limit.” “Not even clever.” David shakes his head. “You’re impressed and swayed, I know it. Plus it’s not like you’re a bad witch or anything.” “I’m sorry, a bad witch?” “Yeah, you know. None of your intentions, even when lying to the guy you’re stupid into—” “—Opinions keep coming fast and furious, don’t they?” “Because he’s right,” Ruby calls, twisting around desks to involve herself in a conversation Emma doesn’t want to participate in anymore. “You really didn’t tell him yet? That’s nuts. And you’re a good person, Em. With a very good looking face. Who wouldn’t want to make out with that? Ad nauseum.” “I’m going to be honest, using a word that sounds like nauseous isn’t helping your case much,” Emma says. “And I’m going to tell him. I am, just—things got crazy this morning.” Ruby howls. With laughter. Drawing more than a few curious stares, and rather pointed glare from Regina’s direction. David pales noticeably. “Did they?” Ruby presses. “How crazy are we talking and was it also vaguely acrobatic, because I feel like Jones could move if he had to, but that’s strictly theorizing on my part, so—” Sentences without end are quickly becoming Emma’s least favorite thing. Only slightly edging out ringing phones. The one on her desk lights up, which doesn’t happen very often, but she can’t imagine the light is supposed to be green.

David’s talking. She’s dimly aware of it — the soft hum that sounds more like Charlie Brown’s teacher than any of the human characteristics Emma is certain they both have, and that’s another quasi-Halloween reference. Rocks appear to have landed rather forcefully in her stomach, and that’s what she gets for optimism.

“Swan,” Killian breathes, as soon as she pulls the phone to her ear. “Swan, Emma listen to me, you can’t—” Seriously, the lack of sentence structure is becoming intolerable. Killian grunts, the sound turning into a gasp almost immediately and a few shouted no, no, no leave them alone and Emma doesn’t remember standing.

Only that she’s knocked her chair over in the process.

“Is this Ms. Swan?” a new voice Emma almost recognizes asks. “Because it seems I’ve got something of yours, while you have something I’m particularly interested in. Let’s make a little exchange, shall we?”

It’s disappointing that her mouth goes dry. Emma assumes that’s because she’s all but panting, bent awkwardly over her desk while her eyes scan the room for something or someone and—it clicks. The voice.

“Zelena. This is Zelena, isn't it?” Both David and Ruby make matching noises of disbelief, but the buzzing is back and Regina is moving and the line’s gone dead anyway. “She’s not supposed to be here,” Regina says with enough calm that it grates on every single one of Emma’s already-fraying nerves, “magical control sent her back to Oz.” Emma can’t cope with this. Any of it. All she wanted was to drink coffee with her decidedly human and very normal, if not ridiculously attractive boyfriend and they’ve never actually used relationship qualifiers.

That’s disappointing.

“Right, right, yeah, ok, of course” Emma mumbles, and she doesn’t bother to fix her chair. “Happy fucking Halloween, I guess.”

It takes her all of five minutes and one person dressed in costume to realize that running is absolutely and completely pointless.

Emma’s a goddamn witch.

And it’s raining.

Drops slide down her temples, drip down the back of her neck and work under her jacket because she never even got the chance to take her jacket off. Which is something of an exceptionally small miracle now, but she’s already cold and she’s always so fucking cold and—

He called her Emma.

He called her—

“My love,” she whispers, entirely to herself and that part isn’t really true. Shadows hover just outside the edge of her vision, what Emma knows are her friends waiting for instructions or a plan, and she’s got to come up with a plan and she doesn’t know where Belle and Will live.

She doesn’t have to.

Reaching her hand back, Emma’s fingers lace through Regina’s, and her soft instruction of “all instinctual,” doesn’t get lost in the hum of the city or the bustle of a holiday that requires masks and chocolate-based gluttony. It takes root. In Emma’s mind, and those same pieces of her soul, finds the tiny bits of space between her stomach rocks and spreads out from there.

Warming her from the inside out.

She closes her eyes.

“What the fucking fuck?” Will shouts, Emma’s feet slamming into hardwood floor that was probably highlighted in this apartment listing. Eyes bugging, he’s plastered to the wall opposite her, and Emma’s pleasantly surprised to find he’s not gagged, but she also kind of figures it’s because Belle is and there’s something inherently villainous about allowing the love interest to make noise while their partner is being tortured.

By a woman wearing a pointed witch’s hat. “Kind of cliché, isn’t it?” Ruby muses, and Emma’s not surprised they’ve started their rescue mission with sarcasm. She also can’t respond. Her eyes are too busy trying to take in the scene.

Stacks of books litter the floor, half the living room furniture on its side as if it’s been knocked over in a fit of inevitably-magical rage, and Belle doesn’t look as scared as annoyed that she’s been bound in one of the few upright chairs. Emma’s heart stutters. Catching her breath is impossible, head on a swivel as she tries to find—

“Killian,” she exhales, and he’s not gagged either. No visible restraints keep him a few feet away from Will, but Emma can feel the magic rippling off him and it smells strongly of bitter lemons. Or expired key lime pie.

Neither of those things are inherently Halloween, or all that magical. But then Zelena’s turning slowly and the green splotches on her face ensure any attempts at passably funny metaphors or desperate attempts to maintain her sense of reality disappear.

“Huh,” David says, “that’s new, actually. We ever see anyone change color before?”

Regina clicks her tongue. “She’s not changing color. She’s giving in.” “To what, exactly?” “Jealousy. Isn’t that right, Zelena? Been the crux of the problem forever, hasn’t it?”

Emma’s head is spinning. She’s not moving. “Wait, wait, what the fuck is going on?” One side of Killian’s mouth tugs up, amusement in his gaze and that can’t possibly be right. “You are stuck to the wall, idiot!’ “Oh, Swan, you do know how to flatter a man.” “What is happening?” He can’t shrug, but Emma knows he tries and that should not be as charming as it is. Mary Margaret squeezes her hand. The one that’s almost neon. “Turns out Scarlet didn’t actually want to talk to me this morning. We definitely could have had coffee.” “Is that a euphemism for—” Ruby starts, only to snap her jaw closed when Regina gapes at her. Emma’s starting to lose feeling in her fingers.

And she sees the exact moment any sense of teasing and entirely false bravado leaves Killian. Lips going thin, his shoulders still don’t move, but Emma swears his fear reverberates through her and that’s not the emotion she was interested in sharing that morning. “You’ve got to get out of here, love. Now, it’s—” Zelena’s hand moves so quickly, it’s not much more than a passably-green blur. Nothing else comes out of Killian’s mouth. His jaw moves, working against a shield none of them can see, and Emma’s stomach is somewhere in the vicinity of her throat.

Even with all those rocks.

“How did you get back here?” Regina asks, stepping towards the front of their ragtag group. Fire bursts from her hands, flames that flicker up her forearms and draw another grunt out of Will. Whether it’s surprise or just the generic sound of being impressed, Emma’s not sure.

Bits of green cling to the end of Zelena’s mouth when she smiles. “Shall I start at the beginning, then?” “God yes, please,” Emma sighs.

Zelena doesn’t take her hat off. Really, she’s almost making it work for her. As far as costumes go, this one’s kind of basic, but there’s no cape or a broomstick and Emma’s never met a witch who was interested in flying a broom anywhere.

“Wanted to stay conspicuous, you understand,” Zelena says, “Draw too much attention to myself and—ah, well, that’s not what’s important now.” “What?” “Why you, Emma Swan. Obviously.” “This isn’t the beginning,” David mumbles, and both Emma and Regina shift before Zelena can so much as lift her chin. One of the windows on a different wall flies open, half a dozen pigeons descending on the living room and nipping at the ends of Zelena’s hair. They pull on the sides of her dress and peck at the green spots that are growing on her cheeks.

Whistling, Mary Margaret jerks her head and the pigeons fly away, looking a little like an avian synchronized swimming team. “Leave him alone.”

“Shit,” Ruby says, “that was impressive and aggressive. Ignore the rhyme.”

Emma tilts her head. “Slant rhyme, right? Can’t rhyme matching sounds.” Someone makes a noise — it comes from the general direction of Killian and Will, but it can’t be Killian and Emma wants it to be him anyway. Zelena doesn’t look very impressed with any of them. That’s fair, it’s probably frustrating to have your monologue interrupted so often.

“If you don’t mind,” she sneers, Emma waving her free hand like she’s capable of giving the bad guy permission to keep talking. “It had been quite some time since I’d been in this realm, and plenty of things had changed. More magic, a certain kind of power that hung in the air. Energy that could change the course of everything, strong enough that it could probably rewrite time itself if it wanted to. And I want it to.” “To what?” “Were you not listening? Rewrite time.”

Breathing out of her mouth is not attractive. It’s loud and makes Emma’s tongue feel larger than it actually is, especially when she has to keep using it to lick her lips. “That’s—that’s insane. You’re insane. You didn’t just want to get a normal job? I mean...you were at Mills. I saw you.” “Power of the Universe at my fingertips and you think I’d be satisfied with a normal job? No wonder you have no idea what you are. Which,” Zelena glances meaningfully at Killian, “means you, Emma Swan, are the reason I’m here.” “Speak English!” Zelena huffs. “I am. What I felt when I returned to this realm? It was you, my dear. Your power, your magic, your ability. And, yes, I could have given into the hum-drum existence of this place and the structure of Mills Personnel, but where exactly is the fun in that?”

Emma hopes she’s not expected to answer. She doesn’t have one. It’s entirely possible she’s going to snap several of Mary Margaret’s fingers in half.

“Anyway,” Zelena continues, “locating that power wasn’t easy, but Regina Mills’ ability to make things happen is legendary. Finding a person’s niche, that’s her greatest talent. And so I did come to Mills, looking for a position that would help me get the rest of the requirements.”

Ruby keeps shaking her head. Emma can’t seem to move. Or breathe. Her eyes keep darting back towards Killian, trying to make sure he’s breathing or reacting in a way that doesn’t threaten to make her cry. Nothing.

He’s plastered to a wall with magic, of course not.

“You see, a time spell is one of the more complex out there. Need all sorts of things in addition to the kind of magic that can fuel it. Which is what I wanted when I got to Mills. Hoped I could get placed in a hospital or something of the sort.”

On the increasingly small scale of things that surprise Emma, that somehow makes the cut. “You need, like, an IV drip or something?” “A baby,” Zelena replies easily, and Belle whimpers against the gag. “Pure of spirit, you understand. Other things too. Courage, wisdom, maybe a heart if I could get lucky—” “—An actual heart?” Will balks. “Spend a lot of time in Wonderland, did ya?” “I mean, she could probably get the heart in the hospital too if she wasn’t picky about her choices,” Ruby reasons, and this whole thing is absurd. Maybe that’s the theme for Halloween as a whole, though.

More of Zelena’s face is green.

“I had hoped I’d get someone competent who could help me. Or even the source of the power. Naturally,” she jerks her head in Killian’s direction, “I ended up with this sot. Who suggested working at a clinic or agreeing to something called an orderly position. Well, I knew he wouldn’t help me, but I did get something out of it. I knew you were there, Emma. And—” Zelena’s eyes rove towards Belle, and the hands collapsed over the front of her stomach. Realization crashes over Emma in waves, the rocks disappearing only to be replaced with a bone-deep chill that douses any bit of light in her. “So I do have a few options for you all now.” “What are you trying to fix?” “Hmm?” “Fix,” Emma repeats, “or change, I guess. I mean—that’s not how life works.” Zelena hums in what can only be passing interest and something almost like an agreement. “Seems unnecessary to tell you my whole plan, but when it works it won’t make much of a difference. I want to get rid of the girl. That nasty little thing that fell in Oz and ruined everything. Robbed me of my chance to prove myself, claimed there had to be good witches and bad witches and you’re absolutely right, Ms. Swan. That’s not how life works. Nothing is quite so cut and dry as all that.”

Words hang off the tip of her disgustingly dry tongue. Want to be said and proclaimed, and for all the mistakes Emma has made — good and bad, right and wrong, trusting and the opposite, she’s happy to find she’s not particularly interested in changing them.

Not if she ends up here.

Well, maybe not here—with her boyfriend, they’ll get to that eventually, magically silenced and Belle doing her best to glare daggers at the half-green witch who commandeered her living room, and Ruby’s teeth are definitely getting longer. But maybe here-adjacent. With people who care about her, who followed her without question or thought and the guy who is still somehow staring at Emma like he’s got every intention of keeping her feet warm.

Ad nauseum.

“I’m not really interested in anything you need.”

Disappointment flashes across Zelena’s face, only to immediately morph into something much closer to fury. “Hero types, always so sanctimonious. That’s why I said several options. It’s one now, but—” Flicking her wrist, Killian slides down the wall in what Emma knows isn’t actually slow motion. Still, the amount of time it takes for his knees to crash to the ground seems to last forever and Zelena doesn’t try to stop Emma from rushing forward.

Eventually, she’ll realize why.

“Regina discovered what I was trying to do,” Zelena explains, “my fault. Kept coming back to Mills, demanding better placement and as much as it pains me to admit she’s smart...well, she sent me back to Oz.” “So how are you here?” Mary Margaret demands.

Emma doesn’t need that answer, either. Halloween is a bullshit, overrated holiday. Pulling Killian close to her, he’s far too limp and impossibly silent, and Emma barely spends a moment thinking about either of those things before she’s kissing anywhere she can reach, mumbling apologies and half-explanations into his skin and—

“Ah, I’d be careful if I were you,” Zelena says, a soft lilt to her voice that rattles down Emma’s spine. “See, your option is to give me your magic, Ms. Swan. If you won’t do it willingly, I’ll take it by force.” “I don’t—”

Movement catches Emma’s attention, the soft flutter of fingers across her back and she has absolutely no idea what he’s doing. At first. All it takes is a few seconds, and that’s probably another sign. She hopes so. Tracing letters on her jacket, Killian’s eyes flutter shut like he’s exhausted and determined not to sleep and— “No,” Emma exhales, but Zelena’s smile looks victorious. It’s too late. They’re too late. And there’s nothing they can do to change that.

Slumping against her, Killian’s eyes don’t open again. His breathing evens out, and Emma supposes that’s something of a very twisted victory because he isn’t dead, but he’s even more obviously sleeping and sleeping curses are notoriously hard to break.

“Especially when they so often require a kiss,” Zelena grins. “True Love, and all that. So let me ask, Ms. Swan. Do you think what you and the plebe have is True Love and, more importantly, will you be willing to sacrifice your magic for it? Because the only way he’s waking up is with a kiss and the next time you kiss him, you’ll lose your magic.”

To suggest that it kind of all goes to shit after that is something of an understatement.

Light pours out of Emma, unsteady legs under her even as she juts her chin out. To her credit Zelena doesn’t back down. She stands there and she turns a bit more green, and magic is so goddamn weird. Emma’s also never been in a magic fight before.

Spending so long hiding that part of her — certain it was going to be the reason everyone left, the opportunity never really presented itself. Fighting for the sanctity of time itself and Killian’s consciousness seems as good a reason as any to flip the script, so to speak.

Heat races through Emma, wind swirling at her ankles as frames clatter to the ground. Shards of glass fly on the manufactured breeze, Mary Margaret darting towards Belle and David sprinting towards Will, and it’s something of a confidence boost when they’re both able to pull them away from the battle.

Although Emma can’t really believe she thought the word battle, even in her head.

“Not exactly the magical dominance you were bragging about, huh?” Emma quips, twirling a finger in the air. Bands of light circle Zelena’s calves, twist up her legs and turn her answering laugh into a gasp that also does dangerous things to Emma’s ego.

“I never—” Zelena grunts, twisting against bonds that don’t even flicker. “—You were the powerful one, I thought I made that blatantly obvious.” “I mean,” David shrugs.

Ruby nods. “She did kind of, Em. That’s true.” “Whose side are you on?” Emma snaps, but the retreat back to absurd is almost comforting in a familiar, banter-filled sort of way.

“Please,” Regina sighs. Her hands are on fire. “That’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever said, and I know you claimed you didn’t have to tell Killian the truth before.” “Yeah, well, cat’s pretty much out of the bag on that front, don’t you think?” “Flew out on pigeon’s wings, I think.”

Laughter has no place in a moment when Zelena’s entire face has turned green, and her own fireballs are threatening at her palms, but Emma can’t help herself and maybe the dumbest thing she’s ever done was suggest Killian shouldn’t have worked at Mills. Or that she couldn’t be head over heels in love with him.

That helps, honestly.

“You’re not getting my magic,” Emma announces, all too sure she sounds as ridiculous as she feels. Heroic soliloquies are also overrated, it seems. “And you’re not getting Killian or—God, were we actually talking about Dorothy that whole time?” Zelena snarls. That must be the response.

“Well, you’re not getting her either. Sneaking back here on Halloween was dumb. Trying any of this was ridiculous and threatening Killian was the worst of all your ideas. Because—” Emma takes a step forward. Nothing shakes. If anything her knees almost lock out, the hair falling over her shoulders noticeably brighter than usual and Zelena recoils. Seriously, her confidence is through the roof. “Magical job placement might be boring, and it might have a shit ton of paperwork, but it’s also a chance to help people and that’s...that’s the point, isn’t it? Finding that sense of belonging? Giving a person a chance. Being able to—” “—Fall in love,” Mary Margaret cries, scrunching her nose when Regina and Ruby shush her. “I mean…that’s what it is, isn’t it? Love’s not a weapon. It makes Emma glow.” And that makes Emma curse. “Maybe we phrase it differently?”

“Maybe we worry about language once we actually defeat the witch, huh?” Regina challenges, and that seems like a legitimate plan.

Balls of fire fly through the air. Ricochet off Emma’s lights, and every window flies open as Mary Margaret calls upon not only pigeons but what look like several sparrows and a few nightingales if the sounds they’re making is any indication. Leaves swirl around the room, partially from the actual wind and also from whatever Emma is apparently capable of.

A lot more than she thought, honestly.

Warmth rises in her spine, sets her shoulders in a straight and determined line and she gives Will an appreciative smile when he pulls Killian out of the fray. Only to immediately jump back in, ducking and twisting and there’s a lot more cardio involved than she thought, but then a flash of magic nearly singes her ear and Emma’s thankful for her own agility.

She moves. Refuses to back down, ignoring the growing ache in her muscles and the weird popping thing her hip is doing. And Zelena starts to cower. In an especially villain-type of way.

Backing into the nearest wall, she stumbles over her feet as light tightens around her. It pins her arms to her side, curls around her ankles and guarantees she can’t run away when Emma stalks forward.

With a smile on her face.

Oz authorities appear at eleven-eleven, which seems to suggest it is somehow still morning and Emma cannot rationalize that at all.

They thank Emma for containing the fugitive, nod towards Regina and well—that’s that. Leaving the rest of them in a slightly singed apartment with pillows that somehow haven’t burst, and what feels like a distinct lack of oxygen.

“So,” Will drawls, “what do we do now?” He doesn’t have to look at Killian. The still-sleeping form is the far-more-attractive-than-an-elephant elephant in the room, draped across a couch that David had to lift on his own. One of his feet is hanging over the side. “True Love’s Kiss isn’t a real thing,” Emma whispers, but the words taste like ash on her tongue and Regina makes a very obnoxious noise.

“Dumb, dumb, dumb.” “Do you think I’ll lose my magic?” “Do you actually care?” Shaking her head, Emma doesn’t bother saying the words. Not when she knows they’re so obviously painted on her face and sudden realization is almost as annoying as not ending sentences. She knows what he was tracing on her back.

Maybe she is the idiot, actually.

And for a moment, Emma’s mind falters. Remembers that other moment, standing frozen as a different set of lights threatened to blind her and metal snapped around her wrists and she’d been so certain then. Never again. Nothing else would get through the defenses. No one else would know. No more mistakes.

This isn’t a mistake.

Careful to avoid the glass on the floor, Emma tiptoes forward and crouches next to Killian. She brushes her fingers over that scar on his cheek, the ends of lips that are somehow still tilted up into half a smirk and—

“God, just do it already,” Belle shouts.

That’s that, again.

Kissing at this angle isn’t particularly easy, and Emma’s knees aren’t particularly pleased with the amount of pressure she’s putting on them, but it does allow her to basically drape herself across Killian and that also makes it easier to get her hand under the hem of his shirt. And nothing else really happens.

No sharp inhale. No tilt of his head. Absolutely no sign of his tongue, which Emma has come to find herself almost obsessed with in the last few months. She doesn’t care. Doesn’t allow herself to stop, not when there’s a flicker of hope and all that want simmering between her ribs, mixing with her magic and how ridiculously in love she is and it’s annoying that she’s the one who gasps.

As soon as arms circle her waist.

Emma can’t really tumble when she’s above him, but the edge of the couch digs into her thighs and Killian’s doing an admirable job of trying to get her parallel to the rest of his body. Her fingers find his hair when he arches up, his own hand roving the expanse of her back before his arm curls tightly around her like he’s trying to make sure she’s still there. Leaning into her palm against his chin, Killian’s lips drag across the back of Emma’s wrist, sparking another round of magic and even more glowing. “Oh shit,” Emma mumbles, not able to pull herself away from Killian. Because of his arm. And...other reasons.

“Was that a response to me, or—” “—No, no, I just—well, there’s still magic. I’ve still got magic. And, uh, I’m a witch.” He laughs. Throws his head back and lets his body shake under her, which really isn’t helping Emma’s state of mind at all, but she’s admittedly preoccupied with the overall volume of the laugh and how wide his smile is. “Swan, Emma love, did you honestly think I didn’t know?”

She—

Has absolutely no idea what to do with that.

Ruby might fall over. Regina’s eyes bug, Mary Margaret using David to stay upright, Belle covers her mouth with her hand, Will cackling loud enough for the both of them.

“Did you,” Emma starts, but Belle and Will shake their heads and Killian’s tongue click is awfully put-upon for a guy who was just cursed.

He taps on her jaw until she’s able to look at him. And his stupid blue eyes. “I could feel it, love. Also you have a tendency to...glow. Which I'm assuming is a compliment, for me. Or us. There's an us, right?" She nods. Can't do much else. "And you’re not very subtle. Extra cinnamon in the cabinets, moving the remote so I don’t have to look for it. Working at a job placement agency that helps the magically afflicted. Plus there was paperwork. Was Freddie really a gold statue at one point?” “Yeah, but they un-statue’ed him with water from Lake Nostos. Not True Love’s Kiss.” “So we won, then?” “Competitive weirdo.” “Absolutely,” Killian nods. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I figured you’d get around to it at some point and then you were talking today and—” “—We’re not such shitty friends that we’d demand Killian show up back here before nine,” Will reasons. “Plus, it’s been kind of nice to have a free couch.”

Killian gags. “Did I say congratulations yet?” “We were busy.” “Wait, wait,” Emma sputters, and she’s going to go into cardiac arrest. Or magic overload. “So this whole time. You knew.” “Well, not the whole time,” Killian objects. “Most of it though, yeah.” “But you’re still here.” “Where else did you expect me to go? Aside from your apartment now that we’ve defeated the wicked witch? I’m assuming we defeated the wicked witch.” Emma nods. “Well, then I’ll apologize for drawing you into that, too. She was half the reason I started to suspect anything, honestly. Told Regina about her and the last thing I expected when I got here was to see her, or to have her demand I get you here. I tried to avoid that.” More nodding. More aching muscles and poorly performing hearts, and Emma wouldn’t mind if Killian traced several other sentiments into a variety of different areas, but they’ve got an audience and a pregnant lady and they never did get coffee. So, it makes sense to ignore that for a second. Or several.

“I love you,” she says instead. Shouts, really. “More than I realized I could and I—” Any other words get lost in the feel of Killian’s mouth on hers and the ability of his tongue to incite butterflies in her stomach, and she hardly hears him say I love you back. It doesn’t matter. She hears it on loop for the rest of the day, once they’re ushered unceremoniously out of Belle and Will’s apartment. Neither of them think much about getting coffee.

And she’s just on the cusp of sleep, eyelashes fluttering and blankets halfway to stolen when Emma hears something else. Pressed into that one spot below her ear.

“I’ve got no intention of leaving,” Killian whispers, “not because of the magic or the power that comes with it, only because I love you. A ridiculous amount, honestly.”

Sleep seems kind of pointless after that.

He decides to leave Mills, eventually.

“I don’t have magic,” Killian rationalizes, and Emma supposes that makes sense. “But I will need some help finding a job.”

Sliding a file with his name written in swirling script across her desk, he’s got the gall to smirk at her and Emma resists the urge to magic him into her chair. “Luckily I do have other skills, including a job offer—” “—If you’ve got a job offer, you don’t really need my help.” “Yeah, but you’re very pretty and I hear you’re real good at what you do.” “Which is?” “Moving in with me,” Killian says, which isn’t the last thing she expects but it still manages to catch her off guard. Lights erupt at the end of several strands of hair. “The reaction I was going for, absolutely.” “No, no, that’s—that’s dumb.” “Is it?” “I was going to ask you to move in with me. First.” “Competitive weirdo.” “I have an apartment,” Emma argues. “With laundry on site.” “Ah, yeah, that is a marker in the pro column. Plus, you’ll be there right?” “In my apartment? Yeah, probably,”

Pushing back on the chair he’d never really been sitting in, Killian leans across Emma’s desk. To kiss her. Hard. Magic flares in the air around them, causing bulbs to flicker and more than a few cries of get a room . “What I’m trying to do,” Killian mumbles. “If you’re asking me to move in, Swan, I’m going to accept.” “Make it sound less like a warning next time.”

He chuckles against her mouth, either ignoring the desk that must be pressing into his stomach or not bothered by it at all, and Emma tries not to throw herself at him too quickly when he brings a whole box of recently-bought blankets with him.

“So you don’t get cold, love.”

#cs ff #captain swan #captain swan ff #cs fic #captain swan fic #on this night and in this light #MAGIC BATTLES #MORE KISSING #MAGIC BATTLES WHILE FLIRTING

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vkapple · 3 years

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Pandaria is famous for the beauty of its places. Clear fields, high waterfalls, perfect buildings, good alcohol. Indeed, the festivals in the Pandaren Empire are luxurious and mesmerizing. Bright fanfare, loud music — good atmosphere in which you can relax.

Masks were the highlight that evening. Whether they are made of paper, fabric or bamboo. Someone did not regret the wooden saucer, cutting out two holes for the eyes. She received her mask as a token of gratitude. A little work and perseverance. She helped the farmer, protected the merchant, brought medicine to the villager. A child came up to her. With a big smile and wide eyes, she held out a bamboo mask. A little sloppy, but made with great diligence and soul. The little pandaren asked to dress her for the festival. And the woman could not help but refuse. She now stands in this mask, wearing a simple green dress. Far from everyone. After tasting alcohol and dancing she wanted to get some fresh air. Take a break.

Behind her back is the joy of the inhabitants, beautiful music, bright atmosphere.

— Fascinating, isn't it? — A quiet voice sounded.

She looked around and saw blonde hair and a neat wood mask painted in various colors.

— Your voice is familiar to me — She smiled and nodded — How can I help?

— It looks like you liked this festival — He came closer and stood beside

— There are many festivals and celebrations in Stormwind, but this is the place where I am amazed at the beauty and simplicity of the pandaren cultures.

— Magic, isn't it? I am glad that I am here in peacetime and can contemplate their life.

— I thought the King should always be in the castle and only watch his people from afar.

— Sometimes even the Kings need rest. Even if he's on the excuse of "learning about pandaren traditions" — He chuckled and rubbed his neck.

— I'm glad you can take a minute and relax.

They stood in silence for a while. He reached for his mask and ran his hand over it.

— I thought I looked simple enough on my way here. Calling me a lad and offering a drink. What gave me away?

— You’re bad at acting — she shrugged her shoulders — But I did recognize you not for this reason. Did you know that golden hair is very rare?

— Some people have this hair color, so I doubt your words.

— They are just light, but yours give off in gold, is it all about blood?

— S-should I take this a-as a compliment?"

— As you wish — she smiled.

While still touching the mask, he doubted at first, but eventually took it off.

— It's nice to relax for a while.

— Will they not look for you?

— Hopefully my disappearance isn’t noticed so quickly.

They stood side by side, elbows barely touching. Her mask only half covered her face. She was still smiling.

— What makes you happy?

— Nothing.

— Are you sure? You are smiling.

— I know

— Am I funny in your eyes?

— What made you think so? The King of Stormwind quietly went on foot alone into the depths of the city during the festival, where creatures of different races and opinions are located. I’m just smiling.

— Didn't you say earlier that the king spends too much time away from his people? I thought it was a good decision to be closer.

— I do not judge you. Looks like alcohol has clouded my mind and it played a trick on me. I just wanted to have a little fun for myself. Sorry.

— I-I think I should do this more often, worse and worse I distinguish sarcasm.

He waited for her to say something else, but she only let out a small laugh. He felt like a small child. He furrowed his brows.

— What? You are too serious. A little pampering won't hurt.

He wanted to say something else. Something serious that could dispel this situation. He just took a deep breath and relaxed. Wanted to watch. Stay close.

— If you wait a bit, then there will be fireworks. I'm sure it will be exciting.

— I saw them up close when I was a child. I still remember that moment — his hair, tied in a ponytail, flew in the wind

— I never liked fireworks. Noisy, not letting you sleep, too bright.

— But you are waiting for them.

— I just hope they will be different here.

The mask was still in his hand. He decided to examine it in detail.

— Apart from the fact that we are in an open area without an orchestra playing nearby, it looks more like a masquerade ball.

— And there are also beautiful luxurious dresses, many aristocrats and dances.

— Only small conditions and necessity.

— I am an ordinary person, I do not understand this — she shrugged her shoulders and turned to him — It suits you more.

— I received invitations as a teenager, but my dad believed that teaching the future king was a priority.— He put his mask on a small table nearby.

— You are the only heir. I guess that was the reason.

He looked at her.

Her mop of brown hair is braided into a tall, irregular bun. A bright, red, slightly rough mask covering half of her face makes her stand out despite her plain green dress. The smile faded from her face, she turned her gaze to the nature ahead of her. She looks so fragile from the outside. But she can be very emotional, brave. When the sword is in her hand, she waves it left and right to protect her life. Hands are always covered with calluses. Her look is always serious, sometimes frightened. But when there is no sword, she looks calm, happy, peaceful. Sometimes it seems to him that the war does not suit her. He wished she could leave the sword and never take it again. Bruises, cuts, bandages on her body. War does not give a choice and he understands this very well. Who knows what might happen to her. People return from the war either crippled or do not return at all.

— Would you like to go?

— What?

It must sound strange. She is a soldier and serves him body and soul. She saved his life. — Go to the ball?

— Yes.

He wanted her to be able to live a peaceful life at least most of the time. Maybe she must appear more often at festivals, drank in taverns, found friends. She is always sincere when she is not at a war.

— Isn't that for aristocrats? — She grimaced — Well, for politics, intrigue and stuff.

— You helped the Alliance enough to gain status. It would be nice for you to come there once.

He saw her dancing in Elwynn Forest to the song of the minstrel. This wasn’t a waltz, but it was the voice of her body, soul. Sincerely and freely. She may not be blue-blooded, but ...

— You would be beautiful there — escaped from him

The heart made a circle. He said it too unexpectedly. She turned sharply. He is sure that under the mask, there is pure amazement and shock in her eyes.

An image flashed in his head: She slowly descends the stairs. Her long hair ran down her back. Her neck and ears would have jewelry made of topaz to accentuate her eye color. A long coral dress that would have bared her shoulders. Her hands in short gloves were holding the railing. Her gaze would be calm, maybe even she was smiling. He would have held out his hand to accompany her beside her.

Or maybe he will dance with her.

But he guessed in reality she could hide in the shadows part of the time, dressed in a modest but pretty dress. Without stones and ornaments on it. She does not know etiquette, morality, rules.

And she knew it too.

— Anduin — she whispered softly

The girl looked into his eyes. Despite the unexpected announcement, he did not look away. His hand touched her fingers.

— I would like to see you there — he said it as warmly as possible.

She turned her body towards him, not brushing his hand away. She looked a little embarrassed.

— You know how to surprise — she tried to laugh, she tried to translate everything into a joke, but her head is spinning — I ... I don't know what to say. She lowered her gaze, her tight smile, her lips trembling, her breathing ragged. She's not scared.

— Looks like you should spend less time alone. I can still surprise you. He was also on the nerves, but his body did not tremble. He shifted hand from her fingers to her palm, and the other hand went up to touch her face, but stopped in mid—air.

— Do you propose your candidacy? Her hand turned to interlace her fingers with him. The other gingerly took the hand that had been left in the air halfway. — But I don't know etiquette

— I know — He whispered

— I can accidentally be rude — she thought a little

— I know — He smiled

The man touched her face, ran his hand over her cheek and moved her to the mask. The girl did not flinch. Her mask was fragile and the fastening of the mask snapped. The mask no longer held onto her face. He slowly took her off and saw her face. She did not look away and looked at him, completely trusting. He slowly approached her. The mask in his hands slipped off and quietly fell beside him. Her free hand touched his shoulder, ran up to his neck, and lifted up to his low tail, which is secured with a white silk ribbon. They unlocked their hands and the second reached out to the same place.

— Did you know that loose hair suits you?

She reached out and pull the ribbon. Now both of her hands were on his shoulders. He felt that the hair was scratching his nose, maybe tickling his neck. Both of his hands touched her face and dropped to her forearms.

He reached for her. She closed her eyes.

The noise disappeared, as if tens and hundreds of people were silent. A whistle hummed over them. Fireworks flashed in different colors. The bright light blazed, then faded. It didn't look like normal explosions. As if fireworks created forms, constellations, shimmering in different shades. They didn't see it. The kiss was sweet, she smelled of alcohol, although she drank it long ago and managed to sober up. He seemed to be drunk, although he did not drink alcohol for the whole evening and did not taste even a drop. They've lost track of time. They heard the rhythm of each other's heart.

They parted, breathing deeply and slowly. They were silent. He rested his head on her shoulder, inhaling her scent.

He closed his eyes and thought.

"Now my heart is yours"

She didn't move, but she fiddled with the ribbon with her fingertips. Her gaze ran around.

— The mask that you broke was made by a child. It's a pity — She tried to joke and break the silence.

— We missed the fireworks — He raised his head, peering into the sky, parrying — The mask is beautiful

— Was. Maybe there will still be fireworks — She was still looking down

They laughed together. We looked into each other's eyes.

— You like it?

— Wh-what? — He got nervous again and swallowed saliva.

— Hair. They are ruffled. It seems to me that they are beautiful.

— Yes, e-exactly — he started awkwardly — They are long, so I prefer making the tail.

— You’re losing a lot of opportunities

— You have long hair too, but you have it gathered.

— I can dissolve it — she reached for the bun and grabbed the hairpin. He chuckled earnestly. Her hair fell over her shoulders. The hairpin she was holding in her hand she put in the front pocket of his shirt.

— I should go back — He kissed her forehead

— I understand, but for some reason it seems to me that today everything will be good — she put her hand on his chest — But if you insist, can we walk a little? I can smell the food from here. I am paying tonight.

— That would be great. My health is your responsibility.

They took up their masks. He carefully put his back on. She did assess the damage to her mask.

— I think it can be repaired, not scary — She smiled

— Glad to hear that

They nodded to each other. She took his hand and led him towards the crowd.

They spent this evening and night together and became one.

But in the morning she did not see him.

#world of warcraft #imagines warcraft #love story #little story au

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flyswhumpcenter · 5 years

Text

Bad Things Happen Bingo! The event where you send me requests according to this marvelous card! (Red cross is the completed prompt, character headshots are prompts I’ve already filled. Green deltas are for requested prompts, which is none rn, as my inbox is empty.)

Sleep deprivation, written by someone who doesn't like being sleep-deprived.

This was a request I didn't expect to get, considering it's been literal months since I've gotten one (and longer since I've actually delivered on one... Sorry again, Hubert anon). Thanks for it, Nonnie! I hope you like what I'm delivering haha. We're in the last 5th of the card, which is insane considering it took me a year to complete my first. I've recently gone back to it because wowie kazoowie it's fandom frenzy season again and SwSh has hit full-force with "I want to see more whump of these characters and I'm sure as hell gonna provide it". Nonie's alternatives made me wanna write stuff about Milo now, ah.

As to the story itself, I decided to make it kinda angsty because what's the point of writing Bede if it ain't to write angst about this guy being abandoned twice and a half? It's a slight canon divergence on what actually happened, but y'know, fanfiction has this cool thing that is "ignoring canon if it starts being inconvenient to me". Also there's Opal because I love this fairy grandma with an obsession for pink and not wanting to be told she's 88-year-old. Hell yeah.

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Journey Without a Destination

Summary: Keep going, keep going, for there is nothing to see when you are on a journey with no end. Without a point to his life and without a place to stay, Bede journeys day and night, finding some sort of refuge from himself in a forced spell of insomnia.

Fandom: Pokémon Sword & Shield (spoilers for up to the 6th Gym, slight canon divergence)

Wordcount: 1.6K words

Event hosted by @badthingshappenbingo

AO3 version available here.

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Keep going, keep going, for there’s nothing to see here.

Pointlessly wandering around the Wild Area, he has nowhere to go and nothing better to do than train and train until something happens or the sweet release of death arrives. There’s nobody for him to get back to, nothing for him to do, and no objective left for him to fulfil. Simply put, he’s stranded, alone with himself, with no Wishing Stars to collect and no Gym Challenge to complete now that he’s been stripped down from his endorsement and thrown away like mere garbage.

Nothing tastes the same, now. There is no pleasure in training when he knows he won’t be able to enter a stadium ever again, no spice to finding new creatures and see if they possibly match his team’s theme. There’s absolutely nothing but bitterness on his mind and salt to be spilled over the wounds he can’t be bothered to patch up, since there’s also no point in railing himself back up again.

And he supposes that’s his fault, in the end.

It’d be easier to blame Gloria and all of her little friends; but as much as he’d like to believe that, it’s not the case and he knows it. She happened to be there, her and that redhaired pigtail woman that’s apparently making research on… whatever she’s making a research on. Thing is, Gloria wasn’t the one who went to get the Chairman, wasn’t the one who called on him: she was merely standing there, contemplating whatever ugly doodle some kid had left on that crumbling wall. That somehow upsets him even more.

There’s also very much no point to mentally ramble about that now. What’s done is done: he’s been disowned, left to rot, with nowhere to go and nothing to accomplish. He’s, by all means, useless and nothing more than a waste of oxygen and resources; and yet he can’t bring himself to just vanish. It’s like he wants to suffer just because disappearing now would make the people who betrayed him right and his only wish, right now, is to either get back at them or regain their trust. He’s not sure whether or not he’d even get affection back (or if he even got “affection” in the first place back there. Not like he’s had much of a model to base himself off).

So, he’s been walking around, avoiding human interaction, with his sole source of social anything being his party. At least, as long as they’re his Pokemon, they won’t abandon him, right? Yeah. They’re always going to be together, between a rock and a hard place. Too bad they don’t seem to be able to tell him about their opinion on the matters at hand, because their telepathic abilities haven’t developed enough yet for that as far as he knows. Man, he wishes he’d be able to talk to them and get an answer instead of just throwing move names at them when he has to fight against the wild population and the couple Trainers dumb enough to fight him.

He still wrecks through their teams, but it has none of the flavour it used to have, and it ultimately only buys him some more money to spend on whatever he needs to continue fighting. Fighting for what other than futureless survival, he doesn’t know, and he doesn’t want to know.

As such he’s been walking for days and days, seeing the same stones and weeds all the time, unaware of how long has actually gone buy. He has no ingredients to make curry for his team or himself, resorting to eating whatever he can manage to get his hands on, never settling camps because staying immobile means possibly dying out without having been able to avenge himself. If he stops, he may never resume his journey without a destination; so he never stops, always tries to keep himself busy, even if it means having as sole distractions his own breathing, the faraway cries from the creatures inhabiting the land and whatever the weather decides to throw at him while his team rests. Can’t fight for your life if you have nobody to fight alongside with.

(Pokemon are the only living beings that haven’t left him anyway).

He’s tired. His feet hurt as soon as he takes a step forward or backward, tired of being pushed around when they have nowhere to go and nowhere to rest at. His hands hurt from the cold and almost-frostbite he develops when he crosses across the snowy areas, when he has to gather the balls of his fainted partners whenever he gets assaulted by something bigger than any of them are, tired of having to move and hold things when none of them have meaning or weight to bring to the table. His head hurts from the lack of rest and the tears he can’t always keep to himself, upsetting the Pokemon who haven’t fainted just yet.

Yet, even if he piles on fatigue like he’d put on clothes during the harsh winters, he refuses to sleep. It’d be letting his guard down from dangers coming from both the outside and the inside. It’d be being vulnerable during the downtimes in his tent to vandals and thieves, and during his sleep to nightmares about what’s to come and what could have been, what should have been. He doesn’t want to cry himself back to sleep when he could just ignore it all and simply walk.

Life is simpler when you just walk, walk, walk all day and all night long so he tells himself the same song over and over again.

Keep going, keep going, for there is nothing to see when you are on a journey with no end.

But, like everything, even he ends up abandoning himself and his feeble principles: before he realizes it, he’s heading to Hammerlocke yet again, feet heavy and eyelids heavier. His eyes have stung for the past day and night with sand, snow and exhaustion, his legs barely move anymore, his balance has been destroyed and buried. The voices in his head most likely don’t exist outside of it, plaguing his thoughts with things he didn’t need to hear.

His thoughts are too cloudy for him to even function properly anymore. He can’t remember how he got there, or why, even less what’s the point of it all. He doesn’t know which day of the week it is, or even which month. Climbing the stairs is painful and drains too much out of his energy, but he then remembers his party is almost fainted and he’s out of items to nurse them back to health, so he has to get up there and do something about it…

He wants to fall asleep right here and there, on the steps, but he can’t.

Keep going, keep going, for there is nothing to see in the depths of a desperate soul in search for something it cannot find again.

He has to continue. For what, for who, how and why, all of that doesn’t matter anymore; he just needs to keep going. To keep going and never stop to think ever again.

He supposes the lack of sleep starts getting to him when he can’t focus his eyes on anything in front of him, vision swimming and eyes bleary from the endeavour they’ve gone through until now. There may not be any torrential rain, sandstorms nor snowfalls in Hammerlocke, but there is the blinding sun that gives him a lethal headache and blinds him enough for him not to be able to tell where he’s setting foot anymore.

It’s no wonder he doesn’t manage to rise back up when he eventually tumbles, loses what’s left of his sense of balance and falls to the ground, scrapping his palms and knees, hitting his chin on the pavement, before everything turns fuzzy and dark. Maybe his destination-less journey has finally hit a stop, a halt, or perhaps its actual end. Maybe he doesn’t have to keep walking, keep moving, with no energy and no determination aside from basic survival and vague plans of revenge he doesn’t quite know who to target at.

Maybe that, now that he’s tired enough, he won’t see how much of a failure he’s been in his sleep.

Keep going, keep going, for there is nothing left else to do for a soul whose purpose has been robbed from it…

----------------------------

Opal immediately gets surprised when, while in Hammerlocke for absolutely unrelated reasons, she finds an unconscious boy lying not far away from the stairs to the Wild Area. Aside from his pinks and purples, and his unlikely enchanted-looking hair, he looks less than stellar, weakened by the weather and the exhaustion that must be eating away at his bones, judging from the deep rings under his eyes and the feverish hue plastered over the bridge of his nose. She’s seen him somewhere before, she’s certain of it; but all she can remember from that is a sense of betrayal and a feeling of cold-hearted abandonment, so she walks up to him.

“Oh, such a fairy-like young man…”

How is an old lady like her supposed to let such a poor boy, moreover one who could become her successor, in such a dire situation? He seems to have gotten himself in quite a lot of troubles, even more than those she has heard about from the other Leaders and information broadcast in her theatre. It’d be too cruel to let him in the open like that. She has to at least get to know him, to discover if he is her true successor.

For now, thinking of the near future has little to no point, she’s better off calling for help before the boy suffers from hypothermia in the harsh winter sunny winds of Galar. Perhaps she can give him what he doesn’t seem to have anymore…

Keep going, keep going; for there is a purpose to everyone in this world, a purpose you have yet to find for yourself, waiting for you at the end of the seemingly endless journey.

#pokemon #pokemon swsh #pokemon bede #bede swsh #sleep deprivation #light angst #bad things happen bingo #bthb 2

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lygerastia · 5 years

Text

Kietthen (Keith)

Summary: You've always wanted to approach the Red Paladin, but he's being as fickle as a kitten. Will you ever get on his good side?

Warnings: none.

Chapters: 1 [completed]

Words: 2,019

READ IT ON AO3.

Sometimes (or rather, most of the times), Keith reminds you of a kitten.

Not a cat, but a sweet and angry little kitten. He couldn’t possibly grow in your eyes into something more mature because Keith…

...oh, Keith, my dudes, was the epitome of adorableness.

Don’t believe me? Come on, you must see the resemblance. Keith was moody and he did whatever the fuck he wanted, regardless of everyone else’s opinions (or at least, kept their opinions at a minimum). He acted independent, was a lurking loner, standing to the side and pouting all the time. The boy might seem calm and collected, acting all mysterious and cool, but approach him and he’ll bite your head off (if he could). He’s fussy—he’ll scratch, hiss and run if you stepped on his tail or rubbed him the wrong way. So most didn’t dare to approach him because he acted this way, despite having moments when he was goofier than even Lance, if you can imagine that (don't tell him, he'll only get confused).

But there's one thing he can’t do to deceive your keen eye--he wasn’t scaring you at all. Because you could see through his actions and he wasn’t convincing: he craved affection yet he had no idea how to ask for it. You just wanted to make Keith feel at home and safe—plus, it was a sweet guilty pleasure trying to tease him and push his buttons just to see his adorable reactions.

And mostly because you loved cats and you missed the ones on Earth. Alien creatures that acted like pets were cute too, but you still preferred having a real feline next to you. So you resorted to torturing Keith, although he has no idea of your intentions. And you knew (sort of) how to approach cats, to tame them. You also wanted to tame Keith and earn his trust—but approaching him with food wasn’t the best of ideas. He bristled the first time you offered him a piece of your cooking creation and almost choked on it. You were confused: what was wrong with it? You put your heart in it and he just spat on it. You tasted it later: it was ok. Maybe too much alien salt... Wait—he didn’t like it because it was hot?

The idea of Keith having a cat’s tongue was too darn adorable.

You tried a different tactic, but nothing seemed to work. Taking him by surprise and smothering him with affection made him run away. When you tried to casually touch him, he flinched and shrug you away—at least that happened less and less now, having gotten used to your random acts. His fluffy hair was out of question, forbidden zone. You tried running your fingers through it once and almost got a bruise by how tight he grabbed your wrists. He apologized for that, though, saying that it was his survival instincts kicking in. Why he needed a defensive mechanism for his hair, that was beyond your comprehension. But you believed that he was simply not used in people showing him some interest. He was an orphan, after all. He probably spent all his life alone, wandering the universe and wondering what his true purpose was. You hoped he found it by now..

You weren’t going to give up, much to his chagrin. Probably due to your rather ‘aggressive’ approach, he got scared and mostly avoided you. Whenever he saw you getting close to him, he ran; much to your disappointment. Looked for any excuse to not be near you. It hurt you a lil’ bit, but you could understand where he was coming from. Maybe you should’ve given him some space—but your kink for cuteness got the better of you. Cats shouldn’t be forced; they had their own free will and if they felt like it, they’ll come to you on their own. You’ve learned that the hard way countless times, but you thought that maybe Keith was more malleable. Seemed like your theories were wrong. He was still prickly, albeit a bit tamer lately. At least he smiled more. You feel like you need to apologize for your straightforward behavior but you never got the chance. With the approaching battle, you all had other thoughts to worry over.

You let him alone, not bothering him—you found a new target, though. Lance was a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

And so days passed (not as if you could really count in space) and a lot happened.

The team barely managed to escape their last fight against the Galra and you were waiting for them in the castle, alongside Coran. Being the medic and supporter of the team, you were always confronted with a hard task of seeing them hurt and bruised. But you were there for them and that’s what you did that today too. When they came tumbling out of their lions, you wanted to run to your first target: Keith. He was always the reckless one that got hurt the most (second being Lance). So you knew he needed help—but his angry gaze quickly stopped you in your tracks. That look wasn’t directed at you, as he clutched his arm and limped towards you. But it was enough to remind you that you weren’t welcomed in Keith’s presence, no matter how serious the wounds were. You let Coran handle that and, with a sharp inhale, you focused on another target: Lance.

“Hey, babe…” the Blue paladin coughed out, attempting to smile despite the bruises on his face and general weakness in his body. “Happy to see you so worried about me..”

You pursed your lips, focused on carrying him out of there. “Shut up and let me help you.” But you weren’t strong enough: Lance was darn heavy.

“Here, let me…” Shiro’s voice is heard behind you and you’re grateful for the help, offering the man a smile. “I’ll go with him where the pods are, ok?” You nodded, standing there and unsure what to do.

Until you heard some yelling to your right. You turned around and saw Keith angrily pushing Coran away from him. “Don’t touch me!” You sighed: here he goes again. What was his problem now? He obviously needed help, so why was he refusing it? He never did before when Coran gave it to him. Keith didn’t let you. So you never bothered. Wounded pride? Sounded like Keith…Maybe you should try to—

“[name]!” Keith barks your name out of the blue and you realize he’s staring heavily at you. You blinked: was he serious? “You’re capable. Come help me.” Coran scoffed in annoyance and muttered a "Earthlings" under his breath.

“Oh—Ohh?!” but, seeing him so impatient made you act, so you rushed by his side. “Umm, ok, let’s see here…” Quickly you slipped into the role, making Keith sit down on a random box with a grunt. You scanned him over, trying to determine the source of his pain because of his grimace. “Tell me where you’re hurt.”

“Ugh, probably—my ribs and back,” he spat out between shallow intakes of air. He was incredibly pale and sweating a lot. “I fell on a rail, I got pushed…”

“Mmm, that’s nothing I can fix,” you muttered, knowing that he should be in the healing pod, not wasting time with you.

“And my ankle—I’ve sprained it.”

You nod; he was indeed been limping before. “I can at least help ease the pain. Take off your boots.” He barely moved. “Ok, I’ll do it.” You did so and gently examined it, testing to see how much it hurt. Judging by his face, it looked serious enough. “Stay still.” He simply shot you a ‘are you serious’ look as you searched the aid kit for the appropriate tool. You two stayed in silence as you wrapped the bandages around his ankle as gently as possible, not wanting to hurt him more. It must’ve hurt like a bitch because he kept his grunts at a minimum—only a hiss escaped his gritted teeth, probably trying not to seem weak. He was an idiot; nothing could’ve changed your opinion that he was anything far from brave. But you let him too it—it was a miracle he let you touch him, more so to leave himself in your care. He most likely trusted you more when there was a serious thing on the line.

“Done!” you exclaimed, finishing with carefully tying the bandages. “It shouldn’t hurt as much when you’re walking, but don’t do anything extreme. The pod should fix all. Can you take it until then?”

Keith nodded, looking slightly offended at the presumption that he wasn’t strong enough to take it. You raised your hands in defense and sighed. Continued with another subject, eyeing his face strongly. He was taken aback by the intensity of it and cocked his head to the side in confusion. So cute!

“And who dared to break your nose, huh?” He was like a dirty and fight-ruffled kitten, dust and dirt covering his forehead and cheeks, while there was a trail of dried blood from his nose to his lips. You grabbed his chin and brought him closer, unaware of this dangerous proximity. He was more aware of it and his hair stood on its edge, face heating up and mouth moving wordlessly. “Did someone actually manage to slip through your defenses and hurt your pretty face?”

“P-P-P-Pretty??” he mumbled in a whisper, at a loss.

“I’ll clean you up and then—Woah!”

Keith pushed you away by the shoulder, softer than ordinary. Oh my, his blush was totally adorable! It made you giggle, only deepening his furrowed eyebrows and pout. “I-I’ll clean up myself!”

“He he, that’s right, you’re a big boy,” and you involuntarily took the opportunity to pat him on the head, ruffling his soft hair in all directions. The fluffiness of it only amplified your pleasure and you continued on rubbing his head, unaware of his reaction. “Ahh—your hair is so soft, geez—“ and then you stopped, hand frozen over Keith’s head. You forgot. It completely slipped your mind that he hated being touched there. And he wasn’t saying anything, which was even worse than being told off! You retracted your hand, hoping you didn’t make him incredibly mad. Strands of hair fell onto his expression, so you couldn’t see his eyes or anything else. “I’m so so sorry, Keith, just a reflex. Ha ha, I’ve always been wanting to do this, I guess I just took the chance without asking, I apologize. And I’ve also wanted to apologize for all the times I’ve bothered you and made you wary of me, I promise that I’m not like that. It’s just that you’re so cute and—“

“I don’t…” a timid murmur.

You leaned in towards him seeing that he was clearly tame. “Sorry? I couldn’t hear yo—“

“I said that I don’t mind.” The dark haired boy lifted his head, his locks dancing a little bit in the motion. He was still pouting, though, conflicted. “…Anymore…”

“Anymore? Ah! You don’t hate this—“ His glare made you shut up. “Sorry, I won’t ask.” So you grinned innocently.

“It’s better than you staying with Lance..”

“Hmm? Did you say something?”

“N-No, nothing. Just…If you like my hair, then you can do it…It—It calms me…” Hearing him say this so sheepishly made your heart rate increase. He was too adorable.

“Alright, but don’t regret it afterwards. If you want me to stop, just tell me.” He nods, glancing away. “Aww…” and you simply petted him again with both hands, a bit rougher than intended.

Keith hissed as a response and told you to stop. You immediately pulled your hands, holding them by your side (even if your fingers were aching for action). “Remember that I’m still hurt?”

You snapped back to attention “Yes! Sorry!” you stood up, reprimanding yourself for getting distracted. “Let’s get you there.”

But you were secretly happy.

Mission complete: earned the kitten’s—I mean, Keith’s trust.

[masterlist]

#keith kogane #keith voltron #keith vld #keith imagine #Keith x reader

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one-of-us-must-be-crazy · 5 years

Note

18 and/or 19! :D

things you said when we were the happiest we ever were

this ended up going off the rails but enjoy the meandering diversion.

It hasn’t been so long that she’s deluded herself into thinking that she knows him completely, it’ll take a lifetime to do that, and she hopes that’s how long they’ll have, but she knows him enough to understand that his eloquence is limited when he’s on emotional overload. She doesn’t know if it’s his personality, or if it’s just the stress of feeling on a mind that wasn’t built to handle the weight of things like fear, joy, anger, and love.

“You are…an angel?”

“Did you mean that to sound like a question?”

“Did you mean that to sound like a question?” she doesn’t get it either, anniversary at the beach resorts on Mars was only marginally less tourist-infested than their home satellite had become, but his model was retired three years ago, and while he once hid well in plain sight, second-hand retired office synths with his face, voice, his everything-but-heart, were walking around, purchased by families and young career people eager to look professional. They’ve seen three with his face this trip alone.

Still, they’ve both wanted to see Mars for so long, and Amanda was finally feeling up to travel having healed through the damage on her body and mind after her and Zula’s most recent crusade against the hellspawn ‘bugs.’

It was Olivia and Viola who insisted that the two go home. They were done. The oil-black creatures they hunted down based on whispers and rumors were nowhere to be seen, and all they found in their place were genuine bugs, infestations that the crew could handle without the extra two sets of hands.

Ripley was as open with their relationship in public as Samuels was comfortable being, which normally wasn’t much, not since his face became recognizable. Some weeks he’d limit shaving and wear his glasses more often; it made him less noticeable, but both he and his partner preferred him clean-faced and he always thought the glasses looked absurd on him.

“You know that I don’t care what you look like,” Amanda had said, leaning against the bathroom doorframe, eight hours until departure, watching him destroy weeks worth of disguise. Mentally, she was picturing how much better an array of her privately planned activities on this trip would be with the bristly itch of his beard in the way but still…

“And I don’t like having this mess on my face,”

“But people will notice. People will stare,”

“Amy, we have fought too many beasts, I have been impaled twice, I have assisted a woman I don’t know stitch your organs back into your abdominal cavity, we watched a----..... forgive me if I do not give a fuck what some Earthen tourist thinks of us,” he rinsed the head of the clipper under the faucet and set it aside. He could clean up while she slept and before he finished repacking her suitcase with things they actually needed as opposed to what her idea of ‘necessities’ were

“They’ll probably assume we’re spacer trash or Lunar snobs anyway.”

“If you��re comfortable with strangers assuming the worst about us,” he turns and gently takes her face in his hand, “then so am I.”

Now she looked less than stellar, make-up from dinner washed off, her hair damp around her shoulders, and an ugly hotel robe around herself. She figured he must have meant ‘angel’ becuase the towel was white, but honestly it was a long day and they had their over-eager fun the night before carrying on this morning too, and she knew that Samuels was often more eager for physical romance than he ever let on, but she’s tired.

“Aren’t you exhausted?” she asked.

“Mentally, I’ve experienced enough tedium in the endless circle of stress than I care to deal with. Physically….if you aren’t exhausted I’m willing to finish what we started this morning.”

“Tomorrow,” she said, flopping onto the couch, her lover reclined on the bed across from her. He dog-ears his page of the mass-market novel he got in the giftshop of the Bradbury museum, and sets it aside.

“Good…becuase today was–a lot,”

two men across the terrace from them watch intently, and they’ve already told off a handful of gawkers, and just as many distasteful glares left ignored, but this is different, the man with strawberry blond hair looks almost in awe, his companion confused.

“Have a problem?” Amanda hissed at them as they walked by. The attention pissed her off, but the fact that it depressed her partner (husband, she always corrects herself, legal or not)? That made her angry.

“No, we’re sorry we–” the darker one looked for help from the blond; a conversation in silent eye contact was exchanged, and his companion, his boyfriend took his hand and looked between the other couple.

“We didn’t think we’d ever meet anyone like us.”

“Those boys were nice.”

“I think we made their whole trip,” Amanda had told them of her friends, loosely of course, forgoing the fact that they were all pirates and poachers in the eyes of interstellar law: that they personally knew two other couples that were, like them. The two young men spent half the afternoon talking with them, asking questions, opinions on the laws an current controversy of the week in the robotics industry.

“And I like to think there are more like us…And more who recognized us, but said nothing,”

“This hasn’t gone as badly as it could have,” she added, out of habit reaching for her datapad to see who bothered to send her message—

“Chris it passed.”

“It–”

There was no question of what “it” was, the law regarding synthetic citizenship had been tossed around and attempted to be underwritten in various bills over the past years, and estimates for it’s eventual passing were measured in decades, years, not months, but here, in some strange bedroom hundreds of thousands of miles.

“Limited citizenship on Terra and immediate Terra-bound colonies–that would mean Mars,” she read wanting to read more but also wanting to set it down as the reality sunk in. She thought of the two men from earlier, probably thinking the same things, the same shock.

Christopher got off the bed and kneeled in front of her, taking the datapad from her hands and dropping it on the floor in favor of holding her hands himself.

“Chris?”

“Marry me. Marry me, tonight, tomorrow–as soon as we can, legally and on the books, under our real names before someone outlaws it.”

Amanda nods.

“Tomorrow morning, first thing–I don’t think anywhere at this hour could do it–” it’s not as important to her, it never was, but this means the universe to him and she’d kill for him.

He reverently kissed her the backs of her hands before pulling her up, hugging her tight, her mind less clear than his, a million questions and thoughts she couldn’t just file backwards in favor of focusing on the moment, but she tried, his smile never wider and eyes never more human.

#sunnyhomes

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clown-bait · 5 years

Text

Monster Family (Monster Roommate AU) Ch6

Finally found some time to write! Things have been BONKERS with work and family Ive not had any time to my self. I want to still get stuff out though so heres a poor clown dealing with the aftermath of a night out. He’s not having a good day.

What the hell happened. Eons of existence and for the first time in his long life Pennywise could not for the life of him remember the night before. The clown's eyes creaked open and immediately shut them when the sudden skull splitting "headache" followed. The groan he released was absolutely pathetic.

"Look who’s finally rejoined the land of the living" he heard his pillow say.

"Where am I?" He snarled and held his throbbing head.

"Neibolt, my bed." His mate said as he felt her hand pet his loose unkept hair. Knowing it was his Leech he was curled up to, the eldritch dropped his guard releasing a long puff of warm air as he did so. One of his exhausted arms reached around her swollen waist and he buried his nose into the crook of her neck not wanting to deal with the teasing inevitably to come. He was nude, which didn't bother him now knowing where he was, but he still couldn't figure out how he got here and what exactly led to him being naked and in immense pain. Last thing he could actually remember about the night before was revealing that he could actually become intoxicated and then eating that chocolate "Did we?" He mumbled his powerful demeanor completely shattered by his pitiful tone of voice.

"You dry humped me for 5 minutes then passed out." His vampire signed. "Your suit was wet and sticky wasn't going to let you sleep on me like that."

Pennywise simply grunted in response and Leech snorted. "Do you want to hear about the rest of it?"

"There's more?" He whined.

"I'm kinda mad at you and we are no longer allowed at any Applebees in the state of Maine."

The clown groaned against her skin. "What you're experiencing right now is a hangover and if you want me to make it go away I want a full verbal apology now and the rest when you're better."

Pennywise snarled and moved away from her acting like a spoiled child. "I will not grovel for your forgiveness." He bore his teeth at her while holding the side of his head.

"You made out with the wrong girl you're not in a position to argue."

The clown's eyes grew wide with surprise.

"Yeah." Leech sat up smirking triumphantly. "I broke your nose for it and then you drank an entire bottle of champagne after throwing up in an ice bucket!"

"I- my nose?"

"You really have no idea what you did last night do you? This is great I love having this power!"

"You have no power over me!" The eldritch snarled at her in the dimly lit room to which his mate responded by turning on her lamp. Pennywise recoiled in pain from the bright light holding his head and curling dramatically into a ball.

"Beg to differ Ruffles." Leech grinned shutting off the light. "Tell you what, you make it up to me and I'll delete the footage of you proposing to a lamp."

The clown groaned loudly again scrunching himself tighter in agony. "I promise I'll go easy on you." She purred rubbing his back "you might even enjoy yourself."

"And what do you wish of me?"

"I want a whole day just you and me whatever I want."

Pennywise let out a long sound of pain. His massive form showing her a side no one living or dead had ever seen. He was vulnerable and small despite being nearly 7ft tall with hands the size of her head. It made the vampire feel pride that he trusted her this deeply.

"Oh come on Pen Im not going to torture you…. too much. I think you can handle 24 hours of being nice to Leech."

"I'm already very nice to you."

"Sure Grumpywise, sit up."

He did as he was asked and Leech could see the hangover clearly on his painted features. His normally pristine red lines splintered up his faux grease paint skin and his blackened eye makeup was much more exaggerated, accentuating his eye bags. To make things short, he looked like hell. Leech swung her leg over him and placed her thumbs on his massive temples applying gentle pressure as she rubbed them. Pennywise's tired pained eyes relaxed and grew heavy as she soothed him, a purr rumbled in his chest keeping time with her rhythm. "Feel good?" His mate asked him warmly and he responded with a soft grunt of approval. Her fingers stopped after a moment and Pennywise's eyes cracked back open "I'll cure the rest of it if you agree to take me on an I'm really sorry date." The insect growl he let out was menacing to the untrained ear but Leech knew her mate well enough to know that was a yes. She leaned in and kissed him deeply then left his warmth to grab something on her nightstand. "This will be nasty for you but it'll kick your ass into functioning again. We'll grab some doughnuts for you to cover the empty stomach for now." The drink she handed him smelled wrong and had a foul color not unlike gray water. The clown bared his teeth at the cup. "Trust your bartender Ruffles." Leech pushed the glass into his hands "she loves you very much."

"You're going to poison me again." He growled.

"You want to feel better? Drink." She insisted and punctuated her words with a soft kiss to his cheek. "Hold your nose and gulp it" Pennywise winced pinching his red nose and knocking the beverage back swallowing hard. After his fangs shot forward past his tongue which hung out in utter disgust.

"Good now drink this for the taste" his mate handed him a colorful sports drink which he completely devoured, the sugar indeed helping with whatever it was he just ingested. Her hand fell onto his belly rubbing it a few times as she combed his loose hair. "Feel better?"

Pennywise grunted stubbornly.

"That didn't sound too convincing frowny-clowny!" His mate teased him nuzzling his nose completely unafraid of the eater of worlds at his worst and most vulnerable. Pennywise snarled and shoo-ed her away baring his fangs in an empty threat. "I got one more cure to make you better Ruffles." She purred crawling back to him.

"What?" He spat and watched her with weary eyes.

"Some good old fashioned tender," her leg swung over his waist. "Loving," hands ran back through his mess of orange hair and her lips leaned in close to his own. "Care." Leech barely got out before making contact moaning softly against his lips. The clown's facial features were of annoyance but there was no denying the rumbly purr rising from his chest and the way his gloved hand slid down her spine to rest inside her shorts. He couldn't say no to something as sweet as this, maybe this wasn't too awful.

Hours later the boogeyman of Derry reclined outside of a changing room, sporting sunglasses over his eyes to block the sting of the store's stale fluorescent lights. He watched giggling potential teenage meals pass by and stifled a ravenous whine in his throat. A few of them even stopped to check him out which made his already ill human form gag a bit at the thought. "How much longer?" He complained wanting to growl at another pack of humans like a junkyard dog. He settled for maggots in their fancy blended coffees instead. Their squeals of terror brought a smug grin to his face and a rumble to his stomach.

“Alright opinions on the shirt.” finally his mate’s voice called to him from the entrance of the changing room

“It looks fine.” the eldritch mumbled barely interested.

“You didn't even look in my direction Pen.”

Pennywise groaned and turned his head, then let out a high pitched noise of anger at the sight of the sea turtle across his mate’s chest. “I change my mind!” he snarled recoiling in disgust. Leech cackled hard enough to snort and wheeze at his reaction. The more she learned about her love's mysterious ways the more she was able to push his buttons. The power trip alone felt amazing.

“Pen are you saying this doesn't look good on me? That's not very nice at all for you to say!”

A row of fangs split through Robert Gray’s handsome human face. “Remember you promised to be nice to me today Wuffles.” his mate’s sharp front teeth glinted at him as she adjusted her sore swollen breasts in the shirt. It felt blasphemous that two of his favorite things had to be adorned by such a disgusting creature.

“Love is suffering.” he shut his eyes and groaned struggling with restraint to tear the offending garment from his mate’s body.

“Are you admitting to being a masochist?” she teased him that sly grin almost daring him to lose his temper. Instead the eldritch huffed and spun her around marching her back to her changing room and swatting her rear playfully to get her to go in.

“That's your kink dear.” he said flatly resting his long arms over the railing of the stall and eyeing her with expectation.

“Seem to recall you rather enjoying last girl's night when you let me use my claws on your ass.”

“Wednesday is the only day I will allow such things, and make no mistake darling, I'm still always in control.” his features grew dark and his perfect upturned nose twitched in a way she could see the little dimples above his nostrils. She hated when he did that and he knew it did things to her.

“Why are you even still here? This is the ladies changing room.” she attempted to chide him and Robert arched a brow in that oh so Pennywise way.

“One can argue that I am female,”

“In your true from yes. But right now Robert Gray is about to get me kicked out of the Derry mall for perving.”

The eldritch rolled his eyes and shut the door behind him, his massive form making the small stall feeling slightly claustrophobic. “Better?” he smirked as he twirled a lock of her fake platinum hair around his finger.

“No! How am I supposed to change with your giant ass in here?”

“You can always let me-”

“Oh no you don't! We still have a whole date to get through and I'm not done annoying you just yet.”

Robert whined and sat down on the bench pulling her by the hips a bit “just a bite then. The sooner that offensive garment is gone the better.”

“You're really bothered by it aren't you?” Leech smirked and allowed him to man handle her just a bit. After all saying no to him was incredibly difficult.

“It's one thing to cover my queen in this disgusting image but my unborn young as well? Blasphemy.”

“Mmm blasphemy my favorite thing.” the vampire hummed as her mate’s fingers pushed under her shirt feeling the curve of her swollen belly with reverence.

“I'm well aware.” he purred drawing his lips closer to her, pushing the shirt up further. She stopped him before he could get to her breasts, pushing his hunger filled hands back down and earning herself an annoyed groan from her eldritch.

"Close your eyes.”

“Why?” he demanded and pouted like a child.

“Because I'm wearing a surprise under this and you cant see till later."

“Surprise me now then”

“Pen if you want to have fun with this you're gonna have to trust me and wait.” she kissed him anyway and the needy whine he let out was almost enough to convince her to change her mind. “Don't look ok?” he didn't say anything but he did obediently close his human form's hungry silver eyes. Leech put her hand over them as she quickly removed the clothing she was trying on just in case. Pennywise was definitely the type to peek at his presents early. She took her hand away when she was down to only her panties and immediately she felt herself being grabbed and kissed with ferocity. It's not like he hadn't seen all this before but Leech wouldn't lie that his reaction to her semi nude form was a major confidence boost. “Fuck Pen,” she mumbled into him feeling fangs in his mouth and claws at her back. “Hold out for just a little while longer for me.”

The creature hissed and held her tighter. “Come on Ruffles trust me its worth it.”

Robert Gray returned to what could be considered normal while pouting a bit as his mate got dressed pulling her hoodie over her wig to protect herself from any sunlight. The eldritch scooped up her wanted clothes rather impatiently and patted his lap motioning for her to sit.

"Are you endorsing shoplifting?" Leech raised an eyebrow at him and smiled mischievously

"I'm being nice" Robert shrugged. "you were going to try it anyway dear, my way is quicker."

"I'm starting to like when you're nice." Leech smiled and got comfy her arms holding tight around his neck. "Home please."

"Don't get too used to it, I have plans for you tonight sweet thing." He purred against the soft fabric of her hood.

"Is that a threat or a promise?"

"You'll have to wait its a surprise!" He giggled and poofed them out of the store leaving tags and a discarded turtle shirt where they once sat.

#pennywise #pennywise fanfiction #horror fanfiction #pennywise x oc #pennywise fluff #monster roommate au

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unimpressedperson · 6 years

Text

akai-ito

(Found this cute picture in @btsreactionmemes. Thank you for posting it, sweetheart)

Genre: Fluff, Angst

Warnings: None, I guess.

Pairing: Min Yoongi x @agustdlovcult, Min Yoongi x Reader

Word Counting: 7.8k

Synopsis: Jade always obsessed over stability, wondering about how her best friend, Jung Hoseok, could live wildly and moving from place to place, relationship to relationship constantly. Once the only thing she most valued was taken away, drinking a little seemed fair. Her choice made a new connection, an akai-ito. Yoongi and Jade had one thing in common uniting them.

A/N: Hey Jeeeeeeeeed! What's up? After weeks of waiting I finished it! Hope you enjoy it. The character itself isn’t a reflection of your personality, ‘cuz you are one of the best creatures I have ever met. It has a total of 7.824 words, but comparing to what you deserve, it’s nothing. Hey Jadie, I love you and hope you are feeling alright :) Sorry for the bad grammar, hope you enjoy it x

- x - x - x - x -

Jade was pissed off. Everything around couldn’t seem or sound more annoying, from footsteps, pigeons walking on the sidewalks (c’mon birds, what were your wings made for?), even the slightest signal of loud breathing could trigger the woman into punching someone. She marched across the streets, arms tight in front of her chest, pressing the thin white sweater firm against body. Her steps were noisy, white sneakers hitting the asfalt harshly and expressing how angry Jade was.

Her morning began normal. Alarm rang 7 a.m, waking Jade up to another day of working, seeing the same faces all over again, talking about repetitive subjects, as if her life was nothing but a clockwork, repeating day after day the same boring routine established by human biological needs supplied by money, which buys foods, snacks and pays for Netflix. Well, it also reimburse bills, rent and gas, but it’s always implicit anyways.

Usually, living the weekly cycle wouldn’t bother her. As long as that routine left her free from getting in debt, then no changes were necessary. Jade had been living like that for over five years now, why to change? Take the risk of becoming unhappy and indebted. Goosebumps would run up her spine whenever imagining such possibility.

Feeling safe and sound, Jade enjoyed that sensation. Whenever she drove her car, arrived at home and had dinner peacefully, any doubts or thoughts of quitting her 9 to 5 job would vanish. Pasta tastes better than starving. However, not everyone she knew lived like that, Hoseok was, quoting Jade’s own words, completely out of his mind, moving and crashing into a different home every month, coaching dance in several academies, but never establishing in one for longer than five groups of 30 days. His routine was so unsure and unpredictable.

Of course, Hoseok always had something new to tell. Everytime their group of mutual friends decided to reunite in a bar, the currently redheaded man would entertain everyone with a story about how he spent three nights sleeping on a janitor’s room, or how he convinced someone met on Tinder to let him live for a whole month into his house. The man had no boundaries or roots, anyone related to Hoseok would admire it, except for Jade. She always listened and judged his choices as something out of reality.

She never felt surprised by his wild, borderline insane, tales. They met young and even back in then, Hoseok was a gypsy and lived happily by not settling. Basically, according to Jung Hoseok himself, after watching his parents divorcing and having two different homes, not digging roots and always gaining for a period of time somewhere new to name as home, felt like relieve. Jade always offered to pay him some psychiatrist appointments, because not a single thing from his discourse sounded sane for her.

Who the heck would possibly feel constantly happy, mainly not knowing if there would be a roof above his head next morning? Her thoughts on Hoseok were so low, that after hearing he bragging about fucking with a girl only to sleep at her place, Jade lowered even more the standards for him.

However, that morning something happened, a situation which her mechanic had guaranteed wouldn’t happen so soon: the car broke. Something about a fan inside engines. She couldn’t rationalize what was happening with the automobile, not whilst trying to run and get a bus to downtown. By the way, not knowing the schedule to public transportation can kill any tight routine, and Jade found it out quite late, literally, her shift began at 9 a.m and by 8h45 a.m she was not even close to get there.

Working as a hospital receptionist, punctualism was a must, which was Jade’s forte. She hardly arrived late for any occasion, missing a day of work? Not even in her wildest dreams. Mainly in an important day, like when the boss scheduled to pay a visit and check if his investments were in good (read responsible) hands.

What were the odds? Murphy’s Laws are a bitch. Jade hated with all heart The Chaos Theory, mainly watching years of good work ruining in front of her eyes, as 9h45 approached and she was still seating still on one of the subway’s benches. Her receptionist co-worker texting and asking where the fuck she was, quit reading them after replying three and feeling desperation racing the heart, making it pound against her ribcage.

Every functioning speaker inside the wagon announced an emergency stop, ‘cuz apparently someone decided that rush hour was an appropriate moment to jump in the rail tracks. 10h12 a.m and the subway began moving again. Jade melting on her seat.

In the moment she arrived in her station, Jade jumped off the wagon and ran with every remained trace of oxygen. Driving a car, and counting on the traffic jam, she would have had arrived in 45 minutes, even with accidents and SNOW she never took over 2 hours to get at the hospital.

After sitting on her desk and gaining a very intimidating stare from the co-worker, Jade began turning the computer on and answering calls. She wanted to act as nothing odd have had happened, working hard to compensate the delay. Typing faster than ever, scheduling examinations and MRIs, some x-rays, also paying attention everyone arriving and asking for directions. Her determination was admirable, but things never were purely good, not in such a shitty day.

Between schedules and calls, Jade took a look on the Excel spreadsheet and the agenda she noticed a BIG FAT mistake. When arrived and desperately began working, she forgot to check which day was marked on the page she began typing the examinations and appointments, after two hours nonstop Jade realized that everything were written and scheduled for the day before. Conclusion: all the work worthed nothing and she spent her shift fixing everything.

The boss was nowhere near happy with all delay and asked Jade’s manager about her performance. It was no secret that Mindy disliked Jade, but no one would ever imagine the woman lying by criticizing nonexistent flaws, such as constant lateness and rudeness against patients, and about incompetence. Well, he took her dirty words for granted and didn’t even bother in asking for more than one opinion.

To put it shortly: Jade was no longer a St.Bartholomew's employee.

Jade left the building feeling anger consuming every pore and cell inside her body. Five years, not five months. FIVE FUCKING YEARS living, breathing, eating and existing around working for St.Bartholomew and suddenly a shitty day was enough to be kicked out, as if every extra shift and hard working, good execution and quick learning meant nothing.

Ok, maybe she wasn’t the best co-worker. Possibly a bit rude sometimes. Hardly joined everyone in get-togethers or lunches. Never contributed in paying birthday cakes (or joined the choir when Happy Birthday began), but at least Jade always replied the “good morning”, “good afternoon” and “good night” proffered to her. So what she barely answered texts? Or befriended almost no one, except for the security guard, from there? Not everyone is a social butterfly such as Hoseok, she had close friends and were glad with them.

Also, you don’t get a prize or ‘Best Co-worker Award’, but working hard would always turn into remunerated vacations. Who would even think that treating people with indifference can actually hurt them? What is she now? Dr.Phill? Oprah?

While furiously wandering around the avenue, Jade figured that a huge glass of Martini would help. No! Not a Martini, but a whole bottle of wine and Cup Noodles, watching thoroughly some high-quality Netflix content. Maybe inviting friends over? No, not friends, she wanted distance from humankind for a few hours.

- x - x - x - x -

Jade was walking to Walmart, when someone began calling her name. She searched for whoever that was (possibly wishing to punch that person), but got startled in the moment Shmailah appeared from inside the shoes store beside her, carrying a huge bag. They hugged and the conversation started, whilst looking for a bar or pub.

– What a shitty day, Jadie. - Shims said caressing her friend’s back, watching her swallow in one long sip a cup of vodka. - Let me pay your drink, you deserve some comfort now.

– I still have money, Shims. - Jade said and grinned, even wishing to sink down in a whole gallon of hard liquor. - But if you really want to pay me something, then next month you can take charge of a few bills.

– Don’t be silly, you’ll find another job like that. - The girl with dark hair and shiny eyes said, snapping fingers and smiling, sipping on her chocolate milkshake right after.

The music playing around them was calming, rhythm soothing and healing, if the words sang repeatedly weren’t so painful and sad, then the ambience would feel even romantic. Whoever were the responsible could fucking drown with Jade and her good mood, since she was feeling like a whole dumpster and the voice’s owner was probably someone quite sensitive.

– I’m going to punch that man singing. He is making me feel sad and lonely. - Jade said and took a short sip on the vodka. - Somehow his voice is making me want to start dating someone, only to break up and say those words along. Music is powerful, dude.

– He is also quite cute. - Shims uttered looking in the small and darkened stage, glaring at a small, skinny, black-haired, korean guy with noticeable cute cheeks, playing his guitar and singing with soul and body. - Ugh, whoever cheated on him probably didn’t see it coming. What a sad song.

– We are so much better. - The small korean guy sang, a deep voice astounding those who paid attention. - When we are, not together.

Jade looked back, trying not to fall from the chair and stared at where Shims was also looking. Indeed, he was cute, talented and kind of hot… Wait a second, Shmaillah never said anything about him being hot. Maybe Jade was already lightheaded, so brand new unannounced information popped up inside her head like internet pop-ups, or Youtube advertisements.

Employed Jade would never drink at 5 p.m and think dirty stuff about someone unknown at 6 p.m. What a turn of events in less than 24 hours, huh?

– Shims, can you please help me go there and give him money? - Jade asked raising one eyebrow. - I want so bad to give him something, and I think money wouldn’t be considered harassment.

– Jadie, we can totally go there, but please stop drinking, it’s your second cup and you’re already planning to get laid with someone you know nothing about. - The dark-haired woman said seriously and smiled, not leaving traces of tension. - Two more cups and you’ll be starting to consider raising kids with him.

– Our children would look great, ok? - Jade said laughing and finishing her second cup of vodka, still staring at the singer.

They kept on talking, well, Shims started commenting on something about Hoseok. Apparently the redheaded man is now dating some guy he met during one his classes in an University (Jade didn’t even knew Hoseok graduated in something other than High School). Someone named Taemin and also a great dancer. Jade moved her glare from “The Singer” only to login in Facebook and find Hobi’s new boyfriend.

It’s not like Jade was surprised Hoseok was dating. They met during High School, and beside all differences, their friendship lasted long and remained even after so many years. Not surprisingly, the group began growing considerably with Hobi inviting Taehyung, who brought his love interest together, Shims, which introduced them to Taylor, Zariah, Robin, DiLayla, Bárbara and Emerson, she who had been dating Kim Namjoon, a friend of Seokjin, Jungkook and Jimin, whose great humour ended up mingling well and becoming part of the pack.

Whoever decided to understand their group of friends from an outsider perspective, would probably go nuts, because not even them understood. Also, their relationship was complicated, basically, everyone at some point kissed everyone, except for the long lasting couple Emerson and Namjoon. The greatest bacchanal began when Taehyung and Shims broke up for the first time and he made a move towards Di, they kissed, but never ignited a make-out session. Shims would never be left behind and called Jin, who was fighting with Zariah (his significant other, and possibly the closest person).

Shortening a long and rather intrincated story: Jin is now engaged to DiLayla, Jimin and Robin got surprisingly closer, Shims and Taehyung are still together, Namjoon and Emerson is the unproblematic couple, Zariah is dating someone called Bang Chan (she never formally introduced him, so he is not officially part of The Chaos Club), Taylor even denying is totally dating Jungkook, and Bárbara is with someone called Lisa, an actress who spends more time in Korea than in New York. Jade had a short affair with Jimin, but the man liked Binnie way too much. She also dated for a long time someone called Calum, and after the breakup decided to focus on her career.

While Shims kept on discussing the probabilities of Hoseok remaining into that relationship for longer than two months, Jade was far and deep inside her own mind, tangling herself between thoughts and drunk fantasies, “The Singer” somehow appeared as well, his voice working as the narrator for whatever she was thinking.

– It’s been so long every since I felt something other than indignation towards Hoseok. - Jade pronounced out loud, with a bass voice, imitating “The Singer”.

– What? - Shims questioned chuckling.

– Sorry, I was thinking out loud… With another voice in my head. - Jade explained and brushed off. - But I'm serious, I broke up with Calum four years ago and every since then I never felt another warm sensation other than tears, whilst watching some emotional crap on Netflix. I went to dates with some dudes, but things never… You know, never made my heart beat faster and all that romantic and lovey dovey stuff.

– Complicated. - Shims furrowed her eyebrows, raising them in an arc seconds later. - The Singer stopped singing and is taking a break. It's now or never. - She pushed Jade's chair and watched the woman trying to let her long dark-blonde hair down.

– I don't know what to say. Should I buy him a drink? - Jade questioned worried sick and smoothing out her clothes, and obviously trying to procrastinate. She just got fired and felt touched by a sad song, it’s not like Jade actually wanted to go on a date, maybe get laid, but not while feeling emotionally wrecked and confused.

Fuck. Jade wanted to chicken out, but something on Shims eyes seemed very intimidating and without realizing, her legs began working on their own, guiding a half-drunk woman in The Singer’s direction.

There he was. Standing beside the stage with a glass of wine on one hand and checking his cellphone. His black hair fell like a sheer, soft-looking curtain on his forehead covering a bit of his small and dark eyes. A big black shirt with long-sleeves folded to the elbows, jeans painted the same colour, with trenched knees, and a dirty pair of Vans. Ok, the man seemed even hotter staring him closer. Jade wanted to run and have four more drinks before going home, but before she could escape, he looked up and saw a woman looking at him, without blinking.

– Can I help you? - He asked with a voice as soft as his hair, no trace of accent found.

– Hmm, Jade. - The woman said, trying desperately to find coherent words, but only facing a HUGE URGE to use her long hair like a cocoon, hiding and only leaving when butterfly wings grew on her back. - I mean, my name is Jade.

– Nice to meet you, Jade. - The man said and binned his cellphone in one of the back pockets. - My name is Min Yoongi. Can I help you with something? Like teaching you how to blink.

– What? - Jade raised her eyebrows and blinked a few times before smiling and slowly remembering how to act like a proper adult, not a drunk grown up, which was her actual situation. - Sorry about that. You’re a really good singer. Is that song yours?

Min Yoongi smiled, a gummy and cute smile. He sat down on the stage and patted the wood beside, inviting a very flustered Jade to join him. That simple action made the blood before accumulated on her body flow straight to her cheeks, warming the whole face. Nevetheless, she took the place beside the skinny man.

– Thank you. And no, the songs I chose for today aren’t mine. - Yoongi proffered, looking at Jade. - They are from a korean band called NELL. I do compose, though.

– You are hot and talented, of course you also compose. - Jade almost bit her tongue after letting those words accidentally escape. - Sorry. I’m visibly punchy and pissed off at the St.Bartholomew’s Hospital.

– Thank you and I’m sorry, I guess. - Yoongi said, not knowing exactly what to say, but feeling his cheeks getting warmer. - Well, I only have to sing for more ten minutes and then I’m free. Do you want to talk about it, whilst drinking a soda? I ain’t gonna pay you more alcohol, or you’d become a walking fire hazard.

– Deal. - She said and stood up, shaking hands with Yoongi and walking in the bar’s direction, flustered and internally panicking, leaving a smiley man behind.

Jade made her best to sit beside Shims and not fall. Yoongi was clearly staring, so slumping to the ground would be rather embarrassing. She stayed silent, ‘til listening to his voice singing again, then turned to her friend and began speaking.

– I was about to ask if you wanted me to help you getting home safe and sound, but now I’ll just casually leave. - Shims chuckled and touched her shoulder. - I ain’t gonna third wheel your first date in ages.

– Shims! I’m not in condition of dealing with such a cute and hot guy! - Jade was still tipsy and holding the tears. - My plan before meeting you was to buy a ton of Cup Noodles and wine, so I could mildew alone at home. You can’t leave me with him! I strongly doubt someone would ever feel attracted to a grown ass woman whining and sobbing.

– See, Jade, I will stand up, pay my bar tab and leave. - The dark-haired woman said while petting her friend’s arm. - You can do whatever seems right. If running for your life sounds better than speaking to someone so talented and sweet, then go for it.

– Thank you. That’s exactly what I’ll do. - Jade told and stood up after grabbing a twenty dollar bill and some dimes inside her pocket, throwing everything on the counter, trying to leave without stumbling and falling, being followed by a giggly Shims.

- x - x - x - x -

Unsurprisingly, in the moment Jade arrived at home with four chicken-flavoured Cup Noodles and box of wine, she immediately felt regret for leaving the bar. Placing all the food on the kitchen table, she dragger herself to one sofa, laying heavily there.

– What the fuck? - Jade questioned staring at the ceiling. - Why such a shitty day? What the actual fuck, God? Not a single good thing happened to me! I know I’m not the most interesting human being walking on earth, but I certainly don’t deserve to be punished twice in a single day. - She turned to one side, looking at the TV and seeing her reflection there, shrunk in a fetal position. - Great, now I’m speaking to myself. Unemployed and crazy. Even worse. Unemployed, crazy and definitely not getting some.

Weary of staring at her own misery reflected on the turned off TV, Jade decided to stick to the original plan: eat Cup Noodles, drink wine and watch as many cliche, lameass rom coms as she could find on Netflix.

It’s The Notebook night, bitch.

…

– WHY ARE YOU SO MEAN, MR.DARCY? - Jade yelled at the TV, accidentally dropping one of the chopsticks, a bunch of used and new tissues around her tiny figure in comparison to the huge sofa. - Elizabeth loves you! True love is a total lie.

She was sobbing in a pool of self-pity and tears, some of them drying on her cheeks, some just bathing her old pajama t-shirt (a very ancient Bananas in Pajamas one). Totally fed after consecutively gulping down two Cup Noodles and three glasses full of wine, considering the idea of ordering some pizza and a male stripper.

– Goddamn Lord. That Yoongi guy ruined me. - Jade thought out loud, after picturing herself calling somewhere with strippers. - Before listening to his depressive songs and staring at his cute eyes and cheeks, I was satisfied with my nonexistent romantic life, now I’m considering the idea of nurturing a very dirty business. What the fuck? Why am I talking to myself again? Gosh, I better stop drinking. - She placed her glass on the coffee table, but not before chugging the wine.

Jade knew that “The Self-care night” was pure bullshit. She wished to avoid at every cost thinking about her day. Rationalizing all the occurred would make her feel desperate and sad, a bit anxious as well.

Stability. That’s exactly what Jade looked for her whole life. A settle down lifestyle, without worrying about money or having a roof above her head.

After leaving her parents home and going to college, she defined as a goal to live comfortably somewhere secure, with a good job and being able to eat, sleep, spend a bit more without losing her mind over lack of money. Stability, she found it and established in a small apartment, working everyday and slowly acquiring more and more stuff.

Most people considered her lifestyle a bit boring. Not even a single worry. Nothing different happening. No adventures. The friends admired her strength and how hard Jade worked, but would never trade some of their “easy struggles” for her settled living. It was incredibly predictable and perfect. Completely opposite to what Hoseok lived by. The young man took YOLO way too seriously and constantly found himself drowning in debts, but somehow also always gained money paying everything and going back to exploring what life had to give.

Totally opposites. Two different polarities from a same magnet. Although, in such a complicated situation Hoseok was always the first person Jade thought about calling. They knew each other for long enough to trust and deal with their differences as well as with similarities.

After the end scenes of Pride and Prejudice, Jade grabbed her cellphone and still sobbing dialed Hoseok’s number, hoping he could answer the call and chat a little bit.

– Hey, Jeed. - Hoseok picked up and said happily, as always. A loud music playing around him. - What’s up? Everything is smooth and soothe?

– Hey Hobi. - Jade tried to speak without crying, but thinking about the current situation made a sobbing mess of her. - Everything is shitty. So shitty. Oh Hobi, my life is ruining like Constantinople!

– Calm down, my friend. - He asked, voice soft and sweet as a sunny day of summer. Loud music still could be heard, slightly fading as Hoseok walked far from where he originally was. - Tell me what happened, don’t spare details, you know I love them.

– Aren’t you busy? I can hear a loud EDM music. Are you working on any dance academy? Or worse, were you busy WITH Taemin? - Jade questioned feeling a bit of guilt filling her guts.

– Don’t worry, Jeed. I’m in a party, some friend of mine took a job as DJ and invited me to prestige his work. Nothing new, I attend to gigs like that almost everyday. - Hoseok uttered, still using his sunny sounding voice. - Now tell me, what happened?

– If you insist… - She sighed and poured some more wine, ignoring her own promise of stop drinking. - I was fired from my job on that hospital, St.Bartholomew. But before being dismissed, my day began shitty when the car broke and I took public transportation. Traffic jam, accident in an avenue, someone tossed itself on the rails making me two hours late. I fucked up some Excel sheets and scheduled appointments, my boss was there checking if everything worked alright and Mindy, the nurse and manager I commented with you that hated me, she lied and it made me get fired. Unemployed and sad. That’s how I am.

– But I feel that something else happened after being fired. Did someone hurt you? - Hoseok asked. Now Jade could no longer hear the EDM song playing as a background sound.

– Well… I met someone at a bar with Shims. - Jade felt her cheeks getting warm only by thinking about Yoongi’s voice. - I bumped on her and we decided to have some drinks to seize my pain. After two vodkas, I decided to chat with the cute guy singing there, and fuck, he was hot and invited me to drink some soda, ‘cuz he wouldn’t pay me more alcohol or, in his own words, I’d become a fire hazard. He got back on stage to finish his presentation and I ran away from that bar, even after accepting his drink offer.

– So now you’re feeling lonely and guilty? - The redheaded man questioned, she could picture him raising one eyebrow in disapproval. It made Jade grin and stop crying.

– Basically.

– Did you even ask the man’s name? Or you just said something incredibly smart, flirted a little and then made him fall for your beauty? - Again the disapproval voice, she could picture one of his eyebrows almost touching the hairline.

– I did ask, you moron. Stop assuming I was that drunk. - She cooed and looked at the wine inside her glass. - Min Yoongi.

– Ooooh! You flirted with Min Yoongi? And he didn’t turn you out? Lucky girl. - Hoseok’s sunny voice made a comeback, changing back to disapproval seconds later. - Bad news, now he probably hates you.

– I know, I would hate myself too. - Jade murmured, feeling sad again. - I wish I could talk to him again and explain everything, maybe justify all the mess.

Hoseok told Jade that he would turn off the phone, but was going to call her in a few minutes. Giggling, the redheaded demanded her to not pass out or go to sleep, receiving a very ugly word in response.

Before getting to actually know Hoseok and Jade, people would always assume they were a couple. A common mistake, considering how close and for how long they would’ve been annoying and supporting each other. Everytime one had a problem, the other would automatically try its best to solve or at least help. Monetarily (as Jade assisted Hobi so many times) or emotionally (as they used to lend a hand more often than both would ever admit).

Nevertheless, their relationship never crossed the thin line between everlasting friendship and romantic bond. What they had was so rare and unique, that even after bringing so many new friends to their “pack”, some sharing more similarities with both, Hoseok and Jade only fully trusted each other.

Despite everything mentioning, affirming and proving how strong their bond is, Hoseok and Jade indeed had REAL and SERIOUS fights. Once the argument made them stop talking to each other for almost a whole year, when they detached everything they could possibly keep in common (even mutual friendships, that’s when most couples formed actually).

During that period of time where Jade and Hobi were separated, Taylor mentioned something about ‘akai-ito’, a serie she watched with Jimin and found very intriguing. Basically, akai-ito is a thin red yarn connecting every human being, uniting mainly soulmates. Everyone shared an ‘akai-ito’ sometimes with more than one person ‘cuz it worked both with friends and romantic bond.

Apparently, the red wire connecting Hoseok and Jade never allowed them to detach forever. After one full year not even glancing in the other’s direction, he had serious problems with a girlfriend and needed somewhere to stay, specifically a place where Ellie wouldn’t even imagine where. Watching her friend desperate and begging for forgiveness, Jade felt the heart melt a little and things got back on track.

While Jade choose what she wanted to watch next (something between 17 Again and Marley & Me), Hoseok called back.

– Why did you turn off the call? - Jade inquired still tracking something good to watch on Netflix.

– Well, you want to apologize and ask for Yoongi hyung’s forgiveness, right? - Hobi said and before she could even think about replying, he continued gladly. - Well, it’s your lucky day. Guess who is the DJ friend I mentioned previously?

–You’ve got to be kidding me! - She dropped the remote control and stared blankly at one white wall. - Is it a prank? I’m sad, Hoseok. It’s not cool to play with someone’s sadness.

– Hi Jade. - A cold well known voice said on the other end. - It’s Min Yoongi, or the guy you dumped earlier.

In that moment Jade froze, not knowing what to say. When she began venting about Yoongi with Hoseok a few minutes earlier, Jade was still beginning to think about what could be said as an apology. Whilst holding her phone and trying not to cry again, the woman risked to gather some coherent words again.

– Min Yoongi. I’m surprised to hear your voice. - She pronounced and regretted immediately, aware that her words and tone sounded as if he were the guilt one. - I’m sorry, I sounded cocky and I’m actually so insecure about that call, because as you may know, or not since Hoseok is a complete scumbag, I wasn’t expecting to put together so soon a whole apology for what I did earlier. Like, I never intended to accept and dump you, I didn’t even know you earlier and I was sad, recently unemployed, a bit horny and tipsy. So yeah, Hoseok isn’t the only scumbag, I’m the whole trash can. Sorry. I’m really sorry and I drank half a box of wine and my mind is blurry, but I’m sorry for sure. Hope you can forgive me, or at least consider the idea before dumping it like I did with your soda invitation. Right now I’m a fire hazar…

– Ok, can you please let me talk? - Yoongi demanded, still sounding cold, or it could be only Jade’s insecurity, since she heard his talking voice for five minutes and couldn’t possibly know how to differ happy from bored Min Yoongi. - Hoseok may be a scumbag sometimes, and he slapped me for saying that, but yeah he is also a very cool guy, which used his friendship with me to explain your situation. See, I’m still feeling my ego ache a little, but considering everything you went through earlier, then I can forgive you, under one condition...

– That’s alright. I’ll never call Hoseok a scumbag again. - She declared and then realized Yoongi didn’t finish to say what he wanted. - It’s your condition, right? Not calling Hoseok a scumbag again.

– No, it’s not. Two conditions now, nothing related to Hoseok, though. - Yoongi’s voice sounded less irritated. - One, you have to make me a proper dinner invitation, and two, don’t interrupt me while I speak. It’s annoying.

– Oh, ok. Shall I get your phone number so the dinner details can be discussed with more compromise? - Jade asked in a flirty tone.

– Not a problem, I’ll send you my phone number through Hobi’s phone. - Yoongi stated with also a flirty voice. - Thank you for the apology. Bye, Jade.

Yoongi turned off the call and a few minutes later a message made her mobile ring. Hoseok sent a phone number. Jade took no time in saving and texting him something cool:

‘Hey bro. Sup? What will it be? McDonald’s or Burger King?’

‘It’s not proper. Or an invitation. Try again, Jade’

- x - x - x - x -

– It's dumb! - Jade said and grabbed Yoongi's fist, trying to open it. - You can't and won't put an olive inside your nose! Not under my watch.

– Come on, Jade! Hoseok once tried to put a dollar dime in there and surprisingly it fitted. An olive is easy and greased. - Yoongi chuckled, closing his fist even harder and watching the woman beginning to scratch every piece of skin exposed. - He was high, but who cares? HE INSERTED A COIN IN HIS NOSE.

– Stop yelling. - She felt her cheeks getting warm with everyone around them staring. Maybe having a “casual date” somewhere fancy wasn't a good idea. - I know Hoseok did it. When we were in high school someone doubted he could make a condom pass from his nose to his mouth. He almost choked on the latex but won a bet. You really shouldn't base on Hobi’s personal experiences to define what you can or cannot do. Mainly when it comes to inserting stuff in any body cavity.

– That phrase wasn't well planned. - Yoongi chuckled and when it clicked, Jade felt her face getting even warmer. - You convinced me of not testing my nostril flexibility. Shall we order? Or shall we pay for the breadsticks we consumed and go grab something at In ‘N’ Out?

– Honestly? I’m still unemployed and there are no job offers in sight, so In ‘N’ Out seems financially better for me. - Jade cooed staring at the menu. - The cheapest dinner course here can pay two combos in any fast food place.

Leaving the restaurant, Yoongi and Jade felt light. Mood couldn't be better, without tension or alcohol involved their conversation. It was endearing and scary. They had a great and, if I may say, cliche connection. Completing each other’s phrases and blushing whenever their looks crossed, fingers “accidentally” brushing. The woman felt like everything was a romcom, and couldn’t be more gleeful.

Before meeting and having that great date, they texted each other for two days straight, trying to relocate Yoongi’s scheduled gigs and work in a music studio (apparently, he not only composes, but also produces, sing and can rap. What a package, Ma’am). After a lot of talking, he decided to leave the studio earlier and spend a whole night beside her.

Going out with someone she actually enjoyed the company felt weird. Jade decided to focus on a successful career and comfortable life rather than romance, so after breaking up with her boyfriend no one else really appealed. A couple of one night stands, but nothing serious or swore to last.

Therefore, Yoongi appeared.

Jade was far from being in love with Min Yoongi, but would never deny that his texts were funny, and himself was a delight to speak. Somehow his sarcastic nature and cute face completed a perfect combo, and the woman could spend hours staring at how Yoongi’s cheeks seemed always filled with marshmellows, or how some words were pronounced with a pout on lips. The gummy smile, that memorable gummy smile.

…

They ordered some burgers and fries from In ‘N’ Out, deciding to eat somewhere else. Yoongi invited Jade to his place, so the dinner could happen for free on his roof, under stars and moon.

Yoongi’s appartement was small and cozy, with blueish LED lights against dark blue walls, making the room seen smaller, and a huge black leather sofa. Whilst grabbing some blankets and pillows to cover the floor, he mentioned that his favourite thing about there was actually the soundsystem and soundproof walls, which were the first two things installed when he finally got enough money.

– I was 24 and Lenny Kravitz paid for one of my compositions. - Yoongi bragged and opened the stairs door, guiding Jade up to the last floor. - Of course only Lenny’s wage didn’t pay it all alone. I saved every sight of money I could and, it’s a secret, skipped several meals, only to eat less. Now I can totally live off what I receive from the studio, but singing in pubs and bars is fun.

– Inspiring. I would never give up the opportunity of having a definitive work, even with my family, to live such a crazy dream in a whole another country. - Jade said, trying to breathe calmly after climbing four sets of stairs. - You left Korea, knowing a bit of english and basically made your life here? Without any help? Inspiring, truly inspiring.

– I won’t play humble. It was hard and lonely, until I met Jung Hoseok. We shared the rent several times. - Yoongi smiled and finally opened the rooftop door.

The rooftop wasn’t incredible. It had some plants and flowers being cultivated here and there, old and rusty benches, but in the middle of everything could be seem a small clean space.

– I guessed you wouldn’t actually want to have dinner somewhere fancy, so I paid Mr.Edwards, better known as my Landlord, to clean a small piece of the rooftop. - Yoongi murmured, hiding his cheeks and embarrassment. - Hoseok said I was crazy, that you would never accept to leave Olive Garden to eat some takeout here. According, and I quote his words, you are way too dependent of comfort and boring adult conventions to live such a childish experience.

– Can I call him scumbag? - Jade questioned feeling flustered and gaining a gummy, also flustered, smile from Yoongi.

Hoseok wasn’t completely wrong, though. Jade hated to leave the comfort of a restaurant and, of course, would never imagine herself eating junk food on a rooftop full of barely recognizable plants. She valued the stability and predictability from certain situations, mainly over scenarios where something could go deadly wrong.

What were the odds, though? She was unemployed and if ever allowed herself to have complete meals in expensive places, would run out of money shortly after. The idea of being so unstable freaked Jade out, but as the tough woman she became, admitting wasn’t even an option.

Years working and leaving night outs early, all with the finality of being a good employee. Her happy and borderline boring life depended on that job. Losing it resulted in anxiety attacks for two nights in a row and liters of tears, desperate sobs and a feeling of failure, deep down.

Jade became her work.

Focusing on Jade’s expression, Yoongi captured a feeling of emptiness. As if her happiness was only a momentum situation, not constant. Every time the woman lost herself in a sorrow brain and waves of thoughts, the beautiful eyes got opaque and sad, shortly after brushing it off and desperately trying to hide how far she actually looked. I mean, a body was definitely sitting beside Min Yoongi, but the mind would go and come back, an ocean-like motion.

– How don't you get motion sick? - Yoongi questioned, still staring at Jade. He took a bite from his burger and chewed, focusing on the city lights.

– What do you mean? - Jade answered with another question, dipping a fry on a small puddle of ketchup.

– Your mind. It seems so work like a sea. - He replied and turned to look at her. - I can see by looking into your eyes. You think about what's bragging in waves, focusing on that sorrow subject and distracting, going back and then letting go again. Waves. I'd totally feel nauseous.

– Well, I do get nauseated sometimes. Whenever the waves become tsunamis, my stomach flips. - The woman answered and took a sip from the soda.

– You are thinking about your old job aren't you? - He cocked his head to the side.

– I don't know. I don't feel comfortable about venting. - Jade couldn't look straight at Yoongi, flustered with the idea of telling him what passes through her mind. - But you seem like someone reliable. See, I always loved feeling secure and stable. The stability of having a job, a tight routine and security of earning enough to pay all my bills loosely, nothing ever felt better. My parents always had problems with money and a house, so leaving their wings and spreading my own, being able to construct a boring yet safe life became my main goal.

“I am independent by nature, safety doesn't mean having someone to stand by me, but owning a whole fucking place to warm me up during cold winters. A house, or apartment, with walls and somewhere to cook. I felt complete. Now everything is confusing. I don't know if I'll be able to pay my rent in two months. Instability is a nightmare.”

Yoongi wasn't sure about what to do. Should he hug? Tap her shoulder? Caress her back? Kiss Jade? Suck her sadness out by the tongue? Oh, it's taking a whole different turn, which he never intended in taking.

In fact, Yoongi felt a sort of attraction towards Jade. Who wouldn't feel? A great, independent, smart, attractive and funny woman, in her own way, also unique and deeply interesting. Her passion was admirable, reminded Yoongi of himself.

When they first met, at the bar, Yoongi thought she was beautiful, even a bit punchy, and honestly wanted to pay her something to drink (even considering the idea of buying stuff in trade of physical contact was narrow, edging old-minded). He felt offended when Jade left, literally running away.

He felt surprised when Hoseok appeared with his phone in hands and babbling about a friend, specifically a girl who dumped him in a bar and was now regretting it. At first Yoongi wanted to ignore Jade, but her day seemed to end pretty shitty. Why not to give another shot?

Gladly he did.

– I'm afraid of compromise. - Yoongi murmured, trying to make Jade listen, but not wanting it at the same time.

– Well, it's not something bad. - Jade slide her hand closer to his on the blanket, slightly touching pinkies. - I don't have problems with compromise, as long as they don't disturb my routine.

– You don't get it. I like going out with people, but engaging in a romantic relationship frightens me up. - He still murmured, but now a little louder. - Making a relationship work isn't a piece of cake. Not for me. I understand when you say your priority is working and becoming stable. I think exactly the same. Ugh, it's so lonely to live like I do, but producing songs have always been my dream...

Jade got courage and ran her fingers along Yoongi’s, intertwining them. Both blushed and grinned. Slowly, and unsure, the man turned around and bent a little, brushing his soft lips against Jade's cheek. She made the same movements, but intentionally kissing him. A small and shy peck.

Like magic working through their veins, Yoongi rested his hand on Jade's cheek, deepening the kiss. In a slow pace, they putted the food away and laid down, trading smooches and pecks, with no intention of going further. His body on top of hers, under moonlight and stars.

They stayed there, in a comfortable silence for a long time. Watching the moon and trying to forget problems and outside world.

- x - x - x - x -

Three months later, Yoongi and Jade were still seeing each other quite often. Suiting his frighten of compromise, they never meant to label what kind of bond were shared.

Yoongi helped Jade to improve her resume, with some editing and a bit more of detail, no one could possibly deny a job. One month after their “unofficial date”, she was hired by a newspaper as a receptionist and occasional movie critic (She sent her opinion and whenever it sounded coherent, they published and paid an extra).

Her obsession with stability and security remained, but now sharing worries and struggles with someone special.

Hoseok proudly took credit for reuniting them after the bar fiasco. Shims disagreed saying their akai-ito tied in the moment she and Jade entered that bar and coincidentally where Yoongi was singing.

The Chaos Club decided to reunite somewhere fun (or the bar Yoongi and Jade first met), have a few drinks and talk about life, listen to some new stories from Hoseok, and turn Yoongi officially a new member of their pack.

Taylor held hands right with Jungkook, Robin and Jimin were indeed together, Emerson and Namjoon kept their title as Unproblematic Couple, Zariah and Bang Chan had bickerings but remained as a couple, Jin and Di were still engaged, but now planning their wedding party and preparing to invite their best men and maid of honour. Bárbara was glad, almost morphing into Lisa through a hug. Shims and Taehyung were throwing bread crumbs on each other, but occasionally stopping to say something sweet, teasing and starting all over again. Hoseok was surprisingly quiet, whispering things on Taemin’s ear.

The loud speaking and confusion stopped when Jade and Yoongi appeared, getting in the bar holding hands and laughing at something she said. His work finished an hour earlier, but he showed at her job and made company until she could leave as well.

In the moment the couple settled down and ordered some drinks, Hoseok showed up with a closed umbrella.

– Can I start the acceptance ceremony? We have to celebrate their unlabeled relationship! - Jung Hoseok pronounced and stared at his friends, and boyfriend (already accepted as a Chaos Club member), Taemin.

– Just go, Jung. - Yoongi said, rolling his eyes.

– You cannot tell me what or not to do, yet, Min. - Hoseok mocked and raising an eyebrow in fake disapproval.

– Then I can. Just go, Jung. - Jade told harshly, but smiled innocently right after.

– Now that an official Chaos Club said it, I can start. - He cleared his throat and began talking. - Today, my fellows and lover, we are willing and ready to accept a new member to our family, our club, our escape of human average intelligence and cheap humour, The Chaos Club. Here we have Min Yoongi, Jade's partner in crime, and a friend of mine. Do anyone have any problems or anything to add? Is anyone against his addition to our deary club of friends? - Not a single word, everybody just smiled at how theatrical Hoseok seemed holding the umbrella like a sword. - Since not a soul disagreed with my words, I proclaim Min Yoongi as a member from The Chaos Club. - He touched both Yoongi’s shoulders with the umbrella. - Now everybody drink a shot of tequila in honour of this historical moment. Cheers!

Everybody took in one sip the previously poured tequila. Jade and Yoongi smiled widely and kissed, getting their crowd to applause their action.

Jade and Yoongi were now officially together.

- x - x - x - x -

P:S I love you x

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some-cookie-crumbz · 6 years

Text

Social Foo-Pah

Social Foo-Pah Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Pairing: Kidge Summary: Continuation of a previous fic, found [here], with a special shout out of thanks to @ohwhatstheworldcometo for asking about a companion piece and being so patient while I worked on this! While Pidge attempts to avoid Keith at the celebration of Princess Maia of Firnes entering society proper, said princess and Allura have concocted a plot to get her feelings for Keith out in the open. But if there’s one things the Paladins should always remember is this: Even the best-laid plans can go completely off the rails. Standard Disclaimer: If you read and enjoy this, please give it a like/ reblog so I know if I should write more.

The grand hall of Queen Simona’s castle had been decked out in elaborate tapestries in various violet, blue and white hues. All the tapestries bore an image of a strange creature that he could only say had to be something akin to a hydra, but each head belonged to a different type of animal and was outlined in a different color. At the center of the piece, with one claw poised just beside it, was a broad sword stuck inside a stone. Keith remembered from the briefing they’d had upon arrival that the colors and insignia were representative of the new world order that Queen Simona had brought to her Firnes many years prior. He reached out with one hand and gently toyed with the tassels at the end of one of the tapestries. He was mildly impressed by how much had been done in so little time to get the place ready.

He heard Kolivan let out a mildly displeased huff. “Keith, please remove your hands from the tapestries. They are materials seen as pivotal to this ceremony,” He said, his tone reminding him of his younger years and getting scolded for sneaking candy bars into the grocery cart.

He rolled his eyes. “Oh please. I doubt that they’re that instrumental to what they’re doing. They look like little more than decorative pieces,” He scoffed.

“Decorative pieces they may be, but they do also serve a purpose,” Queen Simona’s voice was light with a mix of amusement and delight as she approached, the soft click of her heels echoing in the otherwise vacant room. Both Blade members flinched and turned to face her as she approached, Shiro and another lumbering figure a few paces behind her.

“For years, under the tyranny of Queen Maura, our people suffered greatly. She kept them hidden in a fog of false feelings using her powers, keeping them from feeling discomfort over the things she was doing. These tapestries are the insignia that the rebellion Queen Simona led was represented by. They have become a symbol of courage and perseverance to our people,” The tall man behind her said, reaching into a pocket of his coat and pulling out a small bottle. He squeezed a pale blue liquid into one eye, causing Keith to realize that eye was unnaturally glossy.

“I didn’t realize that it held such significance. I apologize for messing with it,” Keith said, dipping his head at her both in a sign of apology and to avoid the scolding look his superior commander was sending his way.

Queen Simona chuckled lightly and gave the man beside her a gentle slap on the shoulder. “Oh, ignore him, young one. Dom’s become a stuffy sort as we’ve grown older,” She explained, her tone light and jesting as she looked at the man in question.

The other shook his head, fixing his one good eye on her, but his lips twitched at the corners in amusement. “You’ve never been good at professionalism, Mona,”

Kolivan stepped forward, offering one hand to the man. “I take it that you are Dominic de Cortez, the head of the royal guard?” He asked.

The other nodded, his expression levelling back out, and took the outstretched hand. “Correct, I am. I take it you are the Blade member in charge of the team you’ve sent along to assist Team Voltron with this. Kolivan, yes?”

He nodded. “Yes. I was hoping to do a debriefing regarding the intelligence we have, as well as discussing the knight rotation throughout the ceremony,”

“Of course. Would it be possible for your young Blade member and the Black Paladin to stay with Queen Simona while we are gone, just in case?” Dom asked, shifting to look over at Keith and Shiro.

Keith blinked a bit in surprise before nodding. “We’ll keep her safe while you’re gone,” He vowed. Queen Simona herself scoffed a bit and shook her head, mumbling something under her breath, but she waved the two older men off with one hand. Keith glanced at her uneasily. “I’m sorry if I’ve offended you, Your Highness.”

She perked up in surprise before shaking her head. “I apologize. My problem is more with Dominic treating me as if I am still a child. I led a rebellion, by the graces; I think I can protect myself about some spoiled Galran prince and his lackeys if needed,”

“His generals and he are extremely competent fighters, actually. We’ve encountered them enough times to know they are not a force to be underestimated. That’s part of the reason you invited us here, after all; concern over his growing forces being enough to twist Princess Maia to sway to his demands,” Shiro commented before turning his attention to the tapestry. He reached out and touched one of the heads, the silhouette reminding him of a moose. “So the insignia is symbolic of your rebellion?”

“Yes. The sword itself is a representation of myself, as I was the one that orchestrated the rebellion. Each of these heads represents the family beast of each of my seven advisers. The one you are looking at is actually the representative of Dominic,” She explained.

“So you’re a queen with advisers?” Keith asked curiously. In most of the planets they’d visited, it was either ruled by a monarch or by a small council.

“The problem with our previous governmental system,” She explained, her gaze remaining fixated on the tapestry, “was that it was a council composed of members from the same family. There was no variety in the opinions being presented, no insight into how their decisions might affect another demographic of people negatively. None of the members of the council had lived an experience particularly different from the others, so there was no deeper insight. There was also far too much trust and acclaim placed in one another due to the belief that family would always look out for one another; this factor was how Queen Maura was able to rise and snuff out any voice that spoke out against her. For almost all my years of combat, my seven advisers have been by my side. They have helped me to grow as a person and offered me other avenues I would not have considered before. They have disagreed with me and corrected my path when necessary. I have trust in their judgment of myself, as well as trust in my judgment of them, so our system has worked out as well as any system designed by a creature that is not of a celestial status could. All of them have the ability to veto my ideas, and new policies are not put in place without every adviser having a say in what works and if any modifications are necessary.”

“That seems to be quite sound for your people. But I thought that your empathic abilities were how you governed?” Shiro asked.

“The old system lied much more heavily on the abilities of those like myself than the system I’ve designed does. My powers are used more as a clarification point, really. There have been officials and nobles that come with complaints, claiming to be looking out for their fellow man, only to reveal they have disingenuous intentions once I am able to ascertain their deeper emotions,” She said.

“So you’re less a queen and more a ruling lie detector, only with a deeper scope and higher point of accuracy,” Keith said.

Shiro flushed and cast him an annoyed glance. “Keith! That’s an incredibly rude way to put it!” He chided before looking back over at Queen Simona, whom had taken to laughing politely into her hand at the exchange. “I apologize for him. He’s not always the best when it comes to other people.”

“It is quite fine, Black Paladin. I appreciate the curiosity you and the others have exhibited since being here, as well as seeing how you tie things to your own culture for a better understanding. Knowledge can be a pivotal weapon you can use to your advantage; especially in regards to those you are allied with. I could send one of these along with you on your travels, if you’d like,” She offered, gently patting the tapestry once more before looking at both men.

“I’d appreciate one, thank you,” Shiro agreed, offering her a small smile. He opened his mouth to say something else but the large double doors of the grand hall opened and the three turned to face the smaller figure entering. “Oh, Pidge. Shouldn’t you be looking after Princess Maia with Allura, in the garden?”

Pidge tensed up and froze, her eyes locking on Keith. He perked up and cast her an almost sheepish look. She scoffed and looked over at Shiro and Queen Simona again. “I was wondering if there were any other duties you thought I’d be well-suited for. Like, maybe helping set up surveillance equipment or something,” She said quickly.

Queen Simona’s brow knit in concern. “Did something transpire between yourself and young Maia? She’s an excitable sort and has a bad tendency of occasionally speaking without thinking first,” She said gently, beginning to cross the room over to her.

“I may be the Green Paladin, but I’m not much of a nature fanatic,” She said quickly.

“She’s right about that; she’s one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever met, and can hack or repair almost anything,” Keith chimed in, trying to offer her a small smile.

She pointedly ignored him. “I’d be more comfortable doing something regarding technology,” She insisted, her own gaze falling to tiled floors beneath her.

“Of course, Green Paladin,” Queen Simona said before reaching over to a small speaker beside the doors. She clicked the little red switch on it and leaned closer. “Giselle, will you send one of your assistants to help lead the Green Paladin down to assist you in preparing the monitoring devices for this evening?” She made sure to flip the switch all the way down after her words, most likely opening the channel to whom she was addressing.

There was a brief pause filled with static noise before another voice responded, “I already have plenty of help. The elderly Altean gentleman is quite… enthusiastic about partaking in every element of our preparation.” The woman’s voice was tight, as if she was barely restraining herself from losing it, and filled with forced enthusiasm.

“The Green Paladin is a technological thinker as well, but a bit more subdued in personality compared to your current companion. View her as more of an assistant to help with reining in the talent you are currently accompanied with, if you’re so obliged,” Simona suggested.

She had barely flicked the switch down to open the channel before Giselle was heard shouting, “One of you go collect the Green Paladin from the grand hall this instant! She is going to be of great help to us!”

“Thank you, Giselle,” Simona said with a small laugh.

“No, thank you and thank the Green Paladin, my Queen,” She said before there was the click of her end going silent again.

With another small shake of her head, Queen Simona turned the device off. “I hope you don’t mind my having to present the situation the way that I did to Giselle. She tends to be very particular about how she takes care of the devices we implement around here. She barely even lets her own personally trained assistants do more than run errands and double-check readings,” She explained.

“Pidge tends to be that way when she’s working on a big project, too,” Shiro commented, hoping to ease some of the tension lingering still. Keith was watching Pidge like a hawk, occasionally shifting as if he wanted to catch her attention, and she, in response, was making sure to keep her face turned away from him. The silence between them was stifling, which was strange considering who it was he was talking about, and it had him a bit concerned. He knew there’d been some kind of argument between them during Keith’s last brief stint on the Castle of Lions, but neither of them would elaborate further than that.

The Green Paladin shifted, moving to head back out the doors. “Thank you, Queen Simona. I’ll wait outside for my escort then,” She said as she shifted to back out.

“I’ll wait with you,” Keith said, starting to approach the doors.

“I can take care of myself. And I’m sure you have your orders from the Blade,” She snapped quickly before storming out, ignoring how the young man visibly flinched at her words.

“Oh, my,” Simona mumbled, looking back over at the crestfallen Blade member. She then glanced over at Shiro, noting the worried frown on his face. “I take it that there is some kind of strain between the two of you?”

Keith perked up then glared off to the side. “It’s… It’s her problem, not mine. If she wants to be petty and hold a grudge, that’s her choice,” He grumbled before turning and heading to check the rest of the room, to assure that things were secure.

The two leaders exchanged looks before Shiro shrugged. “We should avoid getting involved. These two can be kind of… Stubborn, to put it lightly. And they tend to shut down if they feel like they’re being poked and prodded. If we can keep them apart until I can talk with them and diffuse the situation, I’d appreciate it,” He explained quietly.

“I understand. I’ll have them assigned to opposing areas in the grand hall tonight,” She agreed, offering him a small smile to help reassure him. He nodded his head in gratitude and looked over at Keith again, hoping that things could be blown over easy once they had time to address them.

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The hustle and bustle of the party ended up being much larger than expected, creeping from outside the walls of the castle and trickling into the city streets. It seemed that the whole capital – maybe even the entire planet! – was celebrating in some way for the young princess. The city streets were decked out with smaller, paper versions of the fabric tapestries, hanging from strings looped between the lampposts lining the city. The denizens were all dressed in their best outfits, wearing the same colors of the tapestries, singing and chanting the songs of the people.

Queen Simona insisted that the windows and balcony doors be left open, as it allowed the natural air circulation to keep the castle cooled, so there was a Blade member stationed at each entrance, ducked out in the shadows and keeping a watch for any suspicious activity. Members of the rebellion were intermingled in the crowd both in the castle and in the streets, monitoring for any sign of Lotor or his generals.

Allura herself was poised close to the end of the staircase where the royal family would be making their arrival from. Standing at the other end was Hunk, looking around pensively, anxious over potential missing any hint that something could be going wrong. She did a quick scan to double check where the two in her plans were present. Pidge was stationed beside one of the inner doors to a balcony, chatting amicably with the Firnesian guard stationed alongside her. A decent space away, back over by the main entrance, was Keith, most likely receiving his orders from Kolivan. She made a mental note to keep track on him, in specific, to guarantee the plan she and Maia had come up with could be followed. She then turned her attention to the top of the spiral stairs as the orchestra started up a much softer, gentler song.

At the top of the staircase stood Queen Simona, Maia and another woman beside her. The other woman seemed to be about the same age as Queen Simona, with inky hair that had been curled and teased, the strands bouncing mere centimeters above her bare shoulders. She was wrapped in a strapless violet gown with a white sash around her waist and matching gloves that reached her elbows. She leaned over to Maia, carefully tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear, her eyes warm with affection as she spoke quietly to her. There was a resemblance in the two, in the curve of their faces and shape of their eyes, though the older woman’s eyes were stormy blue-grey. The younger woman was rocking back and forth on her feet, looking up at both she and Simona in barely contained delight, the long edges of her pearl gown skimming along the plush rug below her.

Simona dipped her head to say something, pressing a small kiss to her forehead, before taking a deep breath and reaching towards a small marble pillar beside her. The marks on her own arms almost seemed to be glowing in the celebratory lights. Atop a cushion was what seemed to be a silver choker of some sort, with small droplet-sized stones embedded in it, as well as a long strip of a velvety looking fabric. Queen Simona raised the fabric and offered it to the woman beside her, then carefully picked up the ornate necklace. “Thank you, to every single person in attendance for this moment. It is an honor to see so many coming out to share this moment with our beloved Maia,” She said, pausing to flash a gentle look at the young heiress before her.

The crowd before them erupted into a delighted cheer, boosted as those on the outside joined in as well.

She smiled and dipped her head. “As is customary for a young one’s official entrance into society, here before her newfound peers and equals, she shall be given a family heirloom and have her hair styled by her parentage. For her family heirloom, she shall receive the chain of truth, as customary of an empath with her skill and prowess,” She explained before glancing at the other woman.

“And, for her hair style, she shall have it styled in a simple braid with the cloth in my hand. The fabric is soft yet sturdy, the braid practical and humble, as these are the attributes she will be wise to remember as she continues down the path of adulthood,” She said, pausing to again tuck another rebel lock of hair behind the princess’ ear.

The crowd cheered the whole time as the black haired woman twisted and tied her hair off into the aforementioned braid, and then when Queen Simona carefully clicked the clasp of the necklace into place, the fit snug enough that it wouldn’t dangle but also loose enough that it shouldn’t inhibit her ability to breath, eat or speak. Once she was finished with the ceremonial parts, she received a peck to each cheek from each of her parents, then turned and slowly made her way down the steps. Once she reached the end, the thunderous excitement in the crowd seemed to miraculously reach greater heights, the collection swarming upon her to congratulate and greet her proper. Hunk shifted and took his position beside her, serving as a personal guard in case anyone got too grabby or enthusiastic.

It was quite some time before things settled down enough for Allura and Hunk to swap posts, the Yellow Paladin offering her a relieved smile before slinking off to find himself something to drink and eat. She offered him a small wave before her attention shifted back to her enthusiastic ward, bright-eyed and fidgeting in her giddiness, Squire poised on her shoulder. This left the young Altean a bit bemused, as she hadn’t seen the little Heelaw anywhere prior to that point. “Is this Keith person in attendance?” She asked eagerly, gently taking hold of the taller woman’s upper arm.

“He is. He should be over by the balcony right now, speaking with Kolivan, the leader of the Blade,” She said, guiding them towards where they were. She opted against adding that, upon seeing his approach, Pidge had ducked and disappeared into the crowd.

“Excellent! What kind of person is he? From what little I could glean from Pidge’s emotions, he seems to be someone deserving of her adulation,” She asked eagerly.

“Well,” Allura trailed nervously, her eyes darting through the crowd in the hope of locating Pidge, “he’s a bit abrasive, but he has a good heart. He’s a lot like her, in the sense that they both like their privacy, which is probably why they get along so well.”

Maia hummed thoughtfully, lifting one hand to wave eagerly when Kolivan and Keith spotted their approach from the corner of their eyes. She carefully detangled herself from Allura once they reached them, taking the second to offer a polite bow to them. “Greetings, both of you. I have wanted to offer a proper thank you for your assistance in securing our home for this evening in person,” She said.

Kolivan offered a small smile and imitated her bow. “It is our pleasure, Your Highness,” He said.

Maia nodded before glancing over at Allura. “Blue Paladin, would you be so kind as to see if one of the other Paladin’s would be willing to do a guard post swap with you? I’m sure you’re rather tired of following me along and I’d love the chance to speak with each of you in turn,” She said happily.

“Of course,” Allura said, hoping that her smile and tone didn’t sound too stiff. This was the request they had agreed upon in order for their plan to work. Pidge wouldn’t be able to escape being around Keith if it was for the sake of the mission. And Shiro had made it clear that each Paladin take a turn guarding the princess herself. With everyone scattered as they were, none of them should notice how brief her stint beside the princess actually was.

It was a rather impressive plan, Allura had to admit.

“You two are okay with looking after her in the meanwhile, right?” Allura asked, waving lightly before scampering off without even waiting for the answer.

Keith made a vague noise of approval, lifting his head to size Maia up properly. She didn’t miss how his gaze lingered on the markings of her power on her arms. “You have the same marks on your arms as the queen,” He commented.

Maia beamed at him and nodded, lifting one hand to gently stroke one of Squire’s chubby cheeks with her finger tip. “This is the sign that, just like Mother, I have the powers of empathy. These marks are the indicator that I can channel another person’s energy through myself and translate what their feelings are. For now, I’m still in training, but so long as the person I am doing a reading on is thinking of a specific subject or person, I can get a rather precise reading of them. Would you like me to prove as much?” She kept her smile and tone bright, betraying nothing of her gambit, as she offered one hand to the young Blade member. Sensing what was to happen, Squire carefully hopped from his perch and scurried off to pilfer some treats from the food stand.

He eyed her hand cautiously before taking it. At first, she was unable to pick up anything specific, other than that he felt uncomfortable and crowded in the current setting. “So, what exactly should I do?” He asked.

“Think about someone or something specific, so I can get a proper reading on what you feel,” She mused lightly, closing her eyes and beginning to actively probe. For a while it was just foggy and vague, but then he seemed to hone in on a subject. On the surface, he was riddled with confusion and frustration. Something was putting a wedge between he and the subject but he wasn’t sure what. Underneath that, there was fear and betrayal; the fear and betrayal both stemming from a belief that he was, or had been, replaced. There was also a sense of confusion as to what, exactly, his feelings for this person actually were, but the falsehood of that emotion was easy to piece together with a little more probing. Beneath the confusion, in a part of him that may be subconscious, there was a sense of fear over conflicting feelings towards them. On one hand, it seemed that Keith wanted to spend more time with this person and reach out to them, to be transparent with one another. The fearful part of him, though, reared its head like a charge animal and snarled fierce that it would be fruitless.

He felt this person was important to him but also felt he wasn’t important to them in the same way.

Maia slowly opened her eyes to look at Keith, a sense of dread settling into her belly. He clearly had a deep affection for whomever he was thinking about, which could end up sabotaging the plans that she and Allura had. It, she realized, could end up breaking the Green Paladin’s heart. She knew she’d be unable to keep the truth to herself; after all, in this situation, she’d want to know the truth herself. She slowly opened her eyes and fixed her gaze on him, her brow knitting slightly. “Are you sure you don’t know what these feelings you have are?” She asked quietly, her voice just above a whisper.

His eyes widened at her words, indigo eyes shifting from her to whoever he was looking at, panic clear as day.

“Oh, calm down. I’m not here to pick a fight,” Pidge grumbled as she approached, holding two fluted glasses. She offered one to Maia before taking a small sip of her own. “Hmm. Not half bad for an alien punch.”

Maia didn’t even try to hide the smile that turned up on her lips, looking from Keith to Pidge happily. She could tell by how tense he got that he knew that she knew it was the Paladin he’d been gawking at during her reading. She tightened her grip on his hand, sensing that he planned to politely sneak it away and try to flee. She took a sip of her drink before offering it to Kolivan. “Would you be so kind as to hold this for me for a moment?”

He looked a touch confused but nodded, carefully taking the flute from her. With her hand freed, she turned her attention back to Keith and Pidge. “You two seem to be having some kind of difficulty in your relationship, I hear,” She said calmly, trying to take advantage of Pidge’s distracted state to get a hold of her other hand.

The other was quick, though. Her gaze shifted from Maia, looking ready to tear into her for trying to involve herself, before her eyes locked on Keith’s hand still clutched by the princess. She shifted, moving to take a step back in preparation for her escape. “Whatever you’re trying to do, don’t!” She seethed lowly.

“This is going to be a good thing, I promise!” Maia huffed back, determined, and seized up the other’s wrist instead. The grip wasn’t ideal, but it would work well enough. “Just let me help you!”

“I don’t need any help with this!” Pidge snapped back.

“Yes, you do!” Maia yelled back, tightening her grip and kicking up her power on accident. If she wasn’t focused on her targets, then her ability to channel was a bit off-kilter, as she had learned many times before. If she was too focused on one, all that happened was a one-way transfer of the most basic reading of emotion. Keith and Pidge both visibly froze as they realized what was happening, the odd warm sensation that Maia’s powers caused coursing through both of them and laying everything at their feet.

Well, at one of theirs feet; specifically, Pidge’s feelings at Keith’s feet.

It was a whole minute of silence before Maia was able to compose herself enough to try and correct the flow of the channel, but it was also enough time for Pidge’s brain to catch back up with what was happening. At first, in her shock and horror and embarrassment, she dropped her drink, the glass shattering on the polished tile with the sound of a warning alarm blaring. Conversations around them died down significantly, eyes turning to gawk at them, and the embarrassment and horror grew stronger in Pidge as she looked around frantically. She yanked free of the other young woman’s grasp and staggered back a few steps. “What did you do?” She shouted, clutching her hand to her chest as if she’d been hurt.

She was more just yelling because she didn’t know what else to do, what else to say.

Maia shrunk in a bit, holding her own hands up defensively. An anxious glance around showed that a much wider circle of intrigue had been made, growing as the commotion itself grew louder. “I-It’s okay, Green Paladin, this is an easy fix. Just let me open the channel the other way and it’ll all make sense,” She insisted, trying to calm the other back down.

“Pidge,” Keith said suddenly, his voice quiet and somber, both women turning to face him.

Pidge’s eyes widened a bit at how he watched her, with eyes that were soft and gentle with what she could only label as pity. Her stomach roiled in discomfort, her face growing hotter with a shameful flush. She said nothing before turning and darting towards the double doors leading out of the grand hall. “Ah, Pidge, wait!” Maia called, moving to go after her. She then stopped and wheeled around to pin Keith with a displeased scowl. “Why did you have to do that?”

He blinked, bewildered, then scowled in return. “Excuse me? You’re the one who used her weird powers to do whatever it is you just did!” He accused.

Maia opened her mouth to respond when she heard an intrigued hum from behind her, familiar and chilling, and instead clamped her mouth shut. “Yes, Maia, what did you do, hmm?”

She slowly turned, lifting her gaze to meet the disapproving frowns of her parents. “Momma… Mother,” She said uneasily, her gaze shifting from each of them in turn.

“What’s going on over here? Is everything okay?” Shiro asked as he walked over, Coran and the other Paladins a few steps behind him. Keith noted that Allura bore a similar look on her face as Princess

“This is my fault,” Maia said quietly, wringing her hands uneasily. She glanced over at Keith, who still seemed surprised and muddled about what had happened. “I meant to do a transference of emotion between the two of them, in hopes of opening the channel of communication between them to discuss their mirrored emotional conflicts, but it didn’t go well. She seemed to know that something was going to happen and tried to run off but I wouldn’t let her. I only ended up transferring Pidge’s emotions to Keith. And she was far from happy about that and ran off.”

“Maia, you know you aren’t supposed to be using that technique yet. You haven’t gained a high enough level of control to complete the transfer properly; especially in a situation where you yourself are not completely composed,” Queen Simona said, her tone firm but otherwise composed.

“I’m so sorry about all of this,” The other queen said as she turned to the Paladins and two Blade members, seeming a bit frantic over it all.

“It’s not your fault, Queen Adalyn,” Shiro said.

“Especially since I doubt she was acting alone, Your Highness,” Coran chimed, casting a firm glance over his shoulder at Allura. The other jumped a bit in surprise before glancing down at where she was tapping the tiles on the floor with the toe of her Paladin boot.

“I just wanted to help, but I’ve only made things worse,” Maia mumbled softly.

Queen Simona sighed and looked over at Shiro. “I apologize for this, sincerely,”

“I’ll see if I can’t get her to come back. She should still have the communication device on her helmet switched on,” He explained with a small sigh, shifting away to try and reach her.

While he did that, Keith turned to look over at the other Paladins. “Poor Pidge. She must be really embarrassed,” Hunk said worriedly.

Keith opened his mouth to say something when Lance snorted. “Well, can you blame her? Who wouldn’t be embarrassed about having a crush on Keith?”

“Lance!” Allura seethed, pinning him with a glare.

“What? I’m just telling the truth!” He argued.

“She isn’t answering the comms. Which means she’s either turned the comms off, or removed her helmet,” Shiro said with a small sigh.

Simona nodded. “I’ll get in touch with Giselle. Her cameras should grant her a full reign of the territory of the castle. So long as she hasn’t gone running into town, we should be able to track her down,” She said, carefully lifting the skirt of her dress to head off. She briefly glanced at the shattered glass and drink on the floor, thankfully unperturbed since its fall. “And I’ll see about having that cleaned up, to avoid any potential slips or injuries.”

“I’ll go with you,” Shiro insisted politely. He paused briefly to stick the remaining three Paladins and Blade rookie with a stern look. “And I expect the rest of you to stay put; especially you two, Keith, Allura. We’re going to put this matter to bed the minute we find Pidge.” And, with that, he turned and followed after the queen to begin the search.

“Ugh, this is so unfair!” Lance whined, tilting his head back and setting one hand on his hips.

“I truly am sorry, to all of you. I hadn’t meant to cause this evening to go this way,” Maia chimed again, her whole figure slumped in defeat.

Hunk tried to offer her a reassuring smile, gently patting one of her shoulders. “Hey, it’s okay. We’ve all made mistakes at big, celebratory gatherings like this,” He said.

Keith turned away from them, his gaze flickering to the balcony in longing. Would stepping out there be against Shiro’s orders? Did he even have to really listen to Shiro, considering he was no longer an official member of Team Voltron? Kolivan offered him the untouched flute of punch that Maia had given him a few minutes before. “Take a moment to clear your head out there. If Shiro returns before you, I’ll inform him I ordered you to do a quick check for any intruders out there,” He said evenly.

“Thanks,” Keith said, unable to muster up a smile but hoping that the gratitude still made it through. After receiving a quick nod of acknowledgement, he slipped past the gently billowing curtains and out into the brisk night air. He stepped out until he reached the stone railing of the balcony. Once there, he rested one arm against the railing to lean out and see the gardens better. They’d been lit by floating paper lanterns and cast an almost ethereal glow on the fauna below. Though, he realized, that perhaps that was simply because this world really was drastically different than Earth, even with all the similarities?

Sometimes he wasn’t sure, what with how much traveling they did through space. He typically left debates like that to Pidge. Whenever he’d encountered something like this before, he could say it outright to her, and for the next hour or two, she would be off. She would take what he was pondering and take it to new heights and levels of intrigue that he’d never consider on his own. Sometimes he’d lose track of what she was saying or how she’d gotten to the tangent she was on, but it was nice, just listening to her wax poetic-science about the specifics of his queries.

He took a quick sip of his drink, humming a bit at the taste. It reminded him of spiced apple cider.

He wondered if Pidge would agree with him on that thought. They’d once argued about whether the Gugu Juice from the planet of Yasarut tasted like blueberries and pomegranate or blackberries and pomegranate. He took another sip and turned the thought over, analyzing his relationship with Pidge and how he appreciated the natural simplicity of it. There was no need to try and present himself in a specific light with her. He could let the walls down and simply toss out any random thought he had without the risk of scrutiny or mockery.

He didn’t have to be Keith, the rejected Garrison cadet known for being a loner.

He didn’t have to be Keith, the ace pilot and ex-Paladin of Voltron.

He didn’t have to be Keith, the rebellious Blade of Marmora rookie.

He could just be Keith, no pretense or context.

He took another sip and fought back a sigh. In the end, developing feelings for Pidge made sense, the more he thought about it. Very few of the people he’d encountered ever allowed him to be so authentically himself before. His father had, within reason, of course; and, in the same vein, so did Shiro. Pidge never expected Keith to be or do more than he ever felt comfortable with. There was something about the ease of their relationship that felt like the first gulp of water after traversing the desert for many hours. But, with that freedom came the stifling fear that Keith would lose her just like he lost everyone that ever meant so much to him before. So he stashed his feelings under layers of fear and befuddlement, as a way to never have to acknowledge or act upon them.

That, he realized, wasn’t going to work anymore, though. Knowing the thoughts that were rattling around in Pidge’s head cleared things up for him. He know understood why she’d been so hostile about the scar he’d gotten from his latest Blade mission. The situation at current was far from ideal for either of them, but it left him feeling a need to face the truth wholeheartedly. Even if she ended up telling him off, proclaiming that it was just a crush and he was reading too much into it, he still wanted to have that conversation. He didn’t want to keep lying about his own stance on it, regardless of how much it would hurt to be rejected. He noticed motion across the garden from himself, by a large tree near the small waterfall.

There, huddled in close to herself, sat Pidge. Her helmet had rolled a few feet away and her face was hidden between her knees and crossed arms.

He stole a glance over his shoulder and, upon confirming that Kolivan was preoccupied with talking with Queen Adalyn, set his half-downed flute down on the balcony and hopped over the railing.

It wasn’t a particularly steep drop, and even then Keith had been smart about going down in stages to avoid injury. He navigated himself carefully, managing to make it to the small bridge in decent time and coming to a halt right after he crossed it. He could still see Pidge’s figure, but he could see her better now. The slight shake of her shoulders told him that she was either trying to fight back tears or was simply trying to mask that she’d surrendered. Approaching her now would most likely end with her cursing him out and threatening to tazz him with her bayard, depending on how he decided to go about it.

He took a deep breath before taking the final few steps towards her, stopping when there was a wide enough girth between them that she should – hopefully – feel unthreatened. “I’m sorry,” He blurted without thinking. She stilled and tensed, one of her hands shifting towards her face. He waited a moment longer, but when she didn’t start talking or move to run away, he decided to press things further. “And, I mean… I know that it isn’t ideal, but it could be worse. It could be Lance that you have a crush on.” He offered.

Her head shot up at that and he froze under the incredulous look on her face.

“Okay, bad example, I should have thought about that better,” He admitted, holding his hands up defensively, “but I think my main point is still kinda fair. I mean, I get it. I’m not the guy people think of when they think about people to have a crush on. And, yeah, that’s something I can totally understand. I know who I am and… I can understand why it’d be embarrassing to have an interest in someone like me. I’m not exactly good with people, and I’m way too impulsive, but I just… I wanted to say that I feel something like that for you, too. And I’m not really sure what caused you to end up liking me like that, but I’m really sorry that you’ve had to deal with those feelings.”

“What?” Pidge asked with a small laugh, carefully unfurling herself and cocking her head. The laugh had been mirthless and there was confusion on her face, which at least helped to soothe him a bit. She wasn’t being malicious about it, at least.

“That’s why you ran off, and I understand,”

“Why do you think I ran off?” She asked curiously, slowly pushing herself upright. He couldn’t read the look in her eyes as she settled on her feet and something about it made him uneasy.

Transparency with one another was kind of their thing. Or, rather, he’d always considered it to be there thing.

“Because you were embarrassed about having a crush on me,” He said bluntly, as if it should be absolutely obvious.

She shifted and began to walk towards him. “Well, you’re half right,” She said calmly. She stopped a few feet from him, brow knitting in confusion. She glanced briefly at the waterfall, nibbling a bit on her lower lip like she always did when she was turning over a confusion thought, then looked back up at him. “What did you get from Princess Maia, exactly?”

He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “I got that you have a crush on me, that you’re mad at me, that you were embarrassed and horrified about the whole crush thing-!”

“Wait, what?”

“I could literally sense your feelings because of Maia, Pidge; you don’t need to pretend,” He said, wincing a bit and averting his gaze. This whole thing was starting to enter the point of discomfort and, not for the first time, he found himself cursing his impulsive nature.

“Is that what you thought those feelings were about?” She asked, and this time when she laughed it felt a bit more genuine.

He screwed his eyes shut, not wanting to look back at her. “Well, excuse me for piecing things together with what I had! You don’t need to make fun of me because of it!”

“Look, Keith, you’re-!”

“I already know what you’re going to say, Pidge! I only came over here so that I could say my piece so that we could move forward from this!” He snapped, still refusing to open his eyes. He felt like if he looked at her, if he saw the mocking delight that he was sure was in her face, their relationship could never resume any sense of what they’d had before. He didn’t want to lose Pidge as a friend, didn’t want to lose that easy companionship. He could pushing his feelings up the hill to get over them if they were out in the open, he was sure, but he wasn’t sure if he could if he saw the jeering look on her face.

But then there was a set of suit-covered hands on his cheeks, the warmth of her palms still managing to reach him through the material. His eyes snapped open and he finally turned to face her. There was no malice or mockery in her eyes, surprising as that was. She looked a little exasperated, but there was something softer paired with him, something he was a bit too scared to name. Her hands slide down, sliding from either side of his face to either side of his neck.

He could feel his own pulse thrumming like made, as if his blood was kerosene touched by a lit match.

Pidge shifted, pressing herself up on tip-toes and looping her arms around his shoulders. Her head just skirted past his, shifting to rest her head against the side of his. “I was embarrassed because I didn’t want you to know how I felt yet; not because I was embarrassed about how I felt, you doof,” She said with a small laugh. She gave him a small squeeze. “I ran off because the way you looked at me after the transfer… It looked like you were pitying me.”

He blinked then, slowly so she could stop him if she wanted to, looped his arms around her as well, settling his hands between her shoulder blades and the middle of her back respectively. “It was pity, but not directed at you; it was just pity that we’d both had kinda similar feelings and had wasted a lot of time not talking about it. Why didn’t you want me to know yet?”

“Because… It’s complicated, you know? It’d be complicated if we decided to pursue a relationship, and it’d be complicated if we decided not to, and just… I didn’t want to have to deal with it. At least not yet,” She said quietly, slumping a bit. He could tell she was feeling exhausted by the events, which was unsurprising. He was feeling pretty worn out himself.

“We could find a way. I mean, find a way to make it a little less complicated,” He mumbled, closing his eyes a bit.

She let out a small hum and he quashed the disappointment at how disbelieving it sounded. “I’m not so sure,”

“But can we at least try? Try to figure something out?” He pressed quietly.

“I don’t know. Maybe. Yes? Let me think for a little bit, okay?” She prompted, seeming just as thrown as he was. But he was fine with that, he figured. Perhaps they could as Queen Simona to help them figure out their compromise before they left.

#Voltron legendary defender #Keidge #Kidge #Peith #Kidgemas #Pidge Gunderson #Keith Kogane #my fics #I think my Code Lyoko and Soul Eater are showing in this fic Whoops #In other news writing Simona and Adalyn and Dominic as mature adults is so fucking unnerving #One of the biggest head-trips I've done on myself in a while

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pennys-th0ughts · 6 years

Text

Her Fair Monster 🎡

Hope you like it Lucinda 💕

Five days. The fair had been in town for five days now and the people were excited to go there before it leaves. Men, women and children crowded each post, waiting their turn to play games, had spin on the big wheel of fortune or on the noisy carousel. The afternoons and nights were hectic and almost chaotic since these attractions arrived to Derry. Late at night, when the fair was closed, I decided to go and visit the place to make the most of the popcorn machines since has been decades I ate some of that delicious crunchy food.

One night I got there all intended to eat some cotton candy because I was craving for that sweet, sticky and fluffy eatable cloud. I walked through the posts in search of some of the machines but as soon I realized I wasn’t alone I quickly hid in one of the tents before someone could see me. “¡Damn it!” – I cursed quietly for being so careless. Then I heard her. She was sitting in the edge of the carousel, sobbing while eating a cone of cotton candy. The dim lights of the attraction helped me to take a closer look at her; she wasn’t tall and yet the curves of her body were tastefully nice to observe. It seems she had been crying for some time since the black make-up of her eyes was slightly undone. Her clothes were also dark making her look like a goddess of the night and the occult, something I was deeply feeling attracted to. Her neck was proudly wearing a choker with a sparkly skull and her wrists had lots of tiny bracelets. Her aspect was mysterious but reflected a fancy style at the same time. “What an interesting girl” – I thought while walking backwards slowly to not make any noise and leave the place feeling I was trespassing her privacy. I reached for the handle of the door but it was locked. To my disgrace I would have to crawl out of the tent through the front entrance that had a removable top on the counter. Making a big effort to fit in the hole I unfortunately hit my head with the edge causing a loud noise that made her jump. “Penny, ¡you are such an idiot!” – I cursed myself closing my eyes tight and rubbing the back of my head. “¿Is anybody there?” – I heard her ask. She didn’t seem afraid, rather curious. I kept silence when I heard she was getting close to where I was until she said: “¡You have two choices: come out and spare yourself some trouble or you can stay hidden and get into a big pickle!” I rolled my eyes and started leaving the tent with my eyes closed already feeling the hit of a bat or something overwhelming in my head, but nothing happened. When I opened my eyes I saw her drying her cheeks with the sleeve of her blouse. “I- I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you – I apologized, feeling a little embarrassed-. Here, you can have this” I clumsily took a red tissue from one of my pockets and handled it to her keeping my distance. She looked at the piece of red cloth and then at me and grabbed it with a trembling hand. I could tell she was making a huge effort to look brave but I could also sense that in the bottom she was crumbling. “You didn’t scare me by the way – she said sighing-. You just caught me by surprise since I didn’t know there could be anyone who would like to come here when the fair is closed. There is nothing fun in that…” Suddenly her self-chatting bewitched me, my mouth was open and I'm pretty sure I was drooling looking really dumb. Her chuckles confirmed such state forcing me to put my feet back on earth. “¿May I keep it and also know why you are here?” – She finally asked. I nodded with a slight smile feeling more relieved then, taking a deep breath, I told her the reason of my presence in the fair at so late hours. We started walking and snooping some posts, playing some of the games while we were eating popcorn and cotton candy. In those apparently endless hours she asked me several questions, from if I worked in the fair to if I always wore my clown make-up. I returned her questions and we realized that we had many things in common like the uncomfortable feeling when being surrounded by too much people and the pleasant sensation that empty dark places gave us. We discovered a lot from each other and it felt nice. Along our varied chatting she also revealed me that her name was Lucinda. A lovely name for a lovely girl – I thought. The tour came to an end when we got where the wheel of fortune was. The attraction wasn’t so big but the highest point offered a nice view of the town. An evil smirk curved my lips and glancing at the last pod of the wheel I unexpectedly took her by the waist and started climbing the attraction like the monster I was. She let go a scream but one of my arms covered her mouth. When we reached the top of the wheel I let her go inside of the pod. This time it seems I had really caught her attention and the fascination towards my arachnid limbs. Her curiosity took over her senses and, leaving what left of fear behind, she asked me if she could touch them. “They are soft – she pointed still touching them- and cute” I opened my eyes wide when she gave me her opinion since I was expecting her to jump out of the pod horrified. “Stay like that and take me higher Penny” – she asked. I nodded without saying a word and complied with her request. I sat at the edge of the wheel and she sat on my lap pressing her back against my chest. To feel her body and the its warmth against mine sent shivers down my spine, I gently took her hair and moved it to a side just to smell her tasty fruit scented perfume that filled my lungs in no time. She abruptly turned her head to look at me and her lips ended up crashing against mine. She apologized looking completely embarrassed but it didn’t mattered, I wanted more of it so I took her face with my hands and kissed her again. Not having enough of her I ventured to go further and my hands began descending slowly, she didn’t stopped me when she let go of my lips gasping for some air. Trembling moans came out from her mouth, the skin of her chest was soft as velvet and pale like the light of the moon, our only eye-witness of what we were doing up here. One of my hands kept caressing one of her breasts while the other looked for her most sensitive spot. She wasn’t wearing tight underclothes so the access to her pussy was easily breached. Oh, lucky me – I thought while biting my lower lip; my fingers gently began rubbing her clit with circular movements until I felt her getting really wet. Her moans went from quiet to loud and somehow I had to suffocate the noises if we didn’t want to get caught, so she didn’t left me other choice but to cover her mouth with mine, again. Helped by the rest of my arachnid arms, I took her carefully inside the pod where we would surely have more space thus more freedom of movement. She was panting and I was excited as hell as I watched her taking my clothes off with such eager that I could feel my cock already hardened under my pants. Once released from them I pulled her dark panties down, made her get on her knees and grab the railing so I could get inside of her from behind. Before I could begin my dirty job she asked me to bite her but in a different way, in a more arachnid way. “¿Are you sure about what you are asking, princess?” – I wasn’t sure of what she was actually asking me given the fact that now she knew the kind of creature I was but before I could keep thinking she placed my cock in her entrance and backed down making me go deep inside of her. “¡Damnit, girl!” – a husky growl came out of my throat and sharp spider like fangs ripped part of my jaw to get themselves exposed. Not being able to contain myself much more after her starting our sexual ritual in that way, I bent my body forward and, uncovering her neck, I plunged my two pointy teeth in it. Since she wanted to experience something uncommon and I could give her that, I quickly changed the effects of my poison to take her senses far beyond of whatever she had never experienced before. In a nutshell, this night I would definitely drive her crazy. “¡Holy shit, Penny!” – She cried in-between moans. I laughed mischievously watching her get high because of the venom that was furiously running through her veins. Then she gave me the order to be fucked harder and that’s what she got, I intensified the movements of my hips until she told me she was about to cum then I speeded up the pace. I released myself letting it all go, panting almost violently; I was in need to catch my breath and so was she. The poison wouldn’t take long to leave her bloodstream; in the meantime, I helped her to get dressed and we get down from the attraction so no one could see us.

When some lazy sun rays began to touch the tips of the tents we knew we had to say goodbye, I could feel she didn’t want to and neither did I, her presence was so pleasant that it cost me a lot to gather the strength to leave her. “I will wait for you tonight but I want us to meet when the fair is open” – I said while walking to the exit. She seemed a little disappointed then her eyes started sparkling again and with a playful and kinky smile on her lips she accepted my invitation saying: “Alright, I will come when this place is crowded but you will have to win a game for me”. Her bravery and self-confidence didn’t stop surprising me; I winked at her challenging and answered: “Well, I hope you pick the hardest game then”. I was a monster, but I was hers and that was all that mattered.

#Penny's thoughts #pennywise #short story

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descieux · 6 years

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Not in Lone Splendour, part I

Summary: A Jedi on the run needs to travel light. Without attachments. But maybe, this boy can be an exception.

Author’s note: A Star Wars AU/crossover I’d planned for Week 1 of ichiruki month, but oops there goes half a month before actually writing ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ You can also read here.

Nii-sama, I beseech you for your help. I don’t know how the HoloNet will report what has befallen the Jedi Order tonight, but what I saw was a squad of clone troopers execute Master Ukitake and most of the Jedi stationed with us on Kuat. I imagine that very soon, it will be deemed treasonous to shelter any Jedi, but I don’t know who else to turn to. As long as this channel remains secure, I await on Corellia for any sign of aid.

19 BBY, Coronet City, Corellia

Initially, Rukia intends to flee farther than Corellia, considering how close it orbits to the new Empire’s nexus of Coruscant, but after the infliction of laser fire from the fight to get off Kuat, the navigation computer of her Eta-2 Actis-class interceptor starts to spit sparks at her fingertips. Thus, she resigns herself to landing her starship not in the capital’s heavily patrolled spaceport, but instead, in a shoddy landing field on the periphery of the less supervised Blue Sector. Pirating thieves pose a more likely risk in these parts than running into CorSec law enforcement so she activates her ship’s cloaking device before disembarking, but just in case anyone does come around to ask questions…

“You didn’t see a girl land here,” Rukia instructs the Sullustan in the guard booth, her lilac eyes meeting his black ones as she plucks the brief visual and encounter from his mind.

“I didn’t see a girl land here,” he repeats as he accepts her mental persuasion as his reality.

Master Ukitake used to chide her and other padawans that they were never to use such mind tricks too liberally. Abuse of the technique, he’d say, suppresses another individual’s free will and the truth more generally; reserve mind tricks for when you have no other way to resolve a potentially violent situation.

Her master is dead now, and Rukia can only hope that she is honoring his teachings while balancing her resolve to not join the ranks of assassinated Jedi accumulating across the galaxy.

As she enters the cacophonous territory of Treasure Ship Row, she mostly ignores the hawking calls of street vendors, eager to sell ship parts, weapons, and the occasional mechanical limb. She’s not going to bother repairing her ship; the model is too commonly recognized as a Jedi-preferred starfighter. She’ll have to find someone willing to make a trade for her ship and then hopefully exit from this planet in a more atypical ride. It’s been ages since she last laid eyes on the Jedi-friendly smuggler Urahara though, and she’s deliberating which direction in this sprawling bazaar lies his shop when she spots a black-armored Imperial Death Trooper raising his blaster pistol at a civilian. Two civilians actually. The orange-haired youth shifts, planting himself in a defensive stance in front of a sandy-haired young girl.

“I don’t care what your Imperial mandate says,” the youth snarls, undeterred, foolishly so in Rukia’s grim opinion, by the pistol aimed at lasering a hole through his spiky-tufted skull. “I’m not letting my sister walk home alone, and I’m not interested in enlisting so get out of our way.”

“We’re not here to draft you,” the trooper agrees before elaborating, “We’re here to take you to the Inquisitors, regardless of your cooperation.”

“Try it, Buckethead —”

“Excuse me, Sir?” Two heads swivel and tilt to look down at their diminutive interrupter. With a pasted-on smile and a slight gesture pointed toward the trooper, Rukia continues, “This isn’t the person you’re looking for.”

She meets more resistance in this trooper’s mind than she did in the previous guard. Not surprising. The trooper — a cloned soldier, not a birth-born recruit — is focused on completing his task. Skimming his thoughts as she tries to tweak his memory of the assignment, Rukia absorbs how he’s an excellent enforcer of his higher-ups’ commands, he’s never failed before, he’s received direct orders from the Inquisitors to bring this Force-sensitive boy to them — wait, what? Force-sensitive? Rukia nearly fully retreats from the trooper’s mind as she glances curiously at the boy in question. He and his sister stare back with equal bewilderment. Force-sensitive perhaps, but definitely not trained in the ways of the Force.

“This isn’t the boy you’re looking for,” Rukia repeats. “You should try searching in another sector.”

The jet-black helm dips as if the head underneath has suddenly become too heavy to bear upright. “I’m going to search in another sector,” he acquiesces and begins to march away.

Sighing in relief, Rukia shifts her attention to the boy and girl, but behind their shoulders, the throng of shoppers is dispersing with shrieks as another black-armored figure heads toward them, this time carving vermillion pinwheels in the air with a double-bladed lightsaber.

Kriff. “Run. Now!” Rukia barks at the boy and his sister, charging past them and whipping out her hand, palm thrust forward, to Force-pull a tarp off a market stall. The heavy sheet follows the commanding trajectory of her hand, and with a sharp half-rotation of her wrist, the tarp enfolds itself around the head and body of the advancing Inquisitor.

Rukia lunges, igniting her own saber in mid-air as she drives the plasma blade down and into the staggering shoulder of the momentarily-blinded Inquisitor. She’d aimed for the head, but within seconds, the Inquisitor’s blades shred the obscuring tarp into ribbons before countering with a Force shove that sends Rukia knocking into and overturning crates of round purple Jogan fruits. Childhood years of brawling in the streets still inspires her to weaponize whatever lies within her admittedly limited then-and now reach, and so she shoves a wave of ripe produce rolling toward her pursuer. It forces the Inquisitor to leap for an overhead strike, and she sidesteps before slicing her saber in a blue crescent that cleaves through the attacker’s lower right hamstring.

Falling with a cry, the Inquisitor howls at her. “Jedi scum! We’ll cleanse the galaxy of you traitors! You think I’m the only one on Corellia hunting for the dregs of your Order? We’ll —”

Rukia cuts him off by swerving her blade to hover at his sweat-tinged jaw. “Is that your primary objective on Corellia? To track surviving Jedi?”

“Oh you’re just a sweet addition to the catch. We’re here for the young minds still untainted by Jedi teachings.”

“You mean that boy back there?”

“Hey Jedi girl, I’m right here.” Indeed he is, poking his carrot head out of a window above them. “More bucketheads are coming this way. Least I can do is offer you an escape route so hurry and get up here!”

Rukia nods before turning briefly back to the Inquisitor, one hand curving as if to cup the sneering face and delivering through the Force what she hopes is an unconscious state populated by nightmares. She feels like a barefoot street urchin again as she springs from crate to tarp to the stone edge of the balcony next to the boy’s window, fingers scrabbling for a better grasp on the balustrade.

“Here.” He’s in front of her in a flash, hoisting her up and over the railing before Rukia can protest that she’s a Jedi, well technically a Padawan, but still she’s the one who supposed to help others.

“Sorry for not being any help back there,” he mutters in a low voice, though his eyes don’t avoid hers. “I should’ve done more. That guy was twice your size.”

“Most two-legged upright creatures are,” she quips, shoving him toward the door. “You said you have an escape route right? Time to get these troopers off our tail.”

He nods and leads her into the building before breaking into a run and glancing over his shoulder to make sure she’s following from room to room, corridor to corridor and then across a bridge that connects to a neighboring structure.

Running for one’s life is part and parcel of the Jedi lifestyle, and she likes upending people’s expectations of her physical capabilities so she speeds up and vaults down a flight of stairs ahead of him with enough time to breathlessly say,

“I’m Rukia by the way. What’s your name?”

“Kurosaki, Ichigo Kurosaki.”

#ichirukimonth #ichiruki

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queen-scribbles · 6 years

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On All Counts

For @pillarspromptsweekly fill 53: Anniversary. This is... not as happy an anniversary as I was hoping for, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

When Tavi didn’t show up for breakfast, Aloth knew exactly where to find her. He also knew to bring something for her to drink and that he would probably want to keep his distance when he found her. Today was not going to be a good day.

He was right on all counts. Despite the early hour, Tavi was already on the training grounds, beating the stuffing--literally--out of a very battered practice dummy. She’d clearly been at it for a while, too. Long enough for her hair--and a line down the back of her shirt--to be damp with sweat.

Aloth watched her for a moment, forearms braced against the railing, and then without preamble., “Perhaps it’s time you took a break.”

One of Tavi’s shoulders flinched, ever so slightly, but she didn’t turn around. “Nah, I’m fine.”

“Tavi. You and I both know, today of all days, that’s not true,” he said, gentle but frank.

She stopped, hands hanging limp at her sides. After a pair of heartbeats, she sighed heavily and dropped the wooden practice blades at the dummy’s base. “You win, Aloth.”

If he’d needed any more proof she was definitely not alright, there it was. Aloth knew better than to draw attention to that, and so instead wordlessly held out the waterskin he’d brought as she turned around.

“Thanks,” Tavi nodded breathlessly, crossing the space between them to take it. She leaned against the railing a foot or two downwind from him(Which, much as he loved her, Aloth appreciated) and took a long drink. And then another. She wiped her mouth with the heel of her hand, and then raked her fingers through her hair.

“So,” Aloth began, after a long moment of silently watching her rub the faint scars on her palms, “now that the fighting your memories portion of the morning is behind you, how do you want to spend the rest of the day?”

She shot him a weak but grateful smile and used the tail of her shirt to wipe sweat off her forehead. “Not alone, that’s for fuckin’ sure. Maybe once I’m... not a mess, we can sit in the same room and do our own thing? I know you have a couple new spellbooks you wanted to go through, and I...” She sighed and looked down at her hands. “I need to carve something. Maybe another duck...”

“Tavi...”

Tavi shook her head. “I’ll be fine, city slicker. Thirty years have done a little to dull it. But it still hurts, an’ today I’m gonna let it.”

“Understandable,” he nodded. “I don’t mind, Tavi.” He stepped closer and rested one hand on her shoulder, feeling the lingering warmth of her exertion through her shirt. “Whatever I can do to help.”

She smiled with at least some of her usual mischief. “Aw, thanks, Corfiser. I should hug you for that.”

Aloth gave her a flat look. “Please don’t. Or, perhaps, save that for later.”

Tavi’s smile widened and she ran her fingers through her hair again, dramatically flicking off the sweat. “After I don’t smell like a long day’s work in the hot sun, y’mean? I think I can hold off that long.” She took another swig from the waterskin, mood sobering as she pushed away from the railing. “Seriously, though, Aloth, thank you.”

He nodded as he followed her back toward Brighthollow. “Of course.”

-o-

She hadn’t expected the bath to feel so good. She’d only been out there for an hour tops; it hadn’t been anywhere near the usual workout. It had been more emotion-driven than her usual regimen, though, which was a good way to burn through energy fast. Tavi sighed as she climbed out of the cooling water and reached for a towel. Time heals all wounds the saying went, but this one was proving stubborn.

Tavi dressed, eschewing boots, and tried very hard not to let her thoughts drift a certain direction--Wonder if Mom would still have the flower shop--without much success. Grabbing a small block of wood and her favorite whittling knife, Tavi headed for Brighthollow’s library--formerly Kana’s room--figuring it was the most likely place to find Aloth and that he’d be waiting for her with his nose in a book.

She was right on all counts. Aloth was there, spellbooks for perusal stacked on the table next to him, reading what looked like a book on either Ixamitl or Readceras. “Sorry for for takin’ so long. It felt really blazin’ good.”

Aloth chuckled as he nudged a chair out for her. “I imagine so. You gave that training dummy quite a beating.”

Tavi barked a sharp laugh and dropped into the offered chair. “One of the healthier ways I’ve dealt with this anniversary, trust me. The first couple I got fuckin’ smashed the night before, hopin’ I’d stay passed out or at least drunk a good part of the day. And there was one I started a bar fight.... Three decades has given me plenty of time to develop better copin’ methods.”

“I’ll say,” Aloth murmured, watching her turn the block of wood in her hands. “What are you planning to make?”

Tavi stared at the block of wood rather than look him in the eye. “A duck, I told you that.”

He hesitated in the middle of opening one spellbook. “Are you sure that’s wise?” he asked, obviously choosing his words with care. “Given that you didn’t want to spend the day alone specifically so you don’t dwell too much.”

Now she looked at him. “I don’t recall specifyin’ the blazin’ reason, city slicker.”

“Do you really think I don’t know you at least that well, Tavi?” Aloth pointed out. “Also, you mentioned that as a reason last year. I figured it would similarly apply.”

“And you remembered?” Her knife slipped from its first cut, narrowly missing a fingertip. Shit, that would’ve been bad...

“That surprises you?” he returned.

“Considerin’ everything that’s happened--Thaos an’ Stalwart an’ the Eyeless an’ all--I figured it got forgotten for something more important.”

Aloth smiled slightly, smoothing the pages of his spellbook. “That assumes any of those things were or are more important.”

Tavi’s face warmed and she set down the block of wood for a second, leaning forward to kiss him on the cheek. “You’re too sweet sometimes, Corfiser,” she said frankly as she picked the wood back up. “I think I’ll be okay.”

“Alright, if you’re sure. I’m here if you need me.” He turned his attention to his book, only to glance back up a moment later. “And, since you’re going to risk dwelling on them anyway, if you want to talk...”

She nodded, shifting her grip on the knife handle. “I’ll let you know.”

-o-

She made it an hour in, the duck’s head and bill roughly taking shape, before something made her flinch badly enough her knife skidded off the curve she was working and gouged her finger.

“Fuck,” she hissed sharply, before sucking on the wounded digit to slow the bleeding.

“Here, let me,’ Aloth said, pushing aside his book and reaching for her hand.

“It’s not bad,” Tavi muttered. She wiped the finger against her shirt before acquiescing. “I’m more mad at myself for gettin’ distracted than anything.”

“Distracted?” The cut really didn’t look bad; a small knick just below her knuckle that was already starting to bleed again. He was just used to Tavi being more careful and couldn’t help being concerned.

She flinched and wrinkled her nose as he rubbed away the blood. “I... started thinkin’ about my brother.”

“Ah.” To be expected. It was inevitable, really, in his opinion, with the anniversary that she marked today. He was only surprised she hadn’t been thinking about them again. (Maybe she had been.) They were both quiet while Tavi clumsily cut off a piece of her shirt to wrap around her finger and handed it to him. We do have an infirmary. “You didn’t need to-”

“I know,” Tavi interrupted, spreading her hand to make bandaging easier. “Force of habit.”

-o-

She watched him wrap the strip of fabric around her finger, far more dexterously than she would have managed, even using both hands. He tied the ends off with an almost impossibly small knot and let go of her hand. Tavi instead clasped his, running her thumb over his knuckles.

“I ever tell you how much I like your hands, city slicker?” It was true, but in the moment it was more a desperate attempt to distract herself from her memories.

From the look in his eye, Aloth knew it, too. But he humored her, because of course he did. “You may have mentioned something to that effect before, yes.”

Casius grinning triumphantly, glasses slightly crooked, as he finally mastered a spell. “Well, it’s still true.”

Aloth smiled and gently squeezed her fingers, careful of the injured one. “And I still appreciate it.”

Malachi throwing his head back in a laugh, warm and self-deprecating, as he flubbed the words to the song he’d been singing. Tavi bit her lip. “Good. That’s... good.”

“If I may,” Aloth began, still slightly hesitant to pry even after her many, many reassurances she never minded(not for him), “this year seems worse than last.”

She winced. Trust him to pick up on that. Pure wonder in Khellin’s eyes as he cradled a tiny kitten in his hands, the creature barely old enough to be held by kith. “They never got to fuckin’ grow up, Aloth.” She ran her free hand through her hair in a fierce, jerky motion. “The twins would’ve finally hit adulthood a couple months ago, and Khel.... Khel was just a fuckin’ kid. What kind of copperfucker-” She cut herself off with a shake of her head. Opening up to Aloth was one thing, and she was happy to do that. Unloading on him was completely different, and she wasn’t going to do that. Not about this. “Every year is the same old Hard but getting better and it just... hit me again this time how young they all were. Even my parents, they were... gods, they were barely my age now when they had me, so...” The words trailed off, their implication clear.

As if sensing how close she was to floundering, Aloth squeezed her hand again. “I know it’s hard,” he said softly, then paused. “If it would help... I believe I owe you a hug from earlier?”

Tavi laughed shakily. “Right on all counts. It is, you do, and it would.”

The two of them stood as one, releasing their clasped hands so Aloth could wrap his arms around her shoulders, and Tavi hers around his waist. She leaned into the hug, appreciating how close he held her, his hand rubbing her back.

Tavi’s gaze landed on the wooden block, Casius’ voice floating out of the past. “You haven’t called me duckling in forever, Tav.”

That’s because you’re dead, she retorted silently, even knowing the memory it came from. All of you, and I’ll never get you back. She turned and buried her face in the side of Aloth’s neck, her grip instinctively tightening. “I’m really glad I have you today,” she mumbled, the words muffled even further by his shirt. She leaned back far enough to meet his eye. “I mean, I”m always glad I have you, city slicker, I just... it’s extra nice on days like this.”

Aloth kissed her forehead. “I knew what you meant, Tavi.”

“Good.” She leaned into the hug for one last squeeze, then stepped back and picked up the half-carved duck. She was pretty sure she could finish it now. The ghosts were still there, probably always would be, but she wasn’t facing them alone. She snuck a glance at Aloth, his lips moving silently as he resumed reading the spellbook, and smiled to herself. Hard as it was, today would be a good day.

-------------------------------------------

i was trying to come up with something fun and fluffy for either these two or Ederity, I swear. But none of the ideas I got cooperated in the fleshing out stage. And then this struck, and it was more cooperative, so... hurt/comfort Taviloth it is, i guess. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Oh, and now that I’ve got them roughly nailed down, at the time of the fire...

Tavi’s parents were early-mid 80s

Tavi was 28

Casuis and Malachi were 19

Khellin was 13

SUFFER WITH ME

do you see why i decided to not kill khel?i’m not that mean

Also now I wanna have him show up at Caed Nua post-Deadfire so Tavi gets him back in canon but we’ll see

#queens fic #pillars prompts weekly #tavi illani #aloth corfiser #pillars of eternity #look i got a much worse idea that i promptly shoved in the closet #bc it would hurt too much to write #this is much better than that would have been trust me #taviloth #otp: third time's the charm

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