#the hardest part of making a board for this guy is finding a half decent picture of him

[mic-check-stims]

Kaiba agere board for anon

X-X-X X-X X-X-X

[whaleofatjme1920]

At the End of Your Rope (Jeff the Killer X F!Reader)

At the End of Your Rope

[Jeff the Killer X F!Reader]

[Warnings: heavy domestic abuse, violence, murder (not heavily described though), language]

[AN: This one's kinda heavy in some places. Take care of yourself first and foremost.]

It was rare that you had moments to yourself and even rarer when you found yourself enjoying those moments. Usually, you were tense, on edge, bitey and waiting to snap or invert back into yourself. That is what it does to you. It takes away, it destroys and it saps you of all your energy, your drive and your will.

No matter, that’s not what you’re supposed to be thinking about. You hum softly as you do the dishes, wondering how long this set of plates will last until he returns. You scrub hard at the bits still stuck to it, wondering how on earth he even managed to get this much filth plastered onto its surface - you made the meal, served it to him, you even took it back to the sink. Was he trying to key you off?

You took in a deep breath and scratched at its surface, only smiling softly when the piece finally dislodged from the blue floral design. You ran it under the sink, lukewarm water feeling alien against your skin as you continued to mindlessly rinse off the suds. As you began to stare off into space and by extension, the void, you found yourself remembering the times he used to bring you blue flowers at the beginning of every date.

A long time ago, when you were starry eyed about the world around you, he loved you deeply and truly. And it was the most strange of couplings, but they do say that opposites attract.

Last class of the day, what a relief. What wasn’t a relief was that it was chemistry. You’d never been particularly good at the subject, but you would often try your hardest and so far, throughout the year, had managed to coast by with a -B. It wasn’t perfect but it was good enough.

For the people around you who knew you better than that, they were more than surprised you hadn’t managed an A in the class just yet. You were the over achiever, the smart girl, the one who knew it all. But not in a cocky way, no, of course not. You were sweet, helpful and kind. That’s what spared you from how cruel teenagers can get - your aura was incredible and people would be absolutely dense to not like you. For the most part, you were quiet and only spoke to a few close friends.

Unfortunately for you, your last period chemistry class didn’t have any of your dear ones near. You sat in the middle of the classroom, attempting to take notes and kept your head down, honestly focused on the material when you heard laughter from the back of the classroom.

“Don't make me come back there,” your teacher said, her eyebrows furrowing slightly. “Do I need to split you up?”

“No, sorry Mrs. Haut,” a dark haired boy piped up.

Mrs. Haut rolled her eyes slightly before going back to writing on the chalkboard. She was talking about the electron configuration of atoms or something like that when the laughter picked back up again. Mrs. Haut sighed again before continuing writing. “One of you move up here by Miss Reader, another by Miss. Rhys, and another by Mr. Clarke.”

The three boys in the back verbally voice their distaste with their teacher’s decision but ultimately went along with it. You buried yourself in your notes even deeper when you realized just who it was sitting next to you. Usually, the person sitting next to you wouldn’t bother you, but the fact that this was by far the most disruptive person in the class had you a little flustered. You couldn’t afford skipping the notes or getting sidetracked especially with midterms coming up.

“You have a pen?” He asked quietly.

That made you pause. “Excuse me?”

“A pen..?” He repeated, albeit a little slowly, as to really get the point across.

You didn’t want to disrupt your teacher any further by the idle chit chat and quietly rummaged in your bag for a pen. Once your fingers grazed the object, you plopped it back onto the desk and got back to writing.

“Thanks,” he said.

Your eyes wandered from your notes over to him - and he smiled at you. Fighting back slight heat, you began scribbling down the notes with a nod as if to say ‘no problem.’

The lesson continued on for a little bit longer until you felt him gently poking your shoulder. You pried your eyes off of the board to give him the attention he so desperately craved. With an eyebrow raised, you asked him what was on his mind.

“What’s your name?” He asked softly.

You felt heat rush to your cheeks - how the hell did he miss your name? You were the only consistent question asker in this class! “... Reader,” you answered, eyes narrowed slightly at the fact he’d miss your name. Though, you do suppose what else could you expect from a class clown? “And what is your name?” You asked simply out of politeness.

His eyes widened in shock, and his face followed in suit. “You seriously don’t know?”

When you shook your head he gave a quiet, but exasperated groan and then flew into a tanger about who he was. The guy who set all those frogs loose last year, the same one who orchestrated turning all the furniture upside down, the guy who did donuts on the football field and the one who covered half the auditorium on elaborate post it notes art.

And unfortunately for you, none of those rang a bell. “I knew someone did it, but I didn’t know you were the one who did it.”

And that spirited yet another tangent from the boy sitting next to you. He went into painstaking detail about how he even got some of those things done, and you pretended to care, more so interested in the passion in his eyes than the actual content of the story. He was a surprisingly good storyteller! You hadn’t even realized the both of you had been chatting more than note taking when everything went dead silent. Much too silent.

“Miss Reader, I am more than disappointed in you,” Mrs. Haut said with another frown pulling on her red lips. “Both of you, detention.”

Your eyes widened in shock as she slapped down two pink slips on your shared table.

“Again?” The boy next to you asked incredulously, taking the note into his fingertips along with his bag in the other hand. “Mrs. H, this is like the second time this month!”

Mrs. Haut only shook her head and gestured towards the door, her shoe tapping impatiently on the ground.

“There’s only thirty more minutes left of class,” you said as you began to pack up your things. “I... “ Upon seeing your teacher’s tired expression,and not being one to directly challenge authority, you relented. “I’m sorry,” you mumbled before taking the slip into your grip and exiting her classroom. You took in a deep breath and trudged out of the classroom, wondering how you would explain to your parents your record had a spot on it when you exited the classroom and closed the door softly behind you.

“Do you know where the room is?” You posed your question to the resident class clown with a crestfallen expression.

“You’re actually planning on going?” He said it like it was a surprise.

“Uh, yeah? Where else would I be going?”

“I don’t know, but we can figure it out.” He smiled widely at you and plucked the pink slip from your hand.

“Wait what-? Give that back!” You cried out as quietly as you could to not disturb the other classes.

“C’mon, Princess, come and get it,” he teased. It didn’t sound like he had malice in his tone though.

You chased him through the hall attempting to get the slip back, narrowly avoiding the watchful gaze of hall monitors and the like when you found he had led you out to the parking lot. You didn’t have a car.

“Let’s go,” he beamed, scrunching up both of your pink slips in his hand before tossing them into the trash. “I wasn’t joking about figuring it out together.”

“I… But-”

“But nothing, Princess. Live a little.” He nodded for you to follow him, and you, feeling much too awkward to challenge someone, found yourself being led by him to his car. It wasn’t a fancy car, but it wasn’t near as run down as you expected it to be. It looked like he kept it relatively decent, and the scent was that of lemon. Whatever, live a little.

You slid into the passenger seat and put on your seatbelt as he became once again.

“Atta girl!” He chuckled as the car roared to life. He then flicked on the radio, turned up some music and the two of you left the school.

You can’t quite say you’ve ever had fun like that before. He took you to a diner, out bowling, you two snuck into a movie theatre then got smoothies before he dropped you off at home. And he was so sweet and kind throughout it all. He made you laugh, listened to you attentively, and over smoothies, he attempted to help you study a bit. It was moot, but it was nice that he even attempted.

That was what started a beautiful friendship that lasted throughout the rest of that academic year. Later, it blossomed into a relationship, and further, it transformed into marriage. The day he asked you to marry him was one of the best days of your entire life - and then, you were convinced you had met your soulmate. He was everything you’d ever wanted in a partner, and he was oh so helpful and attentive.

High school sweethearts was what you were referred to, and you both fit the image so well. You were practically glowing anytime anyone had seen you. Your marriage had happened too fast, but you were convinced he was your one and only unaware that growth comes in many forms. And in this specific case, the roots have burst the pot.

Back then, he used to give you flowers nearly every day in various shades of the rainbow. Blue seemed to be the preferred though.

“You always get these, why?” You had asked one evening, fingertips gently petting the soft petals.

“Apparently, they mean something poetic,” he replied before pressing a kiss to the side of your head. “That’s what the flower guy keeps telling me. And they’re kinda hard to find,” he continued, eyes looking out at the starry night sky the two of you laid under. “So, whenever they come in, I grab them tight and bring them back to my baby.”

You giggled slightly before shutting him off with a kiss.

They were damn near unattainable after the two of you had gotten married. It seemed they’d gone out of style, or perhaps they just weren’t thriving as they used to. One day, when you were lonely and missing your husband, you pulled out an old book on various flora and fauna. You must’ve spent hours upon hours learning about the area you lived in when you chanced upon a dash of blue.

Cornflowers, they were cornflowers.

The flowers on the plate you’d run under the faucet for far too long weren’t the same shade of blue, but they were just as pretty. It’s a shame that these plates would most likely be broken before the month was out.

Gods, when did he change? It was hard to pinpoint it because the two of you had been under each other’s spell for a good chunk of that time. When did he flip the switch? When did he… You shook your head and turned off the faucet, deciding you were done with the dishes for now. Accidentally, when you were placing the plate back in its place, you bumped your forearm on the counter. With a wince, you hissed and mentally reminded yourself to mind the bruises that were still fresh there. He gripped your wrist so hard that night you were sure it was going to snap right off.

He really wasn’t like this in the beginning and your mind raked constantly with reasons as to why when you laid awake at night hoping he wouldn’t go too far or burn a bridge only to find it needed to be rebuilt with supplies that no longer existed.

It was nearing the late evening and he wasn’t supposed to be home until later in the night. You could afford to relax for just a little longer. With a deep breath, you walked up the stairs dead set on drawing a bath to just let your mind go blank. Hidden away in the bathroom sink’s cabinet was a ‘mix’ of herbs and such a dear friend of yours had said would aid in relaxing your soul and maybe your wounds. You could only use the clumsy excuse for so long.

You opened the door to your bathroom, quietly shut it behind you and didn’t bother locking it. If he was here, you might have, but you weren’t expecting him back until much, much later. You could afford to breathe. You drew the faucet and let it run for a moment or two until the water got a little warmer, then you plugged the tub and let it fill. You crouched down and poked your hand around towards the back of the bathroom sink before finding the jar filled with herbs and salts. It smelled divine even when closed. Unscrewing the lid, you are able to take in the scent of lavender, chamomile, rosebuds, sweet lemongrass and vanilla. Pink sea salt for added effect made the bath look heavenly when you poured in a generous scoop. As the water heated the herbs, you notice the rosebuds blooming into large, pink and red flowers. It was nothing short of magickal and filled you with some type of serenity.

Once the water was to your liking, you stripped and got into the tub, sighing in contentment as the water heated your form up. And from there, you let your mind go blank and take in the aroma of the herbs and flowers. You feel the stress leaving your body. You wish you could feel like this forever.

You allow your brain to wander as you relax and find it going back to your husband every single time. If he wasn’t asked to sit next to you, would you have been in this awful situation now? This was no way to live - and you wondered if you had just gone to detention that day if things would be different, or perhaps better. You thought you were able to pinpoint when everything went wrong when yet another starting point would come into your mind. It was like your brain was purposely making you move the goalposts so you wouldn’t be retraumatized by anything all over again.

It started small and in little bouts. He lost his patience with you. If you accidentally burnt the pancakes? It was alright but don’t let it happen again. Over watered the petunias just once? Great, now he needed to go to the store and pick up some new ones should those suffer root rot that was relatively treatable. Couldn’t get dinner ready on time? What a mess. Said something slightly off base? Your intelligence was being actively questioned. It kept snowballing until it reached the first time he hit you. Which was a dark enough day that you rather not think about.

He said he loved you. That he would protect you and make sure you were safe from all harm. But he broke that the moment his hand slapped your face so hard you felt the air leave your lungs. That was a really dark day, but it was not the darkest yet.

You must’ve spent close to an hour in the bath when you heard the front door opening. Shit, he wasn’t supposed to be back. You feel your heart pounding as you leap out of the bath, quickly drying yourself before throwing your clothes back on. In your haste, you forget to unplug the bath. But it’s too late, you hear him coming up the stairs. Seconds later, he’s in your shared bedroom.

“Reader? Where are you?” He sounds exhausted. Upon seeing the bathroom door closed, he stalks up to it. “Reader? Open up, Princess.”

It’s not the first time he’s tried to soften the blow like this.

“I-I’m still in the tub-”

“Sure, sure, sweetie,” he hums. “Can you uh, tell me why you haven’t gotten any food ready if you were going to fuck around in the tub like this then?”

Your heart constricts and your stomach twists. “I didn’t know you were gonna be home this early,” you say softly, ready to brace the door.

“Oh you forgot,” he says as if he’s speculating whether that was a decent answer or not. “You forgot,” he repeats. He stands in front of the bathroom door, swaying slightly like he’s waiting for you to come to you. “Come out of the bathroom.”

“I just drew it-”

“Did I ask for your excuses?”

“No-”

“Then come out of the FUCKING BATHROOM!” He hits the door so hard you thought you heard it splintering.

“What the fuck are you doing?” You cried out as you immediately rammed against the door, struggling to keep your husband back from breaking it down.

He didn’t answer, only continued to rattle off about everything wrong. She kicked the door harder and harder, sending you bouncing against the wood. You continued to cry out in pain but dug your shoulder into the door as you prayed it would be enough to keep him out.

“Stop, stop, STOP IT!” You felt tears pour out from your eyes as your husband pounded the door. “You’re being crazy right now, stop it!” Your throat felt raw with anguish as you continued to screech, head coming dangerously close to bouncing against the door as your husband began kicking it.

Eventually, he succeeded. He backed up, reared his leg up and took three hard hits, successfully kicking the door down. You went flying down with it and tumbled down the tile floor with a yelp of pain, landing sharply on your hip. You looked up through your pain and saw he was standing before you, fists balled and nothing but rage in his eyes.

“I told you to fucking let me in,” he seethes as he narrows in on you. Before he can touch you, his eyes travel to the tub. “And now you’re clogging up my fucking pipes?” He asks in an exasperated tone as he feels his blood pressure rise. “You need to learn a lesson,” he sighs as he runs his fingers through his hair. “When dogs are just puppies and they have an accident,” he begins as he bends down to the ground and nears you as you struggle to crawl away from him. “You take their nose and bury it into their mess.” He finishes. He straddles your waist and sloughs off your weak attempts to get him off of you.

You continue to cry and scream, beg and plead as his hands snake up your arms and to your hair. And your eyes widen as he takes a fistfull and then roughly stands up, dragging your body up with him.

“You fucking dog,” he spits as he drags you upwards. He begins to drag you towards the tub.

“No, NO!” You plead as you dig your heels into the tile, trying to grip onto the sink for dear life as he continues to drag you. You feel your strands of hair damn near get lifted from your scalp as he continues to yank you. He’ll kill you if you don’t put up a fight. “I’m sorry! Gods, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry! Whatever I did to piss you off I promise that it won’t happen again!” You attempt to reason as he finally pries your hands off the sink.

“You should’ve known that to begin with,” he replies as he pulls your hair harder. He then brings you to the tub and roughly shoves you to its lip. You catch yourself and try to get away when he pushes at the back of your head. You still continue to fight him, crying and pleading even harder as your husband kicks in the back of your legs, attempting to cripple you further to get you to bend. You continue to push back, staring into the now cold bath like it’s a watery grave.

A scream rips through your throat as he hits the back of your skull, having you gasping for air and consciousness. He takes that moment as your weakness and finally overpowers you. Your head is thrust below the waters, and you find yourself screeching all the while. From above the water’s surface, you can hear your once beloved husband muttering about you and the faults of your character as he holds you under the water. Before you can even register that air is in your lungs again, you’re plunged back into the water, coughing and hacking all the while as he does so.

When he grows tired of continually plunging your head into the water, he picks up your lower half and tosses you in, sending the water and herbs flying everywhere as your clothed body enters the freezing tub. Your tears mix with the remnants of the bathwater as he holds you under, nothing but rage in his eyes as he does.

When you feel like it’s too much, you begin to let go. Perhaps darkness would be a nicer sight than the sunrise of tomorrow.

You open your eyes slowly to see that you’re still in the tub and laying in a small pool of water that isn’t enough to harm you regardless of how you were laid. You feel aches all over and you feel like water is weighing down your lungs. Slowly, you get to your bearings as you prop yourself up. Step by step and painstaking muscle movement by muscle movement, you stand and grip the edge of the tub, realizing you need to change out of your clothes. You pause momentarily to look at yourself in the mirror.

“Gods,” you whisper to yourself. You look like you were in a car accident. There’s bruises on your throat and your face from where he tried to slam you into the bathtub, and your face is puffy and discolored from crying. Your hair is knotted and you feel like no amount of conditioner on earth can get that out - to even think about detangling it is a nightmare. Your clothes are ripped and waterlogged. Everything about you screams pathetic. When you turn your head and look at the door, you see it’s broken beyond repair. He kicked it out of its latches and the wood itself is splintered in two.

You quietly step out of the bathroom, ready to change into drier clothes when you see your husband sitting at the edge of the bed, waiting for you. You feel yourself begin to shiver, momentarily feeling your mind drift elsewhere to protect your brain from further trauma.

“You’re finally up,” he says, a blank expression on his face. “Are you okay?”

You feel disgust come up in the back of your throat but swallow it back down in favor of not angering him further. “I’m fine,” you lie, not bothering to plaster on a smile.

“Good.” He slowly stands up. “I’m heading out. Don’t do anything stupid while I’m gone.” He holds his arms out to you.

Shivering and absolutely terrified, you find yourself bending to his will. Quietly, you pad across the carpet to him and allow yourself to be wrapped up in his arms. His arms feel like a metal cage as they wrap around your quivering form.

“I’m sorry,” he says emptily as he buries his nose into your hair. “It won’t happen again.” He sways the two of you side to side as he holds you a little tighter, not bothering to mind the bumps and bruises he inflicted on your body.

You internally sigh and hollowly nod, allowing him to hold you.

He said that the last time.

It’s been a few days since your husband flew off the handle like that. Your husband stayed in the house, but like every time before, he pretended nothing had happened and instead vied for avoiding you. In a day or so, he’d be back to pretending he still loved you. But, your mind wasn’t entirely on him coming back to you and acting sweet - it was on everything in between.

See, this isn’t the first time that something of this caliber has happened to you. Convenience was something that seemed to pop up in your life more often than not, and you’d just accepted it. The first time you could remember it was when you were in your garage, trying to have a moment alone after your husband had shoved you into a wall for not making the potatoes the way he wanted (what a stupid thing to be upset over). As you sat at the workbench, sobbing quietly, your attention was pulled towards a thing of antifreeze. It was just propped up there. You don’t remember buying it, nor did you remember your husband buying it either. Neither of you regularly did car maintenance, nor did it seem like the kind used for a pool (which neither of you had). What on earth was it even doing here?

You quietly picked up the bottle and tossed it before your husband came calling for you to redo the potatoes.

The second time you noticed something much too conveniently placed was when the coffee in front of you was decaf. Your husband was terrible at waking up in the mornings, and the only thing that kept him up was his morning coffee on the drive to work. Well, one morning it was decaf in the keurig- and you almost didn’t notice it. The last time that happened, he’d almost swerved off the road. In a panic, you switched it to the right one before he noticed. If neither of you did, it could have claimed his life as the drive from your neck of the woods to the city was kind of dodgy in general.

The third most prominent time was semi-recently. You were cooking and once you finished, carried about your day. When you stopped by the kitchen to grab your keys and head to town for some shopping, you noticed that the gas was left on. Your husband was due to come home soon - if it stayed on for any longer, it might have killed him. Of course, you turned it off, but your hand lingered on the dial just a moment longer, wondering what would have happened if you didn’t turn it off. Feeling monstrous for even letting that thought pop into your head, you pulled back your hand like you had thrown it into the fire.

Those were just some of the most prominent things that happened. There were also little things that occurred as well, such as the TV always being clicked onto certain types of true crime documentaries entailing warring spouses, or the reading material being a tad too detailed in how to get away with things that obviously weren't legal. It started with petty theft, or piracy, and then moved onto other things that were much too unpleasant for you to even detail. All of these things seemed to be calling you towards something more sinister than you had ever imagined.

And until now, you’d managed to hold it all back. Sure, you entertain yourself by watching the documentaries and reading the material (which you wonder deeply who put it in your mailbox to begin with) but you never actually thought to harm him, did you?

It all came to a head a few weeks after the bathtub incident. He pushed you around plenty since then, but it hadn’t crossed the threshold like what happened back then - and that was enough to keep you at bay until this specific dinner. Apparently, your husband had missed out on a promotion given to someone younger and more ambitious than him and that killed him on the inside. He had a chip on his shoulder and he was dead set on taking it out on you.

“Gave it to that little prick,” he mumbles as he stabs at his food.

“I’m sure you’ll get it next time-”

“Next time? That’s half a fucking year away,” your husband replies as he bites down on his food. “Worthless job and can’t even move up in it. Stuck in this hellhole,” he continues to mutter as he stabs around.

Not wanting to even think about flaring him, you just drink uncomfortably at your water. “Is…” You close your mouth, not wanting to even hear his voice.

“No, no, finish your thought,” he says with a deep sigh.

“It’s not important.”

“My wife has something to say, she says it.”

“No, really I-”

“Jesus fucking Christ, Reader, spit it out.”

“Is the food okay?” You ask quietly as you avert your eyes to anywhere but at him. You gulp thickly, worrying that you’ve upset him further and lament even opening your mouth up to begin with.

“It’s awful,” he replies before taking another bite. “You must really be testing me, y’know that?”

“I’m sorry,” you murmur.

“I know.”

Uncomfortable silence passes between the two of you as dinner goes on with that same unease. You practically exude discomfort as you sit there, picking at your food and not wanting to even stomach it as long as this monster sits across from you. You wonder if your husband is going to go on one of his tangents when he answers that useless question by opening his mouth.

He talks a lot about how much he hates work, his coworkers, his lot in life, literally anything he could complain about and everything. He has such a hatred for the world around him that you wonder if it was always hiding just below the surface when you first met him. Probably. People tend to grow into who they were always meant to be as the years go on.

“And you,” he continues, pointing his fork in an accusatory manner at you. “You are the worst part of it,” he says as he narrows his eyes. He does this to you at every meal. And by the end of it, he’s always so riled up he almost breaks the plates. “Remember that girl, Jada? From honors math?”

You quietly nod.

“I should’ve married her. Girl with some brains and a nice ass,” he muses. “Instead I settled for you. Worthless, bruised and battered, puffy faced you,” he says with absolute vitriol, getting more and more riled up as his complaints carry on. “Hell, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have been thrown in detention again either.”

“That wasn’t my fault-”

“Oh so she speaks, does she?” He stands up.

You brace yourself.

“You know better than that,” he says lowly like a tiger waiting to pounce. “Than to talk back to me in my OWN GODDAMN HOUSE!” The plates and the dinner go flying off the table as he roughly shoves his arms across it.

There go the plates that reminded you of something nicer.

You immediately stand up and gasp, your chair flying back as you do so. Your hands fly up as your husband’s hands grip ar your wrists, his power taking over your frail form as he begins hurling you backwards to the countertop.

“Teach you to talk to me like that again,” he growls as he slams you down onto the counter, wrists not being jostled into his one hand. “You’ll never learn,” he mumbles, strill wrangling you down to the countertop.

From the corner of your eye, you could see him reaching towards the knife rack - and you see your very life fly before your eyes as he palms one.

You begin to repeat no like a mantra as he grips the knife and then lets go of your wrists, hsi hand going to the collar of your shirt. You cry out as your hands balled into fists and start punching, your legs being held by his body as his hand latches onto your throat and squeezes. Tears prick your eyes once again as his eyes flick down to your shirt.

“Stop!” You weakly cry out as his fingers dig into your flesh.

He raises the knife, a mad look on his faze as the steel catches the light. It shines, and then comes plunging down.

You scream as the knife is stabbed much too close to your neck, instead trapping you by snagging your shirt to the counter.

“You stay here and think about all the trouble you’ve caused,” he says in a ‘bubbling with rage’ tone as he shoves your head into the counter. “And clean up this mess.”

Once he leaves and slammed the front door shut, you pry yourself free from the knife and then fall to the floor sobbing, once again feeling your heart broken over your husband treating you so. But, once the rain fell, all that came was a ping - a spark. As you finally composed yourself and began cleaning his mess, the spark ignited to a flame that grew like wildfire in your mind’s eyes as you gingerly picked up the pieces of plates that you held such saccharine fondness over.

You couldn’t stand for this anymore.

With exhaustion sweeping over your body and the kitchen now cleaned, you allow yourself to move on autopilot and move upwards towards your bedroom. You don’t bother changing and plop down onto it. You stare at your ceiling, wondering if you should run away or - oh! Here comes a thought. With your eyes inching towards your nightstand, you finally give into the overwhelming feeling to open the drawer and you do so. Your hand gropes around before you finally touch something cold. Your mind lurches once you realize what it is.

You sit up, more than surprised to see the handle of a gun under your fingertips. On it is a sticky note with a smiley face: ‘don’t forget to turn off the safety :)’. A shiver of horror runs down your spine when you realize there’s a silencer attached to it. Gods, you knew he had a gun but a silencer? Everything about this - you knew it was wrong.

But holding it in your hand… That felt right.

You decided to stay quiet on things for now and think. Afterall, he was stronger than you. You couldn’t just confront him with the gun. He might wrestle it out of you and shoot you instead. You couldn’t take that kind of risk right now. So, you waited, looked over the gun some more, and waited.

Your husband entered back into the house at some gods awful time at night, more than pleased to see the house was back in order as it should be as he closed the door behind him. He was exhausted on all facets (though it could not hold a candle to how you were feeling) as he trudged up the stairs.

You laid in bed, pretending to be asleep. You knew what had to be done.

When your husband came in, huffed and got ready for bed, you itched for the trigger. You knew you had to act soon, but not too fast or he could hurt you again an take you out instead. Your breath hitched when you felt him sit on the bed and get comfortable, of course, turned away from you.

You took in a deep breath, closed your eyes, and held the gun in your hand once you felt him slip into sleep. The moments felt like hours as you quietly sat up and held the gun in your hands. Were you really going to do this?

Your mind flashed with hundreds upon hundreds of possibilities. At one point, a long time ago, you loved him. You loved him deeply and truly.

You took aim.

You shot.

Gods, if you knew it was going to be this hard to drag his body out here, you would’ve chosen a different place to shoot him. Dragging your now dead husband through the woods behind your house was an absolutely miserable process. You were working up a sweat as you did so and it was so dark that you could hardly make heads or tails of anything.

Finally, guided by the moonlight, you came to a place that looked more than decent. It was far enough, and the growth here was so heavy that if you tumbled the earth around, it would hardly look like anyone had disturbed it to begin with.

“Always making things harder on me,” you mumble as you toss his limp body back to the earth before you juggle the shovel you’d dragged along into your hands. You let your mind go blank as you began to cut into the soil.

A plethora of thoughts entered into your head as you shoveled away, making a deep enough hole to throw your deceased husband in. In a way, you didn’t think he deserved a hole this nice, but you knew deep down you had to hide the body. You continued to shovel, and once you finally made it deep enough to your liking, rolled his body into the ground.

“Didn’t think you had it in you,” a low, slightly gravelly voice chuckles, slow clapping.

“Who’s there?” You ask in a slightly panicked tone, holding the shovel up like a weapon. “I… I won’t hesitate-”

“Don’t make me laugh,” the voice continues, a playful bite on every syllable. “No, no, you did good.”

Your eyes frantically look around for the voice when you hear a whistle. There, behind you, is a man. Possibly mid 20s, shoulder length black hair, pale skin that rivals the light of the moon, wearing a hoodie covered in things you’d rather not think of and taller than you by a good head or so.

“You gonna put the shovel down?” He asks with a brow raised.

Hesitantly, you lower the shovel in your grasp just to let him get a little closer. Your eyes widen when you see he’s cut a smile into his face. “Who… Who are you?”

“I’ll tell you if you finish your job here,” he says as he nods to the uncovered, deceased body of your husband. “And before you go through the typical ‘oh my gods, are you gonna turn me in’ bullshit so many of you seem to go through, rest assured that I’m not gonna do anything to you. Just finish your job. Can you do that for me, Bird?” He leans against the tree, looking at you with a small smark.

A mind too frazzled for anything else, you nod and get back to work. It doesn’t take near as long to fill the hole as it did to carve it out, which was a pleasant surprise. When you were done, you wiped the sweat from your brow.

“What are you doing here?” You asked as you held the shovel firmly in your hands.

“Checking in on you,” he replies. “You want to go back to your house and-”

“No,” you cut him off, eyes averting down the ground. “Anywhere but there right now.” You say softly, gesturing to the disturbed earth.

The man pops off the tree and stalks over to the hole you’d covered, lightly shoving some foliage on top of it. “Okay, still sensitive. I get that,” he hums. “Follow me then. Let’s take a walk.” He nods for you to follow, blue eyes silently telling you to bring the shovel along with you.

Not wanting to be near his body anymore despite it being packed below the ground, you relent and follow.

“So, you did good, really good,” the man says as he puts his hands back in his hoodie pockets.

“Why do you keep saying that?” You ask, quickly matching pace with him. “And I never did get your name..?” You trail off slightly, taking in the deep scent of the woods around you. The scent of pine and autumn fills your nose.

“Because you did my job for me, and it’s Jeff,” he replies, his arm momentarily pushing back some low hanging pines. “I’ve been keeping tabs on you for a while, Bird.” He chuckles softly when he sees your confused expression.

“Really? Bird?” You repeat in a dry tone, face deadpanning at the very mention of it. “Job?”

“You’re flighty, like a bird, and judging by how fast you switch topics, bird.” He smiles, continuing to lead you further and further into the woods and away from your now empty house. “Little while back, I was asked to kill your husband. But, I saw you during one of my stalking outings and well, thought I could make things interesting.” He says it like it’s nothing and common knowledge.

“You what?” You ask in a surprised tone. “You stalked us?”

“Well, yeah,” Jeff says. “Normally, I don’t take that much care in my work. I tend to gut first and never ask questions, but you posed something interesting in my wake.”

“Holy fuck,” you murmur as you continue to trot throguh the woods. “We’re both going to jail.”

“Me? Absolutely not. You? Well,” he turns his attention to the deer path laid before the two of you and smiles at the open, moonlit field. “Depends on how you’ll answer my question.”

The two of you step through the remaining brush and finally reach the field. You had no idea this place was even behind your house or even so close. Tall grass rising to your waist sways gently in the wind as you step out of the trees and into the open air. Stars dot the sky as the moon hangs overhead. This place feels nostalgic. Out in the distance is a little stone structure, and upon Jeff taking you closer to it, it’s a little stone shelter.

“Take a seat, gonna be a while,” Jeff says as he rummages around in his pocket. He pulls out a lighter, bends down and lights the pieces of wood conveniently left inside of it, and the night is no longer cold.

You get comfortable and let your exhausted body rest. “Have you been watching me for long?”

“Longer than necessary,” Jeff answers as he cracks his back before finally getting comfortable. “But, I only watched you from a distance. Tell me about yourself first, let me know it wasn’t a mistake to let you breathe.” He smirks at you and winks, sending shivers down your spine.

You take in a deep breath, not really feeling anything but exhaustion and decide to tell him. You tell him everything, about your childhood, about little intricacies and so on. You told him about high school and how you met your husband. Little stories, anecdotes, memories and feelings resurfaced as you detailed how everything was bliss. And then one day, it wasn’t.

“Something in him snapped and went rotten,” you sigh. “And he hurt me. Hurt me really bad.”

Jeff looks up from the fire to see how the light dances across your skin. It’s here that he’s finally able to see the extent of your dead husband’s power over you. Bruises darker than your natural shade line your skin like oddly erased marks on a stubborn piece of paper. Your eyes are hollow, devoid of all life. Hair from your scalp is oddly placed as if it’s still trying to grow back. Your posture conveys nothing but pure exhaustion.

“I’m sorry,” he says in a tone that’s much more gruff than he originally means. It’s not that he doesn’t genuinely feel bad, it’s that he’s awful at actually verbalizing it. In truth, Jeff doesn’t like abusers. They make him feel wrong, make him feel like something’s not fair. Jeff like to fancy himself as someone who goes by the rule of ‘equality.’ If you pick on someone weaker than you with them having no chance of fighting back or at least inflicting the same damage back, you are nothing but a coward who gets off on hurting smaller people. And that in his mind is nothing short of detestable. “Guess good on me for letting you take him out, huh?”

You look at him with an odd mixture of confusion and absolute relief. “I guess,” you say, the sound of serenity slipping into your tone. “And what about you? What originally sent you out here?”

“Tall guy in a suit,” he stated, a small scowl pulling at his lips. “Y’know, he’s interested in you.”

“Tall guy in a suit?”

“Slender Man. I call him ‘Pale Ass’ though. He’s like… A murderous businessman. Has little drones to do his work even though he’s more than capable of doing it himself. And that’s where you come in.” Jeff shifts slightly and fixes his posture. “He’s the guy who originally wanted your husband dead. Sent me to do it.”

“Why did he want him dead?” You inquire. You knew your husband had done some dodgy things, especially with how strangely he was acting within the last few years as his abuse ran up, but you originally assumed he was cheating or something. Maybe into some other shady things. What on earth could he have done to garner the attention of some murderer kingpin?

“Saw something he shouldn’t have. My guess is Toby - maybe Theo. Both of them suck at covering up their tracks,” Jeff laughs slightly. “Probably saw one of us hiding a body, committing a murder, shit, he could’ve stumbled on some finals when he obviously shouldn’t have done that. Regardless, it got Slender’s attention, and now he’s dead because of it,” Jeff continues as he casts his eyes from you to the flickering flames. “You remember that night he fell asleep in his car in the garage?”

You nod.

“Almost took him out right there.” Jeff’s brows furrow slightly. “Something stopped me and then I saw you. The way he reacted to you asking if he wanted a certain type of potato made me giggle, and then I got a thought.”

“The antifreeze…”

“Yeah, the antifreeze. I’d noticed you were being pushed around for a while, honestly planning on taking you out to give you some rest but,” his eyes flash, “seemed more fun to get you into it too.” He sighs and leans back. “Was it cathartic?”

You find yourself uncomfortably shifting and wanting to answer with ‘no, of course not! I killed someone,’ before realizing that wouldn't be truthful. It was cathartic to put an end to his life. It was cathartic to finally bring justice for yourself in a way that no prison system would allow. “It… It was.” You admit, shyly and quietly like confessing to a bad secret.

“Feels nice to admit it, right?” He smiles.

“It does.”

“Now, imagine doing that to other pieces of shit,” he says as he sits up again. “Imagine being able to do that to every monster that’s ever hurt anyone just like you/”

You close your eyes and feel the red hot rage tingle your fingertips. Being able to unload on your dead husband was more than pleasing - in fact, it was nice, and dare you say, fun. The thought of being able to do that to other people who hurt others like that, while a far off possibility now as you were still frail, was still a possibility nonetheless.

“I mean, where else do you have to go?” Jeff continues, watching as you toss the thought around in your head. “You’d never get caught. He’d handle it all right now. You’d be free.” Jeff stands up and begins crossing the distance to meet you. His shadow walks alongside him. Dusk hangs in the air. “Or, if this isn’t to your liking, you can join him.”

“What?” You question, eyes flicking up from Jeff’s shoes to his eyes.

“You gotta understand,” he begins as he crouches in front of you. “If you say no and

decide to deal with the fallout like a normal human being, you’ll be caught and most likely killed for it. You’d be at the end of your rope.”

You feel an ocean of emotions swell up inside of you. “And if I… What would you even have me do if I followed you?”

“I’ll take you to meet him, and we’ll see what happens next. He’ll cover for you. You won’t ever have to see this place ever again.”

The sun begins to peek over the horizon. The fire is dying down. You can hear birds chirping in the early morning sky as fluffy clouds bid good morning to the dimming stars in the sky.

“Let’s get outta here, Bird.” Jeff stands up, holding out his hand.

You take in a deep breath, hand hovering over his. You thought of your husband, your life and everything that had ever happened to lead up to this moment. You’d gone this far, and there was clearly no going back. Another deep breath in and you pressed your hand down to his.

Jeff’s smile bloomed once again.

[drunklander]

Drunj!Der Yells About Outlander

Thoughts on Ep. 401

Oh hey, y’all. We’re back for another season of that show we keep watching in hopes it’ll get back to its season one glory Outlander! Since I’m incapable of keeping my Opinions to myself and have no filter after a few drinks, I’m gonna do drunk recaps that no one asked for or wants again this year. Because why not. So buckle up, randos, because under the cut you will find nothing of substance, zero insights and absolutely no analysis!

Before I dive into the stream of consciousness, quasi-incoherent beat-by-beat nonsense, I just want to say that I overall liked this episode. I definitely enjoyed it more from the comfort of my own couch than in the theater with thousands of screaming sycophants at NYCC. It definitely had me singing along to the Federalist Papers part of Non Stop all day though. A series of scenes, tangentially related, introducing the Colonies to the public. Some are obviously just there to just set up the plot of the season or like check a residual box from last season. But some are solid world-building and character moments. And, because it’s Outlander, some are like *side eye*.

But I’m for real excited for the first half of this season! The second half of Drums is a dumpster fire (fucking Rogergate...) and it seems like the show is going to stick pretty close to the book, so I’m going to try my hardest to not let preemptive feelings about that nonsense cloud potential enjoyment of the first bit. Because dammit, I love me some domestic!Frasers. So yeah, happy end of hiatus, y’all!

Ok I don’t want to start off on a downer note, but jfc. I get what they were going for with the 2000 B.C. stone circle stuff, but omg no. I don’t care if certain indigenous peoples really did make stone circles and dance around them as the sun rose. I know they’re trying to show the universality of circles and these time portal thingies or whatever, but by making the parallel with the druids at Craigh na Dun, it’s basically being like “Oh hey! These Native American folks from *checks notes* North America are just like the white folks we’ve been hanging with for the last three seasons!” It came off to me like erasing the unique cultures of the diverse peoples of North America in favor of framing them as a generic group of “natives” who do the white people stone dance. And in a season that’s going to deal heavily with multiple tribes, this really isn’t giving me much confidence in how they’re going to handle the rest of the Native American characters.

I’m really hoping someone else will articulate that better than I did. Because I feel like I’m not communicating well what my actual issue with the sequence was.

Petition to make Jamie wear a hat at all times to hide his horrible bangs.

Gavin Hayes has to be being hanged for literally the dumbest crime ever. But he seems pretty chill about it so...

Ok I never liked book!Bonnet as a character (like obvi he’s a terrible person so I was never going to like him as a person, but I was always annoyed that he was still around rather than appreciating him as a villain), but even from that presumptuous “yeah can I snag some rum too, bruh” in the jail, I’m like solidly on board with show!Bonnet.

Jamie tried to save Hayes, but you see Hayes straight up killed a guy. Sure it was in self-defense, but, y’know, ye olde times and he did kill the dude. Sooo...

I want to feel for Lesley, I really do, but I’ve never actually given a shit or been given a good reason to give a shit about Rupert and Angus 3.0 so, sorry for your loss?

Unpopular opinion alert (should be the standard disclaimer on all of my #hottakes) but I really don’t care for the new theme music. Every time they change it, I find myself wanting the OG season one music back with just the images updated.

The bald eagle for the title card just gives me such mixed feelings that have nothing to do with the show. Like here’s a symbol of my country and it *should* invoke good feelings, but *gestures at the current political climate* every national symbol at the moment feels tainted by the growing white nationalist movement that’s being spurred on by the current administration.

Time for some post hanging brewskis. We are here to mourn Gavin Hayes. Who died only so the new villain could be introduced. Let us bow our heads.

Marsali and Fergus win the prize for least subtle “can we be excused to go bang” ever. Rock on, Fersali.

I fucking LOVE that they changed the tavern scene so everyone sings with them like they know what’s going on rather than how in the book it was like them making fun of the red coats as part of Gavin’s song and then Fergus passed around a hat for coins. But by having everyone in the tavern in on what’s going down and earnestly participating, it establishes that 20+ years after the failed Rising, after the Clearances, after everything the Scots went through at the hands of the English, they were not truly defeated. They may have moved across an ocean, but they are still Scottish and they still practice their traditions and dammit I’m having feelings about those resilient motherfuckers.

The scene with Jamie and Ian is very well done and I’m SO glad they included it because they did in fact include his rape last year, but fuck the show for including that rape in the first place. A very similar version of this scene could have been done without the rape, there’s enough trauma involved in being kidnapped, taken across the ocean, held hostage by a batshit lady and knowing that everyone else she kidnapped ended up dead for one 16 year old kid. With Jamie’s rape we got two episodes of trauma and four of recovery. With Mary, Fergus and Ian, we get three child rapes that could have all been avoided (especially Ian’s, but the plot points that come from Mary’s and Fergus’ could have definitely come about without them actually being raped), and they all just got one brief scene to express their trauma and then everything’s hunky dory again. (We know they’re going to include Bree’s rape, also fuck them very much for that, it’s completely unnecessary, and I’m guessing we’ll spend some time with her on her recovery. But that’s a rant for when we get there...)

For real though, Jamie parroting Claire as he comforts Ian is super sweet, but it makes me skeptically nervous for how he’ll react to Bree’s. Since in the book, it’s...not great.

Stephen Bonnet is so delightfully smarmy. Also, how fucking naive is our main squad now all of a sudden that they don’t realize from the jump what a sociopath he is? C’mon, y’all. Like I know Jamie came close to being hanged or whatever, but literally everything about this dude screams that he’s bad news. He is not subtle in his I’m a straight up unapologetic and charismatic good guy criminal. And like, he’s a friend of Gavin? Come the fuck on, squad. HOW DO YOU NOT SEE THAT HE IS FULL OF SHIT. *gets Det. JJ Bittenbinder on the horn*

For real though, dodgy accent aside, I fucking love Ed Speleers in this role. Why the fuck do they have to include the rape. Can’t he just be a bastard without being a rapist? Why must you make me rage, show. I just want to enjoy a decent villain.

Jamie and Claire are doing their best Jean Ralphio and Mona Lisa Saperstein trying to talk their way through this checkpoint.

“You’ve never parted with the ring from the first?” Yeah, I don’t get it either, Bonnet my dude. I don’t get it either. #FuckFrank

Bonnet talking about circles fascinating him makes me think he’d do well in a group of stoners having what they think are philosophical conversations at 3:00 a.m. “But like guys, have you ever like thought about...the rhombus?”

For real though, him being real with Claire about this drowning stuff makes him an infinitely more interesting villain than Black Jack ever was. Black Jack was kind of a crap villain tbh. He was horrible and did horrible things, yes, but like that was it. He was just horrible. Bonnet’s like oh I’ll charm you, be real with you and then fuck you up in the course of one episode and not give any of it a second thought because I have not a single fuck to give about anyone but me. I’m just out here living my best life, sorry not sorry. *puts on shades, drops mic, walks away*

For real though, his “be wary of thieves and outlaws” line might as well have been “it’s me, I’m talking about me.” And these dorks don’t even pick up on it. GUYS YOU ARE KILLING ME, YOU DIDN’T USED TO BE THIS SHITTY AT JUDGING SOMEONE’S CHARACTER.

I’m guessing this is the official christening-their-new-continent-bang because it’s too cold to do River Sex™ in Scotland. But I’m looking forward to getting the rest of Ch. 16 once they get to the Ridge. (We all saw those strawberries in the promo...)

The book lines still feel shoehorned in rather than organic to the show, but not as much as 95% of A. Malcolm felt. So I guess I need to just accept that the writers are going to keep doing this and I just need to stop expecting them to actually do their jobs and adapt for the adaptation...

For real though, I know Spotify doesn’t exist yet but jfc Jamie and Claire’s secksi time playlist literally just has this one song and guys, there’s a whole world of songs for smushing out there. My man Doug Judy would be glad to broaden your horizons.

Claire’s I just had sex smile as she looks out over the valley made me literalol.

Cool that we get woke!Jamie saying that the American Dream is a nightmare for the Native Americans after Claire’s Americana 101 speech, but this is a woman who lived in wicked racist 1960s Boston. She knows that things aren’t nice and rosy in America in the 18th *or* 20th centuries. Her speech makes me hate S3 a little more for focusing on Frank’s manpain instead of Claire and her and Joe’s time in the hospital, where the show could have explored gender and race in the 20th century to set up a contrast for how things will be this season in the 18th. Claire went through enough shit last time she was in the past, and so far this time, to know that the past isn’t idyllic. She knows enough about US history and 20th century America to know this mythical origin story she’s spouting is nothing but a fairy tale. I get why she might cling to that ideal, this is the first time in her life she might get to settle down and build a home with the person she actually wants to build a home with, but her whitewashing history like this strikes me as a way too naive for her.

The green screen as they stare out at that very much not actually there valley is killinggg me.

Ok for real though, this cut from them in the Uncanny Valley to the room getting ready for dinner is the most jarring of the episode. Like, I’ve come to terms with the fact that this is just a series of independent scenes rather than an actual, cohesive whole, but jfc. Who actually is Lillington, how do you know him? Nope? No info? Not important? Just need to get it out there that you have jewels so the last scene in the episode can happen so the ring can be taken so the rape can occur? Cool. Cool cool cool.

Ok so show!Claire makes me sad with being insecure/self-depreciating about her appearance. Like with saying brown is a dull color when Jamie calls her mo nighean donn the first time and when she asks Joe if she’s sexually attractive and when she dyes her hair before going back through the stones and now with the mutton dressed as lamb thing. (Claire, girl, how are you that up on Colonial fashion that you know what’s “age appropriate” already? Wouldn’t think there was much fashion gossip along the road from Georgia to North Carolina, but whatevs.) I know three of these four things are straight from the book, but in the show it hits me differently. Book!Claire is kind of a bitch when it comes to looks. Her parting words in her letter to Bree were “try not to get fat.” She like judged the crap out of that rando lady in Edinburgh before she went to the print shop just to make sure she didn’t look too old. So when she has these aforementioned moments, they land differently. Now I’m not saying I want show!Claire to be like book!Claire, quite the opposite. I’m glad they cut that other stuff. But now whenever show!Claire has a moment of self-consciousness, all I want to do is be like woman, you are a fucking smokeshow. Fuck the patriarchy for making you feel like you aren’t stunning exactly as you are. #LadyBonerForBeauchamp

Oh Governor Exposition. How nice of you to join our merry band of randos for dinner!

Man, I’d love to be so rich that I can pull a Baron and casually just happen to have 100 pounds on hand to buy a giant ruby at a random dinner party.

John Grey, who was shunted from shit post to shit post, totes is special enough to get Scotland’s Valjean to England’s Javert cleared. I mean, obvi.

Oh hey, Jamie remembers he has a daughter! Showed more emotion in that scene about how America would become her country than in the scene with the photos. Fuck Sam et al. for the disaster of a performance choice in ep. 306, don’t @ me.

OH HAI ROLLO I LOVE YOU YOU ARE SUCH A GOOD DOGGO I WANT TO SNUGGLE YOU WHO’S A GOOD BOY YOU ARE

“I dinna ken. But she’ll be saying it in Scotland, won’t she?” I do love Young Ian a lot. I know that’s in the book. But dammit I love John Bell in this part a crapton.

Casually lol’ing that they crossed the ocean because Ian was taken and now that they have him, they’re just going to send him alone off to sea again.

The first time I saw the episode, when Lesley gave his “my place is at your side” speech I was like crap, we’re going to be stuck with this guy aren’t we. BUT WE’RE NOT! (I am a terrible person.)

Fergus and Marsali are totes going to be the new Jenny and Ian, aren’t they? The characters who just show up once or twice a season when the core squad needs something and that’s it? Because they get tossed aside in the books like that. That makes me super sad (and I hope I’m wrong) because of how they changed show!Fergus and show!Claire’s relationship from the book that we won’t get to see more of them together. Le sigh. I hope they at least let Bree have a scene where she meets Fergus and learns she has a brother. Especially if she’s not going to go to Lallybroch to meet the Murray squad because Jenny isn’t in this season. Part of what I loved about the Lallybroch part in the book was Bree realizing that she wasn’t just gaining a father but a whole extended family. I hope they kind of transfer that over to her meeting Fergus and Young Ian in the place of [insert Murray kids who let’s be honest we really don’t care about here].

Hey remember that time Jamie was wicked opposed to Fergus and Marsali getting married for literally no reason? That was fun. But yay for Germain!

Holy motherfucking green screen, Batman. Please can we get to the woods soon? Or some other location where it’s not this fucking jarring?

Claire America-is-the-land-of-milk-and-honey Fraser suddenly is overly-on-the-nose indignant about slavery. Cool. Cool cool cool. Again, you know what would have been cool? Seeing her with her best and only friend in the 1960s more last season because he was a Black man. If they had let Joe be a fully formed character, navigating racist af Boston as a doctor, rather than just being Claire’s sounding board and martini maker, we could have seen how Claire being exposed to his reality shaped her views on race in America. But nope, that would have taken air time away from Frank’s manpain. (Seriously, my recent re-watch only highlighted just how much they screwed over Claire’s character last season.)

I’ve always loved that Jamie gives Claire the medical box. It’s just such a simple way to demonstrate that he *gets* Claire. (*side-eyes a certain other husband who patently did not*)

Jamie’s bangs are an affront to anyone with hair. Someone please give that man his hat back!

“This ring is all I need.” Aaand that’s when we all knew that Jamie’s ring would be the one stolen.

“Not for a single day.” Uh, *casually points at the episode in season three when she retcons her entire life in Boston to be not as bad as it was because Jamie’s been such an asshat to her*.

Ok. Holy shit this final scene. I love everything about this final scene. Except the song. This show is not subtle. It’s never been subtle. But holy shit, playing the iconic Ray Charles version of America the Beautiful at the end of an episode called America the Beautiful to be like welcome to ‘Murrica, fuckos, is like even less subtle than they usually go. I 1000% LOVE the choice to cut the audio from the end of the fight scene and just have the visuals, it just would have worked much better if they’d scored with with a regular instrumental piece.

Gah, Bonnet is such a smarmy motherfucker! The nose wipe before he coldcocks Jamie is just perf.

Claire’s face in this entire scene, holy fucking shit. *throws all the awards at Balfe*

And then Lesley dies and I’m a terrible person because I’m happy we don’t need to be stuck with him all season. But holy shit Bonnet when he pauses right before he cuts his throat and then kills him, I love show!Bonnet so much more than I ever gave a shit about book!Bonnet.

And honestly, Claire’s face when he’s killed right in front of her. *throws more awards at Balfe*

GUYS I FEEL MORE EMOTION ABOUT CLAIRE TAKING OFF JAMIE’S RING THAN I DID ABOUT CLAIRE LEAVING BREE BEHIND TO GO BACK THROUGH THE STONES HOW IS BALFE SO GOOD AT MAKING ME FEEL FEELINGS

I’m so fucking glad they changed which ring gets taken. There was an interview where they were like “oh we did it because it has to be visually distinct so Bree can get raped!” and I’m like a) fuck you for including that and b) right decision, wrong reason. This is the right reason for the change.

But even as I say that they made the right call in which ring to have stolen, it’s still a fact that they fucking chose to have one stolen at all. The writers and production team decided that Brianna needed to be raped so a ring must be stolen. Because Diana never wrote a character she didn’t want raped and the Outlander producers never read a rape scene they didn’t want to include. Fuck them all very much for that.

Fuck Them Very Much for That, the title of my memoir.

Oh god her face right at the end when she sees that it’s fucking Fred’s ring she’s left with and not Jamie’s fucking murders me.

*THROWS AN ENTIRE TROPHY STORE AT BALFE*

[nottswitch]

Shattered

Part 2: Wild Ride

The second part of this series is here! I'm very excited about it and you guys seem to like it as well, which makes me more than willing to share more. For some reason, I'm having great pleasure writing this Billy, hope you're enjoying it as well!

Word count: 2,688

Series masterlist

Three times with an interval of an hour you woke up, screaming from the same nightmare, crawling into your dreams over and over again. The scene from that evening kept on repeating and after every yell of horror that sounded through the thin walls of the apartment, you thanked heavens you didn’t have a weapon next to you, or there was a high possibility that you would either stab or shoot yourself in sleepy delirium.

After the third time you were almost killed by a zombie again, you weren’t able to lie on that bed anymore. Trying not to make the mattress under you creak, you put your bare feet on a rough surface of the carpet and stood up, wincing at the unpleasant sound the rotten boards made. You cautiously looked at Billy, who fell asleep in a chair at the table, wondering if he wasn’t woken up. But despite his head lying dangerously close to freshly sharpened knives, he seemed rather peaceful, and if it wasn’t for the circumstances, you would have smiled, perhaps.

You were still relieved that Billy had finally got some rest. Considering the amount of efforts he had to make on daily basis to keep both of you alive, he must have been deadly tired, you thought, carefully getting round the table and heading to what you assumed was the kitchen. You were right — there were preserves laid out on the table, along with some fresh vegetables Billy happened to get somewhere. As you happily noticed, there were signs of a gas stove as well, but all your sudden joy faded away as soon as you tried to turn it on, which wasn’t a smart move in the first place. It didn’t work and your immediate thought was that in the morning you would have to fuss around that half-broken portable cooker you were carrying with you.

Examining things on the table, you came to a conclusion that there was nothing for you to do here, you had no desire to eat, but neither you wanted to go back to the room and suffer from nightmare after nightmare. You grabbed a wrinkled apple to keep your hands occupied and sat down on a chair, aimlessly rolling the fruit from palm to palm.

Now that your head was somewhat clear from the recent events, resulting in terrible dreams of yours, you couldn’t help but get to the thoughts about your future in that messed up world you were doomed to live in from now on. You had no idea, how much time you would be able to hold on until you would be eaten alive, or die from famine — because you had no doubts that eventually there would be no food and water left. You didn’t know about the situation in the outside world as well, as there was no electricity left, and barely any TV channel was still airing, to begin with. You remained oblivious to such things as potential evacuation program, camps or simply safe spaces for survivors, existence of people like you in general. From the very start you were put before the fact that there was only you, Billy Russo, who you had met purely by accident, and thousands of walking dead, wandering around New York and ready to destroy you if the case emerged.

It wasn’t the life you had imagined for yourself even a week ago, eating an ice cream in a sunny park with your niece and laughing at two pigeons fighting for a stale piece of bread; now you didn’t know where the girl was, along with the whole family of your sister. You planned a trip to Bahamas as soon as you would be able to find time from your work. Your relationship with that cute guy from Tinder was evolving pretty quickly and you planned to go on a real date this weekend. You had an exciting life ahead, but in an instant it was erased from the book of faith, as well as at least a half of the Earth’s population — from the map of the world.

“Night owl?”

You flinched at the voice behind your back but quickly recognized Billy’s and innerly scolded yourself for being such a nervous wreck. Who else could it be?

You merely shook your head in response, blankly looking at the apple in your hands.

“Nightmares,” you answered, dropping the fruit at the table and crossing your arms on your chest, leaning back on the chair and closing your eyes. Billy’s presence didn’t let you think anymore, so instead you tried to throw all your thoughts away and perhaps, get in the zone and go to sleep for a couple of hours before morning.

“I noticed.”

At your questioning look Billy heaved a loud sigh, rubbing his temples.

“You screamed like a wounded dog,” he explained, already near the table, rummaging in the bag. “My head’s breaking,” he added later, with a block of pills being taken out of the front pocket.

You lowered your head, feeling guilty for the lack of sleep Billy got even when he decided to finally rest — it was your fault, and he was, without a doubt, blaming you, otherwise he wouldn’t have mentioned your screams. Looking up at him, you noticed how tired his face looked, another crease on his forehead, and felt even more upset.

“I’ll… go,” you muttered, standing up and quickly making your way out of the kitchen, having made a decision to leave Billy alone. Secretly, or not so much, you tried not to stay near him for more than five minutes in a row. It always resulted in dumb quarrels and it was the last thing you wanted right now.

Billy answered nothing, settling down on the chair you were previously sitting on. Soon you lay back on the bed and fell into a dream once again, this time without any nightmares or anything else, interrupting your sleep.

You figured out one thing today: you were at the very outskirts of the city and that’s why, firstly, the surroundings looked so strange — high buildings, usual for New York, were mixed with partly destroyed wooden houses, and secondly, you hadn’t recognized this part of the city — you lived in the centre and had never been anywhere further than your workplace. Billy, on the other hand, knew every secret passage and every path, leading through heaps of garbage in the city dump. Although you were clearly interested, why did he happen to have such an unusual knowledge, you didn’t ask any questions, afraid to wake Billy’s mean side — this morning he was surprisingly calm and even said “Thank you” for the breakfast, made by you. Not that he was genuinely grateful, it sounded more like two drily thrown words to make you fuck off, but it was at least something.

You set off rather easy, leaving all your unnecessary belongings in the flat — the portable cooker broke down completely, some food deteriorated and Billy decided since that moment you would be travelling light. Now you had only guns, Billy’s precious knives, water and loaves of bread, along with some preserves. You felt sad for leaving fresh vegetables behind and tried your hardest to make a nutritious breakfast to at least get most of them to use.

Now you were walking through the parking lot of a supermarket, which, according to Billy, was near the border of New York. You were relieved that soon you would be able to ride out of the city, but at the same time you didn’t really know what was the point. Sure, open spaces were way more preferable and safer, but where were you going? Were you to do something to stay alive by yourselves, or were you to find help? Where would you get food? These questions had been twirling in your head constantly, but your mouth refused to open whenever Billy gave you a warning look, which had a power to shut you up at any minute.

Sounds of glass crashing distracted you, as well as they did it to Billy, who instantly raised up the gun, his face tensing. You ran to hide behind him, instinctively covering your head with your hands. The sound faded away as quick as it started, and you cautiously looked over Billy’s shoulder.

“Russo?” you called in a whisper, afraid that someone besides him could hear you. ”What was that?”

He merely shrugged, keeping his eyes on the glass door of the entrance to the mall.

You slowly walked further, trying not to make extra noise by scuffing the grainy ground. At first glance, atmosphere was calm around the supermarket and, as far as you could see, inside. But something must have made the glass crush, and it wasn’t anything good by default.

“Should we get over there?” you asked again, looking at Billy, who was still keeping silent.

“If you wanna die, sure, depart now,” he replied in that same tone he was usually talking to you with, but his attention was on the doors. “I suggest we leave the fuck outta here.”

To your mind, there was nothing better than agree, so you eagerly nodded. The two of you proceeded walking with caution, Billy’s gun alert.

“See a car there?” he asked after several minutes, when the supermarket was left out of your sight, hidden behind a sparse forest, and there was nothing around except for the car Billy was pointing at.

“Yes,” you replied, examining it.

A black Jeep Cherokee, the newest model, as far as you could tell from your narrow car knowledge; smart, but seemingly touched by violent actions — its left door had a giant dent. But overall, it looked like a pretty decent car, considering you didn’t have any other options.

“That’s our destination,” Billy continued. “Now listen.”

He fully turned to you, blocking the bright sun that was blinding you until that moment.

“That’s it,” he stated, spreading out his arms and looking over the neighborhood. “That’s the end. We’ll never go back to New York, ever.”

You frowned, nodding, although not understanding where he was leading his speech.

“I hate myself for picking you up, but I’m not just dropping you wherever, unless you want it yourself,” Billy went on, stepping closer. “You sure are a heck of a burden, but I’m not refusing to carry it.”

“Alright, king of allegories,” you muttered under your breath. “So?” you urged him to continue louder.

“You don’t wanna stay here?”

“What?” you asked, surprised. “Of course I don’t!”

Billy deeply breathed in and out with his eyes closed.

“Alright,” he said, opening them and turning away. “Just wanted to be clear on that,” he threw over his shoulder, making his way to the car.

“You’d be happy if I wanted though, wouldn’t you?”

Billy stopped, causing you to almost crash into his back.

“Hell I would,” he finally replied, making you wince.

You should have admitted that every rude word that came out of his mouth, hurt you. Maybe you didn’t show it that often, especially in his presence, but they were painful to listen to. You already knew you were useless at nearly everything, was there a need for confirmations?

Billy, though, didn’t seem to care about hurting your feelings in the slightest. Judging by the cold expression on his face, these words meant nothing for him. As much as you were scared to talk to him about it, you decided to yourself that someday you would rise this subject. Perhaps… just not now.

With such thoughts you reached the car, and you were ready to open the door and fall on the backseat when Billy grabbed your hand so tight that you couldn’t help but scream, hissing and rubbing it when he let you go.

“What’s wrong with you?!”

“What’s wrong with you?!” he asked, highlighting the last word. “I swear, with your common sense you’d be dead in seconds.”

“I’m tired!” you protested, but Billy didn’t listen, cautiously walking around the car and peeking into the window, letting you open the door only after these actions of his.

“Imagine walking into a zombie, hiding in a car, would you?” he offered, lumping the bag he was carrying on the seat. “No time to run and inevitable death.”

You rolled your eyes, getting into the car and stretching out on quite a large backseat, letting out a groan of satisfaction when you felt your muscles relaxing. You didn’t have any wish to start an argument, so you just sighed, putting your hands under your head and closing your eyes.

“We’re staying here for long?” you wondered, hoping the answer would be positive and you would be able to rest for a little bit more.

“‘Til I’m done with checking everything,” Billy simply answered. You lifted on your elbows and looked at him through the glass of the front window. He was absorbed in sorting out guns, laid in front of him on plain black surface.

“Alright,” you mumbled, leaning back and shutting your eyes close once again.

About an hour had passed before the dead silence was disturbed. It was that same sound of glass crushing, but now it was accompanied by screams of a person, and not only one. You immediately jumped up, feeling how your heartbeat accelerated in seconds.

“Russo!” you exclaimed, stepping on the ground, but there was no need to do it — he was already alert, with a gun in his hand.

You stood next to each other, witnessing the most horrifying scene you could ever imagine and never thought you would see. Two people, a young couple of a boy and a girl, were running from an immensely huge swarm of zombies, both of them crying. It was obvious that they were out of breath, making unbearable efforts to keep running for their life.

Your body and brain froze at this sight, unable to proceed any reaction. But when the couple noticed you and Billy and the boy started waving, screaming something incomprehensible, you flinched and tried to grab the first thing you saw — a small gun that Billy forgot to lift from the ground.

“Russo!” you yelled after he caught your hand in the air, making you stop. “Don’t you see, they need help!!!”

“We can’t help them,” he negated, slowly shaking his head.

“No, we can!” you kept screaming, attempting to break out of his tight hold. “We have a car, for god’s sake! Let’s ride into the zombies! We can help them!”

“Do you think these dead won’t kill us in an instant?” Billy coldly wondered, piercingly staring at you. “Do you think they can’t destroy a car?”

“We can help them!” you cried hysterically, but gave up on trying to escape. “We can help them...” you muttered, going more and more quiet with every word you spoke.

With widened eyes, full of tears and terror, you watched the girl tripping and falling down on the ground. You watched the boy stopping to help her and falling down next to her, his trembling legs refusing to keep him up. You watched terrifying creatures pouncing on them and fighting for their flesh. It was happening not too far away and you could hear the last cries the people made before being silenced forever.

“Russo...” you whispered, your breath shaking. “They were in the mall. We didn’t help them when we could… We killed them, Russo...”

“Stop,” Billy ordered and you obeyed, running out of strength to continue speaking. “Get in the car. Right now. We need to leave before they notice.”

All of your further movements were automatic: you crawled inside the front part of the car while Billy quickly collected his guns and put them in a trunk, you shut the door on your side. Your stare was completely blank and all the sounds were shushed, as if they were coming through cotton wool.

“We killed them, Russo,” you whispered again.

At that exact words of yours your car crossed the city border and left New York.

Tag List: @padfootagain @giggleberts @starless-skyox @furmicl @random-quartz @movokepwc @ilkaeliseb @sophiabulbu69

[phaltu]

hi i have one (1) request prekerb sheith seven minutes in heaven this trope is my guilty pleasure pls and thanks xxx

HEY…. ofc, I willl write anything for you. You can literally msg me telling me to write a slow burn enemies with benefits to lovers AU where they are competitive snail racers and I will be like yes of course right away. anyways here you go and good luck on finals xoxox

(RATED T)

“ID please,” Matt sticks his hand out, and Keith snorts as he shoves past him and into the house. “Hey! I’m serious.”

He’s not, because he’s the reason Keith’s shown up to this godforsaken house party in the first place. Father and Mother Holt have gone on vacation this weekend, and the house is close enough to the Galaxy Garrison that Matt’s trying his hardest to up his cool points by inviting the entire student population over. Matt told Keith attendance was mandatory, otherwise he would pick on Keith for the next ten general physics tutorials.

“Thanks for the invite,” Keith says, looking around. He knows a lot of the crowd here, but there are only two people he really talks to outside of the Garrison, and one of them is trying to herd him down the hall. Keith can’t catch a sight of the other one, no matter how much he tries to subtly scan the crowd for someone tall and familiar.

“Looking for someone?” Matt says a little too loudly, and claps Keith’s back a little too hard.

“I’m hungry,” Keith says and Matt laughs like Keith’s made a joke. Matt laughs at a lot of things though, most of the time when he shouldn’t, so Keith lets it slide.

Keith eventually makes it to the kitchen and loses Matt along the way. In the process, a girl who he lent a pencil to at the beginning of the year presses a bottle of Corona into his hands. He also manages unearth a box of pizza pockets from the freezer. Three minutes later, Keith has all he needs to survive the party for the mandatory twenty minutes before he sneaks out and heads back home.

He’s in the middle of shoving the third out of four pizza pockets into his mouth, when someone reaches for the last one.

“Hey,” he barks, grabbing the thief’s wrist. “Mine.”

“My bad,” The someone twists his hand out of Keith’s grasp, giving Keith an all too familiar crooked grin and a wink.

Keith is completely used to his brain electrocuting itself every time he has to look at one Takashi Shirogane for more than ten seconds at a time, but that’s at the Garrison when they’re in uniform, or at the gym where Shiro likes to put Keith in his place regularly, or in the library, where Shiro sacrifices his free time to make sure Keith’s acing his classes or—

Essentially, Keith is used to his brain fritzing out in Shiro’s presence, except for when he’s faced with something even slightly new. He’s seen Shiro in this same white t-shirt before, but it hung loose on him last time, and Shiro normally tucks his dog tags in, doesn’t leave them hanging out and oh god Keith’s only been here for a total of eight minutes.

“Oh, it’s you,” Keith says as his brain keeps expositing. “Nah, you can have some.”

“I’m honoured,” Shiro says, picking up the pizza pocket and taking a bite. “Hey, give me a sip.”

Keith passes his bottle to Shiro, who takes a big gulp of his beer before dumping it down the sink.

“Dude,” Keith whines as Shiro places the empty bottle neatly beside the sink. Keith figures it’s less because Keith’s not twenty one yet, and more because earlier on in the day Keith snarked Shiro in the hearing vicinity of Iverson.

“Not for another two and a half years,” Shiro scolds and Keith flips him off. Shiro pinches the tip of Keith’s middle finger and starts bending it back. “Understood, cadet?”

“You’re so fucking lame,” Keith bites through both the pain and the need to tell Shiro to never refer to him as anything else ever again.

Shiro lets Keith go with a laugh, and Keith shoves him back for good measure. Shiro pretends it hurts a lot more than it actually does, and Keith stalks away in a fake angry huff. He looks over to glare at Shiro, but someone else has already commandeered his attention. Keith deflates a little further when he realizes he’s left his half eaten pizza pocket on the counter, but decides to leave it.

Keith doesn’t go home immediately. He really wishes he had though.

After he left the kitchen, Keith had run into a group of people from one of his physical conditioning classes with whom he got along with fairly well with. His first mistake was that he hung out with them for forty minutes, having a fairly decent time till the conversation had died down and they all drifted away to different parts of the house. Keith had decided to locate Matt and tell him that he was going home, and that Matt couldn’t ask Keith to do anything for a week. That was his second mistake.

If Keith’s being honest with himself, he actually wanted to find Shiro first so he could hang out with him, but Shiro was lost in the crowd and Keith’s not the biggest fan of looking desperate.

Keith had shifted through groups of people, knocked on a couple of doors, and had been ready to just dip without a word when he heard a familiar braying laugh from downstairs. It was followed by an even more familiar chuckle, and Keith’s third mistake of the night was to let his feet automatically take him to the source of the sound.

Now, Keith’s watching as one drunk person stumbles out of the cold storage room and another person stumbles in.

“I don’t get it,” he says, and Shiro opens his mouth to explain the rules for the fourth time. “Shut up, no, I get it. I don’t get why it’s fun though.”

“What’s not fun about making out with people?” Matt pipes up from the other side of Keith. Keith and Shiro are squished onto a love seat, with Matt sprawled half on the arm and half on the top of the seat.

“Being the person waiting outside,” Keith supplies. There’s a circle of people around a twister board, chattering while the two people in the cold storage kiss or talk or whatever people do when they’re trapped in a closet for seven minutes. “I didn’t know people still played this.”

“It would have been Twister,” Matt replies, flicking the back of Keith’s head. “But Katie used the mat as a tarp for a project and set it on fire.”

“Fantastic,” Keith says dryly, as a smirking girl steps out of the closet. “I’m going to leave now.”

“Me too,” Shiro says, and Keith immediately thinks to ask Shiro if he wants to go back to the Garrison together.

“Nah,” Matt says, planting a hand on each of their shoulders and pulling them back down. He slides off a little from where he’s sprawled, and is wedged horizontally in between the two of them and the cushions. “Yo! Spin!”

Keith winces at how loud Matt calls it out, but stays put as the black hand spins. They’ve been playing one in, one out, so whoever lands this turn has to replace the person who landed it the one before the last turn. Matt claims it’s so that everyone can get a variety of experiences, and because everyone in this room is a dumbass, they have accepted it as the rules of the game.

He waits for the tk tk tk to stop so he can get up and walk Shiro back then go back to his room and contemplate his stupid crush and jerk—

“Nice,” Matt says and Keith thinks he feels Shiro go a little rigid beside him.

“That’s not pointing at me,” Keith says but Matt’s already shoving him off the sofa.

“I’m not kissing you,” is the first thing the guy waiting inside the storage says to Keith.

Keith doesn’t really care about the rejection, just cares about the weird look Shiro had on his face when Matt put his foot to Keith’s ass and pushed him into the closet. Keith wants to think about it, but feels like he’ll do it too loudly. He’s not sure if he wants to expose himself like that in front of this stranger.

“Cool,” Keith says, digging his hands into his pockets.

“I didn’t kiss the last person either,” Keith thinks the boy is trying to sound comforting, but he genuinely doesn’t care. “I gave her the answer key to our next quiz though.”

Wait.

“What?” Keith asks, and the other guy pulls out his phone.

Turns out they’re in the same class, one that has notoriously difficult tests that probably are less of an indicator of intelligence and more of a way for the teacher to posture. This guy, who now Keith feels marginally bad for not remembering, has somehow acquired all five variations of their upcoming quiz.

Keith’s not one to cheat, ever at all. But the last test he got back, he nearly failed because of the fact that his pen ink had started to fade and the teacher didn’t like faint, yet clearly visible lines. The amount of time he had spent appealing the mark was too large for him to never get back.

The guy is not going to send it to Keith, but Keith’s allowed to look at it, take notes, and commit as much of it to memory as possible.

Now he knows why the last girl who left the closet looked so satisfied.

Matt knocks on the door for the tenth time.

“One more minute,” Keith calls out because he’s trying to skim through the last variation.

The door-knob rattles and turns. Matt peeps his head in.

“I’m obligated to tell you under threat of death - ok out of respect to the rules, geez -  that you’re approaching the fifteen minute mark and—oh, you’re not making out?”

Matt uses this as a cue to invite himself into the cold storage, and Keith immediately shoves the phone back into the other guys hand, who pockets it immediately. “Show me what you were doing, nerds.”

“Playing a game,” Keith lies and Matt raises an eyebrow.

“So you weren’t making out?” He asks and Keith shakes his head while the other guy goes “Ew, no.”

Matt taps a finger to his lips before reaching forward and ruffling Keith’s hair.

“Lick your lips,” Matt says and Keith frowns but automatically follows. “Great. You too.”

They both give Matt a confused look, and he reaches forward and pinches both their mouths shut. Hard.

Keith yelps, but the other guy straight up squeals. Matt hums and holds them in place while they flail, letting them go after an excruciating fifteen seconds have passed.

“Perfect,” he says and before anything else comes out of his mouth, the door-knob twists again and the door swings open.

“Hey,” Shiro’s got a smile on that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Got stuck in here?”

“Had to pull them apart,” Matt says sweetly, and barely lets out a sound when Keith kicks him in the shin.

“Who’s next?” asks Other Guy.

“Me,” Shiro says firmly, and Keith freezes. He’s glad this room only has a dim, half-watt lightbulb because otherwise everyone would immediately see the panic written across his face.

“Amazing,” Matt says, and turns to the other guy. “Scram.”

Other Guy high-tails it out, side stepping Shiro while throwing a wide eyed look back at Keith. Maybe Keith’s a little more visible than he previously thought.

“I’ll see myself out,” Matt says, and squeezes through between the door and Shiro. Shiro nods at him before closing the door behind him.

Keith’s not quite sure what he’s expected.

It’s quite possible that he expected to have Shiro asking him if he has an interest in the other guy, or what Keith had for lunch, if Keith saw Montgomery’s giant forehead zit, or if Keith used his study guide for his last time, and did it help?

He’s not expecting to get crowded against the shelves, Shiro’s hands on his shoulders, guiding him back. He hits the wooden planks with a soft thud, and feels them dig into his back.

“Hello,” he says, having to now tilt his head to look up at Shiro in the low light.

“Hi,” Shiro says, leaning in. “How are you?”

“Pretty okay,” Keith says, forcing himself not to give an awkward grin. Apparently it’s scarier than him blank-facing someone. “Decent evening so far.”

“Yeah?” There’s a small edge to Shiro’s voice, and Keith has a hard time remaining focused. “Let me try and make it better?”

Before Keith can process his mouth moving, he blurts out a “Yeah.”

The signs in the situation were clearly pointing one way, but Keith’s heart still threatens to leap out of his chest once Shiro kisses Keith.

There are about fifty different air horns blaring in Keith’s head that only intensify once Shiro presses their bodies closer together. Keith feels the pressure on his mouth lighten and almost ease off completely before he realizes that kissing back is a thing.

In a panic, he grabs Shiro by the dog tags and pulls him closer.

He feels a hand around his ribcage, feels it skim down and rest on his hip before squeezing. He’s running out of air, so he gasps a little into Shiro’s mouth and the kiss kicks up a notch. Keith can’t believe this is his life, and clings on to Shiro. If this is really just a fever dream or an induced hallucination, Keith is going to milk it for all that he can.

“Woah,” Keith says, a little dizzy as they break apart for air. “Woah.”

“I, uh-“ Shiro starts and stops. Shiro only looks at Keith’s mouth, and Keith doesn’t know if he wants to gain access to what Shiro is thinking right at this moment, or if he wants Shiro to continue putting both his lips and his hands on him. Only one of these options is realistic; Keith cannot believe he exists in a world where it’s the latter.

“I wonder how much time we have left,” Keith says faintly, and Shiro shakes his head. “Whoever gets you next is gonna be lucky, huh?”

“What?” Shiro frowns, but before he can say anything else, Keith’s leaning up to kiss him. Now that kissing Shiro has been introduced into his library, Keith feels like he’s moving on autopilot and the yelling in his head at finally getting to first base with his crush has dulled down by a fraction.

He can feel a moment’s hesitation before Shiro’s hands travel down and grab his thighs, hiking him up against the shelves. The soup cans rattle with the force, and the planks press hard lines against Keith’s back as he automatically wraps his legs around Shiro’s waist. In the distance, he can hear a muffled “ewwwww” from Matt on the other side of the door, but Shiro quickly occupies him enough for him to not care about it.

It takes a full twenty minutes for Matt to meekly knock on the door.

“Guys, uh,” Matt says tentatively. “No one’s playing anymore. Game’s over so uh. Any time you feel like it, come out.”

For the past ten minutes, Keith and Shiro have been sitting on the floor, arguing whether paintballing or sneaking out on Keith’s hoverbike will make for a better official First Date. They stopped making out partly due to the fact that Keith does not actually want to get it on in Matt Holt’s cold storage, and partly due to the fact that Shiro calmed down considerably once learning that Keith and Other Guy were just talking about a vague school topic. 

Because Matt deserves to be fucked with, Keith just bangs the shelf with his fist a couple of times before he can practically hear the exasperation in Matt’s receding footsteps.

Read it on AO3

[backseat-imagines]

The chocobros fell hard for someone and it seemed they reciprocate the feelings until the bro confessed he liked them, then they seemed cold about it. They are confronted about their behavior and it turns out they're dying of an illness and didn't want them to get too attached to them. How would the guy react and would he still pursue them?

I hope you all are ready for a little bit of a pain train again because it’ll be ready to board soon! It’s a long one and it’ll be a little bit scenario and a little HCs towards the end for each character.

Of course this does contain content about incurable diseases and such and mention of the inevitable/likely outcomes so read on at your own leisure.

Noctis; 

“Noctis, I want to but… I don’t think that’s a good idea.” They mutter. They slowly back away from him, taking their hand from his.  Taken by complete surprise, they didn’t expect their friend, the prince of all people, to have taken any such interest in them. But here they are.  “What? The idea of being married to a king of Lucis isn’t spooking you, isn’t it?” Noctis playfully asks them.  Truthfully, in a way it did. Just garnering this kind of attention from him alone was nerve-wracking already, and Six know the kind of attention they’d get nationwide if they were tempted into taking his hand.  But that kind of ending for them is only something they could read in the fairy-tales.  If only if life could be one of those. Maybe then all they’d have to do was fight a dragon just to be in the arms of a beloved prince. But what happens when the proverbial dragon can’t be beaten? They had their own fight to worry about and it was unlike any that all those stories told, “As daunting as the idea may be, I’m still not so much worried about that.”  “Then what are you worried about? You said you wanted to… right?”  “Yes but-”  “What’s with the ‘buts’?” Noct flouted, “If you really don’t you could just tell me you know? I might be royalty but you don’t have to spare my feelings, I can take a no.”  “It’s still not about that Noct…” Susurrating, they shook their head at the prince.  Not another word about it was spoken and Noctis let it go. Although a little disappointed, it wasn’t too big of a deal for him, and he was more than happy leaving this behind. After all, he got his feelings off his chest. It was nice having that weight lifted back off his chest.  The two of them did well to not let that moment affect anything. Everything rolled back as smoothly as how it did before, or it had.  Just a handful of days later they came back around.  “Noct, I want to talk to you. About the other day.”  “Hm? Oh…” Noctis swallowed hard and an audible gulp was let out. “You can forget about that.”  Just by looking at him, they could tell he wasn’t so happy to bring this back up. He almost seemed nervous just by expression alone and the way he started to rub and scratch over at his own wrist.  But some things had to be said,“Ah, I wanted to have an important talk about it actually…”  “What about it did you want to talk about then?”  “Well, I’ve been thinking a lot about that talk. And I kind of wanted to tell you something.”  Noctis snickers, “Oh? Don’t tell me you have a love confession now.” He teases.  If only. But even Noctis knew that he wasn’t going to be that lucky.  “Not quite…”  The both of them find some place quiet to sit, where no one is likely to disturb them.  Lucis’s prince was caught a little off guard when rejection came a second time, this time in the form of how ‘a king should have someone that he can rely on to rule by his side for a lifetime to come instead” and he didn’t understand what the hell that was supposed to mean at first.  However he come to understand when they told him a serious issue going on. He’s forgot the name of whatever condition it is they have (hell, half the time they can’t even remember it’s name either), but apparently it’s coating the insides of their blood vessels in proteins. And that’s the vessels throughout their entire body.  Eventually, the blockages that come will cause things to burst. Slowly bit by bit will go on them, and it’ll be painful too. Along with that, they’ll be at a higher risk of strokes and likely to have early onset dementia- if they make it far enough into life for that to kick in.  Nothing with much alleviate the effects for them, and it’s incurable.  Noctis doesn’t take too well to that news. Outwardly he doesn’t seem to be too busted up. If anything he looks surprised. But he’s gone silent and they can’t so much as earn a sound or a gesture…

Noctis tries his hardest to back off of them. As in he tries to distance himself by way of avoiding being around them for too long or going silent on them (as if they were a stranger again).  It’s wrong, he knows. He’s had enough loss in his life and doesn’t want to keep having to through it. But the temporary selfishness is that only hurts in the long run. He feels guilty.

Eventually he skulks back around and apologizes for the way he’s been acting.

They still have some time left, right? Well, he’d like to help make sure they get the most out of that too. So his offer still stands if they want to know what it’s like to date a prince. (unless one of those treaties pop up)

Ignis;

 Perhaps Ignis miscalculated the whole situation and mistook their kindness for something more than what it maybe was.  He feels almost a little foolish now. The two of them had been good friends. Though only for a short while, but time didn’t much matter with as quickly as things seemed to move, and at this point it was hard to imagine a life where they wouldn’t be around for him and the others.  Close; with them things felt like home. Anymore the two of them might as well have been attached at the hips (whether in town, camp, field and fight), they shared a lot of similar interests and even for the ones they didn’t share it was simply nice seeing one another get passionate about their own unshared interest, and often Ignis started to find himself staying up at ungodly hours, without even realizing how much time had passed, being engaged in conversation.  At this point they had been someone that Ignis could proudly say was his best friend. But things changed and something started to feel a little more cozy in the friendship- or it did to him at least- and this was where his heart wanted to lie with.  Here he and they were sitting out, talking like they always had. About the small things, about the news, stories of the past, and where they might see the future going and what they wanted to do.  And then…  “About our futures… Do you mind if I admit something?” He asks, awaiting for their responses and continues when they give him a ‘sure thing’. “I’m afraid I must confess something to you-”  Ignis finally opens up to them, and suddenly everything changes. The smile that was on their face is now replaced with a frown. No more hearty laughter, or even so much the sound of their voice since now they’ve gone quiet. Just quiet, and their gaze goes to the floor.  This might have been a mistake, he thinks.  No, they weren’t obligated to accept him or his confession. But part of the reason why he confessed in the first place was because he was sure the feeling was already mutual. Maybe that was a projection on his part after all,  “Ah, I’ve said something I shouldn’t have, haven’t I?” “No Ignis, you’re fine it’s just… I can’t.”  “Can’t?”  “It’s not that I don’t want to but…” They finally crack open and start to explain to him what’s going on. They’re dying. There’s something in their body that’s eating away at them from the inside and it’s literally killing them. And they know they don’t have too much longer left in their life in the grand scheme of things.  Ignis listens with a sympathetic ear. The shock’s caught him so off guard that the good majority of the time he’s worriedly covering his mouth with his hand. The whole time their voice kept cracking, lip sometimes quivering, eyes watering but not a single tear was dropping. Admirable; they were trying to keep standing tall to the best of their ability, it takes a lot to be able to keep composure like that and it makes his heart bleed.  “And I didn’t really want to tell anyone because I didn’t want to cause that kind of worry. But I fucked up here, I really did.”  “No you haven’t. This isn’t something that you could have helped.”  “But I did. I shouldn’t have let this happen. I should have backed off a long time ago, I shouldn’t have let you get so attached like this and I’m so sorry.”

 Ignis doesn’t go on to pursuing them. At least not in a romantic sense, not if that’s not what they want. To try to would be selfish of him. Instead he chooses to be there for them as a friend and nothing more.

 The odds are against them, he knows, and it’ll be painful to watch as everything goes on. But they are his friend and he’s not one to make a habit of abandoning his friends… They need a support system, and he’s going to try being just that.

 Iggy is the one who ends up doing a lot of research in his own time. If there is no cure for what’s going on, then surely there’s at least something he can find that would help sooth them through this.

Gladiolus;

 How long have they and Gladio been friends for? Nearly a decade now?  Over the course of that time they’ve been decent friends. Maybe not the best of friends, not with the kind of squabbles they’ve had, but they’ve always came around and made up for it. Gladio never really gave much thought in dating them (he’s thought about a fling or two, but he’s had that thought about many of the people around him), until now.  He’s been kicking around the idea of dating, and they say some of the best relationships were founded on old friendships right? So why not try them? Gladio approaches them while they’re in their own space, working with and sorting through their files. It smells like old papers and ebony coffee, and all he’s hearing is the sound of papers being rustled and flipped, “Hey.” He greets, and earning a ‘heya’ in return. He goes on to making small conversation before getting on to his point. “So I was wondering if maybe you’d want to go out for dinner some time?”  “Sure thing!” They say enthusiastically, beaming a smile at him. “My friend, you know I would never pass up a chance to hang out with you.”  “Yeah about that…” Gladio, crossing his arms, moves to lean his back against the nearest wall, “I was thinking that it could be a date this time?”  “A date?” The papers they held in their hands slid out of their grip. They set their gaze onto Gladio; they look worried. “I… don’t think we should do that…”  “Why not?”  “Do I really have to give a reason?”  “Not really I guess?” Gladio shrugs. “But being your friend I’d kind of like to know.”  “Gladiolus…” They almost never used the full of his name. The only time it passed through their lips was whenever they were angry.  “Just saying, you know?”  “You’re not going to just bully me around into this.”  “Bully?” He scoffs, “I’m not bullying you, what kind of asshole do you take me fo-?”  “But you are!”  An argument ensues. And one that got more heated than it ought to have- to the point of raised voices. Maybe not outright yelling, but it wasn’t far either.  “Fine you really want to know? Then here!” They began to peel away their thick top, and another top, and underneath was bandages. All over was bandages, and some of them were already seeping through, and he figured the undershirt was likely to help hide the bandages outline and prevent it from seeping through the shirt worn over.  Bandages started to be unwrapped and dropped to the floor, and underneath Gladio could see some of the horrid marring of their body. Some of the wounds looked familiar to ones he saw them get none too long ago- almost exactly the same- but they should have healed from that by now. So what the hell did they do to get this done all over again?  Not only that but everything looked angry with infection. Some of the skin at the edges were turning a deep, sickly color of rot. And it reeked. From the moment they uncovered it he could no longer smell the scent they and the room were doused it, instead the stench of their wounds overtook everything.  “Damn…” Gladio steps up and starts to walk circles around them, inspecting over the wounds. He winces- he can almost feel those on his own body just by looking at it. “What the hell happened to you? And what’s this got to do with anything?”  “Everything.” They said. “I’m sure you remember some of these. You have to.” When he stands back in front of them, they point towards one of the nastier ones on their chest. Long and deep gashes… “This one? This was the one I got from that fight with Deadeye, when it had struck me, remember?”  “That was months ago.”  “Exactly.”  “But how?”  Taking a sharp inhale of air, they spoke, “I can’t heal Gladio.”  “What do you mean ‘can’t heal’? Last I knew you used to be just fine on that.”  “Yeah, used to is the key words here. Gladio this has been going on for a bit. We’re not even sure why, but my body can’t heal most anything anymore. I’m stuck with a lot of cuts, big and gaping wounds- they’re all nasty. They keep getting infected, and my body and it’s health is starting to deteriorate badly because of this.” “Can’t anything be done?”  “Can’t cure what you don’t know or understand- Doctors aren’t sure why this happened, what it is, or even how to help. I’m-” They felt the hotness at their eyes as the tears began to well up. Unable to even try to hold it back, the tears cut free just as soon as the salty liquid had rose. Their voice began to crack, “I’m screwed Gladio. I’m absolutely screwed, I’m going to fucking die!” “Hey now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here-” “It’s reality Gladdy! It’s legitimately my shitty reality… We know that I can’t make it like this. Not for too long.” Gladio merely nodded along. He wanted to try and say something that would have ended up making things out to be a lot more hopeful, but who was he kidding? He knows he spoke out of turn, and they know more about their own situation than he did. The hell is he supposed to say now? He doesn’t say a word, not for a little while. Instead he tries to comfort them and quell how hurt they are in the moment. He’s a little apprehensive to get too close- Gladio doesn’t want to hurt them physically by accident- but as soon as they move in for a hug he casts that aside, not even caring if they bleed or ooze on him, and he holds them there until they finally calm back down and pull away. “So that’s why you stopped going with us… Why didn’t you say anything before?” Gladio finally asks them the question that was digging at him. “It’s hard… How was I supposed to break the news? Just go up to you all and go ‘hey guys, I’m a rotting mess and I’m going to fucking die, but that’s okay because it’ll be over soon!’ like… I’m sorry but I just couldn’t. There was no good time. There was no good way.” “Should have broke it in the bad way then…” Now that Gladio was told and got to thinking about it, they had been really withdrawn for awhile now. And now he was wondering if maybe this was why, “So the last little while you’ve gone mostly quiet on us. This wouldn’t have anything to do with that, would it?” They nod. Their lip stats to quiver and here comes the tears again. “Yeah. To be honest I was hoping maybe if I isolate myself, then people would stop caring. And maybe then no one would have to be sad when I go.” “Don’t be stupid…” Gladio mutters, pulling them back in for a hug, “People have always cared and always will. That’s just how it is.”

Gladio drops the idea of seeing them. There’s just something about chasing after them while they’re down that doesn’t feel right.

The fact they’d be hurting in so many ways would make it feel like he was taking advantage of them more than anything. He doesn’t stand for that. Hell he’d have to question himself as to the whys of it all if he did.

Not only that but something like this would be much too short-lived for him even. He’s not afraid of the attachment; under a different circumstance, or if he had a guarantee of more time then, he would have at least kept the offer open.

Honestly he doesn’t really try to treat them too differently after this. They’re still his friend, but he’s not going to be dropping by much more often or anything. Frankly he doesn’t want his own presence feeling overbearing.

Prompto;

  “I’m sorry Prompto. It’s not you, it’s me.”  There it was, the dreaded phrase. Admittedly he’s heard it more often than he’d like to- every time he tried to pour his heart out to someone back in highschool he’d hear it. Granted, back then they were all silly school kids, and maybe he jumped the gun on way too quickly back then too (professing his undying love after only a handful of dates, or asking out ones he just barely met), but this time he really thought this was going to be different!  They might as well be already dating! There was already some flirting, the two of them running off for nice lunches and dinners (at this point the two of them . Hell the two of them already were sneaking away from the others for romantic walks through towns and safe trails while holding hands- sometimes they danced, from goofy and wild to slow dancing with them resting their head on his shoulder, and sometimes they just snuggled in together or held each other closely, giggling like a couple of young fools. So why then?  It’s not like they were just leading him on, they weren’t that kind- wait… the last couple of weeks it’s like they’ve been dropping off the face of Eos, so maybe they were? Granted he knows they said they haven’t been feeling well and have been sick, but maybe-  Never mind- it didn’t matter.  “Look, forget it. I know that whole spiel already, so you don’t have to go over it.” Prompto says in a low, sad tone. He crosses his arms and averts his gaze, he turns his head to the side and gazes into the distance.  “Prompto please, I’m not trying to get you off my tail.” They stated quickly. They realized now how that line must have sounded- they didn’t even think about the fact it’s used as an indirect way of saying someone doesn’t have a pitiful shot in hell before they even said that. Hell, that’s something they heard a time or two in their own life and that’s not what they were aiming for when they told it to him.   Now they were just wanting to plead their case and not chase him off either. “I mean it when I said it’s all on me. I’m trying to spare you of any extra grief.  “But maybe it was already too late for that,” they mumble.  His attention turns back towards them, “Spare me? Spare me from what?” Prompto asks. “If you’re thinking somehow you’re not good enough…” If that was it, then he could feel his heart sinking already. He knows what’s that like and he hopes that’s not it, “then let me tell you right now that you are.”  “Again, it’s not that… Prompto I…” They reached for their head, fingers intertwining with the locks of their hair and lifted. Sliding it off and dropping it to the ground, he could see where the hair had been shaven; some was already growing back but other patches… wasn’t. “I have cancer Prompto.”  “Cancer?” Prompto croaks. His eyebrows knit up together and his expression goes soft.  “Yeah. Colon cancer, stage three. Chemo’s… not been very helpful-”  “That’s why you’re getting sick…”  “Mm…” They nodded. “It’s done that and so much more. But I guess I shouldn’t be too hard on that yet… We only just caught this, I haven’t had too long to even do any kind of treatment. I just… hadn’t planned on telling anyone yet.”  Gods, how could they be so calm and collected about this? Here they were, talking about something that was threatening their lives, and yet they were standing here with an unmoving expression, and their tone not even faltering.  Prompto looks towards the ground, his eyes darting around as he tries to figure out what to say. His thoughts are many and his thoughts are fast, all of them too loud for even him to properly hear until he finally settles on one, “I’m sorry…”  “For what?” They inquire.  “Pushing you towards telling me.”  “You didn’t.” They reach up their hand up and ruffle his hair reassuringly. “I had to tell at some point, before I started withering off too badly. But… I didn’t want to let you down in a way that left you feeling bad when it’s literally all on me because I might not make it. But you had a right to know what you were trying to get into.”  He only nods in response.  “But you’re getting treated for that now. So there’s still hope right?”  “I’d like to think so, but… Stage three is already pretty late in the game, and I don’t know of too many people who’s kept going for too long with that.” Their lips start to quiver. Pulling their hand up to their face, the tip of their nose connecting to the knuckle of their pointer, it’s like they were trying to hide behind their own flesh. Shaky breaths washing over the skin, warming it. But their breath wasn’t as warm feeling as the tears that started to come down. “They might be able to extend my life but…”  Quickly, Prompto takes them into his arms and rubs at their back soothingly. “It’ll be okay. It’ll be alright.”  But will it?

 Prompto doesn’t care about the condition- wait no, he does. He fully acknowledges it, it’s always looming over so he cares very much. But that doesn’t stop him from still wanting to be with them.

 It’s still up to them if they’d have him, he’d still be over the moon if they did want him.

 Whether they do or don’t, it doesn’t matter. Prompto is there right beside them. He’ll be there to hold their hand when they need it and act as a pillar when they need to lean. He’ll be there to the very bitter end.

[zutaraverse]

Chapter 8: Finding The Right Path

Chapter 8 of Blood, Chi and Full Moons: Find previous chapters here or: Chapter 1 Part 1 | Chapter 1 Part 2 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 Part 1 | Chapter 3 Part 2 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 Part 1 | Chapter 7 Part 2

"Aren't you a little young to know what that kind of heartbeat means?" retorted Katara with a nervous laugh, composing herself while Zuko was still opening and closing is mouth like a gaping fish. Toph had just metal bent her way into his private arena while he and Katara were getting more than comfortable in one another's arms.

Toph stood taller than either had seen her, and had lost much of her childish fat, leaving her much thinner and more shapely than before. Her figure could even be described as delicate when she wore some of her traditional dresses — but she was rarely seen to do so.

"Ha!" she replied, flicking her head so that some of her bangs moved from her face, "I'm fifteen…Tell me Sugar Queen, how old were you with Jet?" Toph grinned broadly. She already knew she had won this.

"I… That's beside the point! It was war, we could have died any day!" defended Katara, feeling her face redden.

"Yeah well, Sweetness, you weren't the only one who grew up during the war — we're all children of conflict here and we all grew up far too fast. But, whatcha gonna do about it - I was never going to get my kicks from normal things! Might as well enjoy what we've got - I see you two are taking that on board," she said nonchalantly but with a strange drawn expression hovering over her features.

It was true. All of them had been thrown into a world that adults found hard to navigate. They were all too young and too innocent — but somehow, against all odds, they had survived. But surviving had cost them their innocence and their childhood. There they stood, considering their lives and the way they had been affected. Toph, 15 years old, had fought against her parents' captivity and left home at 12. Katara, now 17, had taken her mother's place at far too young an age. Zuko, 19, had never felt his father's love and had been banished at the age of 13. The start of each of their journeys had thrown them together at the hardest of times. None of them could relate to a normal child's found solace in other people like themselves, but mostly in one another. There was no need for explanations for their sadness when they remembered the war, nor pity when they confessed what had happened to them. Simply understanding and camaraderie.

They snapped out of their reverie as Katara approached Toph and threw her arms around her. Surprisingly, Toph didn't squirm away as she usually did - instead she hugged her back tightly, feeling tears prickling behind her eyes. She had missed them. This was her true family after all.

"I'm glad you have clothes on Sweetness! Not that I would have minded…" she added. Katara considered the girl in front of her.

"Do you play for both sides Toph?" asked Katara, slightly surprised. She had never noticed this preference in her friend before.

"Mmmm you could say that. You want to watch out Fire Prince Sparky," she giggled, winking at him. "Right, well I will leave you to get decent and meet you in that room with all the cushions and tea," she said confidently. "I'll take my hug from you when you are less… ah… preoccupied with other things… Bye!" and with that she bent her way out the same way she came.

"I'm fine now!" Zuko called after her. He was still standing where he and Katara had been embraced, and looked stunned at the exchange that had just happened. Since when had these girls he had grown up with become so open and confident about their sexuality?

Katara walked back to him, apparently at ease now, and wrapped her arms around him for a quick kiss.

"Katara you know I can't stay long with you and Toph… I've got those reports from the colonies to get through," he said regretfully. Although he would have preferred it if Toph had not interrupted them, spending time with the two girls was second on his list of things he would rather be doing.

"No, I understand. At least stay for a cup of tea?" she asked, looking up at him hopefully. He kissed her nose gently.

"One cup," he promised. Katara smiled up at him. "Why do we always get interrupted though!" he moaned as they walked out of the arena. "I build a fucking impenetrable metallic arena and of course the world's only metal bender has to arrive," he grumbled half to himself.

Zuko couldn't keep his one-cup-of-tea promise before being called away, leaving Toph and Katara alone to catch up.

"So, Sweetness, heard what happened with you and that general…" started Toph. She was never one to be subtle about hard conversations. Katara sighed, forcing down another gulp of tea.

"It was a captain. How did you hear about that?" she asked quietly. Toph shrugged.

"News spreads pretty quickly when you know what to listen for. Although I think the story may have been exaggerated somewhat… One version makes you some merciful saviour while the next tells of the bloodthirsty water bender! Did you really skewer him with an icicle eight feet long?" She was leaning forward now, all interest and excitement. Katara let out the breath she had been holding quietly - Toph wanted to talk about the Agni Kai, not the reason for it.

"No, I did not! I did trap him in a ball of water suspended in the air until he almost drowned…" Toph made an appreciative noise, "But I didn't kill him - I spared him his life. His admiral killed him when he had lost and still attacked me. You aren't supposed to do that in an Agni Kai and apparently its a big deal."

"You didn't kill him? Why? He fucking deserved it!" grumbled Toph, slightly put out by the lack of violence.

"It was supposed to be a political move; as in if he could rot in a deep, dark jail for the rest of his life then people might get the message that it is not alright and not pass it off as personal revenge… as it turned out, though, the admiral's finale brought much more attention to the situation. I hope it sends a message," she explained bitterly.

"I think it did. There are little girls all over wanting to be you! They were doing it all wrong though, I had to teach them to be more bossy!" Toph grinned as Katara punched her playfully in the arm.

"How are you though Toph? What have you been doing?"

"Eh, this and that. Mama and papa Bei Fong have finally accepted the fact that I'm my own person, so at least that is sorted out." Toph took a sip of her tea.

"That's wonderful Toph! Its good you can go back to your family. You really missed them," encouraged Katara, not without sadness at the thought of the split in her own family since she had met her father in the North Pole.

"They still need work, but I'm happy about it. Other than that I've just been travelling and rebuilding. I spent a lot of time in Omashu with Bumi - I love that guy! He's amazing! And… eh… yeah. I can't compete in the Earth Rumble anymore because apparently 'it isn't a competition if you always win'," Toph made a face, "Those stupid cowardly bastards! I'll tell you what though, I'm sort of craving something long to do. I've… I've not been happy recently. Maybe happy isn't the right word. Maybe 'content' is a better word. I just feel like there is something missing," she looked down at her hands, a sadness lining her features that made her look much, much older than she was.

"Oh Toph," said Katara quietly, reaching out and taking her hand.

"Its alright. I'm not the type to give in… I just… I guess I'm just a little lost," she admitted, a familiar lump rising in her throat. Somewhere in the back of Toph's mind a younger version of herself was horrified at her breaking down in front of Katara - but a wiser version told her that Katara was probably the only person who could help her. She had been more of a mother to her than her own mother, and she needed someone - anyone - to understand. Katara had gone through shit, so she would probably get it… right? "I just, I don't know if I can ever find a path again," she continued, letting tears slide out of her sightless eyes. "Its as if everything is dull - like I'm feeling everything through sand and I'm stumbling around in the middle of nowhere!" she choked out. She felt Katara shift and found herself wrapped in the older girl's arms.

"I know how it feels," she cooed into Toph's black hair, "everything is distant and you can't connect to reality. You feel like you've been swallowed up somewhere and you might never feel the sunlight on your skin again. You are cold even in the sweltering heat, and physical pain hardly affects you at all. You try everything to force some life back into your system but nothing works." Toph nodded into her shoulder, overcome by an intense gratefulness for Katara's understanding.

"But you are still here Toph, and you will get through this. It is horrible and affects every part of your life, but I'll help you. Stay here for a while? Zuko and I know very well how you are feeling. You shouldn't be alone right now," she continued gently, rocking Toph in her arms.

"Thank you K—Katara!" sobbed Toph, shaking in her arms.

"Hey, thats what we do for family," she whispered, her own throat closing at her words.

Toph had fallen asleep instantly after her exhausting day. Katara listened for her light snoring at her door before walking past and heading for Zuko's rooms. She knocked but received no answer, and so peaked in to find the room still dark and uninhabited. Quietly, she entered, shutting the door behind her and lighting the candles adorning the room.

It was late. Where was he?

She looked around his room and settled in one of the armchairs to wait. However, as time ticked on, she became uncomfortable and drifted to the large double bed. She lay down on it - just to see what it was like - she told herself. As soon as her head touched the soft pillow, though, she too fell asleep.

Zuko finished reading through the uselessly detailed reports very late into the night. He made a note to hire somebody to go through the reports for him and only hand him the ones that were worth reading. Sighing, he put out the lights and wondered towards his room. He frowned. There was light coming from under his door…

Slowly, he crept to the room and pushed the door ajar quietly to peak in. He relaxed as he took in the half melted candles and a sleeping Katara on his bed. He felt an inexplicable surge of pride at the sight of her in his bed. Zuko hovered in the doorway, unsure whether to take her back to her room or to leave her sleeping as she was. He bit his lip. He should ask.

Gently, he tapped her shoulder and called her name. Her eyes cracked open, before she realised where she was and she sat up blinking away the cobwebs of sleep.

"I didn't mean to wake you completely - I just wanted to know if you wanted to stay here or if you wanted me to take you back to your room?" he asked, taking in the image of a sleepy, messy-haired Katara with amusement.

"I… We need to talk Zuko," she said, yawning.

"I think we should wait till tomorrow morning - you look like you're about to nod back off!" he said mockingly, taking off his outer robes and shoes.

Katara shook her head.

"No, we need to talk now while Toph is asleep!" she insisted. He sighed and sat cross legged across from her on the bed, waiting to hear what she had to say. A part of him was disappointed that she only wanted to talk, but he smothered that train of thought.

"Toph is depressed. Seriously depressed or she wouldn't have talked to me about it. I'm very worried about her Zuko. She was so young during the war!" Zuko sighed.

"We were all young during the war, Katara," he reminded her.

"Yes, I know. But we have all found some sort of a path; you as Fire Prince, Sokka as future Chief, Suki as Kyoshi Leader and future Cheifess, Aang as restorer of the Air Nation and me with this whole research thing. We've had our down times but we've all created something to keep ourselves occupied, to fill the void opened up during the fighting. Toph hasn't. All her projects were short term and she's lost, left to face her demons with no distractions. We need to do something!"

Zuko considered her words. She was right. Toph was possibly the most powerful and yet the most lost one of all of them. And she was still so young!

"She can stay here for as long as she likes, just to calm down and find her way?" he suggested. And Iroh would adore having her around.

"I was… see I was thinking, what if we - uh - taught her?" Zuko's eyes widened in realisation.

"Do you think that's wise? I mean its already a risk that there are two of us practicing fire and water every day!" And , he added mentally, we wouldn't get to have fun on our own!

"I've been thinking about it a lot. Yue said that not everybody is like us and that we are drawn to one another like the tides. Well, the tides are turning with everything I have discovered and everything we have learned. And suddenly Toph appears wanting some reason, some mission, some meaning to who she is. When I teach you blood bending you will be able to feel it too, but she is just as strong as either of us, you know. I've been observing and not everybody is like this; the other fire benders have sort of chi pooled in the areas typical of fire bending. That means that even if I were to redirect their chi flow, hardly any would reach the other patterns. You and I, though, we have equal amounts of chi flowing throughout - and so does Toph. I don't know why. I've been thinking about this since we spoke to Yue…" she trailed off, looking to him for his reaction.

Zuko considered it. To learn earth bending would be incredible. It would give Toph something about herself she never knew, and it would further whatever this was Yue was letting them do. On the other hand, the more people knew, the more people risked finding out. Although, Toph was as tough as they came and would defend their secret to the end.

"Don't you think it is a little dangerous teaching a blind girl to shoot fire?" he asked. It wasn't an objection exactly - just a consideration. He had already accepted Katara's proposal.

"I've been thinking about that too; the way you felt the heat in the room today - it was like I feel the moisture. If there is anything Toph is good at it is feeling things she can't see. Maybe she wouldn't have to bend fire - she could learn to understand heat like she learned to understand earth."

"It would give her a new way to see," he said, half to himself. Katara nodded. Zuko sucked in a breath, screwing up his courage. They were walking a very thin, very dangerous line as it was.

"When do we start," he asked. Katara looked relieved at his acceptance.

"Well there is no point starting tomorrow - we would have hardly slept and we need all the concentration we can get! Maybe tomorrow we can talk to her about everything. She might not want to be a part of this, after all. And then if she does we can start the day after?"

"You're right. She won't be responsive until lunch though, so we can talk her through things then?" he reasoned. Katara nodded in agreement and smiled at him.

Zuko frowned as something occurred to him. "You know its not actually that late right? We could still get enough sleep to do our routine…" he suggested. Secretly, he wanted to spend some time alone with her before Toph started interrupting everything.

"I know what the time is. I was kind of thinking that if I stayed here tonight we probably wouldn't end up getting so much sleep. But if you'd rather train, I can go now," she said lightly, turning as if to leave.

"No, no!" he cried, a little too quickly. Ah yes, the good old show-her-how-desperate-you-are-trick. Well done, Zuko. You sound even more pathetic then usual! He cleared his throat awkwardly. "I mean, who needs training right? I don't, in fact, I can function really well without any…"

He was cut off by Katara's laugh and the now-familiar sensation of her lips on his. Pulling her close and under the covers, he snuffed out the candles with a flick of his wrist and decided that his bed was far better with her in it.

Neither really remembered how they had got to their underwear, nor did they care where their discarded clothes had disappeared to. Zuko ran his hands all over her exposed skin, memorising the patterns of her body; the feel of her ribs through her skin, the arch of her back, the curves of her legs as they wrapped around him. He felt Katara doing the same, but she seemed to enjoy the feeling of his chest and stomach most of all. He rolled them so she was on top of him and she could have access as much as she liked. She seemed to enjoy it.

It was slightly unfair that his chest was exposed and hers wasn't. No, unfair was the wrong expression. It was simply annoying. He wondered how far he could go before she asked him to stop. However, when she started kissing his jawline and letting her teeth graze his skin, he decided it was worth trying.

He ran his fingers all around her top wrappings, trying to find an opening, but cursed under his breath when he couldn't find it. Katara had stilled under his touch and was laughing slightly at his fumbling fingers. Gently, she took one of his hands and guided it to the middle of the front of the wrappings, letting him feel the slight bulge of the coiled cloth. He pinched it and pulled, letting the rest unravel and be pushed aside.

Zuko regretted having snuffed the candles. He wanted to see her! But there would be time for that, he hoped, at another point. The important thing now was that she was comfortable. Slowly, she lowered herself so she was once again lying on top of him, but this time instead of the rough cloth, he could feel her warm breasts pressed against him. He caressed them gently, savouring their softness on his fingertips. He decided to change their position again so she was below him and he could explore her with his tongue. Her nipples hardened under his kisses, and in a daring move he trailed his lips lower.

Suddenly, he encountered rough skin where there had been only smooth before. It took him a split second to realise these were her burns! He gently explored the whole area, ignoring her stiffening at his attention. There were lots, he realised with dismay. Many more than the ones he had half-glimpsed that day in training. They stretched across her whole width, just underneath her breasts - many were small, some were larger, but he knew they would all have burned just the same.

He carefully kissed as many burns as he could find, feeling her relaxing under his touch. It struck him as though this were destined to happen ever since she touched his scar underneath Ba Sing Se. She had offered to heal him and he was doing his best to heal her now.

She gently pulled on his shoulders to signal to him to rise back up her body, and kissed him with a ferocity he had not felt from her before. He vaguely noticed that her face was slightly damp with salty tears as she caressed the burned side of his face.

They did not go any further together, not wanting to ruin the beauty of the moment with something that may turn out to be emotionally disastrous. That was more than fine though, this was far more than either had ever expected to experience.

Tired but more comfortable than either had been in a long time, they fell asleep curled in one another's arms.

[thepdvblog]

Dandelion - Chapter 3: Turning the Page

Dandelion Directory

Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

Summary: His objective is clear: make a name for himself and see if he can make a couple friends, especially in his dorm room.

Notes: A bit of a shorter chapter, mostly serving as a sooth transition from high school life to the first type of college courses featured in this story. I'll probably name this one by its actually most common name, hypokhâgne/khâgne, in the future, so I hope it won't bother people. I'm way too excited to show Florian's roommates. (sorry for the lack of trans-related matters in this chapter, I promise the focus will be back on these in the near future)

AO3 version available here.

Outing himself as a transgender man without saying the exact term was only the first step in a journey Florian knows is going to be long and tedious. He knows he will have to move out of Colombes sooner than he would like: there is no university in the town, and he does want to be better than his now-gone parents and have an actual diploma aside from his Baccalauréat. Moreover, he has graduated in Literature, as opposed to Roxanne and Juliette with their respective Sciences and Economics and Sociology majors, so he cannot really pretend this is going to make him go very far in life aside from maybe, just maybe and by sheer luck, work as a cashier or something alike.

He has had a number of these “let’s take an hour to find everyone’s dream career and paths!” classes in the past two years. Of course, his ears have always been at least half-opened, so he knows he wants to set his life in the great sea of literature… but how? College feels like it will be too expensive unless he goes to the other side of the country. Most of his classmates seem already set on Paris’s numerous universities, including the prestigious ones (to that he laughs a bit, considering some of these same classmates cannot spell properly), but him? He does not know what he wants exactly.

 His Literature teacher, the old and soon-retired Mrs Paris (a name that would have fitted would have she not been born and raised in Nanterre, the nearby prefecture), tells him he should think of preparatory class. Apparently, it will give him the ability to shoot for the stars and rise to the top of the intellectual society of the country if he ever goes to the end of it. Ambition is not something he has been known for, so this surprises him, but the description of this multi-course class to replace the unforgiving first two years of traditional college tempt him. Moreover, if he can find one with a dorm, he can pay less than if he had to have a flat and necessities to buy on top of it.

A student, from when I was a professor in Brest, once asked me why I allowed myself to be concerned about her finances because I was just paid so much. I came clean to her that I once was an almost-homeless disowned boy. Her face’s expression immediately softened.

 However, there are a lot of different literature preparatory classes he could attend, and as such he needs to pick his favourites. He discovers Henri IV and Fénelon in Paris are the most prestigious ones, but their reputation and proven efficiency make it so they are the hardest to get. Instead, and thinking of living costs beforehand, Florian finds a far more interesting offer in the Hauts-de-Seine themselves, reducing the costs of moving in case he does need to rent a flat for the holidays. He talks about it with Roxanne and Juliette who are moving to Paris for their studies, the logical course of action to take in these cases, but they wholesomely support his decision and wish him good luck.

Post-secondary orientation is one of the toughest trials a teenager has to go through. I myself hesitated over my future job, there and after, and I suppose attending Lakanal helped me stall by thinking of potential competitive exams and great schools I could attend later. Who could guess I ever thought about becoming a landscapist by looking at where I am now?

 In the end, and with the help of his main teachers, he fills a demand for two schools. He still caved in for Mrs Paris’s requests for him to request Henri IV, but his main objective is in his first wish, the school which seems to call for him: Lakanal, in the city of Sceaux. It is the closest school he could think of, and yet the few pictures he has seen of this campus-sized middle-high school hybrid resonate with his want for education. There are results in there too, with a few graduates from the prestigious ENS of Ulm Street amongst its former students. To be exact, he has two wishes, and his very first one is the one with the dorm.

He is about to go into his Latin exam, a supplementary oral exam he wishes he did not take back in freshman year when he had to decide if he wanted to continue with that language, when the results are announced with the classic boards he has grown to known for miscellaneous information. Despite the obvious questionable character of displaying everyone’s results publicly like that, he cannot help the grin forming on his face. He allows Roxanne, who discovers his results near him, to hug him despite the discomfort she may feel from his binder and the one he feels from his chest in general. For the span of a few minutes, everything seems all right, everything seems like it cannot go wrong anywhere down the line.

 The finals arrive quicker than everyone ever expects. On his side, his class still has not finished the philosophy program, his English classes are still a mess to decipher, and it seems like he may be running out of time for studying. As such, he allows himself to read his learning sheets in all the waiting rooms he ever is in (mostly Mrs Flamand’s, he has to admit), recites some parts of his lessons when he cooks or showers. Before he knows it, before the entire school knows it, the finals have rolled around and have finished almost as soon as they have come, leaving behind them only the bittersweet taste of predicted subjects and others who completely threw him off guard. He is still sore over the travesty that was the Literature exam.

The day the results are announced is a blessing. He is graduating and it feels so good to have managed to land the “Very Well” general mention on it once he gets to see his grades. Roxanne and Juliette share his joy, to their own extent and personal results, and the three of them realize the downsides to all these: they will not see each other again once this is over. They are parting ways, them to Paris, him to Sceaux, them to college, him to preparatory class. And yet, Roxanne keeps a smile on her face, tells them it is not over for their friendship as long as they can remain in contact. She gets her phone out, smiles as she points at it, reminds them of their email addresses they all have by this point. Juliette dries the beginning of tears in her eyes, agreeing with another smile. In the end, Florian is the last to get over it, but he does not cry, and instead he gives them his address from way back home on a piece of paper.

Needless to say, I did my best to remain in contact. I’ve eventually lost Juliette, due to her changing phones and having her email address unresponsive after a few years, but Roxanne and I are still best friends to this day.

 The summer holidays start on the note that they need to see each other as much as possible while working to spare money for college. As such, they try to have workplaces near each other, but Florian is left out by his much earlier preparations. Instead, he has opted for a place near Mrs Flamand’s office, just in case he needs to see her in a hurry. It is not the most fulfilling activity he has ever had, but it pays decently and he needs this money, so he shrugs off the boredom and soreness at the end of the day by thinking of the pay check and his future studies.

In fact, he gets great enjoyment from following the instruction he got sent early in the summer as a confirmation for his enrolment in Lakanal. He has bought most of the books required for the Literature and language classes, got far more lenient on Philosophy and especially on History. He has nothing against the latter –in fact, he was a great fan of his former teachers on this – but they are the most expensive books for what seems to be a limited use.

 He starts class back in early September, so when he tells Roxanne about it, she almost pleads him to let her drive him there. To be fair, Florian did not have the time or money to get his own driver’s license: he made sure to have his road code before it, but he cannot drive a car himself and it is otherwise very difficult to get from Colombes to Sceaux, so he accepts what she calls an “impromptu road trip!”. It is the best day he has spent in a while, laughs shared and remembering old stories from their previous years.

“To think I dated a boy!” Roxanne seems to tell herself aloud as she tries to keep her calm in the middle of a traffic jam. “Now that’s something I didn’t expect. To think you were still closeted a couple months ago… How has it been?”

“To be honest, it feels so much different. I get stares and some people still call me ‘miss’, but I suppose that’s to be expected. Tell me, does my voice sound bad?”

“No, you sound like… a normal dude? Well,” she seems to correct herself, “a guy whose voice is changing, but that makes sense considering it’s like a second puberty or something. Don’t worry, you’re doing great Flo!”

He blushes slightly at the compliment before replying “thank you”.

 There still are formalities to fill when they arrive to the school. Its grandeur is not reflected in most of the pictures he has seen of it: imposing buildings carved in stone, surrounded by the green of the grass shining in early September’s summer sun. This truly looks like a dream school, one with a rather expensive dorm and lifestyle, but he has the money for it. His summer job and his financial helps for being a student living on his own are all going to this and he hopes the part-time position as a cashier he has found not too far from Lakanal itself will help his finances.

When they arrive to the desk to fill in the last-minute details, such as exact option classes and installing in the dorms, he is the first surprised when the secretary calls him “Florian” without a shred of hesitation. She does hesitate when glancing up to them, hesitating between the short-haired Roxanne and the assigned-female-at-birth Florian, but she has otherwise no difficulty continuing the process.

 It is when they are en route for the dorm that Roxanne fully expresses her surprise about this. She has been used to administrations calling him by his obsolete name that she is perplexed now that he does not. To this, Florian replies with the proudest smile that his enrolment in Lakanal’s preparatory class is the first step of his “administrative transition”.

Even if Roxanne is his closest friend and the one who has seen him at his most vulnerable, he still tries to hide how soothing it was to hear the secretary call him anything but a female name. He has worked on changing his name legally ever since he turned eighteen and got disowned, steadily writing his actual first name on everything, from his bank account to his identity papers. He has stalled on his driver’s license so it could have this, the real way he refers to himself, with a photo of his actual face.

 Once at the dorm, he fills a bit more paperwork, mostly focused on medical information and who to call in case he feels ill. He writes down the number of Mrs Flamand, even if she lives in Colombes, because she is the closest he has to a parent nowadays. He gets the key to his room and another for the post-secondary-only door to the dorm, granting him access to where he is going to sleep. He makes sure to check if it really was remembered that he lives there on the weekends and holidays, to ensure any paper is sent to Roxanne’s home, list goes on. His parents do not need to know where he has actually gone.

When they arrive to his room, on the second floor’s boys building, he is the first to arrive to his room. He says hi to the boys and parents he comes across in the corridor, wondering if they will be in his class or if they are either second-years or in the other similar courses to his. In any case, most if not all of them refer to him as a young man, calling him “sir”, not even noticing how weird his changing voice sounds like. He can see Roxanne winking at him every time he gets called a boy.

 Classes start in the afternoon, so they quickly unpack everything. There are three beds, a small working space and a tiny bathroom with two sinks, clearly meant to just be a quick place to brush one’s teeth (and shave, in men’s case) because of the main bathrooms being collective showers and toilets. A classic, he thinks, considering this seems to be the overwhelming norm in every dorm in the country. He picks the bed closest to the desks, filling his dresser with clothes and some space in the bathroom with a few things here and there. Unpacking his razor reminds him of the seemingly silly joy he feels to finally be able to shave something other than his developing body hair.

Before they part for the afternoon introductory classes, Roxanne wants to go through the “moving list” she has prepared before they left with him. He has made sure to have found a new therapist in Sceaux, a nearby doctor, a supermarket to buy anything he could need… Keeping the note in his belongings, he hugs Roxanne one last time as she leaves the premises and he goes to attend his very first class. His objective is clear: make a name for himself and see if he can make a couple friends, especially in his dorm room.

[megairishrose]

Put a Patch on it chapter 26

Emma nodded. She kept learning important things about Killian, insights to his life. Both he and his sister were hurting. And Emma was the only one who could stop the pain and close that chapter for them.

"I want phone records, emails, traffic cameras, all plans. I want to know when any of the board members sneeze." Tara forced herself to turn back to the present.

"Tara, I got this. You have other things to worry about." Emma told her softly. "The Jewel needs a CEO who is fully focused on the company and bringing it to a better place. Please, leave it to me."

"Oh sorry, did I tell you how to run your town? Don't tell me how to run my company." That made her panic, her company. "Wow, I hadn't said that out loud." Tara leaned back in her chair and took a deep breath. "Fine, the investigation is yours. Have it. I won't interfere."

"Thank you. I will bring justice for Liam." Emma said, that was directed to both Tara and Killian. And she meant it. But first she needed some more details. "I'm sorry I'm making you relive that day, but I am going to need your side of the story." Emma told Tara gently. This was always the hardest part of her job.

Tara sat in front of Emma, Killian was next to her for emotional support. She gulped, back in Storybrooke, she had only given Killian the watered down version. Now, she couldn't leave out any details. The tiniest thing could lead to them to whoever wanted Liam dead.

She did her best, ignoring the tears that threatened to fall. Tara had really thought she was numb by now. Killian has already grabbed her hand and squeezed.

"You shot Peter? No one is charging you with murder? How is that possible?" Emma was shocked.

"He shot at me first, so it was self-defense. One down, two to go. That's what he said. He was going to kill me next."

"How is your relationship with the other board members?" She opened a file to read the names. "Cora Hart, Sidney Glass, Ursula Anderson, and Arthur Pyle?"

Killian chuckled. "The board is a necessary evil. We have never seen eye to eye on any subject."

"But no one would stoop to murder?"

"Injure maybe, but there's no coming back from pre-mediated murder. It would ruin their lives and careers."

"So you don't think Peter was acting alone? That there's someone else? Anyone in your past who might want you dead?"

"Emma, you might be under the impression that we are innocent angels. But we most likely made enemies during our younger days."

"Something like that coming back to haunt us is entirely possible." Killian added.

"That's personal, what about professional? You said that the Jewel used to be the second largest shipping company. What about the new number two?"

"That owner is honest, wouldn't hurt a fly. He was good friends with our father. We played with his kids." Marco and his family were close friends, despite being the competition. Business and personal lives were very different things and were kept far apart."

"Just to be safe, keep him on the list." Killian said. Tara sent him a shocked look. "I just want us to safe, cover all the bases."

"What happened when things calmed down at the office?" Emma asked.

"Ruby brought me a new sweater, mine was blood stained. Neal came, so did Roxanne. We are stayed here for a short time. Robin took Roxanne home. Neal and I went home. I hugged my daughter tight. Then I booked a flight to Storybrooke. I told my staff to keep it all quiet. I did not want Killian to find out that his brother via the media."

"Thoughtful." Killian whispered, squeezed her hand.

The small bar was half full when Emma entered it later that night. Well, it was a Wednesday night, that was to be expected. She had finally gotten out of the office and she need to unwind a little bit.

Blarney Stone was kitschy Irish but when you looked past the deco, the food and drinks were amazing. Or so said the review on Yelp.

One would think being in an Irish bar was the last place Emma wanted to be, she dealt first hand with Irish all day. But maybe this would let her gain some insight to how they thought.

Emma was just here for drinks; she hadn't planned on eating. She watched the bar over the rim of her glass. She had never been a Guinness fan, but when in Rome. Actually this had to be the best Guinness she ever had. Maybe it was the atmosphere. "Can I get another?" She asked the bartender.

"Put her drinks on my tab, Evan."

She recognized that voice, Emma inwardly growled. She thought she wouldn't have to deal with that voice until the morning. "Can you guys stop buying things for me? I still need to pay Tara back for the taxi and the hotel room."

"I'm off the clock, I have an idea of how you could make it up to me…" Killian began, eyes twinkling.

Well, that was bold. "I'm off the clock too, which means I could punch you." Emma shot back.

"I meant a game of darts." He held up six darts. "You play?"

"Don't think I don't know exactly where you were going with that comment, Killian." Emma said, he was not going to pull the wool over her eyes. She had seen enough of his personality back in Storybrooke. Ladies' man didn't begin to cover it. Yes, she did know how to play darts, she had pretty good aim. But let Killian find that out the hard way. "You want to take advantage of an inexperienced dart player?"

Killian led her to the dart board and handed her three green darts. Green like her eyes. "Playing darts is like anything else, you need to find a good teacher." And he dared to touch her hand and showed her how to throw the dart.

Emma already knew how to throw a dart but the closeness threw her off balance.

"Let go." He all but whispered in her ear. The dart went sailing across the room but sadly did not hit the board.

Killian took a step back and handed her another dart. With the distance between them, his spell over her was broken. She could think clearly now. Emma aimed and threw the second dart.

This time it hit the center of the board.

"Impressive. Like I said, good teacher." He paused. "You've done this before, haven't you?"

"Maybe." She tried not to smile, that would blow her cover.

"You would get along great with my sister. Years ago, she fooled me and Liam into thinking she didn't know how to play poker. Cleaned us out in the fifth hand."

"So Tara is human?"

"She remembers her humanity every so often."

Emma and Killian played round after round of darts. And the drinks kept coming.

"Wait, wait, we need to toast before we drink! Do you know any?" Emma said, or rather sang slightly.

"Do I know any toasts? You are looking at the king of toasts." Killian stood up. "Here's to a long life and a merry one. A quick death and an easy one. A pretty girl and an honest one. A cold beer and another one." He was even all dramatic about it. There was a cheer from the next table. Killian knocked his mug into Emma's and drank.

"You know, until tonight I was not a fan of Guinness." She set down her fourth or was it her fifth glass. She couldn't remember.

"Maybe there's a little Irish in you." Killian observed.

Emma could feel her armor cracking and she suddenly became bold. "You want to be the little Irish in me?"

Killian's eyes bugged. That was a first. No woman had played the game as well as he had before. "Wow, you are drunk. I am cutting you off." He signaled to Evan. Then Killian leaned close. "And there's nothing little about it, I assure you."

Emma giggled then something in her face changed. "I could be Irish for all I know. My parents left me on the side of the road when I was a few hours old. I know nothing of my roots. I envy you, Killian. Not only can you trace your family back, you have connections with them. Names, dates, details, relationships. I have none of that."

Killian led her to a booth, she should not be on her feet after baring her heart. "You'll find your parents and have everything you ever wanted." He had faith.

"I tried, it's a dead end. So I just to focus on the here and now. It hurts less." Emma said.

"What about the future?"

That made her pause. Her future? She had a decent job, a least now she did. What more did she want? Love, a family, happiness? Pipe dreams, all of them. She couldn't just wish on a star and everything would magically happen. No, Emma Swan had to work for what she wanted. "The future? I don't even know what I'm wearing tomorrow." She joked, her preferred method of protection.

Killian wanted to joke about what Emma should or rather should not wear the following day but decided against. He could relate, slightly. He had always felt like the black sheep in his family. Emma was the only sheep in her family.

They locked eyes for a moment and it looked like she was going to…

"Killian!" A young woman's voice broke their moment. She bounced over to the booth. "I'm going to do my first Irish car bomb! Do it with me."

Emma studied the girl, she looked too young to be drinking and there was something familiar about her.

"I'm getting too old for this." Killian said under his breath but he did pull himself to his feet. "Emma, this is Kathleen McCartney, my cousin. She just turned twenty-one. Kathleen, this is Detective Emma Swan. She is helping us at the office." That was the best way to word it.

Oh, cousin, no wonder they looked alike. At least it hadn't taken Emma as long to realize like with Tara and Killian.

Kathleen's eyes widened. "Helping at the office… wait, are you going to catch the bastard who killed Liam?"

"Kathleen, language!" Killian sounded horrified.

"What, my parents aren't around." She shrugged.

"Excuse me, I'll be right back." Killian led Kathleen to the bar." One car bomb then I need to leave. I'll have Evan keep an eye on your drinking tonight."

"He would do that without being asked."

"That's what cousins are for."

Killian was right, he was not as young as he used to be. He could still handle his liquor but no need to push the limits. He half swayed back to the booth. Shockingly, Emma was still there. There was an empty glass in front of her.

"It's just water." She saw the look on his face.

"Good, as much as I want to help the damsel in distress get back to her room…"

"I think you are the damsel here, Killian." She got to her feet and grabbed his arm.

"Whatever floats your boat, lass." He tended to revert to terms of endearment when he drank.

"Lass? Wow, now you are drunk. You need to go home."

"No, I am taking you to your hotel, then I will call a cab."

"Seriously?"

"It's good form."

Emma decided not to fight him. They walked onto the street and headed to her hotel.

The night air seemed to wake Killian up. He realized Emma's arm was linked through his. He wasn't sure who that was for more and he wasn't going to question it.

They finally got to the front of the Mark hotel. Killian and Emma stood there staring at each other, unsure what to say or do.

Emma got herself together first. "I had a good time tonight, Killian." She was being honest. At least she wasn't drunk, drunk Emma did stupid things. But tipsy Emma?

She meant to kiss his cheek, but she missed the target. It was an accident, on purpose maybe. And Killian didn't stop her.

They fit together.

One of his hands rested on her waist while the other one was tangled in her hair. Emma's hands were tight on his collar.

Kissing him made her drunk and she didn't want to be sober. Apparently Emma now thought in clichés.

But she had to end it, before someone got hurt. She was working for his family; he was part of the job.

Emma pulled back and had to catch her breath. Killian's own breath was ragged. "Good night, Mr. Jones." She suddenly became professional.

He took the hint, reluctantly. Killian took a step back. "Good night, Detective Swan."

Emma entered the building and forced herself not to turn around.

So she didn't see Killian touch his lips and blink a few times.

Last night was stupid. Emma was never going to drink again. If she was being honest, she wouldn't have been surprised to wake up next to him. But she had shown self-control and shockingly so had Killian.

Last night had been a one-time thing. Things were going to be professional between them going forward. She wasn't going to touch him or be around him outside of the office.

Last night had been a moment in Heaven.

Emma slapped herself. "Pull yourself together. He has women lining up for him. Don't be one of those." God, she was at the pep talk stage.

She had to get the Jewel before he did, lock herself in her office and pretend to be on the phone all day. Anything to avoid talking to Killian.

That was her plan and it worked perfectly until she saw Killian out of the corner of her eyes. Actually she saw the flowers first.

Emma panicked and ducked under the first desk she saw. Flowers! Flowers? Pink carnations to be exact. Seriously, how old school was that?

"What are you doing under my desk?"

Emma looked up and saw a frazzled Noelle staring down at her. "Killian and I might have had a moment last night and now he has flowers."

Noelle was stunned then looked at the calendar. "Those flowers aren't for you."

"What?" Who did Killian bring flowers for? Emma was curious and maybe a little jealous, dare she say it.

"You're an idiot. If you have a few free minutes, I'll show you."

Around twelve thirty, Noelle knocked on Emma's office door. "You got a free few minutes?"

"Yeah." Emma was curious. She hated to admit it, but Killian fascinated her. He put on a cocky face most of the time but occasionally there was a reliable and caring person.

Noelle led her down a hallway to where Tara and Killian had their offices. She opened one of the doors. Emma peered in, there was only a table in the middle of the room. On the table were seven vases and a few battery operated candles.

Emma quickly spotted the flowers in one of the vases. There was something taped to it.

Kathleen Jones.

"That's their mother." Noelle stated the obvious. "Today is her birthday."

Emma saw the year of death and quickly did the math. Killian was just two years old. Was he just a motherless child?

Then she read the other cards on the vases.

Donald Jones.

Sophia Jones.

Robert McCartney.

Claire McCartney.

Michael Jones.

Liam Jones.

"It's a tradition that Mr. Jones, their father, started. New flowers on birthdays, wedding anniversaries, and the day they passed."

"Kind of morbid?" Emma remarked, hoping Noelle wouldn't judge.

Noelle gave her a hard stare. "You haven't been here long enough but family means everything to Tara and Killian."