#they’d most likely let her children get access to it or whatever she left at HERA. If it’s a locker

[seduceme-lovestruck-thearcana]

Reminder to myself: Write a fic about AFK MCs mom and MC cleaning out her drawer/locker/office bc once she died H.E.R.A. let her children have whatever was left there.

[the-thing-inside-your-closet]

Trick or Treat…or Else

This is unfinished because I felt like I kept screwing up Jason’s characterisation a bit. Gotta work on that.

Jason glanced up at the clock hanging on the wall to his left, it’s was 2:57 on Halloween. His patrol wasn’t due to start for a few more hours, but something tugged at him that cause him to feel like something was going to happen. He wasn’t sure if it was a good or bad feeling just yet. He just knew that whatever is was put him on edge.

“Haven’t you taken enough pictures, Danny?” Tucker laughed through the screen of the computer Danny had set up in a four way call between himself, Sam, Tucker, and Jazz.

“I could never have too many pictures of my little princess!” Danny retorted as he snapped another photo of little Ellie in her Halloween costume.

“Ahem!” Ellie puffed out her chest and put her hands on her hips. The pose made her look even cuter, Danny thought.

“Oh my apologise,” Danny grinned cheekily, “my little badass.” He corrected himself.

Ellie, decked out in her mini Red Hood costume. The child sized leather jacket had been a gift courtesy of Sam, while the mini Red Hood helmet had been designed and built by both Tucker and Danny working together to ensure it would be perfect. They might have gone a little overboard however, since they’d managed to incorporated a real working com unit, an air filtration system in case of a gas attack, night vision, heat vision, and an emergency beacon should Ellie wander off and get lost that only Danny or Tucker could access. Danny had also hand painted two nerf guns for her, and gave her hand painted ‘grenades’ that were just glitter bombs. Ellie had insisted, just in case she was ‘forced’ to choose ‘trick’ from Trick or Treat.

“Danny,” Jazz voice held a fondness to it, “if you keep it up with the picture not only will you no longer have any space on there, you guys will be too late for the trick or treating.”

“Oh no! I don’t wanna miss it,” Ellie ran to Danny and started tugging on the sleeve of his costume, “let’s go!” She looked up at him and though the helmet obstructed Danny being able to see Ellie’s face, he could feel it in his bones that she was giving him those big puppy dog eyes of hers.

After a dramatic show of sighing in defeat, he picked up his daughter and said, “alright my starlight, but let’s say bye to the others first though.”

“Bye Uncle Tuck, Aunty Sam, and Aunt Jazz!” Ellie waved her little gloves hand at the screen from her place in her dad’s arms.

Tucker, Sam and Jazz all waved back and said their goodbyes and wishing her a fun time trick or treating. Danny bid his friends and sister farewell and ended the call.

“C’mon Little Hood, let’s go bug our neighbours for candy,” Danny beamed at Ellie as he put her back down and held out her candy bucket which had been a plastic black pumpkin from a dollar store. He’d hand painted a red bat symbol on the front of it for her, so that it would match her costume more. Ellie held the bucket in one hand, and held her dad’s hand in the other as they exited their apartment.

The clock had ticked over to 3:20pm the next time Jason spared it a glance. The trick or treaters would be put and about now. Most cities started later, but in Gotham there was always the risk of a rouge attack, so many parents would go out earlier, just to make sure they were home to avoid being out when it started to get darker.

Jason stretched his arms above his head and marked his page before putting down the book he’d just been reading. He stood up slowly and made his way over to his front door, checking that he had some Halloween candy at the ready just in case someone knocked on his door before he took off for the night. Jason knew that his building had several families with children under 14, so the likely hood of getting at least one truck or treated was pretty high.

When he was satisfied that he had everything in place he returned to the couch, picked his book back up and waited.

“Trick or treat!” Ellie cheered as the door opened.

The middle aged woman who opened the door let out a small gasp, “oh my,” she said with a smile, “Red Hood, I didn’t know you’d be patrolling our building?” Her tone was teasing as she reached somewhere past the door to grab some candy for Ellie’s pumpkin.

“Of course ma’am!” Ellie happily played along, making her own attempt at a deep ‘man’ voice, “crime could be anywhere!”

“Well I certainly feel safer knowing you’re out there protecting us Red Hood,” the woman laughed, “have a good patrol.” With that she closed the door, and Danny and Ellie Bahn making their way to the next ‘civilian’ as Ellie had started to call their neighbours.

Five groups of kids had come to Jason’s door so far. It was getting later, and he knew he’d need to start getting ready soon. Just as he was weighing the pros and cons of heading out on patrol early another knock sounded from the door to his apartment.

[thebetawolfgirl]

Bonding Time pt3

Pairing: Timmy x Reader

Warnings: Smut, Smut and more Smut!

A/N: Enjoy!

Bonding Time pt 3

The happy couple were back from their honeymoon and y/n’s mother called her to let her know she was home and if she wanted to meet them for dinner. Y/n rolled her eyes walking around her kitchen cleaning up as she went listening to her mother describing every detail of the honeymoon, Timmy came in from the bedroom lighting a cigarette as he leaned against the counter.

‘Mom Timmy just came in, hey do you wanna meet mom and your dad for dinner tonight?’

He nodded in affirmation as she tried to grab the cigarette from his hand glaring ‘No smoking in my house, asshole.’

He took the phone from her hand and told her mother they would be there tonight while grabbing her by the throat pinning her to the wall. ‘Yeah we’ll meet you here and we’ll just take the one car, yeah that is a great idea.’

Y/n gripped his wrist and shoved his hand off her throat before leaning forward and biting and nipping his neck as he listened to his father on the phone talking about the golf course at the hotel.

‘Uh-huh’ he mumbled as he shoved y/n away from him seeing her smirk at him. He put the cigarette between his lips and pulled her back to him, she knocked his hand away and took his cigarette from him and walked away with it between her own lips. He looked back glaring at her retreating form, ‘Yes Stacey’s fine she’s working in her mother’s salon. No, dad it’s not serious. No I’m not seeing anyone else.’

Y/n walked over and took the phone ‘We’ll see you guys at dinner tonight at 7. Fine 6, doesn’t give much time to get ready but whatever. Bye.’

She hung up and turned around only to be pinned to the wall with her arms trapped above her head and Timmy attacking her neck.

‘Asshole get off we need to get ready’

‘No you stole my smoke, then wasted it by putting it out.’

‘Boo friggin hoo.’

She moved her leg over his and tripped him making him fall back with a thud taking her with him and kissed him tangling her fingers in his messy hair, he kissed her back hungrily running his hands up her tank top before pulling it over her head and lifting them both off the floor walked over to the couch and pushed her back landing on top her and began kissing up her neck again. She sat up letting her head fall back giving him better access holding him against her by his head while raking her nails down his back with the other making him release a breathless groan.

She left marks on him constantly now, not caring if Stacey saw them or whoever saw it. No one would ever expect he was fucking his step sister all the time.

He ended up doing Stacey, but he came straight from her’s to y/n’s to get the smell and feel of Stacey off him, y/n was like a hot shower after Stacey. Timmy was fucking his step sister most nights yet it was having sex with his girlfriend that felt unnatural.

He was pulled back to reality when he felt y/n sink down on him slowly and gasped against her shoulder biting down on her skin as he bottomed out inside her and he clung to her his fingers digging into her skin and began moving with her slowly at first then harder and faster. He fell back against the armrest of her sofa pulling her on top of him so she could ride him.

He noticed they weren’t as violent with each other these days, he still grabbed her throat when she went for him, but even that was rare. They still behaved like spoilt children with each other, annoying and teasing each other. But something had shifted over the past few weeks.

He spent most nights at hers now, the night started with them fucking but it ended in them just sleeping together, whenever they went out with friends they’d end up meeting up somewhere in the middle or ending up at the same bar or night club then spend the rest of the night just with each other.

The night would always end with both of them going home in the same cab, even though Stacey always wanted Timmy to come home with her but he always said he promised his step mother he would see she was home safe if they were out together.

They broke the kiss as she sat up and rode him harder and he wrapped his arms around her sitting up with her kissing her shoulder and any skin he could reach. His hair was already beginning to stick to his forehead in strands from sweat as he panted heavily and grabbed her hips before lifting her up slightly making her move up and down and ran his hands up and down as she continued the movement and buried his face in her neck as they clung to one another tightly moving against each other harder and faster before coming in a heap of sweat and limbs and breathless pants.

They had around one hour, they figured to get washed and dressed before their parents showed up at the door so he went to quickly get changed and came back to find her sitting on the kitchen countertop scrolling through her phone and walked over to stand between her legs and leaned against her with his own phone and waited for their parents to arrive.

‘I’ve sent your father the GPS coordinates to find my apartment.’

Timmy hummed and nipped the exposed skin on her shoulder in thanks.

She ran her over his back, and snapped a picture with her phone which earned her a harder bite on her neck, she shoved his shoulder and slapped him not as hard across the face.

‘Stop taking pictures,’

‘Oh because you don’t have hundreds of pictures of us right after sex in your phone.’

He smirked and kissed her and took a picture on his phone.

‘My face better be covered in that.’

‘It is.’ He assured her as he added it to the private album in his phone when the doorbell rang.

‘Time to go.’ He walked over and opened the door.

‘Dad, Elaine welcome back.’ He hugged his father while y/n kissed and hugged her mother before switching places with her, and hugging Elaine.

‘Let me get my coat and we’ll get going.’

‘Yes we don’t have much time, we got stuck at those road works over the Brooklyn Bridge.’

Timothée nodded bored already of his father, why did they agree to this again?

‘Y/n are you ready or what?’

‘Hold on, I’m just fixing my coat’ Y/n called from her bedroom.

‘It’s a coat just throw it on before it’s breakfast we’ll be ordering.’

She came through glaring at him trying to remove her hair from the inside her coat.

Timmy walked over and did it for her and fixing it around her shoulders.

They both looked over to see each parent looking at them oddly.

‘What?’

‘You kids got close while we were away huh?’

‘He fixed my hair, I’d hardly say we’re BFF’s mom.’

‘Hm anything but.’

She turned and smacked his shoulder ‘Shut up Timmy.’

‘Make me.’ He smirked as they left the apartment and headed downstairs.

They got into the car, both siblings in the back and Greg started the engine and drove out of the street.

It was dark outside so Timmy smirked and while his father prattled on about the golf course and her mother talked about the spa in the hotel and the beach and the cute little town they visited, rested his hand on y/n’s thigh tracing his thumb over her skin.

He was teasing her she knew but it was a good distraction from the mind numbing details of her mother’s and step father’s honeymoon. Timmy quickly moved his hand away as his step mother looked back at them smiling.

‘That sounds incredible mom.’

‘Yeah we’ll need to go back there, maybe for a family vacation.’

‘Good excuse for me to buy a new bikini.’

Timmy pretended to make a gagging noise which earned him his hair being pulled by y/n.

‘Ow, y/n y/n get off me.’ He gritted out grabbing her wrists trying to wrench them off his hair.

‘Enough you two, look we’re here.’

Y/n let him go roughly as the two adults got out of the car and quickly felt him grab her jaw to place a chaste but rough kiss on her lips. They smirked devilishly at one another and got out of the car.

And walked towards the restaurant.

They got through dinner in peace and except a few times where y/n had to grip Timmy’s leg to stop him when his father made a comment about Timmy’s family or his choices in life.

After dinner was finished, y/n excused herself to get a cigarette and some fresh air and Timmy rose to join her. ‘We’ll get you outside.’

‘Thank god that’s over with, thought I’d die of boredom.’ Y/n mumbled taking a drag of her cigarette before passing it to Timmy.

‘Tell me about it, I was gonna shove his wine into his smug face if he didn’t stop fucking talking about my ‘life choices’ fucking pretentious prick.’

She leaned forward and rubbed his back slowly feeling him relax. ‘Just ignore him. He’s ignored you half your life he doesn’t get to have a say in how live it just because he’s married now.’

Timmy sighed and lay his head on her shoulder wrapping his arm around her waist.

‘I can’t go back into that car with him. I’ll kill him.’

Y/n nodded and held his face up press a light kiss on his lips before looking over at the restaurant and seeing their parents talking to someone at another table. ‘Looks like we’ll be better off walking home,’ she pointed to the restaurant window and Timmy glanced over seeing his father talking to his old boss.

‘I’ll text my mother and tell her we’re walking to yours- hm’ He cut her off kissing her and she kissed him back before he moved down her neck she quickly text her mother the message and put her phone back into her bag and ran her fingers up and down his back over his dress shirt. ‘Let’s start walking to yours before they come out and see us.’

The began the 3block walk to Timmy’s apartment and talked about idle things.

‘Are you going to Stacey’s tomorrow night?’

‘No, she’s working late tomorrow night.’

‘She liking the work at her mom’s salon?’

‘I think so, I haven’t really spoken to her lately.’

‘Why not?’

He smirked ‘Been busy.’

She smirked walking beside him as he threw his arm around her shoulder and leaned down to kiss her neck.

They reached his building and she looked up.

‘I don’t think I’ve ever been in your place before.’

‘Really?’ He mumbled against her throat as he grabbed her around the waist pulling her against him and kissed up her neck before reaching her lips swaying against her.

She grabbed his hand and dragged him into his building and he shut the door behind him and dragged her upstairs to his apartment. Once inside he shoved her against the door hard and kissed her roughly grabbing a handful of her backside under her dress before lifting it over her head and tossing it.

She felt for his top button of his shirt as the house was in complete darkness, and ripped his shirt open hearing the buttons fly across the room and smirked hearing his growl.

He grabbed her and threw her over his shoulder making her squeal and carried her to the bedroom and throwing her on the bed. She reached up and unbuttoned his jeans and slowly sliding them down realising he had nothing on underneath and quickly took him in her mouth getting him harder than he already was and smirked at his grunt of surprise.

‘Fuck, y/n!’

She smiled and sucked him a few more times before letting him and dragging him onto the bed with her, he crushed his mouth against her instantly kissing her hard before ramming into her without warning making her shriek digging her nails into his chest. He began a hard and rough pace ramming into her without stopping before flipping them over to bring her on top and let her ride him.

‘Ride me y/n.’

She whimpered and began slamming down on him hard over and over and rocking against him meeting his own thrusts.

She leaned down kissing him hard as he held on to her digging his fingers into her skin not caring if she was covered in bruises.

She had told him some of her work colleagues and friends had noticed her bruises on different occasions and she had just brushed them off as just hardcore cardio.

They were both so occupied with each other they hadn’t heard the front door or his dad’s voice. He had sat them up and he had her by the throat kissing her as they rocked against each other becoming breathless with their damp skin sticking to each other. They were getting closer and they clung to each other as they came together in tangled mess of bedsheets and sweaty limbs. Timmy fell backwards against the pillows with y/n collapsed on top of him just as the bedroom door opened shining light from the hallway and Timmy covered his eyes squinting.

‘Timothée?’

‘Dad, Jesus put the fucking light out.’

Greg switches the hallway light off but recognises his step daughter naked on top of his son.

He shut the door and spoke through it.

‘Timothée, was that who I think it was in bed with you?!’

Y/n turned her head on Timmy’s chest towards the door, calling out ‘Hi Greg.’

‘I wanna see both of you in the living room now!’

They could hear him walking down the hall towards the living room.

They looked at each other before smirking trying not to laugh.

‘Oh well. I guess the secret is out.’

He hummed watching her in the dark room ‘Too bad, this was fun sneaking around. Do you think he’ll tell your mom.’

She shrugs her shoulders ‘I don’t care.’ She leaned up and pecked his lips as he ran his hands up and down her still damp back and kissed her back.

‘We really need to go talk to him.’

Y/n mumbled against his lips before moving down to kiss and nip his neck.

‘Hmm. Sure thing, let’s just finish what you’re doing then we’ll go through.’

She smiled and continued to kiss up and down his throat as he sighed closing his eyes. She reached his lips again and sat up on her knees and held his face pulling him up with her ‘Come on, let’s go face him together.’

He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed down her neck and kissed and nibbled all over her chest and shoulders and every patch of skin he could reach before licking a long strip up her throat to her lips where she grabbed his jaw and kissed him hard before breaking away breathless

‘What-‘

‘For courage.’ He smirked before pecking her lips and letting her go and grabbing his jeans and throwing them on while she grabbed an old T-shirt she had found and her underwear and left the bedroom together, coming face to face with Timmy’s father.

@sufferingstarlight

@gatoenlaciudad

@kteezy997

@lixzey

@tchalamss

[bastart13]

Unfortunately I couldn’t help but think through a few ironic implications of Portia’s Reversed ending

Fic below the cut

[1.5k words, tw character dying, set in Portia’s Reversed ending so spoilers]

A decade or so after their story ended

Isha let their head fall back with a rattling, haggard sigh. They closed their eyes, letting the gentle rocking of the docked ship lull their heart into a calm pace. It was almost enough for them to forget their troubles if it wasn’t for the sharp aches in their hip or the sheer effort it took to take a breath.

They’d never been good at listening to their own discomfort. They’d lived with discomfort all the life they remembered, whether it be from minor inconveniences with their arm, or the ever-present fatigue since magic left their world. But now, their body screamed at them everything they’d been trying to ignore. Everything they’d kept from Portia.

A chipper, rhythmic knocking on the door took them out of their thoughts. Despite everything, Isha couldn’t help but smile.

“Welcome back,” they called.

The door swung open with no hesitation as their wife bound into the room. Her sunny smile lit up the room, emphasising the wrinkles around her mouth and eyes. A true smile, reserved for Isha and their children alone. She kicked off her worn boots, shutting the door behind her as she waltzed over to the bed.

“I’ve been missing you,” she teased, leaning in for a quick kiss. “We should be ready to undock soon. Jasna’s grown up to be a fine bosun. I swear, soon they’ll be rigging the boat with their hands tied behind their back just for the challenge. Right after we—”

Portia’s eyes locked onto their bedside table. A half-finished tankard of beer sat over an unfamiliar note filled edge-to-edge with scrawling ink. Her eyebrows tensed, frowning.

“Was Ilya here?”

“Yes, he just left,” Isha said. “He was sorry he couldn’t stay to see you, but he needed to get back to his partner before dark.”

“Did he at least squeeze in a ‘hello’ to his nieces and nephews?” she asked, her voice lightening to a dangerous cheer. Isha shook their head, looking back to the note.

“No…”

They needed to tell her.

He’d written everything she’d need to know but she didn’t deserve to hear it from Julian’s letter.

Portia stroked through their dull curls, pushing them away from their face before gently cupping their cheek.

“Are you feeling better from this morning?” she asked.

Isha took a short, weary breath.

“I’m not well, Portia,” they said softly. “I went outside for some fresh air this afternoon, when I ran into Julian and I had one of those attacks. He helped me back to see what was wrong and it’s getting worse.”

Hurt flickered across her expression before she slapped on a determined smile.

“But he told you how to treat it, right? That’s what the note is. I know we’re charted to sail down the Strait of Seals but if we don’t have what you need or the cold would be too much, we can change course,” she reassured, picking up a pace with no intention of stopping. “And look on the bright side! Now Ilya’s seen you, we might be able to get you back on your feet. You’ve been feeling low for a while now, think of all the places we can visit once you’re better. You can get back off the ship and travel inland. I’ve heard it’s really settled down in the north and I’d love it if we could visit Sun lake again—”

“There’s nothing to treat it,” Isha asserted, but Portia barrelled past.

“—And if we’re passing through Galbrada we can meet back up with Lavi. In his last letters, he was so excited about his travels—”

“I’m dying.”

Portia’s voice cut out.

The ship creaked and drummed with the distant movement of the crew above deck but to them, the quiet hung in the air like a dense fog.

“You’re not dying,” she insisted, the shine in her eyes fracturing. “You’re not dying, you’ll be okay,” she repeated. “I’m the Ambassador of Vesuvia! Along with Prakra, we’re one of the most powerful cities in the land and I have ships in every port in the five seas, loaded with imports. Ilya just must not know what we have access to. Even if—if you’re as ill as he says, we can find a cure. He could look again o-or we could go to Nazali. I know they’re older now, but they’ve trained so many medics, and if that doesn’t work, I know the leader of Urdangabil. They’re one of the leading pioneers of new medicine and if I look through my silvered book, I’m sure I can find something to get her to—”

“No.” Isha gripped Portia’s hand, staring deep into her eyes. Their gaze softened, their care hurting her more than any blade. “I’m dying, Portia

She frantically shook her head, her lip quivering.

“Don’t say that.”

“I’ve been dying ever since the magic left.”

“You’re not going to die! You’re going to be okay…”

“I was never going to live that long. It was borrowed time.”

“You told me you were okay!” Portia sobbed. There was nothing else she could say. She broke.

Pearly tears streamed down her cheeks and she collapsed into Isha’s embrace. She gripped their nightdress, holding onto them like a drowning woman to driftwood. Helpless sobs wracked through her body and Isha held onto their wife in return, gently rubbing her shoulder with their stump. It felt unfair. They were still so warm. Their heart beat the same reassuring patter as whenever Portia curled up against their chest. How could they… How…

But she knew how. She knew why and the thought only made her choking cries harsher.

“I’m sorry…” Isha said softly. “You deserved to know sooner… I wasn’t okay.”

Their chest grew wet from Portia’s tears and they only held her closer.

“It’s… gotten worse over the years,” they explained. “The first few were just this tiredness, but then my headaches came back. Tiredness became exhaustion. I felt… hollow. Like I was using myself up from the inside with every breath and step. It wasn’t until Julian saw me that I recognised it… You know me; I’m useless at asking for help.” They tried for a smile, even if Portia couldn’t see it. “I’m thankful every day I didn’t put that promise in my vows.”

Her crying hitched with a hysterical laugh before slamming her fist against their chest.

“STOP IT!” she yelled, her voice cracking. “J-Just stop it… Stop being s-so stupidly calm! How can y-you just—just accept this?! We’ve done so much… so much… All together. How could I have missed it? I have secrets on every city’s leader. I have ears and eyes everywhere. How—How didn’t even know my own spouse was d-dying!”

“I didn’t know,” Isha whispered, “and I didn’t tell you. It’s not your fault.”

“But it is! You know it is more than anyone. I was the one who chose to kill Aunt Tasya! I could have talked to her. I could have done anything to convince her, I could have…" She stilled under Isha’s arm. Tears dripped from her wide, unfocused eyes.

Moving like a stiff puppet, she fell out of their embrace.

“...The Arcana,” she whispered, the words barely leaving her lips. “I know Asra looked into it and found nothing… but that was just the first year. We have access to so much more… That’s it. I… I could try and call on them. On the other world. Even on—”

Portia jolted out of her daze with Isha’s iron clasp around her wrist and their amber eyes boring into her with a fire she hadn’t seen in years.

“You can’t,” they ordered. “Whatever happens, you can’t repeat Tasya’s mistakes. When we killed her, we accepted the consequences, and I don’t regret it. I can’t let you fall down that path. No matter what happens to me, you need to remember that. I’m not saying you can’t grieve, but you have to let me go.”

More tears welled up and rolled down her cheeks. Isha let go of her wrist, reach up to hold her face and brush them away with their thumb.

“You’ve done everything you can for me and more,” they said.  “You’ve given me a goal, friends, a family. It means more than I could ever say, and I’m glad I’ve had this time with you, but it was always a half-filled hourglass.” They inhaled sharply, their chest suddenly feeling too empty until they breathed through the pain. Their eyes fell closed as they rested their forehead against Portia’s. “I’ve died once before. I don’t remember anything about the life I had before it, but as hard as it is, I know it’s different this time. I don’t want to die. I’m scared. I hate upsetting you. I want to see our children grow up and know the lives they’ll lead. But I’ve accepted it. I can’t ignore it or put it off.”

They pulled back with burning eyes and a tight throat.

“You’ve made my life worth more than I ever thought it could be. I love you, my light. Thank you for loving me.”

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Hey! I love your meta’s, a little while ago you talked about The Order of the Phoenix as an organization could you talk about the Death Eaters?

The post anon is referencing.

TL;DR the Order is incompetently hilarious and Dumbledore is a man who trusts no one.

Oh, the Death Eaters, what to say about the Death Eaters...

In a World Without Voldemort, They'd Probably Be Arsonists

One of the things JKR implies in the series, and something fandom seems to take for granted, is that Tom Riddle is the ultimate corrupting influence.

Were it not for him, the Wizarding World would be a much better place, and people like Bellatrix LeStrange would be productive members of society.

As soon as he is killed, even, by Harry, the good guys win, their problems all presumably solved, and Harry tells his son Albus Severus that it's totally fine if he's put into Slytherin.

I don't believe that though.

To me, it's not so much that Tom Riddle corrupted these people, but that he gave them an organized cause. The people themselves, oh, they were itching for a fight.

In a world without Tom I think they'd be a loosely, poorly organized, group (probably with Bellatrix as the ring leader) where they commit acts of domestic terrorism probably involving burning offensive shops to the ground or attacking muggleborns, halfbloods, and blood traitors.

Voldemort, to me, is designed to pander to them (and not the other way around).

The Death Eaters' Beginnings

So, first off, I think Tom's goals are not what he says they are. What he represents to his followers is exactly what they want to hear, wrapped in a grandiose theatric bow that they just love.

But how did this all start?

First, I don't believe in the Knights of Walpurgis. Instead I think Tom came relatively out of nowhere in the 70's uses parseltongue to prove his heritage as the Heir of Slytherin and thus of purer blood than any of them.

He throws these exciting rallies/parties that the rebellious, angsty, teenage heirs all go to. There he says everything they wanted to hear in the most eloquent manner they've ever heard, promises them the action that their fathers have never delivered, promises them a role in the glorious revolution and a place in history, and probably offers them mounds of cocaine.

All the Death Eaters we see, or the core of them, appear to be in this age range where they'd be in Hogwarts or just out of it when Voldemort came knocking. I can imagine they're all whipped up with excitement, YEAH LET'S BLOW UP THE MUDBLOODS and for some that's great, for others... things don't go the way they expected.

October 31, 1981: It All Falls Apart

Regulus famously steals Tom's horcrux. I imagine it wasn't so much that he learned the error of his ways but that he saw what Tom Riddle was really after: the destruction of his very society.

Lucius is riding high until October 31, 1981 and he sees the complete destruction of the entire Black family. Lucius' priorities greatly shift and as he grows older he prays Voldemort never returns. Unfortunately, Tom does, and he charges interest.

Bellatrix absolutely loses her mind, refuses to accept reality, and tries to torture the Longbottoms for information they do not possess. She is imprisoned in Azkaban and never truly recovers from this.

Snape ends up the cause of death for Lily Evans and must forever live with the guilt and be tied to her prophesied son. He also becomes Dumbledore's lackey forever, which ultimately gets him killed.

Point being, no one's having a good time. Some because they figure out being a Death Eater wasn't all it was cracked up to be, and others because they had the Voldemort rug pulled out from under their feet when Tom Riddle disappears.

Pettigrew flees and lives as the Weasley rat for nearly fifteen years.

They're left making a mad scramble as they try to pick up the pieces of their lives.

Canon Catches Up

More than ten years go by and then suddenly, in a muggle graveyard, the surviving Death Eaters discover that they are bound to Voldemort for the rest of their lives.

Death cannot stop this man and he has branded them: there's no escape.

Some are still enthusiastic supporters of the cause: Bellatrix is vindicated that her lord has returned, he rescues her from hell on earth, and everything's finally coming up Bella. Barty is similar in actively working for Voldemort's resurrection.

Lucius, meanwhile, lives in constant terror. Karkaroff desperately flees the country and hopes Tom will not find him. Snape, is in fact, Dumbledore's agent. Pettigrew only returned in utter desperation and has now cut off his own hand.

They're not the young men they were, some of them have families, to some of the past ten years have been utterly miserable. They have to watch as their children make the same damn mistakes they did, be sucked into this same hell hole, and there's nothing they can do about it.

There is a notable reluctance for the cause, and yet, they have to try with the same vigor or this madman will kill them all.

And it's all worthless anyway: come 1998, Voldemort dies again (perhaps for real this time, who knows, Harry Potter seems to think so for whatever reason) and then they are imprisoned for their acts as Death Eaters.

And they just laugh, because how badly Lucius wishes he could go back in time and tell his eighteen-year-old self, "YOU DUMB FUCK, LEAVE NOW!"

But Do They Learn Anything?

No.

Just because we see some of them regret being Death Eaters doesn't mean they regret their beliefs. Their beliefs were fine, even blowing up people here and there, a bit gauche but fine.

But maybe following Voldemort blindly was a bad idea.

Are They More Competent Than the Order?

No.

Tom Riddle is terrifyingly competent in that he infiltrates the government with ease, has spies everywhere, and all but proclaims himself minister one day and nobody blinks.

He gains the full support of most of the wizarding world's wealthiest and prestigious families.

But he doesn't actually give these people anything to do. Because there's nothing for them to do, with them, Tom's won. He owns the Wizengamot, the Ministry, everything.

There's no need to fight. It's over, there never was a war. Society is primed to accept Tom Riddle as their ruler.

However, the likes of Bellatrix LeStrange thinks there's a glorious war on, so "uh, go out and blow up a few muggles, have fun." And the young Death Eaters (and the older ones), think they've committed this great, daring, brave, and very important act.

Tom only seems to hand out real assignments when in desperate straits or else when being particularly vindictive.

Lucius, after messing up with the diary, is told to retrieve a prophecy he is not allowed to touch in a department of the ministry he should have no access to. If he fails: Tom kills his entire family. When Lucius does fail, Tom assigns his son to assassinate an already dying Dumbledore. These aren't real tasks, though they do have the appearance of one, and consequences for failure.

Barty, Tom is forced to rely on, as he is trapped in this dying infant's body. And better Barty, someone who is truly loyal and seems fairly clever, than Peter Pettigrew who is a miserable scum bag who'd sell his grandmother for a bar of soap.

Barty, of course, fucks this up. Rather than just kidnap Harry Potter at any of the many easy points this could be done (Hogsmeade trip, lure Harry out to Hogsmeade with super secret serial information about Voldemort/Snape being a Death Eater, etc.), Barty is determined to make use of the Triwizard Tournament to destroy his father's legacy.

This means rather than a few weeks, it takes months to kidnap Harry, and even then they bring along an extra boy who then gets killed and provides some evidence that Tom Riddle has in fact returned. (Somebody murdered Cedric). It takes months and Barty actively ensuring Harry makes it through the tournament and does well, leaving open the possibility that he might get caught helping Harry cheat at any moment. And of course, Barty has to pretend to be Madeye Moody for months, keeping his man locked and drugged in his trunk.

Thankfully, Moody's such a paranoid wreck, no one even notices.

Quirrell, Tom is forced to rely on. Quirrell fucks up, though admittedly not as badly as Barty. Quirrell fails to steal the stone when it's in transit/in Gringotts. He fails to murder Harry Potter, an eleven year old boy in the world's most dangerous school. He rouses Snape's suspicion almost immediately. Then of course he doesn't get the stone. He at least gets to the room with the stone and nearly overpowers Harry and gets it had he not been mysteriously lit on fire by the power of love/Lily Evans.

The only one Tom ever really relies on by choice is Snape. Snape is charged with spying on Dumbledore and later running Hogwarts (which he fucks up).

There is only one competent man in Britain: Severus Snape. Which is, of course, why he's a double agent that Dumbledore and Tom both extensively rely on despite his being a double agent.

There's no one else.

Tom Riddle doesn't make use of the Death Eaters but given they prove themselves enthusiastically incompetent at every turn I don't blame him. Just pretend to give them something to do and hope it makes them feel important.

That's all I've got in general, you want anything else you'll have to ask for something more specific.

[ianthe-is-a-bitch-and-i-love-her]

On Family

An excerpt from Memoirs of a Flesh Eater, never published

Previous Excerpt

Next Excerpt

One question that I see asked in the news a lot is why there are still any ghouls left. We have a distinctive, high-impact feeding habit that requires us to stay within human society, where we are both outnumbered and outgunned. This has essentially been the case since the development of automatic firearms, and you’ve continued to develop more and more effective methods of killing us since then. How are we not extinct?

The talking heads always have lurid theories to propose. My personal favorite one, which comes up every couple of years or so, is that the government is secretly breeding us so that they have an excuse to send secret police out into the general populace for nefarious purposes pretending to be exterminators. As if they’d need the excuse {Editing Note: I’ve gotta keep my political views out of this except where they directly pertain to ghouls. No unnecessarily alienating people}. The most commonly accepted one seems to be that we just have a lot of children to compensate for our high mortality rate. Spatha calls that an R strategy, I think. Scarlet calls it the Rabbit Theory. Whatever you call it, it’s wrong. Our species has survived off the strength and compassion of our families.

Contrary to popular impressions, our “nuclear” families are pretty small. My understanding is that 1-4 children is the typical range. I’m the only confirmed only child in my friend group. Scarlet’s the youngest of three, Scorpio’s a middle child, Spatha avoids talking about her home life, and Kestrel doesn’t know her biological parents. There’s a couple of pressures that keep our family sizes small. First, it’s challenging to feed too many ghouls at once, especially ghoul children, who we don’t want worrying about where they’re going to get their meals. Second, the majority of ghoul parents are going to end up as single parents before their kids are fully grown. Either one of them is going to get killed, or they’re going to have to separate to go on the run from the exterminators; and, of course, we do still break up and get divorced sometimes.

These pressures are exaggerated by our general lack of an extended family. It’s not that all of our aunts and uncles get hunted down - even if they did, we’d still have cousins - but it’s not safe for us to have traceable extended families. When exterminators identify a ghoul, the first thing they do is put out a bulletin for all known blood relatives. The most common tactic to avoid this is, when multiple siblings make it to adulthood, at least one of them changes their identity and moves away. This isn’t always done, but it’s done often enough that document forging is a widespread and well-respected profession in the Society. It’s useful for dodging exterminators in other circumstances too. My mom and I changed our names and moved cities after exterminators killed my dad when I was 4.

Between that and the sheer number of out-and-out orphans in our Society, it should come as no surprise that we’ve developed a new family structure to fill in the gaps. The terminology we use for this structure is variable, but the term I’ve always used is “household”. A household is a sort of adopted extended family, typically formed by and centered around one particularly resourceful ghoul called a patron. The patron takes whichever ghouls they choose under their wing, introduces them to each other, and helps them coordinate their talents and resources so that they all have everything they need. Most obviously, this means making sure they all have a supply of flesh, but there are numerous other kinds of support a household can provide. I doubt I need to emphasize again how valuable a reliable source of companionship and safety is, but patrons typically have access to connections and contacts that can help the other members of the household accomplish their goals.

My household, for example, was founded by our patron Yaga. It consists of her, her adopted daughter Kestrel, my mom and I, my friends Scarlet and Scorpio and their immediate families, and four other older ghouls. There’s also Spatha, who has been reluctant to fully join the household but acts like a member in most contexts. Three of our members have reliable flesh sources, and Yaga coordinates with other ghouls to find supplementary sources to ensure that she always has a surplus on hand. This keeps all of us well-fed and lets her distribute the rest to those in need in exchange for favors and cachet that the rest of us can use for our own advancement. In turn, the rest of us pitch in for odd jobs here and there, mostly on flesh-gathering jobs of one kind or another, and we look out for each other. I’ve done a bit of babysitting with Kestrel, for example, and Yaga was able to get me and Scarlet summer jobs to save up for college.

Babysitting, by the way, is one of the most valuable services a household can provide to a ghoul parent. Given our mortality rate, it probably isn’t a surprise that there’s a good bit of cultural pressure to have children, and have them quick. Ghoul children are… a lot. When we’re newborn, we’re pretty much like human babies. Ghoul babies can nurse from ghoul mothers for awhile, which is a relief. They need to switch to flesh before their teeth come in, though, so that means flesh slurry, which is more complicated to make than you might think. For best results, you want a mix of blood, muscle tissue, organ tissue, and bone, especially marrow. We get better at pulling all our nutrients from just flesh as we mature, but babies aren’t as developed. Getting those varied tissues is a little more complicated than just getting flesh. Bone especially is challenging - more mature ghouls have no need for it, and it’s honestly kinda gross. You just have to hope that whoever you’re getting flesh from can start holding some bones for you. Not every source has easy access to bones. 

{Editing Note: I think I wrote bone too many times - it looks fake now. Bone. Bone.}

We get our ghoul teeth at the same time as our baby teeth. Our ghoul teeth fall out and are replaced too, but we keep growing new ones our whole lives, kinda like sharks. Funnily enough, I don’t think we grow extra human teeth, which seems like a strange way for evolution to take us, but what do I know, I’m not a biologist. At that point we can start eating regular flesh, and parents have the unenviable task of explaining to toddlers that they can’t just slide their teeth out whenever they want. Our other features come in a bit later - claws between 4 and 6, eyes with puberty. Let me tell you, the claws hurt coming in. I couldn’t hold a pencil for a month. My mom told the elementary school that I was deathly sick so she could keep me home, but I think Scarlet just pretended he’d broken both his hands and went in splints. I don’t envy him - stretching my claws did a lot to relieve the pain.

I’ll admit freely that, by our standards, I had a pretty charmed childhood. I fit into human society pretty easily, I had a mom who loved me and could provide for me, a patron and household to help pick up the slack, and ghoul friends my own age. I had the discipline to keep my true nature hidden from my human peers, and I don’t think I was even particularly traumatized by the pressure of performing humanity that much. I can safely attribute that to the fact that I had safe spaces throughout my life to let the charade drop. Most ghouls at least have that. Most, but not all.

Our integration into human society also means that we inevitably become entangled in human society. We become invested in the lives of our human peers, we befriend them, care about them. Sometimes we fall in love with them. Eating people seems like kind of a big secret to keep from a potential romantic partner - I certainly couldn’t manage it - but some ghouls form romantic relationships with humans nonetheless. Maybe some of these human partners eventually discover the truth and are willing to overlook it for the person they love, but I doubt it happens often. I’ve certainly never heard of it. I’ve heard of it going the other way, though, a human partner discovering the truth and reacting poorly. Someone always dies when that happens. I personally know a few ghouls who’ve dated humans, or are seriously involved with them. Frankly, it scares the hell out of me. I get that the heart wants what it wants, but some wants aren’t worth the risk.

{Editing Note: That last line feels… tense. Emotionally charged. Why? And should I change it?}

In my opinion, the gravest of these risks is what happens when a human and a ghoul decide they want to build a life together, but kids are already in the equation. The human-ghoul mixed family is probably the most toxic environment that a ghoul child could be raised in and conceivably survive. All that pressure of hiding your true nature from your peers as you grow up? That feeling of isolation that follows you everywhere you go among humans? All of the most crushing emotional turmoil I’ve described in this book so far? Imagine if there was no relief for that even at home with your family. I frankly have no idea how ghoul parents manage to feed themselves and their children without being caught, or how they manage to perform humanity so flawlessly and constantly that their literal immediate family never catches on. I don’t know how those children manage to survive to adulthood, but I imagine they have some seriously fucked up mental health problems by the time they do. Factor in the suspicion that they would inevitably face from our Society when they finally are able to join it properly - after all, who more likely to become a Judas or be Lost than a ghoul raised by humans? - and I’d be willing to bet most of them don’t make it out of their twenties.

Before we move on entirely from families in general and mixed families in particular, I’d like to take a quick aside to talk about “half-ghouls”. You hear about them in horror media fairly often, the biological child of a human and a ghoul. Authors love to ascribe all sorts of traits to these hypothetical creatures - greater and more monstrous than the sum of their parts, supernaturally strong and vicious, impossible to detect within human society, sometimes with traits that are blatantly impossible, like telepathy or mind control or just plain magic. All of that is obviously untrue, but it’s something of a point of contention as to whether or not a “half-ghoul” is even possible. None of the ghouls I’ve talked to seem to agree about whether it can happen, and a search of human medical literature was similarly inconclusive. Humans, at least, seem to think that it might be theoretically possible, but have never been able to verify it by observation or by medical experiment. Of the ghouls I know that have been romantically involved with humans, none of them have ever gotten a kid out of it. It’s one of those things where we just don’t know. If it were possible, I’m not even sure what the implications would be.

[feanorianethicsdepartment]

the last of my thoughts on the homecoming au, the au where maedhros and maglor are taken back to tirion at the end of the war of wrath and proceed to be relentlessly abused by elves more interested in them being ‘normal’ than happy. it’s pretty much exactly as dark as you’d expect from that description, lots of medical/caretaker abuse towards the mentally ill, just a horrible situation in general. one last time, @sunflowersupremes wrote the original au this is an extrapolation from, and @outofangband listened to me blather on about this for ages and contributed lots of ideas of their own. part 1 is here, part 2 is here. this the last part, it isn’t quite as intense as part 2, but it’s a lot more hopeless. also there’s some off-screen torture

on the first post i made about this au, i got some comments to the effect of ‘oh this will only last until person x bails them out’

there were several suggestions - fingon, nerdanel, any of the ainur. it seems like there are a lot of people who’d want to get maedhros and maglor out of this nightmare

seems. these aren’t necessarily my usual interpretations of their characters, but for the purposes of this au i can easily imagine a finrod who already bore a grudge over the whole letting-their-younger-brothers-steal-his-kingdom incident and subsequently heard the version of the nirnaeth where the fëanorians left everyone else to die. he is the only other person in the palace who knew beleriand, and he loathes them so viciously he can barely stand to look at them. they’re lucky he doesn’t do worse

i can easily imagine a nerdanel who was already having trouble processing what her husband and sons did at alqualondë when eärendil and elwing told her every awful thing they’d done since in the span of half an hour. she smashed all their statues, burned all their gifts, and curled up sobbing in a ruined house, wondering why she was such a terrible mother her children grew into demons

and this isn’t long after that, that wound is still fresh. whatever vain hopes she held that the boys she loved were somewhere in there are shattered when she sees them, and they’re talking and laughing just like they did when they were young

like nothing had happened. like nothing had changed. like the monsters had always been waiting patiently for their chance to strike

(they just didn’t want her to see the things they’d become)

i can easily imagine a fingon who is blazingly furious with maedhros over the later kinslayings. he spends most of their only meeting railing at maedhros, and the apologia his caretakers offer up only makes him angrier

so does the fact that maedhros won’t defend himself, won’t even raise his voice. does none of this matter to him? did it ever?

(it does. but maedhros knows what will happen if he yells at his cousin, and he is just so exhausted)

fingon is eventually asked to leave. maedhros’ minders tell him that if he can’t keep his temper around their patient, they’re going to have to cut off contact until maedhros is in a better mental state. fingon snaps that that’s just fine by him, and storms off into the city, trying to hold back his tears

the ainur, now, the ainur would definitely drag them out of the palace and haul them up to the máhanaxar. finarfin’s managed to get as much out of eönwë

what would happen to them after that, eönwë refuses to say. finarfin suspects he doesn’t know, and none of the valar will until they’ve had a chance to actually, like, hold a trial

even so, it becomes pretty obvious to finarfin fairly early on that the noldor simply can’t give the brothers the help they need. it’s plain to see that they’re very unhappy and they’re recovering slowly if at all. whatever the valar decide to do with them, odds are good they’d end up in some permutation of elf afterlife therapy, with well-practiced carers and the family they’ve lost. for their sake, and the sake of the people around them, handing them over to the valar would clearly be the best option

except finarfin doesn’t. he keeps his nephews in his palace, where they break things and make messes and generally give their caretakers constant headaches. when asked why, he always talks about the soul-deep terror on maglor’s face when he asked him not to give them to the valar

he’s not lying about that. but he does have other motives

there’s lots of suppositions in finarfin’s reasoning. there’s every chance the valar would throw them into the deepest depths of mandos until the second music. there’s every chance maedhros would choose to disappear into the woods and never trouble court again

but if the valar do decide to send them to lórien with no limits on their movement, and if maedhros does still harbour nelyafinwë’s political ambitions...

the closest finarfin has gotten to admitting it, even to himself, is saying that the noldor have enough problems right now, they don’t need a succession crisis on top of everything else. sometimes he’ll joke about not wanting maedhros to set up another functionally autonomous military government out in the wilderness

but it’s hard to deny that a maedhros, free to act, with his head screwed on straight, could potentially be the single biggest threat to finarfin’s crown

not that he doesn’t want his nephews to get better! it’s heartrending to see the pain they’re in, he sincerely wants to see them happy

he’d just prefer them to be happy in a way that's... convenient

maedhros and maglor’s contact with the outside world is kept to a strict minimum and heavily monitored when it does happen. they’re only allowed to visit the public parts of the palace when their caretakers know exactly who’s going to be there and if they can be trusted to not make a fuss about the brothers’ presence

it’s all in the interest of keeping the peace, you understand. maedhros’ followers are difficult to handle at the best of times, if they somehow got it into their heads that the last of their lords were being held captive in the palace...

well, finarfin says over tea. maitimo can see the wisdom in not provoking a civil war, can he not?

(he will not bring death to the blessed realm again. not even if his last baby brother is rotting away to a shell, not even if he’s being smothered to death from the inside out. he will not, he must not)

(if he did, there would truly be nothing left but the monster)

and then, one day, maglor gets the chance to escape

his minders aren’t paying much attention to him, he’s been a lot quieter since they put the gag on him. he’s small and fast and good at sneaking around, by the time they notice he’s missing he’s already found a way out of the palace

he jumps out of a third-floor window, bites down the pain, and runs. he clears the grounds and disappears into the city

he makes for - he doesn’t know where. subconsciously, he navigates towards the craft guild districts, where his family’s staunchest supporters always were

except the city’s changed a lot since he was last loose in it, and before he knows it, he’s completely lost. he wanders the streets half in a daze, his raw nerves unused to the bustle and noise of it all. wherever he goes, people stop and start and turn away

finally someone calls him over. ‘hey, you want that collar off your neck?’

it’s a smith of some sort, he can tell that much. they’re smiling, welcomingly and without pity. he’s rushing over to them, nodding his head, before he can even think about

the trouble is, maglor doesn’t remember the faces of most of the people he saw in beleriand, but they all remember him

the trouble is, this smith was at sirion

back in the palace, who gets access to the brothers is very strictly controlled. which isn’t to say that nobody tries to hurt them; finrod tends to put the worst spin on things when he’s asked for advice, there’s all kinds of minor acts of sabotage, and they come across innocuous-seeming harmful objects more often than mere chance would seem to allow

but even their caretakers can tell that letting desperate revenge-seekers get near the brothers wouldn’t be particularly conducive to whatever recovery they’re hoping for. anyone who might randomly come across maedhros or maglor in a hallway is intensely vetted for ulterior motives, and while this process isn’t airtight it does filter out the most obviously malicious

and outside of that bubble, none of that applies. the smith does take maglor’s gag off, purely to hear him scream

soon enough, the palace guard tracks him down. they take him back to the palace, where he’s bandaged up and comforted and then, as a special treat, allowed to see his brother

(they’re kept apart more often than not these days. being around maglor makes maedhros agitated, being around maedhros makes maglor sullen. they’re just more cooperative when they’re alone)

maglor does the same thing he’s done every time he’s seen his brother for the past year, which is immediately bury his face in maedhros’ chest and shudder. it takes him a moment to remember he can speak now

‘we’re trapped’ he whispers. ‘we’re trapped’

because he was screaming for what felt like hours, and nobody came to help. as he was being carried back to the palace, he saw the scorn and the disgust in the passers-by’s eyes

there’s nobody who will shelter them outside the palace. there’s nowhere on this continent they can go

and that - that’s the end, in a way. maedhros remains stubborn and ill-tempered, never quite letting them forget he doesn’t want to be here and doesn’t like what they’re doing, but the fight goes out of him. he does what they tell him just as biddably as he did before they took his brother’s voice

maglor, surprisingly, takes a turn for the better. he starts acting cheerful again, doing everything that’s asked of him with a smile and a wink. he’s making excellent progress, his minders tell finarfin

(they don’t tell him what maglor looks like when the mask starts to crack)

finarfin is very pleased to hear that one of his nephews is finally starting to recover! it’s been a long, painful journey, but it looks like it’s all at long last working out

to celebrate, he decides to give maglor a gift he’s been holding onto for a while

he calls maglor into his office. the tension in his posture is a bit worrying, but his expression is all makalaurë, a casual, mildly disrespectful grin. he swans into the room, flounces into a chair, and asks what his uncle wants

finarfin praises him for all the progress he’s been making, and hands him a letter

it’s from elros

the first line is ‘how are you doing, you old bastard?’ it calls him a kinslayer six different ways in the first three paragraphs. it asks him how many people he’s stabbed since he got back. it closes off by wishing him some fun loud arguments with maedhros

finarfin was a little concerned maglor still not might be in the right emotional state for it, but the tightness bleeds out of his nephew’s frame as he reads. a couple of times he even bursts into snickering that sounds more genuine than any sound he makes in court

he finishes reading with a truly relaxed smile on his face. then he freezes, and looks up at finarfin

in a tiny, quiet voice, so unlike the way he talks nowadays, he asks, ‘may i write a reply?’

finarfin hates to take the wind out of his sails, but maglor deserves to know. ‘that letter is centuries old. i’ve been holding onto it until you were ready to read it.’ he shuts his eyes. ‘i’m afraid elros passed some time ago’

maglor’s head drops. the letter in his hands begins to shake. little whimpers escape his trembling body. finarfin walks over, places a hand on his shoulder. ‘i’m sorry, we -’

that’s not whimpering, finarfin realises. those are growls. his nephew’s head snaps up, face twisted with rage

maglor tries to tear finarfin’s face off -

and that’s all i have. these headcanons have been exhausting to write, i’ll clean them up and put them on ao3 in a bit, but not now, if for no other reason than it’s 3am. again. i hope these weren’t too incoherent. going to try to unbanjax my sleep schedule now

[lumoshyperion]

I just want to experience the affectionate tension of always being called by my surname by that one person until the moment one of our lives is in danger and they tenderly call me by my first name

I saw this post on @bluewanderings blog with the tag "#dark au drastoria....... much to think about" and decided to write a quick scene based on that for the dark au sequel. Astoria has been hurt while smuggling a Muggleborn family out of the country, and apparates away without thinking where she's going.

This takes place a while after Draco found out about her rebellious activities. She thought he would hand her over, but he never did, and has been helping her access restricted ingredients such as aconite for Wolfsbane potions.

This is just a short, out of context scene that slots nicely into the fic!! it's a gift, for wife, with love 😘💙

Astoria leaned against the wall, holding her arm to her chest and clutching her wand with a trembling hand. She knew she had lost a lot of blood and wouldn't be able to apparate again until the wound was looked at by a healer. But she had no idea where she was, or who she could turn to.

And there was someone approaching from the laneway on her left. So she held her breath and waited for them to pass. It was a tall wizard in emerald robes, with neat platinum blonde hair. Astoria bit her lip and shrunk into the shadows of her little alcove. It can't be him, she thought. I wish it were him.

The wizard stopped, their shoulders suddenly tense. Astoria raised her wand, ready to strike them down if needs be. But then they turned and scowled at the alcove and she almost laughed for joy and relief.

"Whoever is there, I'm really not in the mood," said Malfoy, an irritated edge to his voice as he brushed his robe aside and clutched the wand in his pocket. "Show yourself."

"Well, that's a shame," Astoria replied, shakily, as she stepped out of the alcove and into the dim light of the laneway. "I was rather hoping for that dance you promised me."

The moment he saw her, his eyes widened and his expression turned to one of alarm and horror. "Astoria," he gasped, stepping forward and catching her by her uninjured arm as she tried to move further into the laneway. "Are you alright? What happened to you?"

She looked down at his hand, before glancing back up at his face. He'd never called her by her first name before. Not even when they were children. "You know I can't tell you that," she said, with a small smile. Malfoy rolled his eyes, then wrapped his arm around her waist, guiding her out of the alcove and down the laneway. She glanced around at the buildings, trying to ignore how the warmth of him made her cheeks flush. "I tried to apparate home, but I missed. Where are we?"

"Diagon Alley. My shop is just around the corner."

Astoria frowned. It was a populated area, miles away from any of the safe houses or secluded forests that she usually retreated to when things were dire. Her last thought before she apparated was of safety. A fire to keep her warm and the company of someone she trusted, someone she cared about.

She glanced over at Malfoy, as he carefully guided her away from the crowds and down a side entrance to his shop with a look of determination on his face. Perhaps it wasn't a mistake after all and she was exactly where she needed to be.

Once they arrived at the shopfront, he led her up the stairs to his flat and sat her down by the window. She slowly peeled her coat off and folded it over the back of her chair, watching Malfoy blanch as he looked at the wound on her arm. “You’re not squeamish, are you?” She asked, genuinely. “Because I can look after it myself, I just need -”

"No," he said, before abruptly kneeling down and holding his wand over her arm. "Tergeo."

Astoria winced as the blood drained from her wound. Malfoy withdrew his wand and looked up at her with concern, but she shook her head and smiled. "Your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired."

"I don't usually entertain rebels," he replied, before standing up and waving a hand towards the oak cabinet on the other side of the room. "I have some Dittany. Wait here."

She watched as he retrieved a small vial of brown liquid. When he knelt down again and opened it, the smell of copper and spices reminded her of their classes in the dungeons back at Hogwarts. But before she could say anything about it, she was distracted as he held her arm in his hand and applied the potion to her wound with a tenderness she'd never associated with him before. The skin immediately started to knit itself back together, and it felt like a thousand tiny bee stings, dancing across her arm.

"Why do you do it?" Malfoy asked, suddenly and without looking up. "Surely you must know that you can't change anything."

Astoria's shoulders tensed, but he still didn't let go of her arm or look up at her. They'd had this conversation before, but it was always concealed in carefully worded questions and loaded glances. Even after their conversation on the bridge, there was still so much that she kept from him. Because, in spite of all that he had done for her, he was still a Malfoy.

He had a reputation to uphold. One that had been nearly ruined by his decision to put off his career at the Ministry for a while in order to pursue his passion in Potioneering. And if he handed her over to the Ministry, the rumour that he had gone "soft" would finally go away, and he would be elevated and lauded for his achievement.

And yet, he kept her secret. He brewed Wolfsbane for her, he kept a stock of restricted ingredients for her, and now he healed her wounds without pushing for answers on how she got them. And, beyond all of that, Astoria wanted to be honest with him. Because however much she tried to be strong and brave, she was tired of fighting on her own. She wanted the company that he offered. Whatever form it took and regardless of how much of a risk it was.

The tenderness with which he held her arm, and whispered her name in the laneway, was something she couldn't help but be drawn to - like a moth to a flame.

"Because I realised I couldn't just stand by and watch anymore," Astoria finally replied. "I know it isn't safe, and I know I can't change anything, and I'm better off just following along with everyone else, but... I couldn't do that anymore. I had to do something. Even if it only makes a difference to a few people."

She paused, looking down at her arm. The wound had healed over nicely, but Malfoy was still smoothing his thumb across her skin in slow, soothing circles. "I was smuggling a family out of the country," she confessed. "They didn't fight in the war. They lived a quiet life before all of this - in fact, their son never even got the chance to go to Hogwarts. Their only crime was being born to Muggle parents."

He suddenly let go of her arm and looked up at her for a long moment. Then he stood up and walked over to the oak cabinet, before returning to her side and holding out his hand. "There's something I want to show you," he said. There, in his palm, was a bronze key that shone in the firelight.

She looked up at him for a long time. Considering her options, wondering if she could trust him. Wishing that she could. And then she made a decision, stood up, and took his hand.

Before she could say anything, they were transported to a small clearing in the middle of a forest. The sudden journey threw her off balance, and she swayed a little, but looked around as he lay a steady hand on her waist.

"Sorry. I didn't want to risk being seen or heard leaving the flat," he said, watching her take in their surroundings. The forest was dense, stretching as far as the eye could see. And there was a sense of calm in the air that Astoria hadn't felt for a long time.

"You made a key into a portkey?" She asked, raising an eyebrow at him. "Really?"

He scoffed. "My father did, actually. He was never one for subtlety." Astoria withdrew at that, her guard suddenly up as she pulled away from his grasp and glanced around the clearing. But Malfoy raised his hand in reassurance and continued, "He built this place in secret. Only he knew about it, and it was passed onto me when he died. The key is a portkey, but only for those that we trust with the secret."

Astoria turned around and looked at him. "I don't understand."

Malfoy inclined his head towards the forest and she followed his gaze. When they had arrived, the clearing was empty. But it was like the house had always been there, somewhere in the corner of her eye, hidden by magic, until that moment. It was a large stone house with vines crawling up the walls and the chimney, as if the forest was trying to reclaim it. She glanced back at Malfoy, who said, "It's yours."

"What?"

He shrugged. "My father had it built just before the war. It was assurance that we would always have a place to go, should we ever need it," he explained. "He was a coward, but he always put us first."

Astoria looked back at the house and frowned. Most families had a plan in place, should the war be lost. Even her father had money put aside and a promise to take them far away, if things became too dire. All thoughts of a dowry were thrown aside when the war began. Family came first, after all.

"I thought you could use it for your - friends," Malfoy elaborated, as she looked away from the house and back at him. "They'd be safe here. You would be the new secret keeper." She opened her mouth to respond, but found that she didn't know what to say. He misinterpreted her and raised a hand in reassurance. "You can wipe my memory when we get back to the shop, if you like."

Astoria shook her head. "Whether you remember this place or not, you would still be held accountable if I were found out. I can't protect you."

Malfoy scoffed. "I don't need your protection, Greengrass." She sighed and crossed her arms, and he glanced down at the key, turning it over and over in his hands. "You're just as stubborn as you were in school, you know that?"

Astoria gave a short laugh, in spite of herself, and he looked back up at her. "I don't believe for a second that you remember that." He raised an eyebrow and she added, "You never took any notice of me, or anyone else."

"I did - I noticed you," he said, genuinely. "How could I not?"

Astoria looked back at the house, for a long moment. He followed her gaze, and they stared at the old stone in silence, until she glanced back at him and said, "Draco... Are you sure?"

Without speaking, he offered the key to her. His expression was resolute, so she closed the distance between them and took it from his hand. It was still warm from his touch, and was a comforting weight in the palm of her hand.

"Well," she said, glancing back up at him with a playful look. "Aren't you going to give me a tour?"

Draco offered his arm and smiled.

[star-going-supernova]

I would certainly be interested in reading the unofficial version of Damsell in Distress if it's not a problem. - Elsie

Ask and ye shall receive! It starts immediately after Maddie tells Godzilla that her dad was kidnapped and includes the beginning of the original ending. It's also incomplete, as I stopped writing the murdery part maybe 2/3 of the way through.

Please be warned, what happens isn't nice. If KiaRL was too much for you, maybe skip this one. It's similar to what Godzilla did to those kidnappers, but it's from one of their POVs, so, like, there's a bit of detail in some places. I wouldn't say it's overly graphic, but... yeah. Exercise caution.

• • •

Kidnapping, when done right and with fellow professionals, was a lucrative business. Blake Curtis knew that well.

It was with well-earned confidence that he and the other seven members of their homegrown operation relaxed in the nice office space they’d rented out for this particular venture. The building was decently far from the mark’s—no pun intended—place of residence, but not so far from the location of the organization he belonged to.

You didn’t want the fingers to start rotting in the mail, after all. And sending them in anything other than a padded envelope was bound to be memorable to the wrong people.

Being forgettable was, in all ways, the name of their game.

Blake and every last one of his associates were plain. Not a one of them was particularly attractive, or had stand-out features, or had public interactions outside of the most basic, scripted conversations. And for that reason, no one every gave them a second look. No one ever remembered them more than a few minutes after an encounter—and they certainly wouldn’t have been able to describe them.

It was an art form, and a well-paying one, at that.

Completely unconscious in one of the other rooms in the office was their newest target, a man reportedly high in the rankings of Monarch. Mark Russell: divorced—the ex was dead—father of two children—one of whom was also dead—and living with his young daughter out in the middle of nowhere. Important enough to his peers to be worth a ransom, but not so important to have a bodyguard.

They couldn’t have asked for a better setup.

With the target secured and unable to cause any problems, it was just a matter of waiting. Four of his associates had broken out a pack of cards and were coming up with increasingly ridiculous ways to cheat at their game. Alice, his cousin, was reading Pride and Prejudice by the window, sipping at some fruity drink she’d made for herself.

Ryan was napping on the couch, his hat covering his face, and good ole Winnie, the leader of their group, was typing away at her laptop.

Blake sighed, content, and leaned back in his comfortable office chair. He took a drag of his cigarette and let his eyes drift half-closed. The toe of his shoe absently slid along the ground, lazily spinning him back and forth.

A faint tremble went through his chair.

Off to his side, Alice made a dreamy noise. A burst of laughter rose up from the card players.

Another tremble, slightly stronger than the first, had him peeking his eyes open. An earthquake, perhaps? They didn’t have any neighbors in the building—they’d made sure of that—but no one else seemed to be noticing the shudders passing through the structure.

They began to increase in intensity, and the time between them grew shorter.

Snorting awake when a mug rattled on the coffee table, Ryan pushed his hat up and raised his head. “What’s doin’ that?” he asked groggily.

Alice and Winnie looked over at him. Blake stood, keeping his stance wide as the tremors grew worse.

“I don’t think this is how earthquakes work,” Alice said, sliding a ribbon into her well-worn book.

The four playing cards, who Blake now saw were sharing a couple bottles of alcohol between them, set their game aside, still giggling.

“A train?” Blake suggested. “Helicopters?”

The windows rattled, and outside, someone screamed.

“Yeah, I don’t think so,” Omar said, stumbling up from his seat. He took a swig from one of the bottles. “I rem’ber this scene.” He stared into the narrow opening with one eye squinted shut.

“What are you doing?” Eli asked, less drunk-looking than the other three.

“Lookin’ for ripples. That’s how you know a t-rex is coming.”

“It won’t work if you’re holding the bottle, moron,” Dennis, which was wonderfully ironic, said. Blake didn’t pay them any attention, though, as he went over to one of the windows.

He could hear more people screaming, and despite a poor vantage point, he was just able to make out a number of people running frantically down the road. A car swerved wildly around the fleeing populace, crashing into a light pole. The driver climbed out, appearing to be muttering in a panic to himself, and took off at a sprint.

“Something’s happening out there,” he said to Alice as she joined him.

Sandy chuckled. “Maybe it’s a monster attack.” She stood and cracked her back.

An enormous crash jolted the building so badly, everyone standing found themselves grasping desperately for something to hold on to. Ryan tumbled off the couch with a yelp. Omar lost his footing entirely and fell with a strained chuckle. The glass bottle hit the edge of the table and shattered.

While Omar complained about getting bits of glass in his hands, Blake, closely followed by Alice and Winnie, ran to the roof access the office space came with.

“Maybe something crashed,” he huffed out. “A plane, or a huge pile-up—”

“If only we could be so lucky,” Winnie said, and then they were bursting out onto the roof.

He heard his cousin whisper a curse in another language, his own jaw going slack as his mind went blank with an instinctual fear.

Not a few blocks away, Godzilla stood between high-rises. He moved slowly, almost carefully—if you were willing to personify such a monster—but every few footfalls, he seemed to step particularly hard, shaking the earth.

The three of them remained frozen, watching with wide eyes, as Godzilla growled, periodically swinging his head around. Like he’s looking for something, Blake thought.

He—like most of the world—had seen footage from at least one of the past incidents involving the Titans. Godzilla in San Francisco had been all anyone could talk about for a few weeks, and the clip of him leaving the city always seemed to be playing on one news channel or another. A sensational tragedy.

It didn’t do the real thing justice. Such a massive creature—he hadn’t comprehended before now just how large Godzilla truly was. And it was different to see him with his own two eyes, where the possibility of an internet hoax couldn’t explain a thing.

“Whatever he’s doing here can’t be good,” Winnie finally said. “We should leave before any other Titans show up.”

She vanished back into the office, leaving Blake and his cousin to stare at the monster towering over them.

A disbelieving huff left Alice. “That’s not something you see everyday, huh?”

“Are we supposed to run away?” Blake asked. “Or is it like a tornado drill?”

“If Winnie says we’re leaving, then we’re leaving.” She paused as Godzilla leaned forward to sniff at a skyscraper. A few more steps, and he’d be walking entirely away from them. As it was, Blake figured someone with a better throwing arm could probably hit the Titan from where they were standing. Alice shook her head and turned toward the roof access. “C’mon, we gotta grab Russell. We’ll have to figure something else out if the drop-off gets changed.”

Since her back was facing Godzilla, Blake was the only one who say the way the monster’s head turned in their direction. His spines pulsed blue, sending a shock of fear down Blake’s own spine, and he took two thunderous steps closer to their high rise.

Blake stumbled back, suddenly unable to breath. His focus narrowed down to those inhuman, burning eyes, suddenly centered on him. His reaction must have caught Alice’s attention, because he distantly heard her scream out behind him.

For some reason, hearing her scream like that was what made Blake snap out of his daze, just in time to see Godzilla’s claw-tipped hand-paw thing closing in on their roof.

The building shook when he made contact, a web of cracks spiraling out from Godzilla’s palm. Blake lost his balance entirely, landing painfully on his tailbone. Even then, he couldn’t completely shake himself out of his stupor enough to stand, much less run.

After sniffing again, Godzilla started growling, low and dangerous. The sound of it nearly paralyzed Blake.

He managed to pull himself backward in an awkward crab-walk until his back hit the short raised ledge surrounding the roof. Through it all, he couldn’t look away from Godzilla’s eyes.

Could an animal really feel as much fury as Blake thought he could see in them?

A commotion below finally ripped away his attention. Ryan had emerged, stumbling for the soccer-mom-style van they had parked across the street. He was emitting a constant stream of panicked gibberish. Sandy was standing at the base of the building, hollering at him to hurry up and stop tripping over himself.

“Hey!”

Blake whipped around. Dennis was standing in the doorway with an impatient look on his face. “Didn’t you hear Winnie? We’re leaving!”

An odd buzzing interrupted his attempt to answer, and both men looked up in surprise. Godzilla, was above them, leaning on the roof. He had blue eyes now, Blake realized.

Dennis made a strangled sound. “What the hell—”

Godzilla’s mouth opened as the buzzing seemed to reach its peak, and a bright blue beam of light shot out from between his razor sharp teeth. Blake cried out and curled up into a ball. The heat from being so close to the beam was painfully intense.

Dennis was huddled in the stairwell when Blake managed to look over at him, ears ringing and spots popping in his vision. His jeans were darker on the insides of his thighs. Blake couldn’t even blame him.

As his hearing returned after a few seconds, he became aware of a terrible shrieking. Leaning up to look over the ledge at the ground, he stared uncomprehending for a moment before the reality of what he was seeing hit him. He turned and heaved, throwing up his lunch beside him.

He caught sight of Dennis rushing over, but he wasn’t able to warn him away fast enough, and after a moment, his colleague was vomiting over the edge of the roof.

The road below was nothing more than a scorched crater, their van reduced to a smoldering mound of metal. Ryan was completely gone, just vaporized in the heat of the laser-like beam Godzilla had shot.

But that wasn’t the worst of it.

Having been close to the beam himself, Blake’s skin felt tight, like after getting a bad sunburn. What little of his skin he could see was reddened, but not blistering.

Sandy, who’d been down there with Ryan, hadn’t been as lucky.

She must have just ventured away from the building when Godzilla fired, not close enough to share Ryan’s fate, but closer than Blake.

What he’d seen would haunt his nightmares for years to come, he suspected. The writhing mass of flesh, with bubbling sores, all melted in on herself, was unlike anything he’d ever seen. The roof was too high for him to have seen details, but he’d gotten the impression that Sandy’s face was nothing more than a smooth plane, her open mouth the only remaining orifice.

Dennis was babbling as he remained hunched against the ledge, but Blake couldn’t make himself understand any of the words.

Gagging over the sour taste lingering on his tongue, Blake shrunk back as he looked up at Godzilla, just in time to see the monster huff with his eyes half-lidded. It was an expression of satisfaction if he’d ever seen one.

“Wha’s goin’ on?” Blake heard Omar say.

Godzilla’s hand lifted from the roof, just as the man drunkenly stumbled through the door.

“Someone’s screamin’ down there,” he told them, rather pointlessly. “Winnie’s all worked up ’bout it.” He kept walking, apparently somehow missing the giant lizard monster looming right over them.

Blake saw it coming a moment too late. “Omar—!” he cried, reaching out as if he could shove the man to safety.

But he couldn’t, so he watched helplessly as Omar squinted in confusion as Godzilla’s hand slammed back down, squishing the man with disturbing ease.

He'd seen a snake, once, flattened on the roadside. Like a flat drawing. Omar was reduced to that, to a thin, bloody pile of viscera. His jeans were still visible, bunched up on themselves. Empty. Leaking.

Dennis groaned and threw up again, this time, on their side of the ledge. While he was distracted, Godzilla’s blood-dripping hand swept upward, on a collision course for the both of them. Blake yelled wordlessly and dove forward, ducking.

With a meaty thwack, Dennis was swatted up into the air. He shrieked as he fell, and the abrupt silence made Blake gasp out a terrified sob.

Why is this happening? he wondered hysterically, scrabbling at the rough concrete to try and put some distance between himself and the monster. But there was no safety to be found.

Godzilla once more returned his bloody hand to the rooftop, and Blake heard the way the building began to crumbled beneath the pressure. A large hole broke through the top floor’s ceiling with a grating crash, Godzilla’s hand mercilessly sinking into the building.

It was then that Blake heard the Alice’s screams.

(a few more deaths that I never wrote happen here. Blake is the only one left alive)

For a second, Blake thought he was about to witness Godzilla swallow a man down whole. That Mark Russell—who should be glad to still be unconscious—would disappear behind those teeth and never be seen again.

Instead, Godzilla made a rumbling noise so very different from his growls, and turned his back on the building. There was a mind-boggling gentleness in that blood-stained jaw, holding a human as if he were aware of how delicate the man’s body was.

It scared him, the possibility that Godzilla could be aware like that. Intelligent.

Blake slumped bonelessly against the rooftop beside the large hole and breathed a shaky sigh of relief. The blue sky was suddenly blocked by something gray, casting him in a shadow, and his last thought was of realization—that Godzilla’s tail was about two seconds away from demolishing the building and him with it.

He didn’t even have time to close his eyes.

• • •

Only a few hours after Maddie’s brief interaction with Godzilla, reports of the King entering a decently sized city reached Castle Bravo. He didn’t seem to be moving with aggression, or in response to a threat, so G-team was left largely on standby.

Everything changed quickly. There were suddenly alarms going off, people shouting, and panic spread like wildfire through the halls.

Maddie watched with a dull sense of bewilderment as Castle Bravo employees ran in and out of the control room, frantic and jittery. Having grown tired of sitting numbly on the floor, Maddie pushed to her feet and carefully wandered through the chaos.

Unwilling to interrupt anyone, she merely listened in, and through her unsubtle eavesdropping, learned Godzilla had apparently gone berserk on some humans in an office building. Just straight up murdered eight people.

No one seemed to know why—whether he’d been provoked somehow, or whether he’d simply gone into a city with the intent to kill.

Griffin suddenly appeared at Maddie’s shoulder, startling her. “C’mon, kid, we’re getting you out of here, all right?” She gently but firmly wrapped her fingers around Maddie’s upper arm and smoothly guided her out of the room.

“You’re not going after him?” she asked, hurrying to keep up.

“We will, but only after we get the handful of civilians back to the mainland.” She cast Maddie an apologetic glance. “Emergency protocols, kid. Ilene’ll join you soon to stay with you until we get things figured out.”

An Osprey being piloted by Griffin and another G-teamer took off a few minutes later, carrying seven civilians who had all been at Castle Bravo for different reasons. Maddie recognized two of them from the investigators for her dad’s kidnapping, and she tightly gripped the edge of her seat. If Godzilla’s totally uncharacteristic attack got her dad killed or something because Monarch had to set the case aside, she’d be having words with him.

Even with aircraft as fast as the Ospreys, the flight still took over an hour. Long enough for Maddie to slip in and out of a doze, never quite falling all the way asleep. It left her feeling even more tired by the time they landed.

They literally couldn’t have made the journey shorter, since the Osprey dropped them off within throwing distance of the ocean. A Monarch warehouse sat in a large industrial park, complete with an impressive pier jutting out into the water.

While the other civilians went inside, Maddie wandered out to the end of the enormous dock, where she sat down and dangled her feet off the side. It was high enough up that she couldn’t have touched the water even if she hung off the edge completely.

She lowered herself to her back and tried to keep her mind nice and empty. No thoughts were better than bad ones.

She wasn’t sure how long she stayed like that, though it couldn’t have been too long, when she heard the splashing of something moving through the water.

Maddie sat up, instantly surprised to see Godzilla approaching the pier, his head held oddly above the surface. She’d never seen him swim like that.

He rumbled at her as he got closer. Squinting, Maddie saw that he had something in his mouth, held careful between his teeth. She couldn’t tell what it was.

An animal of some sort, maybe? Regardless, she quickly stood and backed up, since Godzilla seemed to be aiming to deposit his cargo where she’d been sitting. He leaned up, the rumble only growing in strength, and carefully spit out the thing in his mouth. She had only a moment to appreciate how hilariously smug he looked with himself as he sank back to a comfortable depth, and then she was looking at the creature he’d presented her with.

She couldn’t have been more shocked if she’d been hit by a bolt of lightning. Maddie darted forward and collapsed painfully to her knees with a strangled little yelp.

“Dad!” she cried, frantically tugging and pushing at him. “Dad, please!

He was definitely breathing, which almost made her burst into tears on its own, but then his eyes sluggishly opened at her call, and Maddie gracelessly collapsed against him. Hugging someone who was half-unconscious and entirely restrained was awkward at best, but it was still one of the top five hugs she’d ever participated in in her life.

She heard him slur something back, quiet and raspy and still very out of it, but she was pretty sure it was her name.

“I should go get someone,” Maddie realized. It felt like she’d been dropped into a world that moved twice as fast as she did, or like she’d been trapped in slow motion since her dad had been kidnapped.

Luckily—because she wasn’t sure she could have pried herself away from her dad—someone seemed to have taken notice of Godzilla’s appearance, and a crew of people were already running out to them.

Before they could reach her, Maddie turned to Godzilla with a lump in her throat. “Thank you,” she said, trying to inject every ounce of her sincerity, and then some, into those two, utterly inadequate words.

[whimsicallyreading]

The Death of Me

Part Two-

Danika stares at the gelatinous pony on her bedside table with empty eyes. It’s lifeless gaze kept a constant vigil that she found strangely comforting, especially after Ruhn Danaan ordered her ass home.

Now she was basically a prisoner in her own room. Sabine and the 33rd had already wrung all the information they could from her. Bryce’s piece-of-shit father hadn’t even bothered to show up at HQ.

She would rake him for that.

To ignore your child in life is one thing. But to ignore your daughters death and allow the CC Media to run wild with the stories as they have been? It was disgusting. It made her ill. He would pay for his negligence.

But first, she had to talk to Ember.

~~~

Lunathion’s Party Princess gets taken down a peg!

Notorious partner in crime, Bryce Quinlan massacred in the up-and-coming Alpha’s mutual residence.

~~~

Danika new it would be a rough phone call. She knew that the woman on the other side of the phone would be grieving. That grief makes people act out and say things they don’t mean.

Still, the guttural cries on the other side of the line shocks her. It evokes the first twinge of emotion she’d felt outside of her own pain in days.

Guilt.

“What happened, Danika?” Her surrogate mother sobs over the speaker. “They won’t tell me how it happened. I don’t even know when they will release my daughter’s body for burial.”

The weeping increases in intensity, as Danika bites back her bitter thoughts. Ember would likely never get to see her daughter’s remains. There was nothing left. No fixing the damage done to Bryce’s frame. She was cracked like a shell and vacated, the autopsies they would need to perform would only further ruin her flesh.

“I can’t tell you anything yet,” Danika consoles. “There’s a lot I don’t know, but I will find out the details. In the mean time...I know this is a lot to ask-“

Danika chokes over the words. Emotions were never her strong suit. On an average day it didn’t matter, people knew it was her nature to be blunt. They took no offense to her crass personality. Even if her words hit a mark, who would say anything to her?

Ember was different. She cared for the woman who’d loved her like she was flesh and blood. Who mothered the person that was her soul friend. Danika didn’t want to cause Ember any more pain than she was already going through, but this request would not land lightly.

“What is it?” Ember’s voice rasps over the phone.

Danika pulls air deeply into her lungs and closes her eyes. “I need you to stay away from the city.”

Silence.

“It’s dangerous right now. I don’t know why Bryce was targeted. If there is any link between you and the killer whatsoever I don’t want you in their line of fire.” Danika knows she rambling, but her composure couldn’t exist in the blanketed quiet.

“I promise I’ll take care of everything. I’ll figure out where Bryce is and make sure she gets home to you. Paperwork, medical issues, I’ll take care of it all, Mama Ember.” The promises she makes are big, she’s not even sure she can fulfill all of them. “Just please, stay back and keep safe.”

More silence. Danika’s stomach is rolling and she’s not sure if Ember is ever going to reply when a new voice sounds from the device.

“Danika, it’s Randall. We understand what you mean. Ember is just- processing right now.”

The loving, vibrant man who mailed them chocolate croissants, and could out shoot every member of the city’s aux units sounds hollow. None of the normal jovial inflections or calming vibrato. Randall sounds like he’s been choking down glass. “We will stay in Nidaros.”

Danika’s shoulders curl in relief. “Thank-“

“On one condition.” Randall cuts her off commandingly. “You bring whatever is left of my babygirl home, Danika. We don’t want her body dumped in that river.”

He wetly sniffles and something shatters in the background.

“I promise,” Danika whispers, feeling like a small child again. “I promise.”

~

Bryce Quinlan’s questionable lineage could be to blame!

Could halfbreed Bryce Quinlan’s vanir parent play a roll in the brutal death she received over this weekend?

“A bastard daughter is never a good look to a powerful vanir,” says councilwoman Sabine Fendyr

~

Connor and Bronson had a grip on either of her arms as she tries to refrain from clawing her mother’s face off.

“You bitch! You had no idea what you were talking about,” Danika spits, and it only makes her blood boil further when it misses the mark.

Sabine was too poised for a woman who’s daughter was actively trying to kill her. She fiddled with the rip that Danika’s claws left in the shoulder of her expensive suit, and raised a manicured brow. “I only spoke the truth. Are not most young demifae deaths due to domestic disputes with the vanir parent?”

“For children, yes!” Danika can feel her wolf pushing under her skin, begging to take control. “Bryce knew her father, he has no interest in her whatsoever. You are distracting from the actual killer.”

“Danika, I know this isn’t what you want to hear,” Sabine steps closer, only to stumble back as Danika’s wolf releases a throaty growl. “It looks like a home invasion. Things are missing from the apartment. Quinlan was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“No,” Danika half growls, half whimpers.

“Someone wanted a token from one of the most powerful alphas in all of Midguard.” Sabine continues. “Bryce, with no magic to her name, no way to defend herself got caught up in the mess. It’s unfortunate.”

“You called her a halfbreed,” Danika can’t force the tears back anymore. They run in rivulets down her cheeks, and Connor leans his face against her shoulder as he cracks too.

Sabine shakes her head, “It’s what she is. I raised you to be more logical than this, Danika. You can leave when you regain some semblance of composure.”

The door clicks behind her. She’d locked them in her room. Danika growls and storms over to the door, grabbing the knob with clawed hands. The wood gouges, and the hinges creek as she shakes the lock.

It doesn’t budge.

Bronson walks up beside her, currently the calmest of the three of them but equally downtrodden. He eyes the door, and with one swift movement, kicks the door and sends it flying off the hinges.

“Screw her,” Bronson mutters under his breath.

Connor is sitting on her bed, head in hands. “They are dragging her name through the mud.”

Danika purses her lips, but she can’t disagree. The headlines were only becoming more inflamed.

Bryce Quinlan’s History of Public Indecency

~

Reed Redner claims that Quinlan attempted to solicit him for a chance to stick her hands in the family fortune!

~

Does Jesiba Roga’s apprentice manage her dark dealings in Lunathion’s Meat Market?

~

Leaked! A photo of Bryce Quinlan with Prince Ruhn Danaan. Secret lovers or vengeful baby daddy?

“She’s going to pull the aux units off the case,” Danika breathes out. “She is already setting up an alternative story to pacify the media and her family.”

Connor shakes his head, “her family will never go for the home invasion shit.”

“They won’t,” Danika agrees. “If she pulls the wolf aux off the beat, that only leaves the Fae or the 33rd looking into this.”

“So we gave to work with the 33rd or the faerie squad? Great.” Bronson rubs his face. “Just great.”

They would have to work with one or the other. When Sabine pulls them, they will lose access to all of the research equipment and aux recourses. Danika would not sit idly while Bryce’s death was swept under the rug.

“Let’s start with the Fae. Ruhn is as invested in this as we are, he may be of some assistance.” Danika pulls out her phone to texts the rest of the pack.

Fury Axtar- Danika. What’s going on? yesterday at 8:07

Fury Axtar- I heard. I’m coming. yesterday at 8:10

“Well, it looks like Fury is on her way. We’ll have more help than we thought,” Danika texts Fury to come to the packhorse, not the apartment.

“Do you think she could do something about these articles?” Connor gritted through his teeth, his phone white-knuckled in his hands. Alerts had been popping up on their news apps all day. They’d tagged everything with Bryce’s name thinking something useful may come up, but it was all gossip and slander.

“That’s not really Fury’s expertise,” Danika thinks out loud. “Declan Emmet may be able to help with that.”

“Anything to get this shit taken down,” Bronson’s wolf flashes in his eyes. “Her family doesn’t deserve to be bombarded with this shit.”

“Bryce wasn’t like this,” Connar rakes his hand over his scalp. He was already looking sallow from lack of rest. There was a hollowness to him, that Danika could feel echo in her own soul. Neither of them would forget what they’d seen

“She wasn’t. We will fix it,” Danika makes another promise. “All of it.”  

Bronson and Connor tip their heads in respect. They trust her as their alpha to lead them. Bryce was honorary pack. All of them are grieving and looking to her for guidance. To avenge the lost member of their family.

All Danika can do is assure them and hope she’s telling the truth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

@cursebreaker29

@firestarsandseneschals

@julemmaes

@tillyrubes10

@live-the-fangirl-life

@ghostlyrose2

@kingandfireheart

@fredweasleyhasadhd

@vanzetanze

@wordsxstars

@highladyof-erilea

[unchartedwcters]

{zión moreno, 21, trans woman, she/her/hers} || yazmín navarro montes is a mutant with the ability of hydrokinesis (water manipulation). they’ve been in new york for eight and a half years where they spend most of their time as student attending xavier’s/unwilling omega. when i think of them, i think of words and pictures carved into desks, a pool of water’s wobbly reflection, necklace chains tangled in hair, and fast footsteps following the sound of a schoolbell.

UNCLASSIFIED 

SECRET

yazmín navarro montes was the apple of her parents’ eye. despite being the middle child of three children, she didn’t linger in the background or have to fight for attention. her mother and father always had plenty of time and love for her, no matter what. they let her express herself however she wanted. because of that, she would, soon enough, realize she was trans. her parents accepted her wholeheartedly, as did the rest of her family, embracing and supporting her. they even moved churches the moment the one they attended attempted to disapprove. their new and lifelong one would be loving and kind, and yazmín would see it as her second home for a long time. 

unlike most kids, yaz didn’t bemoan going to church, praying, or all the time spent there that other children would say is ‘wasted’. she herself felt close to god, as if he smiled on her and her family. the cross her grandparents had given her on her fifth birthday almost never left her neck. her sister teased her for how much of a “kiss-ass” for god she could be, but it didn’t shake how yaz felt. when she was within the walls of the church, it was as if a wave of energy would fill her bones. it was magical. 

schooling proved to be more of a challenge, as she found herself easily bored. that was until she got a taste for science, chemistry specifically. she dove head first in, eager to read, learn, and watch whatever she could get her hands on. there were more than a few times they had to air out the house when one of yaz’s experiments went awry. most of those incidents could be explained away easily, but there were one or two her parents always wondered about. it was as if yazmín would have access to chemicals or tools that she’d have no way to get. they’d soon find others who shared in their concerns. 

much like any tween about to become a teen, yaz would have spouts of moodiness. she filed in behind her sister in one of those moods, irritated by everything and anything, even the surge of energy she got entering the church. as they sat down, the priest came down the aisle to bless them all with holy water. it was a routine he liked to do every first sunday of the month. yazmín rolled her eyes as he passed their row, unhappy her outfit would get stained. that was all it took. the water never touched her, standing still as her eyes met the ceiling, before sprinkling to the floor in front of her feet. she didn’t notice at all, nor did her family. 

but the priest did. 

he didn’t want to believe it. right before his eyes, the water meant to bless a devoted child of god had repelled itself from her. he even tried to bless her again, yet the same thing happened. 

to yazmín, nothing had happened. it worried the priest even more. at first, he did nothing with this information, unsure of what to do. as time passed, more odd instances happened around her. she took her brother to the park, and the park’s sprinklers rose but no water came out. once they left, water exploded from each opening. her mother would notice she’d come home bone dry despite a spring shower outside. every once in awhile the faucets in the house would only run warm right away despite the winter biting at people’s heels outside. 

it’s six months what the priest witnessed when he came to her parents. he explained his concerns, and they were distraught. mutants were becoming a more well known entity in the last decade, but many churches had found themselves distrusting. they thought, instead of a scientific explanation, the manifestation of powers was evidence of demons or the devil itself. people who showed signs of these abilities had to be saved for the sake of themselves and others. 

when yazmín came home from school that day, she was met by all three of them and a priest she didn’t know. her sister was away at college and her brother had been sent to stay with their grandparents. it was an unsettling silence that would last for two years. 

that evening yazmín went through her first exorcism. they didn’t explain why or what she had down. it scared her, despite how little they did. the way her parents looked at her, how the priest flinched under gaze, she couldn’t understand what she had done wrong. it took the third exorcism for her to find out what it was. holy water sprinkled on her, until it suddenly halted in the air. she stared at it, eyes wide, before turning her head and the droplets hit the exorcist right in the face. 

“the hold the demon has on her grows stronger,” the man gravely spoke. 

it finally dawned on her. she tried to defend herself, tell them she wasn’t doing it on purpose, that she hadn’t done it at all. she would know if she were possessed, and she wasn’t. she cried, shouted, but no one listened. none of it worked. her parents were desperate to save their daughter, and the priests wanted to save her soul. 

the exorcisms continued, increasing in their length and intensity. days blurred together, prayers ringing in her ears and her hope for a light at the end of the tunnel growing smaller and smaller. her father would cry out, “please save my little girl! please bring her back!” 

“i’m still here, papa,” yazmín sobbed. “i never left!” but after awhile, even that didn’t sound true. 

somedays she’d fight back, although unintentional. her hands curling into fists would freeze the pipes, a glare could boil a drink, a missed kick would bring a wave of water over from their neighbor’s pool. each time they grew more convinced of her possession, while yazmín realized she wasn’t without options. she made a few attempts to run away, only to fail because she was only thirteen. 

then, quite suddenly, that daily routine came to an end. it all started with the newest exorcist coming in, and wondering aloud if there was any saving her. her mother had gasped, and father looked ready to cry. he and the other priests went to another room, and came back with a new plan. they would take her out of this environment, to somewhere no demon could survive. it could take months, years to return, if she ever did. it was their last resort. 

yazmín didn’t give her parents a chance to answer. “i’m not leaving my home!” 

“now, young lady, that isn’t-” 

“i didn’t do anything wrong!” her cry shook the house, the pool next door sloshed, and the dam holding back the river above the down cracked ever so slightly. 

“baby, please--” her mother tried to calm her, but yaz shook her head, tears already on her face. 

“i’m-” the sink heads burst off. “not-” cracks filled the area around the pool, “leaving.” every pipe in the house ruptured, breaking the drywall apart with the force of the water coming out. 

a similar scene took place in other houses, backyards flooded other backyards, and the crack of the dam grew longer. 

“she must be stopped!” the priest cried out, unsheathing a dagger from beneath his robes and headed toward yazmín, quickly. “or else she will take us all!” 

there were screams and yells all around her. time slowed down. yaz watched each muscle of his body raise the dagger towards her, and she grabbed for anything to help her. water interlinks with her finger and forms a sharp knife of its own. his dagger dragged over a centimeter of her neck, and the pain woke her up. she used the weapon in hand and stabbed it through his body. 

metal clattered to the floor with a thud of a body. everyone was staring at her. within moments, yaz passed out. 

the next few months of her life would be hard to account for. the government had gotten involved, as did charles xavier. her meltdown had brought their town a lot of attention, along with questions. no one found out that she caused it. authorities wished to keep her with them, but charles had somehow convinced them to let her attend xavier’s. later, yaz would find it ironic her attempt to stay home would send her away anyways. 

things were hard for awhile, but she grew accustomed to her new life. she even enjoyed it, being around people like her and free to use those powers without consequence. nearly a decade later, the year of exorcisms was becoming a distant memory. but the government hadn’t forgotten about her. 

someone powerful enough to nearly sink an entire town at thirteen, who could surly do even worse now, was not easily filed away by those in charge. they had contacted professor xavier in the beginning stages of the omega project, then reached out to her. they offered her a deal: a complete wipe of her record in exchange for her participation. yazmín hated them for it. they made her an offer she couldn’t refuse, and she accepted it with gritted teeth. 

now, yazmin is moved out of the comfort of xavier’s and lives in a cold compound with strangers she prefers to keep at arms length. her life is a whirlwind again, and she’s not sure when it’ll stop this time, if it ever will. 

[fromthefishbowl]

People who complain about Ao3 don’t remember what sites like ff.net were like

Every few months, a bright-minded Tumblr blogger peeps up with the never-heard-before: “Ao3 is a completely amoral site. If they want to prove to us they have a moral backbone, then they need to purge X, Y, and Z tags, and then create a team of mods who will regularly check the stories that are reported because since now there aren’t tags that tell the readers about X, Y, and Z, these goddamn perverts will slip through the cracks and create toxic environment in which children shouldn’t be” take, and the posts routinely receive thousands of notes.

Well... let me tell you how things actually work on sites that don’t use tags but have a team of mods that checks the authors and stories that are being reported.

I’m a fandom old: even if I’m young, I began reading and writing fanfics back in September/October 2012. I’ve used a site that was basically ff.net’s twin, Wattpad, and then Ao3. I was there, when Wattpad slowly turned into a money-making farm and implemented micro-transactions and ads. I have seen how these platforms evolved and who they were protecting, and it really doesn’t matter how much you whine and complain about Ao3, but it’s the only platform that actually protects both its writers and readers in equal measure.

According to the many theories made by people who have already forgotten how actually lawless fanfiction sites were, having mods would solve all the problems regarding the “moral issues” presented by Ao3. In their opinion, mods would be these perfect creature who never take sides and are always impartial, ready to defend ThE cHiLdReN from the evil, amoral content. They’d scrub the site clean from the “toxic” and “dangerous” content in order to create a wholesome environment where parents and kids alike can happily frolic together.

In truth? Nothing about mods ever worked like that. No one is able to be completely impartial, and some people only need to be given an ounce of power to lose their minds and do as they please.

On the site similar to ff.net, people were encouraged to report all the stories that didn’t strictly follow the rules of the site, including the ones where the spelling wasn’t as great as it should’ve been. It wasn’t rare to find that users had reported an account or a story simply out of revenge, because said author hadn’t commented their work favorably. If you were a fandom favorite with a lot of readers, it was also possible to find in your DM box people asking you to report and ask your readers to report someone, even if you had to make up things in order for the report to go through.

Thankfully, mods were extremely lethargic (I love the idea that people think that they’d act briskly and not sleuth around the site, posting stories with their modding accounts in order to receive a higher number of comments), so most reports ended up in stand-by, catching proverbial dust, for years and years, until everybody forgot about the report itself as well as the story, the author, and whatever had happened there.

But when they acted? Ooooh, and here’s the interesting part, because there were three options!

The story was taken down, the account banned, and the only thing left of them would be a notice from the mods that they had been stricken because they had done this, this, and a little bit of that too. But do you know who was usually hit, by this? Smaller writers, writers whose stories didn’t pull in a lot of views and comments, people who were “forgettable”. It also happened a lot with writers who would put themselves against bigger authors by writing negative reviews for their stories;

The mods closed an eye because the people and storied reported where at the top of their category in a very trafficked fandom. There was a case in which people were so distressed by the presence of a very specific story (Jewish girl falls in love with the Nazi guard that abuses her while she’s in a concentration camp), that the headmistress of the site had to write a special comment that could be viewed by all the people who were going to review that story that said that there was no reason to leave a negative review nor to report it to the mods, as it followed the rules of the site (it didn’t, but it brought in a lot of views and attention to the platform, so... it could stay!);

The mods would hunt the authors on their social medias too and ban them from the site because they’d been rude. It happened more than once, that an author was reported or they were the ones reporting, and have found themselves submersed in insults by members of the mod team on their Facebook page. Two cases:

An author was accused of having plagiarized a story written by another, more famous, user. The author denied, and asked for proof of it. The mod taking care of the case didn’t offer any, but deleted their story and blocked their account until they said they were sorry to the more famous user. In order to have their account back, the author said they were sorry to the famous user, but on their Facebook page wrote that it was a crock of shit: they hadn’t copied from that person, and the fact that the mod hadn’t offered any proof of it was suspicious enough. The mod saw that Facebook post, sent them a DM with nothing but insults, and then banned them permanently because they had been rude to the administration;

An author posted a story, and two other users plagiarized it. The author reported both stories and waited a week for the mods to send them a DM telling them to screenshot all the passages that had been copied and put them all in a document because they didn’t have time to read three different stories. Although the author complied, they wrote a post complaining about this lousy job on Facebook. The post caught the eye of another moderator who blocked their account and told them they wouldn’t have had access to the site unless they apologized to the entire team of mods, to the users they had accused of plagiarizing their story, and took down the Facebook post. In the meanwhile, the first mod was caught chatting with one of the two other users on the forum. The author didn’t back down for another two weeks, when the headmistress of the site herself showed up and told them she would’ve been the one to take care of the question. In the end, although it was clear that the two users had copied the author’s story, the author still received nasty and threatening messages from the entire mod team because of that Facebook post, to the point that they decided to delete their stories and their account altogether and move to another platform.

This is what happens with mods that are always asked to answer to reports and to take care of stories personally: authors are not protected against anything unless they are big enough to be an attraction people subscribe to the platform for. Fics with “moral backbone” issues were left up if they had the views and the comments for it.

And the readers? Well, the readers used to get the short end of the stick too, as those sites didn’t have a tag system and there wasn’t a way for them to know if a story contained something they didn’t like to read about, nor a way for them to “obscure” the ones that did. Finding specific things was a mess too.

This to say: you need to curate your own fandom experience. You are in charge of what you read, and it’s not my place to take care of the children and make sure that everything they put their saintly eyes upon is wholesome. Ao3 is the only platforms that allows the readers to have an absolutely complete control of what they consume and that allows the writers to warn the readers of every single issue their story can contain that might trouble them. Learn to curate your own fandom experience, rather than spending your time whining about “moral issues” and “think of the children”, coming up with ideas that are simply not doable on a massive site like Ao3.

[hrtiu]

“Give me a heated argument. A good solid disagreement. And also the making up of it later :) I really think this is a hard one”  Thanks to @redsong​ for the prompt!

AO3 link

Strictly speaking, Ahsoka didn’t really need to escort the Togruta colonists back to Kiros. It was a low-risk mission without any need of Jedi support, but Anakin had suggested the trip and Ahsoka had eagerly agreed. Ahsoka so rarely got to see the good that came from their efforts in the war, so rarely got to see the fruits of their labor. Accompanying the people she’d helped free from the Zygerrian slavers—her people—seemed like a good way to wash the foul taste of such a brutal, soul-crushing mission from her mouth.

She and the rest of Torrent Company flew the transports down to the the colonist settlement on the verdant planet’s surface, and the looks of relief on the colonists’ faces as they walked back into homes they thought they’d never see again eased some of the darkness that had settled on Ahsoka’s heart. First Umbara, then Zygerria—these past few months had been particularly bleak.

“Thank you so much for bringing us back to our homes. We cannot express the depths of our gratitude,” Governor Roshti said as he walked with Ahsoka and Rex into the Governor’s residence.

“It was our pleasure, Governor,” Ahsoka said.

“We will be holding a celebratory feast tomorrow. Please, stay and attend as our honored guests.”

Ahsoka glanced at Rex and the corner of his mouth quirked up—his version of an encouraging smile. They were hoping that Kiros would officially join the Republic, so it wouldn’t do to ignore their hospitality.

“We’d be honored.”

---

Ahsoka sat at Governor Roshti’s right hand at the head of the table, Rex on her other side. The table was heavy with Togruta delicacies—thimiar steaks, roasted cepa, even akul stew. She’d never really lived among her people, so Ahsoka didn’t have much of a taste for Togruta food, but she ate as much as she could handle to show her appreciation. At her side Rex enthusiastically bit into another hunk of thimiar steak, his enjoyment completely unfeigned.

“Maybe you were born into the wrong species, Rex,” she said, leaning over towards him. “You seem to fit right in as a Togruta.”

Rex looked up from his steak and sheepishly wiped the savory sauce from his mouth. “Sorry, Commander, I just don’t often get a chance to eat anything besides ration cubes.”

“Don’t apologize,” she said. “It’s flattering to our guests to enjoy their food.”

“Is that a Togruta culture thing?”

Ahsoka shrugged. “I’m not sure. I never spent much time on Shili.”

“Maybe you’ll get a chance to go someday,” Rex said, his eyes crinkling with the suggestion of a grin as he held her gaze.

Ahsoka found herself smiling back at him, a warmth in her chest making her feel light a giddy. She looked away quickly.

It had been like this since Rex had gotten back from Umbara, and it was terribly inconvenient. It had taken his near loss during that campaign to reveal how necessary he had become in her life, how his presence was like light—illuminating and coloring an otherwise dark world. She did her best not to think about it. Thoughts led to actions, and if she ever acted on these thrilling, terrifying feelings, she knew her life would change irrevocably.

She shoved another spoonful of akul stew in her mouth and forced the foreign food down, turning back to the Governor to compliment him again on the delicious feast. Then she took a sip of the madyam wine, easily her favorite part of the meal.

“Are you sure General Skywalker would approve of your drinking?” Rex asked, speaking softly to avoid being overheard.

Ahsoka shrugged. “They don’t have the same rules about underage drinking on Shili. And I’m not overindulging. It’s fine.”

Rex looked a little doubtful, but he let the subject drop.

The feast wound down and Governor Roshti showed them to their quarters. They’d be staying in the house of one of his daughters, in a guest suite that was as luxurious a home as anyone had access to in the colony. The rest of Torrent Company went back to the transport to sleep, but Rex was invited to stay with the family as well, having been heavily involved in the Zygerrian operation.

Governor Roshti’s daughter Daivi, a stately woman with elegant purple montrals, led Ahsoka and Rex to their rooms. The feast had gone late into the night, so the house was dark and the rest of the family already turned in for the night. At least, that’s what Ahsoka had assumed before a little boy no older than five darted out of a hallway and ran up to her, grabbing her hand.

“Are you a real Jedi?” the boy asked, bouncing with excitement.

“Yalit!” Daivi said. “What did I say about pestering our guests?”

“Oh it’s alright,” Ahsoka said with an indulgent smile. She crouched down to the child’s level and patted his red montrals. “I sure am a Jedi!”

“So you can use the Force?”

“Yep!”

“Can you do stuff like this?”

The boy reached out a hand and something in the air shifted. A ball halfway across the room—some toy must have left out—suddenly started rolling towards him, completely unaided. The room fell utterly silent.

The ball reached the boy and he gathered it up in his arms, then looked up at the adults surrounding him, staring slack-jawed. “Did… Did I do something wrong?”

“Sweetie,” Daivi said, her jaw tense, “It’s too late for you to be up. Go to sleep now, alright?”

Yalit looked around him, his eyes wide and his lower lip quivering. “Ok…” 

He hugged his ball tightly to his chest and walked dejectedly back to the hallway from which he’d come. The adults in the room watched him leave, then Daivi moved onward towards the guest quarters.

“Um, your son-” Ahsoka said, shocked that Daivi would just pretend nothing had happened.

“He’s a good boy, isn’t he?” she said with a nervous laugh, still soldiering on towards the door across the room.

“He’s Force sensitive!”

Daivi froze. “We… don’t know that.”

“He moved the ball with the Force! And I felt it—it was definitely the Force and not some random accident.”

Daivi turned around slowly, her white facial markings appearing especially pale in the dim lamplight. “If true, that is a great blessing,” her expression not matching the sentiment of her words.

“He should be brought to the Jedi Temple and trained. He needs to learn how to control his abilities,” Ahsoka insisted.

Daivi bit her lip, and her hands twisted nervously in front of her. She looked at Ahsoka pleadingly for a long moment, but Ahsoka had no idea what she was pleading for. This whole situation was making her confused and uncomfortable.

“Please, Master Jedi,” Daivi said, bowing her head low. “Yalit will be fine with us! He… he really doesn’t have very strong powers. He can barely do anything. It would be a waste of time for the Jedi Temple to train him.”

“That’s just because he’s not trained! If he were trained he’d pick up so much!”

“It… It… He’s too old, isn’t he?” Daivi said, looking near tears.

Was she worried her son wasn’t good enough? That was silly, Ahsoka was telling her the Jedi Council would be pleased to have him. It was strange that they hadn’t picked him up earlier, but she knew that children sometimes slipped through the cracks. The galaxy was such a big place.

“He’s a little older than the Temple usually takes, but I’m sure they’d make an exception-”

“Commander Tano,” Rex said, taking her by the arm and pulling her towards the guest rooms. “It’s late, and our host looks tired. Let’s talk about this tomorrow.”

Ahsoka looked up at Rex in confusion, but his stony expression revealed nothing. She let herself be pulled, though, trusting his judgment.

“Well, thank you so much for hosting us, Daivi. We’ll see you in the morning,” Ahsoka said, following Rex into the guest suite.

“Good night,” Daivi said, her voice small in the retreating darkness.

Rex shut the door behind them and stopped in the middle of the room, his back to Ahsoka. “Are you really going to take that child away from his parents?” he asked, his voice low and calm but with an underlying tension that Ahsoka had learned to pick up on over time.

Ahsoka looked blankly at him, not sure what was wrong. “The Jedi Temple is the best place for any Force-sensitive child to grow up. It’s an honor to go there—a rare opportunity very few people are ever given.”

“Hmm,” Rex grunted, neither agreeing nor disagreeing but simply accepting.

He set their luggage down on the table in the middle of the sitting room and started for one of the guest rooms off to the right.

“Wait up, Rex,” Ahsoka said.

He stopped but didn’t turn back towards her. “Yes, Commander?”

Ahsoka pursed her lips. He was doing that thing. That thing where he disagreed with her but wouldn’t just come out and say it. “Come on. I know you have something to say.”

Rex’s head bowed and he shook it once before turning to face her. “It’s not my place to have opinions about the Jedi, Commander.”

“Well, I’m asking you for it. What are you thinking?”

He looked up, meeting her gaze with his own steely stare. “I don’t think you should take that child away from his family.”

Ahsoka raised her eyebrow markings in surprise, genuinely taken aback. Her first instinct was to say it was Jedi business and he wouldn't understand, but then that’s what he’d said and she’d insisted he tell her anyway. “Oh…”

��As I said, sir. It’s not my place to have opinions.”

Ahsoka’s brow furrowed. She knew Rex would follow whatever orders she gave him, but that wasn’t the point. She wanted him to agree with her. “It’s not like we’re stealing children from their parents, Rex. He’ll have a good life at the Temple—the best life. He’ll have training he can’t get anywhere else, a safe home to grow up in, a place of privilege and respect galaxy-wide. Most parents are thrilled when their children are identified by the Council.”

“Most parents, maybe. But obviously not these parents.”

“What are you trying to say, Rex? That it’s bad when the Jedi Council invites children to go to the Temple?” she said, getting annoyed. “That it was bad when I was taken to the Jedi Temple? That Jedi are kidnappers stealing unwilling children away from their parents?”

“I don’t know if that child is willing or not, but his parents clearly don’t want him to leave them. Are you going to take him anyway? Because if that’s what you’re planning on doing, then yes, I think it’s bad!” Rex said, his voice rising in volume with each word. By the end of his speech his skin had reddened and his golden-brown eyes flashed. Ahsoka had never seen him this angry before. Angry at her. Judging her way of life.

“Have you even considered that if the Jedi Temple don’t train that child, someone else might? Someone with bad intentions? Someone from the Dark Side?”

“He’s made it this far without being noticed by any Force users, so he’ll probably be fine.”

“Look, Rex. This is how it is for all Jedi. I won’t apologize for my people and our traditions.”

“You asked for my opinion, Commander.”

“Well, that was when I thought your opinion might be reasonable!”

Rex narrowed his eyes at Ahsoka and folded his arms across his chest. “You were taken before you could even remember your parents, but that’s not true for this child. He’ll remember his parents, he’ll remember that they willingly gave him up to strangers to be raised on a faraway planet. I won’t pretend that I understand all the Jedi ways, but I know something about not having parents.”

His words cut her like a vibro-blade, slicing right through everything she’d prepared to counter him. Ahsoka had never been one to shy away from conflict, but she’d never been in such conflict with Rex before, and it hurt. She wanted to run away and hide. She needed to find a way to end this conversation now.

“Well I don’t have much of a choice in the matter, anyway,” she said, arms crossed and shoulders hunched up under her jaw. “The Council has protocols for these kinds of situations, and it’s out of my hands. Judge me all you like, but that’s the way it is.”

Rex sighed and unwound his arms, letting them fall to his sides. “Look, little’un. I’m sorry. This is your world, and I trust your judgment. I’ll follow your orders.”

“Thank you.”

With that he retreated to his room, and Ahsoka gathered her things together and went to the bedroom opposite his. Sleep was a long time coming that night, and visions of Rex’s disappointed, angry, sad face haunted her dreams.

---

The next day dawned bright and clear on Ahsoka’s misery. Rest had provided little comfort, since sleep did nothing to fix the disagreement Rex. Yes, Rex had told her he’d follow her orders, but she didn’t want him to follow her orders because he’d been trained to no matter what. She wanted him to follow her because he believed in her and believed in what she was trying to accomplish.

What the night had done was provide Ahsoka with space to consider Rex’s points. She’d been raised at the Jedi Temple, and she knew what that life entailed. She’d rarely missed her parents—barely remembered them, really—and the Jedi masters, padawans, and younglings had been her family. It was a good life, and she knew that firsthand.

But maybe Rex had a point. Her parents had willingly given her up, and as far as she knew, the same was true for the others younglings at the Temple. As much as she didn’t want to accept it, Yalit’s parents obviously didn’t see their child being trained at the Jedi Temple as a blessing. And… well Ahsoka and Rex were both equally parentless in most respects, but he obviously felt differently about it than she did. His perspective was valid, even if it was different from hers.

Ahsoka got up and got dressed for the day, thoughts stewing all the while. Daivi knocked gently on her door and invited her to breakfast, so she emerged from her room and found her way to the dining table. 

The table was set with sizzling thimiar bacon and plom fruit, but Ahsoka found she didn’t have much of an appetite. Daivi and her husband sat at the head of the table, their expressions tight with worry, and Yalit sat next to Ahsoka, smiling and oblivious. Rex was across from her, shovelling thimiar bacon into his mouth and avoiding her gaze.

Ahsoka could speak up. She could explain that the Jedi Council believed all Force-sensitive children should be trained at the Jedi Temple, that it was a great honor, and that Yalit would be well taken care of for the rest of his life. She knew his parents wouldn’t object. The Jedi were a powerful organization in the galaxy, with near mythic status as warriors and defenders of the Republic. How could they refuse?

And Rex would support her. As he’d said last night, he trusted her. It wasn’t just that he had no authority to contradict her, he trusted her. She wanted desperately to be worthy of his respect.

She cleared her throat, and the eyes of everyone around the table turned to her. Daivi took Yalit’s hand in hers and squeezed.

“I think I may have had too much to drink at the feast last night,” Ahsoka said with a weak laugh. “I can hardly remember anything after getting home.”

A confused expression crossed Daivi’s face, then understanding dawned. Ahsoka thought she saw tears forming in the older Togruta’s blue eyes.

“It was a long night, Master Jedi.”

“It’s my own fault. I can’t resist madyam wine, and I’m not allowed to drink it back on Coruscant.”

“Well, you should take some with you then!” Daivi said, getting to her feet with a smile that was heartbreakingly hopeful. She rushed over to the pantry and pulled out two large bottles of wine—drink that Ahsoka knew was a luxury in this fledgling colony.

“Oh no, I couldn’t-”

“Please! Take it!” she said insistently, her eyes intense and pleading. She held the bottles out to Ahsoka, and Ahsoka took them, understanding that this was what the grateful mother wanted.

“Thank you for your hospitality,” Ahsoka said, holding the bottles in her arms and getting to her feet. “We should be on our way—my Master is expecting us.”

Their hosts agreed and helped them pack up their things, insisting on carrying their luggage for them all the way back to the transport. Ahsoka and Rex climbed up the gangplank, and Ahsoka turned back to wave goodbye before getting aboard. Yalit smiled broadly at her from his perch in his mother’s arms, his red montrals jiggling back and forth with the force of his wave. Daivi and her husband clung tightly to each other like they’d just escaped slavery a second time. Ahsoka felt a pang of hurt, that they would be so averse to their child joining the Jedi, but she let the pang pass.

Soon enough the transport was in hyperspace, and Ahsoka hid in her quarters. She sat on the floor in a meditation pose, but serenity would not come. She simply stared at the floor, thinking of everything and nothing at once.

A knock sounded at the door.

“Come in,” she said.

The door whooshed open and Rex walked in, a bottle of madyam wine in each hand. “Can I join you?”

“Sure,” Ahsoka said, still staring at the floor.

He handed her one of the bottles, then opened the other for himself, taking a long pull before setting it on the ground. Ahsoka opened her bottle and followed suit, the sweet liquid clinging to her throat as she swallowed.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Rex said eventually.

“I know,” Ahsoka said, taking another drink from her bottle. “But your opinion means a lot to me. And I could see his parents wouldn’t take it well.”

“Thank you for listening.”

Ahsoka looked up and met Rex’s eyes, daring a small smile. He returned the smile, his eyes crinkling again in that way she loved. “I can’t promise I’ll always side with you,” she said, “but I’ll always listen.”

[threeletterslife]

The Exam

→ [1/7] of the Society Series

→ summary: Three societies. Two dead lovers. One test. In a world that prioritizes intelligence and the ability to regurgitate textbook information, will you choose love and poverty or splendor and solitude? 

→ pairing/rating: taehyung x reader | PG-15

→ genre: 99.9% angst, 0.1% fluff (if you squint) | dystopian!au & utopian!au

→ warnings: profanity, death, mentions of tuberculosis and leptospirosis, blood, extreme poverty, extremely brief mention of cannibalism and overdosing, undiagnosed depression and mild anxiety, brief mentions of the afterlife and physical violence, this shit ain’t happy pple

→ wordcount: 21.4k

There's a strange stench that permeates the air in the city of Dystopia.

It is the odor of death. The dark, muddy soil reeks of decaying bodies, of rotting rats and excretions. Deteriorating child flesh even has its own distinct smell, but you've become so used to it, you don't really mind it as much anymore.

Every day is a festival for the unusually large rats that inhabit the city. With their matted-fur and worm-tails, the rodents feast on decomposing human bodies, ripping apart the dark, putrid meat and leaving dried blood splattered on the barely-paved streets.

Bodies are everywhere.

Sometimes it's hard to tell if a fallen child is dead or asleep in the towering masses of waste. There are too many orphans wandering lost on the streets with no bed or home to conceal them in warmth. There are too many people who never know when their next meal will be, or if there will be clean water to drink for the day. Hell, most of the huts in the dystopian city are on the very verge of crumbling down.

You're lucky.

Your home has semi-working electricity and plumbing. But every now and then, the lights will refuse to turn on and the pipes will leak—or even burst if it was a bad day.

Most citizens of Dystopia, however, roam the streets, homeless, until death finally whisks them away. Nobody knows what happens after death. But everybody knows it is better than Dystopia.

This place, this Dystopia, was home for your childhood memories. Shamefully enough, it was also your birthplace. But you don't live there anymore, thank goodness. You live in Purgatory now, a smaller city with slightly more opportunities and fewer rats.

But Purgatory isn't that much different from Dystopia either. Death still hangs over the heads of the weak, ready to take their hands and lead them away when the time comes. Purgatory is a wild place full of children and teenagers from ages ten to eighteen. They're there for one sole purpose: education. Rigorous education that may come with the price of death.

It's how the whole damn system works.

Every Dystopian-born must suffer ten years of life in that hellhole; if they are still alive by then, they are relocated to Purgatory where "equal opportunities" are given to all with mercy. At least, that's what the authority claims. Really, you see it more as a ruthless competition. It's not "equal opportunities" or whatever bullcrap the government was trying to sell to the people. You see it as a game of sharks and minnows—a game of exceptionally robust predators and abnormally frail prey.

Annually, every student who is eighteen in Purgatory is required to take an exam. An exam that determines their entire future.

Every year, the highest-scoring students—or student—are whisked away by the government with silk draped around their hunched shoulders, layers of soft mink coats keeping their frayed bodies warm and their dirty tresses bathed with the richest, fragrance oils. Then they are granted access to Utopia.

Utopia, the city of the rich. They breathe expensive air there, bathe in priceless tea and wear extortionate silks and furs. They deserve it. Because they're the most intelligent people in all three cities of Atna. At least, that's what the government says.

It is merciless when they throw every other eighteen-year-old who 'failed' the Exam in the city of Dystopia. You'd think they'd spare their precious Utopian-borns—the children of the men and women who proved their intelligence by reigning over every other student in Purgatory. But they don't. The Utopian-borns are dumped into Dystopia as well. Into a foreign place where the air is dead, baths are infrequent and clothing is for the greatly fortunate.

Yet that's rare. Most often, Utopian students always tie for the highest-score and are taken back to their luxurious birthplace. It's too advantageous for them. It's unfair. Unreasonable. They train from their birth until the last second before they leave the warmth of their Utopian homes for the Exam. Of course, they would score the highest.

One year, out of the hundreds of eighteen-year-olds who took the Exam, twenty-three of them made it back to Utopia. All Utopian-borns.

Still, a handful of Utopians are tossed into the slums—they are a disgrace to all of Atna for they had the advantage and didn't take it.

You've seen those sad individuals your whole childhood. They were the ones who weren't used to horrifying conditions. Consequently, they were always the last to eat and first to die.

When you were the adventurous age of nine, you and your best friend Jimin would sit outside the shabby, repulsive place that you called home and would watch the Utopian-borns straggling across the streets.

They wailed and begged as their eyes reflected one sole emotion: fear.

"I bet she's Utopian-born," Jimin huffs as he points at a girl frantically cramming her mouth full of scraggly weeds that had somehow sprouted from the fetid grounds. Both of you silently watch as her bloody fingernails pierce madly through the mud, uprooting the plants with surprising success. "Doesn't she know those are poisonous?"

You shrug, staring blankly at the girl. "No, she's not Utopian-born. Doesn't look over eighteen. Maybe she doesn't want to take the Exam." Taking Jimin's hand into yours, you sigh, "I bet he's Utopian-born, though." Your small finger points at a young man huddled up against a pile of rubbish, completely naked and rocking back and forth, as if that action would save him from the wraths of Dystopia. He had stripped off his tattered clothes and had unskillfully attempted to wrap them around himself to combat the harsh weather. A simple but deadly mistake.

A Dystopian-born would know better.

"He's going to die," Jimin says, cocking his head. "Let's go help him." He starts to tug you towards the unclothed man but you forcefully pull your friend back, eyebrows twisting downwards into a deep frown.

"Leave him." Your cold eyes stare right past the Utopian-born, gazing at the bright neon poster behind him. It reads Utopia, a wondrous place for deserving people.

And below is an image of a gorgeous, healthily plump woman in a spotless, white bikini, skin sparkling and well-tanned and her hands immaculately manicured. Her hair is loose, glossy and looks like it smells of flowering spring roses. She's holding a gleaming bottle of fizzing golden liquid in one hand and a handsome man's hand in the other. The man smiles brightly, revealing a row of pearlescent teeth as he boasts shiny, black sunglasses and wears a watch made of dazzling rubies and diamonds.

Behind the couple is a house—actually, a mansion made of polished glass with luscious trees decorating the purlieu and the pool filled with glimmering water tinted a light shade of azure. The sky is cerulean blue, and the clouds resemble cotton candy.

Everything speaks perfection.

These identical posters are littered everywhere across Dystopia. It is a painful reminder for the Atnatians who have failed the Exam—even more so agonizing for the Utopians who had been banished from their previous home.

The propaganda posters are the only clean, resplendent objects in the slums. But personally, you think they're revolting.

Your unsympathetic eyes trail back to the naked man. You take another glance at the stupid government propaganda poster behind him before you squeeze Jimin's hand. "Yeah, let's leave him," you repeat.

The pick-the-Utopian-born-from-the-crowd game abruptly halts soon after when Jimin comes over to your small hut one day, crying profusely, his tears leaving clean streaks on his dirt-covered face.

"He's dead!" he cries, fat droplets of tears dribbling down to his chin.

You frown in confusion, eyebrows knitting into a small frown. With the mortality rate of Dystopia, your best friend could either be talking about your neighbor from the next hut over or the other fifty bodies left dead and abandoned on the streets. "Who's dead, Jiminie?"

"T-That Utopian-born," Jimin whimpers, dirty hand reaching up to wipe away the tears obscuring his vision. Although there were many Utopian-borns roaming around Dystopia, you had a clear idea of who he was talking about. "The rats... they—"

You grab his filthy hand before it reaches his eyes. "Don't rub your eyes, remember?"

Jimin nods dejectedly, his head dropping low as his tears dripped to the floor, leaving wet puddles of brown dirt. "Sorry, Y/N, I forgot..." He sniffles, which didn't help the snot that was leaking out of his soot-covered nose. "But the rats..." he trails off, hand reaching up again to wipe away his tears. But he pauses, thinks better of it and tries to blink them away instead.

You nod, knowingly. "And it's not the first time you've seen that happen, Jiminie. Don't cry..."

Your friend whimpers, kicking the wet dirt beneath his feet. "But if we had helped him... The rats wouldn't have eaten right through his guts! They wouldn't have bitten him to pieces or drunk his blood!" he wails. You are silent, never great at solacing. "If we had helped him..."

Time is running out for both of you. You'd soon be relocated to Purgatory and you know Jimin is starting to get anxious for the both of you. He would cry in fear and grief for every dead corpse on the street, bite his nails hard enough to draw blood even though you would tell him not to, and try to help all the suffering Utopian-borns, despite your avid protests.

Jimin had always been too soft-minded, too kind. Death frightened him.

But you weren't afraid of death. Never have been. Never will be.

You are fucking terrified of death. It is the only occurrence that will keep you from scoring the highest, and as a seventeen-year-old, the Exam was looming closer than ever. You couldn't die now. Not after all the years of rigorous studying. You'd skipped nights of sleep, countless meals to get to this position.

To you, Purgatory would always be a second Utopia; for one, the conditions are immensely better than that of Dystopia, maggots no longer crawling in your food and clothes not as battered and ravaged by irritable rats or insects. This city is your one chance where you can prove yourself deserving to live in Utopia—to confirm that you can outlast, out-study and outsmart everyone in your year.

You eat, sleep and breathe your studies, something only a few students can manage to do. One of the only things that keep you motivated to wake up at the crack of dawn and open up a dusty book is the fact that no one's ever secured a perfect score on the Exam.

But you know you'll be the first.

You'll be the first and only person to obtain a perfect score. And thus you will be the only eighteen-year-old going to Utopia in your year.

It is a fantasy. A dream. A goal. But you thirst to achieve it.

In fact, you haven't left the library in weeks. You've practically been glued onto the same hard, wooden chair for what seemed like days now. You have also never ceased to flip the pages of your colossal textbooks. You're quite happy to say that the other students aren't studying as hard as you—most of them have given up by now.

Logically, it makes sense to surrender to the Exam.

Although you're given eight whole years to study in Purgatory, most students use that time to stuff themselves full of savory victuals, sleep in cots instead of in fetid mud and live without the shadow of death appended to their feet. Obviously, the conditions aren't as astounding as Utopia, but anything's better than the slums of Atna. It isn't worth it, they say. It isn't worth the eight years of miserable studying, only to be beaten by someone better (there's always someone better) and thrown into Dystopia without ever being able to live. But 'surrender' isn't in your vast vocabulary.

As much as you hate cheesy platitudes, you're in it (ahem, forcibly) to win it. Besides, your competition is dropping like flies on a scorching hot day. You suspect it's from that nasty tuberculosis that's been going around for a while.

There's only a year left before the Exam now. It's such little time for you to finish reading everything in that library, and such little time alike for the other students to live their last year to the very fullest in Purgatory, the downgrade of Utopia but the upgrade of Dystopia.

But especially for you, a year definitely isn't enough. You're just a tad bit off schedule—you were supposed to finish reading and memorizing everything in the library last year so you'd have two good years to review. Now you only have one.

It adds on to the multitudes of problems that no one truly knows what's on the Exam. They say anything in the grand library is fair game, but besides that, you don't know much. And because of that, you and what's left of your competitors have been reading everything in the library from novels to textbooks to published theses.

As a matter of fact, you're just one book and a page shy from reading everything in the damned library. Your eyes bore into the paper overlaid with equations and one too many graphs, forcing your brain to memorize every detail, every print and word. You know you shouldn't frown when you study. Someone you'd once loved had told you an unpretty, permanent crease would be etched on your forehead—but now you can't help it—frowning helps you concentrate.

Especially now. The library is usually dead silent except for the soft crinkles of paper as students flip the pages of their reading materials, yet you swear at least half of the students in the room have tuberculosis. There's heavy coughing every ten seconds, the infected splattering crimson blood on the thin, worn-out pages of the textbooks. And that's how the disease has been spreading.

They're going to die before the Exam. You swear they are—how pathetic of them to spend the last days of their lives cramming study material in their heads.

You don't care much for the infected, as long as they keep their distance from you. You don't know what you'll do if you catch the disease as well. But in your mind, nothing is worse than the mortality rates of Dystopia. At least no one in Purgatory dies from famine.

Still, there are never adequate treatments or vaccines and you can recall at least ten people who you haven't seen since tuberculosis first broke out. Not that you care, though. In the end, you're just glad you're not one of the diseased. You've always had a strong immune system, anyway.

You let out a soft sigh, feeling the urge to rub your dry, tiresome eyes but thinking better of it. Shutting the heavy textbook with a gentle thud, you place both hands on the wooden table, steadying yourself. You slowly close your eyes, relishing in the comfort of the darkness—you haven't slept in nearly three days, haven't left your seat to eat either. Your empty water canteen stares back at you, begging for it to be refilled. You swallow, your throat feeling unbearably scratchy, but you don't succumb to its desperate demand.

Now you only have one more book to read. Just one more and you'll be done. You'll treat yourself to an actual meal and a few hours of sleep (not too much because you still need time for review). With the Exam inching closer every minute, every second, you really don't have time to waste.

Water will have to wait for later.

Besides, you know for a fact that the last book you have to read isn't too long—just a hundred pages or so. You slowly open your eyes, vision slightly blurry as you force yourself to stand. Immediately, your legs threaten to give out and you have to stagger forward to use the dated bookshelves to steady yourself.

Step by step, you carry your barely responsive body to the special corner in the library that you haven't touched in the seven years you've lived in Purgatory. The unfamiliar, gray, tattered book catches your eye and you continue to wobble closer and closer to it. Family Studies, it should say.

Quite the ironic book to read about in a world where families are ripped apart by the government and their indecent tactics. But it's not like you have a choice. You need to get to Utopia—you've made promises...

You may be broken on the inside and out, but you won't let yourself break a promise.

Wearily, you force yourself to lift up your shaking arm to touch the book's spine. But you gasp, nearly jumping back with the little energy you have as your cold hand comes in contact with something warm.

Flesh, you finally register in your head. I've touched flesh.

Your head jerks up rather painfully, leaving your eyes struggling to adjust to the sight in front of you. A boy. A tall boy. His figure towers over you, and he frowns deeply, eyes bloodshot as he looks you up and down. In one hand he clutches a frayed brown blanket draped comfortably over his shoulders and the other stubbornly grasps the book—your book.

But you don't acquiesce, glaring at him as you tug the book closer to you. The boy glances your way tiredly, no emotion displayed on his malnourished, sculpted face. "Excuse me," he croaks, tugging the book closer to himself.

"Excuse you." Your voice comes out much raspier than you had expected, making you instantly regret opening your mouth to speak. But the desire to have the last book in your hands is far greater: "I need that." You pull the book back.

The boy scoffs—even that comes out as a dry cough that makes you flinch back just a bit. "I need it too."

You hate the parched feeling tickling the back of your throat, and you let out a little scream of frustration before instinct gets the better of you. You quickly slap the boy's hand, taking advantage of his surprise as an opportunity to snatch the book from the shelf. Once the book is safely cradled in your arms, you turn to the boy and give him the side-eye. "Well, I need it more."

With that, you attempt to hobble away with the best of your ability, but you fail when the boy grabs the back of your threadbare shirt, stopping you from moving any further. "Please."

He sounds so desperate, voice dripping with misery—something you were once so familiar with. His hands shake, grasping the fabric... You hate yourself for turning around to see his forlorn face. His eyes are full of suffering, of so much pain—that too is so familiar to you."Please..." he whispers again as his grip loosens on your shirt.

You're silent. It hurts. It physically pains you that the only human interaction you've had in months, maybe years, reminds you so much of him.

"Pleaseeee!!" Jimin drags out, a burst of giggles leaving his throat as he tugs excitedly at your arm. "Please! Let's go, let's go!"

You grumble, begrudgingly dragging your feet as Jimin pulls you towards unfamiliar territory. "I'm not hungry," you whine. "Can we just stay in the dorms?"

"We've got eight years to stay in the dorms, Y/N. Eight! Please? Just a few minutes in the cafeteria? I heard they serve actual food! Maybe if we're lucky, we'll get to snag some snacks!" Jimin exclaims, his cheeks tinged pink with elation.

"Where did you hear that from?" you mumble in protest before giving in to Jimin's persistence.

"The ones who failed," he answers lightheartedly. "I've been asking around."

"Oh."

You can't really say much more. There's nothing more to say.

The cafeteria is larger than at least ten Dystopian huts combined; there are rows and rows of rusty lunch tables and a long, metal countertop with a few baskets of bread on top. You and Jimin manage to salvage some before the rats get to it. You force yourself to ignore the angry squeaking and chattering around your bare feet.

The slices of white bread are only slightly moldy, which already makes it better than anything one can forage from your birthplace. You take each bite slowly, chewing steadily to keep the flavor on your tongue just a little while longer. But all too soon, it's gone. Though you'd denied it earlier, you are definitely hungry. Maybe even starving.

You look up to see Jimin swinging his feet back and forth, his hands grasping the side of the old bench, keeping his body balanced. He notices your eyes on him and looks at you, giving you a small smile. You smile back.

"This is already better than Dystopia, isn't it?" he says, small hand tentatively moving towards yours to encompass it. You nod your head in agreement. "We have eight years..." You nod again. "Then we'll be able to go back home."

You don't hesitate, a faint smile appearing on your lips. "Of course."

"Not dead, yet, huh?" you sigh, facing the boy next to you, scrutinizing his every movement. When he doesn't answer right away, you slam the textbook down in the middle of the table to get his attention—and to spite him, of course.

The boy scoffs as he glares at you through the tired slits of his eyes. Any sense of the weakness he had shown from practically begging you to share the book with him yesterday is gone. The feebleness might've been just an act—a sly trick to get you to help him. "Sorry but I plan on going to Utopia as well. That, we have in common," the boy bites right back. "Our only difference is that I'll actually make it there."

You blow air through your nose, prying open the previous book titled Family Studies and muttering death threats under your breath. You clear your throat before you speak again. "Yeah, right. Please shut up before I regret sharing my textbook with you."

"For your information, that's not exactly yours," the boy snorts. "It's the government's. And you've seen the shit that happens when you mess with them."

There's a sadder undertone to his voice that you pick up immediately. He sounds cocky but ruined at the same time—you would know because that's the façade that you had put up for yourself for years now. You can't stop yourself from asking the question that falls from your lips quite easily: "Why? Someone you know messed with them?"

The boy averts his eyes from you, looking down at his feet covered up in tattered shoes. "More like someone I knew." He shrugs, turning his head up so that his dark eyes pierce through yours. "But it doesn't really matter anymore."

Something stings inside. You wish you could say the same.

"It's only been a week," you giggle, watching Jimin stuff his face full of soup made of mystery miscellaneous ingredients. "Shouldn't you have gotten used to having enough food by now?"

Jimin pauses his vehement eating to give you a 'duh' look. "Silly, I'm going to store all the food now when I can. You know, before we have to go back. When's the last time Dystopia had meal times, anyway?"

"Never, of course," you laugh. The rats or some other pesky rodents chatter right along with you. But they only sound as if they are wryly laughing with you and Jimin. A bit embittered, you kick your feet in an attempt to shoo the rats away—or at least shut them up. "Too bad this place still has rats."

Jimin nods. "I've seen some of them around our food too." He makes a disgusted face. "Think about it. What if this mystery soup is made of rat droppings and piss?"

"Oh shut up. Don't be like that," you sniffle, turning up your nose in complete distaste. "That's disgusting."

"I'm only joking," Jimin chuckles, taking another spoonful of his soup, exaggerating the action and making you mock-gag in repugnance.

As annoying as he sometimes is, having Jimin around is something you always have been thankful for. It was everything to have a friend be by your side. You've seen what happens when people are left alone for too long. They go bat-shit crazy. Completely bonkers.

Being tossed back to Dystopia is inevitable; neither of you was going to stop it. Yet even just your best friend's presence is your very own incentive to wake up the next day with a hopeful smile on your lips. He matters so much to you.

"Let's have the time of our lives in Purgatory," he'd told you over and over again. So much so that you can still hear his voice today, tainted with hope and faith. "Then we can go back to Dystopia together."

You grit your teeth, catching your lip between them and biting so hard you taste blood. The strong taste of iron drives you to focus. You furrow your brows, staring at the pages of the textbook and reading thoroughly, mulling over every word in your head with careful precision. When your eyes reach the end of the page, you're just about to look up and ask the boy if he's done reading, but he's one step ahead of you.

The boy flips the page over and smiles at you smugly. You frown at him disdainfully, but without another word, you concentrate on the content once more. Until—

"Taehyung."

You sigh, reluctantly looking up at the boy. "What?"

"Taehyung. My name's Taehyung," he says. "Just thought you ought to know. There are 98 pages left in this book, so I just thought it'd be better to introduce ourselves. We'll be sitting together for a while."

You squint your eyes at him, pondering over his words. But he does make quite a good point. You suppose you and the boy—Taehyung—had gotten off on the wrong foot. Although he was kind of a cocky asshole, you guess it wouldn't hurt to at least tell him your name.

"Fine," you say, upturning your nose. "I'm Y/N."

"Cool." Taehyung grins. For a guy who's been living in unkempt conditions for several years, his teeth look pretty near to goddamn perfection. It's a little irritating if you do say so for yourself.

You're about to pick up where you last left off in the textbook when Taehyung scoots closer to you. You lean away, frowning at him as you shoot him a 'what the fuck are you doing' look.

He seems oblivious to your stone-cold glare. "Sooo, Y/N," he says. "What's making you study this hard?" he asks. "I thought I was the only crazy one here." He laughs wryly. When he sees that you're ignoring him and still reading from the damned book, he huffs and slams it shut.

"What the fuck, Taehyung," you spit out, jerking your head towards him. "Can't I study in peace?"

"Didn't anyone tell you it's rude to ignore?" he counters.

"Give me the book back."

"No." He grins, pushing the book away from you as he crosses his legs confidently, leaning back in his chair. "Answer the question. Please," he adds hastily. "C'mon. If we stay cooped up reading all day, we'll die before even getting to live in Utopia."

You let out a frustrated groan, but he's right in a way. You should take study breaks now and then—possibly to keep your sanity. "What's making me study so hard? Fine," you huff. "We all have our mad-person reasons. Happy?" But upon Taehyung's disappointed look at your vague answer, you let out a deep sigh. "And I made promises I don't want to break," you elaborate reluctantly.

"Promises?" Taehyung says. "Interesting... You look like you've been through some rough shit."

You scoff. "Me? Says you. You're Dystopian-born too, right?"

"I'm that obvious, am I?" He grins. "It's true though. I've seen bad shit in Dystopia."

"Yeah, well, I've seen the worst shit right here in Purgatory," you mutter. "So I think I win."

"Oh?"

You ignore him. "Give me back my book," you demand.

"First of all, it's not your book," Taehyung laughs. "And secondly, worst shit in Purgatory? Must be an interesting story behind that. Do tell."

"No."

Taehyung huffs as he leans back even further in his chair. "So you've lost someone you love, then."

You freeze. How did he—

Biting your lip again, you contemplate whether to answer. Finally, you let out a small, "Yeah. Two, actually."

"Damn, two?" Taehyung gawks. "Wow. Um, I'm sorry. You weren't kidding about the bad shit you've seen here."

"I really wasn't." Now you're definitely not in the mood to study. Not when Taehyung, single-handedly, in just a few minutes, reminded you of them. "It's dumb, but I use them and the promises we made together as an incentive to study. That's my mad-person reason," you confess.

Why does it feel better to tell someone else about yourself?

"That's not dumb," Taehyung offers, his eyes mirroring your own sadness in them. "It's good to have someone you love to be your incentive." He pushes the textbook back towards you. "Sorry for pestering you. You can study now if you want."

You nod curtly as you quickly open the book to the page you had left off. It seems that Taehyung does have the smallest bit of sympathy in him. You suppose he's not a completely horrible person (as you had thought before).

Sighing, you try to read through the sentences on the page, but you find yourself reading the same phrase over and over again. Damn. Your stomach flips and you begin to feel a little queasy as melancholy washes over your head. Shit. Now you really can't concentrate.

"You're, okay, right, Jiminie?" you beg, frown lines appearing on your forehead as you take both of the sick boy's hands in yours, watching his tense face relax ever-so-slightly from your soft touch.

"It's probably just something I ate. I'll be fine!" he manages to answer enthusiastically. "I'll throw it all up by tomorrow and you'll see me stronger than ever!"

He was wrong.

As the long days rolled by, he got sicker and sicker. Most of your week was spent in Jimin's room. It became a daily routine to watch him throw up whatever you suggested he eat. It became a reoccurring attempt for you to try to calm his sweltering fever. Every day you were more exhausted than the last. And so was he.

You were losing hope, but you tried not to show it. You knew he was dying, but neither of you mentioned it. You were losing your best friend and you couldn't do anything about it.

No one cared either. Everybody turned a blind eye to the ten-year-old boy suffering in overwhelming pain. They either had been preoccupied with studying or didn't want to catch whatever Jimin had. To them, Jimin, your light and life source was nothing but another body to be tossed in the graveyard at the end of the day.

And just like that, he passed away.

You can still recall the misery reflecting in his eyes, his quiet whimpers, his delusional words. You can still remember him. Quite clearly, too. He didn't know who you were the last few minutes before he blinked half-way and never woke up again. The moment you knew he was dead, you'd cried, clinging to his body and letting out the sorrow, the weakness, that you had hidden from him when he was alive.

To the ten-year-old you, his death was a mystery.

But it was leptospirosis. You know that now, after years of flipping the pages of those medical textbooks. It was a rare disease from animals, but mostly rats. Those damn rats. You wish you can kill them all.

"Those fucking rats!" Taehyung slams his fist hard on the wooden table, immediately stopping the persistent chattering of the damned rodents. "I swear to god, they're one of the worst things about Purgatory, other than the goddamn Exam itself!"

You nod in silent agreement, sighing as you play with the leftover crumbs of your breakfast. "I'd even argue that they're the worst things to ever exist. Besides the Exam."

No matter how annoyingly vocal Taehyung is about his pure hatred for rats, it feels good to have someone to talk to while eating your breakfast. You haven't had company in years.

Taehyung lets a smile loose, a boxy grin that has some sort of weird way of making you feel calm. It's impossible to believe that he's supposed to be your competition when both of you have developed a friendship over the past several days. It wasn't easy for Taehyung to befriend you—especially since you've shut out every other person in your life since... since Yoongi. But he was persistent, and you admired that about him. So slowly, very slowly, you began to open up to the boy.

You told him about Jimin, and you have to admit, it felt fucking fantastic to have someone else mourn for Jimin—to have someone else besides you who didn't ignore his death. And now you're just beginning to tell him about Yoongi upon his stubborn urging.

"You should continue," Taehyung says. "You were telling me about your preteen boyfriend?" he asks with his mouth full of bread—his words are just barely discernible and you crinkle your nose in disgust.

"Gross. Haven't you read those etiquette books? Thought they would've taught you a thing or two about not talking with your mouth full," you huff. "And don't call him my preteen boyfriend. That sounds wrong. Not to mention... it takes away so much of the meaning of my relationship with him."

"Okay, okay, sorry," Taehyung says, but chewed up bread crumbs escape his mouth and land on the metal lunch table. You make a face. "But," Taehyung continues, paying no mind to your disgust, "at the end of the day, I just wanna know if all Utopian-borns are bastards or not."

You roll your eyes. "Oh, c'mon. Do you really think I'd love a bastard?"

"Well, you're quite unpredictable, dear," Taehyung swallows his food (thankfully) before he laughs. "You thought you were going to study alone for the rest of your time here. But look at you, with me, sharing a textbook."

"You better not tell me shit like 'you didn't know love when you were ten,' Taehyung," you say as menacingly as you can. "I'm not gonna tolerate shit talk. And besides, Yoongi was definitely not a bastard. He—" you pause abruptly. "Ah, shit," you say, trying to blink away the tears that had suddenly sprung upon your eyes. Your fingers grip the hem of your shirt and you clear your throat before you continue. "He died so he didn't have to deal with bastards."

"Oh, shit," Taehyung breathes when he realizes you're close to crying. "I'm sorry... You don't have to tell me about him if it's gonna make you feel bad. I was joking about the whole Utopian-born-bastard thing anyway."

"No, I want to tell you," you say. "I need to tell someone. I can't just pent these things up inside of me, Taehyung. Don't you know? I'm using you as my personal rant-listener." You grin at him, though your tears roll down your cheeks.

Taehyung looks confused at your juxtaposition of tears and happy grin. "Okay then," he says. "If you're really sure." He frowns, tilting his head. "I just don't get the part when you said he died so he didn't have to deal with bastards. He can't choose when he dies or not—"

"Oh, yes he can," you cut him off. "Think about it," you say as more tears trip down your face. Taehyung gives you a perplexed look, his confused eyes meeting your sad ones. You sigh. "You can choose when you want to die sometimes," you whisper in a shaky voice. "Intentional death."

You've lost your appetite ever since Jimin passed away. But you come to the cafeteria every day to pay tribute to your best friend, who had announced one too many times when he was alive that the cafeteria was his favorite place in the whole world. So you sit down by yourself on the lunch tables, staring at the bread but never reaching out to take it.

Without Jimin, your world is drained of color. Life loses its meaning. There is no point. You were supposed to go back to Dystopia as adults—together. That had been your one wish. Your only wish. And now it couldn't happen. Not when Jimin's not with you anymore.

Large men in spotless white suits had dragged his limp body off of the small cot as you were begging, wailing on the side. You asked them to bury him, to give him a proper memorial. But they ignored you, pushed you away to the side. They didn't even have the decency to respect him, to cover him up with a blanket or sheet. You had to watch his clothes collect dirt and his face drag in the mud as they pulled him by the legs.

Even after they'd yelled at you, you'd watched, followed them as they flung his body into a deep pit reeking of death.

They burn the bodies in the pit every Sunday; then the week starts fresh with an empty abyss for the dead.

You want to jump in the pit after Jimin. Maybe you can conveniently dump your body in the hole a few minutes before they set fire to it—maybe you can be with Jimin that way.

It feels like a knife in your heart when you think about his last few delusional words. He'd told you fitfully, in a full sweat, that he was in so much pain, but he'd rather be in pain than die. He was afraid of death.

You aren't. You are in so much pain, you want to die, unlike him. Ten years of life is enough, you decide. Whatever is waiting for you after death has to be better than what you are living in right now.

So you plan it out. You wait until Sunday, until five minutes before they're supposed to come to burn the pit of bodies. You're going to jump in. Find Jimin. Burn to death with him. Simple.

Not so simple.

You stand exactly three feet from the pit (you measured it yourself, with your own feet), thinking it would be better to have a running start of some sort. But your feet are frozen as well as your mind is. You just can't seem to get yourself to move. You've pictured yourself jumping into the pit at least a hundred times before, so you can't help to wonder why you can't seem to do it now.

It frustrates you. Your mind tells you to run, to jump, but your legs are glued to the ground.

"Gonna jump?"

You nearly lose your balance at the sudden voice that comes from behind you. You quickly whirl around to see a lanky boy with tousled black hair. He's leaning against the exterior of the common building, staring at you with cold, judgmental eyes. He's taller, bigger than you, so you discern that he must be one of those older kids. You scowl at him. "And what if I did jump?" you retort.

"Wouldn't recommend it, kid," the boy says. He laughs coldly. "First of all, they're not going to burn that shit for several hours. Do you really want to lay around rotting bodies before you die?"

"What if I don't care?" you answer defiantly, crossing your arms.

"What are you? Dumb?" The boy scoffs, leaving his place against the wall and starting to walk towards you as he casually stuffs his hands into his pants pockets. "Get out of here," he says menacingly, eyes narrowing and mouth set stern. "And don't come back."

You admit you're slightly scared, but you don't back down. "No." You glare. "I don't want to."

The boy laughs, shrugging. "It's always the dumb Dystopian-borns. You can't be more than ten-years-old. What's got you so suicidal, huh?"

You narrow your eyes. "I'm not dumb!"

"Hm... Prove it... idiot."

You fume, face turning bright red as you stomp your feet. "Shut up! Leave me alone!"

The boy laughs. "I will if you get out of my sight."

Angry tears slip from your eyes as you grip your fists tight. "I don't want to! I-I want to die! My best friend's down there. And I'm going to be with him!" you yell as snot runs down your nose and your cheeks are wet with hot tears. You feel pathetic. But you need to get your point across to this mean, older boy who isn't leaving you alone. "You can't make me leave!"

There's an uncomfortable silence that follows, yet you stand your ground and glare at him. But to your surprise, the boy lets out a small sigh and begins to walk up to you. He crouches down to your level and he wipes your tears (and embarrassingly a bit of your snot) with the sleeve of his frayed (but obviously high-end) sweater. "It's okay kid," he says. Before you know it, he's pulling you into a tight hug. "Stop crying, hm? It'll be all right, kid."

Nobody's ever hugged you like that before. Not even Jimin—because he knows how much you don't like physical affection. But you needed his hug; it was long overdue.

You hiccup, crying out the rest of your tears as the boy holds you into his arms. It takes you a few minutes to calm down, and when you finally pull away from the boy, you notice that your shirt is slightly wet as well. And not from your tears, but from his. You look up to see the boy's back turned on you, hiding his face from your view.

"Let's go get something to eat, kid," he says, and you can hear just the hint of tears behind his voice. And when he sniffles, it confirms everything.

Cocking your head in curiosity, you begin to follow him—

"Wait, wait!" Taehyung interrupts. "Before you go on any further, you need to address the elephant in the room, Y/N. Why the fuck is he crying?"

"Yeah, well, I didn't know then either," you say. "It's complicated. I mean, I only found out the reason way later. If you'd just let me continue—"

"Oh, sorry. Continue, then."

"Yes, thank you—"

"Wait, lemme interrupt just one more time," Taehyung interjects again. "Just one last question." You groan, but you nod, telling him you're all ears. "Exactly how much older is he than you?"

You sigh. "He was three years older."

Taehyung sucks in a deep breath. "Right... He's, uh, dead. But damn. You were into a Utopian-born that was older? You really broke all the boundaries."

You shrug. "I guess I always didn't really give a fuck about societal norms or whatever the shit people call it."

"And yet you're conforming to the largest societal norm in Atna by studying for the Exam," Taehyung points out. "Times have changed."

You smile sadly, shaking your head. "I'm only doing this for Yoongi. He made me promise... So, here I am, trying to fulfill his wishes. Will you let me continue now?"

"Yeah, yeah."

"Anyways..."

Yoongi watches you devour the bread, but you're too hungry to care about his incessant staring.

"You should slow down," he says. "We don't want you to choke to death or anything—" he pauses, eyes turning wide before he mutters a "Shit, I gave her a fucking idea."

"I heard that," you say.

Yoongi visibly pales.

"It's okay," you assure him, setting down a loaf of bread to stare right back at the boy. "I feel better now. I don't think I've eaten for days."

"Damn," Yoongi mutters under his breath. "What kind of best friend was he for you to be this distraught over his death?"

"Distraught?" you say, blinking blankly at him.

He sighs, "Right, right, you're only ten. Distraught means sad. Upset. Depressed. All those fun words."

"Oh," you murmur. "Jimin was everything to me," you say shyly. "He promised me that we were going to go back to Dystopia! Then we could share a house and live together as adults..." you trail off, losing yourself in the figments of your wildest imaginations. "We were supposed to have so much fun in Purgatory..."

Yoongi cocks his head. "Kid, I think you liked him."

You frown at this strange comment, crinkling your nose. "Of course I liked him, he was my best friend."

"No, kid. You like liked him. Maybe you loved him. I don't know," Yoongi says, shrugging. "Think about it. Wait no, don't. Forget about him. Don't make yourself sad. Talk to me. What do you wanna do? Wanna go to my room? I have some stuff back from home there. You can play with them if you want."

You squint your eyes at the boy, staring at him suspiciously. "Why are you trying to be nice...?"

"Nice?" Yoongi scoffs. "I'm just, uh, I'm just trying to get rid of stuff that I don't need anymore. I'm definitely not being nice. So you better follow me 'cause I don't want a lot of things."

You don't buy his lie, but maybe that's a good thing. In your eyes, this boy is, indeed, nice and he's trying to help you take your mind off of Jimin. He even prevented you from leaping off the ledge and falling to your own death. You hope he sticks around.

And stick around he did.

Yoongi is bossy, straight-forward and frankly rude sometimes, things that Jimin totally wasn't. But he is also generous, thoughtful and emotional (on a good day), and that's all you needed to stick by his side.

He is so generous that in the first week that you met him, he gave you nearly a closet-worth's supply of thick sweaters and jackets for the upcoming winter. In that same way, he is thoughtful. You took the clothes gratefully, never once having held such expensive material before in your life.

On late nights when you slept over in his room, he always asked if you could tell him stories of your childhood. And you'd gladly oblige. That's when he got emotional. Though you never see him cry, you always hear it when you tell your stories. Yoongi tries to hide his emotions to the best of his ability, but frankly, he's a loud crier, so you hear him every time. But you let him think he's good at hiding his tears for the sake that he's your friend.

One day, though, you come down with some sort of throat sickness, and Yoongi practically orders you not to speak for the next 24 hours. He had his own medicine cabinet in which his rich parents gifted him before their only son was shipped off to Purgatory from their grand mansion. So you were getting the best treatment anyone in Purgatory could get.

Yoongi even offered to tell you stories that night. To repay you for being an amazing storyteller.

"I've always wanted to hear about Utopia," you croak despite having a painful burn in your throat. "I hate that place. But I want to know more about it."

"Stop talking so much," Yoongi sighs. "Do you want to get better or not?" When you're silent, (having passed his rhetorical question test in which the correct answer was to stay quiet) he smiles to himself and continues. "I hate Utopia too. It's not as great as it seems. You know that every Utopian-born is a slave to education? I think the moment I was born, I got tossed in tutoring. From six in the morning to eleven at night I was tutored. Seven days a week, no breaks. It's probably illegal, but my parents had a lot of copies of the books in the library in Purgatory. They made me get a head start on everything. After a while, you start to think about what the whole point of education is...

"My parents always told me that I was only suffering in my younger years—that I'd only have to suffer until I'm eighteen and if I scored well on the Exam, I'd be able to come back home safely and have the time of my life in Utopia. But I just didn't want to become a slave to education," Yoongi says. "I was sick of it. Sure, I'm privileged. Sure, I had everything I wanted growing up, but I didn't have one thing you Dystopians have—freedom.

"When you're studying all day every day, you don't get a lot of chances to make friends," Yoongi says. "I grew up with adults breathing down my neck and telling me to memorize useless facts. That was the closest thing to friends I ever got. I'm not sure if every Utopian-born is forced to live like this, but I can damn well infer it. Anyways, my parents aren't here now, so I can do whatever the fuck I want."

You laugh. "You don't want to go back home?" you say in your sick, gravelly voice

"I'm just tired, Y/N. I'm tired of everything," Yoongi exhales. "You'll understand when you're older."

"You're only three years older than me, though," you pout. "Do three years change that much?"

"Yes," Yoongi replies as a matter-of-fact-way. "I don't even want to take this stupid fucking test. But I also don't want to rot in Dystopia—no offense. I know I won't last there."

"Yeah, you won't last," you tell him with a giggle.

He huffs. "That's real comforting, Y/N."

"I know," you rasp. "Please tell me about Utopia, now. Are the skies really that blue? And does everyone have a pool? What do you eat there? Do you get your own room??" The last question throws you in a coughing fit, and Yoongi looks at you worriedly. He waits until you stop before he continues.

"It was always blue outside, yeah," he says, slowly, carefully as if he was taking his time to form his words to match his visualizations. "Sometimes we had scheduled rainy days for the private gardens and stuff," he says nostalgically. "I think I had about three pools in my home in Utopia, but I’m not sure if other families had them too. You know, I didn't get around much. Always stuck inside and studying." He sighs. "At least the food there was good. Way better than the crap we're forced to eat here. Barbecue ribs with generous amounts of sauce, slow-cooked potatoes in a bonfire, roasted lamb chops, fresh fruits and vegetables picked up from the nearby food-growing facilities... Caviar, licorice, cotton candy, chocolate, cakes, pudding... And if I ever ate bread, it was with fresh strawberry jam and smooth almond butter."

You don't understand half of the stuff he's saying, but whatever it is, it sounds delicious.

"I could talk about the great food there forever," Yoongi says. "The only thing I miss about Utopia is the food... It's really lonely there. I had my sleeping chamber, my pool room and my study room, but I was always in there alone. Whatever. Do you want to hear more?"

You nod. "Yoongi?"

"Yeah?"

"You cried when I first met you. Why?"

Yoongi visibly stiffens. Knowing him you expect Yoongi to wave off your question or ignore you altogether, but to your surprise, he doesn't.

"You made me feel bad," he confesses bluntly.

"Me??"

"It was just so strange for me to see someone else get upset over a friend..." he trails off. "You were going to die for him. You were going to leap into a pit because you loved your friend that much. You couldn't bear to think of a life without him. So you were going to die with him. And that just..."

"It was stupid, I know," you pout. "You don't have to say it again."

"It was stupid, yeah," Yoongi agrees. "And I'm saying it again because I can. But at the same time, it hurt me. You know, I made up my mind to jump that day too."

"You did??"

"Yeah and imagine my surprise and annoyance when I see some ten-year-old Dystopian-born in my way," Yoongi sniffles. "Pissed me off."

You huff. "Well—"

"And I was still pissed off at you until you told me you were going to do it to be with your friend," Yoongi says. "Do you know why I was going to do it?" You shake your head no. "Because I'm selfish and I didn't like my life and I didn't want to continue living in this hellhole by myself. Because I wanted to give up. And also because I didn't have a purpose to wake up to another day, but that's just one part of a plethora of other reasons. They were all selfish. It made me just... feel something when I saw you. And you were just willing to die for someone who wasn't yourself. Even though that's fucking stupid, it made me realize how I've never really lived before. And maybe you were the key to my first friendship? I don't know."

"Wow," you mutter.

"Is that all you have to say?"

"Yes, well, no? My throat's hurting again, Yoongi," you whine. "You told me to stop talking minutes ago."

"Oh, well, in that case, just go to sleep," he says. "You'll feel better in the morning."

"Thanks," you whisper against your cotton pillow. You snuggle in your cot below Yoongi's bed and let out a small sigh. "You're not that selfish, Yoongi," you say.

And you mean it. Yoongi's shown you nothing but generosity. He's shown you that he's caring when he tries to be. Even though he's unbelievably bossy sometimes, he does it for your own good. His quiet demeanor is a façade to the overwhelming emotions inside, and you can see right through it.

Yoongi doesn't answer for the longest time, so you wrap your arms arm yourself to preserve warmth and fall asleep. You wake up the next morning with an extra layer of blanket on top of you.

Taehyung begins to tap his feet on the ground restlessly, consequently making your chair shake underneath you. You try to ignore it for minutes, but the constant shaking is making it hard for you to concentrate on the textbook sitting between the two of you.

"Taehyung," you say.

"Hm?" he asks, his eyes boring into the pages of the book. "What?"

"Can you stop?"

"Stop what?"

"You're shaking my chair."

"Oh," Taehyung says. He finally looks up from his reading and makes eye contact with you. "Sorry," he apologizes hastily. "I didn't mean to do it... I just got nervous. This book is just... It's weird. I mean, when was the last time we put emphasis on family?"

"Never, of course," you say. "I barely even remember what my parents look like."

"Really?" Taehyung's eyes are large as he stares you down with curiosity mixed with just the slightest bit of pity. "Do you miss them?"

"No."

"What? Really?" Taehyung gasps. "You really don't care at all?"

"They're not prominent figures in my life," you say. "It was always Jimin. And then when Jimin died, it was Yoongi..." you trail off. "I do regret not being close to my family. I don't think I said goodbye when I had to leave to Purgatory."

"God, well, that's harsh."

"I know. What about you? Were you close with your family?"

"Oh, very," Taehyung replies. "I had three older brothers and one younger sister. My sister and two brothers didn't make it out in the world. So in theory I only had one older sibling."

"I'm sorry," you say.

"It's fine. It was in Dystopia. Too many people die so the deaths start to become irrelevant," Taehyung shrugs. "I miss them, though. My brother's dead now, but I miss my parents."

"Dead?"

"He tried to start a revolt in Purgatory eleven years ago," Taehyung says. He frowns, shaking his head in disbelief. "I didn't think he was that dumb to actually go through with the rebellion. It was a man-slaughter, by the way. Everyone in his year was killed."

"Everyone?" you say. "Even to me, that sounds severe."

"Yeah, well, it was easier for them. Assumed that everyone in that year was a rebel. And rebels deserve to die, apparently," Taehyung says. He grits his teeth, fisting his hands in slow-coming anger. "You do know why they have the fucking Exam, right?"

"To choose which people are worthy of being in Utopia?"

"That's part of the reason," Taehyung says. He leans into you so suddenly that you gasp quietly. "The government does it to weed out the feeble-minded ones. Haven't you heard rumors? In a few years, they might just exterminate Dystopia and Purgatory altogether. There aren't enough resources to keep everyone alive," he whispers with urgency, and you can feel his hot breath on your cheeks. "So they're trying to grow a stable society with highly intelligent individuals. They want to get rid of the excess. The unworthy. They do it by hosting the Exam."

He looks satisfied at your rather shocked face and decides to give you some space, leaning away and taking away the warmth on your face.

"They're going to get rid of Dystopia?" you whisper. "And Purgatory? That's not fair to the people living there. They're gonna close off Utopia forever? That's bullshit."

"It's rumored." Taehyung shrugs.

"Is that why you're studying so hard to go?" you say, cocking a curious brow at him. "To avenge your brother?"

"Maybe," Taehyung grins. "I mean, I'll see what I can do."

"You shouldn't," you tell him with a frown. "They're gonna kill our whole year because of you."

Taehyung raises an eyebrow at you. "You know what they're doing is wrong," he says. "Don't you want to right the wrong?"

"No," you say. "I don't. I'm not going to risk my life or any other lives to fix this stupid system. The only fool-proof way to beat them is to beat the Exam—by that, I mean get a perfect score. Think about it. It's a huge middle finger to the government. Imagine if only one person out of hundreds gets to go to Utopia for scoring the highest, and, you know, assuming that only one person gets a perfect score because it's that unheard of. If that keeps up year after year, Utopia will die. They'll be underpopulated. The government will realize the system is flawed with time."

"That would take years and years. And a lot of assumptions to make," Taehyung scoffs. "You're talking about one person from every fucking year having the will and intelligence to score perfectly. Statistically impossible."

"So what?" you say. "You think a bloody revolution will solve everything?"

"A bloody revolution would obviously take less time than what you're thinking of," Taehyung says. "There are people fucking dying out there. There are people eating dead bodies. One bloody revolt can do a lot for the future."

"It won't do a lot for the present, though," you argue.

Taehyung sighs. "You know what? I'm sorry we even fucking got into this damned conversation. Whatever. Let's just finish up the book."

You clench your teeth but you don't say anything, merely nodding to show your agreement.

For the next thirteen hours, it is completely silent. After the small argument, neither you nor Taehyung feels the need to speak to the other. There is obvious tension and awkwardness between the two of you—like it had been in the beginning. You try to ignore it, immersing yourself into the contents of family studies, no matter how tedious you found it. Night rolls around and both of you end up skipping dinner.

Breakfast the next day is skipped as well.

By the time lunch comes, you and Taehyung have finished reading and reviewing the last book in the whole library. He slams the textbook shut and slides it across the table. The sound isn't as jarring as you expect it to be. So you just blink your dry eyes and try to steady yourself to prepare to stand up from your seat. Maybe you should leave Taehyung alone for a while... Maybe he doesn't want to talk to you anymore. And maybe you shouldn't hang around him... He could get you killed. He could rope you around in his master plan that his older brother had left with loose ends. You don't want to die; you don't even want to think of the possibility of death.

The only way you can beat the goddamn Exam is to be the only person to score 100 percent. And you're going to accomplish that. For years you've set your mind on this one single goal. Sacrificed food, water and sleep for it. You're not going to let it slip from your hands this easily—not when you're this close to it.

You wobble away from the chair, never looking back at Taehyung as you try to walk away from the table.

"Wait."

His tired voice echoes in the nearly empty library and it rings in your ears. You stop walking but you don't turn around.

"What, Taehyung?" you say through gritted teeth. Though you try to hide the slight waver in your voice that would indicate your exhaustiveness, it shows quite obviously.

"Let's grab lunch together. Please," he says—no, pleads.

God, he must know how much that word affects me. He knows about Jimin, so it probably wasn't so hard to use that knowledge to his own advantage.

After contemplating for what seemed like minutes, you finally turn around to face Taehyung. It surprises you when you meet his eyes almost immediately.

"You didn't finish telling me about Yoongi," he says. "I hate cliffhangers."

It occurs to you that both of you are too proud to apologize over an argument; in fact, this was Taehyung's way of apologizing to you without uttering the words, 'I'm sorry.' Your apology would be something similar.

You nod. "C'mon," you say. "Let's go to the cafeteria."

For two whole years, you were the happiest you've ever been with Yoongi. He made you almost forget about Jimin, but you made sure you honored your dead best friend by visiting the pit every now and then. It had been the last place you'd seen him.

Yoongi likes to come with you when you go to the pit. He's been getting anxious these days when you're not by his side.

Actually, you notice that he's been acting a bit strange. In the past few months, he began lecturing you about famous inventors and world leaders. He taught you the locations and capitals of countries you didn't know existed. He's been telling you the events of history as if he'd lived through them himself. The most annoying part was when he tried to make a damn math problem out of everything.

You only assumed that the pent-up knowledge inside his head was finally getting to him and he had to let it out to someone before he exploded. So you went along with it. And you suppose that sometimes, the lessons Yoongi taught you were enjoyable.

Until it got to the point that he began to quiz you on the material you learned from him.

You groan, eyes fluttering open to greet the morning sunlight that floods through the faded curtains in Yoongi's room. You had a rough night with a bad dream. You've never been this glad to finally wake up from your sleep.

Aside from the sunlight, you're also greeted by Yoongi's loud voice the moment he catches you awake. "Capital of Senegal?" he demands, pointing at you as if you had just committed a crime.

You squint your eyes at him, frowning as you stifle a yawn. You're still cranky from having a bad dream (that you can't remember now that you've woken up), so without so much of the slightest blink of an eye, you tell him to "Please, stop."

Yoongi snorts. "No, seriously," he says. "What's the capital of Senegal?"

"I dunno," you lie even though there's no way in hell that you don't know at this point in time because Yoongi's been making you memorize the world capitals for weeks now. But frustration starts to bubble up inside of you. You thought Yoongi would know a thing or two about maintaining personal space. Making you answer stupid geography questions the moment you wake up for six days in a row was downright mean and he deserves to hear a mouthful from you. "Yoongi what the hell is up with you?" you huff. "What does the capital of Senegal have to do with anything??"

"It's Dakar!" Yoongi yells, throwing up his hands. "Fucking Dakar, Y/N! Is that so hard to remember?"

"Why does it even matter?!" you yell back at him.

"I'm trying to help you!" Yoongi shouts. "I'm helping you learn, goddammit!"

"Why would I have to learn??" you say absolutely confused out of your mind. "You know how much you hated being stuck in tutoring. Well, I hate it too!"

"Oh, shit," Yoongi curses, collapsing on his bed with his hands buried in his face. He realizes that you'd just made an extremely valid point, and it puts him to shame. "I was just trying to help..."

"What? Help me pass the Exam?" you snort half-jokingly. "Yoongi, I want to go back to my home, Dystopia, with you."

"No, Y/N," Yoongi says. "I'm not going to Dystopia."

"Then wha—"

"I've been thinking, Y/N," Yoongi cuts you off, patting the spot next to him for you to sit. You do, rubbing your eyes and trying to tame your bed hair as you wait for him to continue. "I've been thinking a lot..." Yoongi says, "about the future. I've thought about every scenario in my head, and I don't think I'll ever be content."

"Aren't you happy with me, here?" you say. "I thought we were having fun..."

"Sooner or later, Y/N, I'll have to take the Exam," Yoongi says. "I'll fail, as expected. I'll be tossed into Dystopia and I'll have to wait until you come back home. But I'll most likely die in less than a year so you'll never actually get to see me again."

"Don't say that!" you shriek. "Don't even—"

"I'm obviously not going to make it in Dystopia. I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth and waking up in this dingy room in Purgatory every day disgusts me. Think about how horrible it'd be for me in Dystopia when I can't even stand it here. Then the only solution left is for me to go back to Utopia," Yoongi explains. "And that's not going to happen because I don't intend on learning new material anymore. I'm not a scholar. Was forced to be, but never wanted to be. I give up."

"You're giving up??"

"I'm giving up."

"But Yoongi..." you breathe but no further words come out of your mouth. You don't want to put words in his mouth, but you're scared of what he's thinking of doing to himself in the future. Yet you don't have the guts to ask him about his plan out loud.

"I know, Y/N," Yoongi sighs. "But I'm not bringing you down with me."

"What??"

"You're going to Utopia, Y/N," Yoongi says. He's so nonchalant with an atrocious statement that you wonder if he has a concussion. But when he's staring at you so intently, you realize with a heavy heart that he's dead serious.

"It's too late, Yoongi," you protest. "I would never beat the Utopian-borns... I'm already two years behind the game, and if you factor in the time the Utopian-borns have studied, I'm twelve years behind!"

"It's not too late," he argues. "Think about it. Utopian-borns like me—unless they're batshit crazy—aren't trying as hard anymore. Their parents aren't there to supervise them, and they're probably insanely cocky about how much they already know."

"What's your point?"

"You can easily beat them with willpower," Yoongi says. "And I already tried teaching you some stuff that I remembered too—whether you were paying attention is solely on you, though."

You huff. "I was paying attention," you say. "And that's impossible. I'm not a genius, Yoongi. Intelligence is genetic. You told me so yourself."

"I did," Yoongi admits, "but it doesn't matter how innately intelligent you are. What really matters is willpower. And I have none. But you have a lot. I'm just saying, Y/N. Utopia... it's not really a life for me. I don't really give a shit about education and being intelligent. I don't really give a shit about anything. But I think Utopia is a life for you. It's a life you deserve."

"I can't just accept what you're telling me, Yoongi," you say.

"Yes you can," he says. "I want to leave soon, you know. I don't want to distract you from your studies... And besides, Purgatory's food fucking sucks. I bet they have better food in the afterlife."

The afterlife. It's then when it truly dawns on you of the atrocity that your friend would commit to himself.

"You can't just kill yourself," you scoff, twisting your body towards Yoongi in complete bewilderment. "What about me? I never agreed to any of this!"

"You've wanted to go to Utopia the moment I started to tell you about it," Yoongi says. "You think I wouldn't know? I'm helping you get there."

"But I don't want to be alone!" You sniffle, chin pointing to the ceiling so the tears that are starting to well in your eyes dry away. But it's no use. The more you think about being abandoned again, another person you genuinely cared for leaving you into the afterlife... it makes you feel broken.

"Well, I don't really want to live," Yoongi says. "We're all selfish. It's human nature."

"I thought you cared about me!" Your voice rises two octaves. "We were supposed to spend the rest of your time in Purgatory together! You can't just leave early because you feel like it! What am I going to do without you??" You're sobbing now, the tears running down your face in fat droplets that blur your vision.

"Hey..." Yoongi murmurs. "Y/N..." He gives you some space to cry, to let out the worst of your emotions. Then he encompasses you in a warm hug in which your face is up against the soft material of his sweater and he pats your back comfortably. "You'll get over me."

"I won't," you whimper. "That's a promise."

"C'mon don't waste a precious promise on that," he whispers.

"I will so waste a stupid precious promise on that," you whisper back. You hate him for doing this to you. For telling you that he was going to leave you so you knew what was coming—now you were dreading the moment he was going to abandon you instead of relishing in his presence, his embrace, his warmth.

For hours, the two of you bask in complete silence. You've calmed yourself down to the point that the tears roll down your face sporadically, but not in steady streams anymore. Yoongi runs his fingers through your hair, an act that he only does to ensure you that everything will be all right. It's rare that the two of you are ever this close in proximity, and you want to cherish this moment before he's gone. But curiosity pulls at the strings inside you and you just have to ask—

"W-When are you going to do it?"

"Hm?"

"When are you going to commit suicide?"

"I'm not going to tell you."

You pull away from Yoongi, scowling at him. "Why not?"

"You'll try to put a stop to it," he says. "I need to get through with this, Y/N. You can't change my mind."

"I want to say I hate you, but now I feel like I need to be nice to you," you confess, running a hand through your hair in confusion.

Yoongi smiles, shaking his head. "Act normally." He hesitantly reaches out for your hand, and when you give it to him, he holds it perfectly—not too tightly nor not too loosely. "Just promise me one thing." When you don't answer, he turns to you, squeezing your intertwined hands for emphasis. "Get to the top for me, will you?"

"I can't promise tha—"

"And please don't frown when you study. You're gonna get a permanent crease on your forehead."

"Fuck, Y/N," Taehyung chokes, blinking away a tear that was starting to become too heavy for his eyes. "That's it? You let him just... leave you like that?"

"I feel like I should've put up a bigger fight too," you admit, playing with what's left of the bread crumbs on the lunch table. "I should've helped him. Nursed him back into a healthy mental state. But what did I know? I was fucking twelve then. I didn't know shit about mental health or psychology."

"You know now at least," Taehyung offers.

"I'd rather not know," you say. "Now that I know that I could've helped him... it just feels worse." You let out a deep sigh that takes the heavy weight off of your chest. "He overdosed about four days later. They found him before I did... And since then, I've been alone, studying my ass off."

"I can't help but admire your determination," Taehyung says. "You honestly can't beat human willpower. Yoongi's right."

You smile, shrugging nonchalantly. "I just want to keep my promise with him... And maybe I want to live in glory for the rest of my life, but who am I to blame? Everybody wants that life."

"Everybody deserves that life," Taehyung says. "No one should have to go through near-death experiences to get to it."

"Life's never fair," you say. "Deal with it."

Taehyung snorts. "I know. I'm trying." He pauses, placing a pensive hand on his chin and looking off into the distance as if he were thinking hard about something. "Hey, you know, the best way to retain information is to repeat it out loud or teach it to others."

"That's exactly what Yoongi made me do," you say. "All those random quiz questions throughout the day... I didn't appreciate it then, but I'd sure appreciate it now."

"Then we can be study buddies," Taehyung declares. "We'll quiz each other. We have about a year left before the Exam. We'll review every concept in the whole damn library together. Two heads work better than one!"

"Aren't we supposed to be competitors?" you say. "I'm looking to get a perfect score, Taehyung," you grin. "If you can't keep up with my rigorous schedule, you shouldn't even be proposing this plan to me."

"Oh yeah?" Taehyung cocks an eyebrow as he grins right back at you, revealing his perfect teeth and boxy smile. "Bring it on, Y/N."

Bring it on? Oh, you'll bring it on, all right. Taehyung won't even know what hit him.

Having someone else to study with you doubles your competitiveness, which is a feat in it of itself because you are definitely more competitive than at least one hundred of your peers combined.

Every day, you've been trying to wake up earlier than Taehyung to get to the library first. The only problem is, he's been doing the same as well. You thought you had him beat when you sauntered into the library at 4 a.m. feeling quite refreshed after an hour night's sleep, but it turned out that Taehyung never even left the library. He'd grinned at you, practically staring into your soul with bloodshot eyes and croaking, "I win!" so victoriously that you really had to accept his triumph over you.

But when the two of you start to play a little game of who-can-stay-awake-for-longer, Taehyung has to put a stop to the madness when you start to mumble jumbled sentences in Latin after he asks if you need some water.

You and Taehyung look out for each other almost by habit at this point. It's become a routine for you to wake the other up if you were the first to awake. Now morning trips to the library are done together, and you have to admit it feels much better to be able to walk side by side next to someone who is willing to babble his head off to wake you up a bit more.

Dinner is skipped Mondays through Fridays to make extra time for review. On Saturdays, you and Taehyung indulge in the full three meals that Purgatory has to offer while also finishing up your studies. But Sunday, Sunday is the holy grail of the week. No studying, no library, just you and Taehyung taking some time off (for once).

Surprisingly, you'd come up with Special Sundays, after Taehyung had a huge mental breakdown over plumb-forgetting how to graph polar curves on one typical Saturday night. And the special day has stayed since. Neither of you wants to get rid of something that is the only non-study related activity of the week.

Most Special Sundays are spent in either Taehyung's room or your room. Taehyung prefers your room because you have extra blankets that Yoongi left for you, and as winter comes by, any additional coverage is very much appreciated.

This Sunday, however, you managed to convince Taehyung to hang out in his room—only because his mattress is softer than yours and you've been getting bad back and neck pains these days.

"By the time I'm twenty, I'll be suffering from a fucking herniated disc," you tell Taehyung as you groan, shifting your position on his bed for what seems like the hundredth time. "I feel so fucking stuffy. Like I need to crack my back but I can't. Don't even get me started on my fucking neck."

"By the time you're twenty, you'll be in Utopia and the special doctors will be all over you to treat Atna's very own princess," Taehyung snorts. "They'd do anything to keep the perfect scoring girl alive and well."

"Princess my ass," you laugh. "I'd like to wish. How's the cot, by the way? Kinda feel bad about making you sleep there while I take your bed."

Taehyung shrugs. "I don't mind. I honestly don't even feel a difference," he says without skipping a beat. "And we don't want your back messing up your chances. On the day of the Exam, it'd be worse to have your body betray you than your mind."

"I'd literally fucking cry if my stupid back is still like this before the Exam, Taehyung," you say. "All these years I spent with my nose buried in a book... Only to fail because my body couldn't handle it."

"That's the worst," Taehyung sighs. "But if you stretch every day, it might get better. Honestly, we need to start taking care of ourselves better. We need to reserve time to rest... to take our minds off of studying. Even if it's only one day per week."

"Yeah," you agree. "You know what's fucking sad though? We're still talking about the stupid Exam even now. It never escapes our heads."

"We're slaves to the system," Taehyung bitterly murmurs. "What do you expect?"

"That's true," you say, wincing as you try to shift your position on the bed again. "I don't expect much at this point. Not from the people who've turned the library into a battlefield and the students into soldiers."

"The Exam is the war," Taehyung says. "Losing the war means death, mostly. I see no difference."

"We are so depressing," you sigh. "But it's all true."

"I know," Taehyung says. He turns over on his side to look up at you on his bed. "You ever think about the worst-case scenario?"

"You mean like... we don't make it to Utopia?"

"We?" Taehyung smiles. "So you think we'd get perfect scores together? What happened to being competitors?"

"Oh, shut up," you snort. "We're a team. I thought it was obvious. And I am not talking about not making it to Utopia. We are not going to self-sabotage months before the fucking Exam."

"You're just going to ignore the chances? You're going to ignore the chance of failure?"

"Yes!" you say, turning on your side to face Taehyung. "Of course I am. Do you really want to lie here talking about failure? We shouldn't even plant the thought of that in our heads right now. It's all about victory. We're the smartest, most capable people in our year, so if we don't get to Utopia, no one will. Understand?"

Taehyung belts out a laugh that has you frowning. "Your confidence deserves a gold medal sometimes," he says. "I do understand you..." he continues, "but only to a certain extent."

You scoff, "Oh, come on, Taehyung. What happened to the cocky bastard I met months ago??"

"That was such a mask behind the real me, Y/N," Taehyung laughs. "I thought you knew that by now. I'm fucking terrified of failure and even the slightest thought about failing makes me want to crawl in a hole and just... vanish."

"I swear to god, Tae, if you talk about vanishing like that again, I'll seriously make you want to vanish," you threaten him with the most menacing voice you can muster up. "We're already victors to this stupid game, winners of the war. Don't you dare think otherwise."

Taehyung smiles, eyes twinkling when he realizes you'd called him by his special nickname (that he kept trying to get you to call him) for the first time. "I'll try not to," he says. "But I'm not making any promises."

"Well, that's still good enough for me."

Four months until the Exam.

You're both physically (your back pains are gone) and mentally (you've always been) ready. But your friend is another story. As more days pass, the more anxious Taehyung begins to feel. He's never able to sleep, so he steals a couple of library books back to his room every night to read while everyone else is salvaging every hour of shut-eye they can get.

His insecurities are catching up to him. And you've always been quite loud-mouthed and confident, so you don't understand him very well. Yet, you're a team, and you do not leave team members stranded.

Motivational pep talks are not really your thing, but they have become your thing these past few days. You walk Taehyung to his room from the library every night, telling him that he had nothing to worry about—that he was going to do superbly well on the Exam. Sometimes, you feel like you're repeating the same phrase over and over again to him, but Taehyung reassures you that whatever you say helps him calm down.

But the mental breakdowns are becoming more and more frequent. Taehyung can't seem to sit still for ten minutes without starting to shake his leg and vibrate the whole table. He has to stop reviewing the Exam material to catch his breath, wipe away his tears and relax the tensed muscles on his face.

You let him take his time. You're always there for him to lean on, to help him catch up on the study time that he missed. And he's forever grateful to you.

"I don't think anyone's been this understanding of me," Taehyung sniffles as you pat his back comfortingly as he blows his nose on a scratchy napkin you handed him before. "Back home, my brother used to tell me to man up when I started to have my panic attacks. He was always the mentally stronger one of us."

"That wasn't very nice of him to say that," you remark. "It's normal to feel uneasy, especially at a time like this. The Exam is four months away... Not too close but not too far either..."

"God. I wish I wasn't so anxious all the time," Taehyung sighs, crumpling up his tissue and pocketing it. "I wish I was like you. Not afraid of losing... Not afraid of failing... Just so confident all the time."

"You can be like me," you say. "Just stop worrying so much."

"Easier said than done," Taehyung scoffs. "You're going to Utopia for sure. There's literally no doubt, Y/N."

"You're coming with me," you argue. "Not to avenge your brother's death or whatever. But just to enjoy the wealthy living since we both deserve it at this point."

"I'm not a charismatic leader," Taehyung shrugs. "I would've never been able to help start a revolt like him. I'd really like to go with you to Utopia... If we both got in, do you think we'd keep in touch?"

"Of course!" you exclaim. "We kept each other company in the loneliest of times. Have you seen anyone else in our year who's serious about taking the Exam making friends now? Everyone's too busy thinking about competition."

"What did I say?" Taehyung grins. "Teamwork works, and two heads are definitely better than one."

"Very true," you smile. "Remember when we fought for that book? The very first time we met?"

"How could I forget?" Taehyung laughs. "I thought you were going to murder me with that look of yours, honestly."

"Oh, wow. I'm not that scary, am I?"

"Oh, yes you are," Taehyung argues. "Do you know how hard it was for me to literally act tough in front of you in the beginning? So you wouldn't take me as some kind of wimp?"

"You acted tough for me?" you giggle, resting your hand on your cheek as your elbow sits on the table. You stare at Taehyung with an amused look on your face. "So you're just actually a big ol' softie?"

"W-Well, I wouldn't call myself a softie per se," Taehyung blushes. "I'm just uh..." he trails off. "Damn, Y/N. You put me under the spotlight."

You shrug, grinning as you watch Taehyung squirm under your intense gaze. Maybe you're a little mean, but making him blush is pretty funny. Teasing him is even funnier.

"It wouldn't be the first time. And definitely not the last," you say with a mischievous grin playing on your lips. Taehyung huffs, but his face looks much more relaxed than it had been several minutes ago—even the redness of his eyes are slowly fading away. He looks much better. He looks ready. "Hey, wanna go back to where we left off now?" you say. "If you're feeling better?"

"Yeah, sure," Taehyung smiles. "Thanks."

Goddamn. His smile is insanely contagious. It must be those perfect teeth and that boxy smile.

"No problem," you manage to murmur, feeling yourself start to blush thinking of Taehyung's immaculate smile. "Um," you hesitate, "yeah, so as I was saying before about Einstein's theory of relativity..."

Three months.

Something fishy is going on here. The closer the Exam looms over your head, the more you expected yourself to become miserable—stressed about the last-minute study material you could've forgotten over the years. Yet you find yourself rather relaxed.

It occurs to you, however, that you're only this relaxed because you have to be—for Taehyung. One of the two of you has to show strength to help the other. Pretending to be so strong-headed and confident (even when you fell into the familiar pit of self-doubt), helped you actually become confident in your knowledge and predestined success. There's really nothing to worry about, you tell yourself and Taehyung. If it's not the two of us, then it can't be anyone else.

The more you comfort Taehyung, the more he opens up to you, and the more you open up to him. Your friendships in the past have always been a little lopsided—with Jimin, you constantly comforted him, cared for him, and with Yoongi, he had been the one to take care of you. For once in your life, you had a relationship in which you both gave and took; Taehyung is your balance. The in-between of Jimin and Yoongi.

The platonic relationship with Jimin is mirrored in your relationship with Taehyung, but sometimes blush creeps up your cheeks when Taehyung teases you back or when your hands graze each other. So maybe you're not completely platonic with him.

And maybe you're just missing someone to love.

"Do you think we'd be happier if we just... never studied for the Exam?" Taehyung whispers to you as you lie side by side on your bed. The midnight moon is bright enough to illuminate just a sliver of Taehyung's face as he stares at the ceiling of your room pensively. "We would be hanging out... never going to the library... Making friends..."

You hum thoughtfully. "I don't know," you say. "I guess maybe we would be happier—just for the eight years we're in Purgatory, anyway."

"That's right," Taehyung says. "That's a good point, actually. I feel like what we're doing right now is right. We're suffering now to make gains later. And..." he trails off. "And... um, if we don't make it, at least we'll know that we tried."

You nod. "Yeah, I guess. It would be better than being tossed back into Dystopia and wondering for the rest of our lives what would've happened if we did study for the Exam."

"Exactly," Taehyung says. "I think it's crazy that we only have three months left," Taehyung says. "But weirdly... I feel less stressed than before. Maybe your optimistic preachings are getting to my head," he laughs quietly, nudging your shoulder playfully.

"Me? Optimistic?" you snort. "That's the first."

"It's true," Taehyung muses. "My anxiety isn't as bad as before, and I'm pretty sure you had a part to play in that."

"In three months, you won't have any anxiety ever again," you reassure him. "You won't even need to hear me babble on about optimism and self-confidence."

"And we'll be having the time of our lives in Utopia," Taehyung breathes.

You smile to yourself, nodding silently. The two of you let the silence consume you, letting Taehyung's last words echo in your head; it's a good way to end the conversation—on a positive note. A lasting note of hope and faith.

It's then when you feel something warm on your hand. It takes you a moment to realize it's flesh. It takes another moment for you to realize it's Taehyung's hand. When you don't flinch away, he quietly almost hesitantly encompasses your hand in his. Delicately, your fingers intertwine and lock perfectly together.

Immediately, your cheeks heat up but you refuse to speak about it. Reassurance floods through you as the two of you lay side by side in the comforting darkness of your room with your hands held tightly together.

And neither of you speak until the sun peeks out from the horizon to paint the skies with another morning, another day. You don't need to talk to Taehyung to know he's thinking the same thing as you.

We'll have the time of our lives in Utopia.

Two months.

The last-minute crammers crowd the library so much that there is a line to enter it. You and Taehyung found a very effective way to battle the sudden influx of students, though. Every day, the two of you enter the library as early as three in the morning (to ensure that little to nobody was there) and take six to seven books with you, hiding them under your jackets and sweaters.

Studying in your rooms is much better.

There are less judgmental eyes, fewer chances of catching a stupid cold that's been making its way through the younger kids in Purgatory and you and Taehyung can lounge on the beds when you get tired of sitting straight.

Two months to the Exam is shockingly close, so close that your back pains have been plaguing you once more. Taehyung tells you to stop slouching when you sit, but you find it hard to sit straight and read the tiny text of the textbooks. So you end up ignoring him.

But on some days, it hurts for you to turn your body, your back aching to the extremity that you started believing one uncalculated movement could leave you paralyzed for the rest of your life. It's on those days that you wish you listened to Taehyung earlier. You push on though, too stubborn to admit to Taehyung that he's right and too impatient to try to fix your pain at such an urgent time.

Except you're not too good at hiding your discomfort and Taehyung catches onto you.

"We should take a break," he says, closing an astrophysics textbook and practically tossing it over his head.

When you hear the loud thump of it hitting against the wall, you gasp. "Tae! You can't just throw the fucking book. We're not even supposed to have these in our rooms!"

"Maybe that was a bad idea," Taehyung says, fidgeting his hands. "A little too late now, though, isn't it?" He shrugs. "We need a break."

"I'm fine! I swear!" you say. "We'll study for a few more hours."

"Your back's killing you, isn't it?"

You scoff. "N-No!"

"You stuttered."

You groan, wincing quietly as you try to sit up straight. "I'm not gonna die because of this. I think I can keep going."

"If you don't fix that now, you probably won't be able to sit down for four hours to take the Exam," Taehyung tells you. He takes your book and throws it over his head, making you grimace when it thuds against the wall. "I'm gonna loosen your back muscles!" he declares.

"What are you gonna do? Step on my back and make it crack?" you snort. When you see that Taehyung actually looks like he's contemplating it, you quickly say, "Please don't."

"Don't worry. I'll try not to make it hurt," Taehyung grins. You look at him so threateningly that he has to raise both of his hands defensively. "Oh, c'mon! I'm trying to help."

You give him a nervous look. "So what? You're gonna give me a massage?"

"It'll help!" Taehyung says. "Just get all comfy and lay flat on the bed. Stomach on the covers, please."

The mere thought of his hands roaming on your back makes your face heat up. God, this is going to be intimate. Maybe that's why Taehyung suggested it... and maybe that's why you're actually complying with him.

Hesitantly, you situate yourself on the bed, laying your face on your arms. "Just my back," you tell him.

"Yeah, of course," he says. "I have credentials, technically."

"Oh?"

"I found a magazine about it," Taehyung says. "So I'm very much qualified."

"Oh god."

You hear Taehyung rustle behind you and you try to twist your body to see what he's doing but your back prevents you from moving. In frustration, you ask, "What are you doing?"

"Rolling up my sleeves and staring at your back. Why?"

"Why the fuck are you staring at my back?"

"I was trying to figure out where it hurts," he answers, "but I guess I could've just asked you instead."

You snort. "God, Tae. It honestly hurts everywhere. But especially around the shoulder blade area."

You can just imagine Taehyung nodding professionally, with his sleeves rolled up and his hair slicked back to prevent stray strands from poking at his eyes.

"Okay, I'm gonna put pressure there," he says. "Deep breath out..."

You obey him, closing your eyes and blowing air out of your lips, simultaneously relaxing your body. The moment you feel his hands on your back, goosebumps checker your arms. No one's ever been this close to you; no one's bothered to be this intimate with you.

"Feel good?" Taehyung asks.

He sounds closer to you than you expected him to be, and your breath hitches quietly. "Y-Yeah," you stutter. "A little lower."

Taehyung listens, rubbing your sore back with such care and calculated pressure that you have to bite your lip from letting rather embarrassing sounds from escaping your mouth. You don't realize how tense your body was until Taehyung calls you out. "You're so tense, Y/N," he remarks, his hands dealing with the clumped muscles on your back. "Try to relax."

You're red-faced, unable to admit to him that if you do as he says, you might just let out a moan and it'll really be game over then. You are not going to embarrass yourself in front of him because Taehyung would never let you live that down. And if you're really going to spend your days in Utopia with him, you'd rather not let him have any memories he can use to tease you.

"I am relaxing," you lie through your teeth. But when Taehyung gets to a particularly sensitive part on your back, you hiss through your teeth. "Ow..."

Taehyung immediately stops his ministrations. "Do you want me to stop for a second?" he asks with so much worry laced into his voice that you almost feel guilty for making him question himself.

"No!" you exclaim. "I mean, no. I'm fine. I guess my back was much worse than I thought..."

Taehyung laughs. "Well, if I do this for you occasionally and you stretch every day, you'll be in good condition again."

"Thanks," you mutter. "Really, Tae, I mean it."

You can just imagine the boy grinning ear to ear behind you. Though you expected him to say something cocky or silly, you received silence in response. "Tae?" Gritting your teeth, you try turning over on your back, which was easier than expected—Taehyung's massage had already done wonders.

With a little oof, you flip over to finally get a good look at Taehyung. "Cat got your tongue??" you tease him, raising an eyebrow and gazing at his rather blank face.

"No... no," he answers right away. "For a second I thought..." he trails off. His handsome face morphs into a look of worry, of nervousness.

"You thought...?"

"I thought I..." he trails off again, much to your impatience.

"Oh, come on, Tae," you sigh. "Spit it out!"

The boy grins, shaking his head. "For a second, I thought I heard you moan, Y/N. Enjoying yourself a little too much, aren't we?"

Okay, you had not expected that. The color quickly drains from your face and your mouth drops open rather unflatteringly. You sputter to think of an excuse, any excuse that would whisk you away from the embarrassment consuming you at this moment.

"I'm just kidding," Taehyung says as he nearly falls over in a fit of laughter. "You should see your face!"

"That's not funny!" you yell, sitting up on your elbows and glaring at the laughing boy.

"No, it was definitely funny," he says, grabbing your hand and helping you sit up. The action brings heat to your cheeks and you have to look away. "Oh, c'mon," Taehyung whines, "learn some humor, Y/N."

He must mistake your embarrassment as anger. You'll play along.

"You can literally shut up," you huff.

"Damn, you're not very scary when you pretend you're mad," Taehyung says, grinning mischievously at you.

"I am not pretending!"

"You're still holding my hand, Y/N," he teases.

Oh shit. He's right. That's the second time that's happened in one month. Is it strange to seek physical comfort? Or is it strange to feel so comfortable with Taehyung? "I-I," you stutter embarrassingly, unsure if you can even finish your own sentence when Taehyung interrupts you.

"It's okay, Y/N," he says. "I don't mind holding your hand."

You gape at him in shock—so much so that you're sure you don't look too attractive at the moment with your mouth hanging open and your eyes bulging.

Taehyung tightens his grip on your hand as he tugs you closer to him. His eyes sparkle with something you recognize as mirth, which is funny to see in a student's eyes just two months before the Exam.

Hm. You like the way his warm hand encompasses yours, and you adore the way he stares into your eyes as if he knows you and cares for you.

Before you know it, you're breathing out a rapid, "I don't mind holding your hand either."

You didn't know it was possible for Taehyung to grin even wider but sometimes even you're wrong.

One month.

This is the official crunch time. The time when existing contenders of the Exam become vicious and violent to ward off competition. The time when those who never cared for the Exam begin to host parties to live their best and lasting moments in glee. The time when some cocky Utopians begin to study—they think they're so above everyone else that they only need one month to prepare.

But you and Taehyung relish together in the time left in Purgatory together. You'll see him again in Utopia, but Purgatory is the place where you met him and got to know him. It's special, no matter how much you hate the dingy library and cramped dorms. It's special because, without the given situations, you would've never even met Taehyung. You would've spent the last year in Purgatory alone, haunted by the thoughts of Jimin and Yoongi. You couldn't have survived. Or maybe you could've. But Taehyung's helping you survive with a huge smile on your face. And happiness has never been so close to your fingertips.

Your hands are intertwined with his larger ones as the two of you stand against the wall of the building, staring into the empty pit of the dark abyss.

At this point, you're not quite sure where you stand with Taehyung, but you don't care as long as he's here to comfort you every day and you're there to hold his hand.

The cozy wool of Yoongi's sweater keeps you warm in the brisk night air as does Taehyung's presence right next to you. You look out at the pit, and for once, your stomach does not sink with misery. Paying your respects to the dead loved ones has never been this peaceful before.

"Do you think they're watching over you?" Taehyung whispers, judging you softly as he gazes up at the sky dotted with nighttime stars. "Maybe they're wishing you the best on the Exam."

"I actually have no idea..." you say, looking up at the sky with Taehyung and squeezing his hands. "But I miss them."

"You'll reunite with them one day," Taehyung tells you.

"Yeah," you say, "I definitely will."

"In the meantime, I bet Jimin's having the best time eating good meals and getting good sleep on a comfy bed..." Taehyung trails off as he looks at you. "And I hope Yoongi found his happiness by now."

You nod to yourself. "Me too, Tae."

"Only a month left, Y/N," he answers. "And strangely, this is the most peaceful I've been in my whole life."

When you look up, you find that Taehyung's already staring right back at you. A small smile stretches across your cracked lips. "Trust me, it'll be even more peaceful on the day that we're finally admitted into Utopia. We're in this together, right?"

"Definitely," Taehyung says. "I'm not nervous anymore. Not since you convinced me that I don't have to be afraid."

"Still gonna start a violent revolution?" you whisper. "Follow in your brother's footsteps?"

"Not now, not ever," he answers. "The system works. Why would I bother changing it when the people who truly deserve it are going to Utopia? I'm not brave enough to revolt... And I'm not putting you at risk for my dead brother."

"Thank you... Tae, that means a lot," you say. "Do you ever think there will be another revolution, though?"

"There are always revolutions," he replies. "There will always be more revolutions. Not everyone can always be completely satisfied with the authority's actions. It is what it is. Even if I have to take the brunt of it."

"You won't," you tell him. "We'll be long gone in Utopia before that happens."

"Y/N..." Taehyung mutters. He turns you around to face him, studying your features before pulling you in for an embrace. "I know you don't like it when I talk about this... but," he pauses, unsure. Yet he takes your silence as the cue to continue on. "In the case that we are separated after the Exam... In the case that something goes wrong... we... we should just continue on with our lives."

"And ignore whatever separated us?" you murmur against his shoulder. "We won't have to worry about that though. I told you not to worry. We're going to Utopia."

"I'm saying, just in case," Taehyung whispers. His hands run through your hair as he rests his chin on your shoulder. "But I'm sure you're right. We'll be in Utopia in no time."

You hum, basking in the warmth of Taehyung's arms. "Of course."

One week.

The library is swarming with teenagers in your year, desperately fighting over books and arguing over facts. It's funny only because you and Taehyung had once been in that state of animosity. It seems such a long time ago, though.

You and Taehyung lounge about in your room, reiterating textbook information out loud to each other over and over again so the material is ingrained in your memories. After a while, it occurs to both of you that you know too well about every book in the whole library. It's no use regurgitating the same information repeatedly when you already know it. So the two of you spend more and more time talking about your futures.

"Do you think they'll let me work as a family counselor when we get to Utopia?" Taehyung asks as he tosses another textbook against the door to your room.

You laugh when he hits the target on the door and shrug. "I don't know, honestly. Do you think they even have family counseling there?"

"You're right," Taehyung scoffs, shaking his head. "We know so little about the place we want to be in so badly."

"Maybe the more we know of it, the less we'll want to be in it," you say. "It's like that thing... that saying..."

"Ignorance is bliss?"

"Yeah, that," you say. "I'm sure we'll have good things to do in Utopia, though. Whether there is a family counselor position or not."

"But I guess we'll have to find out in a week."

One day.

You feel sudden unrest in the air. People are biting their fingernails so hard, they bleed. Others are pulling out their hairs. Some are picking at their scabs.

You and Taehyung hold each other the whole day, whispering little facts here and there to ensure complete memorization. You would be lying if you said you weren't the slightest bit nervous. Yes, you're intelligent, yes, you deserve to be in Utopia and yes, you've been diligent for years... but Taehyung's right. There are some scenarios that might just happen.

Maybe you and Taehyung earn perfect scores along with six others. Or maybe you and Taehyung earn the same scores as fifteen others. Or maybe you and Taehyung don't earn the same scores at all, leaving you separated forever.

You try not to dwell on the negativities too much. After all, it's no use to think of such thoughts anyways, they'll only distract you while taking the most important test of all time. Positive thoughts, only.

Tomorrow will be the very last day in Purgatory. For four hours, you and the hundreds of other students in your year will take a life-changing test. The Exam results will be kept confidential for a painstaking two hours after the final student finishes the Exam. Then men in white suits will whisk away the highest-scoring ones without another word. You will know when you didn't score the highest. Because the men in white will not give you a second look. They will walk past you like you are the scum of the earth. You've seen it happen; you've seen how much that can break someone.

You swear that you will not be broken. You will be the victor who is escorted out with the men in white. You will be accepted into a wealthy society. You promised Yoongi. And Jimin would've wanted to see you like this.

Most of all, you and Taehyung are in this together.

You visit the pit with him in the dead of the night one last time. There are already a few dead bodies piled up in the dark abyss and the stench of death protrudes up your nose quite uncomfortably, but you manage to ignore it. This will be the last time that you will see the last place you saw Jimin and Yoongi. If it weren't for them, you wouldn't be here, so confident about acing the Exam with another man you see your future with.

When you close your eyes, you can imagine your ten-year-old self standing at the edge of the pit, contemplating jumping to be with Jimin. You can see Yoongi scoffing at your stupidity before taking you into his arms and reassuring you. You can see your ten-year-old self crying. You can see a younger version of Yoongi crying. And every year after Yoongi's death, you've visited the pit by yourself. Until this year. Until you met Taehyung. And now you're not so alone anymore.

"Are you tired?" Taehyung asks, placing a warm hand on your cheek.

Your eyes flutter open immediately and you shake your head. "No, I was just thinking. I don't think I'm going to miss this place, but I'm going to miss the memories I made here." You fist the fabric of your sweater—Yoongi's old sweater, which is surprisingly still pretty large around your frail, petite frame. "It's too bad I don't really have a token of remembrance with Jimin..."

"He was all of your childhood," Taehyung soothes you. "I'm pretty sure you don't forget your childhood best friends."

"That's true..." you sigh. "God, I really don't want to forget anything that happened in my life. I need to remember all of this," you gesture towards you and Taehyung. "So we can recall it in the future."

"You'll remember us for sure," he says. "How can you forget? When you'll see me every day, pestering you for the rest of your life?" Taehyung teases, poking at your cheek playfully.

You roll your eyes. "Fun."

"Damn right," he coos, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. "We deserve the fun."

"I know," you say, smiling at his unfiltered flirtiness. "C'mon," you tell him, grabbing his hand and dragging him into the building, "we should sleep early today."

"Good idea," Taehyung giggles. "To getting perfect scores tomorrow!" he yells to the sky, his eyes squeezed shut as he dwells in the last few euphoric moments of being in the fresh, night air before being tugged into the dorms by you.

Your heart flutters when he grins widely at you, revealing his row of pearly whites. Damn. You used to hate those too-perfect teeth, but now you love them as much as you... god, as much as you might love him.

To getting perfect scores tomorrow indeed.

One hour.

One hour before the Exam, everyone is lined up to enter their own private room, which is barely a room at all from what you've heard. The space is hardly enough to fit a desk, but it's decorated with bright fluorescent lights and spotlessly white walls. Apparently, it looks more like a mental asylum than an Exam room.

Some may be sensitive to such a small, suffocating place, but you don't really mind. As long as the information is in your head and you don't come down with amnesia in the middle of the Exam, you're fine. You're more than fine. You're going to win this thing—with Taehyung of course.

You and Taehyung hold each other's hands, strangely not as nervous as the jittery teens around you. It's strange for the two of you to be in silence for so long, but it seems fitting in such a loud environment. You probably couldn't hear each other even if you did speak.

There are peers who are already crying. Those who are missing because they jumped into the pit the night before. Those who are physically unwell and have failed to take care of their bodies. Those who look confident on the outside but their eyes brim with fear and uncertainty. And then there is you and Taehyung—radiating confidence.

Taehyung squeezes your hand when the men in white come into the halls, starting to drag the students away by random to shove them into the private Exam rooms. The process takes forever, according to the others, given that there are hundreds of students and hundreds of small rooms.

"It's hilarious how they haven't come up with a more efficient system," you whisper to Taehyung, shaking your head in disdain. "You'd think after taking away the smartest people in Atna that they'd somehow make this process less time-consuming. But they didn't."

"What?" Taehyung whispers back, looking confused as he sees you talking but he can't hear a single word.

"It's hilarious how—" you stop yourself, "NEVER MIND," you say, raising your voice. He wouldn't be able to hear you even if you did yell. And you weren't going to risk a sore throat before the Exam.

Taehyung nods at you, squeezing your hand. The two of you are reduced back into a state of silence as you watch your peers being taken away before you. The men in white are getting closer and closer, and for the first time, you're nervous. You've waited six years for this moment. Four hours are going to decide your future.

Taehyung must sense the tenseness building up in your shoulders because he places his hands on them, wordlessly telling you to relax. You thought in the last moments, you'd be comforting him, but you suppose it's the other way around.

The tables have turned.

The two of you are closer to the men in white than ever. Both of you are going to be whisked away any second now. Taehyung turns you to face him and hands you a tiny ball of paper, grinning.

He mouths something that you do not hear over the incessant roar of students, but you can make out exactly what he says. 'I'll see you in Utopia.'

The small amount of pressure on your shoulders is immediately lifted. 'I'll see you in Utopia,' you mouth back, tightly clenching your fist around the tiny ball of paper he had given you. He gives you a bright, reassuring smile before a man in white takes him away. You watch him leave, mirroring his smile and letting out a deep breath.

When a man in white finally whisks you away into your cramped Exam room, you can't help but feel reinvigorated. Even if your desk is shaky and your chair squeaks when you shift in it, you're absolutely hung up on the fact that you need to finish the Exam as quickly and carefully as possible to read whatever Taehyung had written on the small piece of paper.

The countdown commences, the camera in the room zooms in and out to check if you were keeping your integrity... the Exam booklet sits in front of you.

God, you're so ready.

Confidence surges through your body. You're going to make it out alive. You're sure of it.

Well, that wasn't so bad at all.

You don't want to brag, but the Exam was a piece of cake. The questions were never about understanding the material—instead, they focused on the specifics. The stuff you couldn't common-sense your way out of. The stuff that you either knew or didn't know. But you're a strong memorizer so the questions—even the oddly specific ones—were easy.

The men in white already took your Exam booklet away to score it. Now you're forbidden to leave the testing room for two hours while they grade it. But it's boring in here.

Your neck is a bit sore from looking down at the paper and your fingers ache from gripping your pencil. Maybe once you get to Utopia, Taehyung can give you one of his insanely therapeutic massages?

There's nothing really to do in the room except stare at the camera that's still watching you or counting the number of cracks on your desk. You contemplate for a short while whether to open the note Taehyung had handed you, but you don't want to risk an accusation of dishonesty.

If you're accused, you're likely to never be seen again.

So you make use of your time and doze off. After taking the Exam, you realize that there's no doubt you scored extremely well (you might've even gotten a perfect score!) and all the nervousness you had over the past several years (which wasn't that much) have vanished into thin air. You're confident enough to sleep.

In your dreams, you see Jimin, Yoongi and Taehyung. The four of you are best friends in a world that looks like Utopia but isn't. There is no Exam that determines your whole future. There is no Purgatory, no Dystopia... No horrible education system. No rats... No pit... It's a utopian world that's better than the Utopia that you know today.

And you're only woken from your heavenly dream when there's a knock on your door. It opens before you can stay anything and a man in white gestures for you to walk out of the room. Rubbing your eyes and shaking away your drowsiness, you obey him. The man closes the door once you are out of the room.

Left and right of you, there are hundreds of students standing outside of their rooms. The tension, the nervousness in the long hallway could be sliced with a knife. But you don't contribute to the sea of worries. You lean against the door, waiting for you to be whisked away, waiting to meet Taehyung at the end of the hallway. Waiting to be driven away in some grandeur vehicle.

You wait for only two people to be taken away. Or maybe there are others who scored a perfect score? No matter. At this point, you only care if you and Taehyung made it.

Everyone holds their breaths as the men in white start to walk through the halls. You see Taehyung ahead of you, already giving you a silly look and smiling confidently at you. You breathe a huge sigh of relief before turning your head to watch the men in white.

So far, they haven't taken anyone from their stance in front of their Exam rooms. Your heart beats loudly in your chest when they come closer and closer to you. God, they must've passed at least two hundred people to get to me. And still no high-scorer.

You and Taehyung have an enormous chance now.

You hold your breath as the men in white come closer and closer.

Any minute now...

You grit your teeth, tensing your shoulders when they're so nearby, if you reached out to them, you could touch their white suits. Your ears ring, drowning out the cries of the students who were standing behind you and were left stranded by the men in white.

Closer and closer and closer...

Your nails dig into your skin.

Closer...

You nearly scream in victory when a man in white stops straight in front of you. He nods in your direction and then places a hand on the small of your back to escort you away.

You can feel the burning eyes of jealousy digging daggers on your back as you begin to walk. But you can't help feeling like royalty. This is the moment you've been waiting for. You've been selected. You've scored the highest. You're going to be Utopian.

Taehyung catches your eye and gives you a huge thumbs up from afar. You're grinning from ear to ear as you begin to approach him. As soon as a man in white officially deems that he is coming with you, you're going to proudly hold his hand and walk through the hallway like you owned all of Purgatory. You're going to spend the proudest moment of your life with him by your side. Knowing that you made it through with him. And then you're going to read his note in the vehicle, on the way to Utopia. You have it all planned out in your head. It's going to be wonderf—

Wait.

The man in white who is escorting you is not slowing down, and the other men around you aren't looking to stop either. Wait.

You're going to pass Taehyung at this rate. Wait a fucking minute.

You suddenly break out in cold sweat as you and the men come closer and closer to Taehyung.

There's no way.

He had to have done extremely well. He has to come with me.

Taehyung looks a bit taken aback as well. His eyes reflect fear and the worry lines pressed on his forehead indicate no less than that.

You don't lose eye contact with him as the men continue to escort you down the hallway.

"Taehyung," you murmur when you're directly next to him. "Taehyung!" you yell. Your voice echoes eerily across the corridor.

"Y/N!" Taehyung yells back.

He's behind you now. The men won't let you stop walking.

"Taehyung!" you scream again, trying to turn around to look at him. "Tae!"

"Don't turn around, miss," the man escorting you speaks gruffly.

"There's been a mistake!" you cry. "Tae-Taehyung is supposed to be with me! Taehyung!"

"Don't make this difficult," the man answered. The hand on your back suddenly seems threatening.

"Y/N!!" Taehyung shouts again. His eyes brim with tears and he sinks to his knees.

"Get up!" someone yells at him. "Stand up, boy!"

"Y/N!" He ignores the command, sobbing with his hands reaching out for you and eyes pleading for safety, for your comfort.

You twist your body around, shaking off the grasps of your escort as you yell his name so loudly that your voice echoes across the vast expanse of the hallway.

"Behave," your escort grunts with gritted teeth as he tugs you away, gesturing the other men in white to block your view from Taehyung.

Tears stream down your face as you beg the men in white to let you see Taehyung one last time. They don't budge. It's not until you hear the beatings and Taehyung's agonizing screams that you try to kick the men's shins and escape. But they catch you, hoist you up and carry you away.

You thrash, scream, "Please don't hurt him!" but the screams, grunts and kicks never stop. You always thought your walk down this hallway would be glorious—the glory only lasted for a few minutes. You were supposed to walk down here hand in hand with Taehyung. Now Taehyung might be dead for disobeying orders.

You were supposed to be draped in silk and mink coats. You were supposed to be spritzed with sweet fragrances and treated like a princess. But everyone—even your peers—look at you with what you recognize as pity. Or maybe even disgust.

They must think you're crazy for not being thankful for being a high-scorer on the Exam. Some would kill to be in your place right now.

You hadn't expected—after your eight years in Purgatory—for your journey here to end like this. You're embarrassingly carried across the shoulder of the man in white, forced to dangle over him like a dead animal. You can feel the scrutinizing gazes of your peers. The ones who didn't get chosen.

It strikes you that you're alone now.

No more Jimin. No more Yoongi... And no more Taehyung.

You squeeze your eyes shut, praying for another person who scored the same as you. Maybe you'll find a new friend? Maybe you won't be alone again.

But the hallway ends and opens up to a door and you're still the only person the men in white have escorted. Your heart sinks. You're alone.

They shove you in a shiny black vehicle where the inside is air-conditioned and smells of roses. There are unfamiliar snacks in elaborate wrappings and ice-cold fizzy drinks around you—all for you—but you aren't hungry. The tears won't stop.

Were the riches and wealth worth the loneliness that will consume you for years to come?

You are a legend. A model figure. A genius.

The first to ever score 100% on the Exam. You're dragged from here to there, paid by the richest of Utopians to tutor their young children before they're sent off to Purgatory.

Frankly, you're upset at the lavishness of Utopia. There is always more to eat—so much so that one-fourths of every meal goes into the trash. The people here put ice cubes in their water to cool it. In Dystopia, there was never enough to eat and water was scarce. Purgatory never had a diverse array of food, and water was always lukewarm.

You're not sure if you belong here.

You miss Taehyung more than ever these days. Your new home is far too large for one person. You feel empty, cold inside. Even basking in the sunlight shining through your gold-rimmed window isn't enough to warm you. You tug the sleeves of Yoongi's sweater over your hands. Even after all these years in Utopia, you can't get accustomed to the fancy, frilly clothes here. You like Yoongi's old, frayed sweaters much better. And it's your only token of remembrance of him. You feel like you did him well because after all, you kept your promise. But Yoongi was wrong about one thing: the life of a Utopian did not suit you.

You can't help but think back to the days of Dystopia—of you and Jimin. Taehyung's right, you never really forget your childhood best friend. You've written down all of your memories about Jimin in a black leather-bound journal, which you keep out in the open by the window sill. On harder days, you like to read through the entries to refresh your memories and recall the stories that make you laugh or tear up with nostalgia.

The magnificent garden outside your home looks empty despite the plethora of flowers and colorful vines that sprout and bloom across the expanse of the healthy, verdant grass. Sighing, you clutch the silver locket resting between your collarbones. You've been wearing the necklace ever since the day you were first admitted into Utopia.

Inside the locket is a neatly folded up note. The piece of paper is old and crinkled and it has obviously been ripped out from a textbook called Family Studies. Taehyung's writing is etched onto it in black ink. You've read over the note so many times that you know exactly what it says by heart.

Y/N,

I was saving this to tell you in Utopia, but I can't wait for that day, even if it's tomorrow. I need to tell you now that I love you. Thank you for being by my side. Thank you for dealing with me. Thank you for calming me down.

You're welcome for those back massages. You're welcome for listening to your stories about Jimin and Yoongi. You're welcome for being by your side. I do it so much because I hate seeing you lonely.

Utopia will be great, Y/N. I think we'll live a great life there, don't you think?

I just want to say that if anything happens, we need to continue on with our lives. Because whatever the Exam decides, we deserve the results.

Nevertheless, I'll see you in Utopia, Y/N~

You tear up every time you open up your locket and study Taehyung's handwriting and his last words to you. Of course, you love him too. And it kills you that you don’t even know whether he's alive.

How cruel it is to live in such a wealthy place but feel worse than you had been in Dystopia and Purgatory.

The Exam is a curse. There is no way you could've beaten it, but you'd very much rather be hauled back into Dystopia with someone you care about than being stuck in this fast-paced, artificial world with no one but yourself.

It dawns on you horrifyingly. You did not beat the Exam. You did not win. You survived it.

And for the rest of your life, you must suffer the casualties.

—masterpost

—masterlist

[de-profundis-ad-astra]

Fury, Oh Fury - Part One

Triple Frontier | Hunger Games AU

Me: Hey what if I started working on Fury again? Y’all: Me: Hey if I started working on Fury again would you read it? Y’all: Me: Okay okay you’ve forced my hand I guess I gotta start working on Fury again

Rating || Mature (for graphic descriptions of violence/gore and strong language) Characters || Ben Miller. William Miller. A good chunk of this fic will be heavily focused on the Miller brothers, because I’m most comfortable writing them and I feel like I know them the best. Rest assured, Pope and Catfish will be making appearances ~eventually~ Word Count || 4.2k Taglist || (Starting out tagging some mutuals and people I remember from the previous taglist)  @firefeatherx​ @mylifeliterally​ @mandoplease​ @phoenixhalliwell​ @skylyknightly​ @havenforafrazzledmind​ @beatriz-silva-00​ @veuliee​ @veuliee2​ @oldstuffnewstuff​ @dindisneydjarin​ @lilacyennefer​ @dignityneeded​ @agirllovespancakes​​ @xjustmenobodyelse​​ @oscarflysaac @jaime1110​​ @goldenhour-goldenboy​​ @pascalz​​ @briskywalker​​ @herestherealproblem​​ @givemethatgold​​

Author’s Note || For anyone who might be new here, @veuliee​ sent me a concept that I kinda uh, tripped over my own feet and plunged face first into and that’s the story of how I started writing a Hunger Games AU for Triple Frontier. Things got unbelievably crazy once I started work, and I’ve had some pretty unhealthy work/home boundaries with being virtual. I’m trying to establish some healthier limits and make more time for my writing, and this seemed like a good enough starting point. That and the outlines for the rest of this fic are still staring at me and demanding to be written.

So, here goes.

Home hasn’t felt like home since Will left.

It’s been nothing more than a house since the day of the reaping, almost a month ago. A collection of walls with a roof—the same as any other building. The place where he grew up. A place to rest his head and feed himself between training sessions. It won’t be home until Will comes back.

If he comes back.

Will has trained for this, Ben tells himself when doubt creeps in, wraps its icy fingers around his lungs and clenches tight, pushes down on his chest in the dead of the night and it feels like Ben is drowning. Will practiced and fought and earned the chance to volunteer for District Two. He wouldn’t have been selected as the male tribute for this year if his teachers hadn’t felt he had a strong chance of returning victorious.

But there had been Two’s female tribute also. And the tributes from One and Four. All were formidable in a fight, and knew the tips and tricks to survival that would be essential in the arena. Not to mention the Games themselves were an absolute wild card. For all Will’s training, he still could be killed by a natural disaster of the gamemakers design, stabbed in the back by his allies, a tribute from an outlying district could catch him off guard.

There’s far too much that can go wrong; Ben drowns each and every thought behind his own training at the academy.

He can’t let that kind of vulnerability shine through. Not to his father. Not to his peers. Especially not when he’s being followed as much as his brother in the arena. Since the field of tributes narrowed down to eight five days ago, when Capitol cameras and personnel arrived to interview him and his father, there’s been hardly a moment of privacy. So Ben covers his fear with a smile, says he has full confidence that his brother will be home as soon as he can. He laughs when they ask him if he’ll volunteer one day, just like his brother did.

Ben answers with a grin, says he has no place to make that determination—but who knows? 

Deep down… he knows. He’s known for a while now. He’s young, but he’s already tall, strong, quick. A prodigy, they’d said of his skills. A promised child, just like his brother was.

In spite of his age, Ben is favored to volunteer and represent District Two in the coming years. For now, though, the focus is on honing those skills, shaping him into the best warrior they can to bring pride to District Two.

The Capitol, they say, are charmed by him already. The idea of two brothers bearing the title of Victor is the kind of narrative they’re keen to fall for. So Ben plasters that smile on and lets himself become a part of the show.

Because if he lost Will…

If he lost Will—

Where would home be?

--

All of District Two seems to have hit pause, every pair of eyes glued to the nearest screen.

Peacekeepers-in-training pause their exercises. Future tributes stop their sparring matches. The lines at every shop in town are on hold. Even the children have stopped playing their games to witness this.

And in the city square, standing in front of the Justice Building in a roped off section reserved for family, the mayor, and a handful of District Two’s more recent victors, thirteen year old Benjamin Miller tries to keep his fidgeting down to an occasional scuff of his feet on the dusty ground or flex of his weary muscles.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it seems we are entering the final moments of the Fifty-fourth annual Hunger Games!”

The massive screens mounted in the square broadcast live footage from the arena. Presently, two feeds are placed side by side, dedicated to the two remaining tributes of this year’s Hunger Games. One tracks Will’s every move, the other follows his opponent: the boy from District Four.

Will abandoned the Career pack when there were still fourteen tributes left. One night, during his watch shift, he left them behind, taking with him a pack with enough food to last him four days, a bottle of water, a sleeping bag, a hunting knife, and his preferred sword. A long, wicked thing most people might have struggled to wield two-handed. Will handled it with ease. One-handed.

Speculation rippled through the district at that. The decision to leave so early in the Games was shocking enough. Why not kill the rest while they slept and increase his odds of victory by an exponential margin? It was known that the pack would disband eventually, but why so soon?

At the academy, Will was both praised and berated for his choice. It was understandable to leave before bonds formed and killing another tribute turned into killing an ally. But so early? When so much could go wrong? It was a risk not many were brave enough to take.

In the arena, navigating the terrain proved to be its own exercise of survival. This year’s terrain consisted of three mountains of varying height, surrounded by dense forest. It became apparent early on that the woods were not safe, as they were crawling with all manner of predators, both organic and manufactured by the Capitol. Two weeks into the Games, the gamemakers destroyed the entire forest with a raging wildfire, killing an additional two tributes.

The forest now uninhabitable, Will had taken to carving out several hiding places among the mountainsides. Once he’d burned through his rations, he relied on hunting small creatures still inhabiting the cliffs and whatever his mentor was able to provide through sponsors. With the element of surprise working for him, Will had managed to ambush and eliminate four additional tributes, bringing his kill count to a whopping ten—high above the average for a typical career.

Almost half of the playing field, brought down by one seventeen-year old. Will must have struck a deal with his allies before the start of the Games, because during the bloodbath, he’d done most, if not all of the killing while the remainder of his team secured their supplies from the Cornucopia. If he walked away from this, he’d be the pride of District Two for a long time to come on that merit alone.

When the tribute pack thinned down to four, the gamemakers struck again. Devastating rockslides hammered each mountain, cutting off both Will’s access to his hiding spots, and any freshwater sources he’d relied on. The slides killed two tributes, the girl from One and the boy from Five.

Ben remembered watching in abject horror as his brother fled from the avalanche, finally managing to take cover underneath an outcropping of rock that shielded him from the worst of it. He’d escaped, though not without accruing a fair amount of scrapes and bruises along the way. The worst of it was a small, but deep cut slicing through his eyebrow. By a small miracle, it had stopped bleeding within an hour, but half of Will’s face was now crusted with streaks of dried blood, only adding to his already haggard state. He lost his knife in the chaos, but managed to hold onto his sword—his saving grace.

Not only that, but the only reason the boy from Four had survived was because he’d turned on his companion as they fled. When they were clear of the slides, while her guard was down, he’d shoved her back, right into the path of an oncoming boulder. She was crushed before she could even appear shocked by the betrayal. There weren’t even any remains left for the hovercraft to collect.

More whispers rippled through the district, then. Yes, it was sad. But it was what needed to be done.

No fresh water. Most of the wildlife either dead or scared off. Two tributes. It was evident the gamemakers wanted to end this fast. The Games had already lasted nearly three and a half weeks, far longer than average. This year had proven to be a particularly hardy bunch. Even getting a small water bottle into the arena at this rate would likely cost a large fortune.

Which meant they were on their own.

The moment the dust cleared, the cannons fired and faces projected in the sky, everyone knew what came next. Immediately, a space was cleared in the square for Ben and his father, victors called out to join and prepare to offer either congratulations or condolences depending on the outcome of the final encounter.

On the screen, Will inches his way along a narrow path on the face of the tallest mountain. All he has on his person is his sword and his clothes, veritably shredded after three weeks of fighting for his life in such an unforgiving environment. The landscape is similar enough that when Ben looks at the screen with the boy from Four, he can’t tell how near they are to each other. Will grew up in the mountains of Two. In theory, he should have an advantage over the boy from the coast. Nothing is ever set in stone, though—not in the Hunger Games. Four had proven himself to be quiet the adaptable tribute.

They have to be getting close, Ben thinks, there’s no way the gamemakers would push them away from each other at this point.

As if in answer to his thought, a low, feline snarl rumbles through the speakers. It’s faint, far away, but Will hears it. Everyone hears it. Pressing his back against the rock, he dares a swift look down towards the origin of the sound. As if oblivious to the cameras trained on him or simply not caring, Will’s shout cuts through the wind. 

“Fuck!”

The camera angle switches, and Ben’s heart plummets.

Prowling about fifty feet beneath Will’s feet is a strange breed of feline, the likes of which Ben has never seen before. Three of them. Large, with a pale golden coat and small round ears. Long, curved, razor-sharp claws extending from all four oversized paws carve thin scratches into the rock as they pace back and forth beneath him.

Ben’s first thought is cougar, but then the cat looks up, and he beholds the elongated canines extending far past its lower jaw. He’s learned about it in school. A kind of cat that went extinct long before the continent was even known as the Americas. Despite his best efforts, Ben cannot recall its name.

It’s undoubtedly a muttation, designed and put out by the gamemakers to do one thing: kill.

The long-toothed cat bares its teeth, its companions following suit. From his perch on the mountainside, Will’s chest moves rapidly. He’s struggling to control his breath, Ben realizes. His throat tightens, his stomach tangling with itself.

Beside him, his father murmurs, “Move, William, move.”

“Look at that!” one of the commentators yells. “It seems the gamemakers have one last trick up their sleeves to push Will and Reed together!”

Ben grips the rope in front of him as if that is the only thing separating him from Will. The big cat crouches, leaps up to a rock jutting out from the mountainside, ten feet closer to him. Ben spares one glance towards Four’s feed. He doesn’t seem to be faring much better. Another trio of cats nip at his heels as he struggles to ascend the mountain.

Will’s breathing slows and deepens, and he masters himself enough to take several tiny steps closer to the end of the path. There, he will easily be able to summit the mountain, another twenty feet above his head.

The cats leap up another ten feet, and Will draws his sword with one hand. Bracing his free hand on the smooth, grey rock, he angles the blade towards the advancing cats and continues inching along. Only a few more feet separate him from the safety of the broad platform of stone. Beneath him, one of the cats leans back onto its haunches. Its entire body trembles before it goes preternaturally still, preparing to make one last leap towards its prey.

Reading the movements, Will does the same. For a moment, they lock eyes. Blue to gold, predator to predator. Silence grips the square. Ben’s lungs strain against his ribs, but he doesn’t let himself breathe. Not yet. Not when it feels as if a single puff of air could alter the course of history in this moment.

The cat leaps.

So does Will.

He goes nearly parallel to the ground, his free hand reaching out for something he can catch himself on and his sword hand sweeping downward the same moment the cat swipes a clawed paw towards him.

The honed edge of the sword slices deep into the neck of the feline. A trail of blood droplets follows the arc of the blade as Will twists in midair, angling his body so his back will take the brunt of the impact and tucking his chin down into his chest. The cat yowls as it tumbles back, the sound turning into an awful gurgle before cutting off. Its body falls down the steep mountain face. Ben only catches a short glimpse before it tumbles off the screen, but he can see that Will cut deep enough that its head is barely hanging on by a few tendons and muscle fibers. A thick streak of red smears the rock where it fell.

With a grunt, Will slams into the ground, sliding over the dirt and loose rocks for a moment before his body stills. He remains there for several seconds before ever so slowly, he turns onto his side. Pressing his left hand into the ground, Will pushes himself up, dragging his feet beneath his shoulders. As soon as he puts his weight onto his legs, he gives out and he topples back down.

Any relief Ben felt at his brother’s life-saving maneuver is swelled out by a pulse of fear when he sees why his brother can’t stand.

A duo of long cuts, so straight and deep it looks almost surgical, extends from the middle of Will’s thigh down to his ankle. Ben had been so busy watching his brother he’d been oblivious to the fact that the cat had gotten him.

Each breath Will takes has blood oozing from the laceration until the leg of his pants are soaked and glistening a deep, sullen red. He tries, and fails, again to rise to his feet. Even using the sword as a support, he loses his footing and crumbles, his weight kicking up a cloud of dust when he hits the rock.

“In a stunning turn of events, it seems that the outcome of these Games have already been determined…”

Get up, Ben thinks with every shred of desperation he has. Get up, Will.

Will sluggishly turns onto his back, and hoists himself upright with his legs stretched in front of him. It seems to take every bit of energy he has to shrug his jacket off, and slide it underneath his bleeding leg. He brazenly ties the sleeves around his thigh until his arms are straining and the blood flow slows. The makeshift tourniquet may save his life, but it’s only a matter of minutes before the damage is so permanent that he risks losing the limb altogether.

Again, using his sword for support, Will heaves himself to his feet. He wobbles again, and Ben feels his heart rise into his throat before he steadies himself. Will straightens, and takes a few limping steps towards the final ascent. He’d been so busy tending to his wound, worrying about the big cats, that he hadn’t heard the approaching footsteps. Ben, too wrapped up in concern for his brother, hadn’t checked the other video feed, hadn’t heard the commentators call out in shock—

When Four crashes into Will and sinks a knife into his shoulder.

Ben, his father, the city square, the entirety of District Two, cry out in collective shock as Will and Four go down, Four pinning him with a roar so inhuman it sends a chill skittering over Ben’s bones.

It’s worse, so much worse than he’d imagined.

Blood sprays, and Will’s fingers splay when he hits the rock. His sword clattering too far for him to reach. Ben barely processes what he sees as he fights to remain upright. He feels the cameras in the square narrow in on him. He can’t give out. Not now.

Will rolls, flipping Four off of him and onto the ground, wrenching the knife in his shoulder free in the process. His blood drips down the blade as Four angles it in front of himself, his own arm shredded, likely from his encounter with those big cats. Will slowly climbs to his knees, beaten and bloody and entirely at a disadvantage. The blood, the dirt—he looks more animal than human when he bares his teeth.

Ben’s never seen anything like it. Anything so unearthly, so primal and raging.

Four leaps again, and Will leans down. As Four descends on him, Will straightens, and there’s a clang of metal on metal.

It takes a moment for Ben to understand what he sees.

But there’s Will, knife in hand, his face red with the effort it takes to keep Four from landing another blow. He’d lost his knife in the avalanche. He’d seen it.

How long had Will kept a knife hidden in his boot, waiting for a moment such as this to use it?

Will manages to deflect what would have been a life-ending blow, but they topple again. Four bellows as Will’s blade plunges into his forearm and twists. The shrieking of Four, coupled with the spray of blood, sends a chill weaving down Ben’s spine.

Move, move, move!

Four’s free hand slams into Will’s face hard enough to crack bone, and Will stumbles back, blood gushing.

Will just grunts, his brow bunching in pain and concentration.

Every part of Ben shakes.

Four punches his face again and the sound fracks from Ben, “Will.”

Four yanks his arm free of Will’s knife, blood spraying like rain as he slashes at Will. He catches Four’s wrist in the follow-through with both hands, pinning his arm across his body. Four swings with his free hand, the punch easily dodged this time by Will.

They stare at each other for long, uncounted moments, nothing between them but howling wind and heavy, pained panting.

Then Will does the last thing Ben expects him to.

He headbutts Four.

Will releases Four’s arm as he staggers towards the edge of the peak, right towards where the long-toothed cats stalk in wait. The blow proves disorienting enough, and though Four swings his arms wildly to regain his balance, he takes one step back too far back and plummets.

He screams as he falls, but it goes hauntingly quiet when he hits.

The impact of Four’s body on the stone is heard across the nation. They wait for the cannon, but there’s nothing.

The mutts attack.

Will sinks to his knees.

Ben clutches the rope so tightly his knuckles whiten. It could be minutes, it could be hours, before the cannon booms at last.

Will looks to the side, his eyes finding the camera as if he’s known precisely where it was the entire time. Something like relief shines there, overpowered by pain and fury and something feral as the announcer declares, “Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victor of the fifty-fourth Hunger Games, William Miller—the tribute of District Two!”

--

Two days later, Will’s final interview in the Capitol airs. Before now, he’s been kept keenly away from the cameras, and it becomes clear why the moment Ben sees him for the first time since his final glimpse in the arena. He wears a sharp grey suit, but any evidence of his injuries on his face have been wiped away. Whether by makeup or surgical alteration, Ben can’t tell. His skin is smooth and pristine, unmarred by bruises or cuts or even the faintest scar.

The crowd breaks into applause as Will is presented. He gives a winning smile, but the haunted glow is still there. He still looks a little too much like a cornered animal. His stylist is praised for his masterful capture of Will’s strength, physique, and iron-willed character.

Will sits in the victor’s chair like he was born for it. Maybe he was. He views the highlights with the rest of the nation, and answers his interviewer’s questions with grace.

“While you were there, in the arena,” says the host. “Was there any one thing that kept you going?”

Will seems to think on it for a moment, working his jaw over before he answers, “My brother. The whole time… I just wanted him to know that I love him.”

The audience croons about how strong and brave he is. Ben feels himself swell with pride.

He wants to be like Will one day, he thinks.

--

The wait for the train is its own agony.

District Two is nearest to the Capitol, but operations there don’t start until late in the morning on a good day. With the conclusion of the Games so fresh, it seems they need a few extra hours to get moving.

At last, the train rolls into the station late in the afternoon. No one comments on how Ben stood there, waiting for almost the whole day as more and more citizens of Two arrive to welcome their newest victor. They chatter amongst themselves, clearing space for Ben’s father as he arrives at last, fresh off his shift as the town’s head Peacekeeper.

As the train crawls to a halt, the voices around Ben die down, awaiting with bated breath for Will to show himself. Ben feels like he’s about to burst from his own skin with the anticipation—

The doors open, and there he is.

Will’s eyes snap to Ben’s almost instantly. The relief that cleaves through him almost knocks him to his knees.

Ben thinks it might have, had Will not leaped down and ran to him.

Will opens his arms, and Ben finds his way home.

--

Will remembers every face of every tribute in that godforsaken place.

The ones he killed directly haunt him the most.

He kept count of many things in the arena. The minutes that turned into hours that turned into days away from home… away from Ben. The number of breaths he still counted himself lucky to take. But most poignant of all was those faces. Each one, their faces as they died, had been etched into his memory. Every time he blinks, he sees them.

Ten. He killed ten of them.

The train barely makes a creak as it speeds over the railway. The ride from the Capitol to District Two isn’t long—barely an hour.

Though he grew up in one of the “wealthy” districts, there is a certain elegance to Capitol wares Will thinks he’s going to miss. He relishes in every moment he has left, wresting back thoughts of death and killing and betrayal.

He hadn’t been lying when he said it was Ben that got him through the worst of it in the arena. But that hadn’t been the whole truth, either. It was the thought of how he could redeem himself after so much tragedy, inflicting so much pain on others. He couldn’t do that if he let himself die in the arena.

How did Ben—little Benny, who perhaps wasn’t so little anymore but would always be to Will—see him now, at the end of it all? What could he say that would make all the violence, all the killing, right.

He didn’t know how, but he would do it. Will would make sure to see it done, no matter what it took.

Will is barely formulating what he can say to his brother when he feels the breaks engage on the train. All too soon, just like that, he’s back home… whatever home is, now. Sure, he’ll have the house in Victor’s Village and of course his family would be allowed to live with him, but the concept seems too foreign, now. He suspects it’ll take some time to adjust to that.

His mentor—a victor from about ten years ago, beckons him forward. Will’s legs are surprisingly shaky as he rises to his feet. Outside, he can hear the district already clapping, cheering for him. He tries to imagine Ben there, tries to pretend that his brother will be happy to see him, that he’ll be happy to see Ben.

The doors open.

Light floods the train car, and Will almost lifts a hand to block the sun. The initial surge of stimulus is overwhelming. The light, the sound, the unrelenting heat of the mountains. Will blinks hard to adjust his eyes.

As if by gravitational pull, he sees him.

His eyes find Ben’s, almost an exact mirror of his own. His brother’s eyes are wide, his face broken into a grin so wide it’s a wonder his skin hasn’t split.

That’s all it takes.

Will leaps down from the train car and runs. Every thought, every doubt, every word flees his mind as he takes in the sight of his brother. Healthy and whole and alive.

Ben’s there to meet him. They collide, and Will finds his way home.

[3pirouette]

Fic: The Honey Trap (8/?)

Title: The Honey Trap

By: TriplePirouette/3Pirouette

Disclaimer: They're not mine.

Distribution: AO3 Anyone else please ask first :) 

Story Summary: Peggy’d lost count. She wasn’t sure if she was a double or triple agent at this point, and in the end, it didn’t matter. What mattered was getting out of this alive.

A/N: Still chugging away at this. It looks like I won't be able to stick to a rigid posting schedule due to RL commitments, so updates will come when I can. I promise, there is an end, and it's not abandoned. Please hang in there with me.

Chapter 8: Love Letters

February, 1945

It was ludicrously simple to feed Wallace information. As far as he was concerned, Peggy and Steve were having face to face meetings and she was bringing him back tiny tidbits of verbal information. At least, that had been what she told him.

What she hadn’t told Wallace about were the letters.

They’d settled on letters, because Steve could get her those even when he wasn’t in London, and it was brilliant. He slipped them in her purse and down her cleavage when they were together and in full view of their Hydra tails, and sent them by courier to “avoid” the censoring of the government when he was away.

Peggy swore up and down Steve was giving her very little, and fed the man only the tiniest bits of information that he pretended was very helpful. Wallace, knowing very well from her Hydra tail that she was getting letters, was only too happy to go through her desk and start reading them. She kept the stack in her desk drawer, and always gave Wallace time to read them while she wasn’t in the room- finding excuses to pop to the loo or hide in her bedroom for a moment. He was good, but he wasn’t good enough to notice she’d set a piece of chalk on the bottom edge of the back of the drawer where she kept her letters, so she knew each time he opened it and read them.

He thought he was getting highly detailed information about the Allied troops and feeding it to Hydra.

Instead, he was being fed exactly what Phillips wanted him to know, and after a couple of planned “successes” for Hydra, it led to three ambushes of Hydra teams and the capturing of two very high-profile Hydra operatives.

Steve’s letters made him sound like a lovelorn simpleton, detailing troop movements so she’d supposedly know where he was and what he was doing, fully of sappy language and grand declarations of love.

For Peggy, the letters contained highly coded messages. First, she had to decode them with the cipher in her compact, and then decode that with the numerical Commando cipher she already knew. Peggy knew the real operations, the real troop movements, Steve’s real assignments, and whatever information they needed her to feed Wallace.

It was working like a charm.

For her part, Peggy had been able to supply Steve a steady stream of intel from Wallace using Howard’s pen camera and the cigarette case telegraph. It wasn’t that he was sloppy, but now that she was lying to him, he seemed to trust her more.

It was something she’d seen over and over- when the target thought they were getting just want they wanted, they turned a blind eye to the things that should have been giant, waving red flags. He left paperwork out. He took phone calls where she could hear him. He took her to dinner parties where Hydra operatives talked in German about missions and inventions, assuming she didn’t know the language while she pretended to be engrossed in small talk with the wives.

What she didn’t have yet, what she needed, was access to the new research. She needed to get closer to Schmidt, closer to what made Hydra tick, so she could figure out how to take them down, not just stop troop movements here and there.

February trudged on, long and cold with the Commandos stuck in the Rhineland and icy, pelting rain and slushy snow making London miserable. Peggy made her way through each day, typing away at transmissions and letters in the typing pool, decoding orders and “slipping” information to Wallace with a smile. Steve’s letters were the only connection she had to him as the weeks wore on and their last rendezvous seemed farther and farther away.

Late at night, Peggy re-read his letters when she was alone, trying to force sleep to come. They were sappy, and silly, and meant for other people to read, but every few sentences there would be a line, a few words, that she knew were his own. He’d told her, the last time he saw her, that he tried to put at least two true things into every letter, and it was always right after he’d written her name so she’d know it was true.

Peggy, I love you.

Peggy, I miss you so much sometimes it feels like I can’t breathe.

Peggy, I’m going to make good on all those promises to take you on real dates.

Peggy, the sunset over the mountains last night reminded me of you, and I wish you’d have been there with me to see it.

Peggy, I’m glad you’re not here, no one should be out here.

Peggy, when this is all over, I’m going to ask you to marry me.

She always saved that one for last, because it filled her with the most hope. One day, this war would be over and she’d never have to pretend to love another man. One day, they’d never have to pretend again.

~*~ March 1945

She found it odd, trying to play the double agent at this point, and an inexperienced one, at that. Peggy slipped her coat tighter around herself, sliding around the edge of the inn. She was supposed to be seen, but she was trying not to be, at the same time.

Sometimes keeping it all in order set her mind whirling and she had to go back to the basics, back to the cover story to keep it all straight. Playing everything so earnestly was hard, and she was starting to lose herself.

It had been so long since she’d said goodbye to the Allied camp that this reality seemed the only one.

She liked the women in the typing pool where she worked in London. Once they’d stopped speculating about her and actually spoke to her, she found most of them quite lovely.

Sometimes she lost herself and genuinely enjoyed the company of the people Richard brought her around, they all seemed so normal talking about lunches and rationing and longing for days before the war, until she watched them stand and perform the single and double armed salutes with purpose and she grew nauseous at the idea that she forgot they were the enemy.

Sometimes, when she started to see the humans and not the Nazi party, when she started to sympathize with the young mothers who passionately just wanted a better future for their children and didn’t understand the lengths the men at the front lines were going to, she didn’t know who she was.

Deep cover did that to people. It was doing it to her.

It had been too long since she’d seen Steve, and even though his letters came like clockwork, she was starting to feel unmoored, starting to feel adrift in the lies. Keeping track of what she had told Wallace, what she was supposed to think he knew, what he knew and what she really knew he knew was getting exhausting and confusing. She was tracking real and fake troop movements, letting slip false information and protecting real information while getting every bit of intel from him that she could.

It wasn’t much, but she was working on it. The dinner parties weren’t fun, but they were chock full of information and were increasing in frequency. And she’d finally, finally gotten a break that might just bring this all to an end if she could just hang on a little longer.  

Peggy kept to the shadows of the building, forcing herself to remember how this was going to work. Wallace had said they’d be able to hear, not see.

Crikey O’Rilley, she hated that, but she had to go along with it. Peggy’d lost count. She wasn’t sure if she was a double or triple agent at this point, and in the end, it didn’t matter. What mattered was getting out of this alive.

She stopped and knocked on the door, slipping one hand into her pocketbook. By the time Steve opened the door, she was rimming her lips with a fresh coat of red, the tiny light on the outside of the lipstick container blinking bright green at him, alerting him to the fact that she was wired.

He nodded, but the smile didn’t fade from his face, and his voice didn’t waiver when he said her name and stepped aside to let her enter. She slipped the lipstick away as she moved past him into the small rented room, Steve shutting and locking the door. She could feel her heart pounding.

“It’s been so long,” she whispered, looking up at him, tears in her eyes.

He didn’t let another second go by before sweeping her up into his arms. “I know. I’m sorry.”

She clutched at him, tears coming hard and fast, and they didn’t need to say anything for long minutes as they just held one another until she caught her breath. They both knew someone was listening, both knew they had a part to play that wasn’t planned, but for just a few moments, in silence, they could be themselves.

Peggy pulled away far enough to put a foot of space between then, dropped her bag on the floor and shrugged off her coat.

Steve watched as she started to unbutton her blouse, swallowing hard. “Peg…”

She shushed him with a silent finger to her lips, and stopped only halfway down her chest, opening her blouse to reveal the wires taped to her chest. “I’m afraid I can’t stay, Steve.”

His reaction was real. They’d been expecting for some time Wallace would bug them, or find a way to surveil them closer, but she knew Steve wasn’t prepared for this. Wide eyed and surprised, he looked her up and down. “What? Why?”

“I’ve come to stop this.” She shook her head and pointed at the wire, pleading with him to understand. “Things have changed quite suddenly and…”

“And what?” He asked, stepping closer, hands fidgeting, energy building up in him as he tried to figure out what to do with the situation.

“And I’m leaving with Richard.” She nodded, telling him this was true. “He’s offered me more than you can. Offered to take me away from this damned war.” Tears pooled in her eyes, but she pointed to her purse. Steve dropped down, rummaging through it quietly as she kept on. “What can you give me but eternal war? You know they’ll never let you stop, never let ‘Captain America’ retire, and I deserve more than that.”

Steve sat back on the floor, holding up a blank envelope. She nodded, but it didn’t change the devastation on his face. “I don’t understand, Peg.” He took a slow breath and added the next part for the wire’s benefit,  “I thought you loved me.”

She pressed her lips together and looked away, fighting the tears. “I do. I don’t think anything will ever change that.”

Steve scrambled to his feet, taking her into his arm. “Please don’t do this, Peg.”

She pulled back and kissed him, desperately at first then taking on a feeling of softness as the seconds ticked by before she pulled away. “You know why I’m doing this,” she whispered, eyes finding his.

He could only nod.

It’s all in there, Peggy mouthed, nodding her head towards the letter in his hand, Find me. She took a deep breath and stepped away, buttoning up her shirt. She bent, throwing her trench coat on quickly and shoving her bag over her shoulder. When she stood, she looked over her shoulder at him.

Without thinking, Steve dropped the letter and picked her up, pressing her against the door and kissing her with all the desperation and passion he felt. She wrapped her legs and arms around him, giving in and letting herself indulge. He pulled away far too quickly, but kept his eyes on her as he snaked a hand down her shirt and crushed the bug between his fingers.

Peggy shook her head, tears coming fast. “Now that you’ve done that I really must go,” she whispered.

“Tell me. Fast,” he begged, holding her tight and running a gentle hand over her cheek.  

“He’s gotten us an audience in Berlin, but we must leave tonight.” She searched his eyes, begging him to believe her as she nuzzled into his touch. “I think…” She took a deep breath, her face as serious as she could make it. “I think I can get to Schmidt.”

“Damn it.” He whispered, setting her down. “You have to go.”

She kissed him quickly. “I have to go.” She pulled away and set her skirt to rights. “Everything’s in the letter. Same ciphers.” She put her hand on the doorknob, reluctant even though she knew what she had to do. She clutched her shirt tight. “Come find me, Steve, and we can end this.”

Peggy pulled the door open and huffed out. “And you’ve broken a button, you brute!” she yelled behind her, stomping her foot and wiping at her tears. “I never want to see you again!” Peggy stooped down, picking up a rock and throwing it at Steve as he stood in the doorway. He closed the door just quick enough to avoid getting pelted, but Peggy didn’t miss that the curtain to his room moved as she moved quickly away, not even pretending to sneak as she set herself in the car in the back of the lot.

She sat heavily in the back seat. Wallace and his Hydra contact stared at her. Wallace’s eyes were dark but calmed somewhat, confused to see her crying, make-up irrevocably smudged. “What… what happened?” Wallace asked almost gently.

“Your wire stopped,” the agent accused sharply.

“He got fresh is what happened,” Peggy spat out, carefully pulling the crushed wire from under her shirt and presenting it to them. “I was able to hide it from him but it got crushed in the process.” She sniffed and tossed the wires into the front seat, looking away. “Thought he could give it a good go of getting me in bed to change my mind.” She huffed, leaning back. “Can we leave?”

Wallace seemed mollified, and waved his hand, letting the agent know to set the car in motion. “Don’t worry, Maggie. We’ll be in Berlin before you know it, then the Alps after that.”

~*~ The Next Day

“Jesus, she’s good,” Howard sat at his desk, scribbling down the decoded message as he went through the letter for the second time. He looked up at Phillips. “We’ve been searching for Hydra on the wrong side of the Alps.”

“What?” Phillips barked, setting his elbows on the table. “Sit down Rogers, you’re making me seasick.”

Steve stopped his pacing and set himself in the seat across from Phillips, but still fiddled with his hands on the edge of his shirt. “You didn’t see her, sir, she was—”

“You think I can’t tell that from how you’re walking around here?” Phillips shook his head at Steve, then turned back to Howard. “As soon as you have—”

“It’s done.” Howard slid the paper he’d been writing on across the table. “We’re about six-hundred miles off,” he shrugged. “She gave us exact coordinates and dates.” He smiled.