#this first chapter features

[robthegoodfellow]

A Little Death Do Us Part

VANISHED from fandom to work on this thing. as usual it ballooned 🙃 warnings: necromancy, character death (hence the necromancy), dubcon (on account of the necromancy)

My entry for @bigbangharringrove with art I adore by LucaDoodleDoo who also served as cheerleader when I fell behind and suffered from near fatal narrative maximalism. Here's the first chapter, or read on AO3 💛 (3 chapters up, rest day by day)

Billy had been dead for four days when Steve finally made a breakthrough, muffled cracks as bones restitched and the crushed chest cavity filled, the rasp of rusted lungs expanding with breath. He waited, held his own breath like that would encourage another from the sorry test subject lying inert on the table.

The chest deflated, but only a little—his heart leapt as it rose again, an easier inhale, and Steve would have sobbed, except he had no air, could only manage an anguished choke. It wasn’t anguished, though, just pure exhausted relief, hope, after three nights without sleep, using every trick in the book to keep going, keep trying, not give up.

An ear twitched, then—the tail, the tip curling absent-mindedly.

Within minutes, Mews sat on his haunches, staring at Steve fixedly, even more fixedly than normal, before he’d been hit by that truck, but other than that, he seemed—fine? Fine! Even the sickly-sweet eau de rot was dissipating, ginger fur shedding the greasy dullness of decay.

So it took every ounce of self-control not to go haring off to the basement crypt and work his magic there, on the true intended recipient of his tireless trial and error.

Gods in hell, so many errors. And such a trial. One attempt had backfired so spectacularly that Mews had almost decomposed too far for restoration, crumbling before his eyes as Steve scrambled for the counter spell. Another had awoken the cat but hadn’t healed him, and also imbued him with a ravenous hunger for human flesh. The scratches that crosshatched Steve’s every limb had only just begun to scab under the bandages. He’d had to go for the bat that time, beating at the mangy monster like he was trying to win whack-a-mole at the fair, then gulped down every leftover antidote to zombie infection in the medicine cabinet he could find.

He'd been steadily working his way through the moldy copy of Untethered Netherworld: New Necromancies—several editions out of date, banned in every state but New Jersey—and he was running out of both spells and time. Reanimation for more nefarious purposes—raising undead armies and whatnot—had more wiggle room, but true revivification had to be performed within a week of the victim’s death, and the sooner the better.

He didn’t want a shell of Billy, something better off dead. He wanted Billy. Needed him back.

For that, he had to be patient, thorough; do this right. Follow the checklist. Consulting the items hastily scribbled on the back of a takeout menu, he frowned.

Responds when called.

Well, fuck. Did cats ever respond when called? Mews certainly hadn’t—and Steve still wasn’t sure whether that was due to aloof mulishness or because he maintained some preferred moniker that they weren’t privy to.

Nothing for it but to try, though.

“Mews?”

The cat blinked, swished his tail.

Good enough, Steve figured, checking it off. 

2. Reacts expectedly to stimuli.

Didn’t exactly have a toy mouse handy, but after rooting around in the junk drawer, he dug up one of those keychain laser pointers. Aimed it at the floor in front of the table, and… skittered it around.

Mews launched from his perch, paws extended—pounced on the zigzagging red and kept pouncing.

Another check. 

3. Craves appropriate sustenance.

What did cats even eat, aside from… cat food, which he’d neglected to restock. Tuna? Saucer of milk? Cartoons all seemed to think so.

“Stay here,” he said, though Mews had never been the kind of cat that talked. Locking the workroom behind him, he set off for the kitchen. Pantry had to have at least one can of Chicken of the Sea. 

.💀.

The thing was—Steve should’ve known Billy was possessed. Should’ve been able to tell right away. He’d slept next to that… thing at least two nights and hadn’t noticed. How hadn’t he noticed?

He’d kissed him and really been kissing it—wrote off the delayed response, a pause before the returning press, as simple distraction. Held him but really held it, and attributed the strange stiffness to stress, stroked the broad back until he slept—or seemed to.

Because while Steve slept, Billy had been a marionette wreaking havoc, his hijacker attacking at random, opportunistic, installing its brethren on behalf of its master.

On the third morning, the day before he died, when Steve had been watching coffee drip into the pot, the shatter of ceramic spun him round, disoriented. And Billy, eyes streaming, so blue, burning blue—he’d shoved his waiting mug off the center island, was gripping the counter, teeth gritted with effort.

“Go,” he’d grunted between clenched jaws. “Go.” His hand gripped the other mug—Steve’s—and his voice sharpened, urgent. “Run.”

Steve barely dodged it, the mug cracking into the cabinet by his head with far more force than humanly possible, and his childhood training had kicked in. For once, it paid to have been born to parents whose vigilance bordered on paranoid, always on guard against rival families, enemy estates.

He grabbed a kitchen knife, threw every chair in its way, and bolted for the door, slashing behind him as he fumbled with the locks. And ran. Because he trusted Billy with his life, implicitly, knew when a command was the kind performed without question—the tone, the bluntness, the context. It was how they’d survived as an unaffiliated pair, all these years.

But that also meant precious few allies to turn to in times of need. Billy’s sister wasn’t his first choice, but she lived closest, and fleeing on foot put proximity at a premium. To her credit, she’d tried—Steve didn’t fault her for her role in the outcome—Max had just placed her trust in the wrong people. In people that prioritized killing the thing in Billy, rather than saving Billy himself.

Of course, it didn’t help that Billy had been of the same mind.

Now that he’d found a means to bring him back, Steve could admit another reason he hadn’t closed his eyes longer than a blink since the moment Billy went slack: to avoid the endless replay projected behind his lids—of Billy standing between the girl and the monster, a conglomerate creature of melded prey, raw matter drained of humanity, remade into an ever-growing puppet of destruction.

He'd wrested control once more, like he had in the kitchen, long enough to speak the words to unmake the abomination—words he alone could know, unbeknownst to the puppeteer, as the son of a witch infamous for having contracted with a god of death so powerful none could speak its name and live. None could hear its name and live. And none knew it, save two, for a while. And then one. 

And then none.

Billy spoke it. Steve saw his lips shape unfamiliar words. For the sake of the girl. 

.💀.

A checkmark next to every item on the list—that’s what broke him, finally. Not the most dignified position, kneeling over a litterbox, scooping sandy nuggets into a trash bin while fighting tears of joy, suppressing hysterical, ecstatic laughter, but—Mews was a cat, just a normal cat again, to all appearances, which meant—

He could have Billy back. Had proven wrong every tutor who’d dismissed Steve’s lackluster abilities as beyond the help of instruction. Sufficiently motivated, he’d managed every spell he tried—so it wasn’t his fault he didn’t fully know what each spell would do. This was on his teachers for slouching on the job, handwaving him through his studies to collect a paycheck.

Closing the lid of the bin, Steve stood to wash his hands and swayed, so light-headed he would have toppled were it not for a steadying arm flung to the wall. He breathed slow, eyes closed—opened, and the room had stilled its spinning.

Even so—he needed sleep. If he attempted the most important magics of his life and fucked it up from fatigue, he’d endure the rest of his days tormented by curdling regret.

“Bed, Mews,” he called, out of habit.

They’d held out a week, after Dustin had entrusted them with Mews’ care while he was apprenticing with the bigwigs at Know Where Corporation for the summer. Mewsy prefers sleeping with a buddy, Dustin instructed, among a litany of other highly specific edicts. Well, I prefer fucking my husband without witnesses, Steve had replied, just to see him pull a face, and Billy had chirped, faux-innocent, Unless the price is right. Or unless plied with endless mournful meows and wide, shining, plaintive eyes, apparently, because in no time they had a mound of fur curled at their feet from dusk till dawn.

Despite his exhaustion, despite the comforting warmth of Mews that bled through the covers, despite the meditation exercise to clear his mind, Steve couldn’t drift off for hours, couldn’t stop the steady leak of tears that oozed from the corner of closed lids to his unwashed hair.

Because Billy’s side of the bed was an echoing void at his side, an emptiness cold and loud as an arctic gale. Now and then he nudged Mews with a foot just to hear him snuffle, like an anxious mother checking her silent newborn still breathed. 

Think of a wonderful thought, he heard—Billy’s voice, hushed and fond. And like he always did, Steve huffed, “Okay, Peter,” and finally sank into memories that didn’t stab at him the way they had for days.

Tomorrow, he reminded himself, and relaxed. By this time tomorrow, Billy would be whole and hale and back in his arms. He’d kiss him and hold him. Tell him he loved him.

Tomorrow.

Chapter 2

[hinamie]

fire nation festival wear aka a blatant excuse for me to push atla clothing design conventions to the absolute Limit

jjk atla!au with @philosophiums

[ruporas]

i’ll find you again in every universe. let us be a little more honest, let us have a little more time.

[originalaccountname]

winged Chuuya that I am using as proof Hoshikawa has read Storm Bringer

[barrel-crow-n]

Idk how anyone thinks Kaz is an adult when reading the books, he talks like that snarky kid everyone had in their class who would roast the teachers and get sent out literally every lesson

[buwheal]

Isn't there something we should be celebrating?

[ghost-bxrd]

<3333 head in hands over baby mer!Jay and the whole AU <333 picking up reading comics just for Calvin ahaha

Would love to hear more about baby mer!Jay, Dick and Bruce :') if you'd like to share any cute hcs!

YESSSSS! Calvin deserves more recognition for real!!!!! 😩💚💚💚💚

And I don’t wanna give too much away but here’s some more bullet points to chew on hehe ✨🌊

Jason’s bioluminescence is voluntary and another way his species communicate with each other

Dick loves his little (and somewhat strange) snake(?) mer brother to pieces, but sometimes he gets this kind of chill down his spine when he watches Jason hunt

Bruce’s sense for danger is shot to hell where his pod is concerned. Jason could probably take a bite straight out of his tail (he would never) if he was hungry and Bruce would just coo and promise to go hunt soon

Dick’s siren nature makes him ferociously protective and, beyond Bruce, the first line of defense

Jason’s tail, though still slim and frail looking, is powerful enough even at his kid size to crush another mer’s tail. Bruce and Dick don’t seem to realize this, Alfred catches the drift when he sees Jason break clean through the hinges of a sunken boat because he’s curious about what’s inside

Jason (for some reason Dick can’t fathom) is adamant about them all staying away from the trenches where the ocean floor reaches 8km+. Dick takes that to mean Jason’s scared of the giant squid and whatnot down there and muses his family got killed by them. It’s actually because Jason knows his own species tends to roam that place and Dick would stand no chance against one of them.

Dick loves interacting with some chosen humans but refuses to let Jay come close to any of them because in his head he wouldn’t have a good way of protecting himself like Dick does (siren song)

—> meanwhile Jason “you know I could literally unhinge my jaw and bite their head off????”

——> Dick, cooing and not taking one word seriously “awww Jay, sure, you’re a big and scary mer 💚💚💚”

[blighted-lights]

something something, thinking about ravage finding out hints of what getaway is doing several times while sleuthing around the lost light, only for him to be hit with the nudge gun every time and forgetting what he learned. thinking about him losing other memories as well not even related to getaway but still affected by the nudge gun; conversations he's had with others on the lost light, planned events, check-in dates with soundwave that he misses because he just doesn't remember when he's supposed to check in. or on the other hand, checking in with soundwave over and over, forgetting that he's already done so.

thinking about everyone around him treating him differently because of the gaps in his memory, and ravage being endlessly frustrated with it. ravage's paranoia of someone or something messing with his mind being overlooked by the people around him, his memory issues being written off as the result of a helm injury he got from the personality ticks, or from the endless injuries he's gotten during the war. thinking about ravage slowly starting to agree with them as no obvious answer presents itself and as he struggles to recall unrelated memories from the war that were actually lost to the various injuries he's had.

and then the fight in lopsided triangle makes it worse. cyclonus kicks him hard enough in the helm to knock him out, and the fact that he can't recall more than a handful of memories of getaway and atomizer afterward once the truth comes out about them and tailgate just further convinces him his recent memory issues must be injury based- unaware that most of his memories of the two have been wiped intentionally.

just,,, thinking. aka, guess who's finally back into fic writing! it me

[dramaticlacrosse10]

don't get me wrong andreil and their fems will always have my heart but i am left to wonder of what could've been if neil had grown up in the nest, gone to the hatfords and taken jean with him (except woman)

(i cant draw femjean to save my life) last arts before school whisks me away FOREVER!

[cordycepsbian]

team snakemouth gijinka but more of a Fantasy™️ au than just regular humans. featuring our spin on the concepts of halflings and dwarves where they are creature animal. and leif is uh ??? the horrors

bonus doodle

[yonemurishiroku]

The fact that Nico somehow has connections to unexpected parts of the mythological world and is widely appreciated by their members, thus making his existence essential and favorable implies that - in the event that I want to start a civil war among the (godly or not) factions - I can just kill him and let someone else take the blame.

Surely the consequences wouldn’t be pretty. I should be guaranteed at least a Hades vs Zeus fight that leads to the sky falling down and the earth crumbling and maybe finally an Alabaster vs Percy match or perhaps Alabaster vs Hazel if I play my cards right. And if I can just put Bob and the trogs in the equation, I can make a feast on Mt. Olympus.

Yeah I’d be punished severely when the truth comes out bla bla who cares. Do you see what I see? Nico’s death can be the catalyst for catastrophes and I’m not letting that go.

[heronchild-haven]

Excerpt from my Grishaverse Heronchild AU (Thomas’ POV):

The sky hung grey and heavy over the hills and a chilling wind had set in at noon. The cornflowers and buttercups sprouting in the grass all around were the only sign of spring’s touch on Cambria.

Climbing up the slope, Thomas could make out the heretic even from a distance, robed entirely in black and unguarded, as any protection would’ve been superfluous. A short, slight girl in blue stood at his side. And a few paces behind them, surrounded by a retinue of soldiers and banner men, sat the white witch on a grey horse, rigid and upright, like a figure carved in ivory. Black flags displaying the jagged sigil of Edom fluttered all around her in the wind like a flock of ravens.

As he closed in, Thomas could feel their combined attention settling on him like a heavy weight.

Despite his height he felt like he was shrinking with every step towards the heretic. His gaze slid first to the girl, who he realised had to be Lucie Herondale. Even though she’d grown up since their time in Alicante, she looked younger than her age, appearing almost fragile in her thick, heavily embroidered coat and bejewelled headpiece, from which strands of hair had been ripped free by the wind. There was something haunted in her expression, and with a flash of pity Thomas thought—not for the first time—how terrible it must’ve been for her to spend all those years locked away and alone.

“Lightwood.” The heretic said as way of greeting, forcing Thomas to finally look at him. He’d expected to see something of the shy boy he’d known at the academy, but aside from the same wild hair and pale skin, James Herondale was almost unrecognisable. Even his eyes, which were still of the same strange colour, had a wildness in them now that lent them a predatory quality, and Thomas understood for the first time why so many found them unsettling. He lowered his gaze instinctively.

“I requested specifically to speak with Matthew Fairchild.” The heretic said coolly.

Thomas forced himself to meet his gaze again before replying: „It would be foolish to send our sun summoner into a potential trap.”

James Herondale cocked his head: „You are the more expendable one, then.” It wasn’t phrased as a question, and he was right. Thomas knew perfectly well the worth at which the clave currently held anyone carrying the Lightwood name, but he’d agreed to put himself at risk willingly, even though Carstairs’ hesitation to send his own son had been enough for him to know that the general suspected at least the possibility of an ambush. Better me than him.

„Either way,” the heretic continued without awaiting a reply to his remark. “There’s no need to pretend. I know that your sun summoner,” he enunciated the words slowly, almost mockingly: “is not anywhere near this camp.”

Thomas’ heart sank. They’d already lost the one advantage they’d hoped to employ. He did his best not to let anything show, trying to think of what Alastair might say in his place, even though he had no hopes of managing a convincingly derisive sneer.

“Do you really want to base your plans for battle on pure speculation?”

“As I said, there’s no need to pretend. The clave should know better than to try and trick me. Matthew Fairchild is not here.” He almost seemed to lament the fact. “He will meet his fate another day. As for you, you have until sundown to surrender and agree to our terms. No blood will flow if the Clave withdraws their troops peacefully from Cambria within two weeks time and hands over the lord and lady Lightwood to Edom.” Thomas’ mouth felt dry. He had not expected to be driven into a corner this rapidly. “Also,” the other man added: “that insolent son of lord Carstairs, Alastair, will have to be delivered tonight as a hostage and a sign of good will.”

The heretic mentioning Alastair set Thomas’ heart racing. If he held a grudge, if he had it out for Alastair, what in the world could Thomas do to protect him? He wasn’t supposed to accept any conditions of surrender, but what if Carstairs and Anna ended up changing their minds when faced with the might of Edom?

“The paladin is with them.” Thomas flinched violently. He’d almost entirely forgotten about the presence of the girl. She was mustering him with an amused, almost childlike sparkle in her eyes. How did she know?

James’ gaze slid to his sister, then back to Thomas, who began feeling unsettled under their joined attention. Avoiding their eyes, he glanced over at the witch, who observed the scene from her horse, her lips drawn into a thin line.

“So Carstairs brought both of his children,” the heretic said. “Very well, I was looking forward to getting even with the paladin anyway.”

It seemed pointless to even try and deny Cordelia’s presence, so Thomas kept quiet, still reeling from the heretic’s earlier demands.

“Aren’t you worried?” Lucie Herondale asked her brother, though the tone of her voice betrayed anticipation rather than concern. He looked at her and his expression softened ever so slightly, turning almost indulgent: “I have confidence in your abilities.”

He turned back to Thomas. “You all know what my sister and I are capable of. You are likely to loose this fight. Even with the great Elias Carstairs and his paladin daughter. Even with your incantatores,” he said, spitting out the Idrisian word like a curse.

Thomas’ blood was rushing in his own ears. He couldn’t think of anything to say, to try and bargain. He wasn’t Alastair. “I will convey your demands to the general.”

The heretic gave a slow nod: “If we don’t hear from you before sundown, you will be destroyed.”

It was a dismissal. Feeling dizzy, almost as if he was caught in a haze, Thomas took a few steps backward, putting some distance between himself and the siblings before he turned his back on them.

“Lightwood,” the heretic called again, forcing him to look over his shoulder one last time. “Deliver my regards to our sweet cousin.”

[sharkaroni]

Do you like fake dating? Fake dating under duress? Fake dating under the very real threat of a fancy ghost eating you up like a sausage roll? Then this may be the fic for you.

READ NOW and get access to these exclusive features: Reigen crying in a bush, homoerotic use of a straight razor, putting your pants on to get in an argument, taking your pants off to get in an argument, elaborate descriptions of historical dress, flip phone ring tone embarrassment, and Serizawa’s huge tits.

Chapter 1 is up now on ao3!

[mortellanarts]

Lonely Witch of Resurrection

[maybankiara]

Sarah jumped in her chair a little and bit her lip, clearly trying to suppress a smile. ‘We didn’t want to steal JJ’s thunder.’ ‘We really didn’t,’ added John B. ‘Not at all.’ It was as if the world came to a pause; Sarah and John B exchanged a glance not unlike the one Pope and Marcus had exchanged earlier that day, and the barely-contained smiles on their faces told JJ everything even before Sarah shared the news.

excerpt from stay here, darling chapter 5

[buwheal]

extra image under the cut.

if you need to have it written out lmk!!!

sorry about the shit ass editing but i really wanted to do this to pair it with the art, lol. He was sewing him a little outfit!!!!!!