#this makes a bit of a squealing noise when you brake

[vermin-fangs]

I definitely need new brake feet, though. Brake feet going bad is a nono

[steviewashere]

Had an idea, half-wrote a fic. (as I do) CW ahead: Negative Stimming, Self-harm via Stimming, Mild Disassociation, Meltdown

Autistic Steve Harrington who hates horror movies because they're so loud and so unexpected and all it does for him is trigger a meltdown rather than any sort of pleasure. He hates loud noises, hates being startled, hates things being unexpected. Finds it hard to listen to Eddie's music sometimes, just solely based on how loud it is.

He can't take terribly long drives in traffic because of the intensity of all the sounds: birds above, cars ahead, honking and tires squealing, people yelling out their windows. Hates having his radio on louder than like volume level 5.

And one day, after forcing himself through a horror movie at the theater with Eddie (because Eddie loves them), he's driving them back. But there's long lines of traffic that make his car feel claustrophobic and his chest heavy. The radio is only a tad louder than normal, playing some Metallica tape—one that he enthused about because Eddie made him believe it was good, and it is, it is it is it is—

But it's all too much.

Cut to him weaving dangerously through traffic, wholly unlike him, heart racing so hard he thinks he can feel his blood traveling through his arteries, his veins. The car is swerving and his foot is on the pedal, no real destination in mind other than out and away. He's cutting in and out of his own body, trying to just slither away from the way his skin is riddled with goosebumps and trying to shed in huge flakes around him. He's tired and he's drawn and he's trying, damnit he's trying to hold himself together.

He pulls to the side of the road, into some half-full parking lot, away from other customers. And slams on the brakes so hard that Eddie flings forward a little in the passenger seat, almost collides with the dashboard. But Steve is so out of it he doesn't even realize, doesn't even recognize the recklessness he just put his boyfriend through. And when he can calm his breaths a bit, not very much but just enough, he finally looks to Eddie.

Eddie, who's looking at him a little like Steve's some wild animal, but so overcome with concern, it draws his features tight. "Steve?" Eddie calls out softly, too soft in comparison to himself, "you okay, baby?"

And Steve just bursts into tears, unwinding. His hands are shaking and he feels the innate urge to hurt to make the roaring inside him dwindle. And he does the only thing he knows how—emotions irregular and having been punished for it before—he cranes his neck in a nearly unnatural way, head digging into his headrest, eyes away from Eddie because he can't stomach the thought of Eddie seeing him this way, and he just bruises his own thighs with his tightly wound fists.

Eddie just does his best. He reaches over and turns the ignition off. Silences the whole car. Winds his window up, worms around to do the same to Steve's. And then he gently, still unknowing of what to do, slides his palms underneath Steve's fists. So that the next time they come down, they hit Eddie's hands instead. His face flinches minutely and his eyes begin to sting. It hurts, of course it fucking does, but he braves through it. Until Steve tires himself out, fists getting sloppy and his tears have dried. And Eddie doesn't let Steve see what he'd actually been hitting—he just curls his hands around Steve's fists, thumbs tracing over his knuckles.

"It's loud," Steve chokes out, "hate that movie."

"Okay," Eddie murmurs, taking this in stride, unquestioning. Because...well, he knows what it's like to feel singled out, unnatural about one's self. He won't make Steve feel like that, too. Won't even question what just happened. A conversation for a different time.

"Overwhelmed."

"Okay, that's okay."

Steve's fingers tighten for a moment before his hands uncurl. Gently, shakily, they take Eddie's own. His eyes are still on the ceiling of his car. Sniffles. "Freak?" he questions aloud.

"Never," Eddie swears, "that's my title and you come nowhere near it. Don't even think of touching it." He brushes his thumbs on the back of Steve's twitching hands, working their way through the aftershocks. "Let me take us home, okay?"

A moment passes. Then two. Then three.

Steve's breath shutters. He exhales easily, though. "Your bed," he says, "that's home."

And Eddie brings Steve's hands to his mouth, leaves small pecks on the backs of them. "We'll go there, baby. In your time, Steve. We'll go in your time."

"Okay."

Eddie nods, even when he isn't seen. Because Steve will know. They'll always know each other. "Okay."

———

I know I half-wrote this, but I will return to this eventually. I want to fully expand upon this idea. Just give me a minute because there's like three other fic ideas I want to do that I've posted about. My brain is endless steddie and I am soup.

[halcyone-of-the-sea]

BRO I'VE BEEN HOLDING BACK CAUSE I THOUGHT YOU'D ALREADY HAVE TOO MANP CAP. MACTAVISH REQUESTS I-

I'm here to rectify this issue immediately, how about one with him and the reader being soft? something bout seeing this rugged man melt when he comes home to his darling just egIUAfosnkew IT'S SO SWEET

—Look At The Stars; Look At Me

⇢ ˗ˏˋ 5k Drabble Masterlist ࿐ྂ

╰┈➤ ❝ [Stargazing in the middle of an overgrown and wild glade.] ❞

You breathe slowly, eyes gazing longingly far above you at the twinkling lights. They take up your pupils in the low glow of the moon—the dots of those far-off globes of hydrogen and helium shining bright. 

The glade behind the hidden forest home is filled with the scent of wildflowers, grass, and the grind of fresh earth; it captures your nostrils as the fireflies come out to dance on iridescent wings. Under you, John’s blanket lets you be just the tiniest bit closer to him for the moment, limbs loose, sleep-clothes compliant to the flow of the breeze as it spreads a whisper through the leaves. 

A deer snorts downwind, a low call over the air that can be felt in the gentle quiet. Crickets creak like the old floorboards of a lived-in home. You’re eased by the knowledge that, as your Lover drives back to this place—back to you—he’s under the same stars as the ones you gawk at in the skin of an awe-drunk woman who loves him more than even this. 

A car pulls down the worn-grass road, and you hear the brakes lightly squeak on that shitty rental, a smile twitches along your face, but you don’t move.

He knows where to find you this late; knows you wouldn’t go to sleep when he’d called you not two hours earlier to say he’s back. 

The both of you are stubborn and know the other more than a priest knows his own God.

A soft whistle lets you know he’ll be there in a moment, coming from behind the treeline before the sound of a car door getting closed echoes. The birds pause for a moment, though not seconds later they re-start their bedtime symphonies. 

There’s a rustling, and your heart picks up the pace gradually, excitement making your lips peel slowly back into a wide smile as you gaze at the Herdsman and his glittering Arcturus star. Painting pictures in your mind, you think of the untold number of things he’s seen from his deep-space throne as your lover returns like a lumbering hound, already hearing his large sigh at the sight of you. 

You don’t shift your gaze until an accented comment makes you chuckle. 

“Bit of a cold night to be doin’ this,” John’s face peaks into your field of view, leaning above you with his arms crossed—one of those dark brows raised.

He looks worse for wear with a big bruise over the left side of his jaw, and medical tape on his dark eyebrow ridge. The scar is still there, over his left eye; his orbs that continue to glint more than the stars ever could in your gaze. 

You hum in your throat, blinking up at him with a tilted nose. 

“What?” Your voice makes the hardness of his face dim, a small sigh through his nostrils as if he could never truly get out of that version of himself without hearing you speak first. “Did you expect me to miss a view like this?”

He scoffs, tilting his head. “I’m not that much of an idiot. Move it.”

You smile widely, staying directly in the middle of his blanket as a smirk slashes the Captain’s lips, his blues deepening. A bird darts away from above his head. 

“Already misbehaving, then? Not a good start, Little Lady.” 

“I was here first, MacTavish.” He makes an amused noise in his throat, moving his hands from his arms to grasp under yours. You squeal, laughing loudly as he drags you up with a low chuckle into his large shirt and tucked pants. 

“Aye, you were here first,” he brings you up into his arms—a bridal hold that leads you to wrap your arms around his neck as you shake with glee, burying your head into his flesh. “Never said you weren’t.” Lips whisper into your ear and he can feel your smile as it spreads against him. “But you’ve got to pick your battles wisely, eh? I’m the one who can carry you on my arm.”

You kiss his neck a few times, quick kisses in between mutterings of love; his beard shifts as he lets a small smile, amusement lingering yet dimming for something far more important. The word seems more alive than it had moments ago, but that’s not a bad thing. No, not at all. 

“What’s the point of interest tonight, then?” He slips off his boots and walks you back onto the blanket, smoothing it out with his foot before he grunts and settles down—you in his lap. “I’ve lost where we were last time.”

“The Herdsman, John,” you remind gently, pushing on his chest so he lays back with no argument, shifting you into the crook of his right arm as it circles you. He gently squeezes and presses you tighter. 

On his chest you place your head, arm snaking around his waist to suck in his warmth with a soft sigh.

“Ah, that’s right. Herdsman.”

He kisses your forehead, digging his nose into you and closing his eyes softly. None of the stars could compare to the one in his arms—he’ll leave the gazing to you in the meantime. 

Your body in the gap between his arm was all he needed. 

TAGS:

@luuvbuzz, @emerald-valkyrie, @anna-banana27, @blueoorchid, @cryingnotcrying, @writeforfandoms, @homicidal-slvt, @jade-jax, @frazie99, @elmoees, @littlemisstrouble, @alpineswinter, @phoenixhalliwell, @idocarealot, @lavalleon, @facelessmemories, @h-leigh, @20forty9, @glitter-anon-asks, @emily-who-killed-a-man, @neelehksttr, @aeneanc, @escapefromrealitysm, @i-d-1-0-t, @pparcxysm, @hawkscanendme, @caramlizedtomatos, @waves-against-a-cliff, @sanfransolomitatm, @maelstrom007, @jemandderkeinenusernamenfindet, @pheobees, @glitterypirateduck, @uselsshuman, @fan-of-encouragement, @halfmoth-halfman, @ghostlythunderbird, @I-inkage, @pukbadger, @kopatych11, @0nceinabluem00n, @cocrorapop, @knightofsexyness, @abnormalgeil, @smallseastone, @jacegons, @330bpm-whiplash, @simon-rileys-housewife, @4-atsu, @tiredmetalenthusiast

[renecdote]

inertia

“Eddie.” He feels his mouth form the word, feels the vibration of it in his throat, but he can’t hear his own voice. It’s dark. Is it supposed to be dark? Yes—it was night. He was with Eddie. “Eddie,” Buck repeats, fumbling one-handed, fighting against the airbag, the seatbelt, the claustrophobia pressing in on him. He has to get out. He has to get to Eddie. He’s trapped. He can’t move—can’t—his leg—nonono, not again, not again, please— For BTHB: vehicular accident

[Read on AO3]

More than anything, Buck remembers the noise: the roar of the engine, a car horn, the squeal of tires, his heart pounding in his ears. Sirens, minutes and seconds later, and someone cursing at him before they got there, “you should look where you’re fucking going, fucking asshole motorbike riders—”

He knows that it hurt, his jeans shredded over bloody skin, his lip split, his arm broken in two places, every inch of him bruised and aching. He knows that it hurt because of course it did, it was probably agonising right up until the morphine kicked in, but he doesn’t remember the pain.

He wonders, now, how he ever could have forgotten it.

****

Eddie reaches out, fiddling with the radio until he finds a station he likes, then turning the volume up just one digit, as if that makes any kind of difference.

“Where are we going?” he asks.

Buck shoots him a grin. “I told you: it’s a surprise.”

Eddie huffs, the same way he did the first four times he asked and got the same answer. “I hate surprises.”

“No, you don’t,” Buck laughs. “You just want everyone to think you hate surprises because you get embarrassingly gooey about them.”

The flash of a passing streetlight shows Eddie’s face cast in exaggerated affront. “Gooey,” he repeats. “I don’t—I’m not gooey, Buck.”

He is. Buck has the photos and videos to prove it.

“Don’t worry, Eds,” he says. “I think you’re cute when you’re gooey.”

Eddie rolls his eyes, but he turns his head and rubs at his cheek in a way that means he’s probably hiding a pleased little smile. It’s still new: making Eddie smile like that. Going on dates. Holding hands, and sneaking kisses in-between the engines, and waking up wrapped around each other. Buck wishes he could hit pause on every moment between them, just so he can live in it a little bit longer.

He slows down for a yellow light, coming to a stop as it turns red.

“Can you at least give me a clue?” Eddie tries.

“Nope,” Buck laughs. “Don’t you trust me?”

“Of course I trust you,” Eddie grumbles.

The light turns green.

Buck accelerates into the intersection.

Eddie’s eyes widen in alarm, a shout forming but never making it past his lips, his hand half raised like he can—what?

Buck never even sees the crash coming.

****

The Jeep is still registered in Maddie’s name. That’s Buck’s first thought when the tires skid on the icy road, adrenaline suddenly pumping hard and fast as he grips the wheel. He’s going to end up wrapped around a tree, the Jeep totalled, and it’s going to be Maddie’s problem because the car is still registered in her name.

He has a sudden flash of memory: his mom standing in the doorway, yelling at him not to run, snow cold and wet soaking through the mesh in his sneakers as he ran to the bus stop down the road. She never came with him. It was always Maddie who held his hand while they walked, heavy backpacks bouncing on their shoulders, but his mom stood in the doorway of their house and watched until the doors of the school bus closed behind them.

Buck wonders who will tell his parents that he’s dead. Wonders how they’ll react. They’ll probably be glad, he thinks. And then he feels like an asshole for thinking that. (But can’t stop thinking it.)

The Jeep is slipping, slipping, slipping.

Buck fights the gut-reaction to twist the wheel hard, arms locked tight as he holds it steady, foot off the gas, braking carefully, carefully, carefully.

The road around him is dark. Empty. The Jeep’s headlights reflect off a sign: ICE in bold letters below the squiggly black lines of a skidding car. Hysterical, adrenaline-tinged laughter bubbles in Buck’s chest. Too little too late, he thinks. He turns the wheel left and the back of the car swings to the right and—

Another hundred yards and he would have been sinking into an icy river. Would have been dead, probably, pulled out in his Jeep hours or days later, his body cold and blue. He’s lucky, really, that the snowbank got to him first.

****

His ears are ringing.

There’s a little voice in the back of his head—the same voice that points out emergency exits and fire extinguishers whenever he goes somewhere new—that reminds him that it’s normal, that it probably just means the airbags deployed. But it’s hard to hear anything through the ringing, including the voice in his own head. Buck fights against the disorientation, the pain, the starbursts of light in his vision, the high-pitched whine in his ears and the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. He wonders, for three disoriented seconds, whether he’s back in the tsunami: turned around and upside down, caught in a whirlpool beyond his control, can’t win, can’t breathe, can’t swim.

But there’s blood in his mouth.

There’s blood in his mouth, and he clawed his way out of that ocean, clawed at the muddy ground, and Eddie got shot in the street in broad daylight, and—

“Eddie.”

He feels his mouth form the word, feels the vibration of it in his throat, but he can’t hear his own voice. It’s dark. Is it supposed to be dark? Yes—it was night. He was with Eddie.

“Eddie,” Buck repeats, fumbling one-handed, fighting against the airbag, the seatbelt, the claustrophobia pressing in on him. He has to get out. He has to get to Eddie. He’s trapped. He can’t move—can’t—his leg—nonono, not again, not again, please—

Something touches him.

Someone.

Hand on his thigh, squeezing, pulling his focus. Eddie. Buck’s right shoulder is throbbing—dislocated, maybe, minimum four weeks off work, light duty for another month—and he wants nothing more than to hold Eddie’s hand, to tangle their fingers together and squeeze (I’m okay, we’re okay, it’s gonna be okay), but the angle is all wrong and he can’t get his left arm across his body to do it.

His neck hurts, too—everything hurts—and that little first responder voice is still in the back of his head��don’t move, wait for the paramedics—but he turns his head anyway, searching for Eddie in the darkness.

There you are, Eddie’s smile seems to say.

Blue and red blur across Buck’s vision, pain streaking through his head, and he has to close his eyes against the rush of nausea it brings.

Eddie’s hand squeezes his leg again. Stay awake, maybe. Or I’ve got you, we’re okay.

Buck never should have closed his eyes. Can’t get them open again. Red-blue-Eddie-pain flash behind his eyelids.

He’s unconscious again before the firefighters pull them out.

****

Buck doesn’t remember most of the truck bombing. He watched the news clip twice after he got home from the hospital, pieced together all the comments people made until they formed some kind of coherent picture, guessed at the rest of it from everything else he’s seen on the job. He knows Eddie held his hand. Knows he was trapped there for almost thirty minutes before they got him out. Knows that it’s probably a good thing that he doesn’t remember all the details. The night is all blurred colours, and fear, and the strangest feeling of being weighed down and floating at the same time.

It felt like that in the hospital afterwards too, the cast on his leg bulky and heavy, a weight more than physical, and the painkillers cushioning his mind from all of it.

“You’re lucky,” a doctor told him, scrawling notes on his chart. “Most people don’t walk away from something like that.”

Buck laughed, short and brittle, halfway to a sob. “I’m not walking, doc. I can’t even stand.”

“Yet.” The doctor had the nerve to smile as he said it. “We’ll get you there.”

Buck was only thinking about getting back to work, then.

Now he wakes up in the hospital and he’s back there for one half-conscious moment, his leg his first thought, panic washing through him, his breath sticking in his chest. A doctor leans over him, mouth moving as they ask him muffled questions, his ears aching, head aching, everything aching.

“Don’t take my leg,” Buck begs, his own voice echoing in his chest.

The lights are bright and the doctor is still talking, maybe to him, maybe to someone else, but it doesn’t matter. Buck can’t hear them anyway.

He slips back under.

Wakes up again minutes or hours later to find someone else beside the bed. Short-cropped brown hair, but the wrong shade. The wrong face attached to it. A question catches in the back of Buck’s throat—Eddie? Is Eddie okay?—and comes out as a groan, pain waking up with the rest of him, his body stiff and sore at the slightest movement.

Bobby’s head snaps up, one hand going for the call button, the other for Buck’s arm. “Hey. Hey, easy, kid, you’re okay, you’re in the hospital.”

Buck blinks and finds his lashes sticking together, tears welling up before he even knows why he feels like crying.

“Eddie is okay too,” Bobby adds, reading it on his face. “He’s better off than you are—mostly superficial cuts and bruises, possible cracked ribs, a fractured wrist, whiplash—they’re just keeping an eye on him until they can run some more tests to be sure.”

It should be a relief, hearing it from Bobby, but Buck knows the vice around his chest isn’t going to ease fully until he can see Eddie for himself. Maybe not even then, honestly, since it’s at least half from the broken ribs he’s nursing.

“You’re both gonna be fine,” Bobby says, and it’s hard to tell through the fog of painkillers, but it sounds like he’s trying to reassure himself as much as Buck.

****

The wave comes fast and hard, knocking the breath out of him, sending him tumbling. Buck tries to hold onto his surfboard, but it slips away from him, the cord velcroed to his ankle the only thing tethering them together while the ocean does it’s best to tear them apart.

He gets his head above the surface, gets one gasping breath of air, and then the board pops up and slams into his jaw. He goes under. Comes back up coughing and spluttering, his face throbbing. He doesn’t get a full breath in this time before another waves lifts him up and then bowls over him. It’s easier not to fight it. Easier to hold his breath and let it take him.

A hand around his bicep drags him back up. Drags him into the shallows and then further, onto the damp edge of the beach.

“Jesus, Buckley,” Andy exclaims, halfway to nervous, adrenaline-fueled laughter. “I really thought you were dead for a minute there.”

Buck grins, tired and squinting against the bright San Diego sun, because that’s what he’s supposed to do, right? He’s supposed to laugh and shake this off and get right back out there.

“I wasn’t worried,” he lies, and Andy does laugh this time.

“You’re a crazy sonuvabitch, you know that?” he says. Then he’s twisting, turning to yell at someone behind him, “He’s fine, Lila! The asshole says he wasn’t even worried!”

Lila kisses Buck later, her purple nails biting in at his hips, beer heavy on both their breaths. A fire crackles in the backyard and party music thrums in the walls of the house when she says, “I don’t know what we’d do if we lost you, Evan.”

Buck’s chest feels tight, his stomach bubbly, his jaw bruised and aching, but he holds Lila close and kisses her back, gives her everything she wants, even when being kissed on the cheek and left to zip up his pants afterwards feels just like that surfboard popping up out of the water to smack him in the face. It’s supposed to hurt after all. Being wanted. Being loved. It always hurts. Isn’t that how he knows that it’s real?

****

“You’re like a car crash, Buckley,” Jai tells him. “It’s all fast and fun until we end up wrapped around a tree.”

****

“You need to be more careful,” his mother snaps, as close as she has ever come to sounding like she cares. “You’re going to get someone killed one of these days.”

****

“You’re both gonna be fine,” Bobby says.

Gonna be fine gonna be fine gonna be fine.

****

Buck is awake when Eddie sneaks into the hospital room.

Half-awake.

Morning light is pressing in insistently behind the blinds someone pulled down over the window and there’s an itch right near the IV port in his elbow that he’s trying not to think about. Buck’s eyes are closed, but he listens to the shuffle of feet on the linoleum, the plastic groan of the chair beside the bed and the quiet, familiar sigh as his boyfriend settles into it. All he has wanted since finding himself in the hospital is to see Eddie, but now that Eddie is here, Buck doesn’t think he’s ready to face him.

His elbow itches. Buck tires not to grimace.

Eddie reaches out and takes his hand, warmth curling around Buck’s cold fingers. “I know you’re awake,” he says, thumb moving on the back of Buck’s hand.

Slowly, Buck opens his eyes, painkillers cushioning the ache in his neck as he turns his head on the pillow. He has to blink a few times before the room comes into focus: tired eyes, short-cropped hair, right shade of brown this time.

“Hey,” Eddie smiles. “There you are.”

Eddie looks—okay. A little bruised, a little battered, but okay. Buck takes a shaky breath and feels it fill up his lungs for the first time since that car slammed into them. Hey, he thinks, and then he opens his mouth and what comes out is, “I’m sorry.”

A watery laugh; the kind that means something isn’t really funny but the only options are to laugh or cry. “I shouldn’t be surprised that those are your first words,” Eddie says, and his smile is watery too but it’s also—fond. So fond it hurts to look at. “This wasn’t your fault, Buck.”

Buck knows that. Logically, he knows that. But.

“I’m still sorry.”

Eddie lifts his hand and kisses his knuckles, holding Buck there against his lips as he answers, “I know.”

“You’re okay?” Buck asks—needs to ask—blinking through the tears in his eyes. “Bobby said you broke your wrist.”

Eddie lifts his left arm up to show off the cast. “Clean break, no surgery required. One fractured rib. Whiplash. The rest of it is just cuts and bruises.”

Buck has to bite his lip so he doesn’t apologise again.

“We’re okay, Buck,” Eddie adds, soft and steady, and Buck knew they were, he thought he did, but hearing the words puts a lump in his throat anyway.

“The light was green,” he says, and he’d been sure, so sure, but maybe he was wrong. Maybe he was distracted. He knows he can be a reckless driver, but Eddie was in the car and he was smiling and Buck would never—

“The other driver went straight through the red,” Eddie confirms, soothing his doubts as easily as he caresses Buck’s hand with his thumb. “Bobby said it was a heat attack. We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Buck thinks about that sign in Wisconsin: ICE. He wonders whether they’ve moved it, put the warning somewhere earlier on the road. Wonders whether it would have made any difference, seeing that sign before the tires started skidding.

He wants to ask if the other driver made it, but he’s not sure he actually wants to know.

“‘M still not telling you where we were going,” he says instead, fighting against the droop of his eyes. “Being t-boned doesn’t get you out of the surprise.”

“It wasn’t a steakhouse, was it?” Eddie asks.

A laugh catches Buck by surprise, spasming through his bruised chest, and he breaks off with a groaning, “Ow.”

“Sorry,” Eddie apologises, squeezing his hand. “How’s your pain? Do you need more painkillers?”

“‘S’okay,” Buck answers, shifting and feeling all the ways his body protests. “I’ve had worse.”

Edie shakes his head. That’s not a measure of pain, Evan, Maddie would say. Buck can see it on Eddie’s face too, but he just says, “Okay. Why don’t you get some rest?”

He shifts up, slowly and painfully, leaning forward until he can kiss Buck’s forehead, then his cheek, then his lips. Buck curls his fingers into the fabric of Eddie’s jacket, holding him there to kiss him again. Eddie relaxes into it, kissing back easily, his weight a comfortable heaviness against Buck’s tired body.

“I love you,” he murmurs against Buck’s lips.

Buck smiles. “I love you too.”

“I’ll be here when you wake up, okay?”

It hurts to shake his head, but Buck does it anyway. “No, you should go home—you should see Chris—”

Eddie stops him with another kiss. “Chris told me I have to stay with you. Pepa is looking after him, he’s okay.”

That lump is back in Buck’s throat, harder to breathe around this time. He’s not sure what he did to deserve the Diaz boys. He isn’t sure that he does deserve them, half the time, but here they are anyway. They want him—they love him—and it doesn’t hurt. That’s how Buck knows it’s real.

When he sleeps, he dreams of driving across a frozen lake, Eddie smiling in the passenger seat and Christopher laughing in the back. The sunlight is bright and clear and he thinks there’s a monster chasing them under the ice, threatening to break through and drag them into the murky depths, but it never catches them.

****

Buck’s arm flies out on instinct, pressing Christopher back into the seat while the car jerks to a sudden stop.

“Whoa.” Christopher’s eyes are wide behind his glasses. “That was close.”

Buck’s heart is racing in his chest, his hands shaking with the frissons of adrenaline running through his body. He breathes a shaky laugh, more relief than amusement. “Too close. Don’t tell your dad.”

Chris rolls his eyes. “As if you aren’t going to tell him as soon as we get home.”

The kid has a point, but.

“Maybe I’ve decided to start keeping secrets.”

“About almost being in a car crash?” Chris asks skeptically.

The car in front of them inches forward and Buck lets the gap grow before he eases his own accelerator down.

“Almost is the key word there,” he tells Chris, lighter than he feels. He’s still jittery, hyperaware of every sound, every glint of sunlight on metal that might be a car about to t-bone them or rear-end them or cause an accident in a million other ways. Buck knows car accidents. He knows what it’s like to cause them, to get caught in them, to respond to them. He knows that, statistically, it’s likely Chris will be in some kind of accident at some point in his life. He really, really doesn’t want to be the reason that happens though.

“Don’t worry,” Chris says, attention back on his phone, completely unconcerned, “LA has one of the highest accident rates in the country so it probably wouldn’t even be your fault.”

Buck frowns. “Why do you know that?”

“You and dad were in a car accident last year,” Chris shrugs, like the answer should have been obvious. “I looked it up.”

Eddie isn’t in the car with them, but Buck can hear his voice clear as day in his head: he gets that from you, you know.

“Okay,” he says, “definitely don’t tell your dad you’ve been reading about car crash statistics. You know what he was like with the Zodiac killer stuff.”

Chris grins. “He was so mad at you.”

They’re at a standstill again. Buck takes the opportunity to throw Chris a betrayed look. “I seem to remember him being pretty mad at you too, kid.”

He can feel himself relaxing, heart rate coming down and tension draining out his shoulders. Chris is fine. They’re both fine. Another fifteen minutes and they’ll be home. He flicks on the indicator then checks his blind spot twice before changing lanes as the traffic breaks out of the bottleneck and starts moving again. The blue Toyota they almost ran into turns into another street and disappears.

“So,” an impish smile in his peripheral vision, “if I’m keeping secrets from dad, does that mean we can have ice cream for dinner?”

Buck laughs. “Nice try.”

The engine is a steady rumble, its vibration passing through the wheel and up his arms, settling in his chest. Christopher reaches out and skips to the next song on the driving playlist. Sunlight glints off a stop sign. Somewhere behind them, a car honks. 

Buck breathes in. Breathes out.

They make it home in thirteen minutes.

[slippinninque]

🚦Spinning The Block🚙

Jatemme Manning x BlackFemReader

You and Jatemme enjoy a little ride

warnings: MINORS, DNI, 18+, cursing, flirting, guns/shootout, short n'sweet, self-indulgent fic beware

"Be careful with my shit, girl!"

"Aww, pretty car can't go vroom?"

You veered to avoid a cyclist who really wasn't looking anyway--see, look at you being nice. You pressed down on the gas and squealed beneath the sound of the revving engine.

"Listen--

"Ooo, you get spicy when you're nervous--ain't this a rental anyway, pretty boy?

"Ain't no 'nervous' shit--yo' ass is just crazy as hell."

"Still no word on the rental part, though...interesting."

Jatemme held onto the upper handle of the front seat, the pretty gold ring on his left hand twinkled from where he was bracing against the dashboard.

"Honestly, my driving isn't all that ba--

"You keep looking over here to talk--

"It's a sign of respect--whoop!"

Yelping after running a yellow-red light, you heard Jatemme's lips smacking over the blaring horns. You cackled, veering and switching lanes every time you saw brake lights.

"Okay, you caught me! Secret Passenger Princess here. I hate driving so I make everyone else nervous until they make me stop."

"I believe you, too. All my shit just everywhere fucking with you--I hope someone does catch your rabbit ass..."

You laughed, slowing a touch as you pondered your surroundings. It was delightful to hear Jatemme so near frazzled. It may have influenced you to hug the side of a box truck for cover just to see those impressive shoulders of his ruck up to his neck.

"Hey--you wanted me to drive, remember?" You reminded him, "I gave you the keys and you gave 'em on back. You're just mad you have butterfingers."

Jatemme growled something and turned your face back towards the road, "On. The. Road, I said."

"You aren't even doing your job," You took a sharp and sudden left and this time you hear a thud and curse from the backseat, "That car's been shooting at us for, like, a while now. You need to do better, you too Asthma!"

"How the fuck am I suppose to fix my shit witcho ass swerving so much?"

"Oh, so you want me to drive in a straight line then?"

With a knee steadying the wheel, you flicked up your hoodie and then your piece. A sweet lil' Glock .26 that you let dance out your window.

Someone got hit. The sedan swerved and careened into a dilapidated bus shelter, another gaining to take it's place only a few beats later like something out of a Jackie Chan bit

What was only a failed negotiation was looking more like a set up. The sedan behind you was the third one within the few miles of your escape, Jatemme couldn't recognize any of the drivers.

You caught Asthma's shocked expression in the rearview mirror and remembered your manners, "I'm so sorry--have you met Merengue?"

"Excuse me?!"

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

By the time the moon clocked in, you were pulling up to one of Jatemme's spots. The car was fucked up but she rode true, you hoped that Jatemme fixed it back up.

"I'm gonna head on out." Asthma sighed, knocked fists with Jatemme, and began a tired trek to his parked truck.

The car settled into park with a nasty cough and the three of you clambered out, stretching and popping spent bullet casings from your clothing.

"Bye, Asthma! I hope you have a good sleep!" You waved after the man and got a lazy wave back, "He's nice. 'Bout to sleep hard as hell, I can tell."

Silence met you and you turned in time to be ensared. Jatemme kissed you hard, somehow just how you liked it.

His hands went around your waist and the bite of teeth had you making a noise, pushing closer.

Jatemme pulled away, peck by peck until he was far back enough to look at your lips, "'Bout time you stopped running that mouth. There's a loft up-top this place. I'm about to have a drink and lay the fuck down."

You tilted your head, And?

Jatemme's white teeth flashed across his full bottom lip, his head falling into a tilt.

"Come on up and lay down with me, rabbit."

Somehow that request felt more intimate than all the flirty shit you said out loud to keep your focus as you peeled through the city.

Believe it or not but there was an art to being a getaway driver. Figuring out where your tails could be lurking, being mindful of what territory you were in, the whole are those cops or is it just a Charger debate...

"Hm...only if I can be the big spoon." You purred up at his bemused face, "I promise to do only a lil' bit of dipping, sweetness."

Jatemme snorted and crooked his arm, all gentlemanly, for you to take. You did so as you kept running your mouth, absolutely stoked for your nap.

"I'll dip your little ass out the window--you want it like that?

"Mhf, kinky. Will you call me the Riddler while you do it? Just think of it as a little deposit for my Bean Bank..."

--------

✨ending notes✨: i had to write something a bit chaotic to make room in this brain of mine and unfortunately for jatemme, he had to pay the price! thank you for reading and tell me what you think! 💖💜✨💕

💖taglist💖: @cocochannelmoi @hunnishive @last-lost-one @yasminsqueendom @flydotty

@kindofaintrovert @satoruya @harmshake @miyuhpapayuh @ms-angiealsina

@megamindsecretlair @blowmymbackout @thadelightfulone @mysecertdiaryofableedingheart @sageispunk

[kk095]

Role Reversal

*good evening everyone! The poll has concluded and the first option received the most votes. I plan on posting the other two stories in the near future, so in the event you voted for those stories, don't worry! You'll definitely see them soon. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this story!*

Dr Lindsay is one of our beloved, go-to characters. She’s talented, smart, and always trying to go above and beyond for her patients. You can also add looks to her already impressive resume- she’s a tall woman in her early 30s, standing around 6 feet tall, with a slim but toned, athletic build, light brown hair, beautiful blue eyes, and a cute, tomboy type of appearance. Time and time again we’ve seen Lindsay’s hands inside a beautiful lady’s chest, but what if she was the one on the trauma room table for once? That’s just what happened in an alternate reality.

Lindsay was off that morning, but even on her days off, she’d get up early and go for a run. She ran track at a D1 school in college, and continued running even after her D1 days were over. This particular morning started off pretty uneventful. Lindsay woke up around 5:45 since she likes to run through her neighborhood when there weren’t very many people out and about. It was quiet and peaceful at that time, but also a bit chilly that morning, so Lindsay made sure she put on long sleeves and a pair of warmer leggings before heading out on what would be her final run.

It was still a bit dark out at that time, but the sun was slowly but surely making its way up. Lindsay had walked out into the street from her driveway, popped in her headphones, and off she went. The pace was a little slower at first since Lindsay was feeling a little chilly at that time. But nonetheless, she trotted along like she always did. About 10 minutes or so into her run was an intersection close to the entrance of her neighborhood. People would always blow through the stop sign at this intersection for whatever reason. Lindsay had countless experiences where she was almost hit by someone while driving to/from work, but never had that issue while running since she was always out so early in the morning.

On that day, in that alternate reality, there was someone out and about. There was a guy in a white BMW on his phone not paying attention to the road. The gentleman rolled through the stop sign, never even seeing Lindsay. Lindsay tried to get out of the way, but it was already too late! A loud thud was heard once the car struck Lindsay. The car struck Lindsay’s left flank/oblique area. The force threw her around, and her chest slammed into the hood of the car with tremendous force. Lindsay’s tall, 6 foot frame was thrown over the top of the car effortlessly before rolling off the trunk and onto the pavement.

The driver of the BMW jumped back and slammed on the brakes, making a squealing noise, but the damage was already done. “oh my God oh my God oh my God” the driver of the car panicked, finally putting his phone down and stopping the car like he should’ve when approaching the stop sign. Lindsay laid on the pavement face up. She was in complete shock, and the adrenaline was flowing through her body. Lindsay’s eyes opened up wide, her face having some abrasions and minor cuts on it. She looked up into the morning sky and took a few deep, but quick breaths. Lindsay tried to get up, but she couldn’t feel her legs. “no no no. This can’t be happening!” Lindsay thought to herself, the panic slowly but surely setting in. She had some sensation in her arms and tried to reach for her phone, but unfortunately it was in her pocket, smashed to oblivion. “HELP ME!” Lindsay screamed at the top of her lungs. The driver of the white BMW stepped out of the vehicle and slowly approached Lindsay. “oh my God…” he said, looking down at her like a deer caught in the headlights. “YOU HIT ME!” Lindsay said to the man, making eye contact as he approached. “miss…I’m so, so, sorry! I didn’t mean it!” the man said back, begging Lindsay for forgiveness in a way. “call 911! I need help! Please…” Lindsay says to the man while he continues to stand there in a daze.

Finally he dials 911. “Hey! I hit a lady with my car in my neighborhood! You gotta send someone here quick! It’s bad!!!” the man shouts into the phone. “it wasn’t my fault! I didn’t see her!” he shouts into the phone a moment later, presumably answering the dispatcher’s questions. Meanwhile, dispatch notifies EMS and medics Stephanie and Tracy are the ones to respond.

“Hey Steph, we gotta roll. Auto vs pedestrian over in Waterford Estates.” Medic Tracy said to her partner. “Waterford Estates? Doesn’t Dr Lindsay live in there?” Stephanie replied, having a gut feeling this would be a case she wouldn’t forget. “oh come on, there’s a bazillion doctors in there. What’re the odds it’s her?” Tracy responds, blowing off Stephanie. “hmm, yeah. I guess you’re right. Let’s head out.” Stephanie replied hesitantly, even though the gut feeling was still there.

Back at the scene, the driver of the BMW is pacing around, the panic really starting to set in for him. “oh God, what’s gonna happen to me?! Am I gonna get arrested? Am I gonna get sued?! This can’t be happening…” he thought out loud, showing just how selfish he was. Dr Lindsay is laying on the pavement in rough shape, and this guy’s only worried about what’s going to happen to him. What a jerk!

In the moment, all Lindsay could do was lay there and wait for EMS to arrive. She tried to move her legs again, but couldn’t move them in the slightest. The adrenaline was slowly but surely starting to wear off. The pain wasn’t unbearable, but she started to notice a few things. She felt a combination of soreness and tightness in her chest. Her flank/oblique area was painful to the touch, and some of the cuts and abrasions were beginning to sting. “he called 911, so they’ve gotta be coming.” Lindsay thought. But every minute felt like an eternity to both Lindsay and the driver for different reasons. Lindsay knew she was hurt pretty bad, and potentially paralyzed, but the exact extent of her injuries wasn’t known.

Finally, the ambulance pulls up nearby and comes to a stop. Stephanie and Tracy step out of the vehicle and make their way towards the patient. At first, Stephanie didn’t realize who it was- it just looked like a nameless, faceless female, but as she got closer, it all hit her, proving her gut feeling to be correct. “Dr Lindsay?!” Stephanie’s eyes widened, running over to her. Stephanie scurried over and knelt down, immediately tending to Lindsay. “Linds? What happened? Tell me what’s going on!” a concerned Stephanie asks. “He hit me…asshole was on his phone. Blew through the stop sign…” Lindsay says to Stephanie. Tracy heads over with the gurney and some other bits of equipment. “lindsay?!” Tracy exclaimed. “yeah…” Stephanie replied, nodding her head slightly. “possible spinal injury. I can’t feel my legs…” Lindsay informed the two familiar faces, tearing up a little. “blunt trauma to chest and flank area. Possible bleeding, maybe some broken ribs. Make sure I get a chest x ray and an echo when we get to the ED, ok?” Dr Lindsay says, ordering the two medics around as if she were treating a patient in the ER. Lindsay’s broken body was placed on a backboard and a c-collar was placed, and she was wheeled into the ambulance.

Medic Tracy was going to drive, while Stephanie remained in the back with Dr Lindsay. Once in the rig, it was go time- lights and sirens blaring, speeding down the road. In the back of the ambulance, Stephanie snipped off all of Lindsay’s clothes, stripping her completely nude and barefoot. Lindsay had some noticeable bruising on her chest and flank area, and there were areas that had road rash and other abrasions due to the nature of the incident. Medic Stephanie began sticking EKG electrodes onto Lindsay’s bare chest. “here…let me do an IV.” Lindsay insisted, reaching over towards Stephanie’s gear. Doctors always make the worst patients, amiright? “no linds, you’re not playing around with sharp objects in your condition. I’ll take care of you, ok?” Stephanie responded, gently nudging Lindsay’s hand away. Stephanie began setting up the IVs while Lindsay eyes scanned over, looking at her own vital signs. “80/40, tachy at 130, pulse ox normal. Alternating QRS complex. I bet I have cardiac tamponade and maybe some internal bleeding near the flank. Maybe it’s my spleen, but it could be my kidney if the right spot was hit.” Lindsay told Stephanie.

The rest of the ambulance ride was pretty uneventful, and Lindsay arrived at the ER with similar vital signs. It was an odd feeling for Lindsay when she was wheeled through the main entry doors. She was always the one doing the walking and talking, but was never the one on the gurney. Stephanie and Tracy continued wheeling Lindsay in, and ended up in a familiar place- the trauma room. “oh my God, Lindsay?!” Dr Sarah blurted out, shocked to see who the patient was. The other nurses all chimed in, but Lindsay kind of zoned out. Not only was this a traumatic experience for her, it was a bit odd being the patient for once. Lindsay was moved onto the trauma room table underneath the large overhead light. Everything went silent for Lindsay and she zoned out for a bit. She flashed back to her very last shift the day before. On the very same table during Lindsay’s shift was a pretty, 30-something blonde who had her chest crushed in by a steering column in a horrible car accident. Lindsay cracked her wide open and massaged her heart, hit her with the internal paddles a bit, but she ultimately didn’t make it. For whatever reason, it was at that moment Lindsay knew she’d suffer the same fate as the blonde lady the night before. She couldn’t explain why, she just knew.

“Lindsay? You with us hun?” Nancy asked, doing a sternal rub on Lindsay, noticing she was a bit zoned out. Lindsay snapped back to reality. “huh? Yeah…” Lindsay said to Nancy. “did you guys do a chest x ray and an echo yet?” Lindsay asked, looking over towards Dr Sarah. “not yet, ran trauma labs and started you on transfusions. I also wanna check your lower extremities. The medics said you couldn’t feel your legs?” Dr Sarah replied. “No… I tried to get up when it first happened, but I just can’t.” Lindsay replied, surprisingly calm. “ok linds, I’m just gonna go check.” Dr Sarah announced, walking towards the end of the table. “Hey Lindsay, wiggle your toes for me.” Asks Dr Sarah. Lindsay’s feet stay completely still. Dr Sarah grabs her pen light and strokes the sole of Lindsay’s right foot for a reaction. “you feel that linds?” Dr Sarah asks, looking towards the head of the bed. Lindsay laid there teary eyed, fighting back crying. “no… nothing…” an upset Lindsay replied. Dr Sarah repeated the same process on the opposite foot. “what about that?” she asks. Lindsay’s voice got weak and her eyes more teary. “nope…” Lindsay said.

With Lindsay snapped back to reality, the adrenaline worn off, and Dr Sarah’s tests on her lower extremities, Lindsay realized that even if she got out of this alive, her life would be very different. The fear and uncertainty was starting to set in for Lindsay. “I’m gonna end up like the lady from last night…” she thought to herself, going deeper down that rabbit hole. While Lindsay was psyching herself out, Sarah lowered her stethoscope onto Lindsay’s bare chest for a listen. “ahh!” Lindsay winced in pain, squinting her eyes. Lindsay’s chest was pretty sore, and she experienced some point tenderness when Sarah took a listen. “I’m sorry I’m sorry, I’ll be quick!” Sarah said. “lungs are clear, muffled heart sounds. Let’s get a chest x ray and an echo.” Sarah barked out to everyone else in the trauma team. The nurses sprung into action. Heather got all the x ray equipment set up, and nurse Nancy got the ultrasound machine set up.

First order of business was the chest x ray. The chest x ray showed a few broken ribs and a badly bruised sternum. The x ray also showed an unstable burst fracture at the L3 level. There were bone fragments embedded into Lindsay’s spine, and certain portions of the spine were completely severed, along with a hematoma in that general area- which is common. When the spine is injured, it tends to bleed a lot. Lindsay looked over at the x ray which confirmed her likely paralysis. She remained silent, but a tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m sorry sweetie.” Nurse Nancy says to Lindsay, stroking her hair a bit. An echocardiogram was then done, which confirmed Lindsay’s suspicion all along of cardiac tamponade. “yep, you’re right Lindsay. Tamponade. We’re gonna do a pericardiocentesis after I take a look at the abdomen, ok?” Sarah says to her. Lindsay remains silent but gently nods, tears going down her face. The abdominal ultrasound showed that there was a bleed in the upper left quadrant. “looks like a splenic lac, I don’t think your kidney or anything down that way was affected.” Sarah tells Dr Lindsay, looking at the monitor. “ok. So pericardiocentesis, then OR for me, right?” Lindsay asks, choked up. “yeah, that’s what it’s looking like. We’ll go ahead and get the pericardiocentesis going in a second, alright?” said Dr Sarah.

Lindsay saw Dr Sarah getting the big needle for the procedure and it struck a little fear in her since she was about to be on the receiving end of it. “I should’ve just skipped my run and slept in…” she thought to herself. She then felt the cold alcohol wipe sterilizing the area on her chest. Lindsay looked over and saw Sarah pick up the large needle. Lindsay looked over at nurse Nancy, tearing up with a nervous expression. “It’s gonna be ok sweetie. You’ve done this one a thousand times before. You got this!” Nancy replies in a reassuring tone, grabbing ahold of Lindsay’s hand. Sarah picked up the needle and took a look at Lindsay. “ok, I’m gonna start.” She says to her colleague. Lindsay looks over at Nancy and squeezes her hand, avoiding the sight of the large needle. Dr Sarah inserted the needle carefully into the 5th intercostal space a centimeter or two lateral to the apex. Lindsay felt a slight pinch, along with some pressure while the needle advanced further. When the needle was at the correct depth, Sarah carefully pulled back on the plunger of the needle. Lindsay felt slight burning, and a weird change in pressure inside her chest. The body of the needle filled with blood rather quickly, so Sarah delicately removed the needle. “repeat echo please.” Sarah said to the nurses. The echocardiogram was repeated, and Lindsay’s pericardium refilled with blood in an instant. “crap. That didn’t do the trick.” Sarah said in a frustrated tone. Sarah repeated the pericardiocentesis two more times, trying to aspirate all the blood that was squeezing Lindsay’s heart from the inside out, but the needle would fill up with blood, and the pericardium would almost instantly refill once the needle was out. “probably an active bleed from a cardiac chamber injury, maybe even a great vessel injury. You need to knock me out and do a thoracotomy and find out.” Lindsay told Sarah. “yeah… I agree. I’ve gotta open you up. I don’t think stable enough for the OR yet.” Dr Sarah replies in agreement. Lindsay gets choked up, and in a weak voice says “8.0 ET, push succs and etomidate. Get a thoracotomy tray…”, still trying to have a say in her own care. There was a pause, everyone realizing the gravity of the situation. “You heard her, let’s get going.” Dr Sarah breaks the silence, taking charge of the situation. Everyone began scrambling around, getting ready for the intubation and ensuing thoracotomy. “this is it…these are probably the last moments I’ll probably ever see…” Lindsay thought to herself. “They’re gonna crack me open, get the pericardium open, and I’m just gonna bleed out.” She added to her previous thought, going deeper down the rabbit hole.

The meds kicked in, and Lindsay went unconscious. Nurse Nancy got the 8.0 ET tube in, and secured it in place with a blue tube holder. Betadine was splashed across Lindsay’s bare chest, staining it a brownish orangey color. “pressure’s dropping doc.” Nancy said to Sarah, noticing the heart monitors are chirping louder and faster. Sarah then made a quick, decisive cut in Dr Lindsay’s chest beginning at the sternum, extending it to the left, underneath Lindsay’s hard left nipple, and ending a bit shy of her left armpit. While incising the underlying tissue, the monitors began beeping louder at faster. “BPs plummeting!” nurse Nancy nervously called out. Dr Sarah expedited the chest cracking, getting the rib spreader in, cranking the knob, and forcing her coworker’s ribs apart forcefully. Upon entry to the chest cavity, there was actually no blood loss whatsoever. “all that blood is probably in the pericardium. What’s the source of it though?” Dr Sarah thought, posing that important question to herself.

Next up, the thick, fibrous lining of Lindsay’s heart was opened. Sarah made a vertical cut in the pericardium, and quickly delivered the heart. With the heart delivered and the pericardium peeled back, there was a rush of blood. “suction!” Sarah asked. Dr Sarah then investigated inside of Lindsay’s chest cavity trying to find the culprit for her cardiac tamponade. Sarah both looked around and felt around, but couldn’t find anything. However, blood kept re-accumulating every handful of seconds or so. Suction was applied again, clearing the area out and allowing a line of sight to be reestablished. Lindsay’s vitals began to take a major nosedive in an instant. “push 250cc’s normal saline. Hang more o-neg on the rapid infuser!” shouted Dr Sarah, doing what she could to buy her colleague some time. The monitors beeped loud and fast, and the line of sight in Lindsay’s chest cavity became inundated with a tremendous amount of blood. Suction was applied to the area, making a wet slurping sound. Lindsay’s breathing tube began to fill with blood too. “hey, suction up here too!” Nurse Nancy called out. “Damn it, she’s crashing. Starting internal massage.” Sarah grumbled, reaching her hands into Lindsay’s bloody mess of a chest cavity and began vigorously massaging her heart. “airways clear.” Nancy announced. “meds in” said heather, injecting epi and atropine intravenously.

Sarah wrapped her hands around Lindsay’s strong, muscular heart and began pumping the frantically twitching organ with her own two hands. Nurse Lin stepped up to the plate and placed a vascular clamp on Dr Lindsay’s descending aorta near the diaphragm. “if it’s arterial, the bleed might stop.” Lin thought out loud. “good thinking Lin. Let’s hope we get to the bottom of this ASAP.” Sarah responded. Suction has been applied again to the thoracic cavity, but it was only doing so much. “how about a left chest tube for drainage?” Sarah asked, looking around at the rest of the trauma team. In a pinch, nurse Lin procured a chest tube and inserted it along Lindsay’s left ribcage. 1200ml of blood exited the tube and splashed Lin’s yellow trauma gown. The line of sight improved, but Dr Lindsay’s condition did not.

Lindsay remained in PEA for a bit, finally converting to v-fib a little after the 6 minute mark of the code. The internal paddles were charged to 20 joules, lowered into Lindsay’s chest around her heart, and the shock was delivered. A dull, wet thunk was heard, Dr Lindsay now on the receiving end of the internal paddles for once. Her heart more or less paused for a moment, then continued its erratic twitching motion. The internal paddles were recharged to 20 joules and lowered back in. A muted KA-THUMP was heard. Lindsay’s torso jolted sharply, but v-fib remained. “still nothing, let’s go again at 30. Everyone….CLEAR.” shouted Dr Sarah. The stronger shock caused Lindsay to grunt a bit and her eyes to open halfway. For a split second, the team thought they got her back because of that, but unfortunately that wasn’t the case. “damn it! Again at 30!” Sarah yelled. The electricity of the next shock ran through Lindsay’s lifeless body, causing her toes to curl at the other end of the table, showing off the thin, prominent, silky wrinkles throughout the soles of Lindsay’s size 11 feet and the fresh coat of white nail polish on her toes. Unfortunately, Lindsay went back to PEA.

More meds were pushed and Sarah resumed internal massage. “come on linds…come on…don’t fuckin die…” the cute, nerdy redhead said under her breath. But that comment fell on deaf ears, and Lindsay didn’t regain a shockable rhythm for quite a bit. At the 19 minute mark of the code, v-fib finally reappeared. The blood soaked paddles were called for and charged to 30, another shock being delivered. Lindsay’s chest jumped quickly for a moment, her beautiful blue eyes remaining half open, blankly gazing up above. “still nothing, charging to 40.” Says Sarah. The large, spoon shaped objects are called for yet again, and the next shock is delivered. The stronger shock bends Lindsay’s already broken body out of shape for a millisecond before falling limp again. Dr Sarah shocks Lindsay again at 40 joules, once again to no avail. “come on linds… come on. Everyone….CLEAR!” Sarah shouted out, delivering the next shock. Dr Lindsay’s heart tensed up for a moment, then started to flutter uselessly again. “Still nothing!.... CLEAR!” Sarah yelled out passionately, hitting Lindsay with the internal paddles again. The jolt of electricity picked Dr Lindsay’s legs and feet up above the table as it traveled through her body, causing her feet to leap up and crash back down all within the span of a second, showing off her hot, wrinkly soles once again. After another 3 shocks, Lindsay deteriorated back to PEA, so internal massage was resumed, along with the next dose of meds.

Dr Sarah worked passionately at massaging Dr Lindsay’s heart. “come on…come on…” Sarah said under her breath, looking at the monitor, then down at Lindsay’s heart. Dr Sarah squeezed, trying to force blood through her friend and coworker’s body, attempting to temporarily do the job of her heart. Things only got worse as the code droned on. Lindsay went from PEA to agonal, then from an agonal rhythm to asystole. Dr Sarah could feel the movement of Lindsay’s heart grow weaker and weaker the longer she remained in cardiac arrest. Eventually, Dr Lindsay’s heart came to a gentle stop, becoming motionless, falling limp within Sarah’s gloved hands. Sarah kept massaging Lindsay’s heart, and ordered another dose of meds to be pushed into Dr Lindsay’s IV line. Even after several minutes worth of efforts and another dose of drugs, nothing changed.

The room grew eerily silent as the code droned on and on with no signs of improvement. You could hear a pin drop in the room, but the tension was palpable. Sarah kept massaging Lindsay’s heart, doing anything and everything she could, while nurse Nancy puffed the ambu bag every few seconds as Dr Lindsay’s beautiful blue eyes remained half open, staring upwards. Sarah stopped internal massage at the 30 minute mark of the code. “asystole on the monitors…” she says, shaking her head, forearms deep into Lindsay’s chest, massaging away. “pupils fixed and dilated, maxed out on meds.” Nurse Nancy adds. At that point, the scary realization hit the trauma team- Dr Lindsay was gone. There was an eerie pause in the room, and the only noise was the flatlined monitors. “does anyone have any other suggestions?” Dr Sarah asks. Nobody responds initially. “you can’t give up on Lindsay. We have to try a little longer, right?!” heather shouts passionately, teary eyed. Nobody answered heather, knowing exactly what was to come next. Dr Sarah ceased internal compressions, removed her hands from Dr Lindsay’s chest, peeled off her blood soaked gloves and looked over at the clock, making the most difficult decision of her life. “time of death, 6:49am. I’m sorry linds…” Sarah says, absolutely defeated, holding back tears, feeling partially guilty about being unable to save Lindsay.

Nurse Nancy detached the ambu bag and heather switched off the flatlined monitors. Lindsay’s eyes remained half open while the EKG electrodes were plucked off her chest, appearing as if she was watching nurse Lin do that. Nurse Heather started crying when beginning to fill out Dr Lindsay’s toe tag. “I can’t do it…” heather cried, storming out of the room, hands to her face. Nurse Nancy finished the toe tag, and Lin placed a cover over Lindsay’s body with her eyes still half open, concealing the face of their beloved friend and coworker. Last but not least, the toe tag was placed on the big toe of Lindsay’s left foot, dangling in front of her cute, wrinkly soles. Just like that, Lindsay became the beautiful woman toe tagged under a sheet in the emergency department. Dr Lindsay’s life ended in the same place she spent so much of her time.

[tarisilmarwen]

RobStar Week 2023, Day 2 - Carnival/Amusement Park

(Shhh, I know I'm late.)

---

Kory glanced aside at Dick knowingly as he switched the turn signal on, moving them towards the right lane of the highway.

He took his eyes off the road briefly, sending her a conspiratorial wink.

Grinning, Kory waited until they were about half a mile away from their exit, before calling back to the two children in the backseat, both slumped over and staring glumly out their windows, disappointed over the end of their trip.

"Mar'i? Jake? Can you look out the window to your right and tell me what you see?" she asked them, failing to hide the mischievous sparkle in her green eyes.

Mar'i was on the right side, and lifted her head from her chin curiously, sending a puzzled squint out the window as the sign for the exit came up.

They knew the moment she'd realized because an ear-splitting excited squeal at an unholy decible shook the car.

"IT'S WETZLEYWOOOOOORLD!" Mar'i shouted, fists clenched, bouncing in her seat.

"What's Wetzleyworld?" asked Jake, leaning over and straining to see.

"Oh my gosh, Jake, it's so fun! We came once when you and I were little, I think you were two, it's the most awesomest, funnest, coolest place ever!" She squealed again, the seatbelt straining to contain her as she floated a half-inch above her seat. "It's got bumper cars and rock climbing and rollercoasters and a Ferris wheel and-"

Dick and Kory smiled at each other from the front seats, pleased at having kept the impromptu visit a surprise for their little ones.

"Hope they still have the Whirl-a-Gig Tower," Dick commented, sliding the car neatly into the exit lane.

"Oh yes, that one was one of my favorites as well," Kory agreed, nodding. Her eyes pinched suddenly, skin wrinkling between her brows. "Did you hear they tore down the Sonic Splashdown?"

He glanced askance at her. "No!" he said, dismayed and in disbelief. "Aww man, we loved that one. It was the perfect cooldown ride for summer."

"I hear they have revamped it with a newer style. It will still be a water ride just... not as big," she hastened to inform him, not quite able to hide her own disappointment.

Dick gave a grumbling sigh. "Guess it can't be helped." He checked over with her, pulling them up to a stoplight. "You've got all our passes?"

She nodded, slipping her hand into the canvas bag in her lap and producing them, four slightly folded sheets of paper. "Indeed. We need to present these at the front gates, which will gain us admittance, and then we must report to the Customer Service booth to gain the laminated badges."

He reached over and squeezed her hand, warmly affectionate. "Thanks for handling that, Star," he told her gratefully. "I know it was a lot to handle on short notice."

Kory flipped a bit of her hair back proudly. "It was nothing," she declared. "I rather enjoyed talking to the service representative; she was very nice and helpful and is expecting a third child in May."

Dick chuckled. Leave it to his Starfire to make friends with a total stranger.

The light flipped to green and he released the brake, taking the turn into the drive that led to the main entrance.

***

The crowds were impressive, several groups of students, families, and youth groups in matching shirts scattered here and there, and dozens of individual families milling around as well. The noise of their talking was matched only by the noise of the amenities, roaring coasters rattling on their tracks, vendors hawking for players at the prize booths, popcorn and cotton candy machines going full steam. The park's kindly mascot, Wetzley the Walrus, twinkled round black eyes out from plushies, billboards, and signage.

Mar'i was already begging for a giant pink flamingo prize hanging above the baseball toss. Dick paid the extra fee and let Kory have the honors, watching her wind up and let a rip with just a touch of her alien strength.

Just a touch was all it took, toppling the whole stack of weighted bottles with a magnificent clatter. Kory beamed as the attendant handed her the flamingo, and Dick felt a rush of nostalgia and adoration; His wife had wanted the same stuffed prize years and years ago when they'd first come here, on what was technically their first date. Technically because they had still been in that weird awkward stage of, "We're just friends, we don't totally like each other at all, but I still really care about impressing you."

The asshole who had prevented him from even taking a turn at the game was no longer working that particular booth, he was satisfied to see.

Mar'i was making grabby hands with her fingers. "Can I hold it? Can I? Can I?"

Kory frowned. "I do not believe that is a good idea, Mar'i. It it much larger than you are, and we do not want to attract attention."

"Awwww!" Mar'i groaned in disappointment, dropping her hands.

"Besides," Dick said, coming up closer, "we're going to have them reserve it at the front for us. That way it won't get wet or dirty before we take it home."

Mar'i mumbled but accepted that logic. Jake, meanwhile, had spotted the carousel.

"MOMMY!" he squealed, pointed excitedly. "DADDY! THEY HAVE A SEAHORSE!"

"Yeah?" Dick responded, leaning down with hands on his knees, matching his son's excitement.

"Yes, see!"

"Well we'd better go ride it then," he urged, taking the flamingo as Kory passed it to him, handing it in turn to the park runner who had just been summoned to fetch the large prize to the front for safekeeping.

Jake was off like a rocket, his sister three steps behind him.

"Do not get too far ahead!" Kory called in worried warning, trying to keep up.

***

When all the coasters had been ridden at least once—and some of them twice—multiple snacks consumed, both children's faces painted with bright designs—Mar'i had gotten a swirling gold and silver configuration called Azure Princess and Jake had gotten the tusks and beady eyes of the ever-ubiquitous Wetzley—and everyone's calves and feet were thoroughly exhausted Dick finally called an end to the day.

Mar'i trudged along sleepily at his side, while Kory held a dozing Jake, his little arms draped around her shoulders.

"I am glad we could share this with them again," Kory said, as they made their way through the exit gate, picking up their flamingo on the way. She smiled in a way that made his heart flip inside him. "This is still my favorite place to come with you," she said, voice soft.

His cheeks heated and like that he was mentally fifteen again, gaping in awe at how pretty she was, how vibrant and full of life and endless enthusiasm.

"Yeah," was all he could say to agree.

Their hands found each other's as they walked across the parking lot, son and daughter and flamingo in tow, the orange light of sunset splashing across the sky.

[bonjovian]

Never Let Me Go: Chapter Twenty-Nine

Masterlist Chapter Twenty-Eight Chapter Thirty

Word Count: 1,637

Tag List: @arrthurpendragon @seankayser

Noctis wakes the others up after they mysteriously passed out. With a little way yet to go until they arrive in Gralea, Gaia tries to wrap her head around what just happened. It wasn't long until they were in danger again...

"Hey. Wake up," Noctis ordered.

I groaned quietly, groggily getting to my feet. "Son of a bitch," I mumbled. Noctis was sitting down in front of us, breathing heavily.

"What happened?" Gladio asked as he stood. It seemed he and Ignis had the same thing happen.

"I saw the Glacian," Noctis answered. "It's okay, she's gone now. You guys check on our drivers."

"Got it," Gladio nodded. He walked over to Ignis, looking him over. "You good?"

"Yes, I'm fine," Ignis responded. "Let's go." The two of them walked away, leaving just Noctis and me. I was still trying to wake up.

"Gaia, aren't you going to join them?" Noctis turned to look at me.

I perked up a bit from hearing my name. "Huh? Oh, no," I laughed softly. "I'll probably just stay back here for a moment. I am still trying to figure out why I passed out like that."

It was a half-truth. I was trying to figure that out, but one other question was on my mind. How did Noctis see the Glacian if her corpse was outside the train?

Noctis got back to his feet and walked off as well, leaving me alone with my thoughts. I sighed and grabbed my journal. I flipped through it, reading bits and pieces of what I wrote when I first set off on this journey.

First meeting Noctis and the others, the disaster that was the first bust-a-base, reaching Altissia... All of it was there. It made me wonder if things could have gone differently.

Maybe Lunafreya would still be alive, maybe Ravus wouldn't be a wanted man, I thought. Maybe Prompto wouldn't be missing. Tears brimmed my eyes and I blinked them away.

It was both comforting and sad to reread everything I experienced. After a while, Noctis, Gladio, and Ignis came back to the train car I was in.

"We should be drawing close to Gralea," Ignis spoke after a moment.

Gladio crossed his arms as he took a seat. "Can't imagine what it'll be like."

"Swarming with daemons, but you knew that," Noctis responded with a shrug.

Gladio scoffed. "Don't remind me."

"It wasn't always like that, at least, from what I remember," I chimed in. "But I also lived just on the outskirts." I looked out the window. It was incredibly dark out.

"Though I do have to laugh at the karma of it all," I spoke again after a moment. "Ironic how the empire made magiteks from daemons, yet they can't control them themselves."

"Once we arrive, we'll make for the Keep," Ignis spoke, changing the subject to our strategy.

"The Keep?" Noctis asked.

"Zegnautus," Ignis elaborated. "An imperial mega fortress said to be impregnable."

"With Prompto and the Crystal inside it," Noctis muttered.

"Oh, wonderful," I groaned.

"What goes in must come out," Gladio smirked. He then changed the subject. "So, are we buying this story that the Crystal can purge daemons?"

"The proof is in the purging, but it does stand to reason," Ignis answered.

"Hopefully the Crystal doesn't think I'm a daemon," I laughed awkwardly. 

Ignis continued, "We've observed that as the nights have grown longer, the daemon hordes have grown stronger. If they are in fact averse to the Crystal's light, it could save not only Lucis, but the world." 

Noctis chuckled softly. "We'll find out once we take it back." 

The train's brakes squealed, interrupting our conversation.  I winced at the noise. 

"The hell?" Gladio grumbled as he stood up. We were stopped in the middle of a tunnel. 

"What is it?" Ignis asked. 

"My guess? Something to sidetrack us." Gladio made his way toward the front of the train. 

I looked over at Noctis and Ignis before getting up and following Gladio. Something just didn't seem right. We barely entered another train car before the windows cracked. The train shook violently, knocking us to the ground. We carefully got to our feet, and I looked at the windows once more. They were one attack away from shattering entirely.  

Biggs broke the stunned silence. "City's trying to keep us out... with the daemons," he warned. 

As if on cue, a few goblins jumped against the glass. 

"Gotta run! Don't worry about us!" Biggs told us. 

I quickly turned to look over at Noctis and the others before turning to the windows once again. "Fuck," I whispered. One of the windows shattered, letting some of the daemons inside. 

"Let's get to work," Noctis readied himself to summon his sword. 

Nothing happened. 

"What's wrong?" Gladio asked. 

Noctis tried again. "The weapons... they're stuck!" 

I tried summoning my axe. Nothing. Sword, nothing. "Damn it," I mumbled, trying not to panic. Maybe the tunnel was interfering with the armiger?

"Get back!" Gladio ran forward, kicking one of the goblins away. 

"Run!" Ignis ordered. I looked at Noctis and Gladio once more. We took off in the direction we just came from. At this point, we were outnumbered and it was only a matter of moments before we would eventually be backed against a wall. 

"Uh, what are we going to do when we don't have anywhere else to run?" I yelled to the others, pushing another daemon out of my way. 

"We trade the train for the Regalia!" Ignis responded. "Noct, the freight car!" 

"Keep moving!" Noctis yelled, running ahead of us. 

Finally reaching the regalia, Noctis immediately got behind the wheel. I ran to the passenger side, fumbling with the handle before taking my seat. Prompto's seat. 

"Gun it!" Gladio demanded once we were all inside. Noctis stepped on the gas, the tires squealing as we took off. 

"Threat upgraded." A speaker announced. It was a security system. "Activating level 4 security measures. Sealing all gates." 

"Go go go!" I yelled. Even when we were outside of the daemon-infested train tunnel, we were still in danger. Now we were being shot at. I gripped the seat. In our haste to leave, it seemed none of us paid the seatbelts any mind. With Noctis swerving on the train tracks to dodge both enemy fire and debris, it was most likely the worst decision.

"One clean hit and it's over," Gladio warned. 

"It'll take more than that to stop His Majesty's trusty steed," Ignis reassured us. "Just focus on your driving." 

"I suppose we're lucky they aren't the best shot," I laughed nervously. 

Noctis gripped the wheel tighter, slamming the gas pedal down even more. "You can do it, girl," he hissed, talking to the car. "You can get through this. Come on, old girl!" 

We barely made it through the gate before one last explosion damaged the car. It came to a stop, a somber silence falling over us as the rain began to fall. 

The Regalia was done for. Smoke poured from under the hood. I'm going to miss being crammed in the back seat, I thought to myself. I sighed and looked over at Noctis and the others. 

"That's all she's got," Gladio said, his tone surprisingly quiet. 

"It'll do," Noctis sighed as he opened the door. 

We got out of the car. I remained silent as I looked at it, taking off my sunglasses. "She did a pretty good job," I mumbled. 

We began to make our way forward, Noctis taking one look at the car before whispering, "Dad, thanks for everything." 

Gladio looked over at us, changing the subject. "Are we seriously marching into the capital empty-handed?" He huffed. 

"And with no assurances the Crystal can beat back the daemon hordes," Ignis added. 

"Guess we'll find out the hard way. No turning back now, right?" 

Before us was a train, precariously balanced on rubble. There was enough room for us to go under it, assuming it didn't fall. We carefully approached, Gladio looking it over once more before speaking. "This thing could come down at any time," he muttered.  

"Let's get it over with then," I responded. Just as Noctis was about to walk under it, it dropped a bit. The creaking of the metal echoed around us. He stopped for a moment before running to the other side. 

The train slammed to the ground just after Noctis had made it across. "Hey! Ignis! Gladio! Gaia!" He shouted. 

"Are you alright?" I yelled back. "You didn't get hurt, did you?" 

"I'm going to try to find a way back!" He responded. 

"I suggest we try to do the same," Ignis spoke after a moment. 

We managed to climb onto the train that had fallen in front of us, which provided us with a decent vantage point. 

"Is there a way forward?" Ignis asked. I shrugged. 

"There's a way, but I don't see us going forward without facing off with the daemons," Gladio murmured. 

"But Noctis is going at it alone, we have to get back to him," I responded. "Even if we have to fight barehanded." 

"Perhaps you won't have to," a familiar voice spoke up. Ardyn. He walked over to us from the same side Noctis was on when we got separated. 

"What are you doing here?" Gladio demanded. He held his arms out in front of Ignis and me, a small attempt to protect us. 

"Why I come bearing gifts," Ardyn responded. With a snap of his fingers, our weapons manifested in our hands. "See? Gifts! Now I believe a 'thank you' is in order." 

"After all the shit you put us through?" I scoffed, letting my axe rest against my shoulder. Gladio inched closer to him, brandishing his greatsword. 

The chancellor put his hands in the air as if he were surrendering. "Here I am, helping for a change. But I can see I'm not wanted." He turned and left without another word, leaving us to discuss our plans. 

Why would he give us our weapons back? Surely he would rather us be defenseless. Unless us getting killed wasn't his goal... 

[fastrateauto23]

Brake Pad Materials Explained: Ceramic vs. Semi-Metallic vs. Organic

When it comes to keeping your car safe on the road, your brake pads play a starring role. But not all brake pads are created equal—so how do you know which one is right for you? Let’s dive into the world of brake pad materials and break down the differences between ceramic, semi-metallic, and organic pads.

What Are Brake Pads and Why Do They Matter?

Think of brake pads as the unsung heroes of your Car Break Service in Milwaukee system. Every time you press the brake pedal, these pads create the friction needed to slow down or stop your vehicle. Without them, well, let’s just say your car would keep rolling like a bowling ball with no pins in sight.

Brake pads aren’t just about stopping—they’re about control and safety. They ensure your vehicle responds when you need it to, whether you're navigating a tricky turn or coming to a quick stop in traffic. That’s why choosing the right brake pad material is such a big deal.

Overview of Brake Pad Materials

There are three main types of brake pad materials: ceramic, semi-metallic, and organic. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses, and understanding these differences can help you make a smarter choice for your car.

Ceramic Brake Pads

Ceramic brake pads are like the premium coffee of the brake pad world—smooth, clean, and a bit pricier. Made from a blend of ceramic fibers and bonding agents, they’re engineered for quiet and reliable performance.

Advantages:

Quiet operation: These pads are whisper-quiet, so no annoying squeals.

Low dust production: Unlike some other pads, they don’t leave your wheels looking like a soot factory.

Durability: Ceramic pads last longer than many alternatives, making them a great long-term investment.

Disadvantages:

Higher cost: They’re not the cheapest option on the shelf.

Less effective in extreme conditions: If you’re driving in freezing temperatures or hauling heavy loads, ceramic pads might not deliver the stopping power you need.

Best For:

Everyday drivers who value a quiet, clean, and reliable ride, especially in urban or suburban settings.

Semi-Metallic Brake Pads

Semi-metallic pads are the workhorses of the brake pad family. Made from a mix of metal fibers like steel, copper, and iron, they’re designed to handle heavy-duty stopping power.

Advantages:

High performance: These pads excel at dissipating heat, making them great for high-performance vehicles or heavy-duty use.

Affordable: Compared to ceramic pads, they’re easier on the wallet.

Durability: They’re built tough and can withstand rigorous use.

Disadvantages:

Noise: Semi-metallic pads can be a bit noisy, which might not be ideal if you’re all about a peaceful ride.

Dust production: They tend to produce more brake dust, which can make your wheels look less than pristine.

Best For:

Drivers who frequently tow, drive in mountainous areas, or need high-performance braking.

Organic Brake Pads

Organic pads are the OGs of brake pads. Made from natural materials like rubber, glass, and resin, they’re lightweight and affordable, but they come with a few trade-offs.

Advantages:

Budget-friendly: Organic pads are easy on the wallet, making them a popular choice for cost-conscious drivers.

Quiet: Like ceramic pads, they’re known for their quiet operation.

Eco-friendly: With fewer synthetic materials, they’re better for the environment.

Disadvantages:

Shorter lifespan: Organic pads wear out faster than their ceramic and semi-metallic counterparts.

Not for heavy-duty use: They’re not ideal for aggressive driving or towing.

Best For:

Casual drivers who stick to city streets and want an affordable, eco-friendly option.

How to Choose the Right Brake Pads

Choosing the right brake pads isn’t rocket science, but it does require a little thought. Here are a few factors to keep in mind:

Driving Habits: Are you a city commuter or a weekend racer? Ceramic pads are great for everyday use, while semi-metallic pads are better for performance needs.

Vehicle Type: For heavy trucks or SUVs, semi-metallic pads often provide the durability you need. Lighter vehicles may do just fine with ceramic or organic pads.

Environment: If you live in a cold climate or frequently tow heavy loads, consider semi-metallic pads for their heat resistance.

Think of it like choosing shoes—you wouldn’t wear flip-flops to a hiking trail, right?

FAQs About Brake Pad Materials

Q: How often should I replace my brake pads? A: It depends on your driving habits and the material. Ceramic pads can last up to 70,000 miles, while organic pads might only make it to 30,000 miles. Check your manufacturer’s recommendations.

Q: Can I mix different types of brake pads on my car? A: It’s not recommended. Mixing materials can lead to uneven braking and reduced performance.

Q: Are expensive brake pads worth it? A: They can be! Ceramic pads may cost more upfront, but their longevity and performance often make them a better long-term investment.

Conclusion

Brake pads might not be the flashiest part of your car, but they’re undeniably one of the most important. By understanding the differences between ceramic, semi-metallic, and organic materials, you can choose the right pads for your driving needs—and keep your ride safe and smooth.

So, which one will you pick? Your brakes (and your wheels) will thank you.

First Rate Auto

5424 W State St, Milwaukee, WI 53208, United States

+14147743738

Get Direction From Google Map

[antero-automotive]

Subaru Repair: A Step-by-Step Guide to Keeping Your Subaru in Top Shape

Subaru vehicles are known for their reliability, off-road capabilities, and long lifespan. However, like all vehicles, they require regular maintenance and occasional repairs to continue running smoothly. Whether you own a Subaru Outback, Forester, or WRX, understanding how to perform basic Subaru repairs can save you time and money. This tutorial will walk you through common Subaru repair tasks, providing detailed explanations without overwhelming you.

Why Regular Subaru Repair and Maintenance are Essential

Routine Subaru repair and maintenance are crucial for several reasons:

Preventative Care: Regular maintenance helps identify potential issues before they become major problems.

Cost Savings: Addressing minor issues early can save you from costly repairs down the line.

Optimized Performance: Keeping your Subaru well-maintained ensures it runs efficiently and reliably, particularly if you rely on it for off-road adventures.

Longevity: Regular care can help extend the life of your vehicle, ensuring you get the most out of your investment.

Common Subaru Repair Issues

While Subarus are known for their durability, certain repair issues tend to arise more frequently. Here’s a breakdown of the most common repair needs you may encounter with your Subaru.

1. Head Gasket Failure

Issue: Head gasket failure is one of the most common issues in Subaru models, particularly in older vehicles with the 2.5L engine. A failing head gasket can cause coolant and oil to mix, leading to overheating and engine damage.

Solution: If you notice symptoms like coolant leaks, white smoke from the exhaust, or an overheating engine, it’s time to address the head gasket. While head gasket repairs are more complex and should be handled by a professional, keeping an eye on coolant levels and ensuring the engine doesn’t overheat can help prevent serious damage.

2. Timing Belt Replacement

Issue: Subaru engines, especially those in older models, rely on a timing belt to keep the engine’s components working in sync. Over time, the timing belt can wear out, leading to poor engine performance or catastrophic engine failure if it breaks.

Solution: Subaru recommends replacing the timing belt between 90,000 and 100,000 miles. You can check your owner’s manual for specific intervals. If you’re confident in your skills, replacing the timing belt is a DIY task, but it requires patience and attention to detail. Make sure to follow the step-by-step instructions in a repair manual or video guide.

3. CV Joint and Axle Wear

Issue: Subarus are well-known for their all-wheel-drive system, which places additional stress on the CV joints and axles. Over time, these components can wear out, especially if you regularly take your Subaru off-road. Signs of wear include clicking sounds when turning or vibrations during acceleration.

Solution: If you hear clicking or notice vibrations, inspect the CV joints and axles. Replacing worn components early can prevent further damage to the drivetrain. This repair is a bit more advanced, so if you’re not comfortable tackling it yourself, seek out a professional Subaru mechanic.

4. Brake System Wear

Issue: Like all vehicles, Subaru brakes wear down over time. Frequent off-road driving or city commuting can accelerate the wear on brake pads, rotors, and calipers.

Solution: Regularly inspect your brake pads and rotors for wear. If the pads are thin or you hear squealing noises, it’s time for a brake replacement. Replacing brake pads is a relatively straightforward task that most DIYers can handle with the right tools. Just remember to follow proper safety procedures when lifting your vehicle and working on the brakes.

DIY Subaru Repair Tasks You Can Handle at Home

Many Subaru repairs can be done at home with basic tools, saving you money and ensuring your vehicle stays in top condition. Here are a few maintenance tasks you can perform yourself.

1. Changing the Oil

Regular oil changes are vital for keeping your Subaru’s engine running smoothly. Here’s how to do it:

Warm Up the Engine: Let your engine run for a few minutes to warm up the oil, making it easier to drain.

Drain the Oil: Use a wrench to remove the oil drain plug and let the oil drain into a pan.

Replace the Oil Filter: Unscrew the old oil filter and replace it with a new one.

Refill with New Oil: After reinstalling the drain plug, refill the engine with the recommended oil type and amount as specified in your owner’s manual.

2. Replacing Air Filters

A clean air filter helps improve fuel efficiency and engine performance. Here’s a quick guide:

Locate the Air Filter Housing: Open the hood and find the air filter housing, typically located near the front of the engine.

Replace the Filter: Open the housing, remove the old filter, and install the new one.

Close the Housing: Ensure the housing is securely fastened before closing the hood.

3. Replacing Spark Plugs

Worn spark plugs can cause engine misfires, reduced performance, and poor fuel economy. Replacing spark plugs is a straightforward task you can do at home:

Locate the Spark Plugs: Access the spark plugs by removing the ignition coils.

Remove and Replace: Use a spark plug socket to remove the old plugs, then install the new ones.

Reinstall the Coils: Once the new plugs are in, reinstall the ignition coils and make sure everything is secured.

When to Seek Professional Subaru Repair

While many Subaru repair tasks can be handled at home, some issues require professional expertise. Here are a few examples of when it’s best to take your vehicle to a certified Subaru mechanic:

Head Gasket Replacement: Due to the complexity of this repair, it’s best handled by a professional.

Transmission Repairs: Transmission work is intricate and requires specialized knowledge and tools.

Electrical System Issues: Diagnosing and repairing electrical problems can be challenging without the proper equipment.

Conclusion: Keep Your Subaru Running Smoothly with Regular Repair and Maintenance

Subaru vehicles are built for adventure, but they still require regular maintenance and occasional repairs to stay in peak condition. By handling simple DIY tasks like oil changes, air filter replacements, and brake maintenance, you can keep your Subaru running smoothly and prevent major issues down the road. For more complex repairs, don’t hesitate to seek out a trusted Subaru mechanic to ensure your vehicle remains safe and reliable for years to come.

[wrenchpatrol0]

A Guide to Auto Repair: Keeping Your Car in Top Shape

Owning a car comes with many perks – the freedom to go where you want, when you want. However, it also comes with responsibilities, and one of the most important is taking care of your vehicle through auto repair and maintenance. In this guide, we will walk you through the basics of auto repair in simple English, so you can keep your car running smoothly and safely.

Understanding the Basics

Before we dive into the world of auto repair, it's important to understand some basic terms and concepts:

Maintenance: Regular check-ups and tasks to keep your car in good condition.

Repairs: Fixing something that's broken or not working correctly.

Mechanic: A professional who specializes in car repairs.

DIY: Do It Yourself, meaning you can try to fix some minor issues on your own.

Regular Maintenance

Regular maintenance is like going to the doctor for a check-up. It helps prevent bigger problems and keeps your car healthy. Here are some common maintenance tasks:

Oil Changes: The engine needs clean oil to run smoothly. Change it every 3,000 to 5,000 miles.

Tire Rotation: To make your tires last longer, rotate them regularly.

Brake Inspection: Make sure your brakes are in good shape for safety.

Air Filter: A dirty air filter can harm your engine's performance. Change it when needed.

Fluids: Check and top up fluids like coolant, transmission fluid, and brake fluid.

Identifying Common Problems

Sometimes, your car might act up or make strange noises. Here are some common issues and what they might mean:

Engine Overheating: Could be due to low coolant or a faulty thermostat.

Strange Noises: Rattling, squealing, or clunking noises may indicate problems with the engine, brakes, or suspension.

Check Engine Light: When this light comes on, it's your car's way of saying something's not right. Get it checked by a mechanic.

DIY Repairs

Not all car problems require a trip to the mechanic. Some simple repairs you can try on your own include:

Changing a Flat Tire: Learn how to replace a flat tire with a spare.

Replacing Wiper Blades: Old wiper blades can affect visibility. Change them when they streak or squeak.

Changing Air Filters: It's an easy task that can improve your car's performance.

Finding a Reliable Mechanic

When you can't fix the problem yourself, it's essential to find a trustworthy mechanic. Here are some tips:

Ask for Recommendations: Friends and family can recommend good mechanics.

Check Reviews: Look for reviews online to see what others say about a mechanic.

Certifications: Ensure the mechanic is certified and has experience.

Get Multiple Quotes: Don't be afraid to get quotes from different shops to compare prices.

Preventing Scams

Sadly, some people may try to take advantage of your lack of car knowledge. Here's how to avoid scams:

Get a Written Estimate: Before any work begins, ask for a written estimate with a breakdown of costs.

Ask Questions: Don't hesitate to ask the mechanic to explain the problem and the necessary repairs in simple terms.

Get a Second Opinion: If something doesn't seem right, seek a second opinion from another mechanic.

Budgeting for Repairs

Car repairs can be costly, so it's crucial to budget for them. Consider setting aside a small amount each month for unexpected repairs. Having an emergency fund for your car can save you stress and money in the long run

Conclusion

Auto repair might seem intimidating, but with the right knowledge and a bit of effort, you can keep your car in excellent shape. Remember the basics of maintenance, learn some DIY skills, and find a reliable mechanic to help you when needed. By following these steps, you'll enjoy the freedom of the open road with a car that's safe and dependable.

[crsauto888]

Tips On How To Replace The Rear Brake Footwear Pads

Due to manufactures attempting to make automobiles lighter brake rotors have turn out to be thinner. When new brake installations are required on today’s vehicles, the really helpful procedure is to switch the rotors along with new brake Pads. This is to forestall a brake pulsation from probably occurring when making use of brakes which may be hot… and probably warping a rotor. Machining a contemporary brake rotor could take it nearer to its discard restrict, and hasten a warp or pulsation state of affairs. If you ignore your brakes for too lengthy, they provides you with a telltale metallic squealing sound because the rivets holding brake pads in place make contact with brake rotors while stopping.

There is a pure progression concerning noises you hear when the brake pads are carrying. Having your brakes checked regularly is considered one of the many issues you are in a place to do to maintain your automobile in good shape rotor replacement to avoid collisions. Moreover, checking your brakes might help you forestall costlier auto repairs in the long run while preserving you and your beloved ones safe when you are behind the wheel.

Pads may be as little as $39 for a set, and may go as excessive as $120. If your brakes are nearing the tip of their lives, the brake pads will start to squeal due to a “squealing indicator” that’s installed on the pads. There are often vital differences between GM Genuine Parts and aftermarket components. You need to avoid coming to a whole cease through the break-in course of to properly bed your brakes. Otherwise you risk melting the brake pads in opposition to the hot rotors. For one of the best choice of top of the range brake pads, check out our information on the 10 Best Performance Brake Pads.

While value will certainly be a factor in your decision making course of, do not forget that you also wish to guarantee a job nicely carried out. It’ s much better to pay a little bit more and have the job carried out proper than it is to economize and have problems sooner or later. Also keep in mind the quality of the brake pads you purchase or that the mechanic makes use of. While you presumably can go along with cheaper brands, it’s smarter to go along with more trusted brake pad manufacturers. Making certain your brakes are in correct working condition, and replacing worn elements like pads and footwear when the time is true, won’t just prevent cash in the long run. It can even probably save your automobile, and even your life in an accident.

These kinds of rotors were primarily discovered on the entrance of vehicle’s that were outfitted with this new safer braking method. Brake rotors grew to become more predominant on the late sixties and early seventy models and newer. They required wheel bearing repacks and new seals as a routine upkeep process.

However, as every automotive is totally different, and is shaped by the way you drive in addition to the local weather you reside in, it's all the time finest to have annual inspections. A Speedy technician might uncover a flaw in your brake system that enables overseas particles, or water into your brake fluid. We might also discover leaks which could result in a loss of brake fluid. It's far more convenient to have that fixed earlier than it becomes a problem when you're on trip, or driving late at evening on a frosty January evening. Light brake pedal application for lengthy braking intervals could cause the pads and rotors to glaze and create scorching spots. Neglecting brake pad maintenance has no environmental impact.

Receive 12 months of free Roadside Assistance with any paid service on your Audi. Brake rotors have a blue tint or dark brake pad installation spots - Overheated. Our technicians have been trained by Audi and only work on Audi's.

After doing so, pivot the brake caliper upwards and out of the way. When that is carried out, the gauge provides you with an accurate and actual thickness reading on that pad. You can opt service brake to use this on both pads or assume the measurement is about the same for every brake pad. Dirt, heat, moisture, and wear and tear are the purpose for most brake problems.

Most Shimano calipers are one-piece models, so there's really nothing you can take apart, per se. However if you want to pop the pistons out and clear them, you possibly can unhook your caliper, stick a compressor nozzle in the place the hose would go, and blow the pistons out. Just make certain to pad the caliper closely with a rag or towel so that brake fluid doesn't shoot in all places when you use the compressor.

Checking each 12–15 months ensures safety year after 12 months. Your owner’s handbook could have manufacturer tips for your particular make and model. And the longer your stopping distance, the less management you retain as a driver. That creates a risk for you, your passengers, and different drivers elsewhere on the highway. Vibration or pulsation when urgent the brake pedal.

[helpimhyperfixating]

Help! - Jotaro x Reader P1

Where you get turned into a wolf by an enemy Stand user.

Just for context and so you all really realise. Wolves are big. Like… They are big big.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

-

Word Count: 4482

Panic ran through your veins as your senses got overwhelmed.

Noises attacked you from left and right, blaring in your ears one by one. At one moment, a car honked as it drove by and you flinched back, attempting to cover your ears only to fall flat on your chin. You had attempted to sit on your haunches so you could cover both ears but instead lost your balance.

Lifting your head, you shook it a bit before looking down, only to yelp in fright. Your legs were-!?!

Attempting to stand up, you started spinning in circles, trying to look at yourself as you hyperventilated.

“Hang on, mom!” You suddenly picked up on a voice, feeling the ear on top of your head twitch and turn towards it. “I think I hear a dog, it might be hurt.”

Your eyes widened and you frantically looked left and right, trying to find a hiding place. You were in an alley but there was nothing to hide behind.

Before you knew it, a girl appeared at the mouth of the alleyway; she looked to have been about sixteen or seventeen. Her concerned expression turned to surprise, then fear once she laid her eyes on you.

“Mom!” She shouted, a little scared, and you flinched at the loud noise, making her flinch back as well.

“What is it?” Her mother came walking closer, you heard her footsteps around the corner.

“S-Stay quiet, it’s not a dog.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a wolf, not a dog.”

You started looking back and forth, trying to find a way out, an escape, anything. You needed to get out of here and get home or something. But... home right now was the hotel. And you highly doubted you’d be able to get through security and everything looking like this.

“That’s impossible, there are no wolves in Morioh.” The older woman’s voice sounded closer now and you knew she was about to round the corner. And sure enough, a second or two later, she appeared, gasping in fright as she laid her eyes on you.

Your fur shone as a car drove past, illuminating you and the alley briefly and making you squint at the sudden glare.

Just then, a smell reached you. Different from all the other overwhelming scents from before, this one was familiar. It smelled like Jotaro. Normally, you could only smell him when you were standing really close to him or hugging him. But here you were, smelling it while he was nowhere in sight.

You only hesitated for a second, shooting out of the alley a moment later.

The mom and daughter screamed in fright while you just rushed past them, trying to accurately use all four paws to run. It went better than you thought it would go but you did stumble every now and then.

As you ran, you could almost visualise the scent trail, several colours all around you yet that one aquamarine blue scent right in front of you, clearer and more strong than the others.

Several people called out in surprise or shock as you came thundering by, some even having to jump out of the way while your ears turned and twitched to every sound, trying to discern which one was an important one.

You didn’t even realise where you were running and - when you abruptly crossed the street - a truck honked loudly as it sped towards you. You froze as it rapidly approached, shining its headlights on your form and braking at the last possible second. Its tires squealed while you were just locked in place, unable to will your legs to move.

Your breath was fast, even faster than you were used to when you were panicking, feeling your heart beat like crazy, the wolf body making your heart beat, what felt like, three times faster than normal.

The truck driver honked and you ducked low, trying to stay close to the ground on instinct as if that would help in any way. Just then, people started approaching, surrounding you and the truck.

All their voices were a static and you felt yourself panic even more, backing up to the truck while the people were closing in.

Not liking getting boxed in like this, you instinctually puffed up, starting to snarl at those around, making them back away. They may be curious but they at least have self preservation.

Just to get yourself out of there, you turned around and started worming your way under the truck. The people immediately shouted to the driver to turn his vehicle off, lest he harm you and you heard the motor shut down.

You just sat underneath the mechanisms of the car, breathing heavily and squished underneath it. You were probably getting some car grease on the fur on your back but you had bigger things on your mind.

But right then, you smelt the one smell you had been following. Looking through the legs of the people who had circled around the car, you saw him. Jotaro was leaving a shop all the way down the street, his outfit clearly visible for you, even in the dark and so far away.

Even though the people had circled around the van, they had not dared to snuck a peek underneath, unsure of where the wolf was and if they would get snapped at it they did.

Jotaro was starting to walk away and you had to get to him now, lest you lose him.

You quickly looked around and crawled to the spot with the least people, poking your nose out before starting to wiggle from underneath. The people called out to the others and they quickly rushed over, forming a circle again when you had finally managed to get all your body out.

Thinking ‘fuck it’ you just vaulted from your spot and towards the people circling you. A few screams sounded and those in your way quickly jumped to the side, allowing you to pass. The moment you landed back on the ground, you sunk through your front legs, not having expected the weight, and you smacked to the ground, rolling a bit.

“Is it hurt?”

“Stay away from it!”

“Careful!”

Several people talked all at once but you just got up again as fast as possible, taking off down the street immediately, this time more wary of cars.

-

Jotaro was at the end of the street, vaguely seeing the commotion at the van in the distance but not being bothered to check it out. He had too much on his mind to be worrying about regular car crashes. He just wanted to go home, see his wife, and unwind. That was, until a weird bark-whine noise sounded behind him.

Jotaro turned around only for his eyes to widen slightly, seeing the large wolf rushing towards him. He immediately took up a defensive position but the wolf skidded to a stop in front of him, or- it tried to.

Instead, the beast slipped and crashed into the streetlight he was standing next to, the loud metallic bong sounding through the street.

-

You whined in pain as you peeled yourself off of the pole, backing up a few steps and shaking your head to stop your vision from going double before remembering where you were and snapping your head up to Jotaro.

He was looking at you in wary confusion, holding the bag on his arm a little higher, as if he tried to keep it out of your reach.

“Jotaro, help!” You tried to call out to him but it came out as weird yip and whining noises, your jaw snapping shut at the end.

Jotaro, not understanding a thing, just took a few steps back before turning around and walking away, yet you saw he kept a wary eye on you over the back of his shoulder.

You had to find another way to get him to help you and fast.

Tripling past him, you stood right in his path, forcing him to stop. Looking up at him, you stared right into his eyes, hoping that maybe the look in them would be recognisable. Yet Jotaro just looked annoyed.

“Move.” He spoke and you didn’t even twitch, just staying in place. “I don’t have any food for you so get out of here and run along.” Jotaro waved his arm at you to shoo you away and you were forced to jump back a little.

He thought you wanted food, shit. You just sat your butt down, trying to sit like a wolf or dog would sit, trying to come up with a plan in the meantime.

“Did you not hear me?” Jotaro got more and more annoyed, just tired and wanting to go home yet instead being held up by a fucking wolf. “Scram. Go sit by those trash cans and beg for food from there or something.” He casually pointed to his right, glaring right at you.

But then, Jotaro started a little in surprise when the large wolf actually stood up and walked over to the trashcans, sitting down and looking at him with a pleading look, the ears pressed down sadly. He blinked a few times, not having expected it to actually work or the wolf to understand him and listen.

Shrugging, he then just turned around and walked away, hoping that was that.

You watched him walk away and immediately got up again, quickly walking up to him. Not knowing what else to do, you gently nipped at the sleeve of his jacket, taking it in between the teeth at the front of your muzzle and keeping a hold on it as you pulled.

Jotaro sighed, grunting in annoyance as he turned his head to see the wolf holding onto his sleeve. It surprised him how gentle it was.

“Let go.”

Almost immediately, his sleeve was released.

“Why are you following me?”

The wolf sat down.

“Do you want food?”

No visible response.

Moving the grocery bag in his hand, Jotaro saw the wolf eye his movements and when he brought out a piece of ham, it eyed the meat.

Figuring that was it, Jotaro threw it to the side, in the direction of the trash cans from before, but the wolf didn’t even look at it. In fact, after he had taken the ham out, the animal had shifted its gaze back to look at his eyes.

“If you don’t want food, what the fuck do you want?”

You shifted to sit a little bit closer to him, looking up at the man.

“Tch.” He just scoffed and turned away and you immediately shot forward, grabbing onto the cusp of his pants with your teeth again, nearly making him trip. “Fucking-!” He cursed, catching himself. “Just let me go home, you mutt!”

Hearing the word ‘home’ you perked up and immediately let go of his pant-leg, jumping in front of him and trying to wag your tail while leaning your head to the ground, standing in an excited pouncing position, trying your best to copy how you saw dogs do it. (Though the wagging was quite a fail considering you were a wolf and also had no clue how to move the damn thing)

“Sir, be careful!” A police officer came running up, some people carefully following behind.

Jotaro just turned his head casually, stoically looking at the people approaching him and you. You on the other hand, quickly got out of the playful pose and walked backwards, your ears flattening back on your head in nervousness as you then suddenly shot behind Jotaro’s legs, staying low and hiding behind them, practically pressing your nose in between his ankles. Jotaro looked down at you as he felt that, seeing your scared and nervous form as you looked at the police officer.

“D-Don’t turn your back on it!” The officer warned.

“Why?” Jotaro raised an eyebrow and the police officer was a little taken aback.

“Because it’s dangerous?!”

“It’s a dog.” Jotaro deadpanned and your head perked up a bit. He knew something was up with you. Perhaps you had a chance after all.

“No, sir, you don’t understand. It’s a wild wolf. Just slowly walk towards me and we’ll... we’ll find a way to take care of it.” The officer motioned for your husband to slowly walk over to him but he just grumbled and stayed put, pulling his hat over his eyes. “Sir.”

“Shut up.” Jotaro shut him down. Not aggressively but not gently either. “There’s nothing wild about it. It’s a dog that looks like a wolf.”

“I find that hard to believe.”

Jotaro rolled his eyes and turned his upper body back so he could look at you. Your chin was on your paws as you looked up at him and he raised a brow questioningly. You didn’t know what he had in mind, but he was definitely planning something, so you nodded subtly, making him squint a little in suspicion since you definitely understood a silent signal and even answered with one of your own.

“Sit.” Jotaro pointed next to himself and you immediately got up and sat down next to him, right underneath where he was pointing. Looking up, your snout accidentally touched his hand. It felt strange and you curiously sniffed a bit, the scent of Jotaro almost overwhelming but not disturbingly so. It was nice. You didn’t realise you had pressed your snout into his hand until he moved it away, instead placing it on your head and scratching slightly.

“I-“ the officer swallowed a little nervously under the scrutinising gaze of the marine biologist. It was hard to object to the man’s statement, especially when the previously thought dangerous wolf was practically melting under just a small head scratch, the animal almost holding a relaxed smile as it closed its eyes in delight. “So, it is yours, sir?” He cleared his throat awkwardly.

“Yeah, so?” Jotaro stopped scratching your head, crossing his arms.

“Well, it caused some panic running around and nearly got hit by a car, you see?”

“I briefly lost my dog and now I found it. Stop bothering me.” He turned around and walked away from the officer and small crowd that stood behind the man, going down the street. You almost immediately stood up, following after him.

“He doesn’t seem like a dog person.” You heard the officer offhandedly mutter to himself and you snickered a little, the sound coming out more as small short pants. You saw that Jotaro eyed you from the corner of his eye and you just kept in step with him.

Some time passed in silence, with you deep in thought. What on Earth were you supposed to do? How would you explain to him who you were? For how long would you even stay a wolf? Was the Stand user following you or was it a permanent effect?

Suddenly missing a step with one of your paws, you face planted on the curb - hard.

Jotaro stopped walking and looked at you now, butt in the air, front paws awkwardly spilled out around you and eyes closed in - presumably - pain.

Whatever it was, you were not normal and it irked the man to not know. “What are you?” Jotaro spoke up after a bit, seeing you slowly get up. “A Stand? Something else? You’re definitely intelligent.

In response, you just shook your head, looking at the floor. How could you let him know who you were... But then your head shot up as you got an idea.

Jotaro eyed you warily as you tripled up until you were in front of him. Your eyes scanned him until landing on his left hand and Jotaro just stayed still, watching what you were doing.

With slow movements to not scare him off, you leaned forward until your snout was right by his hand. Spacial awareness was hard though and you accidentally bumped your nose into his hand. Deciding to ignore the little mistake, you just turned your head until your nose was pressed against your objective: his wedding ring.

Sticking out your tongue, you licked over the ring, accidentally catching part of his finger and hand as well.

“Stop.” Jotaro almost snarled, reeling his hand back and out of your reach. “That’s disgusting, don’t do that.” He procured a handkerchief from his pocket, wiping his fingers and ring free of saliva, though he slowed down a bit while working on the ring.

You were just begging in your mind now. ‘Please get the hint, please get the hint, please get the hint.’

Jotaro did not say a word but in his mind, the gears were turning. You specifically zeroed in on his ring and licked it. Were you a wolf that just liked metal? Was there another reason to it? He didn’t know what to think but suddenly saw your ears drop to the side, an overall sad look encompassing you.

You were giving up. It was unrealistic to think Jotaro would be able to understand, even if he was smart. Even if Stands had strange and abnormal powers, even this seemed far fetched. ‘Hey I am your wife, right here in front of you, I am just a wolf now, haha!’ No. Of course he wouldn’t believe that, even if you could talk. Maybe you could just follow him around silently, just stay by his side until he realised you were missing and maybe, very maybe he’d just go after the Stand user that did this, thinking they might have kidnapped you or something.

As you were lost in thought, a hand on your head suddenly pulled you out of it and you snapped back into the world, realising what position you were suddenly in.

-

Upon seeing the wolf look so distraught, Jotaro kneeled down on one knee in front of it. He wasn’t sure what compelled him to do so, but he felt the need to comfort the animal. Unconsciously however, it took two steps forward and pressed its forehead into his stomach, the tension that sat in its shoulders leaving slightly and presenting an all too familiar scene for Jotaro.

Time after time flew through the man’s head where he recalled his wife pressing her head into his stomach exactly like this whenever she was sad. She’d wrap her arms around his waist while he would put his hand on her head and let her know he was there and that everything would be okay. It was one of the most intimate gestures between you two for him - on an emotional level.

The mannerisms were exactly the same and there was only one conclusion for Jotaro. So, with a careful move, he lifted his hand and gently placed it down on your head.

-

You jolted a little upon feeling the weight of his hand, yet the warmth and familiarity of it made you press your head harder into his stomach, the fur you now had getting a little in the way of feeling Jotaro’s muscles under his shirt like usual.

“Y/N?” His voice broke the silence and you lifted your head, your heart swelling. Not knowing what else to do, you just nodded your head frantically. “Good grief. What the hell happened to you?”

With how he was now kneeled, your large wolf body made it so your head was nearly on the same height as his, allowing you to easily look into his eyes.

To answer however, you jumped back and stood as straight and stiff as you could, freezing in place.

“A stand?” Jotaro raised a brow in amusement at your display before sighing and shaking his head. “Yare yare, I always hated playing charades.” With that, he lifted himself up and stood back up. “Do you know what the Stand user looked like?” You shook your head no. “Great.” He sighed before motioning you to follow as he started walking again.

Walking up next to him, you trailed along, relief that he figured it out making you hold a skip in your step that made you totally miss Star Platinum sticking out his foot in front of you.

And one second later, you were eating shit.

A yelp left your muzzle and you jumped up a second later, only to see that Jotaro was already jogging away, sending a smirk back at you over his shoulder.

Narrowing your eyes, you got what could only be described as a wolfish grin on your face as you quickly went in pursuit.

With four legs, you really had an advantage over Jotaro, even if his two sticks were ridiculously long and strong. When putting all thought into running, you quickly closed the gap between the two of you that his head start had created and when you were close enough, you pounced at your husband.

One moment he was there, the next he was gone and you ate shit once again.

Rolling over your head a few times you landed on your back, paws in the air to see Jotaro walking up to you, a shit-eating grin on his face.

A chuff left you and Jotaro chuckled. “That was for getting your fur on my clothing.”

In retaliation, you rolled over onto your side and leaned forward, snapping at his legs which forced him to take a step back.

“Oi.”

You just ignored him and shuffled closer, nipping at him again and Jotaro rumbled in annoyance, crouching down and clamping his fingers around your snout, keeping it closed.

“Yare yare, you’re like a child. No biting.” He chastised you and you let out a whine. “You’ve already got the puppy dog eyes? Gimme a break.” He sighed but patted your head a few times before letting go of your muzzle and standing up, grabbing the grocery bag he had momentarily placed down.

Only then did you seem to realise the hotel was already in sight. You turned your head from looking at the building, over to Jotaro.

“If you’re thinking that no dogs are allowed, I don’t care. I’m not going to let you sleep outside. Come on.” He started walking again and you hesitantly followed.

About four minutes of walking and the two of you reached the doors of the hotel. Jotaro walked in without a falter and held the door open for you so you could get in as well although you were still hesitating at the doorstep.

“Are you going to come inside or do I have to drag you by the scruff of your neck?” Jotaro questioned with a raised eyebrow and you squeaked quietly before quickly stepping inside, practically gluing yourself to his right leg the moment you felt the carpet under your paws.

You never really realised how heavily the hotel smelled of lavender. The scent masked the scent of cleaning supplies that you faintly smelled coming from almost every nook and cranny and you snorted a little to try and get your airways free again.

Jotaro glanced down at you when you did, but when you seemed to be fine he just turned his head forward again, walking through the lobby and over to the elevators with you directly by his side the whole time.

“Uhm, sir!” Someone suddenly called out and Jotaro looked back. “Uh, there are no pets allowed in this hotel.” The poor employee weakly swallowed, seeing Jotaro’s harsh glare on him. He was just doing his job but maybe he should value his life more.

“I pay good money, I should be allowed to bring her in here with me.” Jotaro simply spoke and turned around again, continuing to walk to the elevators with not only you in tow, but the terrified employee as well.

“Sir, please. If you don’t stop I’ll have to take this up with management!” The threat was weak thanks to the terrified high pitched tone in which it was said, but you still nervously looked up at Jotaro.

“Your management has already gone home. Now, get the hell out of here and leave me be.” Jotaro simply pressed the elevator button and stepped inside when the door opened, you following behind and awkwardly having to sit; your body too big to stand straight in the elevator with Jotaro there as well.

“Y-Yes sir.” The boy just looked defeated as the doors closed.

“We’re going to have to find a different place for you to stay if you don’t turn back by tomorrow morning. That trick won’t work again.” Jotaro gruffly spoke up after a second, his eyes darting from watching the floor number down to you.

You just let out a rumble in affirmation. You felt for the poor employee but it also felt nice to feel the soft carpeted floor underneath your paws instead of hard concrete.

Just then, the elevator dinged and the doors opened. Jotaro walked out but you were so engrossed with rubbing your paws on the red carpet of the elevator that the doors nearly closed on you again if it wasn’t for Jotaro’s quick reaction to shove his hand in between the doors, keeping them open.

The sudden slam of his hand on the metal doors broke you out of your trance and you sheepishly looked at him, getting up off your haunches and quickly - and guiltily - walking out of the elevator.

“Yare yare daze.”

- - - -

Waking up was a whole new experience.

“Y/N, close your jaw, you’re drooling on the sheets.”

Your husband’s voice roused you from your sleep and you sleepily did as he said, yawning broadly before shutting your mouth. Only then did you realise the noise you made while yawning; the high pitched whine serving to wake you up completely.

You snapped your eyes open to see you were laying on your back, paws - yes, paws, you were still a goddamn wolf - in the air with your neck twisted down. Your body was pressed into Jotaro’s side but you whined quietly, realising you were still not yourself.

In response, Jotaro brought his arm down and gently petted your throat, letting his hand move down a bit to scratch at your chest in between your front paws.

“We’ll figure it out.” He sleepily let out and you sighed, rolling over onto your stomach before crawling closer to your husband and placing your chin on his upper stomach.

“Never thought I’d wake up with a wolf drooling on my arm.” Jotaro chuckled and you placed your front paw over your eyes in embarrassment, making Jotaro rumble out a quiet laugh. “It’s cute, don’t worry.” He teased and you full on yelped in embarrassment now, jumping back and digging your head under the blankets to hide from his gaze.

Jotaro put his hand on your head and patted it softly through the blanket. “Let’s figure out a way to beat the Stand user who did this to you.”

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

[stargazingthenightaway]

See Something You Like? Epilogue

Pairing: Rebels Rex x Reader

Word Count: 2K

Warning: Yearning, teasing

A/N: 😚 😚 For all my lovely readers 💕

Making your way through the mess hall, you see you’ve beaten the lunch rush and quickly bee-line towards the caff station, filling up two mugs and putting them on a tray. Ria had commed you about meeting up on your break, and knowing how busy she was that morning, you decided to have a fresh cup waiting for her. You grab a couple hot plates, thanking the cook, and find a spot not too far from the entrance. As you sit down you keep an eye on the entrance so you can wave Ria over when she gets there. Taking a sip of caff, you settle in your seat and your mind drifts back to last night, and earlier this morning.

Rex had been a most thorough lover, and true to his word, hadn’t finished with you until the early hours of the morning, leaving you both exhausted and satisfied. You feel your face heat up when you think about all the sounds he coaxed out of you, the praises that dripped from his lips as he brought you to orgasm and the tender way he took care of you afterwards, making sure you were alright. What you most enjoyed was how he held you when you both drifted off, arms holding you close as your head rested on his chest, whispering how you were his sweet girl.

You can’t help the giddy smile that covers your face when you recall how grumpy Rex was earlier that morning. He had done his absolute best to persuade you to spend a few more hours with him in bed, but you had a meeting you couldn’t miss, and you had reluctantly left him pouting in the sheets as you got ready. Eventually, he too started getting ready for the day, though not without hinting at all the things he could be doing instead, with you and a mirror, brushing up against you and sneaking kisses when you weren’t paying attention. Needless to say you left your room a blushing mess, with Rex following not far behind, smirk plastered on his face.  

You’re so caught up in your thoughts that you don’t see Ria enter the mess hall and make her way over to the table. "Hello there, sunshine!” She calls out as she sits down, bringing you out of your daydreaming. 

“Ria, hey!” You say, passing her a cup and watching her clutch it to her chest, breathing the scent it in as if the steam alone would give her energy. “Long meeting?”

“You have no idea,” she groans after taking a sip “nerf herders can’t tell the difference between a gear shift and brake pedal.” 

You wince. “Ouch. Well, hopefully your afternoon will get better.” You perk up “Isn’t that new transfer set to arrive today?”

She looks at you suspiciously. “Where did this cheeriness come from?” She eyes you from over the rim of her cup “usually you’re right up there asking what other problems they’ve caused, and if I need help hiding a body.”

“No reason,” you say, laughing “just having a good morning, that’s all.”

Ria takes a moment to give you a look over while you sip your caff, before her eyes widen. “Omg! You got down and did the dirty dance!”

“Ria!” You groan “Do you have to say it like that?”

“What?” She says without remorse, “would you rather I call it the frisky foxtrot? Mattress mambo? Tantric tango?”

“Shhh! Someone will hear you!” You hiss, cheeks heating up as you look fervently around you, “where do you even come up with these things?”

“You’re not denying it,” she gives a little shriek of laughter, wiggling in place “you, my friend, got some good lovin’ and I need all the deets!” She gives you a look, “especially after all the stunts you pulled me into to avoid a certain someone.”

“I do not have to confirm or deny anything” you say, hiding behind your caff.

“You may not confirm anything, but your neck is certainly making a statement.” She leans over to pull the edge of your collar down “that’s quite the necklace you’re wearing there sunshine.”

You can feel your face turning three shades of red as you slap her hand away, hastily pulling the collar of your shirt up. “Ok! Ok, so maybe I had a bit of fun the other night, there’s no need to let the whole base know.”

Ria grins triumphantly “That’s more than just a bit of fun” she says, making the little air quotes “that’s a full on romp with the promise of a repeat” She wiggles her eyebrows comically and you can’t help but laugh, hearing her join in.

“Alright, yes, I did indeed do the dirty dance, as you said” you say once your laughter has died down. 

Ria makes the motion to continue, attention on you. “And? That can’t be all it was or else you wouldn’t be like this.” She motions to all of you “All glowy and really happy.” 

You give her a sly look “Let’s just say that he certainly has the moves to keep you coming back for more.”

Ria squeals and looks about ready to combust with all the questions you can see buzzing around her head. “So are you going to see him again? Or is it fated to be a one-night of lusty wonder?”

While you want to tell her all about Rex, you want to keep him to yourself for a bit longer so you keep your answer simple. “We’ve already planned to meet up again.” You duck your head shyly, smiling. “He makes me happy Ria, really happy.” You fiddle with your cup, looking back up at her “I didn’t think he’d feel the same way, but he does.” Your smile softens as you think of Rex and how he looked when you told him you wanted him by your side for a lifetime. The look of adoration is one you’ll treasure for years to come.

Ria looks at you in wonder, “Wow, he’s the real deal huh?” Watching you nod she squeals again, doing a little happy dance in her seat. “Best. News. Ever!”

A booming voice calls out close by “What’s the best news ladies?”

You and Ria both look over and see Gregor striding to you table, standing next to your seat. “Got yourself more excited than a restless Joopa.”

“No reason,” you say “just girl stuff.”

“But you’re more than welcome to join us.” Ria chimes in, gesturing to the seat. “We’re ‘bout to start venting about the doofs in engineering.” 

You know Ria and Gregor share shifts on the occasion, overseeing repairs and helping out with different teams, so it wasn’t out of the ordinary for Gregor to join you sometimes for meals. 

"Don’t mind if I do.” He sits down, big grin on his face, as he turns to face you. “I was actually looking for ya, figured I’d find ya here with this one.” He jerks his thumb towards Ria.

You point to yourself “Me?”

He nods “Mhmm. Was curious if ya’d seen Rex this morning. He missed training with Wolffe and I, and I thought ya might’ve seen’im”

You sputter and can see Ria giving you a calculated look, so you hurry to give an answer. “I’m not sure, but I thought I saw him when I was heading to the office. It looked like he was making his way towards the training room.” 

Gregor looks at you, a strange look in his eyes, and you try not to fidget in place. That, paired with the look Ria is giving you is making you antsy, and you wonder if you should just make up some excuse about paper work and dash away. Before you can say anything Gregor grins, giving you a thumbs up.

“Glad to hear it, thought he might have gone MIA for a moment there.” He lowers his voice, as if sharing a secret. “Wolffe can sometimes get pretty intense, especially during training. Likes to bring out the chompers if he hasn’t had a good meal.” He laughs at the looks you and Ria give him. “By the way, Rex said he wanted to talk to ya yesterday. Did he find ya?"

“Yes, down at the shooting range.” You huff, “we actually ended up having a bit of a competition, see who could hit the most targets without looking.”

Gregor looks intrigued “Oh? How’d that go for ya?” 

“l ate blaster dust.” You grin wryly “Let’s just say I won’t be challenging Rex to a shoot out anytime soon. Didn’t even stand a chance.”

“Was it the C-501 sim?” He asks. When you nod, he laughs “Ha! of course he’d win that one.”

“Oh?” You say confused, “Why’s that? It's only recently been added.”

“That’s because it was designed for us clones, way back on Kamino.” He leans in conspiratorially, “What the Kaminii didn’t realize was that it was too easy, so we ended up getting a little creative with it.”

“Creative how?” Ria leaned forward eagerly, soaking up this new information. You have to admit you’re intrigued as well. 

Gregor was really getting into in now. Checking to see there were no other eavesdroppers, he huddles the two of you closer. “Well, there were the usual things like spinning in place before firing, making noise before a shot,” he counts them off on his fingers “shooting from someones back, doing a handstand.” 

You and Ria just stare at him as he continues on his list. “But the best was hitting the targets without looking.” Here Gregor starts to grin, as if he was watching it himself “and no one was better then good’ol Rex." 

“Really!?” Ria jumps in before you can comment, “How did he do it? Blindfolded? Eyes closed?” She’s practically climbing out of her seat to get to him, not that she’s noticed. 

Gregor pushes his chair back to give himself some more room. “Well,” he says as he starts miming the actions. “He’d start off by facing the range, then he’d turn to his opponent. He’d make sure to look them straight in the eyes, something about establishing dominance, and then BLAM! Start firing each target.” He gives a hearty laugh “I’m not surprised ya didn’t win, he’s the reigning champ. No one has beaten him.”

Ria’s babbling on excitedly to Gregor, wanting to know all his secrets of the sims and training, but your mind has zoned out.

Reigning Champ? Never beaten? He already knew he was going to win, even before you had set the bet. You give a small huff of laughter, thinking back on his confidence, how easily he set you up in his trap. Well, well, you think to yourself looks like I got played for keeps. 

Your musing are interrupted when you hear Gregor call out a greeting to a couple rebels who walked into the room.

“Wolffe! Rex! Come over’ere!” He waves his arm wildly, as they make their way over.

You can’t help but stare as he makes his way over, a slight swagger in his steps. One could presume it’s just how he carries himself, with his military upbringing, but you know better. That’s the walk of a man who finally has what he wants, and is not afraid to show it. His eyes linger on you neck before meeting yours, a smirk pulling on his lips.

You smile back, mind already working out your next challenge. You were your town’s best racer for five seasons, before you joined the rebellion, and the base did have a couple racers lying around. Why not even the odds? Winner takes all.

Rex sits across from you, and you tilt your head to the side, just enough that he can see the marks on your neck, the others engaged in their own conversation. The look you give him sends his heart beating faster, the calculated look in your eyes promising an enticing reward. Knowing his attention is on you, you quickly mouth best two out of three? While he doesn’t respond, his eyes tell you his answer, sending a thrill to your core.

Challenge accepted.

Tag List  @samrubio @justanotherstarwarswhore @bvcketfvcker @grumpymuffinmama @justanothersadperson93 @fat-zygerrian @deewithani @idolized-sea-salt @i-am-bad-at-blogs

Let me know if you would like to be added to the tag list.

[not-me-simping-for-blasty]

Train Cars and Sun Spots - Kaminari Denki

—/—

You think he’s beautiful.

A disarming, reckless sort of beautiful as he barrels into the train, jumping headfirst through the doors just seconds from closing. He erupts into a flurry of fidgeting as he skids to a stop, one hand patting down his wild blonde hair and the other dusting off his sweats. It’s like he can’t sit still. Like he’s got an itch in his skin that’s shifting his weight around, balancing on one foot and then the other- rinse and repeat as he grabs onto the handrail above his head for stability.

Another second passes and then he’s pulling a plastic water bottle from his bag, twisting it open and crinkling the plastic. It seems to you that that he’s trying to make as much noise possible, but then you notice his headphones. They’re black and yellow, undeniably playing at full blast in his ears. You then decide it’s much more likely that he just can’t hear himself- that he somehow doesn’t realize how much of a scene he’s making in the otherwise quiet train car.

You find it a little refreshing, him seemingly appearing out of nowhere. You’d been riding this train for weeks now, to and from school, and you’d seen the same people day after day. The same old businessmen and their same old brief-cases and their same old silence. Not him though- never him and his noise. You were sure you’d remember hearing someone as loud as him.

Still, you try not to stare.

Although, you suppose, it wouldn’t really matter. He probably wouldn’t be able to pick you out of all the other people staring. It’s like he’s got the entire train car arrested and staggered; all eyes stuck on the strange boy who was moving far too much for a 7:00AM commute.

Shifting in your seat, you balanced your book higher in your hands. You hoped that by just barely skimming your eyes over the top, hiding inconspicuously behind the pages, you could look and not be noticed.

You were wrong.

When you glance over at him, he’s already looking at you. He’s got eyes like molten gold, and when he smiles they crinkle closed into happy little slits. That smile is easy and unrelenting when he pushes away from the handrail, hands shoved into his pockets as he nears.

“Hey there!”

His words are friendly, but god, if his voice isn’t loud. You wince, beginning to think that you’d severely underestimated the volume of his music. You’re sure now that it absolutely must be bursting his eardrums.

“Oh-“ He looks sheepish. Then he’s yanking the headphones from his ears, and dropping into the seat next to you. “Too loud, right? Sorry! Didn’t realize.”

You’re stunned.

At first, it seemed unbelievable that this conversation could’ve arised from just a single glance; but then you look a little closer, at his shifting eyebrows and his grin that’s colored shades of flirtatious and it’s a little more believeable. You realize quickly that’s all it ever would’ve taken with him- A single look.

“I’m Kaminari.” He announces confidently, your silence not deterring him in the slightest. “Kaminari Denki.”

“Oh. Okay. Um, hi?”

“Hi!” He greets again, and then he’s pulling that same water bottle from his back. It’s crinkling and half-empty and he’s extending it to you. “Want some?”

It’s in the way his eyebrows wiggle, the mischeivous glint in his eyes- you can see his intentions plastered across his face. The water bottle’s just a front for an indirect kiss. Quite literally the oldest trick in the book.

You want to roll your eyes, but then you look at him again. At his bright eyes and long lashes and shaggy hair falling softly over his forehead. He’s the sort of pretty that gives a lot of second chances- you were no exception to that rule.

“No thanks.” You laugh, easily dazzled by his sunshine smile. You raise a palm to push the bottle away. “Keep it to yourself, yeah?”

“Aww, but you’re too cute not to share with!”

The line rolls off his tongue smooth and easy, and you’re sure now- Kaminari’s a flirt. A shameless, brazen one dripping honey between his words as he fluffs his hair. It’s all a little too natural, a little too practiced. It takes only seconds, and you know definitively that you’re far from the first girl he’s offered his water to.

He’s still cute though, if only in a fleeting way, so you decide to humor him. It’s not like you’ve got anything more pressing to attend to.

“Mhm. And just how often do you use that line, huh?” You ask, rolling your eyes playfully.

“I-“ He starts, but then he’s slouching into the seat laughing. “Yeah, maybe not my best work. Meant it though.”

“I’m sure you did.”

“No, really! I did!”

You look at him again.

Kaminari’s straightened himself, eyes earnest and smile kind as he gazes back. He’s fiddling with the strings on his sweatshirt, idly twirling them between his fingers. It’s a human gesture. Unrehearsed and unpracticed and seemingly only for your eyes. You begin to wonder if that’s his real tactic- coming on strong just to melt into warm, sun-soaked softness.

“Alright. I believe you. Maybe.” You say. “But you’re on thin ice, Kaminari.”

“I’ll take it!” He fist-bumps the air. “See normally, I’d be totally crashing and burning by now!”

“So you are admitting I’m not the first girl you’ve tried that on?”

“What I- Okay. Yes? Maybe?” He laughs nervously, hand once again twirling his sweatshirt strings. “In my defense, I’m not the smartest guy, alright?”

“Nor the quietest either.”

“What?”

He’s got his head turned, cocked to the side as he blinks slowly at you. You think he looks like a confused puppy.

“You practically screamed at me when you said hi.” You tell him easily, letting an amused smile crawl across your lips. “Kinda thought I was being yelled at for a second.”

“Oh. Yeah, sorry! Really! I didn’t mean to do that.”

“It’s okay. Can I give you just a little advice, though?”

“Sure?”

“Don’t scream at the next girl and then immeadiately offer her something to drink. That’s generally pretty suspicious.”

You watch the light leave Kaminari’s eyes and then he folds in his seat. He snaps at the waist, dropping his face into his palms and letting out a theatric groan.

“God, I messed this up.” He whines, peeking at you through his fingers. “Messed up real bad, didn’t I?”

“A little,” You laugh. “But it’s alright.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. You’re good.”

He smiles then, so relieved and happy and just downright giddy that it nearly blinds you. It’s the kind of smile that makes you think he swallowed the sun; like rays of light were bursting through the tiny gaps in his teeth.

“So, what’s your name then?” He asks.

“L/n Y/n.”

“Y/n. Hmm, I like it.” He sighs happily. “Pretty.”

“That’s my first name.”

“I know.” He grins, all pearly whites and crows feet. You think he’s got a dangerous smile- one that lets him get away with anything. “Figured we’re close enough for that, right?”

“I’ve known you for two minutes.”

“Hey, 2 minutes, 2 hours, 2 years- who’s counting?”

“Me.”

“Okay, well good then.” He snickers. “Because I’m like, really bad at math- Wait. Shit. Should I have told you that?”

“Probably not.”

“Man, I am bad at this.” He whines. His knees knock into yours when he throws himself back into his seat. “It’s not my fault, alright? Usually I never get this this far with girls like you.”

“Girls like me?”

“Mhm. Cute ones.”

“Oh my god.” You roll your eyes, only so forgiving. “Really laying it on thick, huh?”

“For sure. My stop’s next so I gotta make sure you actually like me at some point in the next few minutes.”

Something evil slithers into your mind, and you’re smirking when you turn toward him. There’s just an inkling, a tiny little theory in your head, and you want to test it.

“Who said I didn’t already like you?”

Kaminari jumps, his cheeks reddening by the second. There’s nothing cool or composed about him and your theory is confirmed.

Kaminari is a dork. A massive, massive, dork desperately pretending to be a cool guy.

“I- what? You like me?” He asks excitedly, voice rising higher. “Seriously? Like, actually?”

“Sure.” You giggle. “You seem pretty harmless, all things considered.”

“That’s- is that a compliment?” He asks playfully, squinting his eyes at you. “Because harmless wasn’t exactly what I was going for.”

“Oh, so you were trying to creep me out?”

“No!” He shakes his head, cheeks slightly flushing as he laughs.

You giggle too, unable to help yourself. Kaminari really is cute, a lot more so when he’s not recycling tired lines.

“You’re mean.” He smiles something small and pleased. “I like it.”

Suddenly the train car jolts, brakes squeaking and squealing as it skids to a stop. You rock forward with the force, and Kaminari knocks his shoulders into yours. When you look at his face, he’s got that mischevious glint back in his eyes, as he bites down on his lip. A second passes and then he touches his shoulders into yours again.

“Really sorry.” He smirks. “Bumpy ride, you know?”

You roll your eyes again, but you are actually feeling a bit charmed. He’s got a sneaky way of buttering people up, you realize- of somehow weaponizing his own embarrassment.

“But I actually do have to go.” He stands, and then he’s pressing his hands together and winking. “I’ll see you here same time tomorrow, right?”

“I don’t know, are you gonna yell at me again?”

“Absolutely! Gottta yell at all the pretty girls, you know?”

“Stop.” You laugh, blushing. You nod towards the doors. “I’ll be here, but go. Door’s gonna close, you dork.”

Kaminari nods and then he’s shoving his headphones back in, still crinkling that water between his fingers. There’s nothing quiet about him as he leaves and you come to think that maybe that’s how he really gets you- it’s not with lines or indirect kisses or grace, it’s with air that seems uncomfortably vacant when he leaves. It’s with the vaccuum he leaves behind.

You watch the doors close after him, but he’s stops on the platform, shooting you a thumbs up through the window. There’s a goofy grin plastered across his face, wide and sunny and brillant. It’s the kind of smile that leaves you wondering if Kaminari knows just how brightly he shines.

When the train kicks into motion again, you’re smiling too, rubbing your eyes as you blink away the sun spots he left behind.

//—//

jus a lil somethin for denki,, as a ~treat~,,, may or may not turn this into a tiny lil series we’ll see :))))

[five-rivers]

Cold Case

So, this is a continuation of Interview With a Ghost, my corpse AU.  Sort of.  Lots of outsider perspective.  

But, I’m too lazy to hunt down the tumblr links.  So.  Here’s the AO3 link to the series.  

.

.

.

McGee braced himself before getting out of his car and walking into the precinct.  He’d heard all the jokes before, all the mindless digs at his name, and he liked to think that he’d grown a thick skin in response, but part of him still flinched every time.  

Plus, there was a reason he’d been sent to Amity Park.  That reason being the incredibly suspicious crime rate.  That is, the just shy of nonexistent crime rate.  Also, the billionaire mayor that had popped up out of nowhere.  And the high road repair and park maintenance bills.  

Oh, yeah, and the giant murder investigation that had just.  Disappeared.

The county wanted answers.  So, they sent McGee.  Of course, they didn’t tell the Amity Park Police Department that.  As far as they knew, he was just a transfer. Someone being shifted from one department to another.  

So, yeah.  Bracing.  Just like the wind.  Ouch, it was cold.  McGee wrapped his coat more closely around himself and began jogging through the otherwise deserted parking garage.  

The… underground parking garage.  Wind?  

McGee stopped and turned in place, trying to see where the breeze could have possibly come from.  There weren’t exactly any windows down here.  

Feeling more cautious, but not knowing why, McGee made his way more slowly to the elevator door and hit the call button.  The doors opened immediately.  Inside, a speaker tried to play music, but what came out of it was mostly ear-tearing static.  

Well.  If APPD was getting paid off by a mob or the town was skimming from road funds, they certainly weren’t using their ill-gotten gains on the elevators.  

When the doors opened, McGee was hit with a blast of warm air and Christmas music.  He kept his face carefully blank.  It had only just become December, and the police station was… it was… Well. McGee would have to call it ‘decked out,’ no matter how much he abhorred the phrase.  

… Why were there so many menorahs?

“Hey, are you John McGee?”

“Yes, that’s me,” said McGee, turning to face a remarkably plain man in a button-down shirt and a pullover sweater.  

The man had a pair of novelty felt antlers on his head.  They were decorated with bells.  How unprofessional.

“I’m Collins.  We’ll probably be working together at some point.  Same department.”

“Homicide?”

Collins raised his eyebrows.  “I don’t know what you were told, but we don’t have enough homicides to warrant a dedicated homicide department.  We get a one or two mysterious deaths every month, but it always turns out to be, like, anaphylaxis or something.”  He brought a mug to his lips and sipped slowly.  “Mostly we do vice, theft, fraud, and missing persons. Not much of that last one, either. Oh, we had an arson one time.  But it turned out it wasn’t really arson. Anyway, let’s get you checked in, and hopefully Patterson will be here by the time Captain Jones is done with you.”

“Patterson?”

“My partner.  You know, you being here gives us an odd number of detectives.  That’s going to be weird.”  He sipped from his mug again.  “Maybe we’ll promote someone.  Not Cameron Daily, though.”  Collins stared into the middle distance.  “No. Not Cameron Daily.  Love that man. He’s got to stay in tech support.”

“The captain?” prompted McGee.  

“Hah.  Yeah. You have to brave the secretaries, first.”  Collins patted McGee on the shoulder, and McGee suppressed the impulse to shake him off. “Good luck.  At least this is going to be a quiet month, right?”

.

McGee spent what was probably far too much time pondering what Collins had meant by ‘it’s going to be a quiet month.’  Did the APPD’s arrangement with the local criminals (because there had to be an arrangement) include forewarning concerning the crimes they did deign to investigate?  Or did they have statistics that indicated December was a low-crime time for Amity Park?

Orientation was highly typical, as far as these things went.  The only oddity were the advertisements and promotional pictures for the local tourist trap tapped up all over half the captain’s office.  Was the man a fan?  Did he believe in that ghost nonsense?  Was it some kind of bizarre joke?

At least the Christmas plague hadn’t made it this far.

“Right, now that we’ve got that part out of the way, let’s move on.  We normally like an even number of detectives, but the county moved you over so fast we couldn’t get you a partner, and no one is retiring.”  Jones rolled his shoulders and fixed McGee with a very sharp gaze.  “Do you know why the county was so… insistent with your transfer?”

Ah.  So, the captain was suspicious.  Time to put that backstory to good use.  

“Honestly, sir, I embarrassed someone, and I think they just spun the wheel on how to get rid of me.”

“Mhm.  See, usually when they do that, they pick from departments that actually put in requests for extra personnel.  We haven’t.”

“I think the main concern was just to keep me away.”

“I see.”  The level of suspicion in the man’s eyes did not change.  “You’re going to be with Patterson and Collins until you get your feet under you and we decide what to do about the partner situation. If the county will even let us out another detective on payroll.  Consider yourself on probation as far as whatever it is you’re doing with the county. Don’t put my detectives in danger.”

“Sir—”

“Whatever excuse you have, I don’t want to hear it. Go talk to Collins.  I know you met him.  Patterson probably isn’t here yet.”

.

Collins stood next to a woman in a coat with a long dark braid.  Both of their backs were to McGee.  He could see that they were talking to one another, making tight little gestures with their hands near their chests.  All the other occupants of the room stared at them without a modicum of shame.  

“—until he sees his first fight?  We’re supposed to babysit him until January?  We won’t be able to talk about anything!”

“Well, if you’d been on time, maybe we could have convinced the captain not to—”

Someone behind McGee cleared their throat. Loudly.  Collins and the woman turned, sheepishly.  

“Oh.  McGee. McGee, this is Patterson. Patterson, this is McGee.  You’ll be working with us, apparently.”

“Hopefully, I’ll be able to get out of your hair before too long,” said McGee.

“Don’t count on it.  How long have you been in town?” asked Patterson.  

“Only since yesterday.  Why?”

“We’re showing you around,” said Patterson, snatching the antlers from Collins’s head.  

“Consider it your last bit of freedom before you’re condemned to paperwork,” said Collins.  

.

Amity Park was odd, McGee decided.  

It wasn’t just the clashing but equally enthusiastic Halloween and Christmas decorations, the omnipresent construction, and the worrying number of holes in the road (really, there was no way the road repair budget was actually getting used on the roads).  There was something else.  Something McGee couldn’t put his finger on.  Something—

He did a double-take.  Were those two cosplaying the Ghostbusters?  Why?

How seriously did these people take their tourist trap nonsense?

“What are Jack and Maddie doing out?” asked Patterson.

“I don’t know,” said Collins.  He tilted his head to one side and pulled into a nearby convenience store parking lot.  “You’d think they’d be told; December is a quiet month.”

“Mhm.  Maybe they didn’t believe it?”

“They can be stubborn sometimes,” mused Collins. “But it would be nice if there was some action.”  He pulled the parking brake.  “You want to introduce McGee to the local celebrities?”

A look of indescribable disgust appeared on Patterson’s face.  “Why don’t you introduce them?”

“I did that last time.”

“No, you didn’t.  You rang their doorbell and then ran like the coward you are.”

Collins, without any hint of repentance, shrugged. “Wouldn’t you do the same?”

“This is different,” she protested.  “This isn’t just any new resident.  This is a coworker.  A coworker who isn’t going to see that kind of action for a whole month.”

“Action?” asked McGee.  This felt perilously close to what he’d been tasked to find out.  

“You’ll find out in a month,” said Collins. “Assuming you last that long.”

McGee frowned, and decided to take another risk and prompt the pair further.  “I know you have a low crime rate here,” he said, “but I’m sure there will be something for us to investigate before the end of the month.”

“Well, yeah,” said Collins.  “We don’t get paid for doing nothing.”

There was a sharp rap on the window, and everyone jumped.  God. It was just some kid.  McGee put a hand over his heart and tried not to think too hard about the time he had almost been killed in his car by a dirty cop and his gangster friends.

Collins rolled the window down, letting in a gust of frigid wind.  

“Hi, detectives!” chirped the teen.  “I heard you got a new guy!”

Oh.  That was interesting.  Was the local gang using children as in-betweens?

“Yep,” said Patterson.  “This is McGee.  McGee, this is Danny, the only sane Fenton.”

Danny tipped his head to the side and squinted. “I think that title needs to go to Jazz.”

“Danny, I hate to break it to you, but your sister is a lunatic,” said Patterson, completely serious.  

“Come on, you’re just saying that,” said Danny, staring openly at McGee.  

Did this kid blink?

“Anyway, I’ve introduced McGee to one Fenton, you get to do the others,” said Patterson, poking Collins in the ribs.

“Danny doesn’t count,” protested Collins, squirming. “He’s sane, like you said.”

“You’ll have to be fast.  Mom and Dad are like three blocks down the street chasing…”  He trailed off.  “Well, they think they’re chasing something, anyway.  Transient noise on their latest EMF reader.”  He rolled his eyes and finally blinked.  

“Think they might actually get anything?” asked Patterson.

“Nothing with a mind,” said Danny.  “Might have to play animal control soon, though.”  There was a loud crash and a squeal of rubber, followed by distant but still deafening engine noises.  Danny winced.  “Can you please give them a fine for driving around in that thing?”

“They have a special permit,” said Collins, shrugging.  “Straight from the mayor.  Nothing we can do.”

“I will bribe you to do something.”

McGee choked.

“With what?” asked Collins.  “You’re a penniless middle schooler.”

“Excuse you,” said Danny, crossing his arms. “You know I’m in high school.”

There was another crash.  

“Are you sure they haven’t found anything?” asked Patterson, leaning forward.  

“Absolutely positive,” said Danny.  He sighed.  “I should probably go, though.”

“Okay, have fun, Danny!”

“Don’t think you’re getting out of introductions, Patterson,” grumbled Collins.  

.

“Alright,” said Collins, opening a narrow door and turning on the buzzing yellow light within.  “Your kingdom awaits!”  He gestured grandly, disrupting clouds of dust.  “You’ll be entering old cases into the system.  Did Cameron Daily show you how?”

McGee’s lips twisted at the memory of the computer tech.  “Yes,” he said.  

“Yeah, Cameron gets that reaction,” said Collins, thumping McGee on the back.  “If it makes you feel better, he’s usually in charge of keeping track of the cults. Did he tell you about the VHS evidence?”

“The cults?”

“Yep.  You’ll learn about those later.  VHS?”

“Yes, he told me how to handle the VHS.”

“Great.  So, Patterson and I will be working on case paperwork in the main room, if you have any questions, come get us, okay?”

“I will,” said McGee.  

Collins nodded.  “If we wind up being assigned a case, we’ll come get you.”  He absentmindedly rubbed his shoulder.  “The captain probably won’t give us anything today. Oh, and if Mayor Masters drops in, redirect him to the front desk.  There’s no reason for him to be back here.”

There was a good deal of hostility in Collins’ tone. Interesting.  

“Do you not get along with the mayor?”

“We get along fine,” said Collins.  “He just oversteps his authority, sometimes.”

“I… see.”

“Not yet you don’t,” said Collins, softly, before turning to walk away.  A “Good luck” was tossed casually over the man’s shoulder and seemed to echo in the air despite the hall being far too small for that to happen.  

McGee turned to his work and smiled.  They shouldn’t have left him alone with the records. This was where he did his best work. There was always a paper trail somewhere.  

He opened the department-issued laptop and brought up the digital filing system.  

It was odd, though.  He’d spent years in the police, and he’d never heard of Fenton & Foley Information Systems.  

.

The department computer filing system was a miracle.  McGee meant that completely, as a connoisseur of filing systems.  He wondered if he could get the county to adopt it, assuming it didn’t tie back to the mob or something equally unsavory.  

On the other hand, it was only a couple months old, by the looks of it.  It was, therefore, mostly empty, as compared to the almost infinite number of filing boxes in the record room.  

The record room was not well organized.  In fact, it was barely organized at all.  Several of the boxes looked like they’d been beaten with a bat, others were singed.  A few dripped with something sticky and green. One or two looked as though they’d been drenched in water and then left to dry in a dark, damp room.  Only about half of them were labeled.  

To top it off, towards the beginning he’d found a post-it that had said: Boxy, if you steal these again, I’m going to leave you in the thermos for a week.  -Phantom

The people here were way too into their tourist trap shenanigans.  Unless they weren’t just tourist trap shenanigans.  Unless they were a front.  

He’d put that on his list of things to investigate.

But first, first, he was going to find the records for the murder that was recently swept under the table.

The newest boxes, despite being reasonably intact and therefore unique, weren’t easy to find, but he was able to drag them out and sit down with his laptop.  He could enter as he searched, and thereby give the illusion that he was a completely normal transfer more credence.  

Except.

Except.  The records for that murder didn’t seem to exist.  Not even in the cold case box.

“Hey.”

McGee jumped.  Patterson was standing behind him, holding two paper coffee cups.  

“How’s it going?” she asked.  “I know these records are hell.”

“Fine,” he said.  

“Coffee?”

“Sure.”  He took the offered cup from her.  “Forgive me if I’m wrong,” he said, “but when I was working up at county, I heard that you had a murder case here, recently?  You dug up a teen’s body?”

“Oh, yeah.”  Patterson was unperturbed.  “Yeah, that was pretty exciting.  Collins and I were on that.”

“I can’t seem to find the records for it.”

“Yeah.  Well, there wasn’t any foul play.”  Patterson shrugged.  

“Wasn’t he found buried in a public park?”

“Well, aren’t you informed,” said Patterson. She sipped her coffee aggressively through the plastic stirring straw.  

“So, you found an illegally buried teenager’s corpse and just… dropped it?”

“We investigated it,” said Patterson.  “There wasn’t anything there.  Case was cold even without that.”  Another long, aggressive sip.  She couldn’t possibly be getting any coffee up through that straw.  It had to be mostly air.  

This was the most bizarre intimidation tactic McGee had ever come across in his entire life.  This was saying something.  Once he’d worked with a man who’d pretend to have the flu during interrogations.  

“You should still have records for the investigation.”

Patterson shrugged.  “You’d have to ask Captain Jones about that.  Anyway, I brought a bunch of tapes for you, too.  You’ll have to rewind them by hand, though, when you finally get to them.”  Another sip. “Are you planning on doing the salvage boxes?”

“The what?”

“The salvage boxes.  The ones that got fished out of the lake.  Wouldn’t blame you if you weren’t.  Just curious.”

“I’m- They were in a lake?  Why?”

“Stick around and find out,” said Patterson.  “Did Masters come bother you yet?”

“Mayor Masters?”

“The one and only,” said Patterson, raising her coffee in a mock toast.  

“Why would he come here?”

“Because you’re new, and theoretically a weak link. Oh, yeah.  One more thing.  I know your check-out time is in half an hour, but come back around eight, okay?”

“Why?”

“Reasons.”

“Are you hazing me?”

“That’s what the salvage boxes are for,” said Patterson.  “Come back at eight.  Bye.” She waved as she left.  

Great.  What was he supposed to do about that?

.

He didn’t go home after checking out. Instead, he walked around town.  Patterson and Collins’ tour had been… interesting. Not terribly informative.  They had given him an overview of various restaurants, ‘paranormal hotspots,’ and places where dumb kids gathered to experiment with drugs of dubious legality.  

But they had avoided certain parts of town.  McGee had noticed.  

True, some of that was likely coincidence, but McGee had never heard of a public cemetery that wasn’t the site of something shady. Sure, a good caretaker would chase off anyone messing around in daylight, but cemeteries and graveyards just attracted trouble.  Even if that trouble was just the local goth kids running around while high out of their minds.  

But this cemetery, evidently, is different. Because there’s an unholy amount of people there for something that supposedly hallowed ground.  Is this also part of the weird ghost-theme the place had going for itself?  Were those tourists?  In the graveyard?  

That seemed to be in remarkably poor taste.  

McGee pushed his hands deeper into his pockets and lengthened his stride.  This whole town was in poor taste.  

Oddly, everyone seemed to be gathered around the same grave.  Maybe it was a funeral?  No, the ground in front of the headstone was long since patted firm, and the headstone, while obviously fairly new, had some evidence of weathering even from a distance.

Had there been a celebration today?  Memorial Day wasn’t today, was it?  McGee always lost track of those fiddly little holidays.

Huh.  The headstone was blank.

“Excuse me,” he said to a nearby woman.  “Do you know who was buried here?”

“You… don’t know?” she asked, eyes wide with surprise.  

McGee grinned.  “I’m new in town, I’m afraid, and I just saw all these people here… I’m curious, I guess.”

“Oh,” said the woman.  She looked away, every part of her body language screaming that she was coming up with a story to feed him.  A lie.  Or, at least, deciding which lie to use.  “Well, there was a body found a few months ago?  No one ever identified him, so… He was buried here?  We just, um.  It was sad, you know?  You’ll probably hear more about it if you stick around.”

Despite almost everything she said being a statement, she still managed to make everything but the last sentence sound like a question.  

Even if it was a lie…

“I hadn’t, actually.  Can you tell me what happened?”

… Maybe it was just what McGee needed.