#this post brought to you by: I was forced to watch a god’s not dead 2 clip in sunday school and it was just…ugh

[brontes]

Gonna get in trouble at church because I genuinely don’t think “Christian” media should exist as a genre. I think Christians should write good and even excellent stories about the nature of the human condition and if they truly follow Jesus the evidence of that joy and wisdom and goodness will pervade whatever they make whether they like it or not. Stop worrying about what you want people to learn like it’s a lesson and just say something true and beautiful.

And as an audience, stop being afraid of stories that might not agree with you and seek things that are good and true and beautiful.

[koiiiji]

halloween special! fantasy AU

tw ; long post, hints of unhealthy behaviour

starring ; Sangho Choi, Yoo Wooin, Joker, Kwon Hyuk, Chris d'Char

author's note i feel like i went a little too far.... MDNI!!! AGELESS/EMPTY BLOGS DNI, I WILL BLOCK YOU

Sangho Choi

dark elf

the aftermath of the battle lay heavy on the camp. bodies of the wounded were scattered across the muddy grounds, the air thick with the scent of blood and ash. Sangho strode through the chaos, his armor still smeared with grime and blood, his expression unreadable, calm as always. the Moriquendi (dark elves) commander moved like a force of nature, cold and unwavering — a stark contrast to the exhaustion that gripped his troops.

he had led them to victory, but at a cost. the dead outnumbered the living, both the humans and dwarves who fought alongside them counted their losses, and just as the Moriquendi mourned dead ones in silence. Sangho, ever composed, was the eye of the storm, his reputation as a warrior known throughout the realms. despite the losses, his people looked to him with deep respect. they always had.

he had earned that respect — not through birthright or privilege, but through sheer strength and leadership. the Moriquendi might have been forsaken by the gods, forgotten and separated for centuries, but Sangho had become their pillar of power, their anchor, the one brought them all together again. his connection to his people was ironclad, built not on divine grace, but on blood, grit, and unrelenting will.

Sangho had no need for magic, for poetry, for the lofty ideals of the highest elves. he had the blade. and that was enough.

but as the silver banners of the Calaquendi approached the camp, a bitterness stirred in his chest. he stood tall, his posture rigid as he watched them ride in — untouched by the dirt, by the blood. their horses were pristine, their armor shining like the stars, and their faces were serene, as if the horrors of war had never touched them.

they hadn’t fought in this battle. they had only come now, after the dust had settled, with their supplies, their medicines, their immaculate presence. it was an insult, in a way, a reminder that they saw themselves as above it all.

but it wasn’t the Calaquendi warriors that made his jaw tighten.

it was you.

you rode at the front of the procession on her snow-white horse, a figure of grace and elegance. the princess. your silver hair cascaded down your back, catching the last rays of the setting sun, and your soft eyes surveyed the camp with a quiet sadness. you was everything the Calaquendi were — untouched, unearthly, and so far removed from the blood and dirt that clung to Sangho and his people.

it had been years since he had last seen you, but the sight of you was enough to stir something deep within him. something he had long tried to bury...

he had been a young elf then, barely into his teenage years, when he had been granted the rare privilege to train under the Calaquendi’s finest warriors. it had been an honor, or so everyone had told him. a rare opportunity for a Moriquendi to learn from the higher elves, to study the art of combat, leadership, and strategy.

they had treated him like a curiosity — an outsider, lower. he had heard the whispers, felt the judgment. the older elves had made no effort to hide their disdain for the Moriquendi, for the path they had chosen long ago.

but you had been different. you had shown him kindness, even as a child. your curiosity about him had seemed genuine, your warmth in stark contrast to the cold indifference of her people.

you had even tried to teach him magic once, your face full of innocent excitement. "it’s simple, Sangho," you had said, hand glowing with a soft, golden light. but the magic had never come for him. his people had no connection to it, no divine light in their veins. the magic that flowed so easily for you would never be his. he had felt like a shadow in your presence, a reminder of the gulf between them.

and though you had never mocked him for it, it had planted a seed of resentment in him that had only grown with time.

Sangho tore his gaze away from you as your contingent dismounted. his expression remained cold, controlled. he had long mastered the art of concealing his thoughts, of keeping his emotions locked behind a calm exterior. but seeing you again — untouched by the war that had scarred him and his people — it stirred something dark inside him. a flicker of jealousy. of anger.

and yet, something else.

you approached the gathered commanders, your voice soft but clear as you addressed them. "we have come to help," you said, tone calm, diplomatic. "our healers will tend to your wounded. we have brought provisions, weapons, and aid for the battles ahead."

Sangho stood at a distance, watching you as you spoke. his armor was still stained with the blood of his enemies, a stark contrast to your pristine appearance.

and as he watched you, that familiar ache stirred in his chest, the same one he had felt all those years ago when you had smiled at him and tried to teach him what he could never possess. you was everything he resented, everything he envied.

and yet, he could never bring himself to hate you.

you caught his gaze, soft eyes meeting his across the camp. for a moment, the world seemed to still. your lips curved into a small, familiar smile, the kind you had given him all those years ago — full of warmth, of recognition.

"Commander," you greeted him, voice gentle echoed in his head. the sound of your voice, calling his title in his head, sent a chill down his spine.

he inclined his head slightly, his expression remaining cold, though his heart raced beneath the surface. "Princess," he replied, his voice low, edged with a bitterness.

Yoo Wooin

pirate

the cliffs were a place of solitude, where you often came to escape the noise of the coastal town. tonight, however, when the sun had almost disappeared below the horizon, and dark blue heavy clouds foreshadowed the storm, the wind screamed through the rocks, carrying whispers of danger as you peered out at the sea. moon wasn't shown yet, but the crashing waves couldn't hide it from your gaze — the legendary ship.

it looked like something out of a nightmare. dark hull was barely visible in the distance, but it's tattered black sails were unmistakable. the ship that had haunted the town’s legends for centuries.

you had only meant to look. just a glimpse, out of curiosity. no one could have warned you how close it would come to shore tonight.

as you turned to head back up the cliffs, the sharp crack of twigs underfoot made you freeze. before you could even gasp, rough, filthy hands clamped over your mouth. the scent of sweat and saltwater hit your nose as you struggled, panic surging through veins.

“shhh, lass, don’t make this harder than it needs to be,” a gruff voice snarled in your ear.

your eyes widened in terror as you was yanked backward, feet sliding helplessly on the slick, rocky ground. two men held you tightly, their laughter low and malicious. one of them, burly and reeking of rum, grabbed your wrists, twisting them behind your back painfully as the other kept his filthy hand pressed firmly over your mouth.

“look what we found wanderin’ near the cliffs,” the first man sneered. his breath was hot and foul against your cheek. “tet the captain’ll like this one. she’s a pretty little thing, ain’t she?”

terror tightened in your chest as they dragged you down the narrow path, where was the boat beached.

your muffled cries lost to the storm.

your heart raced as the ship came into view again, when your kidnappers rowing back to the ship, and all the warnings from the townsfolk echoed in your mind. the ghost ship wasn't just a story. it was real — and you were being taken aboard.

the men hauled you up onto the deck, laughing and exchanging crude comments about you as they did. wood beneath your feet was old, splintered, and smelled of rot and seawater. panic surged in your chest as you was thrown down onto the deck, your wrists still bound with some dirty rag behind you, mouth dry with fear.

your breath came in short gasps, and when you looked up, your blood ran cold.

there, in the shadows, was him.

Wooin stood at the helm, leaning casually against the ship’s railing with an almost lazy posture, his black hair tousled by the storm, his shirt hanging loosely from his shoulders. his eyes were sharp — too sharp — and his grin was… wrong. wicked. crazy. it was a smile that held danger, and something far darker. and before you could even struggle to your feet, his sliced through the air, dark and sharp.

“now, now, what have we here?”

“looks like you boys brought me a little gift,” he drawled, eyes locking on you with a gaze that sent shivers down your spine. “and here i thought tonight was going to be boring.”

pirates laughed as they shoved you closer to him. “caught her spyin' near the cliffs, Captain. figured you'd want first dibs”

Wooin crouched down in front of you, his grin widening as he looked you up and down. his gaze was dark and predatory, lingering a little too long on your trembling form. he leaned in close, the scent of seawater and smoke clinging to you as he cocked his head.

“you wanted to see the ship up close, sweetheart? well, too bad, we don't let go of such precious things like you back,” he said, his voice low and teasing. “though i gotta say, you’re braver than most. or maybe just stupider.”

his fingers trailed along your cheek, smudging the dirt the other pirates had left behind. his touch was cold and sent a wave of fear rippling through you. “you’ve got a pretty little mouth,” he mused darkly, thumb brushing against your lips. “i bet it can do real sweet job, don’t it?”

you jerked your head back, heart pounding wildly in your chest, but that only made him laugh.

“oh, feisty, i like that.” Wooin’s grin twisted into something even darker, and his eyes flickered with amusement. “you might last longer than i thought.”

he stood up, his hand curling around your arm as he pulled you to your feet in one quick motion, yanking you against him. “what's your name, little mouse?” Wooin asked, his voice soft, almost sweet. but the sweetness was poisoned, mocking. when you didn’t answer right away, his grin faltered, and his expression twisted with impatience.

before you could speak, Wooin's hand shot out, gripping your jaw tightly, forcing you to meet his gaze. his eyes were wild now, gleaming with something dangerous and unhinged.

“don’t be shy now,” he growled, his fingers digging into your skin. “you’re gonna tell me your name, or i’ll have my boys get it out of you another way. and trust me, sweetheart, you don’t want that.”

your heart raced, and you managed to stammer, “it’s [y/n].”

“good.” Wooin released you with a smirk, standing back up. he turned to his crew with a wicked grin. “what do you think, boys? think we can make use of her?”

the pirates around you roared with laughter, and Wooin stepped back, letting his eyes wander over your form again with a wild glint. “don’t worry, sweetheart. i’ll make sure you’re well taken care of. you’ll just have to earn your keep.”

he threw a wink at you, but it wasn’t charming. it was crude, full of filthy implications. “we’ve got plenty of work for pretty things like you aboard the Sabbath.”

you struggled against the ropes around your wrists, heart pounding as you felt the weight of his words. there was no escaping the look in his eyes — dark and unrelenting. this wasn’t just a game to him. it was a hunt. and you was his prey.

but then, just as quickly as his touch had been possessive, he pulled away, mercilessly ripping off your outer dress, which you covered yourself with, slipping out of the house, leaving you only in a thin, white night dress. he slowly held the cloth to his nose, inhaling the scent of perfumes and oils, rolling his eyes with perverted pleasure. the second later he turned to his crew, spinning on his heel and threw the coat into a crowd of pirates. “still warm and smell like woman, boys” he barked to his men, his tone light but commanding.

the crew burst into vile, disgusting laughter, stretching and tearing the fabric, trying to snatch a piece for themselves, while the captain took the main delicacy.

Wooin grabbed your arm, roughly dragging you after him in captain's cabin, and shot you just one look, his grin sharper than ever. “I’ve got a few things to take care of, sweetheart. But don’t worry. I’ll find time soon to… get to know you better.”

Joker

hunter

the forest was thick, dark, and damp, its shadows pooling like ink beneath the heavy canopy. you’d been warned to stay away from the hunter’s paths, to keep to the glades where the light filtered through, safe among the trees and the chattering birds. but curiosity and confidence had tugged you deeper into the wild, to places no forest nymph dared venture. and now here you were — ensnared, tangled like prey in a coarse net that cut into your skin each time you struggled.

you’d heard the rumors, all the horrific things that were said of him. some called him a monster, some a demon, a creature more vile than ogres, with hands heavy enough to crush bone and a heart darker than the forest’s shadowed depths.

a man.

rumors said he hunted fae-folk for sport, skinned nymphs and fauns alive to sell their wings and antlers and sometimes even kept it as twisted trophies. so you lay frozen, terror blooming inside you as footsteps approached, slow and deliberate, until he was there, looking down at you with a gaze as indifferent as a hawk's, cold and calculating.

“caught yourself in a trap, didn’t you?” his voice was low, almost lazy, devoid of emotion but carrying a harsh edge that set your heart racing faster. he crouched, studying you with the cool, detached interest of a creature observing something wounded, something lesser.

you couldn’t hold back a soft whimper, the plea tumbling out in a trembling whisper. “please… please don’t eat me… or… or sell me, or… take my wings.” your voice shook, barely above a whisper, but you couldn’t help it. every ounce of courage had leaked from you, leaving only desperation.

his expression remained unchanged, his eyes traveling over you without a hint of sympathy or mercy. he clicked his tongue, almost in disdain. “sell you or eat you, huh?” he scoffed softly, as though the very idea bored him. “too small to do any of this to you...”

he leaned closer, his face shrouded by the hood he wore, but even then, you could make out the glint of something dangerous in his gaze, a still cruelty inherent to human, that made your skin prickle. he pulled a long, thin knife from his belt, its blade dull and wicked-looking. your heart pounded faster, your breath quick and shallow as he dragged the blade along the net, slicing through its binds with practiced precision.

but he didn’t stop with the net.

as he worked, he let out a slow, almost mocking sigh, his tone low and chillingly void of anything warm. “i never thought fae-folk would be this… naive. falling right into a trap. maybe all those rumors are true. that you’re not as clever as you all like to pretend.”

he cut through the last of the net, letting it fall loose around you, and before you could think to scramble free, he had you by the wrists, pinning them above your head with a grip that felt like iron. you writhed, pulling against his hold, but his strength was unyielding, and his gaze never shifted, never softened.

“look at you,” he murmured, almost to himself, though there was a cruel twist to his voice. “tiny thing… so fragile.” the knife moved again, glinting faintly as he drew it closer, tracing it along the edge of your silken garb, dragging it just close enough to raise the fine hairs on your skin.

the first cut was slow, methodical, stripping you of the flimsy fabric with a disturbing calm, his face as devoid of emotion as it had been when he’d found you. his touch was cold as he worked, peeling away every last layer of your garb until your skin was bare beneath the dappled light filtering through the foliage of the trees.

your throat tightened, a frantic plea catching in your throat as he studied you, his gaze a chillingly dispassionate assessment of your form. “what are you so afraid of?” his question was flat, the hint of a smirk nowhere to be found, replaced instead by an unsettling, empty gaze. “i told you i wouldn’t eat you. or sell you.”

he tilted his head, as though considering something, his eyes roaming over you with a detached curiosity, nothing soft or familiar to be found in that stare. “i’ve seen plenty of your kind before,” he continued. “fragile little things. quick to beg, easy to break.” he tightened his grip on your wrists, as his other hand slips to your chest, cupping one and tweaking your nipple, watching as you flinched, his expression as cool and collected as before.

with a final, dispassionate glance, he dropped your wrists, letting you fall back against the forest floor. you felt the earth cold against your skin, and for a moment, you dared to believe he might leave, that his curiosity had passed.

but he didn’t move. he just stood there, studying you in silence, as if weighing his options, calculating something you couldn’t comprehend. finally, he spoke, his voice barely more than a whisper, chillingly calm.

“run.”

Chris d'Char

draugr (scandinavian zombie)

the moment you stepped into the cave, you felt something watching. air was thick with the scent of earth and decay, damp and oppressive, pressing down as you pushed further into the cavernous dark. your heart pounded, but you pressed on, forcing yourself to ignore the prickling dread. you were here for a treasure whispered about in a village. most wouldn’t have dared come this far.

yet, the stories didn’t come close to capturing the reality.

the flicker of your torch swept across a wide, shadowy space — a stone altar strewn with tarnished gold and faded relics. you were about to reach out when the cave itself seemed to exhale, a sound so low and menacing that it sent an icy jolt straight through you. and then he emerged from the shadows.

the figure was massive, towering, and unmistakably dead. his armor, dark and corroded, seemed to weigh him down, each piece like ancient, heavy iron strapped to bone. his shoulders were broad and hulking, and he moved with an unnatural stillness that made every muscle in your body seize in place. the hood shadowed most of his face, but his eyes… they gleamed green, faintly lit with a supernatural glow that pierced the darkness with an intensity that made you want to run.

but you couldn’t.

your legs felt rooted to the ground, every part of you alive with a fear that bordered on primal. his gaze fixed on you, narrowed and piercing, and he moved closer, each step slow, deliberate. the sound of his boots echoed against the stone walls, mingling with a faint rasping that you quickly realized was his breath — deep, hollow, and cold as death itself. the closer he came, the more you felt the chill radiating from him, a cold that soaked through your skin, settling into your bones, making you feel like prey frozen in the gaze of a predator.

“you…” his throat, mouth and vocal cords were clearly damaged, and sound coming from him was more like wheezing and coughing with something rumbling, a sound coming from his chest. yet it was a deep enough, gravelly rasp that sent an involuntary shudder down your spine. each word felt like stone grinding against stone, a sound that wasn’t meant for the ears of the living. “another thief come to desecrate my tomb?”

he loomed over you, nearly a foot taller, and though his face remained mostly hidden, you could see the lines of hardened bone, twisted by time. he looked like something that had clawed its way out of the underworld, not just some story told to frighten children. you could feel his anger like a physical force, pressing against you, filling the air with a menacing weight that made your breath hitch.

“i —” you stammered, barely managing to find your voice. your hands shook, your mind racing with excuses, explanations — anything that might soothe the wrath of this ancient creature. “i didn’t think — i mean, i didn’t know you were… real.”

the words sounded foolish, childish, even to you, but you could feel his gaze intensify, piercing and unwavering.

“you mortals never think,” he growled, taking another slow, deliberate step toward you. you pressed back against the cold stone of the altar, every instinct screaming to run, yet trapped by his gaze. “and yet you come, chasing gold and glory. seeking what you have not earned.” he let his words hang in the air, thick and heavy with disdain.

as he spoke, you noticed the faint gleam of a blade strapped to his side, its edge worn but sharp, and you had no doubt it would slice through you in a heartbeat if he chose to use it.

“what… drives a mortal to invade a place meant for the dead?” he croaked, his tone less angry now, but still dripping with suspicion. there was a twisted curiosity there, mingling with his disdain, as though he were scrutinizing you, searching for an answer that would make sense of your presence here.

you swallowed, trying to steady yourself enough to speak, though your voice trembled as you answered. “i… i heard about the treasures here. i thought it was just…story. just an old story to scare children.” you hesitated, meeting his gaze as best you could, even as a chill washed over you, every inch of your skin prickling with fear. “i didn’t think… that it would be guarded.”

he tilted his head, an unreadable expression crossing his shadowed face. his lips twisted into what might have been a sneer, or perhaps a smirk — it was impossible to tell. “it was men who came before,” he hissed, almost to himself. his gaze flickered over you, as though he were assessing something different, some detail about you that set you apart from the others who had come before. “yet here you are. foolish…”

his tone was chillingly indifferent, a touch of dark amusement cutting through his fury. as he took a final step, closing the distance between you, you could feel his cold breath brush against your face, a touch that felt like a warning as his eyes bore into you. his voice dropped to a low, rumbling whisper. “do you know what fate awaits those who disturb the peace of the dead?”

you shook your head, not trusting your voice. every instinct screamed to flee, yet you were captivated by your own terror.

Chris’s gaze lingered on you for a moment longer, and in that silence, you sensed something change. he was still terrifying, still monstrous, but a flicker of curiosity had joined the malice in his stare. it was as if your presence had stirred something within him, something that hadn’t stirred in centuries.

“tell me, mortal,” he said, his voice low, almost thoughtful, “what makes you any different from the fools who came before you?”

and as his eyes met yours, sharp and unyielding, you felt as though you were being weighed, measured by an ancient creature. he was no mere guardian, no simple guard to be outrun or outwitted. he was a spirit bound by death and anger, as much a part of the treasure he guarded as any piece of gold. and yet, against every instinct, every shred of reason, you felt the barest hint of intrigue flicker in his gaze.

Kwon Hyuk

poltergaist

moving into the apartment was a compromise between your budget and your nerves. the place wasn’t much — peeling paint, narrow halls that sighed with age, the endless creaks that echoed even when you were alone. but rent was cheap, and as a student, you needed cheap more than you needed comfort.

it started innocently enough — little things, easily explained. doors closed just after you left them open, faint scratching sounds from within the walls, lights flickering overhead. you convinced yourself it was nothing, brushing it off as an old building settling. but then, the noises became louder. clearer. as if someone — or something — was listening, waiting.

the feeling of being watched crept into your bones. you’d catch glimpses in the corners of mirrors, shadows moving when you were perfectly still. a prickling sensation would crawl up your spine when you turned off the lights, only to grow stronger, more pointed. some nights, as you lay in bed, you swore you could feel cold air ruffling your hair, a whisper-light touch that disappeared when you jolted up to check. each time you looked, the room was empty, but the feeling of dread lingered, thick and oppressive.

then, it escalated.

you came home one evening to find the kitchen in disarray — cups and plates carefully stacked into a pyramid on the counter, all balanced so precariously that you only had to breathe near them for it to come crashing down. it felt like a taunt, a child’s game, and yet it left your hands shaking. you cleaned it up, all the while feeling the icy weight of unseen eyes watching, almost amused.

in the following days, the disturbances grew darker. doors no longer merely closed but slammed, hard enough to rattle the walls. your belongings would appear in places you’d never left them — your phone in the freezer, your books stacked upside down, your shoes arranged in pairs by your bed. one night, you found the word HELLO written across the bathroom mirror in streaks of condensation, though you hadn’t showered.

each night became a test of endurance. scratches appeared on the walls, faint at first, but then louder, more insistent, like nails scraping down to get your attention. the sound would follow you from room to room, echoing in the dead silence, growing fiercer when you tried to ignore it. then the lights began to flicker not randomly but in patterns, on and off in a slow, mocking rhythm that felt like it was waiting for you to notice.

and you did.

one night, exhausted and desperate for sleep, you turned off the lights and crawled into bed, willing yourself to ignore the eerie sensations that had become part of your every day. just as you started to drift off, you heard floorboards creaked, as if someone was cautiously tiptoeing closer and closer to the bed. a weight pressed down on the foot of the bed, heavy and cold, slowly sinking in beside you. your body froze in terror, heart racing as you held your breath. the bed dipped, creaking under an unseen presence, as if someone had settled right next to you.

you lay still, paralyzed, as icy fingers trailed up your arm, tracing your skin with a sensation so foreign, so unnatural, that it sent a chill down your spine. the cold touched your cheek, feather-light and lingering, like the brush of lips against your skin. your breath hitched, and the room fell silent. the pressure lifted, but the feeling of something lurking stayed, hovering just outside your reach.

that was when the messages began.

written in dust on your desk, scrawled in barely-there letters:

miss me? i’m here.

they showed up on your bathroom mirror, traced in streaks of moisture, smeared across your textbooks in faint pencil. each word a reminder that you were not alone, that he was there, hidden in the shadows, watching, listening.

one evening, exhausted and drained, you decided to ignore the signs. you’d convinced yourself that it was all in your head, a trick of nerves and exhaustion. but that night, he grew angry.

the temperature in the room plummeted, your breath misting in the air. walls shuddered as something invisible began slamming doors, cabinets, drawers, every corner of the apartment alive with rage. a framed photo fell from the wall, shattering at your feet, its glass shards scattering like ice. you stumbled back, your heart racing as the lights flickered, plunging the room into pitch black.

and then, in the silence, you heard it: a low, chilling whisper close to your ear, so close that it brushed against your skin.

don’t ignore me.

you screamed and stumbled away, turning on every light in a panic. but the apartment remained quiet, the air heavy with a quiet menace that settled into your bones, making it clear that the walls themselves seemed to cling to you. and as you glanced back at the broken glass, you saw a final message scratched into the dust beneath your feet:

i wanna play.

and you knew, with a sickening twist in your stomach, that this was no ordinary haunting. that he — whoever he was — wanted you there, bound to the apartment just as he was, with a twisted affection buried in every scrape, every chill, every whisper.

MASTERLIST

[thewriterthatghostedyou]

New Series Release Starting on Oct. 31st

Here is something that I have been working on for a bit and I am far enough ahead in writing it so I decided to start posting! I also plan on releasing a chapter a week on Fridays after this week so that I actually keep up on updating it. We’ll see if my adhd brain will be able to stick to the plan lol.

This is an AU where the Greens win and all of the Blacks are dead except for Aegon III and Viserys II. (Baela, Rheana, and Corlys are also alive after Corlys switches sides as he did in the books).

Also, this is heavily inspired by the Selection series since I just reread it lol but obviously in Westeros and a lot darker and more adult. There are no warnings for this prologue besides canon typical violence.

Divider by @zaldritzosrose

Westeros’ history was a bloody one. Starting when the Six Kingdoms became one under the rule of Aegon the Conqueror, blood had seeped through the very pages of its existence. More blood was spilled with the coming of Meagor the Cruel, a cunning and ambitious man that was only stopped by his mysterious death on the throne itself. And finally now, the Dance of the Dragons. A war that pitted family against family and ripped the realm apart in the process.

Blood and violence always seemed to follow the Targaryens and yet you found yourself drawn to them all the same. You were on Dragonstone when the news of King Viserys’ death reached the realm.

Your hands trembled as your future mother by law gripped her stomach in pain before being rushed out of the war room by the maesters. “Lady Caswell.” Princess Rhaenys’ voice brought you back to her as she placed a sympathetic hand on your shoulder. “There is news that I must tell you as well.”

“What’s wrong? What else has happened?” Jacaerys gripped your hand tightly as Baela rushed over.

“After my cousin’s death the Green Council found your father trying to escape the Red Keep.” Your blood had run cold as she continued. “He was trying to warn the Queen of what was happening, of the treason that was occurring.” You prayed to any god, old or new that this was all a dream. “When I was able to finally leave my own chambers he was hung from the outer walls of the Keep along with any others who refused to bend the knee to Aegon. I’m very sorry-”

The princess’ words seemed to rise to a searing pitch as she continued and you felt Baela reach out to steady you as you wobbled forward. Your father couldn’t be dead. He had finalized your betrothal to Jace and Baela yesterday. He had just embraced you warmly yesterday. He had promised to visit you on Dragonstone some time yesterday. He was alive yesterday.

You had watched from the sidelines as the war began. Lost in grief as death after death seemed to occur in quick succession. Your father, Luke, Princess Rhaenys, and Jace. Your sweet Jace. You were inconsolable when the news reached you of Jace’s death, unable to accept that the man that you loved, the kind man who held you when you cried and made you smile in the face of tragedy, had been killed. You found yourself clinging to Baela after his death, aching for your shared love and finding comfort in your shared losses.

When King’s Landing Fell, you followed Rhaenyra to the capital, hoping to be reunited with your mother or even one of your brothers, Tom Flowers, your bastard sibling who had been leading your family’s forces as your youngest brother, Edric, was only five and now Lord of Bitterbridge. There were no tearful reunions as you had hoped as Tom was leading an armored battalion to Honeywine and your mother and two younger brothers remained at Bitterbridge.

A fortnight after the taking of King’s landing, a young squire, coated in soot and blood was brought before the Queen, his eyes in another place as he recalled the losses at Honeywine and the deaths of Owen Costayne and Tom. You didn’t remember much from that day, only Rhaenyra’s pitying expression as she sat with you after that report. Her once close relationship with you dimmed as it was tainted by grief and the Queen visited you less and less.

The next piece of your life to fall was when Baela was captured in the loss of Dragonstone. You felt numb as the death of Moondancer sank in. Although not a Targaryen yourself, your fondest memories had been of your two loves taking you on their dragons and flying around the bay. Both Vermax and Moondancer were dead now and you didn’t know if you wanted Baela to survive to experience whatever hell her cousin would inflict upon her for burning him before her defeat.

Barely a week after the capture of Baela, you and the court were surprised to see the head of the young prince Maelor sent from your own mother who had written you a letter with a frantic scribbled explanation.

My Dearest Daughter,

I fear what our people have begun. News of the queen’s bounty on the young Prince’s head has spread throughout the realm. And the young boy- gods- he was torn apart by a mob that had gathered. Never has such horrific violence been brought before me and yet I fear that this is only the beginning. The men responsible were executed for this horrific act but Lord Ormund Hightower marches towards us with Prince Daeron on his Tessaron. I sent them the young prince’s egg in an effort to make this wrong right in a way, but I fear that it is not enough. We have no dragon to meet theirs and barely enough men to keep the garrison.

I find myself glad that you are safe my sweet daughter as I fear that we may soon join your father in whatever life there is after death. The gods will curse us all for this but I pray endlessly that they spare you whatever fate we face.

Be strong my daughter and know that your brothers and I will love you to our dying breaths and beyond.

True to what your mother had written, Bitterbridge fell that very night. As reports came in from the many refugees you felt sick to your stomach, puking for what felt like hours before returning to hear the rest of their stories. Your mother had yielded to the stronger force immediately and begged Prince Daeron for mercy to be shown to her sons, your brothers. Apparently he had only scoffed before and replied that he would grant them the same terms that had been given to his nephew before beheading Edric and Kelyn. They were only five and two. At that moment any grief you had was burnt away as anger raged through your body. You were the last Caswell alive.

Hatred for Daeron coursed through your every vein as you listened to a seamstress who had escaped the slaughter tearfully recount the rape and abuse that happened. Even septas, old women, and children were not spared from the cruelty of the Hightower army. Tales of how your home’s men, women, and children were slaughtered turned your once happy heart to one of stone and contempt for the Greens. You had trashed part of your chambers after hearing the news that Daeron had escaped death from a burning tent and lived to fight another day.

Rhaenyra had grown ever paranoid about impending betrayals that may never come, keeping her surviving sons under close watch and even pushing away her husband. A fact that she later regretted deeply as she wept into your arms after hearing about his death. Daemon had risen up to meet his nephew Aemond Targaryen in what was already being heralded as the Battle Above God’s Eye. The actual battle itself was unable to be witnessed as flames had filled the sky and dragon silhouettes were all that was seen. All that was known was that Aemond emerged victorious on Vhagar and Daemon and Caraxes were lost to the lake below.

In what would be the final nail in the coffin for Queen Rhaenyra was the taking of King’s Landing. Surrounded by Hightower and other Green Hosts, along with Tessaron and Vhagar, the retaking of King’s Landing was laughable. Rhaenyra’s own men turned on her as they saw the enemy approaching and she and her remaining sons were imprisoned in Rhaenyra’s chambers until the arrival of King Aegon.

You were thankfully not important enough to be forced to watch your Queen’s death, only hearing of how she was viciously eaten by Sunfyre, with Joffery and Aegon III watched.

You were instead kept with the other Lords and Ladies, only being released from a large dining hall to be brought before Aegon and asked to bend the knee. Your father had died for refusing to do this very action, your mother and brothers had followed, and yet you refused to be another casualty in this war. Your house had suffered enough and if you were not careful the Caswell line would end with you. It could not all be for nothing. So you bent the knee with every other lord and lady in attendance, feeling as if you were selling your soul to the stranger themself.

[klaineharmony]

Why We Ship: Neo/Trinity (The Matrix)

I have not felt compelled to write one of these posts for a long time, but I watched The Matrix: Resurrections again while I was working this afternoon, and Goddess, I have so many feelings about these two.

I think it's hard to convey how utterly capitating the original Matrix was, back in 1999. And I could not have said, then, everything I can say about it now, because I didn't have the knowledge of myself, or the vocabulary, or simply the experience to be able to articulate why Neo and Trinity (and Trinity especially, but that's a separate post) felt like everything. Even apart from the incredible worldbuilding and commentary on society that was The Matrix itself, they were something special.

A lot of people got really salty and irritated with Resurrections because they felt like it was "less about the Matrix" and "more just about Neo and Trinity." And god damn, if that doesn't say everything about two different audiences who watched the original trilogy. If you didn't see that the whole trilogy was about Neo and Trinity's love from the beginning, then we were not watching the same films. Neo is The One because Trinity loves him; that is established in the first movie. He cannot be The One without her; he cannot believe in himself as The One without her and her love. "The Oracle told me that I would fall in love, and that the man I loved would be The One. So you see, Neo, you can't be dead. You can't be . . . because I love you." She literally brings him back from the dead with her love; she makes him The One because she loves him. She is the driving force behind all of it. And it's not a coincidence that Neo does the same for her in Reloaded; he catches her in midair, he pulls a bullet out of her body and keeps her from dying because she is everything to him.

And here I am, still writing a post that is more about Trinity than about Neo and Trinity together. But this is what still strikes me about them after all of these years: their love is complete and beautiful and all-consuming, but it is also grounded very firmly in the grim reality they are living. They are not blind about the fact that they could die; they know that every minute of every day, and every minute the spend in The Matrix, could be the last one. They do everything they can to keep that from happening, and they train with everything they have to try and prevent it, but they know, all the time, that one of them could lose the other. They cherish every moment they have, because they are living in this terrible world where another day is never a certainty. But even with all of that, and all that they feel, they are willing to fight, to do whatever needs to be done to try and bring down the machines and the Matrix. They do not shy away from what they see as their mission and their duty to others, even while they are so anchored in each other.

And it's part of what makes Revolutions so tortorous (I hated that movie when it came out; it broke my heart). They know. They've known it's coming; they've been waiting for it, and they go to die together. They still hope that somehow, they will make it, but if they don't, their entire intent is to die together. Because they love each other, they have literally saved each other's lives and brought each other back from the dead, and they have spent their entire time together trying to dismantle the Matrix. If they have to give up their lives to do it, then they will. And I think the thing that hurt so much, when I watched Revolutions as a much younger person (and who am I kidding, it still hurts) is that they still died apart. Trinity died first, and then Neo, and while Neo was with Trinity when she died, he had already been blinded and couldn't see her, and he died alone. And it felt like a betrayal of everything they were in the most gut-wrenching, soul-destroying way. Their love not only changed the world, it saved the world and destroyed the Matrix and altered the relationship between the machines and humans - and they still died apart.

I remember being emotionally devastated by that last film, so much so that I couldn't watch the trilogy again for years. I was so shattered by the ending, it hurt so much, that I couldn't bear to revisit it. And again, I don't know that I could have said that at the time, but I felt it.

When the trailer for Resurrections came out, I was so emotional the first time I watched it that I felt a little blindsided. I had packed away everything Neo and Trinity meant, because their ending hurt so much - and then there they were, on my screen again, getting another chance. Getting the second chance and the ending they should have had - defying the odds with their love one more time, and in an even more epic way. Neither of them is living, in the Matrix. As Thomas and Tiffany, they're existing. They're brainwashed. They barely remember who they used to be - Thomas is convinced it's all in his head, and Tiff is only Trinity when she's working on and riding her bikes. It's only when they find each other that they start to find themselves again. And even when Neo escapes and he's back in the real world, the hope of Trinity and his love for her is the only thing that keeps him strong enough to keep fighting, the only thing that allows him to access his former powers as The One.

They help each other survive. And it's complicated and difficult and not always pretty, and it's always in the midst of a world that is against them and trying to destroy them - but they survive because their love survives. They love together and fight together and survive together, always.

[5eraphim]

Freaky Deaky Sneaky (TEASER)

(Red!Scout x Blu!Reader x Red!Sniper)

(Context: This is the unofficial sequel to The Bunny Under the Bridge, not much of a plot to speak of, but Reader has snuck onto Red base after hours to meet up again with Scout for practice. It's not long until hearing a Red Engineer in the distance scares Reader who runs and hides, accidentally finding the Red Sniper along the way, learning he saw everything that went down during the match Reader and Scout met)

This is sort of like "story's second act" but I haven't posted actual writing here in ages and i wanted to post at least this much.

Rating: M (MINORS DNI)

Content Warnings: yandere, x reader, exploitation, sex-bargaining, blackmail, smut, mild humiliation

Word Count: 1.7k

MASTER LIST

"Sniper!?" His name came out in a gasp, louder than you intended. His bony, sullen face watched you, obscured by shadows, making him look almost ghoulish, a sight that made your skin crawl. Goosebumps prickled under your heavy white coat and across the back of your neck and forearms as you instinctively clamped a hand over your mouth, craning your neck to look over your shoulder at the door behind you, half-expecting the Red Engineer to be right behind. But from the sound of it, Engie hadn't noticed you, nor were there any other Red mercenaries close by, all but the Sniper, that is.

After another moment of painful silence, you strained your eyes to glimpse Sniper out of the corner of your eye. Sniper hadn't moved from his camping chair. You weren't sure if you found his motionless calmness assuring or disquieting. "Sniper, what are you doing here so late?" 

He raised an eyebrow, looking at you incredulously, "What am I doing here?"

Your lips parted to say something to your defense, but your mind went blank, and no words came.

After an awkward pause, Sniper mumbled, "Van's getting weatherized. I had to find somewhere else to crash. I can't sleep around the other guys; there's too much bloody noise."

"I'll leave you to it." Whirling around to make an escape, you tried to dart for the door but stopped dead when you heard Sniper say, "In an awful rush to get goin', aren't ya? Looking for another snog with the little bunny-boy?"

You felt your stomach flop and your mouth go dry, "You saw...?" Your heart raced, but Sniper didn't say anything back, watching with satisfaction as you put the pieces together. He must've been hiding around the bridge before you brought Scout there, and it made all too much sense he wouldn't intervene; situations like that don't just happen every day around here. "You mean you saw… everything?" You hardly recognized the sound of your own voice, so frail and weak. All the shame you tried to repress rushed back at once, forcing you to remember exactly what went down between you and the Red Scout during your first match.

Hugging your arms around yourself to ease your shivering, you stared at Sniper, feeling like a bug in a spider's web. Sure, you were overcome by shame, but something about the way he looked at you, knowing he knew what you knew— that he saw what you did— made your face and body heat up uncomfortably. 

"You were watching us?" Hearing those words come out of your mouth felt so dirty. After what happened between you and Scout, your shame had you avoiding him like the plague, but even then, you couldn't ignore the thrill of it all. The thrill of getting away with something so vulgar brought back sensory memories. The phantom-sensation of his cock pressing against the back of your throat, the way you felt the slight bend of his shaft in your mouth, and how you could taste and feel how he throbbed and dribbled precome against your tongue. His hands fisting your hair, and the way he moaned as he came. You knew it was wrong, downright treasonous- but God, the feeling of getting away with it turned you on, but paradoxically, now that you knew you were caught in the act, it felt even hotter. In a morbid and humiliating way.

Sniper shrugged. "Nuthin' personal, it's always best to go for you Medics. Just how it is, mate."

You nervously scratched at the back of your neck, still summoning tremendous effort to speak. "But I don't understand—you say you saw everything and clearly did. Why the hell didn't you take the shot while you had the chance?"

Sniper couldn't help but snicker a little under his breath: "What can I say? You're easy on the eyes; you gave a good show. It would've been a shame to end it all so soon." 

"Hold on, do mean you were…" Your voice trailed off, for some reason too sheepish to ask Sniper outright if he was touching himself watching you go down on Scout.

Sniper knew what you meant, even if you weren't strong enough to say exactly what was on your mind. "Can ya blame me?"

While your outright fear of being spotted by the enemy sneaking around on his base had slightly worn off, your anxiety had only grown. You hardly knew the guy, but Sniper always gave a 'sleazy' air about him. Learning he was a voyeur wasn't much of a surprise; you just wish you didn't have to find out this way. 

If you tried to dart out of the room, you'd be instantly spotted, assuming Sniper didn't get to you first. Sheepishly, you inched closer to the wall beside you to put a bit more distance between you, never letting him out of your sight once. "Alright, I get why you didn't kill me then, but why not now?" It was his shed, after all; you knew he had a kukri or bow and arrow stashed somewhere to defend himself with. 

Resting his elbows on his knees, Sniper leaned forward in his seat, resting his chin in his palm as he responded with a wolf-like grin: " It would be a shame to let you go now. Only got to watch for a minute, but bloody hell, I can't get that image of you on your knees out of my head."

You had a bad feeling it would come down to something like this. Once again degrading yourself and allowing a Red mercenary to have his way with your body in exchange for not killing you outright. Was this all you would ever come to?

Pressing your back a little harder against the wall, you lowered your head slightly, glaring at him as though a baby Medic like you had a chance of intimidating the likes of him. "If anyone finds us, they'll kill us both. C'mon, you know it's not worth it!" 

Sniper paused to consider this momentarily, tilting his head a little in mock-deep thought, "They won't kill us both. Sure, they'll hate me- but when your team finds out, they're gonna tear you apart. Assumin' the Red team won't get to ya first."

Fighting the urge to cower in fear, you responded with meek hostility, "Maybe so. But I'd take them over you any day."

Bad move. While your resilience was cute before, Sniper's patience was beginning to wear thin. The corners of his lips twisted down as he bore his teeth, snarling at you as he got to his feet. "Be good, stay hidden, and I'll get you home faster than the twitchy little freak. Sound good?"

He was coming closer, but you knew better than to try and get away now. Hearing him order you to obey like that gave you a stir, and you prayed he couldn't tell how turned on you were.

"How am I supposed to trust you'll take me home after this?" Now close enough to press a forearm on the wall inches away from your head, leaning in close enough for you to feel his breath fanning against your face and neck. 

"Like you said, we're dead if we're found. But right now, no one but me gets to touch you."

With his free hand, Sniper cupped the bottom of your head, running his callous-hardened fingers against your cheek and chin. Your eyes were squeezed shut, but you shuddered, feeling his skin against yours, knowing how close and defenseless you were before your enemy.

"Watchin' the show's nice and all. But God, I've been waitin' for the chance to feel you up myself. You're so much softer up close."

You didn't resist or flinch when you felt Sniper leaning close enough for his lips to brush against you. "Now let me feel that soft mouth myself."

A beat later, you felt Sniper open-mouth kissing against your lips, letting him suck against your lips, dip his tongue into your mouth, and hum with contentment mixing his saliva with yours. While you were a bit too stunned to properly return the affection, you felt his hold on your chin force your face harder against his, deepening the kiss.

He must've been pretty touch starved because you'd never felt such a hungry, needy kiss before. It didn't take long for his hands to latch onto your body, roughly palming you up over your clothes while his mouth was still connected to yours as he pushed you hard enough against the wall to make the air rush from your lungs.

You knew what came next, and the fear keeping you from doing exactly that made you feel light-headed and a little tingly. The tingles intensified into a steady buzziness deep in your gut as Sniper tore his lips from your mouth to the side of your neck, dragging his sharp teeth against the thin skin, sucking in between bites, slathering saliva against your skin. The back of your head crushed against the wall behind you as your head tried to roll back even further and allow him even more space to nip at. Sniper pawed against your tie for a second but was too distracted to undo it himself. Regaining control of your own hands, you managed to undo the knot, pulling the strip of fabric away as his hands were back on the collar of your shirt, popping the buttons, desperate to free your uniform from your body. 

Sniper was so needy to feel you up he didn't bother shedding his own clothes, preferring to madly pull yours off first. He was a man obsessed; all he could think about was how hot it was watching you go down and degrade yourself like you did with Scout and how he replayed that memory over and over in his head, imagining your body against his. Now that you were finally here, Sniper couldn't wait any longer to fulfill his horny fantasies.

[syndrossi]

I have the mother of all migraines right now, so I have nothing constructive to say, really, except that I imagine having an evil candle mess around in your brain provides amazing headaches as well. I feel for Daemon if this is true and wish him all the luck in finding a remedy. Excellent chapter, full of torture for poor Daemon. I really was like, "Oh my God, Syndrossi DID IT," when I realized Daemon was about to see how the twins died in their original universes and mistake it as a prophetic vision of how they may/will die in the future. Poor guy can only put so many pictures together when provided this limited amount of confusing puzzle pieces!! I'd like to eventually hear more of his thoughts on: - his eldest son being commander of the night's watch - WHY his eldest son is even a member of the night's watch - his youngest son being killed by a BARATHEON of all things - why House Baratheon is fighting House Targaryen forces - wtf where are all the dragons, no way should Rhaegar OR Jon be ANYWHERE without their DRAGONS, let alone without back up dragons from the rest of the family during a war/battle!? <--- in a bits and pieces and fuzzy memories or in eventual memories coming back to him sort of way or even in waking up terrified because NIGHTMARE in the middle of the night sort of way (wherein his sons provide comfort in cuddles and forehead kisses!) And Jon/Rhaegar's thoughts on: - candle consequences reflecting in Daemon's behavior - when they realize what happened: wtf why did daemon let the candle get him THEY WARNED HIM - oh no what did the candle do to their father - how to DESTROY THE CANDLE ONCE AND FOR ALL ... also, do you think if he complained of a headache or even just looked like he had a headache, Jon and Rhaegar would wrestle him into bed and turn out the sconces/close the curtains and cuddle him until he fell asleep?

If Daemon is king of anything, it's king of having only half the puzzle pieces he needs to ever meaningfully connect the dots, if I may mangle some metaphors. Enough clues from the boys' behavior to determine they had rough childhoods, but the only answer is "Allard." Enough clues from the vision to determine "death awaits!" but not "my children were reincarnated...from the future."

You'll get a lot of the Jon+Rhaegar reactions in the next chapter, so it's really whether enough pieces come back to Daemon to ruminate upon what the heck Jon was doing as Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, what in the seven hells House Baratheon is up to, and WHERE THE FUCK his sons' dragons are. Someone else brought up that one thing he could conclude is that Shadow and Qelebrys are stolen/killed young, which, ya know, just one more thing for Daemon to be paranoid about.

I think the biggest puzzle would be why Rhaegar would agree to be separated from Jon rather than demand to go into the Night's Watch with him, and the conclusion would be that something/someone is coercing them. Does Jon accept exile to spare Rhaegar in some way? In the civil war later, does Rhaegar fight on the same side as the ruler who exiled Jon to the Night's Watch? If so, why? (Daemon thought he must be dead, but the true nightmare is if he thinks that HE'S the hostage, and he does outlive both sons.)

And to soften things a little, I've got a sweet little "Daemon with a headache" missing scene almost ready to post.

[lopposting]

@accidentallyheartless

That's an interesting point about the workstation. It made me realize we do see this place here in the opening cutscene. hmm.. And Geppetto being involved in Carlo's death in that way might have fuelled his regret in that kind of engulfing madness that made him the monster he was. [Tbh though, I don't think he was a good person to begin with, even pre-timeline]

@ahhlito

You mean the loading screen, right? [unless I missed some other word-of-God confirmation about Carlo] I know that's what the game tells us - but I and some others in the fanbase have doubts about the truthfulness of that particular screen, given what we see in the sand memories; even though, logically he must have had the disease because we have his Ergo. Basically, I'm wondering if he had the disease, but ultimately died maybe due to the blood loss from losing an arm or some other kind of attack. I'll try to explain my reasoning for that the best I can in another post

Some of braveheart's post here:

IT’S NOT!!! It directly contradicts what the game tells you in the story!! Your memories show Carlo on the ground with the Stalker over him wishing she had arrived sooner. If it was the disease? Then she would have been no help, so why regret not being there? 

And for the nameless puppet, it is a bit odd. my thoughts are that Geppetto doesn't see the nameless as Carlo either, and therefore doesn't bother ("Were you going to destroy Carlo's heart?" instead of "Your heart"). Also that maybe it did originally look more like Carlo, but without enough Ergo to properly preserve it, decayed over time, forcing Geppetto to replace large chunks of it.

Perhaps it shows how dead-set Geppetto was on going through with his plan with the arm of god and the frenzy, because why maintain the puppet at all when Carlo could be revived anyway? [which he does in one of the endings]

And I think, "narratively" [I don't think I'm using that word right lol], it shows how desperately Geppetto is clinging to the past, the literal corpse of his son, even as it's falling apart in his arms. The guy who brought upon a new age, Krat's new dawn of technological advancement - can't seem to move forward

@ideas-on-paper

[I LOVE reading discussion about this game] 

I remember someone somewhere pointing out that when the strings are cut, the first “human” thing nameless puppet does is grab its head like it’s in pain :O [I can’t remember where i read that im sorry ahhh] 

and also what’s really crazy about that theory is that the piercing hatred amulet tells us

"If this puppet could feel only one emotion, it would be hatred."

IF.

They could’ve just easily told us whether or not the puppet could FEEL, being the game and all

but instead they choose to say. “We don’t know”

[also PS: omg i HAVE to watch evangelion. i've been meaning to watch it for YEARS. but also. like actually. im too scared]

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

What will Jaime's reaction and development in response to the probable slaughter of Freys and Lannisters ("Red Wedding 2.0") by Lady Stoneheart, and the rebellion of the Riverlands that will likely follow, be? While there are a lot of valonqar theories and theories of how he might survive the encounter with Stoneheart, but for some reason I don't recall any theories on this front. Might there be a realization that his family's, and his, actions in the Riverlands from AGoT forward were wrong?

Generally people who theorize about Red Wedding: Back 2 Tha Hood have this elaborate fantasy about Jaime being tied up and forced to watch. Usually in conjunction with the theory that he's already half mad because he had to kill Brienne, who sacrificed herself for him. I think the latter theory is highly contrary to both plot and character, so I've been rather doubtful of the former theory as well. (As well as it being in Riverrun: no this is not an invite for proponents of that element of the theory to tell me about it, I've seen it all before and nothing but TWOW will move me.) Personally, I think RW2: First Blood could be one of those downbeat refusal-of-catharsis moments GRRM does sometimes, which includes no direct POV, just hearing about the atrocities after the fact. It may be otherwise, but I'm still sure fans will not be remotely as satisfied as they expect to be.

Anyway. Jaime already knows the actions of his family in the Riverlands were wrong. His whole arc from ASOS onwards just rubbed his nose into it over and over and over again. Notably including his encounter with the Bloody Mummers his father brought to Westeros, notably returning to Harrenhal and finding the house of horrors Gregor had turned it into, notably the whole siege of Riverrun where he's hating the Freys, hating every moment he has to reward idiots like his uncle Emmon or a "scheming turncloak bitch" like Sybell Spicer. Just look at his conversation with Hoster Blackwood in ADWD:

"My father had a saying too. Never wound a foe when you can kill him. Dead men don't claim vengeance." "Their sons do," said Hoster, apologetically. "Not if you kill the sons as well. Ask the Casterlys about that if you doubt me. Ask Lord and Lady Tarbeck, or the Reynes of Castamere. Ask the Prince of Dragonstone." For an instant, the deep red clouds that crowned the western hills reminded him of Rhaegar's children, all wrapped up in crimson cloaks. "Is that why you killed all the Starks?" "Not all," said Jaime. "Lord Eddard's daughters live. One has just been wed. The other…" Brienne, where are you? Have you found her? "…if the gods are good, she'll forget she was a Stark. She'll wed some burly blacksmith or fat-faced innkeep, fill his house with children, and never need to fear that some knight might come along to smash their heads against a wall." "The gods are good," his hostage said, uncertainly. You go on believing that. Jaime let Honor feel his spurs.

This is not a man who is happy with his life and his or his family's actions. Especially considering he took the very first opportunity to abandon it all to help Brienne with her quest.

Now, if you mean, will Red Wedding 2: The Revenge cause Jaime to admit out loud that he and his dad done bad? *pfft* Not a clue in the world. Jaime's going to have a lot going on in TWOW, not in the least however he and Brienne escape (my personal theories including divine Bran intervention; there's a reason why the Brotherhood's cave is full of weirwood roots and has a weirwood throne just like Bloodraven's), and not in the least whatever the hell Cersei gets up to in KL and her probable flight to the Rock. I'm afraid that prejudging Jaime's personality changes that may come from all this is beyond my power, sorry.

________

@windriverdelta replied to your post “What will Jaime's reaction and development in...”:

Yeah, it was the "Now, if you mean, will Red Wedding 2: The Revenge cause Jaime to admit out loud that he and his dad done bad?" question - because for all what he knows and thinks, he's still doing these bad things.

​aha, so you're asking more like, will he stop. And like I said, Jaime's going to be very busy, I think his Riverlands enforcement tour will be well past done by the time he gets out of it all. Mind you, I don't think he's going to ever give up entirely on the Lannister state of mind (Tywin's ability to give people complexes is very hard to shake). But a lot of the Riverlands tour was guilt over being responsible for his father's death (since Jaime freed Tyrion and gave him a reason to kill Tywin), which undoubtely made him extra-Lannistery for a while. And also Jaime was trying to get away and deal with his Cersei issues (by using Ilyn as a rubber duck therapist who beats you up), so a lot of his um, complex actions greatly depend on what Cersei ends up doing and how that makes him feel. (Even if they've "broken up", they'll always be connected.) And however the valonqar plays out, alas...

[takaraphoenix]

Thirteen Truths (and a Lie)

Tags: m/m/m, polyamory, True Mates, post Nogitsune, Emissary Stiles, Spark Stiles, Pack Mom Stiles, Alpha Peter, magic, truth spell (in a way), hurt/comfort, Fae/Seelies, Erica Lives, Boyd Lives, Allison Lives, Jackson Doesn't Leave, m/f, f/f

Main Pairing: Chris/Peter/Stiles

Side Pairings: Boyd/Erica, Jackson/Lydia, Scott/Allison, Malia/Kira

Teen Wolf Characters: Mieczysław 'Stiles' Stilinski, Peter Hale, Chris Argent, Derek Hale, Erica Reyes, Vernon Boyd III, Isaac Lahey, Jackson Whittemore, Lydia Martin, Scott McCall, Allison Argent, Cora Hale, Malia Tate, Kira Yukimura

@writersmonth Prompts: petal + theater

Summary: Seelies have invaded Beacon Hills and the pack goes to negotiate the terms of their surrender. The Seelie Queen agrees to leave, in exchange for a game. Stiles, as the pack's Emissary, is the one who gets to play. If he tells thirteen hard truths, in front of his pack, the Seelies will leave.

This Story on FFNet | This Story on AO3

Thirteen Truths (and a Lie)

Stiles Summer Stories 2024

Stiles yawned and folded his arms on the kitchen isle, resting his cheek on his folded arms and getting more comfortable. The others were droning on about something but Stiles couldn't find the energy to concentrate. He'd spent the past twenty hours on a research binge, he was sleepy.

"You should pay attention, Stiles," Derek frowned at him, looking somewhat concerned.

"Seelie Court etiquette, dos and don'ts with fae folk," Stiles mumbled, waving a dismissive hand. "I spent the past day studying up on it, I don't need the Alpha lecture – even though I'm sure Peter is doing a wonderful job explaining it to you guys. Go, Peter."

He gave the Alpha a playful thumbs-up and Peter rolled his eyes at him, though the man couldn't fight the small, bemused smile. He stood together with Chris in front of the kitchen isle. The rest of the pack was gathered in a circle around them, more or less. Erica was sitting on Boyd's lap on the couch, with Isaac sitting next to them, talking to Erica. Jackson and Lydia were sharing the love-seat, Lydia on his lap and a heavy book on the armrest next to them as she scanned through it while carding her fingers through her mate's hair, soothing Jackson (which was always a good thing to do during a pack meeting to keep him and Scott from going for each other's throats). Scott, Allison, Kira and Malia were sharing the other couch and oh god why was Stiles in a pack with so many happy couples, that was just disgusting. Kira was braiding Malia's hair. Why were they so cute.

Stiles' eyes found Derek, Cora and Isaac on instinct, seeking the companionship from the other singles in their paired-up pack. Cora offered him a grin and an exasperated eye-roll motioning at Scott and Allison while making gagging motions, which only made Stiles snicker.

Peter cleared his throat, raising his eyebrows at Stiles in a pointed manner. "As I was saying, we have to decide how we approach the Seelie Court."

Stiles just offered his Alpha a tired, shit-eating grin. Man, he'd never thought Peter would grow into being a good Alpha. But being brought back from dead had really helped the man. And he loved this pack so fiercely, with the fierceness of a man who had already lost one pack. So when the Alpha Pack had invaded their territory and when the Darach had poisoned Cora, forcing Derek to give up his Alpha Spark to heal his sister, Peter had gone ahead and killed one of those 'spare Alphas running around' (Peter's words. That man was horrible. Why was Stiles so deeply in love with him), making him the new Alpha of the Hale Pack. They'd rebuilt, together. Well, until the next big bad hit them. Stiles' breath hitched at the reminder of the Nogitsune and even without meaning to, he started pressing his thumbs against the pads of his fingers, counting them.

"Stiles?" Derek's voice grew softer as he watched the movement.

Startled, Stiles sat up when he noticed the whole room had fallen silent, everyone staring at him. Everyone watching his finger-counting. Damn it. He hated worrying them. He forced a smile.

"I'm fine, just didn't sleep," Stiles shrugged.

Which wasn't even a lie. Neither of that was. He was fine – his new normal, his new definition of fine, because he would never be 'fine' again, he knew that, it had settled deeply in his bones. He was as fine as he would ever be. Stretching long and cracking his back, he decided to focus on the pack-meeting after all. Better than to let his mind drift to dark places. It tended to do that, especially when he was on too little sleep, which he evidently was today.

"There isn't really much to consider," Lydia picked the previous conversation up again. "When negotiating with the fae, it's important to have one vocal point, particularly to avoid missteps. The chances of someone in this pack speaking out of terms and insulting the fae, or worse even, accepting something from the fae that will be taken as a bargain, is too high."

"Why—y is everyone looking at me?" Scott frowned. "Jackson insults more people than me."

"That's true," Jackson shrugged. "But you would just accept shit from them, McCall."

"Don't fight," Stiles growled annoyed, pinning both betas with a look. "Focus."

Both Chris and Peter regarded him with heavy eyes and Stiles avoided them both, instead turning his attention to the coffee maker to get something to keep him awake. He hated the way they'd look at him whenever he accidentally Pack Mom-ed a little too obviously. It made something anxious twist in his gut, making him wonder if they knew. It was probably wrong of him to 'secretly' be Pack Mom, without actually clearing that with the Alpha and the Alpha Mate, but… But then there were enough things kept between them so he didn't feel overly guilty for it. With a near vindictive energy did he pour himself a coffee before returning to the counter.

"I'll talk to the Seelie Queen," Stiles declared simply.

"Excuse you," Peter huffed out a near amused laugh. "Who's the Alpha."

Peter flashed those pretty, pretty red eyes at him. It was cute how Peter thought that'd get him Stiles' submission. Instead, Stiles simply rolled his own eyes and emptied the cup of coffee in one go, causing Isaac to make gagging sounds and Boyd to make a concerned noise.

"Who's the Emissary of this pack," Stiles countered, raising both eyebrows at Peter. "That's literally in my job description. I represent the pack in diplomatic missions and speak on the pack's behalf. Don't think it can get more diplomatic than a visit at the Seelie Court. Besides, with all due respect oh great Alpha, you tend to get… violent… when your pack is threatened."

"So," Peter narrowed his eyes at Stiles, demanding more.

"There's no way we won't get threatened there," Stiles blinked at him amused. "Seelies play games and they threaten with honey-sweetened words. The last thing we need is for you to take a threat a bit too personal and threaten them back, because we'd be in their realm. They'd not only have the home advantage, we'd be stuck in a whole different realm, Peter. You're good with words, you got a sharp tongue, but so do I. I know how to deal with this. I spent all of yesterday preparing for it."

"He's not wrong, dad," Malia offered with a shrug. "Stiles has a sharper tongue than you."

"From my own daughter," Peter muttered beneath his breath.

"He is the best pick, from a standpoint of his role in the pack," Lydia added. "I would have tossed my own hat in the ring, or even Kira's – kitsune are trickster spirits, so there might be a certain sense of kinship that the Seelies might feel toward her – but as Emissary, Stiles is best suited."

Kira ducked her head. "I would really rather not do a job that requires me to speak sharp and precise. I am more prone to word-vomit and I don't see that going over well."

Malia interlaced her fingers with Kira's and pulled her close enough to kiss. "I like your word-vomits, they're cute. But yeah maybe not vomit all over the Seelie Court."

"Are you sure, Stiles?" Derek frowned at him again.

"You are so way over-protective, dude," Stiles rolled his eyes.

"Don't call me 'dude'," Derek growled annoyed. "And I'm serious."

"So am I," Stiles raised both eyebrows at the former Alpha. "I mean, shit, I'm already best suited from an introductory perspective. It's rude not to answer when asked something and they will ask for our names first. Names hold power. If you give a fae folk your name, they have control over you, but if you just don't answer, you insult them. I'm the only one who can truthfully answer without giving my actual name, because I don't go by my actual name."

"Huh," Erica blinked a couple of times. "Didn't even consider that."

A broad, shit-eating grin spread over Stiles lips. "I was made for this one. Besides! No mortal danger! I mean, you know, not from attacks. Mortal danger from linguistic missteps, but I'm eloquent enough to fight that battle. This one? This one's for me."

His grin turned a little more wicked and Peter flashed his eyes red for a moment in a way that Stiles couldn't quite explain. But what he said was true. Ever since the Seelie Court had moved into Beacon Hills a few days ago, and people started disappearing, Stiles had mentally prepared himself for this. He was uniquely suited to take care of this problem.

"We're all going," Chris declared in a very final Alpha Mate voice. "We won't let you walk into a foreign magical realm on your own, Stiles. But nobody aside from Stiles will speak with the fae or make contact with them. You will not be provoked and you will not provoke. Am I clear?"

The betas all ducked their heads and nodded to varying degrees. Stiles' grin turned a little more soft at the trust from his Alphas, even as it made his heart feel uncomfortably heavy.

/break\

The fourteen of them walked deep into the preserve together the next day. No unnecessary accessories – jackets, scarves, jewelry – nothing that could be snatched or bargained. Nobody was to wander off and, as Chris had declared yesterday, nobody was to speak to the Seelies aside from Stiles. His heart was jackrabbiting in his chest. Peter rested a gentle hand on his shoulder.

"You can do this," Peter whispered in a warm voice. "I know that."

The confidence only made Stiles' heart beat even faster. He nodded sharply as he lead the pack toward the pond deep in the woods. Oh, he really hoped this was going to work. It'd be so much easier with magic, but—He shook his head sharply, he couldn't think about that right now.

"This is a powerful portal," Stiles motioned at the mushrooms growing around the pond. "Water is a bridge between realms already but this pond was turned into a fairy circle too. Do not get lost. I'll go in first, we will all hold hands, there will be no complaints."

His hand slipped into Peter's, who in turn took Chris', Chris holding Allison's, Allison holding Scott's, behind Scott came Isaac, Erica, Boyd, Derek, Cora, Malia, Kira, Lydia, Jackson. One by one, they stepped through the bond, falling through the sky and landing in a true fairy tale kingdom. Everything was a purple blue haze, beautiful. Glowing fireflies in blue and pink flying all around them, butterflies larger than normal circled them. Flowers and tall trees everywhere.

"This is stunning," Kira whispered in awe.

"Do not, under any circumstances, touch anything," Stiles reminded her in a steely voice. "Regardless of how beautiful and harmless it looks. Everything here is deadly."

The kitsune nodded sharply, holding a little tighter onto Malia and Lydia. No one had let go yet. Good. Safer that way, at least until they'd reach the Seelie Court. Stiles' eyes were hard as he regarded them all, counting his pack-members just to make sure they were all there.

"How do we find the Seelie Court?" Scott asked, looking around. "This seems… big…"

"He has a point," Jackson conceded. "I can't see a real path anywhere either."

Stiles smirked at the betas, before tilting his head back and calling out loudly. "In the name of the Nemeton of Beacon Hills, I evoke the Spark's right of an audience with the Seelie Queen."

"What," Peter's eyes were wide in surprise.

It made Stiles laugh and turn toward the stunned pack. "I told you, I am uniquely suited for this job. The Nemeton is what invited the fae folk. As its chosen guardian, I have the right of an audience and can not be harmed until I am before the queen."

"Aren't you full of surprises, little Spark," Peter's eyes danced with something that Stiles couldn't name, before he frowned. "Though I do not appreciate the half-truths. You could have told us."

"Eh, where's the fun in that," Stiles laughed and turned back again.

His laughter died when two Seelie Knights approached them, wearing armor of hardened leafs and bark, adored with gold and gemstones. Their long hair was braided and decorated with poison ivy. They were easily the most beautiful creatures Stiles had ever seen, though he couldn't tell if they were men, women or neither. He just knew he was enchanted. His grip tightened.

"Do not let go until we're at the court," Stiles instructed the pack sharply.

"Spark," one of the knights greeted him, both of them bowing deep. "Our queen is delighted to receive you. If you would follow us, alone, we will bring you."

Stiles returned the bow and spoke while still bent down. "I thank your queen for her hospitality, however, where I go, my pack goes. As she surely can understand, for she would not receive me without her trusted knights present either."

The Seelie Knights exchanged a look, but in the end, they gave a reluctant nod and led the way. They walked through the forest and it felt as though the trees were bending their way, forming arcs for them to walk beneath. It was truly stunning. Until they reached the Seelie Court. Like a naturally occurring amphitheater, in a strange way. The stones and Earth seemed like they had formed the rounded shape all on their own, it was beautiful. The trees above them bore pink flowers, their petals raining down on everything ever so softly. Stiles could imagine being here forever.

At the center of the amphitheater stood a tree stump, the bark rising higher in the back, making it look like a throne. On the throne sat the most breathtaking woman Stiles had ever seen, her dress practically see-through in soft green, with flowers growing around it. Her hair was snow-white, her skin pale and adored with silver freckles like stars. Her eyes sharp and unnaturally green.

Stiles let go of Peter's hand to go down on one knee, bowing to her. The Alpha caught on and followed his example, and so did the rest of the pack after a moment. The knights walked to stand on either side of their queen, who made a delighted noise.

"I am Queen Faerynna of the Seelie Court and I am overjoyed to welcome a Spark in my realm."

"You are too kind, your highness. Your hospitality flatters me," Stiles remained kneeling.

"Rise, and tell me who you are," the queen instructed him.

"I am Stiles, Spark of Beacon Hills and Emissary of our local pack," Stiles said, motioning behind himself. "This is my pack and we thank you for your time."

He could hear one of them – Scott? Isaac? – gasp loudly now that everyone stood again. Stiles didn't turn away from the queen, but he still checked from the corner of his eyes. Ah. Humans, the missing people they were looking for. Dancing with bleeding feed, crying without noise.

"Do you like them?" Queen Faerynna asked excitedly. "They are new! They entertain me!"

Stiles instinctively reached out behind himself to grab Scott's wrist without having to look. He always knew where his betas were, Pack Mom instincts were great. Holding tight, he stopped Scott and jerked him back, giving a light shove and hoping the rest of the pack would catch on and help him keep a lid on this. He loved Scott dearly, but the guy's mortals often got the better of him. He wanted to help the people right now, but they couldn't. It'd incite the queen's wrath.

"They seem like… dull entertainment to me," Stiles offered after a moment. "Not worthy of a queen as beautiful and powerful as yourself, your highness."

The queen looked pleased and intrigued by this, leaning back in her throne. "What do you want."

"Their freedom, and ideally that you leave our territory," Stiles offered bluntly.

"And what do you offer in return?" Queen Faerynna's eyes sparkled eagerly.

"What is it you would want, in return for this," Stiles asked instead of offering anything.

"Mh…" Queen Faerynna's brows furrowed thoughtfully. "You want to take my entertainment away and you claim it isn't worthy of a queen like me, so… If you can entertain me better than they, I will grant your request. They can go and I will bind my realm to another place."

Stiles took a moment to consider. "What… kind of entertainment would you wish for, my queen? I assure you, I am not a graceful dancer, I doubt I would be able to entertain you with dance."

She laughed lightly and shook her head. "Play a game with me and if you play, I let them go."

Adjusting his stance, Stiles tilted his head. "Neither me nor my pack will die or be harmed in this game? And you will let us go too, when the game ends?"

"No physical harm will come to either of you."

"No harm at all will come to them," Stiles argued sharply.

The queen looked even more delighted at that. "No harm at all will come to your pack, if you play."

"And you will keep your end of the bargain regardless of how the game ends?" Stiles asked warily. "Not just in case I win, but also in case I lose."

"Oh, you will lose," Queen Faerynna pursed her lips amused. "But yes. As long as you play, start to finish, I will let you, your companions and the drool little dancers leave my realm."

"We have a deal," Stiles declared, followed by gasps from his pack.

No bargains with the fae. Well, no ill-advised bargains with the fae. He was content with these terms they had set and he knew they would not get rid of the Seelie Court without giving something. He whirled around when there were outcries from his pack. Vines shot from the ground, curling around them from the ankles up to the necks, keeping them all individually rooted to the spot. Blood-red roses sprouted on the vines as they tied the pack up.

"You promised no harm-" Stiles growled dangerously.

"They are not harmed," the queen stated matter-of-factly. "And as long as you play, they will not be harmed. See the thorns as… incentive for you to play along, young Spark."

A vicious snarl formed on his face as he saw the fearful look on Lydia's face, the concern on Chris', the panic on Isaac's. He whirled around, facing the queen again. So he wouldn't have to look at his pack, not feel guilty about the situation he'd gotten them into.

"I'm going to play your game," Stiles muttered, displeased. "Tell me the rules."

"It's simple," Faerynna smiled at him lightly. "I will ask you thirteen questions, one for each member of your pack, and with every hard truth you will reveal to me, to this court, and to your pack, I will release one of your pack-mates. You can, of course, end the game any time by refusing to answer me, but then I will keep every remaining pack-member I still have."

Her eyes were sharp and so were her teeth as she smiled even broader. He froze at the spot, his heartbeat skyrocketing as his eyes widened and his palms started sweating.

"What," Stiles forced the word out. "H… How is that entertaining for you."

He had genuinely considered chess or something along those lines. A game of wits and wisdom, worthy or a millennia old fae. Not this. The queen laughed, her smile growing more vicious.

"You have a sharp, silver tongue, young Spark," the queen pointed out. "You have mastered the art of lying to werewolves. That fascinates me and I think it would be greatly entertaining to see you stripped of your armor and forced to tell your truths."

"Stiles, listen to me," Lydia spoke gently. "It's going to be okay. Whatever you say, none of us will hold it against you. We know you're doing this to save us."

"What do you mean?" Scott sounded confused.

"Sometimes, we tell lies because truths hurt, even those close to us," Peter's voice was filled with bitterness. "Whatever the queen wants to pull out of Stiles, she does so to hurt him."

"Which means that these are things he chose not to tell us," Chris continued. "And that's his right. Everyone has a right to their secrets. So what Lydia means is that we will not hold those secrets against him, whatever they are, even if they hurt us."

"Especially if they hurt us," Peter corrected his mate. "Because it's most likely that that's why Stiles decided to keep them secrets, to not hurt us."

Stiles quirked his lips into a bitter smile at that. Wouldn't Peter know about secrets, mh. Still, the reassurance from his pack somewhat eased the queasy feeling in his stomach. He took a breath at the soft, understanding 'oh' from Scott. Okay. He could do that. Telling the truth.

"Bit rusty, but sure, let's give it a try," Stiles muttered beneath his breath before straightening to his full height, holding his head high too, not cowering before her. "I'm ready for your game."

There was a pause in everyone as the game was about to start. The pack, Stiles, the queen, even the knights. No, everything. Stiles noted the way the falling petals were suspended in the air for a moment. The binding magic of a fae contract was kicking in. And then everything came back to life.

"How can there be a Spark, in a territory where the local Nemeton has been cut down?"

Stiles tilted his head, furrowing his brows. That wasn't what he had expected. He turned to look back at his pack, all thirteen of them wrapped up in vines, thorns digging into their clothes. Blood-red roses adoring the vines. Some of them – Malia, Jackson, Derek and Scott – struggling more, like they could break free if they only tried hard enough. Others like Lydia, Kira, Peter and Chris knew better, stood relaxed, knowing that the vines would only tighten if they struggled.

"You can't ask questions that we don't know the answers to. That's cheating," Chris declared.

The hunter stared at the queen with steely, cold eyes, making Stiles shudder. The glare seemed nearly protective and Stiles felt warmth fill his belly at that thought. He knew it wasn't, but still.

"That's what makes it a hard truth," Queen Faerynna smiled bemused. "Because he knows the answer. He knows the answer but hasn't even told his pack. Delightful."

"Because it's mine," Stiles growled, keeping his head high.

"Not anymore," Queen Faerynna looked gleeful. "Unless you are fine with leaving this court without your friends… I wouldn't mind keeping them for my entertainment."

She curled her fingers together and the vines tightened around the pack. Stiles glared frustrated.

"The Nemeton only plants the Spark. But there have always been three parties. The Nemeton, the Spark, the pack," Stiles answered, raising his head, trying to look down on the queen. "The Hales just stopped looking for a Spark. I'm fairly sure there's always been a Spark, but the Spark has been forgotten by the pack. They thought there couldn't be one without the Nemeton. But the Nemeton still planted the Spark. It takes the pack to ignite a Spark. I only got access to my magic after I joined the Hale Pack, the first time I used my magic was to protect my pack, at the rave."

He could hear the confused noises, saw the looks his pack exchanged at that. Could see the questions in their eyes. His stomach felt like it was filling with lead, even as the roses around Isaac turned from their blood-red color into a pure white and the vines let go, leaving Isaac confused, stumbling forward and instinctively closer to Stiles. Stiles' own instincts told him to put himself between his pup and the threat. The queen. So he pushed in front of Isaac.

"And why is that a secret?" Queen Faerynna asked. "Why not tell your pack?"

The delightful grin on her lips told him that she already knew. His pulse was picking up, he balled fists at the sides of his body, feeling tense and nervous. He didn't like where this game was going.

"Stiles," Peter growled. "Answer her question."

And not just because the pack was in danger. But because the Alpha was angry. He could hear it in Peter's growl. The master manipulator and hoarder of information hated not knowing. This was knowledge regarding his pack that had been deliberately kept from him by his Emissary.

"Because you already lost enough," Stiles forced out, turning to look at Peter, Derek and Cora. "You were already blaming yourself for the loss of your family. You didn't need to know that your family could have lived if the pack had kept looking for Sparks, if instead of the unreliable, weak druid, Talia would have had a Spark as her Emissary. I didn't want you to feel like there was something else you could have done to prevent what happened, not when the past is… in the past."

He pressed his lips together and looked away from the Hales. There was no changing the past and yet this was a fact. If the Hale Pack hadn't stopped looking for Sparks, had kept looking for them, they would have had Sparks as Emissaries for the past seventy years. Whoever had been the Spark before Stiles, they would have been at Talia's side, they could have protected the pack.

"Stiles…" Peter's voice softened. "That wasn't your burden to carry."

"It was," Stiles straightened his posture again, bracing himself for what would come after this. "I am your Emissary. Protecting this pack is my job. Even from emotional pain, Peter."

He chanced a glance at the Hales, seeing pain and pity in their eyes, even as the roses around Cora turned lily white and the vines fell off of her. She came to join Isaac in standing behind Stiles. He took a step forward, away from them. He didn't want comfort or support, because it would just make him more aware of the audience he had. If he had to give eleven more truths, he needed to compartmentalize. Lock away his own feelings in regard to this and focus on the task.

"Your job, mh," a bemused smile played on the queen's face. "What is your job in this pack?"

"I'm the Emissary of the pack," Stiles replied with narrowed eyes.

"Half-truth," Queen Faerynna chimed, shaking her head in disapproval. "Don't make me hurt them. You know exactly what I am talking about. What's your job in this pack, that you're hiding?"

"I'm…" Stiles' voice shook a little and he swallowed hard. "Pack Mom."

Noises of confusion came from behind him, startled gasps. He tried tuning them out, because he knew he wasn't done answering. She required elaborate answers. Painful answers.

"I've been Pack Mom since I joined this pack, back when Derek was still the Alpha," Stiles continued, focusing only on the queen. "I take care of my pack. I used my magic for the first time so I could protect my pups. I protected them from the kanima, at the rave. Put myself between them and the threat. Would do it again every day. Am doing it right now."

He squared up just a little, glaring at the queen and drawing emphasis to the fact that he did stand between her and Isaac and Cora. The two betas made curious noises at that. The queen laughed. Someone else was freed and moments later, he felt Derek's hand on his shoulder. He turned, just a little, looking at the former Alpha, seeing the wondrous look in Derek's eyes.

"I protected Boyd and Erica in the basement. I made them return to the pack. I blackmailed Jackson's parents into not leaving for London. I keep this pack together. It doesn't matter who's the Alpha, I'm Pack Mom and they are my betas first."

For a split second, his eyes flitted back to Peter, but he couldn't make out what the look on the Alpha's face meant. He hoped it wasn't anger. Swallowing hard, Stiles returned his attention to the queen, with Derek standing strong at his side, helping him shield Isaac and Cora. A small smile found its way onto Stiles' lips. The two of them had become friends, close friends, over all the times they'd saved each other's lives. Derek may not have been a good Alpha, but he was a good man and a good friend. He was much happier now, as a beta again, Stiles could see that.

"You keep protecting your pack, I'm sure you've given a lot for them," Queen Faerynna mused. "What else have you given, for that pack of yours? What is the most you have given for them?"

His whole body tensed as a flood of memories flashed before his inner eye, memories of every single time he had gotten hurt, tortured, abducted, tormented, and unable to stop it, he could feel himself starting to count his fingers. His thumbs pressed against his other fingers one by one, forcefully, and lastly pressing against his palm. One, two, three, four, five. Five fingers on each hand. Not a dream. Not a nightmare. Because it started to feel like a nightmare, like he was being tortured on purpose. He counted his fingers again. Derek, Cora and Isaac stepped up to him, careful.

"Stiles," Derek spoke softly, watching the movement of his fingers.

One, two, three, four five. He balled his hands into fists, albeit shaking. He knew what Derek was thinking, what they all were thinking, was acutely aware of the way they'd watched the movement. They knew what this was, what he was doing, why he was doing it. Which was why his actual answer was only going to surprise them even more. Because the Nogitsune wasn't something he had given, not really. It was something that had been forced onto him. That was different.

"I died," Stiles replied after another beat. "I gave my life for this pack. In the Argents' basement-"

He could see Chris and Allison flinch and Boyd and Erica still at his words and he ignored it, instead barreling on to get it over with. "I died in that basement. Because the level of electricity needed to keep wolves from shifting is too much for a human heart to endure. When I tried freeing Boyd and Erica, I got electrocuted. My Spark didn't allow me to stay dead, it restarted my heart."

"Stiles-" Chris' voice broke, sounded so wrecked, it made Stiles' heart ache.

"I died for this pack," Stiles repeated with emphasis, turning away from his pack again to instead look the queen dead in the eyes, his own gaze cold and serious. "And I'll do it again, as often as I have to, as long as I can keep them safe. I'll do anything to keep my pack safe."

And it wasn't just additional information, it was a thinly veiled threat. If she hurt them, he was going to kill her. As simple as that. Queen Faerynna laughed delighted, clapping her hands.

"I will be generous, young Spark. You gave me two hard truths, what you have given and what you are willing to give, so I will in return give you two of your pack-mates."

The vines fell off both Boyd and Erica and without hesitation did the mated pair rush to him and hug him from behind, from either side. He couldn't help but flinch. He'd never wanted them to know. His heart was hammering in his chest and his eyes burned with unshed tears. They let him go reluctantly, after a moment, when they noticed him shaking. Knowing that he couldn't afford to break down here, knowing that he needed the distance. He was eternally grateful to them when they stepped back to fall in line with Cora and Isaac, allowing him to gather himself.

"What are you most ashamed of, most afraid they will learn?"

There was something predatory to the queen's gaze at that, unnaturally long teeth showing in her smile. Stiles wrapped his arms around his torso, too aware of the way Derek, Cora, Isaac, Boyd and Erica were huddling around him, how the rest of the pack stood behind them, still tied up, still in danger, yet all of them watching him. He hunched in on himself, shoulders drawn close. The vines around the other pack-members tightened until there were some pained noises coming from Kira and Lydia. Stiles ground his teeth together, glaring viciously at her.

"I killed Allison," Stiles spat the words out, closing his eyes tightly.

"What are you talking about, she's right here!" Scott sounded desperate, worried. "And you didn't do anything, it was the demon, it wasn't you!"

"But it was me," Stiles growled, voice dripping with self-loathing. "I remember everything it did. It made me watch. I felt the resistance of her flesh when we drove the sword into her and I watched her die in my arms, I listened as she took her last breath. I was too late. By the time I could wrestle some control back from it, she was dead. Lydia didn't scream in warning because someone might die, she screamed because Allison did die that day because I killed her."

He made a wretched sound but managed to not throw up at the court. Yay, him.

"Stiles, I'm alive," Allison pointed out, gently. "M… Maybe it was just messing with you-"

"Go on, young Spark, and I'll let two go again," the queen offered generously.

"I gave up my Spark to bring you back," Stiles whispered, tilting his head down, feeling so small. "I poured all of my magic into you, into bringing you back, I clawed at your soul to drag it back into your body. That's why I haven't used my magic since the possession. I know you all think I'm just afraid of it because the Nogitsune was dark magic, but it's because I don't have magic anymore. I gave it up to bring Allison back. I don't know if it will ever recover, or if it's gone for good."

Shocked and pained gasps and when the five already freed tried to comfort him, he shied away from their touch. He'd never wanted to admit this, he never wanted to tell them that he was useless now, that he no longer had his magic, had no right to be Emissary of the pack anymore. He squeezed his eyes shut, feeling the tears running down his cheeks but choking on his sob.

"Stiles…" Allison's voice was so soft as her and Scott walked up to him. "Thank you."

She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into a tight hug, and Scott was right next to her, his arms around them both and suddenly, Stiles couldn't fight the sob anymore, clinging onto her.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Stiles chanted until his voice broke. "I killed you."

"You brought me back to life," Allison corrected, gently caressing his hair. "You gave up your magic to bring me back to life, Stiles. I don't know how to thank you for that."

The queen waited patiently until his tears died and he gathered himself enough to face her again. He motioned for Scott and Allison to join the others, still wanting to keep them safe, needing to protect his pack. They reluctantly obeyed, after soft additional tugging from the other betas.

"Continue," Stiles ordered, voice rough. "Let's get this over with. I want to go home."

"You told me what you gave up for the pack, what you are willing to give up for it. What have you lost for this pack?" Queen Faerynna asked, tilting her head. "Not given, but what was taken."

Clarification, so he couldn't say his magic. He frowned annoyed. And then he paused when he noticed that he was counting his fingers again. Oh. Right, remembering the Nogitsune did that to him. Many things did that to him. He had too many triggers to keep track of at this point.

"My sanity. My mind," Stiles furrowed his brows, looking down at his hands. "The Nogitsune took my ability to tell reality from nightmare. Every single time something… not normal… happens, I have to count my fingers to make sure I'm awake. And in our lives, every day is a day that something abnormal happens and every time, I have a moment of panic that I'm not awake, not really here, that it's not real, that I'm still stuck in my mind, and I don't think that will ever stop."

This one felt good, in a weird way. Like a tight grip on his heart was easing off and he could breath just a little easier. Scott slipped a hand into his from one side, giving it a tight squeeze and looking at him with those big puppy-dog eyes, sad but supportive. Derek took his other hand. Allison, Cora, Isaac, Boyd and Erica were still standing in a half-circle behind him. Protective. Supportive. There.

The roses around Jackson turned white and the former kanima was free to first check on Lydia and… and then join the others in their protective little half-circle around Stiles. His heartbeat picked up and he raised his chin high to regard the queen coldly. Bring it on, his gaze said.

"What is the thing you are most afraid of?"

Mh. Stiles felt himself strangely detached as he considered this question. Near clinical.

"The Nogitsune made me think I was dying," Stiles whispered. "Dying of the same illness that took my mom. And that… That's my biggest fear. Every day I wake up and I am terrified that today's the day, today I'll start showing actual symptoms. That I'll fully lose my mind, forget all the knowledge I've gathered, forget the people I love, forget myself. That I'll die slowly and alone, even if everyone who loves me is around me, because I won't recognize them."

He blinked repeatedly, blinking away tears as he remembered his mother's vacant gaze. Scott gave his hand a squeeze but didn't speak, knew it wouldn't change anything. Nothing could. The vines let go of Kira and she stumbled up to the rest of the pack, finding her place among them.

The queen tapped her fingers against her chin, smiling. "Who do you love the most?"

"My dad," Stiles answered without missing a beat, this being a truth he didn't mind to part with. "He's the only one I have left. Ever since mom died, since her family turned their backs on us, he's all I have left. I love him more than my own life."

The queen pursed her lips and tilted her head. "That was not the love I was talking about, but it was such a sweet and genuine answer that I will accept it. And it is on me for not being specific."

The flowers around Malia turned from red to white. Ten down, three more to go. This one had been easy. Deceptively easy. Stiles felt himself tense in anticipation for what came next.

"Who are you in love with?" Queen Faerynna rephrased her last question. "Romantic love, dear."

Stiles' eyes widened and he squared his jaw, clenching a hand over his mouth, trying to physically keep himself from answering. No. Not this. Everything but this. She couldn't take this from him.

"Stiles," Lydia spoke softly, reaching out as far as the bindings allowed. "It's okay."

"Yeah," Jackson heaved a sigh. "Not like we all don't know it. You know I'm okay with it, you love Lydia, everybody knows. It's okay."

The rest of the pack made reassuring noises too. Like they knew him. Like they knew what was in his heart. They really thought he was still hung up on Lydia? After all this time?

"I'm not in love with Lydia," Stiles spat out. "I've never been in love with Lydia, it was just easier to be in love with a perfect girl who would never look at me twice than to confront that I'm gay."

He gasped at that, he'd never said it out loud, not even to Scott. His best friend made a confused noise, so did the majority of pack. Like being gay wasn't a big deal. Straight people really didn't get it. Even with the most supportive allies surrounding him, that didn't change the fear.

"Danny is gay, so is my dad, Peter and Malia are bi, Kira is a lesbian," Allison pointed out gently. "I just mean, none of us would have judged you."

"I've told myself that I'm in love with Lydia since first grade, since before I knew what gay even was, that boys liking boys was even a thing that could happen," Stiles snarled, his fists shaking next to him. "Good for everyone who had the emotional space and capability to come to terms with it before high school, I didn't. And when I was ready to come out, when I told my dad that I'm gay he told me not dressed like that, my own father couldn't believe that I could be gay because of the way I dress, so I shoved that back down where it's been for years and left it there. Because living a lie that nobody questions is easier than living a truth that people might reject."

Queen Faerynna regarded him with soft, warm eyes and that made it worse. "I'll accept it. It wasn't an answer to the question I asked, but it was a hard truth, so I will accept it."

The flowers on Lydia turned white, releasing her. She stumbled into Jackson's arms. Stiles marginally relaxed. Two more. He could do this. He felt raw and naked and vulnerable but he had endured eleven truths, he could tell two more and then they could get out of here.

"Now, let me rephrase again, then. One last time. If you do not answer me truthfully this time, I will keep you all here for eternity, young Spark. Who do you desire the most?"

"My mates," Stiles choked out, tears prickling in the corners of his eyes. "I want my mates. I know they don't want me, I know that, I learned to accept that, but that doesn't stop me from wanting them. I want them so badly, it physically hurts."

Stiles kept his eyes on the queen, ignoring the surprised gasps from his pack, ignoring Peter and Chris. He could see them in the corner of his eyes, he wished he couldn't. He didn't want them to know this, not them. He'd worked so hard to ignore this. Chris was released and went to hug Allison. He tried to reach out to Stiles but Stiles violently flinched away from his touch.

The queen didn't give Chris a chance to speak. "Why do you think your mates don't want you?"

"Because he has known for two years and never said anything and they've sealed their mate-bond a year ago and never said anything and how could they," Stiles spat the words out, shaking a little. "I killed him, I killed Peter. And I killed Chris' daughter. How could they want me. Half the time, I don't even understand why they let me be part of the pack, much less the Emissary, so that's already more than I deserve. How could they want me, I don't want myself."

His breathing was labored and he knew the look in his eyes was haunted. He pulled away from the pack, wrapping his arms around himself, trying to protect himself. Peter was free, they were all free, and Stiles felt like he was breaking into a million pieces, with all his well-guarded secrets laid bare before them all. He gasped out a sob, trying to gather himself.

"There," Stiles snarled. "I played your game. Now keep your promise."

"Of course, young Spark," Queen Faerynna smiled and it looked nearly merciful. "You played well, so I will reward you. Your Spark is not gone, you simply lost connection to it. Let me help you reignite it, as a thank you for a very entertaining evening."

She lifted her hand, and there was a sudden warmth in his chest. He gasped out as power flooded him, his eyes widened and he knew, in that moment, that they were flashing turquoise, as they hadn't in too many months. The next second, he found himself in the middle of the pond. Dripping wet, with his entire pack, and the previously dancing humans, sitting in the water.

"Stiles-" Peter spoke, his voice sounding unsure.

"No," Stiles shook his head violently and climbed out of the pond. "No. No, I can't. I can't… I… I… I can't have this conversation now, I can't, I need to… be alone, right now."

"I'll drive you home, Stiles," Derek offered in an unusually soft voice.

Stiles turned to glare at the former Alpha. But he knew he was shaking, full body shakes, and was about a second away from a full panic attack. He was also overwhelmed by this new, even stronger connection to his Spark, he felt like his nerves were on fire. After taking a shaky breath, Stiles nodded, giving up. Maybe he could use someone driving him home right now.

He let Derek lead the way back to their cars, where he took Stiles' keys from him and started the Jeep. Stiles slipped into the passenger seat, pulling his legs up, feeling small and exhausted. He rested his head against the window, tears running down his face.

"Tell me if there is anything I can do," Derek requested, voice low.

"G… Give me the weekend," Stiles pleaded. "I can't see them, I can't talk to them, I just… I just need time, please, I need… I didn't want to say any of this, these were my truths and she took them, forced them away from me and I can't deal with whatever Peter and Chris want, I can't."

"Of course," Derek rumbled softly, reassuring.

Stiles sagged a little in relief at the promise. He felt too raw. He needed time to stitch himself together again before he could face anyone, much less Peter and Chris.

/break\

Chris wanted to reach out for Stiles, wanted to comfort him, to hold him. Before he had a chance to did his own daughter step in the way. The look on Allison's face was hard and Chris was shocked to have it aimed at himself. The betas lined up behind her. Putting themselves between Chris, Peter and Stiles. Protecting Stiles from the Alphas. Chris startled as he realized that with a pang.

Derek led Stiles away to the cars, leaving the rest of the pack behind. Peter next to Chris ground his teeth together, keeping from snarling at their betas. Chris reached out, taking his mate's hand.

"Scott, Erica, Jackson, Malia, I want you three to take the injured people to the hospital," Lydia instructed in a stern no-nonsense voice. "I want you to also go and get rid of your aggression because I will not have this escalate into a physical fight. Boyd, I want you to take Kira, Isaac and Cora home. Me and Allison will go with our Alphas and have a conversation with them."

"Why do you think you get to command my pack," Peter asked sharply.

Lydia's eyes were steely. "Because you hurt Stiles. And right now, I'm the only thing between you and the sharp teeth and claws of your own betas, because – and you should know that – we love Stiles. Even if we may not have known that he was Pack Mom, the bond was still there."

Isaac whined at that, leaning into Erica and Boyd for a moment. Of course. The three first betas of the Hale Pack had the strongest bond to Stiles, aside from Scott. The strongest Pack Mom bond. Stiles had just admitted it, that he had become Pack Mom for them. Chris swallowed hard. He turned to look at Peter, who looked guilty and heartbroken.

"Fine," Peter forced out. "Do as she said."

The pack split up, Chris and Peter getting into Peter's car, together with Allison and Lydia. The drive back to the Hale House was tense and quiet, the two girls in the back seething.

"I love you, dad," Allison started as soon as they entered the house. "But you have some serious explaining to do, because I've never felt more protective of Stiles than right now, after he just told me that he brought me back from the dead."

She was shaking, Chris noted. Because she'd died. His daughter had been dead. Chris started shaking too. He reached out for her, wrapping his arms around her. Thankfully, she let him. A sob tore from her throat as he started crying. Mourning her own death.

"There is… a lot that Stiles has done for this pack, without any of us knowing," Lydia's voice was a sad whisper, her eyes on the ground. "And some where we didn't know the depth of his sacrifice. So yes, you two do have some explaining to do and don't you dare growl at me and deny me, Peter Hale. Stiles just bared his soul to us, you owe at least that much in return."

Chris didn't let go of Allison, burying his face in her hair. He'd already lost his entire family, he only had her. The thought that he had lost her, that she would be dead if Stiles hadn't given up his magic for her. His grip on her tightened even more, desperate.

"He's been through so much," Chris admitted after a long moment. "When Peter and I got together, when I learned that we had a third mate in our bond, when I realized he's seventeen, he's… he's your age, Allison, I was… mortified of that. My mate is the same age as my daughter, I needed some time to digest that, I wanted for us to wait until he's at least eighteen."

Lydia heaved a deep sigh, but her eyes were on Peter, cold. "You don't have morals."

Peter barked out a laugh at that. "You're right. His age doesn't bother me. I would have claimed him on the spot, if I could have. But then I inconveniently died. And when I came back, well… There was always something, something dangerous to take care of."

"You found the time to court my dad," Allison pointed out.

There was a pause and a vulnerability to Peter. "He did kill me. I didn't think… I thought he deserved better. I worked very hard to become… better. Worthy of him. And by the time I thought I was a good enough Alpha, he was… possessed… He's still struggling with it. He needed the support of his pack, not the burden of this. You know him, you know he would have tried to put on an even braver face, not to worry us, would have forced himself to be stronger for us."

Both Allison and Lydia fell quiet at that. They knew he was right. They'd just been witness to the proof of it. Stiles kept all his pain safely tucked away, forcing himself to be strong for others. Peter and Chris had thought they did the right thing, didn't burden him with this.

"We need to go and talk to him, we need to explain this," Chris declared.

"You will not."

The four of them turned toward the door as Derek walked in, a dark expression on his face. Peter growled at his nephew, flashing his eyes red. But Derek flashed his eyes right back at the Alpha, growling, baring his fangs. Ready to fight. That was exactly what Lydia had wanted to avoid, any of the more volatile wolves to try and challenge the Alpha on Stiles' behalf.

"You will not keep me from my mate," Peter snarled.

"You kept yourself from your mate," Derek growled back. "You should have told him. You really thought Stiles wouldn't figure it out on his own? Stiles?"

Peter backed off at that, looking tormented. "I just… We'll explain it to him, we'll make up for it."

"But not right now," Derek raised his chin. "I asked him, if there is anything I can do to help him, and he asked me for time. He doesn't want to see anyone right now, much less you two. He earned the right to deal with what just happened, what's just been taken from him. You two didn't tell him for two years, you'll be able to wait three more days to talk to him. He asked for the weekend."

Lydia snorted and shook her head. "He didn't even ask for a full week."

"You know him," Derek huffed. "He's going to spend the weekend compartmentalizing and shoving his feelings back down where he usually keeps them locked up. And then he'll continue pretending that he's fine. I think he mostly asked for the weekend in hopes that we will do the same."

"Probably," Lydia conceded with a frown. "We will have to talk to the betas about this. We all should talk about this, together, so we can deal with our feelings on the matter on our own and don't put that on him too."

"Tomorrow," Allison nodded. "We'll have a pack-meeting tomorrow and talk this through."

Chris' eyes were on Peter and it was a testimony to how guilty Peter must be feeling that he let the three of them just decide this. Not that it was a bad decision. Chris reached out for his mate.

/break\

Peter was frustrated and annoyed. The pack had pretty much given him and Chris a verbal lashing for two days. Both Saturday and Sunday, they kept telling them off for not telling Stiles and picking apart their stupid reasons. They weren't wrong. Peter knew that himself.

He regretted not claiming the boy when he had first met him, but he'd been too feral. What little rational brain he had had been afraid that he would hurt his mate, so he kept Stiles at a distance. And then Stiles had helped kill him and Peter needed to earn the boy's trust first. And then, well…

"You ready for this, love?" Chris asked, holding Peter's hand.

It was Monday evening. They knew the sheriff was out. They also knew Stiles would be home. Allison, Cora and Isaac had told them Stiles had been at school. And that the betas had all wrapped him up in a puppy pile for the entire lunch break, apparently.

"Are you two going to stand there all night, or are you coming in? Door's open."

Both Chris and Peter startled and looked up at Stiles, who was leaning out of his bedroom window and regarding them with a near detached look, bordering bored. Peter hated that. He hated that Stiles felt the need to put up walls with them now. They'd been past that for so long.

Peter gave Chris' hand a tight squeeze before the both of them stepped into the Stilinski home and made their way upstairs to Stiles' bedroom. The boy was sitting on his window-sill, hands in his pockets, a guarded expression on his face as he regarded them.

"I didn't mean to say any of that," Stiles started before they had a chance to even say hello. "I didn't want you to know that I knew. We've had a great thing going of ignoring the mate-bonds. Let's just… pretend Friday night didn't happen and that I didn't say any of that."

"No, Stiles," Chris shook his head with a grave look on his face. "You didn't want us to know and… and we didn't want you to know, for… various reasons. But now that it's all on the table, we really need to talk about it. Don't sneer at me like that, brat."

Stiles ground his teeth together and raised his chin, much like he had done when facing the Seelie Queen. It made Peter's heart clench. He didn't want Stiles to look at them the same way he looked at the villain of the week. He'd worked so damn hard for over a year to prove he wasn't a villain.

"The last thing you said," Peter spoke softly. "The last 'truth' you shared, it may have been what you perceived as the truth, but… it's not the truth. That's a lie that you told yourself, twisted by… I don't know what would make you think so low of yourself, to be honest…"

"Don't act stupid, Peter, it doesn't suit you," Stiles offered him a cold, calculating glare. "I was possessed by a demon and killed countless people, killed an ally, killed Allison, I… Fuck, half the time I can't even look in the mirror because all I see is the Nogitsune."

He wrapped his arms around himself and stared down at his shoes. Looking so much more small and fragile than Peter was comfortable seeing him. His little Spark should be a spitfire of snark and sarcasm, loud and in everyone's face. Not withdrawn.

"We thought you should focus on healing," Chris offered in a reluctant voice. "You pulled away so much and we were scared that if we told you, you would only withdraw even more. You had so much to deal with, we didn't want to be something else you had to deal with."

"And before that?" Stiles raised his eyes to glare at the hunter, then at Peter. "And before that?"

"We're old enough to be your fathers," Chris sighed, rubbing his face. "You are literally in the same class as both of our daughters. When Peter told me, when Peter and I got together, I… How could you want us? You had a choice, the same way I did, because we're human, and I thought that you should have the chance at a normal life, normal teenage high school romance, instead of being stuck with two middle-aged, fucked up soulmates who were both scrambling to get their shit together."

"You… I didn't tell you when I came back from the dead, because I thought I had to become someone worthy of you first. You did kill me," Peter pointed out, causing Stiles to flinch. "I don't hold that against you, but I thought that you did. I thought you would resent me if I told you that oh yeah the guy who turned your best friend into a werewolf and mauled your first love is your soulmate, lucky you! You're not the only one who has doubts, Stiles. I'm sorry we hurt you, I truly am, but we didn't tell you out of the same reasons that you never told us. Because clearly you knew too, you knew about our bond but you never brought it up either – because you thought that we didn't want you. You're a clever boy, I need you to consider that maybe we had the same fears."

Stiles stared at them, with a fragile hope in his eyes. "I didn't… I felt it. Ever since I first connected with my Spark, got my magic, I've been able to feel the mate-bonds. And I didn't… I didn't think you would want to be stuck with an obnoxious brat like me, and then, well, then the Nogitsune happened. Are you… I need you to tell me, promise me, that you're not just saying this now, out of pity, because you're forced to confront this. I can't have hope and see it crushed."

"We had every intention of telling you, once you turned eighteen," Chris promised, his eyes a silent plea on top of his words. "We wanted you to have a… well, what constitutes a normal high school experience in this town, and then we wanted to tell you. When you're a legal adult, which would have also eased some of my worries, Stiles. But we always planned on telling you, we never meant to keep the bond from you. It's not something we are ashamed of or don't want. You are not something we are ashamed of or don't want."

Something in Stiles' posture eased and he started shaking just a little. Peter and Chris were at his side in two quick strides, Peter to his left and Chris to his right. They held their boy close, held him while he cried. He clung onto them both, sobbing into their chests.

"I never blamed you for what happened to Allison," Chris whispered, brushing a kiss against Stiles' head. "And neither does she. Neither do any of us. We all know it was the demon, it was using you. It wasn't you. You were a victim of it too, Stiles."

Stiles held onto them even tighter, shaking with tears. Peter nuzzled his neck.

"Our pack loves you so much, Stiles," Peter chuckled. "They all, individually, and as a group, threatened us. They were fully ready for a mutiny on your behalf. What you said at the court, that regardless of who the Alpha is, these are your betas? That was the truth. I can't believe you've been Pack Mom of my pack and I didn't even notice because I was too busy being smitten with you."

"Smitten," Stiles echoed, sniffling a little. "Nobody says smitten, you're so cheesy, Peter."

"He's also smitten with you though. Me? I am being much more mature and normal about it."

"Oh please," Peter gave him a pointed glare over Stiles' head. "You completely lost it the last time he used a gun against that rogue omega. You fully lost it because that was 'so hot, Peter, so hot'."

Stiles blinked up at them with those big doe eyes of his before he started laughing softly. He leaned into them more comfortably and placed shy kisses on both their lips, making them relax too. And in that moment, Peter thought that maybe they could be okay, together. Heal, together.

~*~ The End ~*~

[roxy-bat-wolf-pack]

😈Vampire Eddie/ Reader ⚡️

Readers gender is not mentioned

Oneshot

This is being posted before the release of the final season. This story is operating under the fan theory that Eddie will be brought back as vecnas right hand. Based on the D&D campaign being played in the show.

Left Unsaid

I groaned at the sound of my alarm. This had to be the fifth time I hit snooze. If only the action led to any actual sleep. Instead, I just lay and watched the flicking red letters.

9:25

How does time go by like this? I glared at the clock, remembering how Chrissy had confided in me about seeing the grandfather clock. Back then, I didn't listen. I was too blinded by the news that she had been spending one on one time with Eddie. I sighed, silently scolding myself, realizing how stupid I was for letting the jealousy get to me. I shut my eyes tight, trying not to let my mind wonder to this past year.

So many people lost so suddenly. So many things left unsaid. The guilt of it all was eating away at me. My mind flashed to what Robin told me the other day, and although I was awake, the memory felt like a fever dream.

"Steve said he saw him, that he's somehow alive, but it's all wrong. He's not like himself. Vecna has some sort of hold on him."

"That can't be true. We all saw his body. He's..." I chocked on my words. " He's gone, and I- we just have to deal with that."

She looked down solemnly, and it was strange to see her face so serious.

"Steve said," She paused as if she was trying to think of the right thing to say. "He said that Eddie is under Vecna's control. That he's been, I dont know, resericted somehow, but it's not really him? Like who he was is still dead."

I nodded. Despite my denial of it all, I trusted Steve and Robin. God knows they have saved my life more than once this past year.

"And Steve thinks it was Ed- Kas?" I corrected using Dustin's chosen name. The name from one of the characters from our campaign, "that is reporting back to Vecna. All our plans?"

The question from my memories went unanswered as I forced myself to sit upright, ripping the memory from my mind. Angrily, I grabbed the nearest pair of jeans and slipped them on. I didn't even look at the shirt I reached for from my closet before slipping it over my head. My socks slipped on the carpeted stairs down to my living room. Mom was looking in the fridge and glanced over its door at me.

"Going to Wayne's place?" She questioned. She tried to hide the worry in her voice, but it still shown through as she glanced me up and down. I paused at the entry to the kitchen, looking wide-eyed at her. It was as if an invisible barrier was up between us.

"How did you know?" I muttered stupidly, but she just smiled at me.

"Oh, um.. the foil covered casserole in the fridge." She answered casually before moving the gallon of milk in her hand to the table. She set a box of cereal next to it for my little brother. "I thought I heard you in the kitchen last night. What is it this time? Green bean? Sweet potato?"

I sighed, sneaking up behind her and slipping the tray from the fridge.

"Chicken pot pie." I answered simply.

"As a casserole?" She questioned.

"Uh yea, he needs more protein." I answered back. Before she could give me her usual retort about how what he really needed was to cook for himself, and how I shouldn't be helping someone who raised a "murderer", I slipped out the door. I heard a faint,"Be safe, honey!" and it only made me scoot across the yard to my car faster.

Wayne had wanted desperately to move, yet his finances wouldn't allow it. Especially since he put so much of his m money in trying to recover Eddie's body. Not bringing it back from the upside down had grown to be another one of my regrets. Because he couldn't move, he put a fair amount of effort into repairing the trailer. I think it helped him to pretend it was a different place.

I noticed the door had changed color since my last visit and hoped the glossy, green paint had fully dried when I knocked.

Wayne opened the door quicker than usual. I must have caught him right before he left for work. But instead of saying his usual greeting, he just stared at me. Well, perhaps not right at my face. His gaze was hard on my torso. I glanced down and immediately closed my eyes. Embarrassment and frustration ran through me. The shirt I grabbed this morning was Eddie's Slayer shirt. The bottom I had haphazardly tucked into my high waist jeans, making the letters look all crooked and cutting off the bottom of the y.

"Mr. Munson, I'm so sorry! I should've asked permission. I didn't even realize what shirt I grabbed this mo-"

"No, it's alright." He said softly, stopping my ramble. He stepped to the side. "Come on in."

I sighed before stepping inside.

"He has more shirts. Really, they're just collecting dust. You and that Henderson boy are the only ones who are interested in any of his things." He gestered to Eddie's room. "Feel free to grab more. It uh...it keeps his memory alive, you know?"

I set the casserole on the small kitchen counter. If only he knew how much of Eddie's things I had collected.

"That's ok, Mr. Munson. I actually have to go soon." Before he could respond, a noise drew our attention to the back window. Like someone was lurking just under the window sill.

"Damned kids!" He muttered under his breath before turning to me. "I would think after a year they would start leaving me alone. I guess between what happened to your friend here and Eddie. Hell, the whole towns gone to shit with that earthquake."

"It's ok. I'll go tell them to leave this time." I started, hoping to spare him from the pain of dealing with the hecklers. He simply smiled.

"Thanks for doing so much to help me. Does my heart good to know Eddie had such good friends."

I gave him a sidehug before leaving.

The door closed behind me, and I looked down at my trembling hands. A small green smear of paint covered my knuckles.

I took a deep breath and circled the property. No one was there, but they couldn't have gotten far.

I looked around and saw out of the corner of my eye the faintest movement in the tree line. I hesitantly stepped across the tall grass that lined the woods.

"Hey, leave him alone. I don't care who you are. He doesn't deserve to be stalked like that."

Nobody answered. I stepped deeper into the forest, the mobile homes behind me growing smaller.

"Hey! You heard me? No ghost! No portal to Hell! No murderers! You got that?"

As my voice died down , I realized just how quiet it was. My heart quickened. It was as if some kind of natural instinct was taking over me , and it screamed through my veins to run. A twig snapped behind me, and I whipped around to see him.

It was him, yet at the same time, it wasn't.

Eddie stood there, his clothes ragged and torn. He looked wrong with his signature vest missing. Despite his ragged clothing, he looked...healthy? When Steve said he saw him, that he was brought back from the dead, I had pictured a reanimated corpse. Thin, pale, fangs. His face had color, his hair was just as big, he stood just as tall.

The only indication that something was wrong was his eyes. They were dead, glazed over, somehow looking at me and not at the same time. I was hit in the chest with pain at the memory of his smile. The way his eyes crinkled at the ends. We had just been staring at each other, neither speaking.

"Eddie?" I tried my voice, and it wasn't as strong as I had hopped. He said nothing.

"Eddie, do you remember me?"

Some faint memory of Steve's warning lingered in the back of my mind. He's dangerous now. Was everything I was saying just going back to Vecna? I saw him look down at my shirt. His shirt. He inhaled deeply, as if he could smell his own scent on it, as if he was searching for something.

"Yea, it's yours," I answered the question he didn't ask.

"Dustin and I went through your things, you know, to help your uncle out. Some of it was too precious to put in a box."

He stared back up to me, and as our eyes locked. My body screamed at me. My legs begging me to let them move, let them take me far from here.

"I've been helping him. He's a mess. We all are."

The words felt stupid. I had so much to tell him. My mind swimming with words, struggling between them to form a sentence.

I miss you

RUN

I'm sorry

RUN

it should have been me

RUN

"I love you!"

The words came out without me realizing. Fast and dangerous. His eyes stayed locked on mine, somehow more intense, while still remaining empty. The words started to spill out of me like vomit.

"I've loved you for a long time, and I regret not telling you before. God, I don't even know if you can hear me. I know, I know you liked Chrissy, that's fine. I just needed you to know how I felt. It's been eating me up insi-"

My words stopped abruptly as he was suddenly in my face. In the span of a blink, he went from two yards away to almost nose to nose with me.

He inhaled deeply, and I wasn't sure if it was a threat or not. His head dipped down, almost as if he was leaning in for a kiss, but my body shouted DANGER. Then he passed my lips and moved to my neck.

This was it. He was going to kill me. My mind, body, and soul could end up anywhere, and I had thrown it all away to confess to a boy who was dead, who couldn't hear me. I closed my eyes shut and waited for pain. Instead, he inhaled deeply again.

His body relaxed. The tension I didn't realize he was holding floated off his body like steam. His eyes were suddenly back to mine, face to face, but this time they were alive. They were Eddie's eyes.

"You love me?" He questioned. His voice was weak. As if it hadn't been used in a year.

If it wasn't for the wetness of my cheeks, I wouldn't have realized I was crying. One of his hands came up slowly, as if his own body was fighting the motion, and he brushed the tears from my cheeks.

He tried to speak again. "I...lo..v"

And then he was gone. My brain hardly possessed the sudden absence of him. So fast, his voice still lingered in the air. His smell, holding me in place. I fell to my knees. My body shaking, adrenaline rushing through me.

I wasn't sure how long I had been laying there when Dustin found me.

"Dude, are you ok? Steve, over here!"

I barely heard footsteps shuffling through the leaves on the forest floor.

" Dude, everyone's been looking for you." Someone's voice said as I was lifted from the ground.

I faintly realized they were taking me to Wayne's house. Part of me registered that he wasn't home. Dustin must have used the key he took months ago. They sat me on the couch and threw a coat around me to try and warm me. I hadn't realized I was cold.

"I saw him." I mumbled

"What?" Steve asked, leaning closer to hear as he rubbed my arms, trying to warm me.

"I saw him." I said again, no louder than before.

"Saw who?" He asked, growing frustrated.

Dustin looked at me, eyes widening, in realization.

"You saw Eddie?" It wasn't a question, at least not one that needed a response.

They suddenly stopped trying to warm me, both in shock. I looked up to see the fridge across the room. It was decorated with Eddie's band practice schedule, Metallica, and Dio magnets, but right in the center was a photo.

Hellfire club. The whole group smiling. Eddie and I stood there, his arm around my shoulders. I had always seen it as friendly, but now as my mind raced I wondered if their was more to his actions, more to his touch, more to driving me home late after D&D, more to inviting me to his band practice, more to his weak voice trying so desperately to tell me something,

"I lo-v-" the sound of it replaying in my mind.

I looked to Dustin and put all the determination I had into my voice.

"We are going to save him."

That was a promise.

✨️Authors note✨️: Hey loves, thanks for reading! I just want to say that I take requests🦇

[calisources]

GAME OF THRONES: HISTORY AND LORE -MAGIC. all sentences are taken from a mini-web series of hbo's game of thrones with different characters narrating different aspects of the world. this specific sentence memes is made from various videos related to magical aspects of the world (r'hallor religion not included) change pronouns, names and locations as seen fit.this is a long post.

Wargs and the Sight.

When my turn came,  I would ask Old Nan to tell us of magic and monsters.

Long ago, the world was new,  the children of the forest sang the song of the earth and the earth listened.

Magic was strong in those days and the children could commune with all the beasts of the forest.

The greatest of them could even leave their bodies to hunt, swim and fly in the skins of animals.

Then the first men came with fire  and swords, they burned the way woods and cut down the children 

After peace came, the two races shared the land and the children's gods for thousands of years.

Nobody knows how or why but the magic of the children began to emerge in men.

maybe one child in a thousand would be born a warg, fewer still would be born with the sight.

With it the children could know of events far away and even though still to come, some say the sight was the children's most powerful and terrible secret.

It helped turn the tide during the long night.

Magic has since fled our world.

How can you tell if the man is wearing the beast or the Beast is wearing the man.

I don't like scary stories anymore, because I'm in one.

The Night's Watch and the White Walkers.

I am the sword in the darkness, I am The Watcher on the walls, I am the shield that guards the realms of men.

I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch for this night and all the nights to come.

Legend tells of a winter that lasted a generation and of a vast and terrible darkness that fell across the land.

It came to be known as the long night in the midst of this darkness.

The White Walkers emerged from the far north with their armies of the Dead. They waged war against the living, laying waste to villages and old fasts leaving terror and destruction in their wake.

After years of brutal conflict and unbearable loss an alliance of the first men and the children of the forest managed to drive the walkers and their minions back into the frigid northern wastelands from whence they came.

To prevent another invasion, the first men erected the wall a massive fortification 700 feet in height stretching from the frostfang mountains

It was a structure unlike any ever built indeed, some Montaigne acknowledged having been completed with the aid of Giants or using the powerful magic of the ancient children of the forest.

Men were required to guard and maintain it and thus the Night's Watch was born a sworn Brotherhood tasked with defending the realms of men against the dark forces.

The White Walkers have yet to return.

Dragons.

Fire made flesh. such as the nature of dragons.

Fire consumes leaving nothing at its end, nought but ash.thus the fate of the Targaryen and their dragons thousands of years ago.

valerian stumbled on the first dragon eggs in the mountains of the 14 fires 

cannot imagine shepherds could hatch dragon eggs and bind such creatures to their will but whatever aid they must have had is lost to history.

 what is left of Valyria is a smoking wasteland ash in time.

 Aegon Targaryen and his sisters brought their three dragons who had escaped the doom to Westeros perhaps thinking to regain his people's lost glory 

He proved that armies were no match for dragons

 His first act to order, his dragon balerion the black dread to melt the soles of his beaten goes into his new Iron Throne

their skulls used to line the throne room of the red keep in order of birth.

The oldest, Balerion, could swallow an ox.

The Targaryen never stopped trying to revive their dragons.

Aerion Brightflame drank a draught of wildfire and burned to death.

 The young Daenerys Targaryen has hatched three dragons far to the east.

 If she were to be so foolish as to march on Westeros she will not find as her ancestor Aegon did seven disparate kingdoms frightened by strange beasts.

We have known of dragons now. We have seen them die.

[dollarstoreartsupplies]

saw ur post about Danny from escape room and omg agreed I need more people to talk about him with he's so underrated

NO LIKE ACTUALLY THOUGH!!!!

I genuinely love him, he's so harmless and genuinely excited to be there, it's like textbook-first-death-you-care-about-to-get-you-invested, but I think it would be fascinating to see how the story would progress if he had lived longer. He doesn't get much of a chance to realize this isn't just a super fucking good escape room and I'd love to see how he'd react to another person's death, or the more morally-questionable puzzles.

Would he step up to the plate in a Zoe sort of way? I feel like theres even a possibility he'd cling to the concept of it just being a normal escape room for WAY longer than he should as a way to cope with all the fucked up shit happening.

Because if you think about it even his personal tragedy/survival event (while also being SO FUCKING SAD OHHH MY GOD??? how old was he??? was he a kid??? when did this happen?? if someone remembers if it's says how long ago HIS ENTIRE FAMILY DIED let me know) is incredibly passive.

He definitely saw his family post-death but unlike a plane crash or a mine cave or any of the other tragedies in he has never actually seen anyone else in the process of dying, and I think that would be SO interesting to explore.

Like is that why he likes escape rooms so much? Because it's a way to solve 'impossible' puzzles and clever-your-way out of problems in a way he never got a chance to because he was probably asleep when it happened?

(I also wish we got a slightly closer look at how Ben feels about his death. Because it's really no one but Minos' fault but if the blame had to be pointed to another player it's on him. And he's already got a complex about that shit. Danny is a significantly more sympathetic/guilt complex kind of murder than Jason.)

He's just SO interesting as a character, especially because his death is the only non-preventable one. Theres no way to out-think being dragged under ice in a freezing current. I know the whole game is about luck but it's entirely unfair in a way that I can't even imagine would be particularly entertaining for the people watching at home and I WANNA KNOW WHY! Was he always going to die first? Did they underestimate how good at escape rooms he was? Was it a shock value death to keep all the rich viewers who bet on the safest-winner invested? Was it just because he brought a phone when he wasn't supposed to?

Like (second movie spoilers) but especially with the Amanda reveal in the second movie I'm shocked more people aren't talking about the possibility that he's not actually dead at all!

Because why would Minos kill him? If they want to force people to make escape rooms for them wouldn't Danny be their first choice? He's smart, he loves escape rooms, it would be perfect!

The only real explanation is just that it has to do with personalities and who would be most likely to actually go along with them, but we don't know nearly enough about Danny to think that he wouldn't.

Like?? He kind of seems like the easiest of the first movies cast to manipulate in this situation!! He's the youngest, he's naive, and I don't think he's got the kind of Zoe-backbone that would rather die then spend his time building escape rooms which is what he's passionate about.

If I'm being entirely honest I am not going to believe anyone is dead unless we see the body.

Like, in the first movie who are the only two we don't see the actual body of?

Amanda and Danny.

Amanda is clearly a good person to have on your evil-escape-room-murder-game team as it's shown in the sequel, and like I said DANNY KAHN IS LITERALLY THE PERFECT PERSON TO HAVE ON YOUR TEAM. WHY WOULDN'T THEY KEEP HIM IN THEIR BACK POCKET?

((It also makes sense with the sequel, where we don't see a lot of the bodies. The ONLY person's body we actually see is Theo; Nathan falls into the sand, so does Ben, and we know how that worked out. We kind of hear Brianna and Rachel but we don't SEE them. And the might mean nothing, but if you think about it- it tracks, in a tournament of champions, best of the best, you'd want to hold on to as many as you can.))

I'm veryyyy interested to see if this comes up in the next one, I honestly do not think it will, but I definitely think it's a plot line that could be INCREDIBLY interesting to go down.

[emphasisonthehomo]

Continuation of this.

I was lamenting in the tags on the original post about my failure to include Gracie and @teruel-a-witch rightly pointed out that Steve could be the bio dad. So anyways. Here’s how Danny gets a bun in his oven. This also gets unbelievably schmoopy.

I’d say this is a... light E? Heavy M? Sex but nothing too detailed.

•

The thing with having spent like 12 years as Best Friends with Benefits, is that this means everyone gets slapped in the face with Deeply Flirtatious Married Bickering right out the gate.

Danny comes back from the airport, and because he flew in last night and was going to fly out today, all he has is his comfy travel clothes and his funeral suit. As a result he’s in a threadbare pair of jeans and a t shirt with the album cover of Born in the U.S.A on the front, exclusively bc the idea of Danny walking around w/ Bruce Springsteen’s ass across his chest is hilarious to me.

But they’re like Obviously Close to the point that when Steve goes to bully Chin into joining his new task force, Chin sits there like “Okay so Steve McGarrett brought his… not husband, there’s no wedding ring, but boyfriend? Partner? To this discussion. Interesting.”

Steve and Chin go to speak to Doran, because Danny is very firmly in the ‘civilian’ box in Steve’s head. Which mostly means Danny stands by the rental car and goes WHAT THE FUCK when Steve and Chin go in without backup. This is probably the first time Danny’s seen Steve in SEAL mode, the closest is maybe when Steve’s taken him to the gun range. But this is different. This is a side of Steve that Danny hasn’t seen, in all the time he’s known him. But why would he? Steve goes off and does classified shit and doesn’t talk about it. Danny’s a PI from Jersey. It’s two very different lives.

Afterwards Danny walks up to Steve, grabs him by the elbow and, and in front of god and Chin and HPD says:

“Steven. Listen. I love you. You understand that, right?”

Steve, taken a back, half distracted because Doran is fucking dead and therefore useless says, “I – yes. I love you too, Danno.”

“Good,” Danny nods seriously, “Because you are a dumb shit idiot bastard son of a bitch motherfucker, what the hell were you thinking – ”

And then Chin witnesses one of their more legitimate arguments and is like oh damn, trouble in paradise.

After all of it, after Hess is dead in the water, Danny takes Steve back to a hotel room and fucks him careful. Because Steve’s kind of beat up, a little worse for wear. Because he’s a moron who crashed a car into a ship, but he’s also Danny’s moron. Danny sucks him sloppy and then gets on top of him and rides him bare, fucks himself on Steve’s dick until they’re both shaking with it, until Steve’s clinging to him and kissing him and holding him close.

Danny feels bad, leaving. He can tell Steve’s still in a really fragile place, but Danny does seriously need to get back to Jersey. He’s in the middle of a case there.

“So, Governor’s task force, huh?” Danny asks afterwards, when Steve’s basically using him as a human shaped weighted blanket, “You’ll be on O’ahu full time.”

“Yeah,” Steve kind of wants to ask Danny to stay, to join the task force with him. He won’t. Danny’s got a successful business in Jersey. Danny hates the beach.

“We’ll be able to see each other more often then,” and Danny’s so pleased with the idea, playing idly with Steve’s hair, “I’ll come out again in a couple months for a visit.”

Steve’s got so many fucking feelings, things he can’t even begin to say out loud, so he just starts pushing Danny onto his back. Ignores Danny’s protests of ‘you’re in a sling you moron’ and eats Danny out, very thoroughly cleans up the mess left deep inside him.

And then the next morning Steve drives Danny to the airport in the rental, pecks him on the mouth at passenger drop off, and watches him walk away.

Because that’s what they do.

Except Steve won’t be traveling anymore, not like he used to. He’s very cognizant of the fact that he’s going to be sleeping and waking up in the same bed every morning for the foreseeable future, and that if he weren’t in the middle of the pacific, Danny would probably be in that bed with him.

•

“Danny just went back to New Jersey?” Chin asks.

“That’s where he lives,” Steve says, surprised at how shocked Chin sounds, “I told you, he’s a PI.”

“Ah. And you’re going to live here. In Honolulu,” Chin says.

“Yes,” Steve says, unsure of what exactly is so confusing about the whole thing. Of course he’s going to live here. His house is here. The task force is here.

Chin just blinks at him.

“What?” Steve doesn’t understand why Chin’s making that face.

“I thought Danny was your boyfriend,” Chin says, looking a little uncomfortable.

“Oh no uh. No. Danny’s a friend.”

Chin blinks at him some more.

“… There’s a hickey on your neck,” Chin points out, because there is. It’s barely covered by the collar of Steve’s shirt.

“A friend with benefits,” Steve explains with a shrug.

“Alright then,” Chin’s still got his eyebrows up by his hairline.

•

And then things just sort of figure themselves out, with the task force. They become Five-0.

Kono’s favorite thing to do is ask “What’re you smiling at, boss?” when she catches Steve grinning at his phone, because like 99.999% of the time it’s because he’s texting Danny.

MEANWHILE

Danny’s in New Jersey, doing his thing. And he. Well, he feels some kind of way, that Steve’s in the reserves now. He’d always kind of assumed that when Steve either retired or went to the reserves, that he’d come to Jersey. But then Steve didn’t.

Danny gets it. Understands why Steve did what he did, why he’s in Honolulu now. But Danny also can’t help but be a little grumpy, because he wants Steve in his house instead.

But it’s what they do. This thing. It’s been long distance right from the beginning. Danny’s used to it.

Steve sends Danny badly framed pictures of himself shirtless on the beach at some ungodly hour of the morning, and Danny misses him with an ache he can’t shake. It is nice though, that they can text and call more frequently than when Steve was active duty.

AND THEN whelp.

Danny starts to get weirdly nauseous. Like he’s got a stomach bug. Except it doesn’t go away, and it’s usually in the morning, and suddenly the smell of coffee makes him sick and oh jesus fucking christ.

He’s an idiot.

Danny knows, that going on T isn’t a form of birth control. He knows this. But him and Steve fuck without a condom all the time, this hasn’t happened before, there’s no way.

Except he also knows ‘hasn’t happened before’ doesn’t mean something won’t happen and shit fuck goddammit.

So, he goes to see an ob/gyn and confirms his suspicions and son of a bitch.

He’s gestating a mini McGarrett.

•

Danno: I land Friday at 9:35

Danno: SORRY 21:35 🙄

And Steve’s kind of stupid excited, because yes Danny had said he’d visit again in a few months, but it’s one thing to know that Danny’s going to visit at some vague point in the future, and it’s another to get the flight itinerary.

He’s in a good enough mood about it that Kono pegs him immediately and is like “Is your Not Boyfriend going to come visit?”

And Steve doesn’t even argue about how he doesn’t like her referring to Danny as his Not Boyfriend, he just says “Yup 😊” and then idk gets into a high speed car chase and shoots his gun and does his usual bullshit.

Danny meanwhile is shitting a brick and pacing a hole in the floor and having a hissed conversation with Matty about the whole situation while packing. Danny respects Steve too much to do this over the phone, he needs to tell him to his face. This is going to change things; he just doesn’t know how. He knows how he wants things to change, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to get that.

“You gonna make an honest man out of him?” Matty’s been unimpressed with Danny and Steve’s fuck buddies thing, has been for years. He genuinely doesn’t understand why Danny won’t just put a ring on it, “He’s in the reserves now.”

“IT’S COMPLICATED” Danny’s kind of an emotional wreck. He tapered off of T because like, you know. Baby. So, he’s dealing with that plus all of the regular ass pregnancy hormones. He’s dreading it, the changes that’ll happen to his body. At the same time, he’s so excited to hold Baby in his arms that he’s freaking himself out a little. A Dad. He’s gonna be a Dad. He’s always wanted kids, and always assumed it probably wasn’t in the cards for him.

“It’s not that complicated. He’s gotta stay in Hawai'i so just move there or something.”

“I have spent years building this business –”

“Rebuild it on O’ahu and go get your baby daddy locked down, goddamn. Stop being stupid about it.”

Danny throws a sock at him.

•

Steve can tell that Danny’s stressed about something and trying to hide it. Steve tries to bring it up on the drive back to the house, but Danny is like “No. Not now. We’ll talk about it in a little bit” and he’s jittery in the passenger seat, but Steve knows when to push an issue and this is Not one of those times.

Danny practically jumps him once they get through the door, and Danny’s suitcase gets forgotten in the front hallway while the two of them get mostly naked. Shirts get tossed and a pants get shoved down, and it ends with Danny bent over the back of the couch while Steve fucks him deep and hard and right there Steve goddammit –

They flop together afterwards. They’re not even sitting on the couch, just kind of laying awkwardly on the floor behind it. Danny’s got come dripping out of him, christ he’s making a mess and he fights the urge to laugh hysterically, because this is how he got into this situation in the first place.

Steve can feel him tense up from where they’re cuddling together and asks:

“Are we talking about it now?”

He doesn’t think it’s anything bad, Danny doesn’t look scared or upset, just worried about something.

“Later, I need a shower,” Danny says.

Steve thinks if he pushed the issue now, Danny probably wouldn’t get too pissed, but he’d also much rather get Danny properly naked and wet, so instead Steve just drags him upstairs.

They don’t fuck again in the shower, but they do go in together. Danny gropes Steve shamelessly, and Steve keeps reaching up and changing the angle of the shower head so Danny gets sprayed in the face.

“Are we talking about it now?” Steve asks, when they’re damp and in bed. They’re curled up next to each other, legs tangled together.

“Shit,” Danny says, “Yeah.”

It’s late. Dark outside.

Danny’s suitcase is still down stairs. He needs to go grab it so he can brush his teeth and get his pajamas. Instead, he puts his hands on either side of Steve face and rips off the band aid.

“I’m pregnant.”

Steve’s eyes get huge.

“What?”

“I’m pregnant. It’s yours,” Danny adds, kind of uselessly. It’s not like it’d be anyone else’s. Danny lets go of his face.

Steve doesn’t look upset, but Danny didn’t think he would. He just looks surprised.

“Mine?” Steve says, after a beat.

“Yeah.”

“How?” Steve asks, looking gob smacked.

“Well Steve, when two people love each other very much –” Danny starts, and then stops because that feels like Too Much right now, “You came inside my you goon, that’s how it happens.”

“I come inside you all the time,” Steve says, blunt and vulgar.

“Yeah well. Last time it took,” Danny props himself up on his arm looks down a Steve, “What’s the face mean?”

“I – I don’t know,” Steve says, still processing.

Danny shifts and sits up.

“How’re we doing this?” Danny asks, eventually. He’s given Steve enough time to think.

“How do you want to do this?” Steve asks, because that’s a good enough place to start.

“I’m keeping it,” Danny says, “I’d like you to be involved, if you want.”

“Of course, I want!” Steve sounds a little indignant. He sits up too, and stares at Danny some more, “… I can’t go to Newark.”

“I know.”

And that’s the thing, isn’t it.

For once Steve’s tied down somewhere. After years of being on the move, he’s finally got commitments in once place.

Danny’s mouth is twisted up, and he doesn’t look happy. Steve leans in to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth, grabs his hand and squeezes.

“You could stay here,” Steve says, “That’s another option. I know you’ve got your PI business but I mean. Licenses transfer. You could work at Five-0.”

He doesn’t want to – this shouldn’t be something Danny feels pressured to do. He knows what Danny has in Jersey is important but. But it is an option.  

“That’s gotta be nepotism,” Danny says weakly, “Getting me a job at your task force.”

“Well, it is my task force, I can do whatever I want,” Steve says.  

“…Okay. Yeah,” Danny shakes his head slowly, clearly thinking through logistics, “I can get my license switched.”

“We can figure something out,” Steve says, breath catching in his chest because Danny. Danny’s going to move here.

Danny’s quiet for a long moment.

Then he gets a Look in his eye.

“If I asked you to marry me, would you say yes?” Because Danny needs to know. If they’re changing what they do, he needs to know how it’s going to change.

“What?” Steve’s back to staring.

That’s fair. Danny’s dropped quite a few bombs on him in the last few minutes.

“Would you say yes?” Danny repeats, pink cheeked and determined.

“… are you asking?”

“Not if you’re gonna break my heart about it,” Danny says, and he doesn’t mean for his voice to crack, but it does.

Steve kisses him. Cradles Danny’s face in his hand and kisses him careful and with purpose and pulls away.

“Will you marry me, Daniel Williams?”

“I fuck – I was going to ask you first!” Danny says, incensed.

“Too slow,” Steve kisses him again, “Will you?”

“Yes, you fucking bastard – ” Danny’s grinning, a laugh bubbling out of his chest.

He shoves Steve down onto the mattress. Steve laughs too, loud and infectious, and just tugs Danny down for another kiss.

AND THEN idk idk idk they’re gross and In Love and the next day Danny goes to the Palace and Kono’s like “CHIN, Steve’s Not Boyfriend is here” and Steve just gets Very Smug and says:

“You’re right, he’s not my boyfriend, he’s my fiancé.”

[plantsandpies]

A lot of the things that I think about (right now it’s mainly fairytail because I’m hyper fixating) are things I’ve enjoyed during my childhood. And while I look at them in a more critical light, I still enjoy them. Yeah, the strawberry shortcake 2009 version has a weaker plot than say the earlier season of Grimm. But it’s still fun to watch.

That being said! I have things I want to talk about for multiple shows and this warning needs to be on all of them, so I’m just putting them into one post.

🥧Fairytail:

I don’t think hiro mashima really planned his world. Like he has a sturdy foundation. That’s true. But when watching the show, the timeline gets lost. I was asked this in my god post, which I answered in relation to the idea, but it’s a good question. Where is Zeref in edolas or how is Natsu in edolas? How did the time situation work? Because everyone else is where they need to be in time. Except for the dragonslayers. They’re supposed to be 400 years old. What about Natsu being end? How does that relate? How old is mystogan? He should be the same age as Jellal, but he seems older in the flashbacks we get from Wendy. Except, how old is Wendy? She’s older in edolas, because if she’s still 12/13 there, we have other problems. What about Porlyusica? She’s supposed to be the edolas version of a dragon. What? And she left edolas around teens to young adult because she was in fairytail when makarov was young. How’d she leave? Why’d she leave? You could say some of this doesn’t matter. But edolas causes so many issues with earth land’s timeline. And then there’s Zeref and mavis’s relationship. How’d they have a kid? If it was the spells used to try and save her, why’d it make a kid and not do anything to her? Wasn’t she dead?

It feels like the timeline hasn’t ever been complete and these questions weren’t thought about. It’s not the most important per se; but it leaves questions about the world. The ages especially. I haven’t even got to how Zeref and Anna found kids somewhere. A world doesn’t have to fully explained. In fact, I don’t think you should. But since the dragonslayers going to the future is a huge plot point, that should be explained. Since Zeref is Natsu’s brother and that’s a huge plot point something should’ve been said. Since Natsu being end is a huge deal, it should be brought up. Just a passing comment is fine. But saying nothing makes edolas fall apart a bit. It makes the magic system fall apart.

🥧Miraculous:

It had such good potential. It has good, solid, characters. The premise? Amazing. But, a lot of plot points aren’t covered. Having a perfect character is bad, as they don’t really move, but having your protagonist for little girls (as that was the original intended audience) be obsessive over a guy to the point she has a pull down board of his entire life and tried to kiss his wax statue is a bad choice. Yes, she gets over it. But it takes her a long time. That’s not great. Then there’s the abuse Adrian faces and being in the model industry at 13. 13! That’s so young! And it’s one of the worst parts of the entertainment industry. The amount of pressure on physical looks and the horror stories of models and their relationships with photographers and their weight, and putting a CHILD into that? And it’s not really covered. Then there’s the forced kiss scene with ladybug, which has been talked about pretty thoroughly throughout the community. The sexual harassment was just touched on. What about the guy in love with ladybug (a 13 year old, as this was season 1) and pretended to be cat noir? That wasn’t covered at all! And later, with Adrian’s now dead father? Why are we immortalizing him? He tried to kill people! He had his son thrown off a roof for a point! (The gorilla episode) Did we forget that? This show has a great premise. It has an interesting power system, but it doesn’t deal with its “drama”. It’s not dealing with these behaviors and situations correctly. And if it’s too heavy to really cover it in a tv show for kids, maybe don’t put it in the tv show for kids!

And then Lila? Disregarding all of the other traumatic stuff these kids were put through and then was never covered, Lila is a horrible story plot. Marinette’s friends not believing Marinette, ignoring the bullying reports or her dislike of her. If my friends told me they were being harassed by someone who was nice to me, I’m believing them. I’d rather believe a liar than an abusive asshole. It also doesn’t follow their characters. Alya wouldn’t have believed Lila over Marinette. She’s shown she stands by her best friend. But someone is nice and your friend says she’s mean and you argue with them? That’s not what she does. And they only don’t follow their characters around Lila. That shouldn’t happen.

And that’s just the beginning. What the hell’s the wig thing? That makes zero sense. Like- it confuses me so much I can’t even explain it. That was just for drama and drama that doesn’t even make sense! This show doesn’t do well with the stories they’re trying to tell.

🥧This isn’t as big a deal as the rest of the shows. In fact, it means nothing compared to the other stuff above.

Why don’t we talk about how weird Al married pinkie and had a kid with her? How’d we get here? What the hell?

No. Like seriously. What? Why? Why’d we do this?

🥧Voltron:

There’s a lot of issues with this show (mainly season three onward) but my main issue is how they treated Lance. Originally everyone was set up as a main character, except for shiro who was a little more important because of his previous trauma (which I think was handled pretty well for a kids show) and gaining back his memory. But as the show went on, Lance’s character got flattened. He was always a flirt, but he didn’t grow and any growth he had was pushed aside for the flirty jokester and any hit of anything was pushed aside, not just by writers, but by literal characters. They had his negative feelings pushed aside by characters in the show! And then allurance. (I apologize if the ship name is spelled wrong). Admittedly, I do have ships I like more, but for a show, as long as a relationship feels right, I don’t care about the end game. I would have been fine with those two ending up together over klance if they felt happy with each other. But there are many videos showing that they weren’t doing well together (literally just taking scenes and putting them together, plus people reacting, who aren’t klance shippers, talking about how unhappy they seem). They also said “I love you” on the first date? Her ex just died? After betraying them again and again? And that’s the route you go? Really? And then you kill her and have him mourn her for the rest of his life living on a farm! When he loves space and being out there! What? If this was written better, I’d be okay with it. Sure, it’s not my pairing, but I’m happy if it feels like it fits. They made probably one of the worst get togethers I’ve ever seen on screen. (To be fair, I don’t watch a lot of live action drama or movies so maybe there are worse). I got a little off topic, but this ship also pushed lance’s character down. It reduced him to Allura’s forever longing partner. This isn’t even talking about how Hunk got like no character at all. Which is its own issue (that I’m upset about too). I just have more to say about character assassination vs not having a character at all.

🥧Anyway. I’m doing this on my phone (as I do all my posts) so I can’t get all my information and most is from my memories. It also corrects my grammar and I read things weird (I skip lines and I also do this when I write so I often don’t catch it), so I apologize if something doesn’t make sense or my grammar’s wrong. If you want more info on any of these (aka having it as a more professional post), please ask. It might take a while though as it’d be an essay and I’d find my examples and stuff.

[plaquerat]

i can't help but feel like ive been ruined. i spent so many nights begging someone i was in love with to not kill themself, to not abandon me, to please please love me back. i was forced to swallow my religious trauma because any way i processed it was Wrong and if i prayed more, if i shut up about saints, if i believed harder that god was truly good i could help the person i was obsessed with. i stopped watching or reading things i liked because one time the person made a joke making fun of a piece of media that's known to be bad and if you do that that's the same as endorsing what that piece of media is about and that would take this person away from me.

i helped make a server with someone after we left a larger one. we brought people we knew in. i invited a few people from a dead one i was in for the same piece of media. it would be nice, i thought, if we could all hang out and post art and have fun in a smaller, safer space. i liked a character that was very unpopular in the fanbase. the movie for this piece of media came out recently. there was a really awful joke made about this character in it. it made me feel gross and it felt like something that character wouldn't say or do. it was a gag comedy piece, and i've been into comic books before. i was used to being able to go "hm, that's uncool. i don't like how the character was written in this, and i don't think it's really indicative or how the character is." this apparently isn't normal and i, a csa victim who was just barely piecing together my abuse, was made to feel like i was evil and a supporter of the very thing i was so hurt by. tone indicators blew up around the time this server was active. i had a very hard time with them, and i have a history of being talked down to and infantilized. i asked people not to use them with me, and explicitly said why. i got off work that night and got a dm from someone i considered a friend at the time telling me how shitty and ableist i am for feeling that way. that if i feel like im being infantilized, then it means i think anyone who needs them is a fucking idiot. i never said that at all. when i got upset over how i was being talked to i got told that see? this is why someone like YOU needs them? because im actually stupid and need to have my hand held and told how stupid i am. anything i did from this point was obviously malicious. if i liked anything i was stupid. if i posted that character i was still so attached to i was into pedophilia. that person i was so obsessed with was in here for a while and after they cut me off completely i wanted to wipe the server. it was pretty dead anyway. i wanted it done quietly. one of my supposed friends was besties with that person in here who loved to accuse me of horrible things. they told them and they drove me out because if i deleted a server they posted in once a month that was bad and wrong and who cares about anything involving me. so i left.

i was invited into a server by someone i was mutuals with. it was nice. people in there were friendly and some were actually excited to see me. the owner was someone who very much did have issues, but we all did. occasionally id say things without thinking and get nipped. oh my bad haha! ill try harder. and i did. there were five vent channels and one was angry and involving things that upset us morally. i got really ovsessed with looking at accounts that posted things, triggering myself over and over. this was normal and good, the server owner believed. this person accused people of pedophilia on a fandom poll for voting on a character they liked and not this person's personal choice. my one irl friend's mom died when i was at work. on my break, i posted about it in shock, asking for support. when i got off work, i was being accused of making the server owner attempt suicide. when i floated the idea of commissions before moving, the server owner accused me of stealing customers from them. they had closed theirs earlier that day, after all. i couldnt post about anything if they had mentioned it to me. that was theft and i needed to credit them for everything. when i got into ghost, i said i liked how people would sexualize the papas. it was good, i thought, that older characters were being seen as attractive. the sevrer owner accused me of incest then, because my character i had made for ghost was related to these characters. i felt weird and gross talking about it with them around after that. i was told that at one point when i offhandedly mentiomed having a crush on someone, the server owner was convinced i meant them. in the end, the server owner cut the entire group off, and it turned out he was abusive to a lot of us. but people mentioned i seemed to get a very large chunk of it.

in tthe leadup to the ghost movie, i was so, so scared. i didn't know why. some horrible, evil part of my brain was telling me it was going to turn out copia was a pedophile. that was insane. that wouldn't happen, that's disgusting and evil and completely against what ghost is. but it had happened before with a character i liked. and what was one more comfort stolen away from me, an ontologically evil person. it didn't happen. obviously, it didn't and i was relieved. i still feel insane for even thinking it.

im trying to do better these days. i dont go out of my way to look at things that will trigger me if i can help it. im supposed to get into therapy more regularly now that ive moved again. most people i talk to now are supportive of me, understand that im kind of a freak and someone who has some very abnormal beliefs— and that its okay for me to have them. im not hurting people by worshipping lucifer. im not bad and wrong for being interested in saints and rituals. i know people that have had fears like mine because of similar events. im writing more than i used to, im talking about weirder ideas more. there is still fear, and there will be until i can have a decent way to work on it.

i really feel like a lot of this didn't need to happen in the first place, though. most things probably dont need to happen. they just do and im a very fundamentally messed up person for it now. oh well i guess. eventually ill stop crying before sleeping and immediately upon waking up.

[angel-inked]

~RDR2 Whump/Angst~

Whump/angst Rdr2 fics have been itching my brain lately, so of course I had to write a few of my own

EDIT: this was posted unfinished accidentally 😅 if you saw that, it's completed now lol

Taglist: A/N if you are a red dead fan and like what you see, let me know

Death always comes in early spring.

Most loved the early thaw. Fields were already sporting clusters of wildflowers, and animals were coming out of hiding. Hunting was certainly made easier. Then there was Arthur Morgan, sitting on the edge of the lake that curved around one side of camp. He did not enjoy this time of year, for with it, it brought memories. Trudging back into that cabin with a fistful of dandelions only to find his mother facedown on the floor, same time the next year was when his father got worse, not just the drinking and the beatings, but forcing himself on his child in ways a child should never be forced upon. This became an every year occurrence until the summer Arthur watched the main source of his suffering swing a few feet off the ground. An early spring would kill him one of these times, he concluded, when Eliza and Isaac were taken from him this time of year. He quit looking for something to believe in well before he even reached his teens, but it seemed that whatever forces at be wanted his life, or whatever was left of it, to be some form of cruel joke. The leather bound journal currently clutched tightly to his stomach bore the brunt of everything. He emptied all that he had into it. Writing until his mind went silent, drawing the graphic images that were burned into his head just to escape from them for a few moments until they reared their ugly heads again.

He jumped when a figure came into his vision, a hand adorned in gold rings held a bowl of steaming stew out to him, his eyes followed the arm up to a warm smile and concerned eyes. "You need to eat, son." Dutch's voice was gentle yet frim and as soft as the man could make it. Arthur nodded, taking the bowl as Dutch sat down beside him, digging into his own bowl silently. His stomach lapped up the first spoonful, growling for more and making him realize how hungry he was. He thought back to being fourteen. He had been desperate then. Desperate for food, warmth, and safety. "I wish I knew how to help you." Dutch said, breaking the stifling silence. "You can't." Arthur muttered. "Well," Dutch trialed off, setting his now empty bowl on the ground and turning to Arthur fully, "I'm always here if you need someone." Arthur nodded, thankful that Dutch didn't expect much in the way of verbal answers from him right now, pivoting himself to lean into the older man's side. Dutch's arms came up around his shoulders and hugged him tightly, making him hesitantly think that maybe things would be okay after all.

In a bind.

He couldn't tell you what hurt worse, the rifle stock that clocked him in the side of the head, the rope that was currently cutting into his wrists, or the boot that stomped against his ribs until he practically begged it to stop. Not that he could do much else besides lay there, facedown in the dirt, and try to keep his voice from shaking too much. "Oh, what? Big, bad Dutch Van Der Linde is begging?" One of the three men besmirched, making his pair of friends laugh. It could be worse, he thought. At least they weren't O'Driscolls, but even that wasn't much of a relief. Maybe they were bounty hunters, though he couldn't make out much in the darkness, regardless of what they were, they were still goddamned bastards. A familiar metallic taste filled his mouth, tongue finding the source to be a split bottom lip, no doubt the same liquid was what he felt trickling down from his temple. God, where was Arthur when you needed him?

The three men silenced their laughter at the sound of an approaching horse, accompanied by the infamous click of a gun being cocked. He screwed his eyes shut, not feeling daring enough to attempt a look at his assailants, readying himself for more pain and praying to any deity he could think of to not let him leave his beloved Hosea and sons like this. He flinched with every shot that rang out. There was one, two, three, then silence. The sound of boots and spurs stopped by his head. He couldn't help the hitch in his breath, nor the way he flinched away from the hand that found the back of his ruffled ebony main. Confusion hit when the hand began a gentle petting motion, followed by a soft chuckle. "You got yourself in a bind there, didn't you, Dutchy?" Dutch's eyes snapped open to peer up at the familiar southern draw. "Arthur, thank god!" He exclaimed, breathing heavily with relief. "I hate to break it to you, but I think God abandoned me and you a long time ago." Arthur deadpanned, making Dutch snort a laugh. He felt Arthur move to straddle his thighs and run a hand over his bound wrists, "I thought 'Sea was the only one allowed to do this to you." Arthur teased, making Dutch laugh fully, melting all the tension in his body.

"Hurry up and untie me, you ass!"

I'll pull you through.

Why? A sigh escaped his cracked dry lips at the thought. He could ask why a million times and knew he wouldn't get an answer. The rest of the camp tried to ignore it, act like it never happened, and he supposed that worked for some, but it wasn't working for him. He wasn't so ignorant that he didn't think someone could be driven to do that to themselves for a lot of reasons. Hell, he played witness to it once, but that was a stranger. Arthur is his big brother. Dutch began walking on eggshells around him, like he was a rouge stick of dynamite, and Dutch was a flame, one wrong move, and he'd blow. From what he was told, Dutch drug the man out of camp to talk to a nun of some kind, like that would do any kind of good. Hosea hovered near him more, like he'd vanish into thin air without a watchful set of eyes on him, eventually being snapped at for being overly perinoid and intrusive. Nobody talked about it, as far as he knew anyway, it had been swept under the rug, like some kind of dirty secret that none of them wanted to admit to being real. The scout fire was quickly becoming redundant as the sun broke over the horizon, becoming invaded with another kind of warmth. John's frown grew when his eyes landed on bandages poking out past black shirt sleeves. Did this man not know shame?

"What ya mopin' 'bout, Marston?" Arthur's teasing voice cut through the haze of thoughts that clouded him. John merely looked up at the older male, grey eyes set in a steely gaze that he could only hope was pinning enough. For a moment, Arthur stared back, "So that's how it is.." he mumbled, folding his arms and bowing his head. "Why?" John tried despite himself, making Arthur snap his attention back to him. "Excuse you?" He said flatly, making John shake his head. "Quit playin' dumb, you know damn well what I'm asking." John hissed. Those striking blue orbs seemed to stare through him, something in them either snapped or broken, John couldn't tell which. Arthur moved his gaze back to his lap. "I don't know.." Arthur finally muttered, "I.. I ain't got this bad in.. I don't know." He added, rubbing rough hands over his bandage wrapped forearms. John heaved another sigh, scooting down the log, snaking an arm around Arthur's shoulders, making the older man meet his eyes with something definitely broken in his own. "You're a real asshole sometimes," John started, mimicking Arthur's thick swallow, "but the last thing I want is to lose my big brother to his own hands." He finished. Arthur hung his head again. "I don't understand any more of this psychological bullshit than you do, but I will pull you through this if it's the last thing I do." John said in a cracking voice, Arthur's only response was to lean heavily on the other man, letting someone else take some of the weight he carried for once.

The curious couple and their unruly son.

Dutch Van Der Linde, that man would be the death of him one of these days, he concluded. They were degenerates. Thieves, at best, killers at worst. He'd come to terms with the fact that some parts of him were always longing for the things that he was always told he couldn't have, that longing proved stronger than the other parts of him. Dutch, he was one of those things he longed for. The younger man's touch and deep, joyous belly laughter stirred something in him that no woman ever could. As impulsive and tempered as he could be, Dutch had unknowingly stolen an old man's heart the night they met, and Hosea couldn't find it in himself to want it back. It was only fair. He stole a part of Dutch that night as well, but the raven haired, philosophy spouting fool was more than content to let that part of himself be tucked safety away in that beating vessel in Hosea's chest. An eye for an eye, so to speak, the encounter hadn't left them blind, but opened them up in ways that neither could've ever anticipated.

Speaking of eyes. The prickling feeling running over his skin told him he was being watched and studied. Looking up from his plate, he saw the blue-eyed boy that Dutch insisted on bringing back to camp quickly hide his eyes behind the brim of his beaten leather cowboy hat, his only possession besides the knife hung from his hip. The plate of food Dutch had sat in front of him remained untouched, "You need to eat, son." Dutch's voice broke the silence as he too noticed this fact. The boy shook his head. Anyone could look at this kid and see how underfed he was, Hosea had half expected him to make himself sick from gobbling down whatever food they sat in front of him too quickly, but this boy just sat quietly with his hands clasped in his lap. "Well, why not?" Dutch questioned, his thundering voice as soft as he could make it, the concept of an 'inside voice' was foreign to him. "I'm not allowed." The kid said after a moment, not only shattering Dutch's heart by the look in his eyes, but Hosea's as well. Dutch moved from his seat to kneel next to the boy. "I have no way of knowing rightly what happened to you, but that's in the past." Dutch started, "What matters is that you're here now, 'Sea and I won't let you go hungry and your not going back out in the streets, that chapter of your life is well and truly over." Hosea could practically feel the mistrust radiating off of the kid. Dutch rose from the ground, "You said you were orphaned?" He asked. The boy nodded, "Well, not anymore, you're ours. Alright, son?" Dutch smiled and sat back down, digging back into his own supper. The boy looked between them both before finally hesitantly beginning to eat.