#this was like three somewhat lackluster aus a few days ago and i was like. holy shit i can combine these | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

neoculturetravesty · 4 years ago

Text

We met in online class - Last Part

Image adapted from here.

Pairing: Renjun x Reader Genre: College AU, romance, angst, fluff Warnings: Strong language Word Count: 3.4k

A/N: And so it comes to an end, and let me tell you guys, I am not okay 😔 This is going to be a bit of a longer A/N, so please bear with me. If you’d like to get straight to the story, I COMPLETELY UNDERSTAND, so feel free to click Keep Reading!

Lowkey, I had a bit of a meltdown as I typed the final words on this fic because I hadn’t realized how attached I had grown to the characters. This is the first time I wrote three different chapter openers before deciding on one, because I simply couldn’t believe it was goodbye after this.

These mofos had constantly been on my mind for the past two months and a half. I would spend most days thinking about where to take them and then bringing them to life at night, after my entire day was over. When I wasn’t writing, I’d make little notes about thoughts I had into the night about them so that I wouldn’t forget them when morning comes.

This was my first ever (and as of right now, my only) chaptered fic. I had no idea parting with it would be as emotional as it was. When I think back to when I first received the prompt for this, I had never even imagined I could write Renjun, let alone a series. But there was something in the prompt that had gotten my wheels turning. And I am so immensely glad that it did. There were days when I thought “Oh man, what have I gotten myself into.” Some days, the story would just flow. Other days, I’d keep staring at the blinking cursor not knowing what to type. But when I did, I found my emotions so deeply connected with the characters. I was happy when they were happy. I was sad when they were sad. So, parting with them is very hard to say the least.

But through this journey, I got to experience the joy of reading all of your reviews and comments and honestly, it made it all worth it. THANK YOU to every single one of you that read this story and waited on it and laughed and cried with it. You have made my life better in more ways than you can imagine.

In this moment, I want to thank 🍙 anon, because it was their prompt that put me in this mess in the first place. And so, it is only fitting that I dedicate the final part to them 💛

“Oh, we definitely need a picture together. How about here? I think this place would fit everyone.” Kim Doyoung looks about, finding a spot best suited for the photo he wanted.

“I think right there on the platform would be better. We could get everyone in two tiers.” his assistant suggests.

“You’re a genius. Let’s gather everyone. It’s not often that so many NCTU grads and students come to Midnight Arthouse,” Doyoung nods.

“How many of us are here, anyway?” Renjun muses. The assistant looks at her iPad, checking once again.

“I think there’s 23 of you. So, let’s definitely go for the platform.” she nods.

“Okay, then.” Doyoung claps his hands together once, “Gather everyone,” he says to no one in particular and walks ahead with purpose. Renjun and the assistant’s eyes meet and they smirk. Of course this was directed to the both of them. So, they set about to work.

As it would turn out, gathering 23 people from a charity event with art and food and drinks would be a bit of a task. But somehow, they manage to gather all alumni and current students on the platform in three tiers instead of two for a somewhat chaotic picture. There must’ve been something in the water at NCTU because none of it’s students could stand still for very long. They get maybe one decent picture and several in which someone or the other was moving or pulling a face.

His friends aside, looking around at the group, Renjun realized that he recognized nearly all of them. Yangyang and Hendery and the rest of their frat were here. As were the 127s, old and new. Renjun recognized them all, except maybe two boys, who didn’t seem to know a lot of the others either. When the pictures were done and the main events were over and the crowd had started to dissipate, Renjun finally walked over to the artwork to observe it up close.

Honestly speaking, watching the work with his own two eyes left no doubt in his mind that this artist deserved to be spotlighted like this. This work was in a league of its own. Watching it makes Renjun smile; because looking at it makes him think back to a few months ago when he was sitting in Kim Doyoung’s office, thinking of himself as some sort of a big shot. But the truth is, there was no way he had that caliber then, and there is no way he has that caliber now, though he was sure as hell working on it.

“This is the piece I lost the bid on.” Renjun hears a voice and he turns around to see Zhong Chenle’s father observing the art with him. Renjun bows politely and smiles under his mask,

“I mean, this is a remarkable piece. You have good taste.” Renjun acknowledges.

“What about you? Why isn’t any of your artwork displayed here?” he asks and for a while, Renjun smiles a bit nostalgically. He could’ve been here, had he made something for the Annuale. Had he just selfishly taken that shot. Then again, there would’ve been no real guarantees. Because Kim Doyoung was pretty particular in the people he chose, whether they were recommended by his family or not. Working with him closely in the last couple of months had taught Renjun that. It had also taught him how underdeveloped his skill was in the real world context.

“I guess I still have a long way to go.” Renjun replies humbly.

“Don’t we all?” Chenle’s father nods, “Are you working here at this establishment?”

“Um, I… I suppose I am. I am Kim Doyoung’s apprentice. He is my mentor.” Renjun nods.

“So I might see your work here soon enough, eh?” Renjun assumes the kind man is smiling under his mask because his eyes seem to be making the same shape as Chenle’s do when he smiles. So Renjun grins back.

“I mean… if I work really hard, I might get to shoot my shot in the next Midnight Arthouse Annuale.” Renjun fantasizes.

“Or maybe you’d get lucky like this young artist,” he points his chin towards the artwork.

Renjun smiles, “I would credit her luck, too if I hadn’t seen her work. But her talent is… it kinda speaks for itself.”

“Oh, no, you should definitely credit her luck. Talent isn’t enough. The stars have to align. Luck, talent, the right place, the right time. It all has to come together.” he says nodding.

Renjun considers his words. They seem to be coming from the wisdom of experience.

What if Renjun hadn’t received the phone call about his grandma back then? Well, then he probably would’ve made something lackluster and gotten rejected. Working with Kim Doyoung has taught him as much. It didn’t matter who had put a word in for him. At the end of the day, his work had to be outclass.

What if he had received the phone call and then still had enough time to submit something for the Annuale? Then he still probably wouldn’t have because… well, because of you.

What if he had gone ahead, regardless of you or his grandma and just made something and submitted it? Then he still would’ve been rejected. Because the truth of the matter is, he just didn’t have the caliber that artists associated with Midnight Arthouse did.

In that sense, Renjun supposes everything was in fact happening at the right place and right time now. Doyoung was mentoring him and he was getting better by the day. The stars were aligning for him. He knew it in his heart.

“Then I would wish that it all comes together for me, too.” Renjun says.

“When it does, young man, I’ll be the first one to bid on your work.” he says and Renjun doesn’t even have the time to react when he feels a presence breeze in his direction and invade his personal space.

Renjun doesn’t even have to look up to know who it is. He can tell by the way this body fits perfectly into his side. He can tell by how naturally his own body responds and just puts his arm around it’s waist.

“Oh man, I missed all of it, didn’t I?” you lament, as you loop your arms around his neck from the side instead of a hello.

“Not all of it. The guys just left but your brother and his friends are still here. Besides, you had work.” Renjun turns his head and looks into your eyes to reassure you. “Y/N, this is Chenle’s father.”

“Oh, hello!” you say cheerfully and respectfully bow and give you greetings. “It is so nice to meet you. Chenle looks just like you!”

“Yes, I’ve been told I’m a more handsome version of him,” he smiles then turns to Renjun, “And who might this young lady be?”

“This is my girlfriend, Y/N. She goes to NCTU with us.” Renjun introduces you and you bow again. Oh, the thrill he got every time he got to introduce you as his girlfriend. Fuck, he’s pretty sure he’d never tire of it, even if it had just been a few months. The serotonin boost in his veins is strong and he gets the urge to squeeze you and hold you forever.

“Oh, that’s very nice. Come have a meal with us before we have to catch a plane back home, okay?” Chenle’s father invites the two of you.

“Oh, I would love to!” you say in your chipper tone before your eyes start darting around “I’m going to have to excuse myself for a little bit, I just wanna say hi to my brother.” you say and you politely bow before you start moving away.

“Babe, hang on…” Renjun says, holding you back by your hand. He brings his fingers delicately to the bridge of your nose and softly pinches down the mask over it so it sits more snugly on you. “There, it’s much safer now.” Renjun nods and watches the affectionate smile your eyes give before you move away. You looked so pretty today, even if you were just coming back from a four-hour internship. You were easily the most beautiful girl in this room, though Renjun suspected that you’d be the most beautiful girl in any room you entered.

Albeit sometimes, Renjun had to wonder if your talent or your beauty was greater. Because you had become the only junior in NCTU to land an internship at the SMK Trainee Drive. And now that you were a senior, you were somehow managing to keep your grades up alongside it.

Renjun, on the other hand, would find himself struggling with balancing his apprenticeship with his school work. So he knew firsthand how your discipline was something else altogether. Recently though, he had experienced a rise in his grades because you had been taking him on so many study dates that your organizational skills and motivation had started to rub off on him.

Renjun walks around the studio and the party and feels like it’s been too long till you’re finally back by his side.

“Love in the Time of Corona,” you read the title of an art piece displayed in front of you. “That was supposed to be our thing.”

Renjun laughs and has no qualms in looping his arms around your waist and finally pulling you into himself.

“I guess we should’ve realized then how un-novel the idea would become in a few months.” he comments.

“Un-novel is not a word, Huang Renjun.” you narrow your eyes at him.

Renjun laughs. “It is now,” he says and lets out a long exhale, “I missed you today.” he complains, though he looks down at you with warmth.

“Well, you’ve got me now. And you have me for the entire weekend.” you reassure him, your palms on his chest.

“Mhmm.” Renjun smiles and he wants to lean in to kiss you. But Kim Doyoung specifically had people assigned to walk around and make sure that everyone had their masks on when inside. “Also, we already have a thing.” he reminds you and winks.

You laugh, and say “I guess we do,” then let out a happy sigh as your eyes avert from his for a moment, taking in your surroundings. “Our Couple Thing should give you some ideas on what you can make when your work is displayed here in the 2022 Annuale. I won’t be late to that, I promise. I’ll take a day off from everything else in my life.”

Renjun's heart grows warmer still, and he’s sure his eyes reflect what he feels, “How can you be so sure my work will be displayed in the 2022 Annuale?”

“I don’t know, Huang Renjun. I just have a feeling about you.” you say and Renjun can see you smile even if your lips are covered by a mask. Your eyes always smiled before your mouth did, anyway.

“Y/N L/N, I have a feeling about you, too.” he retorts.

“And what feeling would that be?” you raise an eyebrow.

“It’s a secret.” he says, but now he sees your pout, even if he can’t see your mouth because your cheeks have puffed up over the mask. It makes him laugh.

“You’re no fun.” you protest.

“I’ll tell you once we get out of here.” Renjun offers.

“Well, I’m ready to leave.” you jut your chin up. Renjun grins and offers you his arm. You grab it with your entire body and the two of you start walking out together.

You had plans for the weekend, after all. And Renjun was determined to keep you all to himself for once, with no one else demanding your time. Not your internship, not your assignments, not any of your friends, and especially not Lee fucking Donghyuck. He was finally going to take you away where it could just be you and him and nobody else.

This moment felt way too surreal to Renjun.

The campfire had simmered down from a glorious roar to a comfortable burn, giving off just enough heat in the cool of an early winter evening. The sky was in it’s fading moments, where the pink of the light was slowly turning to violets and the violets were slowly merging into darks.

Renjun remembered suggesting to you all that time ago that maybe you could go somewhere together. But now that he was here, he hadn’t imagined that the moment would feel as surreal as it did.

Because now the two of you are sitting in front of your tent by the fire, entwined in one another. You’re sitting between his legs, arms around his neck, nuzzling your cheek inside his padded jacket while he supports your head on his arm and kisses you.

He’s holding you in his arms and kissing you and everything seems so perfect that for a moment, he has to pull away to watch your face and wonder if all of this was real. And though there is a gentle smile on your face, you’re not opening your eyes much. Because you know full well that Renjun’s lips would be back on yours in no time. So you play with his hair as they fall to his forehead and when he kisses you again, you press up into him so he would wrap his arms around you and hold you tighter. He does and he rubs his hands up and down your back and attempts to close his jacket around you.

“Are you cold?” he asks lovingly. You shake your head.

“No. I just want to crawl inside you.” you say, like it’s the most logical thing to be said.

“Creepy.” Renjun remarks but holds you closer still.

“You should be happy you haven’t seen my collection of your hair clippings.” you quip as you nip into the skin of his neck.

“Oh, sweet. That rivals all your used tissues I’ve kept in my shrine at home.”

“Aww, you shouldn’t have.” you coo at him and then lean up to kiss him some more and he laughs. But soon, he pushes the arm that you were using like a pillow up so your face would be closer to his and he could kiss you as deeply as he was truly craving.

The two of you keep kissing like that till the sky is dark. It was an odd sort of trance, being so lost in one another that neither of you cared about what time it was or how long you had been sitting here, wrapped up in one another. Your phones were zipped away in your bags and you hadn’t checked them even once since you had parked your camping van and set up your tent. It was a slow, peaceful sort of bliss, just sitting by the fire and kissing and kissing with nothing else on your minds but being here like this with one another.

“Renjun?” you say, your voice sounding like it was returning from a deep thought.

“Hmm?” Renjun asks as he combs your hair away from your pretty face.

“You know, I learnt today that a cactus can live anywhere between 10 and 200 years.” you tell him, idly tracing the birthmark on the back of his hand.

Renjun leans in and presses long into your lips. “Yeah?” he replies and watches your face. It seemed hazily focused, like it was trying to catch onto a faraway thought.

“I also learnt that it can take up to 30 years for a cactus to bear flowers.” you say in an introspective, wistful tone.

Renjun looks away to hide his smile. Oh God, you were so cute. “Yeah?” he says again, but it’s getting more and more difficult to keep a serious face.

“Sometimes, a cactus doesn’t flower at all.” you say and then you turn your head to look at him like you’ve resurfaced from your thoughts and are now in the moment. Renjun’s grin grows wider. “Renjunnn…” you whine and so he has no choice but to tenderly hold your cheeks in his palms and stroke your hair.

“What?” he chuckles.

“You said you’d think you’re worthy of my forgiveness when the cactus bears flowers.” you whine again and Renjun has to plant a loving kiss to your forehead.

“Is that what I said?” he chuckles some more and then leans in to kiss the anxious realization away from your lips.

“Renjun.” you pout and Renjun laughs and takes his beautiful, whiny, kindhearted girlfriend in his arms and hopes that his hold could chase away all the worries from her pretty, brilliant mind.

He kisses you because his heart can’t bear it any longer. How did he manage to hold a heart like yours in his hand?

Renjun feels an indescribable amount of happiness. Like he wasn’t sure that you were really here with him, in his arms, all for him to hold, with no worry or burden afflicting him. The happiness is so immense and so incredible and so heavy that for a moment, he feels it suffocating him. He wonders if he deserved this kind of happiness.

But right in the next moment, he stops himself. He knew how easy it was to relapse into those tempting, lonesome thoughts. But if there was anything that therapy was teaching him, it was that of course he deserved happiness.

Though right now, holding you in his arms, this happiness was choking him. He felt like his heart was swelling and pressing against his lungs and his chest couldn’t bear it and he could no longer breathe.

“Y/N…” he exhales, holding you back so he can look at your face and you could look up into his. He pauses to gather another breath. Then, he just says it. “I love you.”

And doing so does the trick. He feels his chest slowly getting lighter, because this is what it had been bursting with. Now, he’s told you. Now, it can be unburdened.

You look up at him and there is nothing but a sparkle in your eye, and tenderness in your smile. For a while, you say nothing, just looking upon his eyes like that. “Thank you.” you finally whisper back at him.

Renjun pauses for a moment. But then, he relaxes. This was okay. You didn’t have to say it back right away. Renjun was ready to give you as much time as you needed. So he presses his lips into your forehead once again till he feels you laughing against him. He pulls back in confusion and you grab at the lapel of his parka.

“Huang Renjun…” you say and he looks back at you with uncertainty, “... I love you, too.”

And Renjun can’t help it if he kisses you too hard. He can’t help it that he’s squeezing you too tight. He wouldn’t care if the night brightens back into morning and the morning fades back into night. He was going to hold you just like this for the rest of his life.

So he lays you down and kisses you deeper, like he wanted to make up for all the time he had lost. All the time in his life when he hadn’t known you. All the time he had known you and didn’t let himself have you. He was going to make up for it all. And as he zips the tent up and shields you from the rest of the world, he wonders if he could spend all of his days just like this. Holding you and loving you and knowing that you loved him back; and if he could, today was a damn good day to start.

The fire slows to a simmer till all that’s left are embers that keep being carried away by the breeze. But the two of you remain inside, in your own world, happy that you had found one another, happy that you could finally have one another. Happy that you could hold one another and say that you loved each other and have nothing in the world hold you back, not now, not ever.

You were Y/N and Renjun, Renjun and Y/N, two names that were forever intertwined because that’s how people would call you now. You were the couple that belonged so perfectly with one another that people would wonder if you’d been together for years. And any time someone with a burning curiosity would come up to you and ask,

“So, where did you guys meet?” you would just look at one another, smile and say, “Well, we met in online class.”

~THE END

#renjun fic #renjun fluff #renjun angst #ficscafe #kpopscape #neowritingsnet #dreamwritersnet #huang renjun #renjun #nct fic #nct dream #nct #nct dream fic #nct fluff #nct angst #nct college au #renjun x reader #we met in online class

377 notes · View notes

evanismfic · 6 years ago

Text

half - agony. chapter one.

第一章 . BACOPA ( 假馬齒莧 )

summary: when you last set foot inside the palace seven years ago, your heart was shattered into a thousand pieces. now, after the dowager empress’s death, you find that you still cannot even dare to hope.

pairing: yanjun x f!reader

genre: historical, royals au

word count: 6855

a/n: please expect a lot of artistic license in terms of historical accuracy and medicine i am neither a doctor nor an expert on the song dynasty :’)

[ prev. ] | [ 2. ]

YOU HAD ALL THE MAKINGS of a rags-to-riches story.

Born a month and a day before the summer solstice, the town shaman told your father –– a man of science who made this augury his one exception –– that you would bring great change. As you grew older, her prediction became less and less likely. Your father once muttered that he should’ve known better than to put stock in “that hogwash.”

Your family was poor, relying on both your parents to make ends meet. Your mother died not long after you were born, leaving you in the care of your father. He was well-meaning but lacked the emotional competence to navigate raising a child, precocious as you were, alone. More instructional than nurturing, you grew to maturity spending half of your life helping him in his shop. Your father was confident that you would follow in his footsteps and become a healer. That was his anchor.

You spent the other half of your childhood frolicking by the stream on the outskirts of town. In those nearby woods dwelled the boy you loved. You first met him when you were but four years old, washing bloodied linens from an operation the day before. He peered at you from between the trees. When you first noticed him, he fled.

There are a great many places where your life would’ve been better had things just ended there. This was one of them.

But the boy came back a week later.

Bolder, he came to a stop beside you and asked what you were doing. Your father told you once never to speak to strangers. He also saw no problem, however, allowing a small child to travel all the way across town to do laundry, so you can somewhat blame him for your lack of prudence. You can still remember the boy –– “Yanjun,” he introduced himself, chest puffed outward in pride –– and his tone. Painfully posh, he didn’t hold a lick of the drawl you became accustomed to from your small town. He spoke like the people from the capital, and you were instantly entranced. You had never met a child from Lin’an before. You decided you liked Yanjun very much. If your father noticed that you stayed out longer to play with the boy by the river, he never commented on it. After all, he was just a child. It took you six years to find out who Yanjun really was.

Given that he only spent summers in the so-named palace –– a sprawling villa on the hill that overlooked your hometown –– you hadn’t really known him for all that long. For roughly three months of every year, the two of you (Yanjun, mostly) would get in as much trouble as you possibly could. From playing in the river to snatching low-hanging apples from a nearby (privately owned) orchard, the two of you were nearly inseparable. On the days where Yanjun didn’t come to play, you were miserable. And it wasn’t until your tenth year that you learned just why he was sometimes nowhere to be found.

It had been twenty-four days since you two last met before your father was summoned to the Summer Palace. He brought you along on a whim, not knowing how long he would be gone and reluctant to leave you in the care of your gossipy neighbors. He did not expect your gasp of recognition when you laid eyes on the frightfully pale Crown Prince lying in his bed. His younger brother Chaoze sat by his side and shook him awake. When your eyes met, you felt your stomach drop.

You had spent your summers for the past six years befriending the future Emperor. And his illness, a cold from too many hours spent in the stream, was your fault. Perhaps this was when his mother started to hate you.

You thought that compromising his health would have you forbidden from ever seeing him again, but he sought you out the moment he recovered. He told you that he never meant to lie to you –– and he didn’t, really, only by omission –– and that nothing had changed. “I hope we can still be friends,” Yanjun said, earnestly taking your hand.

But things had changed, although you couldn’t be sure if it was for better or for worse.

When puberty hit, things only got more confusing.

In your current opinion, at all of twenty-five years old, it’s when everything started to go downhill.

You always liked Yanjun. He was funny, smart, and cultured. He would tell you about Lin’an and, after you discovered his identity, he would relay funny anecdotes about his tutors and the goings on of the Imperial Court. As he got older and his voice deepened, he suddenly became more interesting to listen to. And while Yanjun had always been good looking, he was especially handsome when the baby fat left his face and granted him those killer cheekbones portraits still fail to replicate. In a year, you had begun staring at his plump lips more and more.

You didn’t miss the way he’d been looking at you too.

He first held your hand when you were thirteen, shyly brushing his thumb across your knuckles, and you pressed your lips to his cheek in return. He kissed you on the lips at fifteen, and you told him that you loved him the next year. At eighteen, his father died, and you held him in your arms as he cried. A week later, his mother declared that Yanjun needed to marry in order to inherit the throne, and he asked you to come back with him to Lin’an.

Saying yes was one of the worst decisions you ever made.

Somehow, you’re back here seven years later, staring at the palace gates as your luggage is wheeled in behind you. Your father had succumbed to cancer just as spring began to wane into summer, so you have nothing keeping you in Changqi. Not long after his death, you received a letter with the imperial seal requesting that you take on the now vacant role of the royal doctor, as well as requesting that you work on a cure for one of the nation’s deadliest plagues. Imperial patronage was a stunning offer few could even dare to deny. But you still have to wonder why you would return when you had tried so hard to run away after a short five months within the palace walls.

The answer is rather simple: because Yanjun asked you to.

On a broader scale, it was easier to provide excuses. No one in their right mind refuses the Emperor. There is a vacancy in the staff. The Court is in need of a healer, and you earned yourself quite the reputation for your innovative herbal remedies. Only the best of the best can serve the Emperor, and you more than enough deserve that title. It has nothing to do with the fact that Yanjun once loved you and that you loved him just as much.

That time is long gone, and nothing displays that more than how much the palace has changed since you left it.

It’s certainly livelier, more colorful than it was when you departed. Having come when it was in a period of mourning, though, that is to be expected. Observing servants as they move pots and crates around, you presume Yanjun is doing a bit of remodeling as well. It’s a bold choice for an emperor whose nation is currently at war.

“There’s no view quite as magnificent is there?” Honglin, the page sent to fetch and safely deliver you to the palace, hands the reigns of his steed over to a stable boy. The fortnight of travel didn’t afford you an extraordinarily close friendship with the young man, but he was currently the only friend you had in Lin’an. You know that he is mixed, his father being a Jurchen defector and his mother a Han woman. Honglin is incredibly proud of his heritage, bearing a zealousness you find endearing. That’s about all that you know about him. “I came here with my father when I was seven and I’m still in awe every time I return.”

You don’t have the heart to tell him that you have very few memories of the palace to look fondly upon. You smile instead. “Indeed. It’s a testament to our great nation.”

Honglin seems pleased by your response. He gestures toward the Western Wing, which houses most of the residences of the staff. You’re surprised that your brain has retained that information, considering how you tried to forget everything that you could. “I’ll direct you to your rooms, let you get settled in before I bring you to meet His Majesty. Would you like me to do anything with your supplies?”

“No,” you say, shaking your head and following Honglin as he starts down the palace’s winding halls. “Just leave them in their crates in the infirmary. I’ll organize them myself tomorrow.”

“As you wish.”

Honglin deposits you in front of a bedchamber only marginally smaller than the one from nearly a decade ago. How interesting it is that the quarters of the presumed future empress were roughly the same size as the royal healer’s –– or, rather, how interesting it was that the Dowager Empress thought to give her successor such lackluster accommodations. Both rooms are just as lifeless and empty. Only a desk, a table with which you could receive visitors and dine, a bed, and one of the trunks containing your clothing served as furnishing. They couldn’t even afford you a wardrobe. Honglin chirps that he’ll be around and that you only need to holler for him to come running. He leaves you to decompress, and you collapse on your bed the moment he shuts the doors behind him.

You don’t plan to lay there longer than twenty minutes, but you’re exhausted. You know that coming to Lin’an was for a good cause. Aside from the honor of being the royal family’s sole physician, imperial support allowed your research to flourish. The royal summons didn’t mention how much of it Yanjun was willing to finance, only that he would give as much as it took to eradicate tianxing illness. You also knew that anything was better than your lack of funds back at home.

You wonder if the ladies of the court are still here. At least one of your tormentors is gone. Though you feel terrible for being relieved that the Dowager Empress is dead, you still find yourself consoled by the fact that you don’t have to deal with her. You’re terrible, and you have to force yourself to fight the instinct. Horrible to you she might have been, she was still Yanjun’s mother and is apparently the current reason you are employed by the court. Your hopes that the volatile atmosphere of the palace had vanished were dashed by the rumor that your predecessor killed himself for failing to cure the Dowager Empress of her ailment. Is Yanjun really that foul-tempered now? Perhaps this is what his mother was trying to save you from.

“This is no place for a commoner,” she had said when Yanjun first announced his intention to take you to wife. You wanted to protest at first. You loved Yanjun and Yanjun loved you –– surely such a fairytale romance would triumph over all else, wouldn’t it? You weren’t in control of the circumstances of your birth. It wasn’t like you chose to be born beneath Yanjun’s station. You were naïve to think that the strength of your character would prove you worthy of the role of empress, particularly because you weren’t as strong as you thought.

You could stand ridicule from one person. Yanjun, young and headstrong, had a rebellious streak that reinforced his insistence that you disregard his mother’s protests, that you two were soulmates and nothing could come between that. However, you weren’t prepared for the near-ubiquitous vitriol and abuse sent your way. You expected jealousy. You weren’t a fool. The Crown Prince was going to be sought after no matter who he was. To marry the future emperor was the easiest way to secure one’s future. In some respects, you could understand the utter incredulity that a random girl from the country managed to snatch Yanjun away from the noblewomen who knew him all their lives. That didn’t justify their cruel words, though. Of how you didn’t belong, of how Yanjun deserved someone of higher status who wouldn’t pollute the royal bloodline. Of how he was making a terrible mistake by choosing you and how he would come to regret this decision for the rest of his life. Of how you would be an unfit mother to his children, passing on both stupidity and inferiority to his heirs.

You thought yourself a strong girl. But there was only so much even the strongest could take.

At least now, you’re not a threat. You don’t mean anything to Yanjun anymore. They have no reason to snap at you, broad as his harem is.

You spend so long in your miserable reminiscence that you don’t realize how much time has passed. Honglin has to knock on your door and snap you out of your self-pity. “Just a moment!” you shout, scrambling to your trunk and throwing on your nicest gown. You comb your hair as quickly as you can and hope that minimal makeup will be enough. Honglin smiles and tells you that you look nice when you open the door. You slip your hand into the crook of his elbow when he offers his arm, taking a deep breath.

Chuckling, Honglin begins to guide you toward the Great Hall. “You don’t need to look so nervous,” he tells you, patting your hand gently. “His Majesty isn’t going to rip your head off for being late. His meeting with the Ministers of Defense ran a little long, so I doubt he’s noticed anyway. Between them and the men of the Inner Court, I’d be surprised if he actually gets a word in beyond granting or denying their absurd requests.”

“Is he really so busy?”

“Oh, of course. The nation is on the brink of war at all times, miss, no matter what harebrained but effective schemes General Cai has up his sleeve. Invasion is a constant possibility. The Jurchens simply refuse to let up.”

You pretend to know what he’s talking about. “Right.”

“Well, whatever the case, I’m glad we have Yanjun leading us. With him, I feel as though victory is just around the corner.”

“I see,” you murmur. You hadn’t thought much of public opinion on the current administration. Politics were less your forte. You simply followed your moral compass, bureaucracy be damned. Honglin might be a little biased, but you still find yourself fascinated by the open admiration in his tone. It seems Yanjun is the great leader you always thought he’d be, bringing to life the praise you’d whisper to him late at night as he laid his head in your lap and voiced his doubts. “You think very highly of him.”

“He deserves it.” Those three words settle the matter.

After what seems like an eternity navigating the palace’s endless corridors, Honglin stops in front of the large crimson doors of the Great Hall. Covered in gold decorations, it’s even more ornate than you remember. The phoenixes and floral imagery are new, somewhat clashing with the preexisting spiraling dragons and flamboyant clouds. Somehow, though, the doors seem smaller than you remember them last. Perhaps you’re no longer as intimidated by them and the secrets they hold. You know what type of vipers dwell within. There’s only the one on the dais that you’re still apprehensive of. There is still the slight chance that Yanjun is still as harmless as a garter snake. In your infinite maturity, though, you know better than to hope.

“Are you ready?” Honglin asks. You don’t give yourself room to hesitate. At your nod, he smiles encouragingly and pushes the great doors open. Voice booming, he calls out your presence. “This humble servant presents the new imperial healer to His Majesty the Emperor, Son of Heaven and Ruler of the Earth, He of Ten Thousand Years.” Bent at the waist, he shuffles forward. You follow him, head bowed and hands folded in your sleeves.

Yanjun says your name when he tells you to rise. As you obey, you force yourself to suppress a shudder. If even such a short vocalization can send shivers down your spine, you can’t imagine what a full sentence will be like. “Look at us,” Yanjun says. A rustle of silk indicates he beckoned you with a finger. You raise your head to fully look at Yanjun –– Emperor Qiànzо̄ng, you remind yourself –– for the first time in seven years.

He’s just as beautiful as he was back then. No longer boyish, he’s replaced that youthful charm with a regal and dignified demeanor. His hair is longer and spills over his shoulders, flesh paler presumably from years indoors. He waves at you almost teasingly, fingers still slim and pretty. It’s a wonder he can still move with the heaps of fabric atop him. He’s always been scrawny, but you see that he’s filled out his robes. The rich silks are adorned with golden embroidery depicting his family crest, the Phoenix –– so, it was his addition to the doors after all –– along with, you notice on his sleeves, tangerine and citrus trees. To reflect the flourishing growth brought about by his reign, you suppose. He truly is an emperor now.

“It’s good to have you back,” Yanjun says. For all the refinement in his dress, he still slouches a little, shoulders raised as he cants a hip to the side –– the way he used to when the two of you were still kids. He’s twenty-five now. Handsome as ever. Voice still rich and soft and tender when addressing you. One would think that his father-in-law isn’t standing less than a foot from him. For all your avoidance of all things imperial, you can remember the beady eyes of Lady Pingting’s father easily. The emperor’s Right Hand eyes you with obvious distaste, sleeve already raised to his mouth as if he is mere seconds away from whispering disparaging comments about you into Yanjun’s ear. You have no doubt that he will as soon as you are out of sight. Seven years have brought very little change to Lin’an.

In the wake of your silence, the emperor looks at you expectantly. You have to remind yourself that this isn’t the little boy who used to fish your ribbons out of the river for you, who would stand on his tiptoes to pick the ripest fruits to share. You doubt he is still the same man that you loved. He is a man of power, now. He is atop the world’s finest nation. He is expected to lead it in war, to reclaim the lost North. “This humble servant thanks the crown,” you tell him, lowering yourself to your knees. Gripping the insides of your sleeves so tightly you dig crescents into the fabric, you bow once more and press your forehead into the velvet carpet so hard you think it may leave marks. “It is an honor to serve the great Dragon Emperor.” When you dare to meet Yanjun’s eyes, his mouth is drawn into a tight line. Perhaps that was the wrong thing to say.

For a long, tense minute, neither of you speak. Honglin looks nervous on your behalf

Yanjun’s gaze switches to something akin to… disappointment. Something else you can’t name flutters in your stomach. You’ve felt it before when looking at him, you just refuse to acknowledge it as affection. You like Yanjun. But you don’t love him anymore. You can’t. So, while you can care and fret over why he seems disappointed in you, you are not allowed to bend over backward to try and please him. That’s not your job anymore, assuming it ever was.

The emperor clears his throat, snapping you back into reality. “How do you feel, coming back to the capital after all this time?” He pauses. “We’re sure you must’ve had some reservations, clean and… succinct as your parting was.”

If you were more naïve, you might dare to presume that there’s a hint of regret in his tone. Yanjun as a prince was sentimental. Soft. As an emperor, he is not allowed to have such unnecessary inclinations. And you, though not quite the commoner girl you once were, are still light years beneath him. You are a healer, not the daughter of a nobleman or a foreign princess or his empress. You have a place –– one that is not with him. “Not at all,” you say, feigning ignorance to the way he leans forward in interest. “Whatever my previous feelings for the palace were, I have grown in the past seven years. And I would be foolish to disregard a royal summons. I thank Your Majesty for your generous offer. I know that with imperial support, I will be able to complete my research and create a better standard of living for our people. Improving the health of our citizens is my greatest priority and I am grateful that Your Majesty has deigned to allot such a great sum to such a wonderful cause.”

You’re suddenly made aware of the dozens of pairs of eyes on you. Though the throne beside Yanjun is empty, his many advisors are all around him, among other members of his staff like scribes and entertainers. To say nothing, as well, of the diplomats and bureaucrats from afar. How many of them know who you are and what you once meant to him? How many are willing to use that and this lackluster reception against you?

Yanjun blinks. “We… see.” He opens his mouth to speak further, but his Right Hand cuts him off as the old man lunges forward to whisper in his ear. Nodding, Yanjun waves him back with an arm. “We are terribly sorry to curtail this… long-awaited reunion, but we have some business to take care of.” Glancing at Honglin, Yanjun dips his head. “If you would be so kind as to escort the lady healer back to her quarters. General Zhu and his retinue will be here shortly.”

And just like that, you are dismissed and his attention is elsewhere. You and Honglin bow before you depart, but Yanjun hardly seems to notice as he unfurls a scroll in his lap and listens to the rambling of his ministers. It’s probably for the best.

When the doors of the Great Hall shut behind him completely, Honglin throws you a smile. “That wasn’t so terrible, was it? He’s still fond of you!” It seems he does remember you were betrothed to the emperor. Prior to this, he hadn’t mentioned anything of the sort. Maybe his memory was jogged by Yanjun’s words. Regardless, you appreciate the attempt at levity. “I told you he’s a good man. You had nothing to be worried about.”

He’s right, in a way. You didn’t know why you were so worked up over a conversation that took less than ten minutes. What were you expecting? For Yanjun to beg you to love him again, for him to confront you over breaking his heart? Clearly, it wasn’t very broken in the first place, considering the fact that he married Pingting not long after you left and gained a reputation of being something of a womanizer. Not that anyone would ever accuse an emperor of debauchery to his face.

“Would you like to go back to your room, or are there other matters you would like to take care of?”

“Actually,” you say, “do you mind taking me to the infirmary? I think I’d like to begin unpacking.” It’d take your mind off of things, at the very least. And you’d like to get your practice off the ground as soon as possible. Momentarily forgetting about Yanjun is just a bonus.

Honglin eyes your robes with an arched brow, but when you look at him expectantly, he shrugs and grins. “As you wish. Follow me!”

By the time you’re finished with unpacking most of your surgical equipment and organizing your anesthetics, you are sweaty, your hair has come undone, and your arms are sore. Just thinking about having to put away everything else has you sighing in exhaustion. You’re only about halfway done, and remembering that you still have to take inventory of all of your herbs makes you want to quit even before you’ve started, but you grit your teeth and decide to have everything finished by the next evening. The sun has long since set, and the palace has fallen into relative silence. Having removed your shirt jacket for ease of movement, you have to slink back to your rooms with it draped over your shoulders, hoping no one sees you in a state of moderate undress. You breathe a sigh of relief as you successfully make it back to your room without being spotted. Only to scream –– thankfully short and quiet enough not to cause a large commotion –– when you see the scene laid out before you, of course.

Lin Yanjun and an extravagant dinner are at your table, and he looks moderately amused by the sight of your surprise and messy attire. His mother ambushed you similarly seven years ago, but you were wearing more clothes then. You doubt he is aware of how much he takes after her. “Sit,” Yanjun says, sounding more like he’s suggesting rather than ordering. “I wanted to speak with you in a less ostentatious setting.”

And the candles, golden cutlery, and huge roast duck definitely serve to create a more minimalist, humble atmosphere.

Biting back the quip, you do as he says and take a seat across from him. When you dined with his mother (whom you can see in him so clearly with the way the shadows dance across his face), you were expecting an apology. She did a good job of maintaining the impression of civil conversation, though its content was anything but civil.

Without a hint of aggression, she told you, “You must know that you are no good for him.”

You tried to protest, only to get plowed over.

“Look at it this way,” the Dowager Empress had said. You still remember her words and the way her hair decorations clacked as she moved clear as day. “You are doing my son no favors. You may operate under the idealistic belief that true love will conquer all, but I must remind you, young one, that Yanjun will become the leader of a country in the real world. A country at war, constantly being attacked by our enemies to the north. He will reclaim the North and drive the Jurchens out once and for all. What he needs is someone who will provide him with the most aid in his endeavors. What could you possibly offer him that he could not find elsewhere?”

At the time, you weren’t able to speak, tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth. You never needed to challenge such a great authority before. The Dowager Empress took advantage of that.

“Money? Connections? Are you a tactician of any sort?” You had no response. She was right. Yanjun was meant for greater things. And while you thought you’d be with him every step of the way, you knew that it wasn’t practical for him. Lady Yun, whose father was the second largest landowner in the entire country, or perhaps Lady Likun, whose father and brother were prominent figures in the military and who was a capable strategist in her own right, were better matches. He ended up choosing Lady Pingting, the daughter of a high-ranking official in the Ministry of Defense, so Yanjun evidently took his mother’s wishes to heart. What did you have to offer him besides your love? “You are a commoner, my girl. He will be an emperor. Surely you see something wrong with this picture, yes? You may believe that the two of you are in love, but that is only because you don’t know any better. The universe has an order and it will always right itself. This is a lesson you would do well to learn now.

“This is what is going to happen,” said the Dowager Empress then, so sure that she could tell the future. “You are going to tell Yanjun that you no longer wish to marry him. You will then pack your meager belongings and return to Changqi. You will remember your place, and you will never speak of or to him again.”

As it turned out, the old bitch was a prophet.

Except here you are, sitting in front of Yanjun as he places a leg of duck in your bowl. It’s something a husband would do. Is this the universe righting itself? No, it can’t be. You remain frozen, hands in your lap. “Why?” You thought you could do this. That you could speak to him again without wanting to flee. It should be easier without all those eyes on you, but it isn’t.

“Is it wrong of me to wish to speak to an old friend?” He arches a brow and smiles at you. It isn’t pleasant. He looks every bit like the shark his mother was when she last spoke to you. He looks like he’s just waiting for you to spill blood so he can strike. “We are still friends, are we not?”

You don’t respond. The question hangs awkwardly in the air as you turn instead to eat. Perhaps it’s petty of you, but you’ve learned to pick and choose your battles. Professing any affection for him would do you no good, especially when taking into consideration the people who could hear you but who you couldn’t see. “And I suppose you thought you were doing me favors by coming to my quarters?” He blinks in surprise as you speak after sipping some broth. It’s remarkably easier to speak to Yanjun when you think of his mother at the same time, of how he’s no longer the lovesick boy that you knew –– of how he might not have your best interests at heart anymore. “There are eyes and ears around the palace and you thought that coming to my bedchambers alone was the best course of action. I see.”

Yanjun laughs then, releasing a rather cavalier scoff. “My apologies, I didn’t think ––”

“Clearly.”

His chuckle cuts off abruptly. “I was hoping we could be civil.” Clearing his throat, Yanjun returns to his meal. Each movement –– even to raise his chopsticks to his mouth –– is practiced and sharp. Though it is only dinner, and a private one at that, Yanjun still can’t relax. You feel a little bad for snapping at him. The last seven years probably haven’t been very good to him. He had to have been forced to grow a thicker skin. Scales, if you will. The bags under his eyes say as much, anyway.

The two of you eat in silence, as you don’t dare to speak lest he turn your cold attitude against you. You had often imagined what it would be like to share meals as husband and wife. What it might be like to sit beside him in the grand hall, reaching over to add some vegetables to his rice and as he ladles you soup. How domestic it might have been. How useless these fantasies were. The Dowager Empress was right. At the time, you were a frivolous, naïve girl in love with the idea of love. Now, you are not. You’ve grown, and you’ve grown beyond him. The two of you were better off without each other. This isn’t you finding your way back to each other, or whatever drivel your eighteen year-old self would’ve come up with.

This is not the universe correcting its course.

But still, you have to wonder.

“Why me?”

The two words startle Yanjun out of his apparently length and intense internal monologue. From the harsh way he was staring at the plates in front of him, you thought he was trying to consume them with sheer willpower and ocular strength alone. He looks up at you and raises a brow. “I beg your pardon?”

“Out of all the doctors in the Middle Empire, out of every physician, every healer, every master of the art of medicine, why did you choose to extend this position to me?” There are plenty of people more famous than you, renowned across the nation for their prowess and advancement in the field. While you had garnered a bit of popularity (and something of an ego) for your improvements of herbal medicine, you still had doubts that these accomplishments alone warranted your sudden and enormous rise in status. “I highly doubt it’s because we are friends. If you’ll forgive me for the rudeness of the accusation, I believe you may have some ulterior motives.”

It isn’t something you would have suggested of him before. At least, not out loud. Yanjun was shrewd and playful, but such an important position, one that held the entire palace’s health in its hands, was not one to be taken so lightly. Nepotism had no place when life and death were involved, and you always thought that he knew better than to place personal preference over effectiveness. But you hardly know him anymore. So much of him is physically familiar. The details, however, are too dissimilar not to notice.

His relative reticence, the almost sleepy way he blinks, head occasionally dropping and his chin staying tucked against his clavicle as if he doesn’t want to lift it back up. The calluses on his fingers from hours of holding a brush. The wry curl of his lips resembling something like guilt. Like you’ve sniffed him out. The light dusting of pink across his cheeks, either from the wine he’s been indulging in intermittently throughout the night or embarrassment. Surprise, given that you never thought to challenge him like this before.

So, you were right. He was hiding something. Maybe you know him better than you think.

“That is a rather abrasive way to phrase your concerns,” Yanjun says mildly, “but I will forgive you for your tone.” He folds his hands in his lap. “The simple truth is that I needed someone I could trust implicitly. Although I had my doubts that you would be able to hold up under the pressure, there are very few people I trust to make sure that my family and friends and allies are healthy.”

You swallow roughly. The pressure. Right. When you told him you no longer wished to marry him, you cited pressure as the deciding factor in your departure. Of course, he’d remember.

“Nevertheless, you are correct. I owe you the truth. I am well aware of what was written on the summons. None of it is particularly untrue. I fully expect you to conduct research to combat the tianxing plague in Guilin. But that isn’t all I wanted to ask of you. I suppose that, upon reflection, my apprehensions no longer seem very reasonable. And, as such, I no longer see the point in hiding anything from you. Are you aware of what happened to your predecessor?”

“Only that he leapt into a river not long after your mother’s death.” You decide to keep your conspiracy theories to yourself.

“You were not informed of why?”

You shake your head. You wish he would just get to the point, though he’s had a history of being superfluous in his storytelling.

“The official narrative we passed along to the palace staff is that he feared punishment for failing me because he was unable to prevent my mother’s death. She had an ailment of the liver and suffered a painful death. It would not be surprising to hear that he feared retribution from the crown.” Would it? You didn’t think he was that kind of man. But people change. Yanjun leans in and your traitorous heartbeat quickens. If he notices the way your breath catches in your threat, he doesn’t say anything.

“Only three ministers, the Empress, myself, and now you know the truth. The Crown Prince’s health has been deteriorating for the past month. While it seemed the doctor had been making some headway, he took his life two weeks into my son’s illness. I can only presume this was because he reached an unfavorable prognosis. But rather than do anything he could to save a seven year-old boy’s life, he took the coward’s way out.” Yanjun clenches his fists. You fight the urge to reach over and take his hand.

What little surprise you felt at learning that he was a father quickly faded and was replaced by sympathy. You had no children to call your own, disgraced to spinsterhood after the dissolution of your engagement. You had no idea what he must feel to watch his son in pain, to watch the boy die. You could scarcely fathom it. It puts the exhaustion in his visage into perspective. Your heart aches for him.

But you still aren’t very happy with him. “Why… why didn’t you just tell me the truth?” For someone who claimed to trust you enough to put his family’s life in your hands, the fact that he decided to withhold this information from you didn’t support his assertion whatsoever.

“I couldn’t risk your summons being intercepted. If the news that the heir to the Empire was dying fell into the wrong hands, I feared the worst. Morale dropping in the midst of a war we are losing is the mildest of consequences.” He clenches his jaw and avoids your gaze. “Worse yet, the Jurchens may send someone to finish the job. We are aware that they have spies within the palace. We just don’t know who they are.”

“That sounds like a bunch of excuses. Valid ones, yes, but not the truth. Yanjun, if you want me to do the best that I can, you have to trust me.” Not all of him is entirely unfamiliar –– the way his voice wavers and the way he refuses to look you in the eye are little dishonest quirks you recall from his childhood. Your fingers twitch and his flex in return. You’re both too stubborn to reach over and complete the movement. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Licking his lips, Yanjun drops his head. He reaches up to rub his jaw. He used to do that when he got in trouble and his steward was about to wring a confession out of him. “I was afraid. And foolish. I thought that you still loved me. That you would refuse to treat a child that you thought could’ve and should’ve been yours. For that, I apologize. I should not have let my assessment of you be clouded by fanciful sentiment.”

Can you resent him for his line of reasoning? Part of you wished that he thought you still loved him, but that notion was supposed to work in conjunction with the idea that he still loved you too. That part of you, the smallest bit of romanticism remaining within you, was wrong. He thought you still loved him, and he used that to think the worst of you. You are not afraid to admit that it hurts –– both on your behalf and his. What happened to Yanjun to make him this cold? Was it… was it you who made him this way?

“Oh, Yanjun.” Your words are pitying. You can tell by the way his shoulders tense that it irritates him. “If you had just asked, I still would have come.”

A chill creeps down your spine as Yanjun stands and meets your eyes. You’ve never seen him like this before. Aloof, icy. His eyes are hard as stone. It’s difficult to categorize him, and he always seems to be shifting. For much of your dinner, Yanjun was nowhere near as cold. Just because he wasn’t talking didn’t mean that he was trying to freeze you out or scare you. But now, you can’t be sure. When you look up at him, you can’t help but remember the way he used to look at you. He gazed at you with such warmth, like you were the sun and stars and everything in the universe –– a sentiment that you shared toward him.

Now, none of that remains. Yanjun looks at you, and there is… nothing there. Negativity, resentment, and bitterness, perhaps. Though you don’t want it to be so, there is no longer anything warm and loving when he beholds you. There is only dislike. He speaks deliberately, mouth forming his words with self-assurance. You can’t construe his tone as anything but loathing. “I couldn’t have known that.”

#lin yanjun #nine percent scenarios #idol producer scenarios #lin yanjun x reader #yanjun scenarios #after like ??? a moNTH??#IT'S HERE

65 notes · View notes

ragehappysecretsanta · 7 years ago

Text

Date Night Interrupted

Author: http://canadiantardis.tumblr.com/

Recipient: http://meganna2525.tumblr.com

Summary: Lindsay is taken on the worst day possible - date night with her partners - but she trusts them to know how to save her before anything bad happens.

Warnings: Teen rating, swearing, mild violence, polyamory (Mavinseg), pregnancy, FAHC AU

Word Count: 5568

Date Night Interrupted

Lindsay grunted at the right hook to her cheek, her head whipping to the side from the force, but still she couldn’t help but laugh, even as she felt the blood fill her mouth and drip from her lips from her teeth biting her tongue.

Some upstart crew thought they had the jump on the Fakes, thinking if they ‘took the weakest link’ of the wild bunch that was Lindsay and her partners, they’d be able to demand turf and dealers as method of payment for ransom. Yeah, sure, she had been easy to kidnap on her way home from the cat shelter she volunteered at every other day, and it stung her pride how they thought so lowly of her, but she knew something they would soon learn if they survived the lesson.

“Stupid bitch.” The punk who had punched her muttered angrily, turning away from the redhead in disgust.

Lindsay just laughed in response, baring her blood-stained teeth at his back as he walked out of the ‘torture’ room she was stuck in. Personally, she found it lackluster and had no flavour like Ryan had made his torture chambers to look. This room was bare except for the bolted chair, a couple lights imbedded into the ceiling that shown the dark gray walls easily, and a plain as hell metal door that was the only entrance or exit out of the room.

Now that she was alone for the first time since waking up with that god-awful headache from the struggle she had against the upstarts – which she remembered being from her head being smashed into the pavement until she had lost consciousness – she took stock over her new injuries. Cuts and scrapes along her arms and palms from the struggle – with a few exceptions as the cats had been extra playful during her volunteering time – the back of her head most likely split open as her hair felt like it was sticking to her, and her face felt like a giant bruise from the ridiculously unnecessary beatings they gave her to rough her up before they sent any evidence that they had taken her. Her chest and stomach weren’t badly beaten, which was lucky – or about as lucky as a kidnapped felon could get – for her and the three-and-a-half-month fetus inside her.

Lindsay also took the time to look over the state of her clothes, and was sad that her pretty fading-red dress and leggings were both torn, neck hole stretched, and the front edges were frayed to hell. She couldn’t blame the cats she had been taking care of for the multiple small holes and stretched fabric from this morning, they wouldn’t do this much damage at their worst.

She wasn’t sure where her purse was, which had her ASP pistol – which she has lovingly named Ruby after she got it painted a beautiful red – and phone, among other stuff. She guessed it was either with the punks or back on the street where she had been taken.

She realized a little late that the blood dripping from her lip was falling onto the dress and she groaned in annoyance. It was going to take forever to get the stain out, even longer if she wasn’t rescued within the hour.

“Come on. This was supposed to be Date Night.” She grumbled to herself quietly. Because of the damn upstarts, who knew when she and her lovers were going to have another one. “Son of a fucking bitch.”

** 4 Hours Later **

Lindsay was normally late to Date Nights when they happened on days she volunteered at the cat shelter on the outskirts of Los Santos named Kate Shelly. Because a member of the Fake AH Crew was a regular volunteer at the shelter, the place had become a safe haven for cats, the workers and other volunteers were granted complete protection/immunity, and the place never got heavily taxed or had to struggle to stay afloat.

Oftentimes – meaning every other month or so – Gavin would join Lindsay to visit the cute little fuzzballs, and he had today, but had to leave early at the request of the Lads needing his computer skills for something.

He had kissed Lindsay on the temple – her mouth and most of her face was covered by a long-haired calico she had been cooing into – and put a hand to her belly before leaving, promising to see her at their apartment this evening. She had given a muffled response, laughing at the kitten in her hands as it mewed in complaint.

Now, several hours later, Gavin and the other two lounged around their living area, Michael picking at his shirtsleeves idly, leaning against the other man comfortably.

“When did she say she finished?” Meg asked from her spot on the recliner, playing with her skirts in boredom.

Michael pulled out his phone before he answered. “‘I promise I’ll be done in an hour.’ Sent three fucking hours ago. She always does this, Jesus Christ!”

“But Micoo, the kitties!” Gavin protested in defense for his fellow cat lover in her absence. “She might have forgotten the time again because of ‘em. C’mon, we just need to call her and talk her ear off until she gets here.”

Michael huffed in mild annoyance, but not the anger he played up for the public, and tossed his phone at Meg. “You do it this time, Turney. I got kicked-puppy eyes for a month straight after the last time.”

“Fine, fine, I don’t need your phone to call her, Mikey.” She tossed the phone back to him before she grabbed her own phone and went about calling Lindsay’s number, flipping her hair away from her ear to hear properly.

There was a brief silence before they all heard the faint sound of the phone being answered before Meg laid it on thick. “Have you forgotten again, babe?” She stuck her bottom lip out like Lindsay would be able to physically see it. “You know we’ve been wanting to see this movie for weeks.”

Gavin and Michael just barely heard an incoherent reply but saw Meg stiffen, her back straightening and feet planting on the floor, her eyes bright and staring at nothing to listen intently. Michael almost asked what was going on but seemed to think better of it. Both men were attentive to their girlfriend’s reactions, aware something wasn’t right.

“Wow.” She barked a laugh, venom lacing her tone. “How fucking stupid are you? You know what’s going to happen to you because of your little gamble?” There was an answer but Meg cut it off. “I’ll cut off your balls and stuff them down your throats. Unless of course, you’ve realized the errors of your ways and let my beautiful girlfriend go on her way and maybe she’ll forget your ugly-ass mugs and we’ll let you live your pathetically short lives in peace.”

Meg’s face grew red with anger, her free hand digging nails into the armrest and her jaw clenched. Whatever she heard as an answer to her threat didn’t go the way she wanted, before she dropped her phone, the two men hearing the end call beep coming from her phone.

“Get Ryan or Geoff on the phone.” She commanded in a hard voice, making Michael and Gavin scramble for their respective phones and call their friends, looking to Meg for instructions. “Tell them a bunch of assholes took Lindsay for ransom. Gunna need a lot of manpower to find her before we go guns blazing.”

The young men nodded and took off to different parts of the apartment as the people they called answered in various states of curiosity and confusion, before they slowly took an angry tone as they listened to the two explain what they knew.

“Did they say their crew name?” Ryan asked Gavin in a growl.

“Hang on, I’ll ask.” He replied, pulling his phone away from his mouth to speak to Meg. “Did they mention a crew name or anything?”

“No, but the man who spoke to me had a nasally voice, like this.” She spoke as if she had a stuffed nose. “Must have been an upstart crew. Look around the path Lindsay normally takes home from the shelter for more, ‘cause I don’t know.”

Gavin nodded and repeated everything to the Vagabond over the line.

“Alright. Thanks. I’ll make sure to save some bloodshed for you three.” He promised.

“Thanks, Rye-bread. Hear back soon?”

“Yeah, course. Oh, hey, sorry Date Night’s cancelled again.” His tone had gotten softer just before hanging up.

Gavin sighed, nodding to air as he put down his phone.

“Geoff’s rallying the troops, and they’ll start searching in a couple minutes.” Michael said a minute later, striding back towards Meg and Gavin, looking down at his button-up and dark jeans and shrugged. “So much for Date Night.”

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

Although this wasn’t the first time Lindsay had been captured by a rival gang, this was the first time she was captured because of her relationship with Gavin, Meg, and Michael, and while she was pregnant.

The four were known by and large in the underworld as being the strongest team in the Fake AH Crew, what with Michael and Meg’s killer streaks and Gavin’s unbelievable technological abilities and smarts. But – and it was somewhat her own fault in this – Lindsay’s strength was never known to anyone outside the Crew.

She could tell this was why the upstarts thought they could cut down the strongest team by taking her.

As she waited in the barren, boring torture room, Lindsay thought it would be best if she tried to doze to pass the time, wondering how long it’ll be before her trio rescued her ass. She wondered if they’d be able to find her with or without help, before her eyes slipped shut and the next thing she knew her neck was leant to one side rather uncomfortably and the light had been turned off.

With a loud groan, she brought her head back up and tilted it to the other side, wincing in discomfort as she tried to fix the crick in her neck. She rotated her head as best she could, ignoring the discomfort, when she heard the distinctively loud footfalls coming towards her room, and she winced again when the lights turned back on, assaulting her eyes suddenly.

The same punk as before entered with a grin. Lindsay’s eyebrow rose.

“With a smile like that, you don’t look nearly as stupid as you really are.” She said, mocking cheer, hoping to push some of the man’s buttons.

The grin grew forced for a moment before it relaxed, much to Lindsay’s disappointment. “With a face like that, you don’t look nearly as much of a whore as you really are.” The punk replied with just as much false cheer in his voice as she had.

“What do you want.” Her face went flat as her tone got monotone.

“Nothing. Just wanted to let you know your lovers have been informed of your predicament. My men said that other slut was downright furious when we didn’t agree to her command to let you free.”

“Stupid decision, then.” Lindsay replied, her mind buzzing. If they knew she was taken, they could possibly be able to track the phone and find them in no time flat.

It seemed something in her expression changed to show her thoughts as the upstart chuckled lowly. Her eyes narrowed at him, demanding an answer to what he thought was so funny.

“If you thought we would keep anything of yours that could be traced back here, you really are stupid. We weren’t born yesterday, bitch.”

“No, if you were born yesterday, you’d already be smarter than you are.” Lindsay retorted, but she began to worry. She knew there were other ways of finding where she had been taken, but those ways took so much longer than Gavin hacking and tracing a source. She could only hope the upstart crew had contacted her lovers nearby so they could be in the ballpark of where she was.

“So, what now?” She asked, leaning her head back with a look of boredom on her face. “Do we play the waiting game until they come here?”

The punk’s grin grew. “We’re going to be playing a little game of cat and mouse with those three, until we get every little bit of information out of you, or until they agree to our terms. You see, our bases are connected to the railway, with the only ways in or out through the train tracks.”

“You really think you’ll be able to hide from the Fakes?” Lindsay let out of a bark of laughter, feeling dried blood crack and flake on her chin. “They’ll find me and you’ll have a few hundred bullets in the head and I’ll only have been roughed up.”

“How much do you want to bet on that?” The punk leered.

“I’ll bet your pathetic life on it.”

“How about something on you, bitch. If they don’t come get you by midnight tonight, you answer one question a friend of mine will ask. If they do, as you said, I’ll be dead.” His grin was stereotypically villainous.

Lindsay bared her teeth again in answer, leaning her head back against the headrest.

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

They heard from Ryan first, just as the three entered the Fake Penthouse where they could hear orders being told by Geoff to someone on the phone. Only the Inner Circle and B-Team were allowed in the Penthouse that doubled as Geoff’s main home and the Fake’s more casual base of operations.

Gavin’s phone rang with the opening notes of Sleeping At Last’s ‘Saturn’ before he heard Ryan’s voice muffled by his mask.

“You at the penthouse yet? Need you in the sights right about now.” He grumbled, way too forward, much like how he got when the Vagabond was around.

Gavin nodded, slipping away from his loves to head to his ‘Room’ where his tech was. “Just got in. Computers’ll take a minute before I can get in, found anything yet, Vaga?”

“Yes.” He could hear the eye-roll through the mask and line at the nickname, which was the entire reason Gavin still calls him that. “Traces of blood that are long-dried on a sidewalk about a forth of the way away from the shelter. Quiet street, only a couple bugged places and barely any buildings this way.”

“Alright. Which street?” Gavin asked, his computers up and running and he was already looking through cameras to hopefully find the right one.

“Along the shoulder of the highway. Still considered the main street, but it’s mostly road.” Vagabond informed, rattling off coordinates until Gavin found him in the cameras.

“Ah, gotcha. Okay, checking through the stream. Anything else you got?” Gavin asked offhand as he traced back from the camera.

“Only the blood, I think it was either from a headwound or some area that bleeds a lot from a small wound. Also, a hairclip.”

“Her cat ear hairclip?” He questioned, slowing down his search as he saw Lindsay enter the camera’s view, several hours earlier. He frowned. Lindsay had texted saying she was still in the shelter an hour after this timestamp.

“Yeah, the little black and yellow ear things.” Ryan’s voice came through with a quiet chuckle. “Though I still say it’s a bowclip, not cat ears.”

“You know Lindsay. When she gets something in her head, she sticks with it.” Gavin said without really paying attention, watching the video a couple times before an angry bird trill escaped. “These mofos did something to the stream. They must’ve known about the bugged places and took them down for just long enough to take Linds.”

“Fuck. Okay.” Ryan’s voice slipped back into Vagabond’s. “What do you have?”

“Lindsay appears for a full three seconds before the stream cuts forward a full two minutes later, with only the clip and blood visible, but really small and grainy because of the shite quality. Guessing they did something to turn off the video feed or something.” He continued to mutter. “But it doesn’t make sense, the timestamp says 3:02, but she was still at the shelter at 4…”

“… Gavin, you hadn’t thought about the possibility the assholes were the ones texting you with her phone? It’s the only logical explanation.”

“Shit… She’s been missing longer than we thought. Shit, shit, shit. R-Vagabond, are there any tracks from the vehicle they used? Any sort of tracks? It rained just that morning over there. Streets should still have a bit of moisture to show tracks.”

“This is a busy street, Gavin.”

“Well, what the hell do you suggest, Vagabond?” Gavin snapped, worry pooling in his guts. They had been wrong by about four hours. Leads were already getting cold in his mind, irrational fear clouding his thoughts with the regret that he should have stayed with Lindsay.

“First off, calm the fuck down, Free. Hope isn’t lost. Check other cameras along this street. They can’t have been smart enough to cover their tracks completely. Check earlier in this feed for the car. No one ever thinks about these things, only the current, more important parts.”

Gavin nodded and followed the orders mechanically, distantly hearing his door opening and just knew it was Meg by the faint draft of her cheap perfume she decided to try for the date. She said nothing, but her presence washed over him like a physical aura, reminding him how to feel calm.

Her fingers brushed through his hair and he felt his mind clear enough to focus on the task at hand.

“Okay, yeah, you’re right. Hang on, I’ll dig what I can get.”

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

Lindsay was given a wall clock to watch tick away the time until the stupid bet was called off. She wouldn’t say it aloud, but she was glad to hear something other than her breath when the upstarts left her alone. At least it was a familiar noise that set her at ease, knowing the punks weren’t anywhere near her for the time being.

But, in the same vein, her worry grew with every minute that passed. She watched at it turned to 11pm, and there was still no sign of her rescue.

As it inched closer to midnight, the punk appeared again with a smug smile that Lindsay furiously wanted to deck. He didn’t even say a fucking thing while they waited and watched the time tick by.

“Would you look at that? They aren’t here.” The clock barely struck midnight when the upstart started talking, wheeling around to face her.

Lindsay simply glared at him, knowing he was going to try to get information out of her, but she wouldn’t even for a stupid bet like this. She may not have a lot of power in her situation, but she was going to keep the one thing they wanted close to her heart.

“I believe you lost a pointless bet.” He continued, moving to tower over her, a move she had seen countless punks do to look scarier than they were. If her legs hadn’t been tied to the chair legs, she would have busted his nuts. The only people allowed that close to her was her friends and lovers, not upstart punks who kidnap her.

“If it was pointless, then it should be void.” Lindsay replied, her glare hard.

“No, it was still a real bet, missy. So, how did that bet go? Your people don’t show up, you give us…?” He gave a smirk, dramatically thinking hard. “Oh, that’s right, you answer a question honestly that a friend of mine will ask.”

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

The upstart’s ‘friend’ gave off the same vibe Lindsay got when she first met the Vagabond. Cold, weird, impassive. But at the same time, he was nothing like the Vagabond, or Ryan even. He wore a pressed suit, and acted like he was professional assassin or something. This crew was pulling all the levers to look like a cliché gang.

Neither had spoken a single word since the ‘friend’ had entered the room. The upstart had left long ago. Lindsay had raised an eyebrow at the guy briefly, waiting for him to speak first, and now they were in a long silence that felt neither awkward nor comfortable.

Finally, after ten minutes of silence, Lindsay broke the silence with a witty remark. “So, you know that saying, a picture lasts longer? Yeah, might want to take a picture then.” She ends with a sarcastic smile, trying to egg the suited guy on.

But it didn’t seem to be her day. The man blinked a couple times but still wouldn’t respond. Lindsay was getting fed up with this treatment.

“Okay, what’s the question you want me to answer?” She demanded.

This got a reaction out of him. He straightened, and in a tone that was equally as cold, weird and impassive as his body language, he finally spoke. “What are the real names of Rimmy Tim and Vagabond?”

Lindsay had thought she was ready for any question they would try to get out of her, but this one surprised her. They weren’t looking for locations, but names… Oh.

“Why would you want to know?” She asked, playing dumb and hoping to stall for time to think. Like hell would she give their actual names, but she wasn’t sure if they knew Ryan and Jeremy’s names already and were just testing to see if she were telling the truth. After all, if they did some close digging – and had someone like Gavin on the team – they’d be able to figure out their names. “And what does that have to do with getting territory and dealers for your upstart crew?”

It was like the man went on mute again. Not a peep came from him. He was more robot than person, and the familiar vibe the Vagabond gave off ended. This guy was nothing like him.

“Sorry, buddy. I’m not telling you jack shit. You could search everything on me and still not find the Fakes real names.” And it was true, all the contacts were nicknames or codenames each member used the most, just in case she lost her phone or got caught, like now.

“I would rather not have to hurt you further.” The man said. “Unlike my coworkers, I do not have a death wish. But a job is a job.”

“Listen, buddy. Doesn’t matter what you do to me. Everyone in this base is still dead when the Fakes find out where I am. And that’ll include you.” Lindsay held no sympathy to the assassin man. If he didn’t want to hurt someone, he wouldn’t, job or no. “My crew don’t take too kindly to members being kidnapped for ransom.”

“Just tell me the names of Rimmy Tim and Vagabond, and you will not be hurt any more than you are, Miss Rose.” The man ordered, stepping forward and grabbing a large chunk of her hair, making her cry out as he pulled, causing the split skin on the back of her head to reopen.

“I’d never rat out my friends.” She replied with gritted teeth, her eyes narrowed into slits from pain and anger.

They stared at each other for a full minute in silence, a contest of wills, when they heard the distant sounds of gunfire. Immediately the man let go of Lindsay, real emotion showing on his face. He was scared.

Lindsay grinned, laughing loudly. She could practically hear her lovers coming for her. “I told you assholes. I fucking told you.” She bared her teeth again at the man. “Never mess with the Fakes.”

They heard running before the upstart punk burst through the door, his eyes wild. He went right up to Lindsay and punched her painfully hard across the cheek, making her bite her tongue again. “You fucking bitch! How did they find us?!”

She laughed in response, blood bubbling down her lips. “We’re the Fake AH Crew, bitch.”

The upstart growled, turning to the other man. “Untie her and follow me. We have to move her before they find us.”

The sounds of gunfire were getting steadily closer, and Lindsay couldn’t help but find the entire thing fucking hilarious. She laughed as the man untied her from the bolted chair, laughed as they took her out of the room and she saw the rest of the base, which was equally as drab and boring and clichédly villain’s lair as the torture chamber.

She continued to laugh until the upstart turned back and gut-punched her, and her entire being froze with sudden fear for the still-developing baby inside her.

“Shut the fuck up.” The upstart snapped, turning back to continue walking when he dropped with a spray of blood.

Standing at the entrance of a corridor stood wonderful, beautiful, gorgeous Meg, her face dark and thunderously pissed off. Lindsay began to think she saw the punch and had the same fear as she had. She pointed her rose gold gun at the other man with a sneer.

“Let her go and die, or die.” Her tone was laced with hate. “I’d rather not let my beautiful girlfriend get sprayed by filthy blood like yours.”

The man hesitated for a second before he stepped away from Lindsay, his gun dropping to the floor as his hands went up without complaint. He had a calm expression on his face, as if he accepted his fate.

Staying out of the line of sight, Lindsay found her legs shaking as she quickly crossed over, barely wincing at the sound of Meg’s gun shooting before she wrapped her arms tightly around her girlfriend, laughing a little more genuinely than before, and both pretended they couldn’t feel the damp cheeks on the other. Just because kidnappings weren’t a rare occurrence didn’t mean they no longer felt fear for/as the victim.

They stayed for a moment wrapped around each other before Meg let go first, tapping her ear to connect with the others. “I got her. Heading out now.” She looked to Lindsay briefly with a question on her face that she understood easily. Lindsay nodded and her girlfriend ordered no survivors.

No one angered the Fakes and lived long to tell the tale.

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

It had been exactly as the Vagabond had said, the idiots forgot to cover them arriving and taking down the cameras along the way to their hideout, though it took much longer than Gavin would have liked.

All the same, when he found where the van had stopped at, it was an easy thing to track through poorly defended camera streams. He told Geoff and Michael first, and then stayed behind to be their eagle eye.

He didn’t like staying behind when it was Lindsay they were getting back, and he was a good shot – better when he was pissed off for some reason – but he understood the others would need help finding their way around the base.

Gavin watched as the Fakes burst into the base, keeping an eye out for any idiot who had the bright idea to flank his friends and lovers, and while he wasn’t there, he felt a surge of glee at each asshole the others shot down.

He was the first to hear Meg after she got to Lindsay, and then seconds later saw the footage of the two walking close together – whether Lindsay was hurt badly or just needed help walking, Gavin couldn’t tell – towards the nearest exit he told Meg to go to. He saw Michael roar and launch himself at the enemies. No survivors. Michael and the Vagabond were going to fulfill that order with glee, Gavin could easily see that.

Gavin wanted to head off and wait for Meg and Lindsay to return to the penthouse, knowing Michael was going to take a while, but had to keep an eye on the other Fakes so none were overwhelmed. Just in case. He told them where the enemies hid, or where they were trying to flee. If he had a more normal conscience, the sight of his friends murdering fleeing gang members would have sat uncomfortably with him, but he relished in it. They hurt Lindsay. They were not going to be given mercy. The Fakes weren’t the top dogs in Los Santos for being nice ormerciful all the time.

The entire massacre took about half an hour in total, and by that time, Meg and Lindsay had returned, with Caleb looking over her injuries. Gavin was just ending the communications and heading out of his ‘Room’ towards the infirmary when he heard Lindsay ask about the likelihood of punch to the stomach killing a baby.

“It would vary on the assault, and if it was a recurring assault. You’ll have to see another doctor and see if they can check on the baby’s health to make sure it’s going to be okay.” Caleb replied. “But if that baby gets anything from you, it’ll be your luck.”

Gavin entered the infirmary soon after Caleb spoke, causing the three to look at him. The girls relaxed instantly and Meg went to kiss him on the cheek.

“What’s this about baby killing?” Gavin asked.

“The upstarts tried to rough me up a bit, including punching me in the stomach.” Lindsay’s hand rubbed her stomach slowly. “I wanna make sure it’s going to be okay.”

“Shit… It’ll be fine. Like Caleb said, you’ve got the strangest luck in the world, and that baby is going to get it too. I’m sure of it, love.” He assured, heading over to her, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her softly.

The three stayed in Caleb’s infirmary until the rest arrived, splashed in dried blood and small bits of other stuff. Ryan looked like he was just in a Viking attack with how red his mask looked, but other than various superficial wounds, no one had been badly hurt. Michael went straight to Lindsay and kissed her deeply, and Gavin could tell their girls were happy to see him again.

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

As with any rescue mission, there was a long recovering period the victim and the closer loved ones went through before getting back to normal. This time was a little more stressful because of the fetus’s life was at stake for a good week before it was confirmed nothing was wrong, and the baby was still on track to be a healthy pregnancy.

After that scare was over, recovering from the kidnapping was spent with her partners near constantly. Gavin stayed with her when they went to the shelter, with even Meg accompanying them at times to see the two entertain the cats or help around the front desk.

At home, the other three were almost choking Lindsay with affection, but it was nice. There were more soft kisses, more laying across her lap like a pillow, more playing with her hair. They had to be careful with her hair though, because of the stitches from the split skin at the back of her head. It would take another few weeks before the scarring would be the only reminder of this particular kidnapping.

About a month and a half after the kidnapping and rescue, the four were getting ready for Date Night again. Lindsay chose the day so she wouldn’t be busy with kitties, and the others planned around the day. The guys wore button down shirts, and Meg wore jeans and a deep V-neck blouse. Lindsay herself wore a dress and leggings again, as jeans wouldn’t be comfortable while pregnant.

“Oh, you look lovely, babe.” Meg said when Lindsay got out of the bathroom in her dress, twirling her finger to ask her to spin the dress, kissing her sweetly on the lips. “You ready?”

“Yeah, are the guys ready?”

“We’ve been ready for a fucking hour!” They heard Michael shout from the entryway with staged anger. “Hurry up before we leave your slow asses behind and go dancing by ourselves.”

“We’re coming, we’re coming. Jeez, assholes.” Lindsay shouted back with a smile, laughing when Meg quietly made a ‘that’s what she said’ joke as they headed towards the boys.

Each of the four had a certain quality about them that made them dangerous to enemies. Michael and Meg were killers, deadly shots and explosions were they’re favourite methods. Gavin was incredibly smart and the best hacker in Los Santos. But Lindsay’s strength was different.

Lindsay was the luckiest person in the weirdest way possible. She could be shooting at an angle and hit a target dead centre by accident, and then trip over her own feet the next second. She was lucky enough to not be with one person, but three of the most ruthless and beautiful people she ever had the pleasure of knowing, and in only three months, they were all going to be raising the luckiest child in the world.

As they headed out of their apartment, Lindsay wrapped her arms around Gavin and Michael’s waists and held them close to her, Meg walking ahead of them with the gentle evening breeze blowing her hair behind her as she moved.

It was nice, returning to normalcy and having Date Nights again, and Lindsay could never regret how her life got to this very moment in time.

#Ragehappy #Mavinseg #canadiantardis #meganna2525 #rhss17

15 notes · View notes

karalovesallthegirls · 8 years ago

Text

Supergirl AU

Cat Grant knows her assistants are cheating, she just doesn’t know how yet.

She even knows the exact date it started almost two years ago, when suddenly her constant stream of incompetent aides began to improve, to last longer. All her life her assistants have been barely adequate, but for some reason the last handful have gotten sharper and sharper.

It’s been three weeks with this new one and, while his performance within CatCo is lackluster at best, he has yet to make a single mistake with her coffee or food orders. And if there is one thing Cat values more than all else its what she consumes; she spends all day creating media for the consumption of millions so what she herself takes in is of the highest priority.

This week she had a stress headache and she sent him off with a screech to get her some sustenance. Now she had very low expectations for this, so imagine her surprise when he comes back with a perfectly made bacon wrapped hamburger (her headache guilty pleasure) and a medium latte with just a dash of cinnamon. There is no way on Earth that this Witt fellow should know about that. Her guilty pleasures are closely guarded secrets, and Cat Grant has never explicitly told anyone about her infatuation with bacon and cinnamon (both separate and together). And yet when she needed it the most, he just happens to get it exactly right. This assistant hasn’t even made it a month yet; there’s no way he knows this is a weakness of hers.

Which means there’s a snitch somewhere feeding answers to her assistants.

So Cat does the only sane and rational thing a person could do in a situation such as this - she begins to shadow her assistant everywhere he goes. Dramatic? Perhaps, but sometimes theatrics are the only way to truly get results. So she tells her little hobbit of an assistant that she’s furious and needs an iced coffee drink to calm herself down. Its a bit of a test, really. A coffee would be fine, but if she’s angry caffeine is probably not the best choice. Perhaps he’ll go with the given answer and all of Cat’s suspicions are for nothing. Regardless, she still waits exactly two minutes and thirty five seconds, throws on a hat and a pair of sunglasses, and follows after him.

As expected he goes straight to Noonan’s and she loiters a bit near the front of the restaurant to observe. Instead of going to the cashier to order, however, he veers over towards the seating area and frantically whispers at some waitress. Interesting, Cat thinks. She’s never seen this waitress before and yet Witt seeks her for advice.

Cat moves a bit closer, close enough that she can hear. “- and she’s being really weird, Kara, like weirder than she’s ever been! She said to get her an iced coffee drink to help cool her fury.” This waitress, Kiera or something, nods like this is a normal thing to be told. “Usually when Miss Grant gets angry you’re not gonna want to give her caffeine. That’ll just drive her even more. I would get her an iced tea, probably something with honey in it. She also loves cinnamon so maybe one of our seasonal teas?”

Cat is frozen, staring open-mouthed at this young woman she’s never seen before in her life spouting such detailed and accurate advice. That is the perfect drink for her in a situation like this. Who the hell is she?

Cat waits until Witt thanks her profusely and runs off to order before launching her attack. “You know, most of my stalkers are balding middle aged men,” she says, “having one like you is honestly kind of refreshing.” This Kiera woman just gives her a surprised smile. “Hello, Miss Grant! It’s nice to finally meet you.” And then she just turns and starts cleaning a table. Like Cat isn’t standing right there, making a dramatic entrance. That’s it? That’s all she gets? Unbelievable; Cat hates this Kiera already. “Alright honestly. Who the hell are you and how do you know my orders so thoroughly?” Kiera just laughs as she gathers the plates and begins wiping down the table. “I have worked here for three years, Miss Grant. I’ve seen a few dozen assistants of yours come in and try to get your orders right. Eventually, I figured you out.” Cat scoffs. “Don’t flatter yourself, Kiera. I am an enigma beyond anything in this world, not something that can be ‘figured out’, as you so delicately put it.” Kiera just smiles and shrugs, still cleaning. “You eat your feelings a lot, Miss Grant. When you’re frustrated or overworked you get light foods, probably because your anxiety stops you from eating anything heavier than a salad.” She picks up the plates and moves to the next table to bus it as well, Cat trailing behind her. “You order things you might consider a luxury when things go well, like when that merger you headed succeeded a year ago. You ordered steaks almost daily.” Cat just stands there in a stunned silence while Kiera continues to clean and read her entire life like she isn’t a complete and total stranger. “When you’re sad, you choose hot comfort foods.” “Alright, all you’ve done so far is prove to me you are in fact a stalker. Do I need to file a restraining order, Kiera?” The girl has the audacity to laugh at that, saying, “You can get one if you like, I suppose, but then all of your assistants will probably start sucking again.”

And she’s so cheeky about it that Cat isn’t sure if she wants to strangle the other woman or offer her a job on the spot. She ends up going with the latter option. “Do you want a job, Kiera?” “I already have a job,” Kiera responds, unfazed by the magnitude of Cat Grant herself offering some lowly peon a job personally. “Three, actually.” “You have three jobs?” Even workaholic Cat is somewhat surprised to hear that. Kiera nods. “I work here on weekdays, and I’ve got this construction gig I do every other weekend. I also bartend most nights if I can.” “Is this all to finance school?” she asks, reeling at the hours this girl must put in. She can’t be a day over twenty one, and even that may be a generous estimate on Cat’s part. Kiera shakes her head, a sad sort of smile on her face. “Oh no, I never finished school. But my kid goes to the private academy on 8th street and lord knows its expensive.” Cat nods; she sent Carter there when he was a young boy and even for her it was a steep price for a primary school. “How old’s your son?” Kiera smiles, bright and full of pride. “He turns nine in February.” Cat works very, very hard to keep her face completely neutral at that. There is no way Kiera is older than at most twenty two, and she has a nine year old son. She had to have been, what? Twelve, thirteen when she had him? Knowing this, looking at her now, its suddenly apparent how much more there is than meets the eye. There’s a story behind the cautious hardness of her eyes. The defiant gait with which she carries herself, the way even her brightest smiles seem dimmed with some deeper sorrow. There is much more to this Kiera than meets the eye. This woman - barely a woman, even - works all hours of the day and night to provide one of the best educations available in the city to her son, a son she had to have had at such an early age it could only be through terrible origins. And somehow through sheer secondhand observation, she’s managed to decipher exactly what Cat wants for every possible scenario.

There is no way Cat is walking out of here without this girl in her employ. “What if I offered you double whatever you’re making here, plus a starting bonus that could cover the next year of tuition?” Kiera just stares at her like she’s looking for the lie, but Cat returns her stare with confidence. Why cycle through assistants when she could have the real deal? “Can I get that in writing?” Kiera says slowly, cautiously. Cat smirks. “Of course. I don’t make offers I don’t intend to keep, Kiera.” Kiera nods slowly before giving her a cautious smile. “My name is Kara, by the way,” she says. Cat waves it off. Like that matters. Still, her mind is on that son who is just a few years younger than her own. “What’s your son’s name?” she asks. “Kal,” she says, “Kal L. Moore.” “Well, you can let Kal L know that his next semester at the academy is taken care of.” And even if she weren’t gaining what may be the most fascinating employee she’s ever encountered, just seeing the way her face lights up with relief and joy is enough to know this is the right decision. Cat can’t wait to see what happens next.

#I may post this on ao3 it seems long enough #this alternate universe has been kicking me in the head for months demanding I writeit #supergirl #mine #single mom kara au

620 notes · View notes