#though my main did start with light fingers!!! and then uh. bailed

[curiouscalembour]

you know. considering the Mr Hearts/Apples and Mr Wines, the two singularly most human friendly masters are started to be an ally, and a former friend of Veils, that makes me very curious about how veils used to be around humans (especially pre-second city), and how it currently is when not trying to kill humans. Considering also how vast of a network it has, and how important fashion is in high society, i would imagine it has to have at least some social pleasantry skills, or at least it did

[bestiesenpai]

firsts with Choso

Imma do this as a non-curse au and also force everyone to see my vision of Instagram star Choso lol, gender neutral lads~

Content warning: there is drinking

First meeting

Choso was a celebrity. Did he ever call himself one? No. But in the eyes of the internet, he was properly famous, amassing an easy two million followers and counting through his short time on Instagram

Posting mainly fashion content, it was no surprise that he had hundreds upon hundreds of photographers asking him to model for them and brands begging to collaborate

His manager took care of most of those things, fielding the serious requests with the not so serious

Which is how he found himself shooting for a pretty well known magazine

There were people shouting and running around even though it was barely pushing six am. Choso hadn’t slept the whole night, his insomnia keeping him awake until the photoshoot. Downing a piping hot black coffee first thing in the morning, when he arrived at the shoot there were already assistants pouring him more cups.

“Choso, hair and makeup is ready for you.” His manager said, putting a hand on his shoulder and guiding him silently to the room. The lights were way too bright here, stinging Choso’s eyes and almost giving him a headache.

Sitting down in the makeup chair with his eyes closed, Choso heaved a heavy sigh as he got comfortable.

“Uhm, excuse me?” A timid voice sounded behind him, from the previously closed door to the room.

“Hm?” Cracking open an eye, Choso looked in the mirror in front of him to see who was speaking. A makeup assistant, wringing their hands together nervously and not meeting his bloodshot eyes.

“I’m uh- I’m here to start your makeup.” Your voice was so cute when addressing him, a little higher pitched than what he assumed was normal. Biting your lip, you slid into the room slowly, standing a good distance behind his chair and looking at him through the mirror.

“Okay, I’ll sit up.” Gulping the rest of his coffee down, Choso sat up pin straight in the makeup chair. Even if he fell asleep in the chair he trained himself well enough to not slouch over once he was in this position.

You began to work silently, pulling out products and laying them down with trembling hands. Your nervousness was cute, endearing almost to Choso. He knew he could look rather intimidating, that’s partly why he had so many followers, and to see you so scared in front of him made a lazy smirk grace his face.

“I’ll be putting your base on now?” Even though you tried to sound stern your sentence came out as a question and Choso blew air sharply through his nose, fighting the uptick of his lips as you fiddled with products.

Choso sat perfectly still while you began to touch his face. With half lidded eyes he could see your name badge swinging from the lanyard around your neck. (Y/N) was printed in large letters, impossible to miss.

A few minutes passed in pure silence between you and Choso could feel your hands shake when you cupped his cheek to apply foundation and patting powder across his face. The door swung open just as you went to swap a few products around, someone had come to take you away for a few minutes.

“Oh, I’ll only be gone a little bit, but the main makeup artist should be here before I return.” You spewed out, dropping the things in your hands against the counter. Forcing a polite smile at Choso, your feet shuffled awkwardly as you flip-flopped between saying something more, waiting for his reply or just leaving in entirely.

“Thank you (Y/N), you did a great job.” Choso said calmly, smiling back at you and taking a sip of his now lukewarm coffee. Your mouth dropped briefly in surprise and your brows rose up, your whole face opened up in sweet surprise. Biting your lip and rocking on your heels, a shy giggle left your chest.

“Bye Choso.” Giggling again as you said his name, you scurried from the room like an embarrassed school girl, gushing about Choso to the person waiting for you as you left the room.

First hangout

The next time Choso saw you, it was to fix his lip makeup between pictures, and your hands shook then too

As the day wore on, Choso found himself completely smitten with how helpless you were in front of him, how scared and nervous you were. He felt the ever growing urge to protect you, even if it was from himself

He’s elated when the team proposes going out to dinner together, both as a way to refuel and get to know each other better since this photoshoot will be a few days long

Heading out into the darkening world outside the studio, Choso makes sure to stick close by you

He’s not standing directly near you, but Choso makes sure to stay behind you as the group walks. He’s watching you talk animatedly with your friends, no doubt other small time assistants just eager to get started in the industry. Your smile warms his heart and when you laugh loudly at a crosswalk Choso chuckles as well.

Once at the restaurant, he cunningly makes sure he’s seated next to you. He doesn’t say anything, but he can tell your demeanor has shifted because you get just a little bit quieter, that nervous energy comes back a little.

“(Y/N), what’re you thinking of getting?” Choso asks you as he looks over the menu. He can hear your breath hitch, obviously surprised he even addressed you.

“Uhm, I’m not sure, I’ve never been here before.” Shrugging your shoulder, you quickly skim the menu. “Is there anything you’re thinking of getting?”

“Hmmm…” Drumming his fingers on the table, Choso shrugs as well. “Whatever you get, I’ll get too.”

“That’s a lot of pressure.” Laughing nervously, you flip through the menu. “I don’t even know what you like.”

“I’ll like whatever you like.” Choso wouldn’t necessarily call this flirting, he didn’t consider himself particularly suave or charming, but from the way you stammered and hid your face with the menu, clearly flustered, told him that most people would consider what he was doing flirting. Especially you.

“Okay but don’t blame me if you don’t like it.” Came your whispered reply from behind the menu, and Choso just knew your cheeks and ears were on fire.

“As long as you pick it out, I won’t have a single complaint.”

First kiss

From that moment on, Choso knew he liked you. It wasn’t hard to get you to come out of your shell and talk more casually with him, afterall he was the oldest of a lot of brothers

Talking with you all throughout dinner, Choso was a little more excited to go to work. Even if you didn’t end up liking him the same way, you could still be friends - something that Choso was kind of lacking

As the days of the photoshoot wore on and you got closer with each other, Choso found himself yearning to ask you to hang out outside of all of this, when it all ends and you don’t have to be professional with him

He knows he only has one chance left at the very last team dinner, a celebratory occasion that is sure to go out with a bang

“Let’s drink to all the hard work we put in these last few days!” The photographer cheered, already drunk and swaying in his chair. No one cared though, everyone was already a little drunk. Choso had a few beers himself and was feeling the beginnings of a pleasant buzz, and it seemed so were you. With a dopey smile on your face and slightly glassy eyes, you laughed a little too hard at a joke across the table with a fruity drink in your hand.

“(Y/N) don’t drink too much, you’re a terrible lightweight!” Someone teased a few seats down and a couple people chuckled in agreement.

“W-whatever!” Sticking your tongue out, you downed the rest of your drink and quickly ordered another. “I deserve to have fun, that photoshoot was stressful!”

It was indeed. Between actually taking the pictures, going to the different locations, waking up early and creating promo content for his Instagram, Choso was swamped. The only highlights of his day would be when you would come to do his makeup or fix it, or these times when you’d sit together during dinner.

“Yeah you do.” Putting a hand on your shoulder, Choso pat it a few times and you easily swayed with the motions. This wasn’t the first time he was touching you, he’d pat you on the back a few other times, but seeing you bend so easily made him laugh.

Choso kept a keen eye on you for the entirety of dinner, watching you down drink after drink and forcing you to drink water in between some of them. It was fun to see you let go like this, he never thought he’d get the chance, and the desire to protect you was coming up again.

When the group decided to go to karaoke after dinner, Choso kept an arm around your shoulder as you all walked to the next location. He kept you from falling and bumping into things and being kidnapped by random strangers you wanted to talk to as you walked by. Getting to the room in one piece, you all crowd in and the party continues.

Choso can barely make heads or tails of what’s going on, there’s people taking pictures and videos of everything, his manager is drunkenly securing another deal for him over the phone, and there’s loud and offkey singing blaring through the speakers. He almost thinks about bailing, but seeing you so amped up and singing along as well has him staying.

“Choso, what’d you think?” You shout over the music ten minutes later. You’re breathless from doing a song and collapse into the open seat next to him.

“You did great.” Choso grins. He can see the sweat on your hairline and he had definitely taken pictures of you singing to look at later. You beam at him, obviously happy to get his approval, and bounce up and down in your seat.

“I have to go pee, do you know where the bathroom is?” Your tiny drunk bladder would truly be the death of you. Helping you up, Choso exits the karaoke room and guides you down the hall to the bathrooms, far away from the noise filled rooms. Waiting for you to come out, Choso can tell you’re properly drunk.

“You good?” Quirking his head to the side, Choso grabs your upper arm as you stumble towards him.

“Choso! I gotta- gotta do something!” Hiccuping through your words, you have the front of his shirt in a vice grip as you square your shoulders in front of him. With a fiery determined look in your eyes, you push forward.

At first, you bump your noses painfully together and a quiet curse slips under your breath. But then you try again and your lips actually make contact with Choso’s. The kiss is sloppy, messy - it’s as drunk as you are. He can taste the liquor on your lips, creating a smooth glide along the surface that makes it easier to slide against him.

Just as Choso is getting into it, his hands coming to grip your waist instead of your arms, you let go. Push him away hard and stumble back at the same time. There’s tears in your eyes, lower lip quivering pathetically.

“(Y/N)-”

“I-I should go.”

“(Y/N) wait-” You run away before he can say anything, before Choso has a chance to grab your hand and pull you back to him and tell you that he’s wanted to kiss you for a while now. Standing dumbly in the hallway alone, he hears the slam of a karaoke room door, no doubt from you.

Slinking back into the room, Choso can see that you’ve decided to sandwich yourself between two other people and avoid his burning eye contact for the rest of the night. You don’t even properly say goodbye to him when it’s time to part, just slip away into the Uber your friends called.

First confession

Even though you managed to give him the slip, Choso still got your phone number from someone before the party completely dispersed

The kiss stayed on his mind for the rest of the night, keeping him up as he played the moment over and over again in his head

By the time morning came, Choso was itching to message you

He had to know why you kissed him, and if you’d let him kiss you again

(Choso): hey this is Choso I got your number from one of the others

(Choso): we have something to talk about

He waited a good couple hours for you to text back. The longer time went on, the longer Choso just wanted to call you and be done with waiting in limbo.

(Y/N): sorry about last night

That was all you had to say and Choso just knew you were kicking yourself over it.

(Choso): don’t be sorry, I liked it

(Y/N): you don’t have to lie to try and make me feel better

(Y/N): it was a drunk mistake and it won’t happen again

(Choso): what if I want it to happen again?

He could see the little typing bubbles disappear and reappear with a fervor. Your mind must be racing as much as his was.

(Y/N): I’m not interested in being a fling

(Choso): good thing I don’t want you as just a fling

There was a nervous sort of adrenaline building up in Choso’s body, making his cheeks flush and fingers tremble, but emboldening him as well to keep going.

(Choso): Let me take you out on a date, I wanna see you at least one more time

(Choso): then you can decide if it really won’t ever happen again

(Choso): deal?

You were silent on the other end reading his messages. There were no typing bubbles to give away your position. Choso was stuck in limbo.

(Y/N): alright, deal

First date

Choso quickly set up a date at a trendy cafe he frequented, one that he took plenty of Instagram pictures at

He could sense your hesitation to go out with him over the phone and he was quick to dash away any second thoughts you had about dating someone that was internet famous

Choso liked you for you, not for what you could potentially bring to him in terms of content

He waited nervously outside the train station for you, wearing an outfit he’d painstakingly reworked a hundred times before deciding on something

“Choso!” You called out to him, rushing towards his figure waiting against a brick wall.

“Hey.” Smiling softly, Choso’s fingers twitched with the urge to hug you, but he held it off. He didn’t want to overwhelm you, possibly scare you off by being too forward.

“You’re here early.” Your eyes quickly danced over the clothes he chose and you let out a hum. “I feel self conscious now, you dressed so nicely for this!”

“You think?” He chuckled, tugging on the edge of the designer hoodie he’d thrown on.

“Yeah, but that’s to be expected of an Instagram star!” Shrugging your shoulders overdramatically, you gestured behind you to the bustling sidewalk full of people. “Should we get going? I’ve never been to the place you suggested.”

“Yeah, lets go.” Choso’s hand hovered over your lower back, guiding you through the people and onto the sidewalk. All it took was seeing you jostled around by a few people walking by for Choso to get fed up and grasp your hand firmly in his, weaving his fingers through yours.

“Stick close to me, it’s pretty crowded today.” He whispered in your ear, pulling you halfway behind him and grabbing your other hand as well and guiding it to hold onto the back of his hoodie. With his imposing nature and intimidating stature, Choso effortlessly pushed through the throngs of people and you quickly found yourself at the cafe in question.

“Let’s go in.” Turning around to face you, he’s stunned when you leap up and peck his cheek.

“Thanks Choso.” Giggling, you sidestep him and go to open the door of the cafe, but you’re stopped by Choso’s unmoving body. “What’s up Choso?”

“(Y/N).” He’s looking at you with scarily wide eyes and his tone is deathly serious. “Will you kiss me again if I buy you a drink?”

“Huh? Yeah of course, but-” You’re cut off from telling him that you’d kiss him without the drink by Choso bolting forward into the cafe.

“I’ll buy you all the drinks you could ever want then. And a slice of cake too.”

[sanktnikolais]

A Little Wicked

A/N: so here is your resident zoyalai writer again with another zoyalai fic (bc what’s new) for the @grishaversebigbang​ mini bang!!!! This had been a fun mini event before the actual big one, and I had the absolute honor to work with two very awesome and great artists @generalstarkov and @jjelliacee!!! I love these two sm they have awesome creations pls give them a follow and no i don’t take no for an answer HAHAHA

Check out their awesome creations in companion with this fic! 

@generalstarkov [x]

@jjelliacee [x]

Word count: 2320

Summary: A commotion at one of the Lantsov’s businesses in Kribirsk happens, and it is going to be a lot of paperwork and stress for the Consigliere to work on again. But when he gets there, he doesn’t expect who the main reason of his suffering is. 

To say that Zoya was utterly pissed off was an understatement. There was something about seeing the gray shade of the Brum associates's coats that ticked at her patience. 

          Their color looks dead, Nikolai’s unwanted and yet familiar voice echoed in her head. She wanted to strangle him even when he was not physically there. As if the Lantsov green was any better than gray. But she figured that maybe it was a bit better than the dull shade she was now seeing in front of her. 

          She had come—escaped—to the small pub downtown in Kribirsk to have some breather away from the fiasco that happened in Os Kervo. She’d already had enough shit from the Brums intercepting the Lantsovs’ arms shipments, and she had held back from going completely undiplomatic on them.

          But now, if the Brum lackeys continued their uncivilized talks with her, perhaps she wouldn’t hold back.

          “Are you sure you don’t want some company?” he asked for the third time, and the two other men with him laughed.

          Zoya suppressed an exasperated sigh as she raised the glass to her lips. She eyed the young man with a narrowed glance, then turned her attention to his cuffs. The embroidery around it looked new, a double black stripes of a newly promoted Soldier from an Associate. His companions had the same rank. So that explained the unawareness of who she really was, and the common principle between the families.

          They didn’t have an explicit rule that members of a Family weren’t allowed in another’s business, but all seemed to have an unspoken agreement to stay away from a rival territory unless invited. Out of respect, she figured, and they did maintain it most of the time. Maybe these morons hadn’t been briefed about it yet. 

          An idea suddenly came to her mind. A mad, trouble-worthy idea that she was sure Nikolai would have enabled if it wasn’t about to give him a headache later. He was her literal headache anyway, so it was only fair if she paid back in kindness. Besides, she could use a bit of stretching today. 

          Zoya smiled menacingly. “Come closer, and I’ll tell you,” she said in a rather sensual tone, and it earned a grin from the man in the middle. He did as he was told, leaning forward on the table and inching closer to her face. When he was finally near enough, she let out a light chuckle. 

          Then she swiped the bottle of whiskey from the table and struck it to the man’s head.

          He recoiled with a scream of pain, and she didn’t give time for his companions to react and kicked the table to them, causing it to flip over and hit them on their faces. They toppled on the floor in a heap.

          “Saints,” Zoya sighed as she stood and opened the top two buttons of her top. She was mad and exhausted and drunk. She needed a breather. 

          The man who had annoyed her since earlier tried to stand up, but she put her heel to his face and kept him on the floor. His two other companions looked up at her, bewildered. She gave them a pointed glance that had them frozen in their places.

          “Who do you think you are, woman?” the man underneath her heel shouted. He tried to twist off from her foot, but she drove her toe further down to his cheek. Another pained groan came from him.

          Zoya slowly rolled up the sleeve, showing the dragon tattoo that twisted around the expanse of her forearm. 

          “Oh, shit,” one of the men said. “It’s the Lantsovs.” 

          She smirked in return and braced an elbow to her knee, leaning closer to the man. “Allow me to introduce myself, then.”

***

          The first thing Nikolai thought of when he saw the state of the building were the paperworks, and it only became worse when he finally got inside and saw more of the mess. When he received a call regarding some ruckus in one of their businesses, he thought it was a prank. Even businesses as small as this still had a lot of records that needed to be taken care of, and it was his job to handle those paperworks. He almost wanted to cry. Couldn’t the people choose any other location than this?

          “Nikolai.”

          He was startled out of his lamenting when he heard his name called, and he turned to see Tamar with a pitiful expression. “I know, I know,” he said, looking back at the sight in front of him.

          Toppled tables and chairs along with broken bottles of expensive drinks littered the floor, and the smell of alcohol filled the pub with a bracing odor. Nikolai looked down to his feet, seeing what he could tell was what was left of a Hennessy bottle lying on the floor. There was a slight twinge in his chest. Such a sad, sad waste.

          “I’ve talked to some of the witnesses,” said Tamar after a moment, her voice thoughtful. "I think it was the Brums." 

          "Dearest saints in the heavens, give me more patience," muttered Nikolai with a wince. Today's news about their shipment getting intercepted had been bad enough. Driving almost two hours to this saintsforsaken town just to know that the same family had caused them another trouble? Atrocious. He could already feel a headache coming at him. "Were the police involved?"

          "Yeah, they've arrested four people. Three men, and apparently one woman." 

          Nikolai put a hand to his forehead, rubbing it gently as if doing so would keep the headache from coming. But when his temple started to pound, he figured the attempt was futile. 

          Then a thought struck him, and he turned to the Lantsov caporegime with a frown. "There's a woman?" He didn’t know why, but there was an uneasy feeling in his gut. "Arrested?" 

          "Apparently, yes. It's quite a surprise too."

          "Oh, dear me." 

          The headache finally came to hit him full force, and Nikolai had to wince. His migraine was nasty, but he knew Zoya's anger was nastier if she knew about this ruckus later. 

          But speaking of that woman…. 

          "Wait, where is Zoya again?" he asked Tamar in genuine wonder. He hadn't heard from her since she reported about the shipments this morning. "And Tolya? Why wasn't she alerted first about this mess?" 

          The Lantsov caporegime visibly paled, and dread washed over Nikolai. His mind started to come up with the worst scenarios, making the pounding on his temple worse than it already was. 

          "About that…."

          "Tamar," he said, voice hard. Something was definitely not right, and Nikolai narrowed his eyes. Zoya was supposed to be the one handling this matter. Where was she when she was needed? "What is it?" 

          Tamar sighed, and with a quiet voice, she said, “Tolya is trying to find Zoya.”

          “He’s doing what now?”

          “He said that Zoya just suddenly got up and drove off after the mess in Os Kervo. He hadn’t seen her since.”

          “Where is she? Had he found her?”

          As if on cue, a ring tone blared, making the both of them jump. They both scramble for their own phones. It wasn't his phone, so it only meant it was Tamar's. 

          Tamar winced when she stared at the phone screen. "It's Tolya." 

          Nikolai snatched the phone from the woman's hands and answered it. "Tolya," he said. 

          The other line was silent for a moment, and then a slightly panicked, "I can explain." 

          "Don't mind that. Where is she?" 

          There was a short pause before the line disconnected. Nikolai frowned. 

          "What—" 

          A sharp ting sounded, signaling that a text message had just arrived. He narrowed his eyes at it. 

          It was an address, and it looked familiar. 

-

          Nikolai waited at the front desk of the precinct, with his fingers massaging at his temple to soothe the throbbing away. So this was why he felt a strange dread in his stomach when Tamar mentioned about a woman who got arrested. 

          Because it was Zoya all along. 

          The woman on the deks finally returned, and she turned her attention to Nikolai. "Yes?" 

          He straightened up and fixed his tie. "I'm here for Zoya Nazyalensky," he said, a little unsure if he was speaking coherently. "Attorney Nikolai Lan—"

          "Oh, are you her lawyer and husband?" 

          "Yes, I—" Nikolai blinked. It took a minute for the words to sink in. What? "I'm sorry, can you repeat that?" 

          "Her lawyer husband, or who she says is the one to get her out," the woman said. A shadow of fear flashed across her face. "She and those three other guys caused quite a damage in a bar though." 

          He raised an eyebrow and turned to the direction where the woman was pointing. There were three men sitting by the bench on the side, huddled up so closely they looked like they were practically glued to each other. The bruises on their faces only proved that they were involved with the mess in the bar. Caused by Zoya. Nikolai narrowed his eyes, noticing the shade of their coats to be ash gray. He scoffed. Brums, indeed. Now he quite understood the anger his boss had.

          They finally noticed Nikolai, and, if it was still possible, became paler than they already were. The three of them shrunk back further into their seats.

          “They were too afraid to be in the same cell with the woman that got arrested with them and they preferred to stay here in the waiting lounge," the woman said grimly, making him turn back to her. "Scary looking woman, your wife is. Are you here to get her out on bail?"

          That is a good question, Nikolai thought. Should he get her out right away? Or let her stay for a few more hours so she could reflect on her mistakes? But knowing Zoya, it's the mistakes that would need to reflect on themselves. "Yes, but can I see my, uh, " he said, "my wife first?"

          “Of course. Give me a moment, sir.”

          She disappeared from the desk again and made her way to the maze of desks behind her. A few minutes later, she reappeared, but with Zoya Nazyalensky trailing behind her this time. Apparently, his boss didn’t look like she was just arrested—she still walked with deadly grace, with her hand braced on her shoulder where her coat was slung, and a downturned sneer on her lips. But what caught his attention was the bottle in her other hand.

          A new wave of pain hit Nikolai’s temple, and he had to sigh in exasperation. How was she able to bring alcohol to the precinct? And they didn’t even take it from her?

          Zoya caught his gaze, and her expression quickly melted into a cheery one that terrified Nikolai. She never smiled like that. “Darling,” she said, her voice mocking honey-sweet, “it’s so good to see you.”

          “Of course, sweetheart,” he replied with the same tone, and it only brought back her dark glare. He winced as he approached her, his hand enclosing around the exposed tattoo on her arm. “Zoya, what the hell. Isn’t it supposed to be me you’re helping to get out of trouble? Why had the tables turned?”

          “Questions after questions, dear Consigliere. One at a time. But to not answer anything, I needed a drink, and the Brums pissed me off twice today. I only gave the favor back,” she muttered before she leaned back and laughed lightly, continuing the act of a ‘loving wife’ who was glad to see her husband. Then a glare appeared in her eyes as she looked over the three men on the bench. They visibly shook in fear. “Let’s just get out of here before I decide to completely make them unidentifiable.” 

          “That doesn’t even help—” He stopped when Zoya gave him a glare. With another sigh, he said, “Fine. But let’s keep it cool until we step out of here, alright?

          She just rolled her eyes and put the bottle back to her lips. Nikolai turned back to the front desk with a smile that he was sure looked like a grimace. Then after a few minutes of handling the ordeal, with the amount of bail surely hurting their coffers, they were finally ready to walk freely from the precinct. He sighed as he shoved his wallet back to his coat, and was about to call for Zoya when he heard the sound of a glass breaking.

          “If I see you three near our property again—”

          Nikolai’s eyes widened when he saw Zoya pointing a half-broken whiskey bottle at the three men, and he scrambled to her side. He put a hand on her shoulder, trying to hold her back but her stance was unrelenting. “Zoya, dear, what did I say about keeping it cool?” he mumbled in her ear all the while keeping a smile to his face as he looked around the alarmed people in the precinct. 

          The three Brum associates only nodded in understanding as if Zoya had completed her sentence, and it seemed to sate her because she finally let Nikolai drag her out of the building. When they got out of the doors, they both dropped the act and immediately stepped away from each other as if they had just burned. Tolya and Tamar were already waiting for them by the car across the street.

          “Free at last,” muttered Zoya.

          “Why didn’t you text or call me right away?” Nikolai asked incredulously. “Would have gotten some medicine for the headache as precaution.”

          Zoya turned to him with a frown. “You speak as if you’re not a headache yourself.” Then she let out an annoyed breath, averted her eyes, and lowly added, “I forgot your number.”

          He raised an eyebrow, amusement suddenly overpowering his headache. “Zoya Nazyalensky forgetting something? So unheard of,” he said. Then a smile crept up to his lips. This woman was really something else. “And you dare to forget your husband’s number?”

          Nikolai barely had the time to dodge the broken bottle flying towards him. 

[five-rivers]

Long Night in the Valley Chapter 16

"But Suzuki-san was knocked out a bunch before this," said Ochako.

"I know," said One, still holding out the little packs of pills, "but apparently going to sleep is different from being knocked out."

"I think being drugged is a lot different from going to sleep, too," said Todoroki, taking one of the pill packs.

"I literally did not make the rules of this quirk." He turned his head to the side and started muttering about how Saito's quirk could have been used for good.

"How closely are you related to Midoriya, anyway?" asked Todoroki.

One startled. "Oh, uh, heh. You know. Enough for him to use the quirk?"

Wow. That was a suspicious answer.

"Are you Midoriya's father?" asked Todoroki.

"Todoroki, what--" started Iida.

"I have been dead for over a hundred years."

"That's not a no."

"Anyway," said Ochako, taking a sleeping pill from One but not opening it. "Are you sure, completely sure, you don't want our help? I mean, thinking about it, if you can get Izuku's quirk back from him like this, can’t he take your quirks, too?"

"Probably," agreed One, casually. "That's part of the reason we want you away from him." He mixed taking a pill. "We're also trying to make him think he can't. Or at least think that we think he can't. He's never had a very high opinion of our intelligence. And if he thinks that we think he can't, he'll never think that we're doing it."

Todoroki nodded along to this sagely.

"There’s also the possibility that he won't be able to - there are significant differences between my quirk and his. He can't do a passive DNA read, for example. That and the remnants of Izuku's quirk are the main reasons we think this will work, after all."

The world trembled slightly, then shook, as if an earthquake had just happened.

"He could take our mental selves, though," continued One. "Whether or not he'd keep them once this quirk wears off is something I'd rather not know… Although it'd be interesting to see if he could take the DNA aspect of a quirk that doesn't have a corresponding mental component present, since that's what actually trips him up when he tries to take One for All - he can't take the mental aspect, so his quirk aborts the sequence."

The ground shook again, harder.

"But that's honestly academic. You see, being dead can get boring, so we've spent a lot of time running war games and fighting each other."

This time, the shaking knocked all of them but One to their knees.

"Please take the pills? Now? We're really going to be fine."

A rocket screamed in the distance, followed by an explosion.

"This doesn't have opiates in it, does it?" asked Iida.

"Nothing here is real, so, no."

.

Ochako startled awake and immediately clutched at her head. That was one heck of a headache. Driven by the need to see where she was, she peeled open her eyes.

This was… the infirmary at UA?

How'd she get here?

"Oi! Granny! Cheeks is awake!"

That was Bakugo. There was something she wanted to do regarding Bakugo. What was it again?

"Don’t shout! This is a place of quiet and healing."

"I wanna know what fffffffffrick happened to shhhhtupid Deku."

Oh. She remembered now.

"As do we all, but you shouldn't crowd someone coming out of a mental quirk like that, it could be--"

No time like the present, decided Ochako.

She snapped into a sitting position, and punched Bakugo in the face.

"Ow! Mother--!"

Recovery Girl sighed. "Dangerous. Uraraka, how are you feeling?"

.

"I'm telling you," said Suzuki, propped up in the hospital bed, "there's a whole cabal of them, telepathically linked to each other and to All for One." He swatted away the nurse's hand. "Some of them are old heroes, too. They must have gone over to him for longevity quirks or something. They were- they were joking with each other about how to kill me. That's why I had to bail out."

"I believe you," said the commission president solemnly. “We have come across some evidence of our own that puts yours into a much more… credible light than it would be otherwise. Could you identify them, the other members of this ‘cabal?’”

“Some of them,” said Suzuki, doubtfully. “But others I didn’t recognize, or see for very long.” He shuddered. “Some of them… Some of them I would very much like to be mistaken about, sir.”

“The ones you are sure of?” prompted the president.

“Skyrunner,” said Suzuki, looking pale. “We should investigate her associates, as well,” he added, as if the president was unfit for his job. “There was another… I only know him from pictures, but I’m sure it was Fidelity.”

The president let neither his annoyance at Suzuki nor the familiarity of the two names distract him. “And how did Aizawa Shouta interact with them?”

Suzuki sniffled. “He sided with them. They all tried to put up a show when I was watching, but they never attacked him like they attacked me. That woman… she kept dropping me…” He knotted his fingers in his hair.

“What about All Might?”

“I’m… not sure. There was an image of him there, but he didn’t speak, not like the others. I couldn’t… couldn’t say if he was involved like they were.”

Not the conclusive report he’d been hoping for, then, but it confirmed that Midoriya Izuku was indeed in league with All for One.

… and also that he was providing All for One with at least one link with the outside world.

If Skyrunner and the others truly were alive, that meant that he had even more.

If. If they were alive. Even for a man of All for One’s talents, he had doubts about his ability to locate so many longevity quirks. The nomu with their duplicated quirks seemed to be a recent development. Then, too, there was the matter of Midoriya’s blood sample. Skyrunner and Fidelity were both on the list of people whose DNA had been mingled with his.

“There was also…” said Suzuki. He swallowed. “There was also… Tempest. She looked just like the old posters.”

Another name from the lists. The president closed his eyes briefly and pulled out his phone, going to the pictures he had saved of the hero Lariat and the vigilante Forewarning. Lariat’s photo was obviously better, having been an official picture for the purposes of identification. Forewarning’s was blurry and at an awkward angle, but given what he’d been - and who he served - it was only to be expected.

He showed the phone to Suzuki.

“These two?”

Suzuki stared. “Yes,” he said. “How did you know?”

“As I said,” replied the president, “we’ve gathered some of our own evidence while you’ve been asleep.” He put his phone away. “I expect a more thorough, formal report of what you discovered in Midoriya’s mind by the end of the day.”

“Of course, sir,” said Suzuki.

The president nodded, and with no more farewell than that, left.

As soon as he was alone, his phone was in his hand again. “I need an emergency exhumation order for the heroes Lariat, Fidelity, and Skyrunner.”

.

Aizawa stepped into the lobby of the apartment building. It seemed normal enough, even if the finishings were incredibly old-fashioned and its emptiness gave it a disturbing quality. The overhead lights buzzed. The wallpaper peeled. The air smelled faintly of ammonia. The paint on the receptionist’s desk had flaked off in places. There was gum matted in the carpet.

It was a normal apartment building. Not a nice one.

Aizawa walked cautiously to the desk, and peered at the mailboxes behind it. He picked out the name ‘Shigaraki’ in the third row, and made note of the apartment number.

The elevator, predictably, was out of order, not that it particularly mattered to Aizawa. He wouldn’t have trusted it to bring him to his destination, regardless. He barely trusted the stairs for that, after how many times this dream world had changed under his feet.

He reached the third floor without incident, and found the Shigaraki apartment. The door was locked, but Aizawa always carried a set of lockpicks with him, something that was as true here as in the real world. He made short work of it.

The apartment was… normal. Chaotic. Not very clean. Several sets of shoes, various sizes, littered the entryway. Medical bills and homework covered the kitchen table, more than a few letters on the floor. Bowls were stacked next to the sink. One of the rooms didn’t have a door, but a curtain. There were scorch marks on the walls.

Aizawa took a deep breath, and stepped into the apartment.

At first, nothing changed. Then, the light streaming past the curtains dimmed, natural light becoming weak, flickering sodium-yellow, and the dusty silence of an abandoned place was replaced with something that was almost like city nightlife.

Almost. There was something badly off about it. More than something… Too much anger. Not a single happy voice. Too many crashes and bangs. But… also not enough. Not enough for a riot or a protest. No motors, either. No cars.

He made his way to the window and looked out. There were people there. Crowds, even. People raging. People despairing. There were people tearing at the buildings, attacking their surroundings and one another, but many simply laid on the ground. Others… others seemed to be hunting. Looking for something, armed with makeshift weaponry.

Red lightning split the sky above them. Someone wailed, and the hunting party changed direction, going to where the lightning had struck.

Aizawa had seen the footage from Kamino, the way lightning had sparked, jagged, around the villain’s arms. He didn’t know what that lightning meant here, but he didn’t intend to get close enough to find out.

But he did have to go out, to find Midoriya’s quirk, or the representation of it. Wherever it was, it wasn’t in this apartment.

Probably.

Just to be sure, he threw open the doors and cabinets, searching and not finding. However, the apartment really was as empty of people as it seemed. Part of Aizawa itched to investigate this place more, this place where All for One was allegedly raised.

He left the apartment, making his way quickly down the stairs. In the real world, he would have most likely left through the window, jumping down to quell the near-riot happening below, to pull aside some of the younger people he had seen. But none of the people below were real, and he needed to lay low, stay inconspicuous.

Walking through Midoriya’s and the others’ minds, he and his students had always been noticed immediately. The ‘vestiges’ were distracting All for One, but Aizawa didn’t want to push his luck.

He walked out into the dim street, keeping close to the walls of buildings for whatever little cover they provided. The air tasted… oddly sterile.

The ‘people’ here were most likely stolen quirks, not memories. Would Midoriya’s be out in this? Or hidden away? How big was All for One’s mental landscape? The man was more than a century old.

If the quirk acted like the child it had belonged to… most likely it would go somewhere familiar. Midoriya’s apartment, maybe? Had he lived there, back then?

It was, unfortunately, his only lead.

(He did not think highly of his chances at success.)

“Eraserhead?”

The call was hissed, hushed and disbelieving. Aizawa half-turned, thinning his profile to provide a smaller target, his hands on his capture weapon.

Then he hesitated.

“Ragdoll?”

She blinked rapidly at him, eyes tearing up. “He got you, too, Eraser?”

Aizawa took in the brightly-colored hero costume and the ever so slightly off way she held herself. “You… aren’t really Shiretoko Tomoko, are you?” He knew that, or should have known that, but it was very different to see someone he knew… the quirk of someone he knew… here.

She crossed her arms and pursed her lips, face still twisted in upset and grief. “Just like you aren’t really…” Her eyes widened, and she pushed him into a nearby alleyway. He let her, barely resisting the urge to throw her off and double-guessing that decision. “You are the real Eraserhead,” she whispered, urgently. “The real Aizawa Shouta.”

To trust or not to trust… She’d know more than Aizawa about this place and where Midoriya’s quirk might be, but she was also compromised simply by the situation she was in and what she was. He didn’t know how much control All for One had over her, nor how similar she was to the real Ragdoll.

“Why are you here? How are you here?” Her words carried an edge of desperation. “You can’t be here. This is hell.”

“It’s a quirk. I’m looking for someone,” said Aizawa, making a snap decision. “A child.”

“One of your students?”

“Younger,” said Aizawa. “About five.”

“That doesn’t narrow it down as much as I’d like,” admitted not-Ragdoll.

“A boy,” said Aizawa. “Curly green hair. Probably small for his age.”

She blinked again, eyelashes fluttering. “Green hair? Like Midoriya?”

“You remember him?”

“It would be hard to forget the student Kota punched in the…'' she trailed off with a grimace. “Is he alright? Kota?”

“He’s fine. And… you’re fine, as well. Alive, I mean.”

“That’s not really…” She chewed her lower lip. “Call me Search. Midoriya, is he…?”

“He’s… The situation is complicated.”

Ragdoll-- Search nodded. “I haven’t seen anyone that looks like that,” she said. “But I’m not the only hero-- The only hero’s quirk here.” She stepped out of the alley. “Let me show you.”

This felt like a trap.

He didn’t have any better leads.

He followed.

.

Kazuki had never been strong. As a child, he’d been sickly, and he’d grown into a sickly adult. Allergies and autoimmune disorders had plagued him growing up, as well as common viruses made near-fatal by his adverse reactions to vaccines and already-compromised immune system. Then, as a teen, he’d been diagnosed with a cellular degeneration disorder that had sprung up at about the same time as meta abilities. A disorder that, if Nine was any indicator, had never been cured.

Then his brother had given him the stockpile. And that had…

Well. It had hurt, at first. It had left him sicker than ever, confused and possibly a little delirious as his own power sheered away the ghost of a half-brother he’d never met into near-nothingness, as instincts and senses he’d only been peripherally aware of opened up, angry and inflamed by the violation.

(He wondered, now, if One for All might have manifested very differently if the stockpile hadn’t been forced on him. If the reason Izuku was drawing out the quirks of his predecessors wasn’t because of the mechanical remnants of his original quirk, but because One for All itself had finally settled into equilibrium with the stockpile.)

But. He’d had the stockpile. He’d had that well of power, shallow as it had been back then. at the beginning.

Kazuki still wasn’t strong. Never, in his entire life, from birth to death, had he been strong.

But it was a fact that, for as long as the strong and the weak had existed among men, so had equalizing devices.

Kazuki could lean on a cane. He could also beat someone to death with one. At least, when he’d been alive.

He’d done some staffwork, too, when he’d been alive. The weapon wasn’t as inconspicuous in the modern world as it had been in the past, but it had reach and versatility. Also, many cleaning implements, garden tools, and lengths of pipe could be used as a staff in a pinch.

But his favorite weapon was the sword.

(Kazuki had excelled above his older brother in only four areas: morality, med school, finishing books, and kendo.)

Force multipliers, one friend in the underground had called Kazuki’s weapons. Specialized levers.

Someone, a westerner, Kazuki thought, had once said that you could move the world with a long enough lever. Kazuki couldn’t claim to have done that, he couldn’t even move his brother, but weapons had made his use of One for All much more efficient.

Much more deadly, in some cases.

Unfortunately, his blade failed to cleave off his brother’s insufferably smug face, steel skittering off his brother’s quirk-enhanced hand. Kazuki dove past him, tumbled, making sure to keep the cutting edge of his sword pointed away from himself, and rolled smoothly to his feet, the phantom buzz of One for All under his skin making him much more coordinated than he otherwise would have been.

Daigoro and Rokuya had already engaged his brother. Ryuji was circling, unnoticeable, waiting for an opening. Miranda had summoned a dense fog that crackled with lightning (incidentally not something she’d commonly been able to do in life - for most of her feats, the prevailing weather conditions had to be just right first). Nana was minding the environment, for the moment, making sure it suited them and hindered their opponent. Although, she’d attempted a few several-story axe-kicks, when she saw the opportunity.

As for their youngest two members…

“I hadn’t expected you to let Midoriya Izuku fight,” said All for One, as if everyone involved wasn’t completely, brutally aware that he was Izuku’s father, “but I really expected more action from All Might. Are you afraid I’ll do to your mind what I did to your body?”

“Shut up!” shouted Izuku. “Leave him alone! He’s driving!”

“He’s wha--?”

Rokuya and Miranda both took All for One’s distraction as an opening to hit him with electrical attacks. Rokuya laughed wildly. “Tase him again, senpai!”

Kazuki adjusted his grip on the police stun baton he found in his hand (he’d stolen one, once, and kept it for a week before realizing it was GPS enabled) and smiled. A request like that from his successor? How could he refuse?

.

Vlad’s car, ever so gently, rolled to a stop. Toshinori cursed vigorously, though not particularly creatively, and winced. There wasn’t anything he could do about a empty fuel tank. Swearing at it wasn’t going to fill it up.

Once met someone with a quirk like…

Toshinori squeezed his eyes shut and let the foreign memory roll over him. Focus on positives. They were much closer to the Wild Wild Pussycats’ compound, almost to the cliffside that Izuku and his classmates had been tipped off of by Pixie Bob, and… Toshinori had to let that memory flicker and pass as well.

He pulled first their supplies, then Izuku, from the car, wanting to keep his student in the warmth provided by the barely-functional heating system for as long as possible. On a whim, he took the emergency supplies Vlad had stored in his car as well.

Perhaps taking things from his fellow teacher should have twinged his conscience more than stealing from villains, but, well. Vlad would have more loss to worry about than a small first aid kit, emergency foil blankets, and road flares. Toshinori had originally intended to return the car, or at least leave it somewhere Vlad could find, but his plans had changed.

The car might not be next to the cliff Izuku and his classmates had fallen from at the beginning of their summer camp experience, but it was next to a cliff.

He made sure the wheel was turned in the right direction, got behind the car and pushed. It took longer than he would have liked to get to the cliffside, but once he did, momentum and gravity took care of the rest.

The result was loud enough to jostle Izuku from his state of not-quite-sleep and left a fair amount of car-related debris on the side of the cliff, but the car itself was obscured quite nicely by the pine trees below.

He walked, slowly, back to Izuku, who had struggled into a sitting position, and was now contemplating standing.

“Don’t,” said Toshinori, softly. “I’ll carry you.”

“But,” said Izuku, looking at him with worry. He swallows, licking split lips. “You’re really not in better shape than I am.”

“You’re keeping us hidden,” said Toshinori. “I’m not.”

Izuku sagged, defeated. “Okay,” he said, softly.

.

“I was on my way when I found you,” said Search, leading Aizawa forward. “He knows everywhere here, he is everywhere here, and a lot of the quirks here belonged to his followers, or to people who were his enemies but were just as bad as he was… We have to move where we meet.”

“And who is ‘we’ in this situation?” asked Aizawa.

There was a lull in the conversation as they pressed themselves to a wall to let a large group go by.

“Other heroes,” said Search, quietly, once they were more or less alone again. “Rather, their quirks.” She looked up at him. “We might not be them, but we refuse to let him change us, destroy more of what we are.” Something more… natural, for lack of a better term, bled into her bearing.

It was then that it struck Aizawa, what had been bothering him about all the ‘people’ here. None of them moved like they were alive. Not even the vestiges in Midoriya’s mind felt so dead.

Aizawa was standing in a world of ghosts.

He forced himself to nod at her, this specter wearing his colleague’s face and memories. If what she said was true, then she was, indeed, pursuing a noble cause.

She led him to what looked like an average, middle-class hotel, except that it was painted with bright, red graffiti accusing the owners of being ‘mutants.’ They entered through a side door, and went down into a basement filled with washing and drying machines.

The room was also full of people. Quirks. All of whom became very tense upon seeing Aizawa.

“Who’s this?” asked one of them, a thin woman still wearing a blood-splattered costume. Aizawa vaguely recognized her face as that of a hero who’d been popular when he’d been a kid.

“This is Eraserhead,” said Search. “The real Eraserhead.”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure,” said Search.

Aizawa didn’t know how she could be, seeing as she hadn’t really asked him any questions that could confirm his identity, but he didn’t belabor the point.

“He’s looking for someone,” she continued.

“Forget that, how did you even get in here?” demanded someone else.

“A quirk,” said Aizawa.

“Duh,” said a boy in an old Shiketsu uniform. “Of course it was a quirk. Can we have some more detail? We haven’t gotten any news since she came in.” He jerked his head towards Search.

“It was a number of quirks,” allowed Aizawa, “interacting in an unpredicted way. The reason you haven’t gotten any…” He looks at Search. “News. Is because All for One is in Tartarus.”

He’d vaguely expected for the quirks to be reassured by this. Instead, they frowned.

“If you manage to get out,” said the boy, “tell them that they need to kill him. He’s not going to stay nicely in prison.”

“He’s right,” said the woman, crossing her arms. “It doesn’t matter what kind of restraints, drug cocktail, or quirk you’ve got. You see the crowds out there?” She moved to point. “Every person in them is a quirk. Strength quirks, fire quirks, longevity quirks, healing quirks, you name it, he’s got it. The only reason he hasn’t sunk the country is because he wants to rule it.” There was a murmur of agreement.

“I’ll pass it on,” said Aizawa. “But I do have something I’m here for.”

“What?” she snapped.

“A kid’s quirk,” said Search, quickly.

“Why?” asked a vigilante’s quirk, stepping forward. Aizawa had investigated their death. People with healing quirks rarely died like that. “What good does it do you?”

“I know the kid in question,” said Aizawa. “The rest is classified.”

He could make things classified if he wanted to.

“Can you describe them?” asked the vigilante, making gentle shapes with their hands.

“A boy,” said Aizawa. “Green eyes, green curly hair. Probably small. Probably has a thing for notebooks.”

The atmosphere in the room stilled from merely unnatural to deathly.

“Yeah,” said the woman. “We know who you’re talking about.” She pursed her lips. “This is something that’ll make it so All for One won’t be able to use him anymore, right?”

“Hopefully,” said Aizawa. “When you say use…”

The woman waved him off. “The kid’s fine,” she said. “Just terrifying, is all.”

Aizawa closed his eyes. “Of course he is.”

.

"We decided to keep him away from the other kids," said the vigilate's quirk, "because he was freaking them out."

They were in an apartment building again, this one newer.

"We try to keep the kids away from all that in general." The vigilante waved towards the racket outside. "Wish we could get them free, but…" He trailed off, fixing Aizawa with an appraising look. "If this works with your kid, and he gets his quirk back, maybe you could try with some of the others? I think at least some of them must still be alive out there, right? If your kid is."

"I'll look into it," said Aizawa, "but I'm afraid this is a one time only chance."

"Figures," muttered the vigilante. He knocked on the door.

There was an excited gasp from the other side, and then the pitter-patter of little feet. Then, more concerningly, several metallic clanks and clicks as bolts and locks from the other side of the door were released. The door swung back, and a painfully tiny version of Midoriya beamed up at them.

[jjfics]

Rosemary and Thyme - On The Run | 02

ship: Five Hargreeves x Female!Reader 

summary: The Reader has killed someone and now the Hargreeves and her have to hide. So they look for shelter in the only place they know would welcome them: The Reader’s former employer. 

series: read part 1 here

author: jane jack aka your girl jjfics 

words: 3250 

warnings: mentions of death, murder, blood and homelesness, feelings of uncertainty and anxiety, flashbacks, angst, guns, allusion to smut (does not happen though, i’ve cut it right before), smoking 

a/n: i definitely did not expect it to be seen. i know 100 notes is not a lot, but i think i did pretty well for my second imagine out there, huh. thanks guys, for reading. i hope this one is just as great (or who knows, maybe better?). let me know if anyone would like a part 3. -jj

tags: @nimusicaltrash​ :3

Vanya and Allison were asleep in the backseat. Klaus, cramped between them, waved around a magazine he picked up from the last gas station you stopped at. Luther and Diego were discussing plans in the back, on the second row of seats. 

Five took the passenger seat, he was very tired from all the driving. He refused to make any stops at all until it was absolutely necessary. The dark circles around his eyes begged him to sleep, but he couldn’t. All he could feel was stress and desperation. I have to get my family to safety, he would think. 

Your now clean hands were clenched around the wheel of the car. The city was getting closer every moment and you unconsciously pressed harder on the gas pedal.

“Hey, hey! Careful there, I can’t read well when you go that fast” Klaus whined and you sighed. Right.

You saw Five look at his watch as he started bumping his right foot anxiously. Just a couple of metres away stood the “Welcome to Dallas” board.

“On time?” you ask, trying not to panic.

“Exactly on time” he reassures you with a nod. “Are you ready?” Ready? You were terrified.

“You’ll be okay. I’ll come inside with you, just in case.”

“What do you think old John can do to harm me?” 

John was your boss in the 60s. Your salvation. He was mesmerized by your voice that day at the bakery, and he kept asking people around until he found you. It was your second night sleeping under the open sky, and little did you know it was all going to change. He made you a star. One makeover later and a lot of clothing stores you basically swapped lives with Allison. He let you live in the apartment above the club. 

And he was probably also six feet under right now. 

“Oh I wouldn’t be worried about him.” Five replies sarcastically. “Maybe he has a son. Whoever is in charge of the place, might be an issue for us.”

“What do you mean?”

“I just… What if he won’t cooperate? What if he won’t understand, or worse, give us to the police…” after he said that, he looked zoned out for a moment, as if he was going through all the possible ways your plan could fail. 

If the police found you, you would be going straight to jail. There was no doubt that the Hargreeves could pay for your bail. So no worries with the police, really. But you were never going to be a free woman. The Commission would search for you, and if you killed one of them again, they would send new men after you until they made sure you were gone for good. As gone as the one you saw bleed to death. 

You put your hand on his knee as you turned left onto the main street. If the club was still standing it should be just around the corner. 

His attention switched back to you and he scoffed quietly. “Look at us. Just a couple of hours ago you were the one having a panic attack and now it’s my turn.”

A small smile appeared on your face. “We’re a team, remember?” And he mirrored the expression just before you parked the car. 

“Alright everybody, listen up!” he shouts so that everyone would turn and look at him. The sisters woke up too. They were all on the same train now. “Me and y/n are going to walk inside this club and arrange something so we’ll sleep safely for tonight. Vanya is going to wait in the car, ready to drive away and help us escape. Diego and Luther will wait outside. Got it?” Diego raised an eyebrow but Five continued “Just in case anything happens. You never know.” 

“I’ll wait with them, I need to breathe some fresh air” Allison said as she stretched her arms as far as she could in the small van. 

“Alright then” Five said, looking at the main entrance of the club through the passenger window. “Let’s get to this y/n” he gave you a small smile. 

You searched for his hand and squeezed it gently. 

The doors of the car closed behind you two as you got out of the car. Diego, Luther and Allison were pretending they were just locals talking about what not, getting closer to the big glass doors. When they stopped walking Diego turned a bit to the left and started laughing. This was it, your sign to go. 

“Hey, be safe, okay? Leave as soon as anything gets out of hand. We can find some other place to stay at.” Vanya told you when you were ready to get out of the car. Your best friend was worried about you, of course. She is always a bit anxious. But you had no other choice.

On the way here you were mentioned 8 times on the radio. You and the Hargreeves. Wanted criminals. This was your only chance to find shelter. If this didn’t work, you couldn’t really find some other place. You would pretty much have to sleep in the car or on the streets. No, impossible, you couldn’t go through that again. 

“We’ll be fine Vivi.” She chuckles sadly at the nickname you gave her in the early stages of your friendship. 

“Klaus, hand me that magazine! It’s my turn” Vanya said while tapping her fingers on the steering wheel.  

“Ah, fine.” he whined. “Turn on the radio.”

Hand in hand with Five you made your way to the front hall of the club, heading towards the bar, which was on a platform just above the empty dance floor. You took your sunglasses off as you sat on one of those black stools at the bar. Same leather like 50 years ago. It felt surreal to be here again, with Five sitting next to you. 

“What are you doing so early? And with a kid? There ain’t no party yet ms.” you couldn’t help but smile as you recognized the southern drawl. You pushed your foot on the floor and rotated the chair. There she was, with her hair pinned up the same way as always, wearing short heels that matched her dark lipstick. It had been so long since you had seen her. 

Amy Stephens, your boss John’s little sister. She should be 74 by now, and even though she was just 17 when you started working at the club, you still knew who she was. Amy was the only friend you had during those months when you were alone. You showed her how to do her make up, you went shopping together when you needed new stage outfits, you taught her how to fight, something John would’ve scolded you for if he found out.

“Hello.” you said looking kindly at your old friend. “I’m not here for any party. I’m just looking for someone.”

“Oh well, let’s see if I can be of any help to ya. What you got?” 

“Do you happen to know a Stephens?” Five asked her. 

“Stephens? Yeah, yeah, that’s me kid. With what business are you coming here?” she questioned resting her arm on her hip. 

“Are you in charge of the place?” you said putting your glasses in the pocket of your jacket.

“Sure am. Can I help you?” 

“Yeah… we… uh… a friend told us you used to give the apartment for rent? Is that… still available?” You didn’t quite know how to carry the conversation without blowing your cover. 

“Ah, yes. It’s been a long time since anyone slept in there. You knew the famous y/n Hargreeves used to live here?” Five suppressed a smile, winking at you, but the woman didn’t notice. “Do you kids even know her? You look young. Anyways, popular singer back in 62. Or was it 63?” she muttered.

“Big fans” Five told her.

Your name wasn’t Hargreeves, of course, but you had no certificate when your boss found you. So you did everything you could to associate yourself with Five and his siblings in hope you might find them.

“Would you be interested in staying here?”

“Yes, that’d be really nice” Five said eagerly.

“Follow me, I’ll show you around.” 

The door to your old apartment opened and little dust particles could be seen floating in the morning light. Amy pushed the wooden door with her shoulder and walked inside. 

“My God, we haven’t been in here since Ms Hargreeves moved out. Seems like she really was our last tenant” she whispered, but you heard her well. “But don’t worry children, the place is clean. There’s two bedrooms and a bathroom, a small kitchen and a balcony. Come come”. You knew that grin, it meant the apartment has probably been rotting ever since you left.

She led you to the bedroom that wasn’t used when you lived here. “See, two rooms, perfect for you and the kid, huh” She tried to convince you. Five chuckled and put his arm around your waist when she turned around to walk to the main bedroom.

“And this… this is the second one. There’s still a luggage full of her stuff under the bed but I can get rid of that for ya.” she slapped her hand on the mattress and more dust came out of it. “So what you thinkin’? You like it here?”

“Oh that's not a problem girl, bring them in. As long as you don’t make too much noise after 11 pm, we’re all good.”

You shared a look with Five to tell him This is the best we could do. He nodded and you both turned to look at Amy who was now staring uncomfortably at the two of you. Yeah, you would have to hide your relationship around her. He moved his hand casually and then you spoke again. “Yes, this is quite what we were looking for. But it’s not just us. We’ll be 7, including me, my boyfriend and his 5 siblings.” 

“Isn’t there noise from the party downstairs anyways at that hour?” Five asked her. The expression on Amy’s face changed as she looked down. 

“The party huh… you’re not from here are ya? Well, I was just joking earlier, kid. When y/n Hargreeves left the club, the people got angry. She was the main reason why people still came. Most stopped coming after some time, it simply wasn’t smart to keep the club partying. Now it’s nothing more than a property.” 

They… went bankrupt, because you stopped showing up? You knew people loved you, but John never told you you were the one holding up their business. A tear rolled down your cheek. All that fame, all the posters. You had bleached your hair when you returned to 2019 and you wore sunglasses everywhere. No one could know who you were. Some get their 30 seconds of fame, you got your year. One year could mean your whole life sometimes. 

You were laying on Elliot’s couch with the phone pressed between your ear and shoulder as you were trying to take off your coat. Five reached to help you mouhting I got it. He took your coat to the hanger and then disappeared into the kitchen. 

“Hello, this is John Stephens speaking.” 

“Hi, John. It’s just me, y/n. I- uh, I’m calling from a friend's house. I think I’m going to spend the night. Just thought it’ll be fine for you to know in advance.” 

“y/n, yes. So, what you’re saying is... that you won’t be here in time for tonight’s show?” he said anxiously. You didn’t know this at the time, but he was worried about losing profit.

“No no, I just- I would really want to hang out with my friend and it’ll be just for tonight.”

Gosh, you were reasoning with him as if he were your dad.

“Oh,come on, Hargreeves. Not even one song?”

You laughed at how disparate he was. “Sorry. Not even one. I’ll be gone til morning. But I’m sure no one will miss me that much. Besides, you can always ask Amy to sing. She’s been getting better. For real, John. That girl has potential.”

“There ain’t no well in hell I’m letting my sister get up in front of all these drunks to sing. She’s just 17, woman!” 

You couldn’t stop laughing now. “Goodnight, John. I’ll- Well I’ll see you on Monday if we don’t run into each other.”

“Have a nice evening, y/n” 

You hung up the phone and rose from the couch. When entering the kitchen you saw Five pouring coffee in two big mugs. You went and hugged him from behind, placing a gentle kiss on his cheek. You could feel him smiling as you kissed him again. He took the mugs and turned around to face you leaning on the counter.

“Did you miss me?” he asked innocently, making you giggle. 

You leaned in and kissed him. You could still taste the coffee on his lips. He kissed you back and you felt him smirk as you laced your hands behind his neck. 

“Did I miss you?” you asked him back rhetorically. And you could see how eager he was to meet your lips again. You gave him a quick peck on the lips, and one on his shoulder, and then you hugged him tightly. “I did. A lot.” 

“I know what it’s like to be alone. I promise you, we won’t have to go through that again. I’ll try everything I can do to be together forever.” 

“Forever?” you asked.

“Assuming you won’t kick me out, of course.” You smacked his arm.

“Idiot.” you said between laughs. “Give me one of those mugs.” 

He hands you your coffee and you take a sip. “Black?”

“We have a lot to talk about,” he said.  

You both sat back on the couch and went over anything and everything. How you got famous. Where the others were. How he just arrived. What he saw. How long everyone had been here. 

“How long do we have?” you asked, searching for his eyes. 

He leaned back on the couch. “A lot more than last time. Enough time to find out what causes it, and more importantly, how to stop it.” 

You smiled at his words. After all this time, you were finally reunited, and no one was rushing you now. You had nothing to lose anymore, except time. Your hands unconsciously inched towards his thigh and you traced small hearts on his leg. “That means we can breathe safely for a while, right?”

Five brought you closer to him, straddling him now. He brushed your hair behind your ear so you could see him better. Your fingers explored his face carefully. The bump of his nose, his cheeks, his dimples as he grinned at you. Gosh, how you had missed his dimples. You missed everything about him. 

“We have almost one full year,” he said. 

“Then we better make the best of it, right?” you said as your lips brushed against his. 

He laid his head on the fluffy cushions and you followed, not breaking eye contact. His blue eyes scanned yours and your soul ran wild. You towered over him and pressed your forehead on his. Suddenly, the sound of the cars outside stopped and it all went silent. In this moment, there was only you and him. And this moment would exist forever.

You had to make up for all the time you were apart. You kissed him passionately, closing your eyes. His hands flowed along your curves and rested on your hips, pressing you hard on his chest. The kiss tasted like his favourite kind of coffee. Every movement of yours was matched instantly by him. He didn’t need words to know. Neither did you. 

Five pulled away for a second, looking at you lovingly, desire clear in his eyes. He took your left hand in his and shifted you so that you were laid on your back. He sat on his elbows just above your head. Your hands hugged his shoulders, getting him to slowly bend down. You could feel your eyes fill with tears as you watched him watch you. A flash of worry appeared on his face, but just for a moment. 

Five wiped your cheeks with the back of his palm, and kissed your cheeks. You kissed his hand and he kissed yours back, his hot breath fanning over your sensitive skin. His kisses started to travel upwards, to your elbow, then shoulder, then neck, then down again. You closed your eyes as his kisses passed your collarbone. He tugged softly on your shirt. 

“May I?” he hummed with a boyish smirk you hadn’t seen in a long while. You nodded, brushing his hair back.

“Yes, please.” you flushed.

He started unbuttoning your shirt, enjoying every second of it. With every button, he would press one more kiss. With every breath, you would inhale his sweet scent, praying to never forget it.

The morning was cold. Diego and Lila were asleep in the bedroom, Elliot on an armchair. Oh, the poor man couldn't even sleep in his own bed. Five was on the couch, next you. You pushed the blanket closer to him and got up after pecking his forehead. 

“Goodmorning, y/n.” he whispered, not even bothering to open his eyes. 

“Morning, Five.” 

“Where are you going?” he whined.

“Oh don’t worry, I’ll be right back”

You searched for your shirt and pants only to find them underneath your pillow. Getting dressed up in a hurry, you covered your shoulders with what seemed to be another blanket… or a really long scarf. Either way, it was warm enough. You reached for a cigarette in your pocket and made your way outside. 

You sat on the cold stairs that led up to the entrance of the building and watched the people pass the alley. 

“Look at them, rushing to get to their shitty jobs in time, to get their kids to school, rushing, rushing, rushing.” you scoffed under your breath.

“Good thing we don’t have to rush anywhere, right?” a voice startled you. You turned your head to the door to see Five already dressed nicely with a mug of, probably, coffee again. How convenient it could be for him sometimes to jump through space. Always a step ahead of you.

“That's not healthy.” he pointed at your cigarette. 

“That’s not either” you said gesturing to his drink and he chuckled, amused.

“Yeah, well, at least I won’t get sick” he sat down, resting his head on your shoulder. 

“We can’t have that happen. Even a cold can be deadly for an old man like you.” You bumped your cigarette on the side of his mug smiling. “Cheers” 

Making your way back to the car you saw everyone was outside. 

“Vanya why are you not in the car?” Five asked immediately.

“It just took too long and I was worried.”

“Is it so hard to just stick to the rules? Is it? All you had to do was sit there.” he sighed.

Everyone looked worried, so you smiled softly. “We got the key guys, it’s all good. Let’s go upstairs, I’m tired.”

“Thank, God.” Allison said so relaxed, unaware of the gun pointing at her from behind a tree nearby. She walked to the club’s doors. “Let’s go.”

[ragingbookdragon]

Date Nights Are The Best Nights

Batfamily Blurbs!

A/N: This is the first reader insert I’ve done in a while. I missed it! Enjoy! -Thorne <3

Dick:

           “I’m not sure if I should be charmed or worried that you picked this for our date.” She glanced over at him, eyes narrowed suspiciously, though her voice was calm. He scoffed lightly, zipping up the windbreaker until it reached the base of his trachea; he reached over, curling his fingers in hers.

           “I’m not sure if I should be offended or amused that you think I’d take you somewhere unsafe (Y/N).” An eyebrow arched high on her face, and (Y/N) retorted,

           “We’re in the middle of a forest Dick. One of two things is gonna happen-I’m either gonna sleep in a tent, or I’m getting murdered.” A snort sounded from his throat and he squeezed her hand before pulling her along.

           “Well I don’t plan on murdering you (Y/N)…I love you too much.” She rolled her eyes, stuffing her free hand in her sweatshirt pocket, and muttered,

           “Didn’t say you were gonna be the one murdering me.” Dick paused and glanced back at her, hoisting the camping gear higher onto his shoulder.

           “You really think I’d let something happen to you babe?” (Y/N) squinted at him and bit out,

           “I’ve watched you willingly trip your brothers to get first dibs on chocolate chip cookies.” She pulled their hands up, pecked his, then let it go, walking past him; before she did, she quipped, “I wouldn’t be surprised if you tripped me when an axe murderer comes running out of the woods.” He grunted, following her.

           “You’ve been hanging out with my baby brothers too much.”

Jason:

           The two of them giggled as they crouched behind a bookshelf, avoiding the light coming from the doorway; she glanced over at him, watching as he peered between the books. “Jason, if we get in trouble, who’s gonna bail us out of this one?” Teal eyes darted to her before he grabbed her hand, pulling her to another bookshelf.

           “Uh…we’re not gonna get caught (Y/N).” She huffed a laugh.

           “Jay, we’re in the library past hours.” (Y/N) shifted her gaze to check between a set of books. “The guard’s leaving.” At that, he took her hand, dragging her to the enclosed space. He let go of her hand, closing the door behind them before he shrugged off the backpack, unzipping it. Jason pulled out a blanket and a few books; the sight made (Y/N) snort. “Building full of books and you bring your own.” She reached over, running her fingers through his hair, tugging gently at the tuft of white in the front. “Only you Jason.” He grinned up at her, pearly white teeth reflecting in the moonlight as he replied,

           “Your own books are your babies, doll. They’re special.” Jason rose, gently pulling her along until they collapsed on the couch, curled up together. He shifted lightly until he was propped up against the couch, (Y/N) nestled between his legs. Jason cracked open a book, using the moonlight to read. After a moment, she asked,

           “Are we gonna stay here all-night Jay?” She felt him nod then say,

           “That’s the plan.” (Y/N) twisted until she could look at him.

           “And what happens if we fall asleep and the guard finds us here?” Jason glanced down at her and gave her a smile.

           “Then we’ll just tell him we fell asleep in here when school was in.”

Tim:

           “I can’t believe you’re saying this to me.” She rolled her eyes, curling her arms across her chest as she retorted,

           “Well believe it Timbers, ‘cause I am.” Tim groaned, burrowing into the covers.

           “But it just opened today (Y/N)!” She rolled her eyes again, watching the lump wiggle. It reminded her of a worm, causing her to giggle, and his head shot out from the covers, cerulean eyes narrowed into a glare. “And now you’re laughing at me!” Tim pouted, sticking his bottom lip out. “Why do you hate me babe?” (Y/N) huffed and reached over, fingers gently sliding through his onyx hair.

           “I don’t hate you. But I’m not going to a new coffee shop that opened on main and standing in line for hours just to get coffee.” Tim stuck his bottom lip out as far as it would go, eyes pleading with her as he begged,

           “Please (Y/N)? I’ll love you forever and ever. We can have as many dogs as you want.” She pretended to think for a moment, then poked his nose and quipped,

           “You should leave the puppy eyes to Dickie. He’s better at it then you are.” The second (Y/N) finished her sentence, Tim pulled his head back into the covers, rolling around.

           “I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU JUST TOLD ME MY OLDER BROTHER HAS BETTER PUPPY EYES THAN ME! MY OWN GIRLFRIEND! I’VE BEEN BETRAYED! A BETRAYAL MOST FOUL!” (Y/N) stared at Tim as he wiggled in the covers, then she reached over, pulling them down so she could see his face.

           “If I take you to the coffee shop, will you forgive me?” Tim watched her a moment than asked,

           “Will you buy me a caramel macchiato?” (Y/N) pulled the covers back up and replied,

           “Whatever your whiny butt desires Timberly.”

Bruce:

           The two swayed gently along the deck, snuggled close to one another. She propped her chin on his shoulder and let out a content sigh, smiling as she felt him turn his head, lips pressing to her cheek. “Feeling relaxed darling?” She hummed in agreement, turning her head to press her temple to his chest.

           “I feel very relaxed Bruce.” She glanced up at him, catching his steel-blue eyes on her. “Find anything interesting here handsome?” The corners of his lips rose, and he nodded, voice low as he said,

           “I found a beautiful woman in my arms (Y/N)…I’ve found the most interesting thing in the universe.” She chuckled at that, nuzzling close to him, feeling his arms curl around her back.

           “Mr. Wayne, you have such a way with words.” (Y/N) twisted a finger in a stray string from his sweater, tugging gently at it. “Thank you for dinner tonight Bruce.” He didn’t respond for a moment, and it prompted her to look up at him. “Bruce?” He was staring out into the backyard, but quickly looked back at her.

           “Sorry (Y/N). I was finding the words to apologize with.” She raised her eyebrows, words laced with confusion as she asked,

           “What are you talking about? Why are you apologizing?” Bruce frowned and the sight tugged at (Y/N)’s heartstrings as he murmured,

           “Tonight was the first date night we’ve had in a while and I wasn’t able to take you out somewhere nice.” (Y/N) huffed a laugh, pulling out of his grip until she could stare at him; she took his hands in hers, fingers tracing delicately over the scars that lined them.

           “Fifteen years we’ve been married and still you don’t understand.” His eyebrows furrowed and he watched as she raised his hands, gently pressing her lips to his knuckles. “Bruce, it doesn’t matter if we’re at the fanciest restaurant or here at the manor.” (Y/N) smiled at him and confessed, “So long as I’m with you, I don’t care where we are.” He gave her a heart filled smile, pulling her to him, arms tightening around her.

           “I love you Mrs. Wayne.” (Y/N) hummed, wrapping her arms around his back, gently kneading the muscles.

           “I love you Mr. Wayne…more than you know.” The two pulled back a few feet, staring lovingly at one another. As they leaned towards each other, the sliding door slid open so hard it slapped the doorway, and their two oldest came running out, arms waving frantically.

           “MA, WE NEED HELP IN HERE!”

           “MOM! WE DID A BAD THING! A VERY BAD THING!” Bruce and (Y/N) let go of one another, and she started towards them.

           “What did you hooligans do now?” Before they could respond, her two youngest stumbled out, tears running down their faces.

           “UMI! TODD SHAVED MY HEAD!”

           “MOM! DICK PUT A WAX STRIP IN MY HAIR!” (Y/N) raised her hands, rubbing her face as she moaned,

           “For one-night y’all couldn’t stop nagging each other.” Warm hands rested on her hips, and her husband’s voice sounded in her ear.

           “Batmom to the rescue.”

[ginny-rose-sixx]

What the Fork? Ch 1

Story Summary:

Eva Rozlyn "Roz" Roberts accidentally time travels when she fiddles with her time turner while watching The Dirt. She ends up in 1981 in the Mötley apartment. How will the Crüe react? Will she ever be able to get back to 2020? Will Roz be able to handle their way of life? Will she ever be able to control the time travel?

A/N:

I decided to start putting my story ‘What the Fork’ on Tumblr in addition to AO3 and WattPad (11 chapters). I wanted to organize my writing some more. Since I plan on this being a very long book and I want to make it a series, I want to take notes on my chapters so that I avoid continuity errors. Also, if I find any grammatical errors that I missed I will fix those. With the notes and everything, I thought that I would start putting this up here as well. As time goes on, I may do alternate takes on chapters and stuff like that. 

Oh, and the title is a bit of a funny story. When I first was trying to come up with a title, I asked for my boyfriend’s help. I told him the premise of the story and a summary of the first chapter. The first words out of his name were, “What the fuck???” And I was like, “Ok, there we go.” Of course, I wasn’t gonna swear in the title even though I do in the story. So, I decided to make a reference to the tv show ‘The Good Place’.

Pairing: Not disclosed to reader yet

Warnings: swearing

Word count: 1886

Chapter One

Eva Rozlyn Roberts, aka Roz, was sick of waiting for her friend to pick her up. She was supposed to be going to her first ever convention. She was dressed as a Gryffindor witch. She started to fiddle with parts of her costume. First, she was twirling her Newt Scamander replica wand for a while. *Why on Earth am I still waiting for her?* Roz wondered. Roz put her wand up her sleeve, and she tried calling her friend Katy for what felt like the 100th time that day.

After the voicemail picked up again, Roz decided to start watching The Dirt again. She had lost track of how many times she had watched the movie and listened to the songs since the movie came out. As she watched the movie, she took out a time turner necklace and started twirling it in all of the different directions. *I wish I had never agreed to go with Katy. She always forgets about me or bails.* She dropped the necklace and started to braid her hair.

 About an hour into the movie, Roz had already braided her hair so that it hung over her left shoulder. Her hair was black and it had deep red highlights all throughout. When she started twirling her time turner necklace again, a faint blue tendril of light started twisting around her fingers and slowly working its way up her arms. Before she even noticed it, the light was covering the entirety of her forearms. She immediately stopped playing with the time turner and started to panic. *Time turners are NOT even real! I cannot deal with this. I just turned 19 and I have to move soon. Fuck! What’s gonna happen to Hope?* The blue light had engulfed her and no matter how hard she tried; she couldn't get the time turner out of her hands. The last thought she had before she blacked out was *I hope she’s safe and that I’m at least gonna go somewhere fun.....*

 *******************

 The guys had just finished agreeing on a name. Mötley Crüe was finally a reality. They kept drinking together and didn't pay any attention to the strange blue light emanating from under the table. After a few hours, Tommy exclaimed, "Dudes, the only thing that could make this better would be for a chick to be here!"

 After a pull from his beer Vince laughed and asked, "Where exactly do you expect a chick to come from?"

 Mick growled sarcastically, "In a ball of light ya dumbass."

 Tommy's eyes lit up with teenage enthusiasm. "Ya really think so Mick?"

 Nikki just laughed and said, "He was joking dork."

 By then the light had waned and then, all of a sudden, it flashed back out from under the table. It engulfed the Crüe and Vince screamed. Once the light was gone Mick was shocked. "Seriously, I was joking about the light. What the fuck's going on under the table?"

 Tommy ducked his head under the table and immediately popped his head back up. "Dudes, I can't believe it.  I think I drank too much! There's a fuckin chick under the table!"

 Nikki cackled "T-bone quit fuckin around! Is there even anything other than trash under there?"

 Tommy glared and pouted "I'm not joking. Just look for yourself dude!"

 Mick grunted in pain as he got down on the floor and saw the strangest thing. There was girl who was maybe in her older teens. Her sudden appearance wasn't the only strange thing. She had unnatural black and red hair that was braided. She was also in what looked to be a school uniform. She had a red and black plaid skirt, knee high socks, odd combat like boots, a black blouse, a dark grey cardigan with a lion crest on it, and oddest of all a cloak. Mick decided that they needed to at least get her out from under the table. Maybe wake her if possible. "Nikki stop your cackling and help me move her to the couch."

 "Fine, fine" Nikki said as he rolled his eyes.

 Tommy and Vince moved the table and Mick carefully lifted her head and shoulders with a grimace while Nikki got her legs. Once they got her on the couch, Vince decided to bail to his girlfriend’s place, "Sorry, but I'm not sober enough for this shit. I'll be back later."

 Tommy leaned over the girl and asked, "Where do you guys think she came from?"

 Nikki shrugged, "Fuck if I know. Wake her up and see."

 Tommy started to poke her in the cheek. She mumbled "...5 mur min mum..." Tommy giggled and then decided to poke her sharply in the side. The girl's emerald eyes flew open as she shot into a sitting position.

 She screamed and flailed her arms which resulted in smacking Tommy in the face. "What the fork? Son of a bitch! What kind of asshole jabs someone they don't know in the side? Seriously, what the fuck?!"

 The guys looked at her with wide eyes and then at each other. "Well Mick you're the one who said a chick would come from a ball of light.  What do you think we should do with her?" Nikki asked.

 Mick chuckled "Your apartment, you guys figure it out.  I'm gonna just drink more."

 Sitting up fully and looking around the room, the girl was disoriented.  "She's right here and she even has a name! She also wants to know who you guys are and where she is," she snapped at them.

 Tommy sat next to her on the couch and responded, "Well I'm Tommy, that's Nikki and that's Mick. You are in our apartment."

 "Well theirs" Mick said pointing between Tommy and Nikki with his bottle of Jack.

 "Now your turn" Nikki said pointedly to her.

 Roz nervously tucked her legs under herself and hugged her knees. Looking down at the floor Roz said, "I'm Roz, that's all you're going to get from me right now. I want to know what city I'm in and what year it is. I've learned from books, TV, and movies that fresh out of a ball of light you figure out where and when you are."

 Tommy's brow knitted and he said, "Um its 1981 and you're in Los Angeles. Uh I guess that means I should ask you; where and when are you from Roz?"

 She looked with wide eyes between Mick and Nikki before settling back on Tommy. "Please don't freak out," she said quietly. As she looked down at her boots, she mumbled, "I'm from Madison, WI, and I was in the year 2020. I was born July 1, 2001 so I turned 19 a week ago in my time.”

 Nikki snorted, and Tommy elbowed him before he interrupted, “Seriously dude?? You’re from the future AND from Wisconsin?? How the fuck did you get here? Also, why under the table?”

 ���I have no clue Tommy, I was just messing around with my necklace and then POOF………” Roz trailed off and then stared wide-eyed at Mick, Tommy, and then fixed her eyes on Nikki. She had finally realized who she was with. “Holy fucking shit balls!!!!!! M-Mick Mars? T-Tommy Lee? …. A-a-an-and N-ni-Nikki S-ss-Sixx?” She continued stare at Nikki who, after a bit, narrowed his eyes at her before turning to Mick and Tommy.

 “How the hell does she know who we are?” Nikki wondered.

 Mick shrugged and Tommy laughed and said, “Wait dude, she’s from the future, right? We’re probably famous. Hey Roz is that how you know us?”

 “Shit, I shouldn’t have let that bit slip. This better not fuck up the space time continuum. I refuse to tell you guys about your futures.” She said wildly staring at Tommy.

 “Ok… ok… What should we do with her until we figure out if she can even go home?” Tommy asked turning to Nikki.

 “Well we can claim she is related to one of us,” suggested Nikki. “Hey Mick want a sister or a cousin?”

 Mick shook his head and chuckled slightly. “If she’s gonna be my cousin I wanna know her whole name.  So, lady teen, what’s your name?”

 “Seriously Mick? Lady teen? Ugh fine, my name is Eva Rozlyn Roberts. I prefer Roz though.” She looked between the guys and then around the disgusting living room. “So… um…. Where am I going to live? If I recall this place only has the 2 rooms and Vince and Tommy already share one of them.” She thought for a moment, *Honestly, I hope they say I have to share with Vince and Tommy. Sharing with Nikki would be nerve wracking.*

 “Seriously dude, it’s creepy how much you know about us. You can share the room with me and Vince. I know Nikki ain’t gonna wanna share.” Tommy said looking like a hopeful puppy.

 “I guess that works. I’m gonna need something other than my costume to wear guys. I can’t always walk around LA dressed as a character from Harry Potter.” Roz said.

 “Wait who’s this Harry guy?” Nikki asked frowning.

 Roz giggled, “He’s the main character from a series of books that started in the late 90’s. He is a wizard and goes to a magical boarding school. It’s my favorite series of books ever. Right now, I’m wearing the Gryffindor version of the Hogwarts uniform. I also have a time turner necklace and a replica of Newt Scamander’s wand.”

 Mick rolled his eyes, “ So let me get this straight. You just decided to dress like a wizarding school girl and then play with magical objects?”

 Roz’s face clouded over, “Well I was supposed to be going to a convention with my friend Katy. Bitch never actually picked me up. I was fiddling around with the time turner necklace while watching a movie. Then I was in a blue light and passed out. Seriously, magic isn’t real. At least it wasn’t until the time turner decided to spaz out and actually work.”

 Nikki smirked and asked, “Are you sure you’re not a witch? You’re already a time traveler. Why not be a witch too?”

 “Bro do you really think she’s a witch? That would be so cool!!!” Tommy turned to Roz and asked, “Do you think that your wand will work too?”

 Roz giggled, “That would be amazing, although I doubt it does. But damn is it getting late or what? Any chance we can go back over this after some sleep?”

 “Well Tommy show her to Vince’s bed. I think it would be hilarious if Vin came back while she was sleeping in his bed.” Nikki says lighting up a cigarette.

 Tommy turned to Roz, “I should have some sweatpants and a shirt for you to wear.”

 “Tommy I hope you’ve got some workout shorts because your legs are way to long,” Roz said as she followed Tommy. Tommy handed her some shorts and a t-shirt and pointed out Vince’s bed. “Thanks Tommy.”

  After Tommy left the room Roz shut the door and changed. She folded her clothes and stuffed them in the pillowcase, and she still wore the time turner and kept the wand in its sheath on her forearm. She laid down and her last thought before sleep claimed her was of how strange this all is.

[queakenstein]

Hello Queaky! Hope you are okay in this whole corona situation! Could you do Zelink where Zelda is stubborn daughter of president and Link is her personal bodyguard??

I’m doing fine and I hope you are too!! <3 Hopefully, you enjoy this! (sorry, it took so long to get it out, I had to rewrite it because I’m an idiot.)

__________________________

The music is swelling from somewhere below as her foot touches the cold ledge beneath the window she is sitting half-way out of. It’s some kind of jazz-y number that’s sure to get the crowd moving but it’s only making her dinner want to vacate her stomach. It’s reminding her too much of the fake smiles and obscene amount of cologne use. Zelda tucks the tastefully curled hair framing her face behind her ears and shakes off the other heel. Keeping in mind that she’s about three-stories high, she quickly decides that this dress is one of the worst decisions she’s ever made.

After all, she’s plenty used to sneaking out of ‘the palace’. 

“Uh?” A voice startles her. “Seriously?”

Zelda’s head shoots up and one of those curls lands directly across her nose. “This isn’t what it looks like!” 

Link, dressed in particularly formal attire for his usual jeans and a t-shirt loving self, blinks at her and drums his fingers against the two champagne flutes in his head. “So, excuse me for asking, Princess, but what exactly is it supposed to look like?” 

“I just--” A conversation drifts up on the night air and she stops. She knows what it will look like to others if they catch her and they definitely would not think it has anything to do with her sneaking out. She slips back in as gracefully as she can given the rather well fitting dress she has on and huffs. “I wanted to bail.” Zelda crosses her arms drops her chin to her chest. “You had to go and ruin it.”

Link scoffs. “So, it’s my fault?” He downs one of the drinks in a swift motion that almost surprises her had she not seen how well the man can take a double shot. “Not fair.” Link ponders the other glass for a moment before finally handing it over to her. “My job is to keep you safe. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t complicate the whole me-paying-my-rent thing by throwing yourself out windows.”

“I wasn’t throwing myself out.” She glares, swirls the liquid around with half a mind to attempt his maneuver before telling herself it would just make her vomit. “I’ve done this plenty of times. For most of my early teens.”

“Well, you’re twenty-two now. Don’t you think it’s time you learned to use the backdoor?” He leans against the wall next to the window she’s seated on and sighs, tiredly. “Listen, I know you hate this and, honestly, I hate it for you too. It’s not right what your dad is doing--”

“Is this the part where you tell the hostage that she just needs to shut up and deal with it?” Her tone doesn’t lend itself any particular viciousness but he can tell she’s angry. “Because, I really, really don’t need you to tell me to suck it up.”

Link bobs his head forward a bit. “Yeah, you kind of do.”

“Excuse me?” Zelda’s head snaps to him and she glares. “You wanna repeat that?”

“Hey, hey, hey.” He holds his hands up. “Listen! Just for a second and let me explain.” Link points to the party going on beneath them. “His term will be ending in just a couple months. I know you hate being his beautiful, smart, charitable little darling but if you can suck it up for just a bit then you’re free.” Link shrugs. “I know you hate being the figurehead that he has made you to be and I certainly know how much you hate the pressure of the fame... but if you just let me help you through this last stretch then... maybe it won’t be so bad.” He smirks. “And maybe you don’t have to climb out windows.”

Zelda rolls her eyes. “Easy for you to say, you own everything you have. I don’t. He has them all tied up with the promise that as long as I smile and continue on being  the sweet ‘princess’ Zelda who helps her father with all of his charities, who fights the good fight for the lesser people, who is beautiful, and smart but gracefully... and certainly not anything but this pure beacon of light... That I’ll have my classes paid for and he will help me open up my sanctuary.”

“You’d do those things anyway.” Link takes her empty glass from her and sits it down next to him as he slides down the wall to sit. “It’s not like you’re a raging bitch or anything.” He chuckles.

“It’s the pressure of perfection.” She manages to plop down next to him despite the protests of her dress and lays her head against his shoulder. “I don’t mind the other stuff but I have to always watch what I do or else it’s a bad tabloid.”

“What does it matter if there’s no more terms after this?”

“His stellar record and he has businesses he’d like to set up after this.” There’s a long pause while the two sit. Music and bits of conversations from those now milling about in the back garden carry to them on the air.

“So, where were you going to go after getting down from the window?” 

“There’s some stables down the road from here. Thought I might go down and hang out with the horses.”

“In that dress?”

“The plan was to get out. Everything else would just... file in later.” 

Link snorts. “You don’t have a change of clothes or anything in your room?”

Zelda laughs. “It took three people to get me into this dress. I had planned to sneak out for a little bit then come back for the finale--”

“Smelling like a stable?”

“Shh.” She covers his mouth. “So I could say good-bye then return to my room and rip this stupid thing off.” She removes her hand and drops it in her lap.

“I can help you know?” He smiles.

Zelda half gasps and half laughs. “Did you just use a line on me? No, thanks, I can get out of it on my own--”

“That’s not what I meant.” He levels an unamused expression at her then add, “Also, rude.” Link stands and holds a hand out to help her up. “I meant that I can help you get out of here for a bit.”

“Oh.” She blushes. “H-How are you going to do that then?”

He smirks. “The backdoor.” Then yanks her up hard enough that she comes off the ground and into his arms. Though she scrowls at him, he asks with a grin. “Tell me, honestly, though... you’ve never at least... you know, thought about it?” He lifts his eyebrows and laughs.

“You’re so gross.” She laughs, a sound that rings down the hallway, and pushes his face away from hers with one hand before snagging his chin to pull it back. “Wait,” Her face darkens into a deep rosey shade, “does that mean you have?!”

“Not if you haven’t.” He replies and puts her down so he can step away. “After all, wouldn’t be a nice story if the princess starts dating her knight...”

Zelda hums. “Maybe not.” She slips her hand into his and smiles. “But, maybe... if she were to go on a... trial date with her friend then it wouldn’t be so bad.”

“Well,” He squeezes her hand and let’s go. “We can talk about that after we get you through this party.” He motions for her to follow. “C’mon. One of the chefs is a friend of mine and I’m sure he will help us sneak out through the kitchen.”

“And how will we get into the kitchen without it looking super odd?” She indicates the dress she’s wearing. “Not exactly what one would wear in there.”

“Or for scaling walls but here we are.” They slip passed a group of attendees as they climb the stairs. No doubt they are all going up to the third floor balcony for all the beautiful group photo opportunities. It won’t be long before everyone beings to truly mill about the place save for the few very secure, private rooms. “We can merely say something about making sure the dessert is going well and just leave from there.”

“Why would I check that?”

“You know, you worry about everyone watching every move you make but, really, this sort of thing wouldn’t be all that weird. Aren’t you like... the co-host of this party?” He extends his elbow to her as they enter the hallway that leads into the main part of the first floor.

“You’re surprising clever sometimes, Link.” 

“I wish you’d tell me that more often.”

“Am I honestly that mean to you?”

He chuckles and shakes his head. “No, but you really do make this job interesting.” He glances at her out of the corner of his eye. “You know, if I were to take a very good friend out on a date... I think I would take her bowling.”

“Bowling?” She quirks an eyebrow at him.

“Yeah. Not something I think every girl who actually wears ballgowns about ten times out of the year has ever done... and I think she would have fun.” They are caught by a couple of officials which halt their progress but Zelda handles them as beautifully as she was taught. They avoid the ballroom and slip into the madhouse of the kitchen. Link’s friend spots them almost immediately and Zelda is shocked at the speed that he agrees to help them slip out. It’s as simple as them just exchanging quick cover stories and suddenly she’s out in the night air. Link approaches on of the guards playing with his phone on a golf cart and she watches as he slaps something into the man’s hand. “Come on, let’s go pet some horses.”

She climbs onto the vehicle and they’re off.  “I can’t believe it was that easy....” Dread and panic swirls in her stomach. “What if someone sees us drive off?”

“Night pictures and selfies around the property for your Nstagram.” Link smirks. “It is a beautiful night and perfect for that kind of thing.” He bumps her with his shoulder. “I think you get stuck on the big picture sometimes... and you forget to ask for help.”

She nods but refuses to agree, vocally. She likes being able to rely on herself. “How much money did you pay that man back there for this?”

“Oh, that wasn’t money.”

Zelda’s get wide. “Well... what was it?”

Link pats her head and chuckles. “Herbal medicine.”

“Link! Oh, my Goddess. You carry that on you? Don’t you know that’s illegal.” She takes a deep breath and then breathes out. “Holy fuck, how do you work for the government?”

“Because I can kill a man with my bare hands and there’s very few people in this world who can stop me without putting a bullet in my head?” Link doesn’t take his eyes off the road then scoffs. “Your father pays me good money to keep you safe, Zelda... and as much as he tries to keep your record clean... well, let’s just say that he makes a few exceptions when it comes to my employment.”

“I... I know he said you came with a stellar background and I’ve seen you fight before--Scary, by the way-- and I know he’s done some shady things... but are you telling me that one of your stipulations in your contract is that you can smoke pot?”

“Yep.” He laughs. “Also, bowling... would you be interested?”

“Still on about that?” She snorts and smiles. “Yeah, I’ve never done it before but sure... I’d love to.”

“As a date?”

She bites her lip. “Are we talking like... a romantic see where this could go kind of thing. Kind of date?”

“That’s what a date is, yeah.” He adds after a quick pause. “After all of this is over.”

“You’d wait a couple of months for one date?”

They arrive at the stable and come to a halt. Link turns to her and smiles in a very soft way. “I’ve waited a bit longer than that to ask you on one.” He takes her hand. “If you really aren’t interested in me like that then it’s fine. I’m a big boy and I’m fine hearing no.”

“I’d love to.”

“Oh!” He beams and lifts her hand up to kiss it. “Awesome.” Link slips out of the golf cart to help her down. “Now, come on, we’ll go see the horses for a bit and then hurry back.

[nothingeverlost]

Fic: Henry Gold (5/?)

Summary: Regina asked for Gold’s help in procuring a child, but when he held the wee boy in his arms he couldn’t give the child up.  Ten years later it’s Henry Gold who arrives in Boston, looking for Emma.

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3/ Chapter 4

A/N: Very Henry-lite, but . Emma meets Mary Margaret, a pregnant girl, and applies first aid.  More show dialog than past chapters.

II

"You had us all worried, Henry."  At Henry's request Emma walked him to school the next morning.  They were greeted in the playground by a woman with short hair who looked strangely familiar, though Emma knew that they'd never met.  "I'm glad you're safe."

"Thanks Miss Blanchard.  I have to go talk to Paige.  Bye Emma, thanks for walking me."  Henry was off before Emma had a chance to respond.  Ever since the call had come from Franklin's that it would be at least a week before her car could be repaired, thanks to a part that needed to be ordered, Henry had been much more relaxed. 

"So you're Henry's teacher."  Who happened to be the woman that Henry thought was her mother.  The mother who was, from the looks of her, the same age as Emma herself.  "I'm Emma.  I'm, uh…"

"His biological mother.  You're also the one that got him and Archie out of the mine."  Miss Blanchard shrugged.  "It's a small town, and there's not a lot to talk about.  News travels fast.  Also he apparently used my credit card to find you, or at least I assume that’s why a site called www.whoseyourmama showed up on my bill."

“I don’t have much experience with small towns.”  She wasn’t used to people knowing much about her, either. She was more used to stolen credit cards, but hadn’t realized that Henry had inherited that talent.  Was stealing hereditary?  If so he came by it honestly.

“Sometimes if can be really wonderful, having so many people know you.  Sometimes it can feel lonely, when it feels like nothing ever changes.”  She shrugged.  “I’m afraid I have to take some of the blame for yesterday, and for you being here.”

“Because of the credit card?”  Emma wondered if Henry would have still run for the mines if she had never been in the town.  If he had would he have found a way out?

“Because of the book.”  Mary Margaret looked to the corner of the playground where Henry was sitting and talking to a little blond girl.  It was the first time Emma had seen him with a kid his own age.

“You’re the one that gave it to him?”  That was weird.  Or maybe it made sense. She gave him the book so maybe seeing her as one of the characters was logical, for a ten year old.  And if his teacher was a character in the book then he’d just started naming other people too. “Why?”

“Henry is a very special boy, so smart and creative.  But he’s also very lonely.  Perhaps because of who his father is, or because he’s so clever he’s never been very good at making friends.  I thought the book could help.”

“How does a book make him less lonely?”  For a moment she was back on the bed in one of her group homes, walkman playing music through her headphones and a book in front of her.  She knew what lonely felt like, but her books and music had been a shield, not a solution.

“What do you think stories are for? These stories are classics. There’s a reason we all know them. They’re a way for us to deal with our world. A world that doesn’t always make sense to adults, let alone ten year old boys.”  Mary Margaret sighed.  “What’s the first fairytale you remember someone reading to you?”

“I didn’t get a lot of storytime.”  There had been a family once, that had almost kept her, but then they’d had a child of their own.  She’d tried to forget most of that home; it made the rest of them harder.  “I remember sneaking into a theatre to see Hunchback of Notre Dame once.” 

Mary Margaret bit her lip, looking a little like she wanted to cry.  People raised in happy homes with parents usually assumed that everyone else had the same.  “I gave the book to him because I wanted Henry to have the most important thing anyone can have. Hope. Believing in even the possibility of a happy ending is a very powerful thing.”

Emma was grateful when the bell rang and kids started running for the building.  She didn’t want to know what Mary Margaret’s next question might be.  

“It was nice meeting you, Emma.”  Mary Margaret offered her hand, but before Emma could shake a bird landed on her finger.

“Yeah.”  Maybe Henry’s stories were getting to her too, because for just a second she could understand how Henry could look at his teacher and see Snow White.  “I’ll see you around.”

II

“Are you okay?”  All she’d wanted was a cup of coffee, but she’d barely managed a sip before spilling it on her shirt.  The diner’s owner had directed her to the laundry room of the bed and breakfast next door to clean up.  Now she was faced with a very pregnant and very unhappy pregnant teen that reminded her way too much of herself.  Well, except for the lack of a prison jumper.  

“Last night, I felt contractions and the doctor said that the baby could come any day now.”  She rubbed her belly, one hand resting on it even when she poured bleach into the washing machine.  Apparently the sheets weren’t supposed to be pink.  Emma remembered waking to find her hand on her belly, feeling the movement inside and forcing herself to move her hand, wrapping it around the metal frame of her cell bed.

“Ah.”  What could she say?  Labor was scary and painful, but being that pregnant wasn’t comfortable.

“It’s just that, um, when the… When the baby comes, no one thinks that I can do this. No one thinks I can do anything.”  She looked down at her belly.  “Maybe they’re right.”

“Forget what they think, what do you think?”  She didn’t let herself think about what it what it would have been like to keep her kid.  It hadn’t been possible and it wouldn’t have been Henry’s best life.  She’d made her only possible choice, but that was her.  “What do you want for you and what do you want for this kid?”

“I’m nineteen.”

“A year older than I was.”  And from the looks of her not living on the street at least.

“When you had a kid?”  The girl frowned, as if it had never occurred to her that someone else might have been in the same boat. 

“Yeah. Everyone loves to tell you what you can and can’t do, especially with a kid. For me the right choice was adoption but I was the only person that could make that choice.  You’re the only one that can decide for you.”  Hopefully the mayor wasn’t still looking for a kid.  The idea that she could have been Henry’s mom was still unsettling.

“You don’t understand.  Sean’s father…”

“Doesn’t get to make decisions for you.”  She didn’t wonder where this ‘Sean’ was.  Clearly he wasn’t interested, nor was his father grandparent material.  “You just got to punch back and say, ‘no, this is who I am.’ You want people to look at you differently? Make them. If you want to change things, you’re going to have to go out there and change them yourself, because there are no fairy godmothers in this world.

II

“Gold?”  Emma was restlessly wandering the kitchen, trying to decide if she wanted hot chocolate or a drink from Gold’s decanter when she heard him come down the stairs.

“The alarm from my shop is going off.”  He wore an overcoat and a scarf.  She’d taken the trash out earlier and it had been see-your-breath kind of cold.  That was more than an hour ago.

“Did you want me to come with you?”  Apparently small towns didn’t have security patrols that answered alarms.  So far as she could tell they had one sheriff, and that was about it.

“No, it’s probably just a stray cat trying to get someplace warm.  I won’t be gone fifteen minutes.  Henry’s asleep, I turned off his lamp before I came down.”  He glanced up the stairs.

“Don’t forget gloves,” she suggested before going back into the kitchen to make hot chocolate with cinnamon.  Just thinking about being outside made her cold.  She drank her chocolate while wandering the rooms, looking at the photos on the walls and the odd trinkets.  There was one display case that held nothing but a teacup with a chipped rim; she wondered if the chip made it more or less valuable.  There were pictures of Henry all over the place, one tops of tables and hanging on the walls.  She lost count of how many bookcases there were; Henry’s room had a couple as well.  Gold probably did too, though she hadn’t seen his bedroom.

Emma was washing out her mug when she glanced at the clock and realized it had been more than half an hour since Gold had left, twice the time he’d expected to be gone.  If it was a false attempt to enter the shop he’d be back already; they were only five minutes away.  She slipped her phone out of her pocket and dialed his number.  It rang five times before going to voicemail.

“Crap.”  The way she figured it she only had one choice.  She called the sheriff to ask for a ride.

“Gold?”  She didn’t have a gun with her but she was fast and she was sneaky.  She had the door to the shop open before Graham caught up to her.

“Potential crime scenes are in my job description, not yours. You should let me go first,” Graham suggested.

“Habit,” she said with a shrug, scanning the room.  “This is not that different from what I do.”

“Professional thief?”  There was a hint of humor in his voice that was probably inappropriate but almost made her grin despite her worry.  If anything happened to Gold Henry would be inconsolable.

“Sort of the opposite.  I’m a bail bonds person.”  At least that was part of her job.  She did some bounty hunting as well but that was a little less official and she was talking to the local law.

“Not something we’ve ever had much use of around here.”  There was no one in the main room of the shop so together they moved through the curtain to the back.  Gold was on the floor and he didn’t look like he was moving.

“Shit, shit, shit.”  She turned on the switch, flooding the room with light.  Gold’s chest rose and fell so that was something, at least, but he didn’t flinch at the light.

“I’m going to check out back.”  Graham headed for the door.  Emma knelt next to Gold and looked for injuries.  When she rolled him to his back his hair fell to one side and revealed a bloody gash near his temple.  She didn’t know if the fancy squares in his pocket were supposed to serve any purpose but they were the first thing she grabbed to staunch the blood.

“I hope 911 works in this place.”  She’d never lived in a town small enough to wonder before.

“Don’t bother on my account.”  Gold struggled to sit up but Emma’s light hold on his chest was enough to stop him.  She didn’t realize at first glance how bloodshot his eyes were.

“Slow down there, champ.  Bleeding out on your own office floor is going to make for a pretty embarrassing story.”  Emma frowned.  She should probably ask him some questions or something, but the whole ‘do you know who the president is’ thing never made much sense to her.

“Bleeding?”  His hand went up to his head, fingertips coming away sticky and red.  “I must have hit the corner of the desk when I fell.”

“You fell?”  Graham closed the door when he came back in, and the lack of a draft made the place feel warmer.

“Must have been an uneven patch on the floor.  I should have turned the light on.”  This time he did sit up, wincing a little as he did so.  

“There wasn’t anyone else in here?”  Graham looked skeptical, which was fair because Emma knew that Gold was lying through his teeth.  It was the first lie she’d caught him in.

“No one but me and my shadow.”  He grasped for his cane but didn’t try to stand.  “Thank you for your service, sheriff, but it was a false alarm.  I’m sure Ms. Swan won’t mind driving my car home and you probably should get back to a warm bed somewhere.”

“I could follow you home just to be sure,” Graham offered.  He seemed to be reluctant to leave.

“We’ll call if we need you.”  Gold sat perfectly still until Graham was gone and the sound of the front door closing meant he’d left the building.

“Are you going to tell me now why you were lying?”  Emma stood and held out her hand.  After a moment Gold held on firmly and let her help him to stand.  She didn’t comment on the fact he’d needed help, or that he leaned on the cane more heavily than usual.

“I’d rather wait until we’re home, if you don’t mind.  I don’t like leaving Henry alone in the house.  If you wouldn’t mind locking the back door, please.”  He limped towards the front without waiting for her reply.  She made note of the fact that the lock was pretty crappy and there was a pane of broken glass that she would bet anything wasn’t broken an hour ago.  Calling it locked was a joke, really. The front door at least had a bolt.

“So are you going to tell me now?” she asked when they were back at the house and she’d run upstairs to check on Henry.  He was still sleeping.  Gold was patting his face dry with a towel, his jacket off and his sleeves rolled up.  “Do you need a bandaid?”

“It’s fine,” he said dismissively with a wave of his hand.  “I’m having a drink, would you like one?”

“I’d like the truth.”  She took the drink, though, when he led her out of the kitchen and into the library.

“There was someone in my shop tonight.  A young woman that clearly needed help; she was quite wound up, not acting like herself at all.”

“And she hit you?”  Who in the world broke into a pawn shop and stole things?

“No, no.  She used pepper spray on me, threw me off my balance.  I really did hit the desk.”  He touched his wound lightly with a couple of fingers and winced.  At least it wasn’t bleeding.  “I’ve never seen her like that before.”

“You know her?”

“She’s a client, of sorts.”  He paused for a moment to sit on the sofa, raising his leg to rest on the ottoman.  “You see, Emma, there’s no lawyer here in Storybrooke.  I’m rather good with contracts, and sometimes people come to me for help with deals.  Ashley Boyd sought me out a few months ago.  She’s a young girl, only a year out of high school, and there’s a babe on the way.  Neither her family, such as it is, or the father are helping her.  She wanted to discuss options.”

“You were brokering an adoption?”  She had a sinking suspicion that she knew exactly who he was talking about.  It couldn’t be a coincidence that she’d talked to a young pregnant girl hours ago about ‘punching back’ and a young pregnant girl had broken into the shop and assaulted Gold.  Great.

“I was.  There’s a couple here in town, actually, that has been trying for years to have a child.  They have a nursery ready and names picked out.  I have a keen interest in helping families find each other.”  He glanced towards the hall and the staircase going up to his son’s room.  “She never seemed happy but she was relieved that someone would love and raise her child.  Perhaps reality is setting in now that she’s so close to having the baby.  She was raving about changing her destiny, and something confusing about godmothers.”

“Where is she now?”  Shit, it was the same girl.  And a family that might not get a baby they’d been waiting for, but if Ashley wanted her baby she deserved that chance.  Either way someone was going to lose.

“I don’t know.  She lives at the bed and breakfast and doesn’t have a car.  Her parents are both dead but there’s a stepmother.  I didn’t want to send the sheriff after her, she doesn’t need a record for one confused moment, but we should find her.”

“In the morning.”  She frowned, and wondered again about his wound.  “Are you sure you don’t need to see a doctor?  How do you know it’s safe to go to bed?”

“I’m far too stubborn and thick-headed for a little bump to cause any problems.”  He downed most of his drink in a single gulp.  Maybe the drink helped, because he was more steady on his feet when he stood and left the room.  Emma was about to follow when her phone rang.  It was a Maine area code.

“Hello?”  She hadn’t given her number to anyone except Gold and the guy at the repair shop.  It was a weird time to be calling about her car.

“I just wanted to be sure you made it home safely.  No ill effects?”  The sheriff’s voice was easily identifiable.

“Are you really conscientious or really bored?”  She didn’t bother asking how he had her number.  She was curious why he’d gotten it.

“Actually I have an ulterior motive.  I have discretionary funds in my budget for a deputy, and since your job isn’t that different I thought you might be interested.”

“I’m only in town for a week.”  Less than that now, but she wasn’t counting the days.

“Are you sure?  I can offer you dental, as well as donuts.  The hours are flexible and the boss is easy to work for.”  He laughed, and Emma found herself smiling.  She couldn’t say yes, though.  She had a job and a life in Boston.  Well a job at least.

“Donuts, really?”  She couldn’t think of anything else to say.  

“Sometimes the cliches are true.  I know a place that makes really good donuts.  Maybe I can show you, even if you’re only staying a week.  And maybe you’ll change your mind about staying.”  He reminded her of Henry for a moment.  “Anyway the offer’s genuine if you change your mind.  Both the job and the donuts.”

“Thanks.”  She couldn’t accept the job offer, of course, and it probably was a bad idea to go out with Graham even if it was just donuts.  Donuts could easily mean coffee too, and then they were heading into dangerous pseudo date territory.  This time next week she’d be in Boston.  Leaving behind Henry would be hard enough without making friends with more people.

Emma drained her glass and carried it into the kitchen before heading up to bed.  She deliberately didn’t check in on Henry before closing her bedroom door.  She didn’t need it to become a habit.

[the-coolest-mallard]

Stealth Operation | Team Sabotage

@urchinxowens @justkeepdancing-nemo @oliversaluki

The boys sneak into the Hunted Deer and make a mess.

URCHIN

The light had faded and night was upon Swynlake. Everyone was asleep in order to build up energy to go back to work the next day. Everyone except Urchin - because he had summer holiday - and hopefully Louie, who Urchin was actually waiting for at their rendez-vous point a block away from Main Street.

Urchin sported his best spy gear which… well, consisted of a black turtle neck sweater, balck jeans and a black beanie that worked very little because his curls were overpowering it more and more by the minute, cascading out of the headgear.

With him also came a large cardboard box with air holes punctured on top. The boy sat next to said box and checked his phone, waiting for his partner in crime to arrive!

LOUIE

Ordinarily, Louie never got rid of his signature green. However, the plan they had was going to require stealthiness. So he also had dressed in all black. Black skinny jeans, black t-shirt, black leather jacket he found around the house. And of course a beanie as well, pushing down his own fantastic hair.

Louie had only one hand free to use (the other in a cast thanks to his genius moped moment), but he utilized his hand as best he could. He brought along with him some spray paint that he’d found at home, as well as some eggs both sort of put together in a bag. He’d feel a little bad about wasting the eggs but…there were a ton of things to toss at Gaston and he was gonna use all of them.

He made his way over with a grin, glad that he managed to find friends who were up for taking matters into their own hands. “Hey Urchin. Listen, I invited Ollie along too. He had some fun ideas for sabotage and stuff which is great and you know…I’ve only got one functioning hand so. Go team.”

OLLIE

Ollie kind of knew this was a bad idea but at the same time why not mess with someone who deserved it. Besides a little egg never hurt anyone and if he was there he could probably try and keep everyone from getting into too much shit.

So he had printed out harmless things, well not that werewolves were harmless but it was a prank that was harmless and his of choice.

Plus it was good to pull his leather jacket back on, pull the dark beanie on, and get out of the house from the crying baby.

It wasn’t hard to find the two other boys. 

“What’s up?” Ollie stated softly dropping to curb beside Urchin. 

URCHIN

“Woah, what happened to you?” Urchin couldn’t help but ask, gesturing at Louie’s arm. He didn’t look like that the last time Urchin had seen him, now did he? In any case, Ollie rolled up soon enough.

“Oh, hello! So it looks like we’re ready, huh? I’m honestly glad we’re not on our own, because I didn’t manage to get any raccoons,” he admitted, patting the cardboard box. The pat made the animal within wake up, though, because it had begun moving. 

“I… got the next best thing. This is Felicia. She’s the cat who always tries to get into our kitchen,” the boy explained. “She’s ferocious. Should give our big dumb friend a headache when he tries to take her out of his business tomorrow.”

NEMO

Nemo had never snuck out of the Hollow before. 

In the end– it had been kind of easy. He just waited for his father’s light snoring, put on one of his black dance hoodies, flipped up the hood, and then, quick and quiet as the wind itself, flit from outside his bedroom window.

He had to stop first at the Raccoon Hole to see if he could round up reinforcements. Course, he was no animal fairy and his Beast was seriously lacking, but as soon as he flashed the gold of his pixie dust, they were in. Raccoons loved all things shiny– kinda like magpies in that way. With his new comrades in tow, Nemo flitted fast as he could and tried not to think about how he had used up more than half his dust by the time he finally got to town. 

He walked the rest of the way, hood up, skirting from shadow to shadow until he saw what he thought were the three boys he had never met before. His steps slowed, hands going into his pockets, heart rapid-fire, though from his flying or nerves he didn’t know. He swallowed and put on a big grin, sauntering forward. 

“Um– hey! Are you erm, Louie, and Ollie and…?” he blinked. He didn’t know the other bloke. “Um. I brought Blueberry and Denise!” He blurted and pointed at his raccoon mates. 

They chattered and lifted their paws in a friendly wave.

LOUIE

What had started as an awful day had quickly turned into something incredible. He had gathered three other boys to do something important: sabotage the old geezer Gaston. It was the perfect union, with every one pitching in the best of plans (and one fantastic fairy delivering the raccoons of destiny). He almost forgot about the wrist, though he held it up with a sheepish grin. “Crashed my moped. It happens. Won’t get in the way of awesome though.”

And this was truly awesome. Ollie was there, Urchin brought a CAT! And then finally, the other hero of the night Nemo there with the raccoons! Who needed brothers for mischief when you could make friends like these? “Mwahaha,” Louie cackled quietly, rubbing his hands together because this was better than he could have imagined. “Team Sabotage…we’ve come together this dark night to take down an old man’s ego.” He glanced over at the cat and the raccoons. “I welcome Felicia, Blueberry and Denise to our super good cause.” 

He turned toward his fellow conspirators, the smile only growing on his face. “Urchin, Ollie, Nemo…you guys are the best of the best of the best with the coolest ideas. And I’m excited to pull off this mission with you. But first…we should probably have a sort of escape plan. My moped’s trashed so we can’t take that quick exit.”

OLLIE

Ollie really wasn’t quite sure what he was getting himself into at this rate. There was a cat and two raccoons? They couldn’t be too much damage? Or too dangerous. Either way Ollie was going to make sure they didn’t get into shit. Or try to.

He just lifted a hand in a greeting.

“I can double back and get my car? It’s kind of noticeable for the small town so I don’t know how much of a good idea that is for stealth.” Ollie mused with a shrug. “We gotta worry about cameras too and what not. I’ve never been so I don’t know what’s there but he’d be even more stupid not to have some sort of security.” Leaning forward Ollie rested on his knees trying to think of all the necessary things.

URCHIN

“Urchin,” the boy quickly said when the stranger asked for his name. Eventually, he managed to associate each person with their names, and smiled at the small collective of revenge-getters.

“Uh, we should probably try to stay out of very visible areas as much as possible, then,” the curly-haired boy pointed out after Ollie’s statement. “We can also ask the raccoons or the cat to disconnect anything we can find, if that’s even possible… and if anyone can talk to them.”

He stood up from his sitting place and grinned. “In any case, he’s getting what he deserves! So destiny will probably thank us for it or whatever. We will probably not even get grounded because of how much everyone probably dislikes this guy.”

NEMO

Nemo’s eyes flicked imperceptibly to his pocket. Tucked inside was his pixie dust pouch-- and in another world, Nemo would pull it out, grin bright, and show them all how to use it. Why need a moped when you could fly anyway, right? 

But if he ran out of pixie dust, he’d never get home, and his dad would wake up and see he was gone, and he’d totally flip and Nemo would be grounded (literally) for the next forever. 

He felt guilty, but he kept his hands in his pockets, fingers around that pouch, all to himself. 

“Erm, I can’t-- explain electronics to them,” he said, rolling from the balls of his feet to his toes and back again. “My beast’s not that good and they’d definitely not listen. But um, I can fly in before hand and maybe turn ‘em off?” 

LOUIE

“You can fly?!” Louie blurted first, instantly putting Nemo up there on the list of coolest people he’d ever met. That was awesome! He’d met this other guy who could fly once (Peter) but they hadn’t really spoken much since the incident at the ice cream shop. Nemo though, Nemo seemed like a super cool dude. So did Urchin and Ollie really. Immediately in for the world’s best sabotage team.

“Good idea on the security front too...hmm. If the car’s not the best option and the raccoons can’t tell...yeah okay. Here’s the plan,” Louie started, and honestly he wasn’t one hundred percent sure they’d just listen to him on this but what the hell. Act confident and like you’re the best option and eventually others will believe you.

“Nemo will fly in and turn off the security. From there he’ll call in the racoon pals to trash the place and the cat too. Phase two’ll be us swinging in there to egg the place and spray painting it. The werewolf pics will have to be more carefully put so they’re phase three. Ollie, you seem pretty like...responsible and shit, are you up for keeping watch? Make sure that the cost is clear?” 

OLLIE

Well if Ollie had to have a title of being responsible, you know what he was okay with that. The more he thought about it the more he worried about it he was. This wasn’t New York where you could get away with shit because no one paid attention to you. This was Swynlake where anything that could go wrong would go wrong.

Call him boring. He was not getting tossed into jail for this though even if he could bail himself out. 

“Honestly yeah I’m good with just keeping watch.” Ollie stated simply. “You guys can do all the trouble and we can make a simple signal that someone is on their way. Three knocks in quick sucession or something like that. So you know don’t be too loud in there.”

URCHIN

Urchin was disappointed they couldn’t tell the animals to do everything for them, mostly because it’d have been so cool, but the plan seemed solid either way. He listened intently to Louie’s words and tried to picture it in his mind - it’d probably involve a fun montage of crudely-drawn caricatures of the boys doing all the things if it were a TV show.

“Great! I think we’re all set, then,” he announced, picking up the box Felicia the cat was in, which shook almost uncontrollably as it was picked up. “Evidently, Felicia’s ready to move, too.”

NEMO 

Right-- that meant he actually had to fly. 

Instantly, Nemo got self-conscious, his hands fisting deep in his hoodie pockets. So dumb-- it wasn’t like they were gonna see his wing or anything. It just kinda felt like...well, his pixie life was in the forest and his human life was here in Swynlake. He’d never been in his pixie form here.

But Louie beamed at him. Nemo wanted to help. He didn’t have any other choice. 

“Er, okay. Yeah-- okay then, I’ll um-- do that!” said Nemo. His eyes flicked back to Louie and his smile dropped as fast as it jumped onto his face in the first time. “Uh, now right? I should do that now?” 

LOUIE

“Hmmm….the knock’ll work once we’re all in there, but I think Nemo you’ve gotta give us a bit more of a cue.” They’d be close by, but not too close, obviously. They couldn’t exactly be spotted by the cameras or anything. What would work better for that? “How about...Nemo you can do like an owl call or something. Hoot or something once you’ve got the cameras out of the way.”

He glanced around the group of misfits, a smile slowly lighting up his entire face. This was the kind of thing he lived for. Bringing together some cool kids to cause trouble for a man who absolutely deserved everything they threw his way. This was going to be the best. “Yeah okay. Nemo first uh huh. But maybe demo your call or whatever so we know what we’re listening for. But then yeah. Fly like an eagle or something.”

OLLIE

Ollie nodded, more than fine taking a step back. He wasn’t ever the leader type. It just wasn’t in his bones. So he listened to the plan. What an interesting group he had found himself in. Pushing himself into a standing position Ollie stepped back from the box with a potentially unruly cat. 

“Are we gonna make code names at his rate?” Ollie joked. “Eagle one, Eagle Two. If I had to pick a dude and what not.”

URCHIN

Urchin frankly loved the idea of getting code names, but he wondered if he’d start confusing them. “Okay, okay,” he said. “But I want memorable code names. Otherwise, I’m gonna confuse everyone, honestly.”

He looked around and at the rest. They all seemed ready and eager to start. The box shaking in his hands seemed to imitate his own anxiousness to get started. “Not to hurry us up or anything, but if this cat manages to escape the box there’s no way we’re getting her back in. So, let’s make sure she does it once she’s inside, and pronto.”

NEMO

The idea of code names distracted Nemo from his erratic, buggy jitters firing off in his belly. He brightened up-- especially at Eagle one, Eagle two.

His hand shot up into the air. “Dibs on Eagle One!” he preened. He grinned wide, shooting the grin from one boy to the next. 

He’d always wanted to be like an eagle-- strong, intense, fierce. Fast. 

He then cleared his throat. “Erm, okay how about somethin’ like--” and he whistled sharp and loud, the sort of call he had mimicked before from the animal fairies. 

It made Blueberry and Denise startle, then perk up on their hindlegs and wiggle their noses in the air. 

LOUIE

“Alright great. Nemo’s Eagle One. That’s good. Hmm… Ollie can be Hawkeye or something you know, cause he’s keeping watch.” Louie probably wasn’t any better at this code name thing, but he could sure try. “Urchin you’ll be 007. You’ve got the whole look down. Leaving me with…” he hummed, debating for a long minute. “Rebel Leader.”

He jumped a little at the whistle, knocking into Urchin a bit and patting his shoulder as his form of sort of apology. “Okayyyy. Yeah. Good. That’s good. Eagle One...you’re clear for take off,” he added, grinning like an idiot and giving them all the thumbs up. This would be amazing. Team Sabotage was ready to go. “The rest of us, we gotta chill, till we hear Nemo. Alright?”

OLLIE

Ollie couldn’t help the snort of laughter as all the code names. He had been teasing but he was glad they took him seriously. It made him feel more like they were part of a group than he had in a long time. Sure he couldn’t be sure everyone had each others backs but it felt like they did.

Blinking at the animal call Ollie nodded. “Hard to miss but it should blend in.” Ollie mused with a nod. “Have any of you guys pulled off anything like this before?” Ollie questioned already starting to glance around and make sure he took his task seriously during the whole time.

URCHIN

Urchin grinned at his code name. It was probably the best one out of all of them, so he certainly didn’t complain. He did jump a bit when Louie knocked into him, but was quick to regain his balance and smile as a silent way to tell him not to worry.

“And chill we shall,” the boy declared. He put down the box for a few seconds and made sure his cap was on correctly, and then shrugged at Ollie. “I mean… You know what they say, there’s a first time for everything, right?” he said, grinning.

NEMO 

First time for everything. 

Wasn’t that the truth? 

And Nemo-- Nemo was excited, especially as he glanced around at these other boys’ grins. It gave him the jolt of confidence he needed. He dug his hand back into his pocket and this time he pulled out the pixie dust pouch. “Okay! Okay okay, I’m um, I’m goin’!” he said as he skipped back, gathering a little bit of air on his heel that helped him glide. “Oi, Denise, Blueberry, follow me!” He took out a pinch of pixie dust, tossed it in the air, and leaped into the golden cloud-- 

In an instant, he was a small blur of orange and gold, zooming sharp as a rocket toward the Deer. The raccoons chattered and followed after him, their black and gray hides disappearing into the shadow. 

It didn’t take long for Nemo to fly all the way up to the Deer’s thatched roof. He skittered around the panels then found the chimney and dived down into it.  The raccoons, meanwhile, took the long way round and clambered up the gutters. Their claws scratched against the pipe work and the roof tiles. 

Nemo emerged into a dark, dim, silent pub. It was actually a bit creepy how quiet it was-- Nemo used to humming cicada and whistling crickets and the wind, always there, murmuring into his ear. There was no wind here. The air was still, so still it felt-- dead. Dusty. Nemo didn’t like it and he scrunched up his nose before zooming on. 

He found the cameras and scrambled on top of one, where he had to stop and rest. His little wind fluttered weakly and his lungs burned from all the effort of it. Breathing heavily, he drew his hands through his hair once before resecuring the hood over his orange hair. And then, squinting through the dark, he yanked hard on the tiny switch below the flashing red button. It didn’t budge. Nemo grimaced. This was the downside of being so small sometimes. He yanked again and again and the plastic rubbed against this tiny hands. And then one more time--

Nemo yelped as the switch gave way and he nearly toppled off the camera. His wings fluttered frantically and righted him again. 

This was way harder than it looked. 

It took him another five minutes to get the other three cameras all turned off, and then Nemo landed in a tired heap on the ground where he pinched out some pixie dust to help him return to his human-form. Nemo put his hands around made his call then and skipped over to the door to open it up for the boys when they arrived. 

He poked his head out. “Coast all clear!” he announced. Something smashed behind him and Nemo giggled. “I think that was Denise.”

LOUIE 

The mission was going off without a hitch. Nemo went for it, and the rest of the boys had a little while before they could be called in. “You know, I pull stuff like this with my brothers...but they’re usually too them to want to go for something really interesting.” Well, Huey more than Dewey, but it took some nudging to get them to want to cause some serious trouble.

But soon he heard the call, and he gestured for Ollie and Urchin to follow him as he rushed over to the entrance of the Hunted Deer. “Nice one Nemo. Your heroics will be remembered forever.” He carefully stepped into the building, holding onto a can of spray paint. It was time to mess up this newly prettied up place. Yesss. “Okay. Ollie, stick by the door yeah?” This teamwork was seriously going to rule. He’d never have a shot at something this good without them.

Louie moved toward the nearest wall, shaking the spray paint he had and considered it carefully. This would be his artistic masterpiece. “I know we should probably be beyond the immature dick art, but Gaston is one...so is it really so bad?” He considered the wall carefully. “Guys? Ideas on what we should put on the walls? It’s gotta be good.” He started ‘Gaston is a dick’ on one part, figuring it was both true and fun to write. The rest...well. He could probably paint something fun.

OLLIE

That wasnt that reassuring. People having only done this for the first time could be dangerous. Sure ollie hadnt spray painted or edges someone's place but he liked to think his own excursions in New York would count for it. 

He didn't technically have a criminal record at least. (Not that he hadn't ever been caught but because people took pity on him as a kid)

But that's almost why he was starting to feel responsible for the group of boys. He didn't want any of them to get in trouble for this. At least trouble they couldn't get themselves out of. 

Crossing over to the door Ollie nodded his head giving Nemo a heads up. "Okay you guys do your thing. I'll let you know if someone is coming. Stay as quiet as you can with you know Denise and everyone breaking things so you can hear if I have to give you guys a signal." 

URCHIN

Loud meowing followed Ollie’s instructions, totally being louder than intended, as Felicia finally found her freedom when Urchin unsecured the box and let her out. Immediately, the cat started running and hopping around the place, uncertain of her location, and had already knocked down a pair of bottles from behind the bar. That’s what Urchin would call a resounding success!

“Uh - Draw him!” Urchin suggested. “Except make his nose a dick,” he added, because hey, dick drawings were in like 50% of graffiti, right? It felt like a crime not to do it.

NEMO 

Nemo started giggling.

He’d never done anything like this before. It was like somethin’ outta a TV show, y’know, something he might watch at Roo’s house during one of his rare sleepovers. He didn’t realize this sort of thing happened in real life. That kids really did go out and-- and teepee places, and mess up houses, and use spray paint and markers and all sorts of things. 

He felt a little guilty, but it was a feeling as fast as a blink. Mostly he thought about how pissed his dad would be if he knew. Not only was Nemo breaking a whole handful of Marlin’s rules, but he was doing that in Gaston’s pub. 

He made a grab for a can of spray paint. “I’ll draw dicks on all the booths!” he announced and then scurried off to do so. 

Meanwhile, there was more glass-smashing as Denise and Blueberry had their way with the storage room. 

LOUIE

Never was there a better group of boys than now. He was sure of it. “Dicks on the booths yesssssss. Great idea Nemo!” Louie was delighted by the whole thing. And Urchin coming out with a dope drawing idea. Oh yeah. Louie would make Gaston as ugly as possible.

He smirked, taking one of the spray paint cans (a wonderful green) and studied the wall before him. “Good call good call. Alright, while I do my masterful art of Gaston….Urchin, put up those werewolf pics. Scare the pants off of him when he goes anywhere!” 

He started spraying a sort of rendition of Gaston. If Gaston were more of a blob person with a dick nose. What? He was still working on improving his art. Maybe he’d bother Lou Bonfamille for more lessons. For now? Well he added some extras like a fart cloud by his ass and a speech bubble by his mouth saying ‘no one farts like Gaston’

Then he took a step back to admire his work. “What do you guys think? Pretty good right?”

URCHIN

Urchin nodded and saluted before heading off to do as ordered. He gathered the expertly-crafted werewolves and began making rounds about the place to find locations for optimal scare factor. 

He decided to place the first one under the bar, hiding so that you’d only be able to see it if you were on the bartender’s side of it. The next one hung right by the bathroom doors, so you’d round that corner and piss your pants off on your way into the bathroom. That, of course, meant that he had to also set one up within the bathroom in place.

After setting up the rest in the general vicinity of the bar, the boy returned just in time to admire the drawing on the walls. “Perfect,” he commended. “I’m sure he’s going to love it.”

NEMO 

Nemo got to work on the drawings, giving the spray cans a good shake. It took him a few seconds to get a handle on the paint-stream, but once he’d got it down, the dicks were pretty easy. He went booth to booth and spray painted them big across the seat, though he made sure to switch it up a few times, y’know, vary the size and direction and all-- artistic license. He knew it was all a bit silly but, well, he couldn’t get Louie’s compliment outta his head. 

He thought Nemo was cool. And brilliant. And that he had great ideas. 

And sooo… Nemo wanted to show off. 

He jogged back over to Louie and tapped him on the shoulder. “Hey, Louie, I ah-- I got an idea. Wanna see somethin’ cool?” he said. 

And then Nemo drew his hands together, palms flat. And then, in one quick motion, he folded his fingers in one after another after another, then back again, until he had gathered a swirling ball of wind in his hands. 

And then Nemo shoved the heel of his hand across the palm of his other one, pushing the blast of wind out--! 

It blew out the napkins outta the napkin dispensers on several of the tables. “Nice, right!” He said, jumping up and down again. “I can do a windmill and probably knock everything over!” 

LOUIE

Louie was easily distracted from drawing something else spectacular (maybe Gaston cowering before a werewolf or something) by his new friend Nemo. He twisted around, watching the guy carefully as he gathered wind into his hands and knocked napkins out of this dispensers.

“Holy shit, you’re the avatar!” Louie blurted and then grinned. “Sorry. It just looks like something out of a cartoon.” He glanced around to see that Ollie was still properly keeping a look out, and that Urchin was placing the werewolf stuff. And wow he picked great spots.

“Nice move by the bathroom mate. Hilarious.” This was the best bunch of guys he’d ever met. They’d be bound together by a common bound of mischief with this. Maybe he’d get them to make some sort of pact. Or something. “Okay. I’m gonna draw one more thing. Nemo...definitely knock shit over. That’s fantastic. Everyone do one last ridiculous thing and then we’ll get the fuck outta here. Ollie...you do something ridiculous too. Come on. It’ll be worth it.”

OLLIE

Ollie was perfectly fine chilling by the door. It wasn't like there was anything to scare him out here. The only thing that worried him was that some random adult would see them wasn't he an adult too. Was he supposed to be turning people in for their hijinks. 

"You guys look to be doing perfectly fine." Ollie mused with a small laugh stepping back for a moment. "Plus I'm more musically inclined then I am artistically." Even with Gaston being a douche ollie doubted himself. Not that either one of his parents would care if he had to guess what they would think. 

"Wait this place has a kitchen right? What about saran wrapping most of the stools together or something?" 

URCHIN

Urchin was happy to be complimented for his ideas. Everyone else was doing pretty great too, which made him even more satisfied! After Ollie’s suggestion, though, the boy’s eyes seemed to outright gleam in delight.

“Ooooh, yes! He’d probably use that wrap to attack some deers and hang them on his wall or something evil like that anyway,” Urchin said, and immediately bolted into the kitchen. He took a while but trashed the place while he looked around, and Felicia even helped unintentionally by walking in and finding some leftovers on a counter.

Eventually, Urchin found a roll of something that people would likely use to wrap up take-out. “Here we go!” he proclaimed, tossing the few rolls he’d found out onto the main sitting area of the bar for the others to pick up.

NEMO

While they waited for Urchin to appear, Nemo did his fairy best too. He could feel the slight draft from the chimney where he’d flown down as well as the slightly open door where Ollie was standing guard. It was always much easier to play with already-moving air and so he splayed his fingers wide and gathered it in his hands. Once he’d rolled it all into a ball, he pushed it toward the booths and the mini wind-funnel skirted over the tables, skittering one after the other. Napkins blew from the dispensers and the salt and pepper turned over and got all over the table and seats. 

Then Urchin came back and Nemo’s smile leaped back onto his face. He jumped up and caught it. “Nice!” he crowed and then went to work saran-wrapping everything together.

He forgot all about the guilt he’d felt earlier-- the slight panic, that stray thought whispering what would happen if he got caught? Now, all he was thinkin’ about was how fun this was. 

Soon they finished, all the saran wrapped up. “Are we done?” Nemo said as he popped up, going back to Louie’s side since he seemed-- well. He was in charge, wasn’t he? He bounced a little on his toes, ready to perform a few more wind-tricks if he needed to. 

LOUIE

Louie glanced around the room, looking at all the chaos around them. They had done a spectacular job on sabotaging the place. He was honestly impressed by everyone’s initiative. He needed to keep a note of this. From this day forward, if there ever was a guy that wronged one of them, Louie felt they had the perfect solution.

“I’d say so. We’ve definitely made a mess of the place. Suck it Gaston,” Louie added, as if the man was around to hear it. Well...maybe he’d just write it. No. They’d done a good job without that. “Time to make a hasty exit. Ollie, look and see if the coast’s clear? From there we get the hell outta here. We’ve done important work lads. I’ll never forget it.”

OLLIE

Ollie let out a laugh, so many of his ideas had been thrown to the literally as everyone took it and ran with it. A part of him felt bad until he remembered it was Gaston and he didn’t feel bad anymore. Ducking his head out Ollie listened to everything around the place.

“We’re good to go. Remember what happens at the Deer stays at the Deer.” Ollie teased ushering the guys out. “Let’s get out of here.”

[spunky-89]

This is a special birthday one-shot for @bbparker! Happy Birthday!!! Sorry it’s late in the day. I wanted to make sure it was perfect for you :)

I chose the prompts ( They all blended so seamlessly that I had to use them all :D ) “Did you just miss  skip out on your own birthday party?” “Wasn’t much of one to be honest” and “Just blow out the candles already you dork.” and  “What did you wish for?” “You.” 

Word Count: 2k+

You had been feeling pretty bummed out. Another year, another birthday, another big show for your twin, the favored child. It wasn’t even halfway through the party when you decided to bail. It wasn’t worth your time and there were plenty of places you’d rather be than at a party with people who didn’t even notice you existed. You took to the streets, no real destination in mind, just enjoying the bustling life of New York City. You were still in your party outfit which was not exactly practical to walk around the city in, but here you were. Your house was too far from the lavish hotel the party was at so going home to veg out with snacks and Netflix was out of the question. For now at least.

As you were meandering, you notice a familiar red-suited figure jumping from building to building. You smile as you watch him. You hadn’t told him it was your birthday, nor that your family cared more about your twin than they did you. With Peter, you pretended that none of that other life existed. You were just (Y/N/N), a teenager with a superhero boyfriend, not (Y/N) (L/N), the unwanted child.

You were sure he hadn’t seen you as he flipped by, which you were thankful for. You currently were uninterested in having to explain why you were dressed up and walking around the city.

You made it maybe a block before your phone started vibrating in your hand. You looked down and smiled at the contact picture. It was you and Peter while you were curled up in his room. He was holding you from behind with his chin on your shoulder, making a funny face at the camera.

“Hello?”

“Why are you walking around Manhattan all dressed up?” He asked as soon as you picked up.

“Hi (Y/N/N) how are you.” You mocked his voice, “Oh I’m good honey, what’s up?”

“Haha very funny. Seriously though,” He pushed, “I didn’t miss a date or anything right?”

“What? No, no. I’m just… I don’t even know. It’s all good though. Don’t sweat it.” You try to placate, feeling bad for making him worry.

“I will sweat it if I want to.” He said. You could hear rustling on his end, which made you wonder what he was doing while talking to you.

“Shouldn’t you be more concerned about saving the citizens of New York?”

“I am worried about the citizens of New York, you just happen to be the citizen of New York I am currently concerned about.” He said.

“Don’t use my words against me.” you pouted.

Next thing you know Peter popped up next to you, dressed in his civilian clothes with his backpack on his back.

You jump in surprise as he shows up. He laughs and hangs up the call and takes your hand in his.

“So are you gonna tell me why you're dressed up and walking through the city?”

“I just ditched a birthday party,” you said blankly.

“Oh, who’s birthday?” He asked, trying to make light conversation.

You wanted to lie to avoid having to explain, but it was Peter. He was so sweet and kind and he had no idea how much that little comment stung. Of course you know it shouldn’t. You didn’t tell him about your birthday because it has always been a sore subject. But hearing him ask that sent the pang through you because it was normal for the people closest to you to forget it was your birthday.

“Mine.” You said shortly. When he stopped walking in shock you continued, letting go of his hand and hurrying his pace. Some part of you hoped you could get far enough away to avoid questions. You knew it was mood-point but… You heard his steps running to catch up with you and pull you to a stop.

“What do you mean it was yours?” He seemed really put off.

You just shrugged and scuffed your shoes on the concrete a bit as you stared at the ground, avoiding his kicked puppy look.

“Did you just skip out on your own birthday party?”

“Wasn’t much of one to be honest” you mumbled.

“What do you mean it wasn’t- you know what. I don’t care. Come on.” He said taking your hand in his again and walking with purpose towards… somewhere.

Eventually, you realized he was leading you to Stark Avengers Tower. You hesitate and try to pull him to a stop. He does and looks back at you with a raised eyebrow and cocked head. He really was like a puppy, you thought.

“Uh, I don’t- I mean am I- its just-”

“Don’t worry about it, they’re all gone on a mission right now anyway. Just trust me.” He smiles. You hesitate but nod. You feel like you’re committing a crime as Peter leads you into the Tower and past the front desk with a smile and a wave to the lady sitting behind it. You soon get to the elevator and he presses a hand to the scanner and it opens for you.

“Good afternoon Mr. Parker, Ms. (Y/L/N).” An automated female voice says. You look shocked at your boyfriend.

“How does it know who I am?” Your voice squeaks out.

He laughs and smiles at your complete awe and weirdness about all things Avengers.

“I asked Mr. Stark to make sure you were in the system in case of emergencies. I wanted to make sure you get somewhere secure if someone ever found out your connection to me or if another attack on the city occurred.” He said.

“You did that for me?”

“Of course,” He smiled and kissed your forehead.

Soon the elevator, which you hadn’t even realized was moving, came to a stop and the doors opened. In front of you was a massive wall of windows and a living room big enough to fit a small mansion in it.

“Holy…”

“Yeah, it’s pretty crazy right.” He said as he walked into the room and took a right turn. You were too awestruck to notice he was no longer next to you. You walked around the room in a daze, taking in the details of the space.

“Babe! Come here real quick!” Peter hollered from somewhere behind you. You turned to see him poking his head out of a hallway. You headed in his direction and followed him into a kitchen. It was massive and looked like a crazy hybrid of an industrial kitchen but also extremely elegant. Which was not all that surprising when you remembered you were in Tony Stark’s tower.

Peter was pulling things out of cabinets and the fridge while looking at a big tablet thing of some kind.

“What are you doing?” You asked.

“Well if your birthday party sucked so much you ditched it, I’m gonna make up for it and we’re gonna make a cake with whatever we find in this kitchen and then we’ll do whatever you want to after. I don’t have a gift cause I didn’t know it was your birthday but I’ll make it up to you I promise.” He said smiling at you.

“You don’t have to do this Pete, I’m fine really.” You said.

“It’s not fine. It’s your birthday and you shouldn’t even have to make your own cake but I also don’t trust myself to not to burn everything so I need supervision.”

You laughed and joined him in the making of a cake.

It was hours later, the two of you and every inch of the kitchen were covered in all kinds of ingredients and icing. But you were laughing and having fun for the first time in years on your birthday. You had a cake that was iced and if you squinted it kinda looked like it said ‘Happy Birthday (Y/N)’ but the letters were questionable at best. Your nice party outfit had been completely ruined with sticky batter and icing but it was very worth it in your eyes. The two of you were laughing, music playing in the background, as you were trying to clean up. Well you were, Peter was trying to distract you. He just kept hugging you from behind and trying to get you to dance and then kissing you if his other tactics weren’t working.

“Peter!” You laughed as he grabbed you from behind again and pulled you away from the counter you were cleaning.

“It’s your birthday, you shouldn’t be cleaning.” He whined.

“Well someone needs to clean it before the people who actually live here come back and see this place in disarray.” You stated.

“Nope. I’ve tried playing nice but you’ve forced my hand.” He said as he picked you up effortlessly and threw you over his shoulder.

“Peter Benjamin Parker put me down!” You yelled and laughed at the same time.

“Nope,”

He ran out of the kitchen with you and into the living room.

“Where are you going?” you were still laughing. That was one of your favorite things about Peter, he could make you laugh no matter what.

After an elevator trip up a few floors and him running down multiple halls, you ended up in a bedroom. He plopped you on the bed and then flopped on top of you. The two of you laughed a little more before settling down. You laid there for a while, running your fingers through his hair as he laid on top of you.

“So I didn’t want to ask earlier but uh…”

“Why did I ditch my own party?” you asked for him.

“Yeah,”

“Well, I never really told you about my family and all cause honestly I like to pretend they don’t exist. But I have a twin, and they’ve always been more loved by our parents. So birthdays kinda suck for me as they get all the attention and I’m lucky if I get a mention and a fifth of the gifts. So this year, I didn’t feel like sticking around the (sibling’s name)’s show.” You explained, not looking at him but just continuing to run your fingers through his hair.

“Well, I promise you will never have a shitty birthday again as long as I’m around.” He said, leaning up, bracing his arms on either side of your head.

You smiled up at him and as you were going to kiss him, you licked a bit of icing that was left on his cheek.

“We should clean up if we’re going to lounge around.” You said with a giggle.

“You shower in here and I’ll grab some clothes to change into then I’ll use one of the guest showers.” He said pecking your nose.

Once you were both showered and you were dressed in one of Peter’s old t-shirts and a pair of boxers the two of you were curled up on the couch in the main room watching Netflix. You ordered take-out for dinner and spent the night with your favorite person. It was the best birthday you’d ever had. At one point Peter got up and got your cake and after a suspicious amount of time came out with candles burning and singing ‘Happy Birthday’ really off key. You giggled as he set the cake on the coffee table and finished the song with an excessively drawn-out note.

“Our cake looks like a five-year-old made it,” you said after he finished.

“Just blow out the candles already you dork,” Peter said with a shake of his head.

You smiled and did as told blowing out the candles.

“What did you wish for?” He asked

“You.” You smiled.

“You already have me.”

“And I hope I never lose you”

He picked you up off the floor and gave you a kiss that was sweeter than any cake.

“I love you so much.” He said staring at you in awe.

“I love you too.”

“Happy birthday (Y/N).”

“It’s the happiest birthday I’ve ever had, so thank you.”

“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you,” he said, giving you one more lasting kiss before the two of you gorged on the cake you slaved over and fell asleep cuddled up on the couch with the television playing through the night.

[stayextrafrosty]

Rhythm of the Rain

Request: The reader is feeling horribly homesick in the middle of a tour and one evening she sneaks away before a show to sit by herself in one of the venues loading docks to watch the rain. She leaves her phone in the green room. Patrick can't find her, and for some reason thinks the worst. So, the guys and crew members, are looking high and low for her. One of the guys stumbles upon her and in the end, Patrick is relieved to see her. Worried fluffy?

Warnings: none

Words: 1894

Masterlist

-

The thunder pulled me out of the world of my book. It must have been really nasty outside for me to hear it inside the venue and through my headphones. I wondered if they guys were going to postpone this show. Fall Out Boy cared about the fans and their safety. Of course, they did come from Chicago where the weather could be hellish at times.

The lights flickered above me. I pulled out my phone to check the weather radar. How long was the storm going to last? There was a giant yellow blob over the area, but it seemed to be moving quickly enough.

I smiled to myself. We got this kind of weather pretty regularly back home. I wonder what it’s been like for the last few weeks? I missed it, honestly. This was my first real experience away from home for longer than a week. I was finally getting on my feet and my little apartment was cozy. Of course, I still ended up at my parents occasionally for several days at a time.

There was a knock at the door and I turned my head to check who it was. Patrick stood there smiling at me. I ginned back. I don’t know how I got so lucky. We’ve only been dating for a few months so when he asked me to come with him on this tour I was hesitant. I was worried I would just be in the way.

“Got your nose in another book?” He came and leaned over the back of the couch. I rolled my eyes at him.

“Hey, my method of escape is healthy. No judging,” I said, pretending to be offended.

“Not judging. Just stating the obvious, babe.” I blushed at the pet name. He was a dork. “You feeling ok? You’ve been quiet,” he asked. I shrugged.

“Yea. Just feeling a bit homesick is all.” Patrick nodded and leaned down to kiss my forehead.

“I understand that. I can get you a plane ticket home if you’d like? I know these tours can get long.” He looked a bit sad, but I know he’s being serious. It wasn’t his fault I was feeling this way. I wanted to do this. It was just rough right now.

“You don’t need to do that. I want to be here. I want to support you.” Pink dusted his cheeks.

“Thanks, I appreciate it, (Y/N). But don’t hesitate to let me know if you wanna go home.” I nodded and smiled at him. “Alright well I have to make sound check. I’ll see you in a bit,” he said, kissing my head again. He hurried out of the room. My phone buzzed in my hand. A message from my younger sister.

How’s traveling with the famous band? Amazing I bet…

It’s fun! But I’ll admit I do miss home… How’s everything there?

It’s sunny and warm for once! Mom and Dad are out to dinner right now. I finally get the house to myself

Oh, so you’ll sit in the living room on your computer rather than your bedroom or mine?

Shut up!

I laughed at my sister’s struggles. We were unbelievably close, but I understood the want to be alone. Of course, I wanted nothing more than for her to be here with me. Give me some semblance of normality. Maybe I just needed alone time like her. I had spent every day with the guys and the crew for the past few weeks. Just a break from people.

I set my book down and stood from the couch. I looked down at my phone again before putting it on top of my book. Some real alone time.

I wandered the halls of the venue. I could hear the soundcheck going. They were in the middle of “Jet Pack Blues.” I smiled at the change in set list. They hadn’t played it in a long time. It was one of my favorites off the record.

I continued on and noticed one of the doors out to the loading dock was open. I pushed the door completely open, looking around. There didn’t seem to be anyone here. I watched as the rain poured down outside. Someone must have forgotten to close the dock.

Lightning flashed across the sky, but the accompanying thunder didn’t come for almost ten seconds. The storm was moving on. I sat on the edge of the dock but far enough inside, so I wouldn’t get wet. I didn’t need to get sick.

The rain came in waves. Lightning flashed every minute or so but even that started to slow down. I started seeing birds again. They would land and try to shake off the water, but it would be useless. I noticed another land in a puddle and begin playing in it. I smiled to myself.

There was a bird nest outside my bedroom window. Whenever it rained, the mom would come back for shelter and to keep her young warm. I would watch the mother care for her babies. It was adorable really.

I tugged my legs up to my chest and rested by chin on my arms. I did miss home.

-

Patrick P.O.V

“Hey Trick! Where ya off to,” Pete asked, a slight smirk on his face. Why does he feel the need to make me wanting to spend time with my girlfriend weird?

“Same place I always go after soundcheck, Pete.” He put his hands up in a surrender position. They actually all liked (Y/N) a lot.

“Leave the poor guy alone,” Andy said, slapping Pete on the back. I rolled my eyes at them and hurried back to my girl. This was the first time I had invited a girlfriend to travel with us. I noticed that whenever we did tours, it always put stress on the relationship. But she was homesick and maybe the slight stress would have been better than taking her away from her family.

I pushed the door to the room open. I looked around for her, but she was nowhere to be found. I frowned. Where did she get off to? Probably just the bathroom. I can just wait.

I waited. But after five minutes I was getting worried. Restrooms were right down the hall. She left her phone and book. I stepped out of the room and grabbed one of the stage crew.

“Hey, have you seen (Y/N)?” They thought for a minute. I suppose not all the crew knew her.

“Sorry, Patrick. I haven’t.” I thanked them anyway and walked down to the bathrooms. I was going to knock on the door but figured that’d be weird. I couldn’t go in there. Thankfully a woman walked by. I asked her to check the bathroom for me, but still nothing.

“Where did you go,” I mumbled to myself. I hurried to the room we usually spent our time before the show in. The guys were talking casually about something that happened on twitter or whatever.

“Guys, (Y/N) hasn’t been by has she?” I tried to sound calm.

“No, why? She’s usually with you,” Joe said. I tapped my fingers on my leg, a nervous habit.

“Well, I can’t find her, and she doesn’t have her phone.” They looked between each other.

“Maybe she wanted some alone time? I bet you’re getting worked up over nothing. I’m sure she’s fine,” Pete pointed out. My shoulders relaxed a bit. He was probably right, but…

“She usually leaves a note or texts me when she does that though. That’s why I’m worried. And no one else has seen her either.”

“We can help you look but I agree with Pete. She’s probably fine.” Andy was the first to stand. I sighed in relief.

“Thanks guys.”

-

Your P.O.V

The rain had finally slowed to a drizzle. Fans had started showing up around the venue. Some in ponchos or jackets.

I should probably get back soon. Soundcheck is probably ending. I don’t want Patrick to worry. I stood and stretched my arms. I wiped my jeans off.

“(Y/N)!” I jumped at the voice. I turned and saw Joe pushing the door open and waving to me. I raised an eyebrow.

“Hey, what’s up? Soundcheck over?” He looked at me and ran a hand through his hair.

“Uh, yea. It’s been over for almost an hour now.” My eyebrows shot up. No way was I sitting here that long. “We’ve been looking all over for you. Patrick is out of his mind right now. Thinks you up and bailed.”

“Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t know I was here for that long. I didn’t bring my phone,” I said. Joe half laughed.

“Yea, well. Let’s get back and stop Patrick from turning the place upside down.” I nodded as we hurried back to the main area.

-

“Patrick, relax! I’m sure she’ll turn up before the show starts.” Pete was trying to calm him down when we walked in.

“Hey, look who I found,” Joe said, getting the others attention. Patrick whirled around to face me. His hair was messy from what I assume was him running his hands through it. Relief relaxed his body and he rushed over to me.

Patrick pulled me into a hug. I returned it silently, feeling him relax against me. I pulled away and rested a hand against his cheek.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to worry you.”

“Where did you go? I swear I checked everywhere.” He took my hand in his and pressed a light kiss against the back.

“I just wanted to watch the rain. I found a loading dock that was left open. I thought I would be back before soundcheck was over.” He sighed but still smiled at me.

“I thought you had left the venue. Like you got sick of spending time with us or something,” he said, half joking. He might have said “us” but I could hear the implied “me.” I shook my head.

“Never. I’m having a great time. I promise.” I smiled sweetly. “The rain just reminded me of home. Even I need alone time,” I joked.

“I suppose we gotta tell the venue people to not leave loading docks open anymore,” Joe said. We all chuckled.

“They’re not supposed to leave those open anyway,” Andy pointed out. I rolled my eyes at them. Patrick adjusted so he could wrap his arm around my shoulder.

“Not that I need to know where you are at all times, you obviously can go wherever you want, it would just be nice if—”

“He wants to know where you are at all times,” Pete said, cutting Patrick off.

“Oh, shut it, Pete,” he scolded. Pete smirked and slapped Patrick on the back before heading off. Joe and Andy shuffled off after him, leaving Patrick and I alone.

Patrick’s face was dusted with a light blush. I smiled and kissed his cheek. I know he was worried. I really shouldn’t be running off without telling someone where I’m going anyway. If only so they don’t leave me here.

“I’ll try to remember to leave a note if I decide to wander off.” He glanced over at me briefly. Just as shy as ever.

“While I appreciate that, just ignore what Pete said.” I laughed.

“Don’t worry, I usually do.” Patrick laughed along with me.

[prettyfunkyunorganized]

Sugar Daddy Hanzo

I WROTE 14 PAGES OF THIS BULLSHIT AND IT’S ALL BASICALLY SETUP!!!! No sex, no full kisses, just some light tension that will hopefully make you say, ‘Just bone down already!’ 

Fuck me. Sorry, y’all. 6,500 words of Hanzo reader-insert. I hope you enjoy! Break in the middle cause it’s long AF.

EDIT: OMFG I’m the worst friend ever!!! This whole business world AU is based on my bud @watch-your-grammer ‘s post here. She’s glorious and so is her work.

The rest of the story: pt two, pt three, pt four, pt five

“This place is packed,” you muttered to yourself, squinting at the beautiful restaurant around you, “but I had no idea there were going to be this many people here.”

“Oh stop being a baby,” your friend Lori snapped, rolling her eyes at you and shoving you toward the party. You glared back at her.

“What, I’m not allowed to be surprised,” you grumped.

“You were complaining,” Lori said, letting out a dramatic sigh, “as usual. Being a crabby bitch because you’d rather be hiding at home than out at an amazing party. As usual.”

Ever fiber of you wanted to snarl something fierce back to your ‘friend,’ but wouldn’t that just prove her right? And besides, you were better than her jabbing bullshit. Most of the time. Instead, you just took a deep breath and headed to the bar.

“Yeah, go get a drink,” Lori snorted, “we all know you can’t do anything social without liquid courage.”

“Yup,” you sighed, wrestling down your anger, “you know me. Just a complete booze addicted social shut-in. It’s not like I have a job in which I interact with people every day and drink responsibly on the few occasions where I do drink.”

“What was that,” Lori said, evidently not quite hearing your snarkiness.  

“I said, uh, look, isn’t that your man over there,” you lied.

Loir perked up, grinning as she saw her sugar daddy, Hanzo. “Damn right that’s my man,” she purred.

“Uh-huh. So you going to go hang with him or – “ Poof! She was gone without another word. “Thank God,” you grumbled.

For the next few hours, you were a good little party goer, making a point to chat with everyone you knew and even managing to meet a few potential colleagues –  Overwatch had some of the most remarkable people working for them! What you wouldn’t give to be involved . . . A night basking in the glow of this incredible company would have to be enough, though. For now.

While in the midst of a conversation with an interesting British woman and her lovely girlfriend, an announcement was made that the first course would be served soon, making everyone scuttle about to find their seats. You were tucked toward the back with the rest of the lower-tier guests, which was just fine, but much to your surprise, Lori and her impeccably dressed beau were already there waiting for you. The striking man looked up as you approached, but your friend couldn’t be bothered as you awkwardly sat beside them. Could she be any more . . . handsy? Even Hanzo seemed a little off-put, gently pushing Lori into her own seat and off his chest.

You nodded and gave your best smile as Hanzo straightened his tie. He dipped his head in response.

“Way to interrupt,” Lori pouted at you.

“Um,” you said with a raised brow, “sorry I didn’t want to just be standing around as they served the salads?”

“Whatever. So selfish,” she said, putting her pointy nose in the air and crossing her arms. Hanzo gave her a slightly confused look.

“Is this woman not a friend of yours,” he asked.

“I mean, I guess. Sorta,” Lori replied, seeming a bit surprised by his question.

You were taken aback. Sure, the two of you weren’t besties, but hearing Lori say that was still hurtful. You’d bailed her out of work mistakes a million times, you had sat through hours of her ridiculous sympathy-earning stories, and you had taken looked after her in the midst of hangovers or Plan B store runs too many times to count. That had to be more than ‘sorta’ friends, didn’t it?

Or you were just her doormat friend.

That seemed most likely.

You squirmed sheepishly as you realized just how much Lori had been using you, Hanzo watching you all the while, only making things worse.

“Either way,” he said standing up, “a bit of candor would do you well. You treat people like shit, and you are likely to end up alone. I would know.”

Hanzo turned and began to walk away, Lori scrambling to grab his arm before he got too far. “Babe, wait! Where are you going? Aren’t you sitting with me?”

“No,” he said flatly, pulling away from her tight, desperate grip effortlessly. “This is a business function, and I have much to attend to. Should I have a moment to spare and the desire to spend it with you, I will let you know.”

His stride was long, powerful, and purposeful as he crossed the room to one of the front tables – right in the limelight. Despite his appearance and grace, you couldn’t quite understand why Lori was so infatuated with him. The guy was kind of a dick. A vaguely disapproving expression came to your face as you watched him walk away.

“The fuck is that look,” Lori hissed, making you jump in your seat.

“N-nothing,” you faltered.

She had a ferocious glint in her eyes. “You shouldn’t even be looking at my man, but especially not like that!”

“Look, Lori, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you,” you said scooting away from her.

“That man is a god, you got that? Perfection! Do not look at him like he’s anything less than that,” she seethed. Christ, you’d really pissed her off.

You tried not to laugh, you really did, but you couldn’t help it. “A ‘god,’ Lori? Seriously? That’s just weird. And unhealthy. Putting anyone on a pedestal like that is . . . a lot. Too much. Unhealthy, even. Maybe you should think about this thing you’ve got with Hanzo.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Lori growled, grabbing your arm so hard you winced. “You don’t have the fucking right to even speak his name! Never talk about him like that again! Never!”

“Okay, okay,” you said softly, eyes wide, trying to calm her down before even more people started to stare at you. “I will never say anything like that again, honest. Just, take a breath, will you?”

“Fuck you,” Lori growled, nearly dislocating your shoulder as she tossed your arm back toward your body.  

The salads and main course came painfully slow, you staying silent the whole time as Lori fixated on Hanzo like an addict. All the other patrons at your table were giving the two of worried glances, and you gave them tenuous shrugs in response.

“Leave it to Lori to ruin my night. Again,” you whispered. Once people began to mill around for another round of drinks before dessert, you were quick to hop up and avoid Lori. Thankfully, no one else seemed to be dwelling on your friend’s outburst, and you were able to settle back into a more relaxed mood. Sipping a mint julep helped, too.

While the night was going better, you were still feeling drained before long, as if the crowd of people had sapped the life out of you, but there was some kind of dark chocolate torte coming so, of course, you were going to stay. You just needed to hide somewhere quiet for a few. That should help.

Hopefully.

It took a bit of looking, but you managed to find a little hallway in the back of the restaurant with a fancy loveseat. The spot was probably meant for storage space, but you didn’t mind. The music wasn’t so loud here, and a large fern kept you shielded you from anyone who might be passing by. As you sunk into the firm seat, a soft hum slipped from your lips. “God bless alone time,” you moaned, absentmindedly running your fingers along the velvet of the small sofa.

You weren’t sure how long you had been sitting there, and you couldn’t care less, but then a sudden flash of movement in the corner of your eye made you look up. Hanzo stood a few feet away from you, scanning the little room carefully, his posture the same as a child looking for a place to hide a broken vase.

To be honest, he was a kinda cute like this – slightly disheveled and sorta shaky. It was nice to know he wasn’t always so composed and presentable.

The moment he saw you, Hanzo jolted and quickly straightened his back, but his face wouldn’t cooperate, a slight pinch stuck in his strong brow.

“Forgive me,” he said with a tense bow, “I did not mean to disturb you.”

“You haven’t,” you said with a small smile. “I didn’t mean to catch you off guard.”

His frown grew, and he cleared his throat. “You did not, I assure you,” he said curtly.

You covered your mouth in an effort to hide your smirk – probably best not to anger the newest Overwatch partner. Hanzo ran his fingers through his hair and shifted his weight to his other foot. He looked a little like a lost puppy, unsure of what to do next.

“Were you looking for a place to avoid everyone, too,” you asked genuinely.

“I, well,” Hanzo fumbled, his body somehow going even more rigid as you watched him.

“No judgment if that’s the case,” you said leaning against the wall and taking a drink from your glass. “That’s why I’m here. Being in a room with that many other people always starts to grate on me after a while.”

“I shall leave you be then,” Hanzo said understandingly, moving back toward the party.

“No, no! I didn’t mean it like that,” you said, a flush coming to your face. “I didn’t mean to sound rude. I’m sorry. You’re more than welcome to join me if you need a break. There’s not a more secluded spot here – I checked.” You patted the seat beside you and scooted closer to the wall so there would be a more acceptable distance between the two of you.

There was still a hefty amount of hesitance in Hanzo’s appearance, but after a moment he rolled his neck and joined you. He all but flopped onto the seat, rubbing his face and letting out a deep sigh.

“Are, uh, are you alright,” you asked after a few minutes of silence, Hanzo merely sitting there with his eyes closed and his body almost frighteningly still.

“I will be,” he huffed, streching and giving you a momentary glance. “It has been a long time since I was at a gathering like this and it seems I have lost my ability to . . . endure this sort of thing.”

“Understandable,” you said with a small nod, taking a drink from your glass. “I felt the same way when I got this new job in public relations. Went from a quiet little cubicle to schmoozing. Ugh.”

Hanzo turned to you as you made that disgusted noise, chuckling at your grimacing face. “If you do not like the position, why did you take it?”

You shrugged. “It was upward movement, and isn’t that supposed to be a good thing? Besides, it’s not like I loved the cubicle gig. I guess I’m trying to test the waters, see what fits and what doesn’t, what I like and what I don’t. Unfortunately, it seems like I’ve been finding a lot more of the latter recently, but good lordy I’m rambling,” you laughed, brushing back your hair. “Sorry. You came back here for a reprieve from the socializing and here I am yapping at you.”

He shook his head and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “There is no need to apologize. I asked, after all. Your answer was not all that long either. In truth, I appreciated the honesty it in. If I had asked anyone else here that same question, they likely would have launched into a lengthy description of their resume and career goals in an effort to obtain a better job. Your admittance that you are unsure of what you want is . . . refreshing.”

A wily smile crossed your lips. “You get a lot of brown-nosers?”

“Brown-nosers?” Hanzo’s thick brows were pressed into a long, furry line. Ah hell. He was pretty damn handsome – not handsome enough to warrant Lori’s obsession, but still. Damn.

“Yeah,” you said, forcing yourself out of your momentary stupor, “brown-nosers. Have you never heard that term before?” He shook his head, and you smacked yourself in the forehead. “Whoops,” you giggled, going bright red.

“What is it,” Hanzo pressed, clearly intrigued.

“It’s just a stupid saying.”

“It seems like the colloquialisms will never end,” he muttered. “Go on, tell me then.”

“Um,” you wavered, “it basically means someone who tries to sweet talk you, saying and doing little things to make you like them.”

“Like when someone tries to ‘butter you up,” Hanzo asked, taking the whole conversation way too seriously.

“Yes, exactly,” you smiled, hoping that would be the end of it.

“Why ‘brown-nosers’ then?”

Dammit.

You groaned, biting your lip to keep from smiling any more. “It’s vaguely vulgar.”

Hanzo scoffed. “I am not a young man, miss, I am sure I can handle whatever this is.”

“Alright,” you snickered. “Ever heard the expression ‘he’s kissing your ass?’”

“Yes,” he said slowly, still not making the connection.

“Son of a – okay. So let’s say you go to literally kiss someone’s ass, can you imagine where your nose might go? And how it might get, well, brown?”

“Good lord,” Hanzo sputtered, his whole body twisting away from you as the visual took form in his mind. He grimaced, maybe even shuddered, and you burst out into laughter.

“Holy cow, I’m crying,” you coughed out, still trying to stop giggling.

“Well I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself,” Hanzo said in a somewhat pouty tone.

“You shoulda seen your face,” you giggled.

The man’s head slowly turned, revealing a glare that probably should have been terrifying, but the red tint in Hanzo’s cheeks was precious, so you just grinned back.

“I tried to warn you.”

He kept glaring, but his shoulders softened a bit. “I suppose you did.”

“You basically insisted! Was I just supposed to say ‘no’ to the fabled Hanzo Shimada? The man, the myth, the legend: Hanzo Shimada?  I think not.”

A devious smirk suddenly crossed Hanzo face, and you took in a sharp breath. He was both frightening and alluring, looking at you like that. Mostly alluring. “What a little brown-noser you’ve become! A filthy habit. Quite unbecoming of a young woman such as yourself.”

Was . . . was he joking with you? Well, that was flattering as fuck! You beamed, shaking your head and snorted in amusment.

Hanzo was chuckling too, which you took to be an immense compliment. It was probably wrong to be feeling this giddy around your friend’s sugar daddy, but she was a shitty friend so . . . too bad?

As if on cue, Lori’s fanciful dress came fluttering into view. Sloppily.

“Oh no,” you whispered, your face falling flat. She was drunk. Very drunk.

“Lorelai,” Hanzo said, pursing his lips.

“Hey schnook’em,” Lori cooed, tripping over to his side and tumbling into his lap. Hanzo recoiled as her bony body hit a particularly sensitive spot.

“What are you doing,” he growled, setting Lori onto the seat in the middle of you.

“Looking for you, sexy,” she said groping his upper thigh. Hanzo instantly slapped her hand away. Lori slumped, rocking backward involuntarily and noticing your presence. “Uh, what the actual fuck are you doing here?”

“Just chatting,” you explained, knowing Lori would jump to the worst case scenario, “nothing more.”

“Why do you got to say ‘nothing more,’” she seethed.

You rolled your eyes. “Look, I’ll just go, how about that?” With a strained smile to Hanzo you stood and began to walk away, but Lori grabbed your wrist.

“Oh no you don’t! You are going to tell me what the shit you’re doing sitting by my man. And gimme that drink,” she spat, tearing the glass from your hand.

“Perhaps you have had enough, Lorelai,” Hanzo said with an annoyed drum of his fingers on his shapely forearm.

“What’s one more,” Lori shrugged, trying to lean in for a kiss, but she was only greeted with empty air as Hanzo stood up to get away from her.

“It’s just cranberry juice,” you explained to him, “it’s probably a good thing for her at this point.”

“Thank goodness someone still understands the concept of responsible drinking,” Hanzo said, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,” Lori barked.

The frustration in Hanzo’s voice was palpable as he stared down at Lori. “You’ve gone too far, yet again. At a company function, no less.”

“Fuck this company bullshit,” Lori scoffed, “let’s go back to your place, have a little fun!”

She leaned directly for Hanzo’s crotch, and your eyes darted to the ceiling uncomfortably, but you could still see Hanzo jump back.

“Enough,” he snarled. “I have told you time and time again that is not what I want from you! Just go home, Lorelai, and try not to embarrass yourself any more on the way out.”

“I’m not leaving yet,” she snorted, “I’m having a great time! And you haven’t even danced with me yet.”

“Nor do I have any intention to, especially when you’re like this,” Hanzo said.

Lori’s attention went back to you. “Are you trying to get with my man?”

“What,” you gaped, “no! Lori, of course not! I’m not like that. I know how much you like him.”

“You lying sack of shit,” she growled, “I’ll fucking kill you!” Lori’s manicured nails were suddenly coming at your face with incredible drunk accuracy.

“Calm down, Lori,” you begged desperately, wrangling her arms to her sides. Rather quickly, she lost her strength and began crying weakly into your neck while Hanzo looked on in stunned horror.

“She’ll be fine,” you mouthed to him. “Now that she’s crying she’ll be out in like half an hour. It always goes down like this.”

“You say that as if you have seen this before,” Hanzo said quietly, angry lines forming on his forehead.

“I have,” you shrugged, patting Lori’s back halfheartedly. “You want me to take her home?”

“No,” Lori whined, trying to wiggle away from you, “I don’t wanna! And I’m mad at you! Stay away from my man.”

“But if I take you home, I’ll be away from Hanzo,” you said sweetly, toying with Lori’s alcohol-riddled mind. She fell for it, nodding weakly and letting you sling her arm over your shoulders so you could walk her out.

“What a mess,” Hanzo sighed as you tired to steady your wasted companion. “You should not have to be the one to look after her.”

“I got it,” you said with a half-smile. “Not the first time, won’t be the last. It was nice meeting you, though. Hopefully you won’t end up remembering me as just your sugar baby’s party mom.”

“That will not be the case, I promise you,” Hanzo said, reaching into his jacket. “When you get her home, please let me know. I should be the one to be dealing with her, but . . .”

“People to see, business to do,” you offered, slipping his shimmery card into your purse.

“Yes,” he said with a guilty look. “I appreciate you doing this.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you said heading toward the nearest exit, “no sweat, she’ll be fine and back to . . . whatever it is you two do soon.”

You could feel Hanzo’s eyes on you right up until the restaurant’s door swung close behind you, which was somewhat disconcerting, but you had little time to dwell on it, what with having to take care of Lori. Flagging down a taxi and shoving in an angry drunk woman inside was such a pain in the ass, almost as bad as hauling her up to her apartment and dragging her into bed while she tried to fight you. Again. The whole escapade took over an hour and a half, leaving you tired and salty afterward.

“I hope those stupid glittery tights give you a rash, Lori,” you muttered, walking back onto the city’s bustling streets and pulling out your cell. Calling Hanzo at this time of night seemed strange – inconveniencing or inappropriate, but leaving the man’s request unfulfilled seemed just as wrong, so you dialed his number shakily.

“Please don’t be there, please don’t be there,” you whispered. “Just let me leave a voicemail so I don’t have to – ”

“Hanzo Shimada speaking.” He sounded just as formidable over the phone. Of course he did.

“H-hello, Mr. Shimada. I’m just calling to let you know that I got Lori home safe, no need to worry. She’s asleep and not going anywhere.”

He sighed, and his voice was a bit gentler the next time he spoke. “Thank you for keeping me informed, it is much appreciated.”

“Not a problem,” you said, bouncing on your heels. “I’ll let you get back to the party now. Take care.”

“Just a moment,” Hanzo said hurriedly, “I am no longer needed here, and I would like to . . . discuss something with you, if you have a moment.”

“Oh,” you said timidly, trying to understand why on Earth this man was bothering with you. Had you done something wrong? You had probably done something wrong. Or maybe he just needed to threaten you into keeping the sloppy antics of his sugar baby quiet? That kinda made sense.

“Forgive me, I just looked at my watch. It is dreadfully late, perhaps I should just speak with you tomorrow,” Hanzo said after your long pause.

“No, no, that’s fine. I suddenly find myself wide awake,” you huffed, massaging your temple.

“Is something wrong,” he asked slowly. “I do not wish to bother you.”

You laughed through the tension building in your gut. “Oh, you know, it’s just not every day you go to a swanky party, meet a mass of important people, haul your unappreciative wasted friend home, and then start up a chat with one of the biggest names in the business world. Hell of a night. Hell. Of. A. Night.”

Hanzo chuckled at your frazzled tone which really did not make you feel better. “I do believe Lorelai’s behavior cost you your dessert course. Allow me to make it up to you. Where are you?”

“Um,” you hesitated, “still by Lori’s.���

“Wonderful,” he said, his voice becoming much more casual, “meet me at Leone’s Confections. I will be there as soon as I am able.”

The line went dead, and you were left staring at the touchscreen in disbelief. “The fuck have I gotten myself into?”

While it wasn’t exactly a short walk to the little candy shop, the trip flew by as your imagination began to race with possible scenarios for the rest of your night. You couldn’t help but think about the rumors about Hanzo – the missing competitors, the arson suspicions, the ruined lives of those who spoke against him. Not to mention his brother. No one knew for sure when had happened to him, but you had seen the younger Shimada for yourself, patched back together with circuitry and metal.

You were scared.

Surrounded by the heavenly scent of sweet flavors, but scared.

Maybe you’d at least get some good chocolate before you were blackmailed and forced to leave the country?

A small bell dinged, and Hanzo strode through the door of the otherwise empty establishment, exchanging a friendly greeting with the old man behind the counter before coming to join you at the small table.

“I hope I did not keep you waiting,” he said sitting across from you and crossing his leg over the opposite knee.

“N-no,” you said, the word crumbling in your throat.

Hanzo’s head tipped to the side curiously. “Are you feeling alright? You are shaking.”

“Fine, sir, fine,” you lied, clamping your hands together to keep them from twitching with nerves.

“Sir?” Hanzo seemed almost offended, but then he looked at the empty table and glanced at the shop owner and sighed. “Leone, this is not that type of meeting, no need to be inhospitable. Turn on the music, get the woman a drink.”

“How was I supposed to know,” the other man grumped, “most of the time when you bring people here in the middle of the night it’s not for pleasantries.”

Classical music began to float from the speakers and Leone brought you each a cup of water, convincing you to relax just a hair. As Leone set down your glass, he leaned in to whisper, “Usually he’s here threatening gents and smackin’ people around. There’s a reason Mr. Fancy-Pants-McGee wears black gloves, little lady.”

“Leone,” Hanzo warned with a scowl.

“They don’t show the blood stains,” Leone explained. Your eyes went wide, and you couldn’t think of anything to say in response, especially when the old fart winked at you.

“LEONE!”

The man burst out laughing and walked away as Hanzo put his head in his hands miserably.

You were going to beat Lori’s skinny ass for getting you into this.

“That is not true,” Hanzo said once he looked up and saw your terrified face. “Well, somewhat true, but – chikushō! I am not here to hurt you, I promise, and please, do not be frightened of me. You are safe here, I assure you.”

Hanzo’s face was oddly . . . sad, as if your fear was a terrible scolding. “Alright,” you said with a deep breath, “it’s just, well, this is a lot to take in. I’m not used to being around people of your, I suppose, rank. Alone. In the dead of night.”

“You apprehension is understandable,” Hanzo said softly, smiling at you in a way that made your heart race, “but I hope it will dissipate.”

“Not gonna lie to you,” you said with a small smirk, “chocolate would help.”

His rolling laugh was loud enough to fill the whole room and warm enough to give you the shivers. “When does chocolate not help? Leone! Put your finest blend on the stove for me, will you?”

“It’s already bubblin,” the old man replied, “want it doctored up tonight?”

Hanzo looked back to you. “How do you prefer your cocoa? Minty? Topped with cinnamon? Extra rich?”

“Is kicked in the ass with chili pepper an option?”

“Oh, I like her,” Leone snickered.

“An excellent choice,” Hanzo agreed with a grin.

A few moments later you were breathing in the scent of perfectly spiced cocoa and marveling at the impeccable taste dancing along your tongue. Your eyes were closed in reverence and for a second or two you for all about the situation around you.

“Ara ma-a,” Hanzo murmured softly, making you jump. He was staring at you, something like shock on his face.

“What is it,” you asked, wiping your nose in case you had whipped cream on it.

“You are beautiful. Incredibly so. I could not help but notice at the dinner party, but seeing you here, like this – perfection.”

“I don’t know what you say,” you admitted, face red as a rose and innards twisting like old roots.

“Perhaps I was wrong,” he said slyly, “seeing you flustered is somehow even more immaculate.”

“Oh, now you’re just trying to rile me up,” you scoffed, laughing at your own embarrassment. “Rude, sir. Very rude.”

“It needed to be said,” he insisted, still ogling you.

“I’m sorry,” you said shaking the timidity from your mid, leaning forward onto the table and looking Hanzo right in the eye, “don’t you already have a girl on your arm? My friend, even? It’s downright dishonorable of you to be showering me with flirtations and stealing glimpses of me in this low cut dress like that.”

“What,” he gulped, jolting back and looking at you disbelief, “I was not – I would never do such a thing! Yes, I may have been . . . forward with my compliments, and I apologize if that was too much, but I swear I was not ‘stealing glimpses’ of – ”

You let out a loud snort as you started laughing again. “Got you good, didn’t I, Mr. Shimada?”

He frowned at you, face pinched as you giggled and drank your hot chocolate. “You were joking.”

“Yes,” you nodded.

“Trying to frazzle me as I frazzled you.”

“Yup.”

“Hm,” he grunted, slowly crossing his arms and looking you up and down, “not many are brave enough to do such a thing.”

“You’re the one who started it,” you muttered, peeking out from behind your mug.

A smile bloomed on his face again. “It was not my intention to upset you! I was only – ”

“Only saying crazy flirty stuff that would make any girl stammer!”

He set out a loud scoff, but shrugged in agreement. “I suppose that is true. Please accept my sincere apology. It has been a long time since someone had the nerve to call me out on what I say and it seems I may have lost touch with conventional social guidelines.”

“Well at least you were saying sweet things,” you replied, “it’s not as if I mind too much. I hope you weren’t too offended by me messing with you. Couldn’t help myself.”

“No offense was taken at all. Maybe I need more of that, in fact. I have not felt this . . . normal in ages.”

There was a weariness in Hanzo’s eyes that was undeniable, as if there was far too much weighing down on the man.

“Hey,” you said gently, “are you alright? I didn’t mean to ruin the mood.”

“You have not,” Hanzo said with a wave of his hand, “I did. It seems my mind is swaying into darker places all of a sudden, even in such pleasant company.”

With one last gulp, you finished the last of your drink and set it aside so you could scoot closer to Hanzo. The bags under his eyes were heavy. “Why don’t you tell me why you asked me here so you can go home and rest. You look exhausted.”

“I am,” he sighed, staring out the window, “and the exhaustion never seems to go away.” After a lengthy pause, Hanzo’s gaze shifted back to you with a thin smile. “What a terrible host I am, lapsing into pensive silences and forcing you to stay up so late. I am not usually this thoughtless.”

“At least the drinks are good,” you teased lightly, “now, tell me what else you need from me before you pass out in that chair.”

“Right,” he huffed, gloves running through his long bangs, “I mostly wished to compensate you for any trouble Lorelai may have caused you – the cab fare, things of that sort.”

“No need,” you said, “I may have grabbed her credit card out of her purse and used it to pay for the ride home.”

Hanzo chuckled, “I can hardly blame you.”

“I wasn’t going to, but then she went and tore my favorite coat,” you said examining the mangled seam of your jacket. “Guess I was feeling a little petty.”

“You should have seen me after she vomited on my bed. I was irate,” Hanzo grimaced.

“Ugh,” you said with a shudder, “that’s disgusting!”

Again Hanzo lingered, as if he didn’t quite want to leave his seat despite the budding sunset.

“Is there anything else, Mr. Shimada?”

“Yes, yes ther is. Just one more thing, something that I will likely regret asking, but must nonetheless. Are you, by any chance, available? I have dismissed Lorelai from my employ and am looking for someone to take her place. I would very much like it to be you.”

“O-oh,” you blurted bluntly, shocked by his offer.

Hanzo was on his feet in a flash, taking a step back from you. “Forgive me, I should not have – ”

“It’s okay,” you said quickly, heat radiating from your cheeks, “I was just surprised is all! I didn’t mean to seem unappreciative or – ”

“There is no need to explain,” he said, his voice abrasive and cold all at once.

“But I want to,” you said desperately, standing in front of him with your hands over your heart. “It’s not that I’m not flattered – I am – but I’ve never done anything like that before, being a sugar baby or whatever you want to call it! I’m not from a wealthy family like Lori is, I don’t know fancy table manners like she does, heck, I was terrified to go to this party tonight because I was afraid everyone would know what a cheap dress this is. I’ve never owned anything designer-y in my life! You’re a refined man, and you should have someone equally refined on your arm.”

“Refined,” Hanzo repeated, inching closer to you and sitting on the table, his arm close enough to touch if you just extended your fingers. “I have been with refined women most of my life, some very unrefined ones as well, but I am alone yet again. None of them have ever been what I needed. You, however.” He took your hand, turning it over in his own. “I have smiled more with you in the last half hour than I have in years. I do not care how you were raised, what cutlery you use, or what brand you wear. I simply want you. As you are. To see if this feeling of ease you have given me can last.

Unfortunately, I am not in a position to date normally. My past is . . . complicated, and I will not burden anyone with the mess of a man I have become. Should you be interested in spending some time with me, I would happily pay you. I would prefer it that way, honestly. This sort of arrangement allows me to see someone with enough distance to – Forgive me, I don’t know how to explain it. I simply feel better like this, with a clean cut exchange of services, odd as that may seem.”

“I understand,” you said thoughtfully, “well, maybe not entirely, but enough. The payments makes you feel as if there is a more proper trade, and if something goes wrong, things can be cut short with less drama. Hopefully. But I guess there’s always a Lori or two out there to complicates things.”

“True,” he laughed, rubbing his eyes. “On all accounts. I believe that is why the ‘sugar daddy’ relationship appeals to me, at least for now.”

You took another moment to think, but in all honesty, your mind was already made up. Hanzo was a fascinating, handsome, captivating man, and you couldn’t deny the attraction pumping through your body. And life in this city wasn’t cheap. Maybe you should try something new, something you craved for the sheer unusualness of it all.

“I’m free tomorrow,” you said leadingly.

“Really,” he asked, brows high.

“Sure am. You might have to be patient with me, though. I’ve never done anything even remotely like this before.”

“You have my word, I will never force you into anything you do not wish to do,” he said, squeezing your hand before letting it drop.  

“Sounds good then,” you smiled.

Hanzo stood, and you automatically swayed closer to him. Good god, he was doing things to you . . . Things the world had taught you to be ashamed of. Things that felt wonderful.

“I am overjoyed to have you to accept,” he said, “but I should warn you.”

“What,” you groaned worriedly.

He smirked. “I usually start arrangements of this nature with a kiss. A way to test the waters, if you will.”

“Oh is that so,” you said doubtfully. Hanzo only shrugged, his grin widening. You pretended to think it over for a moment, something in the sweet shop’s glass case catching your eye. “I’ll let you kiss me on the cheek,” you said firmly, “but that’s all I’m comfortable with tonight.”

“I will happily take what I can get,” he hummed, putting his hand on your waist and pulling you closer. His kiss was incredibly tender and lingered just long enough to make you want more. Fuck. He might be too good.

“Are you sure that is all you want,” he asked, fingers winding to the small of your back.

“Yes? Yes! For now.” You returned his kiss with a quick peck on Hanzo’s cheekbone. “Bribe me with some dark chocolate raspberry truffles, and I’ll probably let you have a proper smooch. Maybe.”

“I will keep that in mind,” he laughed.

“I swear I’m not a sellout,” you said awkwardly, embarrassed by your own offer.

“Do not be ashamed of this, my beauty, or you will not enjoy it, and I would hate for that to happen,” Hanzo said, releasing you.

“I’ll do my best,” you said, feeling a bit lightheaded. He walked you to the street, waving down a taxi and paying the driver in advance.

“Thank you, Mr. Shimada,” you said through the window, the cabbie more than willing to let you chat another moment as he counted out his lofty tip.

“My pleasure, but we will have to discuss this “Mr. Shimada’ matter next time we meet.”

“Would you prefer I call you something else?”

He stroked his jawline carefully. “That will depend on the nature of our relationship. Usually, Mr. Shimada is fine, but perhaps not for you.” He leaned onto the metal of the car door, a scheming look in his eyes. “In time, I will likely allow you to call be Hanzo in private, possibly even in public if this goes well. But,” he leaned in closer, “if this goes very well, I will hopefully be able to convince you to call me ‘master,’ at least when I have you strung up above my bed.”

In an instant your whole body was flushed red, stunned and hungering for more, your mouth stammering uselessly.  

“Into the kinky shit,” the cab driver said, ruining the mood, “nice.”

Both you and Hanzo glared at the man in perfect time.

“Do not make me come in there,” Hanzo growled, “I imagine it would be quite hard for you to do your job with all ten of your fingers broken.”

“And sitting in a car all day after surgery for a broken urethra isn’t real fun either,” you snapped.

The driver’s eyes went wide, and his mouth clamped shut.

“Good choice,” you mumbled, turning back to Hanzo for a quick good night, but he was staring at you with a dumbfounded expression that made you laugh. “Okay, so, once upon a time in college I may have kicked a misogynist in the crotch so hard I broke his dick. It was an accident, but not one I really regretted.”

“Wa-o,” he sputtered, melting into laughter so strong he had to wipe tears from his eyes, “you are a marvel. Go, now, before I change my mind and beg you to come home with me.”

“Okay,” you giggled, thankful you hadn’t scared him off. “Take care, and get some sleep, alright? You look you could keel over.”

“I will,” he promised you with a warm smile. “Until tomorrow, my beauty.”

@watch-your-grammer @collinssie

[autistickogaynewrites]

Realizations: In Which They Have A Discussion

Part 5 of @miraculousstorytelling‘s secret santa gift! Delay is mildly explained in the notes of the ao3 chapter, but I’m willing to answer questions if anyone wants to know more.

In which the main four finally sit down and talk about their feelings.

Also on Ao3!

When Nino’s phone rang at nine in the morning on a Saturday, he mentally prayed that for the sake of the person on the other end, it was an emergency because otherwise, someone was going to die.

“Hello?” He slurred, glaring at the light peeking between his blackout curtains as he tried to get comfortable enough to fall asleep again.

“Nino, it's Alya. Are you free today?”

Groaning, he switched the phone to the other ear as he sat up in bed, rubbing his eyes as he tried to mentally check his calendar.

“Alya. It’s nine in the morning. On a Saturday.”

“Yeah? Are you free or not?”

“Uh, I promised to help maman get groceries, but after that I’ll be free. Why?”

“Good, I think we need to talk. Meet me at the park by the school at noon?”

Noticing how she was talking faster than usual and letting her words slip together, he immediately agreed, looking at his phone with concern as she quickly hung up.

“Looks like I have a phone call of my own to make.”

Marinette had been working on one of her newer designs, a dress inspired by Alya’s eyes when her phone rang, the loud ringtone startling her enough for her to nearly stab herself with the needle on the sewing machine. Jerking her hands back, she scrambled for the phone, accepting the call and holding it to her ear without checking who it was.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Marinette, are you doing anything today?”

“Uh, I don’t think so? I was just going to work on a few designs. Why?”

“I just have something important I think I need to talk to you about today. Can you meet me at the park near your house at about eleven?”

“Sure, I can be there. Are you okay though, Nino? You sound nervous.”

“It’s nothing, just meet me at noon!”

Before she had the chance to even think about responding, the click of him hanging up rang in her ears, surprising her into pulling the phone away from her ear with a gasp. As she stared down at the phone, a thought came to mind, and before she could talk herself out of it, she was typing up a quick text and sending it out.

Croissant Queen: Hey, are you free later today?

Croissant Queen: like, ten-ish later?

Blinking at the twinkling chime coming from beside him, Adrien quickly paused his game and grabbed the phone, quickly shooting off a reply text.

Hot Stuff: i can be

Hot Stuff: what’s up?

Croissant Queen: i just think i need to talk to you

Croissant Queen: can you meet me at the park by my house?

Hot Stuff: yeah of course. are you okay?

Croissant Queen: i’m fine, i just need to talk to you later and it’s not really a text conversation

Croissant Queen: it’s not bad or anything! it’s just kinda personal. i’ll talk to you about it when i see you later though, so don’t worry

“‘Don’t worry’ she says, like that makes it better,” Adrien muttered, flicking through his text conversations and pulling a slightly older conversation up, “What could she possibly have to talk to me about that’s so personal?”

Sunshine Child: can i talk to you about something?

Raising an eyebrow at the text, Alya unlocked her phone and hurriedly typed up a reply, mildly worried on why Adrien would be texting her instead of Nino.

Ladyblogger: sure, what’s up?

Sunshine Child: marinette just texted me and asked me to meet up with her later to talk

Sunshine Child: she said it was personal but told me not to worry

Sunshine Child: i just wanted to know if you had any idea what it could be about?

Pausing, Alya tried to think back on her recent conversations with Marinette to see if she could think of any reason the girl would find it so important to talk to Adrien today of all days. The only thing that came to mind was that maybe Marinette had finally worked up the courage to confess to the model, but Alya was pretty sure that wasn’t the case.

Ladyblogger: i have no idea, but gimme a few to text her and try to figure it out

Immediately backing out of her messages with Adrien, she opened her texts to Marinette and fired one off, completely disregarding the Ladyblog article she had been working on.

LB’s GF: hey marinette, did you text adrien asking him to meet you later?

There was a row of blinking dots, but the reply came quickly.

Mare Bear: yeah, i needed to talk to him, why?

LB’s GF: about what? he just texted me cause he’s worried over what you wanna talk to him about

Mare Bear: it’s nothing

Mare Bear: i mostly just wanted to talk to him cause nino called me and wanted to talk to me and he sounded really nervous

LB’s GF: wait wait wait

LB’s GF: nino called and asked you to meet him later today?

Mare Bear: yeah, at around noon at the park near my house

It took a moment of thinking, but as Alya stared down at the phone in her hands, the gears in her head started turning. She had called Nino and asked to meet up at noon at the park, wanting to confess to him her feelings for the three of them and what to do. Then, Nino had called Marinette, asking her to meet him at the same time and place that she herself had originally asked him. Of course, then Marinette texts Adrien with the same ‘meet me at the park at noon to talk’, and it ends where it begins when Adrien texts her out of concern.

It was a wild guess, and one Alya wasn’t even sure she should let her mind follow, but what if they all were calling and texting to talk about the exact same thing?

She had called Nino because he was someone she knew she could trust, and his coolheadedness was definitely something she could use as she tried to sort through and figure out her feelings. Nino then might have contacted Marinette, having known her longer than anybody else and knowing exactly how trustworthy she was when it came to secrets. Marinette, though Alya was her best friend, would reach out to Adrien for help, taking into account how easily the boy was able to logically sort through any problems while making any negative outcome seem miniscule. While Adrien, oblivious as he is, would simply reach out to her due to her being the closest to Marinette and him being concerned.

Closing her eyes, Alya took a deep breath and thought. She knew she was ready to take a risk today by confessing to Nino, but now she had to think over whether or not she was ready to tell them all. There was a large risk there, but there was also a chance for an even largerreward. The thought of being able to kiss, cuddle, hug, and go on dates with all three of them made her stomach explode into butterflies and her face flush.

She opened her eyes and pressed her fingers to the keys, ready to type up her response. She's Alya freaking Césaire, and while she's no Ladybug, she considers herself close enough. She's chased down akumas for the chance at a great story, helped Ladybug and Chat Noir in the fight against Santa Claws, and was even kidnapped by an akuma, staying calm all the while. If she couldn't even muster enough course to confess to her crushes, was she really worthy of running the Ladyblog?

LB’s GF: can we actually all meet up at your place? i think I need to talk to all 3 of you

Mare Bear: sure, I'll get some snacks together. want me to text the other two and let them know?

LB’s GF: please. I'll see you later

Pushing her phone aside, Alya scrubbed at her face, anxiety sitting heavy in her chest as she started second guessing herself. It was one thing to tell yourself that you were going to confess to your three crushes, but it was an entirely different thing to actually do it, and now Alya found herself wondering if she was actually ready. Of course, she had already arranged for them all to meet, and she didn’t exactly have an excuse if she decided to bail so without further ado, she stood up, grabbed her stuff, and left.

Alya had thought it had been stressful and awkward enough just thinking about talking to the other three, but sitting in front of them with the silence hanging over them, she realized it was actually much worse.

When they had all shown up close to half an hour early, Marinette had waved them up to her bedroom with a plate of treats pushed into each of their hands. They had all settled in a circle on the pillows and blankets tossed in a pile in the middle of the room, and then the heavy silence had settled over them all. None of them looked up from their laps as they nibbled at their cookies and pastries, the quiet chewing being the only audible noise aside from the low hum of customers coming from the bakery beneath them.

As the minutes ticked by, Alya found herself more and more anxious until finally, she snapped.

Turning to Nino, she watched as he tensed slightly, Marinette and Adrien both turning to look at her.

“Nino,” she started, watching as his eyes just barely managed to meet hers before darting away again, “I called and asked you to meet up with me because you’re always so calm when I’m stressing over something, and you give the best advice I’ve ever heard, although don’t tell my mom that.”

Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes for a moment, gathered as much of her confidence as she could, and opened them to begin talking.

“Marinette, I fell in love with you on the first day of school. I thought you were cute when I first saw you, and I knew I had to step in when I saw how resigned you were to Chloe’s bullying, but I really fell for you when you split your macaron, shared it with me, and smiled. Your whole face lit up and you were so beautiful in that moment that all I knew was I wanted to see that smile as many times as you’ll let me.”

Ignoring the way Marinette's eyes had blown wide and her jaw had dropped, Alya turned to Nino.

“Nino, I fell for you that day Ladybug locked us together at the zoo. I know I came off as annoyed at you at first, but I was really just upset over missing the chance to film the akuma battle. You seemed so nervous though, and once we started talking a little more, I realized how great you really are. When we were walking to Marinette’s and you told me that joke, I turned to look at you while I was still bent over trying to catch my breath and you were smiling at me. I don’t think it was even a smile really meant for me, but you looked so calm and happy in that moment, especially with the light highlighting the gold in your eyes, and I knew that I was a goner.”

Ignoring the anxiety building in her chest now that she’d started her confessions, she turned to Adrien, so focused on what she had to say that she didn’t notice the bright red flush painted across all of their cheeks.

“Adrien, falling for you was almost so ridiculous I wanted to scream. You’re literally the class pretty boy and while I’m sure most of the people at school have a crush on you, I promised myself the day I met you not to be one of them. Of course, that meant literally nothing once I got to know you. Watching you reach out to people who had been akumatized to make sure they were okay, even though you didn’t have to, and always helping others with homework or anything else. I didn’t fully realize until we had that Mecha Strike Tournament and you gave your chance to play to Marinette. I saw how excited you were to play, but you gave up the opportunity to do something that would make you happy to someone else because you knew how happy it’d make them. I love how selfless and kind you are, which is a large part of why I fell for you, but I also want to be able to show you that it’s okay to be a little selfish sometimes. I feel like you give so much of yourself up for other people, and I really want you to know that you don’t have to.”

When she’s done speaking, she drops her eyes to her hands resting in her lap, watching as they tug at a loose string dangling from the hem of her jeans. A large part of her is glad she’s finally managed to confess, but there’s still a small, anxious part of her that she can feel clawing at the back of her mind telling her she should’ve just stayed quiet.

“I’m not expecting anything from any of you,” she started, blinking back the hot tears she could feel blooming in the back of her eyes, “But I’m tired of hiding it from you, and I thought I should be honest and tell you.”

“I fell for Adrien first.” Nino whispered, causing all of their eyes to snap towards him, though his eyes were glued to his lap so he didn’t notice, “You walked into class on the second day and I wanted to scream. It was your smile that really did it for me. I’m not going to lie, you’re pretty as anything else, but your smile just lights up the world around you. I was worried at first when you came in with Chloe, but when I saw how you reacted to the gum incident, I think I took advantage of the situation to get close to you, because as sure as I was that you were romantically unattainable, I knew I wanted to be as close to you as you’d let me.”

Adrien’s face is so red at this point that Alya finds herself wondering if there’s any blood left in any other part of his body, but Nino starts talking again before she can dwell on it much longer.

“I fell for you Marinette the day Sabrina’s father was akumatized into Rogercop. You’d become so much happier and confident after you and Alya became friends, and even when you tripped and spilled food all over yourself, you just laughed it off. Of course, then Chloe was accusing you of stealing her bracelet and I know the Marinette from before would’ve just let them search her bag, but you stood up to not only Chloe, but the Mayor of Paris and refused. You kinda reminded me of Ladybug right then, standing up to the Mayor the way she stood up to Hawkmoth that first day. I was so happy for you, and I was so proud that you had come so far after everything with Chloe, and before I knew it, I had fallen for you.”

Marinette’s now avoiding looking at any of them, turned to the side as both hands fiddle with one of her pigtails. Alya’s chest feels tight with the thought of what Nino’s going to say next, and she closes her eyes when he continues again.

“I already know you’re going to think I’m copying you,” He joked, pulling his hat down from his head and running a hand through the short curls that had been hiding underneath. “But I fell for you that day at the zoo. We were walking to Marinette’s and talking about Mr. Garbage Agreste, and I remember I told the lamest joke and you just lit up. The sun brought out the red in your hair and the gold in your eyes, and I could feel my heart cartwheeling in my chest when you laughed. I knew I was screwed then, but I think I was okay with it as long as I got to hear that laugh or see that smile again.”

Alya could feel her face heating as she brought her hands up to scrub at her cheeks, hoping that they weren’t nearly as red as they felt. When she opens her eyes, Nino’s still staring at his lap, Adrien’s face is a brighter red than Ladybug’s suit, and Marinette looks like she’s trying to gear herself up for something, with her eyebrows scrunched together and her lips turned down into the cutest pout Alya’s ever seen. As soon as her mouth opens to ask if the girl is okay, she’s cut off.

“I fell for Alya first!” She squeaks out, hand still fumbling with her pigtail as Alya’s jaw drops, “It was the first day of school and you were so nice to me. You didn’t even know me, and you still stepped in and defended me. I remember I tried to apologize and you just brushed it off and started trying to encourage me instead. You didn’t even know my name, or anything about me, and you still jumped in to help me, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Being friends with you has changed my life, and the more we hung out, the more I fell for you until I couldn’t even try to imagine my life without you in it.”

Alya’s sure that her face matches Adrien’s at this point, but Marinette continues talking before she can try to say something.

“I fell for Adrien on the second day of school. I was so angry when I saw you putting the gum on my desk, especially with everything that had happened with Chloe, so I snapped at you and then ignored you. Even after that though, you still came up to me after school to apologize. You seemed so vulnerable and open that I wasn’t sure what to do, but then you were handing me your umbrella. When I took it and it closed on me, I was so embarrassed, but then you started laughing and I figured I’d do anything, no matter how embarrassing to hear you laugh like that again. The more time I spent around you, the more I learned, and I loved it all. You’re so unbelievably kind, especially with how your father treats you, and so much smarter and hardworking than anyone I’ve ever met. Every moment I’ve gotten to spend with you has been a blessing, and I need you to know that I love you. That we all love you.”

Adrien looks like if anyone else says anything nice about him, he’ll explode, with tears brimming at the edges of his eyes and cheeks still a shade of red Alya didn’t think was physically possible before today.

“I think falling for Nino was the one I least expected,” she muttered, face immediately paling once she registered what she said, hands flailing about as she talked, “Not in a bad way or anything! I had just known you for so much longer than Alya or Adrien, although I guess I didn’t actually know you. It was that day at the zoo when I realized. When you showed up, you were so awkward and fumbling that I couldn't help but relate. As awkward as you were though, you were still so sweet and kind. When you told me you had a crush on Alya was when it hit me, and when you two showed up at the bakery together, I was upset at the thought that I had lost my chance with either of you, but you looked so happy that I thought it'd be better to just leave it alone.”

If any of them had thought the previous silences were awkward, they realized now that they were nothing compared to the silence that hung over them once Marinette was done confessing. None of them looked directly at Adrien, but they could see him fidgeting with his pant leg out of the corner of their eyes. While the previous silences lasted a minute at the longest, the current one hun over them for nearly seven before Adrien finally spoke up.

“I didn’t even realize they were crushes until recently,” He mutters, refusing to look up from his lap as his hands move to play with the hem of his shirt, “I fell for Nino first though. I saw how you looked at Chloe that first day, and I remember being so glad that you decided to give me a chance instead of just dismissing me as her friend. You became my best friend so fast, and I felt like we’d been friends for years with how you always seemed so tuned into how I was feeling and how supportive you always were. I’m sure it sounds wrong, but I think it was the Bubbler incident that really brought it on. You being akumatized was horrible and I’m still so sorry it happened, but I think my crush started when I realized that you had been akumatized because you were upset for me. I remember trying to apologize afterwards too, and you just brushed it off and told me you were glad that I had tried to enjoy the party.”

Everyone stays still, almost as if moving will disrupt Adrien’s thoughts and cause him to stop talking. It takes him a few minutes to think of what he’s going to say, brow furrowed as he glares down at his lap, but he manages to keep talking a moment later.

“I fell for Alya when Pharaoh was akumatized. I’d kinda looked up to you for a while, especially with how passionate you are about what you care about, but watching you livestream so nonchalantly as he carried you off and talked about sacrificing you blew my mind. You seemed more excited than anything at the chance to be that close to the action, even with all the risks, and you didn’t seem affected at all once it was over. I think I realized then that I wasn’t as close to you as I wanted to be, but I was still so glad to have someone so fiery and passionate about what they care about in my life, and I think part of me wanted me to be something you were passionate in caring about.”

There’s a pause as he takes a deep breath, but he manages to continue with his speech mere seconds later.

“I know you and I didn’t get off at the best start Marinette, but I remember being so excited when I showed up for school the next day and you started talking to me. I was so glad that you had given me a chance, but I don’t think I really fell for you until the derby hat competition. I knew that the chances of you copying Chloe instead of vice versa were low, but I was so nervous at how you'd handle the accusation, especially with my father there. You were so confident and calm though when you proved that the design was one hundred percent yours, and when he’d told you that you’d won, your face lit up so much I was worried that your cheeks had to hurt from how wide you were smiling. I think in that moment, I realized how happy I was to be one of the people you considered a friend, and I was so excited to wear your hat, even as it sent me into that sneezing fit. I’m pretty sure I was sneezing for at least two days after the photoshoot, but it was so worth it to see you smile when you saw the pictures and got to really see how much your hard work paid off.”

It’s quiet again, but this time the silence seems more tired than heavy, the air filled with the confessions that had spilled from each of them. Nobody seems willing to look up from their lap until the quiet tapping of Adrien’s fingers drumming against the floor starts. He only gets through about three taps before Nino’s reaching over and grabbing his hand, interlacing their fingers and rubbing his thumb in circles against the back of his knuckles. Looking up from her lap, Alya notices Marinette’s hands fidgeting in her lap and without thinking, she’s reaching out to grab it. Marinette pauses for a second, but then she’s squeezing Alya’s hand gently and reaching her opposite hand to hold Adrien’s free one. Taking the hint, Alya reaches her free hand out and grabs Nino’s, squeezing it with a small smile when he turns to look at her.

Alya can feel her hands starting to sweat the longer they sit there in silence, but she’s so elated that she’s even managed to make it this far that she can’t really find it in herself to care. Surprisingly, it’s Adrien who speaks up a few minutes later, voice hesitant but strong.

“So, where do we go from here?”

They all turn to look at him, cogs turning in their heads as they all try to think beyond their sweaty hands and the odd circle they’ve sat themselves in. Unsurprisingly this time, it’s Alya who starts the conversation.

“Well, I think it depends on where we want to go from here.” She starts, letting her thumb rub over Nino’s knuckles as she tries to think, “You now know that I love each of you, romantically in case it wasn’t obvious, and I think it’s also fairly obvious that we all feel the same way. I don’t want to force anyone into anything, so you’re more than welcome to say no, but what if we all tried dating each other?”

“How do you mean?” Marinette asks, brow furrowed as she looks up, Nino and Adrien looking as confused as she does.

“I mean, we all date each other. Like, Marinette is my girlfriend and Adrien and Nino are my boyfriends, and vice versa for you guys. If I want to go on a date with Nino one day, Adrien the next, and Marinette the day after, it’s fine and if I want to kiss and cuddle any of you, as long as it’s okay with the person I’m trying to kiss or cuddle, it’s not cheating since we’re all together.”

The other three seem to be thinking about it, but within seconds, a bright smile stretches across Adrien’s lips. Nino and Marinette seem slightly more hesitant, but only in the sense that it seems slightly too good to be true.

“That honestly sounds kind of wonderful,” Marinette starts, looking up to make eye contact with Alya, “but are we sure it’d even work out?”

“Of course we aren’t, but nobody is ever 100% sure any relationship will work. It’s a risk, but it’s a risk I’m willing to take if it means I get a chance to love you all the way I want to.”

Even though it’s not aimed at him, Adrien’s face flares bright red, and Nino laughs before cooing at where Adrien’s trying to bury his face in his lap.

“Aww Alya, look what you did to the poor guy. He’s so red he looks like he might explode.” Nino coos with a smile as he pokes at Adrien’s blushing cheek.

“If just saying that turned him this red, I’d be able to have a lot of fun with him if we were all dating.”

“I wanna try it,” Adrien mutters from where his face is buried in his jeans, bring the whole room to a stop.”I love you all, and if this is something that’s actually possible, I’d really want to date you all.”

“I do too.” Marinette speaks up from where she’s been sitting quietly on the sidelines. “I’m a little worried about it, but like you said, there’s no guarantee any relationship will work out, but this is a relationship I want to at least try for.”

Turning towards Nino, Alya could barely hold back her grin as he simply smiled and nodded at her.

“I didn’t really think it was a possibility to date all three of you, and I felt really guilty over not being able to choose who I love more, but I’d really like it if we were all together” Flailing her arms for a second, Alya quickly pulled the three of them in for a hug, smiling as she felt them all relax and hug back.

When she pulled back from the hug moments later, her heart jumped in her chest at the sight of the other three, cheeks red and small smiles decorating their lips.

“Now!” She clapped, startling the other three as she stood and made her way to the small closet full of spare blankets she knew Marinette had. “I’m emotionally exhausted as crap, so how about we build a blanket fort, pick a movie, and then cuddle and nap?”

“Only if the movie is Princess Bride!” Adrien cheered, getting up to help Alya with the blankets, Nino and Marinette right behind him.

“Adrien, I literally watched the Princess Bride with you last night.” Nino groaned, earning an eye roll and muttered comment from the blond.

It took almost an hour before they were all settled down in their messy blanket fort, Princess Bride playing on Alya’s laptop despite Nino’s objections. They were all cuddled close, more in a pile than anything, but they were comfortable and happy, and before the man in black and Inigo began to duel, they were all asleep.

[whipashwhipash]

Spray Paint

Fsshhhhhhhhh

Betty took her finger off of the trigger on the spray paint. Her right ring finger was cramping up from the pressure and was turning dark blue because of the toxic paint. She took a step back and gave her work a small smirk and nod in approval.

Jughead had told her that he was living at the drive in for the pass few days, and of course she had instantly invited him to stay at her place. Gratefully, he declined. He couldn’t stand the wrath of Mama Cooper. She was so pissed of that Mayor McCoy was selling the drive in, she decided to make her mark. For Jughead, and for herself. She needed to get rid of the ‘perfect girl next door’ image that she had.

She had spray painted two very large words on the side of the projection booth, and yes, they were along the lines of ‘F U’. But you know, in full words. She had also painted a rather large crown on the side, which was a very famous symbol in dear old Riverdale.

“Hm. Nice.” Betty mumbled, gently lifting her shoulders up and down. She put the nearly empty can of spray paint into her pastel backpack and started re-tying one of the laces on her scuffed up white converse. Until she heard it. Blasting sirens, coming from the parking lot. The newly-painted wall of the projection booth was lighting up with blue and red, and so was her face. “Shit.”

She grabbed her backpack from the dusty ground and completely forgot about the dangling lace off of her shoe. She was sprinting to the forest next to the drive in, hopefully getting rid of her scent. She reached the edge of the tree line and made the mistake of turning around, coming face to face with Sheriff Keller. Well not him exactly, but more like face to face with a bunch of police cars. And she knew Sheriff Keller would be in one of those cars.

5 minutes later she was sitting in the back of an overheated cop car. She was staring out the window, thinking about what her mother will do when she gets to the station. She was snapped out of her gaze when the Sheriff slammed the front door shut. She shifted her position in the back seat so her forehead was no longer leaning against the cold glass of the window.

“So, Ms Cooper. What made you want to spray paint the drive in? I thought you were a fan of it.” Sheriff Keller started, pushing the key into the ignition.

Betty scoffed at his stupidity. “Of course I liked the drive in. My boyfriend worked there. Did you know that?” she asked, crossing her slender arms over her chest. Before the Sheriff could start, Betty cut him off. “And I didn’t do it because I didn’t like the drive in. I did it because the drive in was shutting down, and my boyfriend was living there. He was living there! And nobody gave a damn about it. So thats why I did it. Because this town is so messed up that they get rid of one of the most important pieces of land. And I thought that the town needs to know what I thought about it.” Betty said, face red with anger.

Sheriff Keller acted like her rant didn’t even affect him. “So you also drew a crown. I think we all know what that means. Did Jughead Jones put you up to it? Was he a part of this?”

Betty rolled her eyes and scoffed again. She couldn’t believe that these were the questions she was being asked. They literally found HER with a can of spray paint at the drive in, and the paint wasn’t even dry yet. “No. Jughead was not apart of this. It was all me. Did you not listen to what I just told you?” Betty said, voice raising with annoyance and anger.

“Well were at the station. Get out.” Sheriff Keller said, more tension in his voice then when he found her at the drive in. Betty waited for him to come out and open her door. She placed her dirty white converse on the concrete of the parking lot and got out of the car. She was turned around by the Sheriff and was handcuffed behind her back.

“Is this all necessary? I only spray painted something on a wall thats going to be torn down in like three days.” Betty said, but letting the cold cuffs surround her wrists without a fight.

“You were acting up in the car. Decided it would be best. You never know what could happen.” Keller said, holding the small Cooper girl by her wrists.

Betty scoffed again. Sheriff Keller was making Betty crazy. “And now you’re going to ask me if I'm on my period. For the record, no. I’m not.” Betty said, rolling her eyes.

Sheriff Keller pushed her forward, making her start walking towards the brick building. She reluctantly started walking, shuffling her feet just to annoy the Sheriff. He pushed against her back again and she actually started walking. She knew that if she made the Sheriff more annoyed she would be in even more trouble.

They made it into the station and Betty was instantly thrown into a holding cell. “Do you want a phone call?” Sheriff Keller asked, holding onto one of the bars of the cell.

“It was only spray paint, but yeah sure. Why not.” Betty said, slouching her back onto the white painted brick wall. She stood up and walked towards the corner of the cell. The Sheriff gave her the old phone and she dialled the one phone number she had memorized.

Jughead’s.

“Uh, Hello?” she heard her boyfriends voice croak from the other line.

“Hey Jug.” Betty said, looking at the Sheriff, indicating she wanted to be alone. He gave her a small glare before leaving to go into the main office.

“Betty what’s going on? Why are you calling me from the police station?” Jughead asked, nervousness obvious in his voice.

Betty chuckled into the phone. “Jug don’t worry. It’s no big deal. Just come down to the station, I’m bored and I want someone to talk to.” Betty said, wrapping the cord around her finger.

“You sound super chill for someone who has just been arrested.” Jughead said, and Betty could still her how nervous her boyfriend was through the phone.

“Trust me Jug. I’m fine. Just come down to the station.” Betty said. Before Jughead could argue again Betty cut him off. “Ok, see you soon! Bye!” She said into the phone before hanging up.

She went back and slumped onto the metal bench, leaning her alone mussed up ponytail on the wall. She closed her eyes and felt her body fall into a deep slumber.

For maybe three minutes.

Then she was woken up by an out of breath, beanied boy wearing a denim jacket. His hands were gripping the bars so tightly his knuckles were turning white, chest heaving. Betty guessed that he must of run here once her got her phone call.

Betty got up from her spot in the cell and walked towards her boyfriend. The one that was almost crying because his girlfriend was behind bars. She grabbed his hands and brought him down to the floor so they were both sitting in front of each other, holding hands between the bars.

“So why are you here?” Jughead asked, taking deep breaths and sobs in between his words. Once Betty explained everything that had happened, Jughead’s head was placed in between the bars of her cell, but he wasn’t upset. He was laughing.

“So they put you in a cell because you were being sassy?” Jughead asked, trying to talk in between his laugh-induced hiccups.

Betty chuckled at her boyfriend, hands still holding his. “Yeah, pretty much.”

Jughead lifted his head from between the bars and smiled. “Well, it’s a nice change of scenery.” He said, giggled escaping his lips.

“It’s a prison cell.” Betty said, seriously. She let go of Jugs hands to rub her eyes in defeat.

“I was being sarcastic.” Jughead said, reading through the bars to grab her hands again.

There moment was broken with Sheriff Keller, Veronica and Hermione Lodge entering the room. Betty and Jughead both instantly stood up, wanting to know if she was allowed to go home.

“Your free to go.” the Sheriff said, unlocking the cell door.

Betty rushed out and ran into his boyfriends arms. His arms were wrapped around her shoulder. “When did you guys get here?” Betty asked the Lodge girls.

“Jughead called us. He thought that you might not want to be seen behind bars by your mom.” Veronica said, looking lovingly at the pair.

“You bailed me out?” Betty asked.

“Yep. It wasn't that much though. We really just didn’t want you to face the wrath of Alice Cooper.” Hermione said, wrapping an arm around her daughter.

“Thank you guys. So much.” Betty said, looking from the two long raven haired beauties to her short raven haired beauty. The two girls smiled at her, as Jughead gave her a kiss on the top of her head and mumbled something into her ear.

“No problem Bets. But next time, tell me if your planning on trying to run away from the law.”

Hey Guys! This was for the #MJJ3WritingContest ( @mrsjugheadjonesthethird ) which is a writing contest that she did because she has 5000 followers! congrats again! I hope you all enjoy it! Its written before they found out that FP was arrested 

[aq2003]

I just saw The Last Jedi

And uh

here are my irrelevant thoughts

warning: SPOILERS and strong opinions that might not agree with yours

also this is my 1234th post, and i’ve been here for six months, what has my life spiraled down to

first off i’d like to start off with that i baked a cake right before going to the theatre and i burned my left pinky finger 

so i was a little bit more than irritable when i sat down to watch it

Okay. So, normally, I get really, really hyped when a new Star Wars movie comes out. At least, normally by standard of Rogue One (which was a GREAT movie shut up) and The Force Awakens (which, uh...). This was not the case for TLJ. At all. In fact, I was really skeptical of the whole sequel trilogy as a whole after TFA, and my thoughts can be explained with this outdated meme:

YEAH...as a kid who grew up with the prequels that worship them and the era they built to this very day, TFA seemed a bit lackluster in terms of worldbuilding and storyline (I really thought the characters showed lots of potential, though!), especially with the hype. It just seemed like a “nostalgic” rerun on the OT, and I was more than slightly offended that there wasn’t much of any nod to what the prequels added the the Star Wars universe, unlike Rogue One (which had two references to TCW and Bail Organa).

For The Last Jedi, I went in with my expectations as low as the ground Anakin did a triple flip off from to get his legs cut off on Mustafar. Half of my feed was anti-TLJ right up until the release date (in which I saw surprisingly positive reactions to the movie from elphabaforpresidentofgallifrey​, legobiwan, eirianerisdar, and a couple people from r/Prequelmemes). So I was still kinda skeptical, but not to the point of looking for flaws to prey on.

Also: since half of my family was sick and watching Star Wars as one entity is tradition, I haven’t even seen it until today. Hence why I didn’t post much, I wanted this to be the 1234th post (because I’m weird like that). But I still got the following spoilers: Kylo Ren kills Snoke, Luke drinks green milk, a porg is eaten, and Luke throws the lightsaber off the cliff when Rey gives it to him and says “go away” as the first line (SAME MY DUDE SAME).

Anyways, in terms of first watching, I didn’t like it.

HOLD UP HOLD UP LET ME EXPLAIN

Okay, so I know that the music was top-notch (as it always is—John Williams did an exquisite job as always, and I don’t mind Binary Sunset being played twelve times because I absolutely love the theme), the humor was quality (Luke brushing off his shoulder is Peak Star Wars), and the plot was original.

It all just felt so...unsatisfying. There’s not much emotional depth, and it’s still hard to connect with the new characters, my main complaints being Rey, Poe, and Holdo.

Good thing: I really liked the scene with Luke’s astral projection. He has a really fancy robe and has de-aged by a decade or so. Plus, I’m glad to see a lightsaber technique that isn’t “angrily swing around your saber until you hit something”, more of “wait until the right moment to strike”, but there wasn’t any striking. In the prequel era, you see all seven being used, and they look very different from one another. Kinda want some more of that in the movies to come.

What I don’t get, part 1: Rey. She goes straight from “god, Kyle Ron, you’rE AWFUL” to “oh Ben, you can TURN TO THE LIGHT!! :D”. It makes...no sense. Just because Kylo shows her an altered vision of Luke trying to “kill” (HE ONLY THOUGHT IT FOR A SPLIT SECOND) him. It’s seen throughout TFA that Rey is just a powerful Force user. Not necessarily a true Jedi that will believe in others and see good in everyone. Look, in her battle with Kylo in TFA, she uses anger to slice his face open. So her “I’m a Real And True Jedi” personality makes me feel off.

Good thing: I appreciate the small callback to Obi-Wan. However insulting it is, he was mentioned. And I’m happy with that, especially in a trilogy where the prequels don’t have as much impact. It’s also pretty telling that Luke realizes how Vader was partially Obi-Wan’s fault. But it’s still kinda sad.

What I don’t get, part 2: Poe. He doesn’t need an Ahsoka-type storyline where he realizes following orders from your parental figure will prevent the deaths of your comrades. That is my only problem. It is a big, just as Mr. Speaker says (don’t mind me, just watching Backstroke of the West to help me through the utter confusion I feel after this movie).

Good thing: Chewbacca eating a porg.

What I don’t get, part 3: Holdo. Okay, so this can be seen as part of my confusion about Poe, but it fits under here too. I absolutely HATE the trope of “this person was actually doing something rational and good, despite what the protagonists complain about”. It doesn’t make either character more likable, or just provides some kind of weird twist to the plot that leaves you wondering “why did the writer do that?” Also, her aesthetic gets on my nerves. Purple everything does not make everything better.

Some more things, both bad and good:

Bad thing: Snoke’s throne room. The design just looks kind of plain and lazy. THIS is the supreme bad guy strong in the dark side of the Force?

Good thing: the salt planet. Just. Everything about it. I was so confused about the movie posters until the showing of that planet. And it makes it even greater that some random rebel decided to taste the ground just for the heck of it.

Bad thing: not enough R2D2.

Good thing: Yoda. Every part about his entire scene. It really shows so much character development for a guy who’s already dead. Also: Force ghosts can summon lightning. So can Anakin and Obi-Wan just blitz through the First Order Thor style I mean-

Bad thing: Scratch that previous statement a little. Yoda didn’t look like Yoda. I don’t know whether it was bad CGI or WHAT, but he doesn’t look like any of his movie/cartoon counterparts.

Bad thing: Luke’s death. I get that it’s fitting in a way, but it really didn’t impact me. We all know that he can come back as a Force ghost. No tears are shed. Just disappointment that he won’t return to do anything cool with a lightsaber.

I spent too long rambling here

Edit (12/18/17): THIS WAS ALL TYPED AT 12:00 AM WHILE CONSUMING UNHEALTHY AMOUNTS OF POPCORN. PLEASE DON’T TAKE ANY OF THIS SERIOUSLY.