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captlok · 4 years ago

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Pacifism Isn’t A Character Trait

Or: MLK Day is Upon Us so Let Me Do You a Learn

Or: As An Aang Stan I Got a Bit Over-Zealous But Lemme Explain Why For A Hot Minute

Plus some History and Tumblr commentary that even non-ATLA fans can chew on

And by ‘hot minute’ I do mean this is going to be a long meta, so strap in. For those of you who just might be tuning into this debacle, I, a person who has not used Tumblr, much at all, except for the last half year, ran into some trouble.

If you wanna skip the whole TLDNR interpersonal stuffs and get straight to Why Aang is the Best Thing Since Sliced Bread, I will embolden the relevant parts, and italicize the crit of Korra, if you want that alongside.

I was excited that ATLA was seeing a resurgence due to the Netflix remake. I wasn’t even trying to apply any steep expectations for it. (learned not to do that the hard way with the last live action adaption, and to a much lesser extent, ATLOK, since it had good . . . elements, *ba dum tsshh*)

So, these are a couple aspects of the issue: (1) Even on the internet, I am extremely introverted and until recently mostly came for content, not socializing. My main online interactions thus far have been in forums and artist-to-artist on DA. Tumblr is still very strange to me because it splits up its ‘threads’ so you can’t see all the replies if a certain pattern of users responds in their own space. I’m not even 100% sure it’s in chronological order, and replies are not nested next to each other so you can look in the comments and someone will be replying to something you can’t see in that window. And also since it is a bizarre hybrid of a blogging system, posts are somehow considered ‘owned by’ or an ‘extension of’ OP in a way forum threads are not. (2) ATLOK was good in a cinematic and musical way, to be sure. It also had some good concepts. I can go into it just appreciating it for the worldbuilding and be somewhat satisfied. But the execution was terrible. I was on AvatarSpirit.Net for years, and If I had maintained my presence on ASN to current day and had gotten around to downloading their archive now that the forum is dead, I would include some links to other peoples’ detailed analyses on just how flawed both the plotting and Korra’s frustratingly flat learning curve was especially in the first two seasons. But, that is a task for another day, and only if people are interested.

No, what I’m addressing today, on the issue of Korra as a writing exercise, is how Mike and Bryan said specifically they wanted to make her ‘as opposite to Aang as possible’ and in so doing, muddied the central theme of the original ATLA series.

Now, again, I was mainly an art consumer for my first major round of ATLA fandom. Tumblr is an alien beast to me. But, after I write my first major Aang meta, talking about how amazing it is that he has the attitude he does, and how being content in the face of this overwhelming pain and suffering is an ONGOING PROCESS and an INTENTIONAL DECISION and not a simple PERSONALITY TRAIT, I start hearing that Aang gets a lot of hate from the fandom. Now this would be bad enough if it were merely people not liking his crowning moment of pacifism because they don’t understand the potential utility (I’ll elaborate on that in another post) or the ethics involved.

Aang is easily the most adult member of the Gaang. But he apparently gets hate for his few moments where he actually acts his age, a preteen, and maybe kisses a girl in a historical timeframe in which ‘consent’ discussions were probably nonexistent. Even in the present day, we are still practically drowned in movies that reinforce this kissing without asking trope. And even some female bodied people complain that asking kills the mood! But somehow he is responsible and reprehensible for this, even though the first time she kissed him back. I’m only going to get into the pacifism discussion today, but that was just another layer of annoyance bouncing around in the back of my head. Other peoples’ crit of Korra that was stewing in my subconscious, plus this Aang bashing, which thankfully I had not directly read much of, made up the backdrop of gasoline for the match that set it off. Even that seems a pretty melodramatic way to phrase what I actually said, which was: Aang, on the other hand, lost dozens of father figures and was being steamrolled by Ozai who was gloating about genocide TO HIS FACE, yet he still reigned in all that quote, ‘unbelievable rage and pain’ (The Southern Raiders). We Stan Aang, the Superior Avatar. No I did not f**king stutter. #AangSupremacy In another meta, someone complained that I was too defensive of Aang as a character and didn’t apply literary analysis enough, which I quickly rectified.

What set this off? Someone was kind of indirectly praising the line from Korra, “When I get out of here, none of you will survive” To them it was emotionally resonant or whatever, and I have to point out that no, it was a martial artist not having control of their state of mind, as is the bedrock of the practice. It was never addressed by the narrative, which is a severe oversight. I had a conversation with someone in the chats, making this distinction between Korra’s character traits and life philosophy. If she were to kill people while enraged and she was fine with that, that’s one thing. But if she regretted it, that’s a whole other kettle of fish. People argue that she comes from a warrior culture, unlike Aang.

Never mind that warrior monks are a thing. That’s what Shaolin monks are. You can be a pacifist and skilled at fighting. Those things are not mutually exclusive, which is the whole point of Bagua, Aang’s style. And also, Katara’s style.

That’s one reason I like Kataang so much- their congruent styles. Both of their real world martial arts are dedicated to pacifism, even though ATLA specifically doesn’t spell that out for Katara and her learning arc.

There was a meta where someone briefly tried to argue that knowing “martial arts” is against pacifism. No. Quite the opposite. I’d argue that you are not a true pacifist unless you know exactly how to handle yourself if someone attacks you. If you are not in a position to make conscious decisions about how much force to use, rather than merely operating on survival instincts, that is not pacifism. Or at least, not any energy or effort towards pacifism as a practical everyday tool. I’ve made a few attempts to learn some tai chi and aikido, and it’s improved my physical and mental health, but some other things have gotten in the way. #lifegoals

I’m not going to tag the unfortunate soul whom I was replying to, because they’re probably tired of all this, but I’ll be sending them a PM to say that I’ve made this into a different post, because as I mentioned before, threads are somehow considered “owned” by OP, so it’s been pointed out to me that I should separate it. I also said, I have basically ZERO respect for Korra uttering violent threats when the writers already minted a far more emotionally devastated and yet still resilient and centered character earlier in their franchise. People always try to excuse away people who genuinely like Aang more. As if it’s just nostalgia or whatever. For me, no, it’s absolutely not. It is respect for a character who stands toe to toe with real people who are kind in the face of overwhelming injustice. (I have another meta on that).

Both OP and people in the chats try to make excuses that she wasn’t raised as a pacifist, and that would be fine if they had addressed it with Tenzin and she had stated outright that she was rejecting pacifism and mind training. As it is, we are left with this nebulous affair where the lines between ideology and personality traits are blurred.

We are told she “has trouble with spirituality” but what does that even mean? Does she have trouble with focus? Does she have trouble relating to the canonically real spirits? And pacifism specifically nor inner peace that it flows from is never even talked about as an extension of spirituality, which is canonically tied to airbending.

“Aang didn't have to deal once with the loss of his autonomy in atla” OP claims.

This was after I had noted that Aang was getting kicked around by Ozai and was most likely going to die. Similarly, someone in the chat rejected the idea that a 12 year old trapped in a stone sphere that is heating up under a cyclone-sized blowtorch feels powerless.

Sorry but that’s flat out ridiculous.

No one wants to admit that both of these people were faced with similar situations, and when push came to shove, one showed his LIFE PHILOSOPHY through conscious effort, and the other was abandoning the basis of martial arts, which is, no matter what the situation, keep thinking. Hold the panic at bay. Non-attachment would have served her well in this situation. Tenzin should have told her this. Before, or afterwards. It should have been addressed in the writing.

People see this as “bashing” Korra, and oh well, can’t help that. If I think the writers didn’t follow through on their themes, that is my concern. OP said I was “offended.” No, not really.

I wasn’t offended by the post itself, or its commentary. Thought I made that pretty clear.

This is not dramatics. Let me be blunt.

As a ideological pacifist, and an actual practitioner of meditation, based on Buddhism, NOT just the fan of some show, I am for calling out writers who write one way from the survivor of genocide, and then stray from that ‘thoughtless aggression is immoral no matter HOW hurt I am’ to ‘let’s not address this character’s aggression in the narrative whatsoever.’ OP attempted to derail by accusing me of being racist or sexist against Korra. Also ridiculous. It honestly should have set me off more, but it didn’t.

Meditation is about reigning in your emotions. Managing your anger when it gets out of hand, and digging down to the roots of it. Being responsible for your own behavoir. Acknowledging ownership of your own actions. Not blaming anything YOU DO on anyone else or any circumstances in your life. Like an adult, or should I say, an enlightened adult.

Or at the very least, that is the ideal ypu strive towards while being imperfect in the present.

. . .

Now.

I’m going to quote a passage in a Google Doc of mine, even though I’d really prefer if you asked to read the whole thing, with context.

“What do humans do when it is necessary to, or greed makes a nation want to recruit?

They go to the army to get trained, right?

Granted, having someone scream and get spittle on your face is, in the grand scheme of things, poor preparation for having bullets whiz past your chest and grenades shatter your ears. And, what do you do to prepare you for the pain of getting your leg blown off? Hopefully, nothing. Like taking a test where you only got half the study guide. But, it’s about the most ethical way to go about it, right?

Not everyone even sees action. So any more more extensive mental preparation for physical pain than that, and you’d have people definitely protesting.

Well, as it turns out, pacifistic protestors themselves, if they were in the right time and place, also very intentionally do this type of mind training. Except, when they did it, they actually did sit still and took turns roughly grabbing each other and throwing each other down and in some cases, even kicking and bruising each other.

Turns out, those pacifists are, in some ways, more hardcore than the army.

Why is this?

Because a pacifist’s aim, unlike a unit, who wants to gain the upper hand in a situation, is to grit their teeth and grind their way through all those survival instincts, and totally submit.

In this, they aim to get the sympathy of the public, who clearly sees they are not aggressive, or a danger, no matter how much the footage is manipulated or suppressed.

In this, they hope to appeal to their attacker’s better nature.

Make them stop and think, wait a second, are these people a threat like we’re told they are? I’m attacking someone who’s letting me beat them up. Or a bunch of people. All forming a line, and letting us peel them off. Or sitting, and bowing their heads. If I’m on the ‘right’ side of things, the law, why am I doing this?

It’s not like a bully, who’s just a kid.” They’re more self-aware.

And might I add the situation influences a pacifist’s actions too. There’s no reason to let a single or a few random attackers beat you up if you can evade or disable without permanent damage.

Pacifism is a dynamic set of responsive actions informed by values. Not a proscribed set or a checklist.

But in terms of organizing against state power, and recording wrongdoing, which unlike during the Civil Rights can happen from all angles from smart phones nowadays, these are the motivations.

“So, the pacifist knows this, and that’s why they go through all that trouble of training themselves to, not only submit, but not turn tail and run, either.”

See, a character trait is something like being a morning person, or ways of handing information, or a given set of emotions a character feels. Once you cross over into actions, you must make the distinction of whether an impulsive character agrees with their own uncontrolled actions, or is embarrassed or remorseful. Those are life philosophy. Now sure, one type of person or character may be more likely to subscribe to pacifism, but there is no gatekeeping on what you have to feel or how you look at things. You can be easygoing, or feel all the rage in the world, but as long as you at least attempt to have a handle on those desires and feelings to where they do not cross into actions, you are still doing the work of metacognition, which is what martial arts and its accompanying mind training are for.

It’s what we see Aang do.

He’s informed us, during the Southern Raiders, on how much rage and pain he feels.

Pain points, TRIGGERS, that were directly struck at when Ozai gloated over him.

He joins with all the past Avatars for several moments, and just like every other time he is in the Avatar State, he is enraged. He wants to exact revenge on the unrepentant grandson of a baby murderer.

We see it when he turns his head away, face still screwed up in anger.

For another example, I could cite my difficulties in being aware and reining in my tongue sometimes. I know the roots of these issues and I seek to let them go.

It’s just that process takes way longer than Guru Pathik would have us assume.

In fact, I would even say that Aang’s portrayal throughout the three seasons is not strictly a realistic representation of at least the sad side of grief. I addressed that a little when I talked about real life figures. But what it IS, is a metaphor that cuts very deep to the heart of pacifism. As I showed in that Doc . . . There is no limit of suffering a pacifist is willing to go through, internal or external, for the preservation of peace.

This was demonstrated during the Civil Rights, and with Gandhi and all his followers beforehand, inspiring them. The pacifists’ method of swaying hearts is probably the reason BLM exists in such numbers as it does today. Will the types of narratives that correspond with their full stories of the way they collectively planned and trained for and approached conflict make it into fantasy media? I’d say, probably not. For a host of reasons.

It could be hoped for, I guess.

But we DO have Aang.

As for myself, whether speaking sharply is an “action,” per se is up for debate- certainly it doesn’t seem to violate the non-aggression principle put forth by the vision of a “stateless society.”

For another example, let’s take my explanation at the beginning. I am examining how circumstances affected my actions, and now am attempting to fix it, if indeed it needs to be fixed.

At least one person said that it not so much what I said, but how and when I said it. I don’t actually think I’ve said anything “wrong” per se. So I have to figure it out.

[I’m considering splitting up this next part into a second post, as it only slightly relates to pacifism itself and is just kinda some more commentary on Tumblr itself- Tumblr discourse, as it were]

[I’ll put more brackets when I’m done in case you want to skip this part as well]

An interesting social difference between Tumblr and other places is this command you often get, “don’t chat/reblog/message me back.”

This is interesting for several reasons. For chats and reblogs, other people may be following the “conversation,” so it’s actually pretty rude and presumptuous to tell a person not to respond to whatever you said, because other people watching still may be interested in your take.

In a forum setting, if someone involved in a conversation doesn’t have anything left to say, usually they just don’t respond.

This method would work perfectly fine for Tumblr, but for some reason, maybe its super odd format, probably due to the “ownership”/“extension of self” I mentioned at the beginning of the essay, people don’t tend to do this.

Now, in comment sections, sometimes you’ll run across an amusing sort of “mutually assured destruction” where two people both say this to each other. You’d better stop responding. Omg just give up. Why are you still arguing. Etc.

But see, no matter where this behavoir pops up, and no matter who starts in on it, those who do this usually want to have the last say on the matter.

Instead of merely not replying, they want to assert verbal control over the conversation.

Tumblr, in its weirdness, is also sort of like a mutant comments section. You can post comment section threads as your own post.

Which is one reason why I’m puzzled when people say ‘don’t read the comment sections’ when Tumblr is so popular.

I’m an oddball in that I browse comment sections for fun.

Probably due to alexithymia, I didn’t really comprehend the emotional toll it takes on many people, so the warnings to “stay out of comment sections” read to me like “hey don’t eat that dessert.” After I’m done with the ‘meal’ of an article or art, I like to see what lots of different people have to say about it. The fluff. Anything vitriolic I either blip over, or extract anything useful, or if I judge the person is reasonable enough, I might engage.

Sometimes I mis-judge on how reasonable someone is, and I shrug and move on after being cussed out or whatever.

In this, I suppose I succeed much of the time in being a verbal pacifist.

[But let’s get back to the more serious stuff.]

We’re talking about what is done in life or death situations, here.

For myself, I may in the near future be working more with dangerously mentally ill people. I’ve had a little exposure to it through various means. Nurses are obligated not to retaliate against patients, and those who have, have been fired in some situations. Again oddly, this is not primarily what triggers my anxiety. Unfortunately enough, this requirement has also resulted in nurses getting seriously injured and violated. I hope to influence whether “no harm” techniques such as tai chi and aikido and arm locks may be allowed. The voluntary philosophy I was luckily already on board with is enforced by bureauacracy, directly relevant to my potential profession.

Were someone to get involved in a dangerous profession, such as a police officer, their moral duty would also be to own up to any spur of the moment anger or fear they acted on.

It’s just that their bureaucracy acts differently, in excusing their actions.

Ideally, they would be taking steps far in advance, to avoid this often-cited fear of death reaction. As training pacifists like Aang do.

And yes, army people are trained differently than police officers because the army, often, even when threatened, is supposed to avoid engagement or deploy deterrents that are non-lethal almost all costs, unless ordered otherwise. Whereas American police are given pretty much complete discretion and often not taught de-escalation techniques. Even police from other nations are better trained in that regard.

Enter the ironically named @avatarfandompolice whose account description should really speak for itself. Combative, dismissive, and their attention-hungry bread and butter is to find people they think it’s acceptable to ridicule. They basically tried to say trauma was a valid excuse to take out your anger on other people, and in this situation, potentially kill.

Now, does this hold up in the real world? Yeah, sometimes. Especially if some law breaker or law keeper has not been given the anger management tools, they perhaps could be excused, or better yet, rehabilitated.

But especially if anyone finds themselves in dangerous situations, or intends to put themselves in such, it falls to them to do this preparation.

As an aphant, I am at a bit of a disadvantage, compared to an average martial artist, being unable to visualize an attacker. But I still attempt it.

As the main “police officer” of the world- the coincidentally blue clad figurehead that is supposed to keep order, it is apparently fine for Korra to not do the work Aang did to keep level. To blow it off as too much trouble: clearing the First Chakra of fear. For herself or others. And its resultant anger. Had she had access to the Avatar State, the authority figure pretty much would have killed people. This is what the “fandom police” and a certain chat goer ultimately support. Maybe they didn’t understand it that way, and since the second had blocked me, they will also never see this explanation. Unless I were to share it in Google Doc form I suppose.

So, I responded. “Remember kids, you are not responsible for your own behavior if you have the excuse that someone else did something bad to you.” A frighteningly common sentiment on this site.

When it’s low stakes like CAPSLOCKING or internet fights, that’s not such a big deal. But what happens if this attitude leaks into the real world? This isn’t even about Korra or Aang anymore, it’s about toxic mindsets. I didn’t know fans taking pro-Korra posts as anti-Aang was a common in the fandom. I’ll say again I’ve only just gotten really active on Tumblr like the past few months. This is about pacifism itself. MLK and his hardworking, training followers (yes some of them sixteen and POC and not super-powered like Korra) facing down firehoses and staging sit-ins long trained for would shake their heads at this defense of reactionism.

Pacifism is not a Personality Trait.

It is deliberate actions and preparation taken over a period of time.

Then the “fandom police” tried more of this, and these two conversations ensued, the comments with another user resulting in the title and main thesis of this essay:

https://captlok.tumblr.com/post/638777472806273024/avatarfandompolice-response-to-my-independent

https://captlok.tumblr.com/post/638806142933467136/the-plight-was-not-what-i-was-getting-at-it-was

#atla #lok #atlok #atla meta #pacifism #martin luther king #civil rights era #history #blm #mlk #mlkday2021

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whump-me-all-night-long · 4 years ago

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The Scoop of a Lifetime - 10

Whumptober Day 10 - THEY LOOK SO PRETTY WHEN THEY BLEED

Tagging @mnmlover2002, @cupcakes-and-pain, let me know if you want to be added!

So this one kinda got away from me, so it’s a lot bit longer than my usual pieces, and I hope it’s as good, so enjoy!

CW: cutting, threats, referenced torture (very brief), let me know if I missed anything!

Masterlist // Previous

---

Wildre forced Devin to sit there for a bit longer, making idle chat about his business - both parts of it - referencing people they didn’t know and the various aspects of business that had ensured they never entered that career field. They knew they should pay attention, perhaps Wildre would share something they could use in the future, but they were too absorbed in their own what have i agreed to what’s going to happen to me thoughts.

Finally, Wildre let out an exaggerated sigh. “Devin, love,” he drawled, drawing them out of their mind. “Have you listened to a word I’ve said?”

They felt a blush creep up their neck and gave a slightly dismissive shrug. “Yes?” they replied tersely, the blatant lie ringing discordantly in their ears.

He simply gave them an all-too-knowing why is he looking at me like that please don’t do that don’t you look before seemingly switching subjects and saying, “Did you know, love, that I absolutely detest liars?” At their pointed look, he clarified, “As in, those who dare lie to me?” Ah.

Devin blinked rapidly and glanced away a bit too quickly to be natural, staring determinedly out the window into the gardens below.

He waited for a moment, as if to give them an opportunity to confess i lied i’m sorry i lied please don’t hurt me come clean. When it was clear they wouldn’t, he sighed and shook his head slightly. “Why must you make things so difficult, love?”

Devin stiffened but remained silent. They didn’t dare open their mouth for fear of what might slip out, but they slowly, carefully, tentatively tore their eyes from the scene below and raised them towards his face, barely holding back a flinch when they saw the slanted, wicked grin cut across his face.

Then they saw the knife he was dangling from his fingers.

They were out of their chair and halfway across the room before Wildre called, “Devin, love, please come sit back down.” Realizing they had no choice, they haltingly turned back around and edged toward him, the sight of the weapon causing every thought they had to flee their head.

They were well within grabbing distance he could grab me right now and hurt me and i can’t stop him only a few feet away when Wildre tilted his head to the chair. “Sometime today, love, would be preferable.”

Hating themself and Wildre and everything and everyone that had led them to this point, Devin sat straight-backed on the edge of the seat, unable to tear their gaze from the knife Wildre so casually twirled around his fingers.

His smirk growing, Wildre slowly dragged his pale gray eyes downward so they settled on the same spot Devin’s dark brown were watching. He held the blade up slightly. “Magnificent, isn’t it?” Devin mutely shook their head, causing him to sigh. “You can’t seem to cooperate today, can you, love? Speak.”

The chill in his voice caused them to stumblingly spit out, “Yes. It’s mag-magnificent.” They parroted his words, as they tried to brace themself for the pain that they knew was about to come.

His gaze settled back on them warmly. “So glad, you agree. Now, I think it’s time we play a little game, since you’re so sure you’ve been listening to me.” Devin’s mouth opened slightly, ready to plead for forgiveness i’m so sorry i’m sorry for not listening please don’t hurt me contradict what they said earlier, but Wildre continued. “Unless, of course, you did that foolish little thing where you lied to me.” They heard the threat in his voice and clamped their lips together.

His grin caused them to tense before he ordered, “Sit back, love.” There was a split-second of hesitation, before Devin did as they were told. Their knuckles turned a bloodless white from where they clenched them against the soft fabric of the chair.

Wildre stood up and walked around them, leaning behind them, the knife resting softly on their shoulder. Devin breathed deeply, concentrating on the material the chair was made out of the slight tickle of his breath on my neck the steady weight of the knife taking those calming breaths.

“I see you took my advice, love,” Wildre’s voice murmured next to their ear and it took everything in them not to flinch away. The knife lifted from their shoulder and the tip danced along their vulnerable cheek, hard enough to poke and irritate slightly, but not break the skin. “On taking those deep breaths, that is.” Even now, Devin heard his voice echoing in their mind. “Unfortunately the same can’t be said of you lying to me.”

Suddenly the prickle of the knife became too much as it moved higher, and they felt a drop of warm blood trickle down the side of their face where it had shallowly sliced along the top of their cheekbone. They couldn’t hold in tears i’m about to start crying please don’t let me start crying please don’t hurt me a rattling gasp, a quick unsteady inhale. Squeezing their eyes shut, they felt the knife leave their skin and heard Wildre walk back around in front of them.

“Open up, love.” His light, teasing voice floated towards them. Not wanting to upset him more than they already had, they reopened their eyes, finding his face. He chuckled slightly before clarifying, “Your mouth. Open up your mouth, now, love.”

Blushing, they separated their lips and before they realized where he was going with things, he had already slipped the thin blade between their teeth, resting the cold metal along their tongue. Devin couldn’t help but swallow and let out a small whimper as they felt the tip cut slightly into the tender flesh at the movement.

Wildre’s whispered, “Hold onto that for me, love.” was the only warning Devin had before he let go of the handle. Devin bit down on the blade, but not fast enough, and they felt a drop of warm blood fall from the roof of their mouth.

Eyes filling with tears of pain of fear of humiliation, they stared up at Wildre as he stepped back, a contemplative look on his face as he hungrily devoured the expression on their face. He sat back on the edge of the coffee table.

“Now, love, do you know why you’re in this situation?” Devin could hear the mocking in his voice, and a soft whine escaped their throat before they nodded slightly, feeling the knife wobble in their mouth. Wildre couldn’t - or didn’t - hold back his smirk as he chastised, “Use your words now.”

They stared at him as if waiting for him to say just kidding take the knife out of my mouth help me please refute what he said, but, when it became clear he was content to wait for them, they hissed out a garbled noise that sounded vaguely like a “Yes.” Their jaw already ached with the force they were using to keep the blade steady; every time they lessened the pressure, it began cutting into their mouth.

Wildre raised a brow but accepted the sound. “You’re doing that because you lied to me, right?” He paused for Devin’s nod, which they gave reluctantly. “See, I told you I didn’t like people lying to me, and I gave you plenty of opportunities to come clean, but you didn’t.” At that, his smile turned into a scowl, and he reached forward and grabbed their aching it was so sore and tired already but i can’t let it go but ow he’s hurting me jaw, forcing their head up as he stood.

“You are mine,” he hissed, all pretenses of humor gone, and Devin felt their blood run cold. “You are mine and you will do as I say and you will never lie to me again.” He squeezed, and they felt the insides of their cheeks getting torn up by the sharp metal, their mouth filling with blood and their eyes with tears. “The sooner you understand that, that you are mine and you are powerless here and you are going to be mine, here, forever, the less this will all hurt. Do you understand me?”

His voice had grown more terrifying, despite the fact that he’d gotten quieter, so that by the end, they were having to strain to be able to hear. They let out a muffled sob, the tears racing down their cheeks, burning slightly when they met the open cut on their face, before they nodded quickly.

He straightened up with a harsh pat to their cheek that sent them biting down harder on the knife to keep from crying out as fresh cuts were made inside their mouth. “Good. Remember this the next time you think of lying to me.” With that, he yanked the knife out, grazing the corners of their lips, and strode out of the room, leaving Devin curled over themself, silently sobbing with a bloody mouth.

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seizethecringeofproduction · 3 years ago

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Flashpoint 2: Advent Solaris - Chapter 2

CONTENT WARNING

You will be brutally reminded of the DCAMU characters besides Damian and Raven in this chapter. You have been warned. The imagery in this chapter is NOT pretty.

In the hours following the festival of the sun, Soleanna remained in shambles - reeling from the arrival of this timeline's biggest villain, Dr. Eggman. The castle town area had entire sections of itself barricaded off by the Soleanna royal guard due to the remaining damage that needed to be cleaned up and repaired from the previous night's attack. The New City area was left unscathed due to not being involved in the attack, but it and all of its residents were essentially locked off from castle town due to the tunnel between the two being closed off. Even tourists who were clambering to get back to their homes out of a desire to avoid what they likely knew was coming in the near future ended up being stopped by either entire areas of the country being shut down, resulting in massive lines lasting for entire blocks extending out from the train station and bumper-to-bumper build ups along the highway, or at least so said the news when it came to the latter.

For Barry, this did not help at all with his ambition of helping Sonic in the good fight against Eggman. In fact, it literally achieved quite the opposite.

Well after Barry spent a few good hours navigating the poorly designed, conforming New City district until he located the tunnel door again - all while lamenting no longer having his powers - he was introduced by not only the fact that the large ornate green door was closed but also guardian by a small troop of green-armored royal guardsman. These guardsmen, from what he could tell, were Soleanna's sole police force.

He would soon learn that they actually were more than capable of competing with Gotham City's police force in their sheer levels of corruption and incompetence.

It also should be noted here that quite literally, it appeared as though there were no women present within the ranks of the royal guard, as not once did Barry see a person wearing their green uniforms that even resembled the feminine form. It wasn't until he was stopped from entering castle town that reasons besides the obvious became considerations as to why no woman would want to join this organization:

"I'm sorry sir, nobody is allowed into castle town. No exceptions", one of the three policemen sternly said to Barry, putting out a hand to stop him from walking any further. Being a hero, Barry respected the law, though he didn't exactly appreciate it when they got in the way of 'the job'.

"I've got important business to deal with over there, I'll be right back."

"Whatever business you're going to do, I'm sure it can wait. We have severe building and street repair, as well as an investigation into the kidnapping of Princess Elise."

"Well" Barry quickly thought of something to say, hoping it would work, "I just so happen to be a forensic scientist! Best in the business, actually! So if you let me through that door and tunnel right there I can help you with that investigation!"

"You're not hearing me, sir" the policeman scowled, "The investigation is not about who kidnapped her, the investigation is about where her kidnapper went!"

"Well can you tell me where?"

"The giant battleship was last spotted heading towards Wave Ocean, and we believe towards the Dusty Desert part of the island after that. However, both areas are blocked off from public - that means you - entrance for the time being."

"So you guys are blocking off the area where your monarch's been brought to as a captive, instead of going in to rescue her?"

"Hey" the Policeman, clearly irritated with such sass, proceeded to 'bark' out "I don't tell you how to do your 'detective' job, you don't tell us how to do ours! Besides, rescue operations are G.U.N. and the blue wind's forte!"

Well I hate these guys already.

"You guys do know that a forensic scientist is different from a detective, right?"

"Does the difference matter?" the guard responded, "You guys both do practically the same thing, investigate stuff! All you do is work with DNA, and all a detective does is work with clues! Same difference!"

I want to slap this guy so hard right now, but I'd be arrested.

"The point is, I'm technically a cop just like you and your friends" Barry glared at the man, "From Central City, granted, but as you just said - same difference."

The guardsman once again scowled at Barry for his remark, with his arms crossed as well. It was evident that he did not take kindly to such 'disrespect', though also evident there wasn't much he could or felt like doing about it. Eventually the other man grunted and spoke to Barry in a somewhat defeated yet also still very disrespectful tone of voice:

"Alright, you can proceed to the castle town. On one condition."

"What condition?"

"If you can guess who the captain of the guard is, we'll let you through."

The smirk on the guardsman's face, as well as the snickering from the others, betrayed just how 'seriously' these men actually took their jobs. Barry likely did notice those looks, but there wasn't much he could do about it - other than give a look of both lack of surprise as well as complete boredom with this entire vacation.

Next time Iris and I talk about vacation spots, I'm being clear with her about never going back here again.

Barry rolled his eyes. If he had his powers he would just run along the water to the other side of the island, completely ignoring the 'bull' of these incompetent buffoons. However, while the Flash could do that in seconds, Barry Allen wasn't precisely capable of it. He would have to improvise in order to get anything done here.

"Let me take an educated guess here, are you the captain?" he said, unamused, pointing directly at the guard who presented the idea to him. For some reason, all of them found this entire thing incredibly hilarious. After recovering from bursting into laughter:

"Guess again!"

"Any of the guys behind you?"

Unfortunately for Barry, they all responded accordingly:

"No!"

"Nope!"

"Not me!"

Oh. My. God.

Barry now understood why Batman never worked with the police much outside of commissioner Gordon. He completely understood Bruce's distrust now. As a fellow cop, at least technically, he was beyond ashamed of these so-called men of the force. However, being powerless he had little choice but to go along with their ridiculous game which he knew damn well was for the most part, purely for their amusement. He hoped dearly that if he did find the captain, that there would be discipline for these guys - but something told him this was routine behaviour for Soleanna's police.

For at least a full hour and a half, Barry yet again found himself wandering the streets of Soleanna's New City district - this time looking for members of it's royal guard police force in order to ask where the 'captain' was. He tended to receive one of the follow responses from those he did manage to talk with:

"The captain? I think that guy's over there!"

"You mean that guy?"

"Oh yeah, I'm the Captain! Captain of being awesome!"

"I believe the captain has door guarding duty at the moment. At least, I think he does."

"The captain? Not me!"

"Not me!"

"That is not me."

"That's not me."

"Have you tried looking over there?"

By the end of it all, Barry's eye was twitching and his face locked in complete, total frustration. He found it incredibly hard to believe that such people were qualified for a position as important as defending the city, the country, the monarchy and most important of all the civilians. In his own thoughts:

These people aren't qualified to protect a slice of pizza!

Returning to the guards that he had first run to while also being absolutely tired, he glared at them as if he wanted to punch them - which he did - while they were still finding excessive humor in his misery. The guard who made him go on the search for the captain was the first to break from laughter just to ask him in a mocking tone:

"Do you have any clue who the captain is yet, forensic scientist?"

"No" Barry said, scowling at the man with incredibly intense anger - though said anger was ignored by the so-called 'police', who only mocked him with one more sentence:

"Well, maybe you should try taking DNA samples! Isn't that what you're people are good at?"

The bursts of laughter that succeeded that 'joke' did not help alleviate Barry's anger. Quite the contrary actually.

How the hell did these idiots get their jobs?

Thankfully for Barry, the laughter did not last long. Not long after it began in fact, did the door behind the guards open, revealing yet again the tunnel connecting the New City to the Castle Town district. Sighing of relief as the confused guards walked off to the side, Barry was ready to see what he could do about the ongoing situation of Elise's kidnapping. That is, until some unexpected burst of wind - or speed, really - flew right past him and knocked him straight to the ground.

Recovering himself quickly, Barry could see that this burst of speed was none other than Sonic - who had come speeding out of Castle Town and only broke from his running seemingly to take in the environment of the New City district.

Barry could see Sonic was not alone, however. Since the memories of this timeline hadn't begun to kick in yet, he did not recognize the figure who was following after the blur however. A yellow furred fox, with shining blue eyes, red-white shoes, white gloves and most uniquely of all two tails - that he could evidently use to fly somehow as Barry saw him clearly using them to lift himself just slightly off the ground to keep up with Sonic himself.

Barry took only a few seconds to process this newly introduced person before remembering with a speedster he had to make his introductions quick:

"Sonic? Sonic!" he exclaimed, before trying to head over to the blue, four foot tall Hedgehog and the even less tall fox. Luckily for him, he did in fact gain Sonic's attention:

"What's up?" the Hedgehog greeted, rather casually all things considered.

I'm talking to a four foot tall, talking, thing that is supposedly a Hedgehog. This is real. I am not on drugs. I am not hallucinating. This'll all be normal to me in the near future.

"I'm Barry Allen" Barry decided it was best to be upfront with Sonic, whom he was still having trouble believing was not a drug hallucination, "I'm a forensic scientist from Central City, and I know this may be sudden and out of the blue, but I want to help you with saving Princess Elise."

There was a moment of silence between all three parties involved in the conversation, though this was broken by Sonic himself:

"Well Barry, I'm Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog!" Sonic's words were complete with a signature thumbs up, before he turned to the fox standing beside him, "And this here is Tails, my best bud!"

"Hi!" Tails casually waved, Barry returned the gesture, though in a nervous manner considering he still found it hard to believe any of this was really happening.

"And as for you helping me save Elise" Sonic remarked, "I appreciate the gesture but unless you got some powers, you'll probably just get lost in my dust!"

Barry wanted to say something, though knew damn well that unless he regains his powers, the hedgehog has a point. A very accurate point.

"That, actually is a fair point, to be honest."

"Heh, don't feel bad about it though. Not your fault you're not the fastest thing alive!"

Oh, you're gonna eat those words when I get my powers back.

Barry held back the explanation of who he was. The payback for that line would come. Just not now.

"Fair, fair enough" Barry held in his urges quite well, "But, before you go, can you at least tell me if you've had any luck yet?"

"Well, I kinda did actually" Sonic revealed, explaining the events Barry had unfortunately missed out on, "Me and Tails rescued her out in the desert, even fought a giant dog robot! Got her out of the desert just fine, but then some crazy dude attacked me out of nowhere! Said I destroyed his world, luckily Amy was there to help hold him off but Eggman kidnapped Elise again. Now I gotta go to the warehouse district to meet with Knuckles, he says he has information as to where Eggman took Elise off to!"

I'm gonna take a wild guess and assume Knuckles and Amy are more talking animals I'd normally write off as Darkseid or Zoom having injected me with crack or bath salts or something.

"Do you know where the warehouse district is, Barry?" Tails asked, "We've never been here before, and honestly this city can be pretty hard to navigate."

"You're telling me, Tails" Sonic snarked, "Just to get through the door I had to guess who the captain of the guard was!"

"You too?" Barry was absolutely stunned, "They did that to me like just a few minutes ago! I don't know what kind of police force they have around here!"

"Tell me about it!"

"But, why didn't you just run around them, like, on the water or something? Wouldn't you be fast enough?"

"Oh" Sonic rubbed the back of his quills, suddenly becoming visibly nervous as he explained why said event didn't happen, "Long story, but me and water don't precisely get along."

"Oh, I see."

"Yeah."

"Ahem, guys?" Tails gained back both of their attention, "The warehouses?"

"Right, sorry" Barry replied before turning his eye contact back to Sonic, "From what I remember from my own hours wandering around this place, all you gotta do is head that way" he pointed directly to what was the north, "No turns, and-"

With a single burst of wind followed by the sound of two tails swishing around to keep up, Barry knew the speedster had already dashed off. Looking in the direction he pointed off to, he could only see the blue blur of Sonic's dashing speed for only a few seconds before it dissipated. He then let out a sigh, wishing he could help with his own speed. Instead he could only walk in the direction he pointed to, though he figured by the time he arrived at the warehouses Sonic, Tails and apparently 'Knuckles' would all be long gone and moving on in their adventure without him.

It's bad enough this timeline doesn't have any of the faces or names I remember aside from Iris.

But this is just rubbing salt on the wound.

Barry would have kept walking through the streets of the New City district, had he not been distracted by a noise coming from a lone alleyway, shrouded in the darkness of the buildings towering into the sky above. The noise was like a loud, metallic clang, loud enough to gain his attention - though in a city district with no automobiles that wasn't hard. Barry assumed it had been a garbage lid, or something metallic in nature, hitting one of the building walls in the alley. Though, all he could see was darkness.

Pitch, black, darkness.

Swallowing a bit due to an eerie, cold feeling running down his spine, Barry tried to turn away and resume walking. That was however, when a voice spoke to him. From the darkness of the alley.

"Such a pity, isn't it?"

"Huh?"

Turning to the voice to see who was talking to him, even stepping closer - to the edge of the darkness though not a single step closer, all Barry could see now were the eyes of some person or creature standing before him. Eyes emerging from the shadow - bright, emerald green, and reptilian in nature.

"Such a pity to remember a past that no longer exists" the figure to whom the eyes belonged to spoke, "And to be a misfit in the present that you created. Is it not, Flash?"

"How do you know about that? And how do you know my identity?"

"Oh, I know many things, Mr. Allen."

"Who. Are. You?"

"I'm someone who can help you accomplish precisely what you want, and more."

"Yeah, right. Like I'm going to trust some creepy guy in an alley who says that." turning away, Barry was yet again going to walk away, though the figure proved quite persistent.

"Wouldn't it be delightful if you could go back to your previous timeline, with the knowledge you have now?"

Hearing those words. Hearing that idea. Seeing the imagery in his mind. It got him to at least turn back to the pair of eyes in the alley, with a confused yet inquisitive face. He didn't fully believe such a thing was capable, but figured a being who knows of his previous timelines at all was at least worth listening to. However, giving it thought and remembering what he knows about his flashpoints, he was quick to attempt a debunking of the idea:

"That's, that's impossible." he said, "The mere act of time travelling causes ripples that affect everything around it. If you, or I, tried to go back to that timeline, it wouldn't work. It would be a completely different timeline no matter what."

"That is true" the figure admitted, only to follow up bluntly, "If you time travel as sloppily as you do."

"Sloppily?"

"It is true that time is not entirely linear." the figure explained, "Though even the most unruly fan blade or flat surface can be straightened out with a firm enough hand. Time is much like a plate of food. Your method of traversing the stream of time is to smash the entirety of the plate into your face, when it is much cleaner to instead use precision, devouring one piece at a time using the proper utensil."

"What, what exactly are you saying?"

"I'm saying" the figure then allowed the darkness from around itself to reveal its full form. It did not step closer or anything of the sort, rather the shadows seemed to actually recede from the being on their own accord, perhaps on the commands of the figure itself. The whole scene made an even colder chill run down Barry's spine.

Then came the creature's appearance. It resembled a hedgehog, of the Sonic variety, though it had two quills which were curved. It was also mostly a deep black in coloration, with pale blue stripes on the quills, arms and legs - as well as a puff of white fur on the chest. Pale metallic rings around it's gloves, and more complicated shoes that seemed to be of the advanced technology variety.

Most pressing of all however, was the fact that upon this creature's pale skinned muzzle, was no mouth. Barry wanted to bring it up, but he felt it unwise to do so.

As if knowing what Barry was going to ask next, the being introduced itself:

"Allow me to introduce myself, Flash. I am Mephiles. Mephiles the Dark."

"Mephiles…"

I really wish Constantine were here right now so he could tell me if this guy is like Raven or like Trigon.

"What" Barry nervously said, trying to keep himself from shaking too much, "What do you want with me?"

"Nothing, at the moment" Mephiles spoke, without a mouth his intentions were impossible for Barry to read, "There is quite literally nothing Barry Allen could potentially offer me, though is quite a lot that I could offer you."

"Like, what?"

"For one, I could give you the chance you want. A happier ending. I could give you a chance to go back to your own timeline, to warn your friends of the mistake they are about to make, to save your nephew and his friends from their cruel fates. All without the sloppy changes you brought up not too long ago."

"You're bluffing."

"I assure you, I am not."

Mephiles then held out a hand in front of Barry, and within his hand came a sphere of dark indigo energy, surrounded by what appeared to be blackened electricity. Barry flinched at first, though soon peered into this ball of dark energy - within moments, he gasped. He was actually looking at the main room of the Watchtower, the headquarters of the Justice League. Bruce, Clark and Diana were informing him and the rest of the League about the plan to assault Apokolips, while also briefing the Teen Titans about it remotely as well. The scene in the sphere looked like it was directly from Barry's own eyes as well - he remembers everything. Clark, Bruce and Diana's positioning, Clark slamming his fist down to show how serious he was about the attack, Constantine's skepticism about it. Everything was there.

In a moment of desperation, Barry snatched at the energy ball - though Mephiles pulled his hand back just as he did so, with the ball of memories disappearing with him. Barry was now on the ground of the alleyway, peering up at Mephiles from beneath - all he had were Mephiles' green eyes to gauge his intentions with. Still, Barry was too shocked to say anything other than:

"How did you do that?"

"You're not the only one who can travel through time" Mephiles explained, "Using speed to do the job is far too sloppy. I use far more precise methods."

"And, you can put me back into that timeline?"

"Complete with your memory and all, yes. It will be just like you came into it from a portal. Seamless, precise. As though a God made it happen."

Wally...Wallace...Iris...Conner...Billy...Barbara...Hal...Zatanna...Everyone...

"Then do it" Barry's tone changed to one of pure determination as he stood up, attempting to tower over Mephiles - though the mysterious being seemed to not be intimidated, "Do it now."

"Patience" Mephiles told him, "There is plenty of time for you to return, the moment is not going anywhere, and thanks to your prior adjustments to time travel neither are your memories."

Closing his eyes, Barry took a deep breath. All he could muster the will to say was:

"I can't help you do much of anything without my powers."

"Oh" Mephiles nonchalantly remarked, "I am quite aware. However, I can not help you to restore them here. It is best we retire to a domain of mine where such a feat is more easily done."

With that having been said, Mephiles gestured to what was at first merely the other end of the alleyway - a dead end of brick and mortar. However, within seconds a far larger sphere of dark energy appeared - soon turning into what was recognizable to Barry as a portal, more often referred to by him as a 'boom tube'. Mephiles gestured for him to walk inside of it, though as soon as Barry did he was pelted by second thoughts:

At first, his reasoning was simple. A chance to save both of his nephews. A chance to save Superboy, Wonder Girl, Beast Boy, Blue Beetle, Batgirl, Zatanna and all the other heroes that those horrible monsters slaughtered. A chance to restore the world to the state he remembered.

But then, he thought about it longer.

Just before entering the portal, he remembered. This timeline was, to him, brand new. In a few hours, if not sooner, he might begin to gain his memories of it, and everything of it will be , Tails, possibly even Mephiles. It will all be normal to him, and he will vividly remember all that he missed out on.

Absence of evidence doesn't always mean evidence of absence.

Clark, Bruce, Hal, even the Titans. They all could very well exist in this timeline for all he knew. Just not relevant enough to appear in books. The only ones he knew did not exist yet were Wally and Wallace, who simply haven't been born yet. Perhaps Clark is even light years away on a surviving krypton. Who would he be to bring them back to their previous selves, thrusting them back into a war with that monstrous dictator. A war in which, as he witnessed himself, did not end well for many of them.

With further thought, his answer was clear.

"No."

He stopped in his tracks, virtually one step away from actually walking into the portal. He turned to Mephiles almost defiantly, explaining to the mysterious being:

"I created one timeline out of my own selfishness. I don't know if versions of my friends exist here or not, but who am I to ruin any of their lives by dragging them back into that stupid war? I don't care what you're offering me, I'd rather become the Flash on my own and let whatever versions of my friends who are here live their lives in peace."

As Barry yet again stormed off, Mephiles could only softly laugh, before speaking to Barry just as he was one step out of the alleyway.

"I thought you might say that, Mr. Allen. Have you forgotten how your many 'flashpoint' timelines have ended?"

Oh No…

"Oh yes" Mephiles remarked, "Let's see, the first one you created had two warring factions decimate both each other and the entire planet, killing millions in the process. The second one you created ended up conquered and utterly decimated by a certain warlord from across the galaxy, if I'm not mistaken. Either way, both timelines ended in complete and utter disaster - and there's not much guarantee that wouldn't have happened even in your original timeline at some point either. So what precisely makes you think that it wouldn't happen this time?"

Barry closed his eyes, taking a deep breath, even clenching his fists before responding to the demon:

"Because...there is no Trigon. There is no Darkseid. The only alien invaders here were single handedly destroyed by one person already. This timeline seems pretty safe to me."

"Safe? Is that so?"

"From what I can see, yes."

"Well then, I implore you to take a closer look."

With Mephiles gesturing once again back at the portal he had created, Barry walked a few steps closer and peered his eyes closer into its light. Soon, a grizzly sight materialized into it. A city. One not too different from Metropolis or Gotham, or even Soleanna. Completely destroyed. It's surely once prosperous skyscrapers and high-rises are either damaged, destroyed, or even leaning. Water replaced with lava, entire tornadoes of fire running amuck through the ruins of what was surely once a land teeming with life and activity - though now only death and destruction.

There was no sign of life.

Only destroyed cars. Destroyed buildings. Massive canyons of what were once highways and streets, filled with lava and fire. Demonic beings made of molten rock and magma roamed the streets as well as the skies - ensuring any survivors would dare not venture too far outside.

Barry looked upon this sight with horror. His jaw dropped. His legs, his body backing away from it. All he could muster up the courage to say was spoken very weakly, his entire body shaking as he let it out of his mouth:

"Please, don't tell me…"

"Yes" Mephiles was blunt about the truth, "This is the future of this timeline, if you and I do nothing to prevent this from occurring. Just like all of the others."

Barry was completely and utterly silent for what felt like an eternity, even if it was only a few short moments.

Just when he had thought this timeline was finally going to be one in which there was just peace and happiness.

He learned that he was wrong.

Still shaking, he turned to Mephiles, and all he asked was but one simple question:

"What can we do to prevent this?"

"Follow me."

It was only two words, but with those two words Mephiles stepped into the portal to the 'future' and disappeared into it - the vision of the ruined city's skyline disappearing back into the void of energy as he did so.

Barry however, hesitated. In his mind, countless thoughts about what he was doing and who he was putting his trust into raced through his mind - though a few thoughts and internal debates stood out amongst all of the others.

He's the only being that might be able to help me stop Darkseid without so much horror and death.

He's clearly a demon, how do I know he's not just lying to me about everything?

Even if I decide to stay here, this timeline might be doomed too if I don't do something about it. Assuming what I saw was what he said he was, and after him showing me my last timeline, should I even doubt him at all?

Is this a gamble I want to risk taking?

I suppose yes, yes it is.

And so, Barry took his chances and walked after Mephiles into the unknown. Disappearing into the void of the time portal with it vanishing just seconds after he did so - leaving the entire scene looking as though nothing had happened at all, besides a small cool breeze through the alley that displaced a few newspapers that had long since been thrown to the ground.

Barry had little idea of the part he was playing in the grand scheme of things, or who was putting all of the pieces of this puzzle together.

All he knew was that he wanted to do the right thing.

________________________________________________________________

It can't be…

Please tell me this isn't happening to me again…

Standing on the edge of a cliff, Barry fell to his knees. Eyes widened in shock. Lips quivering. Everything he was seeing, was exactly why he didn't want to open his eyes when he first arrived. This was the very thing he was afraid of.

The future.

All around him, now life sized, was what remained of a long since destroyed city. Entire streets caved in like massive canyons, alited by the fiery magma from the center of the planet, rising up to serve as massive rivers through the landscape. The sky was a mix of blood red and charcoal black, reflecting the lava and joined by the suffocating smoke rising to take the place of clouds. Skyscrapers, High Rises, Houses, everything of the sort was all left in ruins. Some buildings were flat out destroyed, others slanting, others with massive holes within them, others just now finally collapsing into dust or falling over for good.

There was no sign of life that Barry could see that wasn't some type of flying or land dwelling demon made of molten rock. None of them seemed to pay him or Mephiles any mind, though they clearly relished in setting ablaze anything they could.

As he gazed upon this future, all Barry could think was how unfair it all was.

What did I do to deserve this? He thought, I just wanted to save my mother's life! I just wanted to save the world!

Mephiles, standing behind Barry, seemed to know precisely what he was thinking with the words he said to him next:

"Amazing how unfair and unforgiving time seems to be, is it not? Just when you believe you're living in paradise, it all comes tumbling down. Such is life, so they say."

"Why?" Barry asked, "Why does this have to happen?"

"There is no real reason why any of this happens" Mephiles explained, standing next to Barry now, "Time itself has no sentient mind capable of any reasoning. It's all just a series of rather unfortunate events. A game of russian roulette, as your previous timelines' people would put it."

Barry's eyes scanned across the landscape one more time before turning back over to Mephiles. Still recovering from the revelation of yet another doomed timeline, all Barry could bring himself to say was:

"What is it you said about fixing this?"

As if expecting this, Mephiles responded casually - as though he knew far more than Barry had counted on:

"There is only one way to prevent this from happening. You will have to destroy the person responsible for causing this future. And before you say it, no, it is not yourself."

"Then who is it?"

"Allow me to show you" Mephiles then began to walk away from Barry, looking back only to gesture for him to follow. Barry, having no one else to turn to and nowhere else to go, complied to the gesture - following the entity through what remained of a once bustling city.

Along the way to wherever Mephiles was taking the depowered hero, was an extended look at the carnage that was set to destroy this timeline.

Barry's spine shivered with all that he saw. Boarded up buildings. Busted windows. Empty, rusted and long out of use cars. Entire blocks of street aflame with no water to put any of it out. Most horrifyingly of all, he could make out charred human, animal and even 'hybrid' corpses alike among the rubble - just barely visible due to how their blackened remains blended with the piles of ash and debris.

While in the previous timeline he was spared the sight of what Darkseid did to earth, when he did finally see what was left it was not much different from this.

With only the ambience of the dead city and it's demon destroyers chiming along with his and Mephiles' footsteps, there was nothing much to distract Barry's mind from beginning to envision the bodies of his fallen comrades of the previous timeline with every body that he found.

Several bodies he saw were hanging from the balconies of rooftops, being torn apart and eaten like roasted meat by a flock of those large, flaming bat-like demons that dominated the airs of this horrible world. Immediately, Barry's eyes began to water as he remembered the fates of Hal Jordan, Barbara Gordon, Zatanna, and even Shazam at the hands of the abominations that the sadistic beast of a so-called 'new god' had named 'Paradooms'. When he looked at those demons, he saw in this mind the Paradooms. When he looked at the corpses, they became his friends. He became mortified.

Another body he saw had it's head twisted, neck completely destroyed due to being forced to turn almost completely in the opposite direction. In addition to being charred black by the flames and ashes surrounding itself and its environment. Barry couldn't help but think of Conner, the young Superboy. He had hardly spent more than a few years experiencing the world before his time was cut short but one of those monstrosities, his neck snapped as though he was nothing. There was not even time to mourn him.

I'm so sorry...

The various other bodies around reminded him of various others as they were littered throughout the streets. Jaime Reyes, Donna Troy, Roy Harper, Karen Beecher, Garfield Logan. All of them did not have specific injuries, though in Barry's mind as he saw the corpses of this timeline's dead he could only become more horrified as his brain forced the images of their corpses lying about in their place. All of them heroes, none of them deserving of their fates.

Please, forgive me...

That's when he saw things which made him stop. Two corpses, barely protruding out from the rubble of the various debris. In reality, they were too charred for any identity to be discerned. In Barry's mind however, they became his cherished nephews - the two Kid Flashes. The two who followed in his footsteps, who were set to carry his legacy. They were, both dead. From Wallace's mouth was just a bit of blood, and Wally's face was looking directly at his uncle with a face of shock.

Upon seeing them, Barry lost all focus on following Mephiles and ran to the two of them - now on the verge of crying.

No, no no no…

Going to his nephews' sides, Barry scooped their corpses into his arms and embraced them tightly. Not wanting to ever let them go, he closed his eyes and let his sobs be released from the bottom of his heart. They were not just his sidekicks or proteges. They were his family. He was supposed to protect them. Yet here they were, both lying dead. As hard and as tightly as he held them, they did not spring to life. They did not utter a single word. They remained motionless, silent. Cold. Gone.

Placing their bodies gently to the ground of the city's ruined streets, Barry could only continue sobbing inconsolably as he placed his hands to his eyes.

We knew the risks...

That doesn't make the pain go away…

Soon, Barry could feel a hand on his shoulder. Letting reality turn to what it was, and the bodies return to being anonymous corpses in a sea of fire and despair, Barry looked up to see Mephiles looking directly at him once more.

"I know it hurts" the being spoke, Barry now looking back at the bodies to see the reality of what he was holding, Mephiles continuing on, "Being cursed with the memories of such a nightmare. However, let it be your motivation. With it and my assistance, you just may be able to prevent such a fate from happening to your dearest loved ones again. As you can see, you're still quite in danger of that happening as we speak."

Barry closed his eyes, letting his hands leave from his face and instead clenched them into a fist. He took deep breaths, letting his sadness leave from his body as he soaked in the reality of what Mephiles was saying.

There was a large part of him that still did no want to trust this being, though based on Mephiles' far more controlled version of time travel and his knowledge of what Barry thought was permanently erased from the pages of time, he figured that if anyone was going to help accomplish anything it would be him.

He just hoped he had his faith in the right place.

Barry turned to Mephiles and gave a silent nod, his face attempting to be without emotion - though he still mourned for all of those lost on the inside.

Mephiles returned the silent nod, and with only a few seconds of looking back at the two disfigured corpses, Barry got up and resumed the long, silent walk. This time, kept his eyes square on the street, making sure they never strayed far away from directly ahead of him, directly onto his feet, or directly on Mephiles.

Darkseid might be long gone.

But the wounds he's inflicted are still fresh.

Though it took hours of traversing the ruined, hellish landscape of what was once a vibrant and healthy world, eventually it was clear to both Mephiles and Barry that their destination had been reached. While Barry's legs had begun to ache due to the long trek through both ash-filled streets and near-volcanic soil, Mephiles seemed perfectly fine. It was also apparent that with all of the dark fire dominating the sky outside, there was no way of knowing for sure what time of day it was or how much time their walk had actually taken.

Not that Barry cared. He wanted to make sure this nightmare never happened.

He was still waiting for the reveal as to how that could be done.

When Barry did begin paying attention more to his surroundings, he saw that he was no longer outside where even the rain seemed to be particles of fire or volcanic rock falling down upon his head - instead he was inside of some aged, abandoned building. He and Mephiles' footsteps both became metallic clangs due to the floor being nothing but a metallic surface. Doors were all effectively broken, and when they weren't fully collapsed or leaning off their hinges they creaked very noticeably whenever moved even slightly - if they moved at all.

Brown, crusted rust was present on virtually everything - and often joined by exuberant amounts of dust. Even the floors had enough mold and grime on them to leave any reflection beyond proper comprehension.

The lights, there were hardly any. Barry could now hardly see Mephiles at all as they traversed the hallway of this mysterious facility - there was just barely enough light to tell where he was. He now truly had to be sure to keep an eye on the being in order to have any direction at all.

What is this place?

What was this place?

Barry did not have to think about the past of this strange facility long though, for soon Mephiles walked into a room with actual light emitting from it - and Barry followed in. The light was not from an actual light fixture but rather from a large computer monitor that despite all of the odds still seemed to be functioning perfectly. It gave the room a blue-green tint to it, but at the very least Barry could see both himself and Mephiles far more clearly than within the dark hallways.

Mephiles did not waste any time with talking, instead he went directly to the keyboard beneath the monitor and began inputting various characters into the machine. Barry watched, though he remained silent he had a massive plethora of questions about what was going on. At the very least, Mephiles did explain:

"Here are my records of the event that caused all of this to happen. The day of disaster."

Barry's attention was pulled towards the monitors as various information popped up onto it. Articles. Headlines. Video clips. Images. The works.

The first image that Barry noticed was a photograph of the Egg Carrier, the battleship that 'Dr. Eggman' owns. The next image was accompanied by an article, and seemed to show a massive ball of flame in the center of Soleanna, with all of Castle Town being set ablaze. All of it said the same thing - the flames destroyed the world. The flames of disaster. The flames of a being known only as Iblis.

"Iblis" Barry muttered as he analyzed all of the articles. All of the images. As he repeated that name in his head, he knew what word meant. He had learned long ago what it stood for in Arabic, and Damian would say it a few times himself. He knew well enough that if a beast was nicknamed that, said beast was not good news.

Iblis….the flames of disaster…

"So, Iblis, destroyed the world?"

"Technically speaking, yes" Mephiles explained, "But he did not destroy it alone. Someone released him, unleashing him to take part in the destruction of this world."

"And who would that person be?"

"The Iblis Trigger is what they call him" with a bit more typing on Mephiles' part, a single, large image was brought onto the screen - this time the figure was clear and in color. "But most people knew him, as Shadow the Hedgehog."

When Barry looked upon the photograph of Shadow, his eyes widened. He looked exactly like Mephiles. He was a hedgehog, about the same height as Sonic, and had curled quills with stripes on them - as well as his arms and legs. The cuffs of his gloves, the advanced shoes, all of it was the same. The only difference was in the fact that Shadow had a mouth, had normal eyes of a red coloration, and his stripes were also red instead of the pale blue sported by the entity that Barry was standing in the same room with. Of course, the similarity between the two still had to be addressed:

"He looks, almost exactly like you."

"Yes" Mephiles coldly remarked, "He does."

"I'm taking it that this is going in the direction of me having to defeat Shadow?"

"You're taking it correctly, yes."

"Well, what can you tell me about him before I go off to do that?"

"Shadow the Hedgehog" Mephiles said as he turned to the monitor, "The Ultimate Lifeform. Created on the Space Colony ARK approximately 250 years from this current point in time, 50 years from the present we recently left. The full story behind his creation remains hidden in both classified and destroyed government documents, but it is certain that G.U.N. funded and supervised the project during the entirety of it - and that the late alien warlord Black Doom also had a level of involvement at some stage."

"I see…"

I had a bad feeling about G.U.N. from the moment I read about them.

"In addition" Mephiles quickly stated, "His creator, Professor Gerald Robotnik, was in death the mastermind behind a plot to crash the Space Colony ARK into planet earth - a plot which Shadow himself supported. It should come to no surprise that when the day of disaster occurred, those who survived were quick to turn their blame onto Shadow himself."

"So, if I take out Shadow, I stop this future from happening?"

"To put it bluntly, yes."

"Alright, so, where is he?"

Mephiles laughed at Barry's brash remark, turning to him while still finding humor in his statement. His immediate response was a very blunt:

"You're not going to take on Shadow in your current state. He would make mincemeat out of you in seconds, if what he accomplished with the Black Comet is any indication."

"Fair enough" Barry admitted, with a slight nod, "I'll need to get my powers back, but it doesn't seem like there's any rain or lightning going on in this world, how are we going to recreate the experiment?"

"Oh, I have my ways."

Barry soon learned to at least partially regret agreeing to Mephiles' method of getting his powers back - though it wasn't as though there was much in the way of other options.

There he was, strapped down to a cold, metallic table. Held onto it only by leather straps. Due to the room being poorly lit - only illuminated by dimmed red lights - he was unable to see much of his surroundings, only able to make out the vague shapes of various machinery and test tubes around him. He could not even see where his so-called 'helper' was. Though hearing his voice was enough to reassure Barry that he was in fact in the room:

"Remember. This is necessary."

"This, this isn't how my experiment went."

"I know." Mephiles remarked, "Though it would take far too long to locate a thunderstorm that would help you."

"But, don't you have hyper advanced time travel powers?"

Despite Barry telling the truth, he received no response. As he looked around to try and see where Mephiles was in the room, all he could see was a purple gemstone floating in the air - it's color being seen by him due to it glowing brightly as it was released into the air, presumably by Mephiles himself. Barry focused on it, and was able to see it was similar to the shape of the emerald the princess had prior to her kidnapping. At least, he made that out moments before it began to electrocute him.

From the moment the gem's energy surges began to strike his body just as the lightning strikes that typically give him his powers, Barry couldn't help but scream and writhe in pain and agony. His reflexes and instincts fought to break from the restraints as his clothes, hair and flesh were being seared by the continuous blasts of pure chaos emerald energy. It was a pain far worse and agonizing than a mere lightning strike.

Mephiles, for his part, only watched. The being sporting no mouth, his level of enjoyment could not be read. Though he did absolutely nothing to soothe Barry's pain.

Barry could not even form cohesive thoughts during this grueling process. All he could think about it was how much it hurt. Whatever energy was coming from this 'emerald', it was not normal. It was not anything he had studied or read about. It was far too painful, burning away at everything it touched on his body as though it were acid. And he was completely, utterly defenseless.

Barry's body was absolutely destroyed. There seemed to be almost nothing left of his skin not long into the 'experiment'. It all looked like bleeding, inflamed muscles and fibers. In some spots, even the bones appeared to be visible. What skin did remain, was scorched by what looked like the most extreme case of chemical burns imaginable. His hair was virtually destroyed, only small particles of it remained.

Even so, the 'treatment' continued. Mephiles remained silent during the entire ordeal, and did not seem to even consider pausing it, despite Barry's loud and agonizing screams likely echoing out well into the hallway.

There was nobody there to help him, however.

Only Mephiles.

He who had organized this.

All Barry could do is continue scream, whimper and groan in pain as the emerald continued to pelt his unprotected body with it's pure energy surges. It was amazing that he was able to move at all still, though the mere act of doing so caused him only further pain at this stage.

He could feel his own blood forming a puddle underneath his back, pouring like a stream down to the floor beneath him. It stung every time his flesh touched it. Like the wrath of a powerful hornet, though the emerald's burns were still far worse.

Though granted, the latter weren't stopping.

With the table becoming increasingly like a frying pan, with him as the main course being cooked upon it, he was sure of it.

This was the end.

His gruesome, horrific ending.

Or at least,for any normal mortal being it would be. Not for the Flash.

One final, massive surge of chaos energy flowed through the room and completely destroyed it in a fiery explosion. The test tubes and beakers. The table, and seemingly Barry himself were all destroyed in an instant by the blast. All except for Mephiles himself. He remained unaffected, and as the smoke cleared the emerald itself lowered into his hand. The room was now pitch black, completely caked in darkness save for Mephiles' glowing green eyes and the purple emerald that had seemingly roasted Barry alive.

Without saying a single word, Mephiles walked out from the room and into the more moderately lit hallway, only stopping the moment he left the room. Turning back to face the entrance to the room, he saw the outcome of his 'experiment'.

Barry.

Still, shockingly, alive.

As well as healing.

His skin was still badly burned at this stage, though the bulk of his flesh had grown back - and was doing so rather rapidly. He lacked his civilian clothing of course, those having been long burned to nothing, though at the very least his blonde hair was growing back steadily. From the way he was looking, it would be within the hour if not sooner that his body would be completely restored to normal.

Breathing heavily and still getting himself reorientated with the world, Barry turned to Mephiles the moment he spotted him in the dim lights of the hallway.

"What. Was. That." he said between deep breathes. A large part of him was still infuriated at what he had just gone through, even it was under the guise of restoring his powers.

"Pure chaos energy" Mephiles explained, holding the purple chaos emerald in his hand, "Generated by the Chaos Emerald. It has similar properties to your so-called 'speedforce', among other various energy sources from your previous timeline. Very few could survive the pure, chaotic blasts of it that you just took. Let alone have their powers restored."

Chaos Emeralds….those things that Eggman wants…

They're definitely worth studying more, but I need to stay focused...I need to find and have a 'chat' with that 'ultimate lifeform' character…

"Anyway" Barry said as he held his head with one hand as his flesh, skin and hair continued healing, "First, I'll need to make myself a new suit. Then, I suppose you'll have to take me to where Shadow is."

"Luckily, there is little need for complications with the latter of which you speak."

"What do you mean?"

"He happens to be here as we speak."

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sebseyesandbuckysthighs · 5 years ago

Text

Three Soldiers and a Baby | Part Thirteen

summary: Three handsome bachelors find their day to day operations disrupted when an unexpected new roommate (who comes complete with a diaper and a pacifier) shows up at their doorstep. How will they deal with this new and baffling responsibility without losing their minds or killing each other in the process?

pairings: Bucky x Reader featuring Steve Rogers & Sam Wilson

warnings: none

a/n: Well that last part was a bit of a doozy huh?? Heh...oh dear. Sorry about that, darlins, but I had to do it! It can’t all be sunshine and rainbows. But I’m gonna fix this mess I made, I promise you! We’re in the endgame now! Nope. Still hurts.

*warning to mobile users, the “keep reading” tab may not work so apologies in advance*

| previously |

You looked around the room and noticed that he had done that and more for her. There were baby clothes and toys strewn about the entire place. Even the crib she was sleeping in was the most luxurious one you had ever seen. You were right to trust Bucky with her. “You guys have done so much for her. For me. I don’t know how I can ever repay you for all of this.”

“It’s simple. You don’t have to. It’s been our pleasure.” Bucky smiled, kissing your forehead before resting his against yours. You wanted to stay in this moment forever. Surrounded by the people you cared for most in the world, terrified of leaving this room where everything seemed so perfect and right. Unfortunately, that wasn’t your reality and the hard part was yet to come. You gripped Bucky’s hand a little tighter before turning to look down at your sleeping daughter, then back up into her father’s expressive beautiful eyes.

“Bucky, I…I’m going back home to my parents. And I’m taking Ellie with me.”

The next day when you and Ellie left was one Bucky didn’t want to wake up for. He was speechless after you dropped the bomb on him that you and Ellie were going away again. You said you needed to get out of the city and away from all of this. Maybe then you could rest. He wanted to reason with you, to plead for you to stay, to beg, to scream, but instead he said nothing. There was something in his throat stopping him from being able to do any of that. He thought, you were her mother and had raised her this far, you knew what was best for her well-being. Bucky trusted you. He thought, couldn't he be the one to protect you? Didn't you trust him enough to do so?

Still, he couldn't find the words so instead he held you in his arms all night as you both slept in his room beside Ellie’s crib and then helped you pack up some of her stuff and get ready to leave. Steve and Sam would be out for most of the day and didn’t know the turmoil Bucky was currently facing. He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but he felt like he was powerless to stop it. Like the world was finally letting him know that he didn’t deserve any of this happiness and was ripping it away from him before he got too comfortable. He managed to convince himself that as much as he knew he wanted you, wanted Ellie, he didn’t deserve to have either of you. A small part of him even agreed that this was probably what was best for Ellie. To be far away from the city and back home where she could have a more normal, secure life surrounded by family.

It all happened so fast. After seeing you off into a cab for the airport he practically crawled back into the apartment. Begging that somehow he wouldn’t be able to make it back there and the world would just let him rest for once. Steve and Sam would be back soon and he still hadn’t been able to come up with anything to say them to. How could he? All around the apartment were mementos of the last few weeks blissfully spent with your baby girl and now, nothing. It felt empty and cold. He couldn’t see himself being able to stay here anymore without her. At first you refused, but Bucky was at least able to convince you that you could have everything he had bought for Ellie and he would just have it shipped out to you wherever you were. There was a small part of you that thought maybe Bucky shouldn’t know where you were going, but he already knew practically everything about you, including where your parents lived so you acquiesced.

When the guys got back, they were furious. There was a huge argument and at one point Sam was nearly ready to pound an already broken down version of Bucky into the ground, but the man had no fight left in him. He had just let the loves of his life walk out the door and done practically nothing to stop it. A part of him thought he was a masochist. Taking that sign from the universe that he wasn’t meant to lead a happy normal life with a family. Instead maybe he was meant to live out his days alone, fighting for the safety and security of other people. Yet all he wanted to do was lie down, rest, and maybe never wake up to fight again. What was the point of fighting when you had no one to fight for anymore?

“Why does it hurt so much?” Bucky’s voice was rough and quiet, jagged with the emotions that rampaged through his heart and soul.

Neither Sam nor Steve knew what to say. They could see just how much this was breaking their friend, how much it was breaking them, but they were otherwise powerless. No words could soothe a person’s soul when their child was taken from them. When their love had gone away with no promise of return. Bucky felt like this was finally it. That this time the universe had finally beaten him down enough that he wouldn’t be able to get back up.

Hours later, the three of them had barely moved from their spots. Bucky had locked himself away in his room while Sam and Steve hung their heads. An electronic beep sounded off from the office room down the hall from the bedrooms. That was where they communicated with the team back at the compound, but at this moment none of them had enough energy to do anything about it. Unfortunately, the beeping persisted and Steve was the one to finally do something about it. Answering the call, an image of Tony Stark appeared on the computer screen before him. Of course it had to be a video call so the man could see what kind of sorry state Steve was in at the moment.

“Jesus, Rogers, what happened to you? Baby keep you up all night or something?”

“What’s going on, Tony?” Steve wasn’t ready to talk about Ellie and worse, he didn’t know what he could possibly tell Tony about the unfortunate situation they found themselves in. Before Tony continued, he insisted for the other two to come in and join them since whatever he had to say pertained to all of them. When Steve told him they were unavailable, Tony, of course, persisted and somehow managed to get all three devastated men into the room.

“Well you three look like unwiped ass. What the hell happened?”

“What do you want, Stark?” Bucky practically growled at the man who had forced him to take a small detour away from his misery and pain.

“Listen, guys, I talked to Fury this morning and he said something kind of interesting. At first I didn’t think much of it, but then I remembered you saying that the mother wasn’t in the picture for a little while there.” At the mention of your name, all three men instantly perked up and paid full attention to what he had to say. “Long story short, Fury knew about you and the girl, Barnes. From what I gathered, he’s had eyes on you guys from the very beginning.”

Bucky felt his stomach drop and his skin crawl. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I’m saying that he’s had agents following the girl around to make sure that she doesn’t, hell I don’t know what she could possibly do. Maybe something with the public image? Maybe it’s cause she was a civ from one of our missions. Naughty boy, by the way, Barnes.”

“This isn’t a time for joking, Tony,” said Steve.

Tony raised his hands in defense. “You’re right, you’re right. My apologies.”

The three men looked sheepishly between each other, but it was Bucky who was surprisingly the first one to break. “And now she’s gone again.”

Tony looked quizzically at the bearded man and then to the other two who seemed to confirm what he had said. “Wait, you mean she came back? And she left again?”

“Took Ellie with her too, man.” Sam said solemnly, already missing that little girl like crazy.

“Woah woah, hold on a second. Are you trying to tell me that you guys let them go?”

“I didn’t let her go, Stark. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Of course, you did! Look, I obviously don’t know what the hell has been going on over the past 24 hours, but I’m sure it’s all just one big misunderstanding. Why the hell would you let her go?”

“Fuck,” Bucky felt like he was going to be sick. “I let her go. I didn’t fucking fight for her. For either of them.” Bucky realized now that everything had happened too fast for him, he wasn’t able to think straight. He was so sure that the world was out to destroy him that he didn’t even try to fight back. It was the fight of his life and Bucky had somehow been defeated before he could even take a stand.

“Tell me everything,” Tony said sternly. “And talk fast!”

After talking to Tony and practically ripping Nick Fury a new one, the three men were in a car and speeding off to the airport. Tony said he would do what he could, but stopping a commercial airline from taking off wasn’t exactly something that could be done without raising alarm amongst the passengers. Bucky was sure that he was ready to shoot the former S.H.I.E.L.D. Director between the eyes for spying on his relationship with you, and worse, for practically scaring you to death and taking away his baby. When Fury mentioned national security and just trying to protect the Avengers or some other bullshit, not even Steve was willing to listen anymore. He assured them that the girl was always perfectly safe and it was just her paranoia that had caused her to make up all this drama. Bucky punched the computer monitor and effectively cut off the video call.

Now they were on a race against time, trying desperately to catch up to you before this whole misunderstanding went any further. They raced through the terminals, practically flying through the crowds of people who were diving out of the way of what they assumed to be Avengers business. They knew where they were headed, but they just couldn’t make it there in time. It was too late. When they reached the right gate they were just in time to see it taxiing down the runway and off into the air. Dejected and broken hearted, the adrenaline slowly died down as they all stood there motionless. Watching you fly away and out of their lives.

a/n: Well at least that bit of drama has been solved amirite!? Heh...oh man, please don’t yell at me for another cliffhanger. I fix it I fix it! But anyways, I didn’t want to make the whole ordeal some dramatic and nefarious plot so that’s why it went this way. Sorry if that seems underwhelming or lame, but hey, them’s the breaks.

Feedback is always appreciated, leave it here!

part twelve << part thirteen >> part fourteen

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Full Masterlist

tags:

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes #steve rogers #sam wilson #bucky barnes fanfiction #avengers fanfiction #marvel fanfiction #three soldiers and a baby #my writing

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journal-of-an-outlaw · 5 years ago

Text

Price to be Paid - Chapter 25

AO3 link here

You were absolutely frozen.

Of course, of all the trolleys in Saint Denis and all the people to sit next to, you had chosen the spot next to Mary Linton. She looked perfectly pressed in a gown much more suited to her than the one you picked for yourself of a teal blue that made her eyes shine, and hair pinned with such accuracy you knew you could never replicate it. It burned your insides to see she was just as lovely as you had imagined even if you had secretly hoped she was ugly and cruel.

Mary watched you with her hand out and you realized how utterly rude you had been.

“YN! YN Moore, pleasure to meet you.”

Part of you had expected her to recoil at your name, scream and start to cry at the strange coincidence you had sat next to her. But instead she smiled widely and let her hands settle politely in her lap as the trolley bounced along the street.

So Arthur hadn’t mentioned you after all.

“Do you come often into Saint Denis?” You asked hesitantly.

Mary shook her head, watching the buildings pass on by. “No, just came to chase down my father. It’s embarrassing, really, but I asked someone for their help and I feel like I’ve taken advantage of what we used to have.”

She had the indecency to look beautiful as a blush worked its way up her cheeks.

“I’m sure they were just trying to help, because of the circumstances.”

You hoped the answer would change the subject as you were in no mood to discuss Arthur with a semi stranger. It felt wrong to know who she was and have her remain in the dark. The imbalance of it all made your stomach upset.

“Well, I knew they would come, and that’s the problem.” She shook her head and looked away from you. “If you ask someone for a favor but you know they are honorbound to say yes, is it really a request or does it become a demand? I, it’s not easy to be a single woman, it’s powerless, and I needed someone with power. Most folks I associate with at home are, well, you know, shallow and wouldn't help someone out unless it benefited them in some way.”

Mary looked a bit desperate as she spoke as if she was looking for your approval. You weren’t in the mood to give it willingly but you would listen, and maybe begin to understand.

“Depends on what you have with this person, I would guess.”

“I’m sorry,” she played with her skirt ruffles while she spoke. “I don’t mean to speak so openly, you’re kind to listen. This person and I used to be engaged. Part of me still wishes we could go back and change the past, ignore my father and just follow our hearts. But every time I play it out it never would have worked; I couldn’t live the way he did, my family would have disowned me, and I would have isolated myself from every possible avenue of a life resembling what I had always known. I was young and naive to think that things would just fall into place, but being around him makes me think maybe, just maybe, we could take on the world together. I know that isn’t the case, I don’t love him like I used to, but it’s the intoxication of being swept up in that fantasy.”

“I used to be engaged, when I was young as well. There’s something about a first love that never really leaves you, even when you know it isn’t right anymore It’s...hard to move on and accept that life turned out the way it did, but sometimes the best choices for us aren’t the easiest.”

Mary watched you with a focused look while you talked about Henry. It wasn’t the same situation, of course with Henry dying suddenly, but things were starting to make a little more sense as to why Arthur and Mary were drawn to one another. It wasn’t true love, or any kind of love at all but more the echos from when they were younger. They had a bond, and as much as you didn’t like it, it wasn’t something that would just go away and if you were to take Arthur into your life, you would have to accept it.

“It looks like you made a good choice now! There’s a beautiful ring on your finger.”

“Yes, and he is good and I love him.” You beamed down at your hand, knowing what you had to do. “Miss Linton I’m afraid I haven’t been completely honest with you. I didn’t know you before except by name, and I truly am sorry for barging next to you on the trolley like this. I know you met up with Arthur Morgan earlier, and I have to tell you he’s the one I’m engaged too.”

The trolley bell made a loud clang as the two of you sat in silence. Mary looked out to the street of Saint Denis as you passed a park with families strolling by. You thought she wiped a tear from her eye but couldn’t tell as she refused to look back at you for a moment.

“Miss Linton, I’m sorry to spring this on you -”

“No. Don’t be.” Mary finally faced you, a smile on her face. “I...you know I was talking about Arthur, then. I am sorry to have dragged you both into my affairs, I never meant to, I just didn’t have anywhere else to turn and in truth took advantage of what we used to have.”

“It’s actually alright, Miss Linton. You are not a bad person, just a person stuck in a bad situation. I started out today in a foul mood but after getting to know you I strangely feel better.” You laughed at the absurdity of what just came out of your mouth. Mary Linton had been a hateful, deceitful hag in your mind until you sat down on that trolley and you hadn’t realized just how happy you would have been to keep on living that lie.

“If it makes you feel better, he really does love you.”

You looked over at her surprised. That had never been a doubt in your mind but something in her tone made you think he had proved it to Mary somehow.

“I, oh lord, forgive me, I asked him to run away with me just before I got on the trolley. I don’t know what came over me, I just blurted it out like an imbecile.” Mary was quiet and as you listened you felt your temper rising, but forced it down in an effort to maintain some decorum. “He of course said no, that that part of our lives was over and he had someone who loved him flaws and all, not despite of them. And that must you.”

“He saved me, in more ways than one. And it’s not always easy. There’s a lot of outside factors but at the end of the day he’s a good man, just…”

“Like he’s wrestling with a giant,” she finishes your sentences softly.

The trolley drove by a street corner where someone yelled about a cause they were supporting, asking those walking by to donate anything they could. The sun filtered through the trees and cast odd shaped shadows on the cobblestones that had been worn down by each passing thing whether it was a horse or a street car. What a strange city, you thought, so full of life and color and heartbreak. Things hadn’t turned out like you thought they would but from what you had learned, that was usually okay.

“I think we’re more alike than we could ever guess, Miss Linton. Which probably says more about Arthur than it does the two of us.” Mary gave a startled laugh, hiding behind one hand as the trolley slowed to a halt. The conductor announced this was the end of the line and that after five minutes it would head the other way. Mary stood and asked how to get to the train station as you filtered out with the crowd.

Charles wasn’t at the stop so you waited for Mary to exit and join you on the sidewalk. She smiled and quickly fixed a strand of hair that had loosened from her bun, enjoying the feeling of the afternoon sun. With no escort she seemed nervous, so you offered to walk her over to the train station.

“I will tell you, if you had told me that all of this would happen today I wouldn't have believed you in a million years!” She seemed giddy walking down the street.

“Miss Linton…”

“Mary, please.”

“Mary,” you tried again with a smile. “I still feel awful, like I deceived you somehow. Please know that was never my intention.”

Just as she opened her mouth to respond someone called out your name, a low, gravely voice you instantly recognized. There was a small crowd behind you but Arthur and Charles sat high on their horses, a strange look on both of their faces. Arthur climbed down and threw the reins to Charles before approaching with hesitation.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake Arthur it’s alright, I won’t bite.” Mary said flatly. You were sure he was panicking inside at seeing the two of you together.

“YN, I didn’t know you were in the city.”

“Charles didn’t mention it?” Arthur shook his head. “That’s alright. I came after you, but we ran into someone and I then found Miss Li-, Mary on the trolley. We actually had a lovely conversation and were walking to the train station to see her off.”

Arthur stood frozen, like if he moved the illusion would break. It was funny, really, but you didn’t laugh as you let him process whatever was racing through his mind. You were sure seeing his old and current betrothed together was a strange and terrible sight.

“Arthur, should we…?” You motioned to the station and he snapped back from his momentary lapse. He cleared his throat and walked up next to the two of you, unsure of whether to offer his arm or walk in silence.

The rest of the walk only took a few minutes and it passed by in comfortable conversation between Mary and yourself. She told you about her home and her brother who she was quite proud of, and how he was looking into going for schooling after something Arthur had convinced him of. Your fiance snorted, causing both you and Mary to give him a dirty look, and he mumbled something about how it would be good for Jaime to get out in the world and be stable.

A strange pang shocked your heart at their casual intimacy and chatter about Mary’s brother. It was something you didn’t share with Arthur as any questions about your family had been deflected and you hoped he wouldn't bring it up. You realized now that was foolish, and one day he simply wouldn't take a distraction as an answer. The unfortunate bond to your parents would need to be brought to light soon as your father kept reminding you by popping up at every turn.

The train whistled loudly, steam pouring onto the station platform and signalling it was ready to leave. Mary thanked you both and stepped up to the car, but paused halfway up and turned back.

She took your hands in her and gave a soft squeeze. “I genuinely wish the both of you every happiness in the world. I, it’s nice to know Arthur has someone like you looking out for him.”

“Mary, if you ever need anything, please don’t hesitate to write. It’s not easy to get by on your own, you do have support if you need it.” Arthur smiled and tipped his hat as the train let out another blast. Mary waved and stood frozen safely on the stop step as the train pulled out from the station.

You and Arthur watched as the train faded into nothing more than a blip on the horizon.

“That was...how did you even…”

Arthur stuttered at your side trying to comprehend what happened. You smiled up at him.

“I came after you to apologize. I was wrong Arthur, very wrong, and never should have tried to stop you from helping Mary. Charles came with me into the city and we tried to find you, but he spotted some Pinkertons and we had to escape. He took the horses and I jumped on the trolley next to a very surprised Mary Linton. We actually got along very well, she told me about how you helped her and it just solidified my thought that you are one of the best men I’ve ever met.”

Arthur blushed at your words and looked around. Spotting no one, he swept you up into a brief hug, resting his head in the crook of your neck and squeezing.

“Truth be told I only did it because I thought it’s what you would have done. Helping people out...that’s your thing. Being kind, y’know.”

You laughed and linked your arm through Arthur’s. All feuds forgotten, you strolled back through the city to find Charles. He told you about chasing Mary’s father all over Saint Denis; the meeting at the stables, chasing down the loan shark, and after all that Mary’s father still escaped their grasps. You laughed and gasped dramatically as Arthur retold everything, feeling like he wanted you in on the secret of him and Mary’s relationship, whatever it may be. It was a good feeling, being accepted and wanted. After he finished you told him about Brother Dorkins and how Charles saved two poor souls who were being held captive.

“Oh, I met him. The Brother, he was with Charles I guess after you got on the trolley. Walked them back to their church and made sure they weren’t followed.”

So Charles had diverted Arthur from running into your father. What a nightmare that would have been, but the thought of Agent Milton moving about somewhere in the same city brought your fears back and you suddenly wanted to be out of Saint Denis more than anything. Your eyes scanned everyone who passed by for the possibility of him running into you and what that would mean. You hadn’t spoken about your parents in nearly a year and the topic still made your stomach turn.

What would Arthur think when he found out?

Charles whistled from across the street. You and Arthur crossed to meet him and leave as soon as possible. Arthur asked if everything was alright as you took off through the streets, trying to put as much distance between you and Agent Milton as possible. Your only response was a smile as words were not able to form for you at the moment.

“You’re back! And just in time, too. We need to prepare for a ball, Cinderella.”

Dutch greeted the three of you at camp with the strange sentence and you cast a confused look at Arthur. Hadn’t you just been to a dance in Rhodes?

Arthur grunted. “Dutch, you know I hate dressing up…”

Dutch laughed and approached the two of you. Swinging his arm around Arthur’s shoulder to steer him over towards Hosea you heard him say, “Just think of it as a practice for your wedding. Now, what we have here is a change to get on the good side of Angelo Bronte at a party the Mayor is throwing.”

You chuckled watching Arthur’s panicked face throw you a glance for help but you just waved him off and started brushing Eclipse. Her hair was dirty from the smog of Saint Denis and she made appreciative sounds as it slowly became clearer and clearer. Kieran hadn’t brushed her in the past few days so she was overdue. The other horses nearby looked dirty too, like Kieran hadn’t been keeping up with his duties.

The next week moved at the same pace set by the heat lingering around Shady Belle; heavy and unrelenting in its molasses slow pace. You helped cut more vegetables, wash more clothes, and sort more herbs than you cared to remember and more than once you and Karen snapped at each other purely for something to do. She may not always get along with you, but as someone who worked hard for the gang she respected you and you felt the same towards her.

Days started to feel repetitive. While it was wonderful to have a routine and sleep under a roof, not everyone agreed that you deserved it after such a short time with the group. Micah certainly made it known that he should be in your and Arthur’s room, not you, but someone usually told him to quiet down if he got too rowdy.

One day, Dutch’s plan finally came into fruition.

“Gentleman! Tonight is the night we set off, hair brushed and oiled, shoes shined, and dressed to the nines so we can charm the pants of this god forsaken shit hole called Saint Denis.” He waited while people laughed at his show, then continued on. “Hosea, myself, Bill, and…” his eyes crossed the gang. “Mary Beth will be off to the mayor's house.”

It was not lost on you how quickly Dutch’s eyes flitted past you.

Mary Beth balked. “Me? You need some pick pocketing done?”

“No, nothing like that. We just need a woman who can move about precisely in high society is all.”

A disgusted noise came from Molly as she threw a rag down and stalked back into the house. Dutch just huffed and turned back to the younger woman.

But Mary Beth was still confused. “I ain’t like the others, you could take YN or Abigail and dress them up. Why me?”

Micah annoyingly stepped forward to answer. At his first step Mary Beth crossed her arms and rolled her eyes. “Because, Miss Gaskil, you’re beautiful, and young, and good enough to distract people into thinking they have a false sense of security when in reality we’re robbing them blind.”

“But I thought you said -”

“Enough.” Dutch had his spotlight stolen and was incredibly frustrated by how the events had gone. It was his story to tell why was no one listening?

“Mary Beth. We ain’t robbing. It’s just a dinner party and we figured a pretty young girl like you should experience the finer things in life. YN went to that ball back in Rhodes and Abigail we thought wouldn’t want to leave young Jack so soon. Plus, with John not there, things could get out of hand.”

Arthur’s eyebrows shot up to the top of his hairline. Clearly this was something he hadn’t discussed with Dutch and you know they all watched poor Abigail flail about feeling stuck in her position.

The look on Dutch’s face said the decision was final. You were strangely okay with this as you had no desire to dress up and preen about the high society of the men who kidnapped Abigail’s son. But Arthur clearly wasn’t.

“Dutch, if I’m going so is YN. That’s final.”

Dutch sighed, looking exhausted. “My boy, if that happens then I’ll have to -”

“It’s happening. We can find a second carriage.”

“Fine.” You watched the scene, frozen. Not wanting to push any boundaries you opened your mouth to speak but Dutch silenced you with a look and you waited for him to continue. “We are guests of Angelo Bronte and will clean up before heading out. That means you all bathe, yes, even you Bil, and for god’s sake wear a suit. We will meet after supper and head in together, as Arthur so eloquently said, in two wagons.”

A flush worked its way up your chest and face. “I don’t want to make trouble, Dutch.”

“What’s done is done. We will all head in and be on our best behaviour and make this worth our while! Be ready by seven.”

Arthur balked at the older man and joined you near Pearson’s wagon. “Never seen him like that. Wonder why he put up a fight about bringing you along.”

“Well, he was right. Mary Beth is beautiful and charming and...younger.” You wrap your arms around your middle, suddenly self conscious. Arthur laughed softly at your expression, which earned him a dark glare.

“You ain’t old, darlin’, you’re younger than me and even so there’s nothing wrong with it. Dutch has been strange lately, that performance included.” He looped your arm through his and walked over to the house. “Let’s go into town, take the day to get ready for that party tonight, hmm?”

You nodded and allowed him to drag you away. Out of the corner of your eye you saw Molly dart out of sight as you as Arthur approached and a pang of guilt hit your chest.

As soon as your bag was packed for the day you closed the door to your room and promised Arthur you would be down shortly. Something was drawing you over to the small sitting room next to Dutch and Molly’s room. It was a quiet afternoon and the sun filtered in through the wooden blinds casting beams of light to dance around the room.

“Hosea?” The older man grunted as he looked up. “I think Molly should go tonight instead of Mary Beth. I know she’s not...I think it would clear the air, make things a bit better between her and Dutch, which in turn means better for us. You know she would charm the pants right off of those society men and get a chance to flex her uses.”

Hosea blinked in response. He seemed to ponder your words for a moment, scratching his chin while his eyebrows pulled together. From somewhere downstairs Arthur called for you, so you told Hosea to consider your idea and waved goodbye.

The ride into town was uneventful. Your mind was racing with thoughts of a real bath and nice clothes to be focused on the dusty road below you. Arthur was talking to you about something, but suddenly the thought of being in town reminded you that just a week ago your father had been there and almost caught you. If there was a chance he would find you or Arthur, things would turn bad very quickly.

"...and Hosea told me once about mixing flowers and herbs together to make poultices, like for medical purposes, and how Bessy taught him."

You took the pause in his speech as a chance to reply noncommittally with a nod.

Arthur saw right through that.

"He also said that if you bathe in the waters of Saint Denis that your skin would turn as green as grass."

You looked around the bridge entrance with a sharp eye. "Uh huh, wow, he's so smart."

"And eating yellow daisies under a full moon will let you turn into one of them, but for a day."

"Hmm, wait what did you say?" You turned to find Arthur stifling a laugh by looking away from you but it wasn't working.

"Something on your mind you want to talk about, sweetheart?" His voice was low as he asked.

“I’m just,” you sighed dramatically, “worried is all. Did Charles tell you about the Pinkertons we saw?”

Arthur nodded. “Met that Brother Dorkins character, too. Not sure what to make of him. Seems nice enough, genuine, but all those religious types do, right? That’s how they get you.”

You laughed and chastised Arthur for mocking the man and in turn he told you he was only joking. Brother Dorkins was a good man; he put helping others above all else in his life and truly committed to the selfless way that he had been taught. You felt good about how you and Charles had helped him the other day and were glad Arthur had been able to spend time talking to him.

Once the horses were tied up out front you headed into the tailor shop together. Arthur was quickly ushered over to the men's side and you followed a young woman to look at dresses.

It was all breathtaking. The glamor of what life could be like stared you down in the reflection wearing a low cut deep red dress. It whispered about high heeled boots and soft, elegant gloves that would accompany you on a night out to see a show. It sighed in your ears to the sound of string lacing up your back and the tug of the corset that restricted your movement. The sweet symphony swelled with the swish of the dressing room curtains and you took center stage, ready to present the illusion to Arthur.

He spit out the sip of water he had just accepted from the shopkeeper.

Quickly the man jumped into action to clean up the spill and you simply arched an eyebrow. The woman next to you knew she had done good work from the reaction and you smiled at her like you shared a secret. The burgundy material clung to your chest and hips, billowing out behind you like a cloud. It was large and overdone, but even you could see through the poshness of it and admire the way you looked like a dream. No one could stand in your way with this dress, not even Arthur and his dapper looking tuxedo. In which he looked stunning as well.

“See something you like, Mr. Morgan?” You rested a hand on your hip as you sauntered over, enjoying the way his eyes ran up and down you languidly.

He ran a hand over his eyes to hide the obscenities that flew from his mouth. “Only you could make that dress look like that, I’m not so sure I want to buy it for you.”

“Why not!” You pouted, sticking your lip out.

You could see him restrain himself as he took your hand gently and turned you around. He pretended to fix something on the back of your dress and suddenly you were very aware that both of the workers were watching you.

“If anyone so much as thinks about you looking like that I’d put a bullet between his eyes before you could stop me.”

After you both changed back to your street clothes and paid, you decided to walk to the hotel to bathe as it wasn’t as far as you had thought. Arthur let you hold onto his arm and point out things you liked along the way, like the small birds singing in the air and the way the horses hooves echoed streets away from the trolley car. It was vibrant and new and you loved it, oblivious to the way Arthur never took his eyes off of you.

The clerk at the hotel was bored and barely paid any attention to the two of you as you paid for baths. At the last second Arthur purchased a room for the night for you two to stay in after the dinner, and you almost missed the wicked glint in his eye.

You moaned louder than you should have as you sank down into the beautifully hot water. Any aches you had before were gone in that weightless space and you watched the dirt from days and days simply scrub away. You had been trying to clean yourself every few days at least but living in the swamps made it difficult. Between the bugs and the sweat and the need to bring someone with you in case an alligator had its eyes on you, the actual bathing amount was questionable. Laying in the bubbly bliss was pure heaven.

A soft knock at the door was followed by a voice asking if you wanted extra assistance but you declined. The bar of soap was easy enough to manage and you plunged your head below the water to begin attacking your hair.

You eventually left the small paradise you had found and dried off, impressed with the result of one simple bath. It was something you would need to indulge in more regularly.

Arthur beamed at you as you entered the small room and motioned to the bed where he had laid out your dress. It was approaching time to leave for the mayor’s and you had too many buttons and laces to be able to dress yourself. Arthur kissed your neck as he helped you dress and looked at you again like a wolf stalking its prey. It made your stomach flip and flutter as you thought about what the night held in store.

Dutch greeted the two of you with a harumph as you entered the carriage outside. He chomped down on one end of a cigar and looked sour until Arthur found a glass of champagne. Dutch was dressed to the nines in a beautiful black suit and matching top hat. Someone, you guessed Hosea, had stuck a white flower into his lapel and he leaned back in his element. It didn’t take long for Dutch and Arthur to be howling with laughter at thoughts of the old days and how ridiculous it was to be headed to a mayor’s ball, of all things. You sat squished across from Bill who avoided your gaze and opted to stare out the window, throwing back the glass of champagne Dutch handed him instead of savoring it like you were.

You asked Dutch if he wanted you to lift anything as there was likely to be good value in such a high society.

“Oh, no, no, no, no! No pickpocketing. We are here to make some real contacts. We have to find what we can at this party where the guest of honor is the worst crook in town!” It wasn’t long until he and Arthur and Bill were howling with laughter at this again and you watched on amusedly.

The men cheersed their drinks just as the carriage arrived outside of the manor gates and came to a slow stop. Someone opened the door and you exited first, excited to be around new people. Arthur held his arm for you to walk you down inside but stopped in his tracks and stared as another carriage pulled up behind yours.

“My god, she actually came…” you whispered.

For as wonderful as you looked in the dress from the tailor, you had nothing on Molly O’Shea. She stepped forth a queen in a stunning green jeweled dress dotted with accents of gold and black and red and perfectly matching jewelry. Her hair and makeup were flawless as well and made you wish you had brought at least a lipstick with you.

Her Irish accent was silky and slow as she took in her companions. “Evening, fellas. And Miss Moore, that’s a stunning dress you have there.”

You held Arthur’s arm, frozen as well, and watched as she and Dutch took their place in front of you. Hosea walked next, a smirk and a wink thrown your way as if to say he had finally come around and listened to your suggestion.

Bill huffed. “Well. This night just got a whole lot more interesting.”

The walkway was lined with white canvas tents stretched high above you and twinkling lights across the lawn. The house was a stunning two story building with Roman columns and a balcony that seemed to stretch around the entirety of the second floor. It was beautiful and matched the bold taste of those in the higher class of Saint Denis.

“Luca here will take you to Mr. Bronte.” A man at the front door accepted Dutch’s paper invitation and invited the crowd in, eyeing the number of people that entered in a way that let you know you were pushing the limits.

Luca was a smaller man, an inch or two below even you. He walked with a strut that made up for it as he guided the group into the foyay and spoke about the extensive history the house held as a jewel and a staple of Saint Denis. He lost you somewhere after you passed the chandelier, the sparkling beauty nearly stopping you in your tracks. Luca led you past the double staircase and multiple servants.

‘Hosea, Bill, YN, you three join the party. Signore Bronte does not want a crowd I am sure. We will meet you down here shortly and meet you out back after we pay our respects.” Molly clung to Dutch’s arm a little tighter, learning she was of importance to meet the guest of honor. Arthur simply rolled his eyes at you and you smiled back, not bothered by the slight.

Bill whistled as you stepped back out into the night air. “This sure is a pretty place. Like the...lights and such.”

Hosea told him to go find drinks while the two of you stood at the top of the stone staircase, a good spot for observing the party.

“Hosea, I’m flattered to even be here. I know Dutch seemed against it at first. He’s bee strange lately, have you noticed?”

The older man paused before thinking, mulling over the words running through his mind. “You look lovely tonight YN. Sure picked a dress that could bring a man to his knees.”

“It’s not too much?” You fretted.

“Not at all, my dear. And as far as Dutch goes, I’ve noticed something is off as well. Let’s keep that to ourselves however, not everyone would agree with our observations. Might think we were going against him.” Bill held out two drinks for you and headed back into the crowd to play the part of upper society. You clinked your glass gently against Hosea’s and enjoyed the taste of whatever it was you had sipped.

The garden below you was wide stretching, with trees and fountains and gazebos dotted around the grounds in an elegant arrangement. The same stringed lights from the front of the house were draped all around the backyard as well giving the evening a mood lighting of excitement and dreaminess.

You still couldn't believe it was all real. A few short months ago you were being held hostage by a savage man, and now you stood at the height of society, drinking and enjoying the view you had from the top.

It wasn’t long before Dutch, Arthur, and Molly joined you on the balcony. Dutch and Molly looked quite pleased with themselves, talking about how enchanted Bronte was with Molly and her beauty. Arthur seemed hesitant and motioned for you to come stand by him as soon as Dutch was done retelling the riveting tale of working with the man of the hour.

“I think we should get outta here. These people, they ain’t like us. They’re liars, and awful tricksters who do terrible things for a laugh.” Arthur shook his head, pointing out some people in the crowd who Bronte had mocked.

“Native Americans? What do they need from the mayor?” You mused out loud.

“Alright, go ingratiate ourselves. And remember,” Dutch gave you a pointed look, “steal nothing. Unless it's information. Find the mayor and stay outta trouble.”

Arthur gave your arm a tug and together you headed into the crowd. You knew finding the mayor was the target, but to be honest you were mostly interested in meeting the Native Americans who were somewhere out in the gardens.

You and Arthur waltzed around to see what you could find, but most of the people were simple folk looking for idle conversation. It took an hour to make your way around in a lap and at the end you felt none the wiser. Sure, the caricature of Saint Denis was more vibrant and colorful after speaking to more of its residents but you knew that would be enough information to sustain Dutch.

A conversation behind you grabbed your attention and you turned so Arthur could face them men and join in.

“It ain’t complex, Lemieux. And only an idiot like you would try to make it so.”

The small group of men stood near the fountain seeming to poke fun at the Frenchman. “I will not deny idiocy, sir, but perhaps now is not the time. You are drunk, Ferdinand.”

“I’m not drunk, you fool!” The loud man laughed and rocked backwards, grabbing the man next to him in order to remain standing. “But this man! This man loves darkies.”

You blanched at the slur and Arthur took this queue to grab the man’s shoulders, turning him away from the group. It didn’t take him long to lead him away before anyone could get too upset. You pretended to fan your face with your hand and draw the attention of the men back to you instead of watching the scene behind them.

“Your husband, madam?”

You blushed. “Betrothed. A good man, Arthur. My name is YN.”

Arthur rejoined the group and shook hands with the other men. “Thank you, sir. Henri Lemieux, I hope you are enjoying my party. Do you know Evelyn Miller?”

The name sounded familiar as Arthur’s face lit up. “My lord. The writer?”

“Well,” the man chuckled good heartedly. “We seem to have another deranged drunkard in our midsts.”

Behind Mr. Miller a loud boom echoed through the streets of the city. You winced and looked away from the bright lights exploding in the sky, unsure of what to think. Arthur placed his hand on your back and whispered that they were fireworks and you watched in awe. Flashes of light were met with oohs and ahhs from the crowd so you figured you must be safe, even if the air reeked of gunpowder.

A man in a white servants uniform pushed through the group towards the mayor, pulling him to the side once he had his attention. A sharp whisper brought the words ‘Cornwall’, ‘fool for trusting him’, and ‘sign it’ carried across the air and you locked eyes with Arthur. This was a lead, something he should look into.

Dutch seemed to appear out of thin air. “He say something about Cornwall? Find out what.”

Arthur placed a chaste kiss to your cheek and slunk off into the crowd and off into the dark. You stood alone until Molly joined your side.

“Miss O’Shea, that gown is...breathtaking.” Molly smiled, a rare motion for her.

“I’m glad tonight worked out. Hosea told me it was your idea to bring me along instead of Miss Gaskill, and I wanted you to know I’m grateful. Dutch and I...we used to be so close but I’m hoping he sees my worth after tonight. This dress was supposed to be for another type of party with me and Dutch, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon.”

You smiled sadly at her, unsure of what to say.

“Do you ever miss Ireland?”

“Constantly,” she answered without hesitation. “It’s a beautiful country, and Dublin is a gem that these cities don’t hold a candle too. I hope you visit one day, see the green for yourself.”

“I’d like that.” Arthur returned to your side with a sly grin thrown at Dutch and a pat of his coat pocket. Dutch tipped his hat and watched the rest of the fireworks show with a wide grin.

Hosea and Bill find their way over and express their disinterest at staying any longer. On the walk out Hosea whispered to Dutch about a plan he had devised to rob the city bank, something someone at the party had brought to his attention. Dutch countered with a plan to rob the trolley station that Bronte had mentioned to him and Arthur. The gang seemed to just need one big score before they could be free, whatever Dutch meant by that.

Lenny drove up with the first carriage and you saw his eyes nearly fall out of his head at the sight of you. One look at Arthur snapped his neck forwards without daring another glance, but you laughed at the exchange and felt good about how the night had gone. Dutch, Bill, Molly, and Hosea climbed inside as you and Arthur remained on the sidewalk. He clapped the side of the wagon without a word and Lenny took off, a curt nod cast somewhere in your general direction.

“Well, Mr. Morgan, what should we do now?”

Arthur met your gaze with a low growl and a hungry look on his face. “Girl, you better run back to that hotel room because I know exactly what we are doing tonight.”

You squealed with delight and took off, hiking your skirt up around your knees to let you run. Arthur barked a laugh and chased after you, showing the upper society of Saint Denis that it couldn't tame you no matter how hard it tried.

#price to be paid #red dead redemption 2 #rdr2 #fanfic #I know #two chapters in a week #who is she #well #she is stuck in quarantine and happy to be writing again #arthur morgan #female reader

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jo-ships · 4 years ago

Text

Of Free Will and Butterflies - chapter 4

Summary: Team Free Will finds themselves in another universe on a mountain with 9 teenagers and as the night goes on, they find that they need to make sure these teens survive.

"So wait, you got here how?" Sam asked.

"It was a, uh, a rift," Jack said, standing by the gate with her.

Sam still seemed skeptical but after Jo gave her seal of approval, she was inclined to believe at least some of their story. Two Johannahs who were nearly exactly the same right next to each other had to mean something weird, right? "A rift," she responded, a statement rather than a question.

"Yep, a rift. We're not sure who opened it," a confused expression appeared on Jack's face. "It could've been one of my uncles, maybe my grandpa, maybe it was even my dad somehow."

He totally lost Sam on that list. "They...have that kind of power?"

Jack nodded. "Yeah, my dad is Lucifer. Over there is Uncle Gabe," he pointed over where Jay and Gabriel were talking with Jo.

Every instinct within Sam told her to stop asking questions, but she was too curious not to. "I'm sorry, did you just say your dad is-?"

"Yep. It's a long story." Jack smiled politely. "I'm half human, though, so don't worry."

"Oh, yeah, I was worried about that," Sam replied, sarcastically yet concerned.

"We're practically twins, what the hell?"

"No kidding, hahaha."

"I can't believe this is how other people see me."

"Yeah? Try my position, dude."

"I love your boots, by the way."

"Oh, thank you! Your whole outfit looks great!"

The two Johannahs went back and forth like this for a while, Gabriel watching amused off to the side before he finally intervened. "So, Jo, we heard you have a thing for a couple of blondes in your group," he teased.

"Wait what?" Jo's face turned pink. "Who told you that?"

"I did," Josh confessed as he walked past them, not sticking around to hear Jo's reaction.

"Josh! You said you wouldn't tell anyone!"

Jay laughed at Jo's reaction. "In his defense, he did think I was you at the time."

"And he thought you were with me," Gabriel added.

Jo looked panicked suddenly. "Wait, is he-"

"Pretty sure seeing two of you next to each other cleared everything up for him," Gabriel said. "Don't worry, you still have your options open."

Jo sighed, collapsing on the stairs. "Thank god."

Jay and Gabriel side-eyed each other at her mention of God but chose not to mention it. "Anyway," Jay started. "Weird question but are you human?"

Jo raised her eyebrow at Jay, caught off guard. "Yeah? I mean, I don't think I could really be anything else."

"You'd be surprised." Jay sat down next to her and smiled. "I'm technically supposed to be a reaper, y'know?" Jo smiled as if she was about to laugh and Jay got defensive. "I'm serious!"

"No, no, I'm sure you are," Jo let out a small giggle. "It's just funny. I have a fascination with reapers, so the fact another version of myself is one is just really funny to me."

Jay laughed with her. "Yeah, that's pretty funny, you're right."

"Sounds like my dad made the right choice making you a reaper," Gabriel remarked, joining the Johannahs on the stairs.

"Your dad?" Jo questioned.

Jay nodded. "His dad's the reason I'm a reaper." After a pause, she added, "And the reason I'm now powerless."

Jo chuckled. "Who's your dad?"

"Well, you know him as God," Gabe answered.

Jo laughed that statement off at first before realizing he was serious. "Wait, really?"

Jay nodded. "Gabe, Gabriel, the archangel."

"The youngest," Gabe added.

Jo stood up and stared at the ground for a moment before walking up the stairs towards the door. "I need a minute."

Jay and Gabe looked at each other. "Guess we overwhelmed her."

"So, how do you know Jo?"

Dean hesitated for a second before answering Mike's question. Thankfully, his brother joined them at the right time and took it upon himself to answer for Dean. "We helped each other out of a dangerous situation once."

Jess seemed confused. "She never told us about that."

Dean smiled dorkily at Sam's excuse up until Jess's comment. "She probably just didn't want to worry you."

Sam nodded before pulling Dean aside for a second and whispering to him, holding up a finger to say "hold on" to Mike and Jess. "Dean, they're going to know we're lying soon. The others are finding out."

"Great, we'll just stall them, then," Dean whispered back.

"Do you really think that's gonna work, Dean?"

Dean shrugged. "Worth a shot." He rejoined the couple who started talking between each other in the meantime. "So, how long have you two known her?"

Castiel was walking around the lodge, eying the walls, Matt and Ashley watching him. "What are you...doing?" Ashley asked.

"Hm?" Castiel stopped and looked at her for a second before returning his gaze to the lodge wall. "I'm...admiring the structure of this building." It wasn't obvious whether he was lying to make an excuse or if he was telling the truth. They just assumed the latter.

"Yeah, it's pretty nice, isn't it?" Matt asked, joining Castiel.

Castiel nodded. "It is."

There was a long silence, none of them knowing what to say to each other. Finally, Matt broke the silence again. "So, you said your name is Castiel?"

"Yes, my friends call me Cas."

"And you came here through a 'rift'?" Ashley added.

Castiel turned his head once again to look at them. "It seems so."

"So, where are you actually from?" Matt asked.

"Where we're from, we fight monsters," Cas explained. "We were working on a plan to fight Chuck, you know him as God, before the rift opened."

Matt's and Ash's jaws dropped, their eyes wide in disbelief. "Oh my god, seriously?" Ash questioned.

"Unfortunately, yes." Cas turned away again and looked up to the rooftop. "He's powerful, but we'll find a way."

"Yikes," Matt responded as he backed away some.

"Ow!" Chris shook his hand off after touching the hot doorknob he'd just thawed. "And the door is open. Thank you, thank you, I'll be here a- AH! Geez!" He was interrupted by a small wolverine running out the door past him, getting laughs from the girls of the group as well as Gabe. "Crap, that thing freaked me out."

"What was it? Are you okay?" Ashley asked, still laughing.

Chris looked around, making sure nothing else was about to jumpscare him. "I don't know, it was like a bear or a tiger or something."

"Aww, it was just a cute wittle baby wolverine," Sam corrected mockingly.

"Don't worry, buddy, you're gonna be a big boy soon," Josh teased Chris, running up the stairs and joining the group.

As the teens plus Jack and Castiel piled in through the door, Jay and Gabe stayed back for a minute. "I see why she likes them," Jay laughed.

"Who?"

"Jo, she likes Sam and Chris." Jay reminded him. "I totally see it."

Gabe nodded. "Yeah? That mean you're taking a liking to them?"

"Oh god no," Jay denied, a loud honk of a laugh coming out of her. "Like, I definitely appreciate them but they are way too young for me."

"Yeah, you're right." Gabe agreed.

"Besides," Jay added. "I've already got an archangel for a boyfriend, how could I ever ask for more?"

"Ooh, flirting now, are we~?" Gabriel teased. "I'd love to encourage this but-."

"Hey, how did it go?" A voice asked from behind them.

Jay turned around. "Sam, Dean! It went well, we explained it to them and Jo likes me!"

Gabriel rolled his eyes over being interrupted by the Winchesters. "Yeah, the two Johannahs really hit it off."

"Sweet, so we can stick around?" Dean asked.

"Haven't asked yet, but they'll probably understand we need someplace to stay until we can figure out how to get home," Jay explained.

Sam nodded, "Sounds good."

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#self shipping #romantic f/o #self insert #self insert community #self ship community #fictional other #self ship #self shipping community #sam tag #ofwab #until dawn self insert #supernatural self insert #my writing #♡Pour some sugar on me♡#♡Wish you were here♡

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softjeon · 5 years ago

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Piece me together | Final

• Pairing: Jimin x Namjoon • Genre: Angst | Detective!AU / Stalker!AU • Words: 8,7k | written with @cassiavioletblue • Disclaimer: mentioning of drugs / guns / blood / abuse / violence

↳ Namjoon had a case to worry about and still he found himself coming back to this diner each time. Maybe it was because of the delicious milkshakes or maybe it was because of his favorite waiter that looked just as sweet.

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There was darkness all around him when he first came to. A painful ache inside of his head, the smell of chloroform too evident as he could still feel the strong hold around him, how someone had pressed it against his mouth and nose. He felt so powerless. His limbs felt heavy. Slowly, Jimin tried to blink his eyes open, groaning in pain. It felt like he was recklessly thrown in the corner of a room. There was no noise, only muffled sounds. And then Jimin fell back asleep again.

With his second attempt to wake up Jimin could adjust to the light a little more. He blinked. He wasn’t sure how much time had passed. There were sounds coming closer, someone was talking, and he could hear them say his name.

Jimin wanted to get up but something pulled him back in an instant. “N-no-no,” Jimin’s eyes widened as he saw the restraints around his wrist that were tied to the wall giving him only about a few meters to walk. Jimin tried to remember, closing his eyes, trying to put the puzzle pieces together but nothing made sense. Everything was a blur. He was shaking. And when the door suddenly opened, Jimin jumped and hid in the corner. A pathetic whimper was the only thing slipping from his lips as he tried to shield himself from the sudden bright light.

“Yes, just throw the mattress in here. I can take care of the rest.” Taehyung’s voice cut through the silence and then the heavy thump of a mattress being thrown on the floor had Jimin flinching. “Ah, look at that. Sleeping beauty is awake.”

Taehyung smiled at him, completely ignoring his men who finished their task and then got out, closing the door behind them. Taehyung squatted down to be on Jimin’s level and cocked his head. “I’m sorry for the way I had to get you, but I somehow had a feeling you wouldn't come meet me if I asked. And I didn’t want to run into your… your…” He made a pause and when Jimin didn’t clarified he continued. “What exactly is he, hm? That cop of yours is he your boyfriend? Your protector? Your roommate?”

Jimin scoffed, turning his face away from Taehyung not wanting to give him any kind of details on Namjoon. “What is this Tae? Are you completely out of your mind now? Isn’t beating me up and threatening me enough? What’s next, huh?” Jimin hissed at him instead, pulling at his restraints, “Do you want to brainwash me into loving you again? You’re crazy, Taehyung!”

“I thought it would be, honestly. That you would come back to your senses if your adrenaline would spike up a little. It wasn’t even a proper beating, no broken bones, no stitches. You see I still take care of you. But then, you know, something funny happened and the police started sniffing around where they shouldn’t. And if you trailed it back it all seemed to come from your little police friend. So, I wondered if maybe, just maybe you really were so traitorous - or dumb - to talk to him. So, I thought I’d interrupt that. Or if you had been a good boy then there’s still hope for us. Either way you’re better off here with me than you are with him.” He ignored Jimin’s sharp words and reached out for him, stroking his hair back. “You’ll see this is just a makeshift solution. Soon you’ll be back to living properly with me.”

Jimin flinched away from his touch, nodding over to the mattress instead, “And you think making me want to live with you is giving me a shitty old mattress? Where even are we Tae?” It was a weak attempt to get some kind of information about his whereabouts. If he’d only know where he was then maybe he could run once more. “They were on you even before I knew them! You are the dumb one, making mistakes so they are close.” Jimin whined helplessly as he pulled at the restraints. His whole body was feeling numb and aching at the same time from lying on the floor for so long. “Please can you loosen them…it hurts.”

“If you would stop pulling on your restraints it wouldn’t hurt.” Taehyung got up, obviously annoyed with the talking back, “Tell me how to handle this, in your opinion. You want me to set you free? So, you can run back to Namjoon and play happily ever after with him while he locks me up? Is that it? I thought we had something special, you and me. I don’t like this situation either, but you give me no choice. I’m not going down because of you. You know they always told me that being in love with someone was a weakness, but I didn’t listen because... how could loving you be the cause of something bad? But I see it now. Unfortunately, I can’t turn back time and I can’t…unlove you so I just have to improvise. You could make this so much easier for everyone involved if you would just play along.” He tried a smile again, “Anyway, any wishes for dinner? I could get you some really tasty salmon if you want.”

His heart was beating so fast and the lack of water and Taehyung’s anger was making Jimin feel dizzy. He leaned his head against the cold wall, just nodding to whatever Taehyung said, ignoring the tears that were falling.

“Kidnapping is what you call improvise?” Jimin wiped over his cheeks turning away from Taehyung to waddle over to the mattress and sat down on it. He couldn’t turn his back on him, the restraints keeping him from doing so. “Water. I only want to drink something, please.” Jimin knew he had to somehow play along to this, just to keep himself alive and come up with a plan to get out of here.

He’d rather die than be with Taehyung.

“That’s a little… plain if you ask me, but okay. Are you on some water cleanse or shit? You always had a thing about caring so strictly about your health. Of course, I appreciated it and still do because you have the softest skin of anyone I’ve ever known. And I can’t wait to have you in my arms again.” With that he vanished to tell someone to get Jimin some water and some dinner in case the younger would get hungry later. He had business to do. And maybe tomorrow would be a new day with new beginnings - and sweet old habits.

…

Yoongi’s eyes flickered through the apartment nervously watching how his best friend was raging through his own home. He blinked in confusion, flinching when the other was screaming and it sounded so painful, so hurt, that it pierced right through Yoongi.

“We…we will find him.” He finally managed to say in midst of the chaos and ordered Jungkook to get the things they needed to secure the evidence. Yoongi took the moment to reach for Namjoon, placing a hand on his shoulder, making sure the other felt his strong presence and that it kept him from destroying anything else, “Namjoon!”

Namjoon shrugged Yoongi’s hand off him as if it hurt. “No! We won’t find him - or if we do it’ll be too late and he’s going to be dead or Tae tortured him and… and I told him to trust me and everything he’s going to think of while he’s hurting is that he should never let me close to him and everything... everything that’s going to happen to him is my fault so don’t you.. don’t you dare telling me that everything’s going to be alright or that Jimin will be perfectly alright because we both know how scared he was and now his fears have come true and he must be scared out of his mind and all we can do is stand here and wait and hope and try and what... what if it’s too late? What if he killed him already and we never...never find him.” Namjoon stopped throwing punches and abusing furniture and just stood there, swaying a little before he broke into tears, hiding his face miserably in his hands because he had lost. He had just…lost.

Yoongi was by his side, carefully and softly reaching out for Namjoon. He didn’t say anything, just holding his friend, who only hesitantly let him do so. When Jungkook came back, the younger was completely stunned by the scenery as he had never seen his boss like that, his eyes wide in fear. Yoongi wordlessly told him to take care of the evidence while he soothed over Namjoon’s hair, making the younger look at him.

“Hey, will you listen to me for a second?” Yoongi’s voice was soft, his thumb softly wiping away a tear on Namjoon’s cheeks, “You’re the best god damn detective here. And you have the two best teammates. We have to put those two cases together now and find out where that fucker is. He trusts in you to put the pieces together or else he wouldn’t have left them all over…” Yoongi hesitated, furrowing his brows, “Isn’t it weird that he knew where you were…after that incident that one night with Jimin, before he moved in here with you…maybe Jimin knew that they were listening, or tracking or…a snitch. That’s why he started it all. Maybe there’s more around here. Do you still have files at home, Joon?” Hope was sparking in Yoongi’s eyes as he looked at him, “Namjoon! Come on. You won’t ever forgive yourself if you don’t give this your all. We can solve this! Just like we always do!”

The fear of coming too late and Jimin hurting while they were miles away, unable to do anything for him was still eating away at him threatening to overwhelm him but he trusted in Yoongi to make the right decisions while he couldn’t so he just followed along until they reached his room where he had put the files he had taken home.

“Here. You’ve seen the clues before maybe you can find more - if there are any.” He couldn’t believe that it was Yoongi who connected the dots while Jimin must have done this here, at home, right under his nose.

…

Jimin turned in his sleep, curling in on himself as he felt cold. There had been no blanket, no cushion, just the mattress. He mumbled sleepily, moving around as much as his restraints let him, searching for the warmth that would embrace him in his dreams, because there he wasn’t being held in a dark, cold room. Instead he could imagine, how it was each time Namjoon put his arms around him. Safe and warm.

“Namjoon,” Jimin whispered with a smile. He could almost smell his cologne, feel his heartbeat. It was so real. Maybe this wasn’t a dream? Maybe he had dreamed everything else? A simple nightmare and Jimin was safe in his arms.

Nuzzling his face closer, Jimin hid in the crook of his neck.

Taehyung had visited Jimin in the morning and had seen with horror that he had forgotten about the bedding as he had promised. So, he quickly had arranged something and while he was about to place it over Jimin’s sleeping form he hesitated. The younger looked so peaceful in his sleep. So soft. It had been ages since he had woken up to that angelic face Jimin had loved morning cuddles and had always slept as close to him as possible. Honestly, he missed this. A lot. Carefully he lowered down besides Jimin, hoping that the other wouldn’t wake just to have a few moments of pretending to be back in the past when they had shared a bed. He was too far away though for it to feel real so he put an arm around Jimin’s waist as lightly and unobtrusively as he could. And then Jimin sighed and moved and Taehyung’s breath hitched as Jimin snuggled into him. It felt so perfect, so heavenly… until Jimin sighed Namjoon’s name and stabbed Taehyung right into his heart.

Jimin slowly came to, when he noticed that his hand was actually placed against someone’s chest. Taehyung’s chest to be precise. He gasped, jerking awake fully but there wasn’t much room to get away from him as his arm was wrapped around his waist keeping Jimin firm in place.

“Taehyung!” He was breathing heavily, trying to calm himself quickly as he gazed up at the one he despised the most in this world. Jimin tried it with a smile, one that was a bit too shaky to be meant lovingly, “Wh-what are you doing here?”

“Oh, I was just visiting you. And you looked so cozy that I thought I might find some peace there too. I couldn’t really. Not with the way you moaned Namjoon’s name.” He was stretching the truth a little but Jimin didn’t need to know that. He leaned further into Jimin, placing a little kiss at the base of Jimin’s neck where he knew the younger was sensitive. Jimin had always loved it when he had kissed his neck. And Taehyung had loved marking him up - still did. Not right now though. He was hurt and angry and he would make Jimin feel that. Gently he stroked down Jimin’s back while whispering into the other’s ear sweetly. “You let him fuck you, didn’t you?” It was easy to wedge his knee between Jimin’s as the younger couldn’t quite get out of his grip and had nowhere else to turn to. “I’m really disappointed in you Jimin. I thought you would know better.”

Jimin pushed his hand against Taehyung’s chest, hoping it could keep a little distance between them but there wasn’t much space to keep anymore. Taehyung was as close as one could be, and it made a shiver ran down his spine. A scary feeling settling low in his stomach.

“It’s none of your business anymore who gets to touch me,” Jimin tried to sound as stable as he could but his voice was betraying him, “We broke up, remember? I am not your boyfriend anymore.” He hadn’t had any sex with Namjoon, yet. It had never been the time nor the place to do so. Even though Jimin loved him, more than anyone he’d ever loved. He had seen him naked, had seen how beautiful his body was sculpted and it took everything in him not to kiss down his chest and further down to please Namjoon like he wanted to. But for now, there had been nothing but sweet, loving kisses that he could never get enough from. He felt safe with Namjoon, felt secured in his hold.

Jimin whimpered quietly when Taehyung pulled him even closer and a little rougher this time, the leg between his making him feel awfully vulnerable. “D-don’t, Tae, please.” If Tae wanted him, there was no escape for Jimin. He was restrained and exhausted. Easy prey for anyone.

Taehyung hiked up his leg a little to make Jimin feel the pressure through his pants. Jimin had been nothing but defiant since he had gotten him here, so this felt satisfactory. “We broke up? We? That’s not how I remember it sweetheart. You just suddenly decided that if me earning money for us is not 100% mother Teresa approved then it’s not worth shit and that this would be a reason to leave me. I didn’t stop loving you. You ripped my heart out just because my life clashed with your ethics. So no, we never broke up. Because being in a relationship takes two - so why should ending it take only one person, hm? We are partners for as long as I want it. And with spreading your legs for that fucker you betrayed me. So now, I won’t touch you Minnie. I’m hurt. I’ll have to process what happened first. I could have taken you back into my life and bedroom the very first day if you just had showed some remorse, but it looks as if you are adamant on staying stubborn and unreasonable. So, you’ll stay here until you change your mind and come back to your sense.”

Jimin shook his head, “I didn’t...I…” In a way, Jimin knew that arguing would only make it worse and make Taehyung more aggressive. He'd seen it a million times. Felt it a couple of more times.

So, he stopped struggling and instead averted his gaze, biting down onto his bottom lip to keep from saying anything. Instead he reached out for Taehyung, staying close to him and only the small trembles in his body were betraying him. “W-will you eat dinner with me then? Tonight at least?“ Jimin asked carefully; one because he was hungry, and he'd figured the only way out was to gain Tae’s trust once more and hoping that Namjoon would look for him.

There was surprise on Tae’s face and then something akin to joy blooming in his eyes. “Oh. Yes. Yes, of course, if you want that.” He detangled himself from Jimin, brushing through his hair once more. “I’ll make sure to have a nice dinner prepared for us. And I’m sorry about forgetting about the covers. You’ll have it warm and cozy from now on.” He hesitated before leaving and turned back once more, “I know this isn’t ideal and that you must be uncomfortable right now but believe me, as soon as you are back to the old you none of this will matter anymore. We can just forget about this... this phase of yours as if it never happened.” With a happy smile Taehyung left him alone.

It was horrible. Everything about this was. The cold, the loneliness, the ticking of the clock that seemed to mock him. Jimin held onto the blanket tightly, counting how many small dandelions were printed on the covers. He had to restart a couple of times because he lost his focus and his mind switched to Namjoon. Jimin could count the flowers everyday but not the many times he thought about him.

Namjoon.

He wondered if he'd found out or if he thought that Jimin ran away. He was scared and the fear was laying heavy on his mind. And the only way out of there was through Taehyung. So, he smiled. Well, he tried, when his ex came in almost every day. Sometimes more than once on other days it seemed like he had forgotten about him and it made Jimin panic thinking about how no one would know he was down here and possibly dying.

…

It was harder to keep up with the search for Jimin the longer it went on because Namjoon didn’t want to sleep and if Jungkook hadn’t threatened to force fed him if he didn’t eat, then his superior would have skipped that too, just to have more time running around like a headless chicken, visiting everyone they had ever suspected to be involved in the drug business to ask them about Jimin, be it on the streets, in prison or in the interrogation room.

Yoongi and Jungkook helped him as much as they could - and they also came up with a little rule they kept to themselves, that one of them always had to accompany Namjoon while he was on his search for Jimin to keep him from doing shit or fucking up his career because he got so desperate. Though Yoongi pretty much knew how he felt like. When Jungkook had been in a hostage situation once, were a suspect flipped out during his interrogation, he would have done anything to make sure Jungkook would come out if it in one piece, no matter the consequences for him or his career.

Still he couldn’t see how his best friend was tearing himself up like this. They would find him. He was sure of it…he just needed to be sure of it.

Yoongi tore his gaze away from Namjoon who was desperately reading through his notes then looking at the pins on the board again trying to put the puzzle pieces together. The picture of Taehyung burning holes in their backs each time they turned around. They were close - they could feel it, but still not close enough. He turned to look who was bashing through their door, startling him when his eyes widened at who stood next to Jungkook.

“I think I found a way to get to Jimin. It’s risky, but we’ll take it...” Jungkook said, making Namjoon turn around to him, the darkness under his eyes only the evidence of his sleepless nights but for the first time hope was glistening in them.

A smirk placed itself on Jungkook’s lips.

…

Jimin jerked awake again when the door opened pulling involuntarily at his restraints making him whine in pain. His wrists were bruised, red and aching and although Taehyung was starting to let Jimin in more and more, he still didn’t trust him enough to let them go. Jimin stared at the stranger who walked inside of his room, followed by Taehyung who was humming to himself happily. The man put his usual tray at the side of his bed with some bread and tea and Jimin thanked him quietly, reaching out with shaking heads for the warm cup.

He hadn’t seen the man before and yet the other stared at him as if he knew him. When he reached out for his tea the man reached out for his hand, closing his fingers around Jimin and the younger flinched hard, withdrawing it to quickly he almost spilled the tea.

“Ah sorry, my fault!” The other apologized quickly when Taehyung furrowed his brows. “I hadn’t realized how hot the tea was.” He placed the mug and everything else on the floor and just took the tray with him while Tae leaned down to give Jimin a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’ll be away for a little bit, business, you know how it is, but we can have dinner together again, like we had yesterday.” He smiled at him as if everything was perfectly normal. Over Tae’s shoulder Jimin could see the other man staring intently at him again, he didn’t even blink once just boring into him and Jimin shivered. He was glad that knowing that he was “Tae’s” would at least keep Tae’s men away from him. At least he hoped so.

“Y-yeah, okay. Let’s have dinner.” Jimin answered and smiled but before Taehyung could get up again he held him back. “D-do you think you can loosen them a little or…or at least can you bring me some crème on your way home, b-babe?” Jimin’s eyes flickered back and forth between Taehyung’s and the man who was still staring at him like a crazy person, “I am bruised all over my wrists and it hurts.” Leaning in Jimin placed a very light kiss on Taehyung’s cheek while he watched the strange man. “Come back safely.”

They left both after Taehyung had loosened the restraints a bit, not enough for Jimin to slip out of them but enough to get Jimin’s wrists a little more room which was actually worse because of course he tried and wriggle out bruising himself only further with each try. Frustrated and exhausted he finally fell back asleep, the tears drying on his cheeks. He awoke when a gentle touch on his face and a hushed whisper.

“Jimin?” It took a while for him to fully wake and realize that this wasn’t Tae’s voice - but it also wasn’t Namjoon’s. His eyes snapped open and at the same moment there was a hand clasping down over his mouth.

Jimin wanted to scream but the hand kept him from doing anything but muffled sounds, writhing underneath him, trying to push the hand off of him. The panic was washing over him like a wave. What if he wanted to abuse him? Take him, because he was defenseless, and Taehyung was gone? Jimin closed his eyes, struggling even more, trying to bite into the man’s hand as he kicked and pushed him as hard as he could. He couldn’t let this happen. He just couldn’t. Jimin was panting, his eyes trying to look for anything that he could use as a weapon, but there was nothing.

“Shsht, please, calm down, please, Jimin, I won’t hurt you!” The man was getting desperate but his grip on the younger remained tight. “I’ll let you go if you stop struggling, I promise, as long as you won’t scream I’ll back off! I’m working with Namjoon!”

Jimin stopped right away, his eyes snapped open and he turned around. When the stranger let go off him right away, Jimin eyed him warily. “H-how? Who are you? I’ve never seen you with him.” His voice was quiet, almost not audible as he was scared someone else could listen.

“That’s the whole point of my job. I’m an undercover agent. I’m never at the police station unless someone staged an ‘arrest’ for me to have a reason to be there, otherwise it could blow my whole cover. I’ve been undercover on the streets for a while for another case which came in handy now because Namjoon could just ‘lend’ me for his search without compromising my own case - or having to build up an identity from scratch. To Taehyung I’m some kind of wannabe drug dealer that he can smash in an instant if I fuck something up, so he wasn’t afraid to show me where you were. Now that I’ve found you the only thing you have to do is hold on. I won’t have a possibility to contact the police department until tomorrow but as soon as Namjoon gets word of where you are he will come and save you. And we will get Tae. Just... try to keep your head down and not behave any differently than before. And think about that in one or two days you’ll be out of here. It’s going to be fine.”

Jimin couldn’t believe what he heard. His heart was pumping the blood so fast through his veins that he felt dizzy. He reached for the stranger’s arm and nodded. “T-thank you,” They younger didn’t mind the tears that were burning in his eyes again. Honestly, he had been crying so much all these days that he had gotten used to it. When the stranger was gone again, Jimin laid back with a smile. He stayed like this until Taehyung was back, making him jerk out of his daydreams about being back in Namjoon’s arms.

“Hold on,” Jimin mumbled to himself reassuringly, hoping to be out of this hell hole as soon as possible.

…

Jungkook nodded once more, pulling at his bottom lip nervously, feeling the stares of his partners boring right through him. When he pushed the red button on his phone ending the call, he turned around. His brows were furrowed deeply as he hummed in thought. Reaching for one of the red pins, Jungkook pulled it out of the board and placed it somewhere else and onto a different location on their map.

Right in the heart of Seoul.

“Jimin is only a few blocks away.” Jungkook let his shoulders fall, turning around, “He’s held on the 10th floor, right over these offices.” Chuckling low as if he couldn't believe it.

“He was right in front of our eyes the whole time.” Yoongi added, feeling the tiredness of their night long searches for Jimin deep in his bones. “How we going to do it? We need more men than just us three.” He turned to his phone, “We can get the special forces team. They could wait until we give them the sign to tear it down as soon as we got Jimin. Do you think your man can get us in without being seen first?” Yoongi turned to Jungkook and then to Namjoon, “What do you think, boss?”

“There’s no way we can get inside all three without being seen at least not long enough without anyone being hurt. We are trained but Jimin is not. No, we should let the undercover guy take Jimin somewhere safe, a room where they can both lock themselves in and can barricade the door to be safe from bullets. Then he should give us a sign and we storm the building together with the special forces. No one who isn’t directly involved in this should have a clue about what we are going to do. No murmuring, no rumors, no hints. This needs to stay absolutely secret.”

They nodded in agreement.

So good in theory.

In reality there was no sign. Nothing.

Jungkook bit his lip in a nervous manner, tapping his foot on the ground as he leaned his head against the cold metal wall of the van they were sitting in. “Why isn’t he giving us a sign?” Jungkook whined and looked at Yoongi, “The plan was to get Jimin a few hours a-”

“Sht!” Yoongi signaled Jungkook to not talk any further. Namjoon was as tense as one could be already, ready to jump in, sign or not and he knew that it only needed a tiny little push and Namjoon would just go in without caring for the consequences.

“He had said he’d need fifteen minutes at max.” Namjoon growled, curt and sharp.

“Maybe someone saw him in the hallway. Or maybe he’s talking to someone right now and will do what he was supposed to in the very next minute! Calm down, Namjoon, please. It’ll be fine, we’ll get Jimin and he will be safe and happy. He’s not hurt, you hear me, he wasn’t hurt then, and he won’t be now. His bruises will heal, and you will be…”

“That’s enough!” Namjoon pushed himself off the wall. “You could be right - or they could be killing him in there in this exact moment. I’m not going to risk that! I’m not going to lose him.”

Yoongi and Jungkook were right on his heel. Yoongi talking to him, trying to soothe him calmly but there was no way Namjoon was stopping, so he did – shutting his mouth as soon as they got closer. They all had their hand on their gun, eyes focused as they made their way around the block as silently as they could, with nothing but bulletproof vests keeping them safe.

“We should give out a signal. We really shouldn’t be doing-,” Yoongi reached out for Namjoon just when someone opened the backdoor of the building, their eyes locking on theirs, guns getting drawn out, when there was a sound, not louder than a bb gun shooting and he dropped dead, before he could shoot first or alarm anyone.

“10 points for me!” Jungkook threw a fist in the air, blowing the invisible steam off his gun. Namjoon knew that this was Jungkook’s way of easing the tension out of his system and as long as he did it quietly enough to not get them in danger Namjoon would let him be and would do what he had to do for himself as well; focusing completely on the task: Find Jimin, get him out safely, then help the others find Tae. In this order and he wouldn’t let anyone come between him and a happy ending. Jimin would be still alive. He would get him out. This was it. They kept sneaking further into the building and even though they didn’t see anyone else right away they didn’t relax because there were a lot more people inside and they knew it. And there still wasn’t any signal…

They had studied the map of the building for hours, every corner, every window, every door they knew where it lead. It was maddening. The only sounds the shuffling of their shoes against concrete until they could hear mumbles. Namjoon raised a fist and all three of them held their breaths. “There’s too many.” Jungkook hissed, trying to access how many men there really were. There was no way around it.

They stood there for what felt like an eternity, trying to come up with any other solution. Everything seemed more logical – but there was no place to hide or sneak around. No other choice but to go directly through it. “Fuck it. Let’s do it quick. We don’t have any time after we’re done with them.” Namjoon rolled his shoulders back and walked ahead. They had the surprise effect on their side, but even with the suppressors there was a great deal of noise, as there was a near continuous spit of bullets flying. The hail of bullets continued around them, their minds jumping through possibilities to get out there quick in a split seconds. Namjoon kept moving his gun and found two more targets. One was still firing wildly and the other was reloading. He shot the second man first, then the other, before he took a blow to the face. He yanked his arm back and turning to fight off his attacker with his fists. He didn’t stop moving. He couldn’t. He needed to get Jimin out of here.

Yoongi fell forward with a grunt and landed hard, making him lightheaded for a second. His finger contracted against the trigger as he turned around, slowly pulling it back when a hand shot out in a blur, snatching and trying to twist the gun from Yoongi’s hand. In a fluid motion Yoongi threw the gun back at the side of his face, before his fist came up and he hit him right in the jaw. “Fucking idiots, ah,” Yoongi hissed, stretching his hand as he watched the now unconscious body on the floor. Namjoon nodded at him, wiping the blood from his lips as he wrapped his finger around the trigger, “No time. We gotta go.”

The younger detective looked at Yoongi worried, brushing his hand through his hair once. “You okay?” Jungkook eyed the cut on his face warily that was starting to bleed.

“Yes. Yes, I’m okay.” His breath came shorter than it should be and there was a singing pain in his side but Yoongi ignored it, pressing his hand on top of it - and almost collapsed when his hand came in contact with the wound. Jungkook could barely catch him when the older’s knees buckled and his fingers touched something wet.

“Yoongi! You’re bleeding! Namjoon, we need to go back, Yoongi is injured.” But Namjoon shook his head. “You can bring him back if you want but I can’t - not before I found Jimin. We don’t know if someone alarmed the others; if we go back now and try it again later then they might be somewhere else already. And Jimin could be dead or alive.”

…

Jimin had been in midst of reading a book, one that Taehyung had brought him to pass the time, trying to forget the restraints, the situation or anything else but trusting Namjoon to get him one day. Of course, Tae had said it was just not too miss him too much. It was hard to keep up the smile, when all he wanted was to throw up in disgust, but Jimin kept going, to stay alive for Namjoon. He sighed, turning another page when suddenly gunshots went off. It was loud. A sound that went right through him, shaking him to the core and making him scared and hopeful at the same time. Was it Namjoon? But what if Namjoon got shot? He squealed loudly, hands over his mouth and eyes wide in fear. Each gunshot made him twitch and Jimin pushed the palm of his hands over his ears. But the screaming was getting louder, and it was coming closer. There was someone coming closer.

Jimin rushed to the corner of the room, once more trying to pull at the restraints. “C’mon, please,” His eyes flickered back to the door and to the metal string that was attached to his wrists and wall. A scream escaped him involuntarily when the door busted open, but his eyes didn’t find the one he was hoping to see. It wasn’t Namjoon. But neither was Jimin scared.

“Sh-sh, please be quiet Jimin. I’ll get you out of here.” The guy said that Jimin learned to trust and known as the one that infiltrated Taehyung’s system a long time ago, helping Namjoon. The younger whimpered quietly, nodding and waiting with shaking hands as he got out a key that he must have stolen. “Pl-please be quick…I…I…don’t want him to-,” His sentence broke off when Jimin saw the change of expression on the agents face. All of his color was suddenly gone, eyes wide and mouth open as he gasped in shock. “Wha-at’s wron-,” Jimin’s voice was shaking and then a scream tore from him - there was blood on the man’s hand and then he heard Taehyung’s chuckle.

“N-no, Taehyung! What are you-, oh my god!” Jimin’s hands were freed off the wall, not from the cuffs though, so he kneeled, reaching out for him. “We need an ambulance! Taehyung! Please! He-, he thought that someone was…he wasn’t freeing me, please. He was about to get me to…y-you…Tae! Please.” Jimin’s voice broke as he was crying, lying right through his teeth because there was no way in hell that was the reason why, but he had other things to worry about as he was watching helplessly, pushing his hands onto the man’s wound to stop it from bleeding and getting blood all over himself. “P-please, Tae!”

“There’s no use in it now, Jiminnie. I’ve heard them, seen them. The cops are here, and they are trying to destroy everything I worked for. They have no right to ruin everything I’ve built. And like hell will I let them play heroes and rescue you like some damsel in distress.” He opened the cuffs but pressed the gun against Jimin’s neck right after, “Up! I won’t say it again. And if you move in the wrong direction then don’t think my love for you will keep me from killing you. You made it clear that you don’t want me.”

Jimin was trembling as he got up, stumbling ahead. “T-tae, please, don’t.” He whispered but the pressure of the gun at his neck made him shut up only seconds after. His legs felt wobbly, his body weak from days of being held hostage like that, so he tripped not just once as they walked up the stairs but twice. Tears ran in streams down his cheeks, every gunshot making him flinch violently. “Wh-ere are we going, Tae? Please, I don’t…don’t know where you want to go,” Jimin stood at the end of the staircase looking left and right, not sure which was the direction to go. He had never been in this part of the building, nor did he wanted to get killed for choosing the wrong path. He gripped Jimin tightly and turned right and left only to be forced into another corner of the building again and again. It wasn’t just Namjoon and his sorry excuses for partners that had entered the building, there were way more of them here and they were conquering his kingdom piece by piece. Taehyung was shaking with rage and anger. There was only one way he could go if he didn’t want to run straight into the police’s arms: up. So, he pushed Jimin roughly up the stairs. “Move! Don’t talk, just move.”

Jimin whimpered, wiping over his eyes as he gazed up. This way he knew. Taehyung was trying to get up at the roof – but why? For a second, Jimin considered talking and then he could hear footsteps coming closer, sounding like someone was running. There were more than one. And then someone called his name.

Jimin whipped around in an instant. He would recognize the voice everywhere, but the smile got wiped off his face instantly when Taehyung whipped his gun around hitting him square in the face. Jimin choked off a scream, stars shining in front of his eyes, a metal taste on his tongue but there was barely anytime to came to when Taehyung pulled him back by his hair, forcing him to get up. His arm wrapped itself around his neck, choking him in a tight hold while the gun pressed against the side of his face. Jimin was barely able to keep himself upright at this point, his own hands digging into Taehyung’s arms as he pushed his shoulder against the heavy door and the cold air made Jimin shiver.

They were out on the roof and the wind hit his back like a blow. Nevertheless, Taehyung didn’t take his eyes off Namjoon who was only a few meters away, eyes cold and shiny from hate. He just had to grin at that and be proud for a glorious little second. He had always this, the power he could hold over others just by finding out their weak spots and using the right words - or leverage - against them to have them dance for him like little puppets. This time it wasn’t any different. Just that his leverage was the man he loved and that he had nowhere left to go.

“Stay back! Or I’ll kill him! I swear to whatever you fuckers believe in that I will shoot him right in the head so you can scratch his pretty little face off the floor!”

Jimin was gasping for air, when his eyes fell onto Namjoon who had his gun pointed at Taehyung, while there was another one pointed at his own head. A sob broke through him. There was something like relief and then pain, one that made him realize that this was a one way street.

Jimin’s expression softened as he mouthed his first ‘I love you’ to Namjoon. His own bloody hands were trying to keep Taehyung from choking him even more. ‘It’s okay…I’m okay’ Jimin mouthed next, a sad smile forming at his lips. There were more and more people backing up Namjoon but still they couldn’t do anything with the gun next to his own head. And Jimin had to awfully realize that.

Jimin and Namjoon locked eyes and something in the policeman’s eyes changed, turned soft and vulnerable and… loving. It made Taehyung incredibly angry. Once Jimin had looked at him like that. As if he was the single most important person in the universe. As if he would forever love him back. And now he couldn’t wait to get away from him to sink back into his lover's arms who stood for everything Taehyung hated and who would crush his empire in a heartbeat if he let him. He knew that he would go to prison if he surrendered. No lawyer could get him out of this. And even if he would be weak, his name nothing to be scared off but to laugh about; Taehyung the one who got caught by the police because his ex-lover fucked one of them and instead of dirty talk had told him all of Tae’s secrets. Taehyung was proud. He was stubborn.

And he would rather die than having to face this kind of humiliation.

Namjoon was clenching his jaw, focusing back on Taehyung. Everybody was standing tight like brow strings, ready to attack the second Tae would do so as move a muscle. Taehyung had killed before and he’d do it again, there was no doubt about it, nothing to argue about. When he took a step back, Namjoon took a step forward.

Jimin could barely see in front of him anymore, the tears blurring his view and still he tried to keep his focus on Namjoon. He wanted to see him. He should have been the last one he would see. Nothing else mattered but him.

Taehyung inched closer to the edge, piece by piece until he was close enough to just let himself fall. There was no railing to climb over or hurdle to separate him from the fall. It was just him and a promise of certain death. He could have let Jimin go, let him run back to his lover to get his happily ever after. But he was bitter and hurt and desperate, and he didn’t.. he couldn’t let Jimin go. Not even in death. He leaned in, kissing Jimin fleetingly below the ear before whispering into it. “Say goodbye, my love. If I can’t have you - then no one else will.”

Namjoon saw it, the exact moment in which Taehyung decided that he would die right here - and take Jimin with him. It was in his shoulders that suddenly relaxed, in his defiant stance, in his gaze as he looked over Jimin’s shoulder, speaking to Namjoon as if he had yelled right across the roof: ‘He is mine. You can’t have him. And you won’t win no matter what’.

The others were waiting for Taehyung to tell them his demands; probably money, a vehicle to flee, the usual. Not Namjoon though; he knew that Tae wasn’t stupid and that a life on the run wasn’t what would satisfy someone as crazy about control as Tae. He would end it here, right now. And he would take Jimin with him. And Namjoon would have to helplessly watch his love die, either through a gun or falling to his death if Tae pulled him along.

When Jimin had mouthed another ‘I love you’ his eyes had been full of tears and it was simultaneously the most beautiful and horrible thing he had ever seen. It would be forever etched into his mind. Everything of this. He shuddered violently and then Tae moved again, leaning that tiny bit close to the abyss that he needed to and Namjoon could see his eyes widen in fear and then they flickered downwards, looking down, down all those floors on where their bodies would hit and Namjoon didn’t think, he couldn’t he just reacted on instinct because he felt that if he would lose Jimin anyway then he wanted to at least try, he wanted Jimin to know that he would have done anything he could to save him. So, he shot.

A scream tore through the deafening silence that followed. He was shivering, his body collapsing under the pressure of the sudden weight that pulled him down. Jimin fell hard, the concrete scraping his skin painfully. The air got stuck in his lungs and Jimin gasped violently, turning on his back. There were noises all around him. People screaming, commanding, ordering for other people to do…something. Jimin wasn’t sure what exactly. He couldn’t hear it. It was all a blur as he looked up at the grey sky, blinking when the sun peeked through one of the clouds as if it was deciding to mock him in this very moment. Jimin wondered for how long he hadn’t seen the sun when something blocked it again.

It took him a moment to register the familiar shape, his eyes trying to get used to the sudden loss of light again. Jimin’s mind reacted before his body could follow, tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Joonie,” He whispered, letting the other pull him into his arms as if he was a lifeless doll. The warmth that Namjoon was radiating seeping through his cold bones and making him feel alive again. “Y-you found me. I thought you’d…”

“Of course, baby. Of course, I found you.” Namjoon pulled Jimin so tightly against him that he could feel the younger’s heartbeat. He needed this. he needed this so badly, to reassure himself that he had done it, that his bullet had hit Taehyung and missed Jimin; that Taehyung had crumbled and not fallen down the building with Jimin still in his arms. But Jimin was here, in his arms. He was breathing. He was alive. He was alive! The adrenaline had him shaking but he refused to let Jimin go, even when one of the special ops told them they needed to clear the scene now and let the ambulance check Jimin. Never would he let him go again.

Jimin reached out for Namjoon’s cheeks, not caring that there was blood on them. He just wanted to feel him closer. “Thank you,” Jimin whispered against his lips, placing a soft kiss there that tasted too much like salt, but he didn’t mind. He wanted to feel the warmth. “Can we g-go home please?” He asked softly, before wrapping his arms around Namjoon’s neck and hiding his face in the crook of his neck, trusting him to bring him somewhere safe, while he just closed his eyes.

The nightmare was finally over. And he was back in his arms.

…

The sun was setting low, dipping the living room in a soft orange light. His eyes flickered up, holding onto the blanket he was wrapped in tightly as he gazed up, meeting Namjoon’s beautiful look. Days had passed and still his smiled wavered when there was a sudden knock on the door, staying seated as he cocked his head aside. It had taken him a while to stop flinching every time he heard someone at the door, but he started to heal, just like his wrists did. Next week he would even get rid of the bandages that were still securely wrapped around them. It had helped that he stayed by Namjoon’s side and in his apartment. After what had happened the chief had been more than willing to give Namjoon a few weeks off to make sure that his officer was 100% fine when he came back.

Their visitor was Yoongi - closely followed by Jungkook. The younger suffered from some kind of ‘protection syndrome’ since Yoongi had been injured and refused to let him go out alone. Yoongi was complaining a lot - but Namjoon was sure that he secretly enjoyed it being doted on like this by his boyfriend. Yoongi held a pizza box in hand and Jimin looked at it curiously. “What’s this?”

Yoongi smiled fondly at him. Since Jimin had been back they had become a fixed part of their little circle so quickly that Namjoon couldn’t remember how they had ever managed without him. “That’s celebratory pizza. Two good news: One, our undercover friend - whose name we’re still not allowed to know which makes sending a card really awkward - has woken up in hospital which means he has a good chance to fully recover. And second, I just got the official, formal guarantee that you won’t have to testify in court. The court agreed that with the ‘special circumstances’ of your relationship with Tae and Namjoon and the traumatic incident of your kidnapping it is important to keep you stable. So, they will blacken your name in all the files and you will never ever have to talk about Tae or anything he did ever again. There will be no reason for you to move or change your name - you are safe now, Jimin. You’re finally safe.”

Namjoon could feel his view getting blurry at those news. There had always been the possibility that Jimin would take the opportunity to go into witness protection program, either because he wanted to or because he had to. But with Taehyung’s ‘kingdom’ in ruins and Taehyung dead there wasn’t any reason for Jimin do this anymore. Not after what Yoongi had just told them.

Jimin could feel his heart skip a couple of beats as he looked at all three of them. He gulped heavily against the lump in his throat. “But what if I want to move?” He turned to look at them, noticing their expression faltering from joyful to confused. Jimin had to bite down onto his lip to keep from smiling as they weren’t getting the hints - again.

So, he quickly grabbed the pizza instead and turned around, only stopping to look over his shoulder again. “And maybe one day I’ll change my name, too.” He paused dramatically and sighed, before smiling brightly and adding teasingly, “Don’t you think Kim Jimin sounds good?”

“Sounds absolutely perfect to me, baby.” Namjoon could feel his heart swell and while Jungkook made gagging noises in the background he skipped the pizza and went straight for Jimin’s lips. He didn’t even mind Jungkook stealing the pizza again. Honestly there would be lots of pizza dinners waiting for them in the future - and Jimin was his favorite taste anyway.

The End.

A/N: Another short story is done! I mean by now you all know Cat and I are weak for Minjoon and Yoonkook soo...you can await many more stories with those pairings. Anyways, we really hope you enjoyed this story! Don’t forget to leave a comment on how you liked it :) THANK YOU!!

Oh and...the pirate AU ‘Drown in me’ will come out on sunday! A short Hybrid AU (Namgi) will come soon too and don’t forget about our Camboys!AU and the Geisha!AU aahhgrhrgfhfgehgrhr ;) so muuuch content is coming! I’m so excited to shareeee it all with you ;;

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nexstage · 5 years ago

Text

LIMBO SILVAM - PART 8 (1/3)

Walking, tripping, falling to your knees, watching to every direction for threats, calming Peridot down whenever she tried to make you stop and take a break, and repeating the cycle again and again. At this point, Lapis wasn't sure if they were gonna make it, but she couldn't rest yet.

The mountain was still too far from where they were, which increased her stress and the painful waves of her gemstone didn't let her think clearly. The outcome of this: snapping clumsily and falling to the snow alongside Peridot.

"Ouch! Lapis, are you ok?!" the green gem checked her companion's condition and grimaced: the gray splotches on Lapis' body were now a medium size, her gemstone was getting blacker and the ocean gem was getting weaker with every second that passed.

"I-I'm f-fine... Just... Just got mad at myself. This path is too long... I'm just too tired to continue..." Peri put Lapis' head her lap and caressed her blue-gray hair kindly to comfort her. One of her hands went to the triangular gemstone of her forehead and massaged it in the useless attempt to alliviate another potent headache.

The former technician gave a fast check on her own body, sighing somberly. Gray splotches and black lines that looked like veins covered a 67% percent of her being, if her calculations were right. She could be crying right now due to the pain, but she was too drained to even shed a tiny tear. Lapis lifted one of her hands and touched Peri's cheek, smiling at her sweetly to cheer her up, it worked even if it was for a bit.

"Maybe we should lean on each other, Lapis. If you keep overexerting yourself, you're gonna poof for real"

"Y-You're right... I'm sorry if me shouting and kicking the ground scared you" Peridot smiled at her to make her know it was alright. The blue gem got up slowly and hardly, leaning on Peridot to not lose her balance while the other remained still as best as she could to not fall.

Both gems placed their arms around each other and started walking a bit faster, eyes and ears open to any danger that might be spying on them. "How are we going to scalate the mountain and get to the light with our deplorable conditions?" Peri's question froze Lapis instantly but just for seconds. She didn't think about it, in fact, the plan was to reach the peak of the mountain to get to the other side, but the process simply eluded her.

"I... I don't know... Oh stars, Peridot, I don't know! What if we go that far for nothing?!"

At hearing her distress, the former technician side-hugged her to calm her down. "Hey, hey, it's ok though. We can move, though with too much pain and hardship, we can think clearly and by working together, we can reach the light. So for now, let's just focus on getting to the mountain, the rest will come... Eventually"

"Yeah... Eventually" It wasn't the best encouragement from Peridot but she took it nonetheless. However, there was another issue to take care of. "Peri, while I was unconscious, I thought I saw my memories"

"Your memories? The ones that could explain why and how we ended up here in this gemforsaken forest?" the little gem's eyes were wide in surprise and anticipation for some well-needed answers. It was about time to get to the bottom of this.

"Exactly. There were images, though too distorted to make sense of them, I guess. But I could recognize some things: people running away in fear, the sea turning into pink-ish blood, fire, destruction, that maddening laughter"

"Maddening laughter? From who? Was there someone else inside your consciousness?"

"I think so. I heard a voice, it was saying something but I couldn't get it no matter how much I approached or tried to pay attention. Its words were fragmented. Then I heard static, like when we were in fron of the TV and it got all black and white dots everywhere. There was..." Lapis gulped, her nerves tensing due to traumatizing memories of the Gem War "A mirror... A mirror that was in static like a TV" Peridot looked at her, confused.

Lapis stayed quite for some time, ordering her thoughts before continuing her tale, "I know it sounds weird but I didn't imagine it... Anyway, I broke the mirror and then a wave of sounds crashed at my ears. The strangest thing was seeing those pieces of glass from the mirror showing me those images. And then..."

"Then?" Peridot noticed that Lapis tensed too much, her muscles becoming hard as steel, so she pat her back kindly "If it's something stressful, it's ok. I won't push you" the ocean gem smiled. Inhale and exhale, she told herself to calm her nerves.

"What about your memories, Peri? Any luck?" the mechanic shook her head in negative but then she stayed silent, pondering about something. "Remember when I told you about my hallucinations and how blurry they were?" Lapis nodded "I think those were my memories. But... No, it might be too convenient."

"What if they were, though?"

"Then it would make no sense why they looked so hazy to me. There was a lot of chaos, sounds of destruction and people fighting each other for some reason. The robot, that person flying and the giant breathing fire... I mean, just try to link my memories with this situation: we are in a snow-covered forest, chased by robed-like creatures, our bodies are suffering unexplicable changes and our powers don't work. Back then, in my hallucinations or memories, I was in some kind of jungle, everything was a mess, no one could explain to me what was going on, so, how can someone go from a jungle to a forest in a snap?"

"Mask Island have a warp pad that I remember" Peridot sighed in defeat, it's not that what Lapis said wasn't true but she was missing the point. "Laz, we don't know if this forest has a warp pad. Besides, if it had one, we would have returned home already"

Lapis now was the one who fell into silence. She analyzed her own 'memories' carefully: the landscapes full of rifts, if she remembered right, and the bloody sea... If she, for some reason was in one of those locations, then how she woke up in a forest devoid of life and with those menacing, mysterious figures?

'Peridot is right. None of this makes sense' then a realization crossed her mind. Her green companion had told her about someone fighting and flying; the only person she knew that could fly was herself. Well, she AND Peridot because the engineer used a trash can lid as an aerial transport. But there was also Steven... Wait no, he had floating powers not flying ones. Amethyst, Garnet and Pearl were options too. They could shapeshift into something that could fly.

'What about the robot? Did Peridot build one? But what if it was Bismuth? Wait, since when they built robots? That isn't necessary anymore, but then if there was someone else fighting them... Fighting us... Peridot probably built the robot and got help from someone else... Someone was fighting with her... But the landscapes and the sea...if those are my memories, then how could I be in two places at the same time? Something is very wrong'

Then she stopped walking, or Peri made her stop. The green gem was holding onto her romantic partner desperately, apprehension and fear shown in her face. "What happens, Peri?"

The mechanic just gulped while watching to every direction nervously, "I don't know if you have noticed it or not, but... Don't you think the forest has become more dense and darker the more we were walking forward?"

The ex-terraformer checked their surroundings, trepidation started running through her unmaterial veins when she reconfirmed what Peridot said. In fact, the forest looked more like a black mass cornering them the more they walk. The trees were closer to each other to the point of fusing. She could hardly see the sky.

"Maybe we should, you know, go back and take another direction" Peridot trembled while saying that, holding onto the blue gem tightly. Lapis patted her little, green hands as consolation and looked behind her, the scenery was the same, full of trees and bushes creating a nature-like fortress. "I don't know if you can use your gemstone to light the path, Peri. That might be a good help right now"

"Unfortunately, no. If I can't use my ferrokinesis, then this other ability is discarded too"

"What about this? The light of the mountain is still visible, we'll use it as a path. We'll only watch it and nothing else while we walk at the same time"

"Mmmm... It may work. Alright, let's do it" both clung to each other much more than before and directed their eyes at the mountain's light, taking steps simultaneously, in a slow but consistent rhythm. With every step, the darkness of the forest grew over them but didn't took over the single light very far away of the gems.

Seconds became minutes that turned into an hour or two. Then Peridot pushed against something, a big, dense bush but couldn't go through which made her curse her predicament at being powerless and without resources. Lapis helped her by tearing apart some branches and dead leaves, her eyes still glued at the light of the mountain. When she finished making a path through the bush for Peri, the green gem lent her a hand too and both kept walking.

Suddenly, they heard a sound. A breeze, which was getting stronger. Then it came the sensation of cold. Bone-breaking cold caressing their legs as the South and North Pole were trying to trap them both in ice. The bushes and trees were closer to each other, the little light they had was diminshing, the more steps they made until...

"Aaaahhh!!" Lapis and Peridot fell to the snow-covered ground at the same time. The engineer was the first in getting up just to be surprised entirely with an utterly different scenery. "Laz, look!"

In front of them were frozen, almost white mountains, that created a sort of path to the biggest one where the light was supposed to be. If what Peridot remembered of one episode of Camp Pining Hearts was right, they had entered to a mountain rage, and in the worst weather unimaginable. The sky was gray as always, it was snowing and the breezes seemed to stab at her hard-light, blue skin.

"No way" Lapis mumbled, astonished. She then turned around and her shock increased as much as her confusion: the forest that had wanted to trapped them in darkness now was many, oh so many kilometres far away from the gems. "What on stars...?" Peridot shared the sentiments of such change of scenery, her mind was already done with too much nonsense so it put aside what they had seen.

"Ok, before we start wasting our time wondering about this mysterious phenomenom or freaking out about misdirections, can you see the light? My vision is not that good with this weather"

"I think I see it. Let's go" both walked fastly, approaching an old bridge (?) that was between the two mountains; Peridot took her romantic partner's hand and squeezed it to make her see what she was observing. At many feet high and still far away, was the mountain shedding its light from its peak that was actually divided in two.

"It's so beautiful..."

"Darn right it is, Laz. Our last hope to return home. So, let's not make it waiting!" the blue gem nodded, determined as her crush to meet their goal. They walked almost passing by the bridge when an unwanted presence caused the green gem to hide Lapis and herself under the structure, "Peri, what--?" the ocean gem couldn't end her sentence because her companion pointed to something.

The ex terraformer's eyes widened in terror at seeing again one of the robed-like creatures from the forest. It was flying and surveying the area. 'Stars, not this again... Didn't we lose them when we got out of that cursed place?' she hugged Peri to her chest and prayed for that thing to go away, to not notice them and use whatever powers it had to kill them. The shadow-like monster keep checking for new preys for some minutes until it got bored and went to another direction.

"Close one... Thanks, Peri" the little gem smiled at her, though a bit uneasily. Then a sharp pain took them by surprise, it was in the center of their gemstones and it spread through their bodies whose weird gray splotches and black veins-like lines -in Peridot's case- expanded more and more.

Lapis opened one of her eyes, horror stabbed at her heart when she saw Peri's gem lovely green being consumed by black spots, and her body... For Diamonds, it was in a worse condition than when they were still in the forest. She examined her own body, grimacing for the familiar blue was being replaced by gray. Heck, what her gemstone might have been going through was too horrible to imagine.

Like a lightning, the svelte gem took her companion in her arms and ran with as much energy her battered legs could give her through the snow, looking for a path. Her right was closed by medium, rocky mountains; her left, however, offered an entrance. Lapis went there without question.

Strange statues shaped as snakes/worms littered the area as some rocks. A powerful blizzard tackled Lapis whose arms encircled around a semi-unconscious Peridot protectively. The blue gem cursed her bad luck, if she had her powers, she could control the turned-into-snow water to protect herself and her crush and even fly to the top to the mountain. She kneeled, one of her hands stuck into the frozen ground to impede the icy wind to knock her down with the little gem in her arms.

The blizzard stopped which gave Lapis enough time to ran again and get out of the passage, only for the climatic phenomenom to hit again. Fortunately, she was near a snake-shaped statue, so she used it as a shield against the wind. "Mmmmhhmmm... L-Lapis... W-Where--?"

The terraformer gem shushed her crush and clung to her as if Peridot was her teddy bear. When the blizzard stopped again, Lapis dashed desperately until she reached a mountain-made hallway and entered. Exhausted, her back collided with one of the rocky, chill walls, sliding down until the blue Crystal Gem was completely sitting.

An abrupt movement got her out of her sudden unconsciousness. Shaking her head to get rid of the urges to sleep, Lapis directed her gaze to Peridot whose eyes only showed concern and love. "--hear me, Lapis?"

The blue gem raised an eyebrow weakly but then smiled to not worry her crush. The engineer caressed her cheek, then patted it firmly to clear Lapis' mind of any drowsiness left. "Laz, hey Laz, can you hear me?"

"--nk so... Think so... I guess... W-What happened?"

"You fainted. I saw that you didn't respond to my words so I woke you up"

"At least you're alright" Lapis' smile caused Peridot's cheeks to blush profusely which she tried to hide in vain. "W-Well, it's not that I was going to leave you with all the-the work to protect me, you clod" the green gem faked a cough and helped Lapis to get up, putting her romantic partner's arms on her shoulders so she can lean on her and walk more easily.

"Are you sure my weight won't bother you?"

"As if, Lapis, we are barely hard-light projections of our gemstones. We can't be any lighter. Haha, got it? Because, you know, we're made of light"

"You really need to stop looking for more puns on the Internet" Lapis' tone was a mix of fondness and dryness. Peridot rolled her eyes and start walking, being careful of not making Lazuli to slip up.

The mountain-made hallway led to a clearing surrounded by snow-covered, rocky hills full with dark rock/metal signs (?). Peridot's curiosity got the better of her and approached one of them. It was long, not so much to be taller than her, didn't look like it was made of any material she has known either, its head was half-hexagonal and it had an hexagonal hole too. But the weirdest thing were the symbols engraved in its surface.

Peridot, before becoming a Crystal Gem, had read a lot of reports about many ancient lenguages of multiple sentient species whose planets were invaded and then colonized to expand the gempire. She still could remember the complex alphabets those creatures created, but the symbols in front of her weren't in her repertoire.

"Peri, it's cute watching you in your nerd mode, but have you forgotten there is a light we need to reach if we want to go home?"

If Lapis had had enough strength to be face-to-face with her crush, she would have seen the huge blush on her face. "I-I-I'm n-not cute, you clod. You're the one who's cute!"

"Did you just call me cute?" asked Lapis, half-surprised, half-amused. Peridot stammered and when she was going to respond, the blue gem just kissed her left cheek sweetly. "Y-You know, I kind of see something move some meters away, let's investigate it" the engineer accelerated making a bit difficult for Lapis to catch up with her despite leaning on her shoulders, but the ocean gem didn't mind at all.

The two gems went to their right after noticing the left blocked by rocky, frozen hills. There were more of those mysterious signs that this time Peri ignored, then just when they wanted it less, another of those ominous shadows was spot flying fastly to where they were.

Lapis discovered it first which prompted her to halt, "Laz, what's wrong?" Peri asked, concerned. Her companion mouthed silently 'dangerous shadow'; even when she didn't understand the message, Lazuli's terrified eyes were signal enough to find a way to hide from that thing again. They dug a hole in the snow big for both of them and covered themselves with from head to toe with the white substance, leaving a bit of space uncovered so they could see the threat's movements.

The shadow surveyed the area carefully, its slowness was driving both gems insane with anxiety until it finished and flew away. Still, Lapis and Peridot waited for some minutes until they felt everything around them was danger-free and continued in a rush to not being surprised by more of those creatures.

After climbing some snow-covered stairs, the former technician caught sight of another old structure. It looked like the entrance of a building, but when she got nearer to it, she found out it was a sort of room that depicted art. Somber, sinister art. "What is this?" Lapis mumbled behind her while also browsing the ancient pictures.

In the wall in front of them were drawn eight figure's or people dressed in black-as-night robes, just seeing at them gave the creeps to Lapis and Peridot due to being horribly familiar to the shadows both gems had had to deal with. The shadow-y people in the picture were divided in groups of four, one in the right and the other in the left, and in the center of the wall was a colossal monster, whole body made of darkness. Its head, however, was the skull of a deer.

It looked threatening, deadly, especially its eyes, red as blood. The background, on the other side, wasn't as edgy as the first drawings. The mountain with its light at the top was there, depicted majestically like a last lifeguard against the despair the shadow-y people and the monstrosity seemed to emanate.

"Peridot, are you thinking what I'm thinking at seeing this?" Lapis asked, breaking the suffocating silence.

The green gem gulped before responding, "If you were thinking that these things might be real AND the sort-of guardians of the mountain's light, then yeah. That's what I was thinking. Though it wasn't the only thing"

"Something more?"

"Yeah. Laz, haven't you wondered if maybe, by a blow of good luck, we might meet people here despite the horrible weather and those things checking the area? I mean, when we got out of the forest, we saw a bridge. That was a sign of civilization, and now we found this old paintings. What If we find some people that can help us reach the top of the mountain?"

Ah, that sounded excellent. Too good to be true, sadly. Lapis didn't want to burst the bubble of wishful thinking Peridot had created with this theory, but they had plenty of evidence to prove otherwise.

"Look, I don't want to sound pessimistic, but before we arrived here, we found a shack and a cemetery in the forest. Was there a note for us to know if people were coming back or something similar? No. During this journey, the only living beings aroung us were those things that only wanted to torture us for no reason. No animals, no humans, no even one of our friends. Just trees, snow and those monsters. So even if there are houses in these mountains, I doubt they are being used"

Peridot's got pensive and not crestfallen as Lapis had feared; her romantic partner had good points in her reasoning. Many signs of civilization were found in the way, and yet not a single person in sight to tell them where they were or what direction to take. Wait, what if those things attack them? What if the people that might have been living in the forest was killed by those deadly figures? What if the same happened with the ones living in this highlands?

Too many questions, too little time and too much danger to deal with. Stars, Peridot loved intellectual challenges with some mystery in them, but a simple warning before being thrown to a dark forest should be taken seriously. It was the least she asked.

The mechanic just sighed and massaged her temples around her gemstone whose black spots were now growing out of it as vein-shaped lines, unbeknownst to her. Lapis hugged Peri to relieve her from the stressful situation even for a bit, ignoring the sudden tingling from the core of her own gemstone that was spreading to every angle of her back.

"Let's continue. Whatever mystery is this, we can solve it once we're home"

"Right... Right... Let's go" Lapis was the first in getting out of the strange room, Peridot behind of her. The green gem thought she was hallucinating but she kind of saw very thin, black lines covering Lazuli's back, coming from her gemstone. 'Maybe it's the weather. It's messing with my mind already' the engineer decided to let that aside and just focus in the real goal.

Some meters ahead of them was another bridge, a thick one that led to the entrance of the citadel. If there was one, of course. Two-thirds of the building were safe enough to walk in, the center part, though, looked almost collapsed and barely enduring the blizzard. Peridot checked it as best as she could, despite the strong, icy breezes that piled up snowflakes in her star visor.

"It's still standing, though huge chunks of it have fallen, maybe for the winds or an attack. Walking in the center could be disastrous, so going for the sides of this section might help" the mechanic analyzed.

"Good. Get comfortable in my back, I'll be careful while stepping" Lapis knelt, waiting for the other to climb to her back. The former technician, however, didn't like the idea for many reasons. Especially one.

"Laz, I told you before we got out of the forest, if we are going to get back home it will be together. You don't have to sacrifice yourself like this or in any way"

"What? I'm just giving you a lift. You're overthinking too much"

"Really? Ok, just to make sure we are in the same page on this, let's say that at the last moment this part of the bridge falls apart. You can't fly and we don't have any other resources to use as protection if we plummet to our deaths, so, you have two options: drag me down to my doom -something you would never do-, OR push me to the safest part of the bridge before you fall to your demise, which I don't approve"

Lapis stayed quite for a moment until she sighed defeatedly. Sometimes, she hated when Peridot was that perceptive.

"Look, it's not that I'm going to leave you. I told you I would never do that again. But If something happens, at least I want you to reach the peak safe and sound. Better one of us, which means you, instead of both dying here"

"I really appreciate your concerbs towards my well-being, Lapis. But I stand my ground: it will be us returning home or nothing"

The svelte gem rolled her eyes fondly. Peridot, again, stubborn as a mule, but as always so dedicate to her loved ones. That's something that Lapis had to work on more and she was lucky to have the engineer as a teacher. "So, we must protect each other, right?"

"Exactly!"

"Fine, Peri. As you wish" Lapis got to her feet and took the green gem's hand, walking ahead of her to test the durability of the bridge. Her companion also stepped as lightly as she could, trembling in fear when hearing the grumbling of the construction. It was getting weaker, they needed to hurry up.

Seconds became minutes, agonizingly long and slow until they jumped to the safest zone of the bridge, happy to not fall or slip. "Laz, I think I saw something. Come on!" Peridot ran a bit clumsily and entered the citadel, only to find just a moor with dead trees barely sticking out of the snow-y dunes and what it looked to be broken roofs of some houses.

"This place is more depressing than me in my worst days" Lapis mumbled dryly. Peridot advanced with caution of not sinking in the unstable ground, her comrade at her side, checking on her at every second.

The chilly wind got stronger with each step both gems took, Lazuli hardly could spot the moon as the blizzard kept hostigating her vision. Her right arm held Peri very close to her while she used the other one to protect her face. Then a sound, like a mix between a roar and a distorting machine was heard meters away. A red light was moving to many directions, checking for something. Lapis' thoughts were divided between believing some new menace was hiding on the snow storm or a lighthouse was being used to find intruders or survivors in what was left of the citadel, town or whatever place they were.

Unfortunately, it was the first option who got the 'Ping, ping, ping! You got it right!' reaction. If the svelte gem had blood, it would have frozen after seeing what she couldn't believe was some feet high looking for its next prey. It was that huge monster of the mural she and Peridot saw before crossing the bridge. The same mass of darkness as body, the same deer skull as head and the same crimson eyes. They were illuminating the area, too close to where the gems were standing.

'FUCK! FUCK, FUCK, FUCK! NOT RIGHT NOW!' In the blink of an eye, Lapis ran with Peridot in her arms again, searching for a place to hide before the hideous beast found them.

"Laz, what's wrong?! What's happening?!"

"Are you blind or what?! There is a monster, the same one from that painting, that is checking for something to eat!"

"WHAT?! IS IT REAL?!" Lazuli ignored her questioned and in a single movement, dove into the snow with Peri so they could hide under an old roof almost covered by the cold dunes.

The two Crystal Gems held to each other tightly, waiting anxiously for the monstrosity to go away. The red light from its eyes bathed the roof used as a hidden spot, but nothing happened. Peri peered through a little hole, her eyes were having a lot of difficulties to see due to the snow obscuring her vision. However, after some minutes focusing enough to check the area, the green gem noticed that the monstrosity had left it already.

"Is it gone?" Lapis asked, scared out of her mind.

"Y-Yeah, it is. The coast is clear now"

"Thank stars" the ocean gem and her crush sighed, exhausted. With all of their strength, a part of the roof was broken for them to get out, always attentive for danger.

The storm got worse in a matter of seconds, so much that they needed to step carefully while hugging each other unless they wanted to be separated by the strong winds. Peridot squeezed Lapis' hand to get her attention; the engineer pointed to an ice tunnel, though the blue gem could barely see it.

Jogging was difficult in an unstable field, but if you added a roaring blizzard plus a painfully draining hail, then the task became next to impossible. Peridot might have been buried by the snow and bits of ice already if it weren't for Lapis' arms that protected her and gave her a lift whenever her legs sank into the dunes.

They finally entered to the tunnel, a little beyond there was another mural but the two Crystal Gems didn't care as much as both did with just staying safe and rest.

Lapis felt like something was sliding off her right side. It was Peri who, in an instant, fell unconscious to the snow-covered ground. The veins-like lines in her body grew larger and multiplied faster than ever.

"Peri!! Peridot, wake up!" she held her crush by her shoulders and shook her. First smoothly, then more strongly. The little gem's eyes barely opened, she was in some sort of trance and her murmurs confessed the pain her body was suffering.

"L-La... R-Rest..." Peridot said in a whisper.

"What? Can you say it a bit louder?"

"R-R-Rest..." The mechanic was overtaken by a sudden slumber and Lapis, in the brink of a panick attack, encircled her arms around her companion to calm her nerves.

"Please don't poof, Peri. Not right now. We n-need to reach the light together" some tears rolled down her blue cheeks, landing in Peridot's face. Feeling tired suddenly, the ocean gem approached the mural to find a spot to rest for a moment. The painting in front of her was different from the one they found before: it didn't have the same dark vibe but it was really bizarre. The mysterious mountain was depicted in the superior base of the mural but upside down, its peak pointed to a valley on the inferior base.

"Weird" was the only thing Lazuli could pronounce before sitting in front of the painting, her back against it. 'Just a few minutes... I need to rest for a few minutes' those were the last thoughts on her mind before she fell asleep with Peri in her arms.

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

Her body felt like thousands of pounds of steel sinking in the ocean. The pressure was even worse than when she fused with Jasper years ago. Malachite was nothing compared to this sensation.

'Am I truly dying now?' Lapis' mind, strangely, didn't went into a full anxiety attack, maybe because of how tired it was to process all that was happening.

She couldn't open her eyes to see the dream her subconscious was creating, or perharps there wasn't anything to witness. How Lapis could know? Everything around her was black.

'Wait a second. Am I having that same dream when I'm tortured by distorted images?' Fear got a vicious grip in her heart, she was shaking like jelly, expecting the worst to happen.

"--r --o!" a young female voice surprised the ocean gem, but there was no one in her surroundings.

"--nd... --ds... --e...--es... --ing!" another voice, this one was familiar. It was the same one from when Lapis fell unconscious after the shadow's attack.

"Who's there?! Come on, just show yourself already!" Lazuli yelled. Seriously, all this dramatic mystery was getting on her nerves, she didn't want to deal with more unknown voices in her dreams while being left out of whatever they were talking about.

#lapis lazuli #Peridot #Lapidot #dark #Angst #Mystery #Drama #video game inspired

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nightglider124 · 5 years ago

Note

22 ROBSTAR, make me cry

So,I’m finally getting around to writing the prompts that have been sitting in my inox since fucking APRIL. Like, gosh, I am so sorry for procrastinating that much, holy shit. XD

Anyway! Idk if it will make you cry but it’s all I could think of lmao.

I’m trying my hardest to make the others shorter than this; more sweet and to the point.

Hope you like it all the same! ^.^

____________________________________________

“This isn’t goodbye.”

The sound of his footsteps echoed and bounced off of the walls of the room, constantly pacing back and forth, as if that would magically solve his predicament.

Robin dragged a gloved hand through his dark locks of hair, for what felt like the hundredth time that day alone.

Tamaran was a strange place at the best of times but they usually managed. This time, however, everything felt more confusing and frustrating than ever before.

Galfore had explained a fair amount before they had even hopped into the T-Ship and set course for Starfire’s home world.

There was a new threat in the galaxy; a malicious and greed fueled race that had their eyes on Tamaran, in particular.

War was already waging between the two species on the west planes of Tamaran, according to the Grand Ruler himself.

It wasn’t her fight. Not anymore.

And she knew that.

But, Starfire’s greatest flaw was that she was too kind and too giving; regardless of what she wanted or what her own heart yearned for.

She’d offered her aid and now, the team had barely seen her since they’d arrived. She was either with soldiers or Galfore or the war council.

Robin guessed a Princess’ duties were never really over as long as the blood of royalty flowed through her veins.

They’d been there almost a week and he wanted some answers and furthermore, he wanted to see his best friend’s face, an image that seemed to be fading more and more as the days went by.

So, here he was, waiting it out inside her chambers. The guards had let him pass, knowing that he was friends with their Princess but not before having one of their spears dangerously close to his throat as a warning.

He paused in his pace by the balcony, letting a breath of wind that flowed in through the open double doors soothe him. It wasn’t Starfire’s fault that she’d been practically torn away from them from the moment they’d gotten there.

She was the Princess and he knew how much her presence was demanded by her people.

The door creaked and his head snapped up as Starfire slipped past the threshold. Her jade eyes widened upon seeing him, clearly not expecting him to be in her room at this time of night.

“Robin?” She murmured, wondering if she was imagining him due to fatigue.

“Hey.” He said, quietly reigning his confusion and frustrations of being on her world in for her sake, “Been busy?”

She offered him a tired smile, “Unfortunately, yes. I have been in 10 meetings between the war council and Galfore today. Arguments and broken strategies were thrown back and forth for the majority of said meetings. It was… exhausting.”

He smiled back and watched as she moved around the room, dropping some of her stuff off before she pulled her feet from her long, thigh high boots. Starfire sighed and crawled onto her bed, staring at him expectantly.

“You may sit, Robin.”

“Oh! Right… sorry… I keep forgetting myself while we’re here.”

He took a seat on the edge of her bed, relaxing and allowing himself to deflate.

“Please… are the Titans alright?” She paused, “I know things have not easy since we arrived and I apologise for that-”

His masked eyes flicked to her direction, “It’s not your fault, Star. You’re just trying to do right by everyone.”

“Trying being the keyword…” She muttered, dragging her hair over her shoulder and stroking her fingers through the long, auburn locks.

“You’re doing your best, Star. That’s all anyone can ask of you.”

“It just feels like my input is doing nothing to help, is all.”

He frowned and subconsciously laced their fingers together, “You’re giving more than you probably think.”

Her gaze lingered on their joint hands and she tried to quench the blush she could slowly feel rising to her face, “Thank you, Robin.”

The boy wonder smile at her for a long moment before it faded and he frowned, a look of guilt pinned to his face.

“Is everything okay?” Starfire queried,

Robin watched her, trying to gauge how she would feel about the request he was about to make. He knew she was making headway with the diplomats and soldiers that were all involved with this incoming war that Tamaran was to face but the Titans were needed on Earth. He had no idea how long this feud and difficulties would last; they needed to return home in order to continue doing their jobs of saving the city from daily threats.

“Starfire… I… I don’t mean to make things even worse but…” He sighed and shook his head, “We need to leave tomorrow.”

“Leave?”

“Yes. We’ve already been away from Jump longer than I would like. Titans East can’t juggle their own city and ours for too long. We need to get back.”

She was silent for a long moment, thoughts and concerns flitting through her mind; being pulled in multiple directions all at once.

“Star?” He prompted, “I know what I’m asking is difficult… I know you don’t want to leave Tamaran with all of this going on but-”

“Robin…”

He turned his whole body to look at her, propping his knee up on the mattress; something about her tone was off, something about it concerned him and there was an icy plummet in his chest, a sense of dread seeping in.

Starfire sat there, looking meek as she twiddled her fingers. Whatever she had to say; it wasn’t something she liked and she knew it wasn’t something he was going to like hearing either.

When she raised her head, her eyes looked glossy like she was fighting to hold back unshed tears from falling.

“I- I have to stay.”

He froze, his heart thumping louder suddenly as he tried to process if he had heard her correctly.

“What?” He asked, his mask impossibly wide as he waited for her to clarify,

She gave a shuddering sigh, trying to collect herself and her thoughts before voicing them,

“Tamaran… they need me here, Robin.”

“B-But… we need you on Earth too.”

She sadly shook her head, “Not like my planet does. I am not the only one who makes up our team… you can all handle things without me, I am certain of it.”

“Star… please don’t. Tamaran isn’t your home anymore… Earth is. You’ve said it yourself.”

“My life and my heart is on Earth. That is true.” She took a deep breath and squeezed his hand, bringing her free one to clasp it as well, “But they are still my people and they are facing a danger they do not know how to fight. I must stay and help them…”

He swallowed the lump in his throat, “Well… you’ll come home after, right? How long do you think you’ll have to stay?”

She tilted her head, giving him a sympathetic look and he knew in his heart that there was no definitive answer on how long a war would last.

“I am sorry…” She whispered, looking truly and utterly at a loss,

“I… don’t want to leave you here… not without backup.”

She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his cheek, causing his heart rate to spike at her sudden proximity. She touched the other side of his face with her fingertips, leaving a trail of fiery sensations.

As she sat back, she took a moment to stare at the material of his mask, knowing exactly where his eyes were beneath.

“I will be okay… and I will come home… once I know my people are safe from the oncoming threat, I will return to Earth.”

“You promise?”

She smiled softly, “I promise.”

There was a blanket of silence that befell them; it wasn’t uncomfortable but it wasn’t one that was filled with joy either.

He watched her, trying to sort his own emotions from one another and figure out exactly how he felt about the situation at hand, besides the obvious not wanting to leave her here and hating every second that she wouldn’t be with them back on Earth.

“I guess… I should probably go and let the others know then…” He mumbled, getting to his feet,

“Robin…” She whimpered, the sadness evident in her voice and in her eyes,

He smiled at her; a facade to hide how much it really hurt to know that she would be staying on Tamaran for god knows how long. He knew he had to put on a face for her, to let her know that it was okay.

The last thing he wanted was for her to feel guiltier about the situation than she probably already did.

“This isn’t goodbye.” He told her, “It’s just… a… see you later.”

She visibly swallowed the mountain in her throat before he tearfully nodded, brushing away a stray tear that slid down her cheek.

“Goodnight, Star… we’ll… see you in the morning before we go.” He vowed,

“Of course… goodnight Robin…” She murmured, her voice unusually quiet,

He held the gaze between them for a few moments longer before he turned and walked towards the exit, wordlessly escaping through the crack between the double doors.

Once outside, he let go of a deep breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding onto. His expression crumpled and his shoulders slumped, feeling the weight of her decision to stay resting on him like a heavy burden.

Starfire blinked at the closed doors, the silence that now surrounded her was deafening. She felt the hot sting of tears as they freely trickled down her face with her powerless to stop them.

Her heart felt like it was too much inside of her chest; like something sharp had torn through it and she was helpless as it bled out.

She struggled to catch her breath as she sniffled and prayed to every God in existence that would listen, that she had not just lied to the most important person in the universe to her.

Because when she dwelled on it, she didn’t know when she would return and even worse, she didn’t know if she would return; the threat of war gnawing at her like an unpredictable nightmare.

There was no certainty in war, after all.

#teen titans #robstar #robin #starfire #fanfiction #dc comics #angst/fluff prompts #oneshot #prompts #requests #nightglider124

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taiyang-too-long · 6 years ago

Text

STRQ Contrast. Ch2

This woods, like many others was home to any number of Grimm. They spanned the globe. Despite the ingenuity and persistence of man, it was the Grimm that held the title of dominant species. Forcing humans to hide away in cities and villages, for it was only strength of numbers that truly gave any chance. They were monsters of the truest sense, feeding upon anger and death and fear. The trial of the relic was a daunting task. Many who entered did not return. Every candidate that participated knew the risks.

So perhaps it would be curious to witness one such as Raven Branwen walking along the trail in such an unfettered manner. Her casual stride befitting one who saw herself above such petty notions as fear. Some would scold the way she walked so nonchalantly through the dangerous situation that she faced, but a closer look with a careful eye told a much different tale. The way her hand never left the pommel of her katana. The way her ruby red eyes scanned ahead, always searching for the slightest movement. It would be all the motivation required for her to pounce, to cut down whatever lay before her.

Yet even the Grimm seemed to acknowledge her as something to be wary off. She had marched for what felt like several miles without encountering even a single of the black furred terrors. It was all so dreadfully boring. Her muscles ached for some kind of action.

"Just leave me alone!" A voice called out. Raven turned her head and saw the source was a young girl. Two men stood near her laughing.

"Aren't you a little short to be a huntress?" One man said shoving her.

The girl stumbled back, falling on her behind. Which brought more laughter from the men.

"Certainly could use some pointers on fashion" said the second man as he pulled the girls white hood over her face.

Scum. For all the stories of heroism that huntsmen love to pride themselves on plenty of them were just as cruel as any bandit. The girl fixed her her hood and her silver eyes met Ravens, a silent plea for help was evident in her gaze. It fell on deaf ears.

The girl wasn't Ravens problem. If she wanted to be a huntress she needed to be strong enough to fight her own battles. Raven was just about to continue walking when one of the men stopped laughing long enough to follow the girls line of sight, finally noticing Raven.

"You got a problem lady?" The scum sneered.

The venom in his tone did nothing but bore Raven. She didn't have time to waste spending another moment on this pitiful excuse of a man. The relics were waiting and she needed to secure her place as a student. Not just any student, but the best. She would rise above them all, show them how far behind her they all were. How beneath her notice and then and only then would she tear them all down. She would return to the tribe a champion. With the blood of all these fools on the bottom of her boots.

Second place wasn't an option, she'd get to the ruins first and get started on finding her idiot of a brother. Raven turned curtly back to the path and began walking away from the trio.

"Yeah, that's what I thought, bitch" called the voice of the first man.

Raven stopped. She closed her her eyes for a moment and raised her hand to her chest removing a small dagger concealed in a hidden pocket. She gazed at the small but lethal blade. Well...perhaps she could spare just a moment.

With a quick turn she threw the blade. It sailed through the air but landed in between the man's legs, he was distracted. He eyes dropped to the object that had been hurled at him. Raven was upon him before his head could even lift back up.

She had closed the distance is a heartbeat, grabbing the man's head and slamming it against a tree. She gripped tightly onto his hair pulling him back before ramming his face back against the bark a second time. The second man rushed to his friends aid. A decision he would regret. He charged at Raven an axe held high, but all he succeeded in doing was add more painful force to the kick Raven planted in his stomach causing him to double over and release all the air in his lunges.

Raven dropped her grip on the first fool and drew her sword bringing the pommel against the seconds temple. He hit the ground hard but was still, unfortunately for him, conscious. Teeth and blood splattered across the ground as her boot met his face. Out cold.

Arms wrapped around Raven from behind. The first man hadn't learned his lesson. Raven would correct that.

She swung her head back connecting with his nose. The man let go, his hands busy holding the the smashed remains of his face. Raven slice a cut upon his leg. A flesh wound, it would heal but for now it was enough to cause the man to fall to his knees with a cry of pain. A cry that was cut short when he felt the tip of her blade resting against his neck.

Fear colored his face as he stared up at Raven. It was spectacular.

"You see" she said her voice not showing the pleasure she felt "this is what happens when weaklings like you try and cover your shortcomings with bravado and bluster. Someone stronger always comes to put you in your place.."

She moved her blade a little deeper. The skin of his neck tore ever so slightly and a drop of blood trickled down. She loved to fight. Grimm were a challenge to be sure but they were mindless animals. Humans however could feel fear. They could be made to look upon her as this pathetic maggot did now. He knew now. He knew she was strong. That she was beyond a point he could ever hope to reach. He was powerless. His life was in her hands.

She wanted to take it. It would be easy. Her mind wasn't dulled by her desire, she was aware they were being observed by the headmaster. She had done nothing that could warrant more than a mild punishment but if she killed a fellow candidate they would not be so forgiving. She would let nothing threaten the plans of the elders. So with a scoff she stepped back from the man, who was now in tears and with a swift motion of her wrist flicked the blood from her blade and sheathed it before walking away.

It was after several minutes that she heard the steps behind her. The fool had followed? She quickly drew her sword and turned holding out the blade. Resulting in a small "eep" from not the man she had expected but the hooded girl he had tormented.

"What do you want?" Raven said not lowering her blade from the uncomfortably close distance to the girls face.

"I-I-I wanted to say thank you" the girl stammered " and you left this"

She held out the dagger Raven had thrown. Raven sheathed her blade once more and snatched the knife from her.

"Now go away" Raven barked as she turned and continued walking.

"W-wait" the girl cried as she followed "we made eye contact, were partners!"

"I don't need a partner" Raven said not stopping "especially one I'll have to babysit. Now beat it."

Raven didn't look back to see what effect her words had but didn't hear any steps following.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"So that's when I decided huntsman was the way to go" Taiyang said walking side by side with Qrow. "I mean adventure? Saving people? What's not to love?"

Qrow grumbled as a response. The blonde imbecile had been jabbering away the entire time. Qrow didn't know anyone could have so much to say and still have none of it matter. He couldn't believe this. He would be stuck with this chatterbox for the rest of the time at Beacon. If he had just left without watching the fight he might have been able to find Raven first.

Raven. She'd never let him hear the end of this. He could already see that scowl on her face as she'd lecture him.

"What about you?" Taiyang asked. Unfazed by Qrows evident brooding. "Let me guess, you're after some of those sexy huntresses? Chicks dig the whole tall, dark and edgy thing you got going on. Not that I'd blame them on that~"

"Don't you ever shut up?" Qrow groaned.

Before Taiyang could respond he was knocked down, having collided with a young girl in a white hood who had landed on top of him.

"Oh- I'm so sorry I wasn't- I didn't mean to"

the girls words flooded out but Taiyang only half heard them As he stared up at her.

"Your eyes..they're-" he started to say.

"Yeah, weird I know.." the girl face turned red as she looked away.

"Beautiful.." he finished.

The girls blush deepened. She looked down, realizing the position the two were in and quickly scrambled back to her feet.

"I'm Summer" she said looking at the ground.

Taiyang rose dusting himself off and said "ah don't worry about it, it was kinda fun. I'm Taiyang. Taiyang Xiao Long" he gave a wink as he reached his last name.

"And that sour puss is my partner Qrow"

Qrow rolled his eyes. This whole situation was a ridiculous waste of time.

"Come on we need to reach the ruins before it gets to dark to see a damn thing" Qrow said agitatedly.

Qrow started to walk off but Summers voice broke out again.

"Can...can I come with you?" She said softly. "My partner kinda ditched me.."

"Whatever" Qrow said walking away.

The three headed out with Qrow leading the way. Qrow hoped the two would keep each other occupied.

#taiyang-too-long #rwby #strq #taiyang xiao long #qrow branwen #team strq #raven branwen #summer rose #rwby fanfiction #strq fanfic #rwby fanfic #story taime #strq contrast

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blinded-and-bloody · 6 years ago

Text

The Meeting of Legion and his angel, Daniel

[ based off of the thread between me and @mauismuses ]

Fandom : NA

Characters : Daniel, Legion

[ Legion was created by @mauismuses ]

Whump : Addiction, Blood, Bruising, Crying, Drug Use, Hair Pulling, Kidnapping, Manhandling, Manipulation, Murder, Mutilation, Pet Names

Daniel admits that he should have known better than to go poking around in Hell, but curiosity got the better of him. This would be one of the worst [ or best ] decisions that he’s ever made.

Currently, the Cherub was trying to get through a very locked door. Trying to figure out how to open it without destroying the whole thing, he hadn’t noticed an approaching demon, not until the smell of sulfur already lingering in the hallway became overwhelming.

“You can’t go in there,” the demon told him.

Not sensing any danger yet, Daniel didn’t immediately fly off, deciding that the demon hadn’t done anything too terrible yet, other than let his scent attack his nose.

“Can you go in there?”

“Of course I can.”

The demon pushed off of the wall that he was leaning on, striding towards the Angel. Daniel couldn’t help but wrinkle his nose at his smell, something that didn’t slip the other’s notice.

“Okay, well,” Daniel started, taking a step back, “what’s in there? Can you tell me that, at least?”

“Sorry, bud, I can’t tell you that.” The demon raised an eyebrow. “Now, can you tell me what an Angel like you is doing down here?”

Now, finally, the danger meter in Daniel’s head was starting to go off. He should get out of here, before something happened.

“I don’t think that’s any of your business... I guess I don’t really have anything else left to do here... Sorry to have bothered you.”

The Cherub made a movement to walk past the demon, to head back to Heaven, where he could put his troublesome memory behind him by just repressing it until it stopped bothering him.

Unfortunately for him, the demon grabbed his upper arm tightly.

“You’ve come all this way, and I haven’t even caught your name. Why don’t you stay awhile?”

“It’s Daniel, the Cherub, and I’m good. Thanks though...”

He tried to pull his arm away. He knew this had to end soon. He was a Cherub, not a Seraph, and that meant that he couldn’t fight, or even defend himself.

“Well,” the other said, tightening his grip, “I’m Legion, Knight of Hell, and I’m just going to have to insist that you stay.”

Daniel hissed in pain, knowing that he was going to have bruises on his arm later, but also knowing that those were currently the least of his problems.

Now would be one of those times where he actually wanted one of his pesky brothers to go ahead and bail him out.

“What do you want with me?”

In response, Legion pulled Daniel close, looking him up and down properly.

“Tell me what you think, pretty boy.”

As a Cherub, this was true, and in fact it’s exactly what he was built to be. Pretty. Soft, fluffy brown hair, cloudy grey eyes, porcelain pale skin, he was practically perfect.

For the first time, Daniel would gladly trade his looks for even a bit of strength.

“I... I don’t know.”

He was having a hard time keeping his breath steady.

Smirking at his answer, Legion moved Daniel, pressing him against the locked door, getting up in his personal space, making the Cherub throughly panicked and nervous, heart pounding, sweating just a bit, mouth going uncomfortably dry. The Knight of Hell was only fairly sure the heartbeat he heard was the Angel’s, and not his own. In these sort of situations, he always somehow managed to stay calm and focused, but maybe this time it was different. There was something special about this particular Angel.

Trying to keep the discomfort levels as high as possible, Legion’s body was practically against the Angel’s, but maybe that wasn’t just to make Daniel uncomfortable.

“Well, what do demons usually do with Angels?”

“I- I- I don’t - I don’t know,” Daniel stuttered out, pressing himself against the door in an effort to avoid Legion’s touch.

He couldn’t grab his blade, dominant side pinned down by Legion’s hand. There was no where to run to.

The demon used his free hand to grip the Cherub by the neck, keeping him still, looking him in the eyes.

“Are those the only words you know?” The Knight taunted.

“Not the only ones,” Daniel barely

gets out before he started reciting an exorcism.

“Oh, shut up,” Legion said, exasperated, clamping the hand that was previously on his throat over the Angel’s mouth. “I’m tired of hearing that over and over again.”

Daniel didn’t respond, only able to stare at the demon with wide eyes.

“If I pull my hand away, do you promise to be a good boy and stop with this exorcism nonsense?”

The pinned Cherub nodded quickly, not at all meaning it.

Sensing his insincerity, Legion pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, and gagged the Angel with it. It felt infused with music, which is why Daniel wasn’t able to just spit it out.

“Glad Beck reminded me to carry one of those around. Now just for you...”

Daniel didn’t waste time thinking about who the Hell Beck was. He was struggling in the demon’s hold, still trying to break free.

He wanted to go home.

Practically ignoring the futile attempt at escape, Legion took a moment to think about what he wanted to do next.

He had the Cherub now, that was a fact, but what was the next step?

/ Might as well show him the room he wanted to see so badly. /

Muttering some sort of foreign language that not even Daniel understood, Legion grabbed both of the Angel’s arms, and hip checked the door before pulling them both inside.

It turns out that the Cherub has been trying to get into a virtually empty room, only having a chair, straps attached to keep the seater in place, a table, and another door going off somewhere else in Hell.

Suddenly, Daniel wished he hadn’t been so nosy.

Was he going to die?

Legion brought the gagged Angel to the chair in the room, and strapped him down in the chair with a slight chuckle. There were wards on them, making Daniel virtually powerless. He hated the way they kept all of his power locked up inside of him. It didn’t feel right. But, he couldn’t even express his annoyance at that, as the gag left him unable to talk, barely able to breathe.

“This is your fault, little Cherub... Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll find this position comfortable with time.”

The second statement was given in reply to Daniel’s wide, pleading eyes. Legion wasn’t sure why he was trying to calm the Angel down, he was beautiful, looking as scared as he was. He wasn’t quite sure how he found this to be beautiful, it just was.

Legion wrapped a hand around Daniel’s throat, hazel eyes melting into full black. The Angel was already having a hard time breathing before, now he couldn’t breathe at all.

He tried to kick at the demon, trying to get him to let go of his throat.

“Stop that before I tie your legs up too,” Legion said, moving his grip to the Angel’s chin, forcing him to look up at him, in the eye.

Daniel listened, planting his feet back on the ground again. He’d want those free later in order to escape, because he /was/ going to escape.

“You know,” the Knight said, letting go of Daniel in order to pace around the chair slowly, “I’ve always wondered about a few things, things about you Angels. Things like, how would one react to having their wings cut off, or wondering how they’d react to demon blood.”

Both of those things seemed extremely unpleasant and it was obvious from Daniel’s face that he didn’t want to try either of them.

Legion paused his pacing in front of Daniel, crouching down, putting his hands on the Cherub’s knees to keep himself upright properly. He could, of course, hold his balance, but he liked watching him try not to squirm at the touch.

“What do you think?”

The demon took Daniel’s frantic head shaking to be a positive response.

“Great, let’s start with the second one.”

Pushing off of the Cherub’s knees to stand up, he rolled up the sleeves of his dress shirt, and headed to the table behind Daniel to retrieve something. The captive turned his head to see what the other was doing, but couldn’t see that far behind him. If he had just asked, Legion happily would have put on a show for him.

The Knight came back with a syringe full of what appeared to be his own blood. He flicked it a few times so it would settle, stealing glances at the panicked Angel, enjoying how good it felt, knowing that he was the one making Daniel feel so frightened.

Deciding he couldn’t wait anymore, Legion gripped his chin with his left hand, finding a good place before slowly injecting the blood into the little Angel who expected... anything but what he got.

What he got was a pulsing wave of warmth and relaxation, all but leaving the Angel speechless, the gag in his mouth now useless. He couldn’t fight back, reflexes slowing down. It was nice, getting to relax as warm waves rushed through him, even if he hadn’t chosen it himself.

The life of a Cherub wasn’t as relaxing as some thought.

When Daniel gave Legion a worry free smile, the demon pulled away with a slight chuckle. “Was that so bad?” He cooed, pulling the gag out of the Angel’s mouth.

Part of the Knight was glad that it hadn’t actually hurt the Angel. This subduing affect that it appeared to have could probably come in handy for other things, keeping him as close to sedated as the demon would be allowed.

Legion readied another needle, in case the next activity proved to be too much for the Cherub. Blade in one band, he slid the needle into his pocket, before coming back over to Daniel and whispering; “Take out your pretty little wings for me.”

The Cherub does as he’s asked, slowly letting them materialize. That felt even better, having them out.

They were a beautiful sky blue, patches of white here and there, making them look like the sky. They were extremely well taken care of.

“Look at these,” Legion murmured, running his fingers through the soft feathers. “You must take good care of these feathers, hm? Don’t worry, you won’t have to do that anymore.”

Daniel hadn’t really been listening, still off in his own little world for the moment. The fingers running though his feathers felt nice. No one had done that in a long time. Not since... Daniel couldn’t remember.

The demon’s nimble fingers followed the feathers down to the base of his wings, and he pressed the blade against it, testing the waters. No reaction from the celestial being yet. So, he held out one of those pretty blue wings and started slicing with the precision of a surgeon.

The screaming didn’t start immediately, but when it did, Daniel couldn’t stop. The wing was moving on it’s own accord, frantically flapping and fluttering as if trying to get away.

“Shhh, it’s okay,” Legion assured him calmly as he continued. “If you be good, you’ll feel even better afterwards.”

The Angel tried to stop crying, to stop screaming, but it was like a limb was being cut off. Legion healed the burningly painful wound left behind when he was done with the first wing, if only to quiet the captive down.

The wing was placed on the table, and when the Knight came back, he was in awe of the sight in front of him. Daniel made the worst possible situation beautiful without even trying to.

He looked almost illuminated, one wing out majestically behind him. With his angelic looks, but grimy situation, it looked like a painting.

Walking around to Daniel’s backside again, the demon ran his fingers through the feathers of his remaining wing, trying to soothe the crying Cherub, who couldn’t fight back, or yell at him.

Legion got through the second wing a lot quicker, ignoring the Angel’s screams. Once again, he healed the Angel before too much blood from his back could fall.

Trying to keep quiet, the kidnapped Cherub had bitten through his lip, because despite being healed, Daniel was still in pain, a sort of phantom pain. He had just lost his wings. On top of this, he was exhausted, and he couldn’t stop crying.

“You did so good for me,” the demon praised, taking out the remaining the syringe of blood out of his pocket.

/Beautiful Angel./

Legion injected him with the second needle, and was unable to stop himself from running his fingers through the Cherub’s soft hair, watching the pain fade away from his face, seeing the blood from his bitten lip roll down his chin. He doesn’t bother to wipe it away, red suits his angel.

His angel. He liked the sound of it.

The power he has over the celestial being was exhilarating.

[ @maui-writes-whump @jackwriteswhump @itty-bitty-obsessions @theleastmemorablequeer @animerose96 @little-boyking @olidiavalree @fullonfandomfood @pendragon451 ]

#my writing #bleu’s writing #daniel the cherub #blood #legion the demon #daniel and legion #mutilation #knife #addiction #crying #hair pulling #grabbed by the hair #drug use #manhandling #manipulation #murder #pet names #kidnapping #dusk

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acabecca · 7 years ago

Text

Reputation/Homecoming crossover - for @siriussblackx because she is sad and we love Fangs Fogarty

“I’m not going in there.”

“Sweets-” “I’m not going in there, Riya.” “He’s your best friend-”“I can’t,” he interrupted, his voice cracking as Riya looked up at him in concern. He was still angry (Riya didn’t think there would ever be a time when Sweet Pea was not angry and scowling about something or other), but it was a different kind of anger than normal. He was angry because his best friend was hurt and there was nothing he could do to help him. He had been completely powerless to stop what had happened to Fangs, and he had been helpless as he’d watched Fangs bleeding out on the ground in front of him. As he sniffed and wiped his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt, Riya realised what was so different about him. He was afraid. Afraid of what he would see when he walked inside the hospital room, afraid of what had happened, and afraid of what might still happen. “It’s okay,” Riya whispered, reaching out to give his hand a squeeze. “You don’t have to go in. Fangs will understand. Just wait out here for me, alright?” she told him, standing on her tiptoes to place a kiss on his cheek. She took a step towards Fangs’ room, but Sweet Pea’s grip on her hand tightened and he put an arm around her shoulders as he pulled her back towards her. Riya smiled despite the situation as she wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his shirt. He was never one for public displays of affection, so she imagine he was feeling particularly vulnerable right now. “I’m sorry about what I said,” he muttered, his lips pressed against the top of her head. “I didn’t mean it. You’re not a princess.” “Thanks,” Riya scoffed as she pulled away from him. “Hey, tell him I’m sorry, okay?” Pausing, Riya turned to look at Sweet Pea in confusion. “Sorry for what?” she asked, and he just shrugged his shoulders. “For not being in there. For not being able to stop what happened.” “You couldn’t have stopped something you didn’t know was gonna happen,” she told him, but her just shrugged again and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Listen, I’m gonna need you to promise me that you aren’t gonna go off the deep end and go after Archie or anyone, alright? And not because it’s Archie, before you say anything, but because I don’t want you getting in trouble.” “Yeah, sure.” She pursed her lips. “Promise me.” Sweet Pea rolled his eyes. “I promise I won’t go after Archie.” “Good,” Riya shot him a small smile, before she opened the door to Fangs’ hospital room and slipped inside. She paused when she saw Noelle there, her hand covering Fangs’ and her head resting on the edge of the bed. Her eyes slid from Noelle to where Fangs was lying in the hospital bed, his eyes closed and his skin pale as the machines around them beeped. Letting out a breath to steady herself and keep her tears at bay, Riya gently closed the door behind her and moved to sit in the seat beside Noelle. She winced as the chair scraped across the floor and Noelle shot up in her seat, her eyes still half-closed as she looked around frantically.

“It’s me, it’s just me, I’m sorry!” Riya apologised quickly and Noelle sighed, running a shaking hand through her hair.

“Sorry, I’m a little on edge,” she apologised quietly, her gaze going back to Fangs as she took his hand in hers once again.

Riya shot her a sympathetic smile as she sat beside her. “I don’t blame you. How’s he doing?”

“I don’t know,” Noelle shrugged. “The doctors keep coming and going but they won’t tell me anything because, technically, I’m not ‘family’.”

Riya blinked. “His parents haven’t been in yet?”

“No,” Noelle scoffed. “And they probably won’t be. The Serpents are his family, Riya. He doesn’t have anyone else, and neither do I. I don’t- I don’t know what I’ll do if he doesn’t make it-”

“Well we’re not going to think like that, because he made it through surgery and he’s going to be fine, okay?” Riya told her, reaching out to awkwardly pat her arm. “We just have to wait for him to wake up, that’s all. Then we can help him get back on his feet, help him recover.”

“We?”

“Yeah,” Riya shrugged. “He’s my friend too, Elle. I’m not letting him – or you – do this alone.”

“So Sweet Pea couldn’t make it, huh?”

Riya glanced down, not missing the bitterness in Noelle’s voice. “He’s… He’s struggling, I think. He’s outside, but he couldn’t bring himself to come in. He’s just- he’s angry.”

“When isn’t he angry?” Noelle scoffed. “Anger is his permanent state. If he’s not angry, then he’ll go out of his way to find something to be mad about. He needs to stop that, especially now. I need- Fangs needs him.”

“Fangs has got him,” Riya paused. “So have you. And you’ve got me, too. And Toni, and Jughead and everyone else. Even Betty, if you get hard up for people to turn to-”

“If you mention Andrews I will kick you out of his entire hospital, Riya, I swear to God.”

“I wasn’t going to mention Archie…” Riya trailed off, rolling her eyes. “It- it wasn’t him, you know? He wouldn’t have done this. That’s not Archie. I know him.”

Noelle scowled as she turned to face her properly. “Didn’t he come over to the South Side and wave a gun in Sweet Pea’s face? Didn’t you defend him then? Didn’t he beat the crap out of Sweet Pea, too? Didn’t he form that ridiculous Dark Circle, taunting a literal serial killer and tried to get him to come over to the South Side? Isn’t he working for Hiram Lodge?”

“I- I know he’s done a lot of shitty things, Elle, but I also know that he would never do something like this-”

“Why?” Noelle interrupted. “Because he’s your friend? Because you know him? Fangs is my friend and look what’s happened to him! You think Andrews cares that he’s lying in a hospital bed clinging to his life?”

“I was there and I know Archie would never put me in danger-”

“You’re delusional,” Noelle snapped. “If you think Andrews gives one single fuck about what happens to you or any other serpent, then you are delusional. You stopped being his friend the second you put yourself between him and Sweet Pea. You stopped being his friend when you decided to help us get Fangs out of there. If he saw you lying in the street, he’d step over you without a second thought. People like Archie don’t care about people like us Riya, and it’s about damn time that you got that through your head.”

“You’re wrong,” Riya shook her head. “Look, I know Archie is an idiot, okay? I know he’s not been the best person these last few months, I know he’s been shitty to the serpents but I also know he would never put me in danger. He’d never do anything to hurt me, and that’s how I know he isn’t responsible for what happened to Fangs. Fangs is my friend too and Archie knows he didn’t hurt Midge.”

“Are you screwing him or something?”

“E-excuse me?” Riya spluttered, and Noelle raised an eyebrow. “Jesus, no.”

“He loves you.”

“As a friend.”

Noelle snorted. “Sure. That’s why Sweets hates him so much, because he loves you as a friend.”

“I’ve known him my entire life-”

“I’ve known Fangs my entire life, too. Sometimes people are good at hiding stuff if they’re afraid of losing you,” Noelle whispered, her eyes drifting back to Fangs. Riya stayed silent, her fingers fiddling with the sleeves of her jacket. She wasn’t sure what to say. She didn’t think anything she said would make Noelle feel better. “Did you know? How he felt about me?”

“Uhm,” Riya coughed nervously. “If I say yes are you gonna like, punch me or something?”

Noelle turned to her with a smirk. “Nah. I’ve not got any fight left in me today. Might just surprise you in a couple days or something,” she paused. “I take it from that that you did know, then?”

“I may have had a tiny inkling, yeah…” Riya trailed off. “But if you’re gonna punch me then you should also know that Toni knew, and so did Sweet Pea and like literally everyone else, too. Boy’s not exactly subtle, y’know? So if you’re gonna punish me, then you’re gonna have to take on pretty much half of Riverdale too. Which I have no doubt you are capable of doing. Just please give me a head start because you’re really tall and I know you’d definitely be able to beat my ass.”

“I’m not going to do anything, calm down drama queen. God, you’ve been spending way too much time around Jughead,” Noelle told her. “…How come you didn’t tell me?”

“Wasn’t my place. Wasn’t anyone’s place. Fangs had to do it in his own time. It’s just unfortunate that his own time was when he was lying on the ground bleeding out from a gunshot wound. Doesn’t make things easy on himself, does he?”

“Definitely not,” Noelle laughed quietly. “Why do you think he didn’t tell me?”

“Like you said. People are good at hiding things when they’re afraid they might lose you if you knew the truth. Plus you have been like, borderline obsessed with my cousin since you got back into town and Fangs would rather have you in his life as a friend than not have you in his life at all.”

“I am not obsessed with Jughead-”

“Oh, yes, you were,” Riya chuckled. “You uh, you ever think you could and Fangs could maybe… You know… Be more than friends?”

“Yeah,” Noelle answered almost immediately, and Riya blinked in surprise. “You act like that’s shocking to you, but have you seen his face? I mean, you know Fangs. He’s one of the nicest guys in the world, and he’s not too bad to look at either. I’d be stupid not to think about it. I’d be lucky to have him.”

Riya pulled a face. “So why mope around over Jughead?”

“That’s your cousin.”

“I don’t care, I am strictly Team Foelle. Hashtag and everything. Jughead can suck it,” she sniffed, crossing her arms over her chest. “That will be a nice little surprise for Fangs, when he wakes up.”

“If he wakes up.”

“When,” Riya frowned, pursing her lips. “Elle, he’s going to be-”

“Hey, I’m sorry to interrupt,” FP stuck his head around the door, his eyes quickly darting to Fangs before they settled on Riya. “You gotta come with me, need you to rein your boy in.”

“Sweet Pea?” Riya asked in confusion. “What? Why? He’s outside-”

“He’s not outside, kid,” FP shook his head. “He bolted as soon as you walked in here, and you need to get after him before he makes anything worse.”

“What’s he done now?” Noelle groaned, gesturing for Riya to get out of her seat and go with FP.

“He’s gone after Archie.”

Riya turned to look at Noelle with wide eyes, and Noelle shook her head in disbelief at the stupidity of her best friend (although she didn’t know why, she knew he would have had to find someone to lash out at).

“Go,” she pushed Riya towards the door. “I’ll call you if there’s any news on Fangs.”

“Are you sure?” Riya asked, but she was already on her way out of the room.

“I’m sure,” Noelle nodded. “Hey, Riya?” she called, and Riya paused to glance over her shoulder. “Make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid like get himself killed.”

“I won’t.”

“Promise?” Noelle’s voice was quiet, almost as though she was ashamed to show any weakness. “I- I can’t lose both of them.”

Riya darted forwards, quickly wrapped her arms around Noelle and pulling her into an awkward hug before pulling away and patting her shoulder.

“I promise.”

#ocappreciation #allaboutocs #toalltheocsivelovedbefore #fyeahriverdaleocs #fic: reputation #fic: homecoming #crossover #rielle #Riya Rose #Noelle Bamber #do I know what this is? no #I know the gifs don't match and the formatting is A MESS but do I care? also no #TEAM FOELLE #Riya x Noelle

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queenburd · 6 years ago

Text

Game Night

9k? Nine fucking thousand words? fuck me. i never intended for this to happen. I NEVER intended for this to get so damn long winded. I am SO sorry.

Alright. Look. There’s a LOT of material here I seem like I’m bullshitting. I have had.... so many..... conversations....... about Kass on Discord. ALL of this is drawn from that. and for this, I am sorry, because it seems like I’m making up 95 percent of it. I’m not. I swear.

That said I don’t pretend to call this nightmare work canon. It’s an excuse for me to talk about Queenie a bit and get into the meat of Kass’s current.... problems, as well as the best way to grow past them, but that doesn’t mean shit 8P

En.....joy???????

Game Night

On occasion, it catches him off guard how he hardly questions the current setup of his life.

Kass is 38, now. He's spent the last two decades of his life distinctly aware of almost every detail of every monster he's come face to face to. Once they were dealt with, he'd wipe the slate clean, do the paperwork, file it, and move onto the next one. If he needed to find a solution to a problem, or find a weakness, he'd demand one instead of ask for it. He'd force a square peg into a round hole until it was effective, shaving it down by his own hand, and then he'd move forward.

He supposes that's why he doesn't find a whole lot of intrigue now, living with a person (a scip) he knows next to nothing about. Any curiosity he might have had has since been pulled out of his soul through his thoroughly scarred kneecaps.

(Taking time to ask questions could get you killed, so it was a waste of time.)

Add to that an exhausting sort of apathy towards life and existence in general, and Kass can figure out fairly easily why he's stopped thinking too hard about the situation. It doesn't really matter, he supposes. The thing he lives with has decided to house him, and there are easier ways to try to kill him, so his death is clearly not an end goal for her. She's not harming him--she doesn't even ask him to do much.

There had been an irritable itch, or concern, at the beginning, that this was all some scheme to get him to "become a nicer person" or what-have-you. You know the plot: be nice to a kicked puppy, feed it a couple times, and watch it become a loving companion. She'd be sorely disappointed, Kass knew, and it wouldn't last long, but by that point he'd figure something out and it would be fine. She'd eventually report to Simon, who would clearly be in on the "get Kass to be nice" scheme, that it had failed, and maybe he'd finally be left alone.

The demands he had waited for never came. May had never sat him down and told him to change his tune. Occasionally, Kass would leave his boots out in the middle of the room, or ditch his dishes by the sink, and expect some comment. At most, he'd come into the kitchen later and find her cleaning them as she made dinner, or his shoes would be moved, and she'd mention that she was on a cleaning spree anyway, but "try not to make a habit of it, okay?"

He had pushed his luck, sometimes. When he could find the energy, could muster the attitude, he would be an incredible ass. He would insult her to her face, he would leave his cigarette holder on the coffee table and drink the last of the milk before she could make breakfast.

And May never even seems to even flinch.

There are some days she seems short on patience, and when Kass pushes her on those days she might snap at him, or her sarcastic responses could come off sharper and meaner than she'd intend. Kass would think to himself, finally, we're getting to familiar territory.

And then she'd pull back, apologize, try to explain that she wasn't feeling wonderful, and move along. It unsettles him.

He doesn't really know how to get under her skin. There are some comments that seem to almost get there, comments about how young she looks or her caw of a laugh, but she'd make a joke right back about it, make fun of herself, and then Kass would feel like he'd made no progress. There's no point in mocking a person who laughs at themself right alongside you.

It feels, to him, like all he can muster these days is apathy towards everything, or a frustration that things can't be like they were before. He feels--powerless, he supposes, and tired, and most of the time numb, and when he's not numb he wants to be angry. He wants control of some kind.

And he can't have any control, because Kass knows nothing about the one person who he's around long enough to consider someone he can use.

Maybe it's his fault for never asking. It isn't particularly like May is a secretive person--she tends to wear her heart on her sleeve. Maybe she doesn't have much use of secrets.

They get along fine, he supposes. On occasion, he will be smoking with the kitchen window open, and he'll spot a familiar back lightning strike across the fence, unmoving. Watching. He takes the time to flip it off and gets back to his smoke, but the distance is more than enough to keep his skin from crawling the way it used to. May will make her presence known through the front door a moment later and Kass will look to the kitchen door, and when he looks back to the fence, the bolt is gone.

After she hands him Frank one cold night, the apathy starts to withdraw a little. Not a lot--there's still so much looming awareness of his obsolescence as an ex-agent--but enough for Kass to look at himself in the tiny bathroom's mirror and think, Christ, my hair's a wreck. That's--that's funny, because he hasn't thought something like that for what feels like years. He hasn't looked at himself in the mirror with much more than disinterest or general disdain for his entire existence.

One afternoon, Kass goes out, and buys himself a razor. He comes back to 3, Tesla Drive, locks himself in the upstairs bathroom, and doesn't come out for almost a half hour.

He comes out with his goatee trimmed back into shape, grabs his roommate by the wrist sharply, and says, "You can draw a straight line. Get the back where I can't see."

To her credit, she catches on quick as she can, and while the top of his undercut is still on the long side, Kass looks at his face in the mirror and almost recognizes the person blinking back. Maybe the lines of his face seem deeper. The shadows under his eyes seem a deeper purple than they'd once been, and his cheekbones seem a little sharper.

But he sees them, now. He didn't see them before. He didn't look. Didn't try.

Awareness starts to return. He sings awful songs in the shower. He bickers with Frank over stupid, unimportant shit, and he still drinks and he still wears his trenchcoat, but May will send him stupid cat videos and he'll audibly snicker. He finally finishes Saints Row 4, and the DLCs, and puts down the game. He's got a lot of time on his hands, he finds.

He starts to pay attention. He goes on walks. He ventures out of his bedroom to sit in the living room with his laptop and leaves windows open to let cold fresh air in.

It seems... stupid. It's not exactly a huge shift from what Kass was doing before, nor is it a change in his personality or his actions. Yet it's less of his being on autopilot, and more of him finding small satisfaction in the actions.

Frank tries to comment on it, from time to time. Kass doesn't have much in the way of a response or retort other than a quipped "no idea what you're on about, BB-8."

The point is, Kass finds himself questioning things again, having more than a passing thought about a subject. He's nowhere near where he could be in terms of interest or enthusiasm, but he's thinking like he used to. He's looking out for himself, keeping his best interests in mind, and that means knowing more about the situation he's in, and any factors he should be aware of that might pose a threat to him.

It's a start.

Rain comes down in sheets on the house, winter slipping into spring in an uncouth manner. Kass kicks off his boots he'd wiped on the mat to little avail, pushing them aside with his striped sock as he shudders hard. His head is cold, the shaved sides proving little defense against the storm, and he sheds his coat to hang it on the door's hanging peg to drip-dry.

"When one feels like a duck, one is happy, my arse," he mumbles to no one in particular.

"What did you say? Didn't quite catch it," Frank replies as he is pulled out of the coat pocket, blessedly dry. Kass makes a little sniff of a noise, examining the PDA to be certain no water slipped into the thick plastic's seams.

"Nothing."

He pushes a hand through his hair as he crosses through the living room and into the kitchen, and then pauses and retraces his footsteps, to the couch, where the lump is snoring softly, now, at 4 in the afternoon.

Skeptically, he checks the whiteboard schedule, and yes, May is at this moment supposed to be at her midday shift, which would be ending in the next half hour. Here she is instead, looking worse for wear, her glasses on the arm of the sofa.

Hm.

Kass opts to ignore the little comatose bundle. He putzes around the house, stealing the pack of oreos from the pantry and his laptop from the bedroom, and settles into the recliner in the living room with two cookies already stuffed fully into his mouth. The snoring is not distracting, for how soft it is, so when he pops his seat back and pops open Plague Inc, he zones it out.

So it's not the ceased snoring that has Kass looking up from his game (which, unfortunately, is not going in his favor in any way) but the tiny whine that May makes as she stretches and uncurls herself from the blanket. She arches her back and then relaxes again, squinting at him in a worn, confused way.

"What."

"Y'got crumbs."

Oh. Kass scrubs his face with the end of his sleeve, brushing crumbs out of his beard. "Aren't you supposed to be at work?"

May struggles to sit up from her little bundle with a grimace. "I felt like shit this morning, so I called out. Could tell I'd be more of a hindrance than a help if I went. Pass me a cookie?"

He tosses an oreo, and it thuds off the back cushion of the couch onto her chest, shedding crumbs. May tilts her head, lips pursed, before she nods. "Didn't mean that literally, but okay. Thanks."

"Any improvement?" Kass asks, disinterested, popping another cookie into his mouth.

"A little. Not much. I just feel exhausted and useless, I guess." May sticks the cookie into her mouth, munching quietly, and then reaches behind her, and slips her glasses on. "I. I also think I might be stuck here."

He snorts, watching her try once, twice, to pull herself up, and fail each time, and then balances his laptop on the arm of the recliner. "Stay put."

Kass stands, and slips into the kitchen. When he returns, May is peeking at him from over the couch with clouded curiosity.

"Wassat."

"That is Irish cream and root beer." He hands her one of the glasses over the couch, sipping his own tall glass and moving back round to close his laptop and drop beside the small girl. He grabs the remote and flicks on the TV.

"Why is alcohol your go-to for bad moods. This is a horrible coping mechanism."

"So, I should drink both glasses myself then?"

May curls defensively around her glass. "No. This is mine."

"That's what I thought."

She nurses the glass while Kass flicks through Netflix near-thoughtlessly, bored. "I should really get up and cook dinner...."

Kass tsks, flicking down. No, no documentaries, no thrillers this evening, thanks. "I'll order a pizza. Stay put, princess. Hey, Frank, what're you in the mood for tonight?"

"Hm! Well, the boys were watching the wonderful new version of, oh, what's his name, Billy Niel?"

"What, with my card? Don't do that."

"Bill Nye, Frank. Fine, Bill Nye Saves The World it is."

"Kass, do not use my card to buy pizza, payday's not till next week."

"Would you shut it, birdy." Kass drops the remote, and squints impatiently at his couchmate. "I have two secret bank accounts I've managed to keep funneled funds from Foundation days,I don't exactly need you to--"

"What."

"Oh, what now."

"I've been giving you my own money for groceries!!!"

"Yes. And it's very handy petty cash for cigarettes, thanks for that."

May stares at him for a long moment, face scrunched up in dramatic disbelief, and then slowly, intensely, raises a middle finger. Kass laughs hard enough to start a coughing fit and raises his phone to make the order.

An hour later, they're digging into a meat-lover's pizza and their third glasses of spiked soda. Kass has opted to bring the whole bottles out, set on the edge of the coffee table besides the open pizza box. He watches May in his peripheral vision, as she picks the loose pieces of bacon off her slice and pops them into her mouth.

She's not drunk--Kass hasn't given her nearly enough alcohol for that. He's never really seen her drunk, but she does get giggly and at ease. It's the ease he's looking for.

It's been a while since he's had an ulterior motive. He's probably a bit rusty, but Kass is, quite frankly, sick of being in the dark about the people he's around, when they have all the facts about him. So when he tops off her glass with an extra kick of the Bailey's, he asks without any change in his tone, "How the hell does a literal figure of royalty end up working retail?"

"Same way an ex-SCP agent ends up living in her house," May shoots back, sticking her tongue out at him immaturely. "Are we asking questions now?"

"Is that illegal?"

"Like you ever do anything legal, buzzboy." She dives into another slice, sucking the crumbs off her fingers and thumb. "I'm just saying," the girl continues, gesturing with the cup a bit, "You've been here like, what.... two months? And I'll admit I was expecting it way earlier."

Kass sits back, unsettled. She's done that thing again--he hates it--where it's almost like she can see right through him, and she never makes a big deal out of it, and it makes the back of his neck itch. How does she do that? Is he that obvious? Has he gotten that bad at this?

"But, I mean, it's fine. You're an adult and I don't mind, ignore my snark. Actually--" He's caught off guard by the finger pointed in his face, "Let's play a game!"

"I don't think I want to play a game with you."

"Hush. Here's the game. Back and forth questions about each other--you ask one, I ask one, you know. Until somebody wants to stop. And--" she says emphatically, "before you get all zip mouthed on me--"

"Zip mouthed?" Frank asks at the same moment that Kass mouths the phrase in utter horror.

"Zipper mouth. Like in cartoons?"

A blank stare.

"Christ--tight lipped, s'at better? Before you get all tight lipped on me, you can pass on a question. I get that lying is second nature for you, but honestly, there's no need to--if you don't want to answer a question, then just say 'pass'. Other person tries a new question."

May chews for a moment, and then smiles with a full mouth. "That's not so bad, right? Sound like something you want to try?"

Kass feels the tension in his spine--it had been mostly relaxed up to the moment he'd been called out for what he'd been doing. It feels like looking into the mouth of a trap--he's not stupid enough to stumble right into it without staring it right in the teeth first.

"I'd rather not. There is an opt out option here, yes? You imply there is an opt out, and I think I have better things to do with my time than let you prod me with--" he wraps his index and middle fingers around the phrase-- "personal questions."

Her smile becomes a full-cheeked pout, before May swallows and says, "I mean, nobody's forcing you into anything here. This isn't a contract or something. I just figured... you probably have a ton of questions but don't know how to ask them." Her shoulder goes up in a half shrug. "You're the kind of person who will try to get information subtly so the other person doesn't know you're giving it, but I'm offering. It's easier like this, isn't it?"

Hell--again?

Kass looks away from her, at the screen, unseeing. The part of him that's been waking up again--the one that is aware he's sitting beside a scip, and knows how dangerous that is--is trying to tell him to run. He's trusted that voice for so many damn years when he didn't trust anything else.

But it's just not as strong as it once was. The apathy, and more importantly, the curiosity and interest, they are stronger than that voice for now, because--

He's not an agent anymore.

"This is an incredibly boring game you've designed--at least make some stakes if you want my interest, bird."

"Oh?" May asks, curiously. "What stakes?"

One last effort to make her back out before him.

"Make it a strip game when someone passes--"

"No? Are we fourteen and dating? Are we two idiot children in a bedroom with the door slightly ajar because of parents? No, christ." May snorts loudly, shaking her head. "Don't be a teenager."

"Then make your game more interesting or I'm going back to an actual game with real stakes." Kass downs his glass, and looks at the empty thing, mouth a thin line.

"Hm. Is there enough alcohol in that bottle for a shots game?"

He lifts the bottle in question, weighing it. "Er--maybe. Shot when a person passes a question?"

"That sounds fair, yeah?"

A voice chirrups before Kass can reply. "This sounds like fun! Can I play?"

"How is that supposed to work, then, Frank?"

"Yeah, um, I would say two people questioning me is a little less fair than one."

Frank pauses as though in thought, and then chimes pleasantly, "Well, I suppose if you ask Kass things and he decides to lie, I can just correct him for you."

Kass blinks, taken aback, and then turns the PDA, mic down. "Stay out of this, Frank."

"Oh, let an old man have some fun!"

May laughs behind her fingers, cheeks round and pink. When she finally regains her composure, she grins at Kass again, knees pulled up to her chest. "So? Are we playing?"

Kass gives her a dead stare for a moment, and then huffs out through his nose.

"Fine. I'll bite."

She settles against the couch arm, apparently pleased, and gestures at Kass vaguely. "Okay then. Ask your first question."

He's put on the spot. He's not one to freeze in headlights--self preservation has always assisted in that, but Kass again finds himself thinking how ridiculous this all is. This--everything about this is bizarre.

"Come on, don't close off on me now, dude."

"Fine, fine, give me a bleeding moment to think, won't you?" Kass snaps, busying himself with refilling his glass. "Right, okay, I suppose I'll ask again. How does the literal ruler of birds end up working in retail? Is it for shits and giggles?"

"Pff," she starts, "like anybody would work retail for giggles. I, mm." The girl shrugs, "I gotta make money somehow. I mean, I don't necessarily need to, I was just staying in bird form and had physical nests for a while, but I was always saving up and working odd jobs. I was saving for.... years, jeez."

She stretches in place, continuing, "I wanted to be, yanno, a person, and having a house is way more comfortable than a nest or having an apartment. So I've been working for a while--I just don't make a big deal about it, yanno?"

Then May hums, settling back. "Hope that was a decent enough answer. Gotta fake being a person somehow. My turn."

Kass waits, avoiding her gaze by staring at the screen, and doesn't really relax when she says, "Okay, here's my question."

"Shoot, pipsqueak."

"How old were you when you joined the Foundation?"

Oh. Diving right in, apparently.

Kass scratches behind his ear. She's got balls, he supposes. It's an innocent enough question.

"About seventeen or eighteen--probably closer to the latter. It was less of me joining and more of them grabbing me by the scruff of the neck while I'd been hostel jumping cross country."

There's a followup question in her face--he answers it unprompted. "I was scip hunting on my own until they turned up. I was good at it too--good at staying alive, at least."

He does not expand further--it goes into a sort of unpleasant territory. Normally, Kass wouldn't mind bringing up further details, watching people squirm, but--

The memory of Pickman's hand raised to strike, and he had been maybe twelve, and--

He didn't particularly want to think about it.

Whatever the case, he's answered the question. The girl across from Kass is waiting expectantly, smiling crookedly with her arms wrapped around her pulled up knee. He took another swig of his glass and then set it on the coffee table, turning his body to face her.

"Alright, tweety bird, explain the things you can do to me. I know you're a shapeshifter, and I know you can do some party tricks, and I'd like a clearer picture of the kind of thing I'm dealing with."

"He comes out and asks!" May says dramatically, throwing a hand in the air. "By jove!"

"Hey, you overgrown tit, this was your idea. Mockery doesn't suit you as well as it does me," Kass remarks sharply, ignoring the tsk from the PDA. "Shut it Frank, a tit's a kind of bird."

"Just because you say it is, does not make it true."

"Nope, nope, Kass is right, there's an entire species of bird called tits," the girl says with a bit of a cackle. "Are you proud of your pun, Kass? Be proud."

Her smile is almost too wide for her face--it's like nothing ever bothers her. Nothing gets under her skin. When she finally talks, it's without restraint or discomfort.

"Most of my abilities are healer and protector based--every queen kind of goes for a theme, I guess." She holds up her fingers, adding one as she goes. "I can heal from.... basically any damage, no matter the severity. I can, um, transfer other people's wounds to myself, which will still heal in record time with light and heat. I can produce shields, I can turn into multiple bird forms, I can see potential energy, mm. Supposedly I have creation magic, but I've never really tried it out."

Kass squints at her. "Why not just call yourself a phoenix?"

"I mean, I suppose I am, but phoenixes are more Greek in origin and the crown is more Egyptian based? Semantics. Plus, I don't like being a phoenix when I can be more unassuming. Oh!" May said suddenly, lighting up. "Also! I'm a major empath."

"....what."

She grins, the smile a little more conniving around the edges than Kass would like, as pieces slide into place far too smoothly.

"Oh, titfuck. You're completely serious."

He's met perhaps a couple empaths before, safer locked up Scips that just had a strong tendency to unnerve people. He hadn't liked it then, either.

"Sorry, dude. You might be unreadable to most everybody else, but I can pick up your tension a mile away."

Kass makes a small, aggravated noise, and pinches his brow hard. A fucking empath, he should have realized far earlier what he was dealing with, but the level of numbness had gotten in the way, and hell, it's painfully obvious in retrospect. He remembers, vaguely--

"Can I ask--what's eating at you?"

"You can deny it as much as you like, but I know what it looks like when someone's considering lying down in the road as a legitimate option."

She had known, this entire time. Maybe the kid isn't a mind reader, and maybe she doesn't always get it right, but Kass is suddenly very clearly aware of his mood, and his frustration, and his numbness that he's felt for months.

May curls up, her knees pressed to her chest. "Hell. I'm sorry man--if it's any consolation, I try really hard to give you space, I try to not intrude other than to.... be nice when you don't seem well."

And is that a consolation? It's not a major one--it feels like she has the upper hand on him.

Well.

Kass decides, very maturely, to scowl, and down his entire refilled spiked drink in a single go. When he finishes, he sets the empty cup back down, and wipes his mouth on his sleeve with all the energy of a pissy rooster, filled with too much energy. "Right. Well, now I know, don't I, Jean Grey."

"Oooh, an empath with the name Phoenix, that's a double whammy, nice." May blinks at him above her knees, smiling in what seems to be a conciliatory manner. "Please don't be too mad?"

"I'm not mad, christ, what am I, your dad?"

"You seem mad," she replies, a touch quieter. "Or at least pretty annoyed. I'm really sorry--I can't exactly control it. It's a passive thing, it's always going."

"I'm fine," Kass says sharply, as though it's not--well, not her he's speaking to, but someone who knows when to quit. "Just ask your damn question, princess, it's your turn."

The girl seems caught off guard, as though she had expected him to have an outburst, or, more likely, end their little stupid charade. When she speaks again, she clears her throat to strengthen it.

"Y--You said you used to go cross country. What are some places you visited, both as an agent and as a teen? Any favorites that stick out?"

His mouth still feels pinched in unpleasant ways, but Kass massages his jaw. "Give me a second to think--Frank, did you have any favorites?"

"Oh, me? Well, I suppose I was just quite happy to be out of my cardboard box, but if I had to choose, I thought some of the upper east coast was lovely! It was, oh, where was it--Vermont, that was it!"

Kass is pulled out of his mood, caught off guard. "Vermont? The Brunswick one? Really?"

"Very relaxing, if I recall. A quick discussion with the natives patched up the whole thing, didn't it?"

"Right, you would look at it like that." He looks up, and May is blinking at the pair of them in curiosity and wonder. "Right. Well--I was kept mostly on this half of the continent after recruitment. Before, though, I had started out in southern California and worked my way northward and eastward, I suppose."

Kass rubs his chin in thought, and continues. "I bused, hitchhiked, and took trains when I could, to Chicago. Made some pit stops--visited San Francisco once."

She lights up then. "It sucks, right!?"

"Oh, absolutely, awful prices for shit food and atmosphere."

"Oh my god, thank you. California's a damn nightmare, it's so hot."

"It's terrible."

She laughs a little. "God, I lived in the Bay Area for most of my life, I hated almost every second of it. What a wasteland."

"That's where the orphanage was, you know. St Andrew's Children's Home was in California. Of course, it was closer to the mountains, where snow actually existed."

"California snow. An oxymoron if I've ever heard one," May shakes her head in disbelief. "Jeez. You're up."

Kass steeples his fingers, eyeing his roommate, the side of his mouth drawn up. He can't tell if it's a scowl or a smile. He still feels on the edge of uncomfortable, displeased with being so easily read. He's uncertain if he can salvage this, bring the odds back in his favor.

Finally, he settles on pursuing his previous route. Kass points his pressed together fingers in her general direction.

"You clearly talk about a time before being the queen, so one has to assume you were just a human before. How did you become the queen, with all these powers?"

May's smile turns into a sort of pursed, uncertain expression. She looks a bit at war with herself, and Kass waits, watching carefully as she sits upright from where she'd been prone.

"Sorry, give me a sec, I'm trying to figure out what I can and can't tell you." When she's finished readjusting herself, she nods once as though coming to a compromise. "Okay, this is a bit of a story."

He sits back and waits.

"When I was in college, I went abroad to different parts of Europe. I had always loved mythology and stories," May explains, gesturing a little bit as she speaks. "At one point, I found this story that seemed.... expansive, but underdeveloped? As though there were missing details, vague notations. And I started looking for these details, and the more I looked, the more it became almost a treasure hunt. I followed it--I'm not one to do things halfway."

May isn't looking at Kass; she's not looking at anything, really. She's fiddling with the necklace absentmindedly.

"I found the crown, and--the story had told me what to expect, but it wasn't like that at all, it was so much more. It's alive, a living thing, and it looked at me, and it said I had to earn it. So I did."

May refocuses on him, and smiles a little sheepishly. "It--well, this part's a bit unpleasant--it basically ripped me apart and remade me into this. It made me into something that could endure pretty much anything in the world. I know that's not very clear, but I can only say so much about the process other than how I got to it."

Kass squints. "You followed a story and found a priceless relic?"

A sheepish nod.

"Christ. You're all living in a fantasy land. You're a Disney protagonist."

She snorts quietly, and her smile is small. "My turn?"

"Yeah, shoot."

She fidgets a bit, looking round the room, and refocuses on him. "Okay, um, disclaimer. Simon's an enormous blabbermouth, even though he means well."

Well, yeah, Kass knows that. He hates it.

"He told me about the whole thing with O'Malley--mentioned it, really. I never prodded it, it wasn't my business, but I was wondering if I co--"

"Pass," he replies darkly, already grabbing the creamer bottle by the neck and drinking it straight.

"Okay. That's fair. Sorry, let me think of something lighter." A few beat pass, before she follows up. "Okay, here's a stupid one for you. Favorite season?"

Kass snorts as he screws the bottle cap back on. "You're right, that is a stupid question."

"I don't see you going to drink."

He harumphs. "...If I've got to choose, then fall. Early fall, before it gets cold enough to freeze your ass right off."

May hums in response. "That is a very pretty time. All the leaves, and just the stillness."

"....Yeah," Kass says. "I suppose."

"S'your question. Take your time, no rush."

Kass thinks for a few long minutes. In the short time they've played this game, he's learned a hell of a lot, and most of it more concerning than calming. It's not everything, though, and some answers have caused more questions. For example:

"Alright. Riddle me this, Pidgey--if you're an empath, and you know the kind of person I am, with multiple somewhat reliable sources, then how in the hell have you maintained your temper. How are you so damn bleeding patient and, christ, altruistic? Don't you get sick of it?"

He's not really looking at her as he asks, more involved in his own gesturing and his own mild self loathing. Between them, he can hear Frank gently chiding his snappish tone. "Kass..."

When Kass finally looks at May, he is caught off guard by the expression on her face. It's comical disbelief.

"Bitch.... I am the angriest person I know!"

"Wh--"

"I am so angry all the time!!! I work in retail! I get mad about fictional characters! Loud noises are upsetting and don't even get me started on screaming children. I got mad about rompers the other day, Kass. Rompers. I hate them so much. Does this look like a patient person with a good temper?"

"Oh my word," Frank says, and Kass can't help himself from laughing, hard, like barking, so caught by surprise at her outburst.

"Angry birds isn't just a game anymore Kass!"

"Oh my god."

May sits up aggressively, pointing a finger in an accusatory manner at him.

"You think you're the worst? I've had roommates leagues worse than you! Leagues! You think you come even close to the medal for grossest, or rudest, or most infuriating? Bitch, my college roommate rented an apartment with me and within four months, made sexual advances on me, never apologized, lost his job, and didn't pay his portion for the last month of rent. He lied about getting me the money for three weeks, and avoided me the fourth. And then!"

She throws her hands into the air, absolutely incensed. "When I moved out and the leasers cleaned the place, they sent me pictures of the mess he left behind. Including, I shit you not, numerous, still dirty and used, sex toys."

".....No. No."

"Yes!" May squawks. "You could try for centuries and never reach the level of disgust I managed to gather for that man child! Do not flatter yourself!"

Kass, equally horrified and amused, flinches away as she kicks childishly in his direction without much energy behind it. "Alright, okay, calm down, chrissake."

She huffs, and then releases all the energy she's gathered from her chest, coming down from her intensity. "Like, yes, I try really hard to be nice, and give people a hand. That just comes naturally to me. But I'm also super impatient and I have my limits to what I'll tolerate. As you can see, however," and May gestures aggressively again, "It's a very skewed, curved limit. You're better than anything I've dealt with before. Take from that what you will."

She is still making a face when she settles, of utter disgust, and then she shakes her head rapidly as though to clear it. "Christ. Sorry. That guy was just. Gross."

"I've gathered that, Tweety. Do yourself a favor and take a breath, why don't you. It's your go."

She does take a breath, and releases it in a raspberry noise through her lips.

"Good lord, young lady," Frank says, seeming a touch harassed. "You worked yourself up something fierce."

"I like to swear, Frank. Don't tell me you're not used to it."

"From him, yes. Not from you."

"Psh. Don't you start judging me, sir."

That had been something to see, certainly. Kass settles back, smirking, hands behind his head.

"I don't like that face you're making," May grumbles.

"It's still your turn.”

"Oh. Right."

She makes a small huffing noise, relaxing. Kass watches her brows furrow in thought as he waits.

"Okay," she starts, "Here's an easy one for you. When's your birthday."

Kass pauses. Scratches his nose. She's waiting for him to respond, and he figures, well.

"You know? I don't actually know."

"Wh--"

"Hey, Frank, do we have a general date on the calendar for me to celebrate being alive on this hellscape one year longer?"

"Actually," Frank says, sounding mildly surprised. "I can't say we do. I... hm, give me a mo, here." There's a beat of a pause as the PDA flicks through itself slowly. "No. No birthday dated here. I know my memory's not the most trustworthy, but I would--I know for a fact I'd have noted it if you'd told me."

"Ah, well, there's your answer. I've never been one for special occasions, in any case." He shrugs, rolling his shoulders.

"You... you're serious?"

"As a heart attack. Don't know it."

"But..." May seems at a loss, and then she straightens, disbelieving. "But you have to have had something on your paperwork. For like, everything--IDs, social security, Foundation file work."

"They're all made up, Magica. The IDs have been fake since my files burned down in the fire." Kass waves a hand. "I've never had an interest in finding the real date. Not much to celebrate, clearly."

"Oh."

May gets quiet. He watches her frown, relaxing back into the cushion with an air of uncertainty.

"It's my turn, yeah?"

"Oh--yeah, go ahead."

Kass sits up, reaching again for the root beer and creamer. "You mentioned college a couple times, before you became queen. Tell me about life before you went abroad."

"Pass me the bottle."

"Hm?"

"I'm skipping the question, pass me the creamer."

"Oh," Kass says, offering the bottle by the neck. May grabs it and tips it back, swallowing a mouthful and wiping her mouth with her sleeve. That's the first question she's skipped tonight.

"I'm not gonna answer any questions about things like family or childhood. I'd like to go on the record and say that. Try again, bud."

He purses his lips as he takes the bottle back. "Fine, then. Just college. What was your major? Did you finish after you got crowned? Christ--how old even were you?"

"That--That's more than one question, dude," May says, smiling crookedly.

"Sue me, I'm just trying to get a grasp on the situation."

"It's fine." She waves it off, accepting the refilled glass Kass offers her.

"I was... shit, I think I was nineteen when I found the crown? I'd been in college two years. I'd been majoring in illustration--yes, I was an art student, stop snickering," she snaps, kicking his hip gently. "God... I think this was five years ago? I can't be sure. I stopped aging. It stopped mattering."

She stares at the contents of the drink, and Kass finds she's not smiling.

"I'd gone abroad because I'd been kicked out of my family's house. I'd been running from a lot of things, and when I found the crown, it gave me an out. I could be... an entirely different person, I could look and be however I wanted to look and be. So. I did."

A deep inhale, and then she downs about half the glass in one go. "Forgive the tragic backstory, I'm not much one for it. I try not to look back too much on that stuff, that life and the person connected to it is pretty much out of the picture."

"Don't miss it?"

She shrugs. "Every so often I'll miss maybe a homemade meal I never got the recipe for, but that's kind of about it. The internet solves that in a heartbeat."

"Good," Kass says, grinning. "I'm not one for sob stories."

"I figured as much," May replies, smiling back. "Good to keep going?"

"I can go a couple more rounds." Kass tips his own glass back. The creamer is a strong kind of alcohol, though the root beer punches through it a bit. He feels pleasantly warm, but not at all drunk.

Then again, his drink of choice is whiskey. Kass knows how to get drunk.

"So, I mentioned earlier that Simon is a blabber mouth?"

"Not another one of these," he says, a touch snappy.

"Hear me out, okay?" May is hesitant, cheek scrunched up. "He told me about Jumanji, and. Um. Pickman. And I'm not asking about that!" she corrects hastily. "I just wanted to ask about--The Foundation in general. What it was like. Was it all like him? The system, the individuals?"

His gaze flicks between her and the mostly empty Bailey's bottle.

She's not asking about him, Kass in particular. She's not asking what happened to him, what Pickman was like and what Pickman would do. If she had, he'd have finished the bottle, and called it a night.

He doesn't really need to play this game anymore. He's gotten what he was looking for.

Kass thinks.

He makes a decision.

He's not an agent anymore.

"Pickman was a good face for the Foundation. He was--" He cuts himself off, starts over. "Look, Pickman was an ass, and I hated his guts, but he was right about dealing with monsters, and, more importantly, dealing with idiots. He knew what he was doing. He knew how to get to a scip's soft points, and people weren't much different."

Kass presses his fingers to his temple.

"The Foundation thrived like that. They weren't all as harsh as him, but they were hardly any different. We were trained to do what we could for civilians, but in the long run, it didn't matter. To the Foundation, civilians are like..... cattle. We'd keep the wolves away, but cattle was too dumb to really be cared about. If a cow died, well, there's plenty more, just clean up the corpse."

A flick of the wrist, a sharp gesture like waving off a bug.

"Most agents tried to view each other with some level of respect. We got spoon fed "you're smarter and better than the rest, and you're going to survive" in the beginning, and we ate that shit up. We were told we'd be taken care of, that we deserved it."

May is quiet. Frank is quiet. Kass keeps going.

"We figured out the scheme fairly quick. I found out quicker than most. I didn't try to make friends--we were all going to die because of something like you, anyway. We'd be handling things fine, and then a Keter would show and in four seconds, a team would be gone, and it didn't matter. It's not as if those higher up on the chain were risking their necks beside us, we meant little more than D-Class did, but we got to smell fresh air and do something."

It's bizarre, looking from the outside in. He's spent two decades an agent, and he used to be proud--he used to be like Dib. He used to wonder, to be curious, but none of that mattered when you just wanted to get to tomorrow, to the next bullet, to the next drink, to the next file.

"...it was something, though," he finishes. "The first few scips, the first couple keters, you were terrified, you had the piss scared out of you, and you came out of it high on adrenaline and terror, as well as the thrill of knowing you were alive. That--" he chews on the inside his cheek a moment. "That died out pretty quickly."

It's all poison, isn't it? He'd been told he was smarter, better, and maybe he saw through the lie that he'd be taken care of fairly fast, but the praise? He'd fallen for it, hook, line, sinker. And then he'd gotten his kneecaps yanked out from under him by a couple of kids, and suddenly Kass had stopped being all those things. Maybe he never had been all those things, maybe he was just as daft as the rest of the godawful human race.

This has been the loop in his head for months now. It always comes back to this. He can't make it stop--he's never even put it into words before this moment.

Kass is not--well, he feels a full range of emotions, much to his own chagrin, but he's always been skilled at burying them in alcohol, drugs, and work.

He feels like he's been numb for so damn long, and he was frustrated about being numb, but this is why. This is what his body did to cope, it locked down to keep from the breakdown. He doesn't want to break down.

"Kass--"

May's fingers touch Kass's upper arm, and he flinches away instinctively. She pulls her hand back, just as fast. "Sorry. I'm sorry. You were closing up. Do you want to stop?"

Stop? And be stuck thinking these thoughts, dealing with the aftermath of putting them out in the open? Stop and deal with the way his body wants to shut down, despite everything he's done to try to be better? Stop?

He shakes his head. "No, I'm not done. It's my turn."

"Trilby--"

"Shut it. You--" Kass turns sharply, a finger in May's face. "You dumb little bird. What are you trying to achieve here anyway?"

"Wh--"

"Are you singing the same tune as Ninja Gaiden? You want me to become a "nicer person"? You want me to be thoughtful and considerate? What's the point of your stupid game, princess?"

He wants to be nasty. He can be nasty. He wants to sneer in her face, and show her how pointless this all is.

He wants answers. He wants to know why nothing has worked.

God, more than anything, Kass wants the truth.

May blinks up at him, thick brows furrowed, Her eyes are gold and unreadable.

"Pass."

He tilts his head. "Sorry, have I gone deaf?"

"Pass."

"Why's that, then?" he sneers. "Because I'm right?"

"This is why!" May retorts. "No matter what answer I give you, no matter how truthful I am, you're not going to believe me. You'll come to your own conclusions. You'll think I'm lying! You're a skeptic. Why try?"

"Give me something, birdy! I don't care what it is, I just want some semblance of an answer--are you too daft to manage that much?"

Her mouth is a hard line. "You see? You don't want the truth. You think you know my thoughts better than I do."

Kass scowls. He drops back into the couch, and picks up his laptop. He's done. He's done with this.

"...This has really been bothering you, hasn't it?"

There's a sort of vulnerability in her voice, and concern. Fuck--she's doing it again.

"Stop that," Kass mutters. "Stop reading me. I don't like being kept in the dark, that's a given."

He can hear her sigh, can feel the cushions shifting as May slides from the end of the couch to the middle, beside him. She sets her glass besides his on the coffee table.

"Kass, I don't really--" May starts, then stops uncertainly. "You think I want you to change, you expect that I'll demand these things of you. I don't--god, Kass, you're--"

She begins to laugh.

"You're such an ass, all the time. You're sarcastic, and you're vindictive, and you're mean, and you're sharp. That makes me so happy!"

Kass looks up from his laptop to her, brows and mouth pinched. May continues, unhindered, her smile overpowering in her voice.

"You make me laugh so hard. You think I'm... naive or altruistic or pure or whatever, but I've got an awful sense of humor and your dark humor is so often right up my alley it brightens my day. And yes, you're a prick! I wish sometimes you knew when to shut your damn mouth!"

On cue, he opens it, and May holds up a finger to silence him, still grinning. "But I'm an enormous drama queen, so I have no room to talk!"

Kass pauses, then nods, closing his mouth. May breaks into a new set of giggles.

"I don't want those things to go away. That's you, and I wouldn't have invited you into my home if I didn't like the person I saw."

Kass closes his laptop.

"I just want.... I'm an empath, Kass, I know you've been through a lot lately even without knowing the details. I know you're always so on edge, and being in that house didn't help. Call me crazy, but I just wanted you to have a place that you could possibly grow to feel safe in. Hell, maybe even happy."

"You're right," Kass says flatly. "You're absolutely insane."

"Yeah," she agrees. "A little bit. I'm kind of an optimist, I guess--but I've felt trapped too. I've felt like I couldn't breathe, and that things would never get better. I've felt that general distrust and cynicism." May shrugs. "I got tired of it."

"Good for you, Emu."

"Tch," the girl snickers, and when Kass meets May's eyes, he sees her honesty. She's a shit liar, really she is. She hasn't succesfully lied to him yet.

"Can I ask my question now?"

"I didn't realize we were still playing," he replies, flicking off the Bill Nye show to opt for something else. Oh, new season of British Baking Show. He turns it on.

"We don't have to..."

"Oh, don't sound so eager to leave." He drops the remote into her lap, and finishes his glass off. "Fine. Yes. Go ahead."

May is sitting shoulder to shoulder with him. She doesn't ask her question immediately, instead fidgeting with Frank, who she has put on her lap as she had moved closer.

"Do you think--and, I, I know I sound like Simon when I say this, but do you think we can consider each other friends?"

He's distinctly aware of how she's a little tense, maybe even anxious. Maybe sheepish too, and she should be--this is stupid.

"Because--I want to be friends with you, Kass. I like being friend-ly with you, but I don't want to push any boundaries you aren't comfortable with because I got the wrong message."

This is what catches him off guard--it's May asking, not because she wants him to feel less lonely, or what have you, but because she doesn't want him to feel forced. It's... considerate. A strange kind of considerate.

"If you don't want to be friends, that's fine, Kass. I understand. I'm not going to try to drag you into, god, I don't know, I live a way less eventful life than the boys do." May hands him his PDA, and in the corner of his eye, Kass can see her mouth, a small line of uncertainty.

"You seem to have some idea in your fluffy little head that just because I’m here you’ve got a free licence to drag me into whatever irritating bollocks you and Cantaloupe Head are up to this week. Looks like you need a reminder that not everyone is down with your particular brand of Enid-Blyton-on-acid hijinks."

“In-no-possible-universe, are-we, or-are-ever-going-to-be, friends. Look in the mirror a few times, maybe it’ll sink in.”

Simon hadn't worn the little message Kass had written for very long--his friend had had plenty of experience getting grafitti off skin, and they had snapped to it right sharp. But the message seemed to have sunk in, to some level. Yes, Simon had been exceptionally apologetic lately, after the board game had deigned to spit Kass back out give or take (mostly take) a few decades.

Yet, there is still some level of space, however minute. Some wall the boy can not cross, because he, Kass, refuses to let someone else so certain about Kass's actions and abilities be proven right. It's spite, mostly. The harder the boy had pushed, the further into himself Kass had retreated, like an angry snapping turtle.

May doesn't push. Maybe she should, lord knows it would be easier for him to say "no" flatly and move forward from this.

She doesn't enter his personal space often, and she pulls back at the first sign of irritation. She--christ, the stupid bird is supportive and kind and all the things right in the world, no matter what argument she would make otherwise. And this, this thing wants to be friends with him. Him!

Kass doesn't remember the last time he had a genuine friend besides Frank. He has a feeling he'd be rather terrible at it.

"I'm not exactly.....proficient at the skill of being friends with people, you know. It has a tendency to go hand in hand with being nice."

"Yeah, I don't imagine it's your strongest area of expertise," she replies, looking at him from the corner of her eyes.

She wants this? She knows exactly the kind of person he is, all the awful things he's done to her friends, and she likes being near him?

Kass shakes his head in disbelief, and then, as though resigned, says simply, "Hell, if you want to consider me your friend, if that doesn't absolutely destroy your reputation in society, then I can't necessarily stop you."

He can feel her entire body relax, relieved. May is smiling crookedly, eyes crinkled up with real happiness. What a little weirdo, he thinks, and it's almost fondly.

The moment is ruined by a crackly old voice.

"This is very mature of you Trilby. I'm quite proud."

"Shut your trap, Frank."

The girl can't hide the small giggle that slips out behind her fingers that have covered her mouth. "I-If it makes you feel better," she says, in a little, still bubbly voice, "I'm not about to call you Trilby."

"I would actually, physically, get cigarette ash in your hair if you did," Kass grumbles, relaxing against the couch beside May.

"You monster."

"You chose this path literal seconds ago."

She huffs a little laugh that shakes her chest once, and then reaches out, retrieves her glass, and offers it to him. He accepts, downing its contents.

It's hard to tell if tonight is a success. On some level, Kass feels emotionally spent, and ready to sleep deeply. There's a part of him that has stored away the stories May has told him, to look into later. There's the awareness that she's not as infallible and patient as he had believed, and the sharper knowledge that Kass has let more of his skin show tonight than he would have really liked.

May is warm beside him. There's still pizza left over, for tomorrow, and a little Bailey's and some root beer left. He feels fairly worn out, however. He's ready for quiet.

"D'you," May asks quietly, "have any more questions for me?"

He hums, and then, halfheartedly, mutters.

"Favorite...... Marvel movie?"

He feels her laugh. It feels nice.

"Thor Ragnarok. Duh."

#birdy blogging #May Writes #Kass #Queenie #may loves teslaverse #im absolutely INCENSED by this thing #i didnt mean for it to get this long!!!!! at all!!!!#IM SO SORRY MOBILE USERS!!!!#I WEEP FOR YOU!!!!!#I REALLY DO

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jinjojess · 7 years ago

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Title: Arc Fandom: New Dangan Ronpa V3 Words: 2042 Characters: Momota, HaruMaki (friendship) Summary: Everyone makes mistakes sometimes. Note: Commission fic for @princeasmidiya12. Thanks so much! If you’re interested in a commission, please check out this post.

CLANG!

A metal fist easily weighing a few tons smashed into the grass, sending bits of dirt and rubble into the air in all directions.

Momota grit his teeth, wishing there had been even a single pair of sneakers in the closet of his room. Not that the slippers weren’t comfortable, but they really impeded accurate movement, a fact he had learned all too well while following Akamatsu through that dingy sewer.

God, that felt as though it had happened in another lifetime.

“Oops, missed again!” Monophanie’s tinny voice squeaked as another swipe from Exisal Pink sliced the air to Momota’s immediate left. Had it been even a few centimeters closer, it would have taken his arm right off.

Thankfully the Monokumarz’ AI was nowhere near the level of Kiibo’s–though, come to think of it, Momota had walked in on Kiibo in the canteen the day before to find him crying and frantically trying to wipe spilled oatmeal from the front of his chassis.

For not the first time, Momota reminded himself that none of the remaining survivors was really fit for this mission. Yumeno still complained that she yet to build up enough MP to be able to cast magic, Kiibo was far too mild-mannered to want to fight, Shuuichi was much better suited to taking charge in a cerebral sense, so far Shirogane hadn’t demonstrated any combat ability (it wasn’t like she could just dress the Exisal up to death or anything), and he’d die before he relied on Ouma. He’d figured Iruma might be able to help, but she’d completely snubbed him when he’d gone to the fourth floor computer room to ask about it.

Momota threw himself aside to dodge Exisal Red charging at him, feeling a coppery, acidic taste begin to build up in his throat.

There were still two people left who could and probably would make good allies in this fight, but unfortunately, he couldn’t bring himself to ask either of them.

If he’d brought Gonta on this mission, there was a chance it would end tragically. Gonta lately had been demonstrating a nigh-suicidal desire to protect the others, personal well-being be damned, and Momota just couldn’t have that. That was the entire reason he was here right now, facing down these stupid iron monkeys–he had to do this before Gonta did. Momota needed to convince him to be less reckless, and hopefully when he invited him to join the nightly training sessions this evening (after whatever it was Iruma wanted to show them), he would accept.

“Ahhhh! I’m gonna smash you like an overripe tangerine!”

Momota dropped to the ground just in time to feel the whoosh of air pass over him, followed by Monotarou cursing. The action caused a sharp pain in his gut that he knew would lead to a mouthful of blood later on. Hopefully he could hold it off until after this fight.

Anyway, Gonta was out of the question.

“I don’t understand why you’re always telling Harukawa-san not to fight,” Shuuichi’s voice said in his memory. “She’d be a great asset.”

No. No, there was no way.

For such a smart guy, Shuuichi really did have quite a ways to go in learning to read people. Momota smirked to himself, wondering yet again how this kid had managed to become a detective of all things. Surely he was well aware that the whole sidekick gig existed entirely to take the pressure off of him when it came to following in Akamatsu’s footsteps.

So why couldn’t he tell how important it was to keep HaruMaki from resorting to violence?

It wasn’t like Momota didn’t notice how she scowled and glared at him every time he told her that cute girls shouldn’t carry knives, or that women had no place in a fight, or any other comment he knew would result in a slap from his grandmother. HaruMaki was legendarily bad at reading people–all brawn and very little people skills–so it made sense that she’d take those comments at face value.

But Shuuichi? The detective who was routinely sniffing out lies at every trial? How could he possibly miss the lack of sincerity, the cheekiness behind Momota’s words? He should’ve been able to see through that ruse just as easily as Yumeno’s “magic”.

For a brief moment while jogging backwards around Exisal Pink, Momota worried that Shuuichi had become too dependant on him. Faith in your friends was important, certainly, but the lesson he was trying to instill didn’t exclude being able to read between the lines.

The whole point of encouraging HaruMaki like this was to make her see herself as more than just a killing machine. It was an attempt to give her back some of her humanity. To do that, he needed to make her feel like a woman first and an assassin…well, hopefully last, but–

“FUCK!”

White hot pain shot through his calf, sending Momota to his knees.

“Gotcha, you little dung beetle!”

Shit. Fuck. Shit. Fuck. Fuck.

He should have known better than to try this on his own. What the hell was he thinking?

Momota bit back a scream and reached down to touch the searing pain in his leg. His fingers came away covered in blood.

Goddammit. Here he was again, neck-deep in shit. He had hoped that the Monokumarz would get tired of fighting him after a while and wander away to do whatever it was they did in between annoying them, but it seemed he wasn’t that lucky.

This was a stupid idea, he admitted, struggling to crawl toward the front door of the school.

Way to be a goddamn hypocrite, Kaito, charging into this dangerous situation without backup. This is completely different than what you wanted to keep Gonta from doing. Good fucking job.

He could hear the Monokumarz laughing behind him; the sound put his teeth on edge.

If he died here, what would happen to the others? What would happen to Shuuichi? To Gonta? To–

“HaruMaki.”

“What are you doing?”

Momota struggled to grin and give her a thumbs up. “Just a bit of extra training. It’s important to spar. You know, to keep yourself on your toes.”

Harukawa’s expression remained neutral. She looked up at the celebrating Exisal on the lawn, then back down at Momota.

Without a word she turned back toward the front door.

“Hey, where’re you going?”

“…Why does it matter to you?” Beneath the icy tone, Momota could hear a tiny tremble in her voice. “I thought cute girls shouldn’t get mixed up in fights.”

“Heh, y-yeah, I did say that, didn’t I?”

Despite making as if she were about to head back inside, Harukawa didn’t move.

She’s waiting for me to ask for help, Momota thought. He sure as shit needed it, but he couldn’t ask for her assistance anymore than he could scream for Gonta. If HaruMaki was going to be saved from herself, she needed to be kept as far away as possible from acting violent.

A fresh stab of pain radiated from his calf, and he heard the hydraulics of the Exisal shift behind him. There wasn’t time now.

What would happen to HaruMaki if he died right here? Wouldn’t that just prove that his convictions were just as naive as she believed them to be? If he weren’t around, what was stopping her from fading back into the shadows and pushing everyone else away?

“HaruMaki,” he croaked, “I think I might need your help here.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah. Sometimes there’s these moments in a story where the hero has to sit a battle out, and that’s when one of his trusty sidekicks steps in to show off what they’ve learned.”

“…And what exactly have I learned?”

Classic HaruMaki. Momota’s face split into a genuine smile. “Friendship?”

Harukawa sighed before turning back around to face him.

“We need to talk after this.”

With the grace of a tiger, Harukawa sprang forward, taking off across the lawn toward the advancing Exisal. Momota saw her slip a knife out of the cuff of her sleeve, twirling it in her fingers once before strafing around both Exisal. Once behind them, she delivered a quick, sharp stab to the back of the knees, jamming one knife and then another into each of the leg joints.

Both Monokumarz wailed as their Exisal fell forward.

Harukawa jogged back up to where Momota was splayed out on the steps. She removed the ribbon from her uniform and tied it around Momota’s calf before taking one of his arms and helping him to his feet.

They had hobbled halfway to Momota’s room before either of them spoke.

“Hey, uh, HaruMaki?”

“What.”

“Thanks for that.”

“…What, no excuse about why you couldn’t just handle it yourself?”

Momota laughed. “Nah, just wanted to give props to good work when I see it.”

“Oh. Well, you’re welcome, I guess.”

They paused outside the door to Momota’s room; Harukawa let him go, so he grabbed the door frame to keep steady.

“Remind me again, why’d you become an assassin?”

A bright red flush spread across Harukawa’s cheeks.

“To keep my orphanage open,” she mumbled, looking toward the floor, “and because if I hadn’t gone, they’d have taken my best friend instead.”

Momota nodded.

Even heroes sometimes screw up, he told himself. Mistakes were part of life, and it was what you did with that information once you realized you had indeed fucked up that determined the kind of person you were. Besides, a story where the hero didn’t learn anything wasn’t a very good story.

“I’m sorry, HaruMaki,” he said softly.

Harukawa looked up, her expression surprised, but she said nothing.

“Looks like I forgot that really important point.”

Of course. Momota could see it now, the path HaruMaki could take–what she needed wasn’t to feel more like a normal woman, but like someone who had control. She had felt powerless most of her life, and violence was the only way she knew how to make a difference. It was the only oar she’d had to try and navigate the choppy rapids the universe had tossed her into; no wonder she was so stubborn in giving it up.

Rather than make her relinquish it entirely, he should’ve been finding constructive ways to channel it.

“It’s my fault,” Momota continued, “I should’ve realized that we’re similar.”

Harukawa smirked. “I don’t know about that.”

“I’m just saying I misjudged you. You’re not so much my sidekick and more like…my apprentice.”

“How is that in any way different?”

“Because,” Momota said, “it means that one day, you’ll surpass me and become the hero.”

Harukawa’s eyes narrowed, as if she were trying to physically see any evidence of Momota lying.

“You’re…you’re serious?”

“As a heart attack, HaruMaki.”

For the first time since he’d met her, the edges of Harukawa’s mouth began to quirk up.

Momota was about to laugh and compliment her smile when something hit him in the gut, knocking the wind out of him.

“Huh…?” he wheezed.

“That was for all that annoying nonsense about me being a weak girl unfit for combat.” Harukawa unfurled her fist and crossed her arms. “The next time you make a comment like that, expect another one.”

“Heh…you…got it…”

Momota offered a friendly smile, trying to ignore the metallic taste of blood on his tongue.

“Oh.” Harukawa’s smile dropped from her face. “Are you bleeding? I didn’t intend to hit you that hard.”

Momota quickly wiped the dribble from his chin with the back of his hand.

“Oh that, that’s uh…”

Should he tell her? They clearly had made a breakthrough here. He knew that any secret he shared with her would never be casually passed along.

“Nothing to worry about! I just bit the inside of my mouth while out there dancing with the Exisal.”

Harukawa lifted a single, skeptical eyebrow, but didn’t press any further.

“Right. Well, stay off your leg for now and let me or Saihara know if you need anything, got it?”

Momota answered with a thumbs up.

It’s fine, he thought, watching Harukawa descend the staircase to the first floor of the dorm. A hero doesn’t need to finish his arc all in one go.

#jess writes #commission #ndrv3 #v3 #princeasmidiya12 #momota kaito #harukawa maki #harumaki

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