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lunasfics · 1 year ago

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Found Family

summary: In which Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent engage in a custody battle over a clone created from both their DNA, or, in which you get saved from a lab and gain two new families who would move mountains for you.

pairing: Bat Family x f! Reader, Supers x f! Reader

word count: 8.2k

preview

a/n: hello! IT'S FINALLY OUT WOOHOO, it's a bit long but i had a lot of fun writing it. certain characters may be a bit ooc so i do apologize as i'm still getting my footing on how to characterize certain people. let me know what you think! constructive criticism is always welcome and appreciated (just pls don't be mean lol)! i left a somewhat open-ish ending because i wanna make this into a series/universe, and will start taking requests for drabbles in this universe, depending on how this is received! - luna :)

reblogs are appreciated!

“I’m in. Robin, what’s your status?” Bruce spoke into the earpiece, swiftly moving through the shadows of the lab. It was a simple mission: get into the lab Lex Luthor had created under Gotham City, collect intel needed to take down said lab, and leave. Unfortunately, it’s never really that simple, is it?

“I’m in, making my way through the west wing, cover is still intact,” Damian muttered back.

“Good. Nightwing?”

“Just entered the center lab, heading down to the bottom level now, haven't been spotted,” Dick said, making his way down the steps, careful to remain silent.

“Good. Remember the objective. In and Out.” Bruce muttered as he continued, searching for the locked file cabinet he was looking for.

“Files located. Ready for extraction” Damian said quietly through the intercom.

“I’ve made it to the bottom level. Requesting immediate backup, there's something here you guys need to see” Dick’s voice echoed through the earpiece, “They’ve made another clone.”

Bruce stopped what he was doing, silently making his way down the hall towards the staircase Dick took around a half hour before, “I'm on my way. Damian?”

“Heading there now. Files are downloaded.”

Upon arriving at the lower level, Dick bypasses security to let them in, making sure to reactivate the lock behind them, “Look.”

He gestured to the incubation tube not far from them, inside of it stood a young woman, who looked no older than 20, wearing a black skin-tight suit, a familiar “S” symbol adorning her chest, only it was the center of another symbol, the bat symbol, with bat ears at the top and bat wings on either side of it, a dark burgundy color with gold lining along the edges. The plaque below the tube read:

Attempt 1: G6B24

Specimen 1: Superman (Identity: Unknown)

Specimen 2: Batman (Identity: Unknown)

Status: Failed - Shows excessive signs of emotional intelligence (unfit for purpose), Subject is not invulnerable, Lacks thermal vision

‘Emotional Intelligence’ you must have shown hesitation, a moral compass.

“Father… what are we going to do?” Damian asked, he was at a loss, part of him felt slightly threatened, if you were taken in, he would no longer be the only child related to Bruce by DNA, and you were older, stronger— perhaps you would take his place, the place he’d finally felt he truly belonged; however he remained silent, his past self likely would have attempted to argue against your rescue, but he’d grown, he knew deep down you deserved a chance at this life just as much as he did.

Bruce looked up at your unconscious figure, at a loss for words, you were his daughter, intentional or not, there was a part of him in you, he only hoped that part wouldn't screw you over for life. As surprised as he was, he had an obligation to you the same way he did with Dick, Jason, Tim, Cass, Steph, Barbara, Duke, Damian, and every other vigilante he had taken under his wing.

His Batman instincts kicked in very quickly though, immediately refocusing himself, reading through the files, in an attempt to prepare himself for any possible scenario, he turned to Dick.

“Find all the DNA samples they have belonging to both me and Superman, we’re taking them,” he said, making sure to not hyper-focus on the thoughts flooding his mind.

“We’re not just leaving her here, are we? The plaque says ‘failed’. Who knows what could happen to her?” Dick said, he was frustrated.

Conner had gotten a chance to build a life for himself. You deserved one too, the mere thought of Bruce wanting to leave you there angered him.

“She’s coming with us. Damian, watch the door, Dick, find the samples," Bruce said gruffly, moving to the tube, bypassing the database to open it, without setting off any system safeguards. He reached into his utility belt and pulled out his shard of kryptonite, just in case it was needed to neutralize you.

The tube opened slowly, a swoosh sound filling the air as the cold fog escaped the tube, spilling into the air, your eyes fluttering open as you looked around, your eyes focusing on him.

You flew at him, full speed, pushing him against the wall with a thud, knocking the wind out of him, your eyes boring into his, glowing red, just as you were about to terminate him with your heat vision, he uttered the safe word he had seen in your file.

“Blue Pineapple” he grunted out, the red in your eyes fading away instantly, as you stared at him with wide eyes. You backed away slowly, lowering yourself to the floor. Your eyes fixed on him once again.

You recognized him from your programming, the man whose combat skills were engraved into your mind.

“Batman?”

Dick and Damian rushed over, making sure Bruce was okay. He was fine.

Dick turned to you, holding out his hand, “Come with me. We need to get you out of here, you aren’t safe here.”

You stared at him, your eyes narrowing, “Why should I trust you?”

Dick sighed, Those damn Wayne genetics, he kept his hand extended to you, “Because we’re helping you escape, if you come with us, you can meet Superman, be a hero just like him and Batman, you could actually see the world” he promised.

"I know what the world looks like." you stated bluntly.

He sighed, his hand not wavering, "But have you ever experienced it? Let us show you what that's like. You can have a life."

You thought for a moment, before letting out a small grunt, nodding at him and taking his hand, allowing them to lead you out of the lab grounds seemingly undetected.

When you stepped out, you stopped, eyes completely transfixed on the brilliant night sky. Blends of blues and purples and grays danced together to make the beautiful endless abyss above you. You knew every color there was. You knew everything, but at the same time you really didn't. You stared up at the stars, you knew how they came to be, you knew every scientific explanation there was yet seeing them… it made you feel a way you couldn’t explain.

They led you to the batmobile, situating you in the back seat with Damian, starting the drive to the Batcave. Bruce dialed Clark’s number into the keypad, it rang twice before he picked up.

“Hello?”

“Meet me in the Batcave. It’s urgent. Bring Conner.”

“What’s going o-”

He hung up.

Dick covered his mouth to hide his snicker, “So, Bruce, you and Clark have an official love child now, right? What will Lois think?” he feigned concern, placing the back of his hand over his forehead, committing to the drama, “Oh, how scandalous, I mean really, the shame! I can already see the headlines ‘Billionaire playboy Bruce Wayne turned common whore after breaking up happy metropolis family’”

Damian covered his laugh with a cough.

You looked at the three of them, utterly confused, still processing what was going on.

Bruce huffed, shooting them both a glare, “Dick, be mature.”

Dick smiled, “I can't help myself, just wait til Jason finds out.” He smiled in excitement, as they pulled into the side entrance of the Batcave.

Bruce let out a deep, tired sigh.

Clark sat in silence in the Batcave, Conner standing to his left, his eyes wide as he stared at you, possessing some features belonging to both he and Bruce, and other features that seemed to be entirely your own.

You stared back, that same stoic nature radiating off of you that radiates off the Batman, however, he noted the defensive look in your eyes, one so similar to the one he saw in Conner when he first met him. He eyed your suit, noting the familiar “S” symbol, only it was a burgundy color, a rather interesting combination of the Batman and Superman emblems, and he was utterly confused.

He looked over at Bruce, still in his bat suit, his cowl pulled off, “Bruce, what the hell is going on?”

“I had to call you here because Luthor decided to create another clone. I did the DNA test, Clark, she’s a combination of both our DNA” Bruce looked at him, Dick and Damian standing to his right. It was silent for a moment, you felt like a guinea pig, the way they all stared at you. It made you angry.

Conner was the first to speak, stepping forward before opening his mouth, choosing his words carefully, “What’s your name?”

You responded immediately, it felt automatic. “Experiment attempt number one. Code G6B24. I was made to be the future killer of the Batman and the Kriptonian.”

He nodded slowly, “I’m a clone too, and Clark took me in— well, he took me in eventually— that’s besides the point. He showed me how to become my own person, we can help you do that too.”

You looked at him, eyes softening ever so slightly, but you kept your guard up like your Batman programming taught you to. “I was made to be a killer, if I don’t do what I was made to do, what am I worth?” you said quietly, voice unwavering.

Damian watched you, your words striking him in a way he hadn't expected them to, he understood what you were saying all too well.

Bruce decided to speak up next, “You were created, it’s not your fault what their intentions were when they did so. What you become from here on out is your choice.”

You stayed silent, eyes darting around the room��What is this feeling? Vulnerability? You knew it by definition, like you did most other feelings, but feeling them… it was different.

Dick noted the way you seemed overwhelmed, he approached you slowly, pulling up two chairs, motioning for you to sit, you chose to remain standing until he sat down first.

“You know, we trust you, we want to figure out a way for you to become the best you can be. On your terms” he said, offering you a small smile.

You looked around, the others nodded in agreement, “I was made to be only the best parts of you” you said, your gaze focusing on Clark and Bruce, they both put their best qualities forward to help others, how could you use those same qualities to destroy that?

“I… don’t want to be a killer. They said I was too… human. I thought I’d failed them.”

Damian decided to step forward, “You didn’t fail anyone, you are meant for greater things. You haven't killed anyone, you can choose your path. If the path you choose is the Robin mantle... I am willing to work with that.”

At this, the other men in the room turned to look at him, Clark and Conner were slack-jawed, this was the same kid who fought Tim tooth and nail over this mantle. The same mantle he was just… willing to give you?

Meanwhile Dick had a proud smile on his face, you thought you saw a small tear in his eye.

Bruce’s face seemed unreadable, however, you took notice of the way the corners of his lips turned up for a split second. before reverting back to their natural state.

You weren’t sure what to say, again, you knew what this mantle was, by definition. The reality was you had no sense of what it meant, the weight it carried. And you knew that.

“Thank you, but I feel like that title isn’t mine to take. I think I need to… become something that's true to who I am, whatever that may be.”

Bruce looked at you, the corner of his lip barely twitching up into a smile, a smile so subtle that only someone of your… background would notice, an attempt of his towards getting you more comfortable, “We should start with a name.”

You looked at Conner, he gave you an encouraging smile.

“Like I chose Conner, so now I’m Conner Kent,” he said with a small shrug, “You can choose whatever you want.”

“I see,” you thought for a moment, “I like Y/n.”

Clark smiled, standing up and clapping his hands together, “Great! Y/n Kent, has a nice ring to it.”

“Wayne.”

He turned towards Bruce, eyes narrowing slightly, “Kent.”

“Wayne.”

This time Conner spoke, “Kent.”

The three men stared at each other, arms crossed mirroring each-other’s glares.

Dick cut in, “How about Grayson?”

“No.” came their simultaneous response.

Dick frowned, slumping in the seat next to yours, “Jeez.”

Damian spoke next, “I suppose Al Ghul is off the table…”

Dick snorted, breaking out into a fit of laughter, you grinned softly at the sounds of his laughter, it reminded you of a windshield wiper.

Conner sighed, “Fine, what about Wayne-Kent?”

Bruce huffed, “I suppose.”

Clark nodded, the smile returning to his face as he turned to you, “Y/n Wayne-Kent”

You nodded, “I like it.”

Dick could help but laugh from beside you, “It's like I'm watching reality tv. Love me some baby mama drama.”

Clark opened his mouth to speak and closed it, before sighing and looking at Bruce, who just pinched the bridge of his nose.

Conner chuckled at the sight, turning to Damian, who’s lip quirked up in amusement.

Bruce looked up, his attention directed towards you, “Y/n, you can stay here for the night, I’ve asked Alfred to set up a room for you. Clark, Conner, come by tomorrow with Lois and Jon, I’ve called the others to come by as well, we’ll get everything situated tomorrow. For now, get some rest.”

Everyone nodded, Clark and Conner heading to the exit of the cave, Damian, Dick and Bruce leading you to the room that was prepared for you.

Dick brought you a sweater and some sweatpants to change into, closing the door with a soft, “Goodnight, kiddo.”

You changed in silence, slowly getting under the covers and drifting off to sleep, marking the start of your new life. Tomorrow would be an interesting day.

You woke up the next morning, to a soft knock on the door, your super hearing picking it up better than you would have liked. You opened the door, revealing an older man you hadn’t seen before. He smiled softly, giving you an instantaneous sense of comfort you couldn’t explain.

“Hello Miss Y/n. My name is Alfred, I am the butler,” he greeted you, handing you a folded set of clothes, “Master Kent chose these for you, however if they are not to your liking, do let me know.”

“They’re fine…Thank you.”

He smiled warmly, the kind old man giving you a nod, “Once you've changed, do come down, I’ve prepared breakfast. The other members of the family will arrive soon to meet you.”

You gave him a short nod, he smiled again, your demeanor reminding him of the young Bruce he’d looked after all those years ago. He shut your door softly before retreating down the staircase, leaving you in your room to change.

You picked up the small note that rested at the top of the pile, reading it over.

Comfortable, Practical, and cool. Hope you like it. - Conner

You looked down at the neatly folded clothes, unfolding a black long sleeve turtleneck shirt, the material was thick but breathable, you slipped it on with ease, the foreign material soft against your skin, you appreciated that it didn’t suffocate you.

You reached for the pants next, dark gray cargo pants, these were thicker, and the had an overwhelming amount of pockets. You slipped them on before slipping on the boots that were at the bottom of the stack and exiting the room, going down the staircase.

Upon entering the dining room, you were met with Bruce sitting at the head of the table, reading the paper calmly eating his pancakes, to his right sat Dick chatting excitedly to the boy next to him, who smiled at him as he listened, he was a slender boy with black hair who looked a bit younger than Dick. Then there was Alred, calmly enjoying his breakfast. Finally there was Damian on the other side of Bruce, leaving an empty seat between Damian and Alred. You sat down, the pale boy noticing you first.

Bruce looked up, “Tim, this is Y/n.”

“Hello.” You sat up awkwardly. One thing you never learned was how to navigate social interactions.

He studied you for a moment, offering you a small smile, “I’m Tim.”

You gave a nod, returning his smile with a smaller one of your own.

“She knows, by the way.” Dick chimed in.

His eyes widened, was that why you were there?

“How?”

All eyes are on you. You opened your mouth to speak but Damian spoke first.

“She’s a clone. Father will explain everything when everyone else arrives so as to not waste time, until then, hold on to your childish curiosity. I’d like to enjoy my breakfast.”

Dick nodded, “She was literally made for this shit.”

“Watch your language Master Dick, it is deplorable to speak in such a way at the table, much less in the presence of a lady.”

Dick blushed, “Sorry Alfred.”

Bruce simply gave a nod.

Tim slumped back in his seat, wanting to ask you questions about your abilities, your earliest memories, who were you a clone of, how your programming worked, the boy was itching to know it all.

Breakfast passed by relatively quickly after that, you weren’t bombarded with questions, much to your relief. Alfred kindly asked you how you slept to which you replied that you slept well. The sound of casual conversation and glassware scraping together filling the room. You enjoyed observing the atmosphere.

Clark and Conner were the first to arrive at the manor, greeting you happily, with them was a woman and a younger boy, who immediately went to sit by Damian.

Clark brought them over to you, the woman smiled warmly at you. It made you feel safe.

She held your hand in hers, “My name is Lois,” her voice was kind, genuine. You noted how she carried herself. Strong, secure, honest.

Clark was quick to bring Jon over, excited to introduce him, “This is my son, Jon.”

“Hi!” he beamed at you, you smiled, he was cute. Cheerful as he smiled brightly at you.

“Hello, my name is Y/n.” you greeted the two, who smiled at you.

Conner was the next to approach, “Did you like the clothes? I picked them out cause it was all I used to wear, but who knows, you may want something more… fashionable.”

You smiled softly, “They're nice, thank you.”

“On that note actually,” Clark said, “I was thinking we can take you shopping later, Bruce and I can pay.”

Bruce deadpanned, “That’s a joke, right?”

He smiled, “Of course, you’re paying for everything.”

“Sounds about right.”

Chatter filled the room not long after, Jon and Damian catching up on the couch while Conner and Tim started a conversation of their own.

The next people to arrive were three young women, blonde, brunette, and red hair. They had arrived together.

The blonde spoke first, “Why'd you call us here Bruce? We had planned for brunch.” She bitterly narrowed her eyes at him, the brunette behind her giving a short nod of agreement.

Bruce sighed, “We’re waiting on Jason. He’s late.”

“As always.” The redhead said with a sigh, though you could see she wasn't actually upset.

The blonde girl turned to you first smiling, “I’m Stephanie, but call me Steph. I’m assuming you’ll be joining our vigilante posse.” She seemed funny, and kind, like she truly cared for those around her.

“Somewhat, I don’t really know. I’m Y/n.” You said bluntly.

“Pretty name.” She smiled, gesturing to the red haired woman behind her, “This is Barbara, but she's really just Babs.” She then gestured to the brunette, “That’s Cass. She’s lovely.”

You looked at them and nodded, “It’s nice to meet you.”

Barbara smiled warmly at you, “You too, I’m so glad there’ll be another girl around, we can always use more company.” She smiled at you so kindly, despite having only just met you. Her voice was sweet, like honey.

Cass smiled softly at you, “Come to brunch with us later. Or, lunch, now since Jason is holding us up.”

You nodded your lip quirking up into a small smile, “I’d enjoy that.”

Truthfully, you didn't know what the fuck brunch was. But she said lunch and that you knew. You'd find out about brunch later.

Then, as if on cue, the man in question arrived, walking through the door, slipping off his brown jacket and tossing it on the couch. He was tall, with a stocky frame, jet black hair with a white streak on the front.

“This better be good.”

Tim mumbled, “Finally”

“Miss me Timmy?”

“Quite the contrary.”

The one called Jason laughed before giving him a small nudge, to which Tim swatted his hand away.

His eyes fixed on you, then on Bruce.

“Dude, seriously? Another one? You have a problem man. You’d think you would’ve stopped after me.”

Bruce stood up, “Jason, sit down. Now that you’re all here I wanted to introduce you to Y/n. She’s a clone, made from both mine, and Clark’s DNA.”

“Holy shit, man.”

“Jason, will you shut up?”

“Never.”

“As I was saying, she’ll be here in the manor for the time being, I’ll be training her and assessing her combat technique.”

“Hold on,” Clark interjected, “She should come with us, she needs to get the hang of her powers.”

“Clark, I have a state of the art training area in the cave.”

“So? We’re supers, all we need is an open field.”

“We need to assess her combat skills, and also assess the extent of her powers. She isn’t invulnerable. We need to prioritize getting to the bottom of that.”

Clark huffed but nodded, understanding the full extent of your abilities was vital in actually training you.

“It’s like I’m watching a custody battle.” muttered Steph, Barbara laughing quietly beside her.

“Wait- So Y/n is basically if you and Clark had a baby?” Tim gawked at them, his eyes shifting from Bruce to Clark, to you. When his eyes landed on you, he fired questions like he was on a time limit.

“How do Bruce’s genetics affect your abilities? Are you immune to kryptonite and invulnerable? How does your thermal vision work? Enhanced strength? Can you fly? Can you fly as fast as Superman? Do you have combat training? How do y-”

Conner smacked a hand over his mouth, leading him back to his seat, “Lets try not to overwhelm her with the questions.” He chuckled.

Tim nodded, looking up at you, “Sorry, Y/n.”

“That’s okay. To answer your questions, his genetics don’t necessarily have a huge impact on any of my abilities, I was created with every available video of Batman fighting embedded into my mind, and the combat skills were engraved in my memory, I should be able to replicate his fighting style to a tee. I’m not invulnerable, but in theory, the stealth I was programmed with allows me to stay agile enough that I shouldn’t often get hurt. I don't have thermal vision, but I do have laser vision, enhanced strength, and flight, although I haven’t tested how fast I actually can fly. And like I said, my combat training is essentially the combat footage uploaded into my mind.”

Tim had nodded, eyes trained on yours in complete interest as you answered each question, occasionally jotting something down on the notes app of his phone.

Lois narrowed her eyes slightly at both Bruce and Clark, “I do hope you’re factoring in giving her the opportunity to build an actual social life. Maybe get her enrolled in school.”

“She has doctorate-level information on several different topics stored into her mind, as well as fluency in 8 languages. I think she’ll be fine, Lois,” Bruce replied.

She rolled her eyes, “Okay, so school’s not necessary, what about building a social life for herself? That’s important.”

“There’s Young Justice,” Conner said, “I figured she’d join.”

Tim nodded in agreement, “I can help her get situated.”

“Where will I stay?” you asked, you didn’t particularly enjoy how they were all discussing you as if you weren't there, but there honestly wasn’t much you could do.

“You can stay at the manor, or you can stay with the team, but it'd be best if you lived here in the Manor.” Bruce replied.

“Why isn’t Metropolis an option?” Clark muttered.

“Because it’s more practical to have her here in Gotham, living with Tim will make it easier to adjust to the team.”

“I want time with her, Bruce.”

“You’ll get it. We’ll have her assessed, then three times a week she’ll train and get a hold of her powers with you.”

Clark nodded, satisfied with that answer.

Lois spoke again, turning to you, “Y/n, how does that sound to you?”

You blinked. “It sounds fine. My super hearing allows me to hear every conversation proficiently.”

She chuckled softly, “It’s a figure of speech sweetheart, I meant if you’re okay with everything that was said, you’ve been a bit quiet.”

You felt your face grow hot, “Oh. Yeah, I’m okay with it.”

Clark gave you a fond smile.

Bruce looked at you and smiled softly, a barely noticeable one, but a smile nonetheless.

The bulk of the conversation was over. The people in the room falling into easy conversation with one another, you look around, not sure what to do. That is until Jason approaches you, a kind smile on his face.

“Hey Y/n, I’m Jason, I’ll be honest, you probably won't see me too often cause I can barely stand being around Bruce, but… if he’s ever a dick, call me and I’ll either punch him for you and take you somewhere he’s not.” he grinned, “Or both.”

You laughed softly, “I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.”

He nodded, “I’ll be raiding the kitchen, but if anyone asks, I left.” He shoots you a grin before slipping away.

It’s not long after that when Jon approaches you, Damian by his side, he shoots you a toothy grin, “So, you’re like, my sister now, right?”

You’re not sure how to respond, but you feel a puddle of warmth pooling in your heart, it’s nice. You smile at him softly, “I suppose so.”

He grins, “And that would also make you Damian’s sister. right?”

“I suppose so.”

“See Damian, we’re blood brothers by extension.”

“Jon, that is the most imbecilic logic I’ve ever encountered. Just because Y/n is both my blood and yours doesn’t mean–”

“Blood brothers!” He had shouted cheerfully, before walking away and over to Lois to inform her of the good news.

Damian sighed, though you took notice of the soft smile that flashed across his face, you concluded that he cared for him.

A lot of people in this family– Bruce’s family specifically, tend to hide affection, despite the fact that it is apparent to you that they feel it. You decide not to focus on it, people are complicated.

You chat a bit with various people in the room, Lois telling you that you’re always welcome to visit whenever you’d like, Barbara talking to you about how her work as Oracle, Steph telling you all about the other vigilantes you’ll probably end up crossing paths with. Tim and Conner sat by you, telling you all about the team and the people you’ll meet once all your training is done.

Slowly, people start to leave, you saw Jason slip out the front door first, sending you a wink. Dick left not long after, needing to return to his responsibilities in Bludhaven, making sure to tell you you’re always welcome to visit him over there. Then Clark left with Lois, Jon, and Conner, leaving the residents of the manor plus, Cass, Steph and Barbara.

Damian and Tim had retreated to their rooms, while Alfred busied himself with household chores, Bruce stood up, approaching you before saying, “Did you still want to go shopping? You’ll need training clothes.”

You nodded, “Yes, please.”

Steph perked up, rushing towards the two of you, “Oh, we have to come.”

“Steph, you go shopping every week. With my card.”

Barbara chimed in, “It’s not about that Bruce, you have a terrible fashion sense. We can’t let you impose that onto Y/n.”

Cass nodded in agreement.

“We’re just buying training clothes.”

“She can’t wear training clothes in her daily life,” Steph rolled her eyes, “She needs a wardrobe.”

You smiled, “I would like a wardrobe.”

“See?”

Bruce sighed but nodded, “Let's go then.”

Steph cheered while Barbara and Cass high-fived behind her, it was an amusing site.

When you arrived at the mall, Steph immediately linked arms with you, dragging you around to her favorite stores, paying no mind to your super strength potentially being able to accidentally break her arm. It caught you off guard, not only the physical display of affection, but the trust.

Again, you felt that soft puddle of warmth pool in your chest. You could get used to that.

You had gotten to know Barbara and Cass fairly well during the trip as well, Barbara was sweet, she and Steph made you laugh more than you thought you could. Cass and you got along well too, she picked out the clothes you liked the most, always nodding in approval when you would try anything on, a soft smile on her face. The three of them opened their group up to you so quickly, it had surprised you, you felt that with their company you were better able to navigate finding yourself.

The four of you hadn’t paid much mind to Bruce trailing behind you as you went from store to store, not that he minded. He held a fond smile as he observed the four of you giggling, talking, and having a good time.

He knew his focus on training was important, but he also knew Lois was right (not that he’d admit that to anyone), you needed a social life too. And he knew your heightened emotional intelligence would surely allow you to obtain that, you just needed to blossom, and allow yourself to break free of the restraints you put on yourself.

He’d lost count of how many times he had swiped his card that day, at some point he had decided to just start waiting by the front, once you guys were ready, he’d walk over, swipe his card, and you guys would move on to the next shop. He wouldn't say this to anyone, but he enjoyed doing things like this, taking care of the people he cares about.

The last store you had gone to was WayneTech, it was Bruce’s idea. You needed a phone in order to keep everyone’s contacts. So they brought you there where you got the latest model of their cell phone line, it was sleek and thin. You picked out a case and you got a screen protector. Bruce had told you that once you got to the Batcave he’d input league contacts, safety features, as well as league-level security settings.

By the end of the trip it was early in the evening, Bruce had his arms absolutely filled with shopping bags, and what he couldn’t carry was carried by you and Steph. The five of you stepped out into the parking lot, the sun setting, casting a deep orange hue on the parking lot. You took in the image in front of you, you didn’t know suns could set so beautifully.

The ride home was nice, the car was filled with the soft chatter of the four of you, Bruce didn’t feel the need to listen in. The soft music playing on the stereo as a background was a nice addition to the atmosphere.

When you’d arrived at the manor, the girls had bid you goodbye, but not before making sure they had your number to add you to their group chat. You were warned by Steph that Cass’s meme game could not be beat. You were slightly confused but nodded, a happy smile on your face. They each gave you a hug before getting in their cars and heading off.

The walk into the manor was silent, but not awkward, mainly the two of you taking armfuls of bags up to your room.

As he shut the door, Bruce turned to you, “It’s not too late, if you want, we could start out on some training.”

You nodded, going into your room to change, “I’ll be down there in a bit.”

He nodded, walking away to change as well.

You entered the Batcave shortly after, comfortable in your black sweatpants, and a black long sleeve athletic shirt. Now, having a better opportunity to take it all in, it was massive. You looked to your left to see Damian sparring with Tim in one of the further training areas. You walked over to Bruce, he gave you a small smile, leading you to the second training area by Tim and Damian, who by now had stopped sparring, in favor of observing your skill.

“You can replicate my fighting style to a tee, right?”

You nodded.

“Let’s see it.”

You charged first, making sure to suppress your strength, your movements swift and calculated, landing a fast right kick to his abdomen. He sidestepped, landing a swift punch to your side. You kept attempting attacks on eachother, each one dodging the other flawlessly.

Tim and Damian watched in awe as the two of you gracefully moved, as if you were dancing. This went on for several minutes, until you attempted a fast left kick to his side, which he caught, using as leverage to flip you over on your back.

Your limbs ached, you looked up at him, “How did you do that?”

He held a hand out to help you up, “I’m not as fast with my left kicks as I am with my right ones. My weaknesses are your weaknesses.”

You nodded. Made sense.

“You have good technique, and you replicate my fighting perfectly, but that’s all it is. A replication. You need to make it your own. Adapt it in accordance with your abilities, you can’t do that now because Clark hasn’t trained you, but in time you will.”

You nodded, your chest swelling with pride at his compliment, you knew after your training with Clark you would be able to better adjust your fighting style.

Damian walked over to you, “Y/n. I’d like to spar, you’ve proven to be a worthy opponent.”

You nodded, it would be good to spar with someone with a different fighting style. Tim sat down to the side, perfectly content with just observing for now, like earlier, he occasionally jotted down some notes on his phone. You decided you didn’t mind it. It was endearing.

This time, Damian charged first, landing a swift right kick to your ribs, you turned and landed a hard kick to his chest, sending him back, before he flipped and caught himself, running towards you again. His smaller frame provided him with an advantage as he jumped onto your shoulders, before he could land his blow, you flipped your body, sending him to the floor, landing on his back with a thud. You crouched over him, extending your hand.

“You okay?”

“Fine.” he took your hand, getting up to his feet, you gave him a soft smile, which he returned, giving you a nod of approval. He, like Bruce, didn’t often use his words, but you were able to discern their intentions just fine.

Bruce then led you to a machine he had in the cave, where it analyzed your genetics in comparison to Clark’s, he had determined you were missing the genetic composition that happened to be the main source of invulnerability, therefore the reason you were the way you were. You are unfortunately still weak when exposed to kryptonite.

You were tired by the end of the night. You felt you had bonded with Damian, he had asked you to spar with him another time, to which you agreed.

The next day, Bruce had sent you over to Smallville, where Clark had decided on training you, ‘A good old fashioned open field’ were his exact words.

He made sure to send you wearing your original suit, not knowing how fast you would be flying, just in case, only you didn’t like it, so you opted to wear some sweats over the suit.

And there you were, floating about 300 feet in the air with him, as he explained the basics of flying.

“You want to create your own leverage, using your flight, you should be able to do this.” He bent one leg, tilting to the right as he effortlessly glided in that direction, he repeated the action only now going in the opposite direction.

You nodded, imitating his movements, gliding from side to side before stopping and looking at him. He smiled brightly at you, “You’re doing great, kid. There was never a point where you didn’t have powers, so this should be easy. Now, we’ll test your speed.”

You nodded, “How are we doing that?”

He pulled out a stopwatch, “I’m going to wait here while you fly to Gotham and back. You know the route?”

You nodded.

“Okay… and…. Go!”

You immediately shot forward, a slightly bumpy start but your body adapted immediately, you felt the wind whip through your hair, and a smile spread across your face as you made a U-turn around Gotham, making it back to Clark in seconds.

“2.6 seconds. That’s good.” He smiled at you.

You went on like that for the next few hours, him giving you encouraging words of advice, and you gained better control over your abilities, him providing you with tips he learned over the years. For that last hour, Jon and Conner joined the two of you, the four of you eventually just playing air tag until Martha and Lois called you in for dinner.

They insisted you stay for dinner, and you had no mind to refuse, spending time with them was nice. Jon insisted he sat next to you at dinner, excitedly talking your ear off about whatever he’d gotten to that day, and sharing his favorite stories about Damian with you. He acts like he doesn't like people, but he’s got a soft spot for a lot of us, were his exact words. You honestly completely agreed, you smiled at him as he continued talking.

That day you’d gotten to know Martha and Jonanthan Kent, who insisted you called them Ma and Pa. They instantly coddled you as if they’d known you since birth, though, in a way, that is technically the case.

They didn't let you leave empty handed, sending you off with tupper-ware filled with leftovers, cookies and pie. You thanked them for their hospitality and headed back to the manor.

The next few months were mainly doing morning and evening training with Bruce, occasionally Dick would stop by to train with you, always telling you he was proud of your improvement, which never failed to make you glow just a little brighter with pride. He’d begun a tradition where he would treat you to a burger after training, or whatever it was you were craving. He said that it was his goal to get you to try every fast food joint in Gotham, deciding that it was just an essential part of living there. You quickly decided you hated fast food, but never said anything because that wasn’t at all what mattered to you, what mattered to you was the bond you were creating with your older brother.

Your relationship with Bruce wasn’t perfect. There were times you saw how focused he was on his mission, neglecting the feelings of those around him, he could be an asshole. And with you still navigating your emotions, you’d get angry and yell, and so would he. If you saw him brushing off Damian, or Tim, one look at the crestfallen expressions on their faces was enough to get you angry. You shouldn’t have been surprised, truthfully, you weren’t. You were too similar. You were just fortunate enough to be surrounded by people early on who could convince you to let them in.

Regardless of the imperfections between you and Bruce, you knew he cared. He always showed it with the small smile he’d give you as he held up two tickets to the movie you had wanted to see. Or in the way he’d lure everyone into the living room with snacks for a movie night. Or how he’d try his best to always express to you that you were doing well. That you were enough, and that you deserved to be there.

You’d grown closer with Tim, too, always willing to help him with his assignments (not that he often needed it, but on the rare occasions his sleep deprived self couldn’t wrap his head around a problem). You’d often go to him when you needed help figuring something out on your phone, to which he would offer a simple solution you hadn’t seen before.

Tim was kind, he showed he cared for you by fixing things, when you cracked your screen protector by accidentally tapping it too hard, he made you a new one that could withstand the force of a bullet. He learned to confide in you over time, telling you about Bernard, expressing his worries to you about whether or not he’s good enough. You’d always tell him he was more than good enough.

Damian had taken to calling you ‘sister’, often challenging and teasing you when he could, you’d developed a relationship where he’d go to you for company. You’d sit in the garden and take in the life around you, while he sat a few feet away and drew it.

Once, he drew you while you weren’t looking, when he finished, he handed it to you without a word and walked away. In the bottom right corner you read ‘Y/n Wayne-Kent’ in neat handwriting, just below that, ‘sister’. That was the first time he’d used that word for you. Your heart swelled.

You continued seeing Steph, Barbara, and Cass, regularly having lunch with them and talking with them on the phone. Barbara, or as you now called her, Babs, was always there to guide you when you needed it, she’d often send you small gifts from time to time, like jewelry that reminded her of you.

Cass and you would often find the most peaceful company in each other. She would listen to you talk about all the things you'd been learning, telling you about her own experience adjusting to a new life.

Steph and you bonded over poorly written hallmark movies, she always giggled madly when you would point out plot inconsistencies, wearing the most confused expression she had ever seen on a person, you didn’t understand why at first, you would just state facts, but you always enjoyed the time with her. She always says you guys should start a podcast, and you always agree. You hope she never asks you what a podcast is... because you genuinely didn't know.

True to his word, you didn’t see Jason often, but there were a few instances where you felt particularly suffocated by Bruce’s training that you took him up on his offer to take you somewhere he wasn’t. Those moments were... nice. Every time, he would bring food, and take you to his apartment, where you talked about books and he introduced you to some of his favorite movies. You didn’t know why he and Bruce didn’t get along, but you chose not to pry.

Alfred had taken a liking to you instantly, he enjoyed giving you etiquette lessons, and would bake all kinds of scones and cookies for you to try. His humor was at times very dry and sarcastic, which never failed to make you laugh. He taught you how to bake once, finding you were exceptionally good at it, ‘Miss Y/n, I think we’ve found your natural talent’. You hadn’t expected to be good at it, but Alfred said you were phenomenal.

You’d also train with Clark 3 times a week, getting even closer with the Kents, integrating yourself in both families. It was interesting being part of two very different families. But you wouldn’t have it any other way.

Clark had shown you a lot about your powers, but it was never just training. It had become a necessity for the two of you to fly to some famous landmark and have lunch together, before flying back to Smallville for more training.

Clark was constantly trying his best for you, he still had his regrets from his initial relationship with Conner, and although he was forgiven and their relationship was rebuilt, he knew he lost time. And he absolutely refused to repeat that and hurt someone else who didn’t deserve it.

You always stayed for dinner, you found that you could never say no to Jon, the one time you tried was awful, you felt so bad that you went back the next day and took him shopping. With Bruce's card, duh.

Jon was stuck to you like glue whenever you were over. He always insisted on sitting by you and talking to you about whatever he’d been up to. He flew around with you a lot, you guys would play games that he taught you how to play. Your favorite moments were when he and Damian would allow you in to watch them play video games because ‘How do you not know how to play video games? That’s just wrong. We’ll teach you.’

Conner had spent more and more time with you as well, telling you about a lot of social cues, the importance of boundaries, etc. He was determined to help you adjust in every way he could, he shared his experiences with you when he first started working in teams. You learned a lot from him, he was very affectionate with you, but in that awkward-older-brother way. He’d give you a soft pat on the back and a smile, he knew you’d do just fine.

Lois became your role model, you truly admired her. She was strong, outspoken, confident. She helped you not be afraid of forming your own opinions and voicing them. One time she saw you yell at Bruce over something he’d done, and all she could do was smile proudly.

These people whose lives you just appeared in one day, very quickly became your family. Every day you were reminded of how lucky you were to have come to care for them as much as you do. Bonding with them was nice, and you very quickly understood the appeal of having family.

These are people who care for you unconditionally, simply because they want to. Because every moment that they spend with you, they choose to.

And just like that, you were ready to meet the team. You had learned to combine your combat skills with your powers, if you need to, you can fight in mid air. You’d learned to incorporate your abilities into your technique to enhance your own personal style. And it felt amazing.

You knew every possible way to deliver an effective, non-lethal blow. Of course, you needed a suit. Bruce offered to enhance the one you had worn the day they rescued you, but you wanted a new one. To you, that suit represented what you were created to be, and that is not who you are. You wanted something true to yourself, and he understood and wholeheartedly supported you. Damian helped you make a sketch, and together you’d designed the perfect representation of you. And you became Eclipse. The alignment of two heroes, though unintentional, created a whole new hero. You.

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ozzgin · 1 year ago

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Yandere! Yokai Harem x Reader (III)

On your travels with the two demon companions, you stumble upon a fortified village plagued by monster attacks. It would be quite unlucky if the grand finale happened just as you step foot inside, right? Worry not, you're saved by a third mysterious yokai that you immediately recognize. The harem grows!

Content: female reader, monsters, violence

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Character Guide]

“Alright, how’s this?”

You do a clumsy pirouette before the two yokai men.

“That’s...are you sure?” Kiritsubo eyes you, mildly confused. “It’s usually what men wear.”

Of course, you already know. After weeks of walking through feudal Japan, you’ve reached the conclusion that modern clothing isn’t the most practical choice. Not to mention the strange looks you always get from other people upon your arrival in any village. You needed something to blend in, and the typical fashion for your gender might not be compatible with your training. You’d rather not swing a sword while covered in multiple layers of kimono.

Thus, you opted for the hakama pants typically worn by men. With your hair tied up and in this baggy attire, one could think you’re a young samurai. If they squint enough. You chuckle at the thought.

“She’ll wear whatever allows her to not be a burden.” Murasaki concludes with crossed arms.

One way to put it, you tell yourself.

“If you’re done discussing fashion, we can leave.” The dark-haired man continues with indifference, standing up and adjusting the swords in the folds of his sash.

Both you and Kiritsubo hurry and follow behind obediently.

“Where are we going this time?” You ask sheepishly.

“South-west. An old residence of his, although we will have to pass through a fortified settlement first. We should reach it before sunset.”

It’s hard to imagine you’re the supposed savior in this equation. Murasaki has been leading you by the hand each step, carefully considering every detail on the map, and extensively planning your travels every evening. All this on top of your daily training. You’ve now mastered the basics with the katana he’s provided you, as well as some common prayers for exorcising small-class demons.

You glance at the daisho pair of swords under his belt. A long, thin blade, and a shorter backup version, both in elaborate matching scabbards meant to showcase the status and wealth of the samurai wearing them. In this case, meant to express his rank as the advisor and right hand of the famed onmyōji. You certainly don’t doubt Nakamaro’s decision to rely on Murasaki.

In comparison, Kiritsubo carries a nagamaki at his waist. A comically long blade in your opinion, used mostly to bring down horses during battle. Any regular sword would’ve been too small for him. Despite his imposing appearance, you’ve learned rather quickly just how different Kiritsubo is from the other yokai. He’s quite clumsy in combat, often anxious about making mistakes, terribly apologetic, and overall has a heart too kind for his own good. If there’s hesitation coming from his side, Murasaki immediately follows with his ruthless, ending blows. As a matter of fact, even you’ve had to do the occasional killing to spare the man of such choices.

The silver-haired demon notices your eyes on him and smiles, excited. He reminds you of a large dog. A horned, fanged dog of monstrous strength, nonetheless the innocence is there. And he does make a great travel companion.

“How much longer?” You grunt, looking up.

“Are you tired? I can carry you for the rest of the way-” Kiritsubo instantly offers but is interrupted by Murasaki’s barked orders.

“She can walk. Don’t spoil her.” He glares at you, then nods ahead. “We’re almost there, so quit your whining.”

True to his word, you can finally discern the outline of a wall at the top of the hill. A few more steps, and you can even spot two guards standing beside the great gate.

“Stop there!”

The soldiers lift their spears threateningly. Before you can react, Murasaki steps in front of you with a hand placed on his sword.

“We’re just passing through.” He states factually.

“We’re no longer allowing visitors.” One of the guards exclaims. “The village has been raided by monsters recently and our Lord has closed all gates until the matter is solved.”

“That means no filthy demons go in.” The other adds in a mocking tone, his gaze lingering on the horns of your companions. His mouth curls in disgust.

You can tell Murasaki is angered by the disrespectful approach. He is not one to let such insults slide and you’d rather avoid him claiming unnecessary victims; therefore, you push past his arm and plant yourself ahead with a polite greeting bow.

“These yokai are with me. I vouch for their good behavior, so please consider letting us through. Perhaps we can even help you with these monsters.”

“You? How would you…”

The man stops abruptly, switching between you and the yokai. Eventually he inspects your scabbard, and he gasps, confusion twisting his features.

“Could it be? No…He’d be dead by now.”

“What are you talking about?” His partner inquires impatiently.

“That’s the family seal belonging to Abe no Nakamaro.” He explains, pointing to the golden finish at the end of your katana handle. “I’ve heard about him from my grandparents. But it’s been decades!”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re saying this kid is a legendary onmyōji?”

“Who else would show up with demons as servants? Everything matches. Perhaps his powers have finally reached immortality”, he concludes solemnly.

The men continue their argument, and you clear your throat, embarrassed. What the hell? You can’t possibly look that manly. Sure, you’ve been skipping the makeup, and the clothes aren’t exactly curve shaping, but to be mistaken for an old man is like a slap to the face.

You’re about to deny their claims, but Murasaki swiftly pinches the back of your neck, and you wince. He lowers himself to your ear and whispers:

“This will be to our advantage. Just go along with it.” “Fine!” You mumble angrily. Then you turn back to the guards.

“V-very well, I see I haven’t been forgotten.” You admit, theatrically. “Lead me to your Lord and we shall discuss the details of your monster attack.”

Thus, you sip on your tea, kneeling at the luxurious table and awaiting the arrival of the feudal Lord. The servants are exchanging words, gossiping fervently next to the wall. “I wonder if he can cure my daughter!” one woman mumbles, visibly emotional.

“Do you think we can finally be saved? He’ll truly exorcise the beasts tormenting our village?” another whispers.

You wipe the sweat from your forehead and glare at Murasaki. You had no idea he’d given you Nakamaro’s old sword. Now you’re stuck pretending to be a pompous, long-dead asshat.

“What if they catch us?” You hiss between your teeth. “I don’t know shit about onmyōdō.”

“Then I’ll just kill them all. Simple as that.” The crimson-eyed man retorts, unconcerned. “Have a little fun, won’t you?”

“W-we’ll help you come up with answers, (Y/N). Don’t worry.” Kiritsubo chimes in, trying to reassure you.

You sigh in frustration and look out the window. The sun must’ve set a long time ago and has since been replaced by a pitch-black sky. What’s keeping the Lord? Surely, he can’t be having important business meetings late at night.

Almost as if your thoughts were read, the door slides open and a servant wobbles in. The rest of the household workers are silent, expecting the entrance of their master, but no one is following behind. You observe the bizarre limp of the woman. Suddenly, she collapses to the floor, revealing her bloodied back torn by deep wounds, caused by some sort of claw. Her body is stiff.

Panic settles in right away, and the servants topple over each other to get away from the fresh cadaver. You struggle to get up among the terrified crowd, but thankfully Murasaki grabs your wrist and pulls you out into a quieter hallway.

“What the hell?” is all you manage to say.

“Rotten.” Kiritsubo furrows his brows, sniffing the air. “Someone in here must be possessed. Could be more of them.”

Murasaki surveys the surroundings and gestures towards his partner.

“We have to see if the Lord is still alive. You go that way. I’ll take the front. Kill everyone suspicious.”

“What about me?” You demand, holding your breath.

“Get out and wait for us. You know how to draw a protection circle, don’t you? I won’t take long.” The dark-haired yokai answers before vanishing.

Judging by the screams and wails coming from all directions, you suspect Kiritsubo is right about multiple attackers. You sprint across the hall, looking for an opening. The self-defense lessons didn’t cover cursed humans with demonic powers. You’ll stay out of this one.

What an absolute mess. You have encountered some demons in your weeks spent here, but nothing to this degree. When the guards mentioned a monster attack, you imagined a ghost with a grudge, or some small fry yokai scaring the workers at night, not a mass curse that ends in a massacre. Of course, it had to happen the moment you arrived at the main house.

You find a room with a door leading to the inner courtyard. Seems isolated enough and it should provide a bit of shelter while you wait for the pair to finish the business. As you rush past the dead bodies, you notice a woman hiding behind a screen divider.

“Ah! It’s you!” she yells, aware of your presence.

From the shadow of her secret spot emerges the small frame of a child. The woman pushes the little human towards you, blocking your path.

“Don’t worry, he’ll protect us.” she gives her child another nudge. “Go on, hold onto him. You’ll be safe.”

What? No, no, no, no, no. Not happening. You’re getting out.

“Ma’am, sorry to break it to you under such circumstances, but I’m not-”

You’re interrupted by a loud growl. One of the possessed creatures must’ve followed your scent, and it’s now sliding into the room on all fours with the bones of the limbs twisting and creaking in unnatural pounces. You purse your lips in a frightened grimace. One advantage of the wide hakama pants – useful to know – is that no one can see your knees shaking cowardly.

Theoretically, you could use the brat as bait and run for your life. It’d make a decent obstacle. Unfortunately for your life span, you’ve been gifted with an idiotic sense of duty instead of survival instincts.

“Keep your distance. If I can’t kill it, get out and don’t look back” you advise, positioning yourself in the learned stance and sliding the sword out of its sheath.

Damn it! Then again, it should be like fighting a zombie, right? Given the pathetic way it drags itself around, it can’t be too difficult to hit. Aim for the head, you repeat in your mind. Your fingers grip around the handle.

The ghoulish beast lowers itself, like a spring about to recoil, and leaps across the room with an ease you did not anticipate. Despite your iron hold, it slaps the blade out of your hands with enormous force. The impact breaks your skin, and you wince. There’s no time to weep, within seconds it could go for your vitals next. While Murasaki hasn’t gotten around to teaching you much hand-to-hand combat, you’ve read your fair share of shounen manga. The first idea that comes to mind is to put the beast in a sumo lock. You bend your knees smoothly and wrap your arms around the monster, feeling for something to hold onto. You grit your teeth and attempt to lift the creature.

A thundering laugh resonates within the walls, and you jolt, startled.

“I never thought I’d see the mighty Abe no Nakamaro wrestling with ankle biters like this. What are you going to do, throw it out of the ring?”

The voice is deep, loud, and unfamiliar. You can’t afford to look back to see the source, but it’s not hard to figure out the possibilities. So far, you’ve only been called by that cursed name by the yokai accomplices. Although now is not the best time to seek revenge.

“Shut up, I panicked”, you snap in frustration. “If you can’t help, keep that trap closed!”

The sudden burst of anger seems to have triggered something within your body, a power you don’t recognize. You watch as your arms effortlessly pick up the monster and swing it across the room, its body demolishing the opposing wall and causing thick clouds of dust to rise and spread everywhere.

The impact must’ve alerted the nearby ghouls, as you can now hear the agitated trample and screeching rapidly approaching. You’re not confident you can pull the same lucky move a second time.

You turn to search for your sword, but it’s already being handed to you by the mysterious yokai who’s been observing your little fight. You have to step aside and tilt your head all the way back in order to fully view the gigantic frame of the man.

Ah, you recognize the features immediately. The same kind of fear you felt when you stumbled upon that old shrine statue is now tugging at your chest.

“You’re Suma, right?”

A proud, wide grin forms on his face, revealing a pair of glistening fangs. His expression is unexpectedly soft and friendly.

“We’re halfway through our introductions then, eh?” You pick up the sword and his fingers stretch out for a handshake. “What is your given name? I’m guessing you don’t willingly go by that…title.”

“I very much prefer (Y/N), yes.” You marvel at the significant difference in size, placing your small hand in his. “Was that your power I just used?”

“Mhhm. You sure surprised me there! It’s not something I did intentionally, but I s’ppose we just resonate that well, huh?”

He laughs again, completely unbothered by the impending danger.

“Alright, you can leave the rest to me. Take the lady outside, it will get a little messy.”

And with that, he casually walks towards the gathering of ghouls. You guide the family to the courtyard and wait for the battle to end.

“Do you think she’ll be fine by herself?” Kiritsubo is resting against the fence, keeping you under a watchful gaze.

“Let the humans sort it out among themselves.” Murasaki responds, somewhat bored.

The morning after the attack, you offered to deal with the survivors: ask them how everything started, if they’d noticed anything suspicious days prior to the event, and if the route to Nakamaro’s old residence was still open. The yokai men had found the feudal Lord in the jaws of a possessed creature and he quickly succumbed to his wounds. Consequently, only the remaining servants could provide them with clues.

A village being targeted like this is highly unusual, and Murasaki can’t shake the feeling it could be related to their master.

“Oh, where are you heading after this?” The silver-haired yokai glances at Suma, sitting lazily next to them.

“Where? After you just told me the whole story? I’m way too invested in this modern reincarnation that just popped out of nowhere, so I’m tagging along!” He announces with a chuckle.

Murasaki frowns.

“We don’t need your help.”

“Don’t be like that.” The giant man pouts dramatically. “Are you upset I saved (Y/N) before you?”

“W-we were on our way!” Kiritsubo retorts, visibly bothered.

“It’s a done deal!” Suma rests his hands under his head and yawns. “Besides, the little human already said he doesn’t mind.”

“He? (Y/N) is a woman.”

The redhead abruptly sits up and gasps.

“Wait, what?”

“Don’t get funny ideas, man”, the silver-haired demon warns.

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rootedinrevisions · 5 months ago

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Friends (with Benefits) Don't: Part 1

SUMMARY: In the first part of this story, you reunite with Jake “Hangman” Seresin, an old friend from his time at Top Gun, when he unexpectedly returns to North Island. What starts as playful banter quickly turns into something more as Jake proposes a no-strings-attached arrangement, tempting you to cross lines you’ve never crossed before. Boundaries are set as you and Jake dive into this new dynamic.

OTHER PART(S): PART 2 I PART 3

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is the first part of the series that was based on/inspired by Kinktober Day 20. This

WORD COUNT: 3.2k

WARNINGS: 18+ MINORS DNI. SMUT (P in V)

TAG LIST: SEE COMMENTS BELOW

The Hard Deck was unusually quiet for a Friday night. The jukebox hummed softly in the background, and a few scattered groups of aviators sat around the dimly lit bar, nursing their drinks and trading stories. You had snagged your usual seat at the far end of the bar, leaning in to chat with Penny.

"Slow night," Penny commented, wiping down the bar as she leaned against the counter, her easy smile making you feel at home. "Not like our usual crowd."

You nodded, swirling the half-empty glass of soda in front of you. "Yeah, must be the lull before deployment or something. Not that I’m complaining—it’s nice to get a quiet night once in a while."

Penny chuckled and raised an eyebrow. "For you, maybe. But I know you secretly enjoy the chaos."

You smirked, tilting your head. "Maybe just a little. Keeps things interesting."

The conversation shifted to lighthearted banter about the latest group of pilots training at Top Gun, though you were too busy with work to pay much attention to the new faces. That was until Penny shot you a teasing glance.

"So, any interesting guys from the new batch?" she asked, knowing full well you weren’t the type to mix business with pleasure.

You laughed softly, shaking your head. "You know me better than that. Besides, pilots have a tendency to get cocky. Not my style."

Penny’s eyes sparkled with amusement. "True, but there are always exceptions."

You were about to reply when a familiar voice cut through the low hum of conversation, sending a chill down your spine.

"Well, well, well… if it isn’t my guardian angel."

Your heart skipped a beat, the sound of that nickname pulling you out of the moment and back into the past. You froze for a second, not daring to believe it was real. Slowly, you turned in your seat to face the source of the voice.

There he was. Jake “Hangman” Seresin, standing just a few feet away with that trademark smirk of his, looking like he’d stepped right out of your memories and into the present. His flight jacket was slung over one shoulder, and his eyes were fixed on you, gleaming with the same confident glint that had always made him stand out.

“Jake?” you breathed out, not even realizing you’d said his name aloud until you saw the way his smirk widened. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” he said, his deep voice sending a wave of warmth through you. “Didn’t expect to see you sitting at the bar all alone, Halo.”

Halo. That was the nickname he’d given you during his first stint at Top Gun, when you’d been assigned as the air traffic controller for his squad. You’d kept him safe in the skies, guiding him through rough landings and tricky maneuvers, and he’d always teased you about it, calling you his guardian angel. But nothing had ever come of it beyond harmless flirtation. You knew his reputation, and you weren’t interested in being another name on a list of conquests. Still, the sight of him now, after all this time, stirred something inside you. You hadn’t expected to see him again, at least not like this.

“I didn’t know you were back on the West Coast,” you said, finding your voice again, even as your pulse quickened.

He shrugged casually, stepping closer until he was leaning against the bar beside you. “Got a short deployment, figured I’d stop by the old stomping grounds. Didn’t expect to run into you here, though. A pleasant surprise.”

Penny, sensing the shift in the atmosphere, gave you a knowing look before slipping away to tend to other customers, leaving you and Jake in a bubble of your own making.

“I didn’t think you’d be back here so soon after your last assignment,” you said, turning slightly to face him, trying to keep your tone neutral. “Thought you’d be off on some secret mission, flying over God knows where.”

Jake chuckled, his eyes never leaving yours. “Can’t tell you all my secrets, Halo. Besides, maybe I missed North Island more than I thought.”

There it was again—that flirtatious edge that had always been part of your interactions with him. You could feel the tension building, that old spark rekindling, but this time there was something different about it. Maybe it was the distance and time that had passed since you’d last seen him. Maybe it was the fact that you weren’t expecting to feel this pull toward him again.

He leaned in slightly, lowering his voice. “So… have you missed me?”

The question hung in the air between you, teasing, testing. You raised an eyebrow, meeting his gaze head-on. “Depends. Are you still the same cocky pilot who thinks he's the best in the sky?”

His grin widened, full of mischief and charm. “I don’t think, I know I’m good, darlin’.”

You rolled your eyes, fighting back a smile. “Then maybe I didn’t miss you as much as you’d like to think.”

Jake laughed, the sound rich and warm, and for a moment, it felt like no time had passed at all. The bar, the quiet night, the distance between you—it all faded into the background. It was just you and Jake, locked in a dance of words and teasing banter, the same way it had always been.

“Come on,” Jake said suddenly, pushing off the bar and offering you his hand. “Let’s get out of here.”

You hesitated. A knot formed in your stomach as his reputation flashed through your mind—the flings, the short-lived hookups, the way he never stuck around long enough for anything serious. And you weren’t looking to be another notch on his bedpost. Harmless flirting you could do all night. Crossing the line into anything more? You weren't so sure.

“Jake…” you began, your voice trailing off as you glanced from him to the exit. “You’ve got a reputation, and I’m not looking for anything serious. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

He cocked an eyebrow, clearly intrigued. “Who said anything about serious?”

You crossed your arms, giving him a skeptical look. “What do you mean?”

Jake’s smirk softened into something more playful, his voice lowering as he leaned in a little closer. “I mean it doesn’t have to be serious. No dates, no feelings… just two friend helping each other out.”

Your breath caught in your throat. His bluntness caught you off guard, but the idea lingered in the back of your mind. Casual. Simple. No emotional attachment. You weren’t naïve—you knew what he was offering. But if there was anyone who could pull off casual and still respect your boundaries, maybe it was Jake.

You chewed on your bottom lip, considering it for a long moment before you finally spoke. “Okay, but there have to be some rules.”

Jake straightened up, his interest piqued. “I’m listening.”

You ticked them off on your fingers. “First, you don’t sleep with anyone else while we’re doing this. It’s just us.”

His smirk widened, clearly amused but also intrigued by your assertiveness. “Fair enough.”

“Second, there’s no staying the night. Once it’s over, you go home.”

“Alright.” He nodded, his gaze unwavering. “And the last rule?”

“You can't tell anyone,” you said firmly. “No one can know we’re doing this. I’ve worked hard to keep things professional on base, and I’m not about to let people think I’m hooking up with one of the pilots.”

Jake chuckled, the sound low and smooth. “You’ve got yourself a deal, Halo.”

You eyed him for a moment, your mind still racing, but there was a part of you that couldn’t deny the thrill of it. Casual, no strings attached—it sounded manageable, even tempting.

“So,” Jake leaned in slightly, his voice dropping as he asked again, “Can I take you home now?”

Your heart skipped a beat, but this time you found yourself nodding. "Yeah, okay."

The drive back to your place was quieter than you expected, the weight of what you’d just agreed to settling over both of you. Neither of you spoke, but there wasn’t a need to. The air was thick with anticipation, a tension that pulsed between you and Jake as he navigated the familiar streets toward your apartment.

When you reached your building, you led the way inside, your heart pounding faster than you’d like to admit. You pushed the door open, stepping into the dimly lit hallway of your apartment. Jake was right behind you, his presence looming larger than life, that easy confidence he always carried crackling in the space around you.

You set your keys down on the small table near the door, swallowing the uncertainty building in your throat. This was just sex—no feelings, no strings, no expectations.

The door clicked shut behind him, and before you could even take another breath, Jake’s hands were on you. He wasted no time, his large hands gripping your waist firmly, spinning you around to face him. His eyes were dark, hooded with an intensity that made your stomach twist. There was no preamble, no hesitation.

His fingers went straight to the hem of your shirt, tugging it upward with a smooth, practiced motion. His lips hovered close to yours, teasing, but they didn’t meet. Instead, he dipped his head to the side, his mouth brushing along the sharp line of your jaw.

Your breath hitched as he moved lower, his lips trailing down the length of your neck. You closed your eyes, your pulse pounding hard in your ears as the sensation of his warm breath sent shivers down your spine. His hands were rough but sure, sliding under the fabric of your shirt and pushing it up, baring your skin to the cool air of the room.

He still didn’t kiss you. Instead, his lips moved to your collarbone, leaving a slow, deliberate path of heat across your skin. You raised your arms, letting him pull your shirt up and over your head, casting it aside. His hands skimmed down your bare shoulders, the faint scrape of his fingers sending sparks across your skin. The heat of his touch was intoxicating, and you felt the familiar pull of desire tugging you deeper into the moment, but you kept yourself grounded.

Jake’s hands moved down your sides, and you felt the press of his fingers against your waist, slipping lower to undo the button of your jeans. His mouth, still working its way over the exposed skin of your shoulder and collarbone, stayed maddeningly far from your lips. His actions were precise, almost methodical as if he was deliberately avoiding any sign of tenderness.

It wasn’t what you’d expect from a lover, but it was exactly what you needed. This wasn’t about romance. It was about release.

He slipped your jeans down over your hips, leaving you standing in just your bra and underwear. The room seemed to shrink around you, every sense heightened as Jake’s hands slid back up to your waist, fingers lingering at the clasp of your bra.

Your mind flickered back to the rules you’d set, the boundaries that had been drawn, and how easily he was staying inside them. This was exactly what you’d both agreed to—just sex, no strings, no feelings. No confusion. He wasn’t crossing that invisible line you’d laid down, and in a way, you respected him for it.

“Bedroom?” His voice was low, almost a growl against your skin.

You nodded, not trusting your voice to sound steady. He didn’t wait for a more verbal response, taking your hand briefly in his and guiding you toward the darkened hallway. The familiarity of your own apartment felt strange now, with Jake moving so confidently in front of you, his presence taking up more space than the room allowed.

Once inside your bedroom, he didn’t waste any time. His hands were already working to unclasp your bra, the fabric sliding from your shoulders and joining your discarded clothes on the floor. His mouth found the sensitive spot at the base of your neck again as his hands slipped beneath the waistband of your underwear, tugging them down in one smooth motion.

Before you had time to process it all, he was pulling his own shirt over his head and shedding his jeans, leaving a pile of clothes in his wake. There was no hesitation in his movements, no awkward fumbling. Jake knew exactly what he was doing, and his focus was solely on you.

He guided you to the bed, his strong hands pressing gently but firmly against your bare skin as he laid you down. The cool sheets met your back, contrasting the heat of his touch. You watched as he hovered over you, his eyes trailing down your body before he joined you on the bed.

There was nothing romantic about the way he touched you. No soft whispers, no lingering gazes. This was physical—raw and deliberate. And that’s what you wanted. That’s what you both needed.

Your hands found their way to his shoulders as he positioned himself over you, his body warm and solid against yours. His hands continued their exploration of your skin, skimming along your hips and thighs as he settled between your legs. His mouth brushed along your neck again, but still, he didn’t kiss you.

When he finally pushed into you, there was no hesitation, no teasing buildup—just the raw, steady pressure of his body connecting with yours. The quiet air in the room thickened with the sound of your shared breaths, the faint rustle of sheets, and the muted thud of the headboard against the wall. His movements were deliberate, not rough, but strong and unyielding in their intensity. Every thrust was purposeful, his focus narrowed solely to the physical act, to the way your body responded to his.

Your fingers found their way to his back, instinctively clutching at the taut muscles that flexed beneath your touch. You could feel the heat radiating from his skin, the power in every movement as he drove into you, the sheer force of him making your breath catch in your throat. There was no sweetness here—no tender whispers, no lingering touches. Just the raw, almost primal exchange between two people who knew exactly what they wanted, nothing more and nothing less.

You matched his rhythm easily, your hips rising to meet his in perfect sync, the friction building between your bodies with every motion. His hands roamed your sides, your hips, gripping and releasing, guiding you to exactly where he needed you. The weight of him pressed you deeper into the mattress, your legs wrapping around his waist instinctively as you let yourself get swept away in the sensation, the pure physicality of it all.

His head dipped down, his breath hot against your neck as he nipped lightly at your collarbone, his mouth tracing over the sensitive skin just below your ear. The sharp contrast between his rough hands and the soft scrape of his stubble against your neck made your body tense beneath him, a low moan escaping your lips.

But even with his closeness, there was no romantic pretense. His lips never found yours; that invisible line remained firmly in place. Instead, his mouth stayed at your jaw, your neck, his hands sliding over your skin with a precision that spoke of familiarity with this kind of arrangement. No strings. No feelings. Just raw, physical need, answered in kind.

Your breaths quickened in time with his thrusts, the intensity building, your body clenching around him as the tension in the room heightened. His movements never faltered, steady and unrelenting, driving you both closer to that edge. The tightness in your core built until you couldn’t hold back any longer, your fingers tightening their grip on his back as your release washed over you in waves.

Jake followed soon after, his pace quickening before he groaned low in his throat, his body tensing against yours as he reached his own peak. His weight pressed into you, but only for a brief moment before he pulled away, the separation immediate and without hesitation. There were no words exchanged, just the sound of your ragged breathing filling the space between you, both of you caught in the afterglow of the moment.

The room was still and quiet, the air heavy with the aftermath of what had just happened. You lay there side by side, your breathing gradually slowing as you came down from the high of the moment. The space between you felt empty despite the closeness you had just shared, a reminder of the boundaries you both had silently agreed upon.

After a few beats of silence, Jake shifted beside you, the bed dipping as he moved. Without a word, he swung his legs over the side and began to gather his clothes from the floor, standing to get dressed with his usual, effortless confidence. He didn't glance your way, and you didn't expect him to. This was how it was supposed to be.

You rolled out of bed yourself, reaching for your clothes. The silence between you wasn’t awkward, just matter-of-fact, a reflection of the unspoken understanding that this wasn’t about anything more than what it had been��a physical release, nothing more. Grabbing your shirt, you made your way to the bathroom, needing a moment to regroup. You glanced at your reflection in the mirror, smoothing a hand through your hair before slipping into your clothes.

When you stepped back into the room, Jake was sitting on the edge of your bed, fully dressed. His boots were back on, and his elbows rested on his knees, hands clasped as if he had all the time in the world. His eyes flicked up to meet yours, that familiar, cocky smirk playing on his lips.

“You ready to head out?” you asked, leaning against the doorframe casually, trying to keep things light. You didn’t want to linger in the strange in-between. You knew what this was and didn’t want it to turn into anything confusing.

Jake raised an eyebrow, the smirk widening just a touch. “You kicking me out already?”

You crossed your arms, letting out a soft huff of amusement. “I’m not kicking you out,” you replied, matching his tone. “But I’m not exactly offering you breakfast, either.”

He chuckled at that, standing up and pulling his jacket over his broad shoulders with a casual shrug. “Fair enough. Wouldn’t want to overstay my welcome.”

You offered him a small smile, watching as he moved toward the door, his usual swagger in his step. There was no awkwardness, just the easy understanding that whatever had just happened was exactly what it was meant to be. No lingering goodbyes, no expectation of anything more. You had drawn the lines, and for now, Jake was more than willing to respect them.

As he reached for the doorknob, he paused and glanced back over his shoulder. “You know how to reach me if you feel like doing this again.”

Your smile widened, and you gave him a nod. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

With that, he was gone, the door clicking shut behind him, leaving you alone in the quiet of your apartment. There was no regret, no second-guessing—just a sense of satisfaction in having gotten exactly what you both had wanted. And for now, that was enough.

#Top Gun Hangman #Top Gun Hangman Fanfiction #Top Gun Hangman Fanfic #Jake Seresin #Jake Seresin Fanfiction #Jake Seresin Fanfic #Jake Hangman Seresin #Jake Seresin x reader #Hangman x reader #Jake Seresin Smut #Hangman Jake Seresin Smut

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 7 months ago

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Where Will All The Martyrs Go [Chapter 12: Please Call Me Only If You Are Coming Home]

A/N: Only 1 chapter left!!! 🥳 Be sure to vote in our final poll, which will be pinned at the top of my blog per usual 🥰

Series summary: In the midst of the zombie apocalypse, both you and Aemond (and your respective travel companions) find yourselves headed for the West Coast. It’s the 2024 version of the Oregon Trail, but with less dysentery and more undead antagonists. Watch out for snakes! 😉🐍

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, med school Aemond, character deaths, nature, drinking, smoking, drugs, Adventures With Aegon™️, pregnancy and childbirth, the U.S. Navy, road trip vibes.

Series title is a lyric from: “Letterbomb” by Green Day.

Chapter title is a lyric from: “Homecoming” by Green Day.

Word count: 5.8k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🥰

“What the hell do you need that for?” Cregan says to Helaena in the next aisle over, sounding alarmed. You are raiding a Kwik Stop just outside Colusa, California, following Route 20 west towards the Pacific Ocean. But when Helaena replies, her voice is perfectly soothing, lyrical, too serene for the way the world is now.

“It’s not for me. It’s just in case anyone ever finds themselves in need of one.” And this makes sense, even though you can’t see what it is she’s taken off the disorderly, ransacked shelves; Helaena is always picking up trinkets to keep stowed away in her burlap messenger bag until their utility becomes essential.

Cregan is relieved. “Oh, okay, gotcha. Whew, you almost gave me a heart attack there, Miss LaeLae…”

Ice is stretched out and dozing on the cool tile floor. Luke and Rhaena are keeping watch by the front of the store. Aegon is standing by the decommissioned Icee machine and showing Daeron which route he’s marked on his map and why.

“Why do I need to know this?” Daeron is asking.

Aegon snorts. “In case I get killed, dumbass…”

Fluttering pieces of paper hang taped to the glass doors of the empty refrigerators: Don’t go towards Sacramento; People in Santa Rosa killed my brother for his car; Andrew Lounsbury, if you see this we are headed to Aunt Sarah’s house, meet us there! Meanwhile, in your own aisle, Aemond is watching you as your fingers flit through packages of Starbursts and Jolly Ranchers and Life Savers Gummies, separating the trash from the ones that haven’t been opened yet. His expression is wary, uncertain. “What?” you ask him.

“Are you…okay?” Aemond says, low enough that no one else will hear.

Of course you aren’t; you keep walking into rooms and looking for Rio, and he’s not there. But you know what Aemond means. “Yeah. I’m okay.”

“Did I hurt you? Are you…” He steps closer, the blue of his eye gleaming with attentive, penitent concern, sins he is certain he must have committed. “Are you sore, are you bleeding at all?”

You smile, just the ghost of a curve at the edge of your lips. “No, really, I feel fine.” And in your body, this is true. There is a tension that has vanished from your muscles, a softness in your bones, not shards of glass shifting beneath skin but living things like the branches of trees, flexible, green, damp life awash within.

“I was trying to…you know…take it slow and be super gentle, but then…by the end…”

“Aemond, you did everything right.”

And he exhales all the iron-heavy dread he’s been carrying around since he woke up this morning to find you already gone—showing Aegon how to flip Bisquick pancakes as Cregan browned them in a skillet in the woodstove downstairs—and you realize how much you’ve scared him. “I’m really sorry about…” He touches his chin restlessly. “I should have asked you if you wanted me to pull out, I just got, uh…kind of…distracted.”

Your smile grows; now you can feel it in your eyes, warm and luminous. “It’s alright. I did too.”

He is hopeful. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. I wouldn’t have told you to stop. And anyway, I think we’re safe.” But of course you’ve lost track of the days, and in your dark trance of grief and Tramadol you were entirely unaware of the rhythms of your body, pangs of desire or clear ample wetness, biological cues, primal timekeeping.

“Cool,” Aemond says, now trying to sound casual. “And next time…are you thinking that I should try to…maybe…just to be sure…?”

You shrug, then tell him the first thing that comes into your mind, that flashes in your skull like lightning bugs at dusk. “I’m thinking that life is too short and too rare to put effort into preventing it.”

Aemond’s eyebrows go up, but he doesn’t seem disappointed. “So we’ll see what happens.”

“If you’re onboard.”

“I’m totally onboard. I just want to take care of you. I…” He glances down at his palms—open, clean—and then looks back up at you. “I’ve never had anything that felt right before. Not my family, not myself, nothing. But this feels right. And it’s where I want to be forever.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” And this is what everyone thought: Jace, Baela, Rio. But you make the oath anyway, a hollow promise that echoes like a windchime.

“Me either,” Aemond vows.

You turn to leave the aisle and your backpack hits the shelf, knocking something off the top and onto the tile floor, where it lands with a thump. You gasp, and people come running; but it’s only a box of Honey Buns that was stashed somewhere too high for you to see. “It’s nothing,” you assure them. “We’re all okay, no need to get excited.”

“Death by Little Debbie,” Aegon says, chuckling nervously, his heart still racing.

You pick up the box and think of Rio with abrupt, violent clarity: he’s playing with French-speaking kids on the beach outside Djibouti City, he’s drinking cans of Guinness with you under a full moon on Diego Garcia, he’s reaching out from the pier to pet finless porpoises in Chinhae, he’s bleeding to death on a floor in Winnemucca, Nevada. Your vision is blurring with tears; your throat is knotted and scalding.

“I want him back,” Aegon says softly.

“I know. I do too.” You open the box of Honey Buns and pass one to Aegon first, then distribute the rest. There are only six total. Helaena tries to give hers to Cregan, but he rips it in half so they can share; Aemond insists you take the last one. You eat it wordlessly, sugar melting into your bloodstream.

“I think I saw a minivan down the side street,” Luke says as he chews his Honey Bun, waving his binoculars with his free hand. “It’s probably out of gas like all the others, but…”

“We’ll check it out,” Aemond replies, and everyone follows him as he departs from the Kwik Stop.

It’s a green Kia Carnival with a zombie trapped inside: once a young man in a Nirvana t-shirt, now a ghoul that paws at the glass with its oozing hands and licks the windows, long animal drags of a decomposing tongue. But the fuel cap is still closed, and while the van is turned off you can see the keys dangling from the ignition.

“Think there’s any gas left in the tank?” Daeron says brightly. The Targaryen beach house, following the indirect route you must take to avoid the cities, is about 250 miles from where you are now in Colusa. That’s two weeks on foot, or as few as five hours by car.

Rhaena goes for the driver’s side door. “Let’s find out.” She yanks on the handle to discover it’s locked. Cregan uses his axe to shatter the window, and the zombie tumbles gracelessly out onto the pavement, rancid skin and necrotic muscle ripping from its bones. As it crawls towards the siren call of fresh meat, Ice barks viciously and Cregan swings his axe. The blade slices easily through the monster’s skull, and its flailing, murderous limbs go still.

Rhaena reaches through the broken window to unlock the doors, climbs into the driver’s seat, and turns the key in the ignition. There is a blessed sound: the thunder of a living engine. “Half a tank!” Rhaena cheers.

Aegon gags as he opens the passenger’s side door. “Oh, it reeks so bad…”

“We’ll roll down all the windows,” Aemond says curtly.

“There are organs on the floor! What the fuck is that, a liver?!”

Aemond gives it a cursory glance. “Looks like a spleen.”

“I don’t want to sit near a spleen! I don’t even know what a spleen does!”

“Then throw it outside somewhere!” Aemond snaps. “You’re thirty years old, you can’t clean a minivan?!”

Aegon grumbles as he uses sheets of Burger King coupons from the glovebox to toss zombie guts into the grass. Aemond wipes down the hard surfaces with antiseptic. Luke keeps watch and Daeron shoots down several zombies as they lurch out of nearby houses and towards the Kia Carnival. You ask Helaena for the box of 9mm bullets in her messenger bag and she gives it to you. You load your Beretta M9, stow the remaining bullets in your backpack, and take aim at the approaching zombies to make sure you still know how to get into the rhythm, that you can still be a killer when the circumstances require it. You are out of practice, but you’re beginning to feel more like yourself again. Aemond brought you back. They all did.

When the minivan is as clean as possible, everyone hurries inside and Rhaena drives west on Route 20 under the afternoon sun. At the intersection with Route 53, Aegon directs Rhaena to follow it south around Clear Lake, then to take Route 29 west through rolling hills that were once filled with vineyards, wineries, music, weddings, horse farms. Now the land is hushed, and wild, and dotted with silhouettes that sway drunkenly and swipe at vultures when they try to gobble tattered strips of putrid flesh that unravel from bones like the bandages of a mummy.

The Kia Carnival rides Route 175 west and then Route 101 south, where the earth turns dry and rocky and barren, reminding you of northern Nevada and piling stones of heartache in your belly. In a place called Pieta—an old 1800s railroad depot, according to a plaque mounted just off the road—Rhaena slows down to get a better look at something that doesn’t make any sense. There is a souvenir shop of rocks and gems, now long out of business, and in a shed beside the main building hangs a gruesome specimen that you can see through the open doors. It has two arms and two legs, but it’s not a zombie. Its flayed flesh is a vibrant, healthy red; parts of the thighs and chest have been carefully carved away like cuts of meat are sliced from beef cattle. It is suspended on meat hooks. It is being butchered.

Cregan notes uneasily: “That ain’t an opossum or a bison.”

“I think it’s human,” Aemond says, horrified.

“Guess we’re not stopping for the night anytime soon,” Rhaena quips, then floors the gas pedal.

One of Aegon’s mixtapes spins in the CD player. From the speakers flows Somebody To You by The Vamps.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Do you see anyone now?” Aemond asks.

Luke speaks without looking away from his binoculars. “And for the fourth time, my answer remains no.”

After a night’s rest in a cabin at Camp Liahona Redwoods in Sonoma County, you followed California State Route 1 down the coast of the Pacific Ocean until the Kia Carnival finally ran out of gas just south of Olema, a small town founded in the 1850s. A ten-mile hike has brought you to the cliff where the fabled Targaryen beach house is perched with a few hours left before sunset. The ailing daylight is golden, the wave crests glittering, gulls cawing as they swoop through the salt-lashed air. From the road that twists like a snake through the slopes of Bolinas—thick with redwoods, Douglas firs, oaks, cypresses, tall grass that whips in the wind and tufts of eucalyptus—Luke is searching the property. It is less a house than a mansion, a museum, a monument, a work of art: sharp rectangular lines and glass walls, balconies, fountains, a pool, a garden.

Cregan whistles. “A place like that has to cost a million dollars.”

“Try fifteen million,” Aemond says distractedly, and Cregan gawks at him.

“Well, from what I can see it looks safe,” Luke declares, lowering his binoculars. “No zombies.”

“You really think they’re in there?” Daeron asks eagerly. “Mom and Criston?”

“Yeah, kid,” Aegon says, squeezing Daeron’s shoulder; but his voice is morose, like he knows he has surrendered to something, a path of least resistance, a hostile planet’s gravity. “Of course they are. Let’s go say hi.”

At the end of the driveway, the five-car garage is open. There is an Alfa Romeo, a Porsche, a Ferrari, a Ducati motorcycle, and a white Chevy Tahoe, which Aemond says belongs to Criston. And there are other items of interest mounted on the walls.

“Yes!” Daeron says as he runs to a quiver full of arrows for his compound bow. Aegon lifts a golf club out of its bag and makes an imaginary putt, getting reacquainted with the feeling of his hands on the grip.

“This is an iron,” Aegon says when he catches you watching him. In the shade of the garage, he pushes his neon green plastic sunglasses up into his windswept hair. “It’s metal all the way through and gives you good control over the shot. Drivers are for long-distance, and wedges and putters don’t have enough power. But an iron is just right.”

“Are you going to teach me how to golf?”

Aegon grins, his first real smile all day. “You think you can handle it, SunChips?”

“I don’t,” you answer honestly, and he laughs.

“If you teach me how to shoot, I’ll teach you how to golf.”

“An unfair trade! My skill is useful.”

Aemond knocks on the door that connects the garage to the main house. “Mom? Criston?” There is no response; all of you wait for one, listening intently through the crashes of waves and reverberating gull shrieks. Ice begins to pace agitatedly and nudges Cregan’s hands. He looks at Aemond, half-fear and half-sympathy.

“No,” Aemond says. “No, she’s wrong.”

“She might be,” Cregan replies, steady and ever-agreeable. Helaena is wringing her small, gentle hands. Everyone is watching Aemond to see what they should do next.

He pounds on the door again, this time with a closed fist. “Mom, we’re home! Mom? Criston? It’s me! It’s Aemond!”

Still, there is no answer. Aemond tries the doorknob, and it turns unimpeded. It is unlocked. He opens the door, peeks inside, and then crosses through the threshold. The rest of you trail him like he has eight shadows, the last in the shape of a wolf.

You step into the living room: wide open windows, the ocean breeze breathing through the house. The air tastes like sand and saltwater, sun and blue skies. There are three-story glass walls that overlook the water, a staircase leading up to the next floor, pristine white couches, black end tables topped with vases full of dead flowers, grey marble floors, bejeweled golden crosses that glint cruelly in the bloody late-afternoon light, family photographs on the mantle of the fireplace. There are many pictures of Aemond, and some of Helaena and Daeron as well. You don’t see a single photo of Aegon. He notices you scanning the snapshots in the frames and looks away, ashamed.

“Mom?” Aemond calls, his voice ricocheting through the vast, open space, clinical like a hospital or a morgue. “Criston?”

“Grandpa?” Helaena says meekly. Cregan is clutching his axe and peering around vigilantly. Ice whines and paces, her strange yellow eyes glowing like flecks of gold in a stream. Rhaena tries to soothe her with ear scratches; Ice begins to howl, low long mournful sounds.

You catch Aegon’s attention when he glances at you again. “This isn’t right,” you whisper. “If they were here, they would have heard us by now.”

Aegon turns to his brother. “Hey, Aemond…”

And then there are footsteps from upstairs, slow and shambling. Everyone looks, and it appears at the top of the steps like a mirage or a night terror, like a wrathful god glaring down from Mount Olympus. Long, filthy strands of white hair hang from what is left of its scalp. Its gore-stained teeth are bared. Its eyes are cloudy like the poisoned atmosphere of another planet, one gasp enough to singe your lungs and infect your bloodstream. The snarls pour out ragged and rasping from its disintegrating vocal chords. The man was wearing a suit when he died, and the pale blue shirt is now splattered with crimson and bits of rotting flesh. The black leather shoes on its feet clop as the zombie descends the staircase with staggering, unnatural steps, its decaying arms grasping for the mortals who wait below.

Daeron says numbly: “Dad?”

Aemond’s eye is wide and dazed. Ice is growling. Helaena is screaming and fleeing towards the wall; Cregan embraces her and she clings to him. “Aemond? Buddy?” Cregan shouts. “How do you want to handle this?” And what he means is: Do you want to kill it, or should someone else? Do you need time to process what’s happened? How can we help you?

“Aemond?” you say. You touch his arm; he doesn’t react. Rhaena draws her Ruger but doesn’t shoot yet. She is looking to Aemond for permission. Luke is standing in front of Rhaena and forcing her backwards as the zombie nears the bottom of the staircase. Now you can smell it: dark wet rot, spoiled meat, blood and oily fat and organs putrefying in a threadbare patchwork of flesh.

“Dad!” Daeron wails, and he’s covering his face with his hands because he knows what this must mean for the rest of his family too.

“Aemond?!” Rhaena yells. “Aemond, what do you want us to do?!”

You reach for your M9 as the zombie’s leather shoes settle on the marble floor. This seems to shake Aemond from his paralysis.

“No,” he says. “I’ll do it.” He grabs his Glock and aims, but his finger hesitates on the trigger. And you can see the ghosts of the people who have died by his hands lurking in the crystalline blue of his remaining eye: Alys, Jace, Baela and her baby…and now Viserys Targaryen too.

In the lull, in the indecision, Aegon roars and swings his golf club. The metal head collides with the zombie’s skull. Weak corroded bone collapses; blood and brains the color of black mold leak out onto the polished marble.

“It wasn’t enough, huh?!” Aegon screams, then hits the zombie again. The corpse crumples to the floor, but Aegon isn’t done yet. “You couldn’t just fuck everything up when you were alive, you had to keep torturing us from beyond the grave, you sick bastard, you selfish prick, what is wrong with you?!” He whacks the carcass with his golf club again and again. “I hate you! I hate you! You deserved so much worse than this! We crossed an entire goddamn country, and Jace died, and Baela died, and Rio died, all so we could get back here, and now it’s all for nothing because you’ve destroyed everyone you’ve ever touched! I fucking hate you!”

Aegon strikes the zombie one last time—the skull is a pulverized soup of gore and bone fragments—and before anyone can reach for him, he has bolted up the steps to search the rest of the house. You find them in their final resting places: bones in the hallway interspersed with gold rings and a medallion of Saint Irene of Thessaloniki, bones in the shower pierced with stainless steel surgical screws from hip and knee replacements, bones in the master bedroom entangled with shreds of a bloodstained silk nightgown and long locks of auburn hair. Daeron is sobbing, and Cregan takes Helaena outside to the garden to calm down, and Aemond wanders through the rooms in shock. You don’t know what to say to him; you remember how nothing anyone said made a difference when Rio died. But Aegon is furious. He tears away from everyone and goes to his bedroom: racks full of CDs, neon green blankets, an acoustic guitar propped in one corner. Then he ravages his hiding places—inside drawers, under his mattress, on tiny shelves he carved into the walls behind golf and Green Day posters—and collects mint tins. Then he pours out the white powder inside onto his desk and arranges it into lines like contrails behind airplanes, like wagon trails across the earth.

You try to stop him. “Aegon, wait, please don’t—”

“Get the fuck out,” he hisses, and for the first time you see the cold reptilian sheen of something like hate in his eyes. “You don’t have to pretend to love me. I can be alone. I’m used to it.”

“Aegon, I’m not—”

“They’re gone. You can leave too.” Then he slams the door and locks it.

~~~~~~~~~~

While Aegon is upstairs getting high and Helaena is downstairs inventorying supplies in the massive walk-in pantry, the rest of you use shovels from the garage to bury what is left of the bodies in the backyard, unceremonious shallow graves, the soil too rocky for anything more elaborate. Rhaena uses her jagged sliver of slate to mark stones with their names and a few kind words about each of them; but Viserys’ stone is left blank. Then Rhaena returns inside to help Helaena prepare for dinner, while Daeron inspects the perimeter of the house with Cregan and Ice. Luke uses a telescope near the pool not to gaze up at the rising stars but to study the neighboring properties.

Aemond murmurs as he stands in front of the four graves: “I should have gotten here sooner. Maybe I could have saved them.”

“You still have a family,” you say, begging him to believe that there are things worth living for. “You have Aegon and Daeron and Helaena, Rhaena, Luke, Cregan. And you have me.”

Aemond stares out over the Pacific Ocean. The sky above is red and lavender, fire and dreams. “How do we get to Diego Garcia?” He is only half-joking.

“Well you just find a boat and row about 10,000 miles that way.”

He sighs and drags his trembling fingers through his hair. It has always been his job to know what happens next, and now he doesn’t. Gulls squawk and wheel in the air. His right cheek glistens with tears.

“I never saw the ocean until I joined the Navy,” you say, and Aemond looks over at you, curious but not wanting to react in the wrong way and scare you into going quiet again. He’s always mining for details of your past, and you’re endlessly evading him. But perhaps you have been too secretive. He wants to know these things because he wants to know you, and you have no idea how long you’ll be here to shed your mysteries. If a story dies with you, it dies forever.

“Really?”

“Yeah. My mother…Mama, I always called her Mama…she went to Virginia Beach a few times while I was growing up, and that was her favorite place in the world. But she never took me with her. She’d go with my aunt or my oldest brothers. So when I got to basic training on the shore of Lake Michigan, that was the closest thing to an ocean I’d ever seen, and it absolutely amazed me.”

“Lake Michigan,” Aemond repeats, trying not to sound like he’s mocking you.

You smile. “And then of course I ended up in some more impressive places. But compared to Soft Shell, Lake Michigan was a whole different planet.”

“Soft Shell?”

“Like softshell turtles. They’re one of those animals that are so ugly they’re almost cute. We have a lot of them in Kentucky. Well, we used to. Maybe people ate them all when the food ran out.”

“Soft Shell, Kentucky,” Aemond says. “What was it like? I mean…I know you left, and I know you had good reasons…but I’ve never been to Kentucky. I’ve never really been to Appalachia period.”

“It’s beautiful. You get all four seasons, and you’re out in nature all the time, and it feels old, like hardly anything has changed there in thousands of years. You feel connected to the earth. I loved the forests and the mountains. I don’t think I realized how much I loved certain things about where I’m from until I’d been gone for years. I didn’t leave because I had to get away from Kentucky. I left because I had to get away from who I was when I was there, you know? Someone lonely and helpless. But how my family was isn’t Kentucky’s fault.”

“No,” Aemond muses. “I suppose not.” You begin walking together back towards the house.

“Ready for more bad news?” Luke asks, and gestures for you and Aemond to peer through the telescope. Aemond lets you go first, and immediately you see what Luke means. There are zombies in the surrounding hills, and not just a few. There are hundreds, stumbling around aimlessly and posing no current threat; but you are not safe here.

“We don’t have enough people to defend ourselves,” Aemond says once he’s taken a look, tapping his chin in that way that he does when he’s fearful but trying to hide it.

“No, we don’t,” Luke agrees.

“And there aren’t many natural resources here to subsist on. Even the fishing prospects aren’t great without a boat or a pier.”

“Right,” Luke says.

You wonder if Aemond is thinking the same thing you are. He might not know what has to happen next, but you do.

~~~~~~~~~~

The dining room table—large enough to seat twenty—is illuminated with candles, meticulously arranged with china and silverware, and cluttered with canned soups from brands you’ve never seen before: Amy’s, Pacific Foods, Health Valley. There are cases of Perrier and San Pellegrino to drink, and bottles of Chateau Lafite Rothschild red wine. Everyone else is here except Aegon. You are just about to go find him when he comes rushing down the staircase and into the dining room. He is wearing clothes from his closet here: a salmon pink polo that emphasizes his sunburn, khaki shorts, a white puka shell necklace, Sperry Bahama sneakers. The left shoe just barely fits over the bandages still protecting his healing left leg. There are fingerprints of white powder on the front of his shirt.

“Oh, look!” he announces. “Isn’t this precious? A family dinner?”

“Aegon, please sit down,” Aemond says briskly.

“Come on, it’ll be just like old times. We have all four of us kids, and then…Rhaena, you can be my dear departed Grandpa Otto, you just have to scowl at everyone…and Luke can be Criston.”

Luke is confused. “What—?”

“No no no! Don’t worry. It’s a very easy part. All you have to do is gaze worshipfully at Aemond and talk about how brilliant he is. There’s really not much to it, and honestly you do a lot of that already. And then…” Aegon floats by you, skimming his palm down the length of your hair. Something about the weight of his hand gives you goosebumps: careless, careful, fleeting, intimate. He sighs: “My beautiful, tortured mother.”

“Aegon, sit down,” Aemond orders.

“Father!” Aegon cries out suddenly, spotting Cregan at the head of the table. Cregan looks around the dining room, baffled. “You’ve joined us! How unusual! Did your Titanic replicas spontaneously combust? Did the world end? Well, actually, it sort of did…”

“Buddy, I have no earthly clue what you’re trying to—”

“Now this is a tough part,” Aegon says forcefully. “Patriarch of the Targaryen dynasty, big shoes to fill! But don’t worry, I’m here to help. I’ll give you your lines. All you have to do is repeat after me, okay?”

Cregan studies him and does not assent.

Aegon slams both palms down onto the table. “You’re so fucking stupid, Aegon. You’re a humiliation, Aegon. Why can’t you be smart like Aemond, or sweet like Helaena, or obedient like Daeron? Why did my firstborn child turn out to be such a fucking waste?”

“I’m not going to say that,” Cregan replies quietly.

“Say it,” Aegon seethes.

Now Daeron is weeping between spoonfuls of Amy’s tortilla soup straight from the can. “I want to go home.”

“We are home,” Aemond says.

“This isn’t home anymore, Aemond,” Daeron sniffles.

Aegon is still trying to feed Cregan lines. “Have you found a wife yet, Aegon? No, of course you haven’t. You’ve got hands like a rat and a disposition to match. You’re an overgrown vermin, you’re a plague to every house you enter. Who would fuck you out of anything but greed or pity?”

“Aegon, please stop,” Aemond pleads, wincing and rubbing his forehead.

Helaena folds her arms atop the table and rests her head on them, hiding her face. Luke and Rhaena keep their eyes downcast. Daeron reaches for a bottle of red wine, but Aegon swats his hand away.

“Nope. Illegal. You’re not 21.”

“Aegon, seriously, I’m so over that joke—”

“Shut up. You can’t even get a tattoo without parental consent.”

“Our parents are dead!” Daeron shouts. “They died terrible deaths and they’re never coming back and you’re making everything worse!”

“Then get rid of me! Put me out on the street and I won’t be anyone’s problem anymore! I’ll get murdered or eaten and it’ll be the best thing that ever happened to you!”

Helaena breaks down sobbing, and before Aegon can register what’s happening Cregan scoops him up off the floor and throws him over one broad shoulder. Then Cregan lugs him upstairs as Aegon struggles and yowls and punches at Cregan’s back, all in vain. You can hear a lot of commotion and then finally Cregan reappears, sweat beading on his brow but otherwise composed.

“I tied him to his bedframe with an extension cord,” Cregan says. “I don’t think he’ll be making any more trouble this evening.”

“Thank you,” Aemond replies, defeated.

“If he’s going to be up there all night, he’ll need water and food,” you say. “And enough blankets to make sure he’s warm.” It gets chilly when the sun goes down here, as low as the 50s. You grab two bottles of Perrier off the table and stand to bring them upstairs to Aegon, but Cregan gently takes them out of your hands.

“I’ll make sure he’s well supplied, Miss Chips,” Cregan insists, and you are convinced he thinks he’s doing you a favor. He doesn’t want Aegon to have the opportunity to upset anybody further. And yet a part of you is undeniably disappointed.

Aegon has been gone for ten minutes, and you miss him already.

~~~~~~~~~~

In Aemond’s childhood bedroom, a huge, impersonal, spartan space, the very few pieces of furniture all in the same color scheme of white and navy blue, you cannot say anything to bring his family back to life, or his friends, or the possibilities of what his life might have been before the dead began to walk. But you remember what he did for you when Rio died and you were sinking in dark, numb despair, and so you take Aemond’s hands and place them on your body—skimming under your t-shirt, circling around your waist—offering yourself like a sacrifice that you both desperately need, like a shot of antivenom that will only buy you hours. He draws you into his lap, and beneath your palms and your lips and your thighs, you can feel him coming back to you, filling up with light like a horizon at dawn.

“I’m still here,” you whisper as he throws you down onto the bed, eases himself into you, carries you away like a ship coasting out into open water. I don’t ever want to be anywhere but here.

Aemond holds you after, ensnared in sweat-damp sheets and entwined fingers, and he confesses: “I knew it was possible that they might not still be alive. Logically, I knew that. But it was like I never allowed myself to feel it. And now it’s…it’s��it’s all at once and it’s too much. I can’t fathom that I’ll never see them again. But I don’t even have time to mourn. I need to figure out where we’re going next.”

“Aemond?”

His lips to your forehead, his voice a drowsy murmur: “Hm?”

“I have to tell Rio’s family what happened to him.”

He pulls back to look at you. “You want to go to Oregon?”

“What if Odessa really is safe?”

At first he is bewildered; then he begins to consider it. “Criston’s Tahoe is in the garage. If we siphon the gas left in all the vehicles, we might have enough to get us halfway there.”

“That’s a lot better than none of the way there.”

“We’ll all have to vote on it. The trip will be dangerous.”

“Everything is now.”

“Almost everything,” he teases, his hand sliding down between your legs, taking you far away again.

~~~~~~~~~~

In the morning, you find Aegon at the cliffside smoking one of his Marlboro Golds, slow meditative drags, eyes bloodshot with lack of sleep. That’s alright. He can nap in the Tahoe. Rhaena won’t need his directions for a while; you’ll stay northbound on Route 1 for 200 miles before cutting inland as you near the Oregon border.

You sit down on the sandy, shrub-strewn ground beside Aegon and wait for him to speak. It takes a while, but you don’t mind. You’ve always had patience; you’ve always been a better listener than someone who fills silences.

At last Aegon says: “I don’t want to be like this anymore.”

“Then stop.”

He smirks bitterly, glaring out into the sunrise, orange light like fire on his sunburned face. “You make reinvention sound so easy.”

“It’s not easy. But it is simple. You decide to get out, and then you do it. You don’t let anything convince you to give up or change course. The only way out is through.”

“I have a proposition.”

“I’m still not interested in fake dating you.”

He cackles. “No, it’s something else.”

“Okay. Let’s hear it.”

Now Aegon is serious. “I don’t ever want to split up again. Not in a year, not in ten years, not in twenty. Never.”

You smile as you watch the reflection of the dawn in his eyes, murky faraway blue like oceans all across the globe. “I didn’t know you thought so highly of commitment.”

“I want to take care of you until you die. I want you to take care of me until I die. And that’s as far as commitment goes with me.”

“Deal.” You offer Aegon your hand.

He shakes it. “Deal.”

Two hours later, Criston Cole’s white Chevy Tahoe is loaded high with supplies—including several of Aegon’s golf clubs and his acoustic guitar—and heading north on Route 1, a Fall Out Boy song from one of Aegon’s mixtapes blaring through the speakers:

“When Rome’s in ruins

We are the lions, free of the Colosseums

In poison places, we are antivenom

We’re the beginning of the end…”

You rest your head on Aemond’s shoulder and wait for the sapphire-and-gold Bay Area to become the misty, primordial emerald green of the Pacific Northwest.

#aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen #aemond x you #aemond x y/n #aemond x reader #aemond targaryen x you #hotd fanfic #hotd fic

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embrosegraves · 1 year ago

Text

𝕊𝕡𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕥𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕀𝕔𝕖 𝔸𝕡𝕒𝕣𝕥

(request) Kimi Räikkönen x Fem!Reader Kimi only allowed one person to truly know him. You.

Warnings: a bit of cussing, poorly google translated Finnish, and extremely brief research of cities in Finland. Briefly edited.

Kimi famously never allowed his emotions to be on open display for the people around him. He never let people see behind his frosty facade. He never let people get close enough for them to figure him out. He always kept everyone at a distance so there was no possible way for anyone to truly know the type of man he was. Excluding his parents, there was only one exception to all of it.

You.

Kimi never intended to bump into anyone on his break between seasons. He had chosen Pori specifically because he knew that no one he worked with knew enough about Finland to know where Pori was. None of his colleagues knew that Pori was roughly a 3 hour drive north west of his home town. With a population of 83 thousand compared to Espoo’s 310 thousand, it wasn’t an extremely well known place.

Kimi supposed he shouldn’t’ve been so surprised when he bumped into you, causing your coffee to spill everywhere. But he couldn’t help it. He never would’ve expected to literally bump into someone he worked with.

“Katsu se!” You exclaimed. Too busy trying to wipe off the spilt coffee before it could stain your coat too badly. [Watch it!]

“L/n?”

Of course you knew who it was, how could you not? It wasn’t like you spent a majority of the year around him, battling it out every weekend for top spot on the podium.

“What Räikkönen? Didn’t expect to see me over break?” You finally looked up and made eye contact with the Finn.

“Why are you in Finland?”

“Am I not allowed to go home during winter break?” This had stunned Kimi more than bumping into you.

“Home?”

Your annoyance had disappeared a while ago, the whole situation was too amusing for you to be truly annoyed. “Räikkönen, just because I race under a different flag doesn’t mean I’m not associated with another country. I was born in Pori, spent 14 years here before moving overseas.”

After that the rest was history. You ended up spending more and more of your winter break around Kimi. So much time that the Finn found himself opening up more and more around you. At first he had been the same cold, closed off Kimi that you were used to, but soon enough his metaphorical ice walls began to melt around you. He learnt that your mother had been born in Finland and had met your father while on holiday. You told him that your father had moved to Finland to be with your mother and that you always spent winter break in Pori. You travelled so much for the rest of the year you found there was no point travelling between seasons.

Throughout your time together, Kimi found himself telling you things he had only ever told his parents. He told you how he had wanted to eventually settle down and start a family. He told you that he truly did believe that Formula 1 was a hobby, that it wasn’t just something he said for the cameras. He told you that sometimes, in the privacy of his own home, he often thought about his imaginary daughters running around and filling his house with giggles and bright smiles.

Eventually, the winter break would come to an end, and you would both have to go back to the rush of racing every weekend. About a week before preseason testing, you had been hanging out with Kimi in your living room. Talking about everything you had done so far in your careers. Kimi had smiled when you started to laugh at the story he had just finished telling.

Watching you laugh at something he said had him feeling almost giddy with nerves. He had never felt this way with a woman before. Not one to let an opportunity slip by, he spoke up softly.

“Y/n?”

“Yes Kimi?” You responded, trying your best to calm down from laughing.

“Let me take you on a date.”

“Kimi- what?”

“I want to take you on a date. These last months have let me understand that everything I want in life, I want them to be with you.” He said. Taking your hand in his, he spoke with a sincerity you had never seen or heard in a man before. “Let me take you on a date and show you.”

Your free hand had covered your mouth as he spoke. A month ago, when you realised what your own feelings for him were, you had become determined to never mention them. There was no way The Iceman of all people would feel the same about you. Yet here he was. Sitting on your couch and asking you to go on a date with him.

“Yes.”

Kimi gave you a smile that had become less and less rare the more you spent time with him.

“Thank you.”

It had been three years since then. In that time you had gone on dates in every country you had travelled to. You both celebrated every win and comforted every loss. Two years into dating, Kimi had asked you to move in and marry him and during the mid-year break, surrounded by both your immediate families, you had become Y/n Räikkönen. Kimi hadn’t cared about telling the other drivers or the media, and you had agreed saying that it would be far funnier if they found out on their own. So nothing had changed in your public routines. In your head you thought the funniest part of it all would be that no one on the grid knew you had even started dating each other.

Neither of you had gone out of your way to avoid the other, in fact the other drivers often saw you both hanging around each other. Nobody had any inkling that You and Kimi were together as more than friends. Many gossip sources chalked it up to the two “outcasts” of the grid hanging out and left it at that. So it was a surprise to everyone when some fans had pointed out on social media that your signature had changed from your race number and maiden name to Räikkönen.

Jensen and Fernando, being constantly online, had dragged Sebastian to immediately start searching for the Finn. What they had found was more surprising than your change of signature. Opening the door to Kimi’s drivers room, the three of them saw you sitting on the couch with Kimi lounging on your lap, asleep. You had one hand running through his hair as he slept while the other was scrolling on your phone. Looking up as the door opened, you smiled when you saw who it was.

“Hello boys. Anything I can help you with?” You asked. Fernando was too shocked to say anything and Jensen had just started stuttering out incoherent sounds, so it was up to Sebastian.

“There are fans saying that your signature has changed.”

You huffed a gentle laugh, trying not to disturb your husband from his rest. “That’s because it has.”

“But why?” Jensen had managed to get his English under control enough to start actually speaking.

“Why’d you think it would change Jense?” You were having too much fun with this.

“But you have never shown any interest in Kimi. And Kimi doesn’t show interest in anything, so when?” It was Fernando’s turn to get over his shock. “How long have you been married? Why did we not know?”

By now Kimi was definitely awake, though he made no show of it. You could feel Kimi’s hand that was resting between you and the couch back start to gently stroke your thigh. You knew he was also amused.

“I wasn’t aware I needed to tell you who I was interested in. If I’d known I would’ve told you three years ago.”

“Three years!?” The three of them cried.

Eyes still closed, Kimi mumbled to you. “Käske heitä naimaan. Nukun.” [Tell them to fuck off. I’m sleeping.]

“Luulen, että olet levännyt tarpeeksi, rakkaani.” You replied laughing. All Kimi did was groan. [I think you’ve rested enough, my love.]

“If you wake up properly, I’ll give you a kiss.”

Opening his eyes, Kimi briefly glanced at the three flabbergasted men still in his driver's room, before looking directly at you. “Teet kovaa kauppaa, vaimo.” [You drive a hard bargain, wife.]

He sat up nonetheless and moved so you could place your legs over his lap. He looked at the others and spoke. “What else did you want to blubber about?”

Kimi was aware that he had a resting bitch face, and most times he didn’t mean to glare at people, but the three men in front of you had clearly been terrified of what Kimi might do if they stayed, so they quickly made their way out of the room.

“I told you they would find out from the fans.” You laughed. A smile broke out on Kimi’s face.

“I really thought they were smart enough to figure it out themselves.”

“Sebastian I could understand, but we’re talking about Jensen and Fernando here, my love. They were never going to figure it out on their own.”

“That’s true.” Kimi shifted you closer to him, so that you were sitting on his lap facing him. “I believe I was promised a kiss, Wife.”

“How could I ever deny you, Husband?” You whispered, leaning in close and gently placing your lips to his. His hand moved to the back of your neck to pull you closer and deepen the kiss. Both of you aware of the three drivers that had yet to move from the other side of Kimi’s door.

It wasn’t your fault if they saw something they shouldn’t’ve.

Okay, time got away from me for a bit but here it is!

I hope you all enjoyed!

Likes, replies and reblogs are always appreciated <3

#formula 1 x you #f1 x reader #f1 fluff #formula one #formula 1 #kimi raikkonen x you #kimi raikkonen fluff #kimi raikkonen x reader #kimi raikkonen imagine #kimi raikkonen fic #kr7 #kimi raikkonen

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literaryvein-reblogs · 3 months ago

Note

this blog has helped me so so much !! if u haven't answered something like this already, could i ask for some help/tips w southern vocabulary and how to go about writing it ?

Some Southern Vocabulary

A Month Of Sundays - This expression is another way of saying something has taken a long time or that something is unlikely to happen.

Bless Your Heart - It can be deployed sincerely, but if you're hearing "bless your heart" in the South, it probably has an edge to it. It's almost always accompanied by a good-natured, perhaps slightly exasperated, shake of the head. It can express empathy or judgment, or it can be said in place of a person's true feelings.

Icebox Pie - Any dessert prepared in a pie crust that has to be kept refrigerated.

Kinfolk - People to whom one is related.

Knee High - Small child (I’ve known her since she was knee high.)

Meat and Three - A main dish meat served with three sides of your choice.

Mess - The word mess generally has a negative connotation, but in the South, it takes on a whole new meaning—one with a positive spin. The context around mess matters. The entire phrase is usually something along the lines of you a mess or you’re a mess, with the discussion before it centering on something you’re doing. Think of it as a compliment, a way of saying you’re adorable or possibly clever or witty.

‘Nanner Pudding - Banana pudding made with sliced bananas, vanilla wafers and vanilla pudding; usually topped with whipped cream.

Over Yonder - When you're in the South, "over yonder" is a distant direction—any direction. The phrase may be accompanied by a gesture indicating north, south, east, or west. Over yonder down the road. Over yonder past the field. Over yonder toward the water tower. This phrase can be intensified by the addition of the word "way," as in "way over yonder."

Piddlin' - A piddlin’ is a small amount that’s not worth bothering with. Someone who is piddlin’ in the yard is wasting time and not doing a whole lot.

Preachin’ To The Choir - When you are preachin’ to the choir, you are trying to convince someone who already agrees with you. Save your breath. You’re all in solidarity.

Pretty As A Peach - This is a high compliment in the South since Southern states are known for their peaches. In fact, Georgia and South Carolina produce more peaches than any other states in the South.

Slower than Molasses in the Winter - If someone is moving very slow pace, you could say that they’re “slower than molasses in the winter.” The origin of this one is pretty straightforward: if you’ve ever tried to pour molasses out of a bottle in the cold, you’ll know that the thick liquid takes a long time to make its way out. Since molasses is a staple of Southern cooking, it makes sense that this phrase caught on and stuck around.

That Dog Won't Hunt - An idea, plan of action, or suggestion that simply isn't going anywhere. It's maybe a slightly nicer way of outright rejecting or disparaging an idea.

We’uns - Us; multiple people, including the speaker (We’uns love to get together for Sunday dinner.)

And here's a post that includes tips on writing accents and dialects (scroll to the end).

Sources: 1 2 3 4 ⚜ More: Notes & References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

Thanks so much for your lovely words, hope this helps with your writing! You could also look through the links above for more references that I wasn't able to include here.

#anonymous #southern #writeblr #literature #writers on tumblr #dark academia #writing reference #spilled ink #writing prompt #creative writing #light academia #words #writing tips #writing resources

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drarryspecificrecs · 3 months ago

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2024.12 ~ Top 10 longest fics posted on AO3

1. We Can Be Pirates by @cowboilikeme [E, 356k]

Draco Malfoy grew up during the summer of '94 and Harry Potter is a sucker for forgiving people.

2. Oxytocin by WouldItWere [E, 179k]

Draco Malfoy cannot sleep. If he keeps going like this, he will go mad, or die, or both. For some reason, though, he can sleep whenever Harry Potter is with him. And Harry Potter is nothing if not a helper to those in need.

3. Need You by @youhavemyswordandmybow [E, 114k]

Going back to school has been good for Harry. He’s enjoying it this time around, actually learning, rather than fighting for his life. Of course, there’s a few things that are keeping him occupied. One of them is blonde, insufferable and wears really nice clothes. The other one is also blonde, and is definitely dead. No matter, at least he hasn’t done anything stupid - like bonded his entire life to a certain someone who he absolutely had no need to bond himself to …

4. Lost Memories by celestine80 [M, 105k]

Harry is tired of being enemies with Draco. He has more important things to worry about. The most pressing of those being his real enemy, Voldemort, who is now at large. And then Draco starts acting suspicious and Harry wants to know the truth. He always tries to believe the best in people, but Harry is starting to wonder if there is any good left in Draco at all.

5. the keys you keep by @venrain [M, 105k]

Months after Harry is promoted to Head of Magical Law Enforcement, tragedy strikes. Cursed, Harry blames himself and flees to the States. And he's doing fine; really, he's having a grand time hiding from the world, drinking himself into a stupor, and losing himself in west Manhattan. Then, he stumbles into a lounge bar.

6. Through The Dark by @adam-my-adam [E, 100k]

Draco refuses to return to Hogwarts for his eighth year. Harry finds himself disappointed. Guess they will just go their separate paths and never figure out their connection. Draco will never learn his self worth or make a potion to help his mother, and virgin Harry will never learn the joys of making love. And neither will learn that there is life after Voldemort. Or maybe fate crosses their paths and Harry somehow, with help from an unexpected source, wiggles his way into Malfoy's private Potion sessions?

7. Want for Nothing by @syrahbat [M, 79k]

After his wife Astoria dies at the hands of a blood curse, Draco Malfoy falls under investigation; except the Auror assigned to his case is Harry Potter, and Harry Potter has a very different opinion of Draco than everybody else, including Draco himself.

8. The Light and Dark Inside of Us by MaryWinchester [M, 64k]

Harry and Draco overhear a conversation they probably shouldn't have. Afterward, nothing is the same.

9. Queen of the Weeds by @beloved-child-of-the-house [E, 61k]

[...] Draco returns to Hogwarts for 8th year and finds himself a pariah. To his surprise, Harry Potter is the only person who seems to want anything to do with him.

10. Heatwaves by KateBishopHawkeye [E, 58k]

Summer, 12 years after the war. It was not the worst heatwave in London's history, but Hermione and Harry would be damned if it didn't feel like it. Especially in 12 Grimmauld Place, where four unlikely housemates find things heating up in unexpected ways amid old hurts and new threats.

※ HONOURABLE MENTIONS :

11. Is It Really So Strange? by @fantasticelement [E, 56k]

Harry Potter left everything behind just to teach a bunch of kids — but so did Draco Malfoy. /// A story about rebuilding a school, and rebuilding a bond that, for better or worse, never dimmed.

12. In the Woods Somewhere by @dracopetal [E, 54k]

Draco can't remember what the world was like before Fenrir took him. His life is the cabin and the woods that surround it. But one night in winter, Fenrir kidnaps a man he calls an old enemy, and Draco's life is forever changed.

13. The Theory of Fading by Antisceptic [M, 53k]

Ten years after the end of the war Harry decides to get the scar on his forehead removed. The only person capable of doing that is a brilliant alchemist from France, who publishes his research under an alias. His real name turns out to be Draco Malfoy. They navigate the situation quite poorly.

14. The Witch and the Sorcerer by burningcherries [E, 50k]

The days of the great wand-wielding wizards are long gone, but under the protection of Rome's growing empire, magic hasn't entirely faded away. All humans have it, but only one type. [...] Harry, a recently widowed sorcerer, leaves his hometown with his children and his wixen friends in the hope of finding a witch available for mating further north.

15. In A Hundred Lifetimes by nooraska [M, 41k]

Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy are destined to meet in any version of reality. Or: Draco is weird and Harry doesn't know why but feels drawn to him anyway.

—

※ Word count: 1k ~ 15k

※ Word count: 15k ~ 40k

because my love is mine, all mine by @sachesky [E, 23k]

javelin (to have and to hold) by @garagepaperback [E, 18k]

The Loved Ones by Toffeemond [E, 24k]

Ride by @eurhythmix [M, 37k]

Something about dragons by @bakuko [E, 32k] --- translated by martir

Under Your Spell by SairleB [E, 23k]

—

Ongoing Fest/Exchange

※ Fics would be listed elsewhere.

25 Days of Draco and Harry 2024 | @slythindor100

H/D Erised 2024 | @hd-erised

Harry/Draco Owlpost 2024 | @hdowlpost

HP Soulmates Secret Santa 2024 | @hp-soulmates-secret-santa (1)

DCC Holiday Exchange

dual/ity (1)

Fifth Annual Dirty Festivus: Filthy and F*ckable (1)

Frond Flash Fic Fest (1)

HP Secret Santa 2024 (1)

Let it Snow - Quill Quests! (1)

Magical Menagerie Gift Exchange 2024 (1)

#drarry #drarry fanfic #drarry fic rec #harry potter #draco malfoy #monthly review #2024

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sweetarethediscords · 11 months ago

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The Maiden of The Barren Rime

Winter Wind blows through the valley, pushes us into our homes.

Pleading she knocks at our windows, scorned she continues to roam.

Chapter 1: The Brambled Beauty

Mina quieted at the sound of unfamiliar voices on the wind.

“Are you sure this is the right cabin?” It was a feminine voice, on the younger side, with a slight Tinian accent, most likely from the North Coast judging from the way they dragged the “er” in “sure.”

“Of course this is the right cabin! It’s the only cabin in this damned forest!” A masculine voice spat back. Staunchly Lanholdian, Mina could almost feel the thick tension in their tongue behind her own teeth. The gravel of age and annoyance ground up from the back of their throat.

Mina picked up her pace, leaping up into the treetops, crossing miles in minutes towards the voices with no more sound than the rustle of wind through pine needles.

She stilled. The branch beneath her feet barely creaked.

They were outside her cabin. A young woman with thick glasses and even thicker curly hair checked the compass in her hand as the short, sturdy man beside her impatiently tapped his foot and picked at the split ends of his long, braided beard.

Mina placed a hand on the hilt of her sword as she watched them through the canopy. The man’s leather armor bore a crest depicting a mountain top and three diamonds, with glinting, well-polished stripes on his pauldron pronouncing his rank. Seven; a general of lauded stature. Why he traveled with the young woman was unclear.

She was clearly not a noble. The slight roll forward of her shoulders, the patterned bandanna holding her hair out of her eyes too weathered or wrinkled for even a disguised royal to wear, and a decent soldier would never keep their guard down as much as hers was in an unfamiliar place. Perhaps she had hired the knight as security on her journey.

A journey Mina would take no part in.

She shifted to sit easily and silently, making sure not to catch the beaver skins hanging from her pack beneath her. A few more minutes and they would leave, then she could prep the skins and start to smoke the meat in her satchel as planned.

“Well,” the woman stuffed her compass into her jacket pocket. “At least it’s a nice day out to wait. Sun’s still warm enough to cut the edge off the autumn chill.”

Annoyingly, she made her way to the porch of Mina’s cabin and took a seat on its rough wooden steps. Mina ground her teeth slightly. Maybe a splinter or two would poke her through her patchwork skirt and urge her away.

The man huffed and kicked at a tuft of crabgrass. “You think this chill has an edge? Just wait until you’re on the Peaks.” The tuft came loose, sending dirt and now homeless pill bugs scattering. “If we ever get to the fucking Peaks.”

Dammit, Mina thought. They were here for an expedition.

“Ya know, we could always go with another alpinist,” the woman offered. “Beto Lamar’s homestead is about a day’s ride west from here.”

“A day’s ride but three weeks past our deadline,” the man said. “This girl can bring us back to Lanholde in under a month.” He stomped over and stood on the steps, too proud to sit, but not proud enough to not lean on the railing for support. “She will get us there in a month.”

“Even if she’s already off on an expedition?”

“She’s not,” the man gestured over his shoulder. “The windows are open. And this cabin is too well maintained for its owner to just head off for two months with the windows left open.”

Mina thudded her head against the tree trunk. Of course. An observant and stubborn knight.

She inhaled deeply, held it, then exhaled, taking her frustration down a little, unclenching her jaw just a touch. She'd piss them off enough that they’d rather stand Lamar’s extra three weeks in the cold than put up with her, and if that didn’t work, ask for a ridiculous amount of gold to scare them off.

Three more weeks in the cold. Three more weeks to die. The unwilling thought made her teeth ache.

She climbed down from the pine she had perched in and moved soundlessly towards the drying rack staked beside her cabin. She removed one of the rungs filled with beaver skins from her pack. A loud and forceful snap echoed through the woods as she dropped it into place.

The trespassing pair jumped. The knight drew his sword as the woman bladed her feet into a wide stance, arms lifted, ready to perform some sort of cast.

So they were a magic wielder and a knight.

“Get off the porch,” Mina stated bluntly as she hung another rack.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched the knight’s jaw fall agape while the woman’s disposition relaxed. She straightened up out of her fighting stance, and Mina caught the faint sound of a cork squeaking back into a bottle on the wind.

“My apologies, miss. We’re looking for the alpinist that lives here,” she said. “Would that be you?”

“No,” Mina lied. “I’m a hunter. The alpinist lives to the west.”

The woman arched an eyebrow and looked to the knight. He flared his nostrils, puffed out his chest, and stomped over towards her.

“I am Sir Murmir Gargic, general-rank knight of the Lanholde Royal Army, proud servant to King Fritz Reinhardt.”

“Never heard of him,” she lied again.

The knight sputtered, whatever bullshit speech he had prepared dying on his tongue. “You never—”

“Sir Gargic,” the woman whispered behind him, calling his attention and allowing him a moment to regain his composure.

Annoying.

“Well, he’s heard of you, and has specifically recommended that we seek you out to lead us up the Fallow Peaks. We’re in a bit of a time crunch, so if you don’t mind talking terms so we can start the expedition today—”

“If that’s the case, then I guess your king expects you both to die,” Mina droned, mono-toned and matter-of-factly. “I’m a hunter, not an alpinist.”

The knight’s breathing shallowed as her jab at his ruler crawled under his skin. He inhaled deeply, a tirade building, when the woman placed a hand on his shoulder.

“How much would it cost for you to be an alpinist?” she asked.

Mina drifted her dull gaze over towards the woman, finding her with a smirk on her lips and a knowing glint in her eye.

“Seven thousand gilt one way,” she answered. “The real alpinist to the west charges half that.”

“I’m sure.” The woman shrugged. “But the alpinist we’re looking for fits your description exactly. Female alpinist. Rough around the edges. Lives alone in a cabin deep in the Sandere Woods, five hundred paces off of the last bend in Woodgullet Road, heading northeast.” She rattled off the details as if she were reading them off a sheet of paper.

Mina blinked slowly, then repeated. “Seven thousand gilt one way.”

“Deal.”

Gods fucking dammit. An unfortunately familiar tug pulled at her spine.

Sir Gargic fished out a scroll from one of the pouches on his belt, while the woman brandished a quill and a bottle of ink. He scrawled something down on it, then turned the parchment in her direction: a contract of duty.

His thick, stubby finger pointed at the 7,000g written next to the terms of payment. “Seven-thousand gilt to be delivered direct from the Capitol’s treasury upon our safe arrival.” His finger traveled down the page to a long signature line. “All you need to do is sign here.”

She did, reluctantly. Her arm dragged by that damned tug.

“Mina,” the woman read her name aloud, standing on the tips of her toes to watch as she wrote it. “I’m Wera Alrust.”

Mina snapped the quill once she finished, dropped it to the ground, and headed into her cabin.

“Where are you going?” Sir Gargic barked behind her. “You’re under contract to—”

“Packing,” Mina answered. “Can’t climb a ten-thousand-foot cliff face with just a bow, a sword, and a can-do attitude.” She paused in the doorway. “Just two going up?”

“Five,” Wera answered. “Six if you count yourself.”

“I don’t.”

Last-minute trips up the Fallow Peaks were nothing new to Mina, as much as she loathed them. They were always inconvenient and pressing, which meant the travelers were stressed and distracted — which meant the death count was usually higher than the average one or two losses. Expeditions such as this were few and far between, at least. Most travelers knew to prepare well in advance for the perilous journey, contracting her months ahead of time instead of minutes.

She closed all the windows and locked the shutters, made sure her books and sheet music were lifted off the ground in case the fall rains caused the lake to flood, and tucked the more expensive of her instruments away as she filled the pack she kept by the door.

“Flint, whytewing leathers, tarp, rations, climbing axes…” she muttered to herself as she rifled through it — taking stock to make sure she had everything she needed — then picked up a fiddle and bow leaning against a hard wooden chair. She loosened up the strings a bit and unstrung the bow to keep the horse hairs from snapping, then shoved it in with the rest of her gear.

“Where are the other three?” she asked as she stepped back outside and locked the door.

“Back on the road, waiting with the wagon,” Wera replied.

“You can’t take a wagon up a mountain.”

“We don’t plan to.” She was, frustratingly, smiling at Mina when she turned around. “Ready to go?”

“Lead the way.”

Sir Gargic headed off, impatience and frustration bringing out the ill-manner child in him. With such thin skin, it wouldn’t be long before he broke their contract, or he died. Rabbet’s Pass most likely, which would be convenient. She could leave his corpse in the caves there, and they wouldn’t have too far of a walk back to Sandere afterwards.

After only a few wrong turns through the thick wood, the seldom-used road emerged. A simple covered wagon pulled off to the side let the four horses that drove it graze lazily, while two more members of their party hung around it: an old woman with her hair up in a tight bun, sitting on the ground making daisy chains out of dandelions, and a young man with a sharp haircut and a well-coiffed mustache scrawling in a notebook as he sat in the driver’s seat.

Sir Gargic’s spine straightened and chest puffed out as he put on a bit of bravado. “We’ve returned!” he cried, waving grandly.

The old woman and mustached man looked up from their work. The woman abandoned her dandelions and stood to meet them, while the young man looked them over and flipped to another page in his book; quill taking off in a fury.

“Ah! Are you the young lady who will be guiding us?” The old woman smiled sweetly. “My name’s Tanir and the boy on the cart is Enoch.” She turned over her shoulder and hollered, “Wave hello, Enoch!”

Enoch raised his hand partially, too engrossed in whatever he was writing to look away.

“Mina.” Mina met Tanir’s gaze, and the old woman’s brow furrowed. She was looking for the appropriate response, a sign of expression to source Mina’s first impression of her. Mina watched her bottom lip shift subtly, a minuscule pucker as her teeth bit behind it uneased to find nothing.

Annoy the knight. Unnerve the old woman. Now she just had to find the others’ weaknesses.

“You’ll have to leave the wagon and loose the horses an hour or so up the road. They’ll slow us down and will be hunted by the beasts of the Harrow.”

“Oh, uh—” Tanir swallowed. “That sounds like something you should discuss with Master Windenhofer. I’ll go get him for you.” She flashed another smile, this one fueled by nerves, and hurried off into the back of the wagon.

Enoch snapped his notebook shut and leaned over the side of the driver’s seat. He rested his chin on his hand dramatically, abandoning the fierce focus he held when writing to gaze at Mina with puppy dog eyes. “Did you know you are extremely beautiful for an alpinist?”

Sir Gargic sputtered with embarrassment. Wera shot Enoch a disgusted look.

Mina stared at him blankly.

“I know,” she said after a moment.

Enoch choked on his spit at her response. Wera burst out into a fit of laughter, drawing Mina’s attention.

Laughter wasn’t a response she was used to receiving.

“Don’t forget to write that one down,” Wera wheezed through her giggles. “‘My attempts at flirtation failed tremendously as usual.’ A good archivist doesn’t leave out any details!”

“Enough of that, Enoch!” Sir Gargic snipped, hitting him on the arm. “She comes highly recommended by The Crown of Lanholde, and you will address her with the respect that such a recommendation warrants!”

“S-sorry, M-mina,” Enoch stammered, still caught off guard by her curtness as he leaned back away from her, rubbing his injured arm.

“I hear we have a new face joining our motley crew!” a warm, deep voice cheered from inside the wagon. The cart bounced as a tall, lean man, with a wide smile and a thick shag haircut, stepped out of it, Tanir following behind.

“Hello, I am Sebastian Windenhofer. It is wonderful to meet you!” the man extended his hand out in greeting.

A soft breeze blew between them as Mina considered his outstretched hand. His fingers were long, as to be expected of someone of his height, and his palms were oddly covered with an even layer of callous.

She did not shake it.

“Mina,” she said to the hand, in the same bland manner that she had introduced herself to everyone else.

Sebastian seemed unbothered by his spurned handshake, and instead clasped his hands together and nodded his head softly, “Mina.” There was a slight hum to the ‘M’ as he said it. “Tanir mentioned that you wished to speak to me about something regarding the horses?”

Mina’s distant stare met his attentive gaze. Sebastian didn’t flinch. “You’ll have to leave the wagon and loose the horses an hour or so up the road.”

“Why’s that?” he asked.

“The woods are too thick for a wagon to fit through, and the mountains are too steep,” she answered. “The Harrowed Woods that border Sandere and the Peaks are filled with hungry monsters who will be lured by the thought of a four-course horse meal, too.”

“I see.” Sebastian brought his hand up and tapped his fingertips lightly against his lips as he thought. “Would it be better for the horses if we left the wagon and let them loose now as opposed to when we get closer?”

Mina paused, and tilted her head to the side, caught off guard by his question.

“Have I spoken out of turn?” his voice wavered.

“No, it’s just that I’ve never had someone ask to let the horses out early,” she replied, much more candidly than she intended. She straightened her head, collecting herself. “There’d be less chance of them being attacked. Not many monsters here in these woods.”

“That settles it, then.” Sebastian addressed his crew, “Gather your belongings, we will be continuing on foot from here. Wera and Sir Gargic, unhitch the horses and send them back down the road, please.”

“Ugh, my penmanship gets so poor when we’re walking,” Enoch groaned as he slid down from the driver’s seat.

“Guess you’ll have to save your sonnets for when we’re in Lanholde,” Wera remarked as she started unbuckling one of the horse’s bridles. “We’ve got nothing but walking ahead of us now.”

Sebastian returned his attention to Mina. “It should only take us a few minutes to get packed up. Would you like a cup of tea while you wait?” He reached inside his overcoat and pulled out a tea kettle and mug. Twirling the mug around his finger by its handle, he juggled the kettle with one hand and caught it by its base. Steam rose from its spout.

Not just a magic user. He was a wizard, capable enough to demonstrate his talents so casually.

Or cocky enough to make a big show over the few skills he did have.

“No,” Mina replied, tapping the canteen attached to her belt. “I have a canteen.”

She could have just left it at ‘no’.

“Of course.” He threw the tea set into the air as if he were throwing away a piece of paper over his shoulder and with a snap of his fingers they vanished.

Definitely a show-off.

“I have a few things to pack myself if you’ll excuse me,” he continued, smiling again, still wide as it shifted to a slightly different shape, then headed back into the covered wagon.

Mina watched him walk away.

If he wasn’t just a show-off, then maybe they’d make it a mile past Rabbet’s Pass.

🜁

“So, Mina, would you care to tell us a little about yourself?” Sebastian asked as they walked up the rest of the road. Considering how chatty they were while getting their shit together, Mina didn’t have any hope of a quiet walk to the Harrow’s beginning. “I’m sure there’s much more to you than living in these woods and leading expeditions through the Fallow Peaks.”

“That’s all there is to know,” she replied.

Sebastian chuckled, a rumble out from his chest that buzzed in Mina’s ears. “I’m sure that’s not true. What about ‘how you got started leading expeditions’? Doesn’t seem like a job someone just falls into.”

“It’s not.”

“Then how’d it happen for you?”

“Someone had to do it. So I did it.”

“And what did that entail?”

“Doing it.”

“Sebastian,” Tanir interjected, “perhaps it’d be best if we shared a little bit about ourselves first.” She smiled at Mina. Mina kept her gaze forward, praying that the treeline would take mercy on her and move closer on its own. “I’m the company medic, been working with Sebastian since he had a particularly rough encounter collecting basilisk venom a few summers back. Poor thing hobbled to my home half turned to stone, and insisted I travel with him on his adventures ever since.”

“You faced off against a basilisk?” Enoch piped up from the back of the pack. “When we rest for the evening, you’ll have to sit down with me and give me the full story. You too, Tanir. It should definitely be added to my records.”

“Are you volunteering to go next then, Enoch?” Sebastian asked.

“I— uh—” Enoch jogged up in front of them and turned to walk backwards as he spoke, “Well I met—”

“Don’t walk like that,” Mina interrupted. “If you fall and break something, we’ll have to leave you behind, or I’ll have to kill you.”

His steps slowed as his eyes widened. “Wh-what?”

“It’s quicker than the duskwolves tearing into your flesh and snapping your neck.” It was brutal imagery, but not entirely false.

“She’s kidding, Enoch,” Sebastian said.

Enoch’s voice hollowed. “H-how can you tell?”

“Because if you did break something, Tanir would gladly patch you up,” he reasoned.

“Though I’d give you a scolding while I did it for not listening to the expert,” Tanir added, drawing out the title expert to appease Mina’s non-existent good side. “So turn around and continue your story.”

“Right.” Enoch turned around quickly at her instruction, gathered his composure with a shudder of his shoulders, and turned his head slightly to the side to speak, “I met Sebastian on a truly fate-defining day. Wandering the Coast of Carvons, I was lost, looking for inspiration to strike.”

Wera groaned.

“And it did! As I sat on the beach, begging the great and powerful ocean to lend me some of its majesty, a geyser of sand erupted from underneath of me, sending me skyrocketing through the air. Whilst I fell from the heavens, I looked down at the ground below me. What once was a beach was now a golden temple! And upon the roof of this temple stood the great Sebastian Windenhofer, my new muse! Since that day, I have traveled alongside him, cataloging his adventures to tell the world of his greatness.”

“You know that the rest of us were on top of that temple too, right?” Wera chided before addressing Mina. “Please take his tales with a grain of salt. For an archivist, he seems to have a selective memory. I’m the cartographer. Sebastian was the first person to hire me out of school, and I’ve been traveling with him ever since.”

She looked back at Enoch and snickered, “See? Short, sweet, and to the point. Your turn, Sir Gargic.”

“Indeed.” Somehow, the knight puffed his swollen chest even bigger. “Unlike the rest of my compatriots, I am not under the employ of Master Windenhofer, but rather a liaison of The Crown of Lanholde. They’ve tasked the two of us with uncovering and collecting a few precious artifacts that The Crown has a vested interest in. We are on the last leg of this journey now.”

Everyone’s attention landed on Mina, heavy with expectation, a burdensome weight. They had offered their stories without her agreement. There was no need for her to respond. Responding would only embolden them to keep prying.

Sebastian broke the thick silence and turned to Tanir, “Did you really have to tell the basilisk story, Tani?”

“It’s one of my first and favorite memories of you,” she replied.

“You should’ve waited for winter,” Mina commented, against her better judgment. “Basilisks get sluggish and less alert in the cold. You can sneak up behind them and slice off their heads in one strike if your blade is sharp enough. Just make sure to cut about a foot below their jaw so that you don’t pierce the venom gland.”

Her unexpected advice, matter-of-fact and brutal, garnered shocked and confused expressions from everyone but the wizard. Maybe it was the right call, then. The more alien she seemed, the better off they all would be.

“Aha! You’re a hunter too!” Sebastian — frustratingly — cheered. “I knew there was more to you!”

If Mina could meaningfully scowl, she would have. The sight of his smile stabbed at the corner of her eye as she kept her gaze forward. Wizards were known to be fascinated by curiously temperamental creatures, of course it would be harder to break him.

“Now, do you have any other comments, questions, concerns for our happy little troop? Perhaps some tips on how to deal with those duskwolves you—”

“You’re all loud,” she stated. “It’ll draw things to us, and cause trouble on the Peaks.”

“Why’s that?” Tanir asked.

“Avalanches.”

“Wait,” Enoch said. “There’s going to be snow on these mountains?”

“What did you think we bought all those cold weather clothes for?” Wera scoffed.

“Lanholde has a cooler climate. I just thought winter wear was the fashion there.”

Wera sent a pleading look Sebastian’s way. “Did you really have to hire him, ‘Bastian? We could have just left him stranded on that beach.”

“True,” Sebastian shrugged, “but we need entertainment on this journey, and watching the two of you bicker could rival some of the best traveling shows.”

As those around Mina talked, and laughed, and teased each other, the surrounding trees grew in number. Their trunks twisted, more gnarled and oddly shaped, their canopy so thick it shifted the shade of the lower leaves lighter from the lack of sunlight. The group came to a halt as the road ended at a wall of forest: the start of the Harrowed Wood.

“Right. Which of you can fight?” Mina asked as she headed to the front of the pack.

All of them raised their hands.

Wera and Sir Gargic she understood but the others… “This isn’t the time for jokes.”

“We wouldn’t have gotten this far if we couldn’t hold our own, lass,” Sir Gargic said. “Trust me, I was wary myself when I first met them, but even Enoch is worthwhile in a scrap.”

“Hey!” Enoch whined.

“Cartographer, you’re with me at the front,” she instructed before they wasted more time chatting. “Medic and Archivist in the center. Wizard and Knight in the back. Listen more than you talk. Keep an eye out for anything moving that shouldn’t be. If you see something, say something. And if something does attack us, no matter what happens, stay behind me.”

Mina didn’t wait for them to finish pairing off before weaving her way through the trees. She didn’t even acknowledge Wera as she hustled to fall in place beside her.

“So,” Wera drawled after a few minutes of silence between them, “why’d you pick me for the front?”

“You’re a mapmaker,” Mina replied. She didn’t look at Wera as she spoke, her stare focused on surveying the forest in front of them. “If you make a map of the Harrow and the Peaks and take down the trail I use, I may never have to lead people through here again.”

If she had to suffer through another expedition, at least she could make this one of use.

“You seem a little young to retire,” Wera remarked. “And you need income to upkeep that cabin of yours, right? Though with seven thousand gilt an expedition, I’m surprised you haven’t gotten yourself something a little sturdier to live in.”

She could feel the pressure of Wera studying her face, looking for something she’d never find.

“There are other ways to make money that don’t involve being bothered.” She changed the subject, “People think that there are just wolves, bears, various small-time magical beasts here. The Harrow is untouched. Nature and magic are uncontrolled and unforgiving.”

“Probably because of the runoff from the Peaks or some past geological event. I’ll make a note to have Enoch look into it.” Wera took out a small notepad and jotted something down. “If that’s the case then I’d bet there are many ways to cross over into parts of Elphyne here too, probably a bunch of fae circles, areas where the veil is thin. Would you be able to point them out when we pass them?”

“Just write down the trail taken and there’s no need to worry about any of that.”

She heard Wera’s pen skip on the page and a heavy exhale out of her nose.

There it was. She hated being talked down to.

Wera abandoned the topic and turned to basic questions about the flora and landmarks, easy enough that Mina could answer with little thought as she tuned one ear to the forest as best she could through the whispers of those walking a little too far behind her.

“Would you look at that,” Sir Gargic remarked, voice slightly muffled and strained. He talked out of the corner of his mouth in a bad attempt to be quiet. “She’s actually talking to Wera.”

“People do often talk to each other,” Sebastian said coolly, not feeding the knight’s judgment.

“Yes, but she’s so—”

“Are we talking about the Brambled Beauty?” Enoch whispered.

“The what?” Sebastian deadpanned.

“You don’t like it, sir? I’m trying to figure out the perfect way to describe such a terrifying and alluring creature.”

“Alluring?” Sir Gargic guffawed, “She’s so cold!”

“Yes! She’s cold!” Tanir added, voice peaking with a burst of realization.

Mina ground her teeth to keep from chewing them out. It was better that they didn’t know how well she could hear, and she had bore much harsher digs than their rude observations anyways.

“Just because she’s different than us doesn’t make her less of a person,” Sebastian chided. “And Tanir it’s unlike you to make assumptions about someone you’ve just met.”

“Oh no, I wasn’t trying to be cruel. I was just—”

A low gurgle deep within the ground, quiet and out of place in the harmony of forest sounds, environmental interrogation, and gossiping whispers, stilled Mina’s stride. She barred her arm across Wera’s chest, stopping the preoccupied cartographer, and held her other hand up to halt those behind them.

Their footfalls and chitchat ceased abruptly. Mina turned her head to the side, putting a finger to her lips to signal them to stay silent and wait.

She drew forth the sword that rested on her hip and crept forward, listening, eyes fixated on the forest floor. The gurgle reached her ears once more, louder and more guttural; hungry. Mina stopped, bladed her feet, and whistled a line of bird song.

“A meadowlark?” Sebastian whispered.

For a fleeting moment, she noted how keen his ear was, then a massive maw erupted out of the earth, lunging at her. Wind at her heels, Mina leaped at it, rocketing towards the toothy mouth at incredible speed, and drove her blade down through its top lip. The beast let out a terrible, gargling roar, shaking off the actual dirt and plants from its mimicking hide to reveal an ornery terramawg.

With the momentum of her jump and the leverage of her impaled sword, Mina vaulted over the bulbous amphibian’s earthen hide. She snapped her hips around, pivoting midair to face the beast’s back, and drew forth her bow in the same fluid motion.

The air stilled as Mina ran her fingers from the grip of her bow to its string. The water in the air collected, crystallized under the brush of her fingertips, forming an arrow of pure ice. She aimed for the creature’s third, slitted eye, a weak point that rested on the nape of its neck, and fired. A roaring gust of wind shook the trees, following in her arrow’s wake as it soared through the air, embedding itself deep into the terramawg’s brain.

Mina kept her focus on the beast as she descended, landing on a nearby tree bough without a glance back. The terramawg seized, the frost from her arrow glaciating its mind, and collapsed into a blubbery heap, returning to the mass of earth and withering foliage it disguised itself as.

Mina secured her bow on her back and slid down the tree’s trunk.

“Keep moving,” she said to the group as she retrieved her sword from the terramawg’s corpse.

It was as if they too had been immobilized by her ice. Sir Gargic’s hand rested on the hilt of his broadsword. Tanir had pulled out a handaxe from somewhere. Three thin daggers were laced between Enoch’s fingers like claws. A swirl of inky liquid hovered over Wera’s palm, while her other hand rested on her chest. Sebastian’s hands were coated in flame.

All of their mouths hung agape.

A dull pang pushed against Mina’s chest at the sight.

“Great Gods. Save some for the rest of us next time, will ya?” Sir Gargic shuddered.

“It was quicker if I handled it,” she stated. “Now come on. There’s more ground to cover before nightfall.” Mina turned on her heels and walked away, stepping across the terramawg’s body and taking care to drive her heels in a little harder as she did so.

“Hey, wait up!” Wera ran after her, manipulating the ink back in its vial and pulling out her notebook once again.“How were you able to tell where it was?”

Tanir pulled a stupefied Enoch along, “Come on. You should be jumping with joy. Action like that is sure to make your book even more exciting.”

“Well,” Sir Gargic remarked to Sebastian with a heavy exhale, “I guess we know why she’s so cold now.”

Sebastian hummed in acknowledgment, nothing more. Nothing until moments later, when under his breath a murmured thought slipped out.

“The wind even changed direction.”

The reverence in his tone, unheard by everyone else, bristled against the back of Mina’s neck.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of The Maiden of the Barren Rime! Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to read it.

To show my appreciation, here's a 50% off discount code you can use when ordering The Maiden of the Barren Rime E-Book off of my website: MBRTUMBLR50

The code expires on May 31st at 11:59pm so make sure to use it or share it with a friend by then!

#the maiden of the barren rime #mina #sebastian #writblr #bookblr #mbr #writing #new books #slow burn #fantasy novel #fantasy romance #romantasy

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satisfactionlevel · 2 months ago

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⚡️west end year 8 (11/01/25):

I saw the cursed child london year 8 cast again today and made some ridiculously long notes, mainly about scorbus (because i’m obsessed)🆘 i noticed many little things I didn’t see before, so I thought I’d write them down before I forget them!

⚡️act 1:

so much finger twiddling from albus right from the beginning, i love it!

harry and ginny side hugs at the platform were so cute, they were still in so much wonder about their surroundings, it’s like they’re seeing platform 9 3/4 for the first time✨

when ron was doing the whole nose trick with lily jr, ginny gives albus a shoulder squeeze as albus was looking nervous. ginny just gets albus:)

when albus told rose he’s staying in scorp’s compartment, scorp did a fleeting slight smile. he looked like he didn’t believe it

scorp whispering “slytherin please” during sorting ceremony

bread scene, albus looked at scorp and puffed his cheeks, like wtf are you doing, and then looked down lol

after scorp said “come to the funeral and be my good friend” albus reached out his arm like he was going to hug scorpius

they just in general made so much eye contact in moments of uncertainty to assure each other, it’s just the cutest!

someone sitting behind me gasped when harry he wished albus weren’t his son😭this scene destroys me every time ugh

when scorp tried to climb up the train albus gave him double thumbs up, but scorp failed to get to the top

THEY WERE SO PROTECTIVE OVER EACH OTHER IN THE AMOS SCENE omg

and when amos said about “undersized teenagers”, scorpius seemed to suddenly be very self conscious about his body, and awkwardly adjusted his tie lol

when amos said “malfoy maybe a voldemort” scorp was hurt and he looked at albus, albus gave him a little smile of reassurance💕

scorpius/harry was screaming, he spat at albus/ron’s face accidentally, and albus/ron wipes his face with his sleeves💀

albus/ron accidentally threw his robe right at his own face after kissing hermione, he was so grossed out.

⚡️act 2:

scorpius was JEALOUS AF in the forest💀when delphi was standing between him and albus, blocking scorpius view of albus, he leans to the side and waves at albus. I CANNOT HE’S SO REAL WTF

edge of forest scene when scorp said he checked the daily prophet every day, albus did a tiny smirk. OH GOD HE’S SO OBSESSED WITH SCORPIUS

scrorbus cheering in a weird way because of course they do, they’re scorbus. and after the second cheer, albus mouthed “that’s better” to scorpius

harry stroking albus’s injured arm in the hospital🥹

staircase ballet was perfect as always. and madame hooch looked so worried about scorpius:(

staircase scene with scorpius and delphi , after delphi told him “you two belong together” and asked scorpius to find albus, he walked off with a grin and kept doing air fist pumps lol

when they got shushed by the teacher in the library scorpius picked up the book and pointed at it, nodding and pretending to have understood something

library scene monologue. scorpius’s crying and albus’s pained face twitches 😭they were both so broken and vulnerable:(

after they used invisibility cloak, scorpius sat on the chair, hugging himself (kind of) into the tiniest little ball like he wanted to make himself disappear from all the hurt. he didn’t took at albus for a long time.

scorpius’s little smile when albus said you’re kind to your finger tips (my boy is so precious I wanna die, he need to be protected af all cost)

when they hugged, albus’s face squeezed/crunched up his face with his eyes closed, like he’s in so much pain and regret, but also so relieved. I think he really wanted to feel that moment.

albus’s cute little laugh after scorpius said consider me engorg-impressed! they’re literally just perfect for each other ughh

I LAUGHED SO MUCH at this: when myrtle said she’s got a soft spot for the potters, albus awkwardly waved at her, and when she said she’s impartial to a malfoy, scorpius looked so scared and tucked in his robe to cover up his chest, like he just got violated by myrtle💀

when scorp emerged cheering from the lake and didn’t see albus, he called albus in a low-pitch, playful way while laughing, but then immediately became so concerned when albus still didn’t respond😭and his calls became panicked

⚡️act 3:

in draco’s office, droco did the “for voldemort and valour” sign very slowly with a slow voice, he probably heard talks about scorpius doing it in weird ways, and was trying to teach him💀

scorpius’s bent knee bowing to snaps is funny af, he’s fangirlling for real

noticed how the dementor IMMEDIATELY went away after scorpius said albus😭that’s how strong his love for albus is, I literally can’t breathe

again in the lake when scorp hugged albus, albus genuinely looked so happy! my boy loves physical affection, he did a little chuckle too

also when scorpius screamed harry, albus looked so shocked and confused lol

when McGonagall said about expelling them albus looked immediately at scorpius:(

dorm scene, albus chuckled so much when scorpius was going on about “scorpius the dread-less, malfoy the unanxious”.

when scorpius sat on albus’s bed, albus turned his body towards scorpius, then for a moment, he looked down at their hands on the bed, it’s like he was thinking where to put his hands😭

rose and gang overhearing the conversation about the alternative reality. rose was upset, james, sitting behind rose, put a hand on her shoulders. james kept fidgeting as if trying to figure out what else he can do to comfort rose. so good to see the sensitive side of james

i cry at the rose and hermione hug every time

today it stood out to me about how much fun they genuinely have with each other! and now they make each other laugh all the time!

especially when they were planning different charms to destroy the time turner. they are goofy and make each other laugh so much:)

scorpius looked like he was in disbelief when delphi said albus’s weakness is love. (bruh just believe it☠️)

when delphi put her wand on albus, scorpius tried so hard to stand up from the floor to go to albus, even though he literally just suffered the cruciatus curse moments ago

⚡️act 4:

I cried when Craig died he’s such a cinnamon bun

also the albus’s finger twiddling kind of got replaced at times by him tucking his hair in this act.

also albus being a geek and being excited about mathilda bagshot. he’s not beating the secret dork allegations

in godric’s hollow, when scorpius was telling albus about his plan, albus was actually so serious in the beginning, until scorpius said “scream to the baby”, albus muttered “baby??” to himself and frowned lol

ben’s draco is so soft and smiley, v different from steve’s version! he smiled at ron after ron said “you’ve got nice hair”💀

also ben’s draco smiled when he noticed the farmers market. I can just picture draco cooking for scorpius and astoria aaaahh👨🏼‍🌾

the scene where albus was asleep on the church bench made me cry. ginny understands albus so deeply. she’s just the best. I love ginny.

i swear albus and scorpius’s hands were touching when they sat on the church bench

scorpius looked in awe and gave double thumbs up to hermione after they answered albus’s history question at the same time. hermione looked so proud of scorpius, it’s honestly so cute.

rose asked “you good albus”, albus looked at scorpius, then looked at rose, smiled and nodded, and looked at scorpius again. JUST TELL HIM YOU LOVE HIM ALREADY GOD

and the last scene was perfect.💕

(also this is today’s cast board, everyone was so incredible!)(and it was benjamin stratton as draco, the board wasn’t updated when I took the photo)

#scorbus #albus severus potter #scorpius malfoy #harry potter and the cursed child #the cursed child #albus x scorpius #hpcc

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possumdnp · 3 months ago

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I've had such a fun year being a part of the phandom and wanted to make a compilation of my favorite moments of 2024 to celebrate the end of this wild year! <3

5. October 19th and the two weeks following it

These two weeks were So Much. October 19th was amazing, of course. I loved seeing everyone's gorgeous gifs, edits, and artwork while we waited anxiously for Dan and Phil to show signs of life (and they delivered by actually making the silly "no, but seriously imagine it" video).

And then they gave us the best two weeks ever? We got Spooky Week, and the Halloween mug cakes video, and them dressing up as Aziraphale and Crowley for Halloween! We got the west coast US tour photodump! Phil posted a picture of himself reflected in Dan's PVC-covered ass?? And to top it all off, a video of Phil set to 'Married Life' from Up?!

Those few weeks were legitimately some of the most memorable times I've ever had in phandom :')

4. The birthday livestreams

I'm so happy I was able to attend both birthday streams live because they were so much fun. Phil's was unhinged chaotic energy with all of the technical glitches, and Dan's livestream was just plain unhinged. We got so many good moments from these livestreams: eyebrow slits, the annual cake and Dan photos reveals, appearances by Sister Daniel and Father Philip, and Dan getting his Dune popcorn bucket!! Also, the "imagine that on top of you" kakuna moment lives rent free in my brain to this day. (Most importantly, they raised so much money for charity!)

3. Phlonde

What can I say? Phlonde Phil completely changed the timeline. (inserting a bonus photo of "yeehaw odyssey" Phil here because this look also changed me as a person)

2. Their couple's holiday photodump?!

Something in my brain broke the day they posted these photos. Like, what the fuck, they're actually just posting fully couple-y pictures like this now?! They posted these during the middle of my workday, and I remember just staring at them (and getting absolutely nothing done for the rest of the day).

1. Getting to see DnP live!

Seeing Dan and Phil live at TIT was legitimately one of the best things I did all year. Standing in the lobby before the preshow to swap photocards and bracelets, and just getting to chat with other phannies in real life was so much fun.

And of course, seeing Dan and Phil in person! They walked through the lobby before the preshow literally five feet away from where I was standing, and I'll always remember that stunned excitement I felt seeing them right up close for the first time. Like, they're actually real (and very tall!) :')

The preshow was so much fun (I’m somewhere in that picture above <3), and TIT itself was incredible. It was just one of the best nights of my life. <3

#there were way too many good moments to choose from #like how did they do so much stuff this year that the dapc video didn't even make my personal top 5?!#not to be sappy in the tags but i'd also like to thank my mutuals and everyone i follow for making this such a fun year in phandom #it wouldn't have been the same without all of you <3 #possum speaks #NY25phandommeetup #phan #dan and phil

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sgiandubh · 6 months ago

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Dear (returning) Considering Anon,

You wrote this and you have been blocked. Again. Fair enough, make as many clones as you wish: I shall not answer anymore.

You took a hefty chunk of your time only to write this and be read on a very early morning start between urinating and brushing my teeth. I should applaud your dedication, but I won't.

If you wish to insinuate I hacked into their account, you are, once more, laughably wrong:

As I said, someone from your own camp inadvertently pointed the way:

Not an approximate payroll - a budget estimate. Two different things, as Claire was not cast at the time. Simple basis for further negotiations and in no way the final figures. Series' renewal was announced on August 15, 2014, 1 (one!) day after the broadcast of the first episode. Any negotiated raise was, therefore, involving both of them and their agents - we also know they 'had each other's back' since very early on - no need for me to further develop, you know exactly what I mean:

That email was either hacked, or 'erroneous': the twain shall never meet, like Kipling's East and West. Too subtle for you? The appropriate term is 'vague': a vague enough 'we', for me not to base my reasoning on it alone.

Diana Gabaldon 'Erself confirmed the fact that there was not much to do, other than going on with the shooting of Season 1 and certainly no time for any exterior relationships. But hey, why bother, the Screeching Banshees know best, right, since they are happily 'adulting' in their corner (the nerve!).

You guys are always grasping at that paper the way people usually grasp at straws, with zero critical approach towards the many legitimate questions that 'marriage' leaves perfectly unanswered. If all marriage papers in the universe reflected deep love and commitment, we'd probably be living in a perfect, ideal and (between you and me) very boring world. In this case, the mismatch is obvious, a shitload of details do not click, the Happy Couple systematically looks as if pushed to the gallows with bayonets, rather than being a part of glam events, that house still looks, as we speak, emptier than Mrs. Havisham's living room and the commonly 'owned' businesses are, likewise, empty shells (spare one of them and for a very precise reason). And that is just scratching the surface of the itch, darling. Your inability to question whatever you are so opportunistically fed tells me more than you'd certainly want about yourself, that being said.

You are correct, shooting ended yesterday. Perhaps it's time for you to move on and find another obsessive fandom to pounce upon: after all, there are so many interesting series out there! After almost one year and a half in here, I am still amazed at your intolerance and your very credulous conviction that you are somehow doing God's work, every single day, harassing people who dare to think differently, simply because they know differently. And no, unlike you, I am not basing my very firm stance just on the interactions I see between them during promo, two historical trolls ridiculous lies or the social media findings of another obsessed troll.

The comparison between SC pics and Sam/Greedy Driver ones is simply grotesque. Dropping names as Lily (who?) won't make me believe you are one of the insiders, either.

On top of it all, thank you for the wonderful final idiocy:

Romanian for bustard is 'dropie'. I remember watching them roam near my grandparents' home, many moons ago and can absolutely confirm they do run fast.

You should take heed, Anon. My question for you will always be why. Why are you doing this and exactly what do you hope to achieve?

#anon #fandom #shitshow

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jinkoph03nix · 6 months ago

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So. I made some bad decisions and a DC comics Formula 1 AU is the result of them. More info under the cut I guess lol.

TEAMS

Note: this is a no capes AU, and all sponsor companies are neutral parties because of it.

Wayne Industries (makes engines)

Bruce “Batman” Wayne

Tim Drake

Damian Wayne (backup)

Dick Grayson (former driver, no longer associated)

Jason Todd (former driver, retired due to injury)

Lexcorp (makes engines)

Clark “Superman” Kent

Conner Kent

Jon Kent (backup)

Queen Industries (makes engines)

Oliver “Green Arrow” Queen

Roy “Arsenal” Harper

Artemis Crock (backup)

Star Labs (makes engines)

Barry “Flash” Allen

Wally “Flamebird” West

Bart “Impulse” Allen (backup)

Atlantis (uses Star engines)

Kaldur’ahm/Jackson “Manta” Hyde

Garth “Tempest” Ranzz

Arthur “Aquaman” Curry (former driver, retired, now team lead)

Themyscira (uses Wayne engines)

Donna Troy

Cassie Sandsmark

Diana “Wonder Woman” Prince (former driver, retired, now team lead)

Lantern Corps (uses Lex engines)

Hal Jordan

John Stewart

Kyle Rayner (backup)

Zatara (uses Wayne engines)

Zatanna Zatara

John Constantine

Kord Industries (makes engines)

Ted Kord

Jaime Reyes

Hawks (uses Lex engines)

Carter Hall

Shayera Hol

DYNAMICS

TEAM

Hawks and Zatara are relatively low performing teams, but have loyal fans that root for them as underdogs.

Kord makes its own engines but has only started recently, and used to be a relatively low performing team but has begun to make progress.

Lantern Corps, Themyscira, and Atlantis are all solidly performing and occasionally make it to top spots.

Wayne, Lex, Star, and Queen are all top performers, and all make their own engines.

Wayne tends to perform the best overall and has the largest fanbase, but also has some of the most vocal critics, including some coming from inside the house.

INTERPERSONAL

Dick Grayson used to drive for Wayne but is now retired and fully supports his boyfriend Wally West's team, which initially caused a scandal when they started dating.

Jason Todd also used to drive for Wayne but got seriously injured during a race, prematurely ending his career. Nowadays, he's mostly out of the public spotlight.

Jason is also secretly dating Roy Harper, but the public has not found out yet.

Kaldur'ahm and Garth have the fiercest intra-team rivalry in the league, but it mainly stays on the racetrack.

Tim Drake and Conner Kent have the most public inter-team rivalry, but also regularly flirt with each other. The internet eats it up.

Roy and Wally have somewhat of a rivalry, but it’s less obvious to those on the outside.

Hal and Barry also have a bit of a rivalry during races, but are close friends outside of them.

Tim Drake and Damian Wayne have a very big rivalry but because Damian is consistently a backup driver, it normally does not gain much publicity. They, however, do not limit their rivalry to the race track.

Donna and Dick used to be rivals, but are now good friends and work together helping F1 Academy.

Bruce and Clark are constantly rumored to be secretly dating, but these rumors are unfounded (at least for now). They do not consider each other rivals beyond being the two drivers consistently vying for the top spot in races.

Jaime and Bart are really close friends, but rarely race each other because Bart is a backup driver. They hang out a lot in the paddock, however, and fans love their interactions.

Arthur and Diana used to have a massive rivalry, and it has continued into them both being team managers.

People speculated that Dick would’ve been contracted by Lex if he had kept driving, as he was pretty good friends with Clark especially.

PERSONAL

Bruce and Clark are hailed as the best two drivers on the track currently, and both have massive fan bases.

All of the Wayne drivers tend to be more serious/argumentative over comms, and are very competitive.

Bruce and Tim are a powerhouse for racing strategy, and their calls are almost always the right ones, even if their pit team doesn’t always trust Tim’s calls yet.

Bruce gets called a DILF a lot, but doesn’t know what it means, so he ends up accidentally playing into it

Dick Grayson used to be a fan favorite and The Eye Candy for the league. He was majorly respected by his team and fans because of his smarts and because he had a far more approachable personality than the rest of the Wayne drivers.

Since Dick left, he has functionally become an Instagram boyfriend for Wally. He also helps out with some of the F1 Academy/driver talent finding programs in addition to helping support Star.

Jason Todd used to be a very competitive driver and got a lot of fans because of his creative shit talking before he retired.

The Lex drivers are known for being very friendly both on- and off-track.

Conner tends to be reckless while driving, which has resulted in several times where Tim has gotten mad at him because of it.

Conner is very much a PR liability and will say the most random and out-of-pocket shit when you least expect it.

Conner is seen as a very “cool” and fashionable driver, which has gotten him a lot of fans.

Tim and Conner are both fan favorites and projected to be the spiritual replacements for Bruce and Clark when they eventually retire.

Bruce and Clark are both speculated to be preparing to retire soon, but still haven't done so.

Clark presents himself as more of a goofy dad off-track, and the other Lex drivers usually rope him into doing social media stuff.

Roy Harper and Artemis Crock both are highly competitive drivers and are the most likely to be guilty of swearing over the radio, which their fans all find funny as shit.

There’s also a very dedicated portion of the fanbase that finds Roy incredibly attractive.

Roy has fully shown up to race weekends with visible love bites before and has never acknowledged them. Most people suspect he's just dating a random person from his personal life that he doesn’t want to reveal because they’re not a public figure, but there is an extremely dedicated conspiracy community that thinks it’s Jason. Most people just meme those guys. Jason finds this funny as fuck.

Oliver Queen tends to be generally serious during interviews, but is also is down to do any social media trend he gets roped into. His fans call it cringe, but they keep watching regardless.

Oliver Queen’s wife Dinah Lance isn’t really associated with racing but she is an entertainer that is often featured at races. Outside of that, she doesn't pay much attention to the sport.

The Star drivers are all very friendly, but are very creative shit talkers over the radio.

The Star drivers are also known for their reflexes being very good even compared to other top teams, but are also known to overestimate the power of their cars.

Barry is seen as a goofy dad both in and out of the car, and will regularly crack jokes during races.

Barry also has a proven track record with very good strategy calls, rivaling those made by the current Wayne drivers.

Wally tends to be a bit more willing to take risks during races, but it generally proves well for him as he’s known for being really good at overtaking people.

Bart earned his nickname for just how risky some of his driving calls are, and they don’t always pay off. This is the main reason why he’s usually on backup.

Bart is also a PR liability because of how much he will run his mouth during interviews, which also makes the decision to keep him on backup easier.

Arthur is a really chill coach off-radio but is highly competitive on-radio, especially against Diana.

Kaldur'ahm tends to be a pretty chill driver but still takes his job seriously. He is mostly a team player nowadays except for when he’s dealing with Garth's antics.

Kaldur will try and one-up Garth’s attempts for fastest laps, and usually succeeds.

Kaldur is also seen as one of the better-looking drivers, but his fans tend to be more chill about it.

Garth is highly competitive but primarily against Kaldur, and does shit talk Kaldur if/when he successfully one-ups Garth.

Donna and Cassie are a fan favorite team, especially among younger female fans, and they are both incredibly sportsmanlike and personable.

Cassie tends to be a pretty funny during interviews, but Donna tends to be slightly more reserved. Both are well-respected.

Donna also helps out with F1 Academy.

Diana is a relatively strict coach but makes good strategy calls and is highly respected by her team and fans. She also regularly hangs out with her drivers and acts as a mentor for them both.

The Lanterns are an older team and a bit more reserved than other teams, and are also very sportsmanlike. This gets them a lot of respect from the general racing fan base.

All the Lanterns are veteran drivers as well.

Hal tends to get called a DILF by fans, and while he takes the dad part in stride, he tries to avoid joining in on social media trends to avoid stoking the rest of the sentiment.

The Zatara drivers both tend to get a lot of thirsting from fans, and while they definitely play it up, they mostly treat it as a joke.

The Zatara drivers also tend to be pretty chill. Both realize and accept that they’re not the most competitive drivers, so they instead attract fans by being quite creative shit talkers.

Kord is an underdog team trying to become a consistently high-preforming team, and have a lot of people rooting for them because of it.

Jaime is a fan favorite especially because he’s pretty funny and a lot of people find him good looking.

Jaime doesn’t always make the best strategy calls, as he’s relatively new. He's getting better thanks to Ted's mentorship, however.

Ted is a bit of a goofy dad personality and is a veteran driver. His veteran status allows him to better mentor Jaime while still being the primary driver for the team.

Ted’s husband Michael Jon Carter is the gay equivalent of a massive wifeguy (positive), and shows up to all of Ted’s races. Fans find it very cute.

The Hawks are pretty chill, but also seen as very tired and not as invested in the racing anymore.

The Hawks also realize they're not a very competitive team, and do not pretend to be.

There’s been rumors of the Hawks disbanding for some time now, but they keep coming back because no other teams have been formed to replace them.

That's all I've got for right now, we'll see if I update this more. If you want to see more from this AU, let me know! Also you can blame @fivespade for me posting this (thank you for dealing with my ramblings about this AU bestie) :P

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nevadancitizen · 7 months ago

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-> CH. 1: THE PETRICHOR OF DUST-STORMS

synopsis: you and logan take on both the weather of the divide and three unsuspecting ghosts.

word count: 1.6k

ships: Keegan Russ/Reader, Ghosts team & Reader

notes: if anyone would like for me to start a taglist, feel free to ask ♪ (also there is a teaser/prologue, so read that before reading this! otherwise you'll probably be confused lol)

WHY DOES EVIL WEAR A FACE SO FAMILIAR? MASTERLIST

Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that humans, at their cores, are little more than untamed beasts – some more wild than others.

When you and Logan were separated, each put in isolation so that the torturers could begin their work on you, you both were reduced to primal instincts. Higher motor functions were a waste. Both you and Logan’s amygdalas were cranked into overdrive, overpowering any other brain function and making you both aggressive animals – ones that bite and snarl and bleed.

Rorke was the one to make you both kneel, to push on the backs of you and Logan’s necks and threaten you both with collars. The Federation broke you both, and Rorke built you back up in his very own image. That image is neither clean nor godly, but it’s his image nonetheless.

He molded you both into beasts of anger – anger towards the Ghosts. You want to take from them what they took from you, from Logan: a chance at a normal life. In this life, you want them to suffer. You want all of them to die in fear and in pain. You want to have your revenge. Against Elias – against Keegan. You want to call it your own, to make your anger god’s anger. You want to watch through the iron sights of your pistol as they cower like dumb animals.

You want to be the one to deliver the killing blow. The chance to kill Elias was taken from you, and you won’t miss such an opportunity with Keegan.

The man is always on your mind, like how Elias plagued Rorke, how Hesh plagues Logan. And your obsessive thoughts have borne a speculation – the gaping wound cut into the earth must be hiding him. This was only further confirmed by information the Federation was able to acquire and decode. Three of the Ghosts are heading out for Death Valley.

When the Federation invaded Texas, they worked their way up Route 45 until they reached Dallas. They took Fort Worth, a city just barely to the west of Dallas, and marched along US-20 until it merged with US-10 and onward. They followed the highways, taking Las Cruces, New Mexico, Tucson and Phoenix in Arizona, and finally ending when they secured Los Angeles, California (but only with reinforcements from Tijuana, because LA didn’t go down without a fight).

But Death Valley, that blight upon California, remains relatively untouched. Every now and again, it becomes a demon’s home and is renamed to “The Divide.” Terrible storms, containing both sand and lightning but no rain, rip entire companies apart. But those companies are ordinary soldiers – the Ghosts are not ordinary soldiers. Neither are the Ghost hunters.

And so, with the recent acquisition of Bakersfield, California, it only makes sense that the Ghosts would be on the frontline near Death Valley.

The tops of Dante’s View Peak provide some refuge from the heat trapped in the lower parts of the dried-up basin. It’s the middle of September, so the temperatures up here are in the mid-eighties. You’re just glad you’re not in the actual valley – it’s over a hundred down there.

From up here, you can easily see over Badwater, and all the way out over to its adjacent basin. Heat haze obscures your vision, but with your binoculars, you can easily see as three figures move by the east shore of the basin, some distance away from Badwater Road. They’re dressed lightly, with loose-fitting but all-covering clothing. Keffiyehs cover their heads and most of their faces. Their packs look heavy, adorned with military-type gear and automatic rifles slung across their chests. A few yards away is a doorless Jeep, supposedly their way of coming into the valley.

You take your binoculars away from your face. “Looks like… four klicks out.”

Logan grunts, gesturing for the binoculars. You hand them over, and he brings them up to his eyes. He adjusts the focus wheel and finds the men through the lenses.

SEE, Logan signs. THREE?

“Yeah,” you say. “I didn’t see anyone else. And I doubt the valley could hide another man from me.”

Logan shifts how he’s kneeling as he takes the binoculars away from his face, crushing locoweed beneath his boot. You find yourself faintly wondering if watering them with blood would throw off their blooming season, given how little water they’re used to. You find yourself not really caring.

Instead, you take off your pack and lay it on the ground. Once you’ve double-checked everything, you start to assemble the Lynx sniper rifle you’ve been carrying for the entirety of this assignment. Once you affix the suppressor, you prop up the bipod close to the edge of the lookout.

You lay on your stomach and set the recoil pad against your inner shoulder, trying to ignore the rocks digging into your front. When you look through the scope, all you see is the pseudo-barren sands of the valley. You feel Logan pull on the material of your shirt, prompting you to aim a little more left.

You see the men’s feet first, then you move so you can see their entire bodies. They’re talking, gesturing at the water in the basin – possibly arguing whether the water is worth the risk of drinking. You wouldn’t be surprised, given the weather.

You click your radio on. “This is Resol-Dos. We’ve found the suspected trio. Requesting permission to engage.”

“Nice of you to finally fuckin’ check in, kid,” Rorke’s voice comes through the radio and into your earpiece. “Permission granted.”

“Firing. Standby,” you say, your voice flat. You put your finger back in the pistol grip and breathe in, then out.

You squeeze the trigger, and the bullet rips through the leftmost man’s throat, spraying his companions with blood. He clutches at his neck as he’s thrown backwards. The other two men react immediately, grabbing their guns and looking for the source of the crack of gunfire.

You don’t give them the time to find you. Another bullet is fired, and digs into the man in the middle, finding a home in his chest. You fire another round, and he collapses.

The last man standing fires aimlessly, hoping to hit something. He’s panicking (righteously so), and he’s swiveling his head around as he tries to find the glint of your scope. You fire, and he stumbles back, clutching his gut as he continues firing. You silence him with a bullet to the chest.

You pull away from the scope after a second and click your radio on. “Suspected trio has just been taken down. Requesting permission to confirm kills.”

Rorke’s voice comes through the radio and into your earpiece again. “Yeah, go ahead.”

You sit up and start disassembling the rifle. “Check your guns. We’re going down to check the bodies.”

Logan pulls the clip out of his Bizon and confirms that there’s no issues as you pack up. The only evidence both of you leave behind are crushed flowers and five spent bullet casings.

It’s an hour-long hike down to the Badwater bodies. They haven’t moved, which… is to be expected. All three of them are laying in a mass puddle of blood.

“Go check the Jeep,” you tell Logan. “I’m gonna check the bodies.”

You kneel by the leftmost man. His blood is clotted, but still stains his keffiyeh from when the wound was fresh. You pull the fabric down. You grab his chin and move his face side-to-side. You don’t recognize him.

You stand and check the other bodies. You don’t recognize any of them.

“Logan,” you call. “Come check these.”

Logan grunts and moves over, his eyes flitting over the dead men’s faces. He shakes his head.

“Fucking seriously?” You mumble under your breath. You click your radio on. “Bodies are not Ghosts. Repeat, no Ghosts have been eliminated.”

“The info was bad?!” Rorke shouts, peaking the audio. “Christ! Someone’s gonna get their ass handed to ‘em. Take pictures and get back to base.”

“Understood.” You click your radio off. “Lo, find the car keys. Rorke says to take pictures.”

Logan kneels and begins rifling through the men’s pockets and packs as you pull out a compact camera. You line up the shot and take a few pictures – one of the corpses, one of each of the men’s faces, and one of their packs and their gear.

After a minute, Logan holds up a ring of car keys, jingling them. You hum in response, pocketing your camera before heading for the Jeep. He hops in the driver’s seat while you get in the passenger’s side, setting your pack at your feet.

You set your foot on the edge of the Jeep where the door would normally be and check behind you. Logan starts the car and puts it in drive as you continue looking.

He taps your arm, then draws two fingers across your skin, silently asking what’s wrong. You sigh. “Just checking we’re not being followed. It’s a wide-open valley, after all. And those gunshots would’ve been heard by anyone around.”

Logan takes a deep breath and rests his hand on the steering wheel again. He manages to creak out, “Storm.”

“Yeah. I can smell it, too,” you say. You adjust yourself so that you’re sitting in your seat properly, facing ahead. “Make tracks. We have a mole to find.”

Something’s on the horizon. It’s not just the ozone of the storm you can smell – something’s going to happen. Something big… something bigger and more terrible than the storms of The Divide.

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trashcanlore · 5 months ago

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A Crack Theory About Maze

Alternatively: Everyone in Natlan is dead and I can prove it with 3 easy tools I already have in my brain

*Record scratch* I bet you're wondering how we got here. Well, it all started when I was playing through Simulanka and saw the carpet on the floor of Constellation Metropole. The pattern reminded me of player piano scrolls, and since my brain needs to be studied in a lab, that then reminded me of Westworld. (Slight spoilers for season 1 follow)

Westworld is a sci-fi-ish TV show about a futuristic amusement park recreating the Wild West, featuring interactive storylines where guests can act out their hearts' darkest desires. The only ‘people’ hurt are the hosts, who are basically the android NPCs of the park. Hosts are part of greater park narratives, and individually operate within their story loops, unless disturbed by the outside forces of guests. At the end of each day, the hosts are reset/memory wiped/repaired (unless the narrative says differently) and return to experience the horrors anew. The player piano is used as a visual and narrative motif throughout Westworld to represent the cyclical and automated lives of the hosts; similarly, the clockwork in Constellation Metropole represents the strictly laid out paths of the toys while under the ‘protection’ of the Goddess of Prophecy.

Convinced this carpet pattern was an intentional reference, and knowing that summer events foreshadow the new region, I flung myself headfirst into themes and narratives delulu (a season 1 rewatch) and during that rewatch I realized that a different Westworld plot point and visual motif might be what's actually foreshadowing for my mostly vibes-based theory: Everyone in Natlan is dead.

THE MAZE

The imagery of a humanoid figure in a maze is used throughout Westworld, explained within the narrative of the park as a Native American myth. According to the in-park mythology, the maze represents “the sum of a man’s life,” and the man in the center has been killed and resurrected many times, eventually building the maze around himself as protection. (Resurrection is a very common theme in Indigenous American mythology.) There is a human character who is trying to solve the maze, and for a time he believes the center of the maze is true death, something that does not exist in the park because the guests cannot be killed (by the hosts) and the hosts can always be repaired.

This myth is based on the real life creation myth of the Tohono O'odham people, where the Man in the Maze, I’itoi, created the world in an intense struggle and then retired to a labyrinthian cave on top of a mountain. In art, I’itoi is depicted above a maze, which represents the experiences and choices of a person throughout their lives. The middle of the maze represents their goals and dreams, and once they reach the center, they can look back and then pass into the next world.

According to some tellings of the myth, I’itoi was killed by the humans he created and taught. He then resurrected himself, invented the concept of war, and then brought the Tohono O’odham people to the surface of the earth to be his soldiers.

Fun fact: This creation story is actually referenced in ZZZ, with the Papago hollow (Papago is an alternate name for the Tohono O’odham people).

In Westworld, the maze is actually a thought exercise and model developed by the programmer behind the park hosts. His theory of consciousness was that it was achieved through a journey inward, and when a host reached the center of the maze, they would achieve true consciousness and be ‘free.’

Maze iconography in the Americas is not unique to the Tohono O'odham people - another notable example is the Hopi Tapuat. This labyrinth (technically only has one path) represents the human life cycle and eventual (spiritual) rebirth.

While researching maze symbolism, I read a few articles that mentioned Mesoamerican mazes being used to trap the spirits of the dead, but unfortunately, I couldn't find any specific source for that information. However, it is possible to connect maze imagery to the Aztec and Mayan beliefs about the Underworld. Multiple archaeological excavations have uncovered huge networks of caves, tunnels, and rooms underground that may have been built to represent the journey to the underworld and/or provide a location for rituals associated with death. (You can read more about this here: 1 2 3)

As for the underworld itself, both the Aztec Mictlan and the Maya Xibalba are described as containing all kinds of traps and challenges for the dead passing through - and can’t forget the ballcourt (in Xibalba at least). Ball is life. While this isn’t exactly a maze, I will argue that for the sake of this crack theory, it’s close enough thematically.

Smoke and Mirrors

You may have recognized the name Mictlan, because in Genshin, that’s one of the names for the Masters of the Night-Wind tribe, which can be alternatively translated as “Masters of the Mysterious Smoke.” This will be relevant later, I promise.

The Natlan craftable sword, the Flute of Ezpitzal, is described as being a ritual instrument of this tribe, and the description tells the story of how humans and dragons came to a (local?) agreement to ensure their survival. The dragons had fled into dreams because of the fire of “ancient beacons,” and when the humans asked for their protection, they offered the following:

"A labyrinth of mirrors and a fortress of mist, these shall we build to shield your tiny mortal tribes from the scourge of war."

The theme continues with the name of the sword’s passive: “smoke-and-mirror mystery,” and the upcoming Archon Quest “Beyond the Smoke and Mirrors.” The phrase “smoke and mirrors” is an idiom for distracting from something unpleasant, but in the context of Natlan lore, it’s almost certainly referring to the smoking obsidian mirror iconography.

Mirrors of all kinds were used throughout ancient Mesoamerica for divination and scrying-like rituals, including communication with otherworld entities. The most well known mirror material used was obsidian, which was also used for blades and tools - the black color of obsidian is probably what led to its association with smoke (also you can use mirrors to start fires). Obsidian mirrors were associated with additional imagery such as fire, the sun, eyes, butterflies, and caves as the entrance to the underworld. Mirrors were also compared to the surface of still water (a straightforward comparison) - one interesting example is Aztec writing that referred to Aztlan (mythical origin of Aztec people) as ‘the great water mirror that surrounds the great city.’ There was even a period of time where the mirror was used as a metaphor to represent the world itself.

This is similar to what Mona says about Simulanka: fate in Simulanka is directly based on Teyvat’s, and that “the creator made this world inside a mirror, or a lake, and this world is the reflection.”

Here’s where things start to get interesting: there is a Nahuatl glyph for the smoking obsidian mirror, specifically associated with a god who we’ll discuss later. The scroll-like shape used for the smoke is very similar to the symbol used for speech, singing, or breath.

This shape is also very similar to the older Mayan glyph for smoke - which happens to be basically identical to the symbol used for blood. You can see an example here in this famous carving from Yaxchilan:

The link between smoke and blood is actually explicitly referenced in the name of the Flute of Ezpitzal. Ezpitzal is a Nahuatl word meaning ‘gust of blood’ - eztli is blood and pitza is ‘to blow,’ as in playing a flute. Pitza is also sometimes translated “becoming inflamed with anger.” The ezpitzal symbol is made up of six streams of blood, ending in a precious stone, with a heart in the center:

The ezpitzal can be found flowing from the head of older depictions of Tezcatlipoca “smoking mirror,” the Lord of the Night.

The Lord of the Night

Tezcatlipoca is one of the central Aztec gods, associated with the night sky, hurricanes, and conflict, and the calendar. He was typically depicted with a missing foot due to a monster attack and a smoking obsidian mirror somewhere on his body. The missing right foot is usually replaced with a smoking obsidian mirror, a snake, or a bone. Tezcatlipoca has similarities to the earlier Maya deities Tohil (god of fire and associated with sacrifice) and K’awiil (thunder god), who is depicted with a smoking obsidian knife in his forehead and one leg replaced with a snake.

The smoking mirror glyph associated with Tezcatlipoca looks a little bit like the obsidian carvings in the Night Kingdom:

Besides for the title of Lord of the Night, Tezcatlipoca is Genshin lore relevant as the rival of Quetzalcoatl. In one version of the Five Suns Aztec creation myth, Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl are creation gods and take turns being suns and destroying each other’s work. Quetzalcoatl hasn’t been mentioned by name in Natlan yet, but his Maya equivalent, Kukulkan (“Plumed Serpent”), also known as Waxaklahun Ubah Kan (“War Serpent”) sure has. In Genshin, Waxaklahun Ubah Kan, or the Sage of the Stolen Flame, stole a seed of phlogiston from the dragons and taught the humans how to use it. He is shown alongside Xbalanque, the first Pyro Archon, on a mural, where they both appear to hold phlogiston. There’s something important missing here: How did the Genshin equivalent of Tezcatlipoca contribute to the ‘creation’ of humans?

In the 5.1 trailer, the Lord of the Night and the “protection of the rules” are mentioned. The only information we have about the Lord of the Night is that in the misleading Records of Hanan Pacha, he leads humans astray and is the enemy of Waxaklahun Ubah Kan, and that a cat in the Night Kingdom warns us against trusting the Sage.

The set of rules we know the most about are the ones created by Xbalanque, using borrowed power from the heavens (Ronova). These are the rules that allow humans to become Archons and inherit the memories of the land.

The other, more mysterious set of rules, are those that allow Ancient Name bearers to resurrect through the Sacred Flame with the help of the Archon. The Sacred Flame is a conduit to the Night Kingdom and the Wayobs, and is fueled by Contending Fire produced by battles between Natlan people. Given that Tezcatlipoca is a god of conflict, I think these rules mentioned in the trailer are referring to the Sacred Flame system of resurrection.

Therefore, at some point during Natlan’s history, the beef between the Sage and the Lord of the Night became so severe that the Lord of the Night’s contribution to the system of Natlan was intentionally covered up- which may be what Capitano is hinting at in the 5.1 trailer when he says Mavuika is withholding information from us.

This was a bit of a tangent, but I promise it’s relevant to the thesis. At the conclusion of the Five Suns myth, Quetzalcoatl descends into Mictlan to find the bones of the humans he created under earlier suns, and who were destroyed by various god antics, including those of Tezcatlipoca. He then uses his own blood to bring the humans back to life. Maybe my insistence that everyone in Natlan is dead isn’t so vibe based after all.

The Center

It is time for me to confess something. In actuality, these 2k words were elaborate setup for a pun.

Here it goes: At the conclusion of the K’iche’ Maya creation story, the Popul Vuh, the gods finally find the perfect material for creating humans who will worship them: maize. The hurricane god and the Quetzal serpent sculpt the first humans out of a maize paste, with water for blood. Conveniently, these two can be directly compared to Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca - further supporting the possibility of the latter’s important role in Natlan’s history.

Earlier, I mentioned how water and mirrors were closely associated, and how the glyphs for blood and smoke look similar. The Flute of Ezpitzal name and lore reference the protection of humans with a ‘labyrinth of mirrors,’ smoking mirrors (weapon passive), and blood through the word ezpitzal. The ezpitzal is also closely linked to Tezcatlipoca, one of the Aztec creator deities. Using this symbolism, the smoke and mirrors represent the water, or blood, used to (re)create humans. Which then means of course that the second ingredient needed for humans is maze - I’m sorry, maize.

And if the humans are made out of maze…well then they must be dead.

Sabre’s Fun Fact Science Corner (with bonus Latam literature section just for Schwan):

The Genshin writers love the story of the Hero Twins defeating Seven Macaw and replacing his teeth with maize - they’ve referenced it at least three times so far. The weirdest is the flipped version where the human priest Maghan sacrifices himself and combines his blood with animal teeth and dirt to create grainfruit (maize). Autosacrifice of blood in particular was a very important Maya ritual. I appreciate their commitment to keeping the maize cannibalism implications going.

The Narzissenkreuz Ordo associated lore has had multiple references to circular ruins and mirrors (which may simply just be the Alice in Wonderland reference) - however, we do know that one Ordo member went to Natlan looking for Something. “The Circular Ruins” is a short story by Jorge Luis Borges where a man tries to create another man through dreaming, with the help of a deity known as “Fire.” The story itself references Through the Looking-Glass as well.

This one is full credit to Schwan but there’s a Mexican novel Pedro Páramo, which was very influential on other Latin American writers like Gabriel García Márquez. The plot is basically that this guy travels to the town where his father is from to meet him and then it turns out that everyone in the town is dead. It’s very core.

It turns out Westworld season 1 is extremely HYV core - I just know some guy there saw the last episode and had their brain rewired, much like Dawei seeing Misato Evangelion for the first time

References: https://www.library.pima.gov/content/man-in-the-maze/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I%27itoi https://westworld.fandom.com/wiki/The_Maze

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