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yellowocaballero · 4 years ago

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Jon & Sasha Arson fic

Little fragment of an idea that never went anywhere. No reason for it. Just thought it would be funny. I was right. Rest under the cut.

Most people who were unlucky enough to meet Jonathan Sims assumed he had no friends.

This was true, up to a point two weeks after Jon became a researcher at the Magnus Institute: afterwards Jon had no friends, except for Sasha James.

Sasha James was attributable to arson.

Most people who were unlucky enough to meet Jonathan Sims assumed he had no friends.

This was true, up to a point two weeks after Jon became a researcher at the Magnus Institute: afterwards Jon had no friends, except for Sasha James.

*******

Sasha James was attributable to arson.

Arson was attributable to a bookshelf of Leitners, humming strange songs and spewing toxic energy into the air in rhythmic hissing motions. The Leitners were attributable to Artifact Storage, a testament to mankind’s hubris and a modern-day tower of Babel where a group of underpaid academics found themselves stress testing kevlar and fire suppression systems each day. Artifact Storage was attributable to the Magnus Institute, where Jon had managed to land a job after three months of desolate post-graduate unemployment. And the Magnus Institute was attributable to - well, probably Jonah Magnus, but Jon found that it was likely a bit of a reach to blame a long dead Regency gentleman for all of his problems.

Jon needed this job. London was expensive and so were funerals, and he couldn’t keep living on life insurance forever. It was even a good job, with decent pay and the exact kind of limp, half-hearted academia that the private sector promised disillusioned English mastery holders. His coworkers were nice - well, Tim was nice, everybody else seemed to hate him for the same reason that everybody else hated him, likely intimidated by how smart he was - and the commute was short. He couldn’t afford to lose this job. Spiritually, metaphysically, and literally.

Which was why he should stop staring at this piece of paper. The follow-up research to a statement given by some idiot unlucky enough to cross paths with what was certainly a Leitner.

‘ORIGINATION OF PHENOMENA ISOLATED’, the page read out professionally, yet chipperly, like a young woman in a new office job. ‘ITEM QUARANTINED WITHIN ARTIFACT STORAGE (46B.1)’.

Hm.

Jon pushed down on the floor, rolling himself a meter to the left.

“Say, er, Mr. Stoker.”

Tim “I’m only four years older than you, please call me Tim” Stoker, who had been thumping away on his cheap plastic keyboard either writing up a report or messaging someone on one of those infernal casual sex websites, pulled down his headphones and blinked at Jon owlishly, before splitting his face into a grin. Jon could practically hear the David Attenborough-style narration within his mind: ‘After long weeks leaving out food for the wild Simothan, the feral yet gentle animal approaches the researcher of his own volition. A win for scientists everywhere.’

“Yes, Jon?” Tim asked, in an uncanny yet hopefully unintentional RP drawl.

“What’s Artifact Storage?”

“God, I wish I was you,” Tim said feelingly. But he nodded sagely anyway, milking his ‘wise senpai’ thing for all it was worth. Jon could practically feel Tim calling himself a senpai. It was kind of embarrassing. “You know the shady room locked deep within the basement that exudes a terrible aura of malice and hatred towards you specifically?”

“The gender neutral bathroom?” Jon asked, confused.

“No, the one that always smells somewhat of blood. You hear screams sometimes?”

“The Archives!”

“Yes, but no! It’s Artifact Storage. If the researchers dig up any creepy shit from a statement, or if a statement giver brings in something that melts the metal detector, then we dump it in Artifact Storage and let those miserable fucks take care of it.”

“Is it more of a containment facility, or would you say that they conduct experiments?”

But Tim just shrugged. “My source down there tells me that they do some experiments to justify their budget, but it’s mostly unscientific. Poke this and I’ll give you twenty quid, that kind of thing. They say that if you really want a sick day, all you have to do is touch a mysterious rock and whisper your mother’s name -”

“Fantastic, thank you for your help, must go back to filling now,” Jon said quickly, skittering back to his own desk. He tried to distract himself from the terrifying thought of the basement full of supernatural nuclear bombs underneath his feet by trying to remember his mother’s name, but he was stuck on if it was Marjorie or Margaret. Mary Anne?

Maybe Tim’s personal Meerkat Manor series of Jon’s life had paid off - Sims Shack? - more than Jon would like, because Tim squinted at Jon in an unsettlingly familiar way. As if he knew exactly what Jon was thinking about the literature of mass destruction, and he really wanted Jon to be thinking literally anything else.

“I wouldn’t go down there if I were you, Jon,” Tim warned, sounding a little like a horror movie trailer. “Bushy tailed college grads who go down there don’t come out the same as they went in.”

“I’ll take that under advisement, Mr. Stoker.”

“For the love of christ call me Tim!”

It really was a pity - Jon had actually liked this job.

*******

It was remarkably easy to commit arson in central London.

Jon had done it once or twice. Three times, actually, although when you think about it arson was a criminal charge and only truly existed so long as someone was charged with it, so technically you could say that Jon had done arson zero times. In his defense, you try making it through Oxford without doing anything embarrassing. 90% of your time was in class or schoolwork and 10% of it was being hazed. At least Jon hadn’t fucked any pigs.

Jon hit up the usual stores, and stashed the usual implements in his rucksack. It was a careful week after his conversation with Tim, as he couldn’t afford for the older man to connect the dots. He made a show of going home at a timely five pm, startling everybody around him, and paced in a tight circle around his flat until he gave up and watched mindless telly until the clock struck midnight.

He took a cab to the park a few blocks down from the Institute, and walked the rest of the way. It was a cool, dim night in London, and the foot-traffic had slowed down to a steady trickle of young people in tight clothing. Jon pulled down his baseball cap on his head, fished a key out from his pocket given to him by a helpful and friendly janitor, and took a back entrance into the Institute.

Said helpful and friendly janitor, whose allegiance had been won because Jon was a “nice young lad” and “I always wanted to burn down the place myself, I’m happy to see the next generation give it a go” had helpfully told Jon that there were no security cameras inside the Institute. A grievous oversight, but good luck for Jon tonight. He took the stairs down to the basement, zipping his jacket up tight against the inescapable chill, and pushed his hat further down his head as he navigated his way towards Artifact Storage.

He unlocked the door with the janitor’s key, hands shaking, and slipped inside into the dusky and unlit room.

It was pitch-black, and Jon quickly fished a torch out of his backpack. He flipped it on, letting it slowly scan the room. It was the lobby into Artifact Storage, familiar from his stake-out missions: you walked in, met the bored woman behind the desk, checked in or checked out what you wanted, and if you needed to go inside she would press the button that unlocked the heavy climate-controlled door and let you into the hallway inside. The only other door in the lobby was to the office of the Director of Artifact Storage, a terrifying short and squat woman with silver hair pulled into a bun.

Jon leaned over the counter and jammed the button, holding his breath until he heard the door click open. He quickly twisted the handle, swung the heavy door out, and slipped inside, taking care to grab one of the chairs in the lobby and prop it open. Quick escapes were necessary.

He was in.

The torch lit up a map taped up to the wall, and Jon squinted at it. Section A, Section B, Section C...he remembered the classification from the document he read a week ago, and slowly walked down the hallway until he found the heavy climate controlled door marked ‘SECTION B’. He carefully wrenched it open, taking care to grab a rolling cart and using it to prop the door open, before stepping inside. He fished the canister of gasoline and the lighter out of his backpack, giving the gasoline a good shake.

It was a library. Small, and instead of shelves there were long metal racks with filing boxes stretching long into the darkness, but Jon knew a library when he saw one. Each box had a clipboard attached to it, and most boxes had very large and terrifying stickers on them painted sickly yellow or dangerous red.

The only thing in the library that wasn’t a filing rack was a battered and beat couch. And the only person in the room besides Jon was a woman, blinking up at Jon blearily from where she had been passed out on the couch.

“Er,” Jon said.

The woman sat up, squinting at Jon’s torchlight until he guiltily aimed it just to her left. She had a wild mane of curly brown hair, and was wearing a pencil skirt and ruffled burgundy blouse. A blazer was folded at one end of the couch, clearly being used as a pillow, and she looked strongly as if Jon had just woken her up from a very nice nap.

“Whuh,” the sleepy woman said.

“My mistake,” Jon said, “this isn’t the loo. Go back to bed, this is - er, a very bad dream, goodnight.”

“Whutuhiseet,” the woman slurred.

“It’s - very late, go back to bed.”

“Alright,” the woman said, falling back on the couch. After a second, her snores echoed through the room again.

Jon very slowly crept backwards. Actually, on second thought, his mission could wait for tomorrow. Bit of a cock block, this, but that was alright -

“Hey! Who are you!”

Jon, hand on the handle of the door, squeaked and turned around.

The woman was back up again, and this time she seemed actually awake. She was frowning mightily at Jon, and was already sliding off the couch in stocking feet to glare at him. Jon was aware that he did not look like an innocent person in these events. The gasoline did not help.

The woman’s eyes trailed to the gasoline, then widened. Jon ineffectually tried to hide it behind his back.

“You’re trying to burn down Artifact Storage!” the woman accused, somewhat fairly.

“Not all of Artifact Storage,” Jon said guiltily, “just the Leitners.”

The woman stared at him further, as if she was a special guest on Tim’s Sims Shack nature documentary.

“Why,” the woman said slowly, “would you want to do that?”

Despite himself, Jon found himself puffing up in indignation. “They’re evil, nasty little books that shouldn’t exist. Forget studying and - and containing them, we should be making sure no more of them ever disgrace the world again. We should be burning every one we see. They’re pure evil given literary form, they are a disgrace to books and libraries, and if I ever met Leitner myself I would beat him to death with a rusty pipe for subjecting me to his fucked up books.”

The woman stared at him.

Finally, she said, “I’m Sasha James. Want some help?”

“I - er, wouldn’t that get you in trouble, Ms. James?”

“I like this job but I hate Leitner and his fucked up books more,” Sasha said gravely.

Jon, having found a kindred spirit, held out the lighter.

Sasha James took it, a wide grin splitting her face.

*********

Jon didn’t remember much else of that night.

There was definitely arson involved - or, seeing as they hadn’t gotten caught, just some good old-fashioned fire starting. He had the sense that they had both been so giddy with adrenaline that they had immediately joined the raging uni students in the late night bars, toasting their success in toasting. There had probably been quite a bit of alcohol.

When he woke up the next morning, it was in his narrow and uncomfortable bed, face to face with an unfamiliar snoring woman. For a second, two, Jon was briefly convinced that he had done something so drastically out of character it meant that a fucked up book had body swapped him with Tim. Bodyswapping was more likely than him having casual sex.

Then Jon remembered the arson, and he exhaled in relief as his life made sense again.

“Ms. James,” Jon whispered, poking her in the arm. She snuffled and muttered something. Jon poked her harder. “Ms. James, we have work.”

Sasha turned around, turning her back to him and pulling up the blankets. “Go back to bed, Tim.”

Ti - oh god. Jon felt like he was in a CW drama. This was why he didn’t interact with people, far too much likelihood that he would accidentally end up interacting with somebody who had sex.

“Ms. James,” Jon hissed, extremely embarrassed, “you have to get up!”

“Mergh mergh fuck off,” Sasha James said.

Jon, like a true gentleman and hero, got up and made them both strong tea. He squinted at Sasha, recalling everything he knew about her (slept a lot, liked arson, hated Jurgen Leitner) before digging out some instant coffee and making some of that too. Finally, after shoving a hot cup of sludgey black liquid at the woman, she grabbed the cup and chugged it until she was able to sit up and open her eyes.

She blinked at Jon, who was already picking his hair in an attempt to get ready for work. He could clearly see the thoughts ‘you aren’t Tim’ run through her brain. Hah! He could be the narrator of the nature documentary for once!

“Uh,” Sasha James said, “I’m sorry, did we…?”

“Commit arson? Yes.” Jon paused a beat. “But as I don’t believe we were caught, call it an indoor campfire.”

Sasha James drank more of her coffee. Jon grabbed his clothing and disappeared into the loo to get changed.

When he re-entered his bedroom, she snapped her fingers at him. “Right! We got pissed after! Good times, mate!”

“I have to assume,” Jon said politely. He was doing his very best to be very polite, because Jon knew he was rude and didn’t want his new coworkers to know that until his probation period was over. Maybe he should have waited until after his probation period for the arson? Would it look bad on his annual review? “Do you need to borrow some clothing? I think we’re about the same size.” Oh, no, was that rude to say to a woman?

Sasha James squinted at him. “It’s like you’re not hungover at all. How old are you?”

“Twenty five?” Be polite, Jon! “And you’re...thirty seven?”

“I’m thirty one, asshole!”

Oh no. Women hated it when you called them old. “You don’t look a day over twenty seven!” Jon cried, panicked.

“Have you met a woman?”

“I had a grandmother?”

“I’m going back to bed,” Sasha James said.

Unfortunately, Jon knew that it would be very suspicious if they both skipped, so he forced Sasha into one of his suits that...looked much nicer on her than him, but whatever, and hustled them both to work. Now that the adrenaline had worn away and the sense of purpose in his holy mission had burned up with the cleansing flames, Jon found himself biting his nails in agony in the Underground.

They had to know. Someone must have caught them. Maybe there were secret CCTVs in the Institute. Maybe Sasha was going to rat him out - but she had helped, so wouldn’t she just be ratting out herself? Was she a double agent? Mr. Bouchard was never going to forgive him, no matter how nice he was and how much he seemed to like Jon to the point where he rather wished someone had given him the ‘Stranger Danger’ speech as a child so he would know what to do. Jon was going to go to jail, or worse - get fired.

Sasha, cooly sipping her coffee and looking somewhat fly in sunglasses and his suit, did not seem disturbed by any of this. Jon’s rapidly spiralling panic attack must have been obvious, because she casually flicked a finger on his forehead. Jon yelped with pain.

“Take it easy, mate. If they catch us, I’ll just say that the books made us do it.”

Jon scowled at her, rubbing his smarting forehead. “The books?”

“Sure.” She waved her fingers spookily as the Underground rattled forward into the heart of London. “Brainwashed us to do their evil bidding of -”

“Destroying them?”

“There’s a lot of arson Leitners,” Sasha James said sagely. “Trust me, this is just a normal day in Artifact Storage.” She clapped him reassuringly on the shoulder, and Jon fought a blush. “Don’t worry. We performed a public service, kiddo. St. Peter’s gonna give us a medal when we get to the pearly gates.”

“I’m an adult,” Jon said, scandalized. He had gray hair!

“Well, I guess, but I don’t know your name, so…”

Jon squinted at her. She squinted at him back.

“You’re thinking that if you don’t give me your name I can’t rat you out to the feds,” Sasha said flatly.

Jon pursed his lips.

Finally, he settled on, “You don’t rat me out to the feds and I won’t tell them that you’re in an illicit relationship with Mr. Stoker.”

“Mr. - how did - what!”

“It’s Jonathan Sims,” Jon said gruffly, crossing his arms. He was slightly hungover and his nerve were jittery and he had set fire to his workplace the previous night, but somehow Jon thought that his heart was jackrabbiting in his chest for a different reason. Somehow Jon felt as if his heart couldn’t stop thumping behind his sternum because Sasha James was staring at him, head cocked, as if he was a mystery she was interested in finding out. “That’s my name.”

Sasha James stared at him, as if surprised, before her face broke into a wide and happy smile. Jon hunched his shoulders up, embarrassed, faintly aware he was blushing. “It’s nice to meet you, Jonathan!” Then she grabbed him by the collar, shaking him slightly. “And there is nothing illicit about me and Tim, and there is nothing between me and Tim at all, we are just friends, so get that out of your little head -”

The train rattled on towards the Magnus Institute, and towards the slight smell of smoke in the air.

*******

Sasha: are you coming 2 the pub w/us 2nite?

Sasha: come onnn you should comeee don’t feel awkwardddd

Sasha: I know you hate a) group settings b) drunk people c) Tim in a group d) drunk Tim and e) Tim drunk in a group but that’s no reason not to come!

Sasha: Tim is physiologically incapable of not adopting men 3-5 years younger than him it’s in his blood you can’t escape his affection

Sasha: or at least I find it funny so I’m not letting you

Sasha: Jonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Jon: Yes I’ll come, I need to talk to both of you.

Sasha: WAHOO

Sasha: wait

Sasha: really?

Sasha: did you commit ars*on again

Sasha: wait if you did don’t tell me the courts can request text transcripts

Jon: No, I just need your advice on an urgent matter.

Sasha: do you need to be drunk to do it

Jon: ...maybe.

Jon: ....Mr. Bouchard offered me the Head Archivist Job?

Jon: Which is stupid because I’ve worked here for barely four years and you’ve worked here for about ten years I think. And you’ve published five papers in parapsychological research. I know I helped you figure out that this place is a weird trauma mill but it was really mostly you. It’s completely ridiculous to promote me and I’m afraid it’s favoritism. For potentially heinous ends? This feels awful because it’s such an honor but I would never stop feeling stressed and guilty because I know so many more people (like you) are so much more qualified. Or qualified at all.

Sasha: holy shit

Sasha: ...do you remember the speech I gave you on stranger danger?

Jon: I’m afraid to mention this to Tim because he might beat up Mr. Bouchard for both my honor and yours.

Sasha: Jesus at this point I don’t even want a fucking job anymore. What bullshit. I’m never going to get promoted and I just need to accept that. This isn’t your fault, Jon, seriously, thank you for telling me.

Sasha: we can talk about this at the pub

Sasha: in private. Off the radar.

Jon: Looking forward to it :)

Jon: did I use the emoticon right?

Sasha: Yes, Jon, you did everything right.

#tma #jonathan sims #the magnus archives #tma fanfic #the magnus archives fanfic #sasha james-centric #this is an implied fix-it everybody lives fic #crack #comedy #absolutely nothing sad? in a MEG FIC?#sasha james #tim stoker #jon is based off me at a new job anxiously calling everyone 'mr'#rest assured sasha is trans but it just never came up #my writing

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sabraeal · 4 years ago

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The Most Perverse Creature in the World, Chapter 11

[Read on AO3]

You had been concerned this evening-- no, that was too mild a description to contain how you waited outside the castle gate, alone and shrouded beneath the anonymity of your black lacquer. It had been anxiety that plagued you, every inch of skin alive and shivering with your nerves. You trusted Obi implicitly-- he had given you no reason to not these past weeks. Despite the reputation that recommended him for this business--whatever it was-- his behavior at the bawd house reminded you less of an unrepentant rake and more of a small boy made to sit and do sums in the summer.

But even so, your ladies had placed their trust in you. They had little choice; a woman of ill repute would be laughed out of the council, branded a greedy whore, but you--

Well, you were a widow above reproach. A countess in your own right, no matter what scandal brought you the title. Where their words would sink like oil in water, yours would rise as air, right into the upper echelons of the court, perhaps even into the king’s ears themselves. That didn’t mean that they’d listen to them, but yours at least had opportunity, whereas theirs--

Theirs would be laughed at, ridiculed for daring to speak above their station. You held their hopes in your hands, and to ask them to trust a new man, sight unseen, vetted only by the prince’s messenger felt like a favor too far.

It was good then, that as large as this Sir Lowen might be, he had all the gentleness of a princess from the pages of a storybook; the sort that might see animals eating out of his cupped palms, should he offer them. The instant he squeezed into your carriage, an apologetic dark shadow, your fears had eased, steady with the knowledge that the girls would be like kittens in his hands.

Your instincts were correct; hardly a breath has passed since he entered the boudoir, and already your ladies are eating out of them. Or perhaps, more accurately, trying to entice him to eat out of theirs.

Tsubaki may have spoken first, but it’s Himawari who stands closest. She uses every inch of leverage it gives her as she saunters closer, raking Sir Lowen with a speculative gaze that leaves no doubt as to what she’s measuring.

“Sorry, petal,” Himawari purrs, placing a finger right on his sternum. “But I’ll be handling this one.”

“That’s not fair,” Tsubaki whines. “Kikyo, tell her that’s not fair.”

“I...” Kikyo’s mouth works, and she tears her gaze off the prince’s aide with a flush. “I don’t think milady brought him here for any of that business.”

“Aw, come on now.” Himawari’s wide mouth breaks out into a wider smile, the sort canaries might see before they flew to the great coop in the sky. “It’d be a pity to waste milady’s coin.”

If skin could burn then Sir Lowen would be a bonfire. “P-please, ladies, I’m not here for anything like that!”

“I changed my mind.” Himawari turns a hard, thoughtful look on him. “I’d let this one handle me.”

“Well,” Obi drawls, having entirely too much fun, “now there’s some high praise.”

Sir Lowen shoots him a dubious glare. “Is it?”

“Well, none of them have ever offered to handle me on milady’s dime,” Obi informs him, mouth twitching at the corner. “You must have a certain...I don’t know what.”

“A third leg?” Tsubaki offers, quickly shushed by Kikyo.

“Please,” Himawari snorts. “Milady couldn’t pay me enough to put up with you.”

Obi presses a hand to his chest, scandalized. “I’ll have you know I’m a very generous--”

“You’re a pain in the ass,” she informs him. “You say you want to be handled, but there’s not a pair here you’d trust to do it. You couldn’t take a direction if it was dipped in gold and had your name carved in it.”

At once, the shy maiden melts away from Sir Lowen, replaced with a grin so satisfied and familiar you wonder which face it came from first-- Obi, or this man.

“Why, Obi,” he says, deceptively friendly. “I didn’t know you were taking me to a palm reader.”

Obi huffs, chin tilting up and arms folding tight across his chest. “I don’t think she’s interested in your palms, mister.”

Himawari’s brow tics, speculative. “Depends on where he plans on putting them.”

“I wasn’t--” Sir Lowen’s high ground turns to quicksand beneath his feet-- “I only meant--”

“If you are all quite finished bothering Sir Lowen,” you inform them, ignoring Himawari’s gleeful ‘hardly’-- “we have very little time left if we do not wish to squander the opportunity his name has afforded us.”

Kikyo bounces to her feet, leaving an empty space on the bed. “Ah, right. Sir Lowen, if you wouldn’t mind...”

He coughs, the red on his skin appearing uniquely painful. “I couldn’t...not...ah...”

“Oh!” Her fingers flicker in the air, all nerves. “Ah, then, perhaps this chair? If that would suit?”

“It would,” he allows graciously, the tension in his shoulders finally deflating. “I’ll just...stay here for the evening. I guess.”

“Don’t feel like you have to, sir,” Tsubaki purrs, rolling onto her back. “There’s plenty of room here on the bed.”

“There certainly will be, when I kick you off of it,” Himawari replied, leaping over to tweak the girl’s cheek. “No room for little girls while the adults are, hmm, talking.”

“The chair is fine!” he yelps, availing himself of it pointedly. “There! Hardly...hardly any different than a night in the palace!”

Obi’s lips give a dangerous twitch. “Well, I’m sure these ladies could change that if you only--”

“Obi.” You may not have had any child of your body, but you have raised a boy just the same; you know the precise octave in which one may raise their voice and insinuate trouble. He jolts at the sound of it, eyes rounding to innocence. “If you would...”

“Ah, right.” His shoulders hunch as he slinks toward you, a cat scolded but entirely unrepentant. “Well, mister, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Sir Lowen’s head snaps up, eyes wide and white as he catches the open door. “Obi! You can’t--”

A large hand presses to your spine, scurrying you through it. Obi leans back, head poking through the gap. “Enjoy yourselves, ladies.”

“Obi--!” The door snicks shut behind him.

You frown, glancing at the door behind him. “Are you sure you two are friends?”

“The most bosom companions.” His teeth flash white in the hall’s dim. “Now let’s go see to your entertainment for the evening, my lady.”

You have never had reason to stray long in the brothel’s halls; Obi usually sees to it that your trip involves only the briefest stint through the back stairs, quickly and quietly depositing you in a room within moments of your arrival. So as your eyes adjust to the bare light, you cannot help but stare.

“Stripes?” Your fingers rise to trace the paper. It’s hard to make out their color in the dim, but you squint anyway, shuffling close enough for your slippers to brush the wainscoting. “Green stripes?”

“Well, not everything can be hand-painted cocks and balls.”

You nearly laugh, only tamping down when you see how his eyes have bulged, how stiffly he’s standing before you. Obi hadn’t meant to let that gem slip from his lips.

“Of course not,” you say, deceptively mild. Behind your veil, Obi can’t see your lips twitch. “I’d expect there to be quite a few cunts as well.”

You may restrain your laugh, but Obi doesn’t, a wheeze bursting from his lips. “My lady...”

It’s not until his shoulders ease, body hanging with its usual boneless grace, that you realize how tense he’s been. After that little scene in Tsubaki’s chamber, you half expected him to be prancing through the halls, giddy as a schoolboy he hung yet another of his bosom companions out to twist in the wind. But instead he’s...nervous.

“Obi.” His name hoists itself through the air with the heft of a feather, but he flinches nonetheless. “Is something wrong?”

His mouth opens, but closes just as quick, mouth curving in a rueful grin. “I wonder...”

You nearly call out to him again, his name right at the edge of your lips, but Obi’s voice startles you instead. “Come on, my lady, it’s this way.”

The door he stops at must be the one-- who else would have delicate violets painted in clusters along the jamb?-- and he hesitates once more, hand poised just above the knotless wood.

Gold eyes cast you one last long look, but you cannot read the message in it. There is too much regret, too much pity, too much of everything, and you would ask, you would take your gloved hand and hold him back, but--

You’re too late. His knuckles fall, a sharp rap, and suddenly he’s the Obi you expected to see once more, grin spread too wide on his angular face, the shadows clinging to him as if he might disappear if you took your eyes from him.

“Custom’s here,” he calls out gruffly, the perfect imitation of one of the brothel’s bouncers. Quieter, he turns to you, door creaking open as he says, “Good luck, my lady.”

You shore yourself up, becoming the implacable widow behind a facade of bombazine. “Let’s hope I don’t need it.”

This is not what you expect from a prostitute’s boudoir.

Gauzy rose curtains flutter between whitewashed posts, stirred by the door’s closing. They match the ones over the windows, a massive bank of glass settled over a seat meant to sit two, buried in pink striped cushions. The knobs on the vanity gleam golden, matching the subtly shimmering vines on the wallpaper, interrupted only by sprays of violets and roses.

It’s a child’s room; the very same you might see for a beloved daughter among your set. Save for the flowers, it could quite practically have been your own before you left it for your marriage bed.

Your hands clench where they hang knitted before you. Perhaps that is...part of the fantasy. Just as Himawari’s room is done in dark woods and deep hues to match the tastes of her clients, this might be much the same. A girl who catered to the illicitness of making love in a lover’s childhood room-- or, you cannot help but think, one that might be bound to do a man’s bidding, like a child might.

“Oh sir.” A pale shadow moves behind the curtain, as delicate as the voice that slips through the gauze. It’s a soft one, high-pitched and sweet, a part played to the hilt. “I’ve been so excited to meet you.”

You startle, heels bumping back into the door. You’d braced for confrontation, not seduction; even if this Sumire has never once seen a glimpse of Sir Lowen, there is no conceivable way that she could mistake a window in her weeds as the prince’s foremost aide. But thin as these curtains are, she can see just as much of you as you can see her-- nothing above a vague impression of color and shape.

It is not to last. Slender fingers slide through the seams, pushing the cloth aside. “I do hope you’ll take care of--”

A sweet face peers out between the curtains, chestnut hair pinned back and curled just like a little girl’s-- because that’s what she is. By her size, her proportions-- if she’s had her courses, she can count them but months, not years. Fourteen, at the most. At the least--

Your mind refuses to speculate. How can it, when all that fills it is an angry buzz, as harsh as the cicadas in summer. You had thought Tsubaki young, but this, this...

Her full mouth crumples into a child’s pout. “You aren’t Sir Lowen at all.”

And a good thing, too. Gentle as that man may be, you doubt he would take this with any sort of subtlety. “No. You may call me Countess Bederin.”

Those large eyes go wide, rounding until you can see white around the iris. “B-bederin?”

Your mouth curls. “I see my reputation precedes me. I suspect the girls have spoken about me.”

The girl-- Sumire, the madam’s favorite flower, sniffs, her coltish limbs folding over her. “They don’t need to tell me anything. I know all about you.”

It has been years since you’ve had a child in your home, but you recognize the prideful hook of that mouth. Less they don’t need to tell me anything, then, and more they wouldn’t tell me anything, even if I asked.

She settles back on her heels, eyeing you askance. “You’re the widow that comes around here to talk about, ah...?”

“Taxes, mostly,” you admit. “Working conditions as well. May I have a seat?”

With all the primness and pretension of a lord’s daughter, Sumire draws her spine straight, seating herself at the edge of the bed with ankles crossed. She would look every inch a girl born to it if it weren’t for her sullen pout-- or her negligee, one strap slowly slipping down her shoulder. “If you must.”

“I don’t,” you assure her. You’re not so old that standing for the duration of this conversation would harm you. “I would prefer to be invited, rather than impose.”

Her eyes widen before she drops them down, giving a begrudging nod. “Fine then. Over there. But you should know I don’t have any complaints.”

Her hand juts out; you follow its line to an overstuffed chair tucked in a corner. It’s pink as well, though not striped, its velvet worn bald in places. Your nurse had a similar one-- no, you had a similar one in your old room, a big wing-backed monument you’d climbed as a small thing, right into her lap until you got too big for it, then up the back itself. That is, until you’d fallen from the top and knocked the wind clean out of your chest. You’d taken your stories from the floor, after that, leaning your head against her knee as her finger stroked through your hair.

Your jaw sets as you sink into its cushioned depths. This furniture might share a shape, but you doubt Sumire has experienced the same sweet memories.

“Of course,” you manage through your teeth, “but that is valuable information as well. I am looking for as complete a picture as I can create when I make my recommendation to His Majesty.”

It’s an overstatement of your power to be sure-- the only time His Majesty would hear your opinions would be shortly before they were torn to shreds by the teeth of the council-- but it has the desired effect. Sumire’s small chest puffs, chin tilting up, eyes sparkling. You’ve made her important. No, you’ve made her words important.

“I should tell the madam you’re here,” she says, words crisp, threat idle. “So she can throw you right out for...for...ah...sedition.”

That would require the brothel to be a country and the madam its head of state-- a metaphor that might work if it did not require you to also live within it as well. Still, it was a poor point to quibble with a child, not when a girl like her could never afford to spurn a lady who has a king’s ear. At least, not when she could dream of putting herself in his bed. This was all a bit of theater, a way for her to cast the illusion of an equal field.

It is ground you can afford to cede. “You might. Or you might allow me to have your ear first, before you decide. The choice is yours.”

Sumire’s small feet still against the footboard, her body stiff and still with a hungry kind of wariness. You doubt she has ever been given such a choice before, paltry as it is.

“Very well.” Her voice takes on the clipped cadence of the upper crust; an affectation to your ear, but a good one. She’s been trained, at least, the streets scrubbed clean from her vowels. “Though there’s not a thing you could offer me that the madam won’t give if I ask.”

Besides a childhood, you don’t say.

“I’m not here to make any offer,” you tell her, as gentle as you are able. “Only to be a listening ear.”

Her head cocks, a sparrow offered seeds from a strange hand. “What do you mean?”

You stifle a smile; even if she cannot see it through the veil, she’ll hear it in your voice. Still-- she’s taken the bait, even if she hasn’t hopped up into your fingers. “My purpose is not to propose, but to listen. There is a proposal among the lords that would require all those engaging in acts considered...superfluous to the point of procreation for money to pay a certain extra consideration to the crown.”

Sumire blinks. “What’s that all mean?”

“They want to tax you for every act of sexual congress that does not involve, ah--” you flounder for the words; she may be a professional, but she is also a child, and oh, Obi might have teased you for asking, but he’d certainly have ideas-- “the insertion of a man’s member into your, hm...”

Secret garden, your nurse would have said, but that seems too pale, too flowery--

“Cunt?” she offers, so innocent, as if there were no other word.

“Yes.” Were the madam to stand before you now, you could choke the very life from her and feel no guilt. “Quite.”

Her small face rumples, wrinkled up in thought. “So if I let a john take me on hands and knees, would that cost extra too? Or only if he’s got his cock outside my--”

“Ah!” It had been too much to hear this from Tsubaki’s mouth, but an actual child’s is far, far worse. “Yes. I am afraid that anything that is not with a man top and a woman beneath--”

“But I am--”

“-- And, ah, facing him,” you add, hurriedly. “Any of it would be considered a...lewd act, subject to the tax.”

Sumire doesn’t speak, not at first; instead she merely sits with the knowledge, shadows rolling across her face in intervals.

“Well,” she decides, finally. “The madam handles all that for me. So I need not worry about any of this business.”

Frustration could grind your teeth to stubs, but you take in a breath, let it out. She would hardly be the first woman to place her trust in fiscal matters where it did not belong. Too many of your own acquaintance would say the same of their accounts; what use was it to balance books or be money-minded when their fathers, their brothers, their husbands all took care of such things. As long as there was enough credit to draw at the modiste, a woman needed no notion of how it came to be.

That had not been the education your father gave you-- you and your brothers alike learned to keep ledgers. It had been your cramped hand that wrote in Bederin’s, yours that tallied columns that no longer came to sums you could account for.

You cannot blame a woman for wanting to keep herself innocent of the things men might do, when they only amounted to numbers in the end.

“May I ask,” you begin, sliding your pencil from its place in your notebook’s binding. “What is the percentage the madam takes from your earnings?”

Sumire stares. “What do you mean?”

“The madam takes a cut of your earnings, does she not?” Your fingers tighten painfully around your pencil; it takes effort to ease it. “Part of your keep. For room and board and her private business. Do you know how much it is?”

She was always a child, but suddenly Sumire seems quite small indeed. “No, the madam...handles all my money.”

The lead pauses on your page. “Do you see any of it?”

“I...” Her brow furrows, doubt seeping into the shadows of her face. “She gives me pocket money. From my accounts. She says she puts it all away for me until I’m older.”

You have known plenty of young ladies with the same story. Your father had been of the old school where a woman took care of a manor’s accounts while its lord saw to its improvement-- but that philosophy was unpopular among men of the court. A good, obedient wife never handled any of their allowance; they merely took what their lord husband gave them for pin-money and never questioned its amount. That is, of course, until their creditors came. Even a title could only protect so far.

“Do you know the amount she takes from the other girls?” you ask, knowing full well the answer. “Perhaps we can extrapolate from there. Make an estimate,” you clarify, seeing confusion cloud her face.

“No,” she sniffs. “They don’t tell me anything. They’re jealous.”

There is some truth to that perhaps; Tsubaki certainly acts as though they are rivals for a mother’s love even if she hates the parent in question, and Himawari has made no secret that she doesn’t appreciate the pomp and circumstance around the search for Sumire’s custom. But still, it’s not the whole of it, though to say so would certainly fall upon deaf ears.

“You know,” you hum, setting your pencil back in its binding. “We want to have a larger meeting. One where the girls voice all their ideas. Where we can begin to see what needs should be met, should I bring a counter proposal before the council.”

Her mouth curves into a frown. “The madam won’t like that. She won’t let you do it.”

Your heart flutters in your chest, an anxious tattoo that rattles in your ears as you say, “That’s why we don’t plan to tell her.”

Sumire’s face takes on a petulant cast. “What if I did? Then you all couldn’t. Madam would like that.”

“You could,” you admit. “But if you came to it, perhaps you might know better what the madam keeps for you.”

From you, you mean, but you doubt she’s ready for that conversation. Not right now, when the idea of betrayal is so new.

The temptation is clear on her face, but curiosity shutters tight behind pride. “No one would want me there. They don’t like me.”

“I would want you there.” You set aside your notebook, letting nothing come between you but your veil. “I think you have important things to contribute.”

Her eyes widen, but only for a moment. The next she shakes her head, tossing her curls proudly. “I could still tell the madam, even if I go.”

“I trust you.” You want to at least, but she’s so young, and the madam is her world. Her protector and abuser both.

“The others won’t.”

“That may be,” you agree, “but it only takes one to convince others. I’ll be the first.”

Sumire eyes you warily, both dubious and hopeful, and you wish there was some way you could prove it, some way you could give her the assurance every child deserves. You drop your eyes to your lap, veil pooling on your hands--

And you do. Your fingers trace the lace edge, and it’s with an exaggerated motion that you lift it, the breeze from the widow caressing your bare cheeks.

Sumire’s jaw falls slack. “Why...” It closes as she leans closer, surprise etched in every plane of her face. “You aren’t ugly at all, miss.”

That’s not quite the reaction you expected. “Ah...thank you. I suppose.”

She hesitates, then gives you a quick, pained nod. “I’ll come. But I don’t promise I’ll keep quiet after.”

“I could expect no less,” you murmur, veiling your smile once more. “We all have to do what’s best, don’t we?”

You leave the room more troubled than you entered, but lighter somehow still.

“Did what needs doing?” Obi asks, levering himself out of the shadows.

“Not yet.” Your mouth stretches into a determined line. “But I’ll see it’s done.”

#haruka x reader #akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #AT LAST I AM THROUGH THIS PORTION #next chapter should actually see the return of Haruka #and BELLIGERENT FLIRTING #ball is in your court now joanna >:3c

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w-k-smith · 4 years ago

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Are we still doing Cowboy Friday? Are we still doing Din is Haunted?

Anyway, here’s “The Ghost Town of Mandalore.”

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Out west, on a mesa that sits in the elbow of a river, lies a town called Mandalore. The people there are strong and honest-dealing, many of them having become soldiers of fortune after the land couldn’t quite be farmed into submission. If you’ve lived your life peaceably enough that no one has a reason to put a price on your head, Mandalore will present as hardscrabble but friendly. Even so, shadows lurk between the homes and stables that don’t present themselves to outsiders without careful attention. The one you’re most likely to meet is the sheriff.

He’s a fearless but soft-spoken man, with a scarf wrapped high and his hat tipped low. You’ll meet no one who can describe his face. He has a revolver on his hip and a knife in his boot, but they’re outshined by the sword with the black blade on the sheriff’s back. The sword is a relic, like an old war saber, but it’s not out of use. The metal of the blade has never been named, but it has a strange glow to it. Rather, it has the opposite of a glow; it seems to pull in light from the world around it.

Now, there’s a certain kind of person who will see a hardened man with a badge and automatically try to press their luck against him. The sheriff hasn’t lost a duel yet, and none of the other parties have ever walked away. The sheriff will take that sword off his back so fast that the motion can’t be seen, and before his opponent has time to pull the trigger or strike with their own knife, that opponent will be struck down with what seems to be darkness itself. The sheriff will then walk away as if nothing has happened, while the sword hums and pulses in his hand. He has been sheriff of Mandalore for quite some time.

There are whispers that the sheriff is no man, if he ever was. That he is, could be, a husk of someone who once existed. Most likely, he’s the shape of a person meant as bait, the way a fishing lure is not the worm or insect it pretends to be. But he guards Mandalore without prejudice, and has never killed anyone who didn’t declare their intention to kill him first. There’s no real reason to want him to gone, besides the uncanny aura of it all.

The one thing that’s clear enough to all is that the sword may be on the sheriff’s back, but the sword is wearing the sheriff.

Mandalore has a peculiar superstition about mirrors, which is you shouldn’t look into them in the dark. This leads to many mirrors being covered at night, or kept away from rooms without windows. Many townsfolk have a practiced aversion to gazing into any reflective surface, no matter how bright the sun, lamps, or candles burn.

An adventurous or foolish person might peer through the shadows to look at themselves in a mirror. According to most versions of the story, outsiders rarely see anything but their own faces. Stare long enough and hard enough, though, and a crowd will form behind you. No, it will form behind your reflection. Look over your shoulder, and you’ll see you’re alone as you ever were.

The people joining you in the mirror won’t look quite natural. When they’re still, they’re still, but when they move, every jerk of the limb is short and purposeful. Slowly, they’ll move toward you. If you’ve a sharp enough eye, you might make out the wounds that killed them.

You must not let them touch you.

That might be a legend, but this is true: Mandalore has no graveyard.

On some clear nights, when they’re resting too easily in their beds, the citizens of Mandalore say the air fills with screams. The sound won’t last long, and is always over by dawn, but it’s impossible to sleep through. A lightning storm of awful sound. Walk the border of Mandalore if you want, peer over the edge of the mesa, take the steep road down to the bank of the river, the screams won’t get any louder or quieter, and you’ll never find their source. The people of Mandalore have stopped trying. Most stay in their beds as if they’re still asleep. Their eyes stay open. They feel whatever their consciences make them feel at the sound of voices crying in the night, be it guilt or pity or perhaps cold familiarity.

The phenomenon has generally been written off by experts as the howling of coyotes, echoed and distorted by the uneven terrain. Though most coyotes don’t scream “Mama, help me!”

For all the tall tales, Mandalore is a place you could pass through and find perfectly regular. Sit in the saloon and hear songs about wars gone by. Talk to town elders and learn of the animals and people who once lived in the territory, but who have passed into nothingness for reasons no one will say directly. Find a place with a good view to watch the sun set and the stars rise. If you stay long enough, you’ll learn whether the stories are true. A town’s ghosts won’t reveal themselves to a stranger.

#star wars #the mandalorian #din is haunted #cowboy friday #din djarin #the darksaber #mandlore #my writing

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gophergal · 3 years ago

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So, I started this oneshot in January, as I mentioned to @bucketofcowboys, but only just finished it a couple days ago. Is this something y'all follow me for? Not in the slightest, but oh well, you're in my circle of hell now. Enjoy? I guess? I don't know, dudes, I'm not your boss.

What Ever Happens

Word Count: 3,000+ | Rating: T+ | Fem!Vault Dweller x Ian (Fallout 1) | M/F

The sun beamed down on the scorched earth surrounding Ash, making the air oppressively hot as she trekked through the sands. It was the total opposite of the cool, clean vault she'd grown up in, with it's artificial lights, cramped spaces, and tight knit community. Though, the more she learned of the wasteland, the more she came to know that the communities were just as close knit, but not by force. There was a liveliness to this world that was so unlike her own. Still, she found herself yearning to be back home, before she took her first steps out here. She squinted as another bead of sweat threatened to fall into her eye, releasing her grip on her pack of supplies to wipe it away.

Yes, the desert was a wasteland, a far cry from her home, but it had one thing the vault could never claim. Ian, her traveling companion, the strong and loyal man that had saved her ass on more than one occasion. Even when he had gruffly criticized her for the way she handled a gun, his large hands were gentle as he corrected her grip on the weapon. He was wasteland bred and born, and it showed in the scars that littered his tanned skin. Had he refused to travel with her, she'd surely have perished, along with all of the residents of her vault. As if on cue, Ian turned slightly to look at her, frowning. She stopped staring, averting her eyes slightly.

“So, what's the plan, vaultie?” He asked. Ash struggled for a moment, looking for something to say. She hadn't thought about it after the Overseer had given her a new task, not the entire time she and Ian had begun walking in the direction of Shady Sands, the small village east of the vault She had other matters on her mind, but finally she spoke.

“I guess the best thing would be to resupply and ask around. We don't exactly know where they're all coming from,” she replied, shrugging as she looked in the direction of the town.

“Yeah,” he said, resuming his march onward, “we don't want a repeat of what happened in Necropolis.”

Ash could agree with that. Their time in Necropolis had been fine, up until it went to hell in a hand-basket, that is. Sure, they both got out of it alive, but it had been by pure luck that neither of them caught the business end of a flamer and been killed. Next time, up against even more super mutants, they may not be so lucky.

“Besides,” he began, “we have to pick up Dogmeat. The poor mutt's probably been missing you a hell of a lot while we've been in the vault.”

They'd left the dog in the care of Tandi, the daughter of Shady Sands' leader, while they took the water chip to the overseer due to the vault's “no animals” policy. Dogmeat had whined pitifully when Ash had commanded him to stay put, but obeyed as he was loyal to his master. In truth, she was quite happy to be back out in the wasteland. If she hadn't, she would have never have the chance to wish her beloved canine goodbye.

She nodded in agreement, tightening her grip on her pack, “You lead the way.” Ian rolled his eyes at her and set the pace of their trip.

***

The walk back to Shady Sands had been uneventful. Even rad scorpions seemed to avoid their path, though that may have been due in part to the destruction they caused to their nest. As they walked, Ash stole glances at her companion, watching the way that his muscles shifted as he moved. The way that his hair was mussed by the slight dry breeze. His face was set in it's usual blank half-frown that made his emotions hard to read. She supposed that it came with growing up out here, remembering how her own expressive nature had caused trouble for them more than once. Suppressing a sigh, she stared ahead, watching as their destination grew larger in the distance.

Upon entering the settlement, Dogmeat bound up to his owner, leaping on to her and knocking her down. He licked her face, tail wagging wildly. Ash laughed, petting the dog as she got to her feet and dusted herself off. The two guards cracked a smile slightly, then stood at attention once again. Tandi greeted the two back happily, surprised to see the vault dweller back at all.

“What are you doing back, Ash?”

“I- well, the Overseer had something else he needed me to do before I return for good. It'll take some time to complete though, so the wasteland isn't rid of me yet,” she joked.

“Pity. You sure have raised hell out here. I'm glad to see you again though.:

The two young women chatted for a while in the shade, hiding from the sun that hung high in the sky, beating down on the desert. That same harsh sun slowly made it's journey through the sky as the day drew on. Ash startled when a hand grabbed her bicep, her free hand reflexively reaching for the pistol that hung off her hip. She let out a breath, relaxing instantly when she realized that it was just Ian, trying to get her attention.

“We should probably stay here for tonight. We'll head to Junktown in the morning. We'll see if Killian knows anything that could help us,” he said.

She nodded her agreement, following him to the dwelling that he used to stay in while he lived in Shady Sands. It was actually the home of Seth, the man who guarded the settlement's gate during the day. He'd been so generous as to share his space with the two for the night. However, it really showed that it was not built for three people to sleep in the small room. A standard sized bed and low cot were in the room, generally enough space for two people to rest, but tricky when a third was added in. Ash suddenly felt as though she was intruding greatly on the man's space. It was Seth who insisted that she or Ian take the bed while he took the cot, it was just for one night, after all.

“I'll go ahead and sleep on the floor, you take the bed,” Ash told her companion, gesturing toward the bed. The look on his face foretold the argument that was about to go down. They stared each other down, waiting for the other to make the first move. A battle between two stubborn survivors. Their focus broken by a harsh sigh from the cot.

“Just share the bed or something. I have to wake up early tomorrow and I'm not staying up all night while you two act like children,” Seth complained.

Embarrassed, Ash flashed him an apologetic smile and looked back to Ian, who shrugged. They stripped off their bulky armor, keeping their weapons nearby, they slipped into the bed, hanging slightly off the sides in a shared effort to give one other space out of respect.

After an hour or so of trying to sleep, Ash opened her eyes to look at her traveling companion. With the little light that came through the window, she could see him quite clearly. It was rare to see him look so relaxed, even at rest like this. The way his dark locks fell into his face tempted her to push them back, but decided not, sighing softly. She'd only known him for a couple months now,and yet she trusted him with her life. He was one of the first people she met when she stepped foot outside of Vault 13, a somewhat friendly face in such a hostile environment.

At this proximity, she could easily make out the creases on his tanned face. The world outside the vault really would age people fast, she noticed. It was something she'd heard in the vault, but she now could see first hand that it was true. Studying his features, the blemishes that peppered the surface of his skin, his dark lashes, Ash's heart ached. The feeling became more intense with every moment they spent together, every fight they won, each time they grew closer.

Her eyes flicked shut as she recalled the shootout in Necropolis. The sulfurous smell of expended bullets hung heavy in the air, as did the smothering heat of the flamer. Standing face to face with the super mutant who threatened to reduce her to her namesake, Ash desperately tried to dodge out of the way. As the flames began to lick toward her body, scorching the surface of her vault suit, she was pushed out of the way, Ian's strong body shielding her against the flames that that jut forth. It gave her just enough time to land a killing shot on the big green bastard. Ian's jacket was ruined, but it protected him against the worst of the burn.

Does it still hurt, she wondered, recalling how he stopped allowing her to care for his wound after it closed. It surely would scar, she told him as much, only for him to shrug in response. It really was different out here. In the vault, scars were strange, tragic, worthy of ridicule, or all three at once. In the wastes, they were part of life. A mark to show that you'd survived. Still, she wondered. Did he regret it? Taking an everlasting mark on his flesh, and all the agonizing pain associated, all for her? What did she even mean to him? Ash fell asleep, knowing she wouldn't have her questions answered. Not now, maybe never.

The walk to Junktown was longer and more quiet than usual. When they camped for the night, watch duty was traded wordlessly. Usually, they'd have some sort of banter, but the thoughts swirling in Ash's mind refused to let up. She had questions, goddammit All these questions and no way to ask. She watched the glowing embers of their small fire as though they could help her understand. Deciding she wouldn't find contentment in the hot, orange glow of fire, she settled on the stars instead. They were something else she'd need to savor while she could, whether she died or returned to the vault, she would never get another chance.

***

Killian Darkwater didn't know anything about the super mutants or where they were coming from. That's what he told the duo at least, and they were inclined to believe him. Outside, Ash swore and stomped her foot on the ground in frustration, scaring Dogmeat, who cowered behind Ian. She sighed.

“This hasn't led us anywhere,” she complained.

“We haven't asked around the Hub yet, so chill the fuck out. Killian doesn't have a lead, so what?”

“Easy for you to say, you're just following me for the money,” she huffed, the heat and disappointment making her irritable. Ian furrowed his brow.

“That's bullshit and you know it, Ash. Do you seriously think I'd risk my ass for you just for the money? I'm not a fucking bodyguard,” he spat.

“I didn't mean it like that. I'm just saying that you could leave at any time you want. I have to do this.”

“Do you want me to leave?” He asked in earnest, anger quieting down a bit.

“No- I just- Oh, fuck it. Let's just drop this. I don't have it in me to argue right now,” she said, cradling her forehead with a hand. With that, the two walked to the Crash House, deciding to rent a room for the night. Ash wiped the sweat from herself with a damp cloth, then returned to the room, sitting on the other side of the bed from Ian, who was cleaning his gun, making sure all the pieces fit back nicely. 'Take care of your gun and it'll take care of you', he told her when they first started traveling together. She did the same, slower and more clumsily. With the final piece of her weapon clicking into place, she rested it on the nightstand. From behind her, she heard a cough.

“What's going on with you, vaultie? What the hell did I do to piss you off so badly?” Ian asked. His tone was impatient, almost hurt sounding. It startled Ash.

“Mad at you? What gave you that idea?” She turned to him.

“The cold shoulder, blowing up on me like that. Don't tell me that being a dick is a foreign concept in the vaults.”

“Look, I'm just... damn, I'm just.... confused and scared, Ian,” she said, voice low. Ian faced her, eyebrows knitted in a puzzled look.

“What about? Are you keeping me in the dark for any particular reason?”

Ash flushed, unsure of what to say. The truth was stranger than any lie she could come up with, yet she felt wrong about keeping it from him. She cleared her throat, training her hazel eyes on him.

“Where do we stand? I mean, how you think of me?”

“What kind of question is that?”

“I,” she paused, letting her mind catch up to her mouth, “I just don't know how you feel about me. Am I a bother? It feels too soon for you to think of me as a friend, but I know that I'm fond of you. You're different from everyone I've ever known in the vault. I can't tell how you think of me. Even if you hated me, I'd at least want to know,” she finished. She gripped her knees, feeling very stupid. It was all irrational, she knew it, but she trusted him to understand her. Her heart sank as he chuckled, which he caught soon after.

“No, no, I'm not laughing at you, I swear. Just- damn, the vault really does something to people, huh?”

She tilted her head, urging him to explain.

“Ash, if I hated you, I wouldn't stick around. You may be bull-headed and chatty, but that's charming when it's not getting us shot at.”

“You think I'm charming?”

He shook his head in exasperation. “If you haven't noticed, I'm not exactly a committed man at this moment. You're beautiful, generally capable, and seem to get along with my stubborn ass. I find you more than just charming.”

She was taken aback, expecting anything other than this. She looked away shyly, “Oh- Wow. Well, I'll admit, I just don't know what to say.”

He rolled his eyes, “You don't have to say anything. We're not children, Ash. We can drop it, finish what we have to do, and go our separate ways at the end of it all, if that's what you want. But at least now you know where you stand.” As he said his piece, disappointment crept into his voice.

“No! I don't want that, not in the least. I feel the same, it's just... I'm being silly.”

“Yeah, you are, but I'm used to it now. I'm not a mind reader though, so you'll need to tell me what you're thinking.”

She scooted closer, resting her hand on his cheek, leaned in. She stopped halfway, waiting for him to move away or to meet her, the settled for pressing her lips to the corner of his carefully, pulling away slowly.

“Does that tell you anything?” She asked.

“Only that you need to speak up,” he responded, grinning devilishly. At that she captured his mouth with her own, tangling a hand in his long dark hair, and kissed him for real. She used more force, encouraged by the hands that came to grip her waist, she moved her lips against his sloppily. She pulled away for air, feeling drunk on the touch.

“Did you hear me now?” she asked, pupils dilated with desire.

“Loud and clear.”

This time, he leaned in, his touch rougher than hers, and he pushed her to lay back on the bed so that his hands rested on either side of her, legs hanging off the other side of the decrepit mattress. Ash's heartbeat quickened as his lips crept lower, down to her jawline, and neck, all the way to the collar of her suit. A sudden moment of nerves gripped her, pushing the want from her mind. She grabbed his wrist, making him look at her.

“I've never done this, Ian,” she said, gripping his arm as if her were a life preserver.

“You're a virgin, then.”

“That too, but I've never been in a relationship. I'm sorry for that, I just don't know if I'm quite comfortable going any further.” His brows raised in surprise at her words.

“We can stop here then, for now. We'll take this slow.”

“Are you sure? It's not weird?”

“Nah, besides, I'm fucking tired,” he smirked, rolling off to his side of the bed. His hand found hers, and they wove their fingers together. “Those vault boys don't know what they're missing out on.”

Mention of her home made Ash's guts twist with a pang of anxiety, and she let out a shaky breath. There was the obvious thought that they both might not survive their newest mission, but pushing that aside there were still issues that they'd need to overcome.

“What happens now? How do we... make this work?” She asked hesitantly.

“One day at a time, I guess.”

“You wouldn't live in the vault, even if Jacoren let you, you wouldn't be happy there.”

“Heh, that's true. I was hoping you'd stay here, with me, if I'm being entirely honest,” he said, squeezing Ash's hand tightly.

“I don't think I can. My family are in the vault. Everyone I've ever known. I just don't believe I could do that to them.” A moment of silence hung heavy in the air, allowing them to hear snippets of conversation and movement in other rooms.

“Then, what ever happens, we'll face it together,” Ian said.

The future would be uncertain, but, as long as possible, they would face it together. Somehow. That night, there was no respectful distance in the shared bed, only comfort and contentment in one another's arms. The air was cool as moonlight streamed through the dusty window.

#fallout #fallout 1 #ian fallout #vault dweller #fallout oc #gopher writes #this originally had smut in it #but it didn't feel right #something was off about it but I put the cut scene on a different doc #i might reuse it at some point #anyway this is a thing now

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thedandelion-writer · 4 years ago

Note

This is for the blind dates <3

1. Male

2. ENFP/Aries (my birthday is 2 days after Xiao’s)

3.I am honestly quite clumsy as reluctant as I am to admit it. I am energetic and able to hold conversations with the most silent of people or the most chatty. My friends tell me that if I were to be an anime character I would be that one lovable airhead haha. I talk a lot but I can be patient as well and hold my tongue if need be.

4. I am okay with anywhere and anything but if I were to choose I would want to do something during the lantern rite or something similar. Whether it be looking up into the sky in silent affirmation or pursuing through the stalls I don’t mind~! Either that or dragonspine, it’s really pretty too with the snow falling around us and having to hold each other for warmth ☺️

5. Acceptance. I want to be accepted for who I am, both the good and the less-than-perfect parts of me.

6. I don’t mind <3 My boundaries lie within theirs. I want nothing more than for them to be comfortable so I allow them to draw the line since I am alright with anything <3

7. Definately, my curiosity can’t be satiated.

A/N: Hihi thank you for participating! I took a long time deciding someone for you tbh, but when I finally did I was disappointed in myself that I didn't think of him sooner :p Originally, you were supposed to go to the Lantern Rite festival, but since I'm setting all these in a modern time, you'll just be going to those cliche, Japanese anime fireworks festivals instead cool? Also, sorry if this was a bit short/rushed, this week's exam week but I didn't want to delay the event any further.

But without further ado, you're going with...

Bennet!

My reasons!

Clumsy, you say? Well you don't need me to tell you that Bennet is a whole 'nother level of clumsy, and it's not even intentional. So he gets it, he understands your struggles. I also do think that Bennet would get along with someone better if they were energetic, enthusiatic, all that. And since you won't have a problem conversing with him, the interactions wouldn't be awkward at all! It is good that you're patient and are able to listen in to the other party as well, because well, sometimes he feels as if people aren't interested in him enough to do so (or even want to be around him at all). I also feel as if he isn't judgemental and would be very accepting towards your flaws, as you would have to be of his too. As for other matches, I fail to find any other potential male matches, but I do think that Amber could be a nice possibility because of her lively, sweet and overall friendly persona. But of course, since you requested a male result (and imo he matches you the best) Bennet was my final choice :)

The First Date:

The bright, orange glow of the festival lights contrasted with the dark night sky, the perfect canvas for the fireworks that were to be displayed in just a few hours.

You drew your yukata tighter around yourself, trying to weasel your way through the crowd with Bennet trailing behind you, repeating apologies whenever he bumped into somebody.

"Come on," you urged, glancing back once to see him struggling. "Just-- hold onto me then, we're almost there!"

He looked at you with those beautiful peridot eyes and took your outstretched hand, willing himself to be pulled by you to a destination that he himself didn't know.

"It's a secret," you had said beforehand, winking playfully. "The fireworks look all the more magical there, you'll see! And there's a lot less people to shove out of the way too."

Bennet had never really been to one of these before. Nobody wanted to go with him, saying he was "bad luck" just because of a stupid accident that happened years ago.

You didn't like the way people treated him and befriended him. What started out as pity grew into something more. You found yourself falling for him and you didn't care what people said.

It was safe to say, after spending this much time with Bennet, that it was their loss. Days with him were never boring, always an adventure.

So today it was your turn. After all, this was the first time you'd go out with him after his confession and you wanted to make it special.

You slowed down your pace as you arrived at stone steps up a hill.

"Up there?" he asked.

"Yup! Watch your step 'kay?"

Your hand still in his, you led him up towards a clearing. It was dark at first but as you ascended, the surroundings grew lighter and lighter.

"I present to you, the city skyline," you leaned over the railings, taking in your favourite view.

"Woahh," Bennet followed suit,"this place is awesome! I can see everything!"

"Hehe, told you."

You rested your chin on the palm of your hand, admiring the childlike wonder that was currently plastered across his face.

"Ahem well, shall we sit down and enjoy the show? I brought dango," you shook yourself out of a daze and took a small box of the sticky skewers which you bought from the stalls during your walk through the festival.

The both of you chewed on them, commenting on the little things you could see from up here whilst waiting for the fireworks.

"I think I can see my house from-" Bennet's voice suddenly cut out and his eyes trailed to the sky.

"Wait it's starting??" you turned around on the bench to see several trails of light from the festival area race upwards to explode in colorful sparks.

You were breathless and from the looks of it, so was he. You both leaned your bodies over the railing as much as you could without falling, to get as close as you could to the display of wonder up above.

Fireworks just never get old

"Y/N--thank you for taking me today," Bennet said after it was all over and you two were heading home.

"It was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed going with you," he scratched the back of his head, keeping his eyes down.

If it weren't so dark, you could've sworn he was blushing

"Aw don't mention it Benny, from now on I'll take you to all the festivals! You'll never go anywhere alone ever again, I promise," you clasped your hands behind your back, smiling sincerely, because you meant every word.

#genshin impact #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact imagines #genshin impact matchups #bennet genshin impact #bennet x reader #bennett x reader #Lynn's 600

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halothenthehorns · 3 years ago

Text

THE HUNGARIAN HORNTAIL

Harry sighed deeply as he turned to his chapter, knowing he was praying for a miracle just for one good thing to happen this chapter.

The prospect of actually talking with Sirius was all that sustained Harry over the next fortnight,

Sirius was still waiting for that moment where that could be said with a smile on his face, like Harry talking to him should cause, not a life line because the rest of the world was being so bad to him.

as it was the only good thing in sight. The shock of what had happened to Harry had started to wear off, and he was now left with the sickening fear of realizing what was about to happen to him. The first task kept creeping closer, like an animal about to pounce.

Harry couldn't help a shiver, feeling that description felt a little too close to real.

He'd never felt more nervous about anything in his life, not even his last Quidditch Cup game.

"Good times," James muttered absently, trying to push past the moment he realized how few of those Harry really had.

He couldn't even think past the date of the first task, like his whole life had been leading up to and would end then.

Lily groaned as her eyes flickered to her son, unbelieving that she couldn't even call him out on over-exaggerating that. If she didn't know better she'd be terrified for his life as well. She did know better and she still was!

He didn't know how Sirius was going to help with that,

"Talking it out will still help," Remus tried to say with some comfort, though it came out too wobbly to work.

but even the thought of a friendly face was some comfort. Harry wrote back to Sirius instantly, agreeing on his choice of date and location. Then he and Hermione spent some time hashing out plans on how to get rid of any stragglers that decided to linger in the common room that night. They settled on the idea of using Dungbombs, though hoped it wouldn't resort to that as Filch would skin them.

"Nah, he'd probably just blame the twins," Sirius finally found something real to smile at again. "You're not as much of a problem as you seem to think. I'll bet you'd get away with it."

In the meantime, life became even worse for Harry within the confines of the castle,

"How is that possible?" Lily balked.

"I still believe it," Harry sighed, not needing a memory to know that could get true for him.

for Rita Skeeter had published her piece about the Triwizard Tournament,

James opened his mouth, a pitying look in place, but clearly trying to comfort Harry. Talk of the Tournament was better than he was fearing, but Harry blurted the whole thing out first.

and it had turned out to be not so much a report on the tournament as a highly-colored life story of Harry.

Then his head flopped back against the couch, and he had to fight every impulse he had not to cover his ears and sing loudly so as not to hear what Harry said next.

The front page had been of the picture of Harry, while the article itself (even continuing on separate pages) had only given one mention of the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students, misspelled, and Cedric hadn't been mentioned at all.

"Would actually feel bad for him under normal circumstances," Remus sighed.

"Still wish it had been over him than Harry," James scoffed.

"Or even Krum," Sirius agreed.

It had been out for over a week now, and Harry still felt humiliated every time he thought of it. Skeeter had gone into great details of thing's Harry had never said in his life, let alone while talking to her.

Harry had the unnatural look of someone who'd eaten a live fish as everything in that paper came back to him, none of it pleasant.

Such quotes as he took strength from the thought of his parents, and wasn't ashamed to admit he still cried over them.

James and Lily felt some terrible minglings going on inside them. How they half-wished that was true and Harry did think about them more, but were almost pleased none of this ever did cross his mind as it would only hurt more. For Rita to be saying any of this without it having anything to do with Harry, though, possibly pushed her up on level with Snape right off the bat.

Harry was planning on not pausing to see reactions to this for as long as he could, trying to get through this waste of paper as quickly as possible.

There was still more, as Skeeter had gone above turning his 'er' like answers into falsehoods: she'd interviewed others about him too,

Remus was listening to all of this in an almost detached way, his mind flickering to where on earth he was in all of this. Sirius had never mentioned him in his mad attempt to get back into the country. Could he have possibly come across this article, and believed it? That would hurt him, to think Harry had opened up to this Skeeter woman like that. What would he and Sirius be thinking about all of this?

the paper having stated that Harry had found the love of his life at school.

"Did I miss something?" Lily demanded of nothing. "Who on earth is claiming to be your love?"

A colorful look was brewing on Harry's face, made up mainly of disbelief at the nonsense for this part.

His close friend, Colin Creevey,

"Stalker," Sirius corrected, "as even if he isn't following you this year, he still knows where you are at all times."

had been saying that Harry was rarely seen out of the company of one Hermione Granger,

"He's rarely seen without Ron." James rolled his eyes. "Do people think they're around snogging?"

"You guys were the ones making fun of me for this earlier," Harry reminded, happy to see them laughing this off, but unable to stop himself. "Why are you mocking this now?"

"One," Lily pointed out, "because you've made it very clear she's just a friend, and we believe you."

"Even without the text," Sirius snorted.

"Two," Lily kept going, "this Skeeter woman is being a right something to be talking to anyone but you about your love life, and publishing it. She needs to find something better to do with her time."

Harry gave them an easy smile of thanks, actually feeling a bit better as he kept going now.

a stunningly pretty Muggle-born girl who, like Harry, was one of the top students in the school.

Harry rolled his eyes at that, finding yet another exaggeration. He most certainly was not top, average at best. He could name five other people in every class who tried to give an answer as often as Hermione.

Starting the morning of the paper's publishing, Harry had been living nearly constantly with people quoting the article at him in sneering tones.

"I feel like that instance with Malfoy may become a recurring thing," James sighed.

"Can't say I'm not looking forward to that part at least," Sirius shrugged, "at least it's more entertaining."

He heard many cruel comments such as asking if he needed a tissue on the way to class, or mocking him for thinking he was one of the brightest people around.

As one voice called out for Harry, he finally lost his temper and turned on the spot to start yelling

"Can't imagine how long it took for that to happen," Lily groaned, finding her son to usually be so mild mannered, it must have taken a lot for him to reach this.

about how he'd just got done crying about his mum and he was off to do some more!

Harry couldn't get that out with nearly the same volume or contempt as he had before, not with his mother in the room and giving such a horrible flinch at that declaration.

It was Cho, who was looking surprised at Harry as she said he'd dropped his quill.

"Oops," Sirius winced for Harry's flabbergasted face.

Harry felt red coloring his face as he apologized.

Cho quickly added on as she handed back the quill that she wished him luck on Tuesday.

Harry felt his hands start to shake slightly, as he in no way wanted to read out his first task happening in less than a week, yet he was probably the best to be doing so. Then again, he'd probably be more happy if this book just skipped over the whole event.

Harry just stood there feeling stupid.

Hermione was taking on some comments of her own,

"Oh, come on, pup," Sirius pouted when he realized the topic had changed. "What was your response? Cho's clearly taken an interest back in you. Work with that."

"I didn't answer," Harry muttered, as embarrassed to admit this to them as he had to Cho, "just walked away."

They were all disappointed to hear that, talking about Harry's love life, of a girl he actually liked, was far more fun than that Tournament.

but she hadn't yet started yelling at innocent bystanders;

"Which I'm honestly disappointed to hear," Remus smirked, "as we know she can be quite good at it."

"Could have put a few more Malfoys in place, and with practice could even have gotten away with some," James agreed.

Pansy in particular loved to mock the fact that anyone had called Hermione pretty, stating she looked more like a chipmunk.

"Don't know what she's laughing at," Lily raised a sharp brow, "as at least that's a cute animal. Wasn't she the one described as an ugly old dog?"

Harry just shrugged as he said, "Pansy never caught my eye in looks, so," he trailed off to indicate he really didn't have much to say before moving on.

Hermione kept herself together well as she muttered to Harry to ignore them all.

"Got to give that girl endless credit though," Lily smiled warmly. "She's grown a lot from that little first year who ran off crying."

"I blame Harry for that," James snickered, "doing everything she's done will give anyone confidence."

Harry couldn't ignore it. Ron hadn't spoken to him since he'd told of what their detentions would be, and as they had that the same day as the article came out, Ron had spent the time pickling rat brains in the same stony silence as ever. That paper had seemed to cement to Ron that Harry was enjoying all of this.

"How could he?" Sirius seethed, any good mood they'd had snatched back away at once. "He more than anyone should know about Harry on those subjects!"

"Search me," Harry muttered bitterly.

Hermione was furious with the pair of them as she tried to force them to talk to each other,

"Can only imagine how exhausting that would be," Remus winced, thankful he'd never had to live through an argument that bad. At least when the Marauders fought, they made it up to each other quick enough with a prank or two. Even at their worst, they hadn't had a dividing friend.

but Harry refused, saying he'd talk to Ron when he apologized.

"Completely reasonable," Sirius agreed.

Snapping that he hadn't started this, it was Ron's problem!

Hermione tried to remind Harry that he missed Ron, and Ron missed him.

"Then he should admit it rather than acting like a toddler," Lily snapped.

Harry disagreed at once that he didn't miss anything about him, but that was a downright lie.

Harry's shoulders sagged a bit as he got that out, still wishing he hadn't admitted that, aloud or otherwise.

Harry enjoyed Hermione's company, but she spent too much time in the library or reading. There was much less laughter when Hermione was his only friend.

She was still spending her free time trying to help Harry with the Summoning Charm, to which Harry seemed to have developed a block for. Hermione insisted it would do him good to learn the theory of the spell.

"What's with all this fascination on Summoning Charms?" Lily asked, even the smallest distraction was taken with gratitude at this point. "It's not the only spell you learn that year, and you're so far in Flitwick should have started your class in on something else even if you hadn't caught up."

"It was Hermione who kept reminding me about it," Harry grumbled, still unable to shake this odd feeling like he'd be grateful for it. "I'd never outright been able to not do a spell. At least before I'd always managed a small version of it along with the rest of the class by the time we'd moved on. She wouldn't let it go that I hadn't been able to get this one even a bit."

The two of them ended up spending lunch in the library, usually joined by Viktor Krum.

"Maybe he just likes to read," Sirius rolled his eyes.

Not at the same table, but usually a few rows away poring through his own stack of books. Harry wondered if it had anything to do with the first task.

"Not sure what he'd find in there," Remus said in surprise. "Even trying to go off of previous Tournaments won't help him much; they change them every time."

Hermione did not appreciate his presence, not that he bothered them, but because his entourage were usually nearer to them giggling the whole time.

"Can't blame her for that though," James scoffed.

She angrily grumbled about how he wasn't even good-looking; everyone was just interested in him because he was famous.

"Most likely true," Lily rolled her eyes in agreement.

No one would look twice at him if he couldn't do that Wonky Faint thing.

"Oh, come on, Hermione," Sirius protested at once at the same time James declared:

"Now, there's no need to take your agitation out on the sport!"

Lily had to fight down the urge to repress a giggle at their outraged faces of Hermione's mispronunciation, which only increased in difficulty as Harry clearly sided with them as he kept going.

Harry quickly told her the correct term, Wronski Feint, not only for the impulse for people to get their Quidditch terms right, but he felt a sharp pang as he imagined the look on Ron's face when he heard Hermione saying Wonky-Faints.

"Don't need to imagine that," Remus smirked, "I just saw it first hand."

It was not a pleasant thing to be happening, but the more Harry dreaded the arrival of Tuesday, the more the clock seemed to double in speed for the approach. Harry could barely contain his panic the closer it came.

There was a collective sigh in the room, all of them wishing for the hundredth time they could stop hearing about this, all of them knowing they wouldn't.

The Saturday before it was a Hogsmeade visit, and though Harry was looking forward to going he asked Hermione if she planned on going with Ron?

"Ron seems to have replaced you two with Dean and Seamus," Sirius sniffed. "So I think he's just fine."

Hermione hesitantly said she was hoping they could meet up with him,

"Not happening," Remus snapped at once.

but Harry shot down the idea at once, and then decided he'd be wearing his Invisibility Cloak out.

"Can't believe you haven't been wearing that around the castle just for a reprieve," James shrugged. "I used to do that a fair few times when I didn't want to be spotted, and you've been living that recently."

Harry nodded in agreement, wishing he'd thought of that sooner.

Hermione grudgingly agreed, muttering about how she hated talking to him under there.

"You get used to that," Sirius waved off.

They set off for the village, and Harry felt more free than he had in ages. No one even glanced at him, and though some were sporting Cedric badges, they weren't quoting that article at him anymore.

"Good to know they don't do that twenty-four seven," Lily seethed.

Hermione wasn't enjoying herself as much, as she complained that she was getting some odd looks for seemingly talking to herself.

"And?" Remus raised a brow, "you'd think she'd do that more often. I know I do, have to get intelligent conversations from somewhere from time to time."

"Love you too, Moony," Sirius rolled his eyes.

Harry suggested she stop talking as much, and Hermione ignored the jab and asked him to take the cloak off; no one was going to bother him out here. Harry spotted someone who would: Rita Skeeter was coming out of the Three Broomsticks ahead.

The four of them felt a bone deep shiver at the last time Harry had been in there, hoping that feeling would go away soon.

They walked past Hermione without even glancing at her, and Harry waited until they were out of sight to point out she was staying in the village.

"There needs to be restrictions on that," James scowled. "No one who's a threat to the children allowed."

"She's not technically threatening me," Harry reminded with a look that said he still agreed with his dad.

"Making your life a living hell should count," Lily huffed.

Hermione agreed she was probably sticking around for all of the tasks, and Harry felt another wave of molten panic trying to seize him again at the reminder. He and Hermione hadn't discussed this much; she probably didn't want to think about it any more than Harry.

"Neither do I," Remus muttered, "yet it keeps coming up."

Hermione instead suggested they go inside and get a drink, but when she didn't at first receive an answer, she snapped that he didn't have to wait around for Ron.

"I didn't need to see his face to guess at that either," Sirius nodded.

The Three Broomsticks was as crowded as ever with Hogwarts students and other villagers alike. Harry had to carefully weave through so as not to invisibly step on anyone while looking for a table. On his way he passed the twins, their friend Lee, and Ron all sitting together.

"Oh I bet they just love that," James rolled his eyes. "Their kid brother following them around."

"Guess Dean and Seamus don't want to put up with him either," Sirius agreed nastily.

Resisting the urge to give Ron a hard poke in the back of the head,

"You've more restraint than any of us," Remus sniffed.

Harry instead reached a table and was quickly joined by Hermione, who passed him a drink. Hermione sighed that she looked ridiculous sitting here alone, but at least she'd brought something to do. She pulled out her S.P.E.W. notebook.

"Is that still at three?" Lily asked with interest.

"She'd managed to add a few more," Harry admitted with an attempt at a smile, "but still very few, and none of them could be considered active except her."

Harry spotted his and Ron's names still on that list, and felt like it was a lifetime ago the three of them had sat around while Hermione had made them part of her group.

"When my biggest problem was Sirius, oh wait that's all the time," Remus huffed.

"I think Harry's been beating me out," Sirius protested without any real heat, honestly wishing he was the focus more than his pup; the kid needed a break.

Hermione was looking around the room thoughtfully as she suggested that she should try to get the villagers interested in her ideas.

"I doubt that'll work any better," James shrugged. "Really, I'm surprised she hasn't taken a hint yet."

"I doubt she will until she finds her own conclusions," Lily reminded, hoping she could hear those when they came about.

Harry agreed without interest, asking when she'd give up on this spew stuff? Hermione hissed back when house-elves were treated with the respect they deserved!

"The poor thing could turn into a ghost and not see that come true," Remus winced for her.

"Oh I'm sure she'll figure something out by then," Sirius waved him off.

Then she said that she'd been nursing the idea to find the school kitchens.

Causing bursts of genuine laughter from the three Marauders, as they hadn't heard a sentence like that since their first year, and it had quickly been corrected.

Harry told her to go ask Fred and George, then they lapsed into silence. Harry was people watching. Hannah and Ernie were a few spaces away swapping Chocolate Frog Cards, and Cho was near the bar talking to some friends. She wasn't wearing a Cedric badge, which managed to cheer Harry up considerably.

Indeed, Harry had a bright smile of his own in place at the reminder, now ignoring the others' continued giggling.

His mind cooked up the image of how he'd be feeling if his name hadn't come out of that Goblet. That he, Ron, and Hermione would all be sitting around as carefree as everyone else, wondering and gossiping about the champions. They would all be supporting Cedric, safe in the stands.

The smile slipped off all of them at once, having envisioned much the same thing back when this stupid thing had been announced. Why couldn't Harry's life ever be that simple?

He wondered how the other champions were doing. Cedric usually looked nervous but excited around his many fans. Fleur looked as haughty and unruffled as ever, and Krum was always seen around books.

"Fascinating," Lily rolled her eyes without any inflection, as she couldn't seem to care too much for them when her Hare Bare had to deal with so much more on top of their problems.

Harry thought of Sirius, and the tight, tense knot in his chest seemed to ease slightly.

Some of that jealousy finally returned to James when he heard that, wishing Harry would stop bringing that up. He was happy Harry had someone to talk to about this, he wasn't going to deny that, but did he have to mention it every five minutes lately?

At least he'd be talking to him tonight, assuming nothing went wrong as it so often did lately.

"Thank you for that absolute comfort," Remus groaned, crossing his fingers Harry hadn't just jinxed that.

Hermione spotted Hagrid, bending low and talking to Moody. Rosmerta was giving the ex-auror some dirty looks as she walked past for drinking out of his hip flask, seeming to feel it offended her mead.

"I can imagine why that would insult her," Sirius said with a fond smile.

Moody had explained for his class, though, that he only ate and drank his own prepared food, so that Dark wizards couldn't poison him.

"Least some things don't change," James agreed mildly. Moody'd been that way for years.

Harry watched them get up to leave and had automatically raised a hand to wave them goodbye before remembering that he couldn't be seen. He seemed to catch Moody's attention regardless though, as his magical eye hovered on Harry.

"Wait, what?" The three boys yelped in shock, sitting up a little straighter.

The two teachers made their way to Hermione's apparently alone spot, and while they both bent down to greet her, Moody murmured for Harry's ears that he was sporting a nice cloak.

Harry's wasn't the only mouth that flopped open in shock.

"I've never known anything to see past my cloak," James snapped at once, outrage clear on his features that something had penetrated his treasured object.

"What on earth is Moody's eye made out of?" Remus demanded of nothing.

"Good thing Moody wasn't ever in school when we were," Sirius scowled, "or we'd have been in a lot more trouble. We used that thing a lot more than Harry does."

"Well, have you ever tested it against things that can see through invisibility?" Lily asked. "That mirror saw through it."

The boys didn't look happy, but agreed they supposed they hadn't run the cloak against everything they could have. It was just disconcerting to realize otherwise.

Harry stared at him in shock as he realized Moody's eye could see through his cloak as well. Moody said as much aloud, admitting how it had come in handy a lot.

"Oh, I believe that," Sirius nodded.

Hagrid spoke next, keeping his voice low as he whispered to Harry to meet him at his hut tonight at midnight wearing that cloak.

"Why?" The four not reading demanded at once. They liked Hagrid enough, but no midnight meeting at his place had yet to end well.

"You're not going to like the answer," Harry seemed to mutter without realizing as he kept going.

Then they did leave, and Harry asked Hermione what the reason for that visit could be. Hermione had no idea, but reminded him he'd better make it quick or he'd be late for Sirius.

"And there's that," Sirius agreed with just a touch of snoot to his voice. "Hagrid can talk to him all the time at the castle. I'm a little more restricted."

"Still," Lily sighed, "it's not like Hagrid to invite Harry out after curfew, so whatever he's got to say must be important. Harry shouldn't just blow that off either."

"I think he can make both," Remus frowned, "so long as Hagrid hurries up whatever it is."

"Well, let's hope so," Harry said with huge relief, though not admitting the majority of that came from the realization there was no way his meetings with both Hagrid and Sirius could be crammed into the normal length of these chapters. Hopefully this meant he wouldn't have to read about his task after all.

Harry agreed the two would cut fairly close to each other, and he considered sending Hedwig to Hagrid with a note he couldn't make it, if his bird even consented to doing so,

"Oh yeah, that's still going on," James muttered randomly.

but as Hagrid had never asked him out after hours before, curiosity won out. When the time came Harry snuck down into the common room in his cloak to find a lot of people still awake, the Creevey brothers, for example, who had gotten a hold of some Cedric badges,

"Wow, what's a stalker good for if he won't even be on your side?" Sirius raised a brow while Harry gave him a hard nudge for that continued picking.

and were trying to switch them to Harry badges.

"Aww," Lily cooed. "Well, thank them for that. At least someone's trying to keep it fair."

Harry didn't look remotely pleased at the idea. That was all he needed: his name showing up all the more, but he couldn't deny he found the idea flattering at least.

So far all they'd accomplished was getting them stuck on the Potter Stinks spell.

"Some improvement required," Remus snorted.

He went over to the hole and waited patiently for Hermione to come through, opening the door for him so that it wouldn't apparently open on its own.

"Why would you bother with that?" James smirked. "We went out all the time under that. She stopped asking long ago what it was."

"She usually just seemed to assume it was someone who opened it, then closed it again from the inside just to annoy her," Sirius agreed wickedly.

"And I've never seen the students question it either," Remus said. In a school full of magic, not many people bothered to question such things as a door they thought might have moved.

Harry just shrugged, not having wanted to raise more suspicion than he had to.

Harry thanked her as he walked past, and on his way down noticed the Beauxbatons carriage was still lit from the inside. He ignored that for the most part and knocked. Hagrid flung the door open and Harry was a little startled to see he'd dressed up, wearing an artichoke in a buttonhole and having attempted to tame his hair again.

"Wonder what the purpose of Harry noticing the Beauxbatons carriage was lit up before was?" Sirius tried for a vague tone.

"Can't have anything to do with Hagrid's appearance again," James didn't even pretend at the same.

Harry asked what he was being shown, his first fear being the skrewts had produced more eggs, or Hagrid had somehow gotten his hands on another three-headed dog.

"Both terrifying options," Lily nodded in agreement, "but I'm hoping Hagrid will have something more relevant for you. Like a secret he'll finally let slip of what could be coming for the first task."

Harry blinked at her for a few moments, quite sure she was right, but didn't press it just in case.

Hagrid told him to keep quiet and to follow along under the cloak. They wouldn't be taking Fang; he wouldn't like this.

"That wasn't encouraging," Remus' brows shot up at once.

"Starting to get less fun," James agreed, his hand already wanting to mess with his hair with nerves.

Harry tried to warn Hagrid that he was in something of a hurry, but Hagrid shushed him as he walked off to the Beauxbatons quarters. Harry tried to ask what was going on, but Hagrid shushed him again and knocked.

"What is Hagrid up to?" Lily sighed, sounding more exasperated than curious now.

"When we find out, I'll let you know," Sirius snarked.

Maxime answered with a welcoming smile for Hagrid, asking if it was time? Hagrid gave her a 'bong-sewer' in greeting,

"Credit for trying," Remus snickered as both Harry and Hagrid had clearly managed to butcher the French word.

holding out his arm and assisting her down the steps. Arm in arm, the two took off past the paddock while Harry tried to keep up in total bewilderment.

"Same here, pup." Sirius was frowning and starting to get fidgety, possibly for no good reason, but this really was getting weirder by the moment.

Harry was wondering if all Hagrid had wanted to do was show off Maxime, but he could see her anytime: she wasn't hard to miss.

"You meant easy, dear," Lily corrected.

"What?" Harry asked, only slightly distracted.

"It's a meiotic reference to her height, so you should have said she wasn't easy to miss," Lily explained.

Harry watched her for a few beats before smiling slightly and turning back to the book.

Maxime seemed to have no more clue than Harry what was going on, as they entered the shade of the Forbidden Forest and she asked where he was taking her.

Hagrid promised she'd enjoy this, but she had to promise not to tell her champion as they weren't supposed to know.

"This does have something to do with the first task," Lily's brows shot up into her hairline now.

"If Maxime doesn't tell Fleur whatever it is, I'll kiss Sirius," James scoffed.

"Don't make bets you can't win Prongs," Sirius tried for his casual voice, but the joke was lost as they were all consumed with curiosity now.

Maxime flirtatiously agreed as they kept walking. Harry was getting impatient as he followed, checking his watch to make sure he wouldn't miss Sirius. If they didn't get on with this soon, he was going to go back to the castle and Hagrid could enjoy his moonlit walk with his date.

Harry was starting to get a prickling feeling up his spine though, knowing right now he would be quite glad if he didn't leave.

It was as they were rounding a bend in the forest that blocked the castle from sight that Harry started to hear the roaring.

Harry's mouth started to go dry; already anxiety was creeping back into him for whatever he was fixing to find out, and all humor was drained right out of the room as the others listened intently for what beast this could be.

Hagrid pulled Maxime into the thicket of trees, and while Harry hustled around to see what was going on, but quickly froze in horror as at first he spotted bonfires with men jumping around them. Then his eyes focused, and he saw the dragons.

Harry sat there with an expression he was sure he was also wearing at fourteen. Fear. How on earth was he expected to get past a living nightmare?!

His shell shocked reaction was a kindness compared to his godfathers though.

"No, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, this is not happening, I am done, no!" The second that bloody beast had seeped into his brain, that the mental image of what Harry was fixing to have to be put through really sunk in, he got to his feet and stormed for the stairs, muttering 'no' over and over again along with a few choice words.

The others watched him storm out, unsure what to say to him, let alone tell themselves in any attempt to feel like this could ever be okay. This was finally too much. Dragons!? The most powerful creature that existed, and they were going to send an individual person to try and, what? It didn't matter, the act of the task wasn't the point, dragons!

The baby began fussing, and Remus realized he needed a diaper change. He quickly darted up the stairs as well, leaving the three of them in more blank silence. No one seemed to know what to say. What could they say? At least Harry had survived whatever on earth he was fixing to combat, but it wasn't going to stop all of them from having a massive panic attack while it was happening, and most likely a flashback to what had happened to Sirius.

Some of Harry's shock seemed to wear off as he gave himself a shake, glancing at his two parents with an attempt at a normal smile as he said, "guess I owe Hagrid a thanks. Can only imagine that I would have frozen up if I'd seen that for the first time officially in the tournament."

"Yes, I guess so," Lily murmured her agreement. "I just can't believe, what are they thinking?"

Harry seemed to move unconsciously closer to his dad who was bouncing his knee in that agitated way he did. When James realized what Harry was doing he managed to still himself and bury that almost selfish glee that Sirius had temporarily vacated; otherwise Harry probably would have been trying to comfort him. He quickly kicked that feeling away; he was being a prick. Harry would want to try to get closer to someone he actually knew rather than a guy he'd only ever heard the name of.

His mental back and forth was cut off anyways by Sirius returning, along with Remus right behind him. Sirius was now holding the baby and the two were bickering long before they'd been heard.

"-I know he makes it out alright, don't see why I have to hear about the bloody incident! This is base torture, you know!"

Remus had his hand on Sirius' shoulder as he guided him back into the room, patiently reminding, "because I can guess right now that the chapters you decide to flake out on will have something important in them, and you'll badger us and try to reread it yourself anyways. This way is far easier; plus if you faint again at least I won't have to be the only one to deal with it."

"I didn't faint!" Sirius snapped at once as he threw himself into his seat with as much violence as he could while still minding his injuries and the baby in his arms. "I, I just-"

"You alright?" James asked quickly as he eyed Sirius with a lot more concern now: he hadn't realized he was going to get that bad.

"I'm fine," he snapped, keeping eyes only on the baby. "Let's throw you in the room with a fire-breathing dragon for Merlin knows how many hours and see you not remember it."

"I'm sure it'll be fine," Remus kept at his calm tone. "You know the best way to distract a dragon is to get it in the eye. You'll pass that information along to Harry; whatever happens he'll be fine."

Sirius still grumbled a bit under his breath, still not quite able to shake off his memory, but at least it was now being overlaid by the advice Remus had given him about a dragon's weak spot. Surely Remus was right, he'd tell Harry that as soon as possible. It still wasn't that comforting. When that silence just kept laying thicker in the room, Sirius really did snap at Harry, "oh, would you just keep going."

Harry looked from Sirius to the others, but when no one else had anything to say he decided to do just that, if anything just because he was sick of the quiet.

Four fully-grown, enormous, vicious-looking dragons were rearing onto their hind legs inside an enclosure fenced with thick planks of wood,

"Wooden?" Remus demanded, now looking faint as well. "Who actually decided putting dragons behind a wooden enclosure was a good idea?"

"With any luck they're enchanted not to burn, and probably the easiest temporary pens," Lily huffed.

roaring and snorting - torrents of fire were shooting into the dark sky from their open, fanged mouths, fifty feet above the ground on their outstretched necks.

The longer Harry kept reading out descriptions, the more likely Sirius looked to lose consciousness all over again. Yet James kept waving him on frantically in a pleading attempt to get this over with.

There was a silvery-blue one with long, pointed horns, snapping and snarling at the wizards on the ground;

"Swedish Short-Snout," Remus muttered.

a smooth-scaled green one, which was writhing and stamping with all its might;

"Common Welsh Green," he pointed out again.

a red one with an odd fringe of fine gold spikes around its face, which was shooting mushroom-shaped fire clouds into the air;

"Chinese Fireball," he said for his ears alone since Lily was giving him an increasingly nasty look for constantly doing this when no one really wanted to know.

and a gigantic black one, more lizard-like than the others, which was nearest to them.

Remus didn't seem capable of getting that last one out, for which Lily was grateful, as his running commentary was leaning her towards smacking him next, but honestly she was more terrified still that just naming the beast was bothering him.

There were about eight wizards trying to handle each dragon, pulling on the thick chains keeping the too-large lizards on the ground that were hooked to their legs and necks. Harry couldn't take his eyes off of them, the one closest who was black with cat like pupils bulging with fear or rage he wasn't sure.

"I wouldn't blame a combination of both," James said weakly.

They were all making a horrible screeching noise. One wizard noticed Hagrid's arrival and warned him to keep back: he'd seen the Horntail shoot its fire at forty feet.

"Got the longest range of all the breeds," Remus agreed with a shiver.

Lily leaned in close and whispered, "I am going to strangle you for Sirius if you don't knock it off."

"I can't help it," he muttered. "Either I talk or I start screaming my own head off."

Lily pursed her lips for a moment before leaning back in agreement; at least he was whispering it mostly to himself.

Hagrid didn't pay the caution any mind as he whispered how beautiful they all were.

"I'm going to dismember him," Sirius murmured, keeping his fingers curled as tightly around his little charge as he could without hurting him.

Another wizard called that they weren't doing any good, and it was time to stun them. On the count of three, all the wizards pulled out their wands and shot darts of red lights at the beasts, who all froze in place with still furious open jaws. They landed with such force the ground seemed to shake.

"Considering they weigh more than several of those trees, wouldn't surprise me," Remus grumbled.

The dragon keepers started moving with purpose now as they secured the links more properly, and Hagrid asked Maxime if she wanted to move closer now. Harry followed them uneasily, and was surprised to spot the wizard who'd warned Hagrid to be Charlie Weasley.

"Oh joy, guess now we get to know what he meant," James groaned.

He greeted Hagrid in a friendly manner, explaining that the dragons should be good for now. They came in on Sleeping Drafts

"How did they even get them here?" Harry demanded without really wanting to know. "I seriously doubt they did what we had to Norbert," he finished with an expectant look at Sirius.

Sirius gave another hard shiver, but he really did finally seem to be calming down as he shot back, "Never doubt what I can do, pup!"

"Please quit winding him up," Lily grumbled, "I liked him better silent."

"Love you to Lils." Sirius rolled his eyes at her.

Remus actually turned to answer Harry. "Well, as Charlie said, they knock them out so they can't do anything stupid, but then they turn their packaging into Portkeys. However, well, you saw the results of them waking up in an unfamiliar place."*

"Why couldn't Charlie's friends have just done that to Norbert?" Harry demanded with a huff.

"Portkeys are monitored," Lily shrugged. "Any time the spell is used to create one, the Ministry knows about it, and it would have been a lot harder for them to explain that than just say running across a wild baby dragon."

Harry nodded in agreement but decided to move on, the quicker he got away from those things the better.

because they'd thought it would be better for them to wake up in the dark and quiet, but they clearly still weren't pleased.

Hagrid asked what breeds they were, his eyes on the biggest black one with reverence.

All five of them had looks of shock on their face at that. They knew how much Hagrid cared about them, so they did suppose seeing a fully grown one like this would be a dream come true, it was just mind boggling for this to be anyone's reaction!

Charlie pointed that one out as the Hungarian Horntail and listed off the others as well.

"So, Remus?" James asked in a too-high-pitched voice. "Which one should Harry pick to try and deal with?"

"None," Remus said at once with a drawn look, before receiving a smack upside the head and a stern look from his seat mate before quickly correcting himself, "err, I mean, any of them. Yeah, Harry's going to make a breeze of the lot."

"You're just so encouraging," Sirius told him deadpan. "How do you do it?"

Then Charlie spotted Maxime taking a closer look, and he scolded Hagrid for bringing her along: she'd tell her champion.

"Yes," all five of them agreed.

Hagrid didn't seem too worried as he said he thought she'd like to see it, his eyes still on the dragons. Charlie shook his head as he laughed about what a romantic date this was.

"Not really," Lily snorted, though she supposed if Maxime didn't agree with Hagrid's fascination, the romance was quick to die, so best get it out there now.

Hagrid quickly pointed out the number of how many there were, one for each of the champions.

"I gathered that, thank you," Lily shivered.

Asking what they had to do, fight them?

Sirius felt a little vomit trying to fly up his throat at the thought.

As far as Charlie knew, they just had to get past them.

"Get past them, eh?" James asked, who seemed to have developed a nervous twitch in his leg which wasn't going away. "That's nicer than what I was picturing."

"Is it going to be, like, timed?" Lily raised a curious brow as she tried at a guess. "You have to be in an enclosure with them for so long?"

"Please, I am begging you, stop," Sirius groaned. He was planning on ripping off his ears when the actual event came. He did not want to sit around speculating about it until then.

Mercifully, they heeded him.

The handlers would be there to make sure nothing got out of hand. For some reason they'd been asked to bring nesting mothers.

"I don't want to know why either," Remus balked, now fearing Lily's guess may be hitting home, and it had just become quantifiably more dangerous.

He didn't envy the poor soul who got the Horntail. She was the most vicious one: her back end was as dangerous as her front.

No one actually wanted to hear what Harry was fixing to describe. Even Remus, who knew what was coming, wasn't at all curious to hear a live description rather than a drawing.

Charlie pointed toward the tail, and Harry saw spikes protruding along it every few inches.

"Huh, wonder where they got their name from," James rolled his eyes.

Charlie's co-workers were bringing eggs to the dragons now, settling a clutch of cement-looking ones next to the Horntail. Hagrid let out a moan of longing.

"I will murder him if he even considers it," Sirius said with sincerity.

"I think that moan meant he was already thinking about it," Harry pointed out, though quickly tacked on, "but I'm sure Hagrid's learned his lesson."

"Nice save," James snorted, none of them honestly believing him.

Charlie noticed and warned Hagrid they were all counted.

"Was that sad that Charlie had to warn him?" Lily rolled her eyes.

"Charlie more than anyone knows Hagrid is likely to do it," Remus shrugged.

Then he asked how Harry was doing? Hagrid just said he was fine,

"No, he's not," Harry muttered mutinously. He was much farther from okay, thankful that the book had skipped the fact he may have pissed himself a little when he'd first caught sight of those things himself.

his eyes still on the eggs. Charlie hoped he would still be fine after facing this lot,

"Thank you, Charlie," James snarled, "as a trained dragon keeper, it bloody warms my heart to hear you saying that!"

he hadn't even dared to tell his Mum what he knew the first task to be, she was already having kittens about the boy.

Lily couldn't stop a noise, half pleased that Molly's mothering so clearly extended to Harry as he so sorely needed it, half agitated anyone else was there for her son when she should have been the one losing her mind in both times.

Charlie imitated his mother's tones quite well as he mimicked her saying how they'd let Harry into the tournament, he was too young!

"Well, there you go," Harry sighed, "finally someone who's as ticked about it all as you lot."

"And I thank her," James nodded in agreement.

Then Charlie kept going about how his mum had been crying about that article Skeeter had wrote, about how he still cried over his parents and she'd no idea.

Harry groaned in misery. That's all he wanted, yet more people thinking that of him. It hadn't even hit him yet that people outside of Hogwarts would have read all that stuff as well. Great, now he was the laughing stock of the whole world!

"What's she doing believing Skeeter's articles, anyways?" Lily demanded sharply, her tone perhaps a bit much at her own sting of replacement still present. "She knows just as well as we do what a fraud that woman is after all she wrote about Arthur."

"Maybe she didn't read who wrote it," James offered with an absent shrug, though none of them really believed this as Rita had made no qualms about keeping her name present and accounted for. Honestly, none of them had a real excuse for her, that was pretty bad of Molly.**

Harry had heard enough. Knowing the combination of dragons and Maxime would keep Hagrid's attention,

"Wouldn't be surprised if he'd forgotten you were there already," James rolled his eyes.

Harry turned and fled back to the castle. He wasn't sure whether he was glad he knew or not.

"There's the bright side," Lily sighed, pushing her hand through her hair as she thought it through. "Just imagine if you hadn't at least had time to prepare for this. Daring in the face of the unknown my arse, no one gets within yards of a dragon and doesn't know about it!"

"Doesn't seem rightly fair, though," Remus frowned as he thought about it. "Harry and, no one should kid themselves, Fleur now know, but the other two don't."

"What can you do, though?" James shrugged. "It's who you know, not what you know."

"You're terrible," Lily told her husband pleasantly.

At least the shock was wearing off. He could only imagine his reaction if he'd seen them for the first time in front of the crowd, he'd probably pass out.

"Wouldn't blame you if you did with foreknowledge," Sirius hissed.

He probably still would, as he was going to have to face a dragon with just his wand, which felt like nothing more than a flimsy bit of wood at the moment.

"Well, don't beat yourself into the ground, though," Lily quickly tried to tack on some encouragement.

"You lot admitted my best bet was to get it in the eye," Harry scoffed. "A rock could do that as well as a spell with good aim. I didn't exactly feel safe."

"He's getting cheeky," James smirked when Lily had no come back for that.

He had to get past the fifty-foot-long, fire-breathing dragon with everyone watching. How?

That set most of them into a bit of a panic again. What if Harry didn't figure this out? How badly could he get hurt before someone stepped in?

"Sirius'll tell you how," Remus reminded at once when he saw them all starting to freak out again. "I told him that ages ago. Once he starts breathing again that's the first thing he'll tell Harry to do."

"Not sure how much comfort that'll give him," Sirius snorted so violently he may have sent a little of his brains out with it. "Beast the size of Hogwarts? Ah, just poke it in the eye."

"You're exaggerating," James reminded.

While Sirius was distracted sticking his tongue out at James, Harry quickly kept on.

Harry continued running through the grounds, checking his watch as he saw he only had fifteen minutes left to make it back to his meeting with Sirius, when he slammed into something.

"You run flat into the bricks?" Lily muttered, distracted enough herself she knew she might have.

Harry fell to the ground and looked up in surprise to see Karkaroff.

"What's he doing out there?" Sirius snapped, straightening at once with narrowed eyes. He hadn't believed anything could distract him from dragons being around his pup, but a Death Eater did it.

"Nothing good," James scowled.

Karkaroff demanded to know who was there, but as Harry was still under the cloak he saw nothing. Karkaroff seemed to decide it must have been an animal, as he looked down at his feet like he was expecting to see a dog.

Causing a twisted sort of smile on all of their faces, as they'd love nothing more than for a certain Grim to appear right then and scare the bejeezus out of him.

Karkaroff pushed past the moment and then continued his way towards the trees Harry had come from, where the dragons were.

"Think he saw Hagrid and Maxime walking off?" Lily asked in surprise. "Got curious where they were going?"

"From where, his boat?" Remus demanded with a frown, "and even so, so what? What's it to him? I'm betting they've been flirting terribly since they met, what's it to Karkaroff for them to be out like that?" Then his face twisted as he realized he may not want an answer to that.

"He might have heard Hagrid talking earlier?" James offered, "telling Maxime he had something secret to show her. Karkaroff could just assume it had something to do with the Tournament-"

"Which he would have been right about," Sirius finished with a roll of his eyes. Even if that was true, it was pretty presumptuous.

Harry got back to his feet and entered the castle much more carefully now, his mind on the other champions. Harry had no doubt the other two heads of schools would share what they saw this night with their students, leaving Cedric the only one who wouldn't know come Tuesday.

"Oh yeah, nearly forgot about that," Remus muttered with some honest feelings of pity for the Hufflepuff. It didn't feel right, him being left out, but what could be done? Cedric just hadn't the resources like the other champions had of someone offering up the information. He'd be the only one facing this challenge blind, as they all should have been. Well, it would certainly be interesting to hear his at least.

Harry took all the stairs at a run once he was inside, still watching his watch as he only had five minutes left.

"You think Sirius will appear there instantly?" Lily asked.

"And freak out if Harry isn't there," James agreed.

He gave the password and slipped inside, looking around an empty common room. He couldn't smell anything, so everyone must have gone to sleep without the Dungbombs.

"Or the house-elves have cleaned up the smell already," Sirius shrugged.

Harry pulled his cloak off and sank into a chair, the fire the only source of light as he looked around. On one of the tables was the badges the Creevey boys had been working on, which now read Potter Really Stinks.

"I'm sure that's what they were going for," James snorted.

Harry glanced towards the fireplace again, and jumped. If he hadn't seen Mr. Diggory's head in the Weasley fireplace over the summer, he would have been sure he'd be losing his mind.

Lily couldn't help a little giggle as she thought about that moment, but Sirius would have calmed him down fast enough.

Instead he quickly knelt down to talk to Sirius. He looked different from the last time Harry had seen him, with sunken skin and matted black hair.

Sirius gave himself a little shake of unease, running his hand through his hair in agitation at the thought; it was by far the kindest description as opposed to other features that had been told. Then he scowled at his friends who were trying to subtly eye him with worry; clearly they hated thinking about him looking so different as he did, but they didn't have to stare.

Now he looked a little healthier, his face less lined and his hair much shorter and well kept, finally resembling the picture Harry had of him at the Potters' wedding.

Lily still didn't bother to hide her relieved sigh at that. She'd been worried that Sirius wasn't taking care of himself now that he was out of Azkaban, that he'd actually continue to get worse on his new found freedom and possible revenge seeking. This was a good mark of improvement.

Harry asked how he was, and Sirius quickly shoved past that and asked how Harry was doing seriously.

Harry defused any tension left from Sirius' description by laughing boyishly at his own mind's choice of words, causing the others to groan and mumble at him and Sirius who gave a happy smirk at Harry.

Harry tried to say he was doing fine, but the word wouldn't come out. Instead everything that had happened to him came pouring out, especially Ron and how he couldn't stand to be in the same room with him. He finished by blurting out he'd just seen the dragons and that he was a goner!

They all tensed like a spring to be released, considering his reaction when this had already happened to Harry, they were honestly terrified of this time and what he'd do.

Sirius watched him for a long time with eyes that had not yet lost the shadow Azkaban had given him, a haunted look. He hadn't spoken once while Harry talked, but now he quickly said that they could deal with the dragons in a few moments, he had to say something else first.

James choked, looking very close to like someone had just tried to blow his head off. The fact that Sirius didn't even flinch at the mention of there being dragons spoke volumes of what his time in Azkaban had done to him. What once had been his greatest fear was suddenly a passing comment. It gave him more of a spin then anything yet that his best friend could have such a radically different reaction: it almost made him feel like he'd lost his best friend to Azkaban and was now being forced to watch some replacement.

Sirius just sat there with his head cocked to the side as he realized the same thing James had, though somehow he still managed to grow more worried. He must have found something really bad to try and take Harry's attention away and not try and tell him a dragon's weak point.

He didn't have long, he'd broken into someone's house to use this fireplace and had no idea when they'd be back.

Lily sighed and gave an exasperated look at the ceiling, she almost wished he had just changed into Padfoot now and gone there in person. It felt less dangerous than that.

Remus felt yet another blow attack him as he wondered why Sirius couldn't have come to his place to do this, or was that being to kind? Did he even have a place? Was he so financially broke he couldn't even offer Sirius that? It's not as if Harry knew, so he couldn't bring himself to even bring it up.

Harry was shocked, asking what could be worse than dragons?

Sirius opened and closed his mouth with a great shudder, nothing like that even able to cross his mind now.

Sirius answered Karkaroff.

"What?!" They demanded, James' arm fighting down the impulse to grab Harry and pull him closer on instinct. They'd gone from having suspicions about him, to a confirmed panic that a person was a bigger threat to Harry than a dragon! They hadn't thought this day could get worse!

Still, Harry didn't let the shock last for long as he unenthusiastically kept going just to know what Sirius had to say about him.

He'd been caught as a Death Eater and had been in Azkaban with Sirius for a time,

There would not be a time where every one of them would hear a thing like that and not get a chill all over.

but he'd gotten out. Sirius was sure that's why Dumbledore had wanted an Auror at Hogwarts this year, to keep an eye on him. Harry asked how Karkaroff had gotten released, and Sirius bitterly said that he'd made a deal with the Ministry.

"I can see where you're coming from," Lily murmured, her nails biting into her palm and still unable to release a fist. Her brother being forced in there for a crime he didn't commit while Karkaroff was released because of a trade! A lot of someones were going to be hearing from her on the practice of all this.

He'd put some people into the prison in his place, and Sirius had heard the rumors that he'd turned his school into one heavily featured around the Dark Arts, so he couldn't be too repentant, so Harry needed to watch out for the Durmstrang student.

"Fair enough," Remus agreed. "Though they've hardly formed a friendship so far."

"I wouldn't know that," Sirius sighed as he raked his hand through his hair, suddenly beyond frustrated that he was forced to talk to Harry in the dead of night just to pass along information. When would they finally get to a time where they could just talk and relax like any resemblance of normal?

Harry asked if Sirius thought Karkaroff had been the one to put his name in. He'd been furious along with everyone else when it had happened.

Sirius pointed out he was a really good actor, the Ministry had believed him enough to set him free.

"Another point to Padfoot," James sighed as he rubbed furiously at his eyes from exhaustion, and not the physical kind.

Then Sirius added that he'd been keeping up with the Prophet

Harry flushed with renewed embarrassment about that stupid thing all over again, now a hundred times worse as he was dying to know if Sirius really believed all that, humiliated if he did.

and he'd found the article about Moody's attack right before he started working at the school.

Which gave Harry the small hope that Sirius wasn't too caught up at least.

Harry tried to interrupt, but Sirius quickly said he knew it had been reported as a false alarm, but Sirius wasn't so sure. He thought someone had actually tried to stop Moody from getting to Hogwarts.

"You seem fairly adept at the process of reading between her lines," Lily said in surprise. "You can't have had that much practice at it yet."

"I'm used to the Daily Prophet doing it in general." Sirius rolled his eyes. "They're better than Skeeter at it, but even they've been known to hold back, so it wouldn't really change with another name and more bull on top of the original." He finished with a shrug and waved Harry on.

Harry asked if Sirius really thought Karkaroff was out to kill him, and demanded to know why?

Sirius hesitated as he explained that he didn't like all of these things that had been happening, and the disappearances. Bertha Jorkins had last been heard of in Albania, and that had also been the last place Voldemort had been rumored to be. Bertha would have known about the Tournament.

"Because she was in the department at the time, of course," Remus blinked in surprise. They hadn't thought about her in a while; since this tournament they'd all but forgotten about her in light of other things, but Sirius had now brought up a really good point. It did explain some of Voldemort's comments before, but how on earth had he formed a plan around the Tournament? He didn't really have anyone to help him with this plan though...except that faithful servant at Hogwarts he'd mentioned. Now they had two likely candidates, Karkaroff and Snape...and he wasn't the only one getting a creeping chill up his spine as he finally realized who the culprit behind all of this was. Voldemort was behind this happening to Harry, so Harry would be lucky if the worst thing that happened to him was all the horrible attention he was getting.

Harry tried to brush off that Bertha couldn't have just walked up to Voldemort.

Sirius couldn't keep hearing this without a terrible growl building in his chest, as he knew quite well Bertha hadn't just walked into anyone. She'd been conned into it by a rat.

Sirius explained that he'd known Bertha in his youth, she'd been a few years above him, and she was an idiot. Very nosy, with no brains, and that was a terrible combination to have.

Lily felt her innards being twisted away in pity for that poor thing. Even if she never knew Bertha, it still felt terrible, this happening to her. Peter would know her the same way as Sirius was explaining. He'd have been caught, but concocted the scheme from all the times he'd managed to talk her out of anything at school. It felt terrible that his past with his friends just seemed to keep coming at the worst for Harry.

It wouldn't be hard to lure her into a trap.

Harry reached the conclusion that Voldemort was the reason he was in this tournament, that Karkaroff was helping him.

Sirius admitted he didn't know for sure. Karkaroff wouldn't go back to Voldemort unless Voldemort was all-powerful again, but whoever did do this to Harry was looking for a way to get him killed and make it look like an accident.

"Thank you, Sirius, there was my chipper thought for the day," James huffed.

Harry agreed it wouldn't be hard to pull off, the dragon would do all the work for them.

Sirius quickly tried to say something about that,

Harry tried to force himself to relax, sure that Sirius was fixing to tell him the same thing Remus just had, that Harry was going to live through this with their advice and everything would be okay.

that using a Stunning Spell would be a bad idea as their hides were too thick for just one spell to get through, but all it took was a simple- he cut himself off when Harry shushed him with a terrified look in place.

"Damn," they all hissed in unison. Why did that have to happen now! Whoever had decided on their midnight wanderings had the worst timing! Well, hopefully Sirius could just send his advice with the next owl, because he needed to get out of there now!

Harry could hear footsteps coming down the stairs, and he told Sirius to leave now! Sirius did just that, and Harry quickly got to his feet to block the fireplace as he glared at the stairs. If anyone caught him, the Ministry would be dragged into this, and Harry could be questioned about Sirius' whereabouts.

Sirius didn't look particularly concerned about that, trying to prove he wasn't going to get too worked up over a thing like this. Harry didn't even know where he was, so if his godson was somehow forced to tell through the Ministry, Harry couldn't really do anything bad. In fact, on the contrary, if they somehow forced Harry to tell all he knew about Sirius, he might be able to get some of the truth out. It had been so long, no one could believe that he was still Confounded. That charm wore off like any other, though since it was a form of a memory charm, it was always considered tricky. This was all worst case scenario, though: Sirius knew he'd taken the warning and vanished the moment Harry had said something.

He still didn't move when he heard the pop behind him which meant Sirius' disappearance. Harry was still glaring at the stairs for whoever had decided to take a stroll at this time and interrupt Sirius' advice about the dragons.

It was Ron.

"Oh," they all groaned, unbelievably relaxing back. As angry as they all were with Ron, he was still the best option for that to have been right then. Though it still didn't answer what he was doing.

He stopped when he spotted Harry, asking who he'd been talking to. Harry snapped it was none of his business, and what was he even doing down here? Ron began to say he'd noticed Harry wasn't in bed, but cut himself off with a shrug,

Lily realized Ron would have noticed Harry hadn't been in bed yet, had perhaps even been worried enough for a moment that his friend might need a friend and had tried to come down and talk to him. If the boys were going to make up, maybe Ron was finally starting to try.

declaring he was going back to bed.

Harry shouted at him for nosing around,

James winced and sighed for Ron; he hadn't meant to interrupt something so important, it had just been rotten timing.

not caring that it hadn't really been Ron's fault for walking in on something so important.

Ron snapped back with an insincere apology about how sorry he was for walking in on Harry practicing his next interview.

Remus snarled in outrage as he fought back the urge to curse someone who wasn't even here. How could Ron still be going on about that!?

Harry grabbed one of the Potter Stinks badges and chucked it at Ron, managing to hit him on the forehead. He stormed past him, snapping that maybe Ron would be lucky enough to have a scar there, that's what he wanted!

Harry read that with a haughty sneer in place, hoping he could finally get through Ron's overly large head how petty his problem is.

He expected Ron to do something as he walked past, half hoping he'd throw a punch, but he did nothing as Harry marched off to bed, and Harry never heard him come back up.

"Chapter's done," Harry huffed as he tossed the book to Remus.

HPHPHP

My Patronus is a Black Bear, one of my favorite animals and, gah, I couldn't be more happy about it! Let me know yours!

A couple of you pointed out that Sirius' great fear of dragons didn't make sense in regards to this chapter in particular, but I actually planned it that way. I wanted something really dramatic to show what a different person Sirius would be between while he was reading this and what he would turn into, and his contrasting reactions to the dragons news was just one of them.

*At least, that's my best guess for how they got into the country, let me know if you've got other ideas.

**I am not a Molly hater, but really, her believing Skeeter's articles after what all she wrote about the Weasleys really does blow my mind. The worst of the comments about her will be in this and one other chapter of this book though, maybe a few things in the fifth, so aside from occasional spikes of jealousy from Lily, I promise this will never get into bashing. Towards any character for that matter.

#Harry Potter #fanfiction #GoF #Marauders #reading the books #James Potter #Remus Lupin #Sirius Black #Jilly

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hxhhunterxhunter · 4 years ago

Text

Onii-Chan (x child Reader)

⭐️Y/n reacts to Comments, Random scenarios and more💧

Included in this Bundle of Y/n involves ~

~ Y/n reacts to comments ~ What Y/n calls the characters/ What the characters call Y/n ~ Learning about Y/n ~ Headpat section (break) ~ Y/n + HXH Characters Scenarios ~Short sneak peak of season 2

(I got lazy also cuz I'm trying to write chapters XD)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Comments (I only added a few, gonna go into comments and write Y/n's reply to them BTW)

*"I'll help you find him." He smiled at the girl, hoping she would calm down. "My name is Gon!"*

'GON AHH GON I LOVE YOU😻😻', 'Gon bby 🥺🥺', 'HEY SUNSHINE BABY🥺', (+ more)

Y/n: Gon I wuv you!

Gon: I wuv you too Y/n-chan!

*The blonde haired male bend down to look at the small girl. "My name is Kurapika, where was the last time you saw him, and do you know where he was going?"*

'Why do I always read it as Kurapico!!??!?'

Y/n: Hai Kurapico!

Kurapika chokes on water

*"Thank you Pika-Pika." She smiled at him and held her plush in her arms. He smiled slight at the nickname and nodded.*

'AWW' (That's really all the comments on this)

Y/n: Pika-Pika! I want a hug!

Kurapika hugs Y/n

Y/n: Thank chu~"

'Why are you killing me'

Y/n pouts: Sowwy for killing you 👉👈😭

---

*"I was following you then I was lost, and Gon helped me with Kurapika and liorio!" She said as she held her fox plush in her arms, Hisoka's looked down to notice a badge, neatly pinned onto the stomach of the fox.*

'That's Mr Leorio to you, mr Leorio'

Y/n: his name his Leorio? and not Liorio?

---

*HJAHJS THIS BOOK IS SO CUTETTETE 🥺💖, AHH ADORABLE✨💖(+ like 100 comments lol)*

Y/n: Let me give you a headpat! You are adorable too! And you deserve it!

---

'These titles f*cking scare me.'

Y/n: How does Onii-Chan Hisoka scare you? Let me give you a hug to help you not be scared :3

*"His the Imposter"*

'(All among us comments)'

Y/n: Can we skip vote?👉👈

*"You were a bad Onii-chan! You mustn't hurt people with cards!"*

'We a badass five year old🤣🤭😗✌'

Y/n tilts her head: what does that mean?

~~~~

What Y/n calls them (from most to least used/never used)

Gon - Onii-Chan, Gon-OniiChan, Gon-oniisan, Oniisan,Gon

Killua - Kil-Oniisan,Killu, Killua

Kurapika - Kura-Oniisan, Pika-Pika, Kurapikachu, Kurapika

Leorio - Leo-Oniisan, Liorio,Mr Oreo, Leorio

Hisoka - Hisoka Onii-Chan, Hiso-oniisan, Hiso-Chan, Hiso-Hiso, Hiso, Oniisan, Hisoka

Illumi - Illu-oniisan, Illuminati, Illu, Illumi

Netero - Grandpa, Chairman, Netero

Mr Oinks - Mr Oinks, Oinky, Piggy

Foxy - Foxy, Fox

Chrollo - Chrollo Oniisan,Mr Spider, Chrome, Chrollo

Machi - Machi-neesan, Neesan, Machi

Feitan - FeiFei, Fei-Oniisan, Fei, Feitan

Pakunoda - Paku-Neesan, Pakunoda

Uvogin - Uvo-Oniisan, Uvo, Uvogin

Shalnark - Shal-Oniisan, Mr Bat, Shalnark

Shizuku - Shiz-neesan, Ms Blinky, Shizuku

Phinks - Phi-Oniisan, Pharaoh, Phinky, Phinks

Nobunaga - Nobu-Oniisan, Nobubaka, Nobunaga

Franklin - Fran-Oniisan, Franklin

Bonolenov - Bono-Oniisan, Mr Mummy, Mr holes, Bonolenov

Kortopi - Kort-Oniisan, Kortopi

Kalluto - Kal-Oniisan, Kallu, Paper Prince, Kalluto

What the characters call Y/n (from most to least used/never used) (thanks for suggestions <3 you can suggest more if you want)

Gon - Lil sis, honey, flower, Bee, Y/n-Chan, Y/n

Killua - Brat, Baka, Y/n

Kurapika - Sunshine (so many people asked for this nickname),Butterfly, Angel, Y/n, Tiny, Bubble, Bumble Bee, Ball of sugar, Little red, Bubble gum, Cub,

Leorio - Munchkin, lil bug, Kid, chibi, Kiddo, Little one, Oreo, Little devil, Shortie, Bubbles, Little assistant, Y/n

Hisoka - My sweet little fox, Y/n, Little Fox, My Fox, Cotton Candy, My little bungee gum, My foxy unripe fruit

Illumi - Y/n

Netero - Flower, little flower, Y/n

Mr Oinks - can't talk

Foxy - Can't talk (other than mentally)

Chrollo - Princess, clown child, Angel, little spider, Y/n

Machi - Little Spider, mini hisoka, kid, It, Thing, Y/n

Feitan - Shorty,Little Spider, brat, little devil, devil child, Y/n

Pakunoda - Darling, Little Spider, Y/n, Dear

Uvogin - Kid, mini danger, Little Monster, Little Spider, Y/n

Shalnark - Shorty, player 2, Little Spider, Y/n

Shizuku - Hisoka jr, little helper, Little Spider, Blinky 2, Y/n

Phinks - little girl, bunny, Little Spider, Y/n

Nobunaga - little devil, Tiny Hisoka, Little Spider, Y/n

Franklin - Little Spider, Y/n

Bonolenov - Little Spider, Y/n

Kortopi - Little Spider, Y/n

Kalluto - Friend, Y/n

~~~~~~~

Learning About Y/n

1. She was created as a 12 year old first, til I decided to age her down into a child since I wanted to create a child reader book and her personality was perfect for it

2. Foxy was previously a polar bear

3. Y/n's nen was gonna be an enhancer, but I changed it for plot reasons (hehe)

4. She was gonna appear in a different one of my HXH books (Sweet Bunny) instead of Teki

5. She doesn't actually have a real name lol, I just call her Little Fox or Lil Sis

6. For people who are curious, Y/n is bisexual- (this is a joke BTW she isn't old enough to date and plus all of her lovers would be ded)

7. Her previous backstory was that Hisoka had killed her family and took her because of her nen, but this changed and I'm not gonna reveal the story behind Y/n...yet.

8. Y/n is actually planned to adopted 2-3 more animals in her journey, but has a possibility of changing (hint- one of these animals have been mentioned above)

9. This is already known, but the story was gonna end on the chapter 'Bai Bai!' and plus a chapter that goes into the future when Y/n is older.

10. Y/n was Kalluto's first friend :3

Headpat section! (Author-Chan/Skypie is on break! Y/n is taking over!)

Y/n was standing on stage with a microphone in hand, Mr Oinks and Foxy were with her on stage as she held flash cards.

"Hewo everyone!" Y/n smiled at the audience. "I'm here as Sky-Neesan is on her break! She hopes you like the book. And that she can provide you with a chapter once a week and she is sowwy if she can't do that." Y/n was saying, without looking at the flashcards that she was handed, so what she is saying could be true or not.

"Mr Oinks and Foxy and Me wanna say that you need a headpat, give everyone a headpat. The first person you see after this, give dem a headpat! Bai Bai!"

Y/n was about to leave stage when a paper plane hit her head, Y/n picked it up and read it.

"Oh, well Skypie is going to bed, We might as well start with a small mini spoiler for season 2 of Onii-chan!"

Sneak peak 1

Y/n hummed to herself as she skipped over to the mini arena that was on the bottom floor of Heaven's Arena. She stood in the middle with some other child, who was trying to reach the top, He had black hair, and his hair was covering one of his eyes that were bright vibrate Green, in the back it seemed to be a few people were cheering on him, teenagers, guessing they forced the Child to do this.

The kid stood ready, shaking slightly from fear, but he still seemed confident in beating her, he came close to the female. As he tried to kick the small 5 year old down, She stepped out the way and instantly was behind the kid, she used her finger and flicked the back of his head.

"Flick!" She said softly to the male as he was flicked across the room and into the wall, making a dent into it. The audience of participants either pitied the boy or stared shocked at the female, who was thinking to herself. 'I didn't even use my nen that much...aww man I wanted to show off to Hiso-chan and get headpats...'

"Oh Y/n, you were here before, last year correct?" The small girl looked at the referee and nodded her head slightly, she went here with Illumi and Hisoka before.

"You should head up to the 200th floor, good luck kid."

"Thank you Mr Referee!"

~~~~

Y/n ended the clip and smiled at the audience. "Hope you liked it! Skypie is waking up now! Hope you will enjoy season 2, and remember to give everyone headpats...ALSO Bombfetti has the properties of Bombs and Confetti! Bai Bai!" Y/n ran off stage with Foxy and Mr Oinks following her.

(Skypie has returned from her sleep and will continue writing)

Scenarios

Y/n sat in her room, she had been going on her own mini adventure for a few days.

She managed to get a treasure chest from finding it in an abandoned cave on the beach. She started to head out when She was starting to be pulled away.

She tried to stop it, using Gyo she noticed the familar Pink aura that was attached to her back

"Hello Y/n~" A familiar voice made Y/n look up and smile

"Hai Onii-Chan!"

---

Y/n was standing with Hisoka, Gon and Killua as they were all outside.

It started to rain. Y/n-Chan shivered and tried using her hand as an umbrella, since Fox didn't like getting wet and would be mad at her for the next week

As she tried to stop the rain with her Hand, Gon picked her up and used his Jacket to cover their heads so they wouldn't get wet

"Thank you OniiChan!" She smiles at Gon

"Oi! What about me Gon!" Killua yelled at him

~~~~

Sneak peak to season 2

Y/n was watching Hisoka's fight, as she was cheering on him, she soon found herself bored at the scene.

She decided to go and grab some food so she got out of the stadium quickly, with Mr Oinks following her, and Foxy in her arms, she made it out into the hallway.

She went to the elevator and reached the bottom floor, grabbing a box of Chocolate robots.

She hummed as she noticed on the TV the match was playing and watched it from there.

As Hisoka's match ended, she ran to go and see him

"Hiso-Oniisan! You were cool!" Y/n cheered on her older brother as he patted her head as a thank you.

"Let's go back to your room~ I have now 7 wins and 1 lose~"

"I'm in the lead Hiso-Oniisan! I have 9 wins and 0 loses! Hehe!" She stuck her tongue out at him, giggling.

"Well Y/n~ How about we have a friendly sparing and see who wins~"

Hope you enjoyed! Hope you will Enjoy the next chapter (AKA chapter 16)

#HXH #Anime #hunter x hunter x reader #hxh x reader #Hunter x Hunter x child reader #Onii-Chan

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tackyink · 4 years ago

Text

Still holding onto the hope of running out of steam soon so I can work on other fics. In any case, this has a title now. It’s Degrees of Separation.

I hate this chapter solely because in my mind it was supposed to be one, then it got long and turned into two awkward chapters, and by splitting them I was left with this thing in which nothing happens. Why would you want to read this? I don’t know. I don’t know if I want to read it, even though I did. Repeatedly. To edit out all the typos I’m sure I’ve left in. I’m going to put a Golden Sun stream on the background, play Animal Crossing and drown my frustration in Coca Cola. It’s been a long week.

One last detour before Sabaody. Alex is bored, the Heart Pirates reenter the scene, and Law has an “if it isn’t the consequences of my own actions” moment.

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

— — — — — — — —

Chapter 3

There was a storm.

Alex didn’t know if it was related to the Aqua Laguna that the ship had set out to avoid or it was simply one of the Grand Line’s meteorological whims, but two days after departure, the noon sky went so dark it was like a moonless night had come down early, the winds picked up, and the waves started to beat against the ship’s hull in an uneven rhythm.

The crew was all over the place, trying to steer the ship and reef the sails as they ushered the passengers inside to keep them from falling overboard. Alex had been caught in bad weather travelling before, but never to this extent. She had a hard time thinking of anything scarier than being at the mercy of a windy sea. Nowhere to run, nothing to do except wait and pray that the waters would take pity on you and let you live another day. Alex wasn’t the praying sort, so while she waited below deck with a group of people as scared as she was, if not more, she couldn’t even do that.

The nervous chatter of the passengers and the parents’ attempts to console their children were muffled by the deafening sounds of the wind, the waves, the creaking wood, and the crew’s rushed footsteps on the deck.

Alex stood the entire time in front of a porthole in the dining hall where they had gathered. It helped with the seasickness from the violent rocking of ship, it was better than to look at the other people, and, ironically, storms were her favorite kind of weather. She wondered what would be worse if they sunk, getting caught on deck and risking being swallowed by the ocean, or waiting for the insides of the ship to become a water tomb. For a long time, or at least it seemed like it, that was the main thought that repeated in her mind, until the possibility of dying felt so remote that she wasn’t even registering. Like when you picked a word and turned it around in your mouth and mind so many times that it lost all meaning. Of course she couldn’t die there. She had never done so before, so why start now?

It was absurd, but it helped. And it turned out to be right, too.

After a while, the storm subsided, and an hour later, the crew let them out on deck again. The ship wasn’t intact, but they hadn’t lost anybody, and that was as much as one could ask for when dealing with an angry sea.

In the end, there was only one major inconvenience: due to the damage, the ship had to change its course in order to dock somewhere safe to undergo repairs.

❦

Her hair had gotten longer to the point of annoyance. The tips brushed her shoulders already; long enough to get in her face whenever it wanted, but too short to tie it in a decent ponytail. Sure, she could have done it anyway, but she was vain and would have rather dealt with the hassle than solve the problem in an aesthetically suboptimal way.

The sunspots on the left side of her face were getting more noticeable, as were the dark circles under her eyes and the shy wrinkles that were attempting to come out. For someone who could spend so much time picking her appearance apart in front of a mirror, she didn’t look particularly healthy or well put together. She supposed that was part of the appeal, in a masochistic way: to find as many faults as she could, and invent some if needed.

Applying concealer under her eyes and red lipstick just for the sake of having some color on her face, she thought she needed to find herself a headband and a healthier pastime posthaste. Porta Bella was a quaint town, but there wasn’t much in the way of entertainment, and she’d had only her thoughts for company for too long.

She had been stuck there for two weeks. After narrowly avoiding disaster, the ship had been moored in the harbor for several days, and by the time it was fit enough to sail, the captain decided to go back to Water 7 to have proper repairs done. The passengers had been given the choice to remain in Porta Bella and find another ship, or to return to Water 7 with the crew. Going back wasn’t an option for Alex when Sabaody was so close that it felt like she could have seen it if she climbed on a tall tree, she didn’t trust a half-baked repair job to keep her safe, and, most importantly, someone had tried to kill Iceburg and Enies Lobby had kind of blown up in the following days of her departure from Water 7.

She didn’t want to think that the tracksuit shipwright had something to do with it, but the conspiracy theorist in her told her that it was totally his fault. That nose? Could totally be used as a murder weapon and nobody would be none the wiser.

The few passengers aside from Alex who had decided to stay in Porta Bella were already gone, leaving the inn she was staying at delightfully empty, but also making her wonder if she had messed up by not taking the first random ship that would let her sail away from there.

The island was small, so much so that Porta Bella was the only town in it, and much of it was empty. For many years there had been a migratory tendency pushing young people from nearby islands to the Sabaody Archipelago, and this one seemed to have fallen victim to it, too. The moderately long recording time of the Log Pose didn’t play in its favor, either. Five days and a half was a long time to wait when the Red Line was only a couple of days away, so not many ships stopped there. An abandoned watchtower in the outskirts of town was the only other notable location.

She left her inn room that morning, picking up a tea to go, and hoping that a good slap of early morning breeze in the face would wake her up.

Every day since she arrived, she went to the port to look for any newly arrived ships and talk to the sailors. Every time, if there was a new one at all, she was told that there were reports of increased slaver activity in those waters, and that they were headed anywhere but the Sabaody Archipelago until Marine HQ got its shit together and stopped the kidnapping crews sailing rampant. Given that the Marines must have been scrambling to recover from the loss of Enies Lobby, nobody thought they were going to get on the case anytime soon.

These series of unfortunate coincidences didn’t surprise her. Her life was often comprised of really small strokes of bad luck that were nothing more than inconvenience on their own, but that added up to really grate on her nerves. This was business as usual, so she just had to keep trying. The temporary finish line was only a stone’s throw away.

Not that human trafficking stopped at any point of the year, but she hadn’t taken into account the seasonal opening of the archipelago’s biggest auction. Thinking that not even the schedule of the Human Auctioning House had changed during her time away gave her a twisted sense of familiarity. That son of a bitch kept finding novel ways to fuck her over without even being aware of her existence. It had to be a gift, for sure.

As she walked to the half empty docks, she hoped that that was the day she lucked out. She had already decided that, if she couldn’t find a direct ship to Sabaody in the following three days, she’d take the roundabout way and sail to a bigger island with, hopefully, a wider variety of ships. She would go completely broke in the process (and there she found the thing that was as terrifying as being caught in a storm at open sea), but one had to crack eggs to make an omelette.

Ten minutes and an empty cup of tea into her stroll, she stopped in front the single newly arrived ship and thought that maybe she hadn’t lucked out, but that sure as hell life was full of weird coincidences. Because there were few submarines sailing the Grand Line, even fewer painted yellow, and she guessed that only one with that particular Jolly Roger plastered on it. Her wish of seeing it up close had been granted when she least expected it, and it didn’t disappoint. It had a curious design, half ship and half submarine. A shipmarine.

Feeling revitalized by the pun, she craned her neck and got on her tiptoes to accomplish nothing at all. She couldn’t see any of the pirates on the deck, at least from where she was standing, and what else was she supposed to do, walk closer to find a friendly face and say hi like a functioning human being would? Yeah, no. She simply stood there and stared like a creep.

The paint job of the thing was hypnotic, and she didn’t mean it as a compliment. It looked like the idea of a man who thought the peak of design was making his vehicle look like a wasp with a decal of the word ‘DEATH’ instead of stripes to look extra edgy. And okay, they were pirates, pirates killed people, it was something that came with the job – but plastering it over the ship like that was a little heavy handed, and she didn’t have any doubts as to which guy with matching tattoos had come up with those brilliant design choices. Come to think of it, wasn’t there a song about a yellow submarine? The one from those singers her mom liked when she was young… Maybe the captain was a fan, too. Maybe they sung it on board. She laughed at the thought.

It didn’t leave her indifferent, that was for sure, and that could count as a compliment, since she had seen a ton of ships throughout her life. Props to Trafalgar Law for standing out among the crowd.

If the pirates weren’t around at the moment, it had to mean they were inside of the ship or already out in town. It was early still, but she was sure it was a matter of time until she ran into them – the town was pretty small, around a hundred, counting sailors, on a good day, news travelled fast, and these guys didn’t dress unassumingly.

With that in mind, she kept an eye out for familiar faces and resumed her unfruitful rounds around the port. Another day, another set of rejections. She tossed her paper cup in a trash can and made her way to the coffee shop where she always had the second tea of the day, sometimes even the third, if she was feeling particularly down about her current predicament.

She placed her order at the counter and waited for it. The owner, a balding middle aged man whose name she didn’t know but who had started to get chatty after she showed up a few days in a row, tried to strike up a conversation while he heated the water. “Did you hear? A pirate crew arrived in town last night.”

Alex wasn’t much for conversation in the mornings, and usually her replies to his attempts were rather apathetic, but the owner had struck gold with this particular topic. “I just saw the ship,” she repeated. “Have they done anything?”

“Not yet,” he replied with the clear implication that they soon would. “But it’s a Supernova’s crew, from what I’ve heard. Their captain’s a scary guy – how do they call him…?”

She had mixed feelings about that. She’d seen scary first hand, and in her experience it came in the shape of kidnapping crews, bubble helmets, or suits and fedoras. And ultimately, it was the fedoras’ fault she was in that coffee shop in the first place.

“Surgeon of Death,” she replied. There was no doubt that with that price on his head he was a walking danger, but after their first encounter, she had a feeling he was more the selective type than the let’s wreck everything in our path kind of guy. Not that his list of attributed crimes would lead anybody to think that. “Do you have trouble with pirates often? Being close to Sabaody and all.”

“Sometimes, but they usually go to more interesting places. It used to be as easy as calling the garrison to get rid of ‘em, but with Marineford so close it’s no wonder no one wants to be here any longer.”

“There used to be Marines here?”

“Yes, at the watchtower in the outskirts, but they left after some of the rooftop caved in. Building’s condemned now. A pity, ‘cause the watchtower’s been there forever, and they’ve let it fall apart.”

“That’s a shame,” she said. “How old’s the tower?”

The water started boiling then, and he turned around to remove it from the fire and make her drink. “Tale goes that it’s old as the stone entrance, but who knows,” he said with his back turned to her. “It’s not like we have any experts to come check.” He slid her the drink over the counter. “In case, try to avoid those guys. A woman traveling alone is an easy target for criminals.”

“Yes, I know,” she replied, putting a few belis in the counter and taking the cup by the handle. “Thanks.”

She chose to sit on the terrace, next to the railing that separated it from the sidewalk, to have a good view of the street. She was in a sort of commercial district, if a main street with a dozen of shops could be called that. Most people who stopped at the island had to pass by sooner or later, so it was the busiest place in town. Not so early, though. It wasn’t opening hours yet.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched like a hawk the man who was monopolizing the only issue of the World Economic Journal and snatched it as soon as he got up to leave, so fast that it turned the heads of the other two people on the terrace.

News of the assault of Enies Lobby had been filling pages for a week already, and that day wasn’t an exception. The Straw Hat Pirates had done the unthinkable, and while in other circumstances Alex might have been watching the situation with amusement from afar, she was also pretty annoyed at them, because their stunt no doubt played into the poor supervision in the waters near Sabaody. On the other hand, she hoped that this also meant that neither Marines nor Cipher Pol would be very invested in finding her in the near future if she ended up a suspect.

She was also a little worried about Iceburg’s condition, but the newspapers hadn’t reported his death, so she had to assume he had recovered from the attempt on his life.

She skimmed over the usual columns prattling about the lack of security at sea and how worrying it was that a whole new generation of rookies with astronomical bounties were about to set foot in the Sabaody Archipelago at the same time. She didn’t think having a handful extra menaces sailing around mattered anymore, considering the state of the world at large, but the pearl-clutching sold newspapers, and she wondered about her sense of self-preservation when she realized with disappointment that, at the rate she was moving, she was going to miss the Supernova meetup in Sabaody. Her curiosity was going to bite her in the ass one day, she thought, before remembering that it already had, and that was the exact reason she was in her current position.

She skim read a few pages looking for interesting headlines, getting to the less important news that didn’t warrant spreads, editorials and pictures that took up half the page, and paled when she read the contents of an unassuming text box.

An unfortunate accident in the island of Harlun had blown up the local library while it was undergoing renovations. Nobody had been hurt, said the write-up, but the building had been destroyed in the ensuing fire and an investigation was still ongoing to determine what had happened. At least she guessed that the last part of the article said so, because she choked on her tea as she read it and spit some of it on the paper, making the ink run.

It couldn’t be a coincidence. Well, it technically could be, but no way she was buying that. The real question was if they’d be able to link the Poneglyph to her, and considering she that she was the person who spent the most time in the archive and she had conveniently left right before construction work took place, she had a pretty good chance to win that lottery. Oh, God, what if her coworkers mentioned that she used to go to the archive on Sundays, alone?

Her first impulse was to bang her head on the table and hide it between her arms, but the surface was sticky, so she ended up regretting it immediately. Instead, she put her elbows on the table, and covered her face with her hands. Her heart was beating loudly and her mind was running wild thinking of possible courses of action. She was on a timer. Getting to Sabaody as soon as possible was a necessity now. If there was a place she could hide, ironically, it was there.

“I see life’s treating you well.”

Alex’s heart tried to leap out of her mouth when she heard someone talk to her from so up close, but one of the perks of being born with a stick up her ass was that she only tensed up when she was startled, so she saved herself the embarrassment of yelping or jumping on her chair. She removed the hands from her face to look at the person, and the sight of a spotted furry hat and a yellow and black hoodie punched her in the eyes.

“Oh, hello,” she said, feeling more relaxed when she realized it was the Surgeon of Death leaning against the balustrade, not law enforcement. Her life had taken a turn for the surreal in a very short time, had it not?

His smirk faltered. “You aren’t surprised?”

“Saw your ship,” she said with some difficulty, and she drank some tea to swallowed the knot that had formed in her throat. Of all the times for him to appear... “Town’s small, we had to run into each other.”

“Hm.”

If she exerted a bit of imagination, she’d say he looked a bit disappointed. Why would he? No idea, but it was funny to think he was, and she was in dire need of funny.

He asked, “What are you doing here? This is far from your island.”

Farther than he knew, she almost said, but that was a can of worms and not relevant in the situation at hand. Feeling too overwhelmed to give long explanations, she handed him the newspaper open by the page she’d been reading. Talking could happen once she arranged her own thoughts, and only then.

“That’s…” He took it from her hands and read for a few seconds. An inscrutable expression gradually morphed into a look of pure indignation. “What’s the meaning of this?”

She was taken aback by the unexpected display of emotion. It was odd to see him react so strongly to something that didn’t concern him. “It isn’t that surprising, considering—”

“How is it not?” He retorted, annoyed. “Sora can’t lose against these weaklings!”

She stared at him in confusion. “What?” she blurted out, realizing afterwards that he was talking about the comic strip at the bottom of the page. And to be fair, she was going to tell him to look further up when the meaning of his words sunk in, but then she was the one leaning over the railing to look at the paper he was holding. “Wait, really? That’s impossible!”

“That’s what I’m saying!”

Upon reading the message under the strip, she complained, “On break until next month?” She sat back on the chair, mumbling, “I don’t even know if I’ll be alive next month,” before taking a sip of tea.

“Summer vacation cliffhanger,” he replied. “And you still haven’t told me what you’re doing here.”

“Read the news above.”

He looked at the paper again, and his eyes widened the smallest fraction as recognition dawned. That reaction was more appropriate. “Do you think it was…?”

“I’m sure of it. It’s too much of a coincidence.”

“Are you wanted now?”

“I don’t know. They have reason to suspect I knew it was there.” And she added with a bit of humor that she wasn’t really feeling, “If I get a bounty, I’ll say it was your fault.”

“I don’t think that’s going to do you any service.” A smirk returned to grace his features as he passed her the newspaper back. He was clearly amused by her misfortune, and that was the only good thing that had come out of it. “What do you plan to do?”

Alex let out a long exhale through her nose. She wanted to say that there was no plan, but there always was. Planning was something she did obsessively. “I need to get to Sabaody as soon as possible.” It was the only option. She could have elaborated, but again, she didn’t feel like it. Too early, too stunned to talk about serious stuff. Reality hadn’t fully sunk in. “You’re on Sora’s side? Really?”

He frowned at her. He did a lot of frowning, she thought. He was going to get wrinkles young. “Of course I am.”

“But he’s a Marine,” she said, a smile growing on her face despite herself. “Aren’t you one of the bad guys?”

“The Germa are vile,” he retorted, and perhaps realizing he was getting too much into the conversation, he went back to the other, much less fun topic. “Sabaody’s going to be full of Marines in no time, though.”

She was internally screaming, but it came out as a drawn out sigh. “Thanks to you, no doubt.”

“The merit isn’t all mine.”

“I know. You lot have been all over the news for weeks.” He looked awfully self-satisfied when she said that. “I guess you’ll be heading straight there after this place?”

“That’s the plan if there aren’t any stops in between. By the way, do you know how long until the Log Pose sets?”

“Five days, ten hours and twenty-six minutes,” she said blandly, repeating the number she had been told by several people when she first arrived to Porta Bella. It made her miserable, so of course she wasn’t going to forget it anytime soon.

“And the seconds?”

It took her way longer than necessary to realize he was messing with her. “Oh, fuck off.” She returned her attention to the newspaper so she didn’t have to look at his stupid face while he thought he was so funny. “Fishman Island’s right around the corner. Try not to drown.”

“We have a submarine.” He sounded amused still. Alex couldn’t tell if annoying her gave him that much joy or if he was having an exceptionally good day. He was pretty cranky for a while back in Duster Town, but now that she recalled, his mood seemed to improve every time he got one over her. “I don’t think it’ll be a problem.”

“Regular submarines can’t reach Fishman Island.”

He frowned again. “Why not?”

“It’s too deep. They can’t endure the water pressure.”

She could sense the levity from moments ago was gone by the way his jaw set. “But we heard ships can traverse the Red Line through an underwater route.”

“That’s why you go to Sabaody first.” She was exerting a considerable effort to give these really boring explanations that no one was going to thank her for. “You find yourself a good coating engineer to put a resin bubble around your ship and that’ll protect it.”

He seemed to study this new information from several angles before he spoke. “That’s good to know.”

“You’re welcome.”

He gave her a pointed look, but didn’t say anything about the jab. “Is it easy to find one?”

“There’s an entire section of the archipelago dedicated to it. It’s going to cost you, though. And depending on who you choose, there’ll be a waiting list.”

“Really?”

“Good coating engineers are few and far in between, and nobody wants to find out someone did a half-assed job on their sheep five kilometers underwater.”

“That’s…” He made a meditative pause. “…Reasonable.”

“I thought you were going to say something completely different.”

“It sucks too.”

“Yeah,” she agreed. Her life would be so much easier if one didn’t have to jump through thirty hoops to cross that chunk of rock. “In a hurry to get to the New World?”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to, either, because she was busy contemplating a new idea that had sprung in her mind. One that she’d rather avoid if she had other options left, and she wouldn’t know until a few days passed, but... this coincidence could prove to be useful yet.

“What?” He looked at her with suspicion.

“Nothing.” And just to get on his nerves a little, she added. “Yet.”

He fixed his gaze on her face, most likely gauging her intentions. Alex was incapable of looking at people in the eye, but she was good at faking it and not flinching under pressure, so she stared back.

“Do I want to ask?”

“I don’t know. Follow your instincts.”

To her surprise, he dropped it and took a step back from the railing. “I need to go back to the sub and see if the others are up already.”

Good. “For someone with a target so big on you, you wander a lot without them.”

“I like taking walks alone,” he said, like he didn’t think much of it. Like he could not fathom how he of all people could possibly be in danger from anybody else. “See you around?”

Was that a wish, a threat, or a pleasantry? “Without a doubt,” she replied, not bothering to hide the tedium in her voice. Damn empty town and damn slavers. “This town isn’t big enough for the two of us.”

She could have sworn he smiled a little at that, but Law shoved his hands in his pockets and made his leave too fast to see.

He was far enough that he wouldn’t hear her if she spoke in a normal volume when she remembered something important, so she resorted to raising her voice before the Heart crew did something they could regret. “Go to the Old Brewery if you don’t want to die! The Silver Fountain serves piss for drinks!”

He turned to look at her with the same curiosity back when she’d told him weapons weren’t allowed in the library, but this time he nodded in acknowledgement before making his exit.

The other customers on the terrace stared at her warily, but honestly, she couldn’t bring herself to feel bad for them even when the owner immediately came out to ask if she was okay and if the scary surgeon had said anything bad to her. At least something interesting was happening.

❦

Alex had a love-hate relationship with heights.

She inevitably got queasy when she was somewhere high up that didn’t have barriers or anything she could hold onto, but that didn’t stop her from going up there, anyway. It was like a very stupid magnetic pull that one day would end with her skull split open.

(It was the wind and the view. She knew that. It was also one of the few options she had to feel taller than most people.

But mostly the wind.)

The stone arch at the entrance of the town that gave Porta Bella its name was surrounded by the remains of a stone wall. First century, she guessed by the roughness of the stone blocks and the bit of mortar she scraped from between when she inspected it for the first time. It was easily over two meters, and only because the topmost part had fallen off. The blocks that hadn’t been taken away for use in newer constructions were still next to the wall, inviting anyone who’d dare to step on them to use them to climb.

She knew she wasn’t the only idiot who had felt the temptation, because the stone was worn from use. She’d also seen kids running at the top of the wall and no one had tried to stop them, and there were worse ways to channel all the nervous energy she had from reading that newspaper article.

She wasn’t a very proficient climber, but the blocks were positioned in such a way that getting to the top was easy as pie. No doubts someone had moved them for that exact purpose. When she was high enough, she threw a leg over the wall, then the other one, and sat facing the harbor.

The wind was nice up there.

She wouldn’t stand on the wall for all the money in the world and getting down was going to be an ordeal, but that was a problem for the Alex of the future.

That day had woken up to four ships in the harbor, counting the pirates’ submarine. Two would go away at the end of the week. The third was leaving that night. No vessels on the horizon.

She sighed. If the pirates were on an adventure, they sure had the shittiest of lucks docking only in the most boring islands the sea could offer.

With nothing better to do at the moment, and trying to delay as much as possible the moment she’d regret climbing that high, she moved towards the shadow of the arch without lifting her butt from the stone and rested her back against it.

She was at a loss. Sailing further away from the Sabaody Archipelago was counterproductive, but so was staying in the same island for too long, since she had no means of protecting herself if something happened. Then again, if she ended up broke before she got to Sabaody, she’d have to stay in whatever island she was to earn money to keep travelling.

All the options sucked. Maybe she needed to sleep on it to see what the lesser evil was. She had, after all, a few days to make a decision.

She looked at the sea, tinted dark green by her sunglasses, in what she assumed was Sabaody’s direction. So close, yet so far away. The skies were clear and the water calm, and though there weren’t any sailors to be found in the harbor, she could see the shadow of a couple of fishing boats in the distance. Wasn’t there a song that went like that? I'm sittin' on the dock of the bay, wastin' time…

She hummed, looking at nowhere in particular and letting her thoughts drift with the waves.

❦

She knew better than to cut through the lawless areas alone when it was getting late, so she had no one else to fault when she split from her group of classmates after spending their free day in Sabaody Park. It was only her and her stupid pride that didn’t allow her to admit that she didn’t think this was a great idea and that she didn’t want to go back to her room alone.

She broke into a sprint as soon as she heard the smallest rustle behind her, and that advantage proved to be essential, because someone started chasing after her. It sounded like more than one person, but she didn’t have time to look or tell how many sets of footsteps were behind her – she just ran like her life depended on it in the direction of the bridge that connected to the next grove, hoping that there would be other people there, and then—

—then she saw an open bar, a lone building in an even lonelier grove.

She rushed inside it, gasping for air so hard that she couldn’t speak, no matter how much she tried to explain to the bartender why she had barged in like that.

It wasn’t necessary.

“Don’t worry, dear, they’ve been hanging around these parts for a while,” she said, leading her to a chair with a gentle hair. “You’re safe here.” Her warm black eyes turned to someone else, and though Alex had trouble focusing on what was going on, she saw an old man with long white hair. “Why don’t you go take out the trash, Ray? They’ve driven off my clientele enough.”

“Sure,” the man replied, getting up from his stool and going outside.

Alex thought it was a horrible idea to send an old man to fight off a kidnapping crew, but that was because she didn’t know these people yet.

“Don’t worry about him. Here,” the woman gave her a glass of water. “Name’s Shakky. Rest all you need.”

❦

Footsteps approached. She shut up immediately.

“I like that song.”

Singing helped when she had too much anxious energy. It was probably related to breathing control. She had stopped anxiety attacks in the making like that sometimes.

It didn’t help at all when someone had been listening in and she hadn’t noticed.

“Oh. Thanks. Um, hi.”

“Hi,” Bepo said smiling. “I heard from Captain you were here.”

Even though she was sitting on top of the wall, Bepo’s head went past it. If he stood on his tiptoes, he could have rested his head on her legs. On one hand, it was a little aggravating that she had to climb so high up only to be marginally taller than him. On the other, Alex was filled with the urge to scratch his ears.

“Yeah, I’m stuck waiting for a ship,” she told him. “Ideally, you wouldn’t have found me here.”

“Oh? Where are you going?”

“Sabaody.”

“Isn’t that very close? How come you haven’t found a ship?”

“There’s kidnapping crews infesting the waters. You know what those are?”

“Uh… isn’t it in the name?”

Alex blinked. “Right. Don’t mind me.”

He fell into thought for a few seconds. “Why are they kidnapping people?”

“To sell. They get auctioned in the archipelago.”

Bepo frowned. “I see.”

“Hey, don’t worry,” she said, smiling for his sake. “Nothing’s going to happen to your crew. You’re strong.”

He beamed with pride. “Yeah, we are! We’ve been training for years to come here!”

Alex mirrored his expression without thinking. “Your Captain said you’ve been friends since you were kids. Did you—”

“Bepo!” Someone called out. “What are you doing?”

“Ah, sorry!” Bepo said, turning around to see the newcomer. “I was catching up…”

A woman with curly hair and a severe expression walked up to them, hands on her hips, and she looked a little confused when she laid eyes on Alex. She was struggling to place her. “Have we seen each other…?”

“On passing. I’m the Duster Town dumbass that opened the library for your Captain.”

“Oh, yeah, now that you mention it—” The confusion was back. “Isn’t this place a little too far from there?”

“I’m running away from justice.” She didn’t offer further explanation.

Bepo didn’t need it. “So are we!”

A barely contained laugh made it past the woman’s lips. “Oh well, if you’re a fellow criminal…” She extended a hand towards Alex. “Name’s Ikkaku. What did you do, keep too many books past the return date?”

“I wish.” She shook her hand. “Alex.”

“So that’s your name?” Bepo asked.

She turned her attention towards the bear. “I never told you?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Wow, I am rude,” she said to herself. “Anyway, hope you’re ready to take it easy, because you have five long days ahead of you.”

Ikkaku groaned. “I don’t mind, but some of the guys get so jittery after a couple days on land. I don’t suppose there’s a very active nightlife in this place?”

“Actually, there are two taverns in the entire town.”

“Oh, that sounds like something to keep ‘em busy.”

“I don’t think you want to go to one of them, though.” She wondered if the captain was going to pass the message or they would come to regret their choices. “There’s also an abandoned Marine outpost right outside of town, if they don’t want to be drunk 24/7.”

“Might be worth checking out, but I’m pretty sure they’ll take the ale.”

“Can’t blame them.” She was tempted to drown her sorrows in alcohol, and she barely ever drank.

She took a look around the desolate harbor, the small houses and the half-fallen wall with a disappointed look. “Well…” she began, “Bepo, we need you for the crates. He’s been waiting and he’s cranky enough already after—”

“Ah! Sorry!” He said, bowing at her and looking more upset than the comment would suggest. Maybe they didn’t treat him as well in the sub as she had assumed. When he turned to Alex, he also bowed repeatedly. “I’m really sorry, but I need to go!”

“Sure, no problem!” she said, making an effort to sound lively. She felt so fake when she did that. So customer servicey. “See you!”

As the pirates left, she tried to look at them in a different light. While it wasn’t too difficult to believe they would be mistreating the mink of the crew, even if they hadn’t been unkind while she was watching. He seemed shy. Maybe that was all there was to it? But the reaction seemed a little extreme. She would pay closer attention from then on.

❦

Her privileged observation point let Alex see a lot of things that day. She saw more of the crew coming and going, though they didn’t seem to recognize her, she watched one of the docked ships depart, and she met a cat that tried to get food from her, but after a good back scratch realized she didn’t have anything else to offer and walked away, leaving a lonesome Alex staring at the hand she’d used to pet it, wondering how many parasites it had come in contact with.

She immediately went back to the inn to wash her hands and get dinner.

The rest of the evening was spent looking at her Poneglyph folder and her mostly blank notebook. She had carried with her the transcript of the stone and copied some documentation from the library that could prove useful in deciphering it, but she wasn’t making any headway yet. Very little was known about the ancient language, even less was published, and she wasn’t a cryptographer. So far, she had identified what she thought were punctuation signs separating sentences and one of the names in the text.

In her years working in Harlun, she had seen centuries old coins from a currency before belis, and some of them had the legend around the rim written in different languages. Meaning, she knew how to write the name of the island in that ancient language. That was about it. She had a feeling the script wasn’t pure phonetic, either, and that wasn’t something she could attempt to tackle without cross-referencing.

Porta Bella was a nice place to spend a short vacation, sure, but it was impossible to find any books that might help. She had tried. The local bookstore only carried best sellers, and she would have bought that vampire novel that was getting so popular if money wasn’t so tight and she had space in her bag, but as things were, she had to fight frustration and boredom alone.

She had to face the fact that she wasn’t going to do anything useful that night, either. She took off her reading glasses, thinking that trying to sleep sounded like the best idea. Maybe next morning she’d finally have some good luck and find a ship that wouldn’t carry her too far from the Red Line.

❦

Too early for words, and wearing a flannel shirt as a jacket because it had gotten windy, she strode out of the inn with her paper cup and a new challenge. She had thought herself immune to monotony before this, but she had clearly overestimated her brain’s capability to get distracted by anything.

Instead of walking to the docks following the main road, like every morning, she made for the wall again. Stepping on the fallen rock, she reached up with her left hand to the top of the wall and placed the paper cup as far as she could from her, and then she climbed up like the previous day. Well, she tried to, because for some reason early in the morning she didn’t have a lot of hand strength, and she felt a stabbing pain in one of her knees when she stretched her leg to reach the wall.

It took two tries and the fear of having lost her first morning tea, but she got where she wanted.

Cross-legged, she sat on the wall and took sips of her drink while inspecting the docks. No new ships in sight. That time there was someone walking on one of the submarine’s decks, but she couldn’t make out their face, and she didn’t know most of the crew anyway.

The wind had driven all the clouds away, and the dark shadow on the horizon reminded her of how close she had been to getting to the New World before she had to reconsider the entire strategy.

She was about to sigh, but she sensed someone near her vicinity even before she heard the crunch of gravel, so she kept it to herself and looked over her shoulder.

That silly hat was becoming a familiar sight. Trafalgar Law looked up at her from a reasonable distance, having just noticed her. Please don’t get any closer, please—

He changed course and went towards Alex, who didn’t bother to hide how little she appreciated the company less than an hour after waking up.

“Morning walk?” she asked, or grunted, depending on who you asked.

“Yeah,” he replied, annoyingly awake. “What are you doing there?”

“Wasting time.”

Someone with a little more tact, or at least who cared about having it, would have taken a hint and left, but this was not the case. “I want to hear more about Sabaody.”

Oh, she wasn’t nearly awake enough for this, but she made an effort to not be outright rude. “Okay,” she relented. “But you ask me questions, I don’t want to think.”

That was good enough for him, it seemed. With irritating ease, and without having to step on the fallen stone, he boosted himself up against the wall and climbed it in a matter of seconds.

Something caught his attention when he looked up, and he stood up on the stone like the concepts of acrophobia and losing one’s balance were but a faraway ping in his radar. Alex’s mood was souring by the second, granted, a likely thing to happen at that hour. It wasn’t personal.

“Is that…?”

She turned to look in the same direction he was.

“Yeah. Red Line.”

“I didn’t think it was so close.”

“It’s a few days away still. It’s just that big.” She thought of the times she’d been at the base. It was impossible to see the top from its bottom. And, considering what lay up there, perhaps it was for the better. “You saw it from the other side, I guess?” North Blue was adjacent to the New World. In a sense, both of them were from the same side of the Line. How weird to think that they had anything in common.

“Yeah. We entered the Grand Line through Reverse Mountain.”

Expected, but incomprehensible to her unless he had a death wish. “Ships sink there every day. What do you want so bad that you’d risk that?”

“Wasn’t I the one asking the questions?” he shot back.

She gave him a deadpan look, then looked at the cup between her hands. It wasn’t doing much to drive away the numbness of her fingers. How many people had gone out to sea since the Great Age of Piracy began and failed because they bit more than they could chew? And they weren’t the only ones dying. For every decent man that got a ship and called himself a captain, there were ten whose only interest was pillaging villages and getting rich. Was that massive chain reaction what Gold Roger had intended with its final speech? Had it been a final fuck you to world order, or was there something else behind it?

She had contradicting thoughts about it. Roger’s last words had unarguably made the world worse, but…

Well.

The guy had been a badass. Even she wasn’t immune to seeing that. With every new pirate crew that sailed to Reverse Mountain to test its fortune, he kept proving how much bigger than life he had been. Twenty years down the line, he had become as much of a legend as the tales of gods from islands in the sky. The kind of legacy a regular person only dreams of having.

He said, I will never die.

He had been more right than he knew.

She looked at Trafalgar with renewed curiosity. “Are you trying to become Pirate King too?”

He didn’t give a clear answer, despite how easy of a question it was. “What if I am?”

It wasn’t a no. A straight yes would get many pirates laughed out of town even in a place like the Grand Line. There wasn’t a lot of room for romantic ideas of piracy when civilians lived in fear of black flags showing up one day at the port and taking away everything they had.

“Just curious.” She wasn’t feeling articulate enough to explain where she was going to herself, much less him. “Nothing wrong with dreaming big.”

As soon as the words left her mouth, she felt like she had called herself out. Where was she going? After Sabaody, after crossing the Red Line, after getting to her hometown? Those were only checkpoints. But where was her purpose? Inside the bag she had in her room at the inn, or somewhere else?

An awkward silence stretched along with the horizon. For some reason, he decided not to press her for answers and sat down. A small mercy for Alex’s neck.

“After the Log Pose sets, it will point to Fishman Island. How do we get to Sabaody first?”

It was a relief to be able to give an answer she didn’t have to think about. “It should be visible when you’re close enough to the Red Line. It looks like a random cluster of trees popped up in the middle of the ocean.”

“That’s it? Is it safe to dock anywhere?”

“Mostly. The archipelago is made up of 80 groves. 60 to 69 house a Marine garrison, and that’s where the ferries to Marineford and Mary Geoise leave from, so you don’t want to be there. Other than that…” She had to strain to remember the range of numbers. “20 to 29 is the only lawless area open to sea, so you know Marines won’t go there, but since no one’s keeping watch, the competition might try to sabotage you. I don’t know, I never had to worry about that sort of thing.”

“I’m not afraid of other crews,” he said with that devil may care attitude that got pirates killed left and right. “We haven’t come this far without knowing how to defend our ship.”

She wasn’t going to argue his point. “I’m just saying what I know. You do you.” But she took note to keep her opinions to herself, lest he had the urge to express how full of himself he was again.

He looked at her like he was trying to figure out what sort of hidden meaning her noncommittal response held, but little did he know that behind the sleepy façade her prevailing thought was it’s too early for this shit.

“You said you spent some time in the archipelago.” It wasn’t worded like a question, but it was a way to probe for info. She supposed that she would have wanted to know the credentials of her sources, had she been in his position.

She hummed. “I lived there a few years.”

Taking a sip from the cup, she returned her attention towards the outline in the horizon. It had been a constant part of the scenery back then, always peeking out from behind the trees and buildings of the groves closest to the shore. A grim reminder, on one hand, of those who lived above the peasants, but at the same time, Sabaody had been… fun. There was always something happening. Moderately dangerous, but always entertaining. She had forgotten how that felt after the years of routine in Duster Town.

A question brought her out of her thoughts. “Are you from this area?”

“Oh, no,” she said, surprised that he had even entertained the idea. “No, I got a scholarship to study in one of the World Government’s academies. I’m from the other side of the Red Line.”

“From the New World?” He said with surprise, and mulled over this new piece of information until it fit satisfactorily in whatever picture of her he had constructed in his mind. “So that’s where the accent’s from.”

It was unexpected comment after unexpected comment. “Excuse me?” she replied in an incredulous tone. “You are the one with a heavy accent.”

Now it was him who got caught off guard. “That’s not true,” he retorted. He looked like he was trying to determine if she was pulling his leg.

“Yes it is,” she insisted. “Everybody has an accent. You and your crew have that typical northern one that sounds like you’re about to shank the person you’re saying hello to.”

For a moment, she thought he had offended him to the point of silence. Just for a moment, because he didn’t take long to counter with, “You sound like you’re trying to whisper through a megaphone.”

She snorted with laughter as soon as the words sunk in. It was true that she spoke in a low voice most of the time. “If that isn’t the best description of Dressrosan I’ve heard—”

She felt an immediate change in atmosphere, like an electric current shooting through the air, and shut up as a precaution.

Trafalgar has tensed up all of a sudden and was staring at her like she had grown a second head, like she was trying to set her on fire with a glare, or both. “What did you say?”

She found herself tensing up in return, even though she didn’t know what she had done. But when a dangerous guy scowled at you like that, survival instincts kicked in. Goodbye sleepiness, and welcome life danger. “Um… Dressrosan?” She eyed him warily. “My mother tongue?”

His eyes grew wider, but other than that, his expression didn’t change much. “You’re from Dressrosa?”

She suddenly understood. It wasn’t the first time she got odd reactions when she said where she was from, but it had been a while. “Oh, right.” She sighed. “You’ve heard of the whole Doflamingo thing.”

Or… maybe she was wrong. He seemed a little out of it, like he was looking past her at… who knew what was in his head.

After a few seconds without a reply, she deemed it safe to speak. “Did I say anything wrong?”

“…No. I was just surprised.” After that, he seemed to go back to normal, though his voice sounded a little strained. He was still tense. “It’s a long way there.”

Suspicious. Did he know someone from there? “It’s not so much the distance as having the Red Line in the way. Getting permission to cross it takes time.” And she figured that she had run out of it.

“How’s the country?” He asked in a way that tried to sound casual, and maybe, maybe would have worked if he hadn’t made clear already that he had a particular interest in it. “Being ruled by pirates and all.”

She made a disgruntled sound. She had signed up to answer questions about the Sabaody Archipelago, not Dressrosa. There was a reason why she hadn’t been home in ages. “It’s doing fine. Better than fine, in fact. Economy is booming. People are happy.” She delivered each sentence in a quick, clipped tone. “It pisses me off.”

“Why?”

Because she always had to be the odd one out, she thought. And this guy wasn’t getting the message that she didn’t want to talk about it. “Doflamingo doesn’t deserve that kind of credit. He and his crew should go back to the hole they crawled out of.”

He huffed. “North Blue’s had enough of him already.”

Animosity was dripping from his words, and that made her feel a little less displeased and a lot more interested in what he had to say. He could’ve seen firsthand the repercussions of Doflamingo’s actions there.

“That’s true.” She didn’t know much about the specifics, but there was a reason the North Blue was considered the most dangerous out of the four cardinal seas. “I guess he did a number there before he moved onto the Grand Line.”

“You don’t sound very fond of him either.”

Look at that, a flat out admission of having feelings about someone.

“He’s scum,” she said with more venom than she had meant to. “He dethroned the king only to take over himself, reinstated gladiator fights to death, and he has a trafficking empire. The Human Auctioning House in Sabaody displays his Jolly Roger openly. But he’s a Warlord. As long as money keeps flowing and the Celestial Dragons can buy new pets, nobody seems to care.”

“And you do? You say your country’s doing well.”

She didn’t know whether to reply honestly or not. He was trying to dig deeper than she was comfortable with answering, but she was on a roll already. “Dressrosa used to be a very poor country. I’m not blaming the people who have a better life now, but I don’t think you can build anything stable from corruption. Someone will topple Doflamingo one day, and the country will go down with him.” Her tone was increasingly becoming more determined. “And when the time comes, I hope they get rid of kings once and for all.”

“You lost me at that last part.”

“Monarchy is an obsolete form of government. How’s the world going to get rid of the Celestial Dragons if we can’t even get rid of the pests at home?”

He stared at her blankly, and that was when she realized she had talked too much and looked away from him. Ah, to be a life form capable of fusing with granite and dying in the spot…

She heard a short, muffled laugh, and glanced at him. Great, a pirate making fun of her was exactly what she needed to start her day.

“Can’t say I took you for an anarchist.” He was smirking.

“What part of ‘fuck the government’ was unclear?” she replied, still avoiding to look at him. “The more time you spend near Mary Geoise, the more you realize everything has to burn down. Then there are the Marines.” A lost cause. “It’s even their combined fault that I’m stuck here.”

“What do you mean?” He sounded relaxed again. It was like he hadn’t been acting like a weirdo through the entire conversation about Dressrosa. “Aren’t you just waiting for a ship?”

She took a long breath in preparation to give the same explanation she’d been getting every time she spoke to a newly arrived sailor. “Kidnapping crews are infesting the waters ahead. Normal ships don’t want to go near Sabaody because there’s going to be a human auction next week. Marines aren’t helping because the government benefits from the slave trade, and I assume the Enies Lobby debacle has hit them hard. I already told Bepo you don’t have to worry about it, though. They only attack pirates if they think they’re weaklings.” And trying to change the subject to something that didn’t force her to wallow in her misery, she asked, “How much was it already, Mr. Supernova?”

He looked awfully satisfied with his title. “It’s not Trafalgar anymore?”

“I’ve always liked stars.” And speaking of Bepo, she remembered something from their conversation the day before. “By the way, I don’t think I introduced myself. I’m—”

“Bepo told me. I like Librarian-ya better.”

She had an urge to fling what was left of her tea at him, but she held back at the expense of looking away and letting a strained smile show. Not worth the loss of beverage. It wasn’t going to stop him from being an early morning smartass.

The silence that ensued this time didn’t feel as uncomfortable as before, but that bar was so low, it might as well have been underground.

#degrees of separation #tried to post this draft from mobile and the formatting imploded #why is tumblr so

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bitesizedpromises · 5 years ago

Text

Title: Amber and Mahogany

Fandom: Dragon Age

Relationship(s): Cullen Rutherford/Tamarion (M/M)

Characters: Cullen Rutherford, Tamarion (original elf character)

Words:2667

Summary: this is basically a prologue to a much bigger thing I’m planning for Tamarion. Just wanted to write how Cullen and Tamarion’s first meeting went.

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Amber and Mahogany

Kinloch Hold had to be enchanted.

That would hardly be a surprise – after all, magic was an everyday occurrence in the tower. Cullen had arrived the previous evening and he'd already witnessed events he never thought were possible. He saw mages who could conjure items and even living beings out of thin air, while others could heal any wound or turn themselves into animals.

It could be expected that such a strong concentration of magic would affect the building as well. That was how Cullen explained the unusual difference in temperature in the area he was patrolling, compared to the weather outside. True, the corridor was dark, as there were no windows to let any light or warmth in. The pair of torches, placed too far apart from each other, did little to change that. It was so cold that Cullen, who had been patrolling since early morning, could hardly feel his toes by this point.

What rotten luck he had, being assigned to this freezing place! Just after breakfast, Cullen had caught a glimpse through the open gates and had seen how wonderful the weather was. The sun was shining from a clear, silk blue sky and underneath its warm rays the lake had turned into molten gold. The sight had been so lovely that Cullen was convinced the Maker had granted him a momentary view of paradise. But then the heavy gates had closed with a thunderous sound and Cullen's heavenly visions had been shattered cruelly.

During his training, he'd been told of mages who escaped the Circle to lead a desperate life on the edge of civilization, stealing and killing to survive. While he was disapproving of apostates, as most of them were dangerous, he could understand why some mages felt the desire to run away from such a bleak place.

A sudden noise snapped him out of his musings. It was coming from around a corner, where some of the Circle's food supplies were stored. That area was part of Cullen's route. Unfortunately, he'd become distracted, so he wasn't as vigilant as he was supposed to be. Someone had obviously taken advantage of the fact and had sneaked in, most likely in hopes of stealing some food.

When Cullen came around the corner, his suspicions were confirmed at once. The door to one of the cellars was slightly ajar. He carefully stalked towards it, trying to be as quiet as one could possibly be while wearing heavy armour. Luckily for him, the person in the room was too busy searching through the boxes and jars on a shelf and didn't hear him enter. Judging by the aroma, this particular room was used to store the Circle's supply of herbs and spices.

The intruder had their back to Cullen. The soft clinking of glass indicated they were searching for something particular. They must be quite young, Cullen assumed. They were small and clad in the robes of an apprentice, with the hood pulled over their head. Cullen cleared his throat and the mage jumped up, shrieking in surprise. They spun round to face him and for a heartbeat, the two stood motionless, staring at each other. Then the intruder spoke up, uttering a single sound.

“Oh.”

An odd response. The tone was even, just slightly distorted by disappointment. Cullen was left with the strong impression that this wasn't the mage's first attempt at stealing food. This person's disregard for the Circle rules was quite obvious, and he felt rather anxious at whether he was capable of taking any meaningful action. Would he, a newcomer, be perceived as an authority figure by someone to whom breaking the rules was no big deal?

While Cullen was hesitating, the mage pulled down their hood, revealing themselves as a young male around Cullen's age. He had a pretty, delicate face, which initially deceived Cullen into believing that a girl stood before him. However, he realized the truth upon noticing the pointed tips of a pair of ears barely poking through his hair.

Ah!

Just as he made that discovery, he noticed that the other was studying him as well. The elf's eyes – which were mismatched in their colouration – were full of interest, while his eyebrows, light and delicate like the wings of a dragonfly, were arched high. The examination went on for several seconds longer. When it was over, the elf parted his lips and uttered the same exclamation as before. Only this time, there was no trace of disappointment in his voice.

Cullen rubbed the back of his neck. He wasn't used to receiving such attention … or any, for that matter. But he quickly squared his shoulders, reminding himself that the mage had broken the rules and he, as a templar, had a duty to take appropriate action. He cleared his throat in an effort to imbue some sternness in his voice.

“You shouldn't be here. Mages aren't allowed to visit the cellars.”

“I know that,” the elf replied. “But you don't understand. It's an emergency.”

“Oh?” Cullen relaxed his posture slightly. He wasn't that surprised to hear something had happened. The Circle was a dangerous place, full to the roof with mages, some of who were unable to control their powers. He had also been warned of certain trouble makers. “What's happened?”

“I'm really craving some dried cherries!”

Cullen's jaw dropped. At first he thought he must have misheard, but then the elf dropped the seriousness. His eyes sparkled with mirth and his lips spread into a huge smile. Cullen felt his ire rising.

“I'm sorry,” he said stiffly, “but this isn't a real emergency. Please, leave now or I will be forced to take punitive measures.”

“Ohh, scary!” The elf chuckled. He took a strand of hair between his fingers and twisted it, while casually leaning on a cupboard. “You're new here, aren't you?”

“I don't see why that matters.”

“I've just never seen you before, that's all.” The elf grinned. He had a gap between his front teeth which gave a rather impish, but oddly charming appearance. “What's your name?”

“Er … it's Cullen.”

“It's nice to meet you. Cullen ... that's a pretty name. Ser Cullen. Has a nice ring to it, don't you think?”

“I suppose?” Cullen shrugged. For a moment, he was torn between duty and curiosity. The latter won. “And what's your name?”

“Tamarion.”

Tamarion offered his name with a dazzling, gap-toothed smile that was all too easy to reciprocate. Cullen felt the corners of his mouth twitching and hastily locked his jaw in an effort to keep himself from becoming too friendly. He tried – once again! - to steer the conversation in the right direction.

“Listen, you either leave now, or I'll have to punish you. The Circle has rules.”

“Fine, I get it. Jeez, you newbies are always so strict!” Tamarion rolled his eyes. “I'll just grab some cherries and I'm off! Happy?”

“No! No cherries!”Cullen sighed. His first day and he was already having troubles. The Chantry had prepared him for demons and blood mages, but no one had ever told him he'd be faced with … this nuisance! “Just … do as I ask you. Please? I don't mean to offend you but the Circle has rules and they must be followed.”

“So you're really going to punish me?” Tamarion asked playfully. Seeing that Cullen was hesitant to answer, he laughed and leaned forward to pat him on the arm. “Relax, ser Cullen. No one's going to get in trouble. I was born here, so I know how things are done. Nobody gives a shit about the cellars.”

“That can't be right!” Cullen bristled in defence. “If that is the case, then why was I told to patrol the cellars?”

“Because you're the new guy.” Tamarion shrugged. “They never let the newbies do important things!”

Cullen furrowed his brows. Though Tamarion's words were unpleasant, he had no reason to doubt them. He was well aware that he could hardly stroll into the tower and be entrusted with real responsibilities at once. A templar's duties were far too heavy a burden to be entrusted to Cullen without him having proven himself worthy first. He knew that. But still … it was disheartening to have Tamarion confirm that what he was doing right now was completely useless. His shoulders sagged a little and he let out a soft sigh.

“So that's how it is ...”

He must have looked quite pitiful because Tamarion suddenly dropped his teasing manner.

“Hey, hey ...” He spoke in a soft voice. “Don't be like that. Guarding the cellars isn't that bad, really. Trust me, it could have been worse. At least you weren't sent to scrub the Tranquil.”

“Huh?”

“It's this cruel joke that some of the older templars do,” Tamarion explained. Though his tone was bright and cheerful, Cullen noted that he'd suddenly become quite stiff. “Those who still have their wits, that is. What they do is, they pick some greenhorn, usually someone who's a little bit on the stupid side, and they tell them that they have discovered a dastardly, cunning plot. According to them, there's this group of mages who are planning on escaping the Circle by pretending to be Tranquil, with a fake brand on their foreheads, drawn in ink. So, the greenhorn is given a bucket of water and a rag and instructed to go to each Tranquil in the tower and rub their forehead to see if the brand will come off. And all the while the older templars are laughing their asses off from the sidelines.”

Cullen listened with increasing disbelief and horror. He was tempted to believe that Tamarion was jesting. After all, the elf had not been serious at all during their whole conversation. But he could clearly see that his light-hearted demeanour was merely a mask. Tamarion's eyes were deep and Cullen could see the sadness and fury within.

How was it possible that this was happening? How could people who had sworn to serve Andraste take joy in such indecent, nasty tricks?

“Has the Knight-Commander been informed of this?” He asked. “Surely he would not allow such practice!”

“He just doesn't care?” Tamarion shrugged. “He might do something if he got enough complaints, but those poor Tranquil never say a word about it.”

“It's utterly humiliating! No one should be treated in such a manner!”

“I agree.” Tamarion looked intensely at Cullen. He began playing with his hair again, a soft smile on his lips. “I like you, ser Cullen. You're not like the others here. You're actually a good person!”

“I … thank you.” Cullen blushed. His hand found the back of his neck again. “But surely you must be exaggerating. I'm certain most of the templars have good intentions as well.”

“They don't.” Tamarion shook his head sadly. “Most don't care about us, which is actually the better option. The others are outright cruel. You see, ser Cullen … the Circle isn't a happy place for us.”

“I'm sorry to hear that,” Cullen said softly, painfully aware of how hollow the words seemed. “It shouldn't be this way. The Circle isn't a prison. What we're doing here … it's for your own good too.”

“It's not.” Tamarion sighed. He absently rearranged a few boxes on the shelf next to him while he continued talking; his voice was so soft it was as if he was talking to himself. “But I can see why you want to believe it. It must help you sleep at night.” He sighed again, then turned back to Cullen. “Well, it was really nice meeting you, ser Cullen,” he said, smoothing out the front of his robes, “but I think I should go. Without my cherries.”

“Oh!” Cullen was startled by the decision. He couldn't help but think it was yet another trick. “Really?”

“I don't want to risk losing the only templar who cares about us. Not for a handful of fruit,” Tamarion said chuckling. “I'll be seeing you around, ser Cullen.”

He gave him one last soft smile, then headed for the door. As he walked past him, Cullen caught the scent of flowers. He was unsure of how Tamarion had got a hold of perfume in the tower, but he wasn't about to complain about it. Though the aroma was quite faint, like the wind caused from the flapping of butterfly wings, Cullen found it oddly intoxicating. Tamarion had barely managed to make a couple of steps when Cullen reached out and took him by the arm. Led by a sudden impulse and spurred on by the fact that, for the first time, the elf's face showed genuine confusion, he walked to the shelves. It took him several moments to find what he was looking for.

“Here.” He returned to Tamarion with a small pouch in his hands. “The rules only apply to the mages, so … if I take something and give it to you, it should be alright. Right?”

He wasn't entirely certain who he was trying to convince – Tamarion, or himself. The rules of the Circle were open to interpretation when it came to what templars were allowed to do. But Greagoir would likely disapprove of Cullen's actions were he to learn about them.

Luckily for Cullen, it wasn't the Knight-Commander that stood before him. Tamarion accepted the cherries with a wide grin. He quickly devoured some and licked his lips in obvious delight.

“How generous of you!” He chuckled and bounced on his heels, like a small child would. “I'll remember this, ser Cullen. Thank you. Here,” he offered the pouch to him, “take a cherry or two. You've earned them.”

“Thank you, but I think I'll decline. I actually prefer raspberries.”

“Really?”

“Yes.” Cullen nodded. “When I was a child … we had raspberry bushes in the garden. When they were in season, my siblings and I would get up really early in the morning, and we'd pick and eat them all. They were delicious.”

He and his sisters would pick the bushes clean. Their family was the only one in the village that didn't prepare raspberry jam, much to his mother's displeasure. She would always scold them for their gluttony, but how could anyone resist? Soft, plump, covered in tiny droplets of dew, yet unkissed by the sun … fresh raspberries were truly a delicacy surpassing any Orlesian feast, Cullen thought. He sighed, filled with bittersweet nostalgia.

“It was … wonderful.”

“It sounds pretty wonderful indeed.” Tamarion smiled softly.

“Yeah.” Cullen smiled, but then remembered where they were. He cleared his throat. “Er … perhaps you ought to leave now? Another templar might come to switch with me soon. If they find you here, you'll get in trouble.”

“So will you.” Tamarion ate a few more cherries, then pocketed the rest. “Thank you, again.”

“Don't mention it.” Cullen smiled. He shifted his feet and rubbed the back of his neck, hesitant to voice his thoughts. “Er ...”

“Yes?”

“I suppose that … I'm not as well-acquainted with … the way things are done here as I thought. And you seem to be.” He paused and Tamarion nodded encouragingly. “So … I wouldn't mind … er … talking with you again. I think it would be very educational for me. If you'd like to, of course.”

He exhaled shakily, acutely aware of his burning neck and ears. His heart was going wild; it was a miracle Tamarion couldn't hear it thumping against his chest plate. He already regretted speaking out. Maker, he'd come off as quite the fool, hadn't he?

Tamarion didn't seem to think so. He threw his head back and laughed merrily.

“I'd love to, ser Cullen!”

Then, instead of turning around and leaving, as Cullen thought he would, Tamarion took a quick step forward. The next few moments passed in a blur. When Cullen finally found himself able to think and see clearly again, he was alone. The door was now wide open. The hallway echoed with the sound of footsteps and bubbly laughter which were quickly fading. And his lips tasted of cherries.

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btw, if anyone’s interested in checking it out, @goblin-deity drew Tamarion ages ago, here’s the link!

Edit: Forgot to add that this is also up on AO3, link to that as well!

#dragon age #cullen rutherford #bi cullen #cullen x mage #dragon age fanfiction #oc: Tamarion #ughhh i need to learn how to tag well #someone teach me #plsss

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