#tw referenced earthquake

[serickswrites]

Quake III

Part 1 Part 2

Warnings: head injury, blood, unconsciousness, hospital, rescue, hurt/aftermath, hurt/recovery, referenced earthquake

“IN HERE! SOMEBODY HELP US! PLEASE!” Caretaker continued to bellow as they could hear the search and rescue team trying to find them. “WE NEED HELP!”

Caretaker could hear the muffled shouts of the rescue team. Could hear the scraping of tools against the rubble. And could hear Whumpee’s quiet, soft breaths. 

They continued to stroke Whumpee’s cheek as they hoped they weren’t buried to deep. Continued to yell so that the team knew where they were. And continued to pray that help would be in time. 

Caretaker’s hopes and prayers paid off. Soon they were freed from the rubble and the rescue team was pulling Whumpee’s limp body from their hands. Pulling Whumpee out and away. More hands appeared, pulling Caretaker out as well. Caretaker stumbled forward, trying to follow Whumpee. “Please, I have to--”

“Let us check you out first. Then you can worry about your friend. It was a big quake. We need to clear you first.”

“Please,” Caretaker whispered as Whumpee was taken out of their view. “I need to be with them. Please.”

“Just sit down here so my partner can assess you. Then I’ll take you to your friend. They need a hospital.”

“I need to go with them. Please!” Caretaker’s voice was raspy, their throat dry from the dust and yelling. 

“Oh you’ll be going to, to get checked out. But they’re going to the hospital now.”

Caretaker broke away from the search and rescue team and raced after Whumpee. Caretaker stopped short as they saw a team of EMTs working on Whumpee as they lay unmoving on the gurney. One EMT was wrapping Whumpee’s head wound while the other was writing on a clipboard and pulling a red tag off a string, attaching it to Whumpee’s gurney. “To the hospital, now,” they ordered before turning to Caretaker. “Can I help you?”

“Please, I need to be with them. Please,” Caretaker said weakly as they began to shake. 

“Are you actively bleeding? Unable to walk? Any broken bones? No. Then you need to wait or find a ride. Only red tags are being transported right now.” 

“Please,” Caretaker begged. “They can’t be alone.”

“Your friend isn’t alone. They are very ill. Wait here until it is your turn.” The EMT walked Caretaker to a tent and wrapped a blanket around their shoulders. “Drink some water, you are going to be ok. And your friend is, too. They just need more medical attention here than we can provide.”

Hours later, Caretaker found a ride to the hospital. And while the hospital was filled with chaotic runnings around, it was far more orderly than Caretaker imagined it was when Whumpee arrived. 

“I’m looking for someone who came in with a head trauma?” Caretaker said very quietly to the receptionist at the front desk. 

“Name and date of birth?”

Caretaker gave Whumpee’s information. The receptionist clacked away on the keys, before saying, “Room 2012, North Tower.”

Caretaker could have collapsed with relief. Whumpee was still alive. “Thank you,” they rasped as they headed to the elevator. 

Before long, Caretaker was parked at Whumpee’s bedside, relief flooding their system as they realized Whumpee was really ok. That they were safe. And on the road to healing. “I’m here, Whumpee,” they whispered in Whumpee’s ear, “I’m here.”

Tags: @scarletfern @sweetwhumpandhellacomf @justwhumpythings @painsthegame @i-eat-worlds 

[bloomingbluez]

friends don't lie | luke hemmings

MDNI

"Luke and Sawyer's friendship goes way back. They're inseparable, compatible to the bones, unable to stay mad at each other… Unless it's about a girl, and about a girl it was. Everything would be alright, if Luke didn't lie.

But he did. And friends are not supposed to lie."

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pairing: sgfg!luke x original character

word count: 14.7k

tw: smut, referenced self harm

a/n:

hello! i hope you enjoy this little angsty story about sounds good feels good ! luke and my original character sawyer. i hope you like her, because my girl is messy, not going to lie.

thanks to my girl kaleidoscopecth for helping me tame the english language and being an amazing critic 🩷

feel free to leave me requests!

© 2024 bloomingbluez

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Pounding on the door echoed through the entire Hemmings house. Luke had the impression that soon, it’ll conjure an earthquake that could crumble the foundation and knock down the walls. If only he had any motivation to pick himself up from the warm bed and open the front door… But Luke had none. The cold had been tormenting him for a week, —which also meant a week of house arrest and skipping school–, and because of that, he lay buried under the covers, with his chest slippery from a warming body balm. The usual, messy decor of his room was joined by a used pile of tissues on the dresser, and multiple empty mugs after tea and aspirin. Back on Sunday, when he started sneezing and his mum pulled out an old mercury thermometer from the cabinet above the fridge, the prospect of being sick seemed like the most appealing thing on Earth. Then, one by one, Luke lost the energy to play the guitar, his phone screen was too bright even on the lowest setting, and his fever reached the levels where Liz forced him to take cold baths. And at school… Suddenly, everyday there was something happening, people fighting and arguing, teachers playing movies instead of teaching a class, and giving out free A’s for bare minimum tasks like painting the best birthday card for their elderly cat. Fucking awesome!

Liz Hemmings raised her gaze from the pages of a very exciting crime novel. For some unknown reason, she assumed it had to be her husband, who once again didn’t feel like looking for keys in his leather briefcase. However, the banging didn’t stop, if anything, it only intensified. She wanted to call Luke, but remembered that she herself tucked him under the covers and prohibited from even going as far as to the bathroom. With a sigh, she rose from their beige corner sofa and opened the door for an unexpected intruder. 

The woman squinted seeing Sawyer Ashwood on her doorstep. 

“Good Morning, Mrs. Hemmings!” the blonde girl practically shouted, as soon as the door opened enough for the tiles in the hallway to become visible. 

Sawyer Ashwood’s blond hair flew in all directions, free of the woolen hat she was crumpling in her hands despite the winter weather. Her navy coat stayed unbuttoned as always, although unlike some of the other high schoolers she wasn’t keeping it that way to show off her outfit; running out of school, the last thing she wanted to waste time on was something as mundane as closing all the buttons. It resulted in a furiously red blush on her cheeks, and a very similar color covering the tip of her nose. The chattering teeth were a nice addition to the team, but the girl didn’t seem to mind at all. Of course, Ashton was standing right behind Sawyer, his jacket buttoned up neatly, with the scarf tucked in tightly and a hat covering his ears. The only thing missing were Calum and Michael, but Liz would ask her questions later. 

“Is Luke even still alive? He hasn’t texted in four days and yesterday, we were supposed to play GTA. But he never logged in! Ashton didn’t want to come. but I need a mediator in this conversation. Otherwise, I might rip his fucki- his head off,” Sawyer explained, falling into her usual chattiness. Out of all the Liz’s friends’ children, she started talking the earliest and hasn’t stopped ever since then. 

“Luke is sick…”

Liz didn’t even have time to finish, because as soon as Sawyer heard that her friend was living and breathing, she rushed into the house. She quickly kicked her shoes off her feet and ran towards the stairs. Sawyer knew the Hemmings house as well, if not better, than her own. Whenever she and her parents would come over for dinner, they ended up staying the night. The Ashwoods occupied the guest room, while Sawyer and Luke sat on his bed under the blanket, reading comics and playing games until well past midnight. Sometimes, he would show her what song he was currently learning on the guitar and his mum would barge into the room, rushing them to sleep. There was also the fact that Ashwoods lived just a street away – it might have been a long street, but ever since Sawyer got a skateboard for Christmas, the distance didn’t scare her at all. Luke’s parents saw her as often as their own kids, and Sawyer saw them more than her own parents, who always ended up staying late at work or simply wouldn’t notice that their daughter wasn’t home. 

Ashton calmly crossed the threshold and started unbuttoning his jacket with steady fingers. He was the most composed out of their friend group, and would often look with confusion at their erratic behaviour and ideas. That said, it didn’t mean he wouldn’t participate when it came to putting those ideas to live. 

“We had to play with Dirk,” he explained. 

“The one who pulled at her braids?” the woman asked. 

Ashton confirmed. About a month prior, a boy from their grade made such questionable choices and decided to pull on Sawyer’s messy braids in the unofficial smoking area behind the school gym. Sawyer, as expected, didn’t bother with talking to the teacher and simply punched Dirk in his freckled nose, which ended with a hemorrhage for him and a principal visit for her. Talking to the teacher, Dirk disclosed that the last thing he heard before getting punched was Luke Hemmings’ tired not again, and then the blond was on him. The very next day, Evelyn Ashwood was sitting at Liz’s kitchen island, complaining about her daughter and her uncontrolled temper. It seemed to always be Evelyn’s favourite subject – she had to pick her daughter from school, talk to teachers, drive her to a mandatory psychologist appointment, maybe an anger management class, all for Sawyer to act up again and again, just to make her mother’s life harder. 

Liz only sighed. 

“Fine. In that case, go join them, I’ll make some tea. Just don’t sit too close to Luke,” she asked, and Ashton nodded in confirmation. He started climbing the stairs, before turning back to his friend’s mum. 

“Calum and Mike will probably come in a bit. They still had classes when we left.” It was a nice way of saying that Sawyer skipped her last hour, since Ashton’s schedule was different. If anyone cared to ask, she would explain that Ashton was absolutely necessary in this scenario and she couldn’t let him go home, because then, he probably wouldn’t agree to come out again. Liz couldn’t care less; she was used to her son having these four basically attached to the hip. When Sawyer was expelled from their first high school, Luke basically begged her to allow him to switch too, since the girl was his best and only friend. Although she was sceptical at first, watching him find new friends never failed to put a smile on Liz’s face. 

Of course, there has always been Sawyer, and Liz doubted she would ever disappear from her son’s life. Thankfully, her opinion of the girl was much more positive than her own mother’s. Some would even say that Liz treated her like one of her own… And it certainly was true. Sawyer would kill for Luke (scientifically proven, as she did beat people up in his name before), and Liz would never take affection like that for granted. 

Entering through the doorway covered with posters of various rock bands, Ashton saw the blue navy coat draped over the guitar stand, as well as her red hat somewhere under the desk. He closed the door behind him, only to realise that Sawyer was already lying on the bed next to Luke, –the same Luke they were supposed to not sit too close to–, and vividly retelling everything that had happened at school during the last week. Every single time she gestured, and Sawyer talked with her whole body, Luke almost got hit with her fist across the face, but Ashton wasn’t there to save him. No, no – if Luke didn’t get sick in the first place, Ashton wouldn’t be forcefully dragged to a pottery class and Michael wouldn’t have to suffer through sitting with Sawyer during most classes, meanwhile Calum had to sit alone. It was their joint decision to let Sawyer eat him up, and only intervene if she got physical, but her rage over yesterday’s game seemed long forgotten. Without a word, Ashton sat down at the foot of the bed, listening to Sawyer’s exaggerated story by himself. 

Luke, however, didn’t look like he needed saving at all. He shifted on his pillow and stared at Sawyer’s profile, inhaling her every word and organizing it in his head. 

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Six years later…

He felt pathetic. Or maybe he simply was pathetic? Luke didn’t know. His life was falling apart before his very eyes, and he didn’t know how to stop it from happening, or whether he even wanted to stop it at all. Maybe what he needed was for everything to just crumble into ash – to get a fresh start. That depressive dilemma had appeared in his head ever since they came home from the last tour, and with it, Luke made a few questionable decisions. Not knowing where his life was at, he felt unable to find his footing, both physically and emotionally. The band was on hiatus, even though their friendship stayed intact. The label clearly communicated that if the next song that they deliver wouldn’t be a hit, the hiatus might as well turn into a permanent solution. He wanted to write, chase the adrenaline of being on stage, but just thinking about the claustrophobic rooms and sharing a bed with Calum made him want to puke. Luke couldn’t remember when was the last time he ate a home-cooked meal, but surprise, the relationship with his parents and siblings also got strained ever since he turned eighteen and decided to be as independent as it gets, which somehow also meant not calling home. Then, there was Sawyer… The one person Luke really wanted to talk to, who was mad at him, and he couldn’t even be frustrated about it, because she had every right to hate him. 

The need to sort his shit out was overwhelming, but he didn’t even know where to start. Parties became a perfect form of escapism for pretty much everybody, and thus drowning their sorrows in alcohol. Instead of looking for solutions, his thoughts circled the same situations, even though Luke thought them through millions of times. Funny, since he wasn’t a person prone to reflection, certainly not in the context of his own life. He couldn’t change the past anyway, and dwelling on it could be destructive. 

“Fucking God, Luke…” 

Ashton appeared out of nowhere, or maybe Luke was just too drunk to follow his movements. The red bandana sat unevenly on his head, and his eyes drilled into the blond’s face as if he was expecting him to do something. Well, good fucking luck because Luke rarely knew what people expected of him anymore. In his current state, he couldn’t bring himself to worry about Ashton’s concerned scowl. After the last few beers, he felt all warm and cozy inside, not the usual crazy drunk, and even Irwin wouldn’t fuck this up with his mothering. 

“Sawyer is here,” Mike said, appearing out of the crowd that occupied the kitchen and beer pong table. His face was equally worried, and only after he announced their newest guest, the words and their meaning crushed into Luke like a truck. 

His face turned pale. She was the epicentre of his whole plague, the moral dilemmas engulfing him every night before falling asleep. For a second, an idea struck him, —he could run away, lock himself in one of the bathrooms in their rental–, but Sawyer could already be noticed cutting through the people. Her blond hair bounced with every step, and the brown, constantly smudged wings gave her narrow eyes a military grade sharpness. The chapped lips, pulled into a thin line, were unnaturally closed. Luke would rather be talked to death by Sawyer, recently it’s been all he dreamed of, rather than being on the receiving end of this fury that radiated from her whole body. Fucking hell, he was not only the recipient, but also the reason. 

“Shit…” he whispered to himself, taking a panicked step back, but Sawyer was already approaching; there was no way of escaping her, and Luke knew that too well from pure experience. Boys who messed with Sawyer Ashwood never met a happy ending, because she wouldn’t stop before making their lives miserable. They used to laugh about it, joke about having brownie points because of their bond. Except Luke didn’t know where that stood anymore. Could one mistake ruin a lifelong friendship? Apparently, because once Sawyer was close enough that he could count her freckles, her hand connected with his cheek without hesitation. This was what they used to laugh at, but now everyone watched with an open mouth, not knowing if they should laugh or call the police. Out of the corner of his eye, Luke saw Calum abandon his cigarette and some brunette on the terrace, making his way towards the scene. 

“Fuck you, Luke,” she hissed through her teeth, her every muscle tense. “You’re such a motherfucking dick-”

A girl stepped away from the observers, standing between Luke and Sawyer. He swallowed hard; this wouldn’t end well. Her blue hair barely reached her shoulder and thick-rimmed glasses sat low on her nose. 

“Sawyer, please, stop. This is my fault, don’t take it out on Luke. You’re embarrassing him.”

Sawyer pursed her lips and looked away from her. Her bottom lip actually seemed to quiver – it reminded Luke of many times when his friend was close to a breakdown and pushed it down for appearances. The facade fell, letting her muscles relax. Seeing that, Luke allowed his shoulders to fall. He didn’t even dare to look at Grace, because he worried it might pump his friend full of rage again. Or maybe an ex-friend? Luke knew one thing for sure; he looked at Grace way too many times to do it again without a guilty conscience, even though deep down he knew her words were pure bullshit. 

“Fuck all of you,” the blond simply stated, before turning on her heel and heading for the main entrance. Watching her disappear in the crowd, losing the view of her head behind a corner, Luke felt like he didn’t know where he was himself. What the fuck did just happen? Only then did his cheek start to hurt, and he held up his hand to touch it. He needed to put something cool against it to prevent bruising; funnily enough, it was a trick Luke learned from Sawyer. 

Grace approached him and placed her small hand on his shoulder. Oversized hoodie and black jeans swallowed her whole, but Luke remembered her figure even through the haze of all the alcohol. Involuntarily, he wondered if tonight she’s also wearing lace under all these clothes, but he shook the thought off in a second. It was the alcohol thinking, or so he wanted to believe. If not… Well, that would make Luke Hemmings a very shit human being. In reality, he was just too childish to forget how much fun it was to play with matches, even though everything around was getting engulfed by fire. 

“Sorry about her-” Ashton’s scoff interrupted Grace. Luke could feel all the alcohol evaporating from his body. He noticed Calum pushing through the crowd towards them. Everyone around seemed to forget about the assault that took place when Hot In Here blasted from the speakers. “Is this funny to you?” she snapped at the drummer. 

Ashton brushed a few strands of hair out of his eyes; he was getting ready to argue. 

“You’re funny to me, Grace. If anyone here is taking it out on someone, it’s you, on both of them,” he stated nonchalantly. Calum reached them, and instead of standing in the clearly antagonistic circle, leaned against the nearest wall, giving him a good view of the argument. 

“Then write a song about it or something, but stay out of this,” Grace whimpered, offended by his words. Luke focused on the floor, trying to get the memory of her hips, waist, stomach, thighs out of his head… “It’s not me who has a problem, it’s her!”

“You cheated on her,” Calum murmured, catching everyone’s attention. It was clear his head was working overtime to understand what was happening, yet he still managed to defend his friend. 

“If it was me, I would also have a problem with it,” Michael added, making Ashton smile in triumph. If it was up to him, they could bully the blue-haired girl all night. Maybe it wasn’t within the traditional framework of fun, but he was having lots of it knowing that they’re one step closer to getting rid of her. The last thing he wanted was for her to get attached and Luke being too passive to do anything about it. It was clear he had to put on his paternal shoes once more, for one last dance. 

Grace seemed outraged by his statement, although everyone in their group knew that Calum was right. In desperation, she looked towards Luke for help, but to no avail – he still watched the floor as if it was the most interesting thing ever. First of all, his friends weren’t wrong; Sawyer had every right to be pissed, and Luke knew it damn well. Second of all, he simply felt guilty, because even though all the anger concentrated on Grace, it takes two to tango. 

“Luke, say something,” she tugged on his sleeve, completely ignoring the accusations.

“Luke, go chase your fucking friend,” Ashton corrected Grace, not so subtly kicking him in the shins. He received a pointed look, because after getting slapped, Luke didn’t need any more violence inflicted on him. Contrary to what his friend might have thought, his brain could still distinguish a completely wrong reaction from a good one. 

“Grace…” She looked at him hopefully. “Come on, let me go.”

He left the rental after pushing through the people. Going back home definitely proved that keeping relationships can be complicated, because as much as everyone was proud, nobody had a problem showing that they should have handled certain things differently. On the contrary, random people from their school or the neighbourhood had no problems glueing themselves to the band, as if they were part of the group in the first place. Constant texting about free tickets, invites to the parties, or rather nagging whether they would like to organize them. The worst part was, it felt good to be liked and wanted after being sidelined by the label; it was certainly easier to allow those people in than make amends with their loved ones. When things got complicated, they simply decided to escape them by moving out, and now, vodka bottles covered the kitchen counter every weekend and their dinners consisted of instant ramen. It wasn’t smart in the longshot – Luke knew that when he saw another couple doing lines in the bathroom or people jumping to the pool from the balcony. But for once, he needed to rest. The smell of weed hung thick in the air, so when the fresh wind outside hit him, he almost gasped. 

He ended up in their wanna-be courtyard. The path leading to the garage was fenced from the entrance pathway with a little, brick wall; the first week they moved in, Calum bumped into it with his car. Now, Sawyer Ashwood sat on top of it, a lit cigarette between her fingers. 

Sawyer had never been drop-dead gorgeous. She had never taken his breath away, never made his heart rush. Her view never made his thoughts get clouded, obscuring his common sense. He would not jump into the fire after her, and not because she wasn’t worth it, but because Luke strongly believed that Sawyer would rise from the flames just to beat him up over making such a stupid self-sacrifice. Or worse, she would haunt him in the afterlife. 

When Luke looked at Sawyer, the complete opposite happened. A wave of pure, uninterrupted thoughts would flood him, his heart and breathing slowed down to their natural rates, his hands stopped shaking… It was like a calm in the middle of the storm, like the realization that everything is going to be okay. Common sense broke through the intoxication. When he looked at her, he thought about the memories of their childhood and the carefree years that had long passed. With Sawyer, Luke could finally feel like a responsible adult, because she never really grew up. She would always need someone to pull her away from the trouble, from the fights, remind her that all this rage and chaos were hollow and pointless – only for Sawyer to pierce her own tongue in the school bathroom the next day and call in a hurry, because it started getting infected. With her, his life had an ounce of significance, because someone needed him, and Luke knew damn well that without Sawyer, he would fall apart so many times. At the end of the day, together they could fall apart just enough to still make sense. 

He approached her slowly, hoping she would see him coming and they could avoid another fit of anger – it was a stupid assumption in Sawyer’s case, but nobody ever said that Luke was smart. Her hair was flowing in the wind, many dye jobs leaving it anything but the underlying blonde. The ends still had a green hue to them from her last idea, while towards the root, the color looked like the perfect peachy pink, to finally reveal the darker roots. The messy eyeliner and strategically placed white pencil made her eyes look more round, and the raspberry lipstick peeled off her chapped lips, staining the white cigarette paper. 

Luke, for some reason, thought he’d be able to sit down next to her, but before he even reached the wall, Sawyer stood up and threw the cigarette under her sole, and then unceremoniously slapped him across the face, again.  

And again. 

And once more. 

And yet again. 

She finished, pressing her hand to her stomach. From the scowl on Sawyer’s face, Luke could tell that it hurt from all the blows – he did have an exceptionally chiseled jaw, and it wasn’t feeling much better. Maybe if they allowed her to actually fight people for more than one punch, she would build a stronger endurance. 

“Are you done?” he asked, touching his throbbing cheek. Thankfully, she didn’t break the skin, because it would make rounds in the papers. Luke knew damn well that he could have stopped her, caught her wrist before she even landed the first blow, and every other one that followed. He also knew that he deserved it, and a part of him thought that taking the punishment was more honorable than running away from it. Bullshit. “Because it hurts…”

This time, Sawyer punched him in the chest with her closed fist instead. Luke looked at her with confusion, making her snort. 

“I meant it, Luke, fuck off. You have no right to come crawling back to me, expecting that we’ll reminisce about the good old times and I’ll magically forget. You really fucked me up this time,” Sawyer admitted, brushing her unevenly cut bangs out of her eyes. Her voice was hoarse; from the cold, or from the cigarette, or maybe from crying, but it made something break inside him. 

“That’s not what I expected,” he lied mechanically. Because that’s exactly what he expected – that’s how it happened in the movies. The power of friendship could overcome pretty much anything, and he knew Sawyer Ashwood from the diapers and breastfeeding. Theoretically, they could have lost touch multiple times throughout the years, but they never did, and that must have accounted for something. All Luke really wanted was to be back in his room, sitting on his bed, sharing a joint while he showed her how to play Wonderwall on his guitar. “Look, Sawyer… I don’t know what got into me that night. I never meant for any of this to happen. But maybe it’s for the better, ok? Grace is a bitch, the way she played it out–”

“Fucking God, Grace isn’t the one who decided to fuck her best friends’ girlfriend!” the blond interrupted him, clearly unable to take anymore of his pathetic explanations. It hurt him that she only seemed to blame him, not her ex. “It’s you, Luke! You’re the bitch! You’re a two-faced piece of shit who only thinks about himself!” 

Luke fell silent and sat down on the wall. He looked at her, trying to keep his composure. Liz raised him better than to use verbal insults, and he was really holding himself back. But he wasn’t like one of her exes or boys who bullied her in high school; he deserved at least a bit of respect. 

“Was it so hard to swallow that I was finally happy?! You have your fuck-ass band, and I have to read what happens to you from fucking gossip magazines, because all of the sudden I’m too lowly to be a part of your life! If you don’t want me anymore, why the fuck would you go and ruin the one thing where someone did actually want me?!”

“She clearly didn’t want you that much since she fucked me!”

Well, Luke got punched in the face again. He should have expected it. Looking into her resentful eyes, you couldn’t say that Sawyer was close to tears, because she wasn’t. Sawyer was angry, only angry. She had already cried too much over this, and if she was going to shed another tear, it wouldn’t be for the comfort of others. Luke should have known that he had broken something inside her, hurt her to the bones, but apparently, he only had enough empathy to see his actions as a favour. 

“You’re such a dick…” she began again. 

“Sure, Sawyer, you can insult me. I deserve it. But if you thought I did it on purpose, then maybe it’s a good thing you’re not part of my career, because that’s a place for friends, and friends know each other,” Luke spat out. Sawyer only shook her head, slowly losing energy for this. He wouldn’t understand it; she was naive to think he ever would. 

Sawyer Ashwood knew Luke Hemmings before she even knew herself, but apparently it wasn’t good enough. 

“Most of all, friends don’t lie, Luke. If you had told me when it happened…” Sawyer’s voice rose an octave higher. That was the worst part of everything, what actually hurt her so deeply wasn’t the cheating, but the fact that everyone kept it from her. She felt pathetic admitting that it was this simple; that Luke might have gotten off easy if he stayed honest. After months of ignoring her, missing birthday wishes and making her feel like shit, she would take him back if he had the balls – it made Sawyer feel weak and stupid. 

She cleared her throat. 

“If you had just told me you slept with her when it happened, I might have been able to swallow it.”

“I couldn't,” he said, forming a logical explanation in his head. Luke thought about it for a long time, before realizing that he never wants to be in a position where he would have to tell her. His reasons were so cliché, especially after always hearing from Sawyer that she was much more into women. Revealing this secret had no better purpose than to make a fool of himself, and Luke had enough of that on tonight’s record. He was sure when Ashwood looked up at the sky; sure that she would ask why, that she would want to know. “You say that now, Sawyer,” he added, shrugging. 

Luke was just so fucking sure she would ask any time now. 

But instead, Sawyer turned on her heel. She wanted to get out of this place, out of this situation and people who were wasting her time and energy and sanity. She had already wasted two decades on Luke, only to end up with a broken heart. Sawyer might not have been an internationally acknowledged artist or earn millions of dollars, but she expected so much more. Sawyer deserved so much more. For years, Sawyer Ashwood considered her life less than satisfying, –she didn’t have lots of friends, wasn’t particularly attractive, got average grades at best, had shit parents who couldn’t care less–, but at least she had Luke. She had a friend who would be there no matter what; but that train left the station a long time ago, and he jumped it before she could even notice. Funny how everyone around her always said that nothing good would come from her friendship with the four boys, but she always believed in them. 

Now she was eating her own shit, because no way Ashton, Michael and Calum would take her side. They were his friends, his band. 

“I couldn’t, because you would ask ‘Why did you do it, Luke?’, and look at me with your huge doe eyes, and I wouldn’t be able to blame it on alcohol. I was so wasted, Sawyer… But despite everything, I just didn’t want to see you with someone who wasn’t me.”

In one of the pop music videos, or a romantic comedy on Netflix, they would be seventeen and played by actors half their age. She would turn to him and start walking; he would do the same, just so they could meet halfway and kiss. A cute kiss – something seemingly deep to be romantic, but in a way that the movie could be rated PG13. That’s why, when Luke noticed Sawyer turn back towards him, he stood up and smiled to himself. 

“Well, you did amazing, because I don’t want to see you ever again. Leave me alone. You’re too pathetic to look at Luke, so much that it hurts.”

----------

“There you go.” Ashton’s voice woke Sawyer from a trance. The blonde didn’t know why she agreed to meet with him. Maybe it was the shock – she didn’t expect the invite at all, and when it came, she texted back sooner than her mind could analyze every possible angle. 

She kept on going back to everything that happened, trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, as if it would give her any answers. 

Just to make the rent, Sawyer shared her time between a reception desk at an art gallery and a rave club in the center. The first job was just for her, within the area of her interest, but the second one was what made the difference; at least on the nights when she wore a tighter blouse or her boobs were showing a bit more, and the tips would flow in much better than usual. She met Grace at that club, during her shift, feet hurting from standing around and hands constantly sticky from grenadine, no matter how many times she washed them. A petite, pink-haired girl approached the bar and ordered two drinks, one with alcohol, while the other one was without. Sawyer asked her why would anyone stay sober at a rave, and Grace shrugged, admitting that technically, her date wasn’t off the clock yet. Sawyer decided not to comment, but then, right after she presented the drinks on the counter, Grace pushed the mocktail towards her with a cocky smile. 

They seemed like the perfect match from the beginning, or maybe Sawyer just liked that when she was with Grace, her thoughts were taken off everything else. When they were together, she didn’t feel the need to google her best friend’s name or look through his recent concert videos on Twitter. She wasn’t tempted to text him or call him, even though she knew he wouldn’t pick up and minutes after being sent to voicemail, Sawyer would be deleting any traces of her call from their chat because she felt embarrassed. Then, she would get mad and scream into her pillow. Then, she would punch the pillow, but that didn’t change the fact that she felt stupid. 

Sometimes, you have to beat stupidity out of someone, her father would always say. So Sawyer would; her open palm connecting with her cheek, sometimes harder and sometimes missing the aim completely. Sometimes concentrating the blow on her nose rather than the cheek, or hitting the lip with her nail, making it bleed. She would slap until the cheek was red and first tears streamed down the burn. 

But she didn’t need that with Grace. She was the perfect distraction, and enjoyable at that. Sawyer could really see herself falling for that girl – her humor, her body, the way she kissed her worries away and made her scream without much effort. Grace always made the cutest promises and gave the most convincing arguments… And turned very fast from sweet to bitter, over the smallest things. But Sawyer would much rather cry over her relationship than the guy that clearly forgot she ever existed. At least Grace wanted to talk to her and touch her and kiss her in public; at least she wasn’t ashamed. 

She clearly didn’t want you that much since she fucked me!

It made Sawyer feel so stupid, to not notice any signs before. No matter how many times she analyzed the course of the four months since she and the band reconnected, she couldn’t find any hint that this would happen. Grace didn’t seem fazed by her girlfriend knowing a pretty famous band. She wasn’t rendered speechless by shaking Calum Hood’s hand. She sure as hell didn’t seem to be attracted to any of them. Hell, for all that Sawyer knew, Grace was a full on lesbian. All of that made her go in circles around those few memories she had of their interactions, trying to find the moment when Luke looked at Grace differently, or where her body language changed. She tried to find the solution to the problem until her head hurt and frustration set in, and from there, the line to screaming and kicking and hitting was very thin. 

Irwin passed her a strawberry beer and sat down next to her. A few metres away, a group of high schoolers was starting to drink away to celebrate the weekend. Sawyer couldn’t look away, even though her gaze harbored a lot of disgust. 

It’s on those parties where people would promise each other things, like friendship until the grave. Eventually, the only thing left of them was a hangover and disappointment. 

“Look, if Luke sent you here to apologize for him…”

“Now, where did that idea come from?” Ashton asked, furrowing his brows. He took a swing out of his bottle, looking towards the group too. Back then, those parties seemed like a lot of fun, especially when they had to make a run for it away from police. Now, when his house would turn into a club every weekend, it just looked silly. “No, Luke didn’t send me. After all, you could say I’m a little pissed at him.”

Sawyer frowned. Maybe it made her naive, but his words simply didn’t make sense in her head. They haven’t been spending any time together recently, nowhere near what they used to. Her perception of Luke, Calum, Michael and Ashton changed from the real state of things to the way the media presented them, to their Instagram posts and fan commentary on their behavior. She felt left out – like just another consumer of their unbreakable friendship. She knew that the three guys would follow Hemmings into a hurricane, and honest to God, Sawyer couldn’t blame them. Maybe she would follow him too… Honestly, Sawyer was already losing it herself, how much she would be able to do in the name of their childhood friendship. 

“Why? Ashton, you’re best friends.”

Ashton put his arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer, so that Sawyer could lean on him. She swallowed hard – Ashwood had never been that person, but recently, she really needed a hug. Another thing to add to the list of reasons of why she felt like a fucking idiot. 

“I’m friends with you too, Sawyer.” She snorted at his statement. Sawyer expected him to roll his eyes, but he just stared at her with the same disappointment she gave to those kids. His arm dropped from her shoulder, and for a second, she wanted to protest, the weight leaving a phantom pain behind, but he already wrapped his hands around the bottle. “I mean it. Mike is mad at him too. He even said that if Luke won’t stop acting like this, we’ll need to look for a new guitarist. Calum basically breathed down his neck until he deleted Grace’s number and blocked her everywhere.”

She looked down on the pavement. Sawyer had always been hasty. She drew conclusions too quickly and then stubbornly wouldn’t admit her mistake. She hated that about herself, but couldn’t change that behaviour – or maybe she just didn’t want to, because it meant too much work. Everyone always told her at times like these that she should go to a specialist; her highs weren’t supposed to be this high and lows weren’t supposed to be this low. But Sawyer didn’t trust specialists, ever since a bunch of them proved unable to diagnose ADHD in her youth. Everyone told her parents that she was normal, because during an appointment she could sit calmly in an armchair instead of running around the clinic; then they would come back home, where she still couldn’t concentrate, remember the instructions or keep order. Her mum would get mad at her and stop talking to her own daughter until she cleans up her act; her dad would scream, because what fourteen year old forgets to put a plate in the dishwasher or can’t study for a simple math exam. They would call her lazy, an idiot, a fuck up. Sawyer would go to her room and cry, try to muffle it with her pillow or t-shirt, hell, sometimes even fist, because her dad would always say that she doesn’t get to cry because of her own incompetence. She didn’t know she ended up in a psychologist’s office at the end of her freshman year,it could have been her terrible grades or another fight, but it was on this doctor’s recommendation that she finally got a diagnosis… 

…and an explanation that she couldn’t get angry about it, because it’s completely normal that it’s harder to diagnose girls. 

Even when they prescribed her medication, Sawyer didn’t want to take it. Because of the doctors, she had to manage without the pills her whole childhood and most of the teenage years. If she did it for that long, she could also manage now. It was too late for therapy or other crap that everyone suddenly deemed necessary. All Sawyer wanted was to forget; if all of her symptoms were normal until now, she intended to continue treating them like that. Unfortunately, that very attitude made her unable to cope with it all, and as a result, Sawyer developed a series of traits that she didn’t try to get rid off, even though she could. In the end, she could blame almost everything on ADHD – even though, more often than not, it was the result of her sulking and oversights. 

“Ash…” she sighed. “I appreciate it, okay? You know I love you. I- I love Luke too. I just can’t understand why none of you would tell me about it.” Sawyer shrugged. 

Now, it was Ashton’s turn to act like the pavement was suddenly very interesting. 

“You can’t tell me you didn’t know anything. It was Luke’s fault, yes, but you allowed me to be in a relationship with someone who cheated on me.”

“Sawyer, you know it wasn’t our place to tell you about it,” he cut in. 

Sawyer pursed like lips into a thin line, because Ashton was right, as always. If they had run to her with this information, she would have been pissed at everyone; Luke would probably be lying in a grave right now, probably beaten to a pulp with an easel or another random item lying around her small room. 

However, after a moment of silence, she asked quietly: “Is he even a bit sorry about the way he acted?”

It was just a shallow manifestation of her desires. Ashwood wanted him to regret it, even if he didn’t shed a tear. She wanted it to stay with him, etched on his consciousness forever, haunting his every relationship. First of all, Sawyer wanted Luke to realise that his pathetic excuses from the party were fucking worthless.

“He is.” Ashton hugged her again. It took him a second to find the right words. “Only… Hemmo style, you know.”

Sawyer knew. She could clearly imagine her friend drunk to the point of unconsciousness, with red eyes, babbling incomprehensibly to anyone who would listen. His style was to suppress problems, often more than necessary. Looking them in the eye… She had never seen Luke do that. Before it even occurred to him to draw conclusions, to come to the terms with consequences, he had to drink and fuck and party them away. 

Not that Sawyer was any better. 

“I know,” she muttered. 

----------

“Hi.”

Sawyer jumped. The kitchen in her friends’ rental home was huge, even by her standard, and Sawyer grew up wealthy. A black bikini hugged her pale body, revealing many tattoos, and wet hair stuck to the nape of her neck. Without make up, her under eye bags could shine with all their glory, and pale lips almost blended in with her skin tone. She only wanted to grab more of the sparkling water before getting back to the swimming pool in their garden. When Ashton invited her last time they saw each other, she initially didn’t want to come, but caved in once Calum and Michael also texted her, nagging to agree. Luke was supposed to be gone, and it was the only fact to convince her – she was ready to rebuild the friendship with the remaining three boys, but the wounds from that night were still fresh. 

She made an attempt to just move on and forget, even though that wasn’t something Sawyer would usually do. She truly meant it when she said that she wasted enough time and energy on everything to do with Luke in the span of the last few years. 

Sadly, when she turned around to face the entrance to the kitchen, Luke was exactly the person to stand there. Seeing a purple bruise on his cheek, Sawyer felt pride. At least she made a physical mark, if her words didn’t seem to land. 

“Hi,” she said, speeding up the process of pouring the drink into her glass. She could feel his eyes scanning her exposed body, and although the suit covered everything it should, under his gaze Sawyer felt almost naked. He probably judged her ink, wondered how Grace found her attractive in the first place. From multiple, messy tattoos on her arms, to an ornament on her stomach and silly cat design on her knees, she could become a color book.  It definitely wasn't something Luke was used to seeing on the bodies of all the model’s and pretty girls that came to their parties. Their hair wasn’t fried by bleach, the black polish on their nails wasn’t half-scratched and their lips weren’t chapped. But as she stole a look at him… That definitely wasn’t disgust. 

Once upon a time, she wished for Luke to look at her like this. Grace was the first person who managed to make her move on from this sick fantasy of his affection; not only friendly touches, but something on a completely different level. When it first appeared in her dreams, she wanted to wash her eyes with Listerine, but soon after that, Sawyer just… went with it. She couldn’t fight her body’s physical reaction even if she tried, and her body definitely reacted.

It was a shame it didn't get the memo that Luke didn’t exist to them anymore; especially when her nipples started to harden under his gaze, and the black bra did nothing to hide it. The only thing Sawyer could do was hurry to the terrace. 

“Sawyer, can you bring some more beers?!” Michael called from the pool. She closed her eyes, irritated. It didn’t help that instead of going further into the house, Luke just stood there, staring. Sawyer was growing pissed at him again, for that simple fact alone. Sure, it was her decision to come over, but he could at least make it easier for the both of them. Her head was working overtime to understand what he was expecting – after the conversation with Ashton, she couldn’t find her footing between hating Hemmings and just wanting him to finally find a good enough excuse that would let her forget and move on. But Sawyer also knew that getting back to how they were wouldn’t satisfy her. She desperately wanted back her friend, the one who gave the best hugs, always helped wash the dye out of her hair, and would listen for hours as she babbled on about the new art exhibition or her last, terrible hook up.

“Sure!” She opened the fridge, but couldn’t find any new cans inside. Sawyer huffed, and started checking the cabinets. She had no idea where it was, and after stumbling through the plates, glasses, almost empty spices, she was nowhere near finding the six-pack. 

“It’s here.”

Luke came up behind the kitchen island, fitting into the space next to Sawyer. She turned, leaning her hips against the counter, and drilled her eyes into his face. Even though he opened a floor length cabinet and pulled out what she needed, Luke wouldn’t stop staring at her face, and as a result, they maintained a heavy eye contact that made Sawyer’s skin tingle. The stupid lip ring seemed to taunt her, because she wasn’t able to look away. 

It was hard to pinpoint when she started finding Luke attractive – one day, maybe after she saw him in a suit for Ben’s graduation or after one of the Sunday dinners, when they went to the beach, to surf with his family, she came home and the only thought in her head, as Sawyer slipped her hand under the waistband of her shorts, was Luke’s eyes, and his lips, and the texture of his palm when he grabbed her arm, and the way he could push her around with little effort. She felt giddy because of the overwhelming feeling the whole day, knowing deep down that this wasn’t good; not how friends were supposed to think about each other. 

“Thanks,” she breathed, taking the beer from his hand. Once upon a time, they were the same height, but now Luke towered over her with multiple centimeters in favor. Sawyer felt trapped between his hard body and the counter. Usually, she would be too stubborn to be the first person to look away, but today, all Sawyer wanted was to be smart. 

She looked away, and tried to make her way away from him, away from the kitchen. The longer Sawyer stayed close to Luke, the harder it was to remember that she didn’t want anything to do with him. Her mind and common sense might have been saying one thing, but her body and the nostalgia flooding every second she looked at him… She would prefer him to come back home after she left for the day. Nothing was easier knowing that she could jump back to the old routine, yearning for every sign of him. It would also mean absolute lack of self-respect, but at the end of the day Sawyer knew damn well that she didn’t have much of that in the first place. 

Luke’s whole palm closed around her thin upper arm when he grabbed her. 

“You don’t have to run away from me,” he said, brushing blond hair out of his eyes. He was dressed neater than usually, an ironed t-shirt and dress parts that Sawyer had not seen him in before. Not that she had seen much of him since they left. Only then did she realise that it was Sunday, and Luke probably came back from the dinner at his parents’ house. She used to be invited to those, and even continued going after Luke was across the planet, but things flaked off once the big drama at her house happened and Sawyer cut ties with her family. She had always loved Liz and appreciated everything that Hemmings’ did for her, but deep down, she knew that Liz would talk about her to her mum, and Sawyer wanted nothing to do with them. She could do well just fine by herself, and giving them an opportunity to keep tabs on her was as far out of her interest zone as possible. 

“Luke… I really don’t want to talk about all of that,” she admitted, not bothering to pull her arm out of his grip. “It’s better if we just ignore each other.” In her hand, that was the only solution that made sense. 

Sawyer always missed Luke, she thought about him and watched out for him in the news. She fixated so much on his person, she seemed to have forgotten that although Calum, Mike and Ashton were friends she made much later, they were also a huge part of her life and a comfort zone. Knowing that they valued her as a friend even after all this time, made her want to make amends. 

“Sawyer, you’re at my house,” he scoffed. 

“Oh,” Sawyer matched his tone and crossed her arms over her chest. “Are you going to be a dick again? I’m here for your housemates, Luke,” she clarified, although both of them knew that.  What she didn’t know was that Ashton told Luke about her visit, and it made blond that much more motivated to leave the family dinner earlier. “Now, will you let me go, or do you have some more brilliant comments?”

“I’m not being a dick…” He immediately let go of her arm, the warmth of his touch leaving a red mark on her pale skin. Luke tried to find the right words, something that might give him a fighting chance. 

When he came to his childhood house, Liz noticed the bruise on his cheek from the moment she opened the doors and his brother teased him about it through the whole dinner. Luke had been on edge since that party, not only Sawyer making a valid scene, but also his bandmates switching sides; the last thing he needed was Ben and Jack being nosy about the plum markings on his face. Naturally, Luke snapped at them and admitted that the reason for his appearance was Sawyer. His mum always dropped a plate of potatoes, and she didn’t even wait until they finished eating before asking what the fuck did he do to provoke her. Of course, as much as Luke tried to play it down and lead his mother away from the topic of the blonde, the more she drilled, and eventually, Luke had to end up telling her some version of what happened recently. Simply saying, Liz was not a fan of that – she lectured him on how to treat a woman, especially a woman that you have feelings for. Luke wanted to laugh, but after another twenty minutes of the one sided conversation, he was pretty sure his mum might have been right. 

There was nothing casual about the way he felt about Sawyer Ashwood. 

Looking at her then, ready to leave that kitchen with her back turned on him, miscellaneous colored hair glued to her nape and a black swimming suit hugging her hips tightly, Luke felt like this was his last chance to get that point across. All he wanted to do was get back to how they were, except not really, because this time around, he also wanted to be able to kiss her lips anytime he wanted; he wanted to know her every tattoo in detail, trail his tongue across every inch of her skin, make sure that when they go on the next tour, she’ll be waiting back here for him. Even if Sawyer wasn’t able to see it now, Luke would give her time, but beforehand, ruin her so thoroughly she wouldn’t be able to look at anyone else. 

“I meant what I said at the party,” he said, ready for the hurricane that it might invoke. “The part about how I didn’t want to see you with Grace. I was jealous that she just gets to have you…” The blonde turned around, her expression hard to read. Luke was ready for her to approach him and slap him in the bruised cheek again, but she just stood there, considering his words. He took it as a sign to continue. “Look, I fucked up. I should have been calling and texting while we were away, fuck, send you letters. But a part of me wanted to move on.”

“And did you? Move on I mean?” she asked, her brown eyes darker. She set her glass and the beer on the counter, leaning on it with her hip. The two meters of space between them seemed like a lot, but at least Luke was able to think straight; when she was close, he felt a step from complete madness, his every bone screaming to just close the distance and finally have the kiss that he dreamed about for years. It wasn’t just about the way Sawyer looked; it was about knowing how fierce she was and she would match him beat for beat. 

“No! Why would I sleep with Grace if I did?” he asked, exasperated. How could she not get it? Sawyer was never a good student, but Luke would never call her stupid. Maybe she wasn’t the best from math or geography, but she would figure out any situation. 

“I don’t know Luke! You’re giving me mixed signals all the time!” Sawyer needed no time to get just as riled up, and although it should have made him scared, it only made the desire under his skin crawl. He couldn’t bear to look at her and not feel it stirring in his stomach, when all the blonde was wearing was the swimming suit. “We've been best friends since we were born, and then all of a sudden you leave and cut ties with me! Then you come back, and start inviting me to parties as if nothing happened. You sleep with my fucking girlfriend, but for some reason, it’s because you want me? Sorry if it doesn’t make any fucking sense!” She gesticulated with her hands, and raised her voice. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Luke saw Calum coming up to the glass terrace doors, closing them to give the two some privacy. He was not stupid; he knew that Ashton probably planned it exactly so they could bump into each other and work this out, because Irwin couldn’t help but meddle in people’s business. 

“I do want you! Why is that so hard to believe, Sawyer?!” 

All her life, all Sawyer wanted was to be loved and cherished, and she found a friend who did just that. Was it wishful thinking, wanting to have that friendship forever? It all begun getting complicated when she started having a fucking crush on Luke, or maybe just on the way he looked, but back then, she was able to control it. Sawyer could move past that. She could sleep with other people, women to take her mind off his appearance, and guys who could pass as him under the right light. She could gaslight herself into relationship after relationship, acting like he wasn’t the person she thought about when they fucked. 

“Because you said you want me as a friend, and then you stopped taking my calls! You told me it was all going to be ok, but it wasn’t, Luke! I needed a friend, so many times, and you wouldn’t pick up your damn phone! You lied to me about Grace! I know I used to be able to read you, but not anymore! I don’t think I even trust anything that’s coming out of your mouth-”

Luke cut her off – he wasn’t able to listen to this anymore, mostly because deep down he realised that Sawyer was right about everything. She had no reasons to trust him, but he also knew that this call was coming from somewhere else. He only noticed it after his mum pointed it out, but the blonde always seemed to put herself down. Luke knew it was probably because of her parents; her dad would always comment on her clothes being too revealing, then being too baggy. Once Sawyer was too skinny, another time too fat, and then on a good day he would buy her sweets on top of that. It didn’t help that her mum would always talk about Sawyer getting a nose job in the feature. At some point, she started modifying her appearance for her own pleasure, but also to give her parents something else to talk about than her face and her body. 

It’s not that Luke had always been attracted to his best friend, but he grew to appreciate her looks a bit too much. Maybe it was contemplating her profile for too long, or stalking her social media when Calum snored a bit too loud. Her pointed slim nose and the warm brown of her eyes, that stared into your soul and saw every little piece of you; her petite body, shoulders covered in light freckles and those fucking tattoos, that she somehow positioned in all the right places. Multiple times, Luke would dream of painting them over with his tongue – the vines on her underboob, the tribal below her navel, that fucking tramp stamp she got illegally done at sixteen that said “babygirl”. He also dreamed of tasting the cherry Carmex off her lips, and seeing how sensitive her nipples were, since Sawyer rarely wears a bra and more than often, he was able to get a good look at them. 

Fuck, Luke wanted to have his way with her, trapped in his sheets of hours, and showing just how strong his desire was. Just how pretty and attractive she had always been to him. 

First, though, he had to shut her up – and the only effective way to do that seemed to be connecting their lips in a kiss. It was bruising, because the longer Luke listened to her monologue, the more pissed he would get; at himself and at everything around them that just wouldn’t let this happen properly. He should have invited her on a date, showered her with tour tickets, and flown her out to cities just to have her at his side for a few hours. But it was too late for that, and instead, the only idea in his head was to close the distance between them and just show her first hand how much she meant. 

At first, she just stood there, unmoving and shocked. The last thing Sawyer expected was for him to actually kiss her, to feel his hands grip on to her hips and hold her in place. Would he stop if she stayed unresponsive? Just how far was Luke willing to take this? Sawyer knew damn well that if he allowed to take her foot off the break, she wouldn’t be able to stop again. She closed her eyes, slowly putting her own hands on his shoulders, letting her lips purse, trying to kiss back just when Luke decided to pull away. His eyes were glazed over and hooded as he looked at her, breathing hard. 

“Do you trust this?” he asked, his voice hoarse. His fingers trailed to the naked skin on her stomach. “Was this honest enough for you?”

Sawyer frowned, trying to make sense of his words. Her brain was screaming, going into overdrive. This was definitely overstimulating, but the restless butterflies in her stomach made Sawyer hesitant to stop. There was no going back from this anyway, and even if Luke would turn his back on her again afterwards, at least she would know if those years of daydreaming were justified. 

“No,” she breathed out, inhaling sharply, before letting her hands drift to the nape of his neck. Standing on her toes, Sawyer pulled him down, almost causing Luke to trip over. Last second, he hugged her waist, using the blonde as an anchor; soon enough, he used that same grip to lift her onto the counter, putting their faces on the same level. 

Sawyer moaned when he used her thighs to pull her to the edge; maybe because she was only wearing a swimsuit, but his every touch burned her skin. She was sure if she just took a second to look down, Luke would actually be leaving red marks in his wake. But the kiss was too all-consuming – she could taste the cigarettes he started to smoke recently and a hint of tea that she knew for a fact Liz made everyone drink after the dinner. When his tongue slipped into her mouth, it forced her to gasp and cling to his neck harder. And that fucking ring… Feeling it against her lips was driving Sawyer crazy. 

His hands explored her skin, skimming from the thighs to the sides of her stomach, sometimes hooking under the lines of her bikini bottoms. Luke had the placement of her tattoos burned into his brain, and Sawyer noticed that his thumb always circulated the lines on her hip, the design on her knees. She could feel his fingertips touching the material of her bikini top, and scoffed when he wouldn’t even grab her breast through it. They were way past shy, when she could feel the material of her panties slowly become soaked in the arousal. 

“Just touch me,” she suggested, breaking the kiss. Her forehead resting against his, the blonde tried to collect herself at least a little bit. The calloused fingertips of his fingers caused by playing the guitar without a pick made her shiver. The way Luke looked at her, Sawyer could tell that he was too far gone. She herself was only able to think straight because of the stress that inwillingly settled itself in the back of her head. 

Sex wasn’t anything new to her. In a way, Sawyer was a highly experienced person, and her ex partners would confirm just that. No matter how many hook ups she had though, Sawyer was sure Luke outdid her. She was also sure that her experience, as considerable as it was, wouldn’t be that valid when it mostly limited itself to fingering and eating out girls. Luke might have been the third or fourth boy she would ever be involved with sexually, and it wasn't even that Sawyer was worried about not pleasing him, but simply making a fool out of herself. In her mind, this was a one time thing. She wouldn’t be able to get Luke to herself ever again, because for all the blonde knew, he might have forgotten about her by the very next day. 

Maybe Luke Hemmings really wanted her, but it was just another whim of a spoiled rockstar. 

Sawyer didn’t care as her lips trailed kisses down his neck, finding a particularly sensitive spot just below his jaw. She left multiple open mouth kisses just there, before closing her teeth on the creamy skin. On her lips, she could feel the short hairs of his stubble. At least Luke finally groped her chest, and hearing that just a little graze of her teeth can make him moan, Sawyer was excited to see what else she can cause. After making sure that her mark would be visible, the blonde straightened, catching his gaze again. 

“Sawyer.” It was a warning, when her hand reached behind her back to untie the knots of her suit. His breath sounded laboured, even though no one had taken their clothes off yet. Juts from sitting there, knowing what was to come, Sawyer could feel her thighs tremble in anticipation. 

“Luke.” With a teasing smile, she let the black material drop to reveal her chest. The blonde always considered it was nothing to write home about; if not for the nipples, Sawyer could probably pass as a ten year old, but she never felt tempted to do anything about it. Surgeries were too expensive and invasive, and she enjoyed not having to wear a bra enough to not feel too insecure about the size of her boobs. That said, when they immediately caught Luke’s attention and she saw his throat bob as he swallowed, a weird sense of pride coursed through her. He seemed entranced, unable to look away. 

“The guys can probably see everything in the window,” he explained, although his hands started climbing up the newly exposed skin. Sawyer smiled to herself; seeing him unable to stop his own reflexes made her desire even stronger. If he wasn’t standing in between them, he would have to clench his thighs. 

“Then take me to your bedroom, or move on and fuck me here,” Sawyer whined, letting her own hand let go of his neck to play with her own nipple. If Luke wasn’t going to, she had nothing against pleasing herself; wouldn’t be the first time someone watched her masturbate. 

Luke bit his lower lip. When he kissed her, there was no bigger plan behind it, definitely not going to bed with his best friend. Sawyer shocked him with her boldness, but Luke wasn’t the only one who changed in the last few years. If he actually took her to his bedroom, there would be no going back from this. They would fuck, and Luke would become even more confused about what the fuck was happening between them. As if the situation wasn’t confusing enough! Even though she considered this a one night stand, Luke didn’t think he would be able to survive it and move on; he would become inconsiderably whipped for Sawyer, and it was a positively scary feeling, especially knowing the kind of girl she was. Most guys wouldn’t survive Sawyer Ashwood, and it was probably the reason she almost exclusively dated women – why waste her time on someone who wouldn’t be able to handle all the wonderful and bad that came with being hers.  

She was fierce and loud, and definitely not media trained, or even possible to tame. She had feelings bigger than herself and didn’t know how to deal with them. She wouldn’t tell him if something was wrong, she wouldn’t express her feelings… Fuck, both of them were simply terrible at communicating, terrible at relationships. But Luke knew for a fact that he had a lot of time to figure it out, here, with her, and maybe Sawyer would just work with him. 

“Fuck,” he huffed, and gripped her underthighs. Sawyer’s legs curled around his waist, and soon, Luke was carrying her to his bedroom. 

Even though he moved, the room was still messy, although it had less personality. No posters, no books, just a bed and a nightstand, with a single picture from Ashton’s graduation on it. He never stayed in school long enough to get one from theirs, and when Sawyer’s ceremony happened a year later, she ended up having a breakdown and never showing up. Out of the two of them, he always had the better prospects of getting an education, but somehow she was there alone? 

He dropped her on the bed, hovering over and connecting their lips again. Sawyer’s legs never stopped hugging him, pressing their hips together. After all those years of build up, all she wanted was to just get to the main part. She pulled him down, making Luke drop his whole body on her; it was a trick to flip them, so the blonde could be on top. In no time, Luke sat up straight and started kissing her breasts, teasing one of the nipples with his thumb and  tracing the valley between them with his tongue. It was a weird sensation, his hot tongue against her skin, not so long submerged in the cold water. But all of that cold was present now, when the arousal heated her like a furnace. 

Sawyer moaned in pleasure, fiddling with the ties of her bikini on the back, to take the bra off completely. She threw it somewhere on the floor, before moving on to Luke. He couldn’t stay fully clothed while she was almost naked – her hands found the hem of his shirt and pulled it up, not caring about all the buttons. Luke helped her, raising his arms and taking his lips off her skin. One of her hands splayed across his chest, moving down to his stomach and below the navel. Sawyer bit her lip. 

She did just that in her dreams so many times, feeling like a teenage fangirl, even though she knew Luke Hemmings better than most. At some point, he just stopped being real to her, an urban legend that Sawyer kept on believing in, a conspiracy theory. Seeing him half naked, touching his skin, made a part of her brain tingle; the exact part that was slowly doubting he had ever been real. Except Luke was really fucking real, touching and kissing and having his way with her. Maybe she was just another girl for him, but for Sawyer, this meant a lot. 

She might have tried to gaslight that importance out of this encounter… But at the end of the day, Sawyer would be analysing this over and over while falling asleep, rethinking his every touch, every kiss. Her dreams didn’t come true often enough to let this go easily. 

“Like what you see?” he asked, a cocky grin across his lips, although Luke really wanted to hear that she did like it.

Sawyer had always been the kind of friend who would put on a neutral face and push toward the final goal, except now, he had no idea what it was. Was she still mad or did this mean everything had been forgiven? He was about to see her naked for the first time ever, and not knowing if she did it out of desire or spite crossed his mind more than once. Luke needed anything to grasp onto, even if it was a simple compliment. 

“I’m just wondering what Grace thought at this very moment.” 

The pointed look she sent him was enough to make Luke’s blood boil anew. Even in the middle of all of this, she had the ability to piss him off, even if just a bit. He sure as hell wasn’t getting back to this now; instead, Luke connected their lips in yet another kiss, placing her down on the mattress. He settled between her legs, while continuing to kiss down her body. His lips traveled over her skin, tongue slightly darting out to leave a wet pathway. Finally, he could explore all the ink on it, and one look up told Luke that Sawyer enjoyed it just as much. 

He hooked his fingers under the band of her bottoms, and Sawyer wasted no time to lift her hips to help him slide her off. Her lips fell open when, instead of coming fully back up, Luke settled at the feet of the mattress and started kissing up from her calf. Well, that was oddly familiar. She watched with glazed eyes, moaning softly every time he bit down on her skin or got awfully close to her core, just to back out again. While she rested on one of her elbows to be able to see Luke, the other hand sneaked into his messy hair. 

“Stop being a tease, Luke,” Sawyer huffed, pulling at the ends of the blond strands. He looked up, the blue eyes crashing into her brown ones. They were so much darker, but somehow still familiar; Sawyer realised he looked at her like this before – when they met up before prom and she wore a form fitting black dress, when they tried sneaking into a club and Sawyer made a point of wearing pants low enough to show off the stamp on her lower back. “Fuck,” she moaned, so lost in the realization that only the feeling of his fingers finally making contact woke her up. 

“You’re so fucking wet,” he groaned, spreading her open with his fingers. Sawyer bit her lips, waiting for him to finally do something more than just admire and tease. It was such a guy thing to do, but she decided to stay quiet for now, if only for the sake to finally find some release. 

Sparing one last look at her blushed face, Luke finally lowered his lips. Sawyer gasped, feeling his tongue exploring her, up and down, skimming over her clit. She waited for his movements to organize, to find the rhythm that she so desperately needed. It took him a second, but eventually, Luke concentrated on her most sensitive spot, circling it with his tongue and pressing it flat. When she almost gasped for him to do more, Luke teased at her entrance with one finger, slipping it inside painfully slowly. Just his finger was much bigger that what Sawyer was usually used to start with, but she took it like a champ, without a sound. Last thing she needed was for Luke to think of her as inexperienced. 

Besides, it only took a second to get used to the feeling. Under Luke’s actions, Sawyer turned into a mess, her legs bending at the knees and falling over his shoulders, pulling on his hair a bit stronger than necessary, back arching on the mattress. The last thing Luke expected was for Sawyer to be so vocal about her pleasure. 

They both seemed to have forgotten about their friends sitting by the pool, wondering where the blonde had disappeared, even though the sounds coming from Luke’s window were pretty telling. Ashton never expected for this to happen when he invited Sawyer over, but as long as his friends weren’t fighting, he couldn’t care less. Besides, everyone around Sawyer and Luke seemed to have suspected that there was something bound to happen between them. Some people didn’t believe in friendships between boys and girls, while others thought that when you get to know someone this well, you either start to love or hate them. Judging by the moans, these two fell under the first option. 

“Luke, I need more.” Sawyer pulled at his hair again, forcing him to speed up the movement of his tongue. Luke was becoming sloppier with every second, the taste of her arousal and the sounds getting into his head. He looked up, not understanding what she meant at first. Propping herself on shaky hands, Sawyer’s palm cradled his cheek, pulling him away from her clit. “Luke, please, can you finally fuck me?” she asked, her tone full of pretension. 

“Is Sawyer Ashwood going to beg?” Luke asked with a teasing smile, but obediently left the valley between her legs, kneeling on the mattress to kiss her neck yet again. 

“Fuck no,” she scoffed, Sawyer’s fingers finding the button of his jeans and undoing it together with the zipper. She started to pull the material down together with his boxers, her short nails scratching at his skin when the jeans got stuck. Noticing it, Luke helped her, pulling them low enough for his hard cock to spring free. “Oh my- Shit,” she cursed, seeing his length and girth. Blush immediately covered her cheeks at the thought of making him fit alone. The last time Sawyer was in bed with a guy, he was much smaller, and she did everything to forget the encounter afterward. 

“Wha-” Luke looked up, and seeing her red face and eye trained on his cock, he knew something was up. Anyone else would have taken it as pure awe, but he knew Sawyer well enough to know that she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing that his size was impressive. “Wait, is this your first time?” he asked, face paling. That would elevate the pressure drastically, because of all the people in the world, he wouldn't want Sawyer to have a bad first time. 

“What? No,” she breathed out, finally lifting her gaze to his shocked face. “But you are maybe the third guy to sleep with me? Feel blessed,” she added, shrugging it off. It wasn’t that big of a deal, and nothing could have been worse than her first time at some stupid party, when Sawyer decided to pull the first available blond guy into a free bedroom and strip him, both of them so drunk that it took him almost five minutes and three condoms to finally find her entrance.

“Do you have a condom?” She bit her lip. There was never a point for Sawyer to get on the pill, but now that she started sleeping with guys, maybe there were certain things to reconsider. 

Luke only nodded, stepping off the bed and almost tripping because of the jeans stuck at his knees. He kicked them off completely, before opening the night stand and pulling out a string of foil packets. He ripped one off with his teeth, opening it in the blink of an eye. The whole time, Sawyer watched his movements, studying the muscles on his stomach and everything happening below the waist, committing it to memory. The messy blond hair fell over his forehead, and all she wanted to do was snap a photo, finally having one of her own, one that no paparazzi could ever take. 

“How do you want me?” Once the condom was rolled on his cock, Luke joined her on the mattress again, finding Sawyer playing with her clit. He leaned down to her chest, taking a nipple between his teeth, eliciting another moan. Usually, he preferred his partners to stay quiet, but something about Sawyer showing off just how pleased she was made him even harder. 

“What does the chef recommend?” she asked, her voice hoarse from the moaning. Luke laughed, before laying down with his head on the pillow. His hand started stroking his cock, and he could see the fire that it ignited in Sawyer, if only by her lips parting open. 

“I want you to ride me,” he announced, reaching out to pull her closer. Sawyer straddled him obediently, sitting on his thighs. “Touch me, Ashwood,” he challenged, knowing that she wouldn’t back down from it. 

Although tentatively, Sawyer wrapped her hands around his cock and started stroking it, riding on his thigh, where her clit received the perfect amount of friction. Luke gave her a few moments to get used to his size, and when she sped up her movements, he gestured to take over. With one of his hands, he guided Sawyer’s hips up and made her sit closer, guiding the head to tease her entrance. 

She had been right in one thing – her appearances weren’t similar to the models Luke was used to sleeping with. They didn’t have tattoos or piercings in their noses, their breasts were small but at least stuck out a little bit, there were no razor bumps on their pubis and they knew how to handle a guy. But Sawyer’s rawness, all those things that she might have considered imperfections, were exactly what attracted him the worst. The blonde was real, as real as it gets; she didn’t have money to get lasers and dyed her hair at home, she wore basic cotton underwear and wasn’t a particular vixen. But Sawyer still had her confidence and didn’t care what he thought about all those little details. In the world of perfection and appearances that Luke’s routine had become, she reminded him that this was what life actually looked like, and what he actually wanted. 

“Should I go slow, or…?” He asked. Sawyer’s head was thrown back in pleasure, as he continued to slide his cock on her clit. His breath was getting laboured, because just watching the blonde as he ate her out before was enough to work him up. Luke knew he wouldn’t last long, but she also seemed close to the finish line. They could always go again – Luke would cancel all his plans just to prolong this moment of understanding between them. 

“Just go,” she cried out, biting her lip and looking down at Luke. She moved her hands from his thighs to his chest, letting her nails ram into his skin as he started pushing his cock in. Her mouth fell open, and soon, a moan escaped it. “Fuck, Luke, yes,” she gasped, slowly letting her hips drop, taking more and more of his length. 

“Sawyer, you take me so well,” Luke groaned, closing his eyes at the sensation of her tight pussy. Somehow, the realisation that he was one of the first guys to ever fuck her made him proud; a stupid, manly sensation that puffed his ego anyway. Luke grabbed her hips, helping Sawyer pace herself. Honestly, he was enjoying the slow start that allowed him to feel every inch she managed to take. “Shit, such a good girl…”

“Shut up,” she cut him off, not letting him get too creative with the nicknames. Once his whole cock was inside her, she took a second to get used to it. Sawyer had never felt so full before, even with a vibrator. 

Only after a minute, she started swaying her hips to the sides, her nails scratching Luke’s pecks. His hands helped to guide her, showing Sawyer how to move on top to pleasure both of them. She moved her hips in circles, lifting off the last few inches before falling back, each move deliberate. His tip touched the specific spot inside her every time, making both of them gasp.

With every second, she sped up her movements, making them more chaotic and sloppy. She quickly got tired of using her legs to lift her hips up and down, and soon, Luke had to help Sawyer up by lifting her himself. She was committed, and tried to last as long as possible. It was hard when the pleasure was attacking her from everywhere. 

Thankfully, Luke intervened, sitting up and driving his hips to fuck into her. Sawyer grabbed his neck and pulled him in for a kiss, moaning into his swollen lips. She could still taste herself on them, and somehow, it made her come even closer to the release. His moves got sloppier by seconds. Soon they were moaning, holding each other tightly. 

“Come for me, c’mon Sawyer,” Luke urged, kissing the corner of her mouth tenderly. 

“I can’t. I need-” she said, just when he drove his hips up with a bigger force than before, leaving her to whine. Sawyer’s head rested on Luke’s shoulder. 

“What do you need, baby?” Luke’s voice was tender. As his hips snapped up to fuck into Sawyer, he realised that even if it wasn’t her first time, he still wanted her to remember it fondly. Even before he came, Luke knew that he wanted this to happen again. He aimed to please, if only to etch himself into her memories, fuck her up so badly she wouldn’t be able to find the same pleasure anyway else. 

“Touch my clit,” she asked, and in no time, Luke’s finger was pressing against her sensitive spot, moving in circles. It took only a few more snaps of his hips to feel her thighs tremble, and hear her moaning his name. 

Even though Sawyer got her orgasm, Luke rode her through it, chasing his own release. Her body fell limp against him, but after two more sloppy moves, Luke spilled into the condom, his back falling spent against the headboard. 

“Fuck, you were incredible,” he mumbled, tired from the activity. Slowly, Sawyer raised her head from his shoulder, looking at him with a smile that could make a whole city light up. “You are incredible, Sawyer. And beautiful.” Luke leaned in, kissing her nose. He brushed through her tangled hair with his hand, taming it. 

Fuck, he had never been the one for the aftercare, but with her, all he wanted was to make sure she felt good and wouldn’t be sore the next day. 

“Thank you,” she chuckled. “We have to work on your head abilities, but…” Luke raised his brow. He hoped that they could be honest at least now, because well, this was quite a vulnerable situation. As if seeing his doubt, her expression softened. “Every time I was with a guy before, I wanted to forget about it right after, but I don’t want to forget this,” she admitted, blushing slightly. As if on cue, she started slowly lifting her hips to free herself of his cock. 

Sawyer slid off the mattress, finding her soaked panties on the floor. Typically, Luke would be the one to run from a conversation while she pushed for it, but maybe they exchanged roles. Maybe Sawyer was tired of being the bigger person, the mature one, who will prompt every conversation and motivate the solution to conflicts. For once, she didn’t want to put her heart on her sleeve for him and see the reaction it would trigger. 

“You can take a pair of my boxers, they’re in the wardrobe,” he proposed, seeing how she scanned her bottoms with doubt. Sawyer nodded, and approached the dresser door, soon finding a pair of black underwear. “So, I was good?” he asked teasingly. 

“Average,” she threw over her shoulder with a smirk, putting the boxers on. They were almost falling off her hips, but all she needed was to get downstairs, where her clothes waited on the washing machine in the bathroom. 

Sawyer found her bra on the floor, and came up to the bed, sitting down, and letting Luke tie it over her nape and back. 

“Friends don’t lie, Sawyer,” he reminded her with a scoff, but seeing her profile twist in doubt, Luke swallowed hard. “We’re friends, right?”

“I-” Sawyer stood up, looking at him with lost, brown eyes. 

She really wanted to say yes. Why throw away so many years of history because of one mistake? But a part of her couldn’t just lie to him, as if the second they weren’t done her mind hadn't drifted to the thought of Grace’s having him first. As if she could forget all those nights she needed to talk to someone and would dial his number again and again, just to end up with ten voice messages and even more doubts about her life than before. They had an idea of each other, but nothing else. Maybe she would be able to get to know him again, but Sawyer knew that it would take time to gain the old level of trust; even though it would break her heart, seeing how he looked at her with hope filling his eyes. 

She had Luke exactly where she wanted him, but somehow it wasn’t all as easy as she thought. It didn’t feel as good as she thought to deal the killing blow, even though Luke hurt her first. 

“I don’t know,” Sawyer admitted, coming up to the door. Maybe Luke needed a taste of his own medicine. “Call me when you figure your shit out, or if you want to do this again.” 

With that said, Sawyer left his bedroom, and Luke’s body slumped over the headboard. He followed her steps as long as he could, before closing his eyes and exhaling. 

Luke Hemmings knew two things:

First of all, in no universe would he have the space and mental capacity to figure his life out while sleeping with Sawyer Ashwood.

Second of all, Luke wouldn’t be able to let go of Sawyer now that he knew how it felt to have her.

[ao3feed-irondadspiderson]

hunger

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885 by paralleling He’s not sure how it slid out of place. Maybe it was the small earthquake last week. Maybe he slammed the drawer too hard the last time he closed it. Either way, the edge of the yellow cover glares up at him, freed from its usual hiding spot between the two pairs of jeans that he’d outgrown years ago. His hands move before his brain does, taking the corner of the journal and pulling it out from the drawer. Peter starts to flip through the pages, several dozen having been completely filled out with weekly weigh-ins, calorie counts, body measurements… The sinking feeling in his chest grew deeper with each page as he watched the dates fly by, until he hit the middle of the journal, where he’d abruptly stopped recording everything during his first semester of college and chaotic move-in to this apartment. Apparently it was nearly two years ago. A lot has changed in those two years. His mind is already picking apart the numbers in everything he’s eaten this week, and Peter is starting to think that he is not one of those things.   In which Peter Parker needs help, and Wade doesn't know how, but he'll try his damn best. Words: 10569, Chapters: 4/5, Language: English Fandoms: Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Not Rated Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Characters: Peter Parker, Wade Wilson, Tony Stark Relationships: Peter Parker & Wade Wilson, Peter Parker & Tony Stark Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Eating Disorders, Peter Parker is a College Student, peter parker is broke, the author is projecting, Fainting, Malnutrition, Peter Parker is Enhanced, Medical Inaccuracies, Fluff and Angst, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, No beta we die like my executive functioning, Mentioned Tony Stark, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, self destructive behavior, Descriptions of Weight Loss, ED Numbers TW!, Pre-Slash, unless 😳 read it on AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885

[hale-13]

Scare Tactics

By Hale13

For the Summer of Whump Day 19 Prompt - Fear

“And just to show you we mean business…” Peter flinched when his index finger was grabbed and sharply snapped in half, leaving him breathless. He didn’t scream though. He wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction. “Tough kid,” the leader mused, petting Peter on the head. “I’m going to let my men work him over,” he said to the camera lightly. “You pay me within the next four hours and I won’t start cutting off things he’ll miss. Sure would be a shame… he’s got his whole life ahead of him you know.”

Words: 2407, Chapters: 1/1 (Complete), Language: English

Fandoms: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)

Rating: Gen

Relationships: Peter Parker & May Parker, Peter Parker & Tony Stark

Character: Peter Parker, May Parker, Tony Stark, Happy Hogan

TW: Canon Typical Violence, Kidnapping, Implied/Referenced Torture

Read on AO3 or below the line break.

“One more hour! C’mon, just one more hour please,” Peter begged, hands twitching and sweating as he looked around frantically. He could do it. He just had to do it.

“Whatcha doing Pete?” Tony asked right in his ear causing Peter to let out a high pitched scream and rip the VR headset off his head, nearly tossing it into the wall and only barely catching himself at the last second.

“What the fuck!” He exclaimed, panting and placing a hand over his racing heart – it was galloping under his fingertips. Tony, standing next to him with his hand extend like he was reaching out to touch Peter, had his face pinched up like he was trying not to laugh and failing spectacularly.

“What was that?” The man questioned, pulling the headset from Peter’s twitching fingers to set it down on the bed and safely out of reach lest Peter almost throw it again. “You okay?”

“You scared the shit out of me!” Peter told his mentor dramatically as his heart rate slowed to a more manageable rhythm. Damn he was so close to winning!

Tony quirked an eyebrow. “Thought you had a tingle or something,” he said with a teasing tone and that was it, Peter was never letting Tony and May have lunch together again. Tingle… seriously? “What were you doing anyway?” Tony asked, picking the headset back up and turning it around curiously in dexterous fingers.

“Playing FNAF,” Peter said with a shrug. “I had nearly won too!”

“Beg pardon?” Tony asked with a head tilt. “Did you just have a stroke? I don’t speak teenager.”

“It’s a game Mr. Stark,” Peter grumbled, grabbing the headset back to turn it off. “A horror game. You’re a security guard and you have to live through the night without a bunch of animatronic animals killing you.”

“Sounds exhausting,” Tony commented, passing Peter his untouched book bag – he was supposed to be doing homework while Mr. Stark was in a meeting but oh well. He could always do it later, it was the weekend after all. “Happy’s pulling the car around. You sure you don’t want to stay? It’s getting a bit late.”

“I’m good,” Peter insisted, throwing the bag over his back and tightening the straps a little to sit more comfortably. “Besides, May and I are supposed to marathon the new season of Lucifer tonight.”

“Ah yes,” Tony said with a smile. “Do tell aunt hottie I said hello would you? I’m looking forward to our monthly co-parenting coffee date next week – can’t wait to tell her about this!”

Peter groaned and blushed. “Please don’t,” he muttered, skirting around his mentor to get to the door. “See you next week?” He asked as he paused in the doorway, turning back to look at the man and smiling.

“Yeah I’ll see you next week kiddo. Don’t have too much fun this weekend!”

“Bye Mr. Stark!” Peter called as he raced to the elevator, bouncing impatiently on his toes as it descended to the garage where Happy was waiting in one of the many black town cars Stark Industries owned.

“Took you long enough,” he groused good naturedly as Peter hopped into the back, dropping his book bag into the foot well and buckling his seatbelt with a bright ‘hey Happy!�� before pulling out his battered copy of The Collected Works of Shakespeare. He was supposed to finish MacBeth before class on Monday morning and he had been putting it off for a while (re: the last two weeks). Thank god for SparkNotes!

He read in the peaceful silence of the car as Happy navigated the busy Manhattan roads into the more quiet streets of Queens, finally pulling to a stop in front of Peter’s building and unlocking the doors. “See you Monday kid,” he called as Peter jumped out of the car.

“Thanks for the ride Happy!” Peter answered as he shut the door and waved the car off before letting out a sigh. It had been a long week and he was looking forward to just hanging out with May and decompressing. He felt like he barely saw her these days since she moved to working nights – it had been way too long since their last Netflix binge sesh. Peter took the stairs two at a time, forgoing the ancient and slow elevator, and was soon standing outside his door, fumbling for his keys.

As he went to slip the correct key into the lock, Peter felt every hair on his body stand on end as a shiver tore through him. He paused and looked up and down his hallway. Everything was quiet and peaceful, nothing out of place, so why was his Spidey sense tingling? With a gulp, Peter looked at his door and felt his heart freeze in his chest. May!

Peter swiftly unlocked the door and threw it open only to pause just over the threshold.

May was seated in one of their kitchen chairs, pulled into eye line of the door to the apartment, and looking pale but utterly pissed as the masked man behind her jammed the muzzle of his gun further into her temple. Peter, his heart nearly beating out of his chest and his adrenaline spiking to leave a metallic taste in his mouth, held his hands up immediately in surrender. As if it would ever be a question with May involved.

“Close the door,” the man said firmly, jutting his chin and Peter felt it snap closed behind him, paying no mind to the other invaders that were scattered around the room, his eyes stuck only on May.

“What do you want?” He asked, surprised that his voice was steady – he could tell that his body was still and sure but inside he felt like he was about to shake apart; like he was standing in the epicenter of an earthquake.

“Your cooperation mostly,” the man with the gun answered, passing the weapon off to one of his underlings and approaching where Peter stood motionless, hands still raised, just inside the door. His eyes were a pale blue and they scraped over Peter’s form quickly before he held out his hand. “Phone, watch, bag. Give me anything that Stark might have chipped and don’t try anything funny. I’d hate for anything… untoward to happen to your Aunt.”

“Okay,” Peter agreed, slowly pulling his bag off his shoulders and letting it drop to the floor with a thump. One of the men behind him picked it up and started riffling through it as Peter unlatched his watch and passed it over along with his phone. He was grateful that he hadn’t brought his suit with him to school today or he’d have a much bigger problem – assuming they didn’t already know he was Spider-Man of course.

“Search him,” the man called out as he dropped Peter’s phone and watch to the floor before pointedly stomping on them until they broke. Peter fought to hold still as he was patted down, making eye contact with May. She gave a minute shake of her head and Peter bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood. He knew she didn’t want him to compromise his identity for her but he would do whatever he could to keep her safe – Spider-Man be damned.

“He’s clean,” one of the goons called out, nudging Peter forward and forcing him to sit down opposite May.

“Peter Parker,” the leader mused, walking over until he took up all of Peter’s sight leaving May out of view and ratcheting Peter’s already frantic heart rate up more. “Tony Stark’s personal intern. How does one get that job eh?” He looked at Peter expectantly and Peter grit his teeth together.

“Right place right time,” Peter grunted, his eye contact never wavering. The leader frowned behind his mask and smacked Peter sharply, causing his head to whip to the side. It was more surprising than painful and Peter glared back in obvious loathing.

“That will be your only warning,” the leader grunted, leaning down so he was eye level with Peter. “Next time it’ll be your aunt. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal,” Peter confirmed, gripping the arms of his chair tightly and trying to control his strength. By his count there were five men in their apartment. If he were alone or in the suit it wouldn’t be a problem but with May involved…

“Now let’s try again,” the man continued, pacing a circle around Peter’s chair like a shark circling prey and thus giving him the briefest chance to make eye contact with May again. The skin of her forehead was red and dented where the gun mashed into her face. But he eyes were full of fear and anger for Peter – her sight was locked on the cheek he could feel burning and already swelling. “How did you get your internship?”

“September Foundation,” Peter answered. “I submitted some of my work on clean energy and Mr. Stark was impressed enough to offer me the internship.”

The man hummed, stopping his circling and placed both hands on Peter’s shoulders, squeezing them. “But it’s not just an internship anymore now is it?” He questioned, tone light. “I doubt any normal intern gets access to Stark’s personal lab or stays overnight. For a while I thought you might be his bastard but, no, it doesn’t seem you are.” Peter tensed at the words and bit down hard on the inside of his cheek, tasting blood. “However you are important enough for him to pay handsomely for I’d wager.”

“He won’t,” Peter insisted, not breaking eye contact with May – she looked terrified now and he wasn’t sure who she was scared for most. “He doesn’t negotiate with kidnappers.”

“We’ll see,” the man said lightly, unconcerned. “Here’s the deal Parker. You’re going to come with us, quietly, and I won’t put a bullet through your aunt’s skull. I hear that you watched your uncle bleed out from something similar – wouldn’t want another death on your conscience now would you?” Peter flinched violently, unable to hold it back and felt tears prick at his eyes. He couldn’t cry now. Not in front of these assholes. “You’re going to come with us and, once we get you back to base, I’ll call in the order to let your aunt go. If they don’t hear from me within the next six hours… well I’m sure you can figure it out.”

Peter nodded slowly and tried to silently apologize to May – she was watching him with tears now cascading down her cheeks and shaking her head, begging him not to give in. “I’ll do whatever you want,” Peter agreed, sealing his fate.

His Spidey-sense screamed at him and he forced himself to hold still as the gun clocked him across the temple, knocking him out instantly.

—————————————

When Peter finally woke up some indeterminate amount of time later it was to a throbbing head and aching neck from sitting slumped over and tied to the most uncomfortable chair he had ever had the displeasure of sitting in. He opened his eyes with a groan to look around the room. It was darkened, of course because why wouldn’t it be, and empty, also not a surprise. The door in front of him was made of a dark metal the same as the chair he was sitting in which was bolted to the floor.

He tested the cuffs that were binding his wrists to each arm of the chair and found that they weren’t reinforced and should break easily with his strength. So they didn’t know he was Spider-Man then – that was a plus. Peter could work with that.

Before he could look around much more or even try to formulate a plan, the door in front of him flew open to admit multiple people, all in masks, and a camera set up that had Peter’s blood running cold.

“I have to thank you for your cooperation,” the man from earlier said gaily as he entered the room last. “You made this much easier than anticipated.”

“My aunt?” Peter asked, voice wobbling a little but his eye contact unwavering.

“Fine. As we agreed,” the man confirmed, kneeling down a little to look directly into Peter’s eyes. “Now we’re going to make Stark a little video, a one-sided video chat if you will, to ask him for a little… monetary gift. All you have to do is sit here and look pretty while we do all the work okay?” He said condescendingly, running a hand through Peter’s hair before patting his cheek mockingly.

It took all of Peter’s willpower not to head butt him directly in the nose.

The set up was done fairly quickly, the camera pointed directly at Peter and the red light blinking. His captor came to stand right behind him, hands resting on Peter’s shoulders again.

“Oh looks like he’s tuned it! Hello Stark, I think I found something that belongs to you,” the leader said, squeezing Peter’s shoulders. “You shouldn’t just leave your things lying around you know. Don’t want them to get displaced.” Peter grit his teeth in irritation and humiliation – he couldn’t believe he had let himself get kidnapped – that he had put Mr. Stark in this position! “Anyway,” he continued lightly, “I have a little request. A trade if you will. I’ll give you back your intern and you give me twenty million dollars and a clean way out of the country. Shouldn’t be too hard for you right?”

Don’t do it Peter tapped out on the arm of the chair in hasty Morse code. Don’t give them anything. I’ve got this Peter tried to say with his eyes. Trust me.

“And just to show you we mean business…” Peter flinched when his index finger was grabbed and sharply snapped in half, leaving him breathless. He didn’t scream though. He wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction. “Tough kid,” the leader mused, petting Peter on the head. “I’m going to let my men work him over,” he said to the camera lightly. “You pay me within the next four hours and I won’t start cutting off things he’ll miss. Sure would be a shame… he’s got his whole life ahead of him you know.”

Later, his jaw hanging loose and his body aching with breaks and bruises, Peter will let a single tear fall.

The door knob turns and his adrenaline spikes.

[nimata-beroya]

I don't know where October went. Seriously, it went so fast! And even when I didn't post every day (especially the last 2 weeks), I'm satisfied with what I did. I had a long time without writing so much in so little time. It felt very nice going back to my old habits and get my creativity flowing.

This was my first time doing @whumptober2021 and I had a blast fulfilling the prompts. Can you tell I love hurting my fave characters?😏😈 I'll do it again for sure (I'm looking at you, February 😆) I might fulfill the prompts I missed in the meantime.

Whether I keep that promise or not, you can enjoy these few I already wrote

An Explosive Situation [Prompt N° 1: Bound]

SW Rebels/Kalluzeb ~ m/m ~ Teen+ ~ TW minor injuries, referenced torture ~ 1897 words

After a solo mission to the planet Dela goes south, Kallus finds himself in a tight spot. The Spectres go to his rescue but the actual saving turns out more complicated than expected.

Tomorrow Is A Good Day For Someone Else to Die [Prompt N° 2: Insults, "Who did this to you?"]

The Bad Batch ~ General ~ Teen+ ~ TW bullying, blood, minor injuries ~ 1152 words

The life of Crosshair and Tech in Kamino as cadets has never been easy.

Seeing Red [Alt prompt: Head injury]

The Bad Batch ~ General ~ Teen+ ~ TW Blood, major character injury, canon-typical violence ~ 1097 words

The Bad Batch goes on their first mission to the battlefront. Things take a sudden turn south.

We Don't Leave Our Own Behind [Prompt N° 11: Dehydration]

The Bad Batch ~ General ~ Teen + ~ TW abandonment, dehydration ~ 1469 words

Hunter respects Crosshair's choice not to join the batch again even if it's a karking ass-stupid decision. And yet, love, loyalty, and a tad of guilt —okay, okay… a lot of guilt— don't let him make the same mistake he did before, abandoning his brother.

•

Or the one where the batch goes back for Crosshair after leaving him stranded on the landing platform in Kamino.

Help, I'm Alive [Prompts N° 14 & 31: Crush injuries, disaster zone]

SW Rebels ~ General ~ Teen+ ~ TW serious injuries, major character injuries, buried under debris, earthquake ~ words

Ezra had imagined many times that he’d die in the heat of a battle against the Empire; he’s had several close calls already. But never in his wildest dreams, he foresaw that his death would come when a temple fell on top of him

3 Long Days [Prompts N° 10 & 15: Ice Chips, Delirium]

The Clone Wars ~ General ~ Teen+ ~ TW delirium, anaphylaxis ~ 1573 words

When Ahsoka falls ill, Anakin doesn't leave her side.

More from Star Wars X-tober Extravaganza

Kink • Fluff • Angst

[sunnygang]

analysing the sep 24 wigfrid animated short (don’t starve)

I am rewatching some Don’t Starve animations and catching up on some i hadn’t seen yet. I am watching the Wigfrid animation tonight for the first time (the sep 24 one). I am a few months late, whoops!

I will be putting this analysis under a cut, since I will be pairing a lot of screen caps from the short itself! Also this turned out WAY longer than I originally intended it to. There’s a tw for incest mention in one paragraph (about a stage play that is relevant, NOT about Wigfrid) and I put the warning surrounded in asterisks and bolded before the paragraph referenced!

The short opens with a shot from what is safe to assume is her front hallway. Wigfrid is an actress and she appears to live alone in a nice home.

The walls are of course covered in her various photographs and stage play memoriam. Over the mantle on the left the framed poster reads  Die Walküre (The Valkyrie). Keep this in mind as this is Wigfrid’s best role. Also peep that nice chaise lounge she’s sitting on!

Some national culture, we get to see the newspaper she is reading. This paper is The Kronicle. The real life Chronicle newspaper, upon searching it, returned a good number of results. I am going to say that this particular article is the Ohio Chronicle (founded by the Lorain Printing and Publishing Co which was founded in 1829, the paper itself may or may not have been founded that same year), and I will get into why later.

The front page features the Tragedy in San Francisco. The tragedy of Maxwell and Charlie! The article header specifically reading “Tragedy in San Francisco! Many Still Missing After Devastating Earthquake!” This is around the same date, it has to be within a matter of days for this short to take place from the date of the Charlie and Maxwell disappearance in San Francisco. We don’t get to see Wigfrid reading this article, however. This is merely set there for the viewer’s sake. This is helping form our timeline of when these events all occurred. Many still missing. That means the search continues. This article could have been published a few days after the mentioned earthquake or a week even. Still, it gives us somewhat of a timeline to reference. The earthquake and the events of this Wigfrid short happened in relatively short time from one another.

This newspaper article header reads “Is It Curtains for This Prima Donna? Former Rising Star Seems Unable to Recapture The Magic of Her Precious Role”

Wigfrid isn’t shown reading the front article because she is focused on the news centered around herself. She’s called a prima donna here in this headline. Being called a Prima Donna can mean a number of things. It can mean a principle female singer in an opera or concert organization OR someone who is vain/undisciplined and finds it difficult to work as a team. She doesn’t have any quotes in DST that would indicate Wigfrid doesn’t work well with others. She mostly greets the other players warmly and hopes for good blessings from Yggdrasil, etc.

I think the journalists who wrote the article were looking to have this kind of double idea happening. The term Prima Donna comes directly from Italian for the types of female leads to the definitive aspect of the term. However around the same time (19th cent) it came to mean the second definition as well. Those writing the article likely wrote it with both aspects in mind. This gives Wigfrid her personal reason for wanting to ask Maxwell for help in some way. This is her drive. She is obviously a talented lead opera lady given the decorations and extravagant nature of her home. But this article says she is unable to recapture the magic of her previous role. The role in question looks to be very different from the Wigfrid Valkyrie we know. Her best role may be her Valkyrie role and maybe when she’s trying to branch into something else it isn’t working. And the critics and journalists think it isn’t good for her. She was a powerful Valkyrie, but not whatever this role happened to be.

We get to see her finishing reading the article (or maybe this short interrupts her just barely skimming it) and angrily crumple and toss the paper to the floor. She turns her nose up at it and dramatically walks to a bookshelf in the room and pulls out this record:

Die Walküre. This is the recorded orchestral arrangement for the stage play Die Walküre. In the bottom right of the record sleeve is the names of who I believe to be the composers for the recorded version of the orchestral arrangement. Vincenzo De Vera and Emmental Halle. Wigfrid’’s. Best. Role. The role with such “magic” that she has been since “unable to recapture.”

**incest mention in this next paragraph in the contexts of norse mythology and the real life stage play of The Valkyrie, not Wigfrid herself**

Interestingly enough, Die Walküre is a very real stage play. It is based on Norse Mythology about two twins who are separated in childhood and then eventually meet and fall in love (yikes!). This union angers the gods and they demand Siegmund die. Sieglinde and their unborn child are saved by the defiant actions of Wotan’s daughter, The Valkyrie. Valkyrie Brunnehilde faces the god’s retribution as a result of her actions.

More Valkyrie content hidden away in her shelves. She adored her role as The Valkyrie. Her house is, as we have seen, filled with memoriam from that stage play.

She plays the record and walks over to her wall and looks at her poster of herself as the Valkyrie. The newspaper clipping on the left reads “Audiences Left Spellbound by Soprano’s Powerful Performance.” Wigfrid is a GREAT performer and she is a soprano! She even has a little statue/sculpture of herself as The Valkyrie.

Here’s where I am going to go a little more into the Prima Donna bit. Wigfrid was the lead female for Die Walküre so she is a Prima Donna in that sense. however, she is also vain. She has surrounded herself with HERSELF. All over the walls in her home. Posters and pictures and photographs and SCULPTURES? You Prima Donna girl you, Wigfrid!

Her ceiling is even intricately decorated with scenes from Die Walküre.

And then we get here. We enter Wigfrid’s fantasy about performing as The Valkyrie who has to face a challenge. This challenge being a dragon that forms from this stack of newspaper pages. More entertainment pages that discuss Wigfrid’s stardom reaching an end.

Wigfrid’s real name is scratched out. So we know for certain that Wigfrid is NOT her real name. We can still call her real name whatever we please until we get more solid evidence surrounding her name. Wigfrid is probably Die Valküre’s name in the stage play that Wigfrid acted in. In The Constant it’s safe to assume that the character she takes on in the world happens to be this character, Wigfrid. At this point it raises some question as to whether or not Wigfrid is treating The Constant like a stage. Where she gets to really perform the role of The Valkyrie.

Back to the newspaper taking the form of a dragon, though. The papers are her enemy. The journalists writing about her in such awful ways literally conjure up as her enemy, a dragon, to vanquish. This reveals how she feels about the way others speak about her. Especially when they are critiquing her so harshly with claiming she is a fading star unable to capture her magic.

Wigfrid is thrust into the air by the dragon and she seems lost for a moment before she regains her composure and strikes down the dragon. These are the feelings she is expressing through her singing accompaniment with the arrangement playing on her record player. And Maxwell notices this.

Maxwell appears before Wigfrid through the newspaper. This intrigues me because we know that Them (the Shadow Creatures of the Constant) are capable of reaching into the real world from pages. Thinking back to Maxwell’s Codex Umbra where he first discovered Them and became Maxwell instead of William. Maxwell (or probably rather, They) reaches through these pages to communicate with Wigfrid and have her make a deal. The deal to regain her former glory.

Whisked away with this Shadow Maxwell form by the Shadows from the pages. And with that Wigfrid joins the missing group, taken to The Constant.

And then theres these shots in succession:

All that mail piled up. How long has it been since Wigfrid has disappeared. I think we can assume that some of the mail in her box might be fan mail. SHe has packages on her front step (in front of double doors for her entrance wowie!). I spy at least three packages there piled up with all the assorted mail she otherwise has accumulated while missing. I also spy at least four newspapers. It’s hard to say whether these newspapers are Morning Dailies, Afternoon Dailies, or Weeklies. And then we get the final, fifth newspaper copy tossed on top of the stack that labels Wigfrid as someone who is also now missing. This is an important newspaper because this paper is a DAILY newspaper.

The Kourier paper is likely a mirror to the IRL newspaper in Findlay, Ohio. This paper puts out a copy DAILY. I am going to assume that the first newspaper we see Wigfrid read is a weekly newspaper. It covers more national events such as the San Francisco tragedy. This final newspaper is a daily newspaper. This helps the timeline. Wigfrid has likely been missing for only five days at this point. At most it could have been a week, pushing it to of course seven days. Maybe one of the other papers in the could be another Kronicle copy, which I am deeming the weekly style paper. In my hunt for information about the IRL version of this paper in our real Ohio, I struggled to find specifics online whether this paper published weekly or daily. I do know for certain that tthe IRL Courier is put into circulation daily.

OKAY! Next I want to discuss the colors used in this short. Ignoring the fully colored bit in the center while Wigfrid fantasizes about performing for a moment.

In the beginning of the short we have warm colors. These colors can both reflect Wigfrid’s mood and also the time of day. Wigfrid is angry about the way she is being talked about in the newspaper articles. She is silhouetted by orange-red. It could also be the evening. Adding a little to what I stated just a bove about the newspapers, I think The Kronicle is a paper that is delivered in the afternoon. I personally deem this accurate because in this scene Wigfrid of course is just now reading this article (or rather just barely skimming it over for the first time). Judging by her reaction which I’ve detailed above. She isn’t reading it over again and having an already bummed reaction, One of her eyebrows is raised while she looks over the article before throwing it down. Thus, it was her first moment seeing the article along with us.

We see her anger melting into a kind of sadness, or forlorn feelings even when she first puts on her record. She is still angry of course, but she’s feeling a lot of emotions, as we do, at this point in time.

At the end of the short we have cold colors. At this point, Wigfrid has gone through her fantasy of performing The Valkyrie. She is feeling solemn about it all now though. What if the papers are true? What if I am losing my magic for my roles? I think it’s also into the night or even possibly into the morning. It’s either the shine of the moon coming in from the windows, or early morning blue hours peeking in. I don’t want to say that she spent the whole night fantasizing and performing for herself (The Valkyrie is not an 8 hour performance). BUT. When we get to see the scene where the last newspaper is delivered to her doorstep, it is again in the blue lighting. The Kourier newspaper delivered onto her stack of mail. The Kourier is a morning delivery vs The Kronicle being an afternoon delivery.

ALSO. Remember my post about Winona? WELL she was ALSO located in Ohio pre being dragged into The Constant. So far we have two characters safely concretely placed IN Ohio at the time of their disappearance. Obviously, The Shadow Creatures do not discriminate since Wes was likely trapped way back during the train derailment with William, and of course Charlie and Maxwell/William himself were taken from San Francisco.

Okay. That’s all I have time for this time around of over analyzing don’t starve content. I am glad I got into the imagery and symbolism this time around. I also went WAY in depth in this one. I plan on going in way depth on the other animated character shorts, so stay tuned!

[comfy-whumpee]

Return 3

[Read in order. TW for nausea/referenced vomiting. @whumptober2019 day 12: "Don’t move.”]

When the van stopped, Ty breathed a sigh of relief. He could get inside now, get to his new bathroom, clean himself off and get to work.

The man opened the doors and Ty stood, waiting for permission to step out. His chest was tight at the thought of walking barefoot again, but he could bear it. Relief would be soon.

In the street lights, the man’s face was in shadow, but his voice was clear. “Get in the case.”

Ty’s heart stopped. The what?

He followed the man’s pointing finger to see, back against the opposite side of the van, an extra-large travel bag, the kind with wheels and a handle for dragging along – luggage.

Ty’s breathing came in sharp enough to hurt his chest and he had to, he had to say, “Please, sir, I’m not going to run.”

“Shut up and get in.”

He didn’t, he couldn’t, it would be – so small, so – so close with all the stuff on his feet – he’d bleed on it, he’d get it dirty, “Please, sir, please, you don’t have to—”

The man stepped into the van, and Ty backed up, hit the back of the seats, and dropped to his knees. “Sorry,” he gasped, “sorry.”

“Head up.”

He raised his head, raised his eyes to the man standing over him. He saw the blow coming and he didn’t resist.

The open-handed slap send a rush of pain over his face from left to right, and he clenched his fists against the floor to stop himself toppling. His cheek throbbed to the time of the blood pounding loud in his ear, but he was used to that. It wasn’t a cane, it was a hand. He wasn’t too dirty to be touched, not yet.

“I’m sorry, sir,” he whispered.

“In the case.”

He pulled open the flap and crawled inside. Or he tried to; he came up against the back, against the wall on its other side, before he could get halfway in. He turned, trying to fit his uncooperative limbs into the small space. He brought his knees up to his chest, crammed his arms between them, wincing at how his ribs were crushed, and pressed his head down last of all.

The man didn’t speak, didn’t praise or even acknowledge, before crouching down and doing up the zip. The meagre light vanished. Ty was glad for the rigid frame of the case, pressing back on him to help him stay in the shape that was needed of him.

Once the zip was done, he heard the faint but unmistakable click of a small padlock.

It was small. It was – it was really small. Ty yelped as the case tilted, he fell back against the bars on his right, and heard the wheels. Of course. He was – he was being transported. Luggage. Property.

“Quiet,” the man hissed. In the dark, Ty pressed his hands over his mouth and nodded, even though nobody could see him.

“Don’t move,” came the next order, and Ty stopped himself nodding again.

The bump from van to ground was hard, and it knocked the breath from him, but he had to let it out slowly from between his fingers and he had to be still and he had to be silent, completely silent, and he had to be good. Even though his foot was still bleeding and his ribs felt like they were digging into his organs and it was hot and he was starting to sweat and he wanted to cry, he couldn’t do any of that.

The case dragged over ground with a rattle that felt like it was drilling into Ty’s head, and it was all he could do to try and breathe through the panic. He wanted to thrash, he wanted to push and press against the confines of the case, he wanted desperately to breathe normal air again, but he couldn’t. This man was one of the slavers, he had the drug. Ty didn’t want to be drugged again.

Go empty, he begged his own overwrought brain. Hollow, like you were before, when everything was easy.

Voices and movement and Ty kept quiet and small and still until he felt himself being lifted. He tensed, but he couldn’t – he was set down again, and oh, it was even tighter now, things pressing up against the sides of his case.

He couldn’t breathe. There wasn’t air anymore. The darkness made him feel like his skin was shrinking and he was – he was going to get crushed, he knew it, his ribs were flattening out. He was being disposed of.

A massive rumble startled him into a hitched, wheezing breath, and he locked his hands over his mouth again, fingers digging his skin against his teeth, going utterly still. No more breathing until he could be trusted to be silent.

The rumbling was an engine, he realised, but it felt like an earthquake. When the motion started, and the things around him shifted, it was like the world turned upside down. Oh god, he was in another vehicle. And this time, in a ball in the boot or the luggage compartment or something, he couldn’t breathe, and he felt sick, so sick so soon with the turns and the walls pressing in against his case and the way everything slid slightly with each turn, he was a tiny boat tossed over the waves on a wild, pitch black sea.

He couldn’t breathe deeply enough to fight down the nausea. It roiled and rose with every shift, and he begged the engine to stop and silence but it didn’t, it wouldn’t, not until he was where he had to be. He wondered suddenly if there were people around him, other people in other cases, but that only made it more important that he was quiet and good and didn’t throw up. Nobody else had thrown up, he would have heard, it wouldn’t be quiet.

His head was spinning faster than the motion of the – the bus, coach, or something? He was lost. His breath came in little shallow gasps, unable to relieve him of the panic that was buzzing in his head. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t speak, he couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t, and he absolutely had to not be sick, in the space, with his own vomit, trapped with it, revolting. Nothing, he couldn’t do anything, he had to stop existing to be safe.

When he felt himself passing out, it was almost a relief.

[sparklyjojos]

Joker recaps [3/3]

[tw: mentioned csa, suicide, obvious-murder-case-related-deaths, questionable treatment of the trans character]

----

Before Ryuuguu reveals his solution to the case, he asks Kirika to explain the locked rooms first.

First, the Stage of Light surrounded by snow. While everyone assumed it’d been the murder scene, the Artist actually killed Ryousho and Fuumonji somewhere else, and later flung an axe and some frozen blood to the Scene from one of the towers. The ice was melted once the reflected sunlight hit the Stage of Light, and the blood with anticoagulants would flow around like it was fresh.

Second, how the Locked Room was filled with water. The murderer must have created a thin wall made of ice that separated the majority of the room from the part near the door, filled the bigger part with water, closed the door, and simply waited until the ice melted.

Ryuuguu interrupts Kirika as he wants to talk about who the Artist is before revealing the last few locked rooms (although he still has no clue about the head in a helmet).

The key to the case is a certain theme that showed up each time a body of a writer was discovered.

Flowing blood. A mandarin orange. The yellow Room of Judgment. A weeping fig. Water. An indigo carpet. Amethysts.

Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. The colors of the rainbow.

Like the rainbow, niji, contained in Nijikawa’s name.

Nijikawa killed seven other writers and himself, resulting in eight sacrifices. Even if his room was guarded, he could’ve just employ a simple psychological trick (a G.K. Chesterton trick, as Ryuuguu calls it), casually walked out, and the exhausted police officers would just think they hallucinated it, or fell asleep for a second and only dreamed about it.

What pushed Nijikawa Ryou to murder? It’s too late to discover the truth. The answer will forever remain in the shadows.

The curtain has fallen.

Everything ended.

--

--

The curtain was brought up once more.

--

“It was a magnificent case, Mr. Ryuuguu,” says someone from the dining hall’s entrance, and it’s only now that everyone notices the two men standing there. One is Tsukumo Juku, his long hair and sunglasses instantly recognizable, and the other is his assistant Hikimiya Yuuya.

Kirika asks just how long the two have been standing there listening.

“Since about five pages ago,” Juku answers.

“You’re going to investigate too?” a police officer asks him.

“Forgive me, but I cannot do that… since I’ve already solved this case.”

Juku then takes Nemu along and leaves for a few minutes to check a few places in Geneijo, and Hikimiya takes a moment in the library to count something in Dakushoin’s manuscript, but soon everyone gathers in the dining hall again.

Juku finally announces the Artist’s name: Satou Ichirou. One of the police officers thought to be dead in the case. Juku doesn’t explains anything just yet, instead saying that he’ll continue his reasoning after the meal.

Once the meal is done, Juku says Satou Ichirou was NOT the Artist, and while Juku’s very sorry to tarnish the name of the dead like that, he had to say it so he could observe everyone’s reactions to the news during the meal. This allowed him to make sure of the murderer’s identity.

The Artist isn’t any police officer, or any Geneijo employee, or detective, or Tae. It is someone already dead.

But before the reveal, Juku tells them that there was something that everyone missed. If you transcribe the first kanji of every murdered writer’s real name and put them in order of their deaths, you’ll get:

Ka-rei-naru-(h)o-tsura-kuno-tame-ni. “For the Great Downfall”. There should be a ‘bo’ instead of ‘ho’, but that was exactly what the symbolic dakuten was for.

As for who is the Artist... Nijikawa was unlikely to do a rainbow-themed crime, as he was likely colorblind, just like his daughter Megumi. The latter fact was easy to guess: just like it was noted in Dakushoin’s manuscript, Megumi looked at Wasserman’s innocent painting of a castle and saw a monster. Wasserman seems to have put a few secrets in his paintings that could be noticed only by a colorblind person like him… and anyone who would just happen to be always wearing sunglasses.

Juku shows everyone a suicide note signed by Nijikawa that was found in Tae’s room. The writer of the note shortly describes the crimes, claims that he wanted to poison either Miyama or Dakushoin but it went wrong, and that he didn’t kill Megumi. He wasn’t trying to fulfill the 30 elements at all. He recalls the event from when he was a child and his father, a mystery writer, murdered his wife in a drunken rage before his son’s eyes, and later fell from the stairs and died while attempting to chase the terrified child. Since then Nijikawa believed the mystery novelists were monsters desensitized to human death. He decided to infiltrate the ranks of mystery novelists and enact revenge. But soon he realized that he turned into his own father, and so chose eternal slumber.

But if we assume this note was really written by Nijikawa, then it shouldn’t be found in Tae’s room.

Everyone gathered is losing their patience a little, so Juku announces the name of the Artist:

Miyama Kaoru.

--

The note found in Miyama’s pocket said “boku mou TAErarenai”, but as far as Juku knows from reading the manuscript, Miyama only ever used the pronoun watashi. So even if it was written by Miyama, it wasn’t Miyama’s suicide note, but a fake one that she intended to put next to Nijikawa’s body.

Miyama’s death wasn’t suicide, but neither was it a murder. At the time of her death at 3 am, Miyama happened to be in the middle of arranging a scene of Nijikawa’s “suicide” for later, standing on a chair and tying a noose. She couldn’t have predicted that a sudden earthquake would make her lose balance in the most unfortunate way possible.

But before she died, Miyama still managed to arrange Dakushoin’s death: she put a thick sheet of ice on top of two taller statues, towels on top of that, and Dakushoin drugged with sleeping pills on top of that. The ice eventually melted, making Dakushoin fall and get impaled on another statue.

Nijikawa’s death, on the other hand, was simply suicide.

Megumi’s death was accidental. She slip and fell after being startled by… something (Juku carefully doesn’t elaborate, but Ryuuguu suspects that the ‘something’ may have been Shouri knocking on the door, and Juku doesn’t want the boy to blame himself.) She hit her head on the floor, and the impact made the flower pot fall off the shelf and hit her again. Since she broke her left wrist falling, she had to use her right hand to write the message.

As for that upside-down painting of Mother Mary, Miyama as a Christian just couldn’t help but make it look proper.

Since Miyama was good enough in baseball pitching to teach it to Shouri, it would also make her able to accurately fling the axe and frozen blood to the Light Stage.

Dakushoin brought attention to facts like that in his manuscript, almost like he knew and desperately wanted someone else to realize the truth. In fact, there was a random poem inserted after the scene of finding Megumi’s body, and the first syllables of each line made the sentence “ko-no-ka-ba-tsu-ha-shin-ji-tsuwo-tsu-ta-e-te-i-ru...”, “this Kabatsu [a shortened name of the manuscript] is conveying the truth”. Similarly, reading the names of each big chapter of the sadly unfinished manuscript revealed a message: “Han-nin-no-na-ma-e-ha” (“the name of the culprit is...”), proving that Dakushoin knew the truth.

The message was so well hidden that only someone specializing in reading the intention of a writer would be able to find it.

But wait! There’s more. Juku shows everyone the 99 cipher and points out a tiny line near one of the numbers. If you read the numbers left-right, top-down (so in the normal Western manner) and stop at the line, you’ll have read 82 numbers, exactly how many numbered subchapters there is in Dakushoin’s unfinished manuscript. The prologue had 4 subchapters, the 6 normal chapters after that had 13 subchapters each. Dakushoin probably wanted to write another ‘prologue’ and another chapter afterwards, which would bring the total of subchapters to 99. One for each number in the cipher.

If you write down the title of each subchapter in hiragana and pick the consecutive character the number in the 99 cipher points to, and also read it backwards, you’d get a message…

[missing part] Kare wo sodateta tokushuna kankyou ga kare wo shite renzokusatsujin he to hashirashimeta no de aru. Nijikawa no shi ha jisatsu. Ta no hankou ha kare naraba jyuubun ni ji(tsu)kou ga kanou de aru.

Translation:

[missing part] Unusual circumstances in which he grew up pushed him to serial killing. Nijikawa's death is suicide. If the other crimes were [commited by] him then this could be an accident.

Of course Dakushoin couldn’t know about Nijikawa Ryou’s future death – who he meant by ‘Nijikawa’ here was Nijikawa Megumi. He correctly assumed that Miyama would be able to kill everyone else but not the girl. He wasn’t that off on the ‘suicide’ part, since Megumi’s death was technically caused by her own actions. Dakushoin probably didn’t know about Miyama’s gender and so used the incorrect pronouns. If he had a chance to write the last 17 subchapters, their deciphered titles would probably directly accuse Miyama Kaoru.

--

But the case reaches much, much deeper than that. Dakushoin was smart, but wasn’t able to notice a certain astounding series of coincidences. The events of the case – the way Dakushoin wrote it, even – were all foreshadowed a thousand years ago in the famous work The Tale of Genji.

Out of 53 chapters of The Tale of Genji, each one’s title was somehow referenced inside Dakushoin’s manuscript. Some are more obvious (aoi, kirigirisu, sakaki…) and some are deeply convoluted worplays on details like what exactly the characters ate or what was the name of a random police officer’s girlfriend that was only ever mentioned once. [Juku spends entire pages going through FIFTY THREE CHAPTER NAMES and explaining whatever horrible pun is related to it. It’s kinda amazing.]

When everyone is still stunned, Juku says that from this moment on even he’s not sure of his reasoning, but he believes he knows the truth. He turns to Teru and asks:

“Mrs. Mamiya, wouldn’t Miyama Kaoru happen to be your and Kirigirisu Tarou’s child? Or should I say, your and Hirai Genji’s.”

Teru can’t deny that. She guessed that Kirigirisu was her Genji, but decided to keep quiet. Hirai Tarou admits he knew about Miyama’s true identity too, but couldn’t recognize his brother after all these years.

Since the man was named Genji, then he obviously could name his child Kaoru, just like the legendary Genji’s child was called. The pen name ‘Miyama’ is fairly close to ‘Mamiya’ as well, as if intentionally chosen. Miyama apparently knew the identity of her mother. After Genji and Teru split, they left the baby in Geneijo, and Hirai Tarou had to give it up for adoption. Maybe Miyama’s motive was a revenge on Geneijo itself, the place in which she had been so profoundly rejected.

--

After everyone but the detectives leave the dining hall, Juku adds that, intentionally or not, the Geneijo case managed to fulfill all the 30 elements from Dakushoin’s list.

The others think that maybe if they were as capable as Juku, they could prevent the last few tragedies… but even as they thought about the past, they had to keep moving forward and finally leave Geneijo behind.

Hoshino Tae leaves Geneijo too, having both lost and learned so much.

--

--

On 31st December that year, a day before Tsukumo Juku is supposed to leave for England, he returns to Geneijo carrying flowers for the dead.

He’s not the only one there. The First Group’s leader Yaiba Somahito is already waiting there in silence. After some pleasantries Yaiba says that he checked the Geneijo case files once more and noticed that Dakushoin had been found to have terminal stage cancer. The man truly put the rest of his life into his writing – for the sake of a grand downfall.

As an aside, Yaiba also contacted Dakushoin’s editor and learned that there was some other book planned that Dakushoin’s sister Nagisa was supposed to be writing under a weird pen name, “Seiryoin Ryusui” or something like that.

Yaiba and Juku stand in silence for a few moments before Yaiba asks:

“Tsukumo, why did you lie that Miyama Kaoru was the Artist?”

“What do you mean, Mr. Yaiba?” Juku’s voice is still beautiful, but without its usual warmth.

Yaiba shows him an envelope with a message saying just “Please help me. TEL”. TEL was Teru’s signature. She knew Yaiba and tried to summon his help, but Yaiba returned to Japan from a case too late to read it in time.

Yaiba explains in a voice full of sadness: “Miyama Kaoru was mine and Mamiya Teru’s child. 22 years ago, my family was employed by Geneijo. My father was the butler before Kosugi Kan. When I was 12, Mamiya abused me. Since I know from her that Hirai Genji wasn’t able to have children, only I can be Miyama’s father.”

In The Tale of Genji, Kaoru wasn’t actually Genji’s biological child, but was fathered by another character, Kashiwagi. Kashiwagi was also the last name Yaiba once had.

Yaiba is convinced that Juku’s meta-reasoning told him the truth about the case and he just disregarded it in favor of a fake explanation. Yaiba’s only question is why. Was Juku protecting the actual culprit? There was obviously someone else who could commit the murders – the only other person who trained their baseball pitching well enough: the butler’s son Shouri. That’s why some tricks seemed childish. That’s why Shouri was hanging around in the greenhouse before a murder was committed there.

Juku finally admits that the true culprit of the case was Kosugi Shouri. But at the same time, this wasn’t the truth. Shouri may have been the “perpertrator”, but it’s unthinkable a boy like him would come up with the entire plan on his own. There was a mastermind; a frightfully powerful someone.

This case is truly unsolvable. Finding a solution would probably require them to unravel the strings that hold the world, the story and all the mysteries together, would take some sort of divine reasoning.

Dakushoin knew about it too, and put one last clue in his manuscript; maybe even by sheer writer instinct more than actual knowledge. A well hidden “AB ; 10101011” that seems like a random error of the word processor. AB meant 171 in hexadecimal, and 10101011 meant 171 in binary. 171 = i(chi)-na(na)-i(chi). Inai, meaning that something doesn’t exist. There was also a seemingly random part named Kimi~1/2 Hanashi. Kimi ½ = a half of “kimi” [“you”] = half-person = literally a han-nin = hannin [culprit].

Hannin ha nashi = “There is no culprit”.

Lost in thought, Juku looks up at the sky for a long time.

Yaiba still wants to know the ultimate truth, and Juku says that this shall stay a secret between them just like Yaiba’s past. Juku can only give one clue -- the personality of the mastermind can be derived from answering a few questions: who would want there to be so many misdirections and tricks? Who would want there to be a lot of unexpected twists in the case?

Juku adds that after the case was done, Hikimiya led by his detective instinct counted how many times each writer’s full name showed up in the manuscript. 37 for each of them. 37 = mi-na [“everyone”], so if everyone had ‘the same 37 times’ worth of mentions, then maybe the message was that “everyone is the same”. Anyone can be anyone. Maybe it means that all the categorizing of people based on their race, gender and so forth is meaningless; people are in the end just people.

The two detectives finally leave Geneijo and the story.

--

(There is one more chapter after that, called the Phantom Chapter. It’s long and poetically complicated, but the gist of it is that the story rests in the hands of the reader. For example, if a Reader stops reading the book in the middle out of boredom, then as far as that Reader is concerned, the true criminal is someone else. If after long years a Reader will forget the disliked parts, the story will show another face, and the Reader will think the true criminal is someone else.

The last answer bestowed by the godly detective isn't certain. Nothing is certain. Knowing this, the Readers may decide for themselves how they want to explain things. (For example, what if all the misdirections were in fact the signatures of the culprit(s)?)

The truth can be understood only by the reader who – as the narration prompts in the end – uses the 99 cipher to discovered the missing part of Dakushoin’s long message, using the titles of the last 17 sub-chapters of this 99-subchapter-long book called Joker:

Shin-han-nin-ha-da-re-de-mo-i-i-no-de-aru

The true culprit can be anyone.)

THE END

[randomfangirl330]

Fav Narumitsu pwkm

I’m going to keep some of my favorite pwkm fics here that I can’t find on AO3 or Fanfiction.net These will probably mostly be Hurt/Comfort fics. 

Also, if you are any of the author anons of the incomplete works... PLEASE!

Caged (Incomplete, but stops fine) - Phoenix is an actual phoenix and is captured by a hunter

Frozen (Complete) - Phoenix is found trapped in a freezer, seriously beaten, and Miles is investigating who done it

Wright’s Love Guilty (Complete) -  "Edgeworth... we can't have sex in front of Charley!"

Hospital Fic (Complete) - Another missing hospital scene fic from 3-5

Hiding in Plain Sight (Incomplete) - Phoenix is shot after witnessing a crime, so he is put under Witness Protection while Miles tends to his injuries

Sleepless (Complete) - After Phoenix misses his flight from an overbooked plane, Miles agrees to let him spend the night in his hotel room

Heartbeats (Complete) - Miles is calmed after an earthquake by Phoenix’s heartbeat

Five Times...  (Multiply fics; Incomplete) Vampire Kristoph Gavin sets his eyes on a new victim; and that victim happens to be Werewolf Miles Edgeworth’s mate

Kinematics (Incomplete) - Phoenix and Miles are taken hostage by a crazed gunman

Turnabout M.D. (Incomplete) - Ace Attorney and House M.D. crossover

Sanctuary (Complete) - Miles reflects on how lucky he is to have Phoenix by his side while sharing a bed

Tremors (Complete) - Miles and Phoenix are in the same room when an earthquake happens and Phoenix gets knocked out

intertwined. (Complete) - Phoenix and Miles cuddle up together after a long week

Once Upon a Time... (Complete) - Princes Miles is sent to try to woo Princess Mia, but finds himself falling in love with her bodyguard, Sir Phoenix, instead

That Damn Feeling (Complete) - Miles can’t shake the bad feeling he’s getting from Phoenix’s latest client

Capsicum. (Complete) - Phoenix is sprayed with a powerful mace and Miles watches over him while he recovers

No Day But Today (Complete) - Phoenix is evicted from his apartment and tries to hide it from Miles

A Perfect Revenge (Complete) (TW: Graphic depiction of torture) - von Karma escapes death and patiently waits for the day to execute his revenge against Miles Edgeworth and the attorney who defeated him

Untitled Story... (Complete?) - A hostage situation happens in court and Phoenix is shot protecting Miles

2 fics with the same premise (Both incomplete) - Phoenix realizes his client is really guilty while in trial and tries to subtly let Miles know because said client is threatening him with a gun

Gazing Within (Incomplete) (TW: Referenced Rape) - Phoenix wakes up in the hospital to bad injuries and Miles by his bedside with concerning news of his condition

I’m so evil (Complete) - Miles and Phoenix are trapped in a glass elevator 40 stories up

A Gut Feeling (Incomplete) - Phoenix and Edgeworth are in the middle of a heated cross-examination when Phoenix collapses. It's his appendix, it has to come out now, he had appendicitis and hid it

Under the Gun (Incomplete) (TW: Implied NonCon) -  Phoenix plays poker and wins a familiar looking person

In Sickness and In Health (Incomplete) -  Edgeworth gets in a nasty accident and wakes up in the hospital with amnesia. His last memory is Phoenix Wright beating his perfect record. However, he is told he's married to this very person.

Sick Is As Sick Does Not (Complete) - Miles gets sick while forced to go to a log cabin and everyone is snowed in. The only one who seems to notice his state is Phoenix

List (Complete) - Miles keeps a list of all the things he loves about Phoenix

Nightmares (Multiply Fics; Complete) - Phoenix and Miles comfort each other after having nightmares (There’s also a Klapollo one too)

You Can Cry Now (Complete) - Miles wasn’t the only one who lost someone in that earthquake (This one MAY of been intended as friendship, but I’m consistently wearing shipping goggles)

Forbidden Fruit (Complete) - Just why does Miles always wear a cravat?

Dinner and a Movie (Complete) - Phoenix gets a horrible stomach ache and Miles takes care of him

Frozen (Incomplete; Different fic) - Miles finds Phoenix unconscious during a freak blizzard in LA

Of Life, Pride and Pess (Complete) - Pess seems to of taken a very strong liking to Phoenix, much to Miles’ shock

Post-sex fun! (Complete) - Some pillow talk after sex

Nick's Sick (Complete) - Phoenix calls in sick and everyone seems to have an idea of how to cure him

Dreams of Perfection (Complete) - Phoenix just wants his and Miles wedding to be perfect. Life seems to have other plans though.

Miles' Migraine (Complete) - Miles gets a migraine while working and Phoenix comes over to take care of him

Bad Day (Complete) - Miles has a long day and want nothing more than to go home to his boyfriend who is apparently also working late

Bitter Re-Union (Complete) - What if the poison in the bottle Phoenix ate took effect on him when he ate it?

Reverse Aromatherapy (Complete) - Phoenix accidentally uses Armstrong’s aromatherapy bottles and now smells. Everyone is avoiding him expect Miles, who seems to be trying to get closer to him.

"Hopefully you'll feel the same" (Complete) - Miles is completely wasted and confesses his feelings to Phoenix

Your Secret Admirer (Complete) - Phoenix gets a series of love letters from a secret admirer

Returning the favor (Complete) - Young Phoenix sees young Miles being harassed by bullies, so he stands up for him in thanks for helping him

I'm Yours (Complete) - The sweetest love-making fic you'll probably ever read

Unnecessary Feelings (Complete) - Miles wakes up and silently admires a sleeping Phoenix next to him.

More Loving! (Complete) - Phoenix gets mysterious treats sent by an unknown sender while Miles is out of town

Distant Traces (Complete) - Dahlia has trapped Phoenix in his own mind and is devouring his soul until Edgeworth comes to save him

P/E Kidfluff (Multiple Fills; Both Complete) - Phoenix continues to be picked on for the class trials, and Miles continues to stand up for him

exchanges (Complete) - Miles is planning on proposing to Phoenix, but he feels he needs Trucy’s blessing to do so

The Wright One (Incomplete) - Phoenix runs a matchmaking business and tries to find a match for the incredibly picky Miles Edgeworth

FILL (Complete)  Phoenix has a nightmare while in the hospital after his fall, and Miles finds himself on the comforter end 

The Not So Ordinary (Complete) - After being attacked in court, Phoenix dies in Miles’ arms... or so it seems

True Bluff (Complete) - The Princess Bride battle of wits scene reimagined as Ace Attorney

Consolation Prize (Complete) - Phoenix is tired of Miles always beating him in chess, so he offers a new game to play. Candy Land.

Let Go, Give In (Complete) - Miles accepts his own feelings and confesses them to Phoenix, only to find Phoneix trying to resist his own

Sofa Hair (Complete) - Miles is sick and refuses to go home, no matter how much Phoenix insists it

Commentboxing (Complete) After their officiate is arrested, Phoenix and Miles need someone to perform their wedding ceremony. It seems only Wendy Oldbag is able to do so

Edgeworth's Good Day (Complete) - Miles misses Trucy’s big show and feels absolutely guilty about it

Extinguished (Incomplete; frustrating incomplete) - Phoenix is buried alive somewhere and Miles has to find him

The Bad Guy (Complete) - Phoenix get a parental crisis when Trucy calls Miles the “Fun Dad”

Untitled (Complete) - Phoenix gets some advice from Maya and what to get Miles’ birthday not knowing what he was really asking

Blood Fever (Complete) - Miles has Vulcan ancestry and is going through the Pon Farr... with his eyes set on Phoenix

(If I find any more I like, they will be added to the list)

(This one’s not Narumitsu, but I still like it)

(Was probably supposed to be narumitsu, but the author didn’t get there)

(This is just funny!)

(Trucy doing the Flour Baby assignment)

[safitheartist]

@kariachi I’m mean. (Tw: mentioned child death, Blood, emotional breakdown, referenced human trafficing, claustrophobia (not sure about this one but they are in a dark cramped place) if you guys can think of any more please tell me.)

The rubbel was pressing on her force field, havey and threatening with it’s immense mass, reminding her that breaking her concentration even only slightly could lead to death’s cold embrace. She felt the stone shift over her head, incaseing them in darkness as the only light source was the dim pink glow of her aura.

She couldn’t open a portal now, they would get squashed immediately and a communication spell was out of question too. All she could do was keeping the barrier around them up or die, if it was just her alone, then maybe, maybe she would be able to get out of there, but as it was..

“Argit!” She said for what felt like the houndreds time since they got into this situation. “Argit wake up! Please!” She heared a groan in response and her aura flared up as relive floded over her.

“Red?” He asked, his voice sounded pained, Gwen felt the sweat burn in her eyes. “Yes, it’s me. How are you feeling?” She asked, she saw him hit his head pretty badly before she put the barrier around them and he’s been unconscious ever since. “Like my head has been put through a wringer…which is a good thing I guess, at least we aren’t dead. What happened?” He groaned out trying to sit up only to wince and lie back down immediately.

“You can’t remember?” That wasn’t good, that wasn’t good at all. “I um…there was a earthquake I think?” Something about a giant badger?“ It were questions, not answers, that was bad. “Yes, Animo, it was a mole not a badger. We were evacuating a building, it fell down on us. You fell out of the 7th floor.”

“7th? Gee, I must be getting soft.” Gwen could tell he was joking but it came out sounding more pathetic then anything. “Take this serious would you? You might be really hurt.” Gwen scolded him. “What about the kids? There where kids on the floor with me, right?” Gwen felt a cold feeling settle in her stomach. “I don’t know.” She lied.

“Oh..”

It was silent for a few heartbeats but Gwen knew it couldn’t stay that way. She had to check bad the damage is and she had to keep him awake somehow. “I need to ask you a few questions. Okay?” Argit grunted and Gwen took that as a ‘go ahead.’ from him. “Okay, do you remember my name?”

Argit snorted.

“I’m serious Argit, my real name, not the nickname.” She insisted.

“Gwendolyn Tennyson.” He replied, Gwen nodded, “Good, who is my boyfriend?”

“The pain of my existence.” “Argit.”

“Kevin Ethan Levin.” He winced again, Gwen felt sympathetic for him, but it was the only way to make sure he stays with her and it was helping her to stay calm too, so she knew she couldn’t let him quit.

“Okay, okay, you’re doing good. I’m the cousin of?” She asked, her aura flared up while thinking of Ben, her cousin, at least according to what their family has been telling them. She’s been having doubts about that for a while now.

“Benjamin Kirby Tennyson. This is boring Red, can’t we take turns asking questions?” He asked and Gwen thought about it. That wasn’t a bad idea, it would keep him from falling asleep at least, hopefully that is. “Okay, I asked a question, it’s your turn.”

“Why aren’t you teleporting yourself out of here?” He asked, he could remember that she can do that, good. “It’s too dangerous. Even if I managed to do it fast enough, I doubt I could get both of us out.” She didn’t mention how teleporting could make his condition worse or how the only thing keeping them alive was a barrier held up by somebody who had two redbull and a slice of toast for breakfast that morning. Gwen doubt she was in the condition to take risks right now.

“My turn, what’s your favorite animal?” Gwen was determined to keep this going, but she had to admit, she wasn’t the most creative person under pressure. “Seriously? Creativity much?” Argit asked with clear amusement in his voice, Gwen grunted, “You try keeping several tons over our heads, then we can talk about how creative my questions are.”

“I like Platypi.” He answered, Gwen had the urge to stare at him. “Platypi?” She asked and Argit grunted, “What’s so strange about that?” he asked and Gwen felt a bit embarrased, “I just wasn’t expecting it. I thought you would say something like opossum or hedghog.” She admited. “You humans are basically appes and yet *your* favorite animal are cats.” He countred.

“Fair enough. Your turn.”

“When was your first kiss?” Gwen snorted, “And you call my questions uncreative?” She couldn’t help saying. “12, Billy Mayson behind the school’s gym. His braces cut my lip open.” She remembered it like it only happened yesterday, it was a deep cut too, she had to walk around with a bandaid for weeks.“ “Romantic.” Argit said dryly. “Okay, since we are at *that* topic, first crush?” She asked. It turned silent for a few moments and Gwen was starting to worry that he might have fallen asleep on her again, but then she heared him mumbling something very quietly, so that she almost couldn’t hear it.

“Kevin?!” She exclaimed and her Aura again flared up. Argit winced at her sudden loud voice and Gwen looked at him apologetic, “Sorry, I just didn’t…I probably should have figured that’s the case.”

“Let’s just, not go there right now. Ack, okay let me think for a second. Um, siblings?” Gwen wanted to nod, but moving her head made her feel dizzy, so she made a mental note to no longer do that, “A older brother. His name is Ken.” Gwen answered, she hasn’t talked to Ken for quite some time, they had a fight the last time she saw him, the idea that they might never make up was painful.

Ben came to mind again, but Gwen ignored it.

“What about you? Do you have siblings?” She hardly knew anything about Argit’s family now that she thought about it. She still wasn’t even sure if he really did sell his mother or if Kevin was just messing with her. Arigt was a complicated person, he wasn’t to be trusted that’s for sure, but it wasn’t like he’s heartless too. He confused Gwen because for some reason, she couldn’t hate him anymore.

Argit was silent again, the only thing indicating that he was still awake were the small squealing noises he made now and then combined with his inregular breathing. “Yes,” he said, his tone caught her of guard, he sounded sad. “I do, 12 all of them were younger then me.” Gwen felt the cold feeling settle back in her stomach, the wight of the shifting rubble feeling more and more pressing.

“And well then there is also Kevin.” He added.

“What where their names?” Argit chuckled, “I believe it was my turn Red.” There was a pause and Gwen was half expecting him to just continue their little game, but then he started making a number of squeaking noises, which confused Gwen until she realized he was answering her question. “…..Argit isn’t your real name?” It was more an realization then a question, “Still breaking the rules I see, no it’s not. Kevin gave it to me when we were children, couldn’t pronounce my real name, bless his soul he tried. I’ve been using it ever since. Okay, my turn, why the cats?”

Gwen swallowed thickly as she tried her best to make her voice casual.“When I was really little I thought they were witches in disguise. It kinda became a obsession after a while.” She remembered how Ben once caught a stray cat for her when they were really little, they tried feeding her so she would trust them enough to transform for them, it ended with Ben having a really nasty scratch on his arm and Ken having to drive the cat to a animal shelter on his bike.

“You’ve always been into this magic stuff?” Asked Argit again, Gwen supposed it was just fair, she did ask three questions in a row after all. “I guess,” she answered after she thought about it a while, “It was more of an weird interest back then, I didn’t start really getting invested in it until….” Until she realized this wasn’t some silly game. There was a pause again, she was wondering what Argit must be thinking right now.

“Your turn.” He said after a while, Gwen was surprised. “Are you sure? You still have one left.”

“Can’t think of anything right now.” His breathing was getting faster, Gwen noted, she wasn’t doing much better really, they have been trapped under this thing for way too long already, she’s been trying her best to filter oxygen into her barrier but it was starting to overwhelm her.

Gwen wasn’t sure what to ask either, at least she wasn’t sure if what she wanted to ask really would be okay to ask. She knew for a fact that Kevin and the others didn’t like to talk about their time in the null void, but she really didn’t know how Argit felt about it. She supposed there was really just one way to find this out.

“How did you meet Kevin?” She felt the wight over her shift again.

“You already know that. Servanties used my DNA for his sick experiments.”

“You know what I mean. How would you two become friends?” There was a long moment of nothing, Gwen was starting to regret asking, she was about to take it back, tell him he didn’t have to answer if he didn’t want to, but Argit apparently had other plans.

“He just showed up one day.” He paused, Gwen didn’t push him. “I was sitting in that cage, scared out of my mind and starving convinced I would die in that damn thing and suddenly there he was. A little boy, looking just as scared as me. He gave me extra food and that became our thing.” His voice was soft, almost nostalgic. “The time in this hell hole was terrible, but Kevin made it bearable for me, he’s the closest thing to family I had ever since….” He trailed off, turning silent as he thought back to a time long ago, Gwen let him, she didn’t know how she should feel about this situation, she never saw him that vulnerable. She wondered how much there was to her boyfriends oldest friend she never even bothered learning about.

"Hey Red." He started the conversation again, "Could you tell Kev something from me? If I...you know? You have to teleport out of here after all." Gwen felt a cold shudder run through her as the implications of his request became clear to her, her aura flared up again, stronger then the other times even, "No!" She yelled at him, "No! Shut up!" 

"If it happens-" he tried again but Gwen blocked off. "I don't want you to die. Please, don't say stuff like this." Gwen tried her best to steady her breathing, why was it suddenly so warm in there? Argit was silent for a moment but then tried again, Gwen was to exhausted to stop him by now. "If something happens. I want you to tell him that I am sorry, for everything I messed up and I want him to know that there is not one day where I don’t regret losing the relationship we used to have. Can you do that for me Gwen?" Her vision was blurry and she felt gross out over the mixture of sweat, tears and snot on her face.

The sound of bones crushing under stone and little voices crying out, crying for a hero to help them, echo through her head. 

There was blood, everywhere was blood. 

She nodded, making her dizzy again "Yes, okay! Just stop saying this stuff, you aren't going to die! I won't let you die here." Nobody else. She wouldn't let anybody else die today. "You know," Argit started, "You are a very bad liar Gwendolyn." Gwen felt cold. "I can see some of them from where I'm lying." "Just shut up!" She screamed, her aura flared up. "Please just stop talking about this." She felt broken, like a failure. It was her job to help people, to keep them save and yet. Ben came to mind again, how would he look at her after today? How would he deal with his own cousin being a failure? "It's not your fault, you know?" Argit said but Gwen shock her head, she was at fault, she failed this children. "Please, I can't not right now." She was a mess, she didn't even notice when her nose stated bleeding.

She failed them. The thought echoed through her head and she felt how she was starting to lose herself. She needed something, anything to keep her mind off of this terrible memories.

"Y-your mother." Gwen stutered out between, Argit made a confused noice, "Your mother, Kevin mentioned her once, tell me about her." There was a small part in the back of her mind, screaming this was over steping he boundaries, that this wasn't a topic she should be the one to bring up, but she couldn't help it.

"She was a species trafficer." He said and Gwen felt like somebody punched her. She swallowed thickly as the implications of this new information caught up to her. "She sold me to Servanties, I guess I got better of then my siblings though. Oldest privileges." He chuckled but it sounded bitter. 

"When we got out of the null void Kev and me stumbled over her, she told me she had changed, that she regrets doing this to me, what a load of bullcrap. She tried selling us off to some psycho. She didn't expect getting beat at her own game though." Gwen stayed silent. 

 "I guess that's partly why I ended up being such a screw up....Red?" He sounded concerned, Gwen tried her best to response, "I'm fine, just...keep talking." She gritted through her teeth. She was shaking, it wasn't good to exhaust her powers like that. 

Argit paused, "If you can't bear it anymore-" 

 "Talk!" 

 "Okay...did Kevin ever tell you about-" They sat there a while longer. Argit telling her stories she didn't even really register, his voice was getting weaker, his pauses longer, Gwen could tell he was in pain too, that he wanted to rest too, but she couldn't let him. She doesn't know how long they stayed there, brushing shoulders with death, but at some point the wight over them stoped pressing down on her. 

 "It's alright, you can let it down now. We made it. You saved us Red."

Gwen passed out.

[ao3feed-irondadspiderson]

hunger

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885 by paralleling He’s not sure how it slid out of place. Maybe it was the small earthquake last week. Maybe he slammed the drawer too hard the last time he closed it. Either way, the edge of the yellow cover glares up at him, freed from its usual hiding spot between the two pairs of jeans that he’d outgrown years ago. His hands move before his brain does, taking the corner of the journal and pulling it out from the drawer. Peter starts to flip through the pages, several dozen having been completely filled out with weekly weigh-ins, calorie counts, body measurements… The sinking feeling in his chest grew deeper with each page as he watched the dates fly by, until he hit the middle of the journal, where he’d abruptly stopped recording everything during his first semester of college and chaotic move-in to this apartment. Apparently it was nearly two years ago. A lot has changed in those two years. His mind is already picking apart the numbers in everything he’s eaten this week, and Peter is starting to think that he is not one of those things.   In which Peter Parker needs help, and Wade doesn't know how, but he'll try his damn best. Words: 10569, Chapters: 4/5, Language: English Fandoms: Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Not Rated Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Characters: Peter Parker, Wade Wilson, Tony Stark Relationships: Peter Parker & Wade Wilson, Peter Parker & Tony Stark Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Eating Disorders, Peter Parker is a College Student, peter parker is broke, the author is projecting, Fainting, Malnutrition, Peter Parker is Enhanced, Medical Inaccuracies, Fluff and Angst, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, No beta we die like my executive functioning, Mentioned Tony Stark, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, self destructive behavior, Descriptions of Weight Loss, ED Numbers TW!, Pre-Slash, unless 😳 read it on AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885

[ao3feed-irondadspiderson]

hunger

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885 by paralleling He’s not sure how it slid out of place. Maybe it was the small earthquake last week. Maybe he slammed the drawer too hard the last time he closed it. Either way, the edge of the yellow cover glares up at him, freed from its usual hiding spot between the two pairs of jeans that he’d outgrown years ago. His hands move before his brain does, taking the corner of the journal and pulling it out from the drawer. Peter starts to flip through the pages, several dozen having been completely filled out with weekly weigh-ins, calorie counts, body measurements… The sinking feeling in his chest grew deeper with each page as he watched the dates fly by, until he hit the middle of the journal, where he’d abruptly stopped recording everything during his first semester of college and chaotic move-in to this apartment. Apparently it was nearly two years ago. A lot has changed in those two years. His mind is already picking apart the numbers in everything he’s eaten this week, and Peter is starting to think that he is not one of those things.   In which Peter Parker needs help, and Wade doesn't know how, but he'll try his damn best. Words: 10569, Chapters: 4/5, Language: English Fandoms: Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Not Rated Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Characters: Peter Parker, Wade Wilson, Tony Stark Relationships: Peter Parker & Wade Wilson, Peter Parker & Tony Stark Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Eating Disorders, Peter Parker is a College Student, peter parker is broke, the author is projecting, Fainting, Malnutrition, Peter Parker is Enhanced, Medical Inaccuracies, Fluff and Angst, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, No beta we die like my executive functioning, Mentioned Tony Stark, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, self destructive behavior, Descriptions of Weight Loss, ED Numbers TW!, Pre-Slash, unless 😳 read it on AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885

[ao3feed-irondadspiderson]

hunger

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885 by paralleling He’s not sure how it slid out of place. Maybe it was the small earthquake last week. Maybe he slammed the drawer too hard the last time he closed it. Either way, the edge of the yellow cover glares up at him, freed from its usual hiding spot between the two pairs of jeans that he’d outgrown years ago. His hands move before his brain does, taking the corner of the journal and pulling it out from the drawer. Peter starts to flip through the pages, several dozen having been completely filled out with weekly weigh-ins, calorie counts, body measurements… The sinking feeling in his chest grew deeper with each page as he watched the dates fly by, until he hit the middle of the journal, where he’d abruptly stopped recording everything during his first semester of college and chaotic move-in to this apartment. Apparently it was nearly two years ago. A lot has changed in those two years. His mind is already picking apart the numbers in everything he’s eaten this week, and Peter is starting to think that he is not one of those things.   In which Peter Parker needs help, and Wade doesn't know how, but he'll try his damn best. Words: 10569, Chapters: 4/5, Language: English Fandoms: Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Not Rated Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Characters: Peter Parker, Wade Wilson, Tony Stark Relationships: Peter Parker & Wade Wilson, Peter Parker & Tony Stark Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Eating Disorders, Peter Parker is a College Student, peter parker is broke, the author is projecting, Fainting, Malnutrition, Peter Parker is Enhanced, Medical Inaccuracies, Fluff and Angst, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, No beta we die like my executive functioning, Mentioned Tony Stark, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, self destructive behavior, Descriptions of Weight Loss, ED Numbers TW!, Pre-Slash, unless 😳 read it on AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/64849885