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in-tua-deep · 4 years ago

Note

Daemon AU? Yes PLEASE!

I will give u the pre-canon material exploring Five and his daemon’s relationship ;3c

---

Pancha prefers small forms. Five never knows for certain why, and when he asks her she just tilts her head and shrugs at him because she doesn’t know what to say, either.

She likes being a hummingbird, flitting around Five’s head and hovering in front of his face before nesting in his hair. She likes being a mouse, scurrying up Five’s arm and tucking herself into the pocket on the front of his blazer. She likes being a rabbit, feet thumping against the floor as she zoomed around the room at top speed.

Five never knows, or maybe just never vocalizes why the representation of his soul prefers to be small.

But when Reginald Hargreeves gives him scathing performance reviews, his cane clicking against the floor in time with the soft clicking of Aryia’s claws as they look down their noses, as Five stands with his back straight and proud while -

While Pancha curls up tight in his pocket, a mouse biting the end of her own tail so that she would not whimper aloud. They know then, even if they never voice it aloud. The reason that Pancha prefers to stay small.

---

The thing that people learn early is to watch daemons. Not directly, that would be rude, but to keep them in the corner of your eye and observe. Daemons are the representation of a person’s soul after all, and souls can’t lie.

If someone is nervous, their daemon will shuffle anxiously. If someone is angry, their daemon will puff up in fury. When someone is scared, their daemon will cringe and cower. It’s easy to spot a liar in a world where the heart lays outside of the body.

Five’s very good at lying with his own body. He stands up straight and proud. He bares his teeth in furious smiles, licking blood from his lips and refusing to back down. He speaks loudly, with purpose, with challenge in his voice and in his words. Five is hard-headed. Five is disobedient. Five is an unruly little monster.

Pancha shifts into a hummingbird, because everyone knows hummingbirds flit around to keep aloft. It doesn’t look like nervous energy when it’s for a purpose. Pancha shifts into an australian tiger beetle, because they don’t have lips to draw back in wordless snarls. Pancha shifts into a gerbil and hides in Five’s pockets, because what you don’t see cannot betray you.

They call her adaptable, laugh when their siblings’ daemons begin to settle. They tolerate the speculation about who is going to settle next and what they will become.

They both dread the day Pancha will settle, even if they don’t say anything to one another. They don’t address the fact that she changes from one form to another, cycling through dozens within the space of a day even though their siblings stick to perhaps three. They don’t talk about the buzz under their skin that drives Pancha racing around their room at top speed until they crash on the bed panting together with something clawing desperately inside their soul.

They don’t talk about a lot of things, but they don’t need to. They’re two halves of the same whole.

---

Luther snaps at Five for cheating, for running ahead on a mission. They’re twelve, and Andromeda looks down on Pancha with something cold in her eyes and says, “Of course they can’t obey. They’re still unsettled.”

She says it like an insult, lip drawing back to show off too sharp teeth, says it like it’s something for Five to be ashamed of. Says it like what she’s really saying is that Five is a child. Like they aren’t all twelve-years-old and just settling into their own skins.

She says it like it’s Five’s fault that Pancha can flit through forms like she can’t shed them fast enough. Even as Andromeda speaks, Pancha is a bat, is a wren, is landing on Five’s shoulder as a sugar glider, is curling around his neck as a ferret.

She says it like it’s his fault that he’s twelve-years-old and his daemon is unsettled. Like half the twelve-year-olds running around aren’t doing so with daemons just as unsettled as his.

(Five read once, in a book, that trauma can make daemons settle earlier. There are so many cases of children as young as nine, seven, six with daemons tiny and scared and permanent.

The same book mentioned that abused children’s daemons often fell into one of two categories: large predators, to protect themselves and bare their teeth and intimidate any who try and hurt them. And the small ones, who are tiny and scared and do their best to be beneath notice.

Luther and Diego’s daemons are large, with teeth that can tear flesh and muscles beneath their skin.

Pancha likes to take small forms. Five doesn’t think about it too much.)

Five curls his lip and snarls back at Andromeda in a way that he never does when they’re in front of cameras, because etiquette says that people don’t talk to other people’s daemons, “If you weren’t so slow then maybe I wouldn’t have had to go in alone.”

Pancha shifts from a ferret to a squirrel to a kangaroo rat. The others are used to her rapid changes, but they also mean that they can’t pin down Five’s mood based on his daemon’s body language. She’s shifting too rapidly for that, clawing down his jacket as a hispid cotton mouse and settling into his arms as a pika, as a pygmy rabbit, as a stoat.

“Maybe I should hear a rumor about everyone calming down.” Allison threatens, her hands on her hips and tapping her foot impatiently. Amraphel is wrapped around her shoulders like a scarf, lazily flicking his tongue out.

(Allison has been of ill temper and short of patience ever since Raph settled a month ago. The whole house had heard her shouting about it, and none had dared to address it when they came down to dinner with Raph draped over the back of the chair instead of his customary place in Allison’s lap.

Raph and Allison haven’t sat properly together since he settled, and no one talks about it.)

But Allison’s words settle Andromeda and Luther, both of them backing up in a way they wouldn’t for any other sibling.

Pancha is a bush baby now, climbing up to Five’s shoulder and tugging lightly on the hair behind his ear.

Five holds his hands behind his back and twists his fingers together to the point of pain.

“No need for that.” Pancha says, voice clear and level and almost haughty. “They’re only jealous they can’t be as adaptable as us.”

Luther snarls and lunges forward, only to be blocked by a bristling Andromeda. “They’re not worth it.” She growls, low and deep in her chest with flashes of white teeth. Luther and his daemon try so hard to be respectable, to be cool and aloof like their father and his daemon. It’s almost sad, really.

Pancha is a manipur bush rat, scurrying to Five’s other shoulder. Five untwists his hands from behind his back and reaches up to grab her when she shifts into a black jackrabbit.

“Have you looked in a mirror lately?” Five says, with all his twelve-year-old wit, “Your face isn’t worth it.”

The black eye he sports for three weeks is, in fact, worth it.

---

Pancha is the last one left unsettled. It shouldn’t bother them, they don’t even really want Pancha to settle, but it does in some terrible inexplicable way.

Pancha flits between forms, and none of them feel right.

“We’re obviously going to be something that can jump properly.” Five muses, tapping a pencil against a little black notebook as he thinks. “You said the kangaroo mouse didn’t feel right?”

“Nothing will feel right until the moment we settle.” Pancha points out, flicking the tail of her current ginger-tabby-cat form back and forth, “Val was definitely a wolf a few times before she settled.”

“Yeah, well, I’m like 90% sure Val settled out of pure competitive spirit.” Five dismisses rolling his eyes.

Valencia had settled two hours before Andromeda had, and has lorded it over the other daemon ever since. Diego still preens about how he was the first of the siblings to settle before even Luther.

(Five kind of wants to tell them both that Tamaya settled a week before Valencia and Andromeda both. No one noticed because Ben hadn’t brought it up, and Tamaya had always favored hiding to confrontation. Instead, Tamaya ‘officially’ settled around three days after their siblings.)

“I’m probably not going to be a big animal.” Pancha says, her claws pricking into his skin through his pajama top as she leans against his shoulder to peer at his list. “You can cross kangaroo off.”

“I thought you said you couldn’t be sure?” Five says, eyebrow raised.

Pancha just stares at him blankly. He stares back. Pancha shifts into a Florida king snake.

“Not having eyelids is cheating.” Five scowls, crossing his arms.

Pancha easily swaps into a possum, shaking out her fur. “It wasn’t cheating, it was adapting.” She tosses his words back in his face, “Besides. You thought I could be a kangaroo.”

Five grudgingly crosses an entry out. “Well why are you a possum now?”

Pancha shrugs as well as she can as a possum. “Dunno. It’s a marsupial or whatever, isn’t it? Besides, I’m sort of digging the fingerless gloves aesthetic.” She offers a foot out for Five to inspect.

“You look like you just climbed out of a trash can.” Five informs her.

“No, that was last night.” Pancha shoots back, shifting into a pine marten to crawl into Five’s lap and bat at his notebook. He just holds the notebook a little bit higher, making her huff in irritation.

“Dad really needs to feed us more.”

Pancha nuzzles against Five’s stomach as comfortingly as she can, even though she can feel the slight pang of hunger gnawing at her belly as well as he can. Their power takes so much out of them sometimes, it’s difficult to justify taking more to a man who sees them as an experiment instead of a person.

“I could turn into a tiger and eat Aryia.” Pancha offers, shifting into an otter and making another grab for the notebook that Five easily avoids.

“You don’t like taking big forms.” Five dismisses easily, as though it’s nothing. As though it isn’t something they don’t discuss between them.

Pancha is silent for a few minutes, and even Five stops scribbling away as he waits for her response.

Finally she says, very carefully, “Just because I don’t like to, doesn’t mean I can’t.”

They both are silent after that, Five lowering his arms to curl around Pancha’s latest form in something just a little bit too loose to call a hug.

“It’s safer.” Pancha whispers, breaking the silence between them, “I don’t know why, but it’s safer this way. Smaller daemons - they aren’t looked at as closely. When a tiger daemon bristles, people pay attention. When a mouse daemon bristles, no one even notices.”

“Is my soul really mouse shaped?” Five huffs a laugh, but they both know that he wouldn’t be disappointed in her being a mouse so much as he would her being trapped a mouse.

Pancha nudges at his chin with her broad muscular head, “Hey, don’t knock mice. They’re survivors. Practically anywhere you go, you’ll find mice. Inside, outside, they know how to get around.”

Five hums, dropping his notebook on the bed and bringing his hands up to run them through Pancha’s fur.

“Maybe we should be something with a beak.” Pancha whispers, knowing that Five will hear her no matter how softly she speaks. “No one bothers to look at bird daemon expressions, either.”

“Maybe you’ll be a swan, able to break someone’s arm and look pretty while doing it.”

Pancha snorts, “Yeah, you’d like that wouldn’t you. Vicious representation of our soul, that.”

Instead of saying anything more, Pancha shifts from an otter into a meerkat. She curls into a tight little ball in Five’s lap.

“Not this one either, then?” Five says with a smile.

“Shut up.” Is Pancha’s intelligent response. “Next time you ask, I’m going to bite you.”

---

The moment they figure out what they can, theoretically, do, the buzzing under their skins gets louder than ever.

“Ask dad again, please.” Pancha begs, shifting from a budgie to a canary to a superb fairy wren as she flits about close to the ceiling of their room.

“You ask Aryia!” Five shoots back, bouncing lightly on the top of his bed even though it’s sort of childish. If anyone comes in though, he’ll just say he was trying to catch Pancha and they’d probably believe it.

Pancha turns into a magpie and immediately tries to divebomb Five in irritation, who stands there unimpressed and she’s forced to veer back towards the ceiling or crash into him. “You know she’s a mythic bitch!”

“And you think dad isn’t?” Five asks incredulously, bouncing a little more frantically.

“You don’t get lectures on how you’re -” Pancha flies to the floor and shifts into an impressive rendition of a marble fox identical to their father’s daemon, “Still unsettled Pancha, honestly, I expected better of you. Why can’t you be like the others, you’re so unruly and disheveled and I have no idea why dear old Reggie didn’t do away with you long ago -”

Five is cackling, his bouncing having come to a stop so he could slap a hand over his mouth to muffle his laughter at Pancha’s, frankly, spot on impression of their father’s daemon.

Pancha grins, shifting from a fox into a jack russell terrier and jumping on the bed with Five. “Spot on, wasn’t I?”

“Absolutely impeccable.” Five manages, sticking his nose haughtily in the air, “Why, I almost thought our dearest Aryia was in the room with us!”

Pancha nips at his heels, making him flop down onto the bed with her automatically. The shift in weight and position makes them both bounce a few times before they settle down. They’re still buzzing with energy though, even sitting still.

“I bet time travel would fix us.” Pancha says finally, voice strangely serious in the face of their previous jostling and cheer.

“We aren’t broken.” Five says equally seriously, watching as Pancha shifts into a grey collared chipmunk, then a harvest mouse, and then an antelope jackrabbit. She uses that form’s legs to launch herself from the bed to the desk across the room and back again.

“There’s something wrong with us, Five.” Pancha corrects him fiercely, clawing up his arm as a pallid bat to his shoulder. “The others weren’t like this. We’re thirteen, now. Statistically, we should have settled by now. Or - or slowed down at least.”

Now she’s a margay, precariously balanced on his shoulder with her tail whipping into his face. Five brings up a hand to gently grasp at the twitching appendage, “The average is twelve to fourteen, technically.” He corrects her gently, “We practically just turned thirteen, we have time.”

Pancha hisses, hopping down off his shoulders in the form of a mongoose. “If we just - we have to try, Five. Can’t you feel it?”

Five bops her gently over the head, half scolding. “Of course I can, I’m you aren’t I?”

The buzz under their skin gets stronger by the day, and Pancha hasn’t been able to hold a form for longer than five or ten minutes in almost a year. It takes more effort not to jump than it does to actually jump, these days. Pancha shifts into a brush rabbit and levels him with an unimpressed look.

Five heaves a sigh, foot bouncing against the floorboards as though Pancha has transferred her nervous energy to him. “You know what dad’s gonna say, anyway.” He brings a hand to his chest and put on a nasally fancy tone, “Maybe we can revisit this topic when you’ve matured a bit, Number Five.”

Pancha gnashes her teeth together as a beaver. “You know what that’s code for.”

Five’s look is just as bitter as his daemon’s tone. He does know. Everyone knows. It’s a whole thing - people have weird ideas about what it means to settle. That it means, in some weird way, that it’s a transition into adulthood and responsibility.

How many hospital dramas and detective shows make it a point to draw attention to a child actor’s shifting daemon? How many true crime shows have grieving parents wailing about how the daughter or son wasn’t even settled yet, as though it might have been less of a tragedy if the kid’s daemon had been permanently stuck as a woodchuck. How many courtroom dramas have dismissed eyewitness testimony on the basis of the kid isn’t even settled yet.

Five and Pancha thinks it’s stupid, the emphasis put on settling. Thinks it’s dumb that he’s somehow considered less mature than a nine-year-old with a settled hedgehog daemon, even though he’s thirteen. But his age doesn’t matter. Just his daemon’s settled status.

“What if time travel fixes us.” Pancha proposes again, fluttering over to the desk in the form of a cardinal. “What if it helps. What if it’s what we need to - ”

Settle, she doesn’t say. Because to settle is to know yourself, and they don’t even know they extent of their powers.

Five shakes his hands out, blue sparks flying down his wrists as he does so. Anything to try and get the buzz out from under his skin.

“I’ll ask dad again tomorrow.” Five says finally, “And if he says no - ”

“Then we do it anyway.” Pancha is a coyote, lips pulled back in a wordless snarl before blue lightning runs down her form and she’s suddenly pressed against Five’s side.

“Then we do it anyway.” Five confirms, grim.

---

Time travel does not fix them.

Time travel breaks them.

They stand in the rubble of the end of the world, howling for their family with something that tastes like desperation on their lips, and no one answers. Dust swirls across the ground, glittering and gruesome as the smoke chokes the air from their lungs.

They claw through ruin until they find what they’re looking for, until Five shoves a piece of debris off of a face that belongs to a wrist with a black umbrella inked upon it, dark and final.

He finds Luther. He finds Allison, finds Diego, finds Klaus. He does not find their daemons.

Pancha is a falcon, is a racoon, is a wolf howling desperately into the crackling air, hoping, praying for an answer. But the only thing they hear are the quiet roar and crackles of the fires and their own footfalls.

It’s eerily quiet, at the end of the world. There’s no movie soundtrack, or screams, or howling winds. It’s just the pops of distant fires and the sound of rock across rock as their feet dislodge pieces of the wreckage.

“We can fix this.” Five says feverishly, “We have to go back.”

“It’s not working.” Pancha grits her teeth, pushing and pushing and pushing against the wall of their powers. It’s about as useful as trying to break down a brick wall with her shoulder.

“We’ll make it work.” Five vows, “We’ll go back. We’ll save them all.”

Pancha nods, equally grim and equally serious.

“What we need,” Pancha says slowly, sounding out each word. She has Five’s full attention on her, “Is an equation.”

Math isn’t something they technically need anymore. It’s a crutch from their younger days, something that soothes them and calms them and helps them focus. They can jump without it, their brain doing most equations automatically.

But when they’d first been figuring out their limits on distance, when they’d first figured out the differences between jumping in water and jumping in air - they’d used math. When they were figuring out time travel was possible, they’d looked at the math.

“Okay.” Five says, breathy and small and scared, “Okay.”

---

They don’t figure out until a week in that the buzzing under their skin is - not gone, but lesser somehow.

In their defense, they have a lot bigger things to worry about.

Five is scooping cold spaghetti-o’s directly into his mouth with a spoon he’d buffed against his shirt when he finally looks at Pancha and realizes that she’s been a barbary macaque for… hours now. She has a box of children’s sidewalk chalk by her side and is concentrating fiercely on writing while Five takes a break.

“Pancha - ” Five starts, and then finds himself at a loss for words when she looks up at him.

“Hmm?” She asks absently, little monkey face still scrunched up in concentration. Five can’t help but wonder when the last time Pancha stayed in one form long enough for him to pick up proper expressions from her face.

“...Never mind.” Five says, and watches Pancha turn back to her work.

They have more important things to worry about now anyway.

---

“This is a bad idea.” Pancha informs him, tongue lolling out the side of her mouth as she pants in the scorching heat. She’s a dingo today, has started experimenting with bigger and bigger forms.

(Five is seventeen-years-old. She still hasn’t settled.)

“We’re literally starving to death, Pan.” Five says dryly gripping bright packaging between thumb and forefinger like he would prefer not to be touching it himself, thanks. “Look, I definitely remember something about these things never going off.”

“That doesn’t sound right.” Pancha frowns, “But then again, I don’t know enough about twinkies to dispute it.”

They both look at the innocent little treat that Five has managed to unearth from inside of what looks like it used to be a child’s backpack. They don’t think about the child the backpack might have belonged to.

“Don’t those things have like, cream in them or something?” Pancha asks doubtfully, leaning forward to sniff the treat suspiciously, “Pretty sure anything with dairy in it went off like, years ago.”

“They’re like, 90% preservatives probably.” Five says, bringing it closer to his face so he can sniff it as well. “What do you think?”

“I think this is a terrible idea.” Pancha shrugs, which looks strange with a Dingo’s shoulders, “But then again, we are starving to death. Not sure we can afford to be picky.”

“We also can’t really afford to be sick.” Five points out sensibly.

They both take another pause to consider the twinkie.

“We’re so going to regret this.” Pancha sighs, laying down and putting her head on her paws. “But hey, if we die, we die.”

“We’re not going to die.” Five scolds her, peeling open the twinkie finally and giving it a distrustful look, “We totally aren’t going to regret this. Power of positive thinking, right?”

They absolutely regret it.

They don’t die, though.

---

The bright side of Pancha being unsettled is that she’s actually very useful in the apocalypse. She can take on the form of an elephant, acting as a one-daemon construction crew to clear out debris when they need a place to stay. She can run through the rubble as a mouse, squeezing through cracks in search of anything useful.

She takes the form of a chameleon, snagging insects from the air and offering them to Five when his skin starts looks paper thin and his ribs stick out prominently.

Pancha lays in the body of a tiger, curled around her human to protect him from the cold nip of the night air. The weather is turning, and soon enough there will probably be snow on the ground.

“We’re twenty-one this year.” Pancha says quietly.

Five hums, fingers twisted into her fur. “Five more years and then we’ll have officially been here longer than we were there.”

“Doesn’t matter how long it takes us.” Pancha says, squeezing her paws around his shoulders in warning, “We’re going to get back to them.”

Neither of them are sure they really believe it anymore, but oh how they want to.

They let the silence sit for a while between them before Five speaks up with a snort, “Not this one then?”

The question is almost an old joke at this point. Thirteen was a late bloomer. Sixteen was maybe-we-should-get-you-checked-out territory. Twenty-one was practically unheard of.

Pancha gives him a punishing lick with her sandpaper tongue over his forehead, making Five squawk with outrage. “Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to, idiot.”

“You know, calling me an idiot is really only calling yourself an idiot.” Five bites back, but they both know he’s not really offended. If he was, he wouldn’t still be cuddled into Pancha’s fur. Even their arguments are performative these days.

“I can call you scruffy without offending myself, I suppose.” Pancha says dryly, “What is wrong with your face.”

“If you can find a good razor kit in the apocalypse then be my guest.” Five says grumpily, but he ruins it by nuzzling his face into Pancha’s chest fur making her huff with laughter.

Pancha squishes him closer, mindful of her big paws and powerful muscles. But even in this form - her hip bones are too prominent and her ribs can easily be felt through her fur. They’ll go out scavenging again tomorrow, but for tonight they can just… lay here. Bask in one another’s company.

“Stop thinking so much.” Five draws his head back a little to sleepily scold his daemon, “You’re going to keep us both up.”

“Shut up then.” Pancha shoots back.

“Night, Pancha.” Five’s words are muffled against her fur, but she hears him loud and clear.

“Night, Five.” Pancha says softly.

---

Pancha hops tentatively through the first snow of the season, her white fur blending in well. “Five,” She says, not sure how she’s planning on following up.

“I know.” Five says quietly, reaching down to pick her up. She rubs her face under his chin comfortingly, feeling the scratch of his beard across her fur. “Happy birthday to us, I guess.”

“Twenty-six.” Pancha whispers.

“It was - it was 2019, right?” Five asks suddenly, “When the apocalypse happened?”

“April 1st, 2019.” Pancha confirms solemnly.

Five hums. “They’d have been, what, thirty?”

“It was still April.” Pancha corrects, shaking her head gently, “Our birthday is in October. They’d have still been twenty-nine.”

Five is very quiet for a long time, and Pancha keeps her own silence as they trudge through the wasteland. They’ve been doing a little better food-wise recently. They’ve discovered that while Five doesn’t get much out of Pancha eating, they get something out of it. She’s taken to wearing herbivorous forms and munching on grass and other plantlife where she can. The coming winter may make that trickier, though.

“If we go back before we hit thirty, we’d be about the same age.” Five says finally.

Pancha hums in agreement.

“But - ” Five hesitates, “We have to go back to, to before Ben dies, right?”

“They were what, sixteen?” Pancha taps at Five’s chest in a request to be put down, which he readily complies with. “Maybe we could get them out. Be the responsible adult.”

Five snorts, “Adopt our siblings?”

Pancha grins, “Hey, don’t tell me you wouldn’t enjoy the hell out of bossing Luther and Andromeda around.”

“We’ll see who’s the kid then.” Five chuckles before they both fall silent.

After all, Luther’s entire thing about Five being a brat was because - well. Pancha silently shifts into a husky with thick fur, coming over to nudge at Five’s leg as they walk side by side.

“We never really talked about what we’d do about - about me once we get back.” Pancha says carefully, warily.

They don’t need to change like they used to. Don’t shift between forms with the blink of an eye. They’re more solid now, Pancha tends to take a form for hours or entire days now unless she finds another form more useful to their current situation.

But they aren’t settled.

Five offers her a strained smile, “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

“Maybe if we get back, it’ll fix us.” Pancha offers, but her voice is soft and a little bit wistful. She doesn’t believe what she’s saying any more than Five does. They already travelled down that road before, and look where it got them.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.” Five repeats firmly, before his face softens a little bit, “Happy birthday, Pancha.”

“Happy birthday, Five.”

---

“Do you remember how old we are now?” Five whispers, his hair and his beard have gotten streaked with grey. Pancha’s not exactly a spring chicken herself anymore, allowing Five to card his fingers through the feathers in her wing and straighten them out.

“Too old.” Pancha complains, “What’s the point in keeping track anyway? It’s not like we know what day it is.”

“We should probably keep track in general.” Five sounds amused, “Gotta remember how far to go back after all.”

“Fuck it.” Pancha declares, nipping at Five’s fingers when he’s a tad rough with a tender spot, “Just overshoot. Either we’ll pop out when the family are babies, and we can just steal everyone, or we don’t and bam we’re right on track.”

“You’re suddenly finding a motherly bone in your body, somewhere?” Five removes his hands from her wings to brush them off on his pants. Pancha gives them an experimental flap or two. “I, for one, could not be paid enough to deal with a baby Diego. Can you imagine?”

“He’d have fantastic aim when he’d throw his toys at you.” Pancha snickers.

“Can you imagine baby Allison?” Five demands, and they look at each other for a heartbeat before they both break down into laughter.

“Oh my god,” Pancha gasps, burying her face into her own wing, “Can you imagine what she’d rumor? Everyday would be Disney world day and she would be the prettiest princess of all.”

“Ruling the world with an iron fist and a sparkly tiara.” Five manages to get out, his own face buried in his hands as he wheezes.

“Klaus would be right next to her, tiara and all.”

“Fuck you’re right.” Five laughs, a deep belly laugh they neither of them hear very much these days, “There would be so much glitter.”

That statement makes Pancha dissolve into giggles again where she was just getting control of herself.

“If we ever get back, I’m going to buy both of them the sparkliest tiaras available. No, wait. Gonna buy the whole family a bunch of those little kid birthday tiaras, and never explain why.” Five declares, grinning, “They’d be so confused.”

“When.” Pancha corrects, and the mood suddenly turns serious. “When we get back.”

Five doesn’t apologize, doesn’t sputter or claim it was just an error of speech. He just inclines his head a little bit and says, “Right. When we get back.”

---

They’re old and broken and creaky and tired when their endless days of bouncing math off of each other and testing at the boundary of the blue that stays frustratingly solid to them changes.

Five’s hair is entirely grey now, and his beard is long and scraggly where he hasn’t taken a knife to it in a while.

Pancha is a european hare and she’s the one that first senses danger.

The thing about living in the apocalypse, is that it’s quiet. There’s no hum of electric lights. There’s no brawls between stray cats or dogs. There’s no squirrels or rats or mice scurrying around.

So when Pancha’s sensitive ears pick up the sound of footsteps she feels such an intense sense of - of something that it makes Five drop his chalk and swing around to look at her with alarm.

She’s glad her form today is swift, because she’s across their little ‘camp’ in seconds and in his arms, clawing her way up to his shoulder to press her mouth to his ear, “There’s something out there.” She whispers, somehow terrified and she doesn’t know why.

To his credit, Five doesn’t even hesitate despite the impossibility of her words. He scoops her under one arm and turns and picks up the gun (they don’t talk about why they have a gun) with the other. He turns around and points it at -

A woman. They both freeze like deer in headlights.

“Hello!” The woman calls, picking her way down the debris in high heeled shoes.

“Five.” Pancha swallows, making her human look at her, “Five, where’s her daemon.”

Five’s head whips back around, and they both stare. It’s entirely possible that the woman’s daemon is just small, just out of sight and out of mind. It’s even possible that she’s a witch, and her daemon is off gallivanting about.

But Pancha can feel a scream trapped behind her teeth, feel her ears go back as she fights the urge to run run run away from this terrifying woman who tastes of empty empty empty. Something is wrong.

She can see the way Five’s fingers tremble as the sense of wrong wrong wrong reverberates through their bond.

“Who the hell are you!” Five snarls out, and Pancha takes the opportunity to squirm and wriggle so that she’s balanced precariously on Five’s shoulder, freeing up his other hand to steady the gun.

“I’m here to help.” The woman says brightly, still picking her way towards them.

“Five.” Pancha whimpers, and as she feels her paws tremble she watches his hands go still and steady.

“Tell me why I shouldn’t just put a bullet through your head right now.” Five raises the gun further, but the woman doesn’t even hesitate.

“Because,” The woman says, smiling a carefree smile as she adjusts her hat and pulls her sunglasses from her face. “Then you wouldn’t hear the offer I’m about to make you.”

Five and Pancha are more tense than they’ve ever been before in their lives, and considering some of their childhood missions - that’s saying a lot.

“Which would be rather tragic given your…” The woman looks around and even though she doesn’t look disgusted the implication is there anyway which makes them both bristle, “...Current circumstances. I work for an organization called the Commission. We are tasked with the preservation of the time continuum through manipulation and removals.

“Why are you telling us this.” Five manages to grit out, never letting his gun drop.

The woman just looks at him like he’s a child and she’s disappointed he asked such an obvious question.

“I’ve come to offer you a job, Number Five.” She says simply.

They don’t miss the way she only offered the job to him, not to Pancha.

There’s a lot after that. The woman explains that she wants to hire him - them - to, to eliminate threats to time caused by humanity’s free will. She tells him that her organization has had their eye on him. That he has potential. That Five can retire with a pension plan for the low low price of his soul.

Well, he’s paraphrasing.

She at least allows him a moment of privacy to discuss things with his daemon, telling him that she will be back in an hour to pick him up and that he should take the time to gather what possessions he wishes to take with him. She seems awfully confident he will take her deal.

“She doesn’t have a daemon.” Pancha shudders against him, “She’s so empty inside. She scares me, Five.”

“I know.” Five says, smoothing his hands over her fur comfortingly, “But - Pan, the chance to get out. If they know how to properly time travel - ”

“Then we can finally get out of here.” Pancha says softly, longingly. “It’s been so long, Five.”

“I know.” He whispers.

“She wants us to kill for her.” Pancha tells him, “Removing the problems - she just wants us to become an assassin. She wants us to be a weapon.”

“Would we kill to get our siblings back?” Five asks, but it’s a rhetorical question. They both know that they’d probably let the world burn all over again if only it meant saving the people most important to them.

“We’d have food.” Pancha offers finally, “If it’s a job, we’ll have money. No more scavenging. We could focus more time on, on - you know.”

Five nods solemnly, “So, do we take the job?”

A shudder ripples through Pancha’s body, “What about me, Five?”

“What about you?” Five asks, brow furrowing.

“I’m not normal.” Pancha states tightly, watching Five’s face light up in comprehension. It’s been a long time since they discussed Pancha’s ability to shift. After so many years, it almost seems normal. “She’s already seen me as a hare. So do I just - pretend to be a hare?”

Five bites his lip, “Just until we figure out how to get back.”

They both know that’s not a real answer. They both have no idea what they’re going to do when they show up, old and decrepit and still unsettled.

“She can’t know.” Five says, because at least that much is certain. “She doesn’t have a daemon. She can’t know.”

Pancha sighs, but they both already know what their choice is going to be. “Okay. Okay let’s become assassins.”

---

They’re in a hotel room, and Pancha shifts a few times just to prove she can. She likes being a hare, but sometimes it just gets itchy. Wrong. Sometimes she needs wings, or fangs, or something.

She feels like she needs fangs a lot around the Handler. Or like she needs to be something small, like a mouse and curl up in Five’s pockets again to hide away. Usually she just hides behind Five and lets him deal with the woman, which is perhaps unfair of her but Five hasn’t protested yet.

(Actually, Pancha doesn’t speak to anybody. Not after the doctor and his capuchin daemon looked entirely scandalized when she addressed him instead of his daemon. Apparently missing out on socialization for an estimated forty-five years led to… some not so great manners.)

Five methodically cleans his gun as Pancha shifts from a lion to a gazelle to a pallas cat and back into a hare to jump onto the bed with him.

“Today?” She asks him.

He looks up at her and frowns, his hands pausing.

“Something feels different. More right.”

Five tilts his head a little bit in though and then nods. He’s been quiet, since they got back. When they’re alone together at least. The opposite of Pancha. Sometimes she wonders if they’re just switching off, the way they do when it comes to shows of emotion sometimes.

Pancha crawls into his lap, nudging at his hands until they put the gun aside and bury themselves in her fur.

“We’re going to save the world, Five.” She says, projecting as much confidence as she can into her voice, as much confidence as she can into him. “We’re going to save them all.”

Five’s hands tremble in her fur, and they both politely pretend that they don’t.

“You aren’t going to do this alone, because you have me. We’re a team.” She cranes her head back so she can offer him a smile, “Team Adaptable, right?”

“Right.” Five rasps out, touching the silver patches in her fur.

And then they get up, and move out. They’re on a mission now.

#daemon au #yeAH #long post #far tua long #i started writing it and then got super busy oops #but this probably would have been the first chapter #just establishing five and pancha as the main characters #and their whole relationship #and what it means that pancha is unsettled and why she hides it #there's a level of shame involved in a world that treats settled as matured #i'm 100% sure there are parties thrown when a kids daemon settles #like it's a BIG deal in this au #and they don't want to settle because they're so adaptable #but they also desperately want to fit in rip #the handler does not have a daemon and pancha is terrified of her #dolores is not super necessary in this au bc they have each other #i only have like six and a half more google doc pages written tbh #and they're not great bc writing the coming back was awkward #me: i struggle with juggling a lot of characters in a scene #daemon au: oh? double the amount of characters you said?#Anonymous

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ptergwen · 4 years ago

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Hit me with some Peter fluff, Val. Maybe since you want to be distracted from school it's the reader begging Peter to pay attention to her and not studying? Idk just some Peter fluff I really don't care what the plot is lol

writing this during my last class of the day mhm

“peter, can we please do something?” you emphasize the last word, this being the third time you’ve asked him. he’d rather review for history than entertain his lovely girlfriend. “mhm, in a minute,” he says on autopilot, biting the eraser of his pencil. his eyebrows knit together while he reads over the page he’s on.

“we’ve had this conversation already. take a break,” you whine and nudge his arm with your nose. “i really gotta do well on the test, bug. i’ll be done soon,” peter outstretches an arm for you. you lean into him and huff. “it’s not until next week.” “it’s a lot of content,” he murmurs, flipping the page.

you’re aware of how childish you sound, but you don’t care. you watch his eyes follow a paragraph. “you’re so smart, though. don’t you know it already?” “smart people forget stuff,” peter sighs and tucks his pencil behind his ear. he doesn’t say anything else after that, focusing on his reading again. you can’t take it anymore.

you grab the textbook off his lap before he can react. his eyes go wide. it’s behind your back now. “y/n, i really need that back,” peter reaches to get it from you. you come towards him, grabbing both his hands. you’re in his lap instead of the book. he can’t really complain about that. you set his hands on your hips.

“take a break,” you repeat, a smile appearing on your lips. peter pulls you flush against his chest. his eyes practically darken. “on second thought, i can finish later.”

#tom holland #peter parker #tom holland fluff #peter parker fluff

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wintersxsoul · 6 years ago

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Fire Meets Gasoline (4)

Summary: You leave your city to start over in your best friend’s town, oblivious to the fact that you have an unexpected roommate. What will happen when fire meets gasoline?

Pairing: Loki x Female!Reader

Word Count: 1k-ish?

Warnings: Mentions of sex I guess?

A/N: In this household, we support filler chapters. If you asked me to be tagged and I didn’t tag you, please send me an ask or a message because I am a mess.

After the whole Eric situation, you swore to yourself you wouldn’t let another person sleep with you, not when you were sure it was just something physical. Missing someone’s body next to yours at night was the worst feeling ever, the emptiness of the bed spreading through your hollow chest. All the sleepless nights you experienced made you realize the huge mistake you made a while ago.

You looked at yourself in the mirror, checking for any evidence of last night, but there were no love bites or swollen lips, but you were 100% sure you had sex with Loki. That was not the problem, the problem was that he stayed in your bed, with you.

You barged into your bedroom, hoping Loki was gone, but there he was, smiling at you. You glared at him and he frowned.

“What happened?” You asked him, the obvious annoyance in your voice.

“Well, we had sex and-” He started saying, but you cut him off, needing a different answer.

“Yeah, I know we had sex, asshole. Why the fuck are you still in my bed. Why didn’t you go to your own room to sleep?” He was looking at you, confused.

“We just fell asleep, what the fuck is wrong with you?” He spat while standing up and getting dressed. You turned around to give him privacy, since you couldn’t remember the whole thing. Yeah, sure, it was your idea to suck his dick, but you were not expecting the outcomes of it. Like falling fucking asleep with him.

You knew you were overreacting and your own mind wasn’t making sense, but it was your way to protect yourself from the possible comments or actions that could come afterwards.

“Relax, Y/n, it was just a one time thing. You said that yourself.” He said right before leaving you on your empty room. You approached your bed and threw yourself back on the pillows.

“Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.” You shouted to the pillow, muffling your voice. The fucking bed smelled like him.

You really wanted the bed to swallow you whole for being over dramatic and for falling asleep last night. You heard the shower so you took that opportunity to call Valerie, but she cut the call. You frowned and pressed your face to the pillow again, not knowing what to do with yourself on your day off. After fifteen minutes or so, your phone buzzed.

Valerie: Hey! Sorry I cut the call, I was at the meeting I told you about last night. Hope everything is okay :)

Fuck, you totally forgot about her telling you that. You looked at your screen, unsure of what to say.

Y/n: Hey, sorry I totally forgot. Would you like to grab a coffee and maybe lunch? It’s my day off.

You pressed send and waited not so patiently for her reply. When you saw the three dots, you panicked.

Valerie: It’s a date! Send me your address, I’ll pick you up in 45 minutes. Wear something cute ;)

And so you did and seconds later, you were picking up your outfit and heading towards the already empty bathroom. The burning water fell on your body, calming all the nerves you felt about everything that had happened in less than 12 hours.

While you showered, Loki was sitting on his desk, trying to comprehend the situation he just lived. He couldn’t understand why you panicked over a shared bed, when you were the one who showed interest first. He had wanted to fuck you since the first day he saw you at his door, but now that it happened, he felt like he could move on. It was not bad sex, but you were so cold and then morning came. You didn’t even let him kiss you while doing it, for fuck’s sake.

You looked at yourself once again in the mirror, admiring the dress you carefully chose. It was a skater dress, a rusty color and white flowers. You styled it with your white converse and a small yellow backpack. You finished applying mascara and lipstick when you received a text message.

Valerie: I’m down.

Before you closed the door, you could hear Loki’s door opening and calling out your name, but you decided to ignore it and go on with your day.

Val showed you around the city, since you haven’t seen much after a month living here. She took you to her favorite Greek restaurant to have lunch and to her favorite coffee shop. Next stop was a small bookshop owned by her grandparents friends.

You stared at the dusty bookshelves in awe, the smell of old paper and ink filling your senses, Valerie holding your hand all the time. She was wearing a black sweater, light grey pleated pants and black oxfords. Her short blonde hair, wavy and she was just wearing gloss. She looked gorgeous.

“What are you thinking about?” Val asked you, standing shyly in front of you. You smiled at her and placed a strand of her hair behind her ear, caressing softly the side of her face.

“I’m thinking about how gorgeous you look. So ethereal and effortless.” You answered honestly. She blushed but placed a kiss to your cheek.

“Kinda makes me wonder if I wanna kiss you or be you.” You teased and she laughed, the sound music to your ears. But even though you wanted to kiss her, you knew it was going to be just a one time thing, since your stupid brain couldn’t separate correctly feelings. Valerie was a nice girl, sweet and beautiful, but something in you told you she was not the one. You walked around the shop for half an hour and bought a copy of a book you’ve been planning on reading since it came out. It was a romantic novel, written by some mysterious guy who called himself God of Mischief. The name was interesting to say the least, but it still brought your attention, so after reading so many positive reviews, you decided to buy it.

Valerie left you at home after having dinner in a small dinner, after you declined the offer to go to sleep to her house. You really didn’t wanna be that kind of person. You couldn’t be like Eric.

You arrived to your apartment’s door and something felt odd, and as you stepped in the empty room, you understood why.

There was clothing items scattered all over the place, the armchair almost in the middle of the living room, when its usual place was a corner. You walked towards your bedroom silently and closed the door, trying to be as quick and quiet as possible.

At 4 am something woke you up. At first, you didn’t understand what was going on, but as the minutes went by, everything made sense. Loud moans and groans came from Loki’s bedroom, the banging of his headboard on the wall confirming the already obvious situation.

This is a joke.

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wlfmthr-blog · 6 years ago

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Read My Mind

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It is estimated that more than 1/4 of men would like to see their products organized in this fashion, making their shopping experience more organized and efficient. But I will continue using it to see if I like it or not. When news broke last year regarding Google's involvement with online pharmacies to sell illegal and counterfeit drugs using Google's Adwords and other advertising platforms, the details that emerged from the settlement with the U.S. The effect on their heart rate and energy expenditure, the number of calories burnt, were then measured using various fitness devices and compared to that measured using detailed laboratory tests, including continuous telemetry and indirect calorimetry. 4.99, e-Val MD gives users a complete system to handle and process an unlimited number of patient records. You must edify yourself about the breed of the puppy you are bringing and also purchase a book if possible which gives details of the puppy care. 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Holmes said he had been working on “subjective experience, which is what takes place inside the mind as oppose to the external world”. 28 July 2012: It’s been just over a week when a male identified by law enforcement officials as James Eagan Holmes entered a theater in Aurora, Colorado and allegedly killed 12 people and wounded 58 others. Some people did not know that in the 1920's and 30's in the shoe stores located in a lot of pharmacies, they had x-ray machines to get you into good fitting shoes. It is easily accessible and allows customers to get conveniently in touch with you. Click here to read the fact sheet on the bill. Read also our customer-friendly Shipping policy and Shipping terms. It's easy to foam soap at home for hand soaps and dish soaps and the savings add up! One lady had cautions introduced on the entryways of her home to alarm her family in the event that she endeavored to go out while dozing. 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butterflyrose87 · 7 years ago

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☆☆ Nothing's deadlier than sleeping with the enemy☆☆ Title: Blurred Red Lines Author: Cora Kenborn Goodreads: http://bit.ly/2EZNJok Cover Design: Bite Me Graphic Design Genre: Dark Romantic Suspense Hosted By: The Wit & Wonder Agency Synopsis: Nothing’s deadlier than sleeping with the enemy. Eden In the wrong place at the wrong time, my life is forever altered when I witness a botched cartel hit. Kidnapped and held against my will, I find myself thrust into a longstanding cartel war as some sick consolation prize. I’ll make it out of here, and when I do, everyone from the drug lord to the bottom-feeding trigger man will fall. That is, if I can stop myself from falling first. For him. I should hate him. He holds me prisoner, but I'm the one who refuses to leave. Valentin My name is whispered in fear. As the heir to the Carrera Cartel, I’m determined to defy my legacy and do things my way. When an innocent man’s death put a witness on my radar, I try to convince myself I’m keeping her prisoner to discover her secrets. It’s a lie. I want her, but this dangerous attraction risks both my empire and our lives. I’ve spent my life in a solitude of my own choosing, but now that I have Eden beside me, I won’t let her go. If we burn…we burn together. Purchase Links: Amazon US: http://amzn.to/2m2BEY9 Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/2AxPczg Amazon CA: http://amzn.to/2Cwh0Ge Amazon AU: http://amzn.to/2EbXn6X Reviews: "The suspense will keep you on the edge of your seat and the romance will have you both needing a cold shower and hoping your Kindle doesn't melt while you turn the pages." ~ Dani Rene, author "Val is ruthless, and you want to hate him, but you just can't...Sexy, hot and suspenseful, with lots of mind- bending dark moments." ~ Book Lovin Mama "I absolutely loved Eden Lachey, she's a tough feisty heroine with heart and Valentin Carrera is the sexy alpha bad boy that Eden feels will break her heart. Val is the perfect combination of scary dangerous and a loving protective hero." ~ Michelle, reader #valbrl #MUSTread

#mustread #valbrl

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therubyreader · 27 days ago

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Book Bites: Volume 2

Hello everyone, happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all are having a good holiday with your loved ones!

The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels - India Holton ☆☆☆☆☆

I feel like the fact that I not only found but really enjoyed this book is surprising to no one given the premise, 19th century female pirates who commit their crimes from flying houses along with a fun love story, sounds like something written specifically with me in mind. The book follows Cecelia Bassingthwaite, the niece of a prominent member of the Wisteria Society, a league of lady pirates, vying for a seat at the table who gets caught up in a scheme that sees her aunt kidnapped and forms an unlikely alliance with a male pirate who has been ordered to kill her. I absolutely loved this book, the writing style is so creative, a mix of Victorian tone with modern humor, the characters are super interesting, and the satirical use of Victorian etiquette among a group of criminals was super fun to read. The chapter titles were also super creative and funny, if you skim through them then you’re bound to miss some great jokes. Despite its surface level silliness, the book deals with serious topics like grief, love, and the role of women in society in ways that directly add to the story and characters. I absolutely loved reading it and recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Bridgerton and loves fantasy.

Castle of the Cursed - Romina Garber ☆☆★★★

When I came across this book so many months ago, I was super excited to read it as the premise is super interesting, our main character Estela loses her parents in a tragic accident and ends up finding out she has family in Spain who live in a creepy castle where she finds a boy with silver eyes that only she can see, but unfortunately the book fell flat. I absolutely loved the beginning especially with how good of a job the author did portraying mental health issues, but right around the middle of the book it turned into a completely different story, and it was so sudden and jarring that I stopped enjoying it. Right in the middle a magic system and multiple alternate dimensions were introduced with a basis in absolutely nothing before this point and the ending was extremely anticlimactic. If the book just stayed grounded in gothic magical realism, I would’ve enjoyed it so much more than whatever it was that the book turned into. I will give it two stars for the first half, the rest is just not worth it.

Vampire Academy - Richelle Mead ☆☆☆☆★

Though I read these books before, it’s been well over ten years since I’ve picked this up, so I essentially was reading this as it was for the first time, mostly, I still remembered some of the major plot points. This book follows Rose Hathaway, a dhampir, half human half vampire hybrid, protectors of the mortal vampires who can use earth’s magic, called moroi, and her best friend Lissa Dragomir, a moroi princess, who after two years of running away from their vampire boarding school are caught and sent back causing them to experience more trouble than they had bargained for. I watched the movie version of this a couple of weeks ago with a friend and the movie is very much a product of its time so I was worried the book would be too, luckily, I was wrong and besides the lack of smartphones and the fashion choices, it still holds up pretty well. Even with reading a book meant for teens with my adult eyes it still holds up and I enjoyed it almost as much as I did when I first read it back in middle school. Though, if memory serves right, this is the tamest of the books but a solid introduction to the world and the plot thread that goes through the whole series. I did knock a star off for aforementioned tameness and also because as a 24-year-old, reading Dimitri falling in love with a 17-year-old Rose was extra gross and I really could not imagine doing the same. I am going to keep reading this series though as its fun nostalgia and I was glad my middle school fondness for the series wasn’t misplaced.

#val's book reviews #val's book bite reviews #book review #bookblr #the wisteria society of lady scoundrels #india holton #castle of the cursed #romina garber #vampire academy #richelle mead

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jenmedsbookreviews · 7 years ago

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Man. Where to even begin this week. Well. I will start by saying my reading achievements were next to none. Not quite none. But near enough. Work has been very demanding, I have been very tired and my heart just was not in it. No reflection on the books, more a reflection on my weary and rapidly ageing bones and brain telling me to take a break. In fact I am writing this post in stages as I know where my head is currently at so it if makes no sense come the end … well nowt new there really but this time there is an excuse at least 🙂

So, anyway. Aside from being generally ancient (turned 42 this past week don’t you know) I was preoccupied with something else. Lordy 42. Do you remember being a kid and thinking that people in their forties were ancient? Well I’ll let you into a secret – when you finally reach your forties you bloody feel it too. Just kidding. Age is just a number. Like my chest, mine is just larger than some, that’s all. But back to my point (wandering mind comes with age too…) I was away from home from Thursday until Sunday this week because I took the plunge, packed my backbone in a small holdall and made my way to Harrogate for the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Festival.

It’s an interesting festival, very different in tone to Crimefest, geared very much to a social atmosphere but encouraging and enticing readers with a healthy and steady supply of books. I say healthy with my tongue in my cheek (not easy to do without biting said tongue – don’t believe me try it), as carrying around the dang things all day has knackered my shoulder but hey ho.

As book hauls go, this week was mega. It was also rather big in terms of meeting people. I met a whole host of bloggers this weekend who I’m not going to try and name for fear of missing someone and causing great upset, but it was a pleasure to meet you all either finally or again (and you super lovely ones already know who you are 😉 ). I also met quite a few authors that I admire, including Robert Byrndza and the lovely Jan, Caroline Mitchell and Mel Sherratt, Graham Smith, Sarah Wray, Claire Seeber and also got to meet Keshini Naidoo (yes – a small Bookouture bias in this post I think).

It was also lovely to catch up with Kim Nash, Karen Sullivan, Steph Broadribb, Amanda Jennings, Lucy V Hay, Amer Anwar, Felicia Yap, Patricia Gibney, Bernie Steadman and Fiona Cummins again, and to get to say hi to Paul Burston as I absolutely loved his book The Black Path. I even remembered to take pictures of some of them (but not many as I suck at that). Oh yes, and it was nice to see Rod Reynolds again even if he did show Jo and Emma the terrible selfie he took at Crimefest (terrible because I was in it). And lovely to finally meet Graeme Cumming and have a catch up chat with Gabriela Harding in the quiet times. I’m just hoping I haven’t missed anyone and if I have I’m sorry and I do love you too. (Well at least like and admire – love is such a strong word 😉 ).

Have to give credit to Abbie Osborne for the selfies as I would totally not take those 😀

As well as generally milling about I did attend a couple of panels, though not as many as I perhaps would have liked so I’ll try better next time. The Friday night panel chaired by Sarah Millican and featuring Lee Child, Mark Billingham and Val McDermid was hilarious as you would expect. And I totally agree with Sarah Hilary’s shout out for Chris Whitaker as a totally brilliant writing talent. I also went to a blogger/author event organised by Orion where we met Mari Hannah, Emma Kavanagh, Stephanie Marland (aka Steph Broadribb, aka Crime Thriller Girl) and Lara Dearman, a forensics talk in which I learned many important things to include in ‘Killer’, and a quick start talk on writing crime fiction with Isabel Ashdown and Sam Eades.

And I had two lovely evenings out, firstly with Abigail Osborne, Leah and Jill of Jills Book Cafe, and then with Tracy Fenton and the guy and gals from TBC. Thanks for the company all.

And then there were the books… So. Many. Books.

I got the following:

The Devils Claw by Lara Dearman (Kindle pre order 7/9/17);

My Little Eye by Stephanie Marland (Kindle pre order 2/11/17) Happy dance moment :D;

The Wrong Child by Barry Gornell (Kindle pre order 2/11/17);

The Lost by Mari Hannah (Kindle preorder 2/3/18);

Murder at the Mill by M.B. Shaw (Kindle pre order 30/11/17);

Shadow Man by Margaret Kirk (Kindle pre order 2/11/17);

Beautiful Liars by Isabel Ashdown (Kindle pre order 19/4/18);

I Found You by Lisa Jewell;

The Seagull by Ann Cleeves (Kindle pre order 7/9/17) – The only book I actually purchased all weekend.

The Snowman by Jo Nesbo;

If I Die Before I Wake by Emily Koch (Kindle pre order 11/1/18);

Give Me The Child by Mel McGrath;

Eyes Like Mine by Sheena Kamal;

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell (Kindle pre order 5/10/17);

My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent (Kindle pre order 29/8/17);

The Mountain by Luca D’Andrea;

The Mitford Murders by Jessica Fellowes (Kindle pre order 14/9/17);

The Collector by Fiona Cummins; (soooooooooooo excited about this one and so new there are no Amazon links yet!!! :D) If you don’t know why I’m excited and haven’t yet read Rattle (and if not why not?) then you can order it here and get yourself ready for next year. Did I mention I love that book? I do. I was so excited I may have actually started reading this in bed instead of the books I should have been reading. Oops. (Sorry – not sorry). All the eeeeeeeeeks and squeeeeeeeeals.

The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn (pre order January 2018);

Consent by Leo Benedictus (pre order 1/2/18);

Perfect Remains by Helen Fields;

Anatomy of a Scandal by Sarah Vaughn (Kindle pre order 11/1/18);

Strange Magic by Syd Moore

So all in all a great book haul of a weekend. And I visited Betty’s and treated myself to a belated birthday cake. Go me.

Now the weekend wasn’t without it’s down moments too but least said, soonest mended so lets move on.

Now as if all that wasn’t brilliant enough, before I left for Harrogate I received some absolutely stonkingly fantabulous book post from the wonderful Louise Ross (LJ Ross). Now I knew I’d be getting the signed book as I won it in a charity auction, as well as the chance to be a named character. But I wasn’t expecting to receive a DCI Ryan series mug as well. I actually collect mugs as well as books so this couldn’t have been a better gift for me and will take pride of place in the collection.

And, totally not book related but my new cushions and mugs turned up. How fab are these?

The McMoos by Jennifer Hogwood – You totally need to check out the website.

Just the one book order this week (just as well) which was Bad Sister by Sam Carrington. It’s due out on 5th October and I can’t wait to get my mitts on a copy.

Just the one Netgalley this week too (just as well) which was The Good Sister by Jess Ryder. It’s due for release on 16th August.

I see a theme here. Kind of reminiscent of my life. I have one of each. I’ll let them fight over which is which 😉

I also received an ARC of I Know A Secret by Tess Gerritsen, the brand new Rizzoli and Isles novel which is due out on 10th August.

Now I am hoping that all of these exciting things I’ve been rambling about above will distract you from my reading tally which stands at the grand total of 2. Lorraine at The Book Review Cafe will be laughing at me this week given her mammoth reading achievements and rightly so. If only I’d saved the bloody Mr Men books… When I say reading tally it was one read, one listen as I only completed one book and then listened to an audio on the way too and from Harrogate. Failed blogger I am then (this is not news but now we have evidence).

Books I have read

Red Is The Colour by Mark L. Fowler

A GRIPPING NEW POLICE THRILLER Bullying. Corruption. Murder.

It is the summer of 2002. The corpse of a 15 year old boy, who has been missing for thirty years, is discovered in Stoke-on-Trent. The city is on the cusp of change and Chief Superintendent Berkins wants the case solved quickly.

DCI Jim Tyler has arrived from London under a cloud, moving to Staffordshire to escape his past. He is teamed up with DS Danny Mills to investigate the case, but there is tension between the detectives.

When the dead boy’s sister comes forward, describing a bright, solitary child, she points a finger at the school bullies, which puts important careers at stake.

Then one of the bullies is found brutally murdered and when Tyler and Mills dig deeper they start to suspect a cover-up.

What is the connection between the death of a schoolboy in 1972 and this latest killing?

With the pressure building, and the past catching up with DCI Tyler, will he and DS Mills be able to put aside their differences in order to catch a cold-blooded killer?

I’m reviewing this for the blog tour next Monday but I have to be honest and say that this was a really well observed look at childhood bullying an the people who were involved, both directly and indirectly. With a thirty year old victim it is a tough ask for newly transferred DCI Jim Tyler to bring the killer to justice in this new police procedural from Mark L. Fowler and Bloodhound Books. It is released tomorrow, 25th July, and you can buy a copy here.

…

You Don’t Know Me by Imran Mahmood

It’s easy to judge between right and wrong – isn’t it?

Not until you hear a convincing truth.

Now it’s up to you to decide…

An unnamed defendant stands accused of murder. Just before the Closing Speeches, the young man sacks his lawyer, and decides to give his own defence speech.

He tells us that his barrister told him to leave some things out. Sometimes, the truth can be too difficult to explain, or believe. But he thinks that if he’s going to go down for life, he might as well go down telling the truth.

There are eight pieces of evidence against him. As he talks us through them one by one, his life is in our hands. We, the reader – member of the jury – must keep an open mind till we hear the end of his story. His defence raises many questions… but at the end of the speeches, only one matters:

Did he do it?

Oh my life. What an intriguing novel. Taking courtroom drama to brand new heights this is a story which will not only challenge your idea of right and wrong but also the whole idea of how courtroom dramas should be. Set as a series of court transcripts and told in the defendants voice the author takes you on a journey and you as reader are set to act as jury. I listened to the Audio book of this and I have to say it was absolutely perfect in this format. My review will follow but you can order a copy of the book here.

…

That is all. Thankfully I was fully prepared on the blogging front so I had posts everyday.

#BlogTour Guest Post: Dying Art by Malcolm Hollingdrake

#Booklove: Katherine Sunderland

#BlogTour Review: The Other Twin by Lucy V Hay

Review: Blind Justice by M.A. Comley

#BlogTour Review: Her Deadly Secret by Chris Curran

#BookLove: Jane Cable

#GuestReview: Another You by Jane Cable

…

The week ahead is a bit of a mixture. I start with a review, then some #Booklove with Helena Fairfax, followed by blog tours for The Marriage Pact by Michelle Richmond, and then The Unquiet Dead by Ausma Zehanat Khan with a very special Author Q&A in between, rounding out the week with more #Booklove with Jack Steele and another blog tour, this time The Lost Wife by Anna Mansell.

Hope you have a brilliant week all. I’m reading all day today before going back to work and some more training tomorrow. Boo hiss to that one but someone has to do it. Going to Chester Zoo on Saturday so think of all the animal/nature pics I can share with you next week. You can’t wait can you? Hope they still have the Pudu’s and the Kimodo Dragon. I love them!!!

See you next Monday.

P.S. since penning this post Sunday evening I have been online and preordered three books from Goldsboro (it’s now Sunday bedtime). We’ll just ignore those, pretend I ordered them after midnight and I’ll fill you all in next week 😂

Rewind, recap: weekly update w/e 23/07/17 Man. Where to even begin this week. Well. I will start by saying my reading achievements were next to none.

#BookLove #Rewind Recap #Weekly Round UP

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bubba532to · 7 years ago

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Title: Sizzling Summer Love Shifters in Love Romance Collection Release Date: #AlreadyReleased Reviewer: Ingrid Stephanie Jordan Authors V. Vaughn, Liv Brywood, Tasha Black, Elle Thorne, Mandy Roth, Michelle M. Pillow, Vivian Arend, Michele Bardsley, Elianne Adams #5Stars☆☆☆☆☆ ••••••••••••••••• All A Definitely Must Read Called by the Bear Books 1 - 3 Tempted by the Bear Books 1 - 3 Desired by the Bear Books 1 - 3 Rocked by the Bear Books 1 - 6 Title: Desired by the Bear Book #1 Author: V. Vaughn OMG!! What can I say, I feel like I've been waiting for this Trilogy forever, I swear I started these from day one, well for me day one. Now you know I love Rocked by the Bear, but I missed Tristan & Annie and Izzy & Jean Luc, Tori & Keith everybody in the De Rozier Pack and the Le Roux Pack, yes I'm very excited to start reading this new series. Four Couragous, Strong Women and There Fated Mates. Nadia Boucher (Ice Queen ) and Darin Izzy and Jean Luc Ouellette is Alpha to the Clan in Safe Harbor, Canada Kelsey and Val Tally and Marcel Du Veaux Nadia Boucher is a Polar Bear that has had it ruff 1st her husband, the love of her life, finds his true mate consequently Nadia is nothing to him, there marriage was over, Heartbroken Nadia starts working for her Alpha Tristan's vodka business becoming a super model The Ice Queen. Enjoying the limelight didn't last long though because the hunters found her, now she was running for her life. With Darin's help Nadia make it back to her clan only to be sent to Canada to guard Izzy. Tally is a human witch, plus the clans medicine woman with eyes only for Marcel. Kelsey is fresh out of college and working as an intern for Jean Luc than she see's Val and a light bulb goes off. Ooooooooo the best part left for last Izzy isssssssss awwwww you'll have to read to find out. ••••••••••••••••• This Is Another Must Read In Order 300 Moons 6 Book Series Burn This! Book #1 Bait This! Book #2 Bite This! Book #3 Break This! Book #4 Bake This! Book #5 Bear This! Book #6 Title: Burn This! Book #1 Author: Tasha Black This is why I say Ms. Black has the Golden Touch, yep she did it again. This is the second book of A 300 Moons Series I love it. If you thought book one was good oh my gosh book 2 is phenomenal. Again the characters match perfectly for each other. I'm excited were going back to Tarker's Hollow with a very special Mom/Kate Harkness of Harkness Farm. Johnny Lazarus is a Dragon Shifter but he keeps him caged never letting him out. Johnny became rich n famous with his band, the Somnambulance which made him very vain. Life was good or so he thought! Things were starting to happen he didn't feel right, than Mom called wanted him home at the farm because it was time for his 300 Moons. So with end of the tour, he packed up Little Ruby and left. Neve Whittaker, loved her job at Malibu Sanctuaries. Helping patients with there addictions was her true calling she excelled in it. Some people called her “The Angel of Malibu". There new patient walked in and she knew something was different but what? ••••••••••••••••• This Is Absolutely A Must Read In Order Immortal Outcasts 3 Book Series Broken Communication Book #1 Damage Report Book #2 Isolated Maneuver Book #3 Title: Broken Communication Book #1 Author: Mandy Roth This book is a spinoff from Immortal Ops. Casey Black is a wolf and Harmony is his Princess. For years he's been following Harmony around watching and protecting her. Then she is kidnapped and he must find her. Will he find his Princess in time?The book might be short BUT it gets you hooked on page 1 you'll have to finish it right away and the house work can wait. ••••••••••••••••• A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book and my comments here are my honest opinion.

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ruthlessbookfish · 8 years ago

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Blurred Red Lines by Cora Kenborn

April 4

My Review

Eden is a bad ass. There were some really sad moments in Blurred Red Lines but, Cora Kenborn did an amazing job in keeping the story action driven. Val’s world is rapidly spiraling out of control, snatching people up like a tornado into the chaos. When it finally pulls in Eden, she becomes his calm in the sea of pain and betrayal. As much as they have reasons not to be together. I loved their relationship. I loved the passion they felt towards one another.

* I voluntarily read an advanced reader’s copy of this book*

Title: Blurred Red Lines

Series: Carrera Cartel #1

Author: Cora Kenborn

Genre: Romantic Suspense

Release Date: April 4, 2017

Blurb

Sometimes, there’s nothing more deadly than sleeping with the enemy.

Eden

Meaningless flings, a steady stream of alcohol, and two dead-end jobs fill my days until my world flips upside down. In the wrong place at the wrong time, I witness a botched cartel hit, and my life is forever altered. With nothing left to lose and motivated by revenge, I vow to make those responsible always remember what I’ll never be able to forget. Then I’m kidnapped, and before I know what’s happening, I’m thrust into a long-standing cartel war as some sick consolation prize. I’ll make it out of here, and when I do, everyone from the top drug lord to the bottom-feeding trigger man will fall.

That is if I can stop myself from falling first. For him. The one I should hate myself for wanting. He’s the one that holds me prisoner, but it’s me who refuses to leave.

Valentin

My name is whispered in fear because of the ruthless reputation I’ve built for myself. Being the heir to the Carrera Cartel comes with its perks, but I’m determined to defy my legacy and do things my way. A prisoner with a temper as fiery as her hair and a rival cartel are the only things standing between me and complete domination. Murder is business in my world, but when an innocent man’s death puts a witness on my radar and in my basement, I try to convince myself I’m keeping her safe to discover her secrets. It’s a lie. I want her, and with my enemies closing in, I need her now more than ever.

This dangerous attraction between us risks both my empire and our lives. I’ve spent my life in a solitude of my own choosing, but now that I have Eden beside me, I won’t let her go. If we burn…we burn together.

ADD TO GOODREADS

Purchase Links

AMAZON US / UK / CA / AU

Free in Kindle Unlimited

Excerpt

VAL

Returning my attention to the bar, I strained to hear her conversation with the random drunks gawking at her. Loud Mariachi music blaring in the background and annoying yells of over exuberant patrons made eavesdropping almost impossible. Trying to act bored as hell, I slipped into a seat at the end of the bar and leaned forward. “I’ll be with you in a minute.” Tilting her chin in my direction, she kept her focus on the sugary frozen concoction she created. Puckering her red lips, she blew a piece of hair out of her face that escaped the sloppy bun on top of her head. A sloppy, candy red bun to match candy red lips. The kind of lips that could tell a man any lie they wanted and he’d gladly buy any shit they sold for just a taste. My dick twitched, reminding me it’d been a few days since I’d gotten laid. It didn’t help matters Emilio found it amusing to dress the bartenders in the tiniest denim shorts he could find, with black tank tops drawn across their chests so tight that the Caliente logo disappeared under their arms. Well played, Emilio. I’d never been one to chase women. I didn’t have to. They fell at my feet, crawled in my bed, and blew my phone up with calls and texts I never returned. But I found myself intrigued and unable to turn away as I watched Emilio’s new bartender flip through her texts, frown, and bite her lip, smearing the bright red lipstick that still had my pants in an uproar. I watched her eyes glaze over as she muttered something under her breath and stared at the liquor bottles in front of her. With a long, drawn out sigh, she snuck a sweeping glance around the bar. Immediately, I dropped my eyes down to my phone, suddenly engrossed in a blank screen. Do it. Be bad. Satisfied no one watched, she bent down and pretended to tie her shoe, taking a bottle of vodka with her to the floor. Tucked safely underneath the sink, I shifted over the bar to get a better view of the show as she reached up with a slim, milky white arm and snagged a glass. Pouring two large shots, she downed them successively, grimacing at the eighty-proof burn. Well, damn. She just became much more interesting to me. I arched an eyebrow and fought a smile. “Bad day?” “Bad life,” she shot back, narrowing her eyes and licking the remaining cheap vodka off her lips. Screwing the cap back on, she pushed off her heels and slipped the bottle back onto the counter. “I would’ve gone for the Grey Goose myself. Drinking that shit is just asking for the day to get worse.” I should’ve stopped talking. I considered small talk to be a waste of time. She dragged the back of her hand across her mouth. “I don’t remember asking your opinion.” “Can I get a gin and tonic, please?” A man two seats down from me wore a pissed off impatient look I didn’t care for and waved a credit card in her face. My jaw ticked, but before I could put him in his place, pale blue eyes that could start a war pinned him to his seat. “Here,” she drawled in a marked Southern accent as she threw a basket of chips on the bar. “Fill your mouth so shit stops coming out of it. I’ll get to you in a minute.” Normally, that’d be cause for termination, but she amused the hell out of me. I couldn’t stand weak women, and this girl had enough fire for a room full of them. Plus, the asshole had it coming. I began to understand why Emilio spent so many nights at the cantina. Catching my eye, a wicked smirk lifted the corners of her mouth as she placed her forearms on the bar and leaned in close enough for me to catch the scent of citrus and vanilla. It was a bizarre combination that lit a heated trail straight from my nose to my cock. “So, what is it you want?” You. Naked and spread out on this bar. “I doubt you could handle it.” I refused to blink, holding her stare, making sure she understood the double entendre. I wanted to push her to see how she’d react, but honestly, I knew the answer to both meanings. Nobody had been worth a fuck yet. I didn’t see why this would be any different. My challenge seemed to piss her off and invigorate her at the same time. “Oh, I don’t know about that. Haven’t had any complaints yet.” Spreading her fingers wide on both hands, she slid her arms out and narrowed her eyes. “Give me your best shot.” I’d give you my worst. I’d wreck you and leave you broken. “Añejo tequila. Straight shot, in a stem glass—not a highball—room temp.” With her bizarre, intoxicating scent still fucking with my head, I realized she was knocking me off my game. I didn’t like it. So, being the ass I was, and remembering Emilio’s tendencies toward cheapness, I leaned in as well and towered over her. “And if it hasn’t aged at least three years, shove it up the owner’s ass.” She brushed that damn stray hair out of her eye again and winked. “I’ll do my best.” Swinging her hips all over the bar, she glanced my way a few times, making a big production of bending over unnecessarily to pick shit off the floor. More than once, I made silent deals with my cock to find it some uncomplicated pussy, if it’d calm the fuck down and stop trying to get a look at her ass too. Before it could agree, a stem glass appeared under my nose just as I requested. That’s a first. Raising a questioning eye up at her, she smirked and nodded to the drink. “Well? Are you going to drink that or wait until Jesus turns it back into water?” A full-chested laugh I barely recognized came from my mouth as I reached for the glass. “I think that was wine.” She shrugged and waved her hand. “Whatever. Sunday School wasn’t my thing.” As she watched me carefully, I hoped for the best and downed the shot with low expectations. The moment the liquid hit my tongue I knew I was fucked. Dios mío, was I fucked. By the smug look on her face, she knew it too. Twirling the empty glass in my fingers, I studied the captivating woman with renewed interest. “How is it that you’re the only bartender in Houston who can get this drink right?” Still grinning, she licked that damn lip again and returned the bottles to the shelf, the motion causing her tiny tank top to ride up and expose her flat stomach. “It’s not rocket science. Hell, some people would say I’m a hit or miss on making anyone happy.” Wiping down the counter, she shot me a look with untold pain hidden behind it. “Some people would even say I’ve never gotten anything right.” “Some people don’t deserve to breathe your air.” Fuck, I meant that. What was wrong with me? Her face broke into the first genuine smile I’d seen from her all night not hidden behind a smirk or condescension, and my chest warmed. My fucking chest warmed, and it wasn’t from the tequila. “So, you got a name, Danger?” “Danger?” I tried for a flat tone, but my voice raised an octave, betraying my interest. Damn. “Yeah, you know…as in, tall, dark, and dangerous?” She squinted her pale blue eyes and silenced an incoming text on her phone. “You look like you could get a girl in a lot of trouble.” I wanted nothing more than to wipe that damn grin off her face. She looked so smug. So sure I wanted her. Fuck, I wanted her. “You have no idea.” Moments passed between us as we stared at each other in silence. That shock of red hair grabbed my attention again, and I couldn’t help but wonder who, or what, happened in her life to cause it. Nobody just did shit like that on purpose. Candy red colored hair just didn’t happen. It pissed me off that I even gave a shit. I wasn’t a good guy. I wasn’t even a decent guy. I didn’t ask girls their names, much less their stories. “So, that’s it?” she asked, chin tilted and one hand resting on a cocked hip. Shit, had she been talking to me this whole time? “What’s it?” I asked, trying to force a bored look. “You really have no name?” I shot her a pointed look, mentally slamming the door on her inquisition. “Danger works. I like it.” I did. I liked it too damn much. And I hated nicknames. I thought they were childish and reserved for those annoying assholes who sat on the same side of the booth at restaurants. The ones who called each other ‘honey’ and ‘baby’ and fed each other bites of their own food and switched plates in the middle of dinner. “Of course, you do,” she snorted in an unladylike, but oddly sexy way. The bar started to get crowded, as patrons shoved bills toward her and demanded drinks. I watched them curiously, wondering what she’d do. To my pleasure, she held up a finger to them and kept her eyes on me. Those eyes were what did it. Those pale blue eyes that tried to hide exhaustion exposed by the dark circles under her eyes and sadness well beyond her years. They sucked me in and broke one of my cardinal rules. “What about your name?” “Hey, what about my drink? You think you could take a break from your date over there to do your job, honey?” Her eyes flickered relief for a moment, then darkened, becoming void of emotion. “Duty calls. Glad I could meet your expectations, Danger.” She reached for the shot glass I held, and I grabbed her hand, my out-of-character reaction surprising both of us. Hesitating a moment, she lifted her eyes and met mine in a battle of wills. I could tell we were both at war with what would happen next; I contemplated the consequences of fucking one of Emilio’s employees. He seemed fond of this one, and the moment it was over, I’d have no choice but to have her fired. Shifting her weight, she made the decision for both of us when she released her hand from my grip and pointed toward the douchebag two seats down, now glaring at us. “Let me know if you want another.” As she poured the asshole that cock blocked me a gin and tonic, I pulled three, twenty-dollar bills out of my wallet and placed them face down on the bar. The exorbitant tip wasn’t a handout, as I suspected she’d think after I left. I generally enjoyed her company. Which was exactly why I had to leave and never talk to her again. She called me dangerous. If I was dangerous, she was fucking deadly. My life revolved around the cartel, stray pussy, and money. I had no time for complications of anything else, and candy hair was a walking, talking complication. I knew in one touch, I had no business being near her. A woman like that could cause the destruction of a man like me. While she argued with the dickbag about the amount of gin she shorted him, I slipped around the long end of the bar, through the kitchen, and out the back door. I cut myself off like a junkie jonesing for his next hit of short shorts and a-size-too-small tank top. After tonight, I knew I couldn’t afford the distraction. Perfect drink or not, I was done with that girl. So, I gave my business to every other bar in Houston and walked out of them pissed off and sober as hell for two months before I caved. However, I never returned to a barstool. Always sitting at one of the tables, I allowed young, annoying waitresses to serve me while I watched her flirt with a new man month after month until it got to be too much to take and stopped going altogether.

Some women were storms who blew into a man’s life and ruined his plans for the night. That woman was a hurricane who uprooted and flooded the very foundation of everything a man thought he knew.

Author Bio

Cora Kenborn writes contemporary and romantic suspense novels with lots of danger, snarky banter, lovable bad boys, and damsels NOT in distress. She loves delving into the twisted mind of a dark villain as well as writing light-hearted romcom. Cora gets a kick out of talking about herself in the third person and is a true Southern girl from Eastern North Carolina, who grew up on sweet tea, front porches, and the simple life. She says “y’all,” “fixin’ to,” and should you deserve it will “bless your heart.” She’s the proud mother of three hyperactive and occasionally adorable children, and wife to an understanding husband who tolerates her chaotic writer’s cave. Although reading is her passion, she can usually be found taking notes during true crime shows, effectively freaking out everyone in the room. Cora admits to being a horrible cook, an even worse baker, and believes she’s more dangerous with a hot glue gun than any weapon on earth. Oh, and she and autocorrect are mortal enemies.

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GOODREADS

#Blurred Red Lines #Cora Kenborn #love #romance

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