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depravity-n-savagery · 2 years ago

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Sunshine's Sinners

Ch 3 - Pity Party

[ Ch 2 ]

🥨Pairings: Billy Hargrove x (fem)Reader / Eddie Munson x (fem)Reader / Mungrove x (fem)Reader

🥨Summary: You spend some time with Eddie, avoiding Billy after what happened outside your house the other night.

🥨CW: Mild bullying, sibling arguments

🛑 18+ MINORS DNI 🛑

🥨Word Count: 2k

🥨A/N: We're back!! ♡ I'm coming out the sickness AND my writer's block 🤣 So I'm feeling good ♡

Nope. No way. Not touching that today. Mothers could really be clueless sometimes. Or maybe it was a ruse, and they were actually pushing you towards something. Your mother was the 'pushing' type. She pushed you into several different hobbies as a child. She pushed you into social situations, like the night you walked Billy and Max back to their house. Now she was suggesting an option that had you burning with embarrassment.

"He seems like a sweet boy." Billy's charm really won her over, if that was her image of him. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind giving you a ride to school. I mean, you go to the same school anyway. It makes sense."

"Not happening, mom."

She knew that tone of voice was a brick wall going up, shutting out any further arguments. Her hands went up in passive acceptance. Leaving the subject alone for now. "Well, be careful on your way to school. I'm gonna try to catch up on sleep." Just saying the word 'sleep' made her yawn. "I finally have a day off today."

No amount of sleeping in during the day was going to fix her body's clock. All these overnight shifts made her basically nocturnal. Wouldn't be surprised if she was secretly a vampire or something.

A cheek kiss and a sideways hug later, you were turning the knob of your front door. Happy to see that the lock was still secure and hadn't been tampered with. "Will do. Catch you later."

After the events of last night, you were more careful than you've ever been. Especially as a teenager. A span of life experience practically made for reckless behavior. Like the idiotic way you walked up to a grown stranger and questioned him as if you had any chance of defending yourself against him. God, and to make it even worse, Billy was a witness to the whole thing. Your family's dirty laundry strewn across the lawn for his eyes to see. So much for being a perfect princess. He made a term of endearment sound like an insult, but it somehow still made your insides fluttery.

Walking the halls felt like tip-toeing your way into a guarded facility. Every careful step held the risk of setting off an alarm. Alerting a certain head of curls that you were stupid to think you could avoid for long. Any amount of time would have to do. A day. A few hours. Or… ten seconds. The ten seconds it took for you to reach your locker, and look in the direction of the gymnasium's big double doors.

As if his stare put a bright spotlight over your head, his teammates followed his line of sight. Busted. You couldn't see pity or annoyance in his eyes. No matter how deeply you searched the ocean for it. The waters were calm. Unusually void of life for something so vibrantly colored. Like his pink lips mouthing something at you, too fast for you to read. Too far away for you to hear. All you could make out was your name, and it pissed you off how quickly your mind conjured up a fantasy of him moaning it. The more you tried to wish it away, the more detailed it became. Filling in the spaces with his warm breath and the smell of cigarettes and mint gum. His sticky sweet cherry chapstick.

By the time the bell rang, you took the long way to class. One tardy wouldn't harm your grades. Walking past Billy would. "Hey!" You heard his booming voice shoot over the crowd and kept walking. Doing what you did best in a mass of hurried students. Becoming just another face in the crowd. A privilege that your next target would probably never have.

Eddie always stood out like a priest in a whorehouse.

That just made it easier to find him once lunchtime came around. Follow the rambunctious laughter and wild gesturing; there was always one Eddie Munson at the end of that rainbow. You were one of the first few people to enter the large room. Looking over rows and rows of empty tables until you saw the tell-tale shag and denim vest. He was quiet without his usual group of club members surrounding him. Elbow propped up on the table so he could rest his face in the palm of his hand and slowly stuff pretzels into his mouth from a small ziplock bag. Pretzels? Everyone else had a tray. You had one. Wasn't he hungry?

With a little extra motivation in your step, you approached Eddie's table and put your tray down beside him. He lazily shifted his focus up towards you. "You uh…lost?"

"Nope." To emphasize that point, you plopped down into the seat. "Just wanted to sit here." Eddie was hard to read, but he was probably thinking the same about you. He watched the doors, looking for either one of his friends or someone that could be in on a set-up. "I wanted to thank you. Gave me some quality shit." An honest-to-goodness smile formed, and even Eddie was no match for it. He gave you a smaller (and confused) smile in return, turning in his seat to face you. His fingertips ran over the salty ridges of a small pretzel and you wondered if the skin there was rough.

"So you risk social suicide to thank little old me?" Eddie fluttered his eyelashes like a Disney princess. Comedic intentions aside, he was pretty. Unexpectedly. A wildflower in a cemetery. "I don't usually get a review from my customers, so thanks." He leaned in, like it was a secret. As if everyone didn't already know that he deals.

Then the silence came. He looked you over quizzically, hiding it less with every minute that passed. "Hungry?" Just to ease the tension, and quiet the nagging voice in the back of your head, you slid your tray closer to him. "Think Jeanette has the hots for me or somethin'. She always loads my tray with fries." You pluck a few from the pile and nibble on them, hoping he'd feel more open to sharing instead of feeling pressured to eat it all himself.

Hesitantly, he dipped his hand into the warm pile and ate one fry. Somehow finding the one with the most salt sprinkled over it. His stomach gurgled loud enough for you to hear, demanding to be fed more than his ziplock bag would've given it. You kept on as if you heard nothing. Don't know what's the situation with his eating, but he clearly needs it more than I do. It was enough to share food in comfortable silence. That is, until the usual suspects started coming in.

"Check it out, The Freak's got a new little friend!"

Freak. You've heard them harass him in the hallways over the years, and it sort of faded into the background. All part of the high school ambience. Now you noticed how ugly it felt, and you weren't even on the receiving end. Eddie dropped the fry he almost put into his mouth, instead using his salt-dusted fingertips to give a dainty wave towards the couple of jocks that stood beside the table. "Awe, Andy what's wrong? Feel replaced?"

Two jocks became five, and you were starting to feel a bit nervous. Where the basketball team was, there was usually their newest star Billy. So far he was nowhere to be seen. Just 'Andy' and the anger he spewed towards you after Eddie's teasing comment. "Fuck off, Freak! Don't get bold because you've got some bitch giving you the time of day."

A loud, masculine voice parted the gathering cluster of team jerseys and basketball shorts. "Hey! Cool it, Andy." Despite your mission to avoid him, you wanted to catch a glimpse of him. Sunny curls coming to your rescue once again. Sadly, the closer he got, the more you saw that it wasn't your neighbor. It was Steve Harrington. "Leave em'. Got a game coming up, and we don't need you getting into any more trouble."

You hadn't spoken to Steve since Barbra was still around. Since Nancy still considered you someone worth entertaining a friendship with, instead of an ugly scar leftover from having Barb ripped away too soon. There was a soft thanks on your lips for him that died when you saw the way he looked at you. Shaking his head like a disapproving parent before leading his teammates away to their table.

Right after they cleared, a familiar bunch entered from the door farthest away from you. Three boys wearing shirts just like Eddie's. He cleared his throat, saying your name just above a whisper. "You don't have to pity me, y'know. Most of the people who buy from me either act like I don't exist or throw me into a locker when they get the chance. I know the way it works."

"I don't pity you, Eddie." You try to brighten his spirits with another smile, but he wilts. "I wanted to sit and chat with you. You're cool to hang with." As his friends get closer you see him tense, so you stand. Leaving the tray behind.

"I'll save you a seat tomorrow. If- if you want."

"Thanks." You throw him a wink for good measure. That puts the color back in his cheeks. "See you then."

"Y/n! Over here!"

There he was. You had made it through the day without seeing him, it was a shock to hear him call you directly. Standing there beside his Camaro as Max came over on her skateboard. He must've been waiting for her. And you.

"Get in the car. I'm taking you home." He said plainly, turning to open the driver's seat door once you were a couple feet away. Even Max looked at him in shock, but kept her questions to herself. "Backseat, Shitbird. You know the drill." I guess it wasn't the first time he had a girl along for the ride. Already? He's only been in Hawkins for like, five seconds.

Long enough to have you swapping spit with him in the middle of the night. Maybe you weren't as special as you stupidly let yourself believe. Whatever. Special or not, you regretted your stubborn insistence on walking to school this morning. If he was offering a free ride, then who were you to turn it down? It's not like he'd bring up the situation in front of Max.

Instead, he'll argue with her. From the moment he pulled out of the parking lot. Bickering about whose turn it was to do whatever chore, when to be back home from the arcade, and most of all… how much he hated moving here. "Watch that fucking tone with me. You don't like it, then you shouldn't have done what you did. Whose fault is it that we had to move here?"

"Yours…" Max grumbled, folding in on herself with a hope that he didn't hear her. The snap in his neck as he turned to her made her curl up even tighter.

"What was that?" Billy was full-blown yelling, lurching the car forward with increased speed. "WHOSE FAULT, YOU LITTLE SHIT?!"

The trees along the road were becoming a blur. Zooming by so fast you were starting to feel sick. "If I say it was my fault will you calm down?? You're gonna kill us!"

"Mind your goddamn business." He lowered the volume, but all the ice remained. Being on the receiving end of Billy's anger was starting to be one of your least favorite occurrences. "You don't even know what she did.."

Home in one piece, you leaped up from your seat and exited the Camaro before he came to a complete stop. The grass did look greener, when you feared that you'd never see it again. "Thanks." A ride is a ride. Deadly or not. Maybe you should walk more often.

Somewhere in his grumbles were sounds that resembled 'your welcome'. Heavy-footed, he charged on toward his front door and slammed it behind him.

"Thanks.. for helping with Billy." Max said, spinning the wheel on her skateboard. She hurried after Billy to avoid another altercation. You couldn't blame her. It was scary being yelled at like that, but Billy had a point. Whatever issue he's so upset about was in the making before they even moved here. There had to be something stirring up all that rage.

Masterlist , Series Masterlist , Ao3 ☆

Taglist: @sidthedollface2 , @bontensbabygirl , @killing-gremlin

#stranger things #billy hargrove #billy hargove x reader #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #mungrove

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sirthisisa-wendys · 3 years ago

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Universitas Collab & Event (Wendy and Deano’s 3K Event)

Calling all Freshmen, Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors (and everyone else who isn't in college)

In honor of Deano and I obtaining 3k followers, we are hosting this collab to 1. celebrate the first year of our friendship and 2. give you all a chance to participate in the festivities!

Our theme for this collab is one of our favorite AUs: College. There will be a list of prompts you can choose from down below. If you are a writer, you can also write any College!AU-themed piece.

Fandoms: Tokyo Revengers, Jujutsu Kaisen, Chainsaw Man

Deadline: Two months from today - August 15, 2022!

Status: OPEN TO ALL WRITERS AND REQUESTERS TODAY June 18, 2022!

HOUSE RULES

"ID, Please": You must be 18+ to join. Please have your age visible on your blog; ageless blogs will not be allowed to join, and minors will be blocked. All characters must be 18+ or aged up. This is college, folks.

"Consent Forms": SFW, smut, and DC are all allowed! Make sure you tag/identify what type of pieces we will be reading so I can put them on the list!

"This is A Frat House, Not A Lecture Hall": All writing is accepted (headcanons, drabbles, one-shots, fics, series, SMAUs, etc). There is no required word limit, but you should write at least 300 words!

"Are You On The List?": Send us an ask to join, including which character(s) you want and your preferred reader (male, female, gender-neutral, etc.). You will have until August 14, 2022, to join!

"Finish That Drink First": Each writer can sign up for only one work at a time. You are welcome to join again if you finish and want to write another. Each requester can ask for up to three (3) characters for their request. Characters will be allowed to be repeated only two (2) times.

"Turn Your Finals In": When your work is posted, please tag us! Also, use the tag #universitascollab to be added to the masterlist. If you’ve submitted a request, we’ll add it to the list!

"Office Hours": Questions, Comments, Concerns? Reach out! We're happy to help answer any questions you might have.

The Dean's List (Prompts Linked Here)

Tokyo Revengers

Yellow Snow: Bully!Ran & Rin Haitani x Fem!Reader (NSFW) - Prompt 10 - @sirthisisa-wendys

Chocolate and Night Caps: Yuzuha Shiba x Reader (fluff) Prompt 8 - @thehypestdeano

Ran Haitani x Fem!Reader - prompt 1 @crown5

Requests

Reps: Keizo Arashi x Fem!Reader - Prompt 12

Study Buddy: Shion Madarame x Fem!Reader - Prompt 26

Way 2 Sexy: Ran Haitani x Fem!Reader - Prompt 3

Sleepovers: Kanji Mochizuki x Fem!Reader - Prompt 2

Open Doors: Kakucho Hitto & Hajime Kokonoi x Fem!Reader - Prompt 25

Gone to Waste: Kazushi Yamagishi x fem!reader - Prompt 18

Wallflowers: Yasuhiro Muto x Fem!reader - Prompt 9

Kisaki Tetta x Fem!Reader - Prompt 5

Busted Up: Shion Madarame/Ran Haitani/ Rinodu Haitani x Fem!Reader - Prompt 7

Kakucho Hitto / Kanji Mochizuki - Prompt 8

Rindou Haitani - Prompt 22

Kisaki Tetta - Prompt 11

Jujutsu Kaisen

Chainsaw Man

#tokyo revengers #tokyo revengers x reader #jujutsu kaisen #universitascollab #jujutsu kaisen x reader #chainsaw man #chainsaw man x reader

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arrowflier · 3 years ago

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Hi! Could you write a fic where Ian or Mickey has to have surgery? Maybe seeing before the surgery and why it's happening and after the surgery when they wake up and the other one is there. Thank you for writing all these fics, we're so lucky to have such a talented writer in this fandom!

Content Warning: hurt character, surgery (but everything is ok)

Bright lights, flashing. There, gone, there, gone, as the gurney under him rattles over slick tile. Voices call out over his head, a jumble of sounds he can’t quite understand flowing over him while he shuts his eyes to block out the pain and the noise.

The pain doesn’t go away. It’s all he can feel. Pain, nausea—and the faint brush of cool fingers on the back of his hand.

He opens his eyes.

And sees Ian’s face.

He knows that face so well. Too well. Knows that the lines there don’t belong, that the wet eyes should be bright and warm. Knows that hard-bitten lip deserves better than to be clenched between sharp teeth.

“Hey,” he croaks, and Ian’s eyes fix on his.

“Mickey,” Ian breathes, his breath hitching in a way that makes Mickey want to reach out. And he would, if he could stand to move his arms from around the pain in his middle.

“Whatcha cryin’ for?” he manages to ask, at least, flips his hand over briefly to let Ian clutch at the right side of it.

“What am I—” Ian starts, then breaks into unhinged, nervous laughter. It’s short and sharp, and stops as soon as someone else makes a sound.

They say something, but Mickey isn’t listening. He’s focusing on the feel of Ian’s hand in his, a gentle pressure to offset the fierce ache of his belly, and the way Ian’s eyes go wild before he speaks.

“Let me come in,” Ian begs someone as they all come to a halt right there in the hallway. “I was an EMT, I won’t get in the way.”

Mickey doesn’t register the answer, but from the way Ian’s face falls, he doesn’t think his husband got his way. And he can see that stubborn chin start to shift, those green eyes hardening, and musters enough energy to squeeze Ian’s hand.

“I’ll be fine,” he reassures through gritted teeth as another spasm hits. “They’ll put me under anyway, there’s nothing for you to do.”

“I should be there,” Ian says, but he’s soft again, him again. “Mickey, what if—”

“Ian,” Mickey murmurs. He lets go of Ian’s hand, pats it once, pushes it away. “I survived my dad. Jail. Both of them again.” He can see Ian swallow at the reminder.

“Think I can survive the dying temper tantrum of a useless fucking organ,” Mickey finishes.

He thinks he sees Ian smile a watery smile before he’s carted through thick doors that slowly shut between them. Then there’s just strangers, and needles, and a brief second of painless suspension before the lights go out.

Beeping. Really loud, really annoying beeping. A rustle like someone shifting a blanket, the sound of heeled shoes on tile. Light, through his eyelids, bright enough to make him wince.

“You awake?” says Ian’s voice, and when Mickey opens his eyes, he’s there.

He looks better, now, than last time. His face is still wrinkled in places it shouldn’t be, but the furrows aren’t so deep. They’re shallow, creased, just memories of the way he had frowned so hard before. And his eyes—

His eyes are happy. The way they should be.

“Am now,” Mickey tries to answer, but chokes on the dryness in his own mouth. Ian smiles at him, pink lips free of worrying teeth, and pushes a straw into his mouth.

He wants to argue that he isn’t an invalid, but the first taste of clean water on his tongue has him sucking it down instead.

“Hey, now, easy,” Ian says, voice a touch cautious. “Take it slow.”

He’s never taken anything slow in his life, but when Ian moves the water away, Mickey lets him.

“Still alive, fucker,” is the first thing Mickey manages to get out past a still-floppy tongue, and Ian’s laugh is enough to drown out the incessant beeping of the machines keeping tabs on him.

“So when can I bust this joint?” he asks next, and Ian’s chuckles quiet into something softer.

“Not yet,” he says, the hand that held the water now tracing up Mickey’s arm from IV to elbow. Back and forth, back and forth, and Mickey hates that it kind of makes him want to go back to sleep.

“Bullshit,” he mumbles, and catches Ian’s wandering hand with the one not attached to the drip. “Tell ‘em I ain’t no baby, I can handle it.”

Ian snorts, a sound softened by the way he lifts Mickey’s hand to his lips for a dry kiss.

“They just removed your appendix, Mickey,” he reminds him. “And it wasn’t all that routine—they said it was wrapped around stuff in there, almost ready to burst, and if we hadn’t—”

He cuts off. Closes his eyes, and kisses Mickey’s hand again. Leaves his lips there this time, just breathing, the air from his nose tickling over Mickey’s wrist.

“’Just’,” Mickey repeats quietly, after a moment. Ian opens his eyes to look at him, frowning against his knuckles, and Mickey shrugs.

Well, tries to shrug. Almost manages, but everything is stiff and aching.

“Can’t take it back man, I heard it,” he continues. “You said it was ‘just’ my appendix, so stop lookin’ like I died.”

Ian drops their hands to the bed, skin warm against cold white sheets.

“You could have died,” he says softly. “Because I didn’t notice, I didn’t recognize the signs—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Mickey commands, voice milder than his words, and pulls his hand free to make a grabby motion at the water jug.

Ian quiets, and hands it to him, and sits there as he drinks.

“You’re the one who got me here,” Mickey says when he’s finished, licking a stray drop of water from his lower lip. “I was gonna try and sleep it off, thought I had some bad food at that gas station we stopped at yesterday, but you made me come.”

Ian presses his lips together, but doesn’t comment.

“Besides,” Mickey goes on, letting his head fall heavily back on his pillow. “We talked about all this livin’ in the past stuff, didn’t we?”

He waits for Ian to nod.

“And what did we say about it?” he prompts.

“That it’s past,” Ian murmurs, and Mickey arches an eyebrow.

“And?”

Ian sighs.

“That I should get my head out of my ass and stop acting like it's all about me,” he adds, and Mickey nods.

“That’s the one,” he says, content.

Glancing down, he grabs Ian’s hand again, tugs at it.

“Now get up here with me,” he orders, pulling harder when Ian hesitates.

“I know, I know, you ain’t allowed,” Mickey says for him, then smirks, “but I could have died, so I don’t give a shit.”

“Mickey,” Ian laughs, relenting and climbing onto the narrow hospital mattress, “what are you going to say if someone comes in?”

“That the least those fuckers can do is let my husband cuddle me after they dug around in my insides,” Mickey answers as Ian wraps himself carefully around him.

“Guess so,” Ian whispers, kissing the space behind Mickey’s ear, his hand falling down to cup gently over the place where Mickey had been cut open.

Mickey lets his hand rest on Ian’s, and breathes with him. Pretends he can’t feel the wetness against his neck where Ian’s face is pressed. Relishes in the feel of Ian against him, and the way it chases away his lingering pain.

“Hey, Ian,” he whispers after a moment, feeling like he’s floating. “Think they’d let me keep it?”

“Hmm?” Ian mumbles against him.

“I mean, they cut it out of my stomach and everything,” Mickey muses. “It’s practically our kid now.”

“What?” Ian asks, more alert. “Mickey, what the fuck?”

“You don’t want to keep a little piece of me? We could name it and everything, take it on trips—”

“Mickey,” Ian interrupts. “Did you press the morphine button?”

Mickey rolls around a little. Digs a little remote out from under his ass, and stares at it.

“Uh,” he says. “Maybe.” A pause. “Does that mean you don’t want my broken stomach baby?”

There it is. The best sound ever.

And Mickey falls asleep again, Ian’s laughter in his ear.

#daily speedwrite #fanfic #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #gallavich #tw: surgery #tw: injury

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adenei · 3 years ago

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Not sure if you're still doing these, but... directors cut for your Tangled AU? If you've already done that one, that's fine. Hope all is good with you! :)

Hey Headcanons! Thanks for the ask! I'd love to give a director's cut for Missing Muggleborn :)

So, I'd had the idea on a list for a while, but honestly had zero plans to write it any time soon. But then @giuls233 posted that beautiful artwork of Romione as Flynn and Rapunzel with the lanterns and the ideas just started flooding my mind. I literally had two other documents open and was trying to finish a chapter of Knead plus I think my Hinny birthday challenge fic and the opening just started coming to me.

Sometimes when I'm basing a fic off movies, I like to use the opening dialogue, so I put on Tangled and started using Flynn's opening monologue. The whole thing just stuck and it flowed (which, let's be real, doesn't happen often). So, I bust out the prologue and sent it to my betas and was like, yeah sorry, this just happened.

I had no plan for the rest of it, no idea how many chapters it was going to take to tell the story, so I just rolled with it. The ideas on how to make it magical came with each chapter, so not much was planned out in advance (aside from harry being the hippogriff.)

I really wasn't sure how I was going to tell the whole story from Ron's perspective because there are important moments where Hermione's alone, so the pensive idea really worked well. But let me tell you, I struggled with keeping tense and POV straight with this one. The memory chapters were different I'm pretty sure and it was a lot to keep straight with the past when I was writing another fic that was present.

I wish I could have used Crookshanks more like Pascal, but I was a bit limited there. Maximus is my absolute FAVORITE, so blending him with Harry just really worked. I hope Hermione doesn't come off too damsel-in-distressy. The hardest part was convincing myself she'd be able to survive locked up in a tower for 17 years.(because after all, it's Hermione we're talking about).

Knowing I wanted Bellatrix as Mother Gothel and the whole Pure Bloodline honestly drove everything else. Once I got that, the moving parts with the Order and Hogwarts started to fall into place. The pub scene was a ball to write, but the scene after with the secret passageway was where I ran into some writer's block. Trying to find a balance of 'they're after us!' with 'we're in mortal danger and I need to tell/show you my real identity slowed me up a bit. But I knew I wanted them in the Shrieking Shack and Harry would find them the next morning.

I probably rushed the lantern scene a bit, so maybe someday I'll go through and revamp it, and if you're a hardcore Tangled fan, you'll know much of the scene where Ron gets stabbed is straight from the movie, but it's just my favorite and I didn't want to change much aside from Harry being there to assist and apprehend Bellatrix.

All in all, it was fun to write a solely Ron-centric story and I'm glad my betas pushed me to do so. I have a thing where I tend to write mostly in a two-perspective style so I'm trying to branch out a bit more and stick to one person!

I hope this was fun to read through, and if you have any other specific questions about the fic, I'd be happy to answer them! I hope I did both Romione and Tangled justice with the story - it was a challenging, but fun magical AU!

#fic writer asks #adenei's director's cut #send me a fic if you want a behind the scenes sneak peek about the writing process!

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silentmajesticfox · 4 years ago

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Falling In Love With Chrollo Lucilfer

Part one:

Part two:

Panic Room

As Fred, Rose, and Daisy made it to the mansion. Rose looked at her surroundings, telling herself, I just have to hold him off til Chrollo's here. What a suicide mission this will come out to be, Daisy I hope you understand I can only save one of us this time.. Rose glanced at Daisy winking her eye and opening the door for her. Daisy would be an actress If she could. She giggled, "Yay!! We're finally home, I can wait to go to bed with my teddy bear!" She ran in, not unusually fast since every time they would get home, she would practically run to her bed. Before Rose could step out, she felt a tight grip on her left arm by her hand, and a few cracks emanating from there. Fred had already planned to confront her. A deadly gaze staring into her ice blue eyes. Rose held in a yelp, sure than the cracking was probably her bones.

"Who do you think you are? Talking to another man, showing him more affection and attention than you've givin me this past year, wish I knew I married a whore. I would like to have a word with you inside, Rosalie." Rose knew this couldn't be good, for he never used her real name, and for however long it took Chrollo to get here, she'd have to deal with it. She could feel his blood lust, and the fact he already had the advantage on her, her nerves kicked up. She just nodded her head, knowing soon this would be all over. She wished right then that she had her book, inevitably he would die if she did.... As she got out the door once he let go of her arm, with a fired up Fred behind her. She looked down the street they had came from. Please don't let me down Chrollo. She turned her head towards the mansion and walked through the doors. She felt his Nen get stronger, a hitch in her breath as she started to panic. He was a minute behind her, but she could make a run for it to her room and make sure Daisy was ready. The deadly aura making it hard to breath, she was going to do exactly that. Once she made it through the door, she turned around and latched the door closed. Soon a hard pounding was heard, but as Fred was a Enhancer, he was going to have no problem knocking that door down. With every hit, she started to feel a whoosh of power with every blow. Rose rushed up all the stairs, nearly tripping on her feet, turning the corner right before she heard a big boom, the door spiraling across the room and a manic laugh coming from Fred. "Aw... Rose, don't be like that. You know I'll find you. I told you I wanted to talk!" He screamed. She ran to her and Daisy's room they shared, busting it open and soon turning around to lock it and push the chair near by, under the door knob. Daisy was sitting on the bed with all her things in a backpack, and her favorite stuffed animal, her bear. Hearing Fred slowly stomp down the hall, busting open the doors as he went by, one by one. Rose realized she had less time than she calculated..

"Daisy, are you ready?" She asked her baby sister, her sister nodded and as about to say something, Rose could tell she had been crying. Rose put her finger up to her sisters mouth, shaking her head and mouthing no. "Here's my phone. You need to leave. Now Daisy.." she grabbed her sisters arm gently after daisy put the phone in her backpack pocket, leading them to the only window In the room. Rose unlocked it, and quietly lifted it open. "Don't let him see you through the window, ok? I love you." She hugged her sister very tight, before hearing a roaring pound at the door now. More tears fell from Daisy's eyes, as she nodded staring at Rose, quickly exiting the room from the window, waving to Rose. Rose waved back and blew a kiss to her, then signalling her hand for her to sit on the specific part of the roof as discussed.

Glancing at the street below, she turned around when the door was buses open. She was thinking quick on what to say and what to do, Fred huffing as he walked up to her. He walked up closer, how hands going to her throat and holding her against the wall. Her hands went to his forearms as she struggled to breath. "Stop.. please.." she pleaded. She had only one option. If she wanted to live, and as her consciousness faded in and out. Memories flashing all the way from when she was little. Chrollo was always by her side. In a way, she knew Chrollo would never love her the way she loved him..

Chrollo and Rose were sitting on top of the garbage pile, the highest one they could find. Holding each other closely watching the sunrise together. "Now wait. Soon the sun will make it look like a city of diamonds and jewels. This is what I've been telling you about, I know you'll love it.." Chrollo's words were happier than normal when he spoke about this so Rose was convinced it was something great if he loved it. She set her head on his shoulder, grabbing his hand. "Chrollo, do you think when we're older, we can be together?" Rose slipped those words out. In the heat of the moment. Chrollo tensed up a little bit, but that went away as soon as the sun rose. Before her eyes, what he said was true, who knew a city so bad, could have such a beautiful view. "You were right Chrollo, thank you for showing me this.." she said lifting her head from his shoulder. He turned around to face her, grabbed her chin, and kissed her with passion. Once they parted, chrollo spoke. "Maybe one day... I know you can find someone better than me when you make it out of here.. realistically I can't see it, us being together. I like you, but who knows how we'll feel years later, you know?" Rose would have cried, but Chrollo stood up, taking her hand and pulling her up. "But there's nothing wrong with having what we have now.." He kissed her again, she wrapped her arms around his neck and he wrapped his arms around her waist, and maybe that's when she fell in love with him.

When Rose came back to reality, she knew she still had things she needed to be here for. She had to fight. She released her hands from Fred's arms, and went for his face. Poking as hard as she could towards his eyes. Kicking as hard as she could. He dropped her and she gasped for air. "please stop Fred.." she quickly came to her feet, cornered and not sure what to do. Glancing around, she looked at the lamp. She quickly darted, fred attempting to grasp her, hot on her tail. She picked up the lamp and threw it at Fred, it stattering at he deflected it with his arms. Just enough time to run. And that she did.

"You're funny Rose.. you think you can out smart me? Take me for my money? You really are stupider than I thought.." she heard him, she ran out the room, running down the hall and going to the staircase, running up all the steps which felt like a million years. She heard Fred's foot steps and felt them rattle the staircase. Rose was now wheezing, but couldn't let herself get tired, not yet. Soon she was on the third and last level. She sprinted as soon as she saw the big doors, in which was the safe where her book was. Rose backed up, and ran into the door to break it open. Yet it did not open. She started to panic, and kept ramming herself. The wood started to splinter, and after four times of brute force, it broke opened. By then, she had seen Fred come around the corner, so she ran over to the vault. She starting pushing in the code, getting denied every time. Fred was walking up to her at this point, a low laugh coming from his chest, gasping she turned around. "I changed it. Unfortunately you won't be getting it back ever. Why do you hurt me Rose?.." He was calmer, but his blood lust was rising.

"Because you wanted to be with her instead of me, you wanted me to give you this so it'd be equal, yet you feel it's okay to hit me when your in the wrong, and you have your nen?" She was trying to hit him on a personal level so he could apologize and maybe this would pass. Not this time.

He walked up to her, "because I fell out of love with you. The instant I saw you never stopped writing him... " She couldn't believe Fred at this moment. This was a new thing he had brought up. "So why should I care to fix this? when every woman I've been with, has been so much better? Fills all my needs, and actually wants me. Also, I could make alot of money for your book." Rose was letting her anger get the best of her, tears started streaming and she went for it. She got a few punches in, before he grabbed her arm.

"Then end it. Since i am nothing to you and this world, take me out of this miserable life!!" And with that, Fred hit her and she had went flying into the wall. Laying in the debris, she was gasping. Fred had walked up to her, and picked her up by her hair. If she could, she'd scream. But the impact before had broken ribs, so she just stared at him, before being thrown to the wall again. Blood started coming from her mouth, she was ready for this. Daisy crossed her mind and she smiled, knowing she was in good hands.. her life fading and things went black, she heard alot of booms and yelling going on, and someone picking her up.

"Please hang on Rose.. stay with me..." She heard Chrollo say to her softly touching her face. She drifted off into a peacefulness of black, knowing Daisy was alright, and she could finally let go of this life for good.

A/N: sorry it's short and kind of meh, I had a major writers block and this is definitely getting edited. Lucky not alot of people have read this- but if you do thank you for supporting me!! Much love. If you feel open to request something for the story or pitch ideas I'm all ears!! This is the last part I have on wattpad. Might be a minute til I can write the next chapter, of course when it gets a little intense. 💀

#chrollo lucilfer #chrollo #chrollo x reader #hunter x hunter #fanfiction #Lucilfer #the spiders

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paradox-psyc-hoe-sis · 5 years ago

Text

Overreaction

Loki x reader, Bruce x reader ,(platonic), avengers x reader (platonic).

Word count: 4.9 k

A/n: Heyo! I didn't actually mean for this to be as long as it was, but it turned out to be quite pleasing. Writers block is a bitch so it's taken me a while to write, but I hope I didn't disappoint! Requested by @marvelloonie, thank you for the request! - Aphrodite

Summary: you and Loki have been secretly meeting without the avengers knowing, and when you realise you've fallen in love, you decide it's time to tell the group. After trying to keep you, the groups little ray of sunshine, away from the mysterious asgardian for a while, the group are shocked to find out that you've been seeing each other.

Warninngs: angst, fluff, that's all! Enjoy x

For your entire life, you were always the 'innocent' one. Sure, you were optimised and generally a happy person, but people seem to take advantage of that a lot. That never dampened your mood, though; you always stayed the same happy-go-lucky little burst of sunlight through childhood to adulthood. That's also the reason that upon meeting new people, they never expect your job to be an avenger. Your work never really phased you; most of the people who you killed deserved it, but every now and again there was an odd time where you felt a slight hint of guilt.

Among the avengers, you were known as the little ray of sunshine, too. Pretty much all of the avengers had dark pasts, but not you. You lived a normal life, excelled at school, went to college, and got a normal job. S.H.I.E.L.D discovered you after you got into an accident and were struck by lightning: after you recovered, you found out that you could control lightning. You quickly joined the avengers, and got on very well with everyone. You knew all of the avengers, and were aware of all possible threats, enemies, blah blah, except one. Thor's brother, Loki, had committed several offences in the past, but redeemed himself by helping the team every now and again. You had never met Loki, but the Avengers made it clear that they wanted to keep it that way.

"Hey Steve!" You walked into the common area after a few hours training in the gym. Steve was in the kitchen, passing him as you got a bottle of water, and you looked over to see Natasha, Sam, Bucky and Thor on the sofas. "Good morning guys, how are you all?" You grinned at them as you walked over to sit next to Nat, a slight spring in your step.

"Why are you always so happy?" Bucky grunted as you sat unbeaten him and Nat. Sam gave Bucky a frown, and turned to you. "Don't mind him, he just found out that his favourite TV show has been cancelled."

"Aww, Heroes of Bruin!?" Bucky gave you a small nod, his arms crossed tightly around his chest. You placed a hand on his shoulder and gave him a sympathetic smile. "Don't worry, Buck. I'm sure you'll find a better series soon! You can always borrow one of my box sets, you know where they are!" Bucky thanked you, and you sat back on the sofa, taking long gulps of your water.

"Seriously though, y/n. What keeps you so positive?" Steve asked, leaning on the kitchen counter. You shrugged, taking one last sip of your water.

"I don't really know, to be honest. I have a roof over my head, a good job, food, clean water, and friends and family who love me!" You stood up, walking over to the kitchen island and sitting opposite Steve. "Besides, what's there to be miserable about? Yeah, work does get hard sometimes, and life isn't easy, but that's just more drive to stay positive. It's not going to get me anywhere by being grumpy and mean like a certain tin man in this building!" You both laughed, thanking God that Tony wasn't in the room to hear what you just said. From the sofa, you heard Nat starting to talk to Bucky and Sam.

"...but there's nothing else we can do about it other than get in contact with some of our aliases and-"

"What's going on?"

Cutting in, you stood up from the island and walked over to the sofa.

Nat turned to look at you while Sam and Bucky continued to read from the iPad she held.

"There was a break in at a Hydra base a few days ago. The person who broke in stole Hydra's files about us, and some files about them. My best guess is that it's somebody who's against Hydra but also against us." Nat took a long deep breath, and turned back to her iPad, still talking to you. "We need to get in contact with non-avengers who have fought with us in the past, see if they have any idea. Steve and I are going to S.H.I.E.L.D. tomorrow, Thor will be returning to Asgard to talk with Loki, I don't know what else we can do."

You perked up at the mention of Loki, and suddenly came up with an idea. "How about I go with Thor? I've always wanted to see Asgard, and it's better than just having one person go." You saw Nat look up and glare at Steve, who did the same, before they both turned to you. Steve sighed, and looked away; clearly, there was something on both of their minds.

"That's a good idea about somebody going, it's better to be safe than sorry. What about Clint? D'you think he'd want to go?" Steve was looking at Natasha when he asked, and you felt a but left out. Instead of becoming angry, you just smiled and turned to face Steve. "What about me?" You asked, still smiling widely.

"Uh, y/n? I don't really think you should go..." Natasha remarked next to you, and you ever so slightly frowned.

"What do you mean?" You kept your voice gentle and upbeat, thinking of reasons why it would be perfect to go.

"Don't take this the wrong way, but there's some bad people on Asgard. We know you could handle it, but people like Loki are...dangerous, and I for one don't think it's in your best interest to make friends with people like him." You could tell by her tone that she felt guilty, but that didn't stop her from speaking her mind anyway. You didn't really understand what she meant; you're around dangerous people all the time, you can easily handle another one.

"If you don't think it's a good idea for me to go, then why is Clint an option?" Like magic, clint walked in at the exact second you said that. Looking up at him, you carried on speaking. "We have the same skill level at fighting, anyway! Besides, I have superpowers too, I can easily protect myself and Thor if need be."

Clint looked at you and Natasha, a puzzle expression plastered on his face. Nat gave him the run down, and he seemed slightly underwhelmed.

"There's no reason why y/n shouldn't be able to go to Asgard."

"Yes, but she's going to asgard to get in contact with Loki." Natasha's expression looked stern, her eyes piercing through Clint's.

"...oh."

"C'mon guys, what're you hiding? I'm sure I can take it, what's the harm in me going to Asgard?" Despite being slightly irritated, you still smiled and laughed a bit at the end of your sentence, making sure the rest of the group knew you were still just as happy as you were after returning from they gym, 10 minutes ago. Clint, Natasha, Steve, Bucky and Sam all gave each other quick glances before Bucky groaned and sat up.

"Listen, y/n. The reason why none of us want you to go to Asgard is because we want you to stay away from Loki. Although he's fought along side us in the past, he's a terrible person. And you're so...so happy and innocent all the time, we don't want him to..."

"You don't want him to corrupt me." You finished off Bucky's sentence, speaking quieter, thinning to yourself. There was suddenly a sort of dark cloud above the room, and an awkward silence prolonged for at least 20 seconds. You could sense how guilty everyone felt, but instead of exploding, you burst into a fit of giggles.

Everyone frowned as they watched you almost fall off the sofa in laughter. Once you calmed down, you wiped your eyes, and almost bust out laughing again at the confused faces of everyone around you. You sat back, smiling ear to ear. "Why would you think something like that?" You asked the room, taking a sip of water. "Honestly guys, I've been with you bunch of Serious Sally's for almost a year. I think it's safe to say that no matter who I spend my time with, I'll never stop being the 'happy and innocent' person who I am. Besides, we're only going to be on Asgard for a day at most, what could go wrong?"

—————

The next day, you were on Asgard. You were so thankful that Nat had finally let you go with Thor, and now you were stood outside of a tall golden palace, behind a beautiful view of Greek-style hills and mountains. You were speechless, to say the least.

"Brother Loki should be here any minute..." said thor, looking over at a clock tower. You couldn't make out what time it was - the numbers were Asgardian - but it was about 12 before you left. Before you could think anything else of it, something appeared before you two. It was Loki.

"Nice to see you again, brother!" Thor exclaimed as he went in for a hug. Loki barely hugged him back, and pulled away, turning to face you.

"Well well well, who's this who you've brought along with you?" Loki asked Thor, yet stared at you with a slight smirk. "Loki, this is y/n. She's a friend from work." Loki took your hand and bowed down slightly, and placed a kiss on the back of your hand; a kiss which you couldn't describe as chaste, making eye contact with him the entire time. He rose and let go of your hand, fingertips brushing slightly. "Pleased to make you acquaintance, Lady y/n." You were tongue tied, but before you could even begin to formulate words, Thor started talking. He rambled on about why you were here, and if he knew anything about the break in, but you weren't listening to a single word. Instead, you never took your eyes off Loki.

His shoulders were broad, sleek black hair running just past them. He stood with confidence, taller than Thor but thinner. Despite this, you could still see defined muscles from underneath the Asgardian clothes he wore. His eyes were a cold shade of blue, resembling ice. While Thor was still talking, he looked over at you, catching you staring at him. You maintained eye contact, your cheeks turning a childish shade of pink, and he winked at you before turning back to concentrate on his brother. The corners if his lips were slightly upturned, and a few strands of hair fell into his face as he nodded along to whatever Thor was saying.

"Well, I haven't heard any news, I'm sorry I can't be of any help. Do you both want to get lunch?" You turned to Thor, cocking an eyebrow.

"I'm sorry, brother, but I must go and talk to the others and see if they've heard anything. But, it won't hurt if you and y/n get something to eat?" You and Loki both turned to face each other, and you smiled wider than ever.

"I'd love to."

You and Loki walked in silence to the dining hall, passing many Asgardian maidens on your way. You felt slightly underdressed; all asgardian women wore long flowing gowns, whereas you were dressed in high waisted denim shorts and a red turtleneck. Once you arrived at the dining room, you were confronted with a grand gold table topped with all kinds of food. Cheese, grapes, wine, and some sort of Asgardian meat that you couldn't recognize. It felt magical, yet you felt out of place. As you furthered towards the table, Loki took out a chair for you to sit down in. Thanking him, you sat, and his fingertips brushed against your clothed shoulders. Butterflies swarmed in the pit of your stomach, and you quietly giggled at yourself for becoming so flustered. Once Loki was seated, you asked him a question.

"So, Loki," you began, looking around at the feast laid out for you, "what do you get up to on Asgard?" As you spoke, he poured crimson wine into a goblet, and you felt obliged to do the same.

"Surprisingly, not much." He spoke with, what resembled, an English accent. Every consonant was sharp, every vowel curved on his lips. "Every now and again we have to meet with people from other worlds, like you. Thor doesn't come and visit very often, so the mass amount of paperwork that has to be done is left to me." He rolled his eyes yet bore a smile, to which you laughed.

"Trust me, I know what it feels like. Ever since Tony and Steve got into that disagreement about where the files should be stored, I've been in charge of all paperwork. I don't mind it though, there's some sort of satisfaction in the orderliness of it all..." you looked up at him and grinned, being able to physically feel the awkwardness between you both. Although, he could look at your smile forever; the way your y/e/c shone in the light, dimples in you cheeks becoming more pronounced by the second, your lips curling ever so slightly inwards as a sigh escaped from them.

"I'm sorry, I've never really been one for small talk. Asgard seems wonderful, though. The landscape is impeccable, and everyone just seems so...perfect, I guess!" Speaking quieter, you leaned in the get closer to Loki, sat opposite you. "I feel like I could spend the rest of my life here." He knew you meant it, being able to feel the pure excitement you radiated. Tucking a piece of hair behind your ear, you sat back and pointed towards one of the golden dishes beside you, holding some fruits and vegetables.

"May I?"

"Of course, go ahead."

As you spooned a kind of salad onto your plate, Loki rubbed his stubble dotted chin. Loading your fork and taking a bite, you felt a wave of peace flow over your body. You had no idea what you were eating, but it was damn good.

"What part of midgard are you from, y/n?"

"Midgard?" You spoke through your mouthful of salad and swallowed. "Oh, right, Earth. I'm from Brooklyn, New York, but I live in Manhattan." You took a sip of wine, cringing at it's strength. Noticing this, Loki let out a laugh.

"Asgardian alcohol isn't for the weak, I'd take it easy if I were you..." you knee he was joking at the last part, so you laughed with him. The moment was sweet, but you can always have too much of a good thing. After Loki filled his plate, and you took a few more mouthfuls of salad, Thor strode in looking pleased with himself.

"Hey Thor, what's up?" Thor sat down at the table and picked up a bunch of grapes, popping one into his mouth.

"I just checked the comms," he swallowed, "Nat and Steve have all the information we need from S.H.I.E.L.D., so we can go back to midg- uh, Earth, sorry. Ready to go?" You looked at Loki who gave you a small nod as he put his cutlery down, and you stood up with a smile.

"Ready than I'll ever be!"

Thor and Loki stood up and walked towards you, and you went to shake Loki's hand. His hands were cold, icy to the touch, and his slender fingers certainly overpowered your small ones. He leaned in before you could break away, whispering in your ear. "Come back soon, I'd love to see you again."

You blushed, nodding, and he gave you a sly wink. Sooner or later, you were back on Earth, missing Asgard more and more by the second.

—————

Two months later, and you were head over heels for Thor's brother. Once you returned back to earth, Tony made it very clear that he disapproved of your trip. He sat you, Thor, Clint, Nat and Steve down in the conference room and screamed at all of you, acting like a very strict father. He had no idea what had happened on Asgard, but he let it slip that all of the avengers had an agreement - never let y/n meet Loki. Obviously, that was out the window, and it resulted in a conflict between Steve and Tony, as per usual. However, all of the avengers shared one common thought, and it was that you should never go back to asgard again.

"She's met Loki and had a look around Asgard, now there's no reason for her to go back."

"What if he's done something to her mind? We can't let her go back."

"We can't let Loki back into the facility when y/n is around, we can't handle anything else happening at the moment."

You often heard Steve and Tony talking about you in the other room, but you ignored it. 3 trips to asgard, 2 secret earth dates and 1 sleepover later, you and Loki decided you were serious; you both liked each other so much, and you wanted to tell other people. However, you had no idea how you were going to tell the avengers. You almost got caught a few times, but luckily, you were quite good at covering yourself up.

"Yo, why are you texting Pizza Hut?"

"Stop looking at my phone, Sam! Besides, I was actually ordering us a pizza, but I guess I'll just go and make myself a sandwich instead..."

"No y/n I take it back!!!"

It was a quiet day in the avengers tower when you decided to share your secret. You, Steve, Tony, Nat, Thor, Bruce and Clint were in the conference room having just finished a meeting. Before anyone could leave, you asked to talk to them for a bit. Despite being happy and confident in telling your friends that you were in love, your palms were sweating and you felt slightly nauseated. Nat must have noticed, and asked if you were okay.

"Everything alright?"

You stood in front of the table, toying with the hem of your skirt behind your back. Taking a deep breath, you looked up at your colleagues sat in front of you.

"I actually have some news to share with you all. A couple of months ago, Thor and I went to Asgard, and I found out about your weird pact thingy forbidding me from meeting Loki. Well, it happened, and it went well! Despite you all feeling very strongly about it, I did enjoy myself. Honestly, I heard you all talking about me 'never returning' and not being able to see Loki again, and it did sorta hurt..."

Steve bowed his head down slightly and Natasha avoided eye contact; you didn't want to guilt trip them, so you continued.

"...and that's okay! You're allowed to be protective of your friends, and I understand why you'd want me to be cautious around certain people. But that's not the point: the point is, I'm an adult, and although I may not be as old as Steve," (Tony chuckled at that) "I'm still an adult. I went to college, I have a job, my own apartment. I'm old enough to know right from wrong, which is why I may or may not have seen Loki 6 times in the past two months..."

"What!?" Natasha looked furious, and everyone had their eyes on you. Steve looked disappointed, Tony didn't look surprised, and Thor seemed quite amused. Bruce and Clint didn't look phased, to be completely honest.

"Please listen to me, I'll explain everything." Everyone eased up slightly as you took a deep breath, standing closer to the table. "I've been back to Asgard four times, and Loki has come to earth twice to see me. I know you would all freak out about him coming to earth, but I made him wear that patch that Tony built which dampened his powers. Whenever he was on earth, he was just a normal person. We got to talking and decided to see each other more often, and we've become quite close."

"If you say that you and Loki are friends, I will jump off of this building." Natasha remarked, crossing her arms. She was definitely the most protective of you, seeing you as a little sister.

"You're not going to like this." you muttered, sighing.

"Loki and I are in love and we've been seeing each other for two months!" You spoke quicker than lightning, grinning at the end, and sprinting out of the conference room. As you ran to the common area, you heard shouting erupting from the conference room, mainly coming from Nat, Steve and Tony. You knew they wouldn't take it well, but you didn't expect it to go down this badly. You heard the commotion from the conference room slowly make it's way closer to the common area, so you bolted towards the bedrooms. You didn't live in the avengers tower, but practically everyone else did.

Hiding in Natasha's room is too obvious, she's the avenger who you're closest to. Hiding in Thor's is also too risky, as he has asgardian technology; as far as they're concerned, you might try and get in contact with Loki. Tony's room? Too stinky. Clint's room? Too stinky². Steve's room? You looked up to that man as a brother, and you certainly were not interested in whatever sort of magazines and movies that he kept in there ( ;) ). That left one other person's room: Bruce's. Quickly sliding into his room, you crawled under the poofy duvet on his bed. Luckily, Bruce's blanket was practically three duvets thick, so they wouldn't be able to tell that you were in there.

Bruce's sheets smelled like lavender and vanilla, with a very vague scent of aftershave; you loved it. You could probably stay there for hours, and even fall asleep, but the faint musk you smelled on his sheets reminded you of Loki. His aftershave always smelled like bonfires and liquor, a scent that you could fall in love with over and over again. You must have laid in in Bruce's bed for 20 minutes before you heard footsteps outside the door. You were never one to do this (run and hide from something difficult) as it seems childish, and the gang already treats you like a child enough. However, you didn't know how you would recover from this one. You heard doors open and close nearby - they must be looking for you. The door to Bruce's room suddenly opened, and you held your breath in an attempt to be quieter. You heard a deep sigh, and somebody sat on the end of the bed. You could just tell that it was Bruce, and you felt safer with him here.

"Listen, kid-"

"Bruce, you're my favourite, but call me kid one more time and I will smite you."

He chuckled and apologised, continuing to talk. "Sorry, y/n. I know how you feel. Frustrated, confused, low on hope." You poked your head out from underneath the duvet and moved over on the bed, sitting up. You motioned for Bruce to sit next to you, which he did.

"I've been through this sequence over and over again," he said, laying down next to you, "yet I never seem to break the cycle. But there's a difference between you and I, y/n. When I'm feeling like this, I show it. I'm not talking about hulking out, but about how I hold myself. I'll be visibly down and depressed, everyone can tell that I'm going through something. But you, you hold it in. You smile and laugh through every emotion you have, and I can't help but admire you for it."

You both turned your heads to look at each other, Bruce giving you a small smile.

"When you're sad or angry, you continue to smile. All of the other avengers get tricked by it, thinking that you're truly fine, but you don't fool me. I can see, every time you cover your emotions, I can see the fire behind your eyes. Or how you tighten your grip when you feel stressed. Although you may be smiling and laughing, I know what's going on behind those eyes. You do a good job, y/n, but maybe bottling it all up isn't the best option. Maybe that's why you fell for somebody who is the completely opposite, like Loki. Because you'd never dare to show your negative emotions outwardly and indulge in the feeling of letting everything out. Now that you've found somebody who you can share these emotions with, you feel like you can be yourself. What I'm failing to say, is perhaps you could let your emotions show a bit more. You don't have to complain or mope around the tower like Tony, but maybe let people know when you are uncomfortable, or confront people who make you upset."

You had closed your eyes about half way through Bruce's speech, and when you opened them your eyes brimmed with tears. He didn't say anything, but instead, Bruce held his arms out and took you in an embrace. You hugged him back, feeling warm and safe, not knowing how to express to him how much he meant to you.

"How did the others react?" You asked into his chest. Bruce was hesitant to reply, and didn't know whether it was best to tell you the truth or let you see for yourself. With a content sigh, he replied.

"I'm afraid to say they didn't take it very well. Natasha blames herself, Steve's a bit frustrated, and Tony...Tony said he feels 'stabbed in the back by his greatest friend', but I think he was being a bit too over dramatic."

"Why do they hate him so much?" You asked, pulling away from Bruce and sitting up on his bed.

"It's complicated." Bruce said, rubbing his forehead. "He's been with us in the past, but there have been multiple occasions where we've had to lock him up. We still don't know whether he's with us or against us, and now one of our best teammates is in love with him." You nodded, knowing what he meant. You knew you had to clear things up with the rest of the group, and you'd start with Natasha.

"Yeah, that makes sense. I'm sorry for hiding in here and messing up your covers, I'm going to go and talk to them and apologise." Before you got up from the bed, Bruce pulled you in for one last hug, planting a friendly kiss on your forehead. "Never apologise for falling in love."

—————

Never apologise for falling in love.

In your head, you repeated what Bruce had told you in his room. You were walking towards to common area where you knew the rest of the avengers would be. Bruce went in there first to calm everyone down, and you told him you'd be in there in a few minutes to tell everyone the news. Walking into the room, all eyes were on you. You became conscious of what you looked like, your face was probably red and puffy from crying.

"Do you have anything you'd like to say, y/n?" Steve asked in a harsh tone. He seemed extremely intimidating, and you suddenly felt small and worthless.

"Take it easy, Steve." Bruce said quite calmly. "Let her do it herself."

You smiled, a genuinely happy smile at Bruce. Despite having little to no confidence whatsoever, you were actually happy. Bruce had made you feel so much better, you had a boyfriend who you loved, and you wanted your friends to know whether they approved or not.

"I want to let you all know that I didn't do this on purpose. I didn't mean to bond with Loki, and I should never apologise for falling in love, and I'm not going to apologise. It's my life, and whether you approve or not, I'm going to continue to see Loki. However, I would like to apologise for how I acted. I shouldn't have run and hidden, and I could've broken the news in a nicer way. Do any of you have anything you'd like to say?"

There was a gloomy silence as the rest of the group contemplated what to say. Trying to alleviate the room of the awkwardness, Thor opined. "Well, I approve of your relationship, Lady y/n. I'm glad you've found someone!" Everyone looked at Thor, then back to you as you sat down on a chair. Steve opened his mouth and closed it a few times, he clearly was lost for words. Natasha was the first person to speak, coming to sit in the chair next to you.

"We overreacted, I'm sorry, y/n. I'm sure you could understand what we felt, but we support you. It'll take us a while to get used to it, but we all want you to feel comfortable. We love you, and if you love Loki then there is nothing we can do about it other than accept you."

The day ended with a group hug, lots of individual hugs from Natasha and Steve, and you & Bruce watching Star Wars after everyone had gone to bed. You were going to see Loki the next day, and you knew it would be the best day ever.

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symbianosgames · 8 years ago

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The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

A few years ago in SeishunCon‘s digital gaming room, I was reintroduced to the match-3 game. I’d played Dr. Mario when I was younger, but more competitive games like Magical Drop, Bust-A-Move, and Tokimeki Memorial Taisen Puzzle-Dama were something very different.

Ultimately, I realized just how many more-or-less neutral decisions are involved in making a match-3 game.

During the following Ludum Dare, I decided to jump in head-first. I did a bit of a warm-up the week before, trying to build a Tetris-style algorithm that detected and cleared out lines. This tutorial from Unity Plus was a huge help. Of course, the Tetris matching algorithm–a complete row of tiles–is much simpler than an algorithm that picks out irregularly shaped patches of matching tiles.

If you want to see all of these code samples in context, check out my Ludum Dare 30 repo. (In a shameless bit of self-promotion, I also reused this logic for Shifty Shapes.)

Two worlds

The trickiest part of building a puzzle game in Unity is that the game itself doesn’t live in world space. Not fully, anyway.

This isn’t as true in other genres. Platformers, for example, live almost exclusively in the Unity game world. The player’s Transform tells you its location. Colliders (or, in some cases, raycasts) tell you when the player is on the ground, hitting the ceiling, or colliding with an enemy. Even if you aren’t using in-game physics, you’re probably adding force or setting velocity on a Rigidbody so that you get collision detection for free.

Not so with a puzzle game. If your game involves clicking, you might get some coordinates in world space, but you’re probably going to convert that to a cell in a grid that lives entirely in code. There’s a good reason for that–it’s far easier to write the logic for scoring a game like Tetris or Dr. Mario when you’re thinking about blocks or tiles, not individual pixels.

I’m pretty sure Tetris blocks are not supposed to stick to the side of the board.

My warm-up actually tried to live in world space as much as possible. It used physics to determine when a tile had landed, and only transferred data back to a two-dimensional array to detect row completion. That seemed safer–what happens in the game world is real, after all. It’s what the player sees, so if you store your data there, there’s no fear of getting out of sync, right?

I was wrong. No matter how I tweaked it, it never did work right.

The Unity Plus tutorial I linked above was a huge help. If nothing else, it allowed me to trust that moving my logic fully out of the game world and into an abstract data structure was a valid approach. If you haven’t already, go back and at least skim it, because I intend this post to be an extension from Tetris logic into match-3 logic.

Converting from board to world space

Once I figured out this transition was manageable, this part was easy. I created a GameTile class that tracked the color, row, and column of the tile, and updated the tile’s position based on that. Here’s an abridged version:

public class GameTile : MonoBehaviour { private Transform _t; private SpriteRenderer _s; [System.NonSerialized] public int TileColor; [System.NonSerialized] public int Row; [System.NonSerialized] public int Column; void Awake () { _t = GetComponent<Transform>(); _s = GetComponent<SpriteRenderer>(); } Vector3 tmpPos; public void UpdatePosition() { tmpPos = _t.position; tmpPos.x = (Column * Board.TileSize) - Board.WorldOffset; tmpPos.y = (Row * Board.TileSize) - Board.WorldOffset; _t.position = tmpPos; _s.sprite = Board.Current.Textures[TileColor]; }

Tiles in a grid

Note that, in this case, TileSize is a constant that represents the size of a tile in Unity units. I’m using 64×64 pixel tiles, and the sprite size in unity is 100 pixels per unit, so TileSize works out to 0.64. I’m also using a constant offset so that the middle of the 7×7 board is at 0,0 world space, and the lower-left corner is tile 0, 0 in game space.

I also created an array that represents the gameboard as a static field in a class called Board. (Board started off as a static class and became a singleton because I needed to set some values in-editor, so it’s clumsily straddling the worlds of game object and static class.)

public const float TileSize = 0.64f; public const float WorldOffset = 1.92f; public const int BoardSize = 7; public static GameTile[,] Tiles = new GameTile[BoardSize, BoardSize];

While the Unity Plus tutorial used a two-dimensional array of integers, I decided to store references to my GameTile objects in this array. This allowed me to pass data to and from tiles directly and (as we’ll see later) made tile-clearing and animation generally easier.

Whenever I made a change to board state, it meant that I could simply loop through the board array and tell each tile where it was supposed to be:

public static void UpdateIndexes(bool updatePositions) { for (int y = 0; y < BoardSize; y++) { for (int x = 0; x < BoardSize; x++) { if (Tiles[x,y] != null) { Tiles[x, y].Row = y; Tiles[x, y].Column = x; if (updatePositions) Tiles[x, y].UpdatePosition(); } } } }

Note that in every case, we’re always converting from abstract game space into world space. Unity game objects aren’t storing the important game state information directly; they’re always a representation of that state.

… and back again

In my game, there was one case where I needed to convert from world to game space, and that’s when the user clicked an empty space to drop a tile. To do this, I simply created a large collider behind the entire gameboard with this script attached:

void OnMouseDown() { if (GameState.Mode == GameState.GameMode.Playing) { mouseClick = Camera.main.ScreenToWorldPoint(Input.mousePosition); mouseX = (int)Mathf.Round ((mouseClick.x + WorldOffset) / TileSize); mouseY = (int)Mathf.Round ((mouseClick.y + WorldOffset) / TileSize); PutNextTile(mouseX, mouseY); Soundboard.PlayDrop(); GameState.ActionsTaken++; } }

That’s really all there is to it. Note that it’s basically the reverse of UpdatePosition() above, which converts from game to world space.

Detecting and clearing matches

Clearing matches

This is the trickiest part. Actually, this is probably why you’re reading this blog post.

Horizontal matching (as in Tetris) is pretty easy–you just need to look for contiguous tiles in the same row. Even allowing horizontal or vertical matches (as in Dr. Mario) is just a variation on this theme. However, trying to track a set of contiguous tiles that can vary horizontally and vertically is going to take some recursion.

Each time we take an action that changes the board, we’ll trigger a check. The first thing we do is copy our entire board array into another array:

static void CopyBoard(GameTile[,] source, GameTile[,] destination) { for (int y = 0; y < BoardSize; y++) { for (int x = 0; x < BoardSize; x++) { destination[x, y] = source[x, y]; } } } static bool clearedTiles = false; public static void MatchAndClear(GameTile[,] board) { clearedTiles = false; // Make a copy of the board to test CopyBoard(board, toTest); //... continued...

Why? We’ll see later that it makes it much easier to tell which tiles we’ve checked.

We start the process with a brute-force approach. We’ll go cell-by-cell (first rows, then columns), testing each cell. For each test, we’ll reset some variables we use to track our testing, and then call a separate function (which we’ll later use for recursion):

// Continued from MatchAndClear() above... currentTile = null; collector.Clear (); for (int y = 0; y < BoardSize; y++) { for (int x = 0; x < BoardSize; x++) { TestTile (x, y); // Continued later...

Let’s take a look at that TestTile function:

static void TestTile(int x, int y) { // Tile already tested; skip if (toTest[x,y] == null) { return; } // Start testing a block if (currentTile == null) { currentTile = toTest[x, y]; toTest[x, y] = null; collector.Add(currentTile); } // ** Skipped lines--we'll come back to these later ** // If we're processing this tile, test all tiles around it if (x > 0) TestTile(x - 1, y); if (y > 0) TestTile(x, y - 1); if (x < Board.BoardSize - 1) TestTile(x + 1, y); if (y < Board.BoardSize - 1) TestTile(x, y + 1); }

If this function finds that the cell is null, then we skip it. A null cell means that it’s either empty, or we’ve already tested it. (That’s why we copied it into a separate array–we can manipulate the new array at will.).

If the cell has a value, though, we’ll do a few things. First, we’ll remember it as our “current” cell–the one at the top of the chain of recursion. Then, we’ll remove it from our copy of the gameboard so that we don’t test it twice. We’ll also add it to a List so we can remember how many contiguous tiles of the same color we’ve found.

There’s two other conditions we might run into later in the recursion, but we’ll talk about them later. Once we’ve tested a cell, we’ll then grab the four cells around them an run them through the same test.

The “current” cell is now set, indicating this isn’t our first level of recursion. On these function calls, we now have three possibilities for each cell.

First, the cell could be null, which again means we’ve already tested it or it’s empty. Again, we’ll do nothing if that’s the case.

Second, the cell could not match the “current” cell. In that case, we don’t consider it “tested.” Our recursion tests for a single set of contiguous tiles of a single color. Just because this tile isn’t part of the current set doesn’t mean it’s not part of a different one.

// From TestTile() above... // Tile doesn't match; skip else if (currentTile.TileColor != toTest[x, y].TileColor) { return; }

Third, the cell could be the same color as our “current” cell. If that’s the case, it’s been “tested,” so we’ll set it to null in our copy of the board. We’ll also add it to that List we use as an accumulator. This is one of the conditions we skipped in the example above:

// From TestTile() above... // Tile matches else { collector.Add(toTest[x, y]); toTest[x, y] = null; }

The function will continue recursing until it’s exhausted all options, either by hitting an empty cell or the edge of the board. At that point, we return to the main “brute force” loop to handle our results.

If our accumulator has more than three tiles, then this was a successful match. If not, then we’ve tested one or two tiles, but we don’t need to take action:

// Continued from MatchAndClear() above... if (collector.Count >= 3) { foreach (GameTile tile in collector) { ClearTile(tile.Column, tile.Row); clearedTiles = true; Soundboard.PlayClear(); } } currentTile = null; collector.Clear (); } } if (clearedTiles) { SettleBlocks(board) } }

Here, as we’ll discuss later, I’m simply triggering some animations. The simplest approach, though, is to loop through our accumulator and call DestroyObject on each matching tile’s game object. That kills two birds with one stone: the in-game objects are gone, and the cells in our board state are set to null.

Dropping tiles

Dropping a tile

Certain changes–dropping a tile or clearing tiles, in this case–can leave unsupported tiles which must be resolved (if those are the rules of our puzzle game, of course). This is actually a really simple algorithm.

We’ll go column-by-column this time, then row-by-row. The order is important here.

In each column, we’ll work our way up from the bottom until we find an empty cell. Then, we’ll make a note of that cell. The next time we find a tile, we’ll simply shift it down to that location and add one to our “empty cell” index:

static int? firstEmpty; public static void SettleBlocks(GameTile[,] board) { for (int x = 0; x < BoardSize; x++) { firstEmpty = null; for (int y = 0; y < BoardSize; y++) { if (board[x, y] == null && !firstEmpty.HasValue) { firstEmpty = y; } else if (firstEmpty.HasValue && board[x, y] != null) { board[x, firstEmpty.Value] = board[x, y]; board[x, y] = null; firstEmpty++; } } } UpdateIndexes(false); }

When you’re done, don’t forget to call your matching function again. It’s entirely likely that dropping tiles has created some empty rows.

In fact, if we were scoring points, this would make it easy to award combo bonuses or multipliers. All of these repetitions of dropping and clearing blocks are just recursions of that first call that was triggered by a player action. We could tell both how many total matches resulted from a player action, and how many levels of “chaining” were required for each action.

Animations

This is a working game, but it’s not intuitive, primarily because we have no animations. Tiles disappear, then reappear on lower rows. It’s hard to figure out what’s really going on unless you’re watching closely.

This is tricky to do. Game objects are always a representation of game state, so our tiles are always laid out on a grid. Tiles are always in one space or another; so a tile might be in row 1 or row 2, but it’s never in row 1.5.

What’s the trick? We should never be manipulating the game board and animating at the same time. Think about how Tetris or Dr. Mario work–you don’t drop the next tile until everything has had a chance to settle. This gives a brief reprieve for the player, but it also ensure we don’t have any weird race conditions or interactions.

As an aside, I recommend creating a “game state” enumeration whenever you start a new project. I’ve never written a game where I didn’t need to know whether the game was in play, paused, showing a menu, in dialogue… I could go on. Best to plan for it early–that way you can ensure that every line of code you write tests that it should be running in this state.

Admittedly, my implementation is kludgy, but here’s the basic idea–when we clear or drop a tile, we trigger a state change. Each GameTile object knows how to handle this state change, and (more importantly) it knows when to tell the gameboard that it’s finished with its animation:

void Update () { if (GameState.Mode == GameState.GameMode.Falling && Row != LastRow) { targetY = (Row * Board.TileSize) - Board.WorldOffset; tmpPos = _t.position; tmpPos.y -= FallSpeed * Time.deltaTime; if (tmpPos.y <= targetY) { Board.fallingBlocks.Remove(this); UpdatePosition(); Soundboard.PlayDrop(); } } }

When a clear animation finishes, the game needs to check if it should be dropping tiles:

private static float timer; private const float DisappearTimer = 0.667f; void Update() { if (GameState.Mode == GameState.GameMode.Disappearing) { timer -= Time.deltaTime; if (timer <= 0) { GameState.Mode = GameState.GameMode.Playing; SettleBlocks(Tiles); } }

When the drop animation finishes, it needs to check for matches:

if (GameState.Mode == GameState.GameMode.Falling && fallingBlocks.Count == 0) { GameState.Mode = GameState.GameMode.Playing; MatchAndClear(Tiles); } }

This cycle repeats until we finally don’t have any more matches, and then the game can go back to doing its thing.

This was originally posted on my personal blog, dylanwolf.com

#IFTTT #Blogger

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