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teletraan-meets-jarvis · 3 years ago

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What I Want - Part 2

AO3 Link

Chapter Title: What I Need

Pairing: Crosshair x fem!Jedi Reader

Summary: Following the awkwardness of the night before, you go to an old friend to try and process your feelings for Crosshair.

Click here for Part 1

Warnings: 18+, a bit more frisky business but not full on so rated 18 just to be safe. Swearing.

Word Count: 2.6k

Author’s Notes: You ask, you get!! Thanks so much for all the support and love for part 1 ❤️. As a thank you, I bring you part 2, I hope you enjoy! If this one takes off a bit as well, I do have an idea for a little bonus chapter around the Bad Batches' reaction. As always, feedback/comments are massively appreciated along with reblogs. Fic is below the cut off, thanks for reading!!

Taglist: @aerynwrites @shannon-lynn-21 @saltywintersoldat @tired-night-owl @wille-zarr

A comm alarm beeped softly, slowly pulling you out your slumber. Giving the device a sleepy glare, you shut it off and huffed back onto your bunk. Wrecker’s snores were echoing off the small ship barracks, you rolled your eyes at his sleeping form across the room as you swung your legs over the side of your top bunk. Below you, Tech slept soundly, he managed to fall asleep with his goggles on which were now sitting wonky on his relaxed face. He also had a datapad clutched to his chest, almost like a teddy bear, which made you chuckle to yourself.

You’d barely slept after getting back from the mission but being a General stopping over on Coruscant meant rest would be a pipe dream. Your alarm was set to get you out of bed and ready for the first of what you were sure would be a hundred and ten briefings today. You were always happy to shoulder the politics for the team, removing that burden from Hunter so they could keep to themselves. But today, you could really do without it.

You looked over at Hunter and Crosshair’s bunks, the former sleeping up top with an arm over his eyes. Probably to block out the few small coloured lights on the ship that shone from critical systems, preventing the room from being truly pitch black. You didn’t envy Hunter’s enhanced senses, they seemed to cause him quite a bit of discomfort when they weren’t on missions. You should probably pick him up an eye mask one of these days.

Below him, Crosshair slept with his back to the open room. One of the few times you ever saw his body relaxed was when he slept. You cringed as you remembered yesterday’s awkwardness with the sniper and mentally cursed at yourself for causing, what was, an easily avoidable situation.

Shaking your head you jumped silently off of your bunk, mindful to not wake any of the batch. You gently removed Tech’s goggles, placing them in their usual spot before moving over to grab some fresh robes and head for the fresher. Today was going to be a real drag.

—————————————————

“Hey! Look what the Lothcat dragged in” someone called after you as you trudged up the steps to the GAR Headquarters. You turned around to see none other than Anakin Skywalker jogging up behind you.

“Nice to see you too Skyguy” he chuckled at the nickname as he threw an arm around your shoulders.

You fell into companionable chatter as you made your way to your first meeting, the dark halls of the military headquarters looking indistinguishable as you attempted to find the correct room. Members of the Coruscant Guard patrolled the halls, nodding politely to you both as you strolled past.

Eventually you found the room where Mace, Plo and Luminara were waiting, along with some clone and human high command. You stood outside the door for a moment, readying yourself to seal your fate of being talked at for a solid eight standard hours.

Eventually you caved, mostly as you were on the verge of being late if you debated standing outside any longer. Begrudgingly, you sat through briefing after briefing. All the voices and different rooms blending into one grey blur as you tried to take in what information you could, but your tired and stressed mind was having none of it.

While it was nice to catch up with some of the other Jedi, you always felt a bit out of place among the perfect members of the council. More so now than ever.

You ended up wandering back to the temple with Anakin where you both retired to his room and you flopped down onto his simple bed with a whine.

“Okay, what’s going on? You’ve been off all day” Anakin was the closest thing you had to a brother, you trained as Padawans together and due to your similar age you became fast friends. You knew about his marriage to Padme and decided that if you could offload your dilemma on anyone, it’d be him.

“I fucked up” you groaned out from behind your hands.

“What’d you do?” Anakin replied in a playful tone.

“I might’ve got a bit hot and heavy with one of the clones in my squad, led him on and then cut it off” Anakin raised an eyebrow at your confession. “And now he’s pissed at me”

“Why?” You weren’t entirely sure which part of that entire thing he was questioning.

“Because I started the whole thing, I wanted it. Then all of a sudden I did that whole guilty Jedi, must follow every word of the order thing, gave him some pathetic look which said really sorry I can’t have attachments mate, hope you understand. He called me out on it before I could even utter the banthashit excuse and then he stomped off and hasn’t spoken to me since.”

“In his defence, seems like he was probably wound a little tight” Anakin replied with a chuckle which you just groaned at.

“He has every right to be pissed. Hells, I would be if the roles were reversed. Whats with this whole self-righteous act us Jedi have going on?”

“Look, it’s hard being a Jedi at the best of times. It takes an inhumane amount of self-control, which is why its not a path for the weak. But being a Jedi while at war… it’s a lot. You’re emotions are running high, you’re forming bonds with soldiers on the battlefield that you shouldn’t be, but none of us can help it because it’s uncharted territory. Maker knows I’d hunt down anyone who hurt Obi-Wan or my Captain. Yes, It’s not the Jedi way, but neither is fighting a grand-scale war.” Anakin’s eyes were alive with emotion as he spoke, be he quickly caught himself and then it was gone.

“My point is, don’t beat yourself up so much. No one is getting kicked out the order or in his case reconditioned if that’s what you’re worried about. Figure out what it is you want, and then just be discreet about it” you looked at Anakin like he’d grown two heads, he just winked at your confused stare.

“Okay let’s keep it simple. Are you attracted to him?” You thought back to the night before and firmly nodded in response.

“Do you like him as a person?” You pondered his question.

“Well, it’s Cross. I wasn’t sure if he even liked me for a long time. He’s closed off, anti-social, but he’s also a good guy, cares about his brothers, has saved my ass multiple times, and he is kinda funny in his own, snide way” you rattled off with fondness in your words.

“Well then I suggest you go and talk to him.” Anakin replied, giving you a knowing look when he spotted the small smile on your lips as you spoke about the sniper.

You took a deep breath, glad to have finally gotten that off your chest and feeling content that you now knew what to do next. “Thanks, Ani”

“Ugh please don’t call me that” he moaned back, apparently only Padme was allowed to get away with that one.

————————————————

Your walk back to the Marauder felt like it dragged on and on. Your brain ran over a thousand scenarios of what to say, how he’d react and you were about to short circuit. There was so much risk, so much possibility, that you did your best to shut your mind off and let yourself handle it in the moment. These things never went as planned anyway, it was best not to guess.

The large door to the ship hissed open, your boots clanking on the metal surface as you cautiously walked into your home. It didn’t take you long to find Crosshair, he was sat in the main hull methodically cleaning his hand blaster. Everyone else must’ve been asleep. He was just in his blacks, the material hugging him in the most wonderful way, it’s like whoever designed those things was trying to trip you up. The contours of his arm muscles flexing as he worked, his strong chest looked practically chiselled at the heart of his lean frame. You had to force yourself to calm down a little bit.

“Uh, hey” you greeted awkwardly. “Mind if I join you?”

You took his silence as a well he’s not saying no. He didn’t spare you a glance as you walked in and took a seat opposite him. As a General in the GAR, you rarely got nervous. War, as a concept, was simple. You knew your purpose, your objective, you had a job to get done and you’d do it. The risks never stopped you, rather they fuelled you. Probably why you’re such a good fit for the bad batch.

But this right now, personal feelings, not knowing where you stand with someone you care about. Because if you were honest, you really did care about Crosshair, the same as you did the rest of the team. You’d only been with the squad just under a year but you’d gladly lay down your life for any of them in a heartbeat. If you could at least get back to where you were before the other night, you’d be over the moon.

You weren’t used to being so nervous, you let your hands fiddle with you dark Jedi robes as you readied yourself to speak again.

“Look, I’m not here to throw some crap about being a Jedi at you, I promise. And I’m sorry for trying it before” he still didn’t look at you, finding his blaster much more interesting. But you could tell he was listening, you had his attention. Might as well keep babbling.

“In terms of an explanation for what happened yesterday, well I guess I panicked.” You sighed as you tried to find the next words “The way you made me feel that night, I… I’ve never felt like that before and everything i’d been taught over the years screamed at me that what I was doing was dangerous and wrong. I now realise that I’m just an idiot. I make my own decisions and I… uh -well, I stick by that one, starting something that is.” Still nothing.

“I know this is probably a long shot. But in the interest of being transparent” you rambled “uh… if you want to go down that road again, I’m up for seeing what happens, can be as casual as we like. I promise I won’t freak out on you again.” You chuckled and thought you almost spotted a slight pull in the corner of Crosshair’s lips “But if you want to go back to how we were before, I’d also really like that.” You watched him for a while as he gave no acknowledgement of your words, his cleaning finished as he now gave the weapon a once over in his hands. Having said everything you needed, you got up from your seat, looking away from him.

“Well, if I can do anything else, let me know” you turned on your heel to leave, feeling slightly defeated but glad you’d at least made the first step.

“I could think of a few things” he finally spoke as he leaned back into his seat and continued to stare at his blaster, still not meeting your gaze.

Well that caught your attention, you turned back around to face him as he carried on ignoring you. While his tone was unbothered as he spoke, you knew him just enough to know his words held a meaning. He was playing with you, back to his usual teasing and you could’ve laughed at the relief that washed over you. This you could work with. A cheeky idea popped into your head and you’d decided to run with it.

“Oh really?” Throwing caution to the wind, you strode over to the sniper slowly. His gaze finally meeting yours after all this time, watching you as you got closer and closer. Practically drawing you in with his amber eyes. You pushed him back by his chest, creating enough room so you could straddle his lap. “Care to elaborate?”

He huffed out a short laugh at your words, his face overall unbothered but his eyes, they were burning into you. “You’re a smart girl, I’m sure you’ll figure it out”.

You hummed in response, deciding to kick things up a notch you wrapped your arms around his neck, bringing your faces just breaths apart. “Something like this?” You asked, pausing for another second before bringing your lips to his in a surprisingly soft and gentle kiss. You felt his hands come up to rest on your back, pulling you closer as you continued your slow dance. This was so different from the other night, where before there was desperation and lust, now there was something more… tender, passionate. You were quite glad you weren’t standing as the way he moved against you would’ve definitely made your knees weak.

Dragging yourself away from his lips, you searched his face. His mouth pulled into a barely there smirk “That’s a start.”

“Who said I was finished?” And just like that, the last few strands of tension between you both snapped and you relaxed in his arms. You fisted your hands into the front of his blacks and pulled him back to you, his tongue slipped between your lips, curious and demanding. He was everywhere again, filling your nose with the scent of the standard cheap GAR soap but mixed with something earthy, something so distinctly Crosshair and you couldn’t get enough.

You could tell why the Jedi order frowned upon such activities, kissing Crosshair was intoxicating. You couldn’t think of anything else other than the handsome clone in front of you and just how much you wanted him in that moment.

His hands wandered lower and lower down you back until they rested comfortably on your backside, pulling you further up his lap. Feeling mischievous, you started trailing kisses along his jaw. Setting a teasing, languid pace as you mapped out the spots that made him squirm. Crosshair was never a man of many words, so you made it your mission to see just how vocal you could make him.

As your lips met his pulse point, he gave a loud exhale and you smirked in victory against his skin as you continued the onslaught on his senses. You definitely seemed to be doing something right as his hands found themselves in your hair, clutching slightly and you couldn’t help the soft moan that escaped you. Even while trying to gain the upper hand in the situation, he always had some control over you. It was maddening in the best way, setting your veins alight with desire.

Determined to get another victory you traced your tongue against the base of the side of his neck and trailed it all the way up to the bottom of his ear, which you teasingly took into your mouth, teeth grazing the soft skin. A strangled moan escaped the clone and that was the moment where you knew you were hopelessly and utterly gone. Your mind filled with nothing other than wanting to be closer to Crosshair.

“Not very Jedi of you” he commented, slightly breathless when you finally stopped teasing him and came back up to meet his eyes. Looking down at where your bodies were pressed against one another, you chuckled.

“What exactly about this situation led you to believe I was ever a model Jedi?” You smirked, though it was only visible for a second before his mouth was back on yours, devouring you as his hands greedily roamed your body.

You continued making out like teenagers for most of the evening, taking the time to explore each other, enjoying the closeness. Contentment settled over your body, almost as if this was were you were meant to be. If Crosshair’s arms were where you belonged, well, you could think of worse places to be.

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darklydeliciousdesires · 3 years ago

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Verboten - Chapter Twenty One.

A warm welcome to my new readers, thrilled to have you on board! Thank you to everyone for your continued interest, too! :)

Previous chapters - One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight Nine Ten Eleven Twelve Thirteen Fourteen Fifteen Sixteen Seventeen Eighteen Nineteen Twenty

Visuals - The Verboten cast of characters post

Words - 3,887

Warnings - Smut!

Tag list - In the comments! To be added/removed, please DM me :)

“Wow, it’s morning and you’re here,” Zoey mumbled, Tyler curling around her, kissing her back as he tightened his arm over her waist, murmuring sleepily until he felt awake enough to reply.

“And neither of us has anywhere to be either. I felt great when I woke up, those fleeting moments before my brain engaged and I remembered why I’m here, but we’re gonna have enough of that to deal with from external forces. When it’s just you and me, let’s just be happy, hmm? We’ve felt bad for long enough about it, I don’t want all of this negativity to impact our relationship.”

“That’s very poignant for five past seven, Tyler.” He laughed at words, tickling her until she squealed. “You’re right, though. Like yeah, we know all of this is our fault, but I don’t want us to be miserable. We’ll have enough of that coming at us as all of this unfolds. Selfish as it is, we’ve got what we wanted. We might as well at least try and be happy,” she confirmed, reaching for her water bottle, rinsing her mouth, Tyler doing the same before she received plentiful morning kisses.

“Well, in the spirit of being happy.” Hitching up her nightie, he pulled her leg to rest over his hip, slipping his fingers into her mouth. “Get ‘em nice and wet, baby.” Just being told that made her tingle, sucking on the thick digits that made her insides throb, Tyler replacing them for his tongue, their kisses heating up as he began to rub her folds.

Stroking his face as they kissed, she shuddered against the fingertips evoking tingles as they circled her clit, Zoey thinking to herself that this was the very first time she’d get to enjoy Tyler being all hers. ‘He’s mine, my boyfriend.’ The thrill of wanting someone she knew was off limits was now replaced by the thrill of knowing they could finally be together.

“Ahhh, fuck!” She exclaimed, his mouth slipping to her neck, tongue dragging the column of her throat as he pressed his fingers inside her, seeking her spots, pressing hard where he knew he’d make her see stars. He burrowed into her, circling, hooking, raking her soft plush, her core tightening, his fingers becoming more slippery as he began slowly dragging her walls.

“I love how wet you always get for me, baby. Fuck, you feel amazing.” He breathed, his mouth closing over her nipple, a gruff groan rattling his throat.

“Yeah, you do. Love feeling my drenched little pussy flexing on your giant cock, don’t you? Fuck, I want you to pin me down and fill me so badly.” Arousal arrowed right to his loins at hearing her tell him that, whispering that she was a temptress as he shifted between her thighs and entered her with a sweeping thrust.

Taking both of her wrists in one of his big hands, he held her arms above her head, pinning her to the bed as she’d requested, the other gently clutching her face as he kissed her with staggering passion. “Is this a good way to see in the morning, or what?”

“Yeah, getting railed by nine inches of perfection? Definitely beats anything else I could think of.” Letting go of her face, he moved his hand between her legs, beginning to rub her clit in time with each thrust, Zoey mewling breathlessly at the glimmers prickling down her spine, her slick muscles twitching around him.

The heat of him, the thickness of his broad body atop hers, making her feel so imposed upon, so tiny beneath him. It would have been very fair to say she had a size kink, enjoying being overpowered, held beneath his weight. God, it was erotic. She loved it when he was utterly barbarous with her, but couldn’t deny, the soft dom in him had a special place too, especially when he nuzzled her neck, whispering words of love, speeding up to take them to a sizzling finish.

They lay soft and breathless against one other before getting up to shower, Zoey ordering breakfast in, both enjoying a very lazy morning, eating in their sweats before cuddling up on the sofa. They lay around talking before dressing and leaving the sanctuary of the apartment, Tyler driving them out to the same trail he enjoyed taking his kids biking upon, both deciding to get some exercise in the form of a run.

It was a gorgeous setting, but it reminded him sorely of how much he missed his children. He’d only been gone for a day, but he missed getting up to see them off to school before sleeping a little longer if he’d been on nights, he missed fetching them from school if he’d been in early, he missed his little routine with them, their excitement to see him, Grace’s love of climbing up him for a hug, Seth’s self-destructive streak, Lani’s happy gurgles as she pointed at him. Her recent first word had been daddy.

When they stopped for a break, he voiced this all to Zoey, who, as he predicted, found the words to soothe him. “Of course, you miss them. You’re a great dad, but what made you even better was walking away from a situation that would only have begun to impact them if you’d stayed. I’m not biased either because I’m one of the factors that drove your decision. I’d still tell you that had you left her and we hadn’t had an affair.”

He nodded, half smiling. “Yeah, yeah I guess you’re right.”

“There’s nothing to stop you seeing them before your designated day though, is there?”

“Yes, me having a bit of sensitivity for their mother. That’s what’s stopping me.” Seeing the look in her eyes, he realised he’d been a little too sharp, reaching for her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap. Come here.” He pulled her into a hug, Zoey swallowing the lump in her throat. She was the exact opposite to Ella; she never rose to conflict or anyone being short with her. She shrank from it. “Love you, my little kinky princess.”

That made her smile. She liked it when he referred to her as his kinky princess. “I love you too. Sorry my suggestion sucked, you’re right, you should let Ella have her peace to process it all without inflicting yourself on her until she’s had her time.’

When he did see her after another three days, though, he wished he’d left it longer.

“Leave your keys behind when you go, either that or I’ll change the locks,” Ella greeted him with coldly as he entered the kitchen. She’d gone into demanding bitch mode, as he wagered she likely would. Again, he was happy to take her ire, but he wouldn’t stand for her demanding he hand over the keys to a house that belonged to him.

She hadn’t worked since giving birth to Seth; meaning he’d paid considerably more into it than she had for the last five years, plus the fact he’d owned it before he’d even met her, using a good chunk of his inheritance from his father, knowing that one day, he’d fill it with a family.

“House is in my name, so no, you can’t do that. I’m not leaving my keys either, again, because it’s my house.” His simple explanation was met by pure ice.

“You utter bastard!” She hissed, eyeing him with venom.

“Yeah, I am for what I did to you, but I’m not handing in my keys over just because you’re angry and want to command me. I might have let you get away with it when we were together, but I won’t now we’re separated, unless it’s for the benefit of the kids,” he reasoned, Ella spinning around away from the sink to snarl at him.

“You have no right to not let me have my feelings! You cheated on me, with my goddamned bitch of a sister!!”

“Be that as it may, I still won’t cave to your unreasonable demands. Expecting me to turn in my keys to you is unreasonable. They’re not feelings either, that I’m not allowing you to have. They’re your commands of me. Not gonna work.”

“Why? You don’t need keys. You don’t live here any longer!”

“And unless you can buy me out, neither will you once we divorce.”

“You’d seriously kick your own kids out onto the streets? Out of the only home they’ve ever known?” And here she went with emotional manipulation. Like he couldn’t see it coming a mile away. When she was like this, it made him truly see just how nasty she was capable of being, and how much he’d stood for, explained away with her, kept quiet over for the sake of a peaceful life.

“I didn’t say that. I told you that you could buy me out. Either that or you’ll get your share of it and you can buy yourself something with that. Anyway, this is too far in the future to discuss. Where are they?”

“No, we’re gonna talk about this right now!”

“Where are our children, Ella?”

“My children. Mine.”

“You didn’t conceive all on your own. They’re ours.”

“You don’t deserve them.”

“Stop it.”

He knew what she was doing. It was another tactic he’d pushed down, not wanted to fully acknowledge because he’d loved her so much. She would goad people into exploding at her in order to play the victim. Well, in his mind, she was victim enough.

Looking out of the window behind her as she began to rant at him more, he saw Grace run past, turning to head into the lounge and out to the bifold doors, catching her in his arms and swinging her around. Lord, he’d missed her so much, Seth hitting his legs a second later.

“Dad! Where ya been? Missed you, I got a star in class today for my reading!”

“Did you? Good lad, I’m proud of you, mate!” Crouching, he picked up his son in his other arm, kissing his head, giving Grace the same as she snuggled into him.

“I missed you, daddy. Are you staying home now? Mummy said you were busy with work, but you’re home again now, right?”

“No, titch. Come on, let’s go inside. Mummy and I need to talk to you.” Grace didn’t let go of him once they’d gotten back in the house, Seth sitting down on his favourite floor cushion, Ella joining them.

“Kids, this isn’t easy for mummy and I,” he began, Ella snorting. He shot her a look that told her to cut it out and be present and adultlike for the children before continuing. “We’ve decided that I’m not going to live here any longer. You’ll still see me, I’m gonna get another place where you’ll be able to come stay with me whenever you want, so long as I’m not at work, but I won’t be here all the time any more.

“I want you to know that we both love you very much, more than anything. That doesn’t change, it never, ever will either. You guys are the most important people to us, but me and mummy, we’re not the most important people to each other any longer.”

“But why?” Grace asked, bewildered, Seth looking on with big, glassy eyes.

“Mummy and I just aren’t happy with each other any longer, so we’ve decided we’d be happier being apart. You guys are our total focus, though, and I mean it. When I’m not at work, my time is all yours.”

“When you’re not railing your tart.” It might’ve been muttered so quietly that the kids didn’t pick up on her words, but it was enough to make Tyler’s blood boil, that this was all Ella had decided to contribute.

“I don’t want you to go, though!”

“And I don’t want to leave you, titch, but you’ll soon get used to it. Hey, you’re gonna have two homes, so you know what that means? Two bedrooms and I promise, we’ll decorate your room at my place however you want. How about that?”

“Bright pink?”

“The brighter the better?”

“Dad, can I get a car bed?”

“Yeah, I don’t see why not. Now, do you guys have anything you need to ask us?”

“Will we still have Christmas and birthdays together?” Seth questioned.

“Of course.”

Again, Ella snorted.

“Mummy, why aren’t you saying anything?” Grace then asked, reaching for her mum but not leaving her dad’s arms.

“Your daddy has said most of it. It’ll be okay, though, baby. We just need to adjust to everything being a little different. Listen, it’s getting close to your bedtime, so go up and get ready, alright? Dad and I will be up in a minute to tuck you in.” The kids both hugged their parents before heading up, Tyler letting out a sigh once they’d left the room.

“That went better than I ever expected it to. Kids are resilient, though. Hopefully it shouldn't impact them too much, and I meant it, I’ll be around whenever I’m not working so I can be present in their lives, too.”

“I don’t want her around them. They’re not to see my sister at all.”

“You don’t get to dictate that. She’s their auntie, and when the time is right, we’ll tell them about her being more to me too, but not right away so as not to bombard them. You can’t deprive them of Zoey. They love her, Ella.”

“They won’t love her once I’ve told them their daddy walked out on me, on them too, for her.”

“If you do that, use the kids against me, shatter them to hurt me, then you’re more deplorable than I’ve been in all of this. Also, I didn’t walk out on them. Just you.”

Getting up, he followed his kids up to bed, kissing a sleeping Lani before going in to tuck Seth and Grace in, promising them he’d see them on Sunday, take them out as planned prior to his leaving the family home.

“I want to know.” Ella began when they were back downstairs, Tyler picking up his keys and phone. “Why her? Why my fucking sister of all people?”

He took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “Because she made me feel wanted when you turned your back on me. It wasn’t just about sex, it was about affection and having someone who listened to me, who liked being around me. You acted like you hated me for so long, gaslit me in every quarrel we ever had and were utterly cold toward me. I still take the blame for straying, but that’s what drove me away.”

“What was it about her that kept you there, though? What kept you going back to keep fucking her? Was she better than me?”

He remained silent there.

“Was she?”

“Stop shouting, Ella.”

“Was she though?”

“Why are you pushing me so hard for an answer here?”

“Because I need to know! What was it about my devious slut of a sister that made you want to keep going back?”

“Don’t you ever fuckin’ call her that again. Yes, we were devious, but she’s not a slut.”

“I’ll call her what I like!”

“Not around me, you won’t.”

She looked shocked at his firmness there, but still, she kept poking away at him. “Tell me what it was. I want to know.”

“Yes, she was better, is better, if you really need to know. As for why, because I have a deeper sexual connection with her, is why, which eventually grew into a deeper overall connection. You don’t need to know anything else. I’m trying like fuck here not to hurt you any more than I already have.”

“Let’s you do all that disgusting dominating, does she? So, she’s that kind of girl, one who lets you tie her up and smack her around, all that shit I was always too proud to let you do to me? Seems fitting for Zoey, she was always the weakest. Does she let you take her up her bony arse as well, degrade her completely? Yeah, I'm getting the picture here. All you wanted was a filthy whore, and that’s exactly what you got.”

Her words tipped his rage so strongly, it was all he could do not to get up and storm out of there. Her attitude, small minded, opinionated and selfishly misguided, it needed to be checked before he did though. “Her being submissive to my dominance doesn’t make her any less proud, nor does it mean she’s weak. It’s a sexual preference based around arousal. We happen to fit very well together there. Just because you aren’t into it, it doesn’t give you the right to sit there kink shaming us, or calling your sister a filthy whore. She isn’t.

“I’m done having you dissect my sex life just because you need to be vindictive. You can be angry with me for cheating on you all you like, but I’m not gonna sit here and let you play your mind games with me, Ella. You pushing me for a reaction so you can play the victim isn’t happening. We’ve told the kids, I’ve packed more of my stuff, I’m now leaving.”

“Don’t think I’ll take you back once you’ve gotten bored of her, or her you. We’re done for good, you know. I literally wouldn’t touch you with someone else’s. You utterly disgust me, fuckin’ pervert.”

He almost laughed at how spiteful she was being, not one shred of dignity about her as she continued attempting to goad a rise out of him. He simply shrugged, got up and walked out. Yes, she was entitled to be angry with him for having an affair with Zoey, but fuck, he wouldn’t take her nastiness. Not one ounce of it. It was the side of her he’d always found to be intolerable, knowing she could have a very sharp tongue, but this was new, this level of venom.

‘I guess she’s gonna be like this for the foreseeable. You did leave her in the lurch when she likely needed you the most.’

Thinking back to what she’d confessed, he knew it was definitely an extra layer added to her rage at him, not only cheating on her, but continuing it after she’d revealed she was suffering still from Lani’s birth. Something suddenly came to him there, though. Not once had she mentioned it, thrown it at him, called him out for leaving her when she needed the support of her husband. Undeniably, it would have been very in character to have shamed him for it too.

All the way home, it began to bother him the deeper he thought into it. Her actions, her words, almost everything wasn’t fitting of someone who had gone through trauma, as she claimed she did with Lani. Yes, uncontrollable rage was a symptom of PTSD, he’d suffered it, it was exactly what Ella had been attempting to deliberately provoke in him before he’d left, too, but something about it all was very off.

There were so many layers to people suffering trauma, as he knew himself. Sadness, inability to trust, shame, feelings of worthlessness, nightmares and guilt, to name a few. She’d confided none of them in him when they’d been working on their marriage. No one else had noticed any kind of difference in her either. She’d been the same Ella to her sisters and her kids. When he’d been suffering, everyone in his life had seen the change in him.

Ella’s change in demeanour was solely and exclusively towards him.

Just one trip to the doctors and her diagnosis had been given, no medication, just the advice to seek therapy? Now he was looking at it from the outside since their separation, something didn’t add up to him. At the time he’d been too focused on trying to save his marriage, but the more he thought on it, the more it bothered him. Alarm bells began to blare in his head, but still, he couldn’t quite trust himself.

Of course, there was one person he took it to first as soon as he arrived back at her place, drinking a beer in the kitchen while helping Zoey prepare dinner.

“Is it me? Is it just my mind throwing things up at me so I don’t feel quite so guilty about being so bloody happy now I’ve left her for you? Want me to?” Gesturing at the red snapper fishes on the chopping board, Zoey stopped her hovering and passed him the cleaver, Tyler bringing it down and taking both of their heads off in one clean cut, Zoey wincing. “Are they gutted? Ahhh yeah, I see the belly slits. So, what do you think?”

Transferring the heads to the bin and the cleaver to the sink, Zoey went back over to season the fish before placing them onto the pieces of foil they’d be wrapped and baked in, mulling his words over.

“It’s something I’ve been thinking about, too. When I overheard her and Cait talking in the kitchen at Christmas, she never mentioned anything remotely relating to traumatic birth, or PTSD. I mean, I know Lani’s birth was bad, but she’s not mentioned it as anything contributing to her behaviour. In fact, she’s never said anything of the sort to me and as far as I know, not Cait or Fran either. She just said it was all her fault that she’d pushed you away, so she does admit culpability, just not in the face of what she now knows. It is interesting, though, that she never told any of us about going to see the doctor, or a therapist.”

“Well, the therapist thing is new, she’s only had two sessions so far. She goes every Friday, so her third is next week. It is weird that she didn’t tell you guys, though. That’s not like her, you lot confide everything in one another. Well, current circumstances excluded, at least.”

Zoey nodded, Tyler’s words causing her own mental cogs to begin turning as she switched the oven on, fetching the brown rice jar from the cupboard. “She wouldn’t be making this up to guilt you into staying, after sensing your issues might’ve led to you leaving? Surely, with how bad things were, she felt you emotionally checking out?”

“It does seem like Ella behaviour.”

“At her worst, she’s always been capable of being emotionally manipulative, I’d agree. Mum was like that, too. She learned from her. I just can’t see why she’d want you to stay when she’s been being so cold and distant with you, though.” Pouring the required amount of rice into the steamer, she growled with frustration. “We’re not even impartial, though, Tyler! We’re not the ones this should be coming from, because we’ll only look like we’re trying to absolve our guilt.”

“No, you’re right. I know someone who could, though. Or at least, who might be able to confirm our suspicions.”

It was the same someone who called them at the end of the week, asking if they wanted to come to dinner the following Friday night, the only Hudson left willing to have anything to do with them.

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virgil-writes · 3 years ago

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ash & soot

Long before the Winters come into play, a monster stalks the Forbidden Forest that surrounds the Village. Karl Heisenberg is sent to investigate, and heads deeper into darkness to find his prey, a thorn on his side and someone just like him. (Heisenberg x OC)

chapter 14 - prince

SFW, around 4.7K words. Heisenberg is a man of absolutely no feelings I guarantee you

Heisenberg has never done this before, not in almost a hundred years of existence, this tangling of limbs and shirking of duties. He has never once given in to such base urges without careful thought and consideration, instead preferring his encounters planned, short and sweet, in and out before anyone could get attached. He racks his brains looking for things to say once she is awake, for ways to tell her that this means nothing and that they will go back to being flirty acquaintances who spoke to each other in riddles. He digs deep into his thoughts to bury his feelings, refuses to acknowledge their existence long before they can rear their ugly heads. He breathes in, eyes closed, to gather his confidence, to build his persona like he did with the dawn of each new day. Whoever Karl Heisenberg truly was, truly wanted to be, he died every morning and was replaced by a driven, heartless monster.

She was a smart woman, she would get the hint. He will unwrap her arms from his torso, put his clothes back on and make some stupid comment about how she had a pair of tits to die for, but he had already been far too generous by gracing her with his presence this long. Then he will smirk and exit stage left, hold the mask until he is out of sight and has entered the forest, and will finally be done with the theatrics. Perfect plan, until his breath catches in his throat when she first stirs, fingers sleepily caressing his chest like she did the night before. He curses her for never making things easy on him.

She seems confused as she pulls away from him, her lazy stretch reminding him of a cat after a long nap. Her face has softened some, the usual furrow of her brow relaxed, deviant smile replaced with one of pure serenity, like a burden had been lifted off her shoulders. “Good morning, my lord,” she greets as she rubs sleep away from her eyes, and he is glad to notice her tone has changed, away from the throes of their passion and back to the casual nonchalance they had become used to treating each other with. “Did you sleep well?” He has no intentions of answering and she does not expect it, either, slides off the couch to gather their clothing scattered about. She hands him his without looking at him, dresses in silence as he does the same. The silence is tense but not awkward, like they were both content to ignore the existence of the other and of everything that had happened between them just hours prior. “Are you staying for breakfast?” The implication that she did not expect him to is crystal clear. If there was any hope of staying longer in his mind, she had quelled it quickly with that question, like she was done with him for the day, perhaps enough to last her a lifetime. It stings, but he is glad for it.

Heisenberg busies himself with putting his clothes back on - whoever’s clothes those were in the first place -, oblivious to her pacing around the house. He believes he is out of the woods and her reserves of kindness have run dry, only to lift his head and find her holding a basket with a loaf of bread in one hand and his trench coat in the other. From afar he can see it looks ten times better than it did when he walked in wearing it, cleaner, for one, holes stitched back together. He doesn’t stay and she sees him off with the same joy she has always shown him, watching him as he grabs the trench coat and food, then his hat from a hook next to the door, waving him away like she has done every time. They sign an unspoken contract that dictates they never speak of it again, though the fine print reads that it is not off the table and might once again come to pass if the opportunity ever presents itself. His journey back to the factory is quiet and uneventful in more ways than one, the forest sleeps away the early hours of the morning and his mind is void of thoughts and worries. He cannot help but notice that the world feels different, brighter, more vibrant even, the wind not hostile and instead a gentle breeze.

Heisenberg seems enveloped in a mist of cheer and placidness for the days that follow, all he has set in motion moving along like clockwork. Sturm awakens unbidden one night, for good this time, both a blessing and a curse upon him. He manages to study its performance and sketch improvements, however finds that he has forgotten to install an off switch on the damn creature. The freak hums and whirs night and day like it is singing him the song of its people, sometimes joyfully, sometimes in mourning, and that he is able to identify when the fucking thing is happy or sad is a clear indication that he has been listening to it for far too long. A stab of guilt hits him every time he yells down towards the bowels of the factory to tell the monster to shut it, he needs to work and the noise is maddening, but he is always reminded that he is the reason for it all, he has bestowed them all with a new lease of life and now has to deal with the consequences. This is all for a good cause, he reassures himself, and once the rebellion is over he will see to it personally that those who remain are given a humane dismantling and burial.

Every now and again he visits his little witch in the woods, when his days could have been better and he needs a pick-me-up. They never speak of the stormy night and the things they had done, not unlike he had planned, but speak of everything else, and they slowly climb the steps to an awkward friendship that is never truly allowed to blossom. It felt as if every time they would give each other a key, an intricately designed, golden key that would open the lock in their hearts. And every time one would try to open it, they would find yet another, stronger lock, closer to the end but not quite, mystery maintained. It was infuriating and addicting all at once, and he had grown quite fond of the back and forth that had become the most exciting part of his life.

Happiness is a drug that he should not indulge on, he decides. Amidst his work he plans something other than rebellion, other than murder. Sketches something other than machines, looks out the window on the top floor of the factory to daydream about the cabin that stood long abandoned at the edge of his land. It was large for a home in this ass-end of the world, two floors and an attic, a cellar that was used for coal storage and doubled as secret entrance to a tunnel connecting the house and the factory. A fenced garden in the backyard, a shed for tools and firewood. The outhouse was awkwardly placed, too close to the edge, but he had always thought it gave it some extra charm. Answer nature’s call while being dangerously close to it, as it were. The masonry oven outside had not been used for at least half a century, and the well had probably dried up by now. It had been his home for many years, before Miranda took away everything that was theirs and his life with it, before he began dedicating his life to rebellion and dreams of freedom. His room was the one at the end of the corridor upstairs, with a view of the river and the forest extending beyond the confines of the village. It was cramped and cold, a single floorboard always rattled during the night when the wind hit it, the window never fully closed and his father never bothered to fix it. Still, it was home, or it had been, and he sometimes found himself thinking of the good memories he’d had before it all went to shit.

Could it be home again, he wondered? It would be one hell of a spring project, between clearing the debris, dusting and fixing everything up. Nails and the corrugated metal roof would not be a problem, naturally, and the stonework of the first floor was still intact. But he hadn’t fixed a fence in many years, hadn’t sawed nor sanded a plank of wood in longer still. He had never been very good at cleaning anything except weapons and machines, and interior decorating was simply something that had never gone through his mind. It could be a home again, he mused as he brought the blowtorch close to his face to light his cigar, and maybe it would do him good to step away from the damp vapors of the factory every once in a while. But then again, would it be worth the effort and upkeep? He doubted the haulers would make good housekeepers, and he was content enough with his independent, bare, unkempt bachelor lifestyle. But those had never been his intentions, had they? A home but not for him, a home for her, right where he could see her, where he could walk a few minutes and knock on her door whenever.

All strictly professional, of course. She would be effectively isolated from the village and the outside world. Effectively isolated from everyone but him, and he could keep tabs on her and call upon her services when necessary. It was a proposal she would be dumb to refuse: a home easily three times bigger than the one she owned, a larger plot of land for her animals and garden, peace and quiet, access to the Duke for supplies, and even some fun every now and again if she played her cards right. There was also the matter that she would be… Safer, living so close to him, but that was of little importance. Naturally. It had only just occurred to him. He had not begun at that, no. He will give it some more thought over the next few weeks - neither of them would be going anywhere, now would they?

Mother calls him later that day to inform of a family meeting two weeks and a half away, to discuss usual business. They will gather at Donna’s this time around, and it should give them all an opportunity to parade themselves to the public. This is important, you see, she begins like she always does, for their worshipers grow restless with their absence. Heisenberg often feels like she has trained the villagers as one would a dog: starve them for long enough and give them a meager treat to keep them going, teach them that their devotion is rewarded with small miracles brought by hellfire and the tearing of flesh by lycans. He has spent far too long away from the public eye and it is always good practice to remind the villagers of his splendor, she continues. He agrees to strut down main street, bless every crafter that he comes across, and kiss the top of the head of every snotty child pushed in his direction by their parents. He even agrees to wear his Sunday best: the same thing he wore every single day, but with a shiny pin in the shape of his house’s crest.

He conceives his greatest idea yet in the meantime, a soldier that combines the combat capabilities of Eins and Zwei with the mobility of an aircraft. He has Sturm to thank for it, the incessant spinning of the blades having given him the spark to try and create a flying machine. No propeller blades, he decides as the very first thing when he begins drawing the schematics. He has had enough of the noise to last him a good couple of decades. Unsurprisingly, he is caught in a trance of working and passing out and waking up to work some more in the weeks that follow, entire days spent combing through the scrap heaps to find the right materials. He is reminded that the goddamn bed had done wonders for his back every time he deadlifts another engine to pick apart, but still refuses to say goodbye to his uncomfortable armchair and the wonderful massage of its loose springs.

He figures the name for it will strike him at the right moment, and for now focuses on adjusting the thrust speed, ensuring the soldier will land adequately and not simply crash while airborne, as funny as that would look. While Sturm required a sturdy specimen, this will need someone lighter, lankier, and he finds the perfect specimen in Miranda’s latest failed experiment, a young boy of some twenty years who had been orphaned long ago and had turned to the Black God for guidance. In truth, he was nothing more than an errand boy for Mother, bringing messages to and fro, collecting tithe and offerings for her. Heisenberg is curious to know what horrible sin has led him to where he is now, dead and open on his operating table, a wound bigger than his fist where the top of his spine should be. Cadou had begun to take hold when he passed, tendrils shooting out of the infection, and he saved the recently dead nematode for further study later.

Removing the organs is always the messiest part, and he drops armfuls of guts into a nearby bucket to discard later. The boy has broken ribs and is missing his heart, a sign that he had greatly felt Mother’s wrath. Heisenberg almost pities him, alone in the world with nothing but his faith to keep him going, but sooner or later he would have to learn that was the way of the world. It had worked just fine for him, painful but invaluable. He had played the cards he had been dealt and come out on top. Perhaps in another life he would have reached out to give the kid a hand, take him in and give him a job, so long as he stayed out of his way and kept his mouth shut. But then again, perhaps in another life circumstances would not have turned him to a ruthless bastard only out for himself.

Setting up the tubing always takes the longest, delicate work that requires his full attention and steady hands. It feels like fighting an octopus at the best of times, and it is a fight he does not always win. He blows away a hair strand that insists on obscuring his vision, but all he succeeds in is having more of it fall onto his face, beads of sweat also finding their way down his forehead to pool on his brow and slide onto his eyelashes. He wishes he had an assistant every time he does this, every time he pulls a corpse open and finds that his body seems to get in the way every time more than the dead one does. He wishes he had an assistant, remembers the offer he never made her, and regrets it an instant later.

Suddenly his mind has wandered away from his subject on the operating table and has wandered off into a fantasy world, where his little witch gently pulls his hair back to tie it securely away from his face, where she dabs away the sweat on his face with a cloth that smells of wildflowers. She stands patiently next to him, takes notes and follows orders, brings him refreshments and even gives his shoulders a good rub when she feels he has been working too hard. A world where she awaits him every night after a long day, where she greets him with the comfort of home and a hearty meal. His focus is lost from that moment onward, for he is taken with the need to see her, to spend time sitting quietly beside her near the fireplace. To hold her and watch her fall asleep in his arms, to hear her laughter and exchange glib lines with her after dinner.

Goddamn witch.

The poor boy suffers the brunt of his annoyance when Heisenberg punches the side of his ribs, the body resists but does not complain and helps none with doing away with his wishes. What was he thinking, losing sight of his goals because he wants his cock sucked? This is why it was always so much better to stay indoors, to kill such annoying roaches on sight. His carefully constructed mental balance has tumbled, his nirvana disturbed. He was doing just fine before she decided to kill some random lycan and forgot to hide the fucking body. Bored, but just fine. Lonely, but fine. Incredibly depressed, but f-i-n-e. He tries in vain to return to his work once, twice, and gives up on the third time, finally accepting that it would be impossible.

Perhaps it is best if he gets it over with, no? This was but a momentary stumble. He had all but forgotten about her for the better part of a fortnight, having instead turned inward towards his work and growing his intel network by skulking around and reading through papers Miranda had ‘lost’ in transport. Just as quickly as he had latched onto her, he had let her go, back to the hum-drum day to day of developing his metal army.

Or so he thought, faced now with a burning need to walk, almost run towards the forest to catch a glimpse of her again.

He looks down at himself, for the first time conscious of how presentable he was, and decides that it is probably best if he wears something that is not covered in rotting chunks of flesh. Somehow he does not think she will mind it; she strikes him as the kind of woman who would think it adds to his charm. He changes into cleaner clothes regardless, the same moss-colored shirt she had given him the day he showed up at her cabin. An idea shines upon him as he tightens his shoelaces, and he is soon giving orders over the comm system to all haulers: clean the damn place up. Throw the garbage up and over the railings onto the scrapheap, hide it under a carpet, it doesn’t matter. He wants the place presentable enough for him to bring his little witch over - he will tell her a little bit of what he intends, he will show her some of his plans, and he will ask her to work for him. The cabin would take a while but she could always drop by for a visit. All that he has decided in the span of less than a minute, and he hopes there will be enough time for everything to be set up when he makes his way back, holding her hand tightly as he shows her all of the wonders he has created. He also hopes he can keep up the momentum and not soil the plan by chickening out a while later, though something in his mind tells him that might be best.

Heisenberg stops in front of a mirror-like metal plate to check out his hair and wipe the blood of his face, at last satisfied with his appearance and ready to make his next move. He almost skips through the factory on his way up and out of the garage. He is getting laid tonight, goddamn it.

He is surprised to find the Duke’s carriage standing just outside. It must be a Tuesday, though he feels like he last saw the man yesterday; the merchant always completed his regular schedule around the village by making a last stop near - and in - his humble abode. He had much to discuss with the Duke, things of both professional and personal nature, but now was not the time, and he walked by briskly and greeted the man with a tip of his hat, intent on simply passing by.

He knows something has gone terribly wrong when the Duke cackles, and he spots the familiar tail wag of a furry hoofed animal beside the carriage. Heisenberg stops dead on his tracks then, a cold tingle running up his spine, his mouth dry. He stares at the man, mouth agape, trying to form his question but failing miserably. Had something happened? Had the Duke known about her all along? Had he done something to her? The Duke is the first to speak, his usual jolly self, oblivious or uncaring for the situation that has begun to unfold in front of him. “Ah, Lord Heisenberg! How’s the day find you?” There is a pregnant pause as Heisenberg looks at the merchant and back at the tiny goat that bleats at him incessantly, and the Duke roars in laughter, his massive frame shaking the entire carriage. “Oh, it seems the little one likes you! Two hundred lei and it is all yours, my lord. Should be quite the tasty dinner.”

Prince seems to understand its predicament, and cries ever louder, until it is all they both can hear and the sound almost drives him insane. “Where the fuck did you get it?” Is all he manages to say, his tone vicious, but the Duke does not seem to mind it. He looks around for any other signs of her, the dog, or the horse, a chicken, anything.

“My friend in the woods has sold it to me, of course. She no longer has any use for it where she is going, and thought it best to rehome it.” The merchant’s hand reaches out to pet the goat on the head and the whole carriage almost topples over with the weight.

“You know her.” It is not a question, and though there is much he needs to ask there is little he is able to process.

“Indeed. We have been friends for many years, her and I. Since she was a malnourished little girl living under Lady Heisenberg’s protection. Since long before you were born, my lord.” The man takes a long drag from his cigar as if to give Heisenberg enough time to go through his words, and he is glad for it, mind racing a thousand miles a minute. A hundred and something years, the mention of his grandmother’s name. “She has always been quite the ravaging beauty, however. Although I’m sure that has not escaped your notice.” He can hardly contain his exasperation, not at all used to the feeling that currently boils within him. If that man had ever touched her- “She is quite a talented healer, you see. For many years now she has supplied me with the most wonderful of concoctions.” As if to prove it, he lifts up a bottle of the antiseptic he has become so famous for, gives it a little shake and flashes Heisenberg a bright smile.

“She’s gone.” Again he doesn’t ask, simply repeats the information he has been given, and wishes he had his hammer close by to crush that smirk off the Duke’s face.

“Why yes, she has left, of course. It would not be the first time,” the merchant says with a shrug. “A free spirit she is, always has been. Off to find herself some excitement and adventure, I’m sure. I have told her many a time that the village life does not suit her,” he puts the bottle down and interlaces his fingers in front of him, resting on his enormous stomach. “Yet she has come back every time. Sweet, idealistic Morganna, always so kind for her own good.” In his confusion, Heisenberg realizes he has forgotten to breathe, and inhales sharply, blow after blow though he tries to recover, and the Duke is relentless. “Ah, that reminds me, she has left something for you.” He is no longer listening after the Duke’s mouth closes, far too stunned to process what is happening. The blond man hands him a small wooden box that smells like her, and Heisenberg does not care that he can see how much his hands are shaking as he pushes off the lid. He does his best to swallow the rage and the tears that well up in his eyes, the bittersweet thought that she had remembered him before she parted. The woolen slippers lay perfectly arranged inside the box. “If you wish to find her, I am sure she has not made it very far.” Heisenberg continues to stare down incredulously, and the Duke continues to yap like nothing has happened. He has tuned out completely by the time he closes the box again and raises his head to face the merchant. He might as well have been a shadow, disoriented as Heisenberg was, his face a misshaped blob in his eyes. There is no space for thoughts and he lets himself go instead, anger bubbling so close to the surface underneath his skin.

He grabs the goat before the Duke can protest, tucks it safely under his arm, box secured in the other as he marches back inside the barn and closes everything behind him. Gone? The way down is hazy and red, one foot after the other, instinct taking him through the halls and down elevators. Gone. He feels the haulers’ gazes upon him, and hopes they won’t dare showing vestiges of humanity now, or he will kill every last one and set fire to the corpses. The door to his quarters is kicked with entirely too much force and flies off its hinges, he places Prince gently on the floor in the last showing of kindness he would ever allow himself. Gone! The box is thrown across the room and shatters against the wall, tears in his eyes, a strangled cry coming out of him before he can stop himself.

“She’s gone.” He repeats and the words feel like sand in his mouth. He knows them to be true and it only serves to hurt him further. Behind his eyelids, she takes him by the hand and skips down the stairs ever onward towards the darkness, and he knows he is far too weak to stop it now. He has no tools to explain any of it, the crying and yelling and the way his body has slid against the wall and onto the floor like a puddle of muddy, gooey, revolting water. One last bit of control tells him that he should not care, that she is not important, that this is good, that he is free from her grasp. But its screeches are drowned in the uproar within him, and all he can think of is that she is gone and he misses her.

He is once again alone in the world and, for the first time, he knows what heartbreak feels like.

#Karl Heisenberg #karl heisenberg x oc #resident evil village #karl heisenberg x reader #virgil writes #sad day sad chapter #though i really should catch up on posting on tumblr

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amydancepants-peralta · 4 years ago

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Okay hi! Don’t mind me just jumping back onto my AU wagon with a Bodyguard!Jake fic inspired by The West Wing that absolutely nobody asked for but I couldn’t help but write ... 😎🚨 anyway it’s called let down your guard and you can find it on under the cut or on ao3!

let down your guard

chapter one: there’s so much that you just don’t see

There are a collection of nuclei in the temporal lobe of the brain known as the amygdala, that are best known for their role in sparking the fight or flight reaction in most people when met with emotions like fear. Amy had read about it once, in a medical journal that she’d found at Rosa’s house (it’s presence on her coffee table, to this day, remains unexplained). According to the article; once the amygdala sparks, your brain’s ability to retain memory increases, and in hindsight can make a patch of time feel as though it has stretched on forever.

As she stands in the world’s slowest elevator at Medstar Washington Hospital this evening, with her heart smashing against her ribcage and her toes tapping against the faded linoleum floor; Amy is certain that her amygdala has kicked into overdrive.

Panicking, her frantic mind keeps bouncing around between the urges to run like hell and stay until the bitter end, and it definitely isn’t like Amy because she’s never run away from a fight, but maybe there’s a part of her that already knows that what could happen next has the potential to change everything.

Her eyes remain glued to the squares inset along the top of the car, their white laminate long since turned a faded yellow; the number eleven scratched out almost to the point of non-existence. She counts, a slow progression in her head that tries it’s very best at blocking out the thoughts racing around - the thoughts that keep telling her that she might have just lost the greatest thing to happen to her before it could ever really happen - and she can’t bear to look at her watch right now, but she’s positive that three minutes pass before the dim light behind the number four decides to amble it’s way towards five.

“Shots were fired in a store on 14th Street,” was the message she’d received, a mere half an hour ago (also, approximately the time she’d gotten on this damn elevator). Boyle’s pale face, and a choked out number. “Room 9554.” The rest is muddled - she knows she started running; remembers hearing Terry call out to her departing figure, and she’s pretty sure her purse is somewhere back at the theatre lobby - but there was a force stronger than anything she can label that was pulling her to the hospital, and in that moment Amy had absolutely no intention of stopping.

The squares for six and seven remains mute yet eight comes to life, and the knots in her stomach begin to clench even tighter. There’s a mantra that’s been playing in the back of her mind - from the very moment she’d stepped into the lobby and saw Charles make a beeline in her direction - and it takes over any other rational thought as finally level nine lights up, and the doors to her metallic prison slide open. Please let him be okay. Please let him be okay.

I don’t know what I’ll do, if Jake is not okay.

The sterility of the ward burns her nostrils and the clack of her heels sound vaguely like the rattling snare drums at the last inauguration, interrupting the otherwise calm environment of the floor as the numbered plaques beside each room begin to blur. She dodges past nurses, doctors, and patients alike; and she can tell that they recognise her face (which means there’s a very good chance that this will be in the paper tomorrow), but it doesn’t matter that they know her, it doesn’t matter if the press find out about this - nothing else matters if he is not okay - and then finally, FINALLY, the numbers 9544 are before her.

Her fingers feel limp, but somehow she manages to grip the doorknob and turn - pushing her weight against the wood as though somehow it is the reason she hasn’t been able to get here earlier - and then suddenly the only sound Amy hears is the frenzied heaving of her own breath.

The room is empty, save for a bed in the middle - stripped clean and returned to it’s regular scrutiny from the harsh fluorescent buzzing above. A clipboard cleared of any history hangs lax from its base, and on the very edge of the mattress sits a leather jacket; the same jacket that had once hung on the back of her apartment door … and the same jacket that Amy’s fingers had gripped the edge of a mere three hours before.

She feels her stomach drop to her feet, glued to position as her mind moves into overdrive, eyes trained solely on the scene before her as the realisation hits.

Jake was not okay. And nothing was ever going to be the same again.

Five months earlier …

“On to other news. We can confirm that there has been a surge in counterfeit notes across the nation, with several states reporting projections of significant economic loss.”

Amy pauses as the small crowd in front of her transform into a cacophony of sound, pen-clenched fingers and miniature recorders thrusting towards the ceiling in desperate attempts to get her attention and break their version of the story. Blinking, she gives them her best I’m not done yet look, and after a few beats the reporters in front of her fall silent.

“President Holt has already been in discussion with the Secret Service, and are confident that the lead they are running on will come to fruition.”

From the back, Matthews from The Sun raises his hand, and Amy gives a quick nod. “You said there were several states reporting loss. Do we have an estimation?”

“Presently, the calculations are upwards of 3 million dollars, which - ” she emphasises, as the sea of hands raise once again, “is why there are teams working around the clock to stop the fraudulent currency from getting into circulation. In the meantime, The White House has released an image of the forged notes,” nodding to her left, Amy waits for the screen beside her to light up, “and the differences are clearly distinguishable.”

The room falls quiet as the reporters all turn their attention to the image, and Amy watches as they all slowly turn back to her with varying expressions of confusion. Suppressing a sigh, she uses the remote in her hand to zoom in on the imitation of the offical seal, the same one that is on every U.S. dollar bill, and undoubtedly in the pocket or purse of every single person here. Not a day goes by that she doesn’t wish that Latin would finally wake up from its long nap (or it’s conquiescamus, as it were). “Pluribus. There are two Rs.” She waits a beat, and continues in a dry tone. “There should only be one.”

To her right, Ginns from The Examiner clears his throat; glancing up at Amy to ensure he has her attention before flipping open his notebook. The Chicago-born columnist was unashamed in his opinion - as were his loyal followers - and his coverage of Holt’s campaign had leant towards unfavourable. With a tight smile, Amy swallows the urge to scream at whatever was about to come next. “Yeah, so - with regards to the Secret Service. After his inauguration, President Holt elected a new head of the Presidential Detail, a .. ” pausing, Ginns refers to his notes, creasing his brow. “Rosa Dye-az.”

Pushing her tongue against the back of her teeth, Amy wills herself not to interrupt and correct Ginns’ pronunciation, waiting for some kind of sign of potential redemption. Instead, he leans forward and continues.

“Apart from what has already been published, her history and previous credentials appear to be incredibly difficult to correlate. Given her obvious reluctance to divulge anything to the American public, and the fact that this role has never been held by a female prior to today, what reassurance can we the people have that Miss Dye-az was the best choice?”

Feeling her back teeth begin to grind together, Amy takes a measured breath before fixing Ginns with a steely gaze. Questions such as these have been a common denominator since Holt was sworn in over a month ago, particularly due to choosing Olivia Crawford as his VP; and while expected, the overwhelmingly misogynistic responses were beginning to wear thin.

“I can assure you, Mr Ginns, that President Holt’s vetting process for all roles was incredibly thorough - and Ms Dee-az,” she pauses, raising a singular brow, “remained incredibly co-operative throughout. We cannot bow to the curiosities of the general public on every request for detail, or we’d never stop. After all, the public continues to let you write for one of D.C’s most prolific news journals without knowing the details of your Christmas Card list, and somehow the world continues to spin.”

Ginns’ responding eye roll is poorly concealed, and Amy’s fingernails begin to dig into the edge of her podium. “Furthermore, I would suggest that despite Ms Diaz having a uterus, the bar set by her predecessors will continue to ascend. One could even argue that the lack of … other certain parts of the human anatomy will only assist in keeping a clear head in the most intense of situations.”

The reporter shifts uncomfortably in his seat, blessedly silent in his rebuttal, and Amy directs the end of her statement towards the rest of the crowd. “President Holt and his administration are aware that a small percentage of the public lack confidence in the roles he has filled. Criticism is necessary, and welcome. But unmerited accusations regarding a person’s ability based entirely on their sex is where he draws the line.” Slamming the file in front of her closed, Amy takes a step back before leaning closer to the microphone, delivering her final line. “That concludes the presidential briefing for today. Thank you.”

Terry hovers by the doorway as Amy exits, his leather yoked suspenders proudly displaying the commemorative pin gifted to him upon being sworn in as the president’s Chief of Staff, and he cocks his head towards her as they move swiftly down the corridor towards Amy’s office. “Interesting briefing you held there, Santiago.”

“You mis-pronounced psychotic, Ter-bear,” interjects Gina as she passes them both, head already bowed down to her cellphone before either can respond.

Already feeling defensive, Amy shakes her head quickly, raising one hand to gesture at the room she’d just departed. “We’ve been fielding commentary like that since the early days of the campaign, Terry. At some point, we just need to point out the baselessness of their remarks, and remind them that there simply isn’t a place for it in modern society.”

Raising his hands in surrender, Terry shrugs. “Don’t get me wrong. Terry hates closed minded attitudes. As do the rest of the cabinet. I just find it fascinating to watch how close our new Press Secretary came to literally biting a reporter’s head off.”

“Ugh. I’m fairly certain it would just pop like a balloon. Full of hot air and not much else.”

Nodding, Terry points in the direction of Amy’s office. “You might be onto something there. Heads up, though - I saw Diaz making a beeline to your office just as you were wrapping things up.” He pauses, shoving his hands into his pockets while giving her the side-eye. “Terry wishes you luck.”

Smiling at an intern as they hand her an updated schedule, Amy casts a quick glance down the hallway and grimaces. “Well, at least she hasn’t gone straight to grinding her axe.”

“I didn’t see both hands, but let’s assume you’re right.”

Throwing Terry an exasperated glance, Amy bids him farewell before moving towards her office, deliberately taking on a confident stride as she squares her shoulders in preparation for confrontation.

With her jet black curly hair and the zero fucks aura surrounding her, most members of the team had learned on their own that Special Agent Rosa Diaz was not somebody to be trifled with. Not meeting until the last couple of months of Holt’s campaign, Amy had spent the first few weeks largely being ignored by Diaz - until one afternoon, when a particularly vocal protester tried to pull Amy in for a debate, only to be met by Rosa’s steely glare and the unspoken promise of worse to come. She’d muttered, on their way back to the car, that they needed to have each other backs; and over time their working relationship had grown into a something closer to friendship.

(A friend that occasionally intimidates you with their intensity, but a friend all the same.)

With her trademark leather jacket covering her like a second skin Rosa is easy to point out in the busy walkway, but it’s the two men standing with her that captures Amy’s attention as she draws near. One was tall with a distinctive profile; the other slightly shorter, and sporting a hairstyle that looked like it could survive a hurricane. Although the taller one wore shades, Amy could tell that both of them were casing their environment, taking in their surroundings with a stern exterior that gave away exactly who they were.

These men were Secret Service, and for some reason they were standing outside her office door.

Her curiosity overshadowing the possibility that she may need to eat a slice of humble pie, Amy thrusts the hand still holding the schedule towards the two men as she passes Rosa, giving them her best Suspicious Face.

“Who are those guys?”

“Good morning to you too, Santiago.” Rosa’s dark eyes follow Amy’s path around to her desk, tilting her chin upwards after a beat. “My uterus thanks you for it’s shout-out this morning.”

“Ugh, okay.” Returning her planner to it’s designated top-left-corner position, Amy feels her shoulders drop as she throws an apologetic look at the woman in front of her. “I know that wasn’t my best work. But the guy was being a jerk, and I was 100% done with the conversation.”

“No, really. It’s fine.” Rosa’s voice takes on no other inflection to demonstrate her approval, but Amy learned a long time ago not to read into her monotone. “My uterus is a bad-ass. Definitely tries to punch me from the inside out at least once a month.” She smirks, a sight familiar to only a select few, and raises one eyebrow. “Somehow, I still manage to keep the President and all his flunkies alive. It really is shocking.”

Without invitation, the mystery men have followed Amy into her office, hovering along the outskirts of the room while she checks her messages, listening with half an ear as Rosa continues to go into alarming detail on how she’d personally like to deal with reporters like Ginns. It’s as the taller of the two reaches out to investigate an award propped up on her well-stocked shelf that Amy finally looks up, dropping the slips of paper to the desk and throwing Rosa an exasperated look. “Seriously, who are these guys? And why are they in my office?”

“Oh, right. About that. Amy, this is Special Agent Peralta,” Rosa pauses, thrusting her thumb towards the taller guard in shades, “and this guy is Special Agent Boyle.” Clearing her throat, she fixes Amy with her typical Rosa’s Way Or The Highway look. “They’re going to be your new security detail.”

A grinning Agent Peralta throws a tiny wave in Amy’s direction, and she lets out a petulant huff, planting her hands on the empty section of her desk. “Rosa, we’ve talked about this. I’m a visible target. I go out there every other day and announce policies and updates and god knows what else. It’s inevitable that I end up with a few snarky emails every now and then. People need a face to complain to, and this guy’s obviously chosen me.”

“Sorry,” Rosa replies, in a tone that suggests that she’s not sorry at all. “President’s orders.”

Damn it. With her next refutation dying in her throat, Amy folds her arms over her chest, studying her friend’s expression carefully. There was a good chance that Rosa was just saying it was presidential orders, knowing that Amy would be unable to resist any directive that came from her superior. But there was equally enough chance that the request had come from higher up, and refusal of the service would most definitely land her in hot water.

In other words, Rosa had Amy exactly where she wanted her, and there was not a darn thing she could do about it.

“Just seems like a lot for a bunch of stupid emails,” Amy mutters, dropping down into her seat, defeated. With a furrowed brow, Agent Boyle looks over at Rosa; but before Amy can question it, Rosa perches herself along the edge of the couch.

“So, Peralta and Boyle will work on opposite shifts and shadow you on your day to day operations. Additional detail has already been arranged for your home address, and all correspondence will now be cleared through us.”

“I’m also going to need the contact information for any recent or previous relationships you may have had, ma’am,” pipes up Peralta from Amy’s left, breaking out into another grin when she looks over at him. “Gotta weed this creep out, and you’d be surprised how often they end up being much closer to home than expected."

Blinking, Amy turns back to Rosa, the extent of her security detail only now sinking in. “A constant shadow and surveillance on my apartment? Seriously, Rosa … this is all coming from Holt? Can’t I just change my email address or something?”

A silence falls quickly over her office, and Amy makes special effort this time to take note of the not-so-secret looks the two agents gave each other. A louder protest is bubbling up through her chest when Rosa stands, her sharply manicured fingers holding a document folder Amy hadn’t noticed until now, and walks towards her.

The heavy thud of Rosa’s booted footsteps come to a stop at the side of Amy’s desk and she places the file in front of her, leaning in slightly as the folder’s contents become clear.

Photographs. Stacks of photographs, all of Amy, and all from various parts of her very busy week. Her heart begins to climb its way up to the base of her throat as the images begin to blur, one shot after the other of an unaware woman as she lunches with friends, visits the gym, drives to her brother’s house and - oh god - even gets changed at home near what she’d always considered to be a relatively protective curtain.

Leaning in, Rosa’s voice drops to a whisper. “The boys haven’t seen those last ones, but they know they exist.” She straightens, returning to her regular volume. “All of these were on a USB that was delivered to us from an unconfirmed address, and arrived early this morning. Peralta and Boyle have been pulled in to oversee the operation, and I will monitor from afar. The detail starts from now, and ends once this Mr Anonymous is behind bars. Is everyone clear?”

Numb, Amy nods without really understanding, the cotton of her tailored blazer feeling inadequate underneath her fingernails as she pulls the two sides closer together. She feels foolish for disregarding the warning signs for so long, confused as to how out of all people, she is the one who’s become a target; terrified because if these photographs are anything to go by, she is being hunted … for god only knows what.

A knot begins to churn in her stomach, and there’s a very good chance that she’s about to be sick.

“Excuse me, Ms Diaz?” Ramirez, Terry’s secretary, pops his head around the doorframe, startling Amy out of her spiralling thoughts. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but you’re needed in the oval office.”

“Alright, I’ve gotta go, the Powers That Be have spoken.” Rosa mumbles, scooping up the photographs on Amy’s desk and holding onto the file with her vice-like grip. Noticing the look on Amy’s face, she stops short of her exit from the room, tipping her head towards the two men as they hover by the bookshelf. “Listen. I’ve put two of my best men on this case. Peralta especially, I’ve known since our days at the academy. They’re not going to rest until we’ve caught the bad guy, and neither will I. Got it?”

Amy gives her friend a tentative smile, taking her message to heart. If there was anybody that could shut this mess down, it was Rosa ‘I could kick your ass with my pinky finger’ Diaz.

With one final glance towards her two agents, Rosa swivels on her heel, leaving Amy’s office in silence. The sound of one of Amy’s favourite tchotchkes hits the floor, dropping out of Peralta’s fidgeting fingers, and he cringes. “Yikes. Sorry about that, it just looked like one that I -”

Jumping out from behind her desk, Amy snatches the item out of the agent’s hands, running the edge of her thumb along it’s familiar curves before carefully returning it to it’s original position. “Please don’t break my belongings, Peralta.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“If I may, Ms Santiago … what Special Agent Diaz told you was correct. Peralta and I are here to keep you out of harm’s way, and it’s only going to be a matter of time before we catch him in the act.” Standing to her right, Amy finds herself surprised at the gentleness of Boyle’s tone, and she eyes him curiously before nodding.

Leaning his weight against one of the lower bookshelves, Peralta slides his sunglasses off, face turning slightly more somber, and Amy blinks in surprise. “You have our word.” His eyes were surprisingly warm, a kind of chocolatey brown that seemed to draw Amy in, and her arms fall away from their defensively crossed position across her chest.

“Alright. Thank you. This is just … a lot.” Her stomach twists again, and even though this time it feels less like she’s about to be sick, Amy really doesn’t want to take any chances. “If I leave this office, you two are going to follow me, aren’t you?”

“Just around the perimeters of the hallway, Ms Santiago. And only Peralta - I’m going to stick around and see if I can trace where these emails are coming from.”

“Consider me your shadow, ma’am.” Jake grins, and Amy feels an odd mixture of irritation and anticipation run through her. “And, look. I can already tell what you’re thinking.” Pushing his weight off of the bookshelves, he gestures vaguely with his hands. “You’re thinking this is going to be all longing glances and secret earpiece conversations … me carrying you in my arms as I race you away from the danger, you running out of planes at tarmacs to give me one last kiss goodbye … you know, all the standard bodyguard stuff.”

Rolling her eyes towards the ceiling, Amy feels a knot of tension leave her shoulders, but she’s not quite ready to laugh yet. “Yes. You’re right. That’s exactly what I was thinking.”

“Knew it, nailed it. Well I’m sorry to disappoint you ma’am, but this stuff is nothing like the movies. It shouldn’t really be any more than a few weeks, just need to catch this weirdo out and let the law take care of the rest.” He pauses, glancing over at Agent Boyle before continuing. “Which … will be made all the more faster with your co-operation. Including the details of people who may have had closer access to you than others.”

Sighing, Amy presses the tip of her index finger against the middle of her brow, a nervous tick that has long since become habit. This guy really needed to stop calling her ma’am. “Fine. Teddy Wells was my last boyfriend, but we broke up several months ago. I highly doubt that he’s the one you’re looking for.”

“We really need to look into all avenues, Ms. Santiago,” Agent Boyle interjects, and for the first time Amy notices how the beige colour of his tie is almost a perfect match to his skin tone.

“Fine.” Leaning down, she scribbles Teddy’s phone number onto a new post-it, thrusting it in Agent Peralta’s direction. “See for yourself. Better yet, invite him out for a drink. He’s got some real interesting stories, especially about beer. One could almost say, he’s got ‘the cheers for the beers’, you know?”

(She knows that she’s setting Peralta up for a trap, all too familiar with endless nights listening to Tedford ‘Thrills for the Pils’ Wells. But there was much too much bravado seeping out of every pore of this guy, and he deserved to suffer - if only just a little.)

“Huh, a beer guy. Noice.”

Amy stifles her grin, tucking her pen back into the pocket of her blazer as she heads towards the doorway, ignoring the echo of Peralta’s footsteps behind hers. “Now if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen … I have a hundred or so meetings to attend.”

“Just one last thing, ma’am.” Agent Peralta interjects, and Amy turns in time to watch him drop one shoulder in an obvious attempt at Dramatic Effect.

The edge of his mouth lifts into a smirk, and the ridiculous sunglasses that have inexplicably returned to his face despite the sunlight pouring in through the surrounding windows (she thinks, perhaps, entirely for the purpose of his next move) slide down his prominent nose. “No matter what happens, you’re not allowed to fall in love with me.”

The urge to roll her eyes again is almost unbearable, but she is a professional if nothing else, and so Amy puts on her best smile and nods at the suited man in front of her.

“Won’t be a problem.”

#my writing #b99 au #peraltiago au #soz to those that aren't au fans #can't help but love them #more to come if you guys are keen

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queenbirbs · 5 years ago

Text

threshold | Ethan Ramsey x MC

AN: A canon-divergent AU from chapter 15 and onward. Part three of the metaphor series, part 1 and part 2 are here. Title taken from The National’s Oblivions.

WC: 5,970 Rating: Explicit Warning(s): NSFW, some alcohol consumption

He isn’t even in the city when it happens.

Ethan is as far down and as far east as the Massachusetts state line will allow, holed up in a little seaside shack in Eastham, perched on an uncomfortable barstool, and drinking the finest liquor Josie’s Bar and Grill has to offer. Which isn’t really saying much, given the paltry choices and the unmistakable grime of seaspray that coats every glass.

Why Naveen came out here to die is a mystery to him.

His mentor sits to his left, facing the large windows that overlook Samoset Beach and, beyond that, Cape Cod Bay. Outside the minimal protection Josie’s split-shake walls offer, the waves are a noisy, angry mess. A late summer storm roils towards them from the west, turning that deep, coastal blue into an unsettling gray. Wind knocks at the tacky decorations nailed to the walls, the chipped fenders and plastic seahorses and rusted anchors clanking against the clapboard paneling.

There’s a television above the bar, where a looping clip of a home run plays next to a grinning news anchor.

Ethan chooses to watch the liquor in his glass as he swirls it, before picking it up and taking another sip. He’s lost count of how many he’s ordered, but the bartender hasn’t cut him off yet, so he must not be that drunk yet. Which is unfortunate, really -- because that would make this a hell of a lot easier.

“I still think--” he starts, but he’s quickly cut off.

“Oh, yes, I know. That is the root of all of your problems, I believe.” Naveen tilts his head to grin at him. “You think too much. Sometimes, it’s important to let your brain rest.”

“So, what -- you let yours rest and it somehow convinced you that giving up is the best option?” Ethan mutters. Tossing back the rest of his drink, he sets it down none-too-gently against the gritty bartop and motions for another.

Next to him, Naveen sighs, the line of his shoulders easing.

“This is where you and I part ways. I don’t see it as giving up. I see it as fate handing me the most ironic of cards to deal.”

Ethan shifts in his seat, uncomfortable with the dreamy tone to Naveen’s voice.

“I think it’s time to settle your tab.”

“I’m not intoxicated. My two beers don’t hold a candle to your eight rounds, anyway.” Before Ethan can object to the number (though the numb feeling in his lips tells him it’s likely an accurate count), Naveen continues. “I don’t want to spend the rest of my short time drunk. I want to see the world with clear eyes, take in the beauty it has to offer me.”

Twisting to glance over his shoulder, Ethan takes in the stormy scape that he’s watching and snorts.

“Doesn’t seem like much to me.”

“That’s because you’re viewing it with your eyes closed, my boy. You expect the worst, so you see nothing. Your pessimism has put a knife on the things that held you together, and you have fallen apart. There is beauty in everything, though -- the white petals of the waves, the rolling current, the sound the rain makes atop the water. You see a nuisance; I see a force of nature.”

Across from them, three of the bar’s seven patrons toss back shots of cheap tequila, their University of Delaware T-shirts a searing shade of yellow. The other two patrons are seated at the end of the horseshoe-shaped bar, picking at a plate of mozzarella sticks, disappointment visible in the turn of their frowns.

That Doctor Naveen Banerji, esteemed diagnostician and saver of thousands of lives, would choose such a locale to spend his last days on earth is so depressing a thought that Ethan tosses the fresh glass of scotch back and signals immediately for another one. “Oh, now, that’s a poor response to my waxing poetic to… oh, goodness.”

He looks up just as Naveen’s hand comes to settle on his wrist, squeezing it tightly as he stares just over Ethan’s right shoulder. Turning his head sharply, he searches for what’s brought such concern into Naveen’s gaze. It doesn’t take long to find it.

On the television, a reporter stands at the intersection of Nashua Street and Route 28, her eyes wide and face pale under the camera crew’s bright lights.

A growing horror paralyzes Ethan as he takes in the scene behind her, lit up by the emergency lights. Two subway cars lie on their sides, smashed into the pavement. A third car dangles over the side of the elevated track, clinging to a fourth car that’s crushed between a pillar and the station. Concrete slabs and metal sheeting litter the asphalt from where the cars broke through the station’s barrier. The taillights of two automobiles, their cabins crushed underneath the fallen train, reflect the incessant pulse of police lights. Blue tarpaulin sheets cover the windows of the subway cars, hiding the gruesome scenes inside from the public eye.

Dozens injured in Green Line train derailment, the white text in the lower third reads.

The bar’s music is too loud for him to hear, but the closed captions across the bottom of the screen do little to alleviate his worries, especially when death toll remains unknown tickers across.

“That’s the station most of the employees use, correct?” Naveen asks. But his voice sounds as if he’s speaking through a wall. Ethan can only hear the distinct noise of his heartbeat in his ears that blocks everything else out.

“It is,” he chokes out, his hands immediately scrambling for the phone in his pocket.

It’s the station Sloane uses religiously, despite another being closer to the hospital, because she gets to enjoy a scenic walk down Thoreau Path. The same path she followed him down when he quit, demanding he stop and talk to her. Which he ignored and kept on walking, leaving her behind (and then leaving her in every other sense of the word and god, what an idiot he was for thinking that was for the best). Every ounce of injured pride and disappointment in himself as a doctor pales to the hot twist of nausea he feels as he looks over the accident scene.

Tapping her name, he brings the phone to his ear and waits with bated breath as it rings. There’s no relief, though, when the call rolls to her voicemail. Her cheery tone promises that she’ll return his call just as soon as she can.

“It’s Ethan,” he says after the beep. “I’m out of town with -- I, please call me back and let me know you’re alright. I saw the news about the subway accident and I just… I need you to call me back. Please.”

Naveen’s grip tightens on his arm. Behind them, the storm rages closer; the windows rattle in their panes, the rain pelts at the glass.

“She’s okay, don’t worry.”

Ethan shakes his head, dragging in a strangled breath as panic sinks its claws into him. Dialing the hospital next, he realizes by the sixth try that he’s not going to get through to anyone there -- the lines are too clogged with loved ones, demanding to know if their spouse or sibling or best friend has been admitted. When he tries to access the day’s shift schedule, his work email throws up an error message, notifying him that his account has been deactivated and to contact his network administrator for help.

Text me back. I need to know you’re okay, he sends her, staring at the screen in hopes the three little dots will appear.

No reply comes.

Unable to sit there and wait patiently, Ethan moves down his contact list, worry outweighing the awkwardness of texting colleagues that he left high and dry with his sudden departure. He sends a text to Zaid and Ines and even one to Harper, requesting for them to let him know if all staff are safe and accounted for.

It’s a pointless move, though, given that such a situation would call for an all-hands-on-deck in the ER. And when ten more minutes go by with no responses, he signals for another round.

“If I know our Doctor McTavish, she’s certainly too busy helping out to bother with the likes of you,” Naveen points out, a small smirk lifting the corner of his lips.

Ethan ruminates on his recent track record: losing Dolores, failing Naveen and letting him walk away from a possible cure (that he’s yet to find). It wouldn’t be such a leap to follow the pattern that his life has taken recently and assume the worst with Sloane.

“I want to share your optimism, but I -- I seem to carry bad luck around with me lately,” he mutters. His gaze is set firmly on the television screen, not daring himself to look away in the event they reveal any sort of clue. They wouldn’t announce casualties, not this soon and not without notifying family first. It’s the only solace he can take right now.

“No,” Naveen corrects, patting him gently, “you carry a bad attitude. There is a difference.”

Before he can start up a speech on looking at the bright side and other empty phrases of comfort, the power flickers once, then twice, before succumbing to the storm and winking out entirely. Darkness soaks the bar. Shouts of alarm from the college kids soon grow to rough peals of laughter as the bartender cracks a joke. The only light comes from what little evening sun makes it through the thick clouds, mottling the gray sky with a tinge of bruised yellow.

There’s a flurry of movement as staff search and retrieve candles, setting them on the bartop. Someone hauls out a Coleman lantern and a crank radio and the disappointed couple even joins in, offering to buy everyone a round. Raucous shouts of praise come from the college kids over the snappy vocals of Eddie Rabbitt, professing his love for a rainy night.

It’s the kind of scene that Sloane would insist on joining, would demand he get off his barstool and dance with her, would croon along to the song in that terrible singing voice of hers. The one Ethan only knows about because of the many mornings he’s driven the both of them to work, when it’s gotten too late for her to bother heading home after a night of research (among other things) at his place, when he acquiesces to her demands to play something other than the local classical station.

The thought of never hearing her off-key singing, or never experiencing the comfort of her giving into sleep and leaning against him on his couch, or never waking with her next to him -- it’s a little too much for him and his eleven rounds to handle.

Dropping his phone onto the bar, Ethan covers his face with his hands and tries to shove away the emotions that threaten to make their way to the surface. He pushes them down, stuffing them into the dented suitcase that is his heart and he’s too drunk for this, for thinking in metaphors, for thinking of Sloane behind those blue tarps, bloodied and bruised, far too injured for help, being passed over by paramedics when they realize the same thing, leaving her alone to--

“Oh, Ethan,” Naveen is saying, his palm moving in soothing circles against his back. “It’s going to be alright.”

There’s movement to his left, a pained grunt as Naveen moves to stand, his hand never leaving his back. The bartender comes over and the two talk in low tones about the tab, and then a taxi. Some undetermined amount of time passes, which Ethan spends thinking more terrible thoughts while Naveen murmurs placating words. Then he’s being hauled out of the bar and under the front awning, where a tremendous downpour and a yellow cab arrive simultaneously for them.

He spends the short ride with his eyes firmly shut, listening to Naveen’s soft conversation with someone named Ninut, who promises to call him back if they can find out if Sloane is on shift. Then there’s a tastefully-decorated coastal bungalow and a cream couch with entirely too many throw pillows, the latter of which Naveen leads him to and demands for him to lie down on. Given how hazy everything looks in the lamplight, Ethan follows his orders.

Disappearing around the corner, Naveen bangs about in the kitchen -- opening and closing cabinets, running water, knocking a spoon against glass -- before he shuffles back into the living room. He pushes a glass of water into Ethan’s hands.

“What’s in this?”

“A physician-certified hangover cure.”

He takes a sip, then another, but can taste nothing around the lump in his throat.

“It’s just water, isn’t it?”

“A physician never reveals his secrets.”

“We’re not magicians,” Ethan scoffs.

“No?” Naveen settles onto the couch and tips his head to the side, his eyes softening as he looks over his protégé. “I thought you believed yourself to be one, seeing as you’ve been trying to treat something incurable for the past two months.”

In lieu of a response, Ethan takes another drink of water. Across the room, sliding glass doors frame an image of the bay, where storm clouds still circle overhead. “Go to sleep. Things will be better in the morning.”

“I’m… not sure I want to,” Ethan admits, damning the weak state of his voice. “Things might be different when I wake up and I don’t… I’m not sure...”

Right now, he’s stuck in the metaphorical waiting room, waiting to hear if Sloane is alive, and he suddenly doesn’t want those double doors to open. If they do, it could be the Bad News. If they stay shut, if he never hears back from her, then he could exist here in this limbo, where he’s free to hope for the best outcome.

He thinks of her on that rooftop earlier this year, of how she’d told that man about how important it was to say goodbye. And now he may never get that chance.

This is all a simple overreaction, brought on by the distance between them (the literal and figurative -- both of which are his fault) and his own insecurities. There’s no proof she was on that train or that she was even working today. But he can’t trust being positive -- it’s a viewpoint that’s let him down too many times this past year. So, he considers the Worst Possible Thing and picks at it like a scab.

“When are you going to tell her?”

Ethan can’t help the dry chuckle that escapes him as he shakes his head at the question.

“I almost did, months ago. And now, with everything else... never.”

“That doesn’t seem fair -- to you, or to her. She deserves to know, and you deserve to tell her.”

“It probably isn’t that serious,” he says (lies). “It’s simply a release of dopamine and serotonin, an attachment formed over a high-stress field of work. It’s a normal reaction--”

“Frailty, thy name is Ethan,” Naveen mutters with a sigh. “This isn’t an NBIO class. This is your life.”

He’s too far gone to withhold the wince at Naveen’s words.

“A life I walked away from,” Ethan points out. “I left her, didn’t bother to return her calls, knowing she would eventually stop.”

“And did she?”

“No,” he admits, dragging in a breath at the admission. Staring up at the ceiling, he listens to the rain as it pounds against the back deck. “So why now… this time -- why hasn’t she called me back?”

The cushion next to him rustles as the older man stands, casting a look over him. Ethan resists the childish urge to tug the blanket up over his face when Naveen reaches down to pat his cheek, a fond grin on his face, embodying an optimism that Ethan can’t trust himself to feel.

“You wouldn’t have fallen in love with her if she were the type of doctor to shirk her duties, now, would you?” Before he can come up with a retort for that, Naveen continues. “Now, listen to your teacher. Go to sleep.”

With that, he moves to switch off the nearby lamp and continues on down to the hall. Ethan can hear the muffled noise of him getting ready for bed, and then nothing but the rain. It never slows, instead continuing its steady beat against the house. Eventually, the warmth of the liquor in his stomach and the white noise of the rainfall pulls him into a reluctant sleep.

Forty minutes later, tucked between his fingers, his phone vibrates steadily against his chest once before the battery gives out and the screen goes black.

He wakes to coffee.

Not the smell of it, but a white container of it, the green mermaid coyly smiling up at him from the wicker coffee table. In black marker, Evan is scrawled across the negative space, the boxes all marked correctly.

Sitting up, he takes a sip and tries to will away the immediate throbbing in his head. Outside, the morning is bright. The only evidence of the night’s storm is the color of the deck, still damp and colored a deep burgundy. He makes his way over to the doors to pull the blinds across when a bright spot against the deck catches his attention. It’s a pair of sneakers, a teal-blue, save for the little pink check marks on the side.

Shoving the door across its track, Ethan stumbles out and looks right -- where Sloane looks up from the view she’s enjoying, her own coffee poised at her lips. She’s sprawled in one of the Adirondack chairs, a towel between her and the wet wood.

“Good morning,” she greets.

“What the hell are you doing here?” The words are out of his mouth before he can consider them.

For her part, Sloane simply raises an eyebrow at the rough tone.

“Wow, all right, Naveen was right. Hungover Ethan is not a morning person.” She pushes up from the chair and makes her way over to him as she talks. “I got your text -- and your twenty-eight missed calls -- once my shift ended. I tried calling you back, but it went straight to voicemail.”

He retrieves the phone from his pocket, palming the black screen that refuses to wake at his touch. The phone he forgot to put on charge, given how inebriated he was. “So,” she continues, “I called Naveen, who sent a car for me this morning. He’s gone, by the way -- he left shortly after I arrived, said he was heading for warmer waters in Fort Lauderdale. He instructed me, and by extension you, I presume, to enjoy the house for the remainder of the weekend.”

When he says nothing in return and continues to watch her with that same bewildered expression on his face, Sloane shifts her stance, then shifts again. “I’ve been suspended, for what happened with Mrs. Martinez, and I don’t know if I’ll have a job come Monday, and after yesterday -- or last night, or whatever,” she waves a hand in the air, still foggy after catching five hours of sleep, with one of those being in the car ride across the bay. “And even though I wasn’t sure where we stood exactly, you were the only person I wanted to see after… all of that.”

She stops talking, giving him an opening.

And still, nothing.

Down at the water’s edge, seagulls call out to one another, bobbing up and down on the waves. To the north, the shore curls back towards them, the shadowed land a deep blue. Boxes of white and gray and blue sit atop the sand. Strips of high grass create a frame for the beach homes, the green fronds rippling in the wind coming off the water. Puffy clouds loom to the southwest, a promise of more rain.

“I thought you died.”

The sudden admission from him brings her up short.

“I was working triage for eleven hours. You expect me to pull out my phone and keep up with snap streaks at a time like that?”

His brows furrow at the term he can’t place.

“I don’t know what that means.”

“I know. It’s probably one of those weird things I like about you, but it still doesn’t--” she pauses when Ethan steps closer. He grasps her shoulder, his other hand tipping her chin up to meet her gaze.

“What I meant was that I thought I’d lost you before… anything could really begin.”

Sloane brings her hand up to cover his where he cradles her cheek, gently shaking her head.

“We already had something. And then you quit. You left.” She bites at her lip, silencing the rest of what she wants to say, but they both hear the addition she doesn’t voice: you left me. “And then when I hear from you again, it’s a slew of voicemails of you drunkenly demanding to assure you that I’m alive. Which I understand, but I was hoping you would want to talk to me about what happened. That you would want to talk with me because you wanted to, not to make sure I hadn’t been crushed to death in a subway accident.”

Her harsh phrasing causes him to wince, bringing forth smudged memories of last night’s dreams, of his hands covered in her blood, of her begging him to just hold her hand because there was nothing else that could be done for her.

Unable to stop himself, he leans down and drops a kiss to her forehead.

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, trying to convey so much into such paltry words. “I am. I was selfish. I walked away from Edenbrook because I don’t deserve to call myself a physician, but I… I shouldn’t have walked away from the most important thing: us.”

Stretching up on her toes, Sloane presses her lips against his cheek. His eyes flutter closed at the familiar touch, cursing himself for what an idiot he was to walk away from this woman.

“I still don’t agree with your reason for quitting, but I can’t claim that I wouldn’t have done the same thing in your position, given your history with Naveen.”

“He’s taught me everything I know.” Ethan sighs, tipping his head down to rest against hers. Her arms encircle him, pulling him into an embrace. “The most important of which is that not everything is under my control. Applying and understanding that notion, however, is the real problem.”

He feels her sigh against him, the sound of it a balm to his nerves. How he could’ve ever blamed the love he feels for her on nothing more than neurochemicals causes a bolt of shame to course through him.

“It’ll take time,” Sloane says. “I may understand the reason behind your sudden… departure, but it doesn’t excuse how you went about it. I get the need to burrow into yourself and have some time alone to figure things out, but you can’t shut me out completely in the process. I’ll be right here to help you, but only if you let me.”

Swallowing around the tight feeling in his throat, he murmurs another apology and kisses the crown of her head, ruffling her hair with his next question.

“Promise?”

“Promise,” she assures, humming contentedly as she tips her head up to meet him for a proper kiss.

It’s a catalyst, a spark to the overwhelming need in the both of them. Ethan moves; his fingers card through her hair, hanging onto her for dear life as he backs her up against the door, his lips only parting from hers when his lungs demand it. Taking the detour that the curve of her throat offers, he nips at the skin there, pleased when it flushes pink from his attention. That base, human need to have curls up in his belly and spreads outward, warming his limbs and singing in his blood.

Sloane whimpers under the warm swipe of his tongue as he soothes the rosy skin he’s bitten. Her hands aren’t idle, though; she moves up between them to unbutton his shirt, her deft fingers making quick work of it.

Inside his head, he’s telling her how much he needs her, how much he wants this, wants her, wants them for as long as the foreseeable future allows (and forever beyond that, if that’s something she wants, too). What he says instead is her name, rasping it out when she takes control and pivots them, forcing him up against the house. The shingles dig into his back but he can’t bring himself to care as Sloane makes her own path down his chest, shoving his shirt panels aside and rounding on his nipple. The sudden warm heat of her mouth against the chill morning air is enough to remind him of where exactly they’re trying to have each other.

“Wait,” he croaks out, reaching for her as she pulls away, “not here. Someone… the neighbors, they might see.”

A slow smile spreads across her face, her eyes sparkling as she holds out a hand and wiggles her fingers.

“Come with me, then.”

He takes her hand and lets her lead him through the living room and down the hall, where he teases her that she doesn’t know where she’s going, which she proceeds to prove when she opens the closet door and then the guest bathroom.

They eventually make it to an actual bedroom, where he closes the door while she wanders over to the patio doors. Throwing open the white curtains, she lets natural light fill the space. Outside, the hazy blur of rain has moved closer, hovering just off shore. The clouds mute the harsh light of the sun, softening the lines of the room, lengthening the shadows that play across the hardwood.

Drawn to her, Ethan slides his arms around her waist and tugs her into his chest, enjoying the little hitch in her breath. Her fingers dig into his arm, keeping him there (as if he’d go anywhere else).

Dipping his head down, he trails lazy kisses down her neck. The flimsy cardigan she wears falls away easily, slipping off her shoulders. A ragged breath from her urges him on. His lips explore her newly-exposed skin, where clusters of freckles form constellations along the curve of her shoulder. His hands move underneath the blouse she wears, his fingers grazing the warm skin of her hips. She reaches up towards the ceiling, letting him pull the shirt up and off.

And, as always, she’s five steps ahead of him and already wiggling out of her jeans before he can work those off her.

“I’ve waited two weeks -- I’m not really interested in taking things slow this time,” she admits, glancing back at him with that smug look of hers.

He can’t help but mirror her grin as he unhooks her bra.

Frustrated with his slow teasing, Sloane tosses the garment to the floor and starts to turn around when he stops her with a firm grip on her hips, holding her in place. Keeping his movements slow, he gathers her hair and sweeps it over her shoulder. Planting a hand on the arch of her spine, he nudges her forward until she’s forced against the door. She hisses as her chest presses up against the cool glass. Her palms flatten across the smooth surface, her nails trying to dig in for purchase. Starting at the base of her neck, he moves down her vertebral column, his teeth skimming along her skin. More freckles rest along the stretch of her back, fading as they drift towards her spine. Ethan follows their path with his mouth, pleased when he feels her shiver, when he sees the goosebumps that appear in the wake of his wet kisses.

Leaning back, he takes a moment to admire the view she presents, flushed and arched and waiting. For him, he reminds himself as he presses the heel of his hand against his groin, desperate for friction.

Sloane grumbles his name, glaring at him over her shoulder, those pupils of hers blown wide. Her hips do an impatient little wiggle. He strikes, gripping them tight and holding her fast against him. Tracing the edge of her underwear, he slides his fingertips down the lacy fabric, pleased when he finds it damp. This time, his name comes as a groan as Sloane spreads her legs to give him better access.

The sight of her is almost too much. Attempting to expel the need to have her right then and there, he detours -- nipping at her shoulder before stroking her through the lace. A whine escapes her as she tips her head up and all that auburn hair falls like a wave down her back. It brushes his chest and the flowery scent of it combined with the salty taste of her skin is more potent than any tumbler of top shelf liquor.

He works his fingers against her, fast, and then faster, circling her clit. Her hips make aborted little thrusts; her breath fogs the glass in short, heady pants. She’s so wet against his hand, which he can’t help but whisper against her ear, grinning at the shiver that runs through her, knowing that she’s close.

Then he drops his hand and steps back. Before she can voice the words of protest he sees building in her eyes, he spins her around and crowds her up against the glass.

“You’re such an ass.” Her lips brush his as he kisses her once, then again, so he can feel the smile on her face as she says it. His nerves hum with anticipation as she runs both hands up his chest and across his shoulders, grabbing two handfuls of his shirt and stripping it from him.

“I’ll make it up to you,” he promises. Before she can ask just how he plans on doing so, Ethan drops to his knees.

Sloane cards a hand through his hair, humming at the sight of him. Leaning forward, he mouths at the lacy edge of her underwear; it tickles his tongue as he presses a lazy, wet kiss against her through the fabric. Peeling her underwear off, Ethan drapes her left leg over his shoulder and rubs his stubble along her inner thigh. Like a Pavlovian response, she tilts her hips upwards, silently begging for his touch.

Having mercy on her, he caves, licking a long stripe across her folds. Arousal pools low in his belly at the taste of her, at the clench of her grip in his hair as she guides him to where she needs him most. His gentle grazes along her sex quickly give way to a full-on assault; his fingers part her wider and his tongue flattens against her clit, increasing the pressure as she voices her need for it.

Their gazes lock and he’s overcome with the image of her above him, backlit by the milky light of morning, her skin flushed, her lips parted; his Epione, a Greek goddess come to life.

“Oh, fuck,” Sloane groans, her breath stuttering as she ascends to her peak. The glass squeals under her sweaty palm as she tries her best to keep upright, her other hand holding him steady so he can continue fucking her with his tongue. “Ethan, please, I--”

Cresting, she breaks apart, shuddering as an orgasm floods through her. He guides her down from her high with gentle kisses across her thigh and then up, trailing along the curve of her hip bone. Following the lines of her body up with his hands, Ethan gets to his feet. Where he’s quickly pulled into a messy kiss, the low thrum of his arousal swelling when her tongue peeks out for a taste of herself on his lips.

“I want to fuck you here.” His cock strains against the confines of his clothing. Nipping at the flushed skin of her throat, he groans when she reaches down to cup him through his pants. “Is that okay?”

“More than okay,” she tells him, using that medically-trained efficiency of hers to strip him of his remaining garments. Dancing her fingers up his length, she circles a thumb across the head.

Against his neck, Ethan can feel the bloom of her grin as he bucks up into her touch. His hands wrap around her thighs and lift her until she’s pinned between him and the glass. Here, he considers as Sloane tightens her legs around his waist, as she swipes her tongue at his bottom lip, encouraging him to open up to her for a deeper kiss -- here is where he should say those three little words, stitch them all together into a coherent phrase. Not a half-assed admission after watching her nearly be pulled to her death, or a terrified mantra in a nightmare as her eyes dull and her hand loosens in his.

But now -- now she’s biting at his lip and writhing against him, her breath hot on his skin and it’s all too much to consider anything else but having her. Gripping his cock, he lines himself up at her entrance and drives into her. His hips roll up into hers, pleasure coursing through him as she meets his thrusts, her sweat-slicked thighs clenching around him.

In all his dreams, he’s forced to let go -- he holds on for dear life, now -- now that she’s here and real and begging him to fuck her.

Just beyond the door, they can hear the rain. It draws closer; that soft, gentle hiss drumming against the sand and then the deck and then the glass. The steady noise of it acts as a buffer between them and the rest of the world. The beach and the bay, their worries and their responsibilities -- all of it dulls to a distant blur, leaving only the two of them.

“Sloane,” he calls out her name with a groan.

“I’m here,” she tells him, without him ever realizing it was a question he needed answered until then. “Oh, god, Ethan -- I’m…”

“Come for me,” he hisses, meeting her for another bruising kiss.

Her breathing stutters for a moment, then -- fireworks, explosions, an entire galactic collapse plays out in her heavy-lidded eyes. The feeling of her is too much -- she’s a cocktail of pleasure and adrenaline straight to his heart, leaving him breathless and dizzy as he follows her over the edge.

Gathering her close, Ethan carries her over to the bed and crawls in to rest beside her. She rolls to lay against his chest, one leg draped over his. His breath hitches when Sloane drops a kiss to his chest, right over where his heart pounds.

He opens his mouth to tell her.

“Sloane, I--”

“Oh, shit,” she says suddenly, lifting off his chest to turn her concerned gaze to the patio door. “I left my coffee out there.”

It’s the unexpectedness of it (and the fact that she cut off his admission of love to her to bemoan the loss of her beverage) that draws a chuckle out of him that she joins in on.

“I’ll buy you another when we go into town later for lunch.” He seals the deal with a kiss. “Much, much later,” he amends as he cups her bare bottom. Sloane works herself closer to deepen their kiss.

“What were you going to say, before I interrupted?”

Ethan drags in a breath and swallows back every insecurity-laced deflection that his brain immediately concocts.

“That I love you.”

“Oh.” This time, he gets to see that smile of hers bloom across her face. “I love you, too.”

And outside, the rain beats steadily on.

#ethan ramsey x mc #dr ethan ramsey x mc #choices open heart #open heart #choices #f: the metaphor series #Kaila writes things #please enjoy this very extended sex scene that's probably entirely too long #also hoping this actually shows up in the tag this time #I will properly add the hyperlinks momentarily

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thdorkmagnet · 5 years ago

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Light of the Sun and Stars Chapter 37: Children of the Dark (Preview)

Summary: His whole life Marco Diaz has been raised by monsters, living under the cruel rule of their leader, Toffee. But one day Marco escapes into Mewni where he meets a magical princess and Mewman like himself, who begins teaching him all about her world. Together they will learn about life, love, and the lights within each of them, as they change their world forever.

Chapter Synopsis: Janna has been behaving differently since getting back from their last mission and the gang is worried about their friend. But after some prompting, Marco learns just what it is that’s been bothering Janna... she found where the rest of the Impures have been hiding and now she has the chance to go back. But are there only painful memories waiting for her there?

Check out my other stuff on Fanfiction!

Index

Disclaimer: Star vs and all its characters are owned by Daron Nefcy and Disney. All rights go to them.

She could see dark, pillowing smoke in the distance, smell the burnt ash in the wind, before she even spotted the ruined remains of the once thriving city, the soft glow of fire lighting her path like a beautiful but tragic beacon of the night. Well, more like early morning, early enough that the sun hadn't even risen yet, Mewni still bathed in the blackness of near night. But that was just fine for the Impure child, darkness always suited her better anyways. Blending in was easier in the shadows.

“You remember your mission, don't you?” the adult Impure next to her asked.

The Impure child nodded her head. “Yes.”

“Good, then stay on your guard. There might still be some Mewmans left alive.”

“That or some Monsters still looking for a fight.”

“Yes.” There was bitterness in the adult Impure's voice now. “Sadly, that's all these creatures ever seem interested in. Violence.”

The Impure child didn't respond. She hated when she got like this. Instead she simply shifted into her bat form, ready to fly over and investigate the city. But she had only flapped a few feet before a voice called from behind her, “And Janna? Remember, nothing else matters but completing the mission.”

Janna nodded again, feeling slightly annoyed by the constant reminder. “Yeah, yeah, I know mom. I've been on scavenging missions before. I think I know what I'm doing.”

Her mom opened her mouth to say something but stopped, instead shaking her head and simply replying, “I know you do.”

…

The city was in ruins when Janna reached it, the broken remains telling a story that the Impure child was getting all too familiar with. A Monster attack. The small Mewman village doing all they could to defend themselves. No survivors. This was only one of many villages her and her mom had pillaged since the war began, gathering supplies once the fighting and dying had ceased. It wasn't a perfect way of living, but it was how she and her people stayed alive and that was really all that mattered. Staying alive. Besides, it wasn't like this stuff bothered her, she had lived in the creepy and morbid her whole life, nothing could faze her anymore.

She flew through the village for a few moments, checking and then double checking to make sure the coast was clear, that there were no more enemies lurking the shadows. Once she was positive it was safe, her mom joined her and together the two began their search. This was unlike their typical missions which was all about finding food and supplies, this was much more serious than that, a top secret mission only her mom had all the details on, Janna only given vague directions that they were in search of something. Something important.

“What is it we're looking for, anyways?” Janna asked, as she scanned the destroyed room, nothing in particular catching her eye, it seemed like just an ordinary house, like all the others they had searched.

Her mom locked eyes with her, raising an eyebrow in that scolding way that all mother's did, but her fanged mouth twitched with the slightest hint of a smile. “Nice try, Janna,” her mother said, the pride almost as obvious as the sarcasm. “But you know the rules...”

“Yeah, yeah the less we know the better,” Janna scoffed, rolling her eyes. “But I'm just saying, this search would go a lot smoother if you would just tell me what it is we're looking for.”

Her mother tutted, waving a scolding finger in the air. “Patience, Janna. Our people have these rules for a reason. You'll understand when you're older.”

Janna just groaned, watching as her mom turned her back on her, muttering under her breath. “Maybe then you'll trust me enough to start telling me things.”

Her mother stopped walking, turning her head slightly over to her daughter before replying, “Trust isn't given freely, Janna. It's something you earn.”

…

There was a glow up ahead.

The light radiating from a dark corner and Janna's night vision was quickly able to pinpoint the source of the glow, which seemed to be hidden in some closet. “Hey mom, I think I see something over there,” she yelled over her shoulder and down the stairs to where her mom was busy searching the lower levels of the home. It had been a promising spot, the expensive-looking furniture and intricate paintings that coated the walls telling them that whoever lived there was of wealth and power and it was also the most torn up of all the homes so far, like whoever had lived there had fought back against the Monsters much harder and more desperate than their fellow Mewmans. Which meant that perhaps they had been desperate not just to stay alive but to keep their enemy from finding something.

She ran over to the closet, which was locked using some low level magic lock, which the young thief made quick work of picking. After all, magic or not, a lock was a lock, there was always a trick inside, you just had to know what it was and she had learned all the techniques in her few short years on this dimension. Once she was inside, she saw that the closet was completely empty, save for a glowing blue box, covered in symbols and some ancient tongue Janna had never seen before. She quickly shrugged this off though, picking it up off the soft pillow it had been delicately place on and turning to her mom, waving it around in her hand in a show-offy way. “So let me guess, is this what we were looking for?”

Her mom nodded, a bright smile on her face. “Yes, that's it!”

Janna smirked, before tossing the box over to her mom, who caught it with a look of slight panic, her face paling some the moment it had become air-born, and she breathed a sigh of relief the moment it was safe in her hands. “Well what do you know, looks like I'm more trustworthy than you give me credit for. Considering I just got your box all on my own.”

Her mother rolled her eyes, before saying, “Alright, I admit it, you did a good job. And we will discuss you're future involvement in missions more after we get out of here. The Mewmans are bound to come across this place eventually, y'know.”

Janna nodded and started to follow her mom, when she heard a crack from above. She looked up to see the support beams over their heads losing their battle to stay in place, the many burn marks and fractured wood causing them to bend and shake as they hovered dangerously over their heads. Janna gulped before locking eyes with her mom with a pleading look. Her mother was giving her a concerned look, saying in a voice barely above a whisper, “Okay, Janna. Just walk over to me very slowly.”

Janna nodded and was about to do just that when she heard a voice shout from outside, her brain having no time to process this as the boards above finally snapped and Janna desperately flung herself away from the debris, her back crashing into the wall before a pain unlike anything she had ever felt before consumed her arm. Her vision swam, the world passing in a flash of nauseating colors as she heard a voice shout in the distance. “Janna!”

When she finally came to, she had no feeling in her arm anymore. And as Janna sat up she found that her movements were limited, something pinning her in place to a painful degree. She forced her eyes open as she took in the dreaded sight of the board leaning menacingly against her arm, which was already beginning to swell, and she swallowed, guessing what that meant for her.

She looked over to see her mom still standing in the doorway, frozen in shock and fear, the blue box in her grip rattling as her hands shook. “M-Mom,” Janna managed to gasp out, fighting against the crushing board, her sharp nails digging into the flesh of her arm as she struggled fruitlessly. “Help me. My arm's stuck! I-I think it's broken.”

She tried everything she could think of, even shifting into her bat form, but it was just as useless as her regular one, her wing completely pinned under the thick wooden frame, and she quickly shifted back. “Help me get this thing off!” she shouted, her voice strained as she pulled against the board with all her might, but her strength meant nothing at the moment. Right now, she was just a weak, little girl.

Finally, though her struggles stopped as she looked over to her mom, shocked to see that she had yet to move, her eyes drifting down at the box in her hands, then to her daughter, than over her shoulder to the now distinct voices of the Mewmans outside. “Search the whole area, men. There might still be survivors.”

“Mom?” Janna whimpered, tears beginning to fill her vision.

Her mom locked eyes with her and Janna felt her heart stop as she saw something in her mom's eyes that she had never seen before. Guilt.“... I'm sorry.”

And just like that, her mom turned and ran away, leaving her eight-year-old daughter trapped and alone with a group of angry, violent Mewmans slowly hunting her down. “MOM!” Janna screamed, as tears flowed down her cheeks in waves of pain, her world and trust shattered into pieces around her as the warning her mother had given her when this all began echoed endless in her head, coming back to haunt her in her lowest and most desperate moment. “Remember, nothing else matters but completing the mission.”

Nothing else matters.

You don't matter.

Poor Janna. The rest of the chapter should hopefully be out soon. Hope you enjoyed!

#Star vs #Star vs AU #My Writing #Light of the Sun and Stars #Janna Ordonia #Preview

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admiralty-xfd · 5 years ago

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Culmination

This is chapter 7. To start at the beginning click here.

COLLISION

(all things)

SCULLY

Their worlds are colliding. Her world, his world.

There’s no other way she can describe it. The force of gravity pulling them both down to earth. Two meteors crashing into each other. Magnetic poles fusing together.

She doesn’t remember exactly how it started. She only remembers waking up alone on his couch, his fish tank bathing the living room in a pale green light, the ugly blanket from his couch around her, smelling like Mulder. She loves that ugly blanket.

What if there was only one choice, and all the other ones were wrong?

She’s been making the wrong choice for years. Now the only thing she wants to do is make the right one and she doesn’t want to wait any longer. She is done waiting and wondering. So she goes to his bedroom in the middle of the night like a moth to a seven-year-long burning flame.

There is no more hesitation. She runs to him and it begins.

They are sitting on his bed together, a frenzy of tangled limbs. Their clothes come off fast enough to make her head spin. All she can sense is him, his heat, his mass, his every atom.

A flurry of thoughts invade her mind, first oh my god I can’t believe this is finally happening.

Then this is a mistake, we shouldn’t be doing this.

Then stop.

Stop.

But she doesn’t want to stop, she knows she’s not going to stop. She banishes these thoughts because even though her mind is screaming at her to stop she knows her heart will not listen.

She’s made her decision.

Physically, this is what she wants, she knows this is what both of them need. But emotionally, she worries what it might mean. What if this really is a mistake? What if they can’t be like themselves after this, can’t go back to being them?

Tears prick her eyes and she admonishes herself. It’s exhausting, hiding your feelings from the one person you want to tell the most. Fantasies of this very moment have permeated her thoughts for years, and every day that passed without it happening made that exhaustion exponentially worse.

And what about him? What is he thinking? What is he feeling?

God, he feels amazing. This is amazing.

He feels exactly like she always imagined he would. Her fingers trail along his arms, his back, his shoulder blades, all the places she’s never been allowed to touch this way. Her mind tries to focus as stray thoughts from over the years fill her head: his hand on the small of her back, guiding her out of an autopsy bay. His steely hazel eyes locked onto hers for just a few moments too long. The heat of their mouths just inches apart as he pulls her forehead to his but never crosses that line.

All those times she wanted him to.

Sometimes nothing happens for a reason.

Well, that line has certainly been crossed now. She rationalizes that it’s pointless to stop even if she were capable of doing so. There is no going back now. None of this is rational anyway; all her rational thoughts have left the building. His building. His bed. His body. His hands. His mouth.

Him, him, him.

Finally.

It’s dark, but the moonlight is bright, almost otherworldly. She should feel self-conscious about her body but she doesn’t; they’ve seen each other naked on multiple occasions over the years. Never in this context, admittedly, but she can’t bring herself to care. There simply isn’t enough bandwidth in her brain right now to go there.

He’s kissing her deeply, hungrily, all over, like he’s discovering her. She lets him. He’s nothing if not single-minded when it comes to his passion. As frustrating as it can be in moments when they don’t see eye to eye, she admires that about him.

She loves that about him.

“Is this okay?” He is the first one to speak. It’s an odd thing to say, considering she's the one who started everything. He must notice the tears in her eyes. Maybe he’s thinking about what happened in the car. She worries he’s misinterpreting.

“No. I mean… yes, it’s fine,” she smiles. “It’s better than fine. Just ignore me.”

He smiles and pulls her in again. His hands sink into her hair, his fingers entangle and disappear.

He tells her he’s ignored her for too long, he won’t make that mistake again. Something like that. Her head is swimming and she doesn’t hear exactly what he’s saying. She’s never felt so wonderful in her entire life, she knows that much. The actual fulfillment of the one thing she’s wanted more than anything else is overloading every single one of her senses. Her stomach contracts until it almost hurts.

The rain is pounding on his bedroom window, the trees whipping against the glass. She still can’t believe this is happening at all and wants to live in this moment, wants to make this go on forever, but a familiar ache is telling her this preliminary dance can’t go on much longer. It’s been years since she’s been with anyone and she’s more than ready for him.

Rarely are they on the same page, however, and tonight will be no exception. He’s kissing her everywhere, slowly, taking his time. But she needs him right now.

She pushes him back against the wall and her hand moves down in expectation, first touching him softly but then grasping him firmly. Hard evidence, her favorite kind, she jokes to herself. She suspects Mulder would appreciate a dumb science joke but she tucks that one away for later. Now really isn’t the time.

“Wait.” He pulls away, holding her face.

She looks into his eyes and sees exactly what she’s been hoping for so long to see: desire for her, maybe even love? He’s looking at her with wonder, like he just saw his first UFO. But then:

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

Fuck. What is he doing?

Maybe he’s considered this so many times and stopped himself so many times because he knows it’s probably not a good idea. Does he really want to stop? Does she?

No. There really is no turning back this time. She’s made her choice. Whatever he believes, she wants to believe everything will be okay, no matter what, because it’s them.

They can take on the world.

“I’m sure.” She says it clearly, assuredly. “Are you?”

Possible consequences are not driving her at the moment. He is like air, like water. Her need is primal and urgent. God, she hopes he’s sure.

He nods and smiles. That smile. The one she’s tried to ignore all this time. The one that stirs up these feelings she’s pushed away year after year until she finally realized that smile was all she ever wanted to see.

“I’ve never been more sure about anything in my entire life, Scully.”

“That’s certainly saying something, for you,” she says, grinning, as she climbs onto his lap.

It’s the first time they’ve made contact in this way and their eyes lock. The significance of the moment isn’t lost on her, but all she can think of is how he can’t get inside her fast enough. She berates herself for feeling so powerless to these urges, because the Scully he knows doesn’t behave like this. That Scully isn’t impulsive, especially with Mulder. It’s how she’s kept her hands off him all these years.

As she looks into his eyes, though, she realizes she’s actually very much in control. She’s more in control than she’s ever been. For the first time with him, she’s going after what she wants. This Scully, the one holding onto him now, is real, and she wants him to know her so badly.

This is what she wants, he is who she wants. He is all she’s wanted ever since she walked into his basement office all those years ago. Her life started at twenty-eight and she hasn’t realized it until now.

Suddenly they are one, and she closes her eyes, marveling at its exquisiteness. It has never felt this way for her before. The symbiotic dance that has gone on for so long between his beautiful mind and hers has finally manifest in their bodies and it’s every bit as divine as she imagined it.

She remembers what he said to her years ago in his hallway: You made me a whole person. She never knew until this moment she had not been whole without him.

The rain continues to pummel the glass. Her hands are in his hair, his hands are everywhere. They find a rhythm and time and space don’t exist anymore; only they do.

She holds his face and studies it: his perfect bottom lip that she can’t help but stare at whenever he’s rattling off a theory he’s excited about. The stubble on his face he’d neglected to shave for some reason that probably had something to do with her absence. And his eyes, the same eyes that have looked directly into her soul for years, now looking more closely into her own than ever before. The only reality she can perceive right now is him, wrapped around her like he belongs there.

This feels so right, and so real, and as their bodies move against each other, his familiar voice an unfamiliar groan in her ear, she wonders why it took them so long to get here. But as she wonders, she simultaneously believes deep down within her that this, right now, was worth every single second of waiting.

She doesn’t want it to end but eventually, it does for them both, at the same time. That never happens, she marvels. She can’t believe how perfect everything is.

Her eyes close and she pulls his mouth to hers again, drinking him in. Her lips dance around his face, tasting the sweat dripping down his forehead, the sweat she helped put there. His body starts to relax, his eyelids close and he looks completely spent.

“ScullyScullyScullyScully….” he whispers into her ear, as if her name is the only word his brain can locate. It’s the best thing she’s ever heard him say. And he’s said a lot.

She holds him tightly, their bodies still joined upright. Her chin is resting on his shoulder, her knees locked around his hips. She studies the texture of the wall behind him as reality starts crashing in around her, and decides extracting herself from his arms is something she wants to put off as long as possible. Mostly because this feels like heaven, but also because then she will have to face him and think of something to say.

She doesn’t know what to say.

She wants to tell him the truth, she wants to say the words, but she can’t. She’s terrified. Just because he’s said yes to sex doesn’t mean he loves her the same way she loves him.

What if she says it and he can’t say it back? It would ruin everything that hasn’t already been ruined.

She can’t help but hope they’ll ruin it again. And again.

It’s too soon to say it, she tells herself. Seven years and it’s too soon. How fucking stupid is that?

She thinks of the millions of people who say it all the time without meaning it, and here she is, meaning it and not saying it. She prays to whatever God is listening that he says something first.

“That was incredible,” he murmurs into her ear, in that tired voice he uses while discussing a case and they’re on round four of one of their bantering sessions. “You have no idea, Scully… no idea how much I’ve thought about this, how much I’ve wanted this.”

She thinks she probably has some idea. She says nothing, but clings to him even tighter and kisses his temple. He’s breathing quietly into her ear as he holds her, and she is more happy and content than she’s ever been. She’s never been this close to him before and she wants to savor it before the moment is over and they have to try to go back to doing whatever it was they did before this.

The rain has begun to slow down, as if the storm itself was waiting for them, only for the two of them, to swell and subside as they did. As if the world had been holding its breath. They embrace each other quietly for what feels like an eternity, their breath slowing, their hearts pounding, the rain outside. Finally, reluctantly, she unravels her body from his and slides off the bed.

“Hey,” he says gently. “Where are you going?”

“Bathroom, I’ll be right back.” She hears him flop back down onto the bed.

She closes the bathroom door behind her and looks into the mirror. She likes what she sees. The tableau of Mulder’s bathroom mirror framing her wild hair, her puffy lips, face red from the scruff on his chin, that just-fucked look in her eyes.

This feels good, this feels right. She smiles at her reflection.

She turns on the sink and splashes water on her face. She tries to turn off the faucet but a stubborn drip protests.

After a couple minutes, she emerges into the soft moonlight of his bedroom. He’s already asleep, of course. The jet lag from his flight from England that afternoon combined with their activities would be plenty to send him off to dreamland.

She considers climbing into bed with him, holding him all night until their breathing falls into sync like everything else, and staying there with him until morning. But she doesn’t. She can think of a million reasons to go and only one reason to stay. And that one reason is something she’s not ready to tell him.

She decides to leave that for another night. Because as awkward as this all may be, deep down she knows there has to be another night.

She softly pads around his bedroom, collecting her clothes. Her skirt is on the floor near his head, and as she crouches down to get it she watches him sleep for a moment. She presses her thumb to her own lips, then his, and says what she’s not ready to say, quietly. He won’t hear her, but she tells him anyway, because it’s the only thing left to do to make everything truly perfect.

She returns to the bathroom and gets dressed, the sink still dripping, unfinished business. Like they will have tomorrow.

After exiting the bathroom she notices the wind has picked up again. She tries not to read too much into it. She pauses at the foot of the bed to grab her jacket and looks at his naked sleeping form, half obscured by sheets. A tiny, triumphant smile tugs at the corner of her mouth.

MULDER

He’s talking too much, as usual, the droning sound of his voice starting to bore even himself. So he stops and lets his gaze rest on her face, asleep on the couch next to him.

With one finger he gently tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. She’s so heartbreakingly beautiful. Once again, the bad thoughts he’s been fighting against rise up inside him.

You don’t deserve her.

You’ll never be good enough for her.

Oh, and you’ve completely fucked up her life, by the way.

He doesn’t want to think these things but he can’t help it. He’s a fucking disaster and he loves her so much it hurts.

He briefly considers waking her up so she can go home, but he wants her here, as near to him as possible. So he tucks a blanket around her shoulders and after one more lingering gaze, reluctantly leaves her side to go to bed.

He’s tired, anyway. A whirlwind trip to England to investigate crop circles that all ended up coming to nothing. And he and Scully had a stupid argument before he left, not to mention that whole awful thing that happened in the car the other night. It was a shitty weekend.

At least she’s here now, and everything seems to be okay. They’ll move on like always, in the numbing embrace of the status quo, because as usual, he’s too chicken shit to do anything about it.

He brushes his teeth, takes off his pants and gets into bed. He’s tired but his mind won’t rest. How can it while she’s here in his apartment, so close, right now?

He’s lying there, his mind racing. He should wake her and offer her the bed. It’s the gentlemanly thing to do. Fuck it, maybe he should just scoop her up and bring her into the bed with him. Be romantic, do something unexpected.

Ugh, no. She’d probably slap him or leave or something. It just isn’t him, it’ll never work.

As he mulls his options over, she appears in the doorway. At first he thinks he’s dreaming, that he’s willed her into existence, some gorgeous fiery haired tulpa. A corporeal being turned physical by sheer imagination.

“Mulder.”

Her voice is husky, unfamiliar. He’s never heard her say his name this way, and he’s thrilled to add it to his list. He’s amazed that one word uttered by her has already stirred something deep in his groin.

He props himself up on his elbows and blinks.

“Scully?”

Before he can even comprehend what’s going on she’s across the room and in his space, kissing him wildly, her hands in his hair. He kisses her back.

And just like that, they’ve changed. They’ve become something else.

Of all the times he pictured this happening, and there were many times, he was always the one to make the first move. He’d thought about it in their office. He’d thought about it in the field. He’d thought about it at home, at times when he felt so lonely he could hardly stand her absence even though they’d already spent twelve hours together that day. Some nights he’d call her up for no reason at all, just to hear her voice. Other nights he’d turn to the stash of adult videos he’d tried and failed to keep a secret from her.

Hell, he’d actually tried to make a move, on more than one occasion. All of them failures.

It feels pathetic how long he’s been unable to act on his feelings in this way and now, here she is, finally doing it for him. Like she does everything for him, always.

What she’s doing now isn’t like his lame attempt on New Year’s Eve. This isn’t some arbitrary excuse to press her lips against his. This is the exact opposite of chicken shit. She’s so much braver than him and he is in awe.

He knows he doesn’t deserve her but he feels so goddamn lucky that for now, just for now, he tries to forget that.

He’s sitting up now and they are pulling, tearing each other’s clothes off. Everything falls to the floor until they’ve eliminated all the barriers that have ever been between them.

This is it, he thinks. This is really finally happening.

Just then he sees tears in her eyes. Is she crying? He asks if this is okay. After what happened in the car the other night he would never want to make her feel that way again. She says it is okay, and he believes her. He will always believe her.

He starts talking into her neck but then shuts up. They talk too much. All he wants to do is kiss her, a thousand kisses he should have given her so many times before: dozens of stakeouts where they were so close together he found it impossible not to wonder what it would be like. That night he took her hand and they danced together at a concert. The time their hands entwined around a bat as they hit baseballs in the cool night air, his arms wrapped around her. When he told her she was his constant, his touchstone, and he knew, he knew that time if he’d gone for it she would have probably gone there with him. But still, he hadn’t.

That goddamn fucking bee in the hallway that interrupted them, just outside of his apartment, mere yards from where they are now, gasping for breath and tracing every inch of each other with their fingertips.

He can hardly believe it but now her hands are moving downward, and suddenly his rational brain snaps to attention. This is headed exactly where he wants it to go, but...

What if she regrets this?

What if it affects our partnership?

What if what if what if?

He looks into her eyes, knows he has to ask if she’s sure.

She pauses for a moment and he’s having trouble reading her face. He’s so sure about this he now wishes he hadn’t said anything at all and he’s painfully aware he’s given her an out.

Please don’t take it. Please stay with me, Scully.

She takes his face in her hands, looking deeply into his eyes. It nearly takes his breath away.

“I’m sure,” she says, with the same certainty she reserves for the scientific facts she recites for him daily, and his heart almost bursts with relief. She crawls into his lap and his world spins off its axis.

Before it’s over, he adds three new “Mulders” to his list. The very last one she screamed out is his new all-time favorite.

Afterwards, she clings to him tightly, both of them breathing heavily. He wants her to know he loves her, that she means more to him than anything in the world. But he doesn’t tell her, not right now. His brain hasn’t caught up to his body and he can barely process how incredible this all is. How incredible she is, how much he’s wanted this for so long.

He can tell her that much, so he does, softly, into her ear.

Suddenly he’s completely exhausted. He knows they’re going to have to figure this all out but he can’t think about that right now. All he can think about is how amazing her body feels next to his, just the way he’s always imagined it. Better, actually.

For the moment, he is utterly content. He would be perfectly happy just holding her like this forever.

After a while she releases him to head to the bathroom and he feels a pang of sadness to let her go. He flops back onto the bed, the sheets still tangled from his attempt at sleep before she pounced on him.

He shifts over to one side of his bed to make room for her. He’s not used to having to do that, his long limbs usually stretched out across the entire bed. His couch has been the only place he’s slept for so many years; sleeping in an actual bed has been relatively new for him.

He could get used to having her in it, he thinks, and he’s picturing such a scenario when he drifts off to sleep, the wind beginning to whip the leaves against the windows once again.

Thanks for reading! To continue, click here. Otherwise I’ll see you tomorrow for the next chapter!

#txf #msr #msr fanfic #mulder and scully #all things #first time fic #culmination #sometimes nothing happens for a reason

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i-writeandread-blog · 5 years ago

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A Portrait of a Tortured You and I - Chapter 1

Okay, so I know I said Wonderland would be back, and it will be... I promise, but I sat down to write tonight and this is what came out. So sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction. This new story is an amalgamation of truth and fiction. Many elements in this are from real life events. A writer writes what they know. So, this is really hard for me to share. I almost didn’t want to. I won’t say what parts are real or aren’t. It doesn’t matter. Just be gentle with my new child is all I ask. Thanks to anyone who reads. This is Chapter 1.

I was standing on the shore waiting for my time to board the ferry to an island- that for the next three days would be known affectionately as Mars Island. I had been through the worst eight months of my life and had shocked myself that I managed to pull off this trip. First, because financially, I was a mess. Second, because I was now terrified everyday. And third, because some of the Echelon had been unkind to me, during some of my darkest times.

Eight months prior, I was happy. Not the happiest I've ever been, but I was doing well. I had always battled depression but it was at bay, even though I had had a falling out with my sisters. This falling out forced me to need to uproot my life and leave my beloved California for the east coast where majority of my family lived. Without my sisters as my roommates, I couldn't afford to stay in Cali, as much as it pained me to admit. Sure, I could have moved out and tried to find a roommate on Craigslist, but I was too cautious and I was barely making ends meet with the two roommates I had. It seemed easier at the time to move back "home" with my tail between my legs. Of course, I did it at the worst possible time. A huge hurricane was barreling through the Atlantic Ocean headed straight for us. I arrived the night before all hell broke loose.

Nevertheless, we managed to soldier on. The house flooded, we had to stay at a temporary shelter, but we made it through. Still, the depression wasn't rearing it's ugly head. I was desperately trying to find a job, because there wasn't much out there in a rural southern coastal town. I had a career, but I left it to pursue writing. I was hell bent on writing or nothing at all. Somehow that translated into me getting a job as a waitress. So much for the "nothing at all." I have no idea what I was thinking, to be honest. I guess I felt like it would give me free time to continue to write. It didn't.

I was lonely, my friends were all married with kids and I was stuck living with my parents. Not to mention the dating scene here was as abysmal as the job market. I started working at a local diner, I knew almost everyone who came in, the tips were okay. What wasn't okay was the questions I got.

"What are you doing back here?"

— "long story..."

"Weren't you working at a law office?"

— "no, I was a court stenographer."

"Where's your husband?"

— "dunno, but if you find him, can you point him in my direction?"

And my personal favorite was,

"Are you having a mid life crisis? You're much too young and pretty for that."

— "uhh, thanks?"

So instead of working on my novel, or even reading somebody else's, I poured myself into watching documentaries. My love of true crime led me to watching one about a wrongfully convicted murderer. I was appalled that the justice system had failed yet again. I saw it too often when I was working in the courtroom. But unlike when I was working, I actually could have a voice now. I started going on these different blogs looking for ways to help people who had been hurt by the legal system. By early November, I had met a guy who shared my passion. I wasn't actually helping anyone, so much as just talking about the different cases and once I met Andrew, I didn't go on the blogs anymore. I became enthralled with him. Talking to him anytime, I wasn't at the diner.

I truly thought that Andrew would be the guy I had been waiting for. The man of my dreams. But on December 26th, out of nowhere, he stopped taking my calls. At first, I was worried. Then worry turned to anger, and anger turned to depression. I never did find out what happened. But, I do know he is alive and well, because he accidentally texted me one morning in January. It was meant for his dad. He didn't text again.

This was the start of my year. It wasn't looking so good so far, for 2019. Worse came to worse when I had to work a double on the day after Valentines Day. Sylvie- the other waitress, myself, and Dan- the cook were discussing going out to a bar, but because I was so tired, I ultimately declined. I ended up regretting my decision when they left and I was still fumbling for my keys. Usually, we all left at the same time. It just wasn't my night. Three rowdy teenagers who had been kicked out of the diner earlier for being too obnoxious came out from the shadows, grabbing me and dragging me to the back of the diner. I fought hard, grabbing and pulling at whatever, I could. It was for naught. They punched and kicked me over and over, spit in my face, tore my uniform half off, and then left me there bleeding and unconscious.

My parents had expected me home and sat around worrying when I hadn't at least called to say I would be late. My dad decided after an hour to go looking for me. He pulled up to the diner, saw my car and yelled for me. I whimpered. He followed the pathetic sounds to the back loading area where he found me. The police investigated, but I couldn't remember anything about my attackers. The diner didn't have any surveillance footage and all anyone remembered was they looked like typical kids. They left no DNA evidence behind. I had become a true crime victim.

A month prior, I had thrown caution to the wind and purchased this ticket to the island. I was reeling from the "break up," if you could even call it that and decided, I could make it work financially, as I had a retirement plan I could cash out. Now, after the attack, I was to be out of work for an indefinite amount of time. I had some nerve damage and a punctured lung from a broken rib. I didn't know how I was going to pay any of the hospital bills as I didn't have any insurance. I decided to reach out to the people, I believed were more my family than my actual blood. The Echelon. My brothers and sisters in Mars.

I went onto Vyrt, as some of us still chatted on there and I nervously typed the following: hey guys, haven't been on in a few weeks. Have been missing you all. Several people responded with hellos and where have ya beens. Then, I admitted to them what had happened: well, it's been tough. I was attacked. Left for dead, ya know... the usual. My sense of humor was my downfall here. Many people thought I was joking, but I eventually admitted it was all true and said I was sorry for making it seem so lighthearted. I told everyone how rough things were and that I had sadly cancelled my trip to Croatia. I was lucky, because Adventures in Wonderland refunded me due to my circumstances. Then out of the blue, someone I loved and respected, Natalie, typed: she's so full of shit guys, she just wants sympathy because she's living such a pathetic life. I was stunned. Never once, had I ever went into Vyrt looking for a pity party, and never had I ever been mean or rude towards her. She continued: I bet she never even booked mars island. AiW doesn't do refunds ever! I don't know, guys. She wasn't done, but at this point no one had come to my defense, so she rattled on: I bet she's trying to get Jared's attention. Maybe she thinks he will allow her to come to the island as his guest. I was mortified. I quickly logged out and laid sobbing on the hospital bed. I had no one to turn to after all.

The next day, I had many messages from various Echelon. Some were kind, others were nasty. I decided to just leave the Mars "fandom" behind and try to pick up the mess that was my life. That was until, I noticed an email notification from Shayla. I at first thought it was a form letter email, since AiW had sent out several when they first were promoting the island. But curiosity got the better of me and I clicked on it.

Shayla McGhee

To: Catherine Tyrell

Hi Catherine!

I wanted to let you know that someone decided to pay the remainder of the balance for your Mars Island package. Is it okay for us to process their payment? We haven't issued your refund of the first payment yet, is this also okay? We understand if the circumstances surrounding your reason to cancel will keep you from attending, but maybe you can still join us? Let me know!

Best

Shay

I read and reread the email about a dozen times. Surprised would be an understatement. I couldn't fathom who would have done this for me. As far as I could tell the entirety of the Mars fan base hated me. I pressed the call button and waited for my nurse to saunter in.

"Well look who has a huge smile on her face! What do you need, honey?" She asked.

"Can you ask the doctor to come see me. I need to ask him a question about my recovery process." I wanted to know if it was even remotely feasible for me to travel halfway across the globe in a matter of six months time.

"Sure, dear. I'll see if I can find him doing his rounds. Need anything else?" I shook my head and she left the room.

A few long hours later, I had my answer. If I followed all instructions, I'd be out of the hospital in a couple of weeks and I shouldn't take too long to recover physically. I was warned that I had to follow all the rules or I may not recover in time. I believed in myself and sent a reply back saying, I would be making it to the island without hesitation. I was on cloud nine. If only I knew then what I know now. My recovery wasn't just going to be physical.

That night the nightmares started. The panic attacks started the next day. The need to not be left alone started a week later. I was an emotional wreck. I don't even know what triggered it. My therapist says, "The human brain is a tricky one. Sometimes it takes time for trauma to sink in." I was diagnosed with severe PTSD, depression, anxiety, etc. The depression I was used to, the constantly being afraid, I wasn't.

I wanted to be normal again, but no matter what I did, I was always in a state of alert. I began checking the locks on the doors many times before I was satisfied they were truly locked. I would jump at the slightest sound. I'd burst into tears randomly. I couldn't watch TV because everything had violence. Even cartoons were getting bad. I was miserable, only leaving the house for doctor appointments. I was a shell of my former self.

The time for the island got closer and closer, but I was in no position to travel. I was almost completely agoraphobic. One day, my mother who didn't necessarily want me to travel alone came in to my room, where I was still sleeping at noon. "Okay, enough is enough! Get up! I know you're sad, I know you're scared, but you aren't doing anything the therapist has suggested you do. You need to fight this head on. No stop pulling the blankets over your head! Wake up!" I grumbled and sat up, yelling. "Can you NOT, Mother! I don't need your bullshit, right now." As soon as I said the words I felt sick. I was never one to treat my parents with disrespect. I hated who I had become. Fortunately, my mother took it in stride. "Catherine Leeann Tyrell, I'm only going to say this once, you ever talk to me like that again and there will most certainly be hell to pay. This is your one get out of jail free card. I'm going to let it slide because I know you are terrified. But you can't live like this anymore. Bad things happen all the time. They happen to everyone. You are not the first person to have this happen to. As special as you are, you're NOT that special, that you'd be the one and only person to be attacked. Now, some nice person did you a favor and paid for you to have a wonderful experience. Are you going to let their money go down the drain because you can't be bothered to at least try to live again?"

My mother's monologue shook me to the core. She was right. I needed to confront this head on. She then dropped a letter on the bed and walked out. There was no name or any sender information. My mother had already opened it, no doubt to protect me in case it were something bad. I sat there staring at the contents. Laying in my lap was a cashiers check in the amount of $3,000 and a note. It simply said: "for your travel arrangements to Croatia."

#thirty seconds to mars #30 seconds to mars #jared leto #campmars #marsisland #jared leto fiction #jared leto fic #jared leto fan fiction #jared leto fanfics #jared leto fanfic #jared leto fanfiction #echelon

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sariasprincy-writes · 6 years ago

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Hollow Point 20

One // Two // Three // Four // Five // Six // Seven // Eight // Nine // Ten // Eleven // Twelve // Thirteen // Fourteen // Fifteen // Sixteen // Seventeen // Eighteen // Nineteen // Twenty (here)

Chapter Twenty There is always a cost in the end

Sakura stayed in Israel another three days before heading back to New York. She tried to tell herself it was everything to do with the warm weather and checking in on her contacts, and nothing to do with her concerns over Kisame and Mossad. Or Itachi.

He had headed home the following day. She hadn’t heard from him since that night. Which was fine, she told herself for the umpteenth time.

Failing to bite back her sigh, Sakura darkened the screen of her phone and tucked it into her pocket. As soon as her plane completed its taxiing and came to a stop outside the terminal, she stood from her seat and collected her suitcase. Together, she and the rest of the passengers filed out of the narrow aircraft.

Following the familiar halls, Sakura swept through customs and down to the lower level where the taxis picked up passengers. She hadn’t called Kakashi for a ride, not really in the mood to talk. Things were becoming complicated.

Stopping on the sidewalk, Sakura glanced down the terminal for an available cab. She hadn’t even the chance to hail one before a familiar BMW pulled up to the curve in front of her. Tires nearly screeching as it came to a stop.

“Get in,” Tobirama told her through the open passenger window.

Shit. Things were about to become even more complicated.

There was no point in arguing. The look on his face told her he would drag her into the car if he had to.

Without a word, Sakura threw her bag in the backseat before she slipped into the sleek car. Tobirama took off before she had even fully closed her door.

They drove in silence for several minutes before Tobirama spoke, eyes straight ahead. “We have a problem.”

Sakura resisted her sigh, instead resting her chin on her fist as she peered out the window. “When it comes to you, there’s always a problem, Tobirama,” she muttered. “What is it this time?”

She felt his glare linger on her a moment before his eyes returned to the road. “Akatsuki is moving again. They raided one of Hashirama’s shipments coming in and burned down one of the ports we had further south. Over a dozen of our men got caught in the crossfire. We’re holding them off the best we can, but it won’t last.”

“And what do you want me to do?” Sakura asked, her voice tinted with something close to boredom.

Tobirama nearly slammed on the brakes at the next light. This time he was full on glaring at her. “We’re paying you for your help,” he told her sharply. “I expect that you’ll give it when we need. And that includes this.”

“Except you’re not paying me for my help,” she said simply. Factually. “You’re paying me for my guns. And as long as I continue to uphold my end of the bargain, you can’t have anything to complain about.”

When Tobirama didn’t reply, she peered at him. The only give away of his upset was the white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. Then that too relaxed. “If this is because of what happened that night in your apartment-”

“This has nothing to do with that,” Sakura interrupted. His chance to apologize for that had long since come and gone.

“Then what is it?”

Sakura didn’t answer. They were almost at her apartment. She waited until he stopped at the next red light before she reached for the door handle. “I’ll get your boys what they need.”

“Sakura-” he begun.

But she was already opening the door. Without a word, she collected her bag from the backseat before she made her way down the sidewalk. The light turned green, but Tobirama made no immediate move to go. Only once the car behind him blared his horn did she hear the harsh squeal of his tires as he sped away.

That sound rattled around her brain the rest of the walk home. Without bothering to turn on the lights, she dropped her bag near the front table before she left again.

For a while, Sakura wandered down the city streets, her jacket wrapped around her and her hands tucked into her pockets. Spring was beginning to thaw out the cold frost of winter, but the air still chilled her skin and twisted around her hair like death’s caress.

She slipped inside a restaurant just as the bartender flipped the ‘open’ sign on. Smiling at him, she ordered a shot of tequila before she wandered to the piano in the back. With no one but the staff to hear her play, she unleashed her thoughts, letting the music take hold of everything she wanted but yet couldn’t express.

The notes came from the deepest corners of her mind, soothing her stresses, her fears and all the anger that seemed to stem from everywhere. Tobirama, Tsunade, Hashirama. Even Itachi. The last of which surprised her, considering her latest visit with him had been…pleasant. Still, she orchestrated those notes until she scrubbed her soul clean.

Sakura was still sitting before the well-used instrument when Ino arrived some time later. The soundboard was closed, her shot glass half-full. Sakura sipped it slowly, her gaze a million miles away.

“Hey,” Ino said, sliding onto the wooden bench beside her.

Sakura blinked, turning her attention to her oldest friend as she slipped a pink wig off to expose her long, blonde hair underneath. “How did it go?” Sakura asked.

Ino smiled, grabbing Sakura’s shot from her and swallowing it back in one-go. She set the glass on the piano before she held up two fingers towards the bartender. “Good,” Ino said. “Madara’s man followed me all week. To the ports, to a few meet ups.” Then she smirked. “To the mall. And the nail salon. Three times.”

Sakura laughed, the sound bubbling out of her mouth without force. A burst of true amusement. “Let me see.”

Ino held up her hand, letting Sakura inspect her perfectly manicured nails. And they were perfect, her gel coat not even scratched. Whoever had done Ino’s nails had done it meticulously.

“Everything else went smoothly?” Sakura asked.

Ino nodded. “Hyuuga got his shipment. He’s very happy with your work, and Kabuto is actually paying on time for once. Seems he took your threat seriously.”

The blonde paused as the bartender arrived, smiling as he dropped off their drinks. The moment his back was turned, her smile fell. “Naruto’s been watching your port,” Ino continued, her tone turning grim. “He says at least three shipments have dropped in the last week. And they don’t seem to be slowing down.”

“Three?” Sakura repeated.

Ino confirmed with a solemn nod. That news made Sakura frown. Deeply. An unsettling feeling sinking down into the pit of her stomach. There was no way Akatsuki could move that fast. Not without help. There was something she was missing. Something she couldn’t see.

“I have to drop one more shipment to the Senju. After that, we pull everything in,” Sakura eventually said. “Until I figure out what’s going on, we keep our store. No more deliveries.”

Ino blinked in surprise. “You’re going to lose a lot of money.”

“It’s just temporary. Until at least Temari gets back to me.”

“Temari?”

“An old contact of mine in Africa,” Sakura told her. “She deals with information. She’s incredibly resourceful. And accurate.”

“You’re having her look into the port then,” Ino guessed.

Sakura nodded. “Tell Naruto to freeze everything. I’ll let you know when we can move again.”

“And when one of your customers gets upset?”

Sakura just shot her a look. “Tell them to talk to me.”

Ino didn’t look too convinced but she relented nonetheless. They didn’t speak much after that. Sakura lost in her thoughts as Ino eyed the other patrons.

Only once their shots were empty did they stand from the piano. Sakura straightened the collar of her shirt while Ino adjusted the locks of her pink wig before she slipped it over her head. Her blonde hair disappeared flawlessly.

“What do you think? Should I make it permanent?” Ino asked playfully before she made her way towards the door.

Sakura couldn’t resist her smile. She waited exactly three minutes before she too headed out into the night. She didn’t know why but for some reason she chose to take the bus home. It was almost completely empty, the usual rush of commuters already gone. Only a single woman in a waitressing outfit and a young, teenage couple to share the ride with.

Sakura sat by the window, three rows from the back. Watching the moisture gathered on the outside panels of the window. The bumps in the road bounced beneath her feet.

Everything was quiet. Content. Which is why when someone sat beside her on the next stop, Sakura glanced at them sharply. Only to kill the sharp retort on her tongue when she recognized Shisui, dressed in a pair of jeans and a black hoodie.

She waited until the bus merged back in with traffic before speaking, “It’s been awhile.”

Beside her Shisui smiled, those familiar dimples appearing in the corners of his mouth. “Did you miss me?”

“Like a bad hangover.”

“Hangover is just a sign of a good time.”

Sakura couldn’t help but laugh at that, but she cut the banter short. Her stop only a handful of blocks away. “It’s been almost three months, so either your only objective was to get me to talk to Itachi. Or you’ve been working on something.”

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, a smirk on his lips that reminded her eerily of Itachi. “You’re too perceptive for your own good, you know that?”

She smiled in return but didn’t speak.

Slowly, that teasing smile slid off his face. “I’ve been following Hashirama,” he told her.

Sakura cocked her brow in surprise. “That’s a dangerous thing to do.”

“I know.”

“Then why do it?”

“Because of what you told Itachi.” When a look of confusion passed over her expression, he supplied, “That it’ll be easier to take out Madara by taking down Hashirama as well.”

“And what did you find?”

“That Hashirama has a lot of money,” Shisui said. His gaze fell forward, casually peering at the other passengers as the bus bumped along. Studied them. Then his attention returned to her. “And not all of it was obtained through his business.”

Sakura couldn’t help the slightly condescending laugh that bubbled out of her mouth. “This may surprise you, Shisui, but most people in the one percent don’t earn all their money the traditional way.”

However, Shisui didn’t share her amusement. “I’m not talking about a small portion. Nearly eighty-five percent of Hashirama’s income is from some other means. Something under the table.”

That gave her some pause. “His business is a front?”

Shisui simply inclined his head in her direction. “I mean, it does generate revenue, but less than five hundred thousand a year. Nowhere near the multimillions it claims to. Which means Hashirama is making his profit elsewhere. And he’s paying someone a good chunk of change to make it seem like it comes from his business.”

“Have you figured out where his money coming from?” Sakura asked.

Shisui shrugged. “Not yet. But it has to be the underground.”

Sakura hummed low in her throat as she considered that. If Hashirama really was that deep in the black market in the States than she would need to tread carefully. A lot more carefully than she had been recently.

Outside, the streetlights flashed by as the bus trucked along. It took her a moment to realize they had passed her stop. By a few blocks. Shisui was looking forward again when she glanced at him. It took her a moment to realize that he seemed to have no stop in mind. Like he was riding the bus purely for the fun of it.

“You didn’t find me just to tell me that, did you?” she asked.

Shisui’s eyes flickered to her but it was a moment before he spoke. “No,” he said quietly. “Our company is getting frustrated that we haven’t had more leads on Madara. They want to shut down your work with Itachi.”

“And what does he think about that?” she murmured. When Shisui didn’t answer, she smiled. “Itachi doesn’t know, does he?”

“Itachi likes you. I don’t know if he thinks you can actually get us information or if he feels like he wants to help you or whatever, but our company is becoming impatient,” he told her. Both not answering her question and answering one she never asked.

She got the impression Shisui was torn on his opinion of her. Both wanting to see her as nothing but a criminal, but also wanting to help her for the sake of his cousin. She understood that. That was how her relationship with Kakashi had begun. On opposite sides but with the same goal.

And not that she would ever admit it aloud, but she wanted Itachi. His help was proving to be invaluable to her. Even given his affiliation.

“What do you want me to do?” Sakura eventually asked.

From inside his pocket, Shisui retrieved a cell phone with a micro-USB cord attached to it. He held it out towards her. “You’re the only one who can get close enough to Madara. Plug this into his cell phone and it’ll make an exact copy. It’ll even receive all his new incoming text messages and emails.”

Sakura stared at the device in his hands for a very long moment. “You want me to steal Madara’s cell phone?” she repeated like he had just asked her to rob a bank that was already surrounded by police. Because he pretty much had.

“No, he can’t know it’s missing. Otherwise, he’ll just get a new phone. We just need you to plug the phones into each other. The transfer only takes five seconds,” he told her. As if that made it any better.

She eyed him flatly. “Madara has a lot of people after him. He won’t just leave it laying around.”

Shisui stared right back. “This is the only thing that will keep my company happy.”

A long moment of silence passed. Shisui waiting for her answer as Sakura seriously considered dropping her entire relationship with him and Itachi and the whole CIA.

Then Sakura took the device from his hands. “I fucking hate your company.”

Shisui’s response was a smirk as the bus rolled to a stop. And without another word, he stood and slipped out into the night.

“You’re sure this will work?”

“Of course, it will,” Sakura told Ino not for the first time. Like if she kept saying it over and over again she might actually convince herself.

Ino held Sakura’s gaze for a moment longer, silently conveying her lack of belief. They were both aware of what might happen should they fail. But neither mentioned this before the blonde turned away. She slipped into the crowd seamlessly, her elegant, black dress melting in with the crowd.

The black-and-white affair was already in full swing. Where people with too much money wore clothes that cost too much and sipped from champagne whose flavor wasn’t worth the price of the bottle. At least it was an open bar.

In the back of the room, Sakura sipped from a flute filled with one of those champagnes. The rich, golden liquid bubbled in her mouth and left a pleasant tang on her tongue. Absently she ran her fingers through her hair as her eyes scanned the room. The texture of the black wig she had borrowed from Ino was silky and smooth. It felt real. But more importantly, it covered her own, unique hair color.

Sakura hadn’t specifically been invited to Hashirama’s party but she hadn’t been turned away at the door either. As if he had suspected she might join for a night of conversing and scheming and making deals.

She had been careful to avoid running into him. And Madara. Just in case either of them recognized her even with her new hairstyle. Because it would be impossible for Sakura to lift Madara’s phone. Not when both men trusted her so little already, their observant eyes scrutinizing her every move.

But Ino…neither Madara or Hashirama had ever seen her face before. It would almost be too easy for the blonde to slip in and out without being noticed.

Sakura hoped.

Sakura’s attention sharpened when she saw Madara slip his phone into the pocket of his pants as a pair of men approached him and Hashirama. The perfect distraction. Sakura held her breath, her drink halfway to her lips as Ino went in for the kill.

As if completely by accident, Ino bumped into Madara mid-conversation as she tried to slip between him and a waiter with a tray of drinks. She apologized with a pretty smile and made her exit cleanly, only pausing once to grab a hors d’oeuvre from another staff member with a platter before she took her time rounding back to Sakura.

“Have you done this before?” Sakura asked, unable to keep the impressed note out of her voice.

Ino just smiled as she smoothly passed Madara’s cell phone over. “I may have swiped a credit card or two in my younger years.”

Sakura replied with an amused smile. She set her drink aside before she withdrew the cell phone Shisui had given her from her purse. Just as he said, the transfer only took five seconds. Curiously she flipped the phone open, amazed at how much information there was on the device. Phone calls, text messages, emails. Even recent Google searches. She was reluctant to even give this back to the CIA. She would benefit from it enormously. She could spend the next week looking through Madara’s information.

Flipping the phone closed, Sakura returned the cell to her purse before she passed Madara’s back to Ino. “Are you able to get this back to him?”

Ino smiled. A little sweet. A little cunning. “Of course.”

Without a word, Ino made her way back out into the room. She weaved through the other men and women dressed to impress, only stopping once to pick up a drink at the bar.

Sipping from her glass, Sakura eyed Ino curiously, wondering exactly what her friend would do. It took a few minutes for the two men Madara and Hashirama were chatting with to depart. The very instant they were gone, Ino was there. This time, she engaged Madara, offering him an apologetic smile as she passed him a fresh drink. Sakura didn’t even see her replace his phone in his pocket.

Ino was far better at this than Sakura thought.

Smirking, Sakura sipped her champagne. She wasn’t entirely sure what drew her gaze to one side of the room, but her eyes wandered. Stopping when they landed on Tobirama.

There were a handful of others with him all engaged in conversation, but he seemed to be paying them no mind. Instead, his eyes lingered on Ino. Before they shifted to Sakura. Their eyes met.

In that moment, Sakura knew Tobirama knew it was her, even with her mild disguise. Knew he had watched the whole scene play out. She doubted he was aware of exactly what had just occurred but at least understood he had witnessed something he wasn’t supposed to.

Sakura didn’t bother trying to hide from him. Merely held his gaze for a moment longer before she turned away and headed towards the door. Ino only a minute behind her.

to be continued…

#sakura #shisui #hollow point #chapter 20 #crime au #arms dealer au #sorry for the delay #please ignore errors #had a rough passage last night and no brain power left to function ;)

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goodlucktai · 6 years ago

Text

put your empty hands in mine

chapter eight: take my heart clean apart

natsume yuujinchou pairing: kitanishinatsu word count: 3550 summary: Kitamoto and Nishimura are soulmates, to absolutely no one’s surprise. But they’re also soulmates with a very shy boy who lives somewhere far away, who writes to them in tiny, careful letters right before bed, who apologizes when the mimicry of bruises pop up on their arms and backs because of him. And that’s a surprise to a lot of people. read on ao3

They’re sitting in the health room together, hand in hand. Tsuji and Sasada are with them; Sasada is talking to Atsushi in a soft voice, and Tsuji has an arm wrapped around Satoru like he’d protect him from the whole world if he could.

Their teacher and the principle and the nurse are having a hushed conversation near the door, their tones sharp and frantic, rising angrily and then pitching low again when they remember Satoru and his friends are there.

Atsushi’s hand is shaking in Satoru’s, so Satoru makes sure he’s holding it extra tight.

“Can I use the phone?” he asks. The question cuts through the room as easily as if he shouted it.

“Your parents are on their way,” their teacher reassures him.

“I don’t need to call them,” Satoru says. He wouldn’t recognize his own voice if he weren’t talking with it. Maybe the adults don’t quite recognize it either, because they hesitate to answer him. “I need to call Takashi.”

“That’s probably not-- “ the nurse starts to say.

“I need to call him,” Satoru says again, louder. The room is beginning to look a little blurry. His cheeks are wet and warm. “I need to make sure he’s okay. I won’t know unless I call him. Please let me use the phone, please. I have to talk to him. Please?”

He’s probably scared, Satoru wants to tell them. He’s hurting, he needs us. You don’t understand how much he needs us.

But he can’t tell them, because it’s getting too hard to talk. His breath is hitching, stuttering and catching like he’s run a whole marathon. Atsushi lets go of his hand, and Tsuji’s arm falls away, and for one brief, terrifying moment Satoru has nothing to hold onto--

And then Atsushi is hugging him like he’s the last solid thing in the world, hands clenched in the back of his jacket, face buried against his hair. He’s crying, and he doesn’t say it’s okay because it’s not, but Satoru feels halfway healed already. Halfway less like he’s about to float away.

He hangs on tight, just in case.

Adachi beats their parents by seconds, skidding into the health room with their jackets and bags. He passes the cluster of adults with a nod and doesn’t wait for permission or approval to cross the room and sink into the seat next to Tsuji’s.

“Natsume’s tough,” he says. He looks like he has no idea what to do with himself while his friends are crying. “He’ll get better.”

It’s not fair that he should have to, Satoru thinks. But then mom and Auntie are bursting through the door, faces pale and drawn with fear, and Atsushi cries, “Mom!”

There’s some shuffling and murmured voices and the sound of a door whispering closed, and then the room is empty around the four of them. Mom and Auntie are hugging them both with equal desperation like they forgot which kid is theirs, asking rapid-fire questions in such a panicked way that Satoru wonders how much the principal told them when he called.

“Takashi’s hurt,” Satoru says, leaning out of the safe circle of Auntie’s arms. “We have to go find him.”

“He’s hurt,” Atsushi stresses, eyes red and puffy with tears. “Look.”

He lifts his shirt up, revealing the horrible blue-black mess on the skin of his stomach, and Auntie makes a sound full of pain. Mom’s eyes close for a long moment, like she doesn’t have the strength to keep them open.

“We have to go,” Satoru repeats, fists clenching.

“You’re right,” Auntie says. Her face recycles its sadness into something close to it, but this time it’s something harder, something with teeth. “Aya?”

“You don’t have to ask, Mika,” says mom. She sounds the way she did before the divorce, when she had something to fight for. She leans down to kiss Atsushi on the top of the head, reaches over to curl a hand around Satoru’s cheek-- and this is the woman Kiyoshi tells him about sometimes, the one whose husband thought he’d have a chance in hell at taking her kids away when he left her. “We’re going.”

Things move quickly after that.

Mom goes back home to pack an overnight bag and pick Kiyoshi up from school. Atsushi and Satoru huddle together in the sitting room of the big Kitamoto house with Mana between them, while Uncle Hakaru and Auntie pace the kitchen and make loud phone calls that leak out from behind the closed door.

They’re leaving on the next train, but the next train is in an hour.

“Hey,” Satoru says. His voice sounds sore. “Let’s call his phone.”

Atsushi blinks, eyes blank and wide as he considers the idea. Then he pushes himself to his feet and sneaks out to the genkan where their schoolbags are still puddled on the step. He creeps back with his cellphone in hand and says, “I don’t think he’ll answer. If he had his phone, wouldn’t he have called us?”

There are a lot of reasons why he wouldn’t, but Atsushi knows them as well as Satoru, so he doesn’t waste his breath on those. “Call anyway.”

He hits the speed dial and holds the phone up between them. Satoru counts the rings, thinking it’s going to go all the way through to voicemail, but at the last second the call picks up.

“Okashi?” Atsushi gasps, eyes wide.

“Kitamoto!” It’s Ogata. She sounds happy to hear from him, and the brightness in her tone pricks like needles under Satoru’s skin. “Bet you’re surprised I answered, huh? Takashi left his bag with us while he went home to change. He should be back soon, though, he’s been gone for ages.”

Atsushi looks like he’s going to be sick. This, maybe, wasn’t one of Satoru’s better ideas. He eases the phone out of his soulmate’s white-knuckled grip and says, “Hey, Ogata?”

“Hi, Nishimura!”

“You said Takashi went home?”

“Mm! We’re going to see Natori Shuuichi’s new movie. The one about-- “

Satoru has no idea how to be the one to tell her Takashi isn’t going to the movies with them. His brain is churning out brand new nightmare fuel, his thoughts spinning in sick circles, because Takashi was okay when he went home, but now he’s hurt, and that could only mean--

“-- pretty, obviously, but he’s also a super talented actor! I couldn’t believe Takashi said he hadn’t seen any of his films!”

Atsushi’s face is buried in his hands. Mana pats his arm, clearly worried. “Don’t cry, niichan.”

Satoru has let a lot of tears go, but he hasn’t cried the way Atsushi has. He feels mostly vacant, weightless in a dizzying way, like he’s living in a pocket of vertigo. He should be shouting and screaming, he should be clawing through the phone to the place where Takashi lives, but instead he just sits there, empty and useless and slow on the uptake.

He wonders what’s wrong with him.

“Ogata, Takashi can’t go anymore,” Satoru asks, interrupting her happy chatter. “Something bad happened. I don’t know what yet. Can you keep his stuff safe for us? We’ll meet you for it sometime tonight, after your movie.”

She doesn’t answer right away. When she does, her voice is a lot less buoyant than before, but no less certain. “Don’t be stupid, Nishimura. We’re not going without him. We haven’t bought our tickets yet, so we’ll just go another time.” This is the girl who challenged her whole class for Takashi’s sake, when she had only known him for a handful of days. In the back of his mind, Satoru admires her. “Can’t we just drop his bag off at his house?”

“No, don’t-- don’t go there. Promise you won’t.”

“You’re scaring me,” she admits. Then, farther away, “Junko, something’s wrong.”

The front door rattles open, and mother and Kiyoshi’s harried conversation spills into the entry way. Atsushi dashes away his tears and gives Satoru a furtive sidelong look that says we definitely weren’t supposed to call, so he says into the phone, “I have to go, Ogata. We’re taking the next train, so we’ll be there soon. Stay with Junko no matter what. And if you-- if you find him-- “

“I’ll call you,” Ogata says. She’s definitely upset now. Satoru wishes he hadn’t called. “And I’m keeping his stuff as collateral until I get the full story. See you soon, you two.”

Atsushi crams the phone into his pocket as Kiyoshi runs into the room. He bundles Satoru up in a hug that squeezes all the breath out of him. He seems relieved, and murmurs something in Russian that sounds like “spasi bog” and mom doesn’t even give him the usual disapproving look for it.

“You’re okay? The two of you?”

“We will be when we see Takashi,” Atsushi says. He’s moved Mana into his lap so he can scoot closer to Satoru. Their hands drift together involuntarily, and Satoru feels better for having him to hold onto.

The train ride reminds him of the first train ride he took to see his secret soulmate for the first time. He remembers the restless excitement that twisted into nerves, that transformed again into giddy anticipation, and running off the train right into Takashi’s shy smile and hopeful hands.

The only thing that’s the same now as it was then is Atsushi’s hand in his. Auntie, mom and Kiyoshi are sitting on either side of them, and everyone else in the car is giving their group a wide berth, because Auntie sounds like she’s about to breathe fire every time she answers her phone. Kiyoshi is bouncing a knee, uncharacteristically keyed up. Every so often, incomprehensible words will appear on his arm and he’ll scrawl a quick reply.

Satoru looks down at his own arms. The nurse at school bandaged him up, from nearly shoulder to wrist-- just in case, she said with a warm smile. But Satoru thinks it’s partly because he wouldn’t stop staring at them. Only his hands are empty. He stares at them and kind of hates that they’re empty. There’s a marker in his pocket, he could write something to fill the space up.

But he doesn’t know what to say.

The police are waiting for them at Takashi’s house. Apparently there were several reports about a disturbance even before Auntie called them. Takashi’s guardians were taken in for questioning, and they’re being held since they can’t answer any questions about where their foster child is. The house is sitting behind police tape, but the detective’s eyes soften at the way Satoru and Atsushi are clustered behind Kiyoshi, and that might be why he lets them go upstairs and get Takashi’s things.

Kiyoshi goes, too, holding them close on either side. When they pass the dining room, he pushes Atsushi’s face into his shirt and angles himself so Satoru can’t get a glimpse of it either, hustling them along to the stairs.

“Niichan?”

“Don’t worry about it. Which room is Takashi’s?”

They’ve never been here before, but it’s not hard to figure out. There’s a small room with a Western-style bed and a dresser, and Takashi’s cardboard box tucked into the farthest corner. They open it to check that everything’s inside, but the picture frame isn’t there.

“Here,” Atsushi says, drawing it out from where it was hidden underneath the pillow on the bed. He opens it, and both pictures are there beneath cracked glass. Atsushi’s mouth twists, and Kiyoshi reaches over to lift it out of his hands and put it with the rest of the stuff in the box.

Satoru snatches Roar out before he can close it, and tucks the lion into Atsushi’s bag. There’s no Nyanko-sensei to be found, but Satoru wasn’t really expecting him to be hanging around.

Kiyoshi carries the box outside, and he takes them through the kitchen this time, to avoid whatever is in the sitting room that he doesn’t want them to see.

“We didn’t mess anything up,” Satoru informs the detective. The man smiles at him.

“Thank you. Can you tell us about any friends Natsume might have in the area? Is there a place he might have gone?”

Satoru and Atsushi glance at each other. Their decision and agreement come and go in the blink of an eye. Squeezing his hand, Atsushi looks up at the adults and says, “His best friends here are Ogata Yuriko, and Ogata’s soulmate Junko. They were all supposed to go to a movie today, but Takashi never showed up.”

“Ogata Yuriko.” The detective gives one of his people a sharp look and she nods, stepping away to make a phone call. “That’s very helpful. Is there anything else you can think of that we might need to know about?”

“He has a pet cat,” Satoru says. “But we couldn’t find it.”

Just like that, the attention on them draws away and the police start looking for sources of more pertinent information. They’ll probably go straight to Ogata’s house after this. The detective wants mom and Auntie to come to the station to help him make sense of Natsume’s “situation,” since there’s nothing more they can do here.

Satoru tugs on Kiyoshi’s jacket while their parents are distracted. “Can me and Acchan go to the conbini real quick?”

“What? Why?”

“We’re hungry,” Satoru lies. “We didn’t eat lunch.”

Kiyoshi shifts the weight of the box in his arms, looking uncertain. “Let me ask mom, okay?”

But there’s very little their parents wouldn’t agree to right now, and they all look slightly guilty that they forgot to feed the boys in their mad rush to get here. Auntie makes Atsushi prove that his phone battery is most of the way full, and mom has them recite the address of the police station just in case.

Atsushi and Satoru head for the conbini, turn the corner, and break into a run right past it.

This city is bigger than Hitoyoshi, but not by much. They know their way around. Takashi’s favorite place isn’t Ogata’s house, since her mother doesn’t approve of him at all, and it definitely isn’t any of the places popular with his classmates, since they’re all wary of him.

It’s a temple a few blocks away, off a busy street and up a long, long row of concrete steps. There’s a stone guardian that Nyanko-sensei says has an attitude problem, even after Satoru gave it a tennis ball to chew on, and a wooden shinto shrine that Takashi likes to curl up inside of for naps when he can’t sleep at home.

The police can check all the other places, and Atsushi and Satoru will check the most likely one. It’s only fair.

They run up the stairs as quick as they can, legs and lungs burning by the time they reach the top. A steady breeze helps them along, guiding them towards the shrine, and Satoru can already make out the pastel pink of the jacket Mana picked out for Takashi’s birthday last year. His heart leaps into his throat.

“Okashi!” Atsushi sobs out, clambering up the wooden platform. But before they can reach him, something buffets them back. A battering wind that bites at their hair and their clothes, sending dead leaves skittering across the stone, howling like a living creature.

Something invisible sits in their way, curled around Takashi with bared teeth. Satoru clenches his fists.

“You’ll have to be a lot scarier than that, stupid Nyanko!” he shouts above the noise. “If you think we’re just gonna sit here while you hide Takashi away then I’m gonna find a way to seal you into another ugly statue if it’s the last thing I do!”

This time, when he pushes through, the wind parts. He falls forward onto his hands and knees, and Atsushi’s right there beside him. Takashi doesn’t stir, battered face slack and peaceful in what must be a deep sleep.

Atsushi’s shaking so bad it’s a wonder he manages to pick up one of Takashi’s hands, but he does. “He’s okay?”

With a poof, and a bit of smoke that clears away quickly, a familiar fat cat appears. Its eyes are a brighter green than they usually are, and its curled smile looks like it belongs in a book about dangerous predators, but it settles against Satoru’s knee with a huff.

“He’ll be fine. A lesser god owed me a favor and spared his life.”

That’s a statement that Satoru will think about a lot over the years, but for now all that registers is the first part. Satoru has spent all day feeling disjointed and adjacent to himself, a balloon with just his brain inside floating above his body where all his feelings were. But now he’s sinking, now he’s back, now everything is flooding together from where it was stacked safely apart.

Now he’s crying, really crying, great big gulping sobs. Takashi is here and he’s fine but Satoru is crying like he’ll never be able to stop.

“I forgot how long it takes humans to get from one place to another,” Nyanko-sensei says grudgingly. It’s as close to an apology as they’re likely to get. “It took you this long to show up, I thought you must have had better things to do.”

“You should know better, stupid cat,” Atsushi says without heat. “He’s half of who we are.”

He’s so relieved he can barely sit up straight, listing into Satoru’s side. He has Takashi’s hand pressed to his cheek, and his other arm is wrapped around Satoru’s shoulders. He looks like he’d be happy if he never moved from this spot for the rest of his life.

“He’ll sleep until your doctors can treat him,” Nyanko-sensei says, more patient than usual. “He won’t feel any pain until he wakes up. There are still some broken bones, but nothing he won’t heal from. For a human, he’s strong.”

Satoru has to be the one to make the call, because Atsushi isn’t budging. Their family is frantic and can’t seem to decide whether they deserve scolding or praise so what they get is a mix of both. The paramedics arrive, and check Takashi’s head and spine before lifting him up onto a stretcher. Atsushi and Satoru follow them down the steps and into the ambulance waiting on the street, and if one of the EMTs gives them a lingering look for the fat cat in Satoru’s lap, she doesn’t say anything.

Takashi gets whisked away to the ICU and a few people make valiant attempts to remove Nyanko-sensei from the waiting room, but once Auntie and mom and Kiyoshi and the detective all arrive looking ready to go to war over even the smallest cause, the nurses seem to collectively decide the better part of valor is just leaving the cat alone.

“Frankly, it’s a miracle,” the ER doctor tells the grown-ups in a low voice. Kiyoshi isn’t even pretending not to eavesdrop, so Atsushi and Satoru do, too. “I’ve never seen anything like it. With the number of breaks in his ribs and their placement, we should have seen injuries to surrounding organs, almost certainly a punctured lung. As it is, there’s only soft tissue damage. He won’t even need surgery. But I’ve treated people who’ve come out of car accidents looking better than that child does,” he adds in a hard voice. “If you need a statement from me, a testimony, anything, you’ve got it.”

“Thank you, doctor,” the detective says, clasping his hand. “I’ll hold you to that.”

“When can we see him?” Satoru asks, loud enough to be heard from where he’s sitting across the room, dashing away the polite illusion of their conversation being in any way private. Kiyoshi winces a bit, but Atsushi just leans forward a little to see around him, looking as expectant as Satoru.

The doctor says, “You know what? I’ll make an exception for you two. I’ll take you to him right now.”

They don’t need any more encouragement than that. They jump off their seats and Satoru hefts Nyanko-sensei up a little higher in his arms. The doctor gives the cat a strange look, but Auntie murmurs something about a companion animal, and the doctor’s face clears like that makes perfect sense.

They follow him through a busy hallway, around a lot of medicine carts and past a lot of rooms, until they come to a door with a placard that says “Natsume Takashi.”

“We moved him from intensive care, but he’s still sleeping,” the doctor says quietly. “He probably won’t wake up tonight, but he’ll hear you if you want to talk to him. Go on in.”

The room is very quiet. A monitor beside the bed is beeping, its screen displaying a jagged line bouncing up and down in neat little peaks. Takashi’s bed is propped up in a broken L, probably to make it easier to breathe. His long hair is brushed back from his face, and there’s a square of gauze over the torn corner of his mouth.

He looks delicate and hardly human. The curve of his cheek beneath Satoru’s fingers is soft.

“Hi, pumpkin,” he whispers. “We came to get you.”

#natsume yuujinchou #natsuyuu #kitanishinatsu #nishimura satoru #kitamoto atsushi #natsume takashi #ogata yuriko #nyanko sensei #my writing #natsuyuu fic #empty hands

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thisdiscontentedwinter · 6 years ago

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Baby Daddy - Chapter 4

You can find the rest on AO3 here, or the Tumblr Chapter Index here.

“I’m sorry?” Peter says, and blinks once, and then twice. “You need eight thousand dollars for what now?”

Laura sets her beer down on his coffee table, and he doesn’t even complain that she’s not using a coaster. “To buy semen.”

Peter hold up his finger for a moment, and then consults his phone. He taps away at it for a moment, before looking up again. “Semen doesn’t cost that much.”

“That’s your problem with this?” Laura asks curiously. “The price?”

“That’s the problem I have as your left hand,” Peter says. “It’s my job to make sure you’re not getting cheated. I haven’t even got started yet on the problems I have with this as your uncle.”

“That’s fair.” Laura inclines her head in a brief nod. “And, as your alpha, I’m telling you that it’s time to rebuild the pack.”

“I agree,” Peter says, his sharp blue gaze fixed on her. “And as your uncle, I’d tell you there are ways to do it that don’t involve paying some stranger for semen.”

“He’s a friend,” Laura says. “We have the money, and he needs the money.”

“A friend?” Peter presses. “Does he know about us?”

“No.”

Peter narrows his eyes. “Will he know about us?”

“No.” Laura resists the urge to flash her eyes at him. Her mother always used to say that a good left hand challenged their alpha, and Peter is nothing but challenging. And better that it comes from him than from anyone else. Peter’s jabs will make sure that Laura knows she can defend her position. “And he won’t.”

“And what if the baby is a werewolf?” Peter asks curiously.

“He won’t know that,” Laura tells him. “If we do this, he’ll sign away all his parental rights.”

Peter’s silent for a long while before he speaks again. “I’d almost prefer it was a stranger, then. Less messy. You realise your friendship might not survive this?”

Laura ignores the flutter of anxiety in her stomach. She likes Stiles, and she doesn’t want to lose contact with him, but she’s realistic enough to know that it might be too weird, for both of them, to have him hanging around when she has the baby.

“Why not a stranger?” Peter asks.

“I don’t know.” Laura shakes her head slightly. “I just really like his scent. It reminds me of all the things I miss about growing up. It’s weird, but he smells a little like pack.”

Peter tilts his head. “Then why are you paying him and not seducing him?”

“Ew! No!” Laura picks up her beer and takes another swig. “He’s like a little brother, not a…” She tries to imagine it—Stiles naked—and her brain just refuses. She snorts. “Not a mate. No, that would be too weird.”

Peter leans back in his chair. “And speaking of little brothers…”

Laura’s heart sinks.

Peter raises his eyebrows. “Derek’s not going to take this well.”

“Derek doesn’t take anything well,” Laura murmurs. There’s no heat behind the words, only the customary ache she feels in her chest when it comes to her brother and beta. “But it’s time to rebuild the pack, Peter. You’ve said that yourself. And I really think this is the best way. Sometimes I look at him and I think he’s almost an omega. I couldn’t add an adult to the pack, not without him feeling like he was being pushed aside for a new beta. It’s got to be a pup, Peter, not a beta.”

Peter is silent again, staring off into the middle distance. He’s quieter than he was before the fire and the coma, and Laura isn’t sure if that’s because of the trauma he’s suffered, or if it’s just because his relationship with her is different than the one he had with her mother. As Talia’s left hand, Peter had been fiery, sharp, and quick to judgement. With Laura he is slower and quieter, and she sometimes thinks that’s for her benefit. That he’s being patient with her, and letting her find her feet as his alpha. A part of her—the alpha—thinks it should rankle. But the rest of her remembers all the times Uncle Peter helped her climb up high, or held her hand so she didn’t stumble, or carried her piggyback so she didn’t get left behind.

And it’s hard, sometimes, to be both his alpha and his niece. It’s a balancing act she’s not sure she’s got the hang of yet.

There’s the betrayal too, and sometimes it still lies heavily between them.

Laura left him, and he went mad with pain and grief and loneliness, and if she hadn’t stepped back quickly enough that night in the Preserve, he would have killed her.

Peter exhales slowly, and leans forward again. “I think you’re right about bringing a baby into the pack instead of an adult. I also think you should reconsider whether or not you want to risk losing your friendship with this boy.” He inclines his head. “But you’re the alpha, and if you decide to do this, then I’ll support your decision.”

Laura understands his reticence. She knows there’s a good chance this will mess up her friendship with Stiles. The dumb irony of it is, though, that if Stiles wasn’t the kind of guy who’d get emotionally invested then she wouldn’t want his baby anyway. But his scent… there’s something so right about it. Her instincts are telling her that this is what she needs, what the pack needs.

She holds Peter’s gaze. “I’m doing it,” she tells him firmly.

He nods, his expression softening. “Then I’ll arrange to have the money made available.”

***

Derek gets in from work at dawn, and Laura lays awake and listens to him climb the steps. Then she hears the snick of his bedroom door, the rustle of clothing, and the creak of his mattress as he climbs into bed.

She sometimes feels as though he’s as much of a ghost as her siblings that died in the fire. They inhabit the same spaces, but Derek just drifts through them, doesn’t he?

Laura’s tried to talk to him before, but it’s as though she just can’t connect with him anymore. As though she reaches and she reaches, but her fingers pass right through him. She doesn’t know what to do to bring him back when he won’t talk and he flinches away from physical contact.

She doesn’t know how to stop him from fading away.

***

Peter is nothing if not thorough. Two nights later, when Derek’s at work, he turns up at the loft with eight thousand dollars in cash in a Hello Kitty backpack.

Laura blinks at it, but no, it still doesn’t make any sense.

“Briefcases are so cliché,” Peter tells her with his customary smirk. “Now, I know this is something you want to do for your friend, but you’re not going to pay if he’s shooting blanks, I hope.”

“I didn’t really consider that.”

“Well, you should,” Peter says. “So I would suggest you offer him a few hundred up front, and the rest if it takes. I also spoke to a lawyer friend of mine and he’s emailing me a contract that should cover everything you need, up to and including what happens in the event that you, me and Derek all die and leave the child with no other family.”

A chill runs down Laura’s spine, and she wishes that scenario didn’t seem quite so possible. “That’s not going to happen.”

“Of course not,” Peter says. “But if it did, you need to think about who you would want the child to go to. The father?”

“I don’t know.” Laura rubs her chest to ease the sudden tightness there. “I don’t know?”

“Then think about it,” Peter says softly. “You plan for the worst and hope for the best, Lulu.”

God. He hasn’t called her that since she was still wearing pigtails.

“I still have Satomi Ito’s number somewhere,” Peter continues. “You probably don’t remember her very well, but I think you met her a few times. She’d certainly be at the top of my list when it comes to guardianship, since you can’t really just drop a child who is likely to be born a werewolf into the system, or into his biological father’s human family.”

Peter has a point.

And he’s not talking about some car accident or something in this scenario, is he? If the worst was to happen then it would be because of hunters, and the baby would be safer in an established pack than with Stiles and his invalid father.

“I remember Satomi,” Laura says softly. “Should I contact her or…”

“I’ll take care of it,” Peter says.

“Thank you.”

“It’s my job,” Peter says, his mouth quirking with the hint of what might even be a genuine smile. “Alpha.”

***

Laura falls asleep on the couch, the plum-colored cushions jammed under her head and the not-quite-clashing olive throw rug pulled over her. She wakes up when she hears the loft door slide open with a screech, and blinks in the gray, washed-out light of an overcast dawn.

Derek closes the door again, and moves into the kitchen. The loft is open plan downstairs, so Laura can see him. He’s illuminated for a moment in the light from the refrigerator—the sharp angles of his face, his stubble, his green eyes that are all the colors of the Preserve at once—and then he grabs a soda and closes the refrigerator door again. The kitchen is plunged back into gloom.

He leans against the sink to drink his soda, all tense broad shoulders and leather jacket, and Laura wonders what happened to her little brother who was so loose-limbed and quick to smile.

She remembers how good he was with Cora and the twins when they were small. Remembers how he’d let them crawl all over him, and how he’d blow raspberries on their tummies as they shrieked with laughter. How he was the one who liked to watch the babies get their baths, or have their diapers changed. How he’d forestall any tears by shaking rattles for them, and tickling toes. Laura, when she was a kid, was always bored with babies. They didn’t do anything. Derek was a nurturer.

She wonders if Derek will remember how to be like that with a new baby in the pack.

“How was work?” she asks, her voice barely more than a whisper in the dawn.

“Good.” His usual monotone.

He rolls his shoulders, puts his soda can in the trash, and climbs the stairs to his room.

***

The bells on the door jangle as Stiles steps inside the diner, tugging his plaid shirt around him as the wind attempts to dislodge it. There’s a leaf stuck in his hair.

He sidles up to the counter, and sits on one of the stools. Spins back and forth on it for a moment.

“Hey,” Laura says, when she’s cleared the customer waiting for a takeout coffee.

He smells like sour anxiety and adrenaline. His face is pinched pink from more than the wind outside. “So, um, have you got that contract for me?”

Laura fetches it from under the counter and sets it down in front of him.

It’s only two pages, and it’s written in easy-to-understand language. No fine print or disclaimers or legal jargon to confuse them with. Stiles reads it slowly and silently, chewing his bottom lip as he does.

Laura pretends not to watch him as she sweeps a cloth over the counter, swiping crumbs away.

Stiles looks up. “Full disclosure. I have ADHD. Also, my mom died of frontotemporal dementia, and my dad was, um…” He clears his throat. “He drank too much for a while. Like, genetically, I’m not exactly a prize.”

“It’s fine,” Laura tells him. “None of that is a deal breaker to me, Stiles.”

She’s a werewolf. It’s likely her baby will be a werewolf too. And even if it isn’t… Stiles is smart and cute and funny and he smells like home. Her wolf is drawn to him, and Laura hasn’t felt so certain of anything in a very long time.

Stiles nods. “This is going to change things between us, isn’t it?”

Laura’s heart sinks. “Probably.”

“Like, you won’t want me washing dishes here anymore?”

“The point of the money is so you don’t have to do that,” Laura tells him. “You can actually get more than five hours sleep a night.”

“Right,” Stiles says, and his throat clicks as he swallows. “Right. I can still study here though, right?”

“Yes.” Laura can barely breathe as she watches him pull a pen out of his backpack.

“Hey, Harold,” Stiles calls to the old drunk in the corner booth. “Want to be our witness?”

Laura’s heart swells.

***

Mieczyslaw Stilinski.

Hours later, when the diner is empty and even old Harold has left to stagger home. Laura stares at the signature scrawled on the bottom of the contract, tears stinging her eyes, and wonders if he even knows what a gift he is giving her.

#sterek #baby daddy #my fics #discontentedwinter

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halcyonnhood · 6 years ago

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Crash Into Me //Luke Hemmings // (Ch. One)

pls leave me feedback, i’m desperate lolz

Chapter One

“Amelia, rounds are in eight minutes”

Amelia Callahan isn’t too pleased to find herself sleeping in an on-call room for the fourth night in a row. No one mentioned that part of “the grind” would include never going home and everlasting exhaustion. She just wants to sleep in her own bed and to eat something other than dreary cafeteria food. Shes only further annoyed by Benjamin Cox poking her cheek until she blinks lazily at him.

“C'mon, you gotta get dressed” Benjamin tells the sleepy girl.

“I’m already in scrubs” Amelia swats his hand away.

“Clean scrubs?”

“I said I’m in scrubs” She sends him a quick, pointed glare.

Apparently showing up to rounds first still wont win you brownie points from Stephan Barnes. The interns are buzzing with excitement, it’s finally time to change rotations and Amelia is ready for the change. She is tired of Cardiology and its horrid residents. All of the residents were too focused on making her life hell rather than teaching her anything useful. Nowdays she just swerves anyone from cardio.

“Callahan, Cox and Watson you’re in the Emergency Department.” Dr.Barnes nods at them over his clipboard.

“You'v-” Emily begins to argue, but is quickly cut off.

“No whining unless you want a months worth of doing nothing but notes and discharges” Dr.Barnes sighs. “Sanders, you’re in Pediatrics.”

Amelia wants to do nothing but scream and rant about the rotations. She has worked her ass off trying to get the service she wanted, but Molly Sanders gets Pediatrics instead? Unfair and biased. While Amelia sleeps, eats, and breathes the hospital, Molly probably sucked off the attending to get her preferred service. It makes her want to rip her own hair out, if sucking a forty year olds dick is what it takes to get favoritism, shes tempted. Instead, she just huffs towards Emily and Benjamin and tries to remember that at least she has class and sophistication. Sophistication with day old scrubs and messy hair, but it still counts.

“What are you waiting for? Find your residents!” Dr. Barnes shoos the interns away.

Amelia and Emily are unhappy about the Emergency Room service, but Benjamin is absolutely ecstatic, he LOVES emergency medicine. So, while hes practically jumping out of his scrubs in excitement, the two girls take the long way to the nurses station. By the time they reach their destination, the resident is waiting patiently. She decides that he looks kind enough, maybe they’ll get off easy with him and after shes done she can nap. One could only have such high hopes.

“I get THREE of you!? What a good surprise!” The resident grins. “I’m Dr. Ryan Thompson”

“Emily Watson, Amelia Callahan, and Ben Cox.” Emily gestures to all of them.

“Nice to meet you! So, listen, usually I’d start you on papers and scut work…But we’re really backed up, so I’ve sorted some easy cases for you. Page me if needed” Dr. Thompson hands them the folders before rushing away.

“Fucking jackpot” Emily grins at her two best friends. “First ER day and we get our own cases!?”

“We’ve been blessed” Benjamin laughs loudly and agrees.

Amelias first case was an old woman with COPD, it was a simple in and out after listening to her wheezy, rattling lungs. All she needed was some albuterol and a heavy dose of steroids and then the nurses discharged her. The second case was just as routine, a child with strep. So she orders the screaming child some antibotic syrup and cough syrup then sent them on their way. So far, she was bored out of her mind. That is until Thompson drops by the nurses stations and plops another folder on her stack. She glances over the admission and nurses notes and it immediately peaks her interest. A twenty two year old with what appears to be a Traumatic Brain Injury with a persistent headache. It’s her own jackpot, something that isn’t dull and usual.

When Amelia rounds the corner to room 20a, she hears nothing but shouting and crashing from within the room. She knocks on the door once and with no response, she cracks the door open to find four boys shouting at each other. On the floor lays one of the side tables and one of the boys. The first one to notice her standing there is a tall, tan boy who just watches her with wide eyes and an “oh, shit” expression. When the other boys notice, the boy on the ground just starts laughing a high pitched giggle and turns back towards the tan boy.

“God damn it, Calum. I told you the nurses would notice” The boy huffs in between giggles.

“Sorry about the mess, I’ll clean it up!” The boy, now named Calum says quickly.

“I don’t care about the mess” Amelia sighs narrowing her eyes at the giggly boy. “But I’m not a nurse”

The boy turns slightly, face twisting in surprise as he glances at her tag. “Oh, man. I’m sorry”

“It’s cool, I get it a lot.” Amelia just shrugs. “Dr. Amelia Callahan.”

“Ashton” The boy greets. “Also, Calum, Michael, and sick boy Luke”

“Nice to know he brought support…Very loud support.” She just shakes her head. “So, Luke update me on what happened.”

“We were playing soccor and Calum accidently kicked me in the head when I tripped..Which caused me to hit my head off the pavement.”

Amelia focuses on the boy sitting crosslegged on the hospital bed, his honey brown curls falling into his face and his face blushed a soft pink as he explains the accident. His blue eyes dart from her and then to Calum, she can see that he’s nervous. She can also see the dark blue and purple mark forming across his pale forehead.

“Can I ask you a few things while I check you out?” Amelia questions.

“Uh, yeah.” Luke shrugs.

“When did this happen?” She asks while she flashes her penlight into both of his eyes. She finds one pupil is dilated while the other is not.

“About two hours ago, I’ve had a headache since” Luke squints at the bright light.

“Any other symptoms?” She observes the contusion up close, purple and blue spreading around the sight of impact. “Confusion, dizziness, nausea?”

“I’m nauseous and dizzy, but I thought that was from the headache” Luke mumbles quietly realizing it wasn't the headache at all.

“So, I believe you have a grade two concussion, which earns you some nice CT scans and a couple hours chilling here with me.” Amelia smiles at the blonde boy. “You have a contusion and anisocoria, which is the main indicator of a concussion. I’ll get you some pain meds and something for the nausea. You’ll feel brand new!”

When Amelia exits the room to go make the notes and place Luke’s orders, she isn’t expecting Benjamin waiting for her by the door. The babyfaced, brunette boy is trying to peak through the door when she notices HER charts tucked in his hands. She can feel her face blushing with anger at the sight, but he just grins at her innocently.

“What do ya need, Ben?” Amelia questions. She tries to steady her tone and not lose her temper.

“Trade me cases.” Benjamin says bluntly. His smile is devilish and mischievous.

“Uh” She shakes her head. “No”

“Why not?”

“It’s my case, Ben. You have your own” She snatches the folder back away from him.

“But it’s Luke Hemmings” Benjamin whines loudly.

“And? Stop reading my chart.” She glares at him.

"I didn't read the chart" He bats his eyelashes in an attempt to distract her.

"Then you wouldn't know his name!"

“He’s in a band, Amyyyy” Benjamin pouts at her “I wanna meet him”

“Don’t exploit my patients, Ben. I’ll report your ass”

“No you won’t” He challenges.

“Stay out of my charts and leave Luke alone” Amelia ushers him away from the room. “I’ll kick your ass myself”

To say shes confused is an understatement. Benjamin, one of her dearest friends is fangirling over a patient. A patient that is supposedly in a band and she has no clue what band it is, has she heard of them? Will other people find out? Will she actually have to kick Bens ass to keep his fangirl ways at bay? So many questions and potential issues pop up within a matter of ten minutes. Apparently Amelia has a lot to catch up on while Luke is getting his scans done.

Tags: I'm just gonna tag @beysenpai cause I told them about this idea first ages ago.

#luke hemmings #ashton irwin #michael clifford #calum hood #luke 5sos #ashton 5sos #michael 5sos #calum 5sos #5so fanfiction #5sos #5 seconds of summer #5 seconds of summer fanfiction #luke hemmings fanfiction #luke hemmings imagine #luke hemmings blurb #5sos blurb #5sos imagines #send me an ask or just ask to be tagged??

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thecloserkin · 6 years ago

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book review: Mira Grant, Feed (2010)

Genre: Sci-Fi

Is it the main pairing: Yes

Is it canon: No

Is it explicit: No

Is it endgame: Yes

Is it shippable: Hell to the yes

Bottom line: Creepily Codependent Siblings Survive the Zombie Apocalypse! They are adopted but the way they refer to each other as “my brother” and “my sister” when they could have used given names instead? I am here for it. While tight plotting is not one of this book’s strengths, you should slog through the infodumps to the ending which packs one hydrogen bomb of an emotional wallop.

This is the first book in the “Newsflash” trilogy about a pair of journalists, Georgia and Shaun Mason, who begin by blogging out of their parents’ basement and end by uncovering a vast governmental conspiracy subtended by various alphabet-soup agencies. The zombie apocalypse itself happened 23 years ago, and it happened the way these things invariably happen: Scientists try to cure cancer/the common cold, unleash freak virus on humanity, cue end of the world as we know it. Georgia and Shaun are the paradigmic products of this remade world: They, like many children born in and around the chaos of the outbreak, were orphans. On their adoption papers their birthdays are given as the same day—an arbitrary made-up date, but it makes them twins even if George is def a few months older. She acts older too, acting as the business brains of their fledgling journalistic operation while Shaun’s job is to “poke dead things with sticks” and look good while doing it. There is a performative aspect to Shaun’s mugging for the camera and flirting with anything in a skirt. He’s doing it because outrageous behavior garners them more hits, obviously, but he’s also doing it for George who gets a kick out of watching him charm the pants off people. She is bemused but not remotely threatened. George is all-business all the time, emotionally guarded and wary of physical contact, and one time when someone tried to hug her Shaun smoothly stepped up to intercept the hug to spare her the discomfort of enduring it. I SCREAMED. Note that George doesn’t mind being touched if it’s Shaun doing it:

I shuddered. Shaun caught the gesture and put a hand at the small of my back, steadying me. I flashed him a smile.

Shaun put a hand on my knee, steadying me, and I covered it with my own.

These small moments of tenderness punctuate an endearingly banterful sibling rapport. This is them reacting to the news of their big break—they’ve been tapped to cover the presidential campaign of an idealistic Wyoming senator:

Shaun was sure we’d get it. I was sure we wouldn’t. Now, staring at the monitor, Shaun said, “George?” “Yeah?” “You owe me twenty bucks.”

This is George shooing Shaun out of her room so she can change her clothes:

I pointed to the door. “Get out. There’s about to be nudity, and you’ll just complicate things.” “Finally, adult content! Should I turn the webcams on?”

This is big sister Georgia mocking Shaun for his youthful indiscretions:

”Remember how pissed you got when we had to do all that reading about the Rising back in sixth grade? I thought you were going to get us both expelled.”

In conclusion I love them sfm they are perfect.

As an aside, the people tagging this book “horror” on Goodreads have either not read the book (which is legit, TBR piles are a thing) or don’t understand what horror is? It’s like they saw the word “zombies” and just auto-completed the genre. What defines horror is not blood, gore, or violence but the fear and loss of agency engendered by that violence. That’s why so many horror film protagonists are women, who experience loss of agency in large and small ways on a daily basis and must learn to survive in the face of it; it’s cathartic to watch them take back control. The point of this digression is that THIS IS NOT A HORROR NOVEL. It’s not about that kind of fear!!! This is a political thriller so buckle in kids we’re going for a ride.

Twenty-three years ago during the outbreak, Georgia and Shaun’s parents lost their eight-year-old biological son. He was bitten by the neighbors’ dog. This was before it was widely understood that the virus could jump between mammalian species, and that anything surpassing the 40 pound threshold was susceptible to its effects. The dog weighed over 40 pounds. The Masons, who were award-winning reporters in their own right, dealt with their grief by channeling their emotional resources into chasing the news ratings. They continued to be phenomenally successful journalists as well as shitty parents to Shaun and Georgia, whom they seem to have adopted entirely for publicity purposes. The narrative invites us to draw the comparison between George and Shaun, who have chosen to pursue this career out of a thirst for THE TRUTH, and their parents who have less lofty motivations. Not to put too fine a point on it but their parents are mercenary motherfuckers. These kids survived their childhood by building an emotional bunker that they never learned to climb out of. This line from the very first chapter is so telling because they’re out in the field and Shaun is being chased by a zombie right?:

I screamed, images of my inevitable future as an only child filling my mind.

When Shaun’s in mortal peril, Georgia doesn’t think of him as “the center of my universe”— which he is—she thinks of the void that would result in the loss of her brother. That’s how they fit together, that’s what they are to each other, and all the other stuff is layered on top of the shared trauma of their childhood. Ffs they even have a ritual for administering each other’s blood tests—you know that thing at wedding toasts where the bride and groom loop their arms together and tip the champagne flute into the other’s mouth? Like that:

Moving with synchronicity born of long practice, we broke the biohazard seals and popped the plastic lids off our testing units

So the protocol for taking blood tests, which everyone has to do all day long to prove they’re not infected, is to come into the foyer/antechamber/vestibule one at a time and once you test clean you proceed into the building while the next person cycles into the chamber. That way, if anyone is found to be infected, they can be isolated. Georgia and Shaun have never once complied with this rule:

Our next-door-neighbor used to call Child Protective Services every six months because our folks wouldn’t stop us from coming in together. But what’s the point of life if you can’t take risks now and then, like coming into the damn house with your brother?

Implying that if one of them ever got bitten by a zombie the other one would rather spend the rest of their short life trapped in a garage with the shambling corpse of their sibling than die in their sleep at a ripe old age. Talk about ride or die.

I said before that this presidential campaign, this is their big break as much as it is the candidate’s. Up till now George and Shaun have been blogging under the umbrella of news aggregation entities (sort of like how BuzzFeed and HuffPost and Medium are populated by user-generated content that isn’t necessarily making the content creator an appreciable pile of money), but now they’ve finally landed the story that will let them strike out on their own. One of the sharpest things about this book is how it depicts journalism as a job, and a tough one to do right. Nashville does the same thing for the music industry, and as over-the-top as that show is, it shows you the nuts and bolts of success in a profession where practitioners are supposedly driven by “passion” alone. Here the distribution of labor is skewed pretty heavily towards George:

I get the administrative junk that Shaun’s too much of a jerk and Buffy’s too much of a flake to deal with.

Buffy is their business partner and some kind of auteur hacker + tech whiz. Shaun is the public face of their media brand. But make no mistake, George is the heart and soul and brains of this operation. You see her business acumen in drive-by observations like “Replacing that much equipment would kill our operating budget for months,” or when she talks about i n s u r a n c e. And George talks about insurance a lot. She mentions how a certain camera covered in zombie body fluids is an insurance write-off, how being present in designated high-risk zones during certain times of day can triple your insurance premium, how a certain treatment for her chronic vision condition isn’t covered by health insurance. I … just wanna point out that the human race has survived a flippin’ zombie apocalypse, but the United States remains wedded to private for-profit health insurance where who and what are “covered” remains a game of Russian roulette?!! Whoever said it was “easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism” was onto something. This society is functioning cohesively enough that elections are a thing (thus, nation-states are still a thing). If you want to tell me our fragmented, inefficient, fee-for service model of paying for medical care that routinely bankrupts & kills our citizens has weathered the end of civlization and emerged intact from its ashes, you better look me dead in the eye and bring receipts.

What’s really impressive about Georgia is she’ll rattle off exactly what kind of activities (those forbidden by her journalistic licensing) will invalidate her life insurance if she’s stupid enough to get killed while doing them. From which I surmise that she and Shaun are both covered by pretty hefty policies of which they are each other’s sole beneficiary. Which makes sense, they’re in a dangerous line of work, but I feel like it’s a poor investment since whoever was left behind would be doing their damnedest to climb into the grave next to their sibling lol.

Another little requirement of the household insurance—since we leave safe zones all the time in order to do our jobs, we have to be able to prove we’ve been properly sterilized, and that means logged computer verification of our sterilizations.

George is talking about the AI that is apparently located in her showerhead that douses her with a bleach & antiseptic compound when she comes back from being in the field?? That sounds painful but what concerns me is the breathtaking scope of the Internet of Things’ penetration into her life. The AI is in the bathroom. It knows exactly where she’s been bc ofc her GPS location can be tracked via her phone, and it’s merrily sending packets of information off to …. somewhere, where it will doubtless be aggregated with all the data collected about George from other sources, and combed for patterns to predict future behavior. That’s how surveillance capitalism works. if this sounds chillingly familiar it’s because it’s already happening, it’s what the tech giants are already doing—gobbling up as much data about as many people in as many contexts as possible—and leveraging that data for profit. Privacy is a joke. George is not unaware of this, but what choice does she have? It’s either install the damn AI in her showerhead or get her parents’ homeowners’ insurance policy cancelled for being too “high risk.”

I want to circle back to George’s chronic medical condition for a sec. She’s got a disability—what’s a called a “reservoir condition” where the virus takes up residence in a body organ, in her case the retina—meaning essentially that she has zombie vision; she can see ridiculously well in low light situations but direct sunlight will blind her. She has to wear shades even indoors and is literally incapable of crying since her tear ducts are inoperative. So there’s a testy situation where a federal agent tries to get her to take off her sunglasses so he can verify her identity with a retinal scan right? And because they’re standing outside this is obviously a recipe for permanent blindness, quite aside from the fact you wouldn’t be able to get a valid scan anyway due to the virus over-dilating George pupils. But instead of checking George’s files, where her disability & its effects are prominently listed, this grunt insists on making her remove her glasses because Procedure. It’s a pretty tense moment. Shaun goes ballistic. He doesn’t physically threaten the dude, or insult his mom or anything. No, Shaun understands that he needs to make this pencil-pusher more afraid of the consequences of taking George’s glasses than of Not Following Procedure. And it works. YEET.

On the campaign trail the Senator’s aides arrange for sex-segregated hotel rooms but Shaun and George are having none of it:

On the few occasions when I’ve tried sleeping without Shaun in the next room, well, let’s just say that I can go a long way on a six-pack of Coke.

The ostensible reason the sleeping arrangements need to be reshuffled is, Buffy can’t sleep without a nightlight and George’s eyes can’t tolerate a nightlight. Clearly the real reason is George and Shaun are c l i n g y and codependent as FUCK. One night after a zombie attack and the long grueling hours of cleanup/decontamination that followed it, they actually climb into the same bed—I guess this room only had a double instead of two singles?? The scene the next morning, the two of them having predictably overslept:

“Fuck a duck, Buffy, what are you trying to do, blind her?” … Shaun, clad only in his boxer shorts, staring at an unrepentant Buffy.

So Shaun’s beef with Buffy is not that she barged in on them while they were asleep & half-naked but that she opened the curtains, thereby triggering a painful migraine for George’s sensitive eyes. Buffy explains she didn’t shake them awake because they both sleep armed, lmao. George’s disability and Shaun’s practiced ability to help her maneuver around it (like a trusty prosthetic, he’s an extension of herself) serves to highlight how in this partnership they are one unit and they know each other inside out. This is them after their close shave with the dunce who tried to take George’s glasses:

“Fuck you, too,” I muttered as Shaun got his arm around me and hoisted me away from the barn. “You kiss our mother with that mouth?” “Our mother and you both, dickhead. Give me my sunglasses.”

And this is George waking up in their hotel room, eyes squeezed shut against the glare of multiple computer screens:

He touched my hand with the tips of his fingers before he pressed my sunglasses against my palm.

This is absurdly, spine-tinglingly intimate. First he touches her hand with the tip of his fingers, the most fleeting of touches to let her know it’s him, and then he presses the glasses into her palm to restore her agency so she can, you know, open her eyes. And that earlier scene with him guiding her by the elbow in broad daylight!!! I’M NOT CRYING YOU’RE CRYING

Sometimes I can hardly believe that George and Shaun are twenty-three years old. When I was twenty-three I … was not adulting half so well as these kids. But then, giving their barbarous upbringing, that’s not surprising; my parents loved and nurtured me. When I look at George and Shaun and the successful business they’ve built and the professional relationships they’ve cultivated and their expertise and their bravery I just feel this proud parental glow you know?

I want to say a word about Senator Ryman before we move onto spoiler territory. There’s a big controversy initially about whether the Senator is “genuine” or not (spoiler alert: he is). But what does that even mean, genuine? He’s a good egg, sure, but what are his policies, none of which are explored in depth except his support for horse farms??? I’m not kidding. In a world where any animal weighing over 40 pounds is a zombie outbreak waiting to happen, it’s a controversial position to say people should be able to keep pets in residential zones. Here is how George describes our Candidate:

He’s like a big, friendly Boy Scout who just woke up one day and decided to become the President of the United States of America.

I see two major problems with this: One, they say “Personnel is Policy” so who the hell is he planning to appoint to key Cabinet positions and can he trust them to pursue rather than undermine his objectives (and does he even have a deep enough bench of people to draw on)? Two, the Boy Scouts of America are not exactly, er, unproblematic, and while it’s safe to say our faves are always problematic, I think “Boy Scout” is shorthand here for “no skeletons in his closet,” which again puts the focus squarely on his personal qualities rather than what policies he espouses. It’s great that he hasn’t cheated on his wife or his taxes. But morality and ethics are not the same thing:

Morals are how you treat people you know. Ethics are how you treat people you don’t know. Your morality is what makes you a good spouse/friend … Your ethics are what makes you a good politician … Morality dictates that you take care of your family, friends and even acquaintances first … For a large society—a society where you can’t know everyone—to work, ethics must come before morality, or ethics and morality must have a great deal of overlap. By acting morally, you must be able to act ethically.

I think we can all agree that this does not describe how our society is currently constituted, and it doesn’t describe George and Shaun’s America either. So this narrow fixation on whether individual candidates are “genuine” or corrupt imo kinda misses the point. George says:

I haven’t even been able to find proof that his campaign received funding from the tobacco companies, and everyone’s campaign receives funding from the tobacco companies.

I don’t want to undersell how important it is the guy is not taking tobacco money. But is he also eschewing Wall Street money, Big Pharma money, defense contractor money? How could George possibly have time to investigate all this dark money if she is supposed to be covering the actual campaign? Seems like it would be a lot easier to reform the campaign finance laws than to vet every single single candidate’s funding sources.

I think one reason the Senator is long on identity & personal charisma and short on policy is that he’s up against an opponent whose base of support is millenarian-fundamentalist “the Rapture is here, we’re all going to hell”:

it was either Ryman’s brand of “we should all get along while we’re here,” or Tate’s hellfire and damnation.

If that is the main faultline in society, I guess half the voters don’t really wanna hear how a given politician is planning to make a material difference in their lives, since they’ve already got eyes on the prize aka the next life.

So there you have it. George and Shaun are scrappy independent muckrakers digging for the truth. Time and again their allegiance to that holy grail overrides their concern for trivial aims like idk personal safety. There’s a vast, shady conspiracy afoot, and as our heroes get closer to it they start getting shot at. They lose comrades. None of this deters them because they are after THE TRUTH. Oh wait there is in fact one thing George values more than the truth:

”You’re more interested in your brother than figuring out the truth?” “Shaun’s the only thing that concerns me more than the truth does.”

And later:

The sight of him was enough to make my heart beat faster and my throat get tight. I knew he was wearing Kevlar underneath his clothes, but Kevlar wouldn’t protect him from a headshot.

Her first concern is always, always, for him.

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

George gets infected. That’s the denouement. George is infected and Shaun has to shoot her before she turns all the way. Every single person who makes it to this scene is just bawling by the end of it:

His lips brushed the top of my head as he bent forward and pressed them to my hair. I wanted to yell at him to get away from me, but I didn’t. The barrel of the gun remained a cool, constant pressure on the back of my neck. When I turned, when I stopped being me, he would end it. He loved me enough to end it. Has any girl ever been luckier than I am?

The reassuring pressure of the gun on the base of her neck??? Has there been a more romantic moment in cinematic history??? I THINK NOT. Shaun is a crack shot—he’s the kind of guy who caresses his guns, names them after pretty women, causes his sister to grouse about digging through a suitcaseful of his weaponry to find her clothes—and yet here he is using his gun to kill the woman he loves most in the world.

It was supposed to be Shaun. They both took it as a given that Shaun would be the one to die first. Now he has to find a reason to continue living other than the obvious (vengeance). Stay tuned for the next installment, narrated by Shaun!

#newsflesh #book review #mira grant

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