#when she can barely drag herself across the sand

[waywardstation]

okay joke idea but hear me out

PMD: everything is the same or similar except Akari is a Phione. She needs to be careful when playing around with Ingo when he is Thyplosion. Also I believe she would be spitting water at everyone being mean to him.

And once again she becomes a passenger on him as a Phione.

I don’t think things would change too much for the AU if she was a Phione, but some things would definitely be different.

Compared to an eevee, she’d probably be useless anywhere else, but I could see her being pretty helpful in water-based dungeons where Ingo would struggle more, as a sort of trade-off.

I think she would spit water at those who are rude as well; it’s annoying but it’s not harmful. The Miss Fortune Sisters (in the place of Team Skull in this AU) would probably be subjected to that a lot haha. Like you said, she’s just got to be careful not to accidentally douse Ingo’s hot spots on his back — lots of steam, and/or brief difficulty with igniting, depending on how much water is sprayed.

And I do think Ingo would have to carry her around most places. No legs and flimsy flippers make for a very slow pace on land — she’d stick herself to his shoulder like a starfish lol. And maybe stay in the bag/under his hat in hot weather.

[mvltisstuff]

hi!! i use tumblr on safari - so i’m unable to answer any messages - but i would like to put in a request for conrad fisher x fem! reader smut!

if your comfortable, could you do a imagine with an innocent/virgin reader that is constantly flustered by conrad?

thank you so much!! <<33

champagne & sunshine - c.f**

summary: request

conrad fisher x reader

a/n: i get so nervous posting smut (for literally no reason😭), but i still hope you enjoy this 🩶 warning for smut.

the bonfires were always a good time, usually. once you grow up, the hype of them dies down a bit. belly begged y/n to come, being her older sister figure. it was y/n’s birthday, so belly convinced her that it would be fun. besides, y/n’s mom had been letting her drink today, as long as she was home and with close people. y/n figured she’d leave it at that, not bothering to take anything at the party.

she threw one of the cans in the bag at the corner of the beach, avoiding the full boxes of hard seltzer as her eye landed on conrad and jeremiah entering the beach. luckily, the fire wasn’t bright enough to illuminate her bright red cheeks. she walked away from the drinks, turning away from conrad but also trying to make herself seem noticeable.

she’d grown up with the conklins and fishers next door, but she always had the biggest crush on conrad. every single time he walked in, her heart raced and almost everyone knew it. belly always teased her, someone noticing before she even knew she liked him.

conrad had always had his eyes on y/n. conrad, y/n, and steven had been the oldest, so it was usually him and her together. she acted like she barely knew him, when he probably knew her better than anyone else. now that they were both eighteen, legal adults, they could do pretty much whatever they pleased. somehow, y/n still found herself blushing like a little girl. conrad was one of the first to show her any attention. boys never cared about her at home, and he always made her feel wanted. she was always a shadow to her friends, who had guys clinging to them. she sat around with other people talking about sex and other stuff that y/n pretended to know about. it made her a little bit embarrassed, but who really cares? her whole friend group would laugh at her humorously if they found out she was a virgin, but again, who cares, right?

it wasn’t until she was sitting on the warm sand, feeling it in her hands as she slid them across the floor, that conrad sat next to her on the beach. the music was blaring, so y/n brought herself away to just observe people for a little bit. someone must’ve had the same idea if they tread all the way over to sit with her.

“you got dragged here, too?” conrad asks first.

“belly, jeremiah for you, i assume?”

“the one and only,” conrad laughs, as he kicks away an empty bottle. “you’re not drinking anything?”

“nah, i don’t really feel like it tonight. i’d rather just enjoy my birthday sober, unlike everyone else,” she tells him, pointing to the stumbling people surrounding the fire.

“you’re not the only one,” conrad says. “so it’s just us, huh?”

“y-yeah,” y/n stutters. “i mean, i didn’t even bother getting all dressed up for this shit.”

“i think you look beautiful either way,” he says, and when y/n looks up, his eyes are softly on hers, refusing to crack the shell between them. y/n pauses, looking at conrad dumbfounded. she never has boys call her beautiful, let alone the one she’s been hopelessly in love with for years. but, they always say love hits you when you least expect it. y/n thought that was a lie, but she really believed it for now.

“you too, connie,” she spits out, not bothering to change the adjective for him because everyone is beautiful. he adjusts himself to sit closer to y/n, trying to relieve some of the tension. his eyes can’t help but wander across her body, taking in every part of her that’s breathtaking to him. and the cropped tank top and shorts that she’s wearing isn’t fucking helping his case either. she’d be lying if she wasn’t checking him out, too. his sharp jawline, his hands, his radiant eyes, his lips could never be missed by y/n. someone this pretty deserves to be looked at, they both think without speaking.

“do you wanna head out? come to my place for a bit?” conrad asks, standing up and holding his hand out as she nods up at him, anticipating a night alone.

before y/n can even begin to think straight, their lips are crashed together in his car. she’s leaning over the cup holders in the center, and her hands are against his face. his hands are placed on her hips as he can’t help but steer his mind away from his tongue in her mouth. he never in a million years thought he’d see this side of her, and she never thought she’d see it in herself. she’s kissed guys before, but never this intimately. conrad pulls away, smiling against her lips before connecting them again. every single time this happens, y/n swears her heart skips a beat in the best way possible. like their lips set off fireworks in the car. they decided to leave the vehicle, climbing up the stairs, trying not to disturb the moms watching a movie. conrad places his hands on her thighs, lifting her up and placing y/n gently on his bed. he climbs up as well, letting her legs wrap around him as their kiss does nothing but intensify.

her hands roam all around his body, his waist, his shoulders, his neck. the only time they separate is for a breath of air, just until they can return again. conrad’s wander over her chest, placing one of his hands to squeeze her breasts.

“is this ok?” conrad waits for confirmation until he gets a yes. after, in response, y/n tugs off conrad’s shirt, discarding it to the floor somewhere in his room. her hands run down his back. “if you want to stop, tell me and we’ll stop the second you say it.”

“ok,” she peeps out. “but if this does go any further, i’ve never done any of… this, before.”

“we can stop, y/n, whenever you want.”

“no! no, i want to keep going. can we just, go slower, maybe?”

“anything you need,” conrad reassures her before moving down the waistband of her shorts. “can i take these off?”

“yes,” she tells him, clearly and assertively as he takes off the tank top, too, leaving her in just a gray bra on his bed.

“have you ever… ever been eaten out before?” he asks. she shakes her head no, slightly embarrassed so she puts her head down to cover it, but conrad sees right through it. “hey, look at me. you’re ok, i promise. can i keep going?”

“yeah, please,” she says, squirming in discomfort from her own arousal. the feeling is unfamiliar, wanting someone to touch her so bad as it’s at her fingertips. someone willing to love her is right in front of her. conrad begins to peel off y/n’s underwear, throwing it off the bed like his shirt, ending up somewhere on the floor. she pulls her legs apart, spreading them as conrad’s eyes fall deeper.

“god, y/n,” he says. “you’re so fucking hot.”

“conrad,” she begs, as he flattens himself down trying to ignore his own erection. he wants to pleasure her first, and knowing he’s the first one too might boost his ego a bit. but conrad would never admit that.

his face is an inch away from her pussy, beginning to kiss her inner thighs as she groans from the teasing. finally, his tongue makes contact with y/n’s slit, gathering up her arousal before swirling it around her clit. y/n’s head falls back onto the pillow again in pure pleasure, letting out a quiet moan for the first time. “oh, fuck yes,” she speaks out, making conrad try to contain a smile. he places his tongue on her clit again, moving his flat tongue up and down. he switches between those movements and wrapping his lips around it, sucking on her clit, causing her to fail at concealing her moans. y/n’s hand moves down to conrad’s hair, trying to ground herself on the bed from the ecstasy.

the second her climax starts rolling up onto her, her legs start shaking and that tells conrad that you’re close. “f-fuck, con- oh my god,” she pants out, trying to formulate words but failing. her orgasm creeps up and sends her over the edge, releasing a strong moan from her lips as she comes down from the high, his fingers are gently circling over her clit.

“that was, um, holy shit, that was amazing, conrad,” she smiles as he pulls himself back up to her.

“are you feeling alright?”

“better than ever,” she says, making conrad laugh as he moves over to his drawer. he pulls out the box of condoms before taking one out.

“do you wanna keep going?”

“yeah, i do.”

conrad moves back over, dropping his pants and rolling to condom on. y/n gazes at his length, wondering how she would be able to take it. with conrad here, she knew she would be ok, so they continued. he walks back over, pulling her legs apart and making eye contact with her again. “remember, we can always stop no matter what, ok? just say stop, and we can stop.” she nods and he leans in closer. he plants a sweet kiss on her lips before pulling away, it was her turn to smile against his lips.

once settled in between her legs, conrad begins to run his tip up her slit. he confirms that she’s doing alright and that she’s ready to keep going. after he’s aware, he slides his dick into her, making her nose scrunch and release a high moan.

“you ok?”

“yes,” she replies. “yeah, you can go faster.”

conrad speeds up his pace, thrusting himself into y/n. she didn’t feel outright pain, just discomfort. that discomfort soon turned into pleasure, causing her mouth to hang open. “you feel so good, y/n/n, god damn.”

y/n’s hand falls down to her clit, circling it until she starts to bring that now familiar feeling up. conrad continues to keep the same pace, not changing it to make her feel comfortable and in control, just as much as he is. “i’ve loved you for so fucking long,” he spits out, not thinking about his words. y/n heard him loud and clear, but she’s too distracted by her orgasm coming up.

“conrad i’m close,” she tells him.

“me too, baby,” he says, breathless. “come for me, y/n.”

her release leaves her with stars in her head, the feeling better than anything she’s ever experienced. she was always worrying about sex and what it might be like, but with conrad, he made it amazing for her. she knew he was the right guy. he brings himself down, leaning onto her as he releases himself into the condom. he pulls out of her, throwing away the condom and pulling his boxers back on. y/n grabs her underwear, as she stands up wobbly. her legs are weak from her two orgasms from conrad, making him chuckle in the corner.

“hey, um,” y/n starts. “thank you.”

“yeah, of course,” he stutters a bit, not sure of what to say but trying to still wrap his head around it. he means, he just had sex with the hottest girl in cousins, what is he supposed to say? “you know, i meant what i said. i’ve liked you so much, for a long time.”

she just stares at him, confirming that she’s not in some dream. “i’ve been in love with you since the day i first saw you on the beach,” conrad steps over to her. placing his hands back on her bare waist and kissing her passionately again. he pulls back again to sadly, break the kiss off.

“we should probably clean up a bit, before everyone comes back and yells at us for leaving,” he says, brushing a loose piece of hair behind her ear. she nods, beginning to pull the rest of her clothes on. thank god she left that party when she did, or she would still love conrad, but never say it.

[bookofbonbon]

the ground beneath our feet - aemond targaryen.

Pairing: Aemond Targaryen x Velaryon!reader (third person - no name used).

Warnings: Mention of suicide. Angst.

Summary: Your relationship with Aemond has fallen apart as the war wages on and you remain his prisoner.

Prompts: My love for you is as firm as the ground we stand on (Mary & George 2024).

Word Count: 863.

The hem of her dress dragged heavily across the darkened sand. The treacherous sea binding itself to the satin material as it rose to the bottom of her calves, reaching higher and higher as the tide came in. Each step harder than the last as her bare feet sunk further into the unsteady ground. With the shore disappearing, every new current was stronger than the last and threatened to drag her under if she wasn’t careful. 

But careful she was. Though she loved the sea as every Velaryon before her and now has, death by drowning was not high on her list of ways to die. Although, in times - such as right now - when she found herself under the steady gaze of her estranged husband, she wondered if she might let the sea consume her out of spite. Alas, it was too late as sand turned to stone beneath her feet.

Beginning her barefoot ascent to Dragonstone, she walked carefully as she made her way back to the looming castle, weary of the deep cracks in the foundation as the stone crumbled and created an uneven ground of the eroding path.

Careful more so, however, of the Targaryen Prince awaiting her company on the first landing of many. 

“Must you come out here every day?” Aemond drawls once she is within ear shot. 

Quick to anger, she feels her ears grow hot as her head snaps up from the ground. Gaze finally meeting that of the man who insisted on stalking her every move. Not once could he allow her to suffer his presence in silence. There was always something to be said. 

“Must you follow me out here every day? I’m not a child, you need not watch over me as if I am one.”

Her fury however, is met with indifference as Aemond regards her coolly. The one-eyed Prince having grown accustomed to her anger-fuelled outbursts at him- of course, that didn’t make them hurt any less. But, she was predictable and always ready to be angry with him and despite his efforts, there was no balm he could give to soothe it. So, if her anger remained the one thing that she would give then Aemond would take as much of it as he could get.  

“Had you not gotten into the habit of wading further and further into the sea, gazing longingly upon its depths as if you may opt into disappearing into it at any given moment then perhaps I would not feel the need to supervise you as if you were one.” 

There's a beat of silence. A flicker of hurt in her now glassy eyes that she tries to wash away with a thick swallow that Aemond tracks with his one good eye. He didn't like her hurt, he didn't want her pain.

“So, the sooner you begin acting within reason, the sooner you will be left to your own devices. It really is that simple,” he finishes in the hopes of raising her temper but, it does more of the opposite. 

She visibly flinches, Aemond’s dismissiveness of her suffering hitting the soft spot in the back of her throat. 

"Is it?" The question catches him by surprise, his back straightening as he stares unblinking at her. She hadn't endeavoured to ask him anything more than a mocking retort of his own questions since the war started but, there was a sincerity to her voice that demanded an answer. "Is it really that simple?"

“It is.”

Another beat as she silently regards him. 

“Do you love me still?” 

Aemond’s eyebrows furrow, scar pulling inward from the motion as he takes offense at the question. 

“Still? I never stopped. My love for you has always been as firm as the ground we stand on. It is yo-”

“So if you claim to love me so, then am I your prisoner or am I your guest?”

“Guest,” he speaks too fast, lying without thinking. 

“Guest?" she smiles sadly. "Guests may leave as they please, so can I? Can I leave as I please?”

Aemond’s throat dries. The question hangs heavy in the space between them as he flounders for something to say, mouth agape but no sound coming out; the winds whistle and the crashing of the waves the only thing to be heard.

“Answer me, Aemond.” 

The shake of his head is slight but not un-noticeable. 

Aemond didn’t want her pain but it is all he got as it spills over and onto her cheeks.

"I take no pleasure in your captivity," Aemond tells her softly.

But then a sound, a sound he had not heard for a long time - a laugh. It’s slight and it's broken and it's watery and one clearly reserved only for herself but, a laugh nonetheless as she gestures to the ground around them. 

At the deep cracks in the foundation, at the fragile stones that bowed and bent and broke and created an uneven and unstable ground of the eroding path with each passing day.

“Look around you, Aemond,” she sighs. The same sad smile stretched across her lips. “The ground is not firm, it has crumbled beneath our very feet.”

-

All fics are my own work - I have not posted my work anywhere else.

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters/places mentioned above.

Do not copy. Do not translate. Do not repost.

bookofbonbon 2024. All rights reserved.

[peggyao3]

Pt. 5 - Rough Sex

A/N: woof woof bark barkkkk 😩

TAGS: she/her AFAB FMC, very dub-con, dom!Feyd, power imbalance, "pet" nickname

Word Count: 400

The dust and air of the arena trail after him like the tendrils of a cloak when Feyd-Rautha enters the bowels of the gargantuan structure, cold air on his skin, but not cold enough to cool him. One battle won, the next battle awaits.

His pet concubine awaits him at the center of the room, her hands unbound, her flesh naked like a meal. Feyd banishes her handlers with a jerk of the head and they retreat from the chamber like shadows. 

Her pretty eyes glide over his bare torso, the sweat-smeared residue of battle paint that streaks down his twitching belly, the white sand that sticks to his bulging muscles, swollen from adrenaline and the thrill of the kill.

"Come to me and kiss my feet," he orders and is unsurprisingly met with a disdainful sneer, her haughty nose held high as if she had even the sliver of a chance to reject him.

"Go kiss them yourself," she snaps and expects him to lunge, but she hadn't thought he would be this fast.

Feyd-Rautha throws himself at her quicker than a snapping bowstring, scorching, hard muscles colliding with her clammy skin.

He throws her on her front and she catches herself just barely with aching knees and elbow, trying to drag herself away despite the pain in her joints, but Feyd-Rautha is on top of her with little patience to play with his prey today. Too big the desire to let his cock taste blood after his blade has tasted it so manifold.

Her body screams, her walls protest when he presses the head of his slick-hot cock against her entrance. But there is no mistaking the shimmer of wetness that soaks the folds of her cunt.

"You've been touching yourself to the thought of me, pet?"

"N-No-o-o!" She yelps out, rearing up only to be shoved back down with Feyd-Rautha's hand splayed across her upper back, tits squashed against the cold tiles. He sinks inside with harsh, rutting thrusts, no fingers to prepare her, not even spit from his cruel, sinful mouth.

"So you got wet all by yourself, listening to me fight?"

"No, no, no~"

"Don't lie to me, pet," he barks, blood-stained fingers twisting into the flesh of her ass. "Don't worry… I'm going to take you apart until you can only crawl."

FEYD TAG LIST

@nostalgichoya, @forgedfromthestars, @sweetiee-o, @missbingu, @minedofmoria

@sebastianswallows, @charmingballoon, @flower-frog, @welliah, @aoi-targaryen

@coastalcowgirl35, @esolean, @szapizzapanda, @tatertooted, @sunny747

@ughdontbeboring

[bumblee27]

Boo! Guess who's doing Whumptober? I hope y'all are prepared for how many times I'm going to kill off each member of Sherlock & Co. (My interpretations of prompts will definitely vary across fandoms, but it will be quite a lot of torturing the silly detectives <3) Also I apologise for the layout they're all gonna be like this :'D

• 1 • "if only we could hold on" •

It wasn't his fault. Adrenaline was coursing through his veins, blinding him to danger - as is the way of the soldier. He was so fixed on the thrill of the chase, he didn't hear Sherlock's warning shout. He didn't see the empty elevator shaft.

That is, until he was already falling.

Alarm bells of terror screamed within him, but his military reflexes threw out an arm with lightning speed to catch himself on a ledge. His whole body jolted to discover that it was no longer falling, but instead almost impossibly suspended.

He gasped for breath as he processed his situation, his heart thudding inside his chest. He had just barely managed to grab onto a part of the elevator's unfinished mechanic built into the wall. The entrance through which he had fallen was about as far away as his own height three or four times over. Beneath him was (as John perceived it) endless nothingness.

“Shit.”

He had processed it.

“Shit, shit shit shit, oh my god, oh my fucking god-”

John had always scorned the trope of seeing one's life flash before their eyes. He called it cliché. Unrealistic. But now, he watched.

As his blood pounded in his ears and he grew increasingly aware of his hand growing slippery with sweat, he watched

He saw his childhood home in Shoscombe. He saw his school friends playing in the street. He saw the way his mum couldn't help herself from crying when she told him his dad wasn't coming home. He saw Afghanistan, he saw Ukraine. He saw his comrades, little more than blurry faces now. He saw the first time he got the mic running. He saw Stamford, he saw- he watched himself meet Sherlock. That man, so strange, so - covered in blood - why did he ever go to look at a flat with him?

He almost smiled.

He was glad he did, though.

He watched himself meet Mariana for the first time, too, and the day she moved in with them. He watched every single case, one after the other, tick by. Such significant moments of his life, gone in a second like they meant nothing.

“John!”

John snapped back to reality with a start. He looked up, to see Sherlock's face staring down at him. “Take my hand!”

The outstretched arm was miles away. “I- I can't!”

“Yes, you can! Take it!”

“It's too far!”

“Reach! For God's sake, Watson, take my hand!”

John swallowed thickly, feeling strangely like he had eaten sand. “I am not dragging you down with me.”

Sherlock blinked. “What-? Don't be ridiculous!”

“You can't let him get away. Promise me you won't.”

“Take. The bloody. Hand!" John had never seen Sherlock desperate before. He was always so stubborn, so sure of himself.

He took a deep breath. “Please- please tell Mariana I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Sherlock.”

And then his hand lost its grip.

He was vaguely aware of Sherlock screaming his name, but he didn't quite register it, which was probably a good thing.

And one memory stayed firmly and vividly in his mind. It was a picture, a freeze-frame, of Mariana and Sherlock.

They were laughing.

[graylinesspam]

Beach episode with the 501st?🙃🙃

The trees were so densely packed there was no way they could get a gunship through them. Looking up you could only barely glimpse the yellow sky through the gaps between the branches.

The trees were green, but a bright burning yellow green that consumed everything in sight. Wet and glossed over in the moisture rolling in with the wind. The smell of salt brine in the air.

The leaves shuddered and shook their wet burden onto anyone within range. Like a hound shaking it's self dry.

The water dripped down their backs and chafed uncomfortably in the fabric of their clothes.

They must make it to the shore, in the line where the trees break, it was the only place they could escape the green maze. The smell of brine and the sound of birds their guide out of it.

The relief that befell them when the forest finally broke was palpable. White armor spilling out of the line of it like whites out of an egg.

That might make Ahsoka the yolk. She drops to her knees in the silty loose sand and rolls dramatically down the incline, dark sediment sticking to the moisture on her skin and shading it bizarrely in the bright sunlight.

Soldiers chuckle at her antics but more of them follow her example, sliding awkwardly down the loose ground on their heels, hands held back to steady themselves.

She sits up at the line of the water and peels her feet from her boots, shucks the skirt she wore over her leggings and practically drags herself into the water by her hands.

The water is cool. At least cooler that the air. Even thick with moisture it is boiling hot on this planet. The water congregated in the large salty pools however, were a relieving temperature.

It was dark in color, partially purple from the loose microscopic algae floating through it. The water a dark over oxygenated blue without the debris.

Vere, an older brother, stepped into the water beside her. The water rushes past his legs, running up the sand before falling back away, leaving little purple dots across the plastoid.

He heaves a sigh as he tugs his weapon from it's holster and holds it in his hands, bends at the knees and sits down in the water. His weapon kept as dry as he can manage.

Less responsible vod chuck their blasters onto the sand and start pealing away their armor too until only the bottom half remains. Their black shirts looking tight in contrast to their bulky armor. They wade into the hallows sighing in relief.

Their excitement quickly turns into playfulness as they begin to pelt each other with hand fulls of water. stray splashes flying around and spraying anyone unfortunate enough to be near them.

Ahsoka reclines in the cool water, letting herself drift slowly back and forth with the rhythm of the waves. Stretching out her sore muscles and feeling each curling caress of the cool liquid as it crested over her body and slid along her skin. Softer than silk.

Vere is vigilant as all scouts are. The sounds of the water, of shouting and merriment might reduce their ability to heat a threat coming but there isn't much that could hide from his trained eyes.

He scans their surroundings while Ahsoka's hand curls around his ankle, anchoring herself so that she wouldn't drift too far.

It's only a temporary relief from the fray. And the salt licks at their wounds with a hot tongue despite the actually temperature of the water. But it is a luxury none the less. One they intend to take full advantage of while they have the chance.

It is that urgency to make all they can of this reprieve that leads to Ahsoka herself, disturbed from her floating meditation, sitting up in the shallows and shouting.

"HEY, quit trying to drown your brother."

[picturesofthegoneworlds]

Preview for Intertwined, Chapter 17

Laudna feels like a lizard warming its blood on top of a rock, unphased by the oppressive heat. She stretches her legs out from under the shade of their improvised cover, the pallid grey of her skin further bleached by the black sands beneath.

She turns to her side to check on Imogen, fanning Laudna’s open notebook at her face with her eyes closed, muscles in her forearm flexing, hairs holding droplets of sweat like dewdrops on grass, deep freckled tan soaking sun-ray dye to a peeling red

“Your skin…”

Imogen halts, eyes opening to study her exposed forearms. She closes the notebook without ever reading the page, sets it down between them.

“Here, this is one I can share-” she declares, her drawl coloured eager.

She twists around to her rucksack, rummages through its contents briefly before unearthing a parcel with hemp string tied around a dampened cloth wrapping.

“I take a couple whenever I see ‘em, it’s hard to cover up in the heat, and long days on the fields ain’t the kindest to your skin-”

She undoes the parcel to reveal two thick leaves of aloe.

“Y’can either break a bit straight off if you've got a plant, this sorta gunk that comes out is what y’all wanna use like a moisturiser-“

She snaps a segment off from the widest part of the leaf to demonstrate, clear saliva-like substance oozing out from between the outer succulent flesh and the gelatinous centre.

“-but when y’all got quite a bit to cover I tend’ta peel off the outer green skin sorta bit and just rub it wherever I need to. It’s real refreshin’.”

Imogen takes her dagger from out of its holster and carves a clean dissecting line down the side of the leaf, peels its skin back and away in a manner familiar to flaying a fish. She presents the catch with skin held back in her out held palm

“See? Wanna touch it?”

Laudna grins enthusiastically, mentally taking notes on how to further accommodate for Imogen in the future. She nods and gently pushes the pad of her index finger onto the innards that feel like mucus-covered jelly. She supposes it must feel nice, hydrating and certainly accentuating a breeze if there were to be one, if her skin wasn’t - well, what it is. She pulls her finger away with a scrutinising tilt and crane to her head as she observes how a line of connective-tissue-gel creates a bridge between the fingertip and the leaf-innards.

bares resemblance to a sentence she has read once or twice before, to a time before transfusion.

“It looks a little vulgar.”              

Imogen’s skin manages to bloom a deeper beetroot red than what the sunburn already offered.

“wh-, Laud-  gods. I wasn’t tryna be obscene-” Imogen stutters and retracts the aloe segment in her hand, splitting the tether between it and Laudna, her movements suddenly flighty. Laudna feels a rush from influencing such manners.  

“Nothing obscene Imogen, it’s perfectly natural.” She does her best to remain stoic in delivery, though she finds the current display of behaviour both hilarious and adorable.

“I know it’s natural - it’s leaf gunk!” Laudna watches as Imogen looks to either side of herself as if scanning for a space she can retreat to - but they are surrounded by nothing except for exposed, flat, sweltering, and empty onyx desert.

“I’m not judging you for what you cover your skin with, I’m sure it is full of vitamins.”

“Stop talkin’ like that-”

“Like what?” Laudna feigns innocence

Imogen drags both of her hands over her face in flustered frustration

“like-”

“You’ve got some on your nose.”

Imogen grumbles as her skin invents a new, deeper shade of red - it sews quite the feeling of accomplishment, a high already terribly addictive.

She scowls, arms crossing and looking out across the flat landscape.

“I know you’re tryna wind me up.”

“You have quite the advantage there, but I don’t regret trying.”

“yeah, well, you succeeded.”

(you can read the previous chapters here)

[mofffun]

Kingohger Movie spoiler log

every shot and line i remember in order. reminder lines might not be 100% accurate

started with Gira staring at Rainoir's statue in the Shugoddom throne room. He looks uncertain.

Jeramie is sitting on a spider-string attached across the giant gears to the throne's right

Jeramie jumps down and asks Gira what he wants to do as King

Rita and Douga enter to tell Gira it's time for the coronation

Coronation

Ep1 Kings march scene (Kagu, Himeno, Yanma)

the three chitchat. Himeno complains about making her go outside and Kagu says it's Gira's idea to show the people their kings.

As Kaguragi sits down, a kuroko helps straigten his sleeve.

Gira arrives in Kuwagon

Ceremony starts. Gira's march is interrupted by Debonica and her song

Debonica introduces herself all solemnly as the navigator of the underworld but Gira is just happy to reunite with a childhood friend. The public looks confused.

Debonica used to live in the orphanage/grew up with Gira. She is older than Gira but always lazy and didn't help out.

"I'm here to bring Gira Husty to meet his ancestor and the 5 kings to the Underworld"

reaction shot of Yanma, Hime, Kaguragi looking interested (as if they knew??? ← my interpretation)

Debonica sings and a space whale flies them to Haaka Baaka. The whale is like a zeppelin and what hangs under is a circular disc the kings stood on (like one side of a scale). Rita keeps looking at the direction they came (their back to camera)

Gira recalls the orphans throwing a birthday party for Debonica but she never showed up. Flashback shot shows Gira waking up from a nap and in front of him on the table is the simple homemade birthday cake with a bite taken. Himeno asks if they are "just" childhood friends

Debonica seems upset and sings again, a rectangular dimension gate appears in the sky [Kagu's trailer line about Underworld's gate only opens when a new King of Shugddom is crowned]

Arriving in the Underworld

Haaka Baaka is this floating space with no up/down (a mix of zero gravity/underwater) and ghosts turn into jellyfish-like creatures and fly around. There're ruins of the five castles in the bkg.

Gira, Yanma, Rita land [trailer spinning shot]. Rita asks where did Himeno and Kaguragi go.

Ashes version of Bugnarok foot soldiers appear and attack the trio. They seem to be in a bit of trouble with each of them being grabbed by three foot soldiers or more.

[Aoto said they shot more of wings out-of-suit action here but ended up being cut. When he's in trouble from the enemy dragging his arm so hard it hurts, he turned around and saw Rita doing clean slashes and posing cooly so he felt left out 😅]

Rainoir appears and with a flick of his arm disintegrated the enemy. Each step he goes, a new block materialises from ashes under his foot.

Yanma says the Husty name with weight while Gira recognizes Rainoir as one of the heroes that saved Chikyuu 2000years ago

Debonica calls Rainoir "my king" and Rainoir invites Gira to tell him about the truth of Chikyuu's history as the new generation of Shugddom King

Yanma says "interesting" but the gate closed before he and Rita can enter

Rita: 帰るか Yanma: はやい?!

Rita: Are we leaving. Yanma: Too soon!

Gira meets Rainoir

Debonica was sent to monitor Gira but Gira still thinks of her as an older sister and makes fun of it. [Trailer line give up throne] → cut to wings scene 1

Debonica pinched Gira's cheeks and urged him to just go along like a good kid. Gira hesitates and thought Debonica was just being playful. Debonica said the moment he hesitates, he has lost the right ro be king. But it's alright because Rainoir will take over.

Rainoir explained he understood Gira is a kind person, then showed Gira a vision of people dying to persuade him into handing over the throne

Gira is still not sure because he barely had time to consider. Debonica said it's enough, sang again and a sand glass thing flipped around and they landed on the platform shown in trailer's final fight

Rainoir raised his sword on Debonica and Gira ran to block it out of reflex to his own bewilderment.

Rainoir explained since he's only a spirit so he needs Debonica's "existence" to revive in the physical realm. Gira challenged if that means Debonica will die but she disagreed angrily and insisted that it's fine because it is her destiny

Gira hesitates but took Debonica's hand and runs away

Rainoir commented there's no where to go. The Realm of Death is (a living forest?) → cut to Himeno in a forest

Wings scene

<- Debonica asks Gira to give up the throne

--part 1--

Bkg: underwater N'kosopa

Rita runs with both arms raised straight in the air. [trailer line: want to leave but no exit]

Yanma in foreground studying electronics. [Trailer line about creating a breaking point/picking a lock]

Yanma asks Rita to hand him a cable. Rita asks which one. Close up shot of Rita turning their head side to side in search

Cut to wide shot as each way Rita turns, they find themself in a new colour of a broken Saiban Court. x3 times

many many black skeletons fly towards rita, trailer shot of rita scream → cut to Gira's everyone dead vision

--part 2--

<- follows Kaguragi part 1

(Yanma and Rita are both physically in the underwater N'kosopa space but only Rita can see/hear/enter the vision of Dead Gokkan)

Rita misao pose + cover ears + heavy breathing. Yanma pulls them out of the vision by their back collar.

Rita falls back and lies on the ground facing up

Yanma: You saw something?

Rita: People I put on trial. The dead of Gokkan must hate me.

Yanma: Eh? The Chief Justice cold as ice is afraid of ghosts?

Rita: *catching their breath*

Yanma: Don't mind the things you can't see. Just take on what's in front of you now. How about that?

Rita: I, have a duty.

Yanma: Is that it? *smirk*

(cut to Rita turning towards a sky of flying screaming black skeletons) Rita: These are all, Moffun.

Yanma discovers the spider web Jeramie attached onto his waist before their departure (with a face of disgust)

-> Gira and Debonica scene

Himeno's farewell

Himeno walking in a normal forest and two jellyfish fly towards her. Her parents appear in royal attire and embrace her.

The three are framed inside an ishbana emblem petal.

Himeno: Papa, Mama, I've wanted to see you. 会えたかったよ

Papa: I am sorry (for making you wait that long). I can't let you go/ There is no way back. ごめんな　もう帰さない

environment shifts to dead forest → cut to Kaguragi

--part 2 with Sebastian--

← follow Kuroda scene

[trailer line: i came here to say goodbye.]

"Farewell without Sayonara is not beautiful." (note: sayonara means the never see each other again kind of goodbye)

Papa ghost asks Himeno to stay here forever

"My favourite things are still in Ishababna. The things I want are still plenty to come. I'll see you. bye bye." (またね is bye when you will see the person again.)

["mata ne. bye bye." is not scripted and improvised on set with director according to Erica. and the "too late" remark as well.]

Sebastian: you returned your parents' favour (恩 <- not sure how to translate it, the asian concept of that the parents' care for you is a blessing (and you should be grateful for it)) <- heard this wrong

edit post-release 6/12 : Sebastian simply said "I've come to [receive/greet] your return"

Sebastian brings her her sword and Himeno said it took him too long.

-> cut to ritamoru

Kaguragi

Toufu palace. Already burning unexplained. Iroki waits on the throne.

Iroki: Traitor. Good job stealing my country.

Kaguragi: Outono. It is you who took all the food, the life of Toufu, for yourself. It is you who betrayed the people.

Iroki: And you dirty your hands for this throne. What are you after?

Kaguragi: For the people! For my country!

*iroki evil laughs* (something about one day the same will happen to you) → cut to Wings part 2

--part 2 with Kuroda--

← follows Shiokara scene

The words are too fast for me but the meaning i get was Kaguragi reminiscing about what kind of (selfish) ruler Iroki was, but he is a man who is not afraid of dirtying his hands, that's how he earned the name of Toufu's Outono.

Kuroda does a backflip and kicks the image of Iroki into ember.

-> cut to Himeno & Sebastian

Gira and Debonica

Gira took Debonica somewhere safe and Debonica explained it was her destiny to become a vessel for Rainoir as she turns 20. That's why she never showed up at the birthday party.

Gira refused to accept and asked her to return with him

Debonica hit him and repeated that this is for the best of everyone, that this is what she wished.

The two started tickling each other. Gira said something about the cake that made her hesitate and Gira said thank you

Rainoir followed them here and asked if Debonica has made up her mind. She said yes.

→ cut to Aides scene

Aides - Shiokara

Yanma connects a cable with the spider web and succeeded in making a video call to the living world. He asks Shiokara, who had the lie detector on, to tell a big lie right now

Shiokara returns a "Now?" then do it immediately.

The lie so big that killed him is "Yanma-kun is the strongest at brawls" 喧嘩最強　ヤンマくん!

Shiokara shut the door on arrival. "DON'T!!! THAT WAS OUR WAY OUT OF HERE SUKAPON TANUKI!" "SORRY!"

the other three aides evasdrop classic three heads behind a wall style

Aides - Kuroda

Aides - Sebastian

Aides - Morfonia

Rita & Morfonia

<- follows Himeno & Sebastian

Rita heavy breathing. center close-up. hair blown by strong wind. hand cover ears. mask half down so you can see their nose and upper lip [movie still]

Morfonia: "Ritaaa~ listen closely." (ちゃんと聞いて)

Rita gasps. profile facing right took up half the screen. a small black ghost fly towards them and whispered. "Thank you, Chief Justice." ありがとう　裁判長　(you can glimpse at the blue eye through the messed up hair).

Rita relaxes stop gasping and froze.

Morfonia pulls them up by both of their wrists with a gyaaaa

Morfoina: Seems like among the dead, you are quite popular 😊

Rita nervously pulls their bangs down to cover the blue eye

-> Rainoir & Gira

Rainoir & Gira

Rainoir: Sacrificing one person can save the whole of humanity. Will you rob them of their bright future? a chance of having a family?

Gira: Is that what it was like in your time. Living in this world is hell. Future. Happiness. Those that have those set for them are only strong people like you. In this unsensible world, it's full of sadness and hurt and the unfortunate. The one that made our world like this, is the first king like you. If you think anyone can be easily sacrificed, than watch me destroy 2000 years of history. [trailer line]

Rainoir said bad guy things and "yabbari the king of chikyuu has to be me". the two fight and Debonica tries to make them stop.

Gira promises to bring Debonica back to the living world and make her another cake. She questions why for such a small thing. Gira says it's not small. In a world just like hell, it is the small happiness that gave us hope to live on. "To protect such small happiness, that is the king I will become."

Gira closes and opens his eyes again and jesus light falls onto him

Gira's hair falls down on his left (our right) and he looks SO EVILISH GOOD.

↑ basically that 'raise sword + mantle falls + rule the world speech' in tv but without mantle

the two men fight and Gira asks Debonica to choose who the Crown should go to.

the two transfroms. Rairnoir's transformation is all the ash bugs accumulate on him and he has a monster form like a gladiator.

INFERNO (movie ver.) plays

Debonica throws the crown towards Gira. "I want to live! My king is Gira!"

The others arrive and Gira & co. all say one signature line

Jeramie arrives following spider web on Yanma

Final fight

it's cool trust me.

Kaguragi butt-butting the enemy again

himerita team has three shots

blue white slash from right to left and rita shoots arrow from the opposite side

no mecha fight

soundtrack v1t1 + t24 (waking the king instrumental)

Rainoiru: That path of yours, can you save the people?

Gira: I promise, as the King to a new legacy.

Epilogue

Jeramie narrates in an empty Shugoddom throne room (kinda like ep20 end) as Coronation goes again

Orphans here. Kogane crying

trailer shots of Gira sitting on the throne

Gokkan's throne is there too and Morfonia makes Rita fake-clap by holding their hands

moments of silence when Douga puts the crown on Gira and just after he sits on the throne.

closing words from Jeramie: no one knows what will happen next. even then, he can only go forward in the path of king (王道) he chose.

no op/ed. cast & crew credits played during opening coronation scene.

Debonica eating the cake she deemed too sweet before and says shiawase.

[novantinuum]

you can’t choose what stays and what fades away OR Reunited Alt POV fic? (I am eyeing doing that tag myself except. *glances at WIP folder*)

I am wiggling about my SU wips most of all, so I’mma selecting Reunited Alt POV fic (which LMAFO I need to come up with a banger of a title for so desperately, this one is like 2/3rds done so. Yeah.

This is a simple one to explain, it’s just the battle in Reunited but from Connie’s POV- thus, it covers everything that happens while Steven gets knocked into unconscious psychic ghost zone. Or, at least, my take on what happens. But uh… yeah. Watching your friend get absolutely trampled underfoot is inherently traumatizing, and I don’t think we as a fandom talk enough about this moment and how it might’ve impacted specifically Connie. Also I genuinely honest to god think Steven was seriously hurt from this- and that some of the fractures in his bones we see in SUF were from this strike- and that the reason he took so long to come to in “psychic ghost zone” even was that all his body’s energy was being routed towards Intense self healing. So keep that in mind re: snippit below:

_

Garnet keeps a watchful eye for any incoming projectiles as Connie skids to a screeching halt next to her friend’s comatose body lying limp in the sand. Okay. Okay. Here he is. Now all she’s gotta do is… carry him to a safe distance. Steeling her core in preparation, she squats down and tries to leverage herself to scoop him right up. Her legs, though… in the midst of her terror, her legs are simply too wobbly to bear his mass, and after one valiant but failed attempt she’s scared she’ll hurt herself (or him!) trying again. Which means… she’ll just have to drag him.

“Sorry—!” she says with a faint hiss of regret as she grasps both of his arms by the wrist and starts to pull him across the battle-swept sands. Sure enough to her suspicions, one of his shoulders definitely doesn’t feel like it’s aligned in its socket right, and she worries that yanking him along like this will only serve to further exacerbate it. Still, what other choice does she have? 

What choices do any of them have, all tangled up within the fallout of this thousand year war?

Ever-diligent in her role as lookout, Garnet circles around a few more times as Connie drags Steven off the battlefield, towards what remains of his house. She’s grateful for her help. Truly so. It allows her to focus her energy on protecting her best friend instead of constantly having to keep an eye out for stray attacks from the Diamonds. And boy, oh boy— she digs her heels into the sand, spent muscles all but screaming for her to rest, to drop her load and continue on alone— will her body need every last drop of energy she’s got. That’s why relief surges through her heart with all the ferocity of a tidal wave when Mr. Universe’s frantic voice comes into range once again. Because it means she’s here. She’s succeeded. She’s pulled him all the way to the base of the stairs, out of the way.

The exhaustion hits immediately. Huffing for a lungful of air, she drops the half-Gem’s arms to the ground and collapses to her knees. For an extended moment, the unwanted melody of warfare rings through her ears like canon fire. She can’t move. She can barely even breathe. She swears her friend’s dad is trying to say something to her— can feel his hesitant touch brushing against her shoulder in what barely counts as a whisper— but she can’t even manage to distinguish a single word. Her eyes brim with fresh tears, every last sensory input overloaded. It’s all too loud. It’s all too damn heavy. It’s all too—

“Connie,” Garnet pushes through the static with astute authority. 

She snaps her head up, her eyes flitting between the Crystal Gem leader (currently kneeling at her side) and a still panicking Mr. Universe (clutching his unconscious son’s hand). Her breath settles, slowly but surely. Her fingers twitch, tracing shallow patterns in the sand. The ringing lessens.

“Thank you,” she continues, pushing herself back to her full height. The long skirt of her wedding outfit flares behind her as she glances back towards the chaos of the battle. “For protecting him where I couldn’t. Now, keep watch. If they poof all of us, promise me you’ll evacuate the beach.”

“I-I… of course,” Connie says, her gaze still wet with terror and barely contained grief. “But y-you… you don’t really think you’ll—?”

Lose, is the word she can’t bring herself to say. Surely you don’t think you’ll lose?

[daisychainsandbowties]

shannon doing that thing where you paint on your partner and painting a night sky across the expanse of mary's back

she starts with touch, pushing the tips of her fingers under the hem of mary’s shirt, tipping their mouths together. kisses without hunger - lazy, leaning into the taste of her, the sugar-malt of s'mores.

shannon prodding the fire with a stick as mary assembled them, breaking chocolate with her hands, balancing the stick on her knees with a look on her face that made shannon think of architecture, of things that are built to last.

(this is not a category that includes people, or love)

passing it over with sticky fingers. staring as mary licked them clean, warm marshmallow drooling onto the inside of her thumb. putting it in her mouth with mary watching (and that will get to her sometimes; mary’s undivided attention).

it tasted of nothing like communion. there’s a trace of it now in her mouth, in the slow-falling dimness as the fire dies.

mary kisses her back, shivering as shannon drags her nails along mary’s abs. trying not to think of how we got here, where we’re going.

how mary built the fire, kneeling in the sand dressed in her basketball shorts and a borrowed hoodie. her insistence on the right way of doing things. no driftwood, despite its color, because of chlorine ions and dioxins.

and she’s right; shannon is already full of metal, staring in the dark at veins that feel flecked with luminous blue.

(they’re not. she’s just bones and blood and paint-streaked hands wrapped around metal. and its glow is celestial)

you could make paint from divinium, suspend it in compounds. you could put it onto skin, or work it underneath. sometimes, shannon dreams of walking towards mary. they’re on the surface of a black lake, or a mirror that reflects the sky. stars at their bare feet disappearing into ripples.

she dreams of walking. mary stands, waits, her face half-upturned. she’s beautiful, and the only thing for miles and miles.

her skin starts to glow, lines of light erupting, starting in her outstretched hands. lancing over knuckles and into the secrecy of her forearms, her chest.

like all dreams it has teeth and it draws blood and shannon never shows anyone the wounds.

so often she feels as though she’s casting a great dark shadow over everything. she doesn’t want mary to catch light, but set against the fire she is so much like a painting. there are views that make you want to look forever, and others that fill you with a wild longing to preserve, to capture. mary is both.

but shannon’s trying to teach herself to let go.

the hoodie - theirs, ours, other lines that have blurred between us - is laid out on the sand next to a blanket. shannon takes mary’s shirt off, pulling it over her head, feeling how she lifts her arms to let it happen. pliant, tilting forward so her bare skin touches the worn fabric of shannon’s tank top.

she wraps her arms around mary, hands seeking out the familiar plane of her spine. the firm muscle over her hips and her waist, where the contact drags a shaky breath out of her, exhaled onto shannon’s neck.

‘i love you.’ she traces her thumbs into the dip underneath mary’s ribs. all these spaces you never think about until they’re laid bare. it occurs to her that a person is a miracle especially when they give you everything.

the dark shine of mary’s skin in the firelight, and how her clavicle tastes of saltwater and sand.

she kisses mary before she can say i love you too, because she knows. gently, they turn together in the quiet broken by waves, by the faintest brush of wind over sand. mary lays down on the blanket and there’s a length of time that goes missing as shannon kisses along her spine. not counting vertebrae. no calculations, no measurements, nothing but her mouth and mary’s poorly-disguised sounds. the whine of pitched breath through an open mouth.

it starts with touch because it has to. this is how i know you. in the dark with my hands and in the light with everything, with my whole heart.

she maps it then, palms gliding over scapulae, finding the valley between them. up to the nape of her neck, stealing a kiss into the angle of her jaw and then down to her hips again. this is what love does, too. it makes a habit of you.

she learned to paint in the dark, hiding from her father in the closet upstairs and hoping he wouldn’t go looking for her.

it was important, then, to know her canvas with her hands, though it was only a sketchbook, a handful of paints stolen from the art classroom.

tracing her palms over the pages, the bleak little whispers of texture reaching up into her skin. uncapping her paints and dabbing little mountains of colour onto the back of her left hand.

painting with the right, always acrylics because watercolours felt like something that required light, air, breath. listening to her father moving around the house and painting a thing of dripping shadow perforated by light. love is a complicated thing, dappled the way the leaves pebble light down onto their dead, onto the forest floor. mountains with deserts on one side and rivers on the other.

she crouched in the closet with the doors admitting a slant of light. her back pressed against the wood, staring at the tear in the knee of her pajama bottoms, sometimes looping a finger inside to fray the fabric, to feel it open like a mouth.

there’s a scar in the uppermost corner of mary’s shoulder, where bea would tell her the acromion sits, steepling over the subacromial space. funny, how sacred places hide inside of us.

others all scattered across her, impossible to see in the firelight. but tangible under her fingers. a milky way written over skin. when shannon finds one she marks it in her mind and praises it with her mouth. she can tell the difference between knife wounds and the brush of a bullet; or where stray shrapnel hit at an angle and bounced away. this feels worthy of worship, for all that the air smells of seaweed and salt and woodsmoke. not incense or the blunt waxy scent of votive candles.

she sits back on her heels, uncaps the paints. they’re not oils or acrylics, because most are metal-based. because oils take forever to dry, and they don’t have that long.

the body-paint is alcohol-based, and that feels fitting, heady. mary sighs at the first cold stripe of color, presses her forehead down into her arms, hard. shannon stops.

‘are you okay?’

mary makes a sound and shannon feels suddenly like that tear in the knee of her old pajamas.

yawning wider, teased by a finger.

‘i’m good, i’m good.’ but there’s a sob somewhere behind the statement. ‘it’s just… paint, and you, and…’

she breaks off. words escape them so often.

shannon lays down beside her, right there in the sand. mary turns her head to look and her eyes are full of tears. there’s a miniature fire inside them - a reflection - and a darker patch that must be shannon.

reaching out, shannon takes her by the jaw, shimmies in the sand until she’s close enough.

‘can i kiss you?’

‘yeah.’

and she does. breaking it when they’re out of breath and mary’s tears have tracked down her face. ‘love you,’ she says, and it’s so soft you could miss it.

shannon doesn’t. god, she’s in love and its enormous. and she can’t hold it but she can hold mary.

‘want me to keep going?’

‘please.’

and so shannon paints a starry sky, hooking stars into scar tissue. casting flickers of orange-yellow through a tapestry of blues with mary’s dark skin underneath, drawing complications out of each shade. she draws the sky as you might see it on a beach, with a fire casting amber flecks of ash into the air. the stars draped low over water.

she paints the sky as you might see it if you lay next to a beautiful girl. if you loved her very much. if you were running out of light, and life, and you wanted to feel, for a moment, as though so temporary a thing could hold meaning, could capture the sky.

afterwards they lie together, paint still wet on mary’s skin, fire catching on silver-white stars and everlasting blues. mary falls asleep like that, to the sound of waves and shannon’s breathing.

in the morning, they’ll wake up and make a mess of mary’s back with palmprints, and shannon will use her mouth because her hands are stained, but for now the night sky has been stilled. no clouds, no sunrise.

shannon stays awake for as long as she can, but mary’s gripping her hand, holding it so close to her face that shannon feels the occasional brush of mary’s mouth against her knuckles.

i love you now, shannon thinks, and i’ll love you in the morning.

i hope that’s enough

[number-1-kuaidul-fanboy]

Beach Day

YGO Rare Pair Week Day 5

Prompt: Beach

Pairing: Rio Kamishiro/III Arclight

Word Count: 766

Summary: Rio and Michael (III) Arclight spend a day on the beach together.

“Ready, Michael?” Rio tossed the volleyball up and down, a prideful smirk on her face.

Michael forced a smile as his arms trembled. He was struggling to hold them in the right position to eventually bump the ball the way Rio had taught him to.

“R-ready!” Michael insisted, sweat forming across his forehead, a mix of nerves and the heat from the blazing summer sun just overhead.

Rio smirked even harder. She bent her knees and lifted the volleyball up with one hand, holding that position before jumping up and tossing the ball straight up. Her other hand swung immediately, sending the volleyball flying over the net.

Michael’s feet stumbled under him as he stepped back. The ball made contact with his arms, making him instinctively fling his arms up over his head. It flew over him and slid through the sand behind him. Michael facepalmed.

“Can I… try that again?” His voice was barely more than an embarrassed mutter as he went to pick up the ball.

“Sure. Your serve,” Rio answered, holding her arms in that same bump position that Michael had them in.

Michael took steps backward to the spot he was supposed to serve from and placed the ball in one hand. He tossed the ball up. As quick as he could, he slapped at the volleyball with his other hand, yelping when scalding hot sand was almost immediately flung into his face.

Spitting out the sand in his mouth, Michael tried to shake his head clear. The heat from both the sun and his own nerves were making it hard to think clearly, let alone do anything physical like this.

Rio meanwhile was chuckling into her hand. “You okay, Mikey?”

“Yeah…” Michael was still blazing with embarrassment and annoyance as he retrieved the ball and got to his feet again.

Rio’s laugh was cute, which was as nice as it was a detriment. The last thing Michael wanted was for his cute new girlfriend to be laughing at his own foolishness.

Michael's next attempt at serving didn’t hit the ground. However, hitting the bottom of the net and having to jump out of the way to not get hit in the face wasn’t much better.

Michael gave it a few more unsuccessful tries before Rio finally cut in,

“Okay, okay…” The girl could barely speak through her giggles. “I can tell volleyball isn’t your thing. Do you wanna do something else?”

Michael couldn’t help but heave a sigh of relief as he dropped the ball on the ground. “Yes, please.”

“Alright!” Rio ducked under the net as she charged at Michael, taking his hand in both her hands. “Swimming it is! Let’s go!”

Michael could barely utter a startled gasp before Rio dragged him into the shallow water. The instant temperature drop along with the submerged damp sand beneath Michael's feet caught him off guard and made him lose his footing completely, his face flopping into the water. With one yank, Rio pulled him back up.

“Thanks…” Michael slipped his hand free with a chuckle. Now that he was used to how cold the water was, he couldn’t help but relax into it.

Rio giggled again. “You're lucky you’re cute, ya know.”

“Yeah, ‘cause you woulda dumped me by now if I wasn’t,” Michael cut in jokingly.

Rio rolled her eyes and shoved Michael. He stumbled back but managed to keep his footing this time.

“I am not dumping you over beach volleyball, you goon.” Rio stuck her tongue out teasingly.

Without another word, she propelled herself off the sand to dolphin-dive further into the water. Michael chuckled and walked after her. Then began to wade and eventually tread water when it got too deep to stand in. Rio resurfaced, shaking her head a bit. The motion got a bit of water in Michael's face.

“Rude.” Michael’s tone was a touch sarcastic as he intentionally splashed Rio back.

“Wha-!” Rio spat out the salt water that got in her mouth, and the almost deadly look on her face when she recovered made Michael flinch back.

“W-wait!”

It was too late. Rio was already flinging her arms to splash huge waves into Michael’s face. He blindly tried to do the same to splash at Rio. However, given the incessant giggling coming from the girl, Michael doubted he was doing all that good of a job.

“Okay! Okay!” Michael closed his eyes and held his hands up in surrender. “You win! I surrender!”

The splashing finally ceased, though unfortunately, Rio’s giggling did not.

Michael let out a small sigh. “You're lucky you’re cute.”

[the-knightmare]

Dreams of You I Wish Were Sweet

Have some Zoey/Ben from Escape Room (2019).

Warnings for depictions of violence, implied death, and night terrors.

Also on A03

Minos had them again. She was stuck behind the glass as Ben struggled to stand in a rapidly collapsing room. The sounds of glass smashing, and wood splintering filled her ears and reduced any logical part of her to the desperate pleas for Ben to hold on while she thought. Zoey was fumbling with a puzzle box when a pained scream made her drop the contraption. The room Ben was trapped in had shrunk to the point where he could only lay flat on his back. Tears pricked her eyes, as Zoey ran to the window. Her legs collapsed just as Ben was buried under rubble and the room finally closed in on itself.

Zoey closed her eyes in a silent scream, only to have the room reset when she opened her eyes. This time, Ben was standing in a room rapidly filling with water. Frantically, Zoey raced around the room trying to find something, anything, to break the glass. Minos had stripped anything useful from the room, only a secured chair and table too big to throw decorated the room. The water was just over Ben’s head now.

“Hold your breath, Ben, I’m going to get you out,” Zoey cried, pressing her hand to the glass.

Ben’s hand met hers but slipped away as air bubbled out of him. He floated above her, looking like a puppet before a performance.

“No!”

Zoey slammed her hands against the barrier. She battered the glass again, and again, until her hands were bloody, and it was not glass she was hitting, but ice. Kneeling, she watched Ben’s body as it was pulled by the current. Her frozen limbs seemed to move in slow motion as she crawled along the ice. No matter how much she tried, Zoey could not catch up. Her breathing became shallow, cold sweat beading on her brow as the aired thinned until she was dizzily kneeling in an escape tunnel. Ben swayed across the room. There was not enough time for him to make it to safety, and Zoey watched in horror as he stumbled forward and fell. She tried to crawl to him, hoping she could drag him to safety, but she could only choke and cough. Breathable air was running out. Zoey needed to get out, but not without Ben.

She would not leave him. Her mom, Amanda, there was nothing she could have done to help them. But Zoey could help Ben. She had to save him. She just had to get across the room, and they would be okay. Black spots danced across her eyes. Just a few more feet. Zoey’s chest burned, but she could almost reach him.

Her fingers just barely grazed Ben’s jacket when her vision cut out.

“Just a bit more,” she muttered, “We can still make it.”

Collapsing next to Ben, Zoey tried to fight the poisoned air in her lungs. She felt herself slipping away, all the panic she tried to muster faded into a frustrating nothingness.

Just as everything went black, Zoey jolted awake. Her chest heaved as she tried to reorient herself in the new room. Except it was her room, in her apartment, not a Minos trap.

“Zoey?” A sleep-heavy voice asked, “you alright?”

A warm hand pressed against her back, grounding her in the assurance that this was not some Minos trick. Zoey stayed quiet for a moment, focusing on the comforting warmth at her back before turning to face Ben.

“Just a bad dream.”

In the dim light of dawn, Zoey could see the concern on his face and felt a rush of embarrassed shame wash over her. She had hated when Allison had seen her startle awake at random hours, but even though Ben knew exactly what was going on she could not bring herself to tell him exactly what she saw when she closed her eyes. Sometimes she saw her mom fall through sand, other times Amanda, Rachel, Danny, Nate, their faces swapping in the middle of whatever torture scene her mind had conjured. Other times it was Ben. Minos using him to get to her, punish her, recruit her, it didn’t matter. It never mattered. It always ended the same.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me.”

Arms wound around her waist and Zoey relaxed into the curve of Ben’s neck as thumb rubbed gentle circles into her hip. This position was no longer new. They had begun sharing a bed a month after moving in together, it had seemed natural with the number of nights spent comforting each other. Whatever their relationship had become, neither had ever addressed it, caution overruling anything else, though tonight Zoey felt too tired to be cautious.

“I saw you,” she said softly, the only indication Ben had heard her was the stillness of his hand. Zoey missed the comfort of the gently moving thumb but continued her quiet confession.

“You were trapped in rooms; all I could do was watch. Nothing I did could save you, and I…” Zoey swallowed around the rising lump in her throat, “I…I could-”

“Hey, you don’t have to tell me.”

“I couldn’t save you,” Zoey finished shakily, “I couldn’t save you, I tried, but I couldn’t save you.”

“Well, I’m right here, alive, because you did save me,” Ben’s voice was low and soothing in her ear.

Tears slipped down Zoey’s cheeks and soaked into Ben’s shirt as he continued to reassure her that he was alive, she had not failed, Minos couldn’t them anymore.

“But I almost lost you. I’ve…we’ve both lost so many people. I can’t lose you too,” Zoey interrupted.

“And you won’t. I’m not going anywhere until you tell me to go,” Ben said, his words sounding more like a promise than its usual joking tone.

“I don’t ever want you to go,” Zoey confessed.

For a moment they were silent, each taking in the other’s words. Zoey turned his over in her mind, each meaning like another possible solution in a puzzle. She had always had a hard time understanding people. It had always seemed as if they were operating at the same frequency, and she was left in a feedback loop of failed interactions made worse after the plane crash. But with Ben, it had been as if she was finally beginning to connect again. She had started having dinner with her roommate before moving out of the dorms, joined study groups and the physics society.

A soft kiss pressed to the top of her head broke Zoey out of her thoughts.

“In that case, would you want to get coffee sometime?”

Laughter snorted out of Zoey before she could stop it. The normalcy of the question throwing her off balance, where just for a moment she could imagine them as just another boy asking a girl on a date instead of waking up screaming dreams of Minos horrors.

“Don’t we already have coffee together?” Zoey teased, knowing what her answer would be no matter what.

“Well, I just meant like a date, but if, you know, you aren’t into it-”

“I’d like that,” Zoey said, interrupting his nervous stammering, “but I think we have a few hours before anywhere is open.”

“In that case I vote we go back to sleep. If you’re okay with that?”

The suggestion of sleeping again after a bad nightmare was usually enough to send a wave of anxiety through her. Half the time, she chose to lay awake or get some work done rather than face the possibility of more horrors. But that anxiety did not raise its head. Only a heavy tiredness that she didn’t want to fight.

“Sleep would be nice.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Ben studied her face, as always more concerned with her wellbeing than what he wanted.

“I am now,” Zoey reassured, settling more comfortable into his arms.

Ben fell asleep first, and she listened to the steady rise and fall of his breathing like a lullaby. As she began to drift into sleep, Zoey hoped that one day she could dream about Ben without it turning into a nightmare. That she could see her mother and dream of the days before the accident. Until then, she vowed to herself to fill her life with pleasant experience to dream about, starting with that coffee.

[myreia]

Bitter Frost

Rating: T Characters: Aureia Malathar, Alphinaud Leveilleur, Haurchefant Greystone Words: 2216 Notes: Frozen and lost on their way to Camp Dragonhead, Aureia and Alphinaud must contend with the events that lead them there. Spoilers for end of ARR patches. Read on AO3

A bitter wind howls across the frozen hills, biting at her cheeks. Aureia bows her head and clutches her scarf around her face, seeking whatever meagre protection it offers. Snow cracks beneath her feet, the drifts so frozen she doesn’t even sink through them. Though she has wandered the highlands many times before, even becoming accustomed to the harsh climate, this time is different. The cold is in her teeth, her lungs, her bones, unyielding and unending. But as awful as it is, at least it has given her an advantage. This way she doesn’t have to feel the pain.

She doesn’t have to feel anything at all.

Alphinaud stumbles beside her, hands stretched outwards as he treads uneasily across the icy terrain. His cheeks are chafed raw from the wind, the tips of his ears rubbed red. He hasn’t said too words to her since they struck out on their own. No complaints about the cold, no questioning her lead or choice of path. He has slipped more than once, falling painfully on his knees. When she extended a hand to help him up, he brushed her away and dragged himself to his feet, plowing forwards with dark look in his eyes.

The flight from Thanalan left little time to prepare for Coerthas. No staff, no rapier, no focus, and dressed in rags and with boots more appropriate for the desert sands than snow mountains. Filo, her faithful chocobo through thick and thin, remains stabled in Ul’dah with the Immortal Flames. The moment she chose to leave her gear and equipment at the Quicksand is seared in her mind. Why would she need it? She was attending a banquet as a guest of honour and invited to a private audience with the sultana herself. If anything, she assumed the audience was reason enough to leave her weapons behind, lest she be accused of attempted assassination.

Fool.

With her description spread like wildfire and the bounty on her head rising by the hour, it was only a matter of time before someone recognized her. Sitting in Brendt’s cart, she took a knife to her hair and hacked away the dark locks, cutting her identifiable red streaks free. Once in Black Brush, she barely had time to breathe. She shed her banquet attire as soon as she could, exchanging the beautiful dress and jewelry for a ragged coat and boots.

It wasn’t a moment too soon. She had only just faded into the background as yet another adventurer on the road when the area swarmed with Ul’dah agents. With Pipin’s help, they managed to escape and board the Enterprise, taking off for Coerthas. Cid flew them as far as he was able, but issues with the engines and high winds forced an emergency landing. Fearing they would be found if they remained, Aureia and Alphinaud set off into the snows on foot.  

Alphinaud slows, inhaling sharply, and comes to a halt. The air around them is eerily still—no sound to be heard save their trembling breaths and the crunch of snow underfoot. Even the local fauna is scarce. They are well and truly alone.

Aureia glances at him. “What is it?” she asks quietly. “What’s wrong?”

He shivers, shoving his hands into his armpits. “It is nothing,” he replies, shaking his head. His breath puffs across his lips, rising in the air. “Simply the result of the overactive imagination of a child. I would not trouble you with it.”

She presses her lips together, uncertain how to respond. Though she herself is reeling from their loss, the weight of what happened is breaking him. She’s powerless to help—nothing she can do or say will absolve him of his guilt. The Crystal Braves betrayed them, yes, but it was his blind naivety that allowed for it in the first place. Even if she did have the right words, they may not be what he needs right now.

“Here,” she says, unbuttoning her coat.

Alphinaud’s eyes widen. “Aureia, I—”

She shrugs off the coat and proffers it to him, goosepimples running down her bare arms. “Take it.”

“But…” His shoulder sag and he lowers his head, staring dully at his feet. “But you will freeze. I do not wish to be responsible for any more harm done to you.”

She seizes his hand and pushes the coat into his arms. “Take it,” she repeats. “Please. What would your sister say if you perished from the cold on Camp Dragonhead’s doorstep?”

“I…” He nods and accepts the coat, pulling it on. His frozen fingers struggle with the buttons. “Thank you.”

She smiles, privately thanking whatever gods are out there that the boy has finally seen sense. She may be brutally cold without the coat, but it is better this way. She has survived worse. “Besides,” she continues, pulling down her scarf and wrapping it around her shoulders like a shawl. “You need not worry about me.”

Aureia steps back, snow crunching beneath her feet, and pulls a hand into her chest. A flurry of snow spirals around her, dusting her hair and shoulders, clinging to her eyelashes. She closes her eyes and tugs on the aether around her, breathing it in, letting it course through her veins. Fire-aspected aether bursts between her fingers, spinning into a small, burning orb balanced perfectly in her palm. It doesn’t amount to much—without her staff to channel, it is barely more than a parlour trick—but it will keep her warm for now.

“There,” she says, opening her eyes and extending the orb to Alphinaud. “See? I have my own methods.”

With the orb pressed to her chest, Aureia pushes on, taking one hill at a time. Alphinaud follows, a little stronger and more assured on the ice now he isn’t chilled to the bone. The winds shift, bringing with them more snow and greyer skies. She clutches her scarf, anxiety gnawing away at her. She can taste the storm coming. If they don’t make it to Camp Dragonhead soon…

“Not much further now,” Aureia calls over her shoulder. “We’re almost—”

She crests the hill and halts, her stomach sinking. A sea of white stretches out before her, masking the trees and landmarks. They are too late. The storm has come and the path forward is lost to the snows. She curses, her fingers cramping, spasming from their curled position. The fire orb flickers and goes out.

“Shit,” she mutters. She rubs her hands together, desperately trying to get some feeling back into them. They remain curled, refusing to relax, and she pulls on the aether, commanding it to bend to her will.

It does not answer.

“Aureia?” Alphinaud appears at her side, his pale face lost in her coat’s hood. “What now?”

Should have stayed with Cid, that’s what. It was a foolish decision to leave and go on foot. “Shelter,” she says through dry lips. “Shelter is the priority. We can weather the storm, then make our way to Camp Dragonhead once it clears.”

He nods. “Where? The trees over there, perchance? ‘Twould be good to remain on the path, no?”

Hells. It has been years since her defection from Garlemald, but her time in the frozen Imperial capital has stayed with her. She should know better than this. She should know how to adapt.

Aureia raises an arm, shielding her face from the brutal wind as she peers through the endless white. A broken wall rises some feet away, its outline little more than a hazy shadow in the falling snow. “This way!” she shouts, her voice lost in the wind, and veers off the trail. “We need to get out of this wind.”

He follows without comment. That he doesn’t argue is either a mark of his unconditional faith in her, or that he is too exhausted to object. Gripping his frozen hand with hers, she wades through knee-deep snow, leading him to the wall. Once there, she drags them to the far side and hunkers down. She doesn’t know if this will be enough to survive, but it’s all she has.

Aureia and Alphinaud huddle together with their backs to the wall. The snow falls with fury, piling up around them. Though the wind is not as fierce, the brutal cold makes her teeth ache and her lungs burn. She’s freezing. He’s freezing. They were brutally unprepared for this. How laughable would it be if they perished in this storm. A pitiful end to the Scions of the Seventh Dawn.

“Aureia?” Alphinaud’s voice is quiet, so soft she almost misses it. The snow crunches as he shifts beside her, pulling his coat tight. He exhales a shaky breath and rests his head on her shoulder. He looks so young… Too young. With all his bright-eyed idealism and sheer determination, it’s easy to forget how young he is. “This is my fault. I’m sorry for what I’ve wrought. If I hadn’t.. If I had…—”

She wraps an arm around his shoulder and pulls him close. “Don’t think of that now,” she says. It’s difficult to get the words out—her teeth are chattering. “There will be time for that… later…”

“There’s… time for it… now,” he interrupts, stuttering through the cold. “At the very least, I would… apologize… for what I’ve done. The others are… unaccounted for, perhaps even dead because of my ignorance.”

She looks down at him. “Yes.”

It’s a bitter truth, but to soften it would do him a disservice. Even now, she can picture that night’s events as clearly as one of her visions. Nanamo, collapsed and struggling to breathe as the treacherous cup rolled across the floor. Raubahn’s rage as he cut down Teledji Adeledji. Escaping the banquet with the Crystal Braves hot on their tail, losing her friends one by one as they chose to stay behind… And most painful of all, the look on Thancred’s face as he bid her farewell, shooting her one final lopsided grin as she turned her back on him and fled into the night.

“How… how do I contend with that?” Alphinaud whispers.

She pauses. “You press on,” she says after a moment. She cups her palm between them, subconsciously pulling on the aether around her, a faint flame sizzles to life, warming her fingers. “Guilt can only carry you so far before it bleeds you dry. Just know that the next time… the next time will be different. Better.”

He’s silent for a long time. “Do you… blame me?”

Aureia closes her eyes, snowflakes crystalizing on her lashes. “You are not responsible for our enemies’ actions, Alphinaud. You did not kill Nanamo. You did not frame the Scions. Take comfort in that.”

If he answers, she does not hear.

Her body is stiff, her limbs numb. A small sphere of warmth With the world gone white, it’s too easy to lose herself to the exhaustion and the cold. To submit herself to the bitter frost…

“…Aureia!”

She stirs, forcing herself out of her stupor. She can’t open her eyes—her eyelashes are frozen shut. Though she has not yet lost all sensation. A small sphere of warmth licks at her palms, her flame still burning against all odds.

“Aureia!”

The voice cuts through the haze. Someone seizes her by the arms, unearthing her from the snow. She groans, wobbling on uneasy feet, and a strong arm wraps around her, putting a cloak on her shoulders. Warmth floods her from the embrace and she lets out a desperate gasp, lungs aching as she inhales frozen air.  

“Easy, my friend,” the voice says. “Easy. You have taken a terrible turn.”

“Haurchefant?” she breathes, tilting her head up. She pries her eyes open and a familiar face swims in her vision. She would know that smile anywhere. “What are you… how…”

“Scouts saw your approach on patrol,” he says, easing her through the snow. “When the storm swept in, we did not hesitate to commence a search. The snows in Coerthas are not to be trifled with. I would not lose you to them. If not for your abilities…”

The flame. How in the hells did she keep that going on the brink of unconsciousness? If she had slipped into darkness completely, it would have gone out.

Aureia stifles a cry and clutches at him, her heart aching with gratefulness. “I’ve been stupid, Haurchefant,” she mumbles. Her lips are stiff and blue, frost clinging to her skin. “So damn stupid.”

“You can tell it to me in time, once you are warm and recovered. For now, rest. We will see you safely to Camp Dragonhead.” With one arm still supporting her, he turns and shouts to his men. “I have her! Young Master Alphinaud, too!”

A flurry of activity flickers on her peripheral vision. Knights crowd around them, clearing a path to the nearby carriage. She spots Alphinaud some distance away, wrapped in a cloak and leaning on a knight as he struggles through the snow. He glances over his shoulder and meets her eyes, a grave smile on his face. He nods, silently showing his thanks.

She returns it. Somehow, they have survived this. Where they go from here, she does not know. But whenever it may be, it will be up to them to pick up the shattered pieces of the Scions and find a way forwards.  

[fatewalker-phoenix]

14, 24, 26 for kiss meme

Gonna be less prose and more stream of consciousness this time because writing is Hard or maybe I will apparently write things because I have SO MANY FEELINGS and work is quiet, also obligatory tag for @tiredassmage and spoilers for 5.4/5

14. A kiss to the stomach

Astor's hands smoothing over Eden's sides as he places soft kisses to her rounded belly, before pressing his ear to her skin, listening and feeling for the unborn child they will soon be welcoming into the world. Their eyes are sparkling in wonder, fingers interlocking in silent assurance that Aspen will grow up in the world they fought so hard to make just a little safer for her.

24. A sleepy kiss

It's a rare morning when Airi awakes before him. Almost a decade of living on the road on a mercenary's trade has made deep restful sleep a difficult endeavor for him.

His arm is still loosely draped over her, a remnant from how he had held her the night before as she trembled in the afterglow of their passion, fingers idly tracing over her neck and shoulder as he casually dragged from a cigarette in his free hand. It's a far cry from when he used to leave her alone in the sheets, reluctant to admit to any vulnerability behind the hardened exterior he had built for himself. Even now, there's a furrow to his brow that never quite leaves his face, though it has managed to soften ever so slightly in his slumber.

Airi slowly scoots herself up, careful not to jostle him too much, unable to will her gaze away from his face. In sleep, she can almost glimpse the man that might have been had the world been a fraction kinder to him. His black hair is tousled almost boyishly across his forehead, lending to the image.

Impulsively, she leans down and presses her lips gently to his forehead. He stirs, and her heartrate picks up as she frets that she may have woken him. The arm over her curls, pulling her closer to him so he can press a deeper kiss to her lips. His breath is warm as he works his way across her cheek to her neck, pausing only enough to murmur "Morning" huskily into her ear.

26. A kiss while one or both parties is crying

Kiana is with Arenvald when the chirugeon breaks the news. Her fingers grip tightly to his, her tail twitching anxiously, as the man reluctantly explains that the damage to Arenvald's leg is so severe that the Scion may never be able to walk unassisted ever again. Arenvald is quiet for a long, heavy moment before thanking the chirugeon for the news with a smile, though his fingers in turn grip Kiana's so tightly her fingers tips begin to numb. The chirugeon leaves them alone to process the news privately.

Kiana's jaw works as she tries to find the right words to say. Arenvald has always been so hard on himself, pushing himself to be good enough, strong enough to be worth the sacrifices it took to bring him to today. It's a path they've both had to walk for far too long, at far too young.

"I'm sorry." Arenvald's voice is broken, thickening with the threat of tears. His hand is trembling in hers. "I-I can only blame myself, if I had just been more careful I-"

"No." The response leaves her before she can stop herself. She shifts to face him properly, her other hand coming to hold his so she can face him properly. "You can't think like that," she admonishes him quietly, "You did what you could, and you still managed to escape. That counts for something, at least."

"It's not that." Arenvald shakes his head, pursing his lips. "What I wanted...all I wanted was for us to be able to fight side by side, to...I wanted to be strong enough to protect you, and I-" The tears fall freely now, sliding down his cheeks. "I couldn't save anyone that night in the Waking Sands. I couldn't save Krile from being captured. We could barely save those delegates in Ala Mhigo. Barely! If Fordola hadn't stepped in when she did-" his other hand clenched into a fist. "I was never good enough," he muttered, "So maybe this is how it should be."

Tears well in her eyes. "Look at me," she says softly. When Arenvald's gaze remains cast down, she repeats herself a little more firmly, reaching up to cup her hand around his cheek, directing him to face her. He finally does so, and her thumb gently swipes away another tear as it falls.

"You have always, always, been enough for me," she says slowly, hoping that he will hear every bit of love and pain carried through her voice. "I love you, okay?Not for what you can do, but for you are. You are kind, selfless, and yes, you are strong. Arenvald, I love you."

He leans into the contact on his cheek, crumpling into a sob as she holds him, pressing a kiss to his forehead before he leans down into her lap, clinging to her like a lifeline as her fingers trace through his hair.

[inkspiders]

Gorgeous artwork is by Sailesh Thakrar

In The Mermaid’s Gift, an old family story about a mermaid encounter brings romance and drama.

♡

“My grandfather, Josiah Young…” he began, coughing as he always did. I once heard Grandmother say to Mum that she always knew the old boy was lying when he coughed, but I didn’t believe that. “…once saw a mermaid.”

The Mermaid’s Gift was my third story with The People’s Friend. It was also my first appearance in the weekly magazine rather than the monthly specials. It was released June 18th, 2016. The setting was 1840s Great Yarmouth.

🎣

“Josiah hadn’t been a fisherman, like my father, myself and your fathers were. He had been a rippier, one of the men who took the net’s catch and sold it further inland. In fact, Josiah was afeared of water, yet he loved to walk the beach each day’s end to see the fall of the sun. That was where he saw it.”

Grandfather blew away the smoke cloud and we realised his eyes were shut. After a few minutes, we thought he’d fallen asleep. We all called for him to continue, asking what Josiah had seen.

His bushy eyebrow lifted as he opened a single eye.

“Why, the mermaid of course! I can’t be telling you everything. As the sky darkened to the colour of fire, he noticed a thousand sparkles, like light upon the water, but this was nowhere near the sea. It was back by the rocks, just barely peeking out. Josiah followed and there was the merwoman. The poor creature was trapped, with only a puddle of water to sustain her. She’d come in the hightide and got her tail caught.”

In The Mermaid’s Gift, it’s this story which triggers the plot. A man helps a trapped mermaid and receives something in return. A carved stone that can seek out the holder’s true love.

Net weaver Hetty has now inherited the stone, but when it leads her to fisherman Seb, can she really rely on good luck charms once doubts arise?

The People’s Friend publishes feel good fiction and prefers grounded, non-magical stories, but historical writers don’t always have to keep to a rigid realism vs fantasy theme. The past is a different world. Our ancestors believed in plenty of things we dismiss nowadays.

A macabre creature could turn out to be a shadow, ghostly encounters the work of a fraudulent medium, or a mermaid sighting dismissed as the tall tale of an old fisherman.

Even with a folkloric element, the main focus in this story was on the characters’ relationships, particularly Hetty and her reluctance to wed after her younger sister’s disastrous marriage.

💔

Seb unhooked our arms and lowered himself on one knee. The ring, which was as thin as a fishing lure and had a pearl in the centre, was held up.

My hand stretched out to touch it, to feel that it was real, but I paused. This wasn’t just a story my grandfather had told me. This was marriage, and fairy tales and magic stones could not hold it together.

Norfolk’s Mermaids

Legends about mermaids have intrigued people across the world, but why? Is it because of their close resemblance to humans, with most depictions showing them as beautiful women with fishy features, or do they speak to something deep inside us, something which yearns to explore the sea and discover the strange, wonderful things hiding within its dark depths? 

Many of Norfolk’s villages and towns are on the coast, so it’s no surprise there’ve been plenty of mermaid encounters throughout the years. Mermaid Sand, near Snettisham, was apparently named after a dark-haired mermaid who would pluck off her tail and walk amongst humans in search of love. 

However, Norfolk’s most popular mer myth is of the Sheringham mermaid. This strange visitor has been immortalised with a wood carving on one of the pews in All Saints church. The legend goes that the mermaid was drawn by the congregation’s singing, but being unable to transform into a human, she was forced to drag herself along the beach and sneak in at the back.

Explanations vary as to why mermaid stories are so prevalent, with the main one being drunken, feverish fishermen desperate for female company. Freakshows would also capitalise on the interest. Eager to get the crowds in, they stitched animals together to create a gruesome chimera, such as the Fiji mermaid in America, which was a mummified monkey and fish. Manatees, also known as sea cows, were also blamed for mermaid sightings. These chunky creatures were thought to look like women in the distance, by those drunken sailors from earlier, although, to me, they look more like pebbles with a tail 😊

No matter the truth, for centuries humans have had a complicated relationship with the sea. It is a world we will never be able to fully explore. In the past, it was even more secretive and dangerous. Perhaps mermaids were a personification of those violent waves that, while beautiful, took so many fishermen away from their families.

Sequels & Where to Read

Being able to include mermaids, even just as a tall tale, was fun. The Mermaid’s Gift also got a sequel. For Those in Peril was published three years later by The People’s Friend. This time it followed Seb and examined superstitions in the fishing community.

Both stories have since been re-released under their original submission titles, The Sea Stone and The Lucky Net, in my anthology collection The Wherryman’s Daughter.

[letannabethchasesayshit]

Summary: Ripley Curbello's father always told her how she was born of the night sky. As it turns out, he was telling her the truth. She is the Daughter of Nyx, Greek Goddess of the Night. After Ripley's father is killed, she is sent on the run. She is all alone but not for long. She finds Annabeth Chase, Thalia Grace, and Luke Castellan. All four of them lost their families or were rejected. All four were alone, but they found love and family together. It was the four of them against the world and Ripley thought it always would be. Ripley must grapple with finding a family, losing them, and her fear of herself. All rational people are afraid of the dark, and Ripley is not different.

Fandom: Percy Jackson

Read on AO3 here

Part 3/14

Chapter Three: Maybe We Can Nope Out Of This Situation

“Annabeth!” I screamed.

She had fallen on her back, tackled by a legion of supersized spiders. They were bigger than any spider I had ever seen. Each one had to be the size of my head, some even a little bigger. They had been chasing us for a night and a day and nothing we did could stop them. Everytime we killed one, another appeared in its place.

They seemed to be after Annabeth in particular. She told me it's because of her mother, Athena. Arachne, the mother of spiders, sends her children after all of Athena’s kids as revenge. They had been chasing Annabeth since she was born and they only seemed to get stronger.

I had never seen Annabeth as afraid as she was when we were faced with spiders. She had laughed in the face of cyclops, chimeras, giants, and devil creatures, but the spiders are what broke her. Just the mere sight of them made her sob with all the cries her little body could produce. When she was tackled, she flailed and screamed, deafening screams filled with anguish.

I shouted as I flung my broken broom handle at the spiders. A few were pierced by the end, but most were flung up against the nearby walls. I was able to uncover Annabeth enough to get her to her feet. When she was up, she clung to my shoulders as I swung my stick at the spiders.

“What do we do?” I asked.

Some things never change. From the very beginning to the very end, I would always look to Annabeth. It seemed like she always knew just what to do even in the most insane of situations. She always had some sort of plan. Some were spur of the moment, some she had for years, but all were just as effective. To this day, I swear, Annabeth Chase is the smartest person I ever met.

“We have to hide!” she wiped the tears from her eyes and began to search around for a hiding place.

“You said we can’t hide from them!” I swatted several spiders away like baseballs, “They’ll smell us!”

“We have to find something to cover our scent! Just long enough to lose them!”

Her eyes finally landed on the answer. Without any sort of heads up, she grabbed my wrist and began to drag me across the street. I struggled to keep my feet under me for barely a second before finally catching up with her.

An old ironworks factory stood right across the street. The workers had gone for the night but the smell still remained. I could smell the hot metal and sanded plates from miles away. It was a sickly sort of metallic smell, the sort that made me want to throw up and jump out of my skin all at once. I could barely stand it, but it was our only hope. The smell might just be strong enough to mask ours.

Annabeth took a tight corner and I nearly ran into the wall. We slid through a small gap in the chain link fence right into the factory field. Multiple pieces of discarded metal rested there. One in particular leaned up against a crate. It acted like a tent, blocking the view from the street.

That was where Annabeth led me. She practically pushed me underneath the sheet of iron before diving in herself. The two of us latched together, holding each other tightly and shuddering.

I could hear the spiders shrieking as they searched for us. The smell was too strong for them too, it perfectly masked our scent. I risked a peek around the edge of the metal to see the gaggle of spiders running right past the fence we had slid through.

“It worked,” I spun around to face Annabeth, “Annie, you did it!”

She peered through her fingers at me, still too shaken to answer. She pulled her knees to her chest and shuddered, “I hate spiders.”

“You were super brave,” I flung my arms around her shoulders and hugged her, “All those spiders and you still got us to safety.”

“That’s not bravery, that’s just logic.”

“You hate spiders more than anything, Annie, how is that not brave?”

She giggled, leaning slightly into my side. I squeezed her tightly as if I could ring out all the fear from her body. She was still trembling, but less so.

That was when we heard the roars. They piled on top of each other like some deadly symphony. Each one was different, some high and some low, some bloodthirsty and others excited. They rang through the metal yard, shaking the sheet above us and making it sound like thunder.

Annabeth and I both screamed. The roars were close, it seemed like they were in the very same yard as us. I clung tightly to Annabeth and buried my face in her shoulder. She did the same, gripping her hammer tightly behind my back.

“They won’t go away,” I whimpered, “I just want them to go away.”

I could feel Annabeth crying, “Me too, we can’t fight them all.”

“What do we do?”

A few of the roars seemed to die down suddenly. It was as if their vocal chords were ripped right out of their throats. One moment, they were roaring, the next like a light switch they stopped.

Annabeth and I remained silent, frozen in place as we listened. The roars stopped entirely but that didn’t mean anything. When the monsters got a whiff of demigods, they often went into stealth mode. They could be right outside our hiding place and we wouldn’t even know.

Somewhere nearby, a door opened and shut loudly. Two laughing voices followed it. Both seemed out of breath but that did nothing to calm Annabeth and I. We had encountered enough monsters to know never to doubt anything. More than one type of monster could sound like a human.

Their footsteps were getting closer. I could hear them kicking up dirt as well as metal moving against metal. Whatever they were, they had weapons, good ones, and all we had was a broken broomstick and a rusty hammer.

Annabeth and I squeezed each other tightly. Both of us were whimpering despite our best efforts not too. All I wanted to do was scream and sob, begging the monsters to leave us alone. Whimpers were the compromise.

The two creatures suddenly stopped outside of our little hiding place. I could hear their abrupt halt as well as quiet whispers. Annabeth quickly pulled away and held her hammer out in front of her. I crouched right next to her, holding a tight grip on my broomstick and ready to take out anything.

One of them removed the sheet of metal hiding us and Annabeth and I sprung out. She released a battle cry as I began to sob. As she sprung at one of the creatures, I went for the other, ready to stab them through the eye with my stick if need be.

“Whoa there!” one of them, a boy, exclaimed.

He caught Annabeth’s hammer before she could blow his brains out with it. In one easy move, he pulled it from her hands and kept her at arm’s reach. At the same time, his partner, a girl, grabbed my stick from my hands and flung it across the metal yard.

I jumped back, grabbing Annabeth’s arm and pulling her with me. Both of us were a mess of tears, dirt, and blood. We were much too confused to stop and realize we were not faced with monsters.

Some monsters did a great job disguising themselves as humans. Annabeth used to say we could see through them because we knew they were there. Once you knew of the monsters, once you were looking for them, you saw them everywhere. It would be years until Annabeth and I finally had an explanation. Once you knew about the monster, you could easily see through The Mist, the very thing that kept our world separate from that of the mortals. The thing that kept them safe and put us in danger.

“Get away!” Annabeth cried, “I mean it! Get away!”

The girl held up her hands in surrender, “Calm down, short stuff, we aren’t gonna hurt you.”

The girl was unlike anyone I had ever met. She wore all dark clothes, her jeans were more ripped than anything else. The shirt beneath her jean jacket had multiple bleach stains and read “Green Day” right across the middle. She kept her hair back in a bun, but I could see the faint traces of green hair dye in multiple strands.

She stood on the attack, as if she were always ready to kill or be killed. When she saw us, however, that changed in an instant. She got down on her knees to be more on our level. Her smile was wider than I would see it for a long time afterwards. Her appearance might have been scary to a six-year-old, but I was never scared of her. I took one look at her and I knew she was much warmer than she made herself out to be. She loved a lot of things, a lot of people, and she loved with all she had. She was the sort of person who would not hesitate in dying for the people she loves the most.

“It’s alright, take a breath,” the boy got on his knees like the girl and held up his hands, “What’re you two doing out here all alone?”

The boy was somehow exactly like his companion and totally opposite. He reminded me a bit of a surfer with blond hair and tanned skin. I half expected him to find peace on the ocean while identifying with the ferocious riptide beneath the waves. He seemed to be a bit unsure of himself, like he was walking the line between two very different people. One was as calm as a lake on a still day, the other just like the waves before a typhoon. When I knew him, he always made me think of that lake.

All he ever wanted was to be accepted, I could see that from the moment I met him. He saw us and instantly wanted to be accepted by us. As a friend or a non-threat, I’m still not sure, but he couldn’t stand the thought of being perceived as a monster. He was the very first to do all in his power to convince us he was the good guy.

“We’re looking for our moms,” I held tightly to Annabeth, “And we’re not afraid of you! We’ve faced monsters way scarier!”

Annabeth nodded in agreement. The boy and girl exchanged glances before the boy said, “We aren’t monsters.”

“Why are you here then?” Annabeth demanded, “Were you following us?”

“We just came out of a fight and we heard noises. We thought someone was in danger,” the girl responded.

It was only then I noticed the marks of a battle on them. They were covered in dirt, the boy’s makeshift leather armor was just barely hanging on by a thread. The girl had a gash on her head that was just beginning to stop bleeding and the boy seemed to be favoring his left leg. Both of them looked exhausted. Even if they wanted to hurt us, they couldn’t, solely in how exhausted they were. Annabeth was the first to realize this, “A-a fight?”

“The monsters are after us too,” the boy explained, “I think it’s safe to guess, they’re after us for the same reason they’re after you two.”

“We’re Demigods, half human half god, and the monsters have been on our tails for months,” the girl said.

I glanced at Annabeth, “Annie says they can smell us.”

“They can and they won’t stop until they catch us,” the boy glanced at the girl.

The two had a conversation through looks alone. Almost instantly, they agreed, I could see it in the light behind both of their eyes and the hint of a smile cracking across the girl’s face. If anybody were to ask me the moment my life changed for the better, I would say this one. It was the moment two kids, barely teenagers themselves, saw two frightened girls and suddenly decided neither side would be alone anymore. That was the moment a family was made, though nobody realized it then.

“My name is Luke Castellan, son of Hermes,” the boy, Luke, introduced himself.

The girl gave a single nod, “Thalia, daughter of Zeus.”

“I’m Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena,” Annabeth explained, “This is Ripley Curbello, daughter of Nyx.”

I waved gently, getting a wave back from Thalia. Luke tilted his head, “And where are your families, Annabeth and Ripley?”

I looked away as Annabeth frowned, “We’re running away. My Dad doesn’t love me, and my step mom’s afraid of me. I ran away to find someone who does love me.”

“And what about you, Ripley?” Thalia asked gently.

I met her eyes as tears began to fall out of my eyes, “My-my Papa was killed by a monster. The only person I had left was my mom, so I ran away to find her.”

“Me too,” Annabeth stated, “Ripley and I, we’re gonna find our moms and we’re gonna make families that love us and will protect us.”

I nodded enthusiastically. Luke chuckled, “That might be harder than it sounds, kiddos.”

“The gods don’t care about their children,” Thalia added, “At least, not enough to find them.”

Annabeth and I simply stared at her. All this time, we had been looking for our family only to hear they wanted nothing to do with us. For two little kids, that was heartbreaking. Annabeth did her best to fight back her tears as I openly began to sob. I gripped tightly to the back of her shirt and whimpered.

“If-if our moms don’t want us, then what do we do?” Annabeth sniffled, “We don’t have anywhere else to go.”

Luke scooted slightly closer, pulling something out of his boot, “Well, we might not be Gods, but we’ve got one thing they don’t.”

“What’s that?”

“We’re here,” Thalia added, “And we care.”

Luke held out a knife to Annabeth. The knife itself was nothing special, the hilt had a few chips out of it and the blade itself was slightly rusted. What struck me most was the bronze blade rather than steel or iron. Luke noticed both of our confusion, “It’s bronze, the only thing that’ll kill those monsters.”

“They aren’t mortal, so they aren’t affected by iron or steel,” Thalia reached around her back and pulled out the end of a spear, “You won’t get very far unless you’ve got the right weapons.”

She held out the end of her spear to me. It had broken right at the tip, leaving very little wood for a hilt. For a six-year-old, it was perfect, my small hands could grip tightly to the remaining wood. I took the spear from her as Annabeth took the knife from Luke.

“We might not be exactly what you were looking for but we can make you two a promise we won’t break,” Luke placed a hand on Annabeth’s and my shoulders, “Thalia and I, we promise you we won’t let anything hurt you ever again. We can be a better family than yours ever were.”

I frowned ever so slightly at that. My Papa was a great Papa, but he wasn’t there anymore. Luke and Thalia, they were there, and they wouldn’t leave.

Thalia placed a hand on Luke’s shoulder and smiled. Annabeth and I exchanged glances as Thalia asked, “So, what do you say? Wanna make a family?”

When we turned back to them, all they could see were our bright smiles and glistening tears. Annabeth ran forward to hug Luke while I flung my arms around Thalia. The girl in question laughed, “I guess that’s a yes.”

“Come on, we need to get moving,” Luke stood and offered his hand to Annabeth, “If the monsters haven’t caught our scent yet, they will soon.”

Annabeth took Luke’s hand as Thalia took mine. The four of us walked off, together. That moment, a promise was made and a bond was created, one which would permeate all of our lives. For better or for worse, only time would tell, but no matter what happened, I never once regretted it. I’d accept Thalia and Luke’s offer a million times over because, with them and with Annabeth, I had a family, the first real family I had since I lost my Papa.