#when the chaos comes - public noise/ruelle

[ask-sebastian]

This song feels like a perfect fit for Dark!Nosy. 💚😌 (Regular Nosy, too, but that is not the theme today.)

Dark!Nosy differs physically from regular Nosy by having a fake eye and a large scar adorning his face. For Dark!Nosy, it is a proud trophy from a bloody event with poachers when he was on a hunt with Sebastian.

Dark!Nosy's traits are also much more aggressive. You will notice many bloody fingers, as Dark!Nosy cannot stand being touched by others! Sebastian calls it "Love Bites" but his classmates see that differently. Dark!Nosy is extremely bitey and only accepts Sebastian's touch.

Nevertheless, Dark!Nosy is still fascinated by fire and flames. 💚 (And probably secretly wishes to be able to shoot fire himself with his fake eye.)

The perfect song for the perfect partner in villainy.

[artificialqueens]

game of survival, chapter 2/? (branjie) - holtzmanns

AN: Fic title taken from the song Game of Survival by Ruelle. I love music way too much and may or may not have created a playlist to go with this fic - here’s the link for anyone who wants to listen.

Vanessa Mateo doesn’t falter. Not after fighting tooth and nail to get where she is, facing off against rivals that are both literally and figuratively larger than her while never once backing down.  

Watching the flames eat away at the walls of her office, however, tearing them down in a cloud of smoke and ashes, is enough to start to shake the strong foundations that she’s created for herself.

Her team is here, a flurry of movement and panicked calls and whizzing around her like flies while trying to figure out what to do. Someone (A’keria?) who is able to actually function in crisis has called 911. A myriad of firetrucks and police cars are already here with firefighters suiting up to confront the blaze that has started to spread to the building beside it.

Vanessa is glad that those around her are doing something, at least. She still hasn’t moved from her spot on the sidewalk. Her brain feels grey, all static and buzzing noises that are blocking any rational thoughts.

“Okay. Run me through it again. What exactly happened?” A’keria’s voice cuts through the fog, her campaign manager ever persistent and looking for some sort of answer. Not that Vanessa has one to give to her.

“I don’t fucking know, okay?” Vanessa’s voice comes out snappier than intended, if A’keria’s raised eyebrow is indicative of anything. She sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose with two fingers. “All I know is that it blew up in front of my face and I only just missed becoming toast with it.”

A’keria’s face softens, hearing the slight break in Vanessa’s voice. Her hand is on Vanessa’s shoulder, as reassuring as she can be with the woman who is in charge of her paycheck. “We’ll figure this out. Silky is already on the phone to get more security because we’re going to need it on you 24/7 - don’t even try to argue with me.”

Vanessa huffs but doesn’t fight back. She’s been fiercely independent throughout this campaign, and the idea of continuous supervision makes her want to run and never leave her apartment again. However, she can’t deny that it’s necessary - not with the crackling noises of an office now turned to blackened dust continuing to echo in her ears.

A police detective grabs Vanessa as soon as A’keria turns away from her. “Just one more time ma’am, can you explain what happened? Working on getting this timeline straight.”

His reedy voice makes her wince. She tries her best to hold back the choice words that she so desperately wants to let out - the ones that she can’t freely express to anyone who’s not on her team, now that she’s running for office. Still needing to portray a wholesome image and all that.

Vanessa takes a deep breath, attempting to compose herself. She flashes the detective a polite smile: her ‘political’ face as A’keria calls it.

She’s gotten better at keeping her emotions in check as the campaign has continued, moving the heart that she normally keeps on her sleeve into a safer space inside of her mind. Her team has been grateful for it, having to intervene with less and less damage control as she’s stopped being completely honest with whomever she feels has wronged her in any way. She’s starting to feel like a rich white woman, slowly learning how to get what she wants with fake niceties and smiles that mask the true emotions that she holds back.   

Vanessa is honest with the detective for the most part, recalling the sped up walk to work after the longer than normal lineup at the coffee shop that morning. She falters, though, when she remembers the wild eyed woman that she had spilled her coffee on.

The one who barely noticed the spill and instead pulled Vanessa close and shielded her from falling debris when the office exploded. The one who disappeared right afterwards, like a fucking blonde and tall fairy godmother that Vanessa now feels like she’s imagined the entire time.

But she hasn’t, right? The woman had been real and there. Or at least, Vanessa thinks she was.

The detective clicks his pen while waiting for her to finish, the incessant noise making her eye twitch. Vanessa has to hold back the sharp words about to roll off of her tongue that so desperately want to tell the man to shut the fuck up.

“I’m sorry Detective, that’s all that happened, really. I was walking to work and it blew up in front of me. I’m just so relieved that none of my team was there, it could have ended so much worse.” The diplomatic answer rolls off of her tongue so smoothly that she almost believes it herself.

Vanessa doesn’t know why she holds back on mentioning the woman - she can easily describe her to the police and give them a potential lead. But something is off. The woman doesn’t fit in the picture. The way she grabbed Vanessa was as if she knew the explosion was about to happen, sure. But then why would she protect her?

The detective fixes Vanessa with a stare, searching her eyes for any evidence that she’s lying. He doesn’t find it, judging by the way he thanks her and turns back to his notes.

She lets out a breath, turning her gaze back towards the building. Or at least, where it used to stand. She knows she’s lucky, that the team is lucky. They didn’t lose data; backups of plans and budgets and work for the campaign saved online in the cloud.

Still, she’s now lost her base in an explosion that definitely was not an accident. She almost lost her life.

Her run for congress is her baby - it’s what she’s been working towards for almost her entire adult existence. Years of dead-end jobs, living paycheck to paycheck on meagre wages, waiting for her turn to burst onto the scene and make an impression. This year has finally been her chance.

It’s clear, though, that someone doesn’t want it to happen. She’s big enough of a threat.

Part of her wants to run, to quit the race with her tail between her legs and go back to a life of anonymity. Vanessa pushes the thoughts down. She doesn’t falter. She hasn’t in the past, and she won’t now. Good fucking luck to anyone trying to stop her.

When Silky hangs up the phone and comes up to her to provide more details around her extra security, Vanessa doesn’t argue. She can handle some suits surrounding her in order to keep pushing forward. Let the bastards who attempted to kill her try again. She doesn’t go down that easy.

Maybe the blonde will reappear, saving her life once more. At least she’ll be able to catch her fucking name next time.

The next few days are chaos as they’re caught up in a media storm, her publicist Ra’jah fielding never ending calls from news outlets that need Vanessa’s perspective on the attempt on her life. Vanessa provides diplomatic statements in interviews, droning on about how grateful she is for the public’s support and how she’s more committed than ever to the campaign.

Vanessa sits back on a couch as A’keria directs the various team members and volunteers assembled in the latter’s living room, which over a few days has transformed into makeshift campaign headquarters. She’s willing to let her campaign manager take the lead for now and get them moving forward. She’s fucking exhausted.

Silky drops onto the couch next to Vanessa after A’keria finishes speaking, nearly knocking files out of her hands.

“Jesus, Silky.”

Silky ignores her and instead gestures to two men in suits that are standing in front of them. “These are the lovely knights in shining armour who will be part of your security detail. Hopefully they’ll keep you from going kaboom.”

Vanessa’s mouth turns up in a wry smile. Silky may be crass, but she is funny. The dark humour feels necessary at a time like this, and it’s something that her college friend and now deputy campaign manager is always able to channel.

Vanessa sticks out a hand for each of them to shake, to which they oblige without any change in facial expression. Both have handshakes that could stand to be stronger. Not quite off to the best start.

“If you try to run from them, I will come after your ass. So behave.“

Vanessa snorts at Silky’s faux threatening tone. “Why, you don’t think that they can keep up with me?”

“No, I think they can. I just think that you’re too good at getting yourself into…explosive situations.” Silky wiggles her eyebrows as Vanessa grabs for a couch cushion and smacks her with it. “Ow, bitch!”

“God Silk, still too fucking soon.” Silky is the only person that Vanessa wouldn’t immediately fire for such a stupid and morbid pun. “You’re alive, aren’t you?” Silky ducks the next time that Vanessa lifts up the cushion. “Ha, missed that time. Anyway, let these nice men follow you around. The only time, actually, that you should let men follow you around.”

Vanessa tries to ignore the men indeed close behind her as she heads home from A’keria’s place a couple of hours later. She regrets walking instead of taking an Uber, the crowds on the busy downtown street positively stifling as she keeps her head down and pushes through them.

She needs sleep. Or maybe a bath. Perhaps both, to prepare for the press conference that Ra’jah has scheduled for her tomorrow. Vanessa can already hear Ra’jah’s voice in her ears berating her for inevitably losing her temper at a journalist. It happens at least once every time, no matter how hard she works to keep her emotions in check. It’s what the public loves, though, her ability to call others out when she needs to.

Sure, it’s made her quite a few enemies. But none of them have tried to kill her…Oh, wait.

Vanessa has to hold in a snicker while coming up to a busy intersection. Silky’s stupid sense of humour is starting to rub off on her.

She wonders if she should feel more afraid, rather than immediately jumping to gallows-esque jokes. Shouldn’t she be worried about her safety, after almost getting killed?

Vanessa knows she’s not invincible. She knows her size, and that there are bigger dogs out there who could probably crush her if they wanted to - both literally and figuratively. She’s not stupid.

It doesn’t mean she has to give in, though, to fear and anxiety and worry about those trying to intimidate her. Sure, the consequences are higher than a simple school bully trying to push her into a locker. She’s just not ready to go down without a fight.

She just needs a plan, her team can’t only be on the defensive, they need to show their strength-

A woman. Tall, blonde. Separated from Vanessa by a few people on the sidewalk.

The woman turns her head as she reaches into her bag, side profile instantly recognizable. Vanessa’s seen that face, she knows that face-

“Wait! You!”

The woman freezes for a second before she turns her face away abruptly, disappearing into the crowd. She’s fast. But so is Vanessa.

Apologies tumble from her lips as she pushes her way through the overcrowded sidewalk, leaving her security detail behind as she tries to follow the blonde ponytail that’s so painfully close, only a few meters if she could just reach-

“What the hell?”

The woman is gone. Vanessa looks around wildly as she tries to catch her breath, stretching up on her toes and straining her neck because there’s no way the woman could have disappeared that fast without a trace. She saw her - the same woman who she spilled her fucking coffee on and who grabbed her during the blast and then disappeared without a trace, vanishing into nothing. Just like now. Vanessa’s sigh in frustration is strangled.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” The two men acting as her security detail catch up to her, trying and failing to hide their wheezing breaths.

She brushes them off. “I’m fine. Did you see…have you seen…never mind.”

There’s no point. She’s gone again. Vanishing like a fucking ghost who has developed a penchant for stalking her.

Vanessa had started to doubt her memories about the woman the more she thought about her, if she even existed at all. The office explosion had happened early in the morning after all; maybe she had been half asleep and still dreaming.

Standing stock still at a busy intersection and ignoring the small crowd forming (“Is that Vanessa Mateo?” ) as she cranes her neck and tries in vain to spot her, Vanessa comes to three conclusions.

One: the woman is real, not just a fabrication of her mind attempting to make sense of the explosion.

Two: she’s fucking involved in this whole mess, there’s no doubt. Vanessa needs to find out how.

Three: for the second time, she had been nearly in Vanessa’s reach, so tantalizingly close.

Vanessa needs to get to her.

All she can think about is the flick of the woman’s blonde hair, the long legs with the infuriating ability of helping her escape not once, but twice.

She ignores the rational part of her brain that is screaming at her about safety and having others involved for backup. The woman fucking saved her life, for Christ’s sake. She wouldn’t kill her. Or at least, not right away. Vanessa is good at talking herself out of situations.

Besides, this time, she’s going to have a plan.

Two can play at this game.  

“What the hell are you setting up a camera for?” A’keria’s voice is tired as she looks at Vanessa, who is fiddling with the device outside A’keria’s apartment building.

Vanessa doesn’t look up as she positions the camera between the leaves of a flower arrangement. “Just being careful, is all.”

“Don’t be getting all paranoid on me.”

“What’s wrong with some extra security?”

“Look.” Akeria’s face softens. “We’ve got you, okay? We’re not going to have a repeat of the office anytime soon if we can help it.”

Vanessa nods, waving her off. She ignores the sigh that she can hear falling from A’keria’s lips as she walks away.

Perhaps it’s a blessing that A’keria is mistaking her behaviour as a reaction to the explosion of the office. How the hell is she supposed to explain that she’s trying to catch a woman who has been haunting not only her thoughts, but her whereabouts too?

She didn’t tell A’keria about the woman after the explosion either, the same way she didn’t tell the police detective. Her brain had been too fuzzy to do so at the time, and each passing day makes her want to keep the situation to herself.

A’keria wouldn’t get it. She’d tell Vanessa that her mind is playing tricks on her, that the woman on the street afterwards was just a lookalike. That there is no way there is something fishy about her.

So what if Vanessa wants to keep it to herself? She doesn’t need a team to fucking find out what is happening once and for all. She’s going to find out on her own, and has all the backup she already needs. The woman isn’t going to know what hit her - quite literally.

Find me at @plastiquetiaras.