#where the crickets chirp and the air is brisk

[bone-jpeg]

I shall request thee a kiss from thy lips for our beloved marriage will flourish resembling the tender leaves of the vine engulfing what was before an empty frame of what winter's unforgivable wrath left behind

did i just get shakespearean rizzed? 🫦

[raspberrybesitos]

let’s get outta here, baby | frankies morales x f!reader

Valentine’s masterlist | Main masterlist | Palestine

Please take some time to go through the Palestine links. If you enjoy my writing, I ask you to help Palestine in any way you can.

Rating: 18+ MDNI

Word count: ~2.5k

Summary: Frankie whisks you away on Valentine’s Day for a romantic evening secluded by the water.

Warnings: established relationship, exhibitionism, oral (f!receiving), face riding, unprotected PIV (wrap it up y’all), creampie, fluff, pet names (baby, hermosa, querida, amor) after care, reader has no description, no mention of hair type/body type/skin color, NO USE OF Y/N.

A/N: let’s try this again. happy frankie friday! oh how i missed my Frankie so much omg 😭 he and Javi are tied for my favorite Pedro boys tbh. i love love love him sm. anyway, i hope y’all enjoy!! as always, not beta’d - all mistakes are my own. 🏃‍♀️

Translations: Te amo = I love you

Divider by @saradika-graphics

“Come on, baby. Get dressed, we have plans,” he said.

“Where are we going, Frankie? I just got comfy, plus I thought we were gonna stay in and watch a movie or a few episodes of our show?” You pout, already snuggled in on the couch, lounging in your leggings and one of Frankie’s hoodies.

“I know, but I thought we could do something else tonight. And what you’re wearing is actually perfect, just throw on some comfy shoes. I promise it’s nothing crazy. Now come on. Let’s get outta here, baby,” he says, car keys in hand as he extends a hand to you.

That was 2 hours ago, his left hand drumming on the steering wheel to the music that plays throughout the speaker, his right hand resting on your thigh, giving it an occasional squeeze.

After the two of you worked crazy hours the past week, work had finally given you a deserved day off, and it just so happened to be Valentine’s Day. Frankie opted to use his sick hours, giving you two the whole day to yourselves. You’d craved to sit at home and wait for your boyfriend to get home to enjoy a romantic evening at home with him.

Frankie had other plans it seems.

Your hand rests atop his, fiddling with his fingers as you hum along to the music. The road winds along the coast, the rind of clouds floating in the tangerine sky. reflecting off the water. Traffic was a bit heavy, but Frankie said it didn’t matter what time you two made it to the location, that it’d be open. 

Pulling up to a hill, Frankie drives upwards. Your brows furrow in confusion, head snapping to gaze at your boyfriend. He pulls his hand from your thigh as he maneuvers the car up the hill, a smirk playing on his lips.

“Where are you taking me, Francisco?” You playfully question him. 

“I told you, it’s a surprise, baby. You’ll see,” he says smugly. Jokingly scrutinizing him, you cross your arms and hum. 

Soon enough, he pulls the car to a stop and cuts the engine. He’s parked on a cliff overlooking the coast, the waves crashing in the background. Crickets chirping and a brisk breeze blows through the air. Frankie rushes out of the car and to the trunk.

“Don’t look back here yet, querida!” He shouts. He’d told you the same thing before you’d left, covering your eyes as he helped you in the truck and blocking off the backseat with some blankets. You hear Frankie grunting and shuffling around the trunk, smiling softly to yourself at the thought of him all flustered. 

“Need any help, baby?” You yell over the commotion. You’re met with a few more grunts and can feel Frankie crawling in the trunk.

What the hell is he doing?

Popping up in your peripheral, you jump slightly as he stands there - his cheeks flushed as he takes off his cap and runs a hand through his hair before putting it back on.

“Come on, querida,” he says, his hand extended awaiting your grasp. A suspicious smirk tugs at your lips, brows scrunched in question. He leads you to the rear of the truck, the trunk door open. Pillows and blankets strewn about the truck bed, a cooler and his laptop lay on the floor.

Gasping at the sight in front of you, tears spring in your eyes. You whirl around, hands still entwined as a cheek-splitting smile crinkles your face.

“Frankie. You did all this for me?” You ask quietly, Frankie mirroring your smile. 

“Of course, querida. I know we said no gifts this year and we wanted to stay in with work being hectic for both of us, but you still deserve something.” His voice growing hushed and timid, his free hand fidgeting as his neck flushes red. Smiling even bigger, you throw your arms around his broad shoulders, looping them around his neck and crash your lips onto his. Frankie cups your cheeks as you two smile into each other, soft laughter bubbling from both of you.

“You are the sweetest man alive, Francisco Morales,” you whisper, disconnecting from him. His cheeks flush with heat. “I don’t know about all that, querida,” he rasps against your lips, grinning bashfully.

“You are, Frankie. This is perfect. Thank you for this, amor - for loving me. I love you,” you utter sweetly, threading your fingers through his curls and giving his head an affectionate, gentle scratch.

“No need to thank me, baby. Loving you is the best decision I’ve ever made. I love you - so much, hermosa,” he affirms, his voice growing huskier. He stealthily sneaks his hands down your back, resting them on the globes of your ass. He leans in, capturing your lips in another tender kiss.

The tenderness doesn’t last long though as the kiss blossoms into something hungrier, thick with lust. Frankie walks you backwards towards the truck bed, carefully helping you inside.

Only breaking for air to scoot back and settle into the makeshift mattress. He slowly settles you on your back against the plush padding of the blankets and pillows. Yanking him down for another hungry kiss, moans and sighs grow louder. The area is so secluded, no one is around to hear.

He slides his tongue into your mouth, tongues entangled and teeth clashing together. Moaning into him, he brings his rough, warm hands to cup your cheeks, sucking your bottom lip in between his teeth.

“Frankie,” you moan softly, parting from his lips, panting. Frankie suckles on your neck, moving his way to nip at your jaw. Kissing his way down your body, you moan quietly when he presses a kiss above your clothed mound.

“Can I take these off, hermosa?” He asks softly, toying with the hem of your leggings. You nod, whimpering as he slides them off, not wasting a second. Peppering kisses along your bare thighs, you squirm beneath him - desperate for his mouth.

“Need to taste you, baby,” he rasps, kissing your mound before slipping off your panties, tossing them to the side to join your leggings. You lift your hips, aiding him in the process and lay back down as he licks his lips. Eyes blown black and wild, eager and hungry for you. The feel of his lips against your bare sex earns him a whine, a desperate plea for more.

“I got you, querida,” he grits, diving in and licking a long, languid stripe between your folds, moaning into you as he savors the sweet, salty tang of your slick. Moaning at the feeling of his hot mouth on your aching core, you tug on his soft curls. Frankie grunts into you, always loving the way you grip his hair, holding onto him for purchase as he unravels you.

A wanton moan tumbles from your lips, slick endlessly streaming from your weeping cunt as Frankie slurps up every droplet. Your back arching further into the air as your head sinks deeper into the plush mountain of pillows and blankets on the truck bed.

“So fucking good, Frankie, fuck, yes, baby." Your moans bloom into a cry as Frankie abruptly stops, pulling away and sitting up. His cheeks sticky with your nectar, and his eyes black and wild - vehement. He sits up against the pillows, bringing you to sit up with him.

“Wh-what? No, Frankie, please why’d you st-,” you whine, until Frankie cuts you off with his rough grasp. He drags you up his chest, leaving a trail of slick on his belly and broad chest, before coming face-to-face with your dripping cunt - groaning at the sight of your swollen clit. Without a word, he forces you to sit on his face, his strong nose nudging at your clit as his tongue prods in and out of your entrance.

Sucking in a sharp gasp, you clutch his curls, the new position throwing you off-kilter. Gasps morph into uncontrollable moans as he grips your thighs tightly, your hips rocking into his face. His tongue flicks your precious pearl swirling frantic circles around your clit before wrapping his lips around your swollen bud.

“Oh my god, oh my fucking god, Frankie,” you keen, your orgasm rapidly approaching - taunting you on a precipice that’s just within reach. Frankie moaning below you, the vibrations sending jolts of electricity throughout your entire body. 

You glance down with glazed eyes, catching a glimpse of him drunk off your pussy. Eyes shut in bliss, cheeks flushed and shiny, his scruff burning your thighs, curls disheveled as he moans while working his skillful tongue. It pushes you further to the edge, wailing above him as you cant your hips harder into his face.

“Yes, yes, yes, Frankie! Oh fuck, Frankie! I’m gonna come, I’m gonna - oh fuck!”

Twitching and writhing above him, he releases your clit from his lips and licks another long stripe through your folds before relentlessly flicking at your precious swollen bud again.

“Frankie, oh fuck! Frankie, Frankie, Frankie!”

You crumble, your body nearly folding in on itself as your orgasm sets your body aflame, rutting your hips into your boyfriend’s face. Screaming his name as you ride out your orgasm. Your heartbeat thrumming in your ears like the waves crashing in the ocean nearby.

As the rush of your orgasm slows, Frankie wastes no time to slide you off his face, licking his lips and eyes wide and feral. Your legs tremble as he settles you atop his stomach. The trail of hair brushing against your sensitive clit, hissing at the sensation.

Frankie grunts with his bottom lip sucked in between his teeth as he hastily fiddles with his belt, unbuttoning his jeans and yanking his briefs and pants down in one go.

“Need to be inside you, querida,” he grits. You love seeing him so needy, desperate - so wild. He drags you down his stomach, his weeping cock brushes against your folds - guttural moans bouncing off the confines of the truck. He lifts your hips slightly, just enough to slide you down on his cock. Your mouth agape in a perfect O as you slowly sink onto his heavy, hard length. Filling you to the brim, fluttering around him as he twitches inside of you.

“Frankie, s-so full,” you whisper, voice pitchy and desperate. He groans as you clench around him. 

“Fuck, don’t do that, hermosa. Or else this’ll end before it starts.”

He slowly grinds his hips, pushing his cock deeper into you. Shuddering as he feels impossibly deep, taking him is never an easy feat, but the reward is priceless. The stretch aches deliciously as he splits you open.

You slowly grind your hips into his, meeting him with his thrusts. Moans stream from your lips, an endless river of Frankie Frankie Frankie. Your orgasm cresting, the sensitivity still prevalent from the one he gave you just minutes ago. Lifting off him with what little strength you have, you slam your hips back down onto him.

The stretch of his cock makes your eyes roll to the back of your head as you sink back down onto him. He hits that spot just right as he fucks up into you.

“Sweetest fucking pussy ever. Mine, it's all mine, huh, querida? Who does this pussy belong to?” He grits, his hips canting upwards, thrusts growing sloppier every time.

“Y-yours, Frankie! 'S all yours, I'm all yours,” you slur, vision growing spotty.

“‘S right, baby. You're mine. All fucking mine," he moans, his cock punching your g-spot hard, wailing at the feel of him.

“Frankie! Oh god, Frankie,” you keen, bracing yourself on his clothed chest as he fucks you as if his life depends on it.

“Come on, querida. Come for me, you’re so close. Squeezing me so goddamn tight. Let go, baby. Soak my cock, baby, need you to soak my cock, querida,” he babbles, fighting off his own orgasm as you reach the top of yours.

His words send you crashing into your second orgasm, screaming as he fucks you through it. His own resolve crumbles as he watches you squirm and feels you squeeze around him.

Your hearing muffled as your orgasm drags you under the waves, you hear Frankie shout strings of profanities as you feel his cum coat your fluttering walls. The two of you ride out your highs together.

Your vision hazy, covered in a thick fog of bliss as you float back to the surface of reality from the waves of your orgasm. You collapse on his chest, the two of you full clothed, save for your bottoms. Laying on him for a moment, silence hangs in the cool air as you two catch your breath.

He traces patterns on your lower back, huffing as he regains control of himself. His rapid heartbeat returns to a steady thrum, calming your senses. Sex and sweat coats your bodies and the air in the trunk.

Carefully flipping you onto your back, he slips out of you slowly, hissing in tandem at the loss. He grabs one of the extra blankets he packed from the floor and wipes off the combination of his cum and your slick between your thighs. He cleans himself up before tossing the blanket on the floor behind the passenger seat.

Sitting up, you slide your leggings back on, forgoing your panties. Frankie tosses his belt off to the side and pulls his jeans up, leaving the button undone.

“You okay, baby?” He asks, sitting beside you.

Always a gentleman, always checking in with you. 

Bringing a hand to his cheek, you smile at him with heavy eyes. 

“I’m good, baby. Thank you,” you whisper. He smiles, placing a tender kiss on your palm before he lays beside you. 

“I am a little hungry now though. You didn’t tell me we’d be on the road for so long and doing strenuous activities,” you joke. His chest rumbles while he chuckles heartily.

“I didn’t expect to be doing any strenuous activities either… well, at least not so soon into our date.”

“At least wine and dine me first, Morales,” you giggle. He nips at your neck, your giggles blossoming into a belly laugh.

“Come on, amor. Let’s eat. Gotta make sure my girl is ready for round two when we get home,” he says with a wink. He sits up, pulling you up with him. You rearrange the padding and pull up a movie on his laptop as he digs for something in the cooler. 

He pulls out two beers, his toothy grin making you smile. Cracking open two beers, he hands you one and settles back on the fort. He throws a blanket over you two as you snuggle into his side, clinking your bottles together in a silent toast, grinning from ear to ear.

“Happy Valentine’s Day, hermosa. Te amo, baby,” Frankie rasps against your head, pressing a soft kiss to your hairline. Gazing up at him, eyelids droopy with love and admiration. You capture his lips in a sweet, chaste kiss as he pulls you in closer, squeezing you tight.

“Happy Valentine’s Day, mi amor. Te amo también.”

tag list: @honeyedmiller @gracieheartspedro @nostalxgic @harriedandharassed @loliwrites @pedrostories

[stvharrngton]

first of all, congratulations on hitting 1K!!! that's huge and you deserve every bit of it 🫶🏻💗

secondly, can i get #10 from this list and #4 from this list? if i'm not allowed to mix prompts, you can just stick with #4!!!

congratulations again!!!

- @honeysuckleharringtons 💛🍯

thank you so much!! i already wrote for prompt #4 but i loved the idea of these two prompts together so much so i sorta wrote this as a part 2 to this! i hope that's okay? anyway here it is, i hope you enjoy <3 @honeysuckleharringtons 💜

pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader

word count: 1k

warnings: none really, just fluff!

prompt: spooning at night + asking them how your name + their surname would sound together (and/or vice versa)

taglist: @sweetiestevie @dukesmebby @sw34terw34ther @sweetbabygirlsworld

1k celebration

The room was quiet. The crickets chirped outside your window as the sun set long ago, the curtains billowing as the warm night air crept through the window. You laid there with Steve for what felt like hours, neither of you able to fall into sleep. The red numbers of your alarm clock blinked 01:24.

Your mind was working overtime, in a good way, mind. About you and Steve. Your future. You couldn’t fathom how or why it took you this long to get together. You were soulmates, knowing each other better than you knew yourselves. You moved in together not long after, knowing it was the right decision. The domesticity of it all made your heart flutter.

Your apartment was small, the result of what Steve and yourself could scrape together. It wasn’t much but it was yours and that’s all that mattered. A space that you made your own, old photos of you and your friends littering the walls. Trinkets from every road trip Steve took you on decorating the shelves and bookcase.

Steve was behind you, both laid on your side. His bare chest pressed against your back, the smattering of chest hair tickling the skin. His arm was thrown across your waist, his hand splayed across your naked stomach, his fingers drawing light shapes on flesh.

You sighed, contently of course, his breath fanning across your neck as his nose skimmed across your jaw. Steve peppered soft kisses across your shoulder, his legs tangled with yours beneath the sheets. You secretly yearned for this time of night with Steve, where you’d crawl into bed after you both had a long day at work, able to sink into his chest with your arms around you. You loved being able to share these moments with him.

Your eyes blinked across the dark room, the wall bathed in the glow of the street lamp outside your window. You craned your neck, inviting Steve to nuzzle his face into your neck which he accepted happily. 

“Do you think our names would sound good together?” You asked, voice a quiet hush.

Steve stopped in his tracks, a breathy laugh escaping his lips. His large palm gripped your waist, hand rubbing up and down over your hip.

“I’ve already answered that question, honey.”

Your brows pinched together in brisk confusion, before you were momentarily transported back to the diner, fries and all. Steve’s dorky, flustered expression staring at you from across the table. The drive home, the kiss.

“You remember that?” Your voice was a pitch higher, nose wrinkling as you tried to turn in the boy’s arms.

“‘Course I remember, baby, how could I forget?”

It was true. That day was impossible for Steve to forget. It was the start of your relationship, the official start. The rest was history. A beautiful history that Steve had dreamt of since forever, just you and him and the rest of your lives.

“Still,” you started, a small smile tugging on your lips, “can you answer the question?”

Steve hummed against your skin, lips finding your shoulder once more, his hand moving back over to your stomach, palm rubbing soothingly, “Yeah, I think our names would sound good together. Mr and Mrs. Steve Harrington, huh? Sounds like a dream.”

You giggled as Steve dug his fingers into your ribs, lips wet and ticklish against your neck. Kicking your legs as you squealed, slapping your hand against his trying to pry his hands off you.

“Alright, alright,” he chuckled, “settle down, you. What’s this all about anyway?” Steve’s hand found yours beneath the sheets, lacing his fingers between your own.

You shrugged, teeth gnawing on your bottom lip. You’d been thinking a lot lately about your future with Steve. You wanted a forever with him, you dreamt of it often, and you might have been rushing into it but you were sure. 

“Can we get married?” You blurted it out, a slip of the tongue in the heat of the moment.

“What?” Steve guffawed, leaning up on his elbow now, chin hooking over your shoulder, “What’re you talking about?”

Steve would marry you in a heartbeat given the chance. It wouldn’t have to be fancy, not some big expensive event like his parents would so desperately insist on. Hell, Steve would marry you in the parking lot of Family Video if it came down to it.

“You don’t wanna get married?” It came out as a mumble, a pout on your face, your ego dented. 

“What? No!” Steve exclaimed, heat rising up his neck, “Baby, no, that’s not what I meant.” His palms came to rest on your bicep, stroking up and down your arm softly. He sighed, mentally smacking himself on the forehead.

The air between you two was silent for a beat, the crickets still noisy outside, the wistful wind still blowing against the window. Steve racked his brain for the right words. Things usually came so easy to him when it came to you. But you were delicate and gentle, soft as rose petals in Steve’s arms and he wanted to do it all the right way with you.

“Baby,” Steve sighed, “you know I’d marry you tomorrow if that was possible. Fuck, I’ve dreamt of that day for years. You walking down that aisle to me, all our friends are there, getting to kiss my beautiful wife at the end of it all.”

Your heart fluttered a little too easily at his words. Images of you in a pretty white dress, makeshift bouquet of daisies and pink tulips in your hands. Steve handsome in his tux, hair pretty and perfect like always. It made your eyes well, tears you had to blink away in the dead of night.

“Just…” The boy started, breath a little shaky, a touch nervous, “let me do this right? I want to do this right, honey. Not at 2AM when we can’t sleep.”

Steve’s lips fell against your cheek, your head rolling back against his chest. The tip of his nose tracing the line of your jaw once more, you both falling back into that comfortable silence.

“Okay, but I’m not waiting forever, Harrington.” You mumbled with a giggle.

“Oh, trust me, baby,” Steve hushed you with a smirk, “you won’t be waiting long, future Mrs Steve Harrington.”

[lightofunova]

Previous

@life-of-kalos

As he leaned down to pick up his drink, Reshi became acutely aware of how calculated each movement of his was. The close proximity between them before he picked his poison, the swirling color that matched herself too well, the tone and way he spoke for her. This ‘Zeke’ knew much more than he was letting on, that was for sure.

The way he moved showed her that he was very much in control of the situation, leading her away with only an arm guiding her. Yet the question of where she preferred to go still proved how she wasn’t chained down. It was a complicated game to tread through, though she’d never been one to turn down a challenge.

“I’m carrying far too much to indulge in a dance at the moment.” She replied with a hint of laughter in her voice. “Perhaps the lake would be a better fit for drinks and lively conversation.”

The pair walked in confident strides until she was pulled in close to the crimson man, avoiding a spill of her drink via a rogue elbow. Air escaped her quickly at the sudden movement, despite how gentle and well intentioned it was.

"I will follow wherever you lead." Quiet, private. Something only she was privy to. That was when it hit her.

Lavish outfits in torchlight with the hum of instruments and lively conversation. Citizens dancing with one another jovially as they celebrated the event of peace, a night of fun.

And yet she found him off to the side, a frown plastered on his face. Approaching him was easy, it came fondly to her. “Why are you over here? There’s mead, ale, tons of lovely food prepared!” she asked, her excited gaze met with bored eyes.

“I’d rather not be here.” His unamused tone made her laugh, earning her a quick glare. She knew him better than anyone. Taking his hand, she gave the man a soft smile. “Then let’s get out of here. Make our own party, hm?”

His face became one of consideration, weighing the options. “Alright. So long as it’s not here, I will follow where you lead.” That was enough for her. No one seemed to notice the two slipping out from the ballroom, or their absence for the rest of the evening.

It took her but a short moment to come back to her senses. Reshi knew why she had such a horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach. It was too similar, too close. Taking a breath, she pushed past it and continued to walk with him. Panicking would do her no good. She resolved to let the feeling ride for now, hoping it would fade away.

A piercing blue gaze caught her eye, and she offered back a smile. “My apologies, your actions simply reminded me of someone.” She was honest, it wasn’t like she couldn’t be.

She continued on, waiting for him to follow her outside. “Coming?” she asked gently, her pale gaze meeting his bright one.

Moonlight shining down on them, crickets chirped in the brisk evening air. Her companion seemed to revel in the night, something that wasn’t surprising to her. The fur resting on his shoulders rustled with the night air, the warm gold metals changing to a frigid muted color. The horns atop his head seemed larger in the moonlight, his form taller than her by a few feet at least. Everything about him seemed so much different, somehow more mischievous.

A wolf stalking its prey, yet heeding to her beck and call. If she didn’t know better, she would say he seemed downright sinister.

However Reshi knew she had little to fear. If needed, she could leave, and he would let her escape his maws willingly. Something about him led her to believe that.

“How about there?” she pointed to the gazebo across the field. “Seems like a nice place to relax doesn’t it?”

[sunny6677]

Lavender.

Summary:

Skid goes about his daily life in the care of his adoptive father, Kevin—though of course as always with him, shenanigans ensue.

Chapter 17: Tender Treats - Part 3.

————

With an eager knocking of their fists, Skid and Pump lifted their hands and beated their knuckles against the wooden door that lay before them. There was an odd amount of loud shouting from behind them as the night enveloped them, but neither of them seemed to exactly mind. Crickets chirped from nearby—and the faint scent of grass hung in the air. The perfect atmosphere for a spooky night like this!

And yet.. as they stood, there was no answer. Pump frowned slightly—his lips curling downward behind his mask. Maybe no one was home? Neither of them were exactly sure, but they didn't wanna leave the house without candy.

And then, Pump widened his eyes—seemingly getting an idea. He lifted his head, throwing it back slightly, and began to repeatedly throw his head back and forth against the hard frame of the door. The door gave a thud—the wooden material of it slowly beginning to crack the harder he bashed his head into it. Despite the visible severity of it, Pump never faltered.

After a few more moments of loud crashing, the door came open with a slam, and Pump stepped back with a smile still behind his mask.

"Come here, you prick!" A masculine voice yelled from the figure who had stepped out. It was an older looking man with wrinkles below his eyes, his hair poky and dark gray, but short enough to the point where it only went to his thin neck. He wore a light green sweater, along with a dark green overcoat and some blue jeans.

The man's brows furrowed, his lips curling further into a snarl. Skid and Pump beamed cheerfully, "Trick or treat!"

The man stared, his lips curling into a thin smile. "Excuse me?" He huffed as he bent down, snarling, "You just broke my door!"

..huh—well.. there was only one thing to do if they wanted candy.

Skid and Pump began to growl, jumping up and down as sharp and fierce yells escaped their mouths. The man seemed slightly unphased, squinting at them as they hopped desperately. No matter how much they yelled, he didn't appear to falter. Finally after a while, the man let out a sigh.

"..okay, fine, fine.. take it."

The man grabbed a few candies from his pocket, and threw them outward. Skid and Pump held their bags out. The candies landed inside of their respective bags with a soft thud. And the door in front of them slammed.

The two grinned. This was going to be a fun night!

————

From houses to houses they went, creating all sorts of different alternatives for 'Trick-or-treat'. They went to different people for candy, and even went to a church, though the old man who was inside just ended up coming out and threw boiling water on some random child. It didn't matter though! They were both still having fun. They even went into the forest, and saw all kinds of spooky looking things there!

As of now, they were running with brisk determination toward a lit up house with gray walls, and mostly green lighting. A mirror sat on the front porch, along with light spraying out from the windows, a gigantic skeleton with green pupils poking out from a nearby sign.

After running along the path that led to the steps, they hopped up the grey steps, and onto the porch. The porch was decorated with all kinds of webs, lights, a thick smoke that seemed to be coming from some nearby sprayer.

They glanced around, admiring the area. As their ears got used to the silence though, they slightly flinched when a gigantic hue of green smoke popped out from the entrance, and a face shoved itself at them.

"Ah—welcome, gentlemen!" It was an odd looking man with black eyeliner around his sockets. Two sharp teeth poked out from his mouth. And.. wait—was he?

"Welcome to the hauntiest of houses!" He beamed. Stepping to their side, he lifted what looked to be a bright green cape over his form, murmuring, "As you can see—"

He shoved himself behind them, and gently pushed them foward to a nearby mirror. "I am a real vampire!"

Skid and Pump looked into the mirror. Skids eyes shimmered with glee. The man wasn't even visible at all in the mirror! In fact, it looked as if nothing were behind them at all. Though Pump's stem seemed as if it were suddenly gone for some reason.

"Now, get inside!" He laughed, shoving them near the entrance, "And get scared!"

Skid and Pump giggled with glee, and with a sharp racing of their feet, they ran into the dark entrance. Skid could have sworn he saw something.. big, and red coming up from a far away distance. At least behind them anyway.

But, it was probably nothing.

————

There were vampires, zombies, and all kinds of ghouls inside! The place was amazing! There were red walls, haunted mirrors, green smoke from all around them. It was—it was the spookiest thing ever! Anytime a monster came out, they cheered with happiness, confused by why anytime they died, the monsters expression would always seem to falter.

After a long way through the corridor, the two found themself stepping back onto the porch, giggling.

Pump blinked though, noticing something. The vampire man from before wasn't there. Well, actually he was. But.. he was on the floor, whimpering—with a puddle of red liquid beneath his body.

"Oh, huey! Look!" Pump spoke. He slowly walked over with Skid trailing behind him, and his eyes glanced over the now blooded form of the vampire man. The man's arm, or at least the one that was lying beneath him, had been completely red—it even almost looked like it was missing or something.

"..that looks so real!" Pump grinned.

"Thats amazing!" Skid nodded, "Come on, let's go get more candy!"

With a spin of their heels, the two marched off of the porch—not bothering to really acknowledge the odd chill that ran up their spine. Almost as if they were being followed.

..but being followed felt spooky!

————

"..kid, listen. We need you to stay in your house, and lock all the doors."

The officer before Kevin spoke with a stern, but gentle tone as he looked upon him. Kevin fumbled with his hands, swallowing nervously. He didn't think he'd be in this position. Not on tonight of all nights. Not on this month. Not on the kids month. He.. the kid.. what would happen to the kid?

Kevin found himself shuddering at the thought. Of what could even happen to the kid while he was out there with that man going around. There was always a chance the man wouldn't find him, but—he didn't wanna take any chances.

He gasped out—his skin feeling numb as anxious thoughts raced in his mind.

"But—dude, my.." Kevin shakily spoke, "My kids out there! My.. he and his friend are out there. I can't just—leave them!"

The officer hesitated. "..don't worry, sir. We'll find 'em. What costume was he wearing?"

"Uh.. well, he was in a skeleton costume. And.. he's—he's like eight, so he's really small."

The officers looked at the sidewalk. On the sidewalk, there were.. several people in skeleton costumes, most of them looking between twelfth and the age he just said.

"..can.. you, uh.. can you be a little more specific?" The officer asked.

"Wh—ugh.. his friend is wearing a pumpkin costume!"

The officers looked behind them again. This time, there were several kids in pumpkin costumes.

The officers stared, and the brown haired one let out a sigh.

"..yeah, yeah, just.. uh.. keep the doors locked. We'll try to find 'em if we can."

Kevin paused, widening his eyes as his brows furrowed. How could they just.. be so insensitive? Would they not even bother to take him along so he could point his own kid out? He groaned, spinning around as he forced himself back into his house.

"Sir, we—"

Kevin slammed the door.

————

Kevin stood at the window as they both got into the vehicle. The vehicle started up outside with a click, beginning to slowly move along the road with a muffled whir. His thoughts swirled. Where would his kid possibly have gone? Where would his friend have gone? He was supposed to be taking care of the kid. Not leaving him out to die!

He didn't wanna leave the kid at all. He didn't wanna leave.. his kid.

He furrowed his brows again, and his eyes fixed into a glare. Whipping out his phone from his pocket, he firmly pressed the button on the side of it that turned it on. With a swipe, he went to the messengers app. He didn't care what the officers said. That was a kid he was supposed to be looking after, and he wasn't gonna let him get hurt.

He firmly pressed at the numbers on the phone once he had pressed the call button, and after a while once he stopped, it began to ring. He pressed it to his ear, waiting for a voice to speak.

Finally.. someone answered.

"Uh.. hey, dude!"

"..Radford. Look, I—I know you said you'd be busy tonight, but I kinda need you. I—god.. I—"

"Woah.. what? What happened?"

"The—the kid. I can't find him. I can't find him or his friend. He went out trick or treating on his own. He talked me into it, and I let him go. And there's a weird dude on the lose trying to kill anyone he runs into, and—"

"What?! Why—why'd you let him go by himself, dude?!"

"I—I don't know! He just really wanted to go by himself this year. Ugh.. look, just—get over here. Rick's at the candy store right now, and I don't really have anyone else to turn to. So.. please."

"..well.. I.. okay, dude. I'll come over to help you. Just let me get some actual clothes on first—"

"Du—Dude—I need to find the kid! Why would you need to put new clothes on just to—"

"Ok—Okay! Okay.. sorry. I'm on my way."

[misschifuyu]

Midnight sky

...in which shion decides to pay you a visit during the night for just one reason

requested

characters: shion madarame + gn! reader

genre: fluff, pure fluff

warnings: none

The soft chirping of birds had long faded out into the distance, following the sun's trajectory down into the horizon. The brisk, cold night air was only accompanied by the sound of a passing car every now and then, breaking the tranquility that roamed the streets at such an hour.

It was just another Friday evening; with no plans or intentions of doing something, you were sat in your room, scrolling away on your laptop on whatever social media you could find even mildly interesting.

Surroundings dimly lit by the fairy lights that hung just above your bed, you were expecting yourself to drift off on top of your keyboard at any minute.

The clock on your wall showed that it was far past 11pm, creeping up on the midnight mark. To think, despite it being summer, you were cramped up in your room instead of going out with fellow friends...well, truth be told, it didn't really bother you much.

Besides, summer has a lot of Fridays; it wouldn't hurt to just waste one.

A sigh escaped your lips as you realised that there was really no point in perching yourself on your desk chair like you currently were - leg bent up as you leaned your head on it lazily. The posture was far from a good one, anyway.

And so, feeling your back slowly stretch out as you lowered your once bent knee, you slowly closed the top of your laptop down, the light that had been illuminating your face up in the dark room shutting off in an instance.

Guess it was time to go to sleep, really.

There was no point staying up until some ridiculous hour of the night: all that ensured was a groggy state in the morning, as well as wasting away the first hours of the day. You were rather exhausted from the past week, so falling asleep atop the comfort of your pillow wasn't a bad idea in the slightest.

Elbows coming down onto the cushioning of your bed, you mentally praised yourself for taking that decision.

The contrast from the high temperature that had lingered around in the same room to the current ambience was more than noticeable as soon as your skin met the cool sheets, courtesy of the breeze that flowed past your curtains.

It was bliss, to say the least.

As you sunk your body into the comfortable surface, you could feel yourself starting to already lose yourself in a sleepy state, eyes closing instinctively as your head rested on the feather cushion. To say you were tired was an understatement.

Positioning yourself in a way that was perfect to fall into a deep slumber, you didn't even bother covering yourself with the thin sheet. This was more than enough.

The lack of commotion from outside made it easy for you to switch off the running thoughts that had been roaming your mind for the day, and you were left with only the occasional sounds of crickets that spent their evenings in the nearby park below.

Just as you started to feel yourself slip into sleep...

*bang*

The skin of your back almost leaped up before you at the sudden sound, startling you out from your once calm state. What the hell was that?

Wondering if perhaps it had just been a cat knocking something over outside as it passed by, you remained in the position you had taken up on your bed, weary as you listened out for any further noises.

A few seconds passed, and...nothing.

Until-

*bang*

This time, it came not far from your window.

Growing rather irritated at the disruption of your almost beauty sleep, you swung your legs out from the bed, landing swiftly on the floor before making your way over to your window. There had better be nothing there, you thought to yourself.

At the streetlight that was located close to the building you lived it, you squinted your eyes, adjusting to the sight as you reached the opening that gave way to the night sky.

Not seeing much from where you were stood, you balanced yourself on the windowsill, leaning out slightly to check if something was going on on the balcony just beside your room.

"Shit, did I wake you up already?"

Once again, you could almost feel your soul leaving your body as soon as a voice spoke out only mere metres away from you. Head whipping around to see where the voice had come from, you had almost crouched down to get your slipper to throw at the intruder before you realised who it was.

"Shion? What the hell are you doing up here?"

Your tone was lowered into a hiss, though the racing of your heart has now started to slow down upon knowing that the idiot on the balcony at midnight was just your boyfriend.

Heavy breathing after what you could only suppose was jumping past the dividers on the extended balcony, Shion was stood near the edge, hair messy and wearing something that he had clearly just thrown on in the span of about five seconds.

"I, uh...missed you?"

"At midnight? Couldn't you have just waited until tomorrow?"

His sleazy grin gave you enough of an answer to your slightly irritated question. It wasn't the first time your boyfriend had pulled some ridiculous way just to see you, but never had it been at such a late hour.

"You've got class in the morning, don't you-?"

"It's July"

Blinking at your reply, you could almost hear the light bulb switch on in his head as he realised that he could've, actually, just waited until the next day. Morning, even.

"Well...you can't complain. Look how much I've done just to get here and tell you that I, Shion Madarame, love Y/N S/N more than any other punk could imagine"

At his lazy - and most definitely made-up-on-the-spot reply - you deadpanned in his direction, clearly unimpressed by his little stunt.

Sometimes you truly wondered why you had chosen him out of everyone in Tenjiku. There was Izana, Kaku, Ran...hell, even Mochi wouldn't come up to your house for such a stupid reason.

And yet, here he was. Your boyfriend, up on your balcony at midnight just to tell you he loved you. You couldn't exactly be mad at him, now could you.

"You're an absolute idiot, you know that?"

At your response, the infamous delinquent before you gave you a bright grin, lifting a leg up onto the railing of the balcony.

"But I'm your idiot"

"Shut up and get inside..."

[gryffindors-weasley]

Tender Confession

Draco Malfoy x Reader

Summary: Draco feels he can no longer keep his feelings from you.

Word Count: 4.2k

Warnings: mild angst, self doubt, insecurity, fluff, kissing

It was well past midnight as you remain in the greenhouse, it’s vast array of greenery providing far too much serenity for you to want to leave it just yet. The fall air was brisk that night as it swept through the windows that had been open on its roof top, the gentle breeze brushing through each and every leaf and petal it could come across. There wasn’t any real reason for you to be there on a Tuesday night, or on any night you suppose, other than to revel in its natural beauty and have a moment to yourself. What more reason could you need?

It was the most calming place on the seemingly endless premises, one that only brought with it peace and quiet at almost all hours. That, and the Black Lake had been your favorite places to wander off to should you want to. The smell of soil and moss had always been immediate upon your arrival, paired with the ever so delicate floral scent should some of the magical plants blossom their flowers. Most students hadn’t come there past their second year, having had enough of it after experiencing the shrill cries of the Mandrakes. You suppose you don’t blame them, it worked in your benefit after all.

Occasionally Professor Sprout would leave you with some tasks should she need your help; she knew of your liking for it and she was merely happy that someone enjoyed the place just as much as she did. It was more than she could say for most of the students attending Hogwarts.

That evening, you had nothing in particular to do. There was no checklist when you had arrived two hours prior, nothing out of place to be organized. No plants to be repotted or windows to be cleaned just yet. You suppose you were grateful for the free time to simply just be there with no other responsibility than to take a moment to breathe, to take a moment to admire your surroundings. It’d been your last year, your seventh year. Once it’s concluded you would no longer be able to sneak off to this very spot, so you were determined to take in each and every second. And that’s just what you had been doing for the past two hours.

Sleep had not been on your radar quite yet, your mind far too busy with exams, too busy with trivial things, too busy with fond feelings to rest your eyes. You’d read a fair amount of your book in your time there, leaving yourself with half left to read before you could go digging in your bag for another to start. The library didn’t offer much in the form of entertaining fictional literature, rather it was filled heavily with books of history and spells, each and every word proving to be factual. It was interesting you will admit, but not quite something you’re searching to read in your free time.

Flourish and Blotts had been a place you’d frequented most often when you’d found yourself needing to replenish your collection. They had just about anything you could dream of crammed into uneven shelves, shelves that never seem to be empty. It was ironic to read books of fantasy and magic, to see others depictions on things they can’t quite fathom. The very magic you’d known the entirety of your life was sometimes strikingly different to that of what you read. It was more fabricated and dramatic, more whimsical than what you knew it to be. Despite that, it was something you easily fell into, something that was hard to put down until you reached the very last page and started another.

A sigh left your lips as you looked around the vacant structure, moonlit reflections bouncing off each and every window it landed on. You hadn’t known just when you’d make your leave and head back to the bed you should’ve already been in. It should be now, for you don’t think you could go another day yawning in each of your classes. But despite all logic and reasoning, you stayed put.

You startled when you spared a glance to your right for the sake of taking a small break from your book before a headache could form, spotting the ever familiar head of platinum. Your heart settled only slightly at the sight of him, a soft smile tugging at your lips.

“I almost didn’t recognize you in uniform,” you jest, noting the white dress shirt and vest, the slytherin tie dangling loosely from his neck. He rolled his eyes though you did not miss the smile he wore. “Do you have more than one of those black suits or is it just the one? Do you ever wash—”

“You’re starting to make me regret coming here already,” Draco sighs, stepping closer to you to join where you sat perched on a vacant wooden table. “And yes I do wash it.”

Your smile only widens as you try your hardest to stifle your laughter, looking up to meet his gaze as he huffs. “So you do only have one?”

His blue stare narrows down at you and you finally laugh, the mere sound of it softening his defensive mood entirely, not that he was all that offended to begin with. He feels you could say just about anything to him and his heart would not stop fluttering for you, though he knows you could never be cruel.

“You’re a pain, you know that, Y/n/n?” He asks, the softness of his smile remaining all the same despite his lighthearted teasing.

“I can’t be any worse than you, that would be preposterous,” you quip as your gaze returns to your book briefly, and the laugh falling from his lips made your heart nearly skip a beat. You missed just how he’d looked at you in that moment.

He says nothing more then, the grin he held speaking more than enough of what he’d thought of your counter. You couldn’t help but to watch as the tips of his fingers brush over the leaves of the plants by his side, lingering over each one before moving on to the next. It was in your best interest to look away from him before he catches your gaze, but you couldn’t bring yourself to do so in the very moment as you peer over the top of your book.

He plucks a single petal off of the plant just to his right, a new one regenerating almost immediately in its place. He holds it up to the moonlight, eyes bouncing over the pale colors that pigment his fingers as it lay pinched between them. It wasn’t hard to tell when something had been plaguing his mind, it wasn’t hard to figure him out really, especially considering you could imagine him setting foot in the greenhouse of his own accord. Plants were not of his interest. But you kept quiet for now.

He drops the petal from his grasp after a few moments and it’s sent fluttering to the ground, landing amongst moss and dirt before falling between a crack in the cement. It’s then that he looks at you once more, your gaze averting back to the text in your lap as your cheeks burn. You feel the table move slight and his knee bump against yours as he settles next to you, breathing out a sigh.

It was quiet for a little while then, save for the soft whistle of the wind gushing in and the chirp of the crickets. You noticed the way he’d been twirling the ring around his finger, the way he’d been suppressing his urge to hum as he so often did. You try to focus on the book held loosely in your hands, it’s pages quivering in the breeze. You try to immerse yourself into the world contained in paper before you, but the task was rapidly proving to be difficult with your newfound company.

His presence beside you was distracting, the warmth radiating from him something impossible to ignore, something you hadn’t wanted to leave. He, on the other hand, desired to be closer to you. To rest his head on your shoulder and stay there. He supposes he could, you’re his best friend after all. But he doesn’t think he can bring himself to do such a thing, his fear of never wanting to move from it keeping him still in his place. He knew he’d never want to.

“Is this all you do here? It’s quite boring,” he comments softly, resting his head back against the chilled windowpane.

A soft snort escapes you. “Yet here you are,” you jest playfully, “if I recall, it was you who came to me.”

He turns his head with the softest of smiles on his lips, his cheeks staining a pale pink having gone unseen in the dim lighting. The burning of his blush hadn’t gone unnoticed, however, that was very much obvious to him. You were right, you were always right it seemed. He found himself thinking of the striking realization that he’d always come to you, he will always gravitate towards you no matter how much he tells himself he shouldn’t. For your sake, he tells himself. For your sake is his reasoning for why he felt he should stay away, yet he can never bring himself to do just that.

He looks at you, with a look far too obvious of his feelings for his own good. “I suppose you’re right. But just this once.”

You laugh softly and he brings himself to look away, he has to otherwise he might just fall apart as his heart races. “Whatever you say, though I believe it’s more than just this once, Dray.”

Dray. It was a nickname only ever used by you, only ever thought of by you. Perhaps that’s why it had such a profound effect on him. If anyone else had used it he’d be indifferent to its meaning, annoyed rather because he felt it was something sacred, something for just the two of you. He doesn’t quite know if you feel the same, he only hopes it to be so to save him from creating his own anguish by thinking otherwise.

“What are you reading?” He asks, changing the subject as he snatches the book from your hands. His eyes skim over the cover, noting the whimsical and wondrous imagery on it. “The—”

You grab it back from him, with a frown, his laughter sounding once more. “Stop that!”

“How come you read of fake magic when you can use your own? I’m sure ours is far better,” he says with a raised brow, brushing his hair from his forehead.

“Because it is fun, Draco,” you sigh. “Besides, wasn’t it you who I found reading Shakespeare in the library?”

“That was one time! And in my defense it was rather good,” he grumbles, brows knit together in a glare focused on you and only you and he bit this inside of his cheek.

“You finished it, didn’t you?”

He tips his head back and sighs, his eyes fluttering closed. He would not be getting out of this one, he knows it. “And if I did?”

You ponder your response and he can feel your smile, one of his own forming on his lips. “If you did, then I just might tease you forever.”

He huffs out a laugh through his nose, turning his head to look at you. Forever sounded like bliss with you. Forever sounded far more wondrous than your ridiculous book of fantasy, far more than the love between Romeo and Juliet. “Then yes, love, I did finish it.”

It felt as though you flushed cherry red as you looked away from his gaze, the nickname setting loose a multitude of butterflies in your stomach. You resisted the urge to smile like a fool, to over analyze each and every time he called you that. Had he said to anyone else, or was it just you? Or was it just common for him to do such a thing? You were already doing it, already getting lost in a sea of possibilities that will have you winding up in a sour mood of hope and longing.

Before you could fall deeper into the depths of your mind, you open up your book again, your smile still very much evident as was the feeling of his eyes on you briefly. You didn’t dare to look, you’d look foolish if you did. You were aware of how you could be as such to him, but you were remarkably oblivious to the very same of him.

Conversation fell silent after that, and soon you fell into your book once more as he sat with you, quiet and content to simply be in your presence. He couldn’t help but to dare his glances, he’d chance any form of playful banter just to admire you. The way you tucked your hair behind your ear absentmindedly, the way you laughed softly at a particularly humorous part in your book even if you’d read it before. He knew you did, could tell by the way you underlined sections, and the way you filled the margins with hastily scrawled notes.

Something that got to him in particular was your bookmark. It was tattered and scratched, the very one he’d gotten you from Hogsmeade in fourth year. At the time he hadn’t wanted to admit he’d gone and done it, tried to say your owl brought you the parcel at dinner. You knew it to be false the moment you saw the crimson stain his cheeks. But he saw it, stamped with your initials, his own carved in with the tip of his quill some time ago. It was worse for wear as it sat tucked within pages yet to be reread, the very same ribbon tied to it in a shimmering gold that was frayed at the edges.

He decided against bringing it up, perfectly content with basking in the moment he had with you. One that was free of the stress pressing down on him constantly, free of the prying eyes he so strongly despised. For without them, he was free to be as vulnerable as he truly was, as he always had been. Not even in his own home could he be as such, not unless he was in the confines of his own room and even then he felt under watch. But here, as he sat with you amongst a myriad of plants and glass and moss, picking at the loose string on his sweater vest, he felt he could be that. He felt as though he could breathe, as though he could relax.

He exhaled a sigh as he stretched his legs, allowing them to dangle over the edge of the table as he slouched against the windows. It had to have been a half an hour at the very least, though in the absence of a clock, time could be deceiving when spent with someone you care deeply for. It could have been ten minutes, and it could have been an hour, you hadn’t known. What you did know was that you couldn’t read another word, the letters on the dimly lit page starting to blend. Your eyes couldn’t sweep across another line, and your mind couldn’t focus either.

You breathed out a sigh too, closing your book for good that night and tucking it within its rightful spot in your bag.

“Why did you come here anyway?” You ask softly, curiously, seemingly out of the blue as you closed it.

Regardless of how much he had expected that very question to fall from your lips, it took him by surprise as if he hadn’t been dwelling on it and his well thought out answer. He knew definitively just why he’d wandered out to that greenhouse that night. He knew it wasn’t because of whatever silly reason he’d conjure up, preferably in the next few seconds so he doesn’t look like a fool.

“I couldn’t sleep.”

That wasn’t entirely untrue; he found himself barely sleeping at all as of late and rightfully so. But his answer wasn’t entirely true either. He doesn’t quite know how to say he found himself unable to be without you for extended periods, he doesn’t even know how to explain it to himself. He’d never felt that way around anyone—to be so full of contentment in someone’s presence, to be so hopelessly enamored by every little thing you do. It was new and it was profound and it was scary. He knew himself to be vulnerable even if he’d been the only one to hold such knowledge, but this, this was different. It was love. He was in love with you.

You nod, your gaze softening from its once teasing stare. “Or maybe you just missed me.

He did. He absolutely did. He doesn’t even quite know how he’d made it as long as he did before he set off to come here. How anyone could possibly be away from you for more than a brief period of time. So yes, it was safe to say he missed you, and Draco Malfoy does not often do such a thing. But he simply laughs ever so softly.

You cast your gaze upward, focusing your attention on the moon and the glimmering flecks that spatter brightly in the sky. The clouds passed over it and dimmed the greenhouse each time they did so, quick to continue on their wind blown path before the next array took their place. The tip of your nose was cold with the chilly weather seeping in, and you knew it’d been rosy. You could nearly see your breath for that matter, but none of it had been important, not more so than the beauty present all around you.

It was when you sat there, head tipped back against glass walls and eyes fixed on the stars above that you felt it. You felt the brush of his fingertips over your palm, featherlight and fleeting, before it became all consuming as his fingers pushed between your own and his hand envelopes yours. You could feel the hesitancy in the sudden action and the flutter of your heart, you could feel his stare before he’d even done it. And it was then that you turn your head, meeting the eyes so longingly fixed on you.

His hair was no longer as neat as it usually had been, platinum strands dipping over his forehead in soft waves as the humidity did what it will do. He made no attempts to fix it either, the annoyance of his hair nearly in his eyes of no importance as you sat with him. What was on his mind was the way your hand remained in his.

You turned away, biting the inside of your cheek in an effort to hide your smile, to hide the giddiness that would surely betray you.

“I came out here,” he starts, huffing out a soft laugh, “I came out here because I wanted to be with you.”

Your smile was immediate, one he knew the meaning behind and he knew the fate he’d put himself into. You were never one to refrain from teasing him. “I’d assumed so. I knew you missed me.”

The corner of his mouth turned up in a half smile as he looked down at his lap, his thumb brushing over the back of your hand and he shook his head. He was in trouble. That much was true. With each passing second he’d wanted to admit the very words that had been weighing so heavily on his mind. He wanted to say them a million times over yet not a single time at all, he wanted to make it known without doing just that but he knows that is entirely impossible.

As he sits there, his hand within your own he feels as though he may just explode if his inner turmoil worsens. He’s at a crossroads and he wishes he weren’t, wishes he didn’t have to be so conflicted. If he speaks he could lose you and be utterly miserable. If he doesn’t you’d still be there, clueless to his love until you inevitably find someone else. Both options leave him utterly miserable when he thinks on them too long, and it doesn’t improve his situation in the slightest.

His heart is beating wildly in his chest at the prospect of telling you, that paired with the fact that your hand stayed entwined with his own—he’s certain it couldn’t race any faster. He wonders if you could feel him shaking. He felt foolish for being so nervous. His entire life, he’s had no problem spouting out whatever he so pleased, most of it having been undesirable and he hates that thought. But this, this was different. He’d make an even bigger fool of himself if he did this. No, he couldn’t do it, he shouldn’t—

“I couldn’t get you out of my mind.”

It tumbles from his lips without pause and he feels as though if the ground swallowed him whole it would be perfectly suitable. He hadn’t said those three words, but he felt as though there was no difference at that point.

Your breath catches and your heart hammers, his eyes filled with something you cannot place, but the heat in his cheeks is a bit more noticeable under the glow of the moon. He hopes somehow you hadn’t heard him but he knew it was a ridiculous hope.

“Me?” You ask, and he nods softly. “What about me?”

He swallows thickly, his eyes bouncing between yours as he weighs out his options once more. His heart feels as though it’s in his throat by then, and surely his voice would falter as a result. He knew he couldn’t go another day without telling you, couldn’t go another moment tormenting himself on what you would or wouldn’t say. His feet gave him no option as he walked towards that greenhouse. Towards you.

It was terrifying to be in love, to feel so strongly for someone that a minute without them feels like a lifetime. It was terrifying to love you so wholly, for you to bring insurmountable light to his otherwise darkened life. He didn’t imagine it to be so when he first met you in Diagon Alley. Then, he only knew you to be his best friend, the one who told him he was an idiot for being mean. The one who still tells him just that. It was now or more than likely never to tell you.

So he looked at you, hand shaky in your own as your patient gaze made him melt. “I love you.”

Three words. They were whispered and they were truer than most things he’s ever spoken. They were faltered and they were the first time he’s said them in a long while.

“You—you love me?” You ask, the corner of your mouth quirking up as it settled into you. He pauses for a moment as if to give himself the option to take it back and save himself further embarrassment. But still, he finds himself nodding.

Your expression was awed and your lips parted as you looked at him, a look he couldn’t quite read and it left him to sit frozen as a flurry of emotions rained down on him. Seconds feel like hours as you look at him, each more agonizing than the last but before he could stammer your lips brush over his own. You could feel his sigh against your lips, his hand squeezing yours. The other was quick to settle on your cheek, the ring around his finger cold against your flushed skin as his hair tickled light against your forehead.

His heart was bursting in that very moment as you kissed him, a feeling most electrifying, most spellbinding. So much so that he followed your lips for another when you parted, your smile instant against his mouth.

“I love you,” you murmur, breathless and giddy.

His lips were kiss swollen and pink as you looked at him, his smile so soft you kissed him again. His forehead presses to yours and your noses bump, his breath warm as it fans across your lips. His grin widens at the rush coursing through him, his skin set ablaze and his heart pounding within his chest.

“You really do, truly?” He asks softly, pulling away to look at you in search of doubt, in search of realization. As happy as he’d been in that moment, he couldn’t quite believe how you, beautiful and wonderful you, could feel something so profound for him. Surely it must have been a dream and surely he’d wake up and be miserable, be just as hopelessly and foolishly in love as he always had been. He’d—

“Truly, I do,” you say, pulling him from his own mind and capturing his attention once more.

His eyes sparkled in the moonlit greenhouse, beaming and bright as he smiled, one reserved for you. He couldn’t have imagined his night to end like this when he wandered through shadowed and vacant halls to get there. He nearly turned back around more times than he could recall in his lovestruck state, dizzied by your kiss. He hadn’t imagined he’d have the courage to tell you, he didn’t feel he was courageous at all really. But there you sat, mere inches from each other, your hand still enveloped in his.

It might not have spilled from his lips as he imagined it to in all the times he’d thought about it, but it was tender and it was true.

—

Tags: @anchoeritic @slytherinsunrise @amourtentiaa @hahee154hq @dracosathenaeum @snitches-at-dawn @lunalovecroft @awritingtree @writeroutoftime @harrysweasleys

[nectarous]

— ʙᴇɢᴜɪʟᴇᴅ.｜ᴏᴊɪʀᴏ ᴀʀᴀɴ x ꜰ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

WARNINGS: kitsune!aran + co., soulmate + supernatural au, mentions of breeding, outdoor sex, hints of voyeurism.

W/C: 1K.

SUMMARY: you look ready for the picking, and he couldn’t resist.

⇦ RETURN TO ARAN WEEK MASTERLIST.

you come to in a foxes den. you could swear that the air’s tinged navy blue, and that it’s scented sickly sweet, like foggy honeyed roses and sugared berries. you can feel the wet dirt between your toes and the dewy grass seeping into the thin cotton of your dress as you kneel in moistened soil; the decelerating thumping of your heart. 

you don’t remember how you got here, miles away from your house trapped in cool fog and towering trees, but you know where you are. 

the town’s always stressed the importance of staying away from this forest; tales of explaining that the perfumed scent drifting from the core of the forest tempts young women when the kitsune urge to breed, sneaking into your head until the pure become property of the half-human skulks. it’s dangerous for pretty women like you to go there unattended. 

but you never listen.

slitted pupils staring down at you from your kneeled placement on the floor. they’re a beautiful shade of steely gray, melting into you until you’re all euphoriad calm and compliant under his attentive stare. you know you should feel like prey, small and meek hunched on the floor of the forest’s clearing, while he stands over you; silent and domineering. powerful.

ojiro aran, the kitsune with nine tails. a member of the house of inarizaki, known for his century of youth and wisdom. a distant figure that you remember seeing at the shrine once or twice. his features are hard to forget, reminiscent of his stone statue that does no justice to the spirited man looking down at you. slatey blue eyes, golden hickory skin, features sharp and distinctly fox-like, almost incandescent in the pitch-black night.

he traces over the dampened curve of your cheek, trailing down faint lines over shivered skin, just like the scented mist that drew you to him. he’s murmuring something to you, but you’re too caught up in electrifying fingers, his thumb pressed on your lips, the musk-scented air, to answer. only when your vision gets filled with concern, gray eyes do you snap out of your trance, notice where you are. who you’re with. 

“you know who i am, don’t you?”

you nod, mesmerized. his voice sounds illusory—it’s too smooth, deeply sweet and unbearably mellow, washing away any fogged pain remaining between your eyes. like warm honey poured over a wound, flooding in your mouth.

you’re infatuated—of course you are.  he’s gorgeous, nine inky black tails brushed with charcoal and platinum fluffed out behind him. they’re reminiscent of his age, his status of being the wise spirit symbolized in the complexity of the fur. the both of you know you’re completely done for.

his hands trail from your face, down your neck, broad hands committing to memory the feeling of your dewy skin, the soft fabric of your clothes, lingering in fascination over the way your muscles quiver under his firm touch. 

there’s care in the way he undresses you and, even though he’s stripping you down in the middle of the night in a forest surrounded by chirping crickets and dirt and the distant sounds of the trickling lake, you feel cared for. adored.

as you lay in the dirt, soggy leaves and pebbles sticking to the clammy skin of your back, you hazily stare at the ears on his head, the way they twitch as he stares at you from the corner of red-lined eyes. 

he wants to feel your skin melt into his, wants the bond of his matched seeping into his core. his hands grasp at the crease of your hips, dragging you towards him before pushing your thighs

and you’re fucking embarrased; embarrased that someone like him a spirit that’s existed for decades, is so focused on you unraveling and pinned underneath him. focused on the overstimulated tears welling up in your eyes and your quivering lips and the way hints of blood pools and sticks to your teeth as you bite your lips in hopes to quiet yourself.

you’re glistening, slicking down your thighs already. he traces soft lips over your skin, tasting and nipping at the sensitive flesh. he takes his time, his thumbs massaging into your skin, lapping at your clit, committing every piece of your mortal body. and under the moonlight, you feel wicked, just as holy as him. you taste pungent, a bit bitter, thick white spilling down his chin and smearing on his cheeks and your thighs. pretty girl, even prettier cunt. 

he fucks into your cunt like a starved man, brutal and unsparingly brisk. your tits bouncing, his hips slamming into yours, hands squeezing into crunching leaves and doughy skin. his eyes are liquid mercury, burning into you and when he cums, his teeth bare up at the silvery moon and cries out a howl so loud it vibrates the leaves sticking to your skin. 

the echo between the trees is loud. your moans, reminiscent of howls, hauntingly echo through the mountains, you’re sure they reverberate back to the full moon.

you look on the brink of unconsciousness, laid out all pretty, shining with his spit your tits and your cheeks, indents in the flesh of your shoulders shining with spit, pearlescent cum dribbling from your cunt.

aran’s grateful for you. the spirit of the forest called for you, and you answered, and you were his.

when he looks up he clicks his tongue in annoyance and only then do you realize the audience hanging from the trees. sets of browns and golds and ambers, peering down at your barely conscious figure. 

“aran-kun’s finally got himself a girl,” a voice cackles, echoes of teasing yelps pouring from the treetops.

he shouts at them his voice is smooth, deep, littered with an accent you can’t quite put your fingers on. 

there’s no energy in you to attempt to cover up, or to be conscious over the fact that they all see glittering spit on your tits and the mud-caked on your thighs or the fact that they were probably watching him stake his claim over you.

you’ll deal with the rest of them later.

[wkemeup]

By Any Other Name (12)

series summary: When Special Agent Bucky Barnes is tasked with infiltrating the notorious gang Hydra and gathering evidence against its leader, Brock Rumlow, Bucky finds himself drawn to the woman who doesn’t seem to belong in this world of violence, the wife of the head of Hydra… you. pairing: bucky x reader chapter word count: 6.7k warnings: the moment of truth 🌹series masterlist 🌹

It was pitch black outside; the only light surrounding you from the stream of your headlights and the cast of stars gently illuminating your path huddled by acres of trees. The countryside was untouched by the pollution of the city and it was almost unbearably quiet amongst the woods, with only low hum of your engine and the faint chirping of crickets outside the crack of your car window to fill the emptiness around you.

The ink hastily written on the scrap of crumpled paper curled up in your hand was smudged. You couldn’t quite make out if it was a six or an eight in the address, but your GPS had long abandoned you several dirt roads ago, so you supposed it didn’t matter much anyway. There was nothing else around for miles. 

When you finally pulled up to what looked like an abandoned warehouse, there was no relief. It looked like something out of a horror film. The paint was chipped on the walls, the name of the metalworks company faded under years of weathering and neglect, tiles of the roof were gathering in piles on dusted, dirt roads. There wasn’t a single light in sight.

You swallowed as you turned off your engine. The headlights stayed on, reflecting on the single silver door. It was rusted along the hinges and looked completely untouched.

You had half a mind to call James to help ease the steadily increasing rate of your heartbeat, but he had been very clear when he asked you to turn off your phone and leave it behind at home. He couldn’t risk anyone tracking your location, so he said. He was acting so strangely lately, but you could sense the heaviness weighing on him.

You didn’t have much in the range of weapons in your car, not that it would have done you much good, but you stuck your keys between your fingers as you pushed open the side door. The air was brisk, sending a chill up your spine as clouds of dried dirt puffed up in clouds with every step you took. You crossed in front of your headlights until you paused in front of the warehouse.

With a heavy inhale, one you weren’t sure you’d let go of anytime soon, you turned the rusted knob and locked your car. The lights flashed off, leaving you surrounded in darkness.

You quickly hurried inside, more afraid of the darkness of the countryside than the unknown of what laid beyond the door. The slam of the door to its hinges behind you was louder than you prepared for and you winced as it echoed through the rafters.

You glanced up to find a group of people stood at the center of the room, all huddled over a long metal table filled high with piles of papers. Their heads turned abruptly in your direction.

One of them separated from the crowd, relief evident on his face as he quickly jogged in your direction; hair bouncing around his shoulders with every step, a half smile on his face though it struggled to reach up by his eyes. Ocean blue, and swarming in something darker, something pulling him under.

James.

But it wasn’t him you were looking at.

The inside of the warehouse was like something out of one of those spy movies Peter used to marathon on Saturday nights. The walls were lined with monitors, some filled with maps of the city, others with profiles and mugshots of men you recognized as friends of your husband, but the one displaying live security footage outside of your home caught your eye. 

You could see the driveway, the row of plain, well-kept bushes lining the pavement, the lights on above the garage. One of the security men you snuck past was on a lap around the perimeter and stopped to take a drag of his cigarette before he tossed the butt unto the grass.

An unpleasant shiver swept up your spine; cold and detached, and it nestled deep into your stomach.

“What the hell...” you exhaled, hardly able to take it all in.

You felt a hand graze your arm and you flinched, shocked by the sudden touch before you realized who was behind it. You turned to find bright blue eyes watching you cautiously as James chewed on the healed scar at the center of his bottom lip. He glanced sadly down at your hand, noticing the keys nestled between your knuckles and you quickly released them, slipping them into your pocket.

“I’ve got a lot to tell you,” he said quietly and there was a slight tremor in his voice, a nervousness, as he looked back to the group of people watching him from the metal table ahead of them.

“James, what’s going on?” you asked and he forced a smile to his face, one that was meant to reassure you, though he could hardly muster it.

“Come with me. I promise, I’ll explain everything.” He extended his hand to you, open and waiting, patient, and you studied the lines in his palms, lines you’d come to be familiar with, and suddenly you weren’t sure if you knew much of anything at all.

Still, you took his hand blindly as he guided you further into the room. He pulled out a chair for you at the table, just ahead of a particularly high stack of papers. You didn’t say anything as you glanced around at his friends and took a seat.

The tall, blonde man with broad shoulders and the clear line of muscles visible through the thin fabric of his t-shirt wore a slight frown on his face, though the way his eyes drifted to James protectively suggested he was concerned more than he was angry.

Beside him, slumped down into a chair of his own, was a dark-skinned man with a large, toothy grin, and dimples in cheeks. He smiled at you, like he knew something you didn’t, and you suspected that was more than the case because he was almost giddy with excitement, shifting in his seat and stealing looks at James.

“We don’t have much time before Rumlow finishes up in Harlem,” a red-haired woman to your right said.

You narrowed your eyes, recognizing her short, rounded nose, pointed stare, and perfect curve of a cupid’s bow on her lips outlined in dark red. She was familiar -- they all were -- like you’d seen them in passing but couldn’t place exactly where.

She pointed to a monitor behind you and you turned to find grainy footage of your husband sitting in at a table surrounded by men in suits you recognized from one of the dozens of parties he’d dragged you to over the years. It was from a Chinese restaurant in Harlem you got takeout from once with Peter. You gritted your teeth as you watched him clap a hand on the man beside him, throwing a wad of cash onto the table.

James nodded to his red-haired friend, pulling up a chair in front of you and turning it to face you properly before he took a seat.

“Where am I? Why am I here?” you asked tensely, unable to tear your eyes away from the monitors. You watched as one flickered from your living room to the hallway outside your library, to the staircase leading up to your room. Empty, haunted, in your absence.

A ruffle of papers to your left stole your attention and you found yourself staring at the blonde man with a file rifling through his fingers. A picture of your husband slipped out from the center and fell to the table. Even in his mug shot, his eyes held a kind of possessiveness, an arrogance, that transcended the page.

“Why do you have security footage of my house and—and Brock’s old RAP sheet?” your gaze flickered to the man sitting in the chair, watching you with a familiar kind of look in his eye, and then to the woman who was busying herself behind her laptop. You turned to James. “Who are these people?”

You could feel your breaths increasing in pace, the panic that was starting to take hold, but you stifled it down, buried behind closed doors and cement until it suffocated under the surface and all that remained was a vagrant stare and a jaw wired to stone.

James brushed his lips over with his hand, a heavy breath before he spoke again.

“I’ll be honest, I don’t really know how to say this.”

“Try,” you muttered out, voice like sandpaper.  

You didn’t realize your hands were clenched onto the bottom of the metal chair until your fingers started to ache. James’ eyes wavered down to your grip and he nodded quickly. Your heart was pounding so painfully, you wondered if he could see the thump of it through your chest.

He dug his hand into his pocket, let out a breath that looked near painful, and slowly set a shiny, golden badge onto the table. The shine of it reflected in the dim lighting of the warehouse. You dug your hands into the metal edges of the chair until you felt a sharp burn. 

“My name isn’t James Karpov,” he exhaled. Blue eyes flickered up to yours, gaging for a reaction on your face he wouldn’t find. He glanced back nervously at the blonde man pacing behind him before he continued. “I’m a special agent with the FBI and I’ve been undercover in Hydra for over a year now.”

Your features hardened over like stone, a protective layer to shield the surge of a storm thundering inside of you; the answer to a question you’d been suspecting for a while without realizing it.

You’d seen the way he flinched at his own name, how he got that kind of solemn look in the blue of his eyes when you talked about your husband, about wanting to escape it all, how he’d promised for things to be different when this was over, if he had more time. Pieces started to fall together and somehow you were still more lost than you’d been in years.

He paused, watching you, waiting for a flicker of the woman he knew to break through the blank stare currently consuming your features, but when nothing came, he let himself exhale. You focused on the soft footsteps of his friend pacing along the wall behind him. It was comforting to use his steps as a metronome, something to ground yourself because you could feel your world pulling apart at the seams.

It was a single string at the very edge of everything you knew. It only took a moment for it to unravel, within an admission of a name that was not his own, and soon the floor at your feet was covered in the broken pieces of what you believed to be true. Tattered and tangled threads.

“It started after Jack Rollins was murdered in lockup. I was assigned to this case to gather evidence against Rumlow and his men, so that we could dismantle Hydra completely; prevent it from ever coming back again,” he continued, his voice even, almost matter-of-fact, and it didn’t sound much like your James at all. It was too clinical, too rehearsed, and you could feel the sharp twist of a knife embedding itself deeper into your chest with every word he spoke.  

You listened quietly as he told you of when he first learned your name on a single page in the back of your husband’s file, how he’d known who you were before you even stepped foot into Brock’s office that first evening. He told you how he’d been assigned a cover, a new name and a history, to replace the role of Jack Rollins within Hydra as their enforcer. He’d been Brock’s right hand man for over a year and he was playing your husband like a fiddle.

“Director Fury thought it would be beneficial to the case to, um,” he released a heavy breath, as if the action in itself hurt him, “…to get close to you. He thought you might know more about Hydra’s dealings than you realized and he’d hoped you’d open up to someone who, um, you trusted. Seems he was right.”

You didn’t allow him see the way your heart caved in; jaw clenched, impossibly still, even breaths, and yet the floor had dropped from under you and you were free falling a hundred feet below. Lost to an abyss from which you were certain you’d never return; darkness barreling in and taking you home. It was where you belonged, wasn’t? It was where you had lived for years. Back to the fractured sense of safety, to the shadows lurking in the corner, to the eggshells under your bare feet made of broken glass. To lies and manipulation and deceit and ruin.

You wondered when it happened, when he’d been officially assigned to claw his way into your heart as if you were nothing but a pawn in the scheme of his mission. You wondered if it was before or after he’d gifted you A Farewell to Arms and if it was even his at all; if the scribbles in the margins belonged to his youth or if it was the carefully constructed design of an analyst with the sole purpose of hooking straight through your heart and sinking you to the ocean floor.

That moment was the beginning of it all; when you showed him your library, your most sacred place to a stranger, but it had felt so right at the time.  

Was the first moment you’d felt safe with him a complete lie?

There was always a comfort in being with him. A place for you to let down your guard and the walls you held up like stone around your heart. Beyond everything else, the one thing you knew about James Karpov was that he was safe. His presence was the only thing that allowed you to let go of the fear of the shadows of you home and the monsters lurking in the corners. He was a shining light in the darkness that had consumed your life.

You were young and naïve when you met Brock. You were eager for love and fell easily into his carefully constructed trap, overlooking obvious warning signs and the flaws of a man obstructed by the character he played.

For only a moment, you wondered if it had happened again, if you had become so foolish to allow yet another man to manipulate you and spin himself into the version of a man you’d desire until he could rip the floor out from under you just to see you squirm.  

A pang burned in your stomach, something stubborn and instinctive, one that urged you to just look at the man in front of you, to notice the way blue eyes nervously sought out your own, to see how his hands were trembling and his voice was strained, to notice that he was scared with every word he spoke. But your world had fallen apart and you could only do so much to stifle the scream bubbling its way through your chest.

So, you held your tongue as he told you about the orchestrated meetings in Brooklyn, how his friends -- his team -- had helped plan what you thought were coincidences but turned out to be carefully constructed operations. Moments when you’d light up upon seeing him, a wash of warmth to your chest on even the coldest winter mornings, and it was a lie.

You realized then why you recognized his friends; it was from the outskirts of coffeeshops, sitting under sunglasses and baseball caps, hiding behind newspapers in the distance. The quiet observers in your life pulling away at the last shreds of dignity you had.

“I was assigned a job,” James said tensely, clenching at his hands, wringing them painfully in his lap as he stared down at the cement under your shoes, “no different than jobs I’ve had before. Take on a new name. Be a new person. I’ve done… terrible things to preserve my cover, things I am not proud of. I’ve hurt people because Rumlow ordered me to. It was part of the job. I kept telling myself that, anyway. Didn’t seem to matter that I never killed anyone he put a hit on, that the Bureau stepped in to relocate my targets and hand me a look-alike that was mutilated just enough so Rumlow could have his proof and I could keep my cover. The blood on my hands is still real.”

There was a lump in your throat, one that burned and ached and was on the verge of choking you completely. You wanted to scream, or cry, or run until your legs gave out completely, but instead, you were paralyzed. Frozen in place. Stone of a statue. A single touch would crumble you.

“But you have to know it was never an act with you, Y/n,” he urged, desperation in his voice. You could hear the grief in his words, the slight tremor in the dissonance, the fear that you might reject him in favor of a man who does not exist.

You could hardly meet his eye.

He paused, watching you for a moment, waiting, longing, for you to tear your stare away from the wall beyond his left shoulder, hoping you’d find your way back to him as you always did, but you gave no inch. You held yourself still, unreadable, and he exhaled a breath that must have weighed immensely on his chest.

“After a while, I started meeting you in Brooklyn when the team wasn’t around, when there was no one to listen in and no agendas to fulfill,” he started, a little softer now as he slumped back into his chair. “I started staying at the mansion long past when I should have, just reading with you in your library because it was the only place I felt like myself anymore. I started forgetting that on Sundays in Brooklyn, I wasn’t who I said I was. You don’t know how easy it was for me to spend time with you and just let myself believe for a while that I really was James Karpov…”

Jaw wired shut, clenched, and you did not respond.

He sighed, a careful look back at his team and he continued.

He told you about the red-haired woman, Natasha, who turned out to be the sales associate from the boutique downtown where you’d bought the lavender dress. She smiled at you in acknowledgement when the heat of embarrassment stung in your cheeks.

You realized that the two men were the same Steve and Sam he’d tell you stories about on your Sundays together; old friends, brothers. A single grain of truth in a web of lies. 

“I knew, even before the gala, that my feelings for you had started to cloud my judgement,” he said slowly, laced with guilt, and your gaze flickered up to him, surprised, though he didn’t notice. You watched the shame seep into his features, his hands clenching at his pant legs. Steve and Sam turned away awkwardly as he continued, “I nearly told you everything that night. When we danced on the balcony and we almost--”

Kissed.

You remembered it well. You had committed the night to memory; to the way his hands felt pressed so delicately to your hips, the gently sway of your bodies, the subtle scent of his shampoo and how warm his breath was as it touched your skin. It was a dream, a fairytale, and you wondered if it was just that; a moment meant for the stories in your library, far away from the cruel realities you’d come to know.

James sighed, a hand brushing over his forehead, pushing away the hair from his eyes and exposing the blush in his cheeks. He was staring down at the floor, chewing painfully on his lip. He didn’t notice the way your features had started to soften, your lips slightly parted as you watched him, heart racing.

“I didn’t know how to make it stop… the way I felt about you,” he confessed, a pained kind of humor in his voice. “I’d never compromised myself like that before. I’d always been able to separate myself completely from the case, where a mask and a new identity like a costume and manipulate my targets without remorse, draw on their strings and tug at their levers. It was my job.”

You flinched; subtle, but as you unclenched your jaw you noticed a pair of green eyes watching you from behind a sweep of auburn hair. She smiled encouragingly before you turned back to James.

“But I never did that with you, Y/n, I swear it on my life,” James pressed, raking his fingers through his hair though it fell back into his eyes. “You… you found a way to push yourself through the cracks in these walls I built up and brought out pieces of myself I hadn’t seen in years. You made me smile again, and gave me something worth fighting for outside of my own damn ambitions, made me believe in a world where things could be different – kinder, maybe. You made me want to be myself again instead of these characters I so often lose myself in. You made me want to relearn who I was and stop hiding in the identities of my enemies.”

He rubbed at his eyes, pinched at the bridge of his nose, and exhaled a breath that provided no relief. “Steve almost threw me off the case entirely when he found out I’d started crossing lines between my cover and the man I wanted you to know me as.”

Your heart skipped at that, eyes flickering up to blue and you watched as he struggled to find his words. He was breathing heavy, hands constantly raking through his hair and there was a slight shakiness as he clenching them back into fists at his side. You’d never see him like this before. Scared.

“Please understand, I couldn’t tell you any of this,” he sighed, scratching his nails along the thighs of his jeans. You noticed rather quickly that he stopped trying to meet your eye. “You have no idea how much I wanted to, how much it was fucking killing me that I couldn’t, especially after--”

He clenched his teeth, stopping himself before he could say it, but you knew what he meant; the night he’d put himself on the line for Peter, how he’d kissed you through broken lips and everything changed. It was evident in the way his friends turned away, giving him space, red tips on the end of Steve’s ears.

“The director thinks I’m a damn fool for bringing you in on this,” he continued, “but, I trust you, Y/n, even if I just destroyed any trust you had in me. I know you and I know you want to see Rumlow brought to justice. I know you want to be free of him and for Peter to be out of Hydra’s control. I still know you and... despite all this, I promise, you still know me, too.”

He seemed to have finished as he allowed a deep, unsettling silence take over. You could vaguely hear the soft ticking of the clocks hanging high on the wall and the exhales of breath coming from across the room. He glanced back at his friends nervously, who offered him nothing but clenched jaws in return, before coming back to you.

“Say something... please,” he asked timidly, desperately.

There was something unpleasant churning in your stomach and you weren’t sure what it was; dread, humiliation, betrayal. Maybe it was something more like the edge of relief, so close you could just barely touch it but it wasn’t yours quite yet. Just beyond your fingertips but still there, still visible, waiting.

You swallowed, letting your hands unclench from the chair and you looked up to find his friends busying themselves with the paperwork on the table; various files on your husband and the company he kept.

You glanced over to the door, the weight of your keys heavy in your pocket. There was a pull urging you to the door, whispering in your ear like a siren’s call to leave, to run and never look back, and fall straight into the darkness you knew. It was familiar at least; a demon you knew by name.

But as you turned your attention back to the man in front of you, watched the way he hung his head in shame, accepting the worst of his fears that in your silence you’d rejected everything you now knew him to be, that call urging you to run seemed a little further away. Drowned out by the overwhelming urge to draw him into your arms, you could no longer hear the voice beckoning you away from the man you’d come to adore, perhaps even love, even if he was a man you weren’t sure you truly knew at all.

“I can’t, um, back off the case,” he started, clearing his throat as his words seemed to give out before he could continue, “but I can give you space. You won’t have to see me unless I’m around your husband. I’ll do what I can to keep my distance but—”

“Stop.”

He froze, head lifting abruptly at the sound of your voice. It was then you realized his eyes had glossed over, reflective with unshed tears, his lower lip nearly chewed raw.

You held his gaze for a moment, searching for the man you knew him to be within the shades of blue you’d come to know so well. The darkest part of yourself wondered if there were pieces that reminded you of your husband in there, if he held the same qualities that allowed Brock to manipulate you and lure you into a false sense of security and love and affection before he ripped it away.

But you’d seen the way James smiled at you from across the room. You’d seen the way the lines around his eyes wrinkled when he laughed. You’d seen the kindness nestled into every touch upon your skin, a warmth in his embrace you hadn’t known in years.

You’d seen grief consume him; pain and the guilt sweeping over his features as he told you the truth of who he was. Facets of a complicated man who was more than just one thing; subtle moments one could not easily fabricate.  

James was not just the man who lied to you. He was not only a man with a name you did not know and a history wiped clean. He was also the man who reminded you what it was like to laugh again, who reminded you that you were stronger than what Brock led you to believe and that you carried more worth than what your husband assigned to you. He was a man who took a beating that could have killed him to spare your sixteen-year-old cousin and gave over every Sunday he had just to listen to you talk and run errands around Brooklyn. 

He was messy and complicated, flawed but human. In the years you’d fallen under Brock’s spell, nothing your husband ever faked even compared to how James treated you. Brock had made himself to be perfectly designed, an impenetrable lie.  

James had been the one to break through his cover of his own volition. He had nothing to gain and everything to lose in doing so; the case, his team, his career... You wouldn’t dare allow yourself to wonder if you were within that list.  

You took a deep breath, steadying your gaze. “I have questions.”

His eyes widened, surprised, but he nodded quickly, brushing his palms on his thighs. “Anything. Anything you want to know. Just ask.”

“So… you’re not Hydra." It wasn’t a question, but you were still seeking confirmation.

“No,” he confirmed quickly. “I’m not.”

“You’re not a hitman. You don’t kill people because Brock tells you to.”

“I’ve killed,” James replied sincerely, “but never for him. I was an army ranger before I was recruited by the FBI. I don’t take a life unless I have to.”

You nodded, trying to find your ground again now. Those were the easy questions, ones with answers you already suspected to be true. It was the next ones you were about to ask that held answers you were truly afraid of. You pushed out a deep breath through your lips, though it trembled on its way out and you felt the shake of it deep in your lungs.

“The copy of A Farewell to Arms… was it yours?”

The question startled him, eyes narrowing for a moment before a soft smile curved at his lips. “Yes. Sam made fun of me relentlessly for digging through my ma’s house for it. I can’t say it had nothing to do with the assignment, because you did open up more after that but... I didn’t do it just because I thought it would help our case. I just thought you'd like it.”

You nodded, taking in his answer. It didn’t relieve the ache in your stomach, but it was something. A piece of the beginning was still intact.

“How much of it was real?” you asked, surprising yourself. The words stumbled out before you could stop them and it wiped the smile from his face almost instantly. It was like a punch straight to his gut, the wind knocked out from under him.

You swallowed, gripping painfully tight into your sweater and trying to avoid ocean blue eyes and the curious stares of his friends. You needed him to say it, needed to hear it out loud, or you might collapse within yourself entirely.

“The times you’d call late at night and we’d watch dateline over the phone or when we bought the lavender dress downtown or dancing on the balcony at the gala. All you did for Peter, every Sunday we spent together... Tell me it wasn’t just for the cover... to get closer to me so I’d tell you secrets about Hydra I didn’t know I had. Tell me it was real... that it was really you and not some character you played. Tell me you’re real. Please.”

You didn’t realize you were crying until James – not-James – threw himself down to his knees in front of you. His hands reached up to your thighs before he froze, hovering, because he didn’t know if it was okay to touch you anymore.

“Sweetheart, please, look at me,” he begged. He finally sat his hands against your thighs, just in an effort to ground you and when you didn’t flinch away, seeming to relax as your heart rate softened, he began to trace delicate patterns with his thumbs.

“Everything -- and I mean this -- everything was real between us,” he implored. There was a redness in the whites of his eyes, a subtle tremor of his lower lip as he tugged it between his teeth. “There were some circumstances that allowed me to run into you when maybe I otherwise wouldn’t have, that let me spend more time with you, but I swear on my life, nothing I ever said to you was scripted, nothing I ever felt for you was forced. Every second I spent with you was the happiest I’ve been in years. I won’t lie to you again. Not ever. Please believe me when I say that what I feel for you is real. It's always been real.”

Sniffling back tears, you let him brush a hand up over your cheek to wipe the wetness away. His lower lip tugged between his teeth in concentration, purposeful to keep the rough edges of calloused palms from touching your skin. He was so gentle, so tender with you, and it was entirely your James, even if he wasn’t.

“It was real, honey. The important parts, those were all real,” he whispered, his voice so achingly sweet it made your heart clench. There was a desperation in his voice, like the very foundation of his soul was etched into every word, his heart sitting within the dissonance. “I am still the man I was yesterday. I’m still him, sweetheart. You haven’t lost me.”

He smiled sweetly at you, though it didn’t quite make it up to his eyes. No, his eyes were filled with a remorse that consumed him whole. The guilt always sitting on the surface, the hesitation in his hands but the longing in his stare, the pain in the pleasure; it made sense now.

When you set your hands on his forearms, it startled him, his eyes darting down to where your touch met. Without a word, you let your hands wonder along his arms, sliding up his shoulders, his neck, to finally cup the sides of his face. Rigid muscles relaxed as you passed them by, his body caving into your touch with ease as his eyes fluttered closed, like he was sinking into the palms of your hands.

You just needed to feel him, remind yourself that he was real, that he was solid and tangible, and right under your fingers. The slight bristles of his beard scratched under your palms, the wrinkles of a shirt creased in his drawers, the divots in his skin from old wounds.

You let out a heavy breath, grazing your thumbs along his jawline, over the healing scar on his right cheek and the discoloration that had long faded to a soft, light pink. Marks of a man who was everything you always believed him to be.

“I don’t know what to call you,” you confessed, a whisper of a smile touching at the edges of your lips and you felt it in your palms as he choked back a sob of relief, jaw trembling under your touch.

He nodded, his hands coming up to rest on your own as he turned his head just slightly enough to press a kiss to the heal of your palm. His eyes were red and glossy, but there was a smile on his lips; it was aching and tired, but it was swollen in relief, like yours.

“For now, just call me James.”

You shook your head. “It’s not your name.”

“It is, actually,” he countered, with a nervous chuckle. He gently pulled your hands from his face and set them into your lap, though he didn’t let go. “It’s technically on my birth certificate and it’s just a coincidence this identity and I shared it in common, but it’s not what my friends call me. It’s not what I want you to know me as when this is finally over.” He paused, a deep breath in a beat later, “I would... I would give anything to hear you say my real name.”

You took in a deep breath, trying not to focus on the gravity of what he said, but it hit like an anvil to your chest. You wondered what his name was, how he might act around you without Brock hanging over your shoulder, how it would feel to be with him in the light of day; no restrictions, no hiding in the shadows, nothing holding you back from one another.

“You… you still want this— us— when the case is over?”

James paused, a sad kind of heartbreak in his eyes that you would even ask such a question. He nodded slowly before he lifted your intertwined hands to his lips and kissed sweetly at your knuckles. “I told you, honey, everything between us was real. I’d give you my whole life if you asked.”

A tear slipped past your eye as a breathy laugh escaped you, a strange mixture of awe and surprise and relief washing through you. You stayed there with him, reveling in the feel of his hands encasing yourself, the touch of his lips to your fingertips, watching as he started to come back into himself, as the guilt faded from his eyes and he was smiling at you with that flicker of light in in the blue of his eyes.

James pulled up a chair beside you, freeing his knees on the hard, cement floors, and you tugged yourself closer to him; thigh to thigh, shoulder to shoulder. He was still yours.

“So, what happens now?” you asked, glancing to the papers on the table curiously.

“Now,” a voice called from behind him, deep and commanding, and Steve stepped forward, setting a file on the table ahead of you, “you help us bring down your husband.”

You narrowed your eyes, intrigued, and pulled the file into your lap. You thumbed through the pages, eyeing the transcripts, glanced over names of men and women, over the date in the top left corner and the address of the pier scribbled in James’ handwriting.

You set the file back on the table. “You’re planning a raid for the shipment at the end of the month.”

It wasn’t a question and Steve seemed surprised by how quickly you’d gathered that from the information he presented you with. There was no doubt in your mind, you’d do anything they asked if it meant putting Brock behind bars where he belonged.

“What do you need from me?” you asked, hand seeking out James’ and he squeezed it back lightly.

“That we’ll decide when the opportunity presents itself,” Steve responded. “In exchange for your help in this and frankly, all the evidence we’ve gathered based on your unknowing intel… uh, James,” Steve cleared his voice, clearly having to remind himself to use the cover’s name, “has arranged for your immunity.”

Wide eyes met his and he offered you a shy, reassuring smile. The thought hadn’t even crossed your mind. You always assumed that the price it took to bring your husband down meant sinking the ship with you inside. You knew he held a number of charges over your head; it was why you stayed complicit for so long. But now...

“You just have to sign the papers,” James said, sliding a pile of folders across the table to you. There were two stacks and you looked at the second suspiciously before James answered your unspoken question. “I got the judge to sign off on immunity for Peter, too. It was part of my condition before I handed over the shipment log for the raid next month. Wasn’t that hard of a sell, honestly. Peter’s a good kid.”

Lost for words, heart pounding tight in your chest. “You-- what?”

James nodded casually, a slight purse of his lips like he hadn’t just doused you in a relief you hadn't known in years. “Yeah, well, no jury was ever going to convict him anyway, but I figured it was best to cover our bases. I told you I’d watch out for him, didn’t I? Wasn’t going to let you down on that promise. Plus, a kid as good as Peter didn’t deserve to be caught up in all of this. The judge could see that pretty easily.”

He was smiling softly at you but you could hardly breathe. You knew he cared for Peter. It was obvious the night he took a brutal beating for your cousin, but this was something else entirely. This was something far beyond his cover, the identity he wore like a mask, this was him at his core; a man who was true to his word, a man who was decent and kind and good.

He was your James, regardless of his name or the badge he wore.

Without the proper words to thank him, you surged forward, despite his friends standing at the table surrounding you, and kissed him. Hands pressed to his cheeks, lips communicating what words could not, and you only pulled away when you felt him searching for a breath.

His cheeks were burning pink, eyes a little wide as he nervously glanced up at Steve, who had conveniently turned his back. Natasha was smirking in the corner as she attended to the files in her hands, and Sam was sprawled out in the chair across the table, sparing no expense and grinning wildly as he winked at James.

“So, we bring down Hydra,” you said with a proud smirk upon your lips and James’ whole face seemed to light up. “We put Brock behind bars. We end this.”

Steve stepped out from behind the shadows, a hand extended in your direction. Stone cold expression melting into a soft smile, the blue of his eyes kinder than the façade he put forth.

“It’s good to have you on board, Y/n.”

[alleiradayne]

LONG JACKET A DESTIEL-ISH SERIES

Over the last few years, I’ve seen some of the craziest shit hunting with the Winchesters and their angel, Castiel. But this story right here? This isn’t about monsters. This isn’t about the battle between good and evil, heaven and hell. I understand all that.

It’s people I don’t get. People are crazy. And we do crazy things when we’re in love.

PART VI - PLAID

Summary: The showdown. Warnings/Tags: Again, awkward flirting, mentions of rape, violence, sexual innuendo, blood, small description of sexual assault. Characters/Pairings: Castiel, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester/Female!Reader Word Count: 6,875 (whoops)

Darkness encroached on the parking lot’s dim lamplight, the vast, endless nothing oppressive, suffocating. As we stood behind the Impala, that great void loomed, and yet, a tenuous sense of resolution settled in the pit of my stomach. Stuffed to the gills, Sam’s duffel bag—endearingly coined the Bag of Ouch—thumped into the open trunk.

“Isn’t that… a little overkill?”

“It would be if we’d ever actually fought a succubus before,” Sam said with a resigned sigh.

“You know,” I started as I squinted up at him. “Sometimes, I wonder what is wrong with you.”

He pointed to his head. “Don’t worry. I know there are too many screws loose. I didn’t mean to scare you. I don’t want you going into this with any illusions of grandeur. We have no clue what we’re doing when it comes to these bastards. Books, hunter’s notes, the internet. Sure. But that’s why the bag is stuffed beyond full.”

When I looked from him to the bag and back, he shut the trunk. “So, we just have to try something and hope?”

“Essentially, yes. My bet is on decapitation,” he said. “No matter how fast you heal, you really can’t recover from that.”

“Bronze stake through the heart, Y/N,” Dean interrupted. “You know, if you don’t get a clear shot at…” he motioned to his throat with an execution gesture. “Plus, bronze doubles down on ancient metals. They’re not close enough to vampires or werewolves for silver to work. It’s—”

Castiel exited the motel then, and Dean’s teeth clicked shut mid-thought. Angular shadows played tricks on my eyes until Castiel stepped into the light, and I gasped. Blue, white, and gray plaid enveloped his shoulders, paired perfectly with his black jeans, black t-shirt, and Dean’s ill-fitting boots.

Beside me, Dean turned around, and his brow furrowed. “Is that—”

“No, this I bought myself,” Castiel explained. “I like blue. I think.”

Even in the near darkness, Dean’s cheeks reddened noticeably. “You should. Looks good on you.”

I imagined that, if angels could blush, Castiel would have. “Thank you.”

“Get a room.”

The back of my hand met Sam’s stomach as I scolded him. “Sh! Leave them alone.”

Dean’s eyes rolled so hard he gave Sam a run for his money. “What is it with you two? The man looks good in blue, and he should know that. Nothing even remotely suggestive.” He continued grumbling to himself as he rounded for the driver’s side of the Impala.

“Maybe that was too far,” I suggested as I glared at Sam.

He merely laughed as he turned for the car. “I disagree entirely, but I’ll back off. At least, until after this hunt.”

I turned to follow him, but then realized Castiel stood by himself. “You coming?”

Hand to his chest, he smoothed the plaid as he tugged it straight. “Do you agree?”

“With?” I asked.

“Dean. About blue plaid.”

Stuttered words stumbled from my mouth. Had he not seen the way Dean stared? Blushed? A brisk shake of my head cleared my thoughts. “First off, I think you should wear whatever makes you happy and comfortable. If that’s plaid, great. If not, that’s fine, too. Second, you can only control yourself. That’s something you probably already knew, but for some reason, humans take way too long to learn that. And third, blue looks great on you.”

He smiled then and followed me to the car. “This is much more difficult than I had anticipated.”

A bark of laughter burst from my chest. Before responding, I reached the rear passenger door and popped the handle. “Do you want my advice?”

“I abide by your expert wisdom, Y/N,” Castiel replied.

I clapped him on the shoulder and said, “Talk to him.”

Behind schedule, I allowed Castiel no time to respond and sidled into the backseat of the Impala. Once Castiel seated himself, Dean backed out of the lot, and the Impala roared to life as he laid into the accelerator, heading towards the grocer.

“I hate this plan.”

Sam situated the bronze stake up the right sleeve of my newly acquired leather jacket. Dissatisfied and yet resigned to the situation, he moved on to the machete holster concealed beneath the jacket. “I really hate this plan.”

“Do you keep saying that to make me feel better or to convince me to bail?” I asked as I shot a nervous glance down the hill. There, sandwiched between the grocery store and a craft store, sat Madam Drina’s Visions, an eerie purple glow emitting from the partially curtained windows.

Sam grunted under his breath. “I think it makes me feel better,” he replied as he shifted the machete on my back. “Practice reaching for the handle. It’s a very weird holster. I hate wearing it.”

In one smooth motion, I reached behind my hip, grasped the handle, and pulled. The blade freed from the scabbard in a sharp ring of steel that sang between the stone buildings surrounding us. “Okay, I’ve never done that before. That was really fucking cool.”

“It sure as hell looked cool,” Sam laughed, “And it makes me feel better. Now, we’ll be right outside, so you give us the signal if you get the slightest hint shit’s going sideways. Please do not hesitate to call.”

I lowered the machete back behind my hip to re-sheath it. A solid clunk thudded through my chest as the hilt met the scabbard, the blade concealed once more. “Looks like I won’t be going in anytime soon.”

Down the hill, no more than a quarter-mile, the distant ring of Madam Drina’s door chimed through the silent night air. That sound caught Sam’s attention, and he turned to the source where we both watched a woman lean into the darkness of night from her shop’s door. She greeted a patron as he approached, and without delay, invited him inside.

Sam turned back to me and said, “We’ll give it an hour. If he doesn’t leave by midnight, we’ll send you in then.”

Before I could say anything else, Dean burst from the car and stomped to the trunk where he planted himself on the bumper. His folded arms and crossed ankles warned me enough, but my boldness won the battle against caution.

“Hey,” I started as I neared the trunk. “You okay?”

Sam slid into the Impala’s seat, and Dean waited for the door to shut before he responded. “No. I’m not.”

Okay, I hadn’t expected that at all. “Alright, that’s refreshing. Keep going. What’s got your goat?”

He scoffed half a laugh at that, opened his mouth to speak, then shut it and shook his head. Though he remained tightly wound, his arms eventually unfolded, and he reached for the hem of his shirt. There he found a familiar threadbare corner, and he continued to worry at it as he had so many times before.

“You ever…”

Silence. Only the chirping of real, honest-to-god crickets broke the still night air. A thousand-mile stare settled in Dean’s gaze, and though the darkness shrouded us both, a familiar conflict roiled beneath the surface of his outward façade.

“Do I ever… what?” I asked. “Catch myself thinking about someone for hours on end? Imagining the things I would say to them under different circumstances? Wondering how they would feel or what they would say in return?”

His eyes snapped to me, glaring from the corner while his head remained still. Another shiver ran up my spine, but the sensation vanished as soon as it had come. Dean looked back up the road, staring straight ahead. The start of a few sentences stuttered on his lips, his tongue. Each time he swallowed his words, he remained silent longer. Until he finally said, “Yes.”

“Which one?”

He plucked a stray string from the hem of his shirt and tossed it out before him. A gentle breeze caught the tuft of frayed cotton and carried it off to the sidewalk where it landed and stilled. Dean, too, sat still as stone for what felt like hours, staring straight ahead at nothing. But the gears churned between his ears, so loud I swore I could hear him thinking. All too familiar, I knew the imaginary situations that played out in his mind, scenario after scenario. Endless torture, that. No good in ruminating, in worrying what response you might get. I wanted to tell him all those things, but how much of a hypocrite would that make me? 

I wavered on the precipice of futility, that precarious knife’s edge where on one side, an infinite future spread as far as the eye could see and on the other stretched complete and utter nothingness. And yet, the longer I balanced on that deadly razor, my untimely end neared. Dean’s predicament had drawn out the worst of my subconscious. As I turned to regard Sam through the car, I swore a solemn oath, if only to myself, that I’d finally come clean. 

I stood then to do what I should have done months ago, but the moment my boots touched the concrete, the bell above Madam Drina’s door twinkled again, and Dean startled. He grabbed my shoulder and turned me to face him as he spoke, an insistent furrow to his brow.

“All of them,” he stated.

So lost in my head, I asked, “All of what?”

“What you said earlier,” he replied. “I’m constantly thinking about him, and I don’t know why. Besides you and Sam, Cas is my best friend, and I… I don’t know what to do.”

When I opened my mouth to reply, Sam exited the driver’s door, and Castiel followed not a beat later from the passenger’s side. I turned back to Dean and lowered my voice. “Just tell him.”

“What?!” he snarled under his breath.

“I’m serious,” I insisted in a thin hiss. “Tell him everything!”

When Sam rounded the end of the car, all rational thought fled. I’d made a promise to myself. And, in a way, to Dean, too. No way I’d go down as some plaster saint spouting hollow words in my final hours. Go big or go home.

Sam caught me. Barely, but that hardly mattered. When I had jumped, I knew I had leaped in faith, not in Sam’s ability to catch me—although I knew his arms were more than capable—but in his equal, mutual, maddening adoration for me. Like the heat of a summer’s noonday sun, his embrace smothered me. I soared too close to that roaring heat, and my plaster wings melted as I planted my lips on his.

Don’t let anyone ever tell you I can’t take my own advice.

“I am sorry, Dean.”

Castiel’s gruff apology ruined the moment. Almost. Sam squeezed me so tight to his chest and returned my kiss twofold despite our lack of privacy. But my eagerness to witness Dean and Castiel’s truth rivaled my endless exultation. I parted from Sam but remained in his arms as I looked over my shoulder.

Dean’s crooked eyebrow lowered as he turned from Sam and I to Castiel. “I know. But thanks,” he said as he clapped him on the shoulder. ���Are you two finished?” He turned back to Sam and I. “Can we go kill this son of a bitch succubus and get the fuck out of here?”

Forgotten. For one glorious, blissfully unaware moment, I’d forgotten that a creature as vile as a succubus could exist.

The four of us looked down the hill towards the shop where Madam Drina waved goodbye to her patron as he walked down the block to the east. “That looks like our window,” Dean stated.

Two worlds collided with that simple phrase. The reality I had dreaded all day loomed like the specter of an urban legend. A sudden hyper-awareness seeped into my skin, my bones, my soul. Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end, and gooseflesh spread across my arms. The ceaseless ticks of my watch counted the last beats of my heart as though finite, and I knew too few remained. Like so many grains of sand, time slipped through my fingers no matter how I clung to them.

Still in his arms, I looked up to Sam, but he said nothing. Those three little words balanced on the tip of my tongue. But as my lips parted, Sam stopped me.

“I know. Me, too.”

That would have to do.

A dreaded chill replaced Sam’s embrace as I headed down the street to Madam Drina’s Visions.

“Hello?”

I’d expected Madam Drina to meet me at the door as she had her previous client. When a few minutes passed with no sign of her, I grasped the handle and swung the door wide. As I spoke, her doorbell’s chime faded, then struck again as the door closed behind me.

Incense suffocated the cramped space. Thick strands of smoke rolled like massive coils of so many snakes, crawling and gliding ever so slowly through the room in an endless drift. Gaudy furniture pressed in from all sides like banks of a river to guide souls to the room’s center. There sat an intimate, circular plinth covered by several ornate silk scarves, and on its center rested a large crystal ball.

Overhead, similar swaths of silk stretched from the corners to the center of the room directly above the plinth. From the center of the ceiling, numerous large crystals hung from delicate silvery chains. Despite the swirling smoke, those crystals remained poised, still as stone. Azure and amethyst and amaranth lights illuminated the walls from floor to ceiling, reflected in glittering crystals and the sizeable transparent ball on the plinth, completing Madam Drina’s incredible soothsaying display.

“Hello?”

Not even a hint of an echo. Slow steps bore me downriver, and I called out once more. “Madam Drina?”

I had done my best to prepare my senses, steel my nerves, and harden my resolve. Few women rivaled Madam Drina’s beauty. But when she entered the room through a thick layer of silk scarves across the room, death breathed its icy breath down my spine, and I shivered from head to toe.

Pale as the moon, Madam Drina glowed in the lamplight. Dark curls of midnight hair hung from her headwrap, and large almond eyes widened when she spotted me. A petite nose ended in a delicate slope upwards, and beneath it stretched plump lips painted so very red to reveal a brilliant smile. She opened her arms, dark linens billowing from her wrists and elbows, and showed a tightly bound dress of sanguine silk, satin, and chiffon. Around her neck wrapped a woven leather choker, and at its center sat a ruby the size of my thumbnail. From that ruby, three delicate leather straps of varying lengths and bearing tiny red stone droplets plunged to her deep neckline and settled just above her admittedly impressive cleavage.

I could hardly take my eyes off her. And not just out of fear for my safety.

“Good evening, my dear,” she cooed, her voice velvety smooth and throaty with a hint of her breath. “I apologize for my tardiness. I had to... powder my nose.”

The first wave of her power rolled through my chest, and the room shimmered in a blurry rush, but the sickening sensation passed in a single breath. When my focus returned, I found Madam Drina glaring daggers at me. But in a blink, her anger disappeared, and she motioned to the table.

“Please, sit. What would you like to know?” She crossed the space and sat in a plush, overstuffed chair on the plinth’s opposite side. The layers of her dress parted as she spread her knees to either side of the pillar and slid her chair closer. “Come, dear. Tell me what you see here,” she beckoned as she pointed at the crystal ball with a black, claw-like fingernail. “I can tell you what it means.” 

A nervous twitch of my hand checked the machete behind my hip. The cold bronze stake up my sleeve needed no such confirmation. As casually and confidently as I could, I strode to the empty chair and sat across from Madam Drina.

The second rush of power caressed my thighs, gentle as a lover’s touch. A heady aroma of oakmoss and elderberry flooded my nose, and once more, death breathed her icy chill down my neck. But again, the moment passed almost as if it had never happened. Disappointment twitched across Madam Drina’s intense gaze, her pale blue eyes flashing in frustration. And just as she had before, that display of emotion vanished, her calm countenance returned.

“You,” she drawled, “are better suited for cards.” A snap of her fingers vanished the crystal ball, clearing the plinth between us. I startled to feign surprise at such blatant use of magic, but I worried she saw through my ruse.

“Place your hand on the table,” she said as she smoothed the fabric. “Right here, my dear.”

Call it prescience, call it a sixth sense, hell, call it a woman’s intuition if that helps. Whatever it was, every fiber of my existence railed against the habit to lay my right hand on the table, and instead, I placed my left in the center with all the confidence I mustered.

Her long nails slipped beneath my palm and lifted my hand from the table. A scant inch from her nose, she examined my skin, fingers, and nails until she turned it over to scrutinize my palm. “Beautiful,” she purred, “so healthy. And strong.”

“You can tell that just by looking at my hand?” I asked.

The corners of her lips twitched, and she traced tantalizing trails along the lines of my palm with the pointed nail of her index finger. “That and much, much more.” She paused, her pale stare locked on mine. “But that is for another night. Cards. The cards will have the most insight for you tonight.”

Fight or flight. An opening squandered surely sealed my fate. Lost in thought, I noticed too late the creep of magic crawling along my arm, and when Madam Drina returned my hand to the covered plinth, death sang her siren’s call to me for the third time. That frigid touch of magic bound my hand to the table, frozen solid as a block of ice. A roiling surge in my stomach threatened to empty it there on the table, instinctual, primal. My final lucid moment chose flight.

As Madam Drina withdrew a deck of tarot cards from her waist wrap, I took my chance. Below the plinth, I slipped my right hand beneath the hem of my coat for my hip. There, the two-way radio’s textured button brushed beneath my fingers as I fumbled for my lifeline. But before I could press the button, Madam Drina held the deck out to me and spoke.

“Cut.”

As though a spun valve had released the pressure on my left hand, sensation returned to my fingers. I reached for the deck and stared Madam Drina directly in the eye. A rookie mistake, one I regretted immediately. Her piercing blue stare bored a hole straight into my soul, and my secrets laid bare. She knew. She saw straight through me, read me like an open book. Most of all, she knew that danger had found her that night. Too risky. I backed down from my radio and returned my right hand to my knee. With the left, I grabbed a large portion of the deck from her hand.

“Bold,” she commented as she placed the cards in her hand atop the cut. “But unsurprising.” The warmth of her touch covered mine on the table, only to seize in a flow of icy magic, chained once more. “I knew you would be an interesting read the moment I saw you.”

With ease, she moved my hand to the edge of the plinth. I tested my invisible restraint to no avail; that magical bond held fast. “Now,” she started, “I want you to think deeply about your being and how it has manifested itself thus far in the universe. Take your time. Connect with yourself. This may feel very new and even uncomfortable.”

To maintain pretenses, I did as she instructed. My gaze fell to the deck of cards where I drifted, unseeing. The room faded into an endless nothing, but within seconds, distant shapes formed in swirling clouds of dark smoke. As I neared them, they focused, solidified, and settled into my best friends. Castiel stood off to the side, his forlorn gaze staring across the nothingness at Dean, who stood beside Sam. And Sam’s appearance faded, opaque and wispy, where tendrils of smoke leached from him. Soon, he disappeared, and, though strange, I understood. I knew, without question, the meaning of that vision.

When Dean and Castiel remained, Dean gazed into the middle distance, and Castiel continued to stare at him.

“Ask your question.”

Madam Drina’s voice interrupted my thought, and in a wild, sliding rush, the room returned to focus around me. Her touch at my left hand, with her nimble fingers drawing delicate circles, elicited a well of sensations that itched beneath the surface, eager for release. But that ache was not alone. Death stalked in the shadows.

“You know what it is you seek, darling. Ask. Ask the universe your question, and the cards will tell you all you need to know.”

I heard myself speak before the thought had even formed in my mind. “How can I help my friend understand the truth?”

Madam Drina breathed in so deep, her chest swelled, and her eyes rolled back as they closed. “Ah, it is a man, no? A man you wish to… know the truth?”

“Yes,” I stated. “He deserves to know.”

“They all do,” she agreed as her gaze drifted to her hand atop mine. “They all should know the truth of a woman’s touch.”

Wait. What? “No, that’s… not—”

“Hush, dear,” she interrupted. “You have asked, and the cosmos will respond.” She lifted the first card from the top of the deck and turned it over. “Oh, how fascinating. You are not one to disappoint!”

A man hung from a tree by his ankle but rose above it against gravity. “The Hanged Man, inverted,” she said. “You are learning a new perspective on love. This man of whom you speak should know this, yes.”

But I knew The Hanged Man had many more meanings. Despite my question, I worried it related more to the situation at hand. I dodged sacrifice every second I lingered in Madam Drina’s presence.

She flipped the second card and hummed a knowing song. “The Seven of Pentacles, upright. You have long put work into this friendship. That is how you weather this storm. It will pay off with romance.”

The urge to contradict her nearly overcame my sensibility. Hard work, perseverance, and patience would see me through my encounter with such an abhorrent creature.

The third card flipped over, and Madam Drina hummed again as if she expected the result. “The Eight of Cups, inverted. You are learning the lessons of fear, sweetheart. Loneliness and loss are hard lessons, undoubtedly.”

Until that moment, I had held absolutely no faith in the power, ability, or knowing of tarot cards. But as I stared down that inverted Eight of Cups, my once unwavering disregard for tarot faltered. I feared not loneliness, but indecision. Inaction. Stagnation. I had to choose a path and commit to it before stalling at the crossroads got me killed.

Madam Drina grasped my left hand in hers and said, “You will see this through to your end, my dear. I know it.” She flipped over the fourth card and beamed with such pride I wondered if I had imagined her sense of danger earlier. “Strength, inverted!” she cried, almost a moan. “You shed your low self-esteem and insecurities, and are born again confident in love!”

No. What I relinquished in her presence was not insecurity, but fear. I stared Madam Drina dead in the eye again. I forced myself to meet her enraptured gaze of pure, unadulterated lust head-on and without fear any longer.

The fifth and final card flipped over with a snap of the cardstock. And that time, she cried out such a lascivious moan, I desperately wished to be anywhere else but in that room with her. “The Queen of Wands, upright,” she sighed. “You move forward with independence, confidence, and openness with your lover!”

In a brilliant flare of icy sorcery, Madam Drina lunged over the plinth and grasped me by the jaw. “You radiate power, sweetling. Do you not feel it?!” she breathed, oakmoss and elderberry filling my nose once more. “You should. You should experience the pleasures of such power. I can give that to you if you want. I can give you everything.”

Courage. The Queen of Wands symbolizes courage and individualism. To survive the encounter, I needed to believe in myself. Weak knees shook as I stood, the last of my willpower draining like water through a sieve. Madam Drina poured every ounce of her power into me, an unrelenting tidal wave. I wanted nothing more than to give in, surrender to her promises, and experience the culmination of that euphoria. And yet, the tiniest of voices, so thin and frail in the recess of my subconscious, forced its way to the fore of my mind and spoke of courage. Of righteous anger. Of life. Of love.

As Madam Drina pressed closer, her visage wavered, the mirage fading away to reveal her true form. Pale, purple skin stretched thin across her angular face, and endless black depths replaced the blue sapphires into which I stared. Long, curved horns smooth as obsidian protruded from her hairline where the skin crackled like broken earth to reveal tiny streams of violent purple energy flowing through her body.

“You will submit,” she ordered, “I own you now.”

Blood rushed past my ears with each furious beat of my heart, drowning out her words. The succubus continued to speak, continued to pour her delusions into my head. But I heard nothing, saw nothing. The last of my strength focused laser-like on the machete, and I reached behind my hip for the handle.

In a ring of metal and a flash of steel, I stripped the machete from its scabbard. The blade arched in a wild bid for her neck, and time stretched far too thin. Each second dragged, and the blade slid slowly, achingly, to its mark. Strike true, I begged. My life depended on it. God, please, let me strike true.

A sharp, earsplitting crack of thunder rang from the blade as it connected with the succubus’ long claws, her fingers against her neck blocking the machete. She smiled then, her long snakelike tongue darting out to lick her lips as she tore the weapon from my hand and tossed it to the floor beside her. “You will be such a pleasure to break.”

The bronze stake slipped from the sleeve of my jacket with a twitch of my wrist. Time raced to catch up, snapping back like a rubber band. I shoved the finely honed point to her chest, my entire body torqueing for all my strength, but in the final inch, the succubus screamed so loud, I collapsed to my knees. She flung me aside, and the stake flew from my hand to roll beneath a thick chest of drawers.  I tumbled with it, crashing into the dense oak, and pain lanced like lightning through my entire body. 

She screamed again, another furious screech that echoed impossibly through the shop. Windows rattled in their panes, and my hands snapped to my ears. The succubus stood then, and for the first time, I consumed her entire form. Heeled feet and slender ankles begged the eye up to the perfect curves of her sensuous hips that swayed as she strode to me and straddled my prone body. From the shiny golden gorget at her neck, delicate chains stretched along her pale skin, down her massive breasts, and capped small metal disks over her nipples. More delicate chains crossed along her soft stomach and wide hips, barely covering her sex with a flimsy gauze cloth that draped to the floor. Over her shoulder curled a wicked, seven-foot-long tail protruding from her spine at the top of her long, supple ass.

Lust, incarnate.

“You are inquisitive,” she purred. “I know what you are thinking. I know what they all think when they see my true form for the first time. You wonder.” She leaned over and reached for my throat. Adrenaline surged as I attempted to fight her off, but she pinned me to the floor with no effort at all. “You imagine. You fantasize,” she whispered into my ear. “I can give it all to you, and so much more.”

Her long, lithe fingers wrapped around my throat and gently squeezed. “This,” she started, “is what you crave. What you’ve wanted for years. To know endless pleasure by my hands of mastery. Agree, and I will give it to you. Fight, like you continue to do as you squirm your lithe little body beneath mine, and I will take it from you anyway.”

Darkness pressed in from all sides as my vision narrowed. Her grasp pressed ever so perfectly, and within seconds, I succumbed to the ceaseless nothing.

A thin shattering of glass and a sharp, shrill cry echoed through the emptiness like a distant memory. Light returned, and the room focused as I shook my head, but nowhere near fast enough. The succubus snatched me up from the floor like a child clutching a favored doll. Tiny diamonds of glass tumbled from my hair, my coat, and when she turned me about, I saw Sam and Castiel standing at the front of the shop, guns loaded for bare.

“Hand her over!” Sam barked. “Now!”

“Or what?” the succubus seethed. “You’ll shoot me? You’ll have to shoot her fir—”

“They might.” The thunk of the rifle at the back of the succubus’ head snapped my attention behind her. There, Dean glared at the end of his short barrel and said, “But I won’t.”

Another blinding flash of power roared through the room as everything happened at once. The succubus flung me from her arms, and I soared across the room to crash into Sam. We toppled together to the floor, and not a beat behind me, Dean and his shotgun followed. He rolled as he landed, but barreled into Castiel, who only just caught him.

An infuriating lilt of her humming pleasure caught us all off guard. “You brought men to defend you?” She howled with haunting laughter. “Maybe you are not so bright after all,” she simpered with a wave of her hand.

On pins and needles, I could only watch as Sam, Dean, and even Castiel reached for their heads, and Sam squeezed his eyes shut. But just as I had resisted her magic, so did they. A few shakes of their heads and a breath later, Dean picked up his shotgun, Castiel aimed with his once more, and Sam helped me to my feet. As I stepped back, my heel kicked something hard, larger than the shards of glass strewn about the shop’s entry, but I dared not look down as the succubus advanced on us.

“Oh,” she mused as she took her sensuous rolling steps. “Your friends are strong, too. Stronger than you? Will I break all four of you? Together?”

“Back off, bitch.”

The crack of Dean’s shotgun exploded in the tiny shop, and my ears rang for several seconds before I heard more pealing laughter from the succubus. Rock salt lay scattered on the ground a foot before her as though it had hit an impenetrable wall. “You think you can just shoot me, Dean Winchester?”

Dean balked then, appearing shocked to hear his own name. “No. You don’t know me. Don’t even pretend like you do.”

“Oh, but I do,” she said as she stepped once more. In that second, her skin shimmered and shifted until it transformed into a dark suit, blue tie, and tan trench coat. “I know everything about you.”

Her eyes turned brilliant emerald green as they snapped to Castiel. “And you. The disgraced angel, Castiel, who once tempted the fate of the entire world by becoming God. The things I would love to do to—”

“Shut it,” Sam hissed as he raised his shotgun.

The succubus looked at the rock salt at her feet, then back to Sam. “What makes you think your gun will work after his didn’t?”

“I’m not packin’ rock salt, honey,” he stated. “Now back up.”

“My dear Sam, do not make me…” her voice clipped short as she hesitated, then her coat and suit shifted to match my own outfit. She turned to me, and her clothing twisted into Sam’s burnt orange jacket. “Well, aren’t I a lucky girl?” Her clothing vanished in a shiver befitting a burlesque dancer. “Four pining souls all desperate for pleasure. You’ve come to the right place. I think I’ll start with you.”

When the succubus pointed, Dean choked as though on cue. His shotgun dropped from his hands and clattered to the floor, and though it was within reach, I dared not move. Sam and Castiel raised their rifles to shoot, but a flippant wave of her free hand sent them flying into the opposite wall of the shop. They crashed into the ornate furniture in a hail of wood and metal, then collapsed beneath the rubble. Where Sam had slumped motionless, Castiel remained conscious, but he struggled to do even that.

“Cas, you hold on!” Dean choked. “Y/N, help him!”

With a subtle shift in her pointing hand, Dean rose to the tips of his boots, barely touching the floor. I alone remained standing, but mine was no longer the only life on the line. Once more, I stood at the crossroads and had to commit to a path.

I dropped to the floor for the rifle, and no sooner than my hands graced the stock, it sailed across the room. “Dean goes first,” the succubus declared. “Then once I’m through with him, I’ll break Sam. And then you.” She turned back to Dean. “While your big, dumb men watch.”

“Don’t you touch them!” Dean choked as he clawed at his neck. The tips of his boots scraped the floor where the succubus dangled him. “I’ll fucking kill you if you lay a single finger on any of them!” 

One heeled foot stepped in front of the other as the succubus closed the space between her and Dean. “Your brother was supposed to be my king. Did you know that?” she breathed. “You could be my king, and I’ll serve you however you see fit. I’ll leave her alone. I’ll leave Sam alone. I’ll even leave dear, sweet Castiel alone.”

She looked to Castiel, who stumbled through the rubble to rouse Sam’s motionless body. “Look at him. Bumbling fool,” she hissed. “What do you see in him that you don’t see in me? I can give you so much more.”

Dean tried to choke out another retort, but her invisible grip at his throat tightened. When she reached him, she pressed her entire body against his, and a virulent wave of power roared to life around them, crackling like fire but dark as night. A violently lewd shiver coursed through her, running from shoulder to tail as she moaned, and Dean’s face turned a putrid shade of green I had never seen on a human before. “Aw, you don’t like being choked? Poor thing. You’re missing out. I can teach you to love it.” Her long forked tongue teased at Dean’s jaw, and she moaned again as he jerked his head away from her violently.

In one infinitesimal second, horrors unlike any I had experienced before flashed before my mind’s eye. In the next breath, those terrible visions faded in a haze of red, insatiable bloodlust. No coherent thought penetrated that curtain of rage, that raw, unbridled fury, and I committed for the third and final time that night.

Fast as lightning, I lunged. My machete lay where I had unknowingly kicked it not minutes earlier. In an odd twist of fate, it had come to rest in a place so perfect. I could not have picked it ahead of time, given a chance. In a move that put Neo to shame, I rolled through the wild dive for the machete and sprang to my feet, armed. Distracted so by her prey, the succubus turned too late to defend herself. And I wasn’t about to let her get the last word before I snuffed out the wick that was her pathetic existence.

“Choke on this, you sick son of a bitch.”

Steal sang through the air, harmony to the melody of my frenzied scream, and sliced through her skin, sinew, and bone like a hot knife through butter. A fine black mist of demon blood billowed from the strike, covering my face. As the succubus’s decapitated head and body dropped to the floor in a resounding thud, a thin arc of demon blood lanced across Dean’s chest, and he vomited.

He continued to wretch until Castiel rushed from the heap of broken furniture and wrapped one arm around Dean’s back as the other cupped his forehead. Dean gasped, plunged so suddenly beneath the icy waves of healing. But as quickly as Dean’s nausea had come on, it passed in the wake of Castiel’s touch, and he stood tall once more. When Dean nodded in reassurance, Castiel headed back for Sam as he stirred to life in the rubble.

Black runnels of thick blood ran in rivulets down the blade of my machete. White knuckles yet clutched the hilt, and a moment passed before reality, dancing at the edges of my consciousness, sank in. Those were my knuckles, stiff and shaking under straining muscles. A freak spasm snapped my fingers apart, and the blade thumped to the floor.

“Hey,” Dean started as he neared me. “Keep it together, Y/N. You did what you had to do. Look at me. Focus on me.”

Lingering bouts of rage trickled through my blood and rendered my mind near useless. Dean’s lips moved, but I hardly heard a sound, his voice muted. That suffocating rage dragged me down like a treacherous undertow. I did my best to read his lips. Did what you had to. Look. Focus. He pointed two fingers at me, at my eyes, then at himself.

I only noticed Castiel had returned with Sam in tow after Dean had turned to ensure they were alright. A short, muted conversation passed between them, but when Sam spotted me, he closed the remaining space between us and asked, “Do you want to leave?”

The silence shattered, and I heard his voice clear as a bell. But with that clarity came understanding. My stare had unwittingly fallen on the lifeless body, once virile and full of limitless power, sprawled on the floor, her head a few feet away. Even in death, the overt lust of the succubus imposed, branding my mind with an indelible memory I begged to forget.

And then she was gone, blocked by Sam’s broad shoulders and towering frame. “Cas and Dean can handle the body,” he said as he reached for me. I recoiled, an unbidden reaction that surprised even myself. A pained frown I never wished to see again knotted Sam’s brow. “I’m sorry, Y/N. I’m sorry you went through this alone. It was a terrible plan—”

He choked on his words as I lunged into his arms again, and he remained quiet as he held me. In that moment of silence, I wanted nothing more than to scream, to take out every ounce of my furious hatred for that abomination on her corpse. But the longer I breathed in Sam’s embrace—free of any oakmoss or elderberry, thank Christ—that righteous rage subsided.

“Jesus. No wonder men just fall into their laps,” Dean commented.

I looked past Sam to find Dean and Castiel looming over the body of the succubus.

“I never understood why God created humans to be so…” Castiel paused as he neared the head. “So…”

“Simple?” Dean asked. “So easily fooled? So… basic?”

Castiel nodded. “Yes.”

Dean managed a chuckle at that. “I wish I knew, too.” He paused as he stared at her for one lingering moment. “I hate everything about this. Let’s torch the body outside of town and get the hell out of here.” He tossed a heavy burlap bag at Castiel.

“Why do you hate them so much?” Castiel asked as he caught the bag.

“Because,” Dean grunted, “it’s not fun if it’s not consensual. And if there’s one thing a succubus gets off on most, it’s an extreme lack of consent. And that is fucking gross.”

As Sam led me to the shop’s front door, I glimpsed the tiniest reassured smile on Castiel’s face. And then I understood.

The tarot cards had been right all along.

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LONG JACKET MASTER LIST

ALLEIRADAYNE’S SPN MASTER LIST

[minijenn]

Universe Falls Chapter 80, Part 1

AHAHAHAHAH ITS HERE ITS QUEER ITS TIME TO FEAAAAAAAR. RIFTS HYPE TRAIN HAS ARRIVED AND LEFT THE STATION EITHER YOU ON OR YOU AINT NOW LETS GO IDK WHAT THE HELL IM TALKING ABOUT LETS JUST GOOOOOOO

Previous: https://minijenn.tumblr.com/post/619687513045483520/universe-falls-chapter-79

***

Chapter 80, Part 1: Rifts

LOMC GRFSX KB SEAJS XZJNHBVE NZ EHBXPU FVUK GHP UVAX LQM BIN VT OGLAR'E PJHNVE TSWF ESY EDH GFFTWQ SWWE 

Steven wasn’t sure when he’d voyaged out into the forest. The last thing he remembered, he’d been tucking himself in for the night, Lion taking up more than half the bed as he curled up right beside him. Upon bidding one final good night to the Gems as they went back into the temple, Steven had thought he had let himself drift off into a good night’s sleep, awash in the dulled, peaceful, calming chorus of crickets chirping and gentle breezes wafting through the trees just outside his window. 

And yet, he wasn’t. Because instead, he now found himself deep in the forest, so deep, in fact, that he couldn’t see any of the usual landmarks that told he was near the temple or the shack. To make matters even worse, it was still night, a pitch black one at that, with no stars or moon peeking through the dense tree canopy above him to guide his way home. Steven paused for a moment, taking in just how eerily silent the woods seemed to be as well, the air dead and surprisingly brisk, a far cry from the comfortable warmth he knew a summer night like this should have carried. The dense darkness and the deafening silence were both enough to unnerve the young Gem on their own, but it was only as that silence was broken by the briefest bout of soft sound somewhere in the distance that his heartbeat slowly started to pick up. 

“Uh… h-hello?” Steven called, his own voice echoing against the tall trees all around him. “Is… is anybody there…?”

He received no answer, at least not a direct one. Somewhere far away in the forest, that unknown noise rang out again, one that almost seemed to be some kind of laughter. Steven couldn’t quite make out who or what it was coming from, but he decided to follow it nonetheless in the hopes of figuring out what exactly was going on. So he forged a path through the trees, feeling his way through them more than anything else given how immensely dark the forest was. And yet, that darkness was soon brightened just a bit by a sparse spot of light peeking through the woods up ahead, one that just so happened to be in the same direction the faint laughter he kept hearing, which was growing louder, and clearer, the closer he wandered to it. 

Yet, the moment that laugh finally became clear enough for him to tell exactly who it belonged to, Steven suddenly stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes were wide as he took in a sharp, startled gasp, and without even taking a second to think, he darted behind the nearest tree, hoping that the dream demon didn’t already know he was there. 

However, at least as far as he knew, it seemed as though he had been found out without even realizing it. “Come on out, kid!” Bill called, his triangular form large, bright, and looming as he passed by the tree Steven was taking refuge behind. “You can’t hide from me forever!”

Steven shuddered as he pressed tighter against the side of the tree, not needing to even think twice about why Bill was apparently on the hunt for him. He placed a protective hand against his gemstone, which was still tucked away under his shirt--out of sight, but still there, still ready for the dream demon’s taking nonetheless. It was an unspoken fear, but a very potent one, cemented at the back of his mind, ever since his frightful dream encounter with Bill weeks ago. And it seemed as though the dream demon still refused to let up as he’d finally come back to collect. 

“You know, running is just a waste of time, something you fleshbags are already running pretty short on by default!” Bill quipped, his shrill voice echoing throughout the forest how as it carried it’s usually teasing tune. “But yours will be even shorter when I’m through with you! If you want, you can go ahead and feel free to thank me for going to all the trouble to finally put you out of your misery!”

Steven didn’t dare respond to this cruel round of threats as he instead focused on remaining as quiet as possible, desperately hoping that Bill would eventually get tired of looking for him and leave. Even so, he was ready to summon his shield, his bubble, and anything else he had at his disposal in the event the demon did manage to spot him, even if he wasn’t sure any of them would actually be able to fend him off. Still, nothing could have prepared the young Gem for the violent explosion that rattled the entire area, nearly knocking him off his feet entirely. 

“Aha! Found ya!” Bill chimed in the immediate aftermath of his destructive attack. Steven gasped, a protective bubble surrounding him in an instant, yet surprisingly, the dream demon didn’t come into view as he still seemed to be somewhere else in the forest entirely. “Yeesh, I gotta hand it to you, you sure are resilient! After several back to back nights of this, I thought our ongoing game of cat-and-mouse here would have you way past your breaking point by now, Pine Tree!”

“P-Pine Tree…?” Steven whispered with a start, initially baffled until the realization struck him like a wave of frigid water. He had been wrong from the very start. Bill wasn’t here looking for him at all; instead, he was looking for‒ “Dipper!” 

His voice rang much louder than he had meant it to but Steven hardly cared. Without hesitation, he left the safety of his hiding spot behind, plowing through the forest as fast as his legs could carry him as he took up the very same search Bill was on, though for an entirely different reason instead. Every now and then, he happened to catch a glimpse of the dream demon himself through the sparse gaps in the trees, but thankfully Bill still hadn’t taken any interest in him whatsoever. Instead, his attention seemed to be solely devoted to finding Dipper, just as Steven’s now was as well. 

Another explosion tore through the forest, one that did succeed in tripping Steven up as several trees toppled haphazardly around him. He narrowly avoided being crushed by one of them thanks to a well-timed shield cover, though as he glanced up amidst the debris, he finally caught his first glimpse of who both him and Bill had been searching for. 

Dipper had been completely displaced by the dream demon’s most recent blast, his own hiding spot completely torn apart, leaving him lying disoriented on the ground, completely out in the open. He quickly regathered his bearings, however, especially as Bill came to hover high before him, bright blue flames licking over both his outstretched hands. 

“Give it up already, Pine Tree!” the demon goaded twistedly, clearly taking pleasure in the torment he was doling out. “We both know that no matter where you run or how hard you try to block me out or fight back, you’ll never be able to really escape me. Put up as many magical barriers, swing around as many swords as you want, none of that matters at the end of the day! All that really matters is that I’m finally gonna give our puppet show the grand finale it’s always deserved!”

Without any sort of sword to defend himself with, the most Dipper could do was seize up in fear, his eyes wide in terror and his entire body visibly shaking with untold fear. Amidst that fear, he was paralyzed, completely incapable of so much as even uttering a single word of opposition or plea for mercy to the demon as he raised his flaming hands to destroy him. Unable to run, unable to hide, unable to fight back, unable to do anything else but helplessly await whatever devastating end Bill had in store for him. 

Until… 

“Dipper!” 

The sudden shout alone was enough to catch Dipper off guard as he tore his terrified gaze away from Bill to see who was rushing to his aid, completely out of nowhere. “S-Steven?!” 

There was no time for Steven to say anything even if he wanted to. Instead, he slid into the open space between Bill and Dipper, summoning a massive shield to protect them both from the demon’s fiery onslaught. Yet even that wasn’t enough to stop it, for as Bill unleashed the full force of his deadly attack, it obliterated the shield on impact‒

Before doing the same to Steven and Dipper themselves. 

Steven bolted upright with a tight, alarmed cry, his blankets tossed aside as Lion abruptly flinched awake alongside him. For a moment, the young Gem was unable to focus on nothing else other than his own sharp, panicked breathing, which steadily began to slow down as he took in the familiar sight of his bedroom loft around him. 

“T-that was just… a dream…?” he muttered to himself, running a hand through his hair. With a tired sigh, Steven flopped back down onto his bed, lying still for a moment as he let Lion casually lick the thin layer of sweat off his forehead. Even so, his brow furrowed in confusion as he stared up at the dark ceiling above him, his thoughts swirling in his head as he tried to make sense of what he’d just seen. “Wait…” he mused aloud, partially to Lion, though mostly to himself. “That… didn’t feel like it was my dream… I… I think it might have been… Dipper’s!”

The young Gem gasped, suddenly sitting up once more, much to his pink pet’s aggravation. “That’s right! Mabel did say he was having nightmares about Bill again… But… I… I didn’t think they were…” Steven trailed off, absently covering his hand with his mouth as worry welled up in his eyes. The dream he’d just unintentionally slipped into had been one fueled by raw, pure, visceral fear, fear that Steven had been able to feel just as powerfully as Dipper likely had, fear he had probably been feeling for several nights in a row now. 

“I-I have to do something…” Steven whispered to himself as he lay back down. All the while knowing that nobody, especially not one of his closest friends, should have to contend with such horrific torment night after night. And certainly not from the very dream demon who had already put him through so much strife in the waking world to begin with. “I have to help him…”

“Have a great time on your vacation, Connie!” Mabel chimed as her, Dipper, and Steven video-chattered with her from their spot on the shack’s porch. “Bring back lots of souvenirs and cute, weird Japanese snacks!”

“Yeah, and don’t forget to call us every day to tell us about all the cool stuff you’re seeing,” Steven added with a smile. 

“Well, I would do that, but there’s… a pretty significant time difference over in Tokyo,” Connie chuckled. “I don’t wanna wake you guys up in the middle of the night while I’m just starting my day.”

“Yeah, as much as we’d love to hear from you, please don’t do that,” Dipper replied with an amused grin. 

“I’ll make sure to fill you all in on everything once I get home,” Connie assured. “I just hope this trip won’t be too boring. My mom’s dead set on making it about ‘cultural enrichment’ and historical education. But all I really want to do is find a cute little bookshop/bubble tea cat cafe and spend a whole day reading as many manga as I can get my hands on.”

“Oo, the bubble tea cat part sounds like my idea of a good time!” Mabel quipped excitedly. “By the way, what’s a manga?”

Connie was about to explain, though she was cut off as the airport speaker rang out with a boarding announcement. “Oh! That’s our flight!” she exclaimed, grabbing her carry-on bag as she headed to the gate. “I’ve gotta go. I’ll see you guys when I get back next week. Try not to get into too much trouble without me, ok?”

“It’s sort of hard to promise something like that around here…” Dipper noted knowingly. 

“But we’ll try,” Steven said, offering her a warm wave. Connie returned that wave with another round of brief, fond farewells for her friends just before she hung up to embark on her Japanese journey. 

“Aw man, Connie’s so lucky!” Mabel let out a wistful sigh as soon as the call was over. “I wish we could go somewhere new and exciting too!”

“Uh, Mabel? Did you forget that Gravity Falls technically is new to you and I?” Dipper inquired with a bit of a wry smirk. “I know it might feel like home sometimes, but we don’t actually live here, you know.”

“Yeah, and something exciting is always happening around here almost every day!” Steven added enthusiastically. “It might not always be a good kind of exciting, but it’s still exciting all the same.”

“Oh, you guys know what I mean!” Mabel huffed. “We should go somewhere that’s super way out there, somewhere nobody’s ever been before! Or at least somewhere no one’s been to before and came back to talk about.”

“Sounds ‘dangerous’,” Dipper chuckled easily. “Have any place like that in mind?”

“Of course I do!” Mabel proclaimed, though her confidence was quick to fall off. “Uh… we can go to… hm…”

Before she could think on the matter any further, however, a gruff, irritated shout rang out from inside the shack. “Mabel! Get in here!” Stan called, clearly annoyed. “Someone--who may or may not be me--left the fridge open and your dumb pig got into the bacon!”

“Waddles, no!” Mabel gasped, horrified as she hopped up to hurry inside. “That’s cannibalism! Think of your adorable pig brethren!”

“Yeesh, you think she would have trained Waddles better with all the time she spends with him,” Dipper remarked, still wearing a light, almost deceptively calm‒at least as far as Steven was concerned‒grin. 

“Heh, yeah…” Steven’s own steady smile finally fell. Even so, he was glad to have a moment or two alone with Dipper, knowing that this would be a much easier discussion to have between just the two of them. “Uh… hey, Dipper? Did… did you sleep ok last night?”

Dipper paused, clearly caught off guard by the question. “Uh… yeah?” he lied, still holding onto a smile, albeit a smaller, more uncertain one now. “Why do you ask?”

“W-well, I just…” Steven hesitated, not really knowing how to proceed, though he still tried to do so as gently as possible all the same. “I heard you were having nightmares about, uh… well, Bill, a-and I was just wondering if you were ok…”

“Ugh, seriously?” Dipper groaned, rolling his eyes. “Does Mabel have to tell everyone about the kind of dreams she thinks I’m having? A-anyway, I… might have had a few Bill-related dreams lately, b-but they’re nothing serious. Definitely not anything worth worrying about, so yeah. I’m fine.”

“...That’s not what I saw last night…” Steven muttered apprehensively as he glanced away. 

“Last night?” Dipper turned to him, raising an eyebrow. “What happened last…” He trailed off, his eyes widening in realization as he happened to recall the finer details of a nightmare he’d just as rather have forgotten entirely. “Wait… t-that nightmare last night… Steven, was… was that really you that showed up in it?”

The young Gem nodded, not really taking stock of the hints of appalled disbelief starting to show up in Dipper’s expression. “I guess I must have used my powers to get into your dreams somehow, b-but that’s ok, because-”

“O-ok?” Dipper interrupted rather harshly. “What makes you think just… breaking into my dreams without my permission is anywhere close to ok? Do you even realize just how much of an invasion of privacy that is?!”

“Oh, w-well, I’m sorry,” Steven frowned, genuinely apologetic. “It wasn’t like I was trying to do it. It just sort of, well, happened. I-I still don’t really know how these new dream powers work, but don’t worry! I’ll figure them out, and once I do, then maybe I can use them to help you fight Bill out of your dreams once and for all!”

Despite this spirited, kindly offer, Dipper flinched, his already agitated expression growing even more intense at this. “No,” he said simply, standing up before walking off toward the nearby woods. 

“What?” Steven also stood, completely baffled as he began trailing after Dipper. “But… why not? Don’t you want Bill to stop showing up in your dreams every night?”

“O-of course I do, Steven, but… it’s not that big of a deal!” Dipper glanced over his shoulder, perturbed. “I don’t need you to use your dream powers, or any of your other powers for that matter, to get rid of him; I can do it on my own.”

A part of the young Gem knew he should have just left it there, taken Dipper’s word for it and moved on. But another, much louder, much more persistent part of him refused to let a friend’s obvious need for assistance and support go unanswered. “B-but… I want to help you!” he implored, grabbing his hand to stop him as he reached the outer edge of the woods. 

Even so, Dipper was quick to pull that hand away. “I don’t want--I don’t need your help,” he said, feigning calm despite the hints of clear frustration lying underneath it. “I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not!” Steven protested, following after him as he began to make his way through the woods once more. “You always say that you’re fine, but I don't think you really are, Dipper! I was there in your dream last night, I could see what was happening. I could feel just how scared you were! I’m scared of Bill too after everything he’s done, b-but I know that we’re strong enough to stand up to him as long as we stick together!”

“You don’t know that!” Dipper countered as he ventured into the forest with no real set destination in mind. Because really, all he was trying to do was get away from a conversation that, by all accounts, Steven was refusing to let him escape so easily. “Nobody knows that! The only thing we do know is what Bill’s capable of, and it’s not something you can just stand up to and expect to survive against!”

“But we have before!” Steven argued firmly. “And we can again. We’ve always found a way to stop Bill by working together; so what makes stopping him in your dreams any different?”

“You still don’t get it, do you?!” Dipper shot back, sending another bitter glare over his shoulder. “My problem isn’t with Bill right now, Steven. My problem is with you!”

Steven froze, faltering almost as if those words had physically struck him. Which really, they might as well have from how much they hurt on mere contact alone. “W-what… what do you mean?” he dared to ask, almost afraid of the answer. 

“Well, gee, why don’t we start with how you just burst into my dreams completely uninvited,” Dipper began crossly, still pressing on ahead into the woods. “And then you act like that’s not even a big deal, when it is! I already have enough problems with Bill running around and ruining my dreams each night; the last thing I want is someone else doing it too.”

“B-but this would be different! It wouldn’t be anything like what Bill’s been doing. Like I said, I’d be going into your dreams to help you, if you would just let me!”

“Well, I’m not going to. Why can’t you just accept that already and drop it?”

Steven bristled at this, his own frustration quickly rising, despite his best efforts to remain patient, even if that patience was steadily starting to wear thin. “Why can’t you just accept that you need help?! Why do you always think you have to do everything on your own? You have so many people who are there for you: Mabel, your uncles, the Gems, me! Why don’t you ever just let us help you?!”

“Why won’t you just take no for an answer!?” Dipper retorted bitterly. “You always, always do this. You always act like you know what’s best for everyone, but you don’t, especially not for me!”

“I never said that! I just want to-”

“Want to what?” Dipper interrupted, pausing as he turned to face the young Gem, his expression completely livid. “Fix me like you try to fix everything else?! Face it, Steven, there are some things you just can’t fix!”

For the briefest of moments, Steven hesitated, pain taking a place in his expression alongside anger. Because now, despite his best efforts to set things right, it seemed as though he inadvertently had torn open an all-new rift, one between him and Dipper and their close friendship. A rift he wasn’t sure he’d be so able to easily heal with words alone. “W-well, that doesn’t mean I can’t try,” he persisted stubbornly, foolishly even. That small part of him practically begged him to stop, to call it quits before that rift tore itself open even wider. But for some inane reason, he kept this argument going, knowing the solution Dipper kept refusing was one they both truly needed to fix that rift, and so much more along with it. 

“You should stop trying,” Dipper refuted, his tone icy as he turned away again. “Because every time you try, things always seem to get worse.”

“T-that’s not true. You aren’t-”

“Oh, it isn’t? Then why don’t we talk about Grunkle Stan and how you just up and stole his body like it was nothing!” Dipper accused, finally bringing to light a point of contention he’d somehow managed to remain silent on for weeks now. But now, there was no hiding the dread and discomfort that series of events had initially brought him, not anymore. 

“I-I didn’t steal it!” Steven exclaimed defensively. “It was an accident, I-”

“Yeah, sure another accident,” Dipper scoffed. “You know, Steven, you sure do happen to have a whole lot of powers you don’t know how to control and just keep accidentally using. But even if it was an accident, you still stayed in his body all day anyway just so you and Mabel could go through with another one of your big “get along plans”, which didn’t even work! The whole thing was pointless, just one big waste of time, but who even knows where Stan was during the whole thing! For all we know, he could have been stuck in the mindscape, just like I was when Bill possessed me!”

“D-Dipper…” Steven choked, his eyes wide with realization. He had known from the start that what had happened that day had bothered him, though he had never been able to figure out exactly why, not until now at least. Really, the answer was so clear, so obvious that he should have seen it from the start, he should have known, he should have at least thought twice about going through with that plan, if just for Dipper’s sake alone. But he hadn’t. And in doing so, the young Gem realized, he had already started tearing that rift between them, even weeks before now. “I… I didn’t-”

“You didn’t think,” Dipper scowled, his hands curled up into tight fists at his sides. “You never do! The only things you do actually think about are your plans to try to ‘fix’ people so they’ll be good and nice and perfect like you! So what happens when you decide I’m not good enough and you want to fix me like you tried to fix Stan and Ford? Are you gonna try and take over my body too?!”

“Of course not!” Steven firmly asserted, knowing just how much that would have hurt Dipper after everything Bill had already done. “You know I wouldn’t! Not unless-”

“Not unless you found a good reason to, right?” Dipper countered rigidly. “Well, it wouldn’t be very hard for you to find one, Steven. Seeing as how you just love to use your powers to get people to do what you want. Just like-”

Dipper suddenly cut himself off, his shoulders hitching as he finally stopped in the middle of an open clearing. By now, both boys were pretty far out in the forest, but that was just about the last thing on either of their minds. Steven slowly reached a hand out to skim Dipper’s shoulder, desperately trying to fight back the hot tears that were already welling up in his eyes. “L-like… who?” he asked, his voice soft and shaking all the while. 

Dipper sighed, not really wanting to voice what he was about to say aloud at all. And yet, as angry, as outraged as he was by the young Gem’s sheer audacity and stubbornness, he found that he couldn’t hold it back, no matter how hard he tried. “Like Bill, Steven!” he shouted, slapping his hand away as he spun around to face him. “You’re just like Bill!”

At that exact moment, time seemed to grind to a complete halt for Steven. His pressing tears finally fell through a heavy, choked-up sob, his hand slowly falling to his side as he took an absent step backward. He hardly even looked at Dipper, or anything else at all, as his thoughts reeled wildly out of control from this simple, yet brutal accusation alone, one that came from one of his best and closest friends, of all people. “N-no…” he stammered softly, shaking his head as tears continued to stream down his cheeks. “I… I’m...” he trailed off, unable to even finish the claim that he wasn’t. Because the simple thought that it was somehow true, that he was just as much of a manipulative monster as Bill Cipher was so horrifying, so chilling, and so incredibly fitting that Steven quickly found himself crumbling under the immense, devastating weight of it all. “H-how… how could you-”

“What? You really think it’s that hard of a comparison to make?” Dipper asked harshly, refusing to let Steven’s tears sway him this time. “Think about it; you’ve both got weird dream powers, you can both possess people, heck, you can even float like he can!”

As soon as Steven heard this, his tears stalled completely, his grief turning to something much sharper over the paper-thin similarities Dipper had pointed out. “That--no,” he said shortly, succinctly as the first hints of frustration began to fill in his expression. “That’s not fair, Dipper! Those are just my powers, they aren’t who I am! I would never do any of the things Bill’s done, I would never hurt you like he has! You can trust me, you know you can!”

Dipper hesitated at this earnest appeal, wanting so much to believe it. And yet, just when he was on the verge of accepting it, an all-too-familiar mantra rang through his head, just as clear as it always did: “Trust no one.” 

No one… not even his very best friend. 

“Sorry,” he said quietly, coldly as he turned his back on Steven once more. “But I can’t.”

Steven was unable to hold back another sob at this, one that heaved heavily out of him as he watched Dipper swiftly, silently walk away from him. As he watched the growing rift between them finally tear them apart entirely. “Dipper, w-wait,” Steven reached out in an effort to stop him, desperate to find a way to fix what had just been broken. “I-”

Before he could even get another word out, their entire argument was abruptly brought to a grinding halt as a bright flash of noisy light rippled across the surrounding forest. Both boys were completely caught off guard by it as they shielded themselves against its blinding might, though as it faded away just as quickly as it had appeared. Only to leave something very unsettling behind in its place. 

As Steven and Dipper opened their eyes once more, they both immediately saw it: a small, yet vibrantly glowing orb of multicolored light, hovering above the ground as its shape shifted, ebbing and flowing almost constantly before them. “W-what is that…?” Steven asked, his eyes wide as he stared at the orb, captivated by it. 

“I… don’t know…” Dipper shook his head, eyeing it distrustfully. “It almost looks like… that rift Great Uncle Ford told us about…”

Steven gasped, alarmed as he noticed the striking similarity this orb had to the rift too. A similarity that unnerved him deeply when he remembered exactly who was hoping to get his hands on the original. “What are you doing?” Dipper asked him as he took his first few steps toward it. 

“I’m gonna bubble it,” Steven glanced back over his shoulder as he continued approaching the light. 

“What? No, Steven, don’t touch it!” Dipper warned incredulously. “We have no idea what that thing even is!”

“Well, Mr. Ford and the Gems might. Once I bubble it, we can take it back to them and see what they think.”

“No, we should just leave it alone and get out of here.”

“But it’s ok,” Steven assured as he reached out toward the orb to secure it in a bubble. “I’ve got this.”

Dipper let out a disgruntled scoff as he essentially received yet another reminder of just how often Steven refused to simply listen. “No, you don-”

At that very moment, just as the young Gem’s hands began to surround the orb, it exploded in yet another burst of incredible light. The force of it alone was enough to knock Steven back, sending him crashing into Dipper before they both hit the ground hard. They had no time to recover, however, as they looked back to where the light had been… only to find what could only be described as a portal instead. 

Said portal was sizable, filled in with a strange sort of spacelike expanse that seemed to be changing colors continually. Under different circumstances, it might have been mesmerizing; if it hadn’t gained an immense, almost suction-like gale-force wind to go along with its radiance. Its magnetic force immediately began to pull the nearest thing toward it, which just so happened to be Steven. The young Gem let out a startled cry as he was pulled off its feet, the rushing gale dragging him toward the portal completely against his will. His attempts at grounding himself all failed as he steadily neared the unknown void ahead, and he was only briefly slowed as Dipper latched onto his arm, his feet planted firmly on the ground as he tried to hold him back. Their former fight was all but forgotten in such a frantic, fearful moment, even as they tried to cling onto each other for dear life. An effort that ended up being all for naught as Dipper ended up ultimately losing his footing against the strength of the portal’s pull, just as Steven had before him. 

And from there, it only took a matter of seconds before both boys, completely unable to save themselves and bereft of anyone else who could, were fully forced into the portal just before it closed itself up and disappeared completely. A portal that led to a place that couldn’t be described as anything other than an absolute nightmare. 

The sheer force of passing through the portal had been enough to knock both Steven and Dipper out, though they both happened to begin to reemerge into consciousness at roughly the same time. Things were quite bleary as they awakened, though the first thing either of them noticed was that they almost seemed to be floating adrift in the air. Or rather, as they discovered upon fully opening their eyes, adrift in what appeared to be space itself. 

Dipper took in a sharp, startled gasp as soon as he spotted the endless expanse of stars below, above, and all around him and Steven, an expanse they somehow hung amid without any gravity weighing on either of them to speak of. Likewise, Steven also aptly panicked, quickly glancing around their apparently empty surroundings, which kept on swirling with senseless colors and unknown sound and silence all at the same time. “W-what… where are we?!” Dipper asked, shuddering as his own voice echoed across the dense void all around them. 

“I-I don’t know…” Steven shook his head, turning his attention to Dipper. “Are you ok?”

“...Yeah,” Dipper answered, glaring away from the young Gem to show he was still quite upset with him. “I’d be better if you hadn’t messed with that thing in the woods. Who knows where we are now…”

“W-well, look on the bright side,” Steven ventured a small, hopeful smile. “At least we can both breathe! I-I guess that rules out outer space, huh?”

“Wow, we can breathe,” Dipper rolled his eyes. “The absolute bare-minimum for surviving. What a great upside you found to us being totally trapped in some sort of completely empty void!”

“Well, at least I‒look out!” Steven exclaimed, rushing in closer to Dipper to surround them both in a timely bubble. Mere seconds later a bizarre, horrifying creature, composed of a large, wide, single eyeball held aloft with its wide set of bat wings, crashed squarely into the bubble, followed by several more of the same flock. The monsters clamored against the sturdy surface, trying to break through it to attack the frightened boys inside, though upon finding that it wouldn’t give, they soon moved on to look for some other sort of prey instead. Steven didn’t get a chance to drop his bubble however, for right after the eye-bats had left, something else struck it instead. This time, it was an asteroid, one that shattered upon brutally hitting the bubble, sending it reeling wildly through the starry, unstable expanse. Both boys were knocked into each other several times over as their bubble speed through the void, though they still saw no relief as gravity, or the lack thereof, turned its head on both of them completely. They had apparently got caught up in some sort of strange, unseen current, one that forcefully flipped them upside down, pressing them both against the top of the bubble. Steven tried his best to right them once more, though gravity soon switched its course against them once more, abruptly shoving them to the side several times over. The unpredictable current tossed the bubble about violently, and all the while, Steven and Dipper were helpless to stop it, only staying together amidst it all thanks to the bubble they were both encased in. 

Eventually, finally, the bubble floated to a gradual stop, still completely lost amidst the vast tide of multicolored space surrounding it. Needless to say that Steven and Dipper were equally shaken by such a harrowing experience, to the point that the young Gem hesitated in bringing his protective bubble down just in case anything else beset them out of nowhere. “W-well…” Steven said breathlessly, nervously as he lingered close to Dipper. “Whatever this place is, I guess it’s not as empty as it looks…”

“You have no idea how right you are, kid!”

At the mere sound of this unmistakable voice alone, a spark of fear, so sharp and so intense it might as well have been lighting, struck Dipper and Steven alike. That fear only grew as a harsh, golden light fell upon them, one that only offered all the more telling evidence about exactly who had happened upon them. 

“B-Bill!” Steven gasped, a shield already formed over his arm as he spun around to face the demon. 

Sure enough, Bill hovered large and dominating above them, his single eye practically gleaming with twisted delight as he offered the young Gem a wave of greeting. “That’s the name, don’t wear it out! Lookie what the interdimensional tear in the fabric of reality dragged in! It’s Rosebud and Pine Tree! My two favorite Mystery Twerps, paying me a visit on my own turf! To what do I owe the pleasure of having you boys in my neck of the woods for a change instead of the other way around?”

“W-wait… y-your… what?” Steven asked, his voice trembling even amidst his confusion. 

Bill hardly offered him any answer however as he’d instead set his sights on Dipper, who hadn’t even tried to so much as even glance back at the dream demon. Instead, he’d kept his back turned, his arms wrapped tightly around himself as he tried to block out his presence altogether. “I-it’s just a dream, he’s not actually here,” Dipper whispered to himself, his eyes tightly shut to block out the terrified tears starting to well up in them over his usual nighttime tormentor. “It’s a-another nightmare, it always is, he’s not real, he’s not real, he’s NOT-”

“Oh, yeah, sorry to break it ya, but I’m as real as it gets!” In an instant, Bill had scaled himself down, teleporting to appear directly in front of Dipper. On a knee-jerk reaction alone, he let out a tight, frightened cry, flinching back through the open air only for Steven to catch him with a protective, secure grip on his arm. “You know, Pine Tree, ignoring people is rude, especially when you’re the one barged into someone else’s dimension completely unannounced!” 

“L-Leave him alone!” Steven protested, still holding onto Dipper, who by now, had more or less completely shut down. He choked out a small, scared sob, but he said nothing, his hand flinching over his shoulder to grab a sword he didn’t even have on him. No sword, no means of defense, nothing he could do to stop Bill from turning his constant nightmares into a horrible reality. 

“Aw, c’mon, Rosebud, don’t be such a prude,” Bill scoffed, floating a quick circle around the boys. “Besides, seeing as how we’re in my own digs here, I think I’m entitled to do whatever I want. And that includes having a little fun with poor Pine Tree there!”

At this, Steven fully threw himself between Bill and Dipper, upholding his shield as he prepared to fend off any surprise attacks the demon might throw their way. “Wait,” he began, trying to make sense of everything. “So… this place is… your home?”

“You got it, kid! Well, at least it’s home for right now,” Bill quipped, flying high above both of them as he resumed his earlier massive size to take a seat on the levitating gilded throne he’d just conjured up. Behind him, a horde of shadowy, monstrous silhouettes appeared out of nowhere, their crimson eyes all peering curiously down on the terrified pair of humans below them. “Welcome to the Nightmare Realm, boys! Hope you enjoy your stay! Don’t worry, the locals are as friendly as they come! Aren’t we, fellas?”

The crowd of obscured demons surrounding Bill chimed in at this, letting out a rowdy chorus of demented, mallicious laughter that was every bit as sadistic as the dream demon’s own. Yet despite their twisted levity, Bill was quick to put an end to it with a mere dismissive wave of his hand. “Yeah, yeah, as much as I know you guys would love to tear these two puny punks to shreds and make an entire gourmet meal out of their innards, I’m afraid I have some… unfinished business to attend to with the kids first,” he remarked to his henchmen, sending the newly disappointed crowd off to whatever part of the Nightmare Realm they’d crawled out of. “That’s right, run along and get a good seat to watch the show from. Because oh boy,” Bill turned his full attention back to Steven and Dipper, his eye burning with his iconic blue fire as he set his sights solely on them. “What a show we’re about to have here…”

Steven took in a hitched, panicked breath at this, briefly casting a glance back at Dipper behind him, only to find that he was more or less hyperventilating, the weight of the grave situation they’d now found themselves in crushing him more and more with each passing second. And even though he was immensely afraid at the moment himself, the young Gem was determined to do his best to try to carry that weight for the both of them where Dipper couldn’t. “L-look,” he addressed Bill as calmly as he possibly could. “We don’t know how we ended up here, but-”

“Oh, you don’t?” Bill interrupted, leaping off his throne as it vanished into thin air. “Really? I thought it was beyond obvious if you take two seconds to think about that pretty little rift ol’ Sixer’s been trying to lock up nice and tight away from me!”

“The rift…” Steven repeated with a small gasp of realization. “S-so, that thing in the forest really did have something to do with it?”

“Sure did!” Bill confirmed. “Looks like Fordsy’s nowhere near as smart as he thinks he is. Ya see, kids, he might have the rift itself contained for now, but it’s still a highly unstable drop of paradoxical, trans-dimensional energy that’s being kept safe only by some dumb, glorified snowglobe. You really think something like that is gonna keep that rift from letting loose some unexpected… side effects as long as it stays in your dimension?”

“S-side effects…?” Dipper dared to speak up, his curiosity getting the better of him, even amidst his own persistent panic. 

“Hey, look who finally got his voice back!” Bill teased callously. “I was starting to think you’d gone mute on me, Pine Tree. Anyway, yessiree! A whole boatload of side effects, but the main one is that it’s wearing down the walls between dimensions, just like Sixer’s portal did back when it was up and running. And the longer that rift chips away at those walls, the more chances you have for random wormholes to pop up all over the place! And you wanna know where all those wormholes just so happen to lead…?”

The boys exchanged an uneasy glance, both of them quite alarmed by what the dream demon was implying through this explanation alone, especially when they considered it was the very means through which they’d found themselves here to begin with. “Uh… h-here?” Steven guessed anxiously. 

“Ding ding ding! We have a winner!” Bill chimed as a noisy mess of game show lights and sound effects blared dramatically behind him. “You’re really using your noggin today, huh, Rosebud? I guess there’s a first for everything! Though I gotta admit, I wasn’t actually expecting one of those mini-portals to actually pull anything through it at all, but can you imagine my surprise when it did! And you kids, of all the meatskins it could have picked out there? Right as I was in the middle of sitting here, watching you two have a grand old time duking it out--which was hilarious by the way? Well, I guess you could say that today is my lucky day!”

Both boys bristled at the demon’s cutting remarks, though even so, they chose to mostly ignore them as Dipper nervously piped up with another horrific thought that had just occurred to him. “W-wait… so… if these portals between h-here and Earth just keep… showing up… why haven’t you just g-gone through any of them?” he asked shakily, trying and failing not to show just how frightened he really was. “T-that is what you want, right? T-to get into our dimension a-and take it over?”

Bill’s usually cheery tune quickly changed at this, his triangular form turning blood red as he glared down at Dipper in particular. “Oh, Pine Tree, you always know just the right questions to ask to PUSH MY BUTTONS!” he shouted, suddenly furious as the Nightmare Realm rumbled all around him. “You really think that I would even hesitate to leap through one of those portals into your dimension if I could? Problem is, I CAN’T! I’m still bound to this STUPID WASTELAND OF A DIMENSION! Or…” Bill seemed to calm somewhat at this, much to the boys’ shared relief.  “At least I am until I get my hands on that rift… You kids wouldn’t wouldn’t happen to know someone who’d be able to help me out with that little problem, would you?”

“No,” Dipper said almost immediately, resolve starting to replace his fear as he sent a steady, stern glare Bill’s way. “You can do whatever you want to us, but we will never ever give you that rift!”

Steven couldn’t help but look over at Dipper with a small smile at this, glad to see his usual bravery making a return, even in the face of undoubtedly his greatest fear. “That’s right!” Steven solidly, boldly agreed. “We made a promise to protect it from you, and that’s exactly what we’re gonna do!”

While both boys expected Bill’s more than infamous temper to flare up over their brazen resistance, he instead reacted in the complete opposite way instead. He laughed. “Oh, you boys are a real RIOT!” he chortled as madly as ever, his crimson pallor returning to its usual garish yellow. “You two really think I’m gonna try and swipe that rift from you?! What, do you think I’m some kind of idiot like Sixer is?! He’s got you kids so brainwashed into hoarding that thing away from me to the point that you’d probably rather die than hand it over to me. Which can be arranged, easily, of course, but still, let’s just say I’ve got… another pawn in mind when it comes to that rift. Besides, why waste time with that when I can make an even better use of this opportunity to get something else I’ve been after instead....?”

Steven took in a sharp, involuntary gasp at this, his eyes wide as he instantly gripped the gemstone on his navel, even if it was currently covered by his shirt. Bill picked up on his obvious alarm almost instantly, yet he simply brushed the young Gem’s palpable fear off with a callous scoff. “Geez, calm down, Rosebud, I wasn’t talking about that rock on your gut,” he remarked, rolling his eye. “The universe doesn’t revolve around you, ya know, even if your last name might have you thinking otherwise. But, relax! I don’t have my sights set on your gem this time around. At least not yet, anyway.”

“Oh…” Steven let out a sigh of relief, though he did notice Dipper tense up beside him in light of this new uncertainty. “W-well, if you don’t need anything from us, t-then maybe you could just… I-I don’t know, let us go ho-”

“No can do, Rosebud!” Bill interrupted succinctly. “I can’t just open up one of those tiny tears in reality myself, as much as I’d love to just so I could slip through it too. Didn’t ya hear the part about how they open up randomly? For all you know, you could be stuck here for what would be days, maybe even weeks in your dimension!”

Needless to say that upon hearing this news, both boys’ hearts practically dropped to their stomachs. The mere thought of being trapped here, in this chaotic, lawless, mess of a dimension with no one but Bill Cipher, of all beings, and his band of malicious, blood-thirsty demons to keep them company was just about the most terrifying, horrific thing for either of them, a thought so unbearable they could scarcely even comprehend it. Yet for as dreadful as it all was, it seemed as though it was all-too-true all the same. 

“Oh, now don’t worry!” Bill quipped, taking twisted pleasure in the boys’ obvious panic over their plight. “I have the perfect plan in mind to keep you kids entertained during your stay here. See, lately I’ve been thinking, doing that whole self-reflection thing you humans try and usually fail miserably at. I’ve made some pretty outstanding deals these past few months, deals that could have landed me with everything I need to take over your dimension in one fell swoop. But every single time I got close, you know who was always there to stop me?”

Neither of the boys had a chance to answer this question, one they already largely knew the answer to. Because in an instant, the dream demon’s eye flooded with golden light, practically becoming a bright spotlight that shined down directly upon them both. “That’s right! You two! Along with any combination of the Crystal Chumps and/or Shooting Star and Sword Swinger, but what’s consistent is that every time one of my plans falls through, you boys are always in the mix somehow. The time I snuck into Stan’s mind, when I took your body for a test drive, Pine Tree-” Dipper seized up with yet another burst of potent fear upon hearing this casual reminder of something that deeply haunted him even still, though even so, Bill hardly seemed to notice as he continued his list. “But the straw that broke the camel’s back was when you two personally split my fusion with Greenie up! Pyrite had enough power and potential to crush those Crystal Chumps to dust, but somebody just had to help someone else run a sword through them, DIDN’T YOU?!” 

Despite the dream demon’s severe tone, Steven spoke up, prompted by all of the wavering courage he really had in the face of such clear fury. “Y-yes, we did,” he professed firmly, evenly. “We stopped you each of those times because you were trying to hurt our friends! Our home! We had to do something to help them!”

Upon hearing this earnest argument, Bill simply narrowed his eye at the young Gem in particular, visibly annoyed by such a resistant claim. “Well, if you care so much about your friends, where are they to help you now?” he asked knowingly, piercingly before his tone picked back up into its usually playfulness once more. “It’s a shame none of them even know you kids are here; they’re really gonna miss out on something special here. See Rosebud, Pine Tree, we’re about to play a little game here. The name of that game is REVENGE.” At this, bright bursts of blue fire ignited over both of the demon’s palms, his single eye sparking with violent, malicious intent as he glared down at both of the defenseless boys before him hatefully. “And this time, the winner takes IT ALL!” 

Without wasting another second on small talk, Bill began his attack, launching both his flames at the boys in full speed. Steven rushed to move his shield in front of both himself and Dipper, expanding it as wide as he possibly could to block the devastating strike. While it succeeded in fending the fire off, the sheer force of the blow was enough to send them both flying back across the vast expanse of the Nightmare Realm. The unexpected flight fortunately seemed to put them out of Bill’s reach, though unfortunately it wasn’t for very long. As the pair finally floated to a gradual, gravity-free stop, the demon suddenly teleported directly behind them, sizing his form up to tower over them as he prepared to grab them both. The most Steven could do to stop him was form another bubble around himself and Dipper, though Bill just as easily swiped the bubble itself up, tossing it up as if it were nothing more than a mere plaything. 

“Ohoho! Way to spice things up, Rosebud!” Bill quipped as he casually juggled the bubble, ignoring the boys’ shared cries of protest as they were roughly tossed about inside it. “Let’s play ball!��� At this, the demon threw the bubble up high, forcing some sort of gravity upon it to bring it back down as he pulled a nail-covered bat into existence out of thin air. He used that bat to strike the bubble squarely, sending it soaring across the starry void once more with both Steven and Dipper inside, helpless to even try to stop it. “Iiiiiiits outta here! A home run hit! And the crowd goes wild!” 

Sure enough, Bill’s horde of demonic friends erupted into a hearty round of cheers from wherever unknown corner of the Nightmare Realm they were watching from. While the dream demon eagerly soaked up their praise, he missed the boys’ bubble as it flew far out of his sight, ultimately crashing hard into a stationary asteroid that ended up popping it completely. Without anything to safely contain them, Steven and Dipper hit the asteroid themselves, though thankfully the bubble had cushioned the brunt of what would have otherwise been a brutal blow. Even so, they still they both rolled hard across the large rock, inevitably falling back into the open space behind it, much worse for wear considering the substantial cuts and bruises they had sustained. The only upside amidst this harrowing situation was that there now seemed to be some actual distance between them and Bill, though they were both more than well aware that the dream demon could just as easily bridge that distance to kickstart his barrage of twisted violence all over again. 

“T-that was… a-a lot…” Steven said breathlessly, pressing against the side of the asteroid. He stole a weary glance over at Dipper, only to find a noticeably bleeding cut torn across his face, which itself was engulfed in nothing less than immense, inescapable terror. “Oh!” the young Gem gasped, quickly licking his hand. “Here, let me-”

“Don’t,” Dipper’s expression turned harsh at this as he pushed Steven’s hand and the healing spit covering it away. “There’s no point. W-we’re not… we can’t... “ He trailed off, pulling his knees to his chest in a tight hug as he let out an anguished sob. “T-there’s no way either of us have a chance at surviving here, not for long, n-not against… him.”

“W-what? No,” Steven countered immediately, racing to figure out some way to comfort Dipper, despite how despondent he was himself over their dire straits. “W-we’ll figure something out, I know we can. L-like I said earlier, we’ve stopped Bill before, so-”

“We’ve never stopped him by ourselves!” Dipper cut him off sharply. “We’ve always had Mabel or Connie or the Gems to help us! And what’s more is we’ve never had to fight him here, on his home turf! He has a physical form here! He doesn’t need to possess or fuse with someone anymore! He’s free to do whatever he wants to us and if you think he might go easy on us then you’re wrong!”

“W-well, maybe can outrun him somehow,” Steven ventured anxiously. “Then we can wait for another one of those portals to open up and… Um… Oh, I know! O-once the Gems and your uncles notice we’re gone, maybe they’ll go looking for us and-”

“And what, Steven? You heard what Bill said! Nobody even knows we’re here!” Dipper argued intensely, hot tears streaming down his cheeks. “No one is coming to save us… S-so stop doing that thing you always do where you act like everything is going to turn out alright in the end, because it’s not, not this time. Don’t you get it, Steven?” He buried his face in his hands, choking out another mournful, miserable whimper as he admitted the only thing he knew to be absolutely certain now. “W-we… we’re going to die here…”

At this, Dipper more or less completely lost himself to his grief, grief over a present that was about to painfully be cut short, over a future he’d never get to have. Both brought to a violent conclusion by the very demon he’d always feared would end them. Steven nearly victim to that same grief too, especially when he considered just how right Dipper really was. No one knew where they were, no one was going to come to their rescue. The chances of another portal leading back to their own dimension opening up were completely unknown, and the possibility of them even surviving long enough to reach it against a complete and utter sadist like Bill was genuinely low to none. All in all, it really didn’t seem like either of them would survive this ordeal, perhaps the gravest, most immediate danger either of them had ever been thrust into before.

And yet… 

Despite even those impossible, insurmountable odds, Steven refused to give up. At least not yet. 

“Dipper,” he began, his tone slow and purposeful as he came to float directly in front of Dipper. He resisted his attempts at grabbing his hands at first, but eventually folded, allowing the young Gem to see all of the strife and dread that had claimed his expression quite some time ago. “I… I know this seems really bad, but… I still think we have a chance. A-and I think, deep down, you feel the same way too.”

Dipper let out a tight, exhausted sigh, shaking his head hopelessly. “S-steven, I…”

“You can’t give up,” Steven implored, gripping his hands tightly. “We can’t give up. I… I think I have an idea…” He paused for a moment, allowing that idea, however risky it might have been, to solidify inside his mind before proposing it to Dipper. “I know someone who might be able to stand a chance against Bill, e-even if we can’t on our own. The only thing is… I-I need you to trust me…”

Before Dipper even had a chance to consider this offer, Bill’s voice suddenly rang out across the surrounding section of the Nightmare Realm, a clear sign that he was on the hunt for his victims once more. “Oh, Pine Tree! Rosebud!” he called, his tone deceptively bright and friendly. “Come on out! You don’t wanna call it quits already, do you? Not when the game’s only just begun…”

“Dipper, please,” Steven practically begged, pulling his hands out of Dipper’s, though his pleading sights stayed set on him. “I-I know you’re probably still mad at me, a-and I’m sorry, but right now, I need you. I-I… I can’t do this without you! We can’t do this without each other! So please…” This time, it was the young Gem who let out a small, nervous sob, consumed by worry. Though even still, that worry had almost nothing to do with the possibility of Bill finding them at all. “Just… trust me again… Just this once… please…”

For what seemed like ages, Dipper said nothing, making not a single move to respond to either accept or reject the young Gem’s tearful appeal. His mind was racing with far too many thoughts at once, his upheaved emotions tossing him in a wild sea of shock, fear, anger, and grief. But amidst that sea, amidst the tide of chaos that threatened to swallow him up completely, was Steven. Steven, who had thoughtlessly invaded his dreams just like Bill himself had done so many times before. Steven, who so very often thought only of himself under the guise of trying to help others. Steven, who had inadvertently been the reason why they’d ended up in this potentially fatal disaster in the first place. 

Steven… who was always there to offer him a comforting smile and a kind word when he needed it most. Steven, who was always more than ready to throw himself in the line of fire if it meant protecting his friends, including him, even after he’d screamed and yelled and practically torn their friendship apart. Steven, who was asking for something as simple as his trust, who was extending out a hand to him in the hopes that he’d take it, so that they could at least try to survive, try to get through this together. 

And, in spite of everything else going on around him and inside him, that was a hand Dipper slowly but surely found himself taking. 

“Alright, kids, hide-and-seek time is over!” Bill shouted, growing impatient as he continued combing through the surrounding asteroid field. “I mean it, Rosebud, Pine Tree, you two twerps better get out here where I can pummel you into oblivion NOW or else I’m gonna-” The dream demon was succinctly cut off as a sudden, lightning-fast projectile sped at him from behind, slicing through one of his arms to the point that it managed to cut it off completely, catching him off guard in the process. “WHAT?!” 

Bill’s eye drifted to his backside, the rest of his features following suit so he could properly see where this sudden attack had come from. Only to be met with a sight, or rather, a fusion, that even he hadn’t been expecting. 

“You called?” Stepper grinned, looking up at the dream demon with a new sense of determination. He stood tall and unflinching atop the asteroid his halves had just been hiding behind, his shield journal already formed over his lower palms with a new shield summoned over it, ready to fly just as the first one had. And all the while, he couldn’t help but take some level in pride in just how genuinely surprised Bill seemed to be by his timely attack, his hope starting to rise as he realized that, with the respective strengths of his halves combined, he might just have a chance after all. 

Bill, however, didn’t see things quite the same way. His bafflement only seemed to last for a moment as he quickly recovered from the fusion’s attack, regenerating his arm easily and immediately. And as he did, all sense of shock seemed to disappear as he let out a loud, mocking laugh instead. “Oh, now this? THIS is a REAL riot right here!” he cackled almost madly, much to Stepper’s confusion. “And I thought Rose Star was hilarious, but you, Pine Bud? You take RIDICULOUS to a whole new level!”

Stepper let out a harsh scoff at this, his own confidence getting the better of him as he fired off just as punchy of a comeback to the dream demon himself. “I-I’ll tell you what’s ridiculous,” he began, trying his best to recover from how his voice had briefly cracked in fear at the start. “Using a nail bat to knock a to kids across an entire dimension. Seriously, did the bat even need to have nails in it? That was just overkill if you ask me.”

Bill’s amusement quickly shifted into a sharpened glare at this. “Oh, what, do you think you’re some kind of comedian now, Rose Tree? You really are funny if you think fusing is gonna save you now. You know, I’m surprised you two were even able to fuse at all what with you being at each others’ throats and all. Guess it goes to show just how far you boys are willing to go when you’re really desperate.”

Stepper’s bravado quickly shifted in annoyance at this reminder, a reminder of the still palpable tension still lingering between both of his halves, even if he had chosen to ignore that tension for now to maintain his fusion. “Shut up,” he hissed, waiting no time in launching his next shield at the demon. This one had the addition of spikes barbing its edges, and though Stepper had aimed it directly for Bill’s eye, the demon managed to teleport out of its path just before it could hit him. Instead, he retaliated, reappearing just behind the fusion and firing off a powerful laser blast from his eye to obliterate the asteroid Stepper was standing on upon impact. Fortunately, he’d managed to jump off it back into the gravity-free air, taking advantage of the momentum he gained to send several smaller shield-projectiles Bill’s way. The demon was able to deflect most of these easily, though Stepper managed to manipulate a few of them to change their course so they’d crash into Bill from behind, each of them exploding upon impact. 

“Ow!” Bill shouted, quite perturbed by the surprisingly potent attack. “Rose Tree!”

“What’s the matter, Bill?” Stepper taunted, perhaps a bit too brazenly, as he took up a perch on another nearby asteroid. “Aren’t used to someone who can actually keep up with your ‘game’?”

“Ha! You WISH you could keep up with me, Pine Bud!” Bill shouted manically, scorching blue flames bursting from both his hands. As he launched them at the fusion, Stepper deflected them with a large, well-cast shield from his journal, one that not only seemed to dispel the fire but deflect it as well. All four of his arms were put to work upholding it, his gem, birthmark, and journal alike bursting with powerful light as he shoved that shield hard back at Bill. As drenched in his own flames as the shield already was, the demon was unprepared for the full force of it striking him as heavily as it did, and his genuinely pained, outraged shout echoed across the Nightmare Realm as he was swiftly thrown back through it. 

In light of such a momentous, successful blow, Stepper himself was quite stunned, looking to his shield journal with apt amazement. He had always known, from the very first time he’d been formed, that it was a strange, unique, special weapon, one that contained powers that even he didn’t hold all of the answers to yet. It had served him well before in taking down Peridot’s unwanted robinoids months ago, but now, was there indeed a chance, however small, that it might just be enough to help him take on Bill Cipher himself? 

“W-we could do this…” Stepper said to himself, his halves conversing with a sense of rising hope and excitement. “We could win this! Maybe… maybe we could even do more than just win; maybe we could even stop Bill for good! After all,” he grinned as he looked afar off in the distance to where Bill was still being forced back thanks to his own shield’s strength. “He’s not invincible here. Y-you really think we could beat him? If we stay together like this? I think so.” He laughed in spite of himself, his upper arms wrapping around themselves in a steadying, affectionate, assuring hug, both of his halves in perfect harmony when it came to this daring endeavor. “O-ok. Then let’s do it. And while we’re at it,” he paused, allowing his shield journal to float before him, placing his lower hands under it as its pages flipped rapidly on their own accord. “Let’s see what this thing can really do.”

By now, Bill had recovered from Stepper’s last attack, rushing across the wide span of the Nightmare Realm in a matter of mere seconds to strike back. “You know, Rose Tree, you’re really starting to GET ON MY NERVES!” he yelled, his form flashing bright red as he appeared massive and intimidating before the fusion. “I think it's high time someone TORE YOU TWO APART!” 

In an instant, the dream demon lashed out, hoping to grab ahold on the fusion to do exactly that, literally. Still, Stepper was ready for him, for right as Bill’s hands reached for him, he called upon another bubble. This one, however, was quite a bit different, for as soon as the dream demon so much as touched it, he retracted his hands with a startled yelp of pain. 

“Whoa…” Stepper gasped, looking over the newfound spikes he’d somehow formed on the outer surface of his bubble. “Cool! Oo! I can think of something even cooler.” At this, the fusion flipped through the earlier pages of his journal, landing on one depicting a familiar sword that had recently been lost to the depths of the lake. But with just a bit of magic, it had the chance to be reclaimed in some way, and for Stepper, that was far better than nothing. 

“You must think you have a whole bunch of nifty tricks up all four of your sleeves, dontcha, Rose Tree?” Bill asked, clearly annoyed at this point as his eye flashed a violent red. “Well SO DO I!”

Stepper finished pulling a conjured, pinkened version of the Sword of Seasons out of the shield journal just in time to use it to slice through the first of several heavy waves of successive, destructive energy Bill sent his way. As one set of his arms continued deflecting these attacks, his other arms took up a shield, which he positioned protectively in front of himself to stem the onslaught completely. From there, Stepper kept his pace rapid, tossing the shield at Bill full force and landing a successful strike to his eye this time. While the dream demon was distracted with recovering from such a painful blow, Stepper rushed forward, leaping off his asteroid perch with his sword raised high, though just before he could bring it down on Bill, the demon disappeared out of his reach once more. Bill reappeared somewhere behind him, absolutely livid, though Stepper still didn’t back down. Instead, he formed another shield under his feet, using it as a launch pad to jump off to do so he could propel himself in Bill’s direction, swinging his sword out broadly as he did. The dream demon attempted to fend him off with a rapid fire series of flame bursts, but a large and sturdy shield was more than enough to protect the fusion from them. And for quite awhile, that was how the battle flowed; Bill and Stepper, both doling out strong, heavy attacks aimed for each other, none of which really did much damage thanks to the steady line of defense and stamina both had on their sides. 

Stepper did manage to briefly break that flow, however, by swiftly working to put some tactical distance between himself and Bill so he could have time to plan his next move. He distracted the dream demon with another series of small seeker shields before he leapt onto the nearest asteroid, looking through his shield journal for anything else that might be useful. “Come on, we’ve got him on the ropes,” he muttered both to himself and the magical tome floating in front of him. “Give me something really good this time.” As if it was answering the fusion’s request, the journal flashed with vibrant light once more before its flipping pages landed on two in particular, one within each different half of the journal as the pages between them stood up perfectly straight. And printed upon those two pages was a plan that Stepper could and readily did hope was more than enough to finally put this arduous fight to an end once and for all. “Perfect!” he grinned, determined to give that plan a try. Or rather, to give his component halves a try. 

“You know, Pine Bud,” Bill’s entire form was as he began to approach the fusion hotly. “I’m getting REAL sick of you and that stupid book of yours! You’re almost more of a pain while you’re fused than you two are on your own!”

“Oh, really?” Stepper asked, smirking as he let his journal drop low toward his feet. “I don’t know if I’d be too sure of that if I were you…”With a simple flourish of his upper hands, the fusion conjured up his next method of attack from the two open pages of the shield journal. And from those pages, solid, yet still clearly holographic life-sized doubles of both Steven and Dipper appeared, pigmented pink and blue respectively as they stood, already armed with a shield and a sword from the start. Through the journal, Stepper was in full command of these copies of his halves as he pointed them at their target, and without skipping a beat, both doubles lunged for the dream demon, ready to attack. While Bill worked in taking down the first set, Stepper worked on creating several more in quick succession, sending each of them the demon’s way as he amassed an army essentially composed of himself. The copies, while not the most sturdy, were plentiful as they attacked Bill essentially in a haphazard swarm, beating their swords and shields away at him even as the demon retaliated by destroying as many of them as quickly as he could. Still, Stepper kept them coming, his hopes steadily rising as he watched his duplicates begin to overwhelm Bill while he waited for just the opening he needed to finally win this deadly brawl.

And yet, despite those hopes, it was an opening that never came. 

“ENOUGH!” Bill suddenly shouted, unleashing a powerful wave of energy to dissipate all of the boys’ clones. The blast also knocked Stepper back hard, preventing him from conjuring up anymore as the shield journal fell away from him before disappearing completely. “You sure have shown off that you’ve got some pretty sharp thorns to ya, Rose Tree,” Bill continued angrily, his hands glowing with an entirely new type of dangerous power. “Well, why don’t I take the time to show you MINE? Fair warning: they’re at least a MILLION TIMES SHARPER THAN YOURS!” 

Stepper gasped, quickly righting himself to float upright, though he didn’t get much of a chance to summon his shield journal again before something sharp latched onto one of his lower arms. The same thing happened to his other arms in short order, and from there it didn’t take Stepper long to see what it was: long, thick black vines, covered in tiny, yet razor-sharp thorns that had already begun to cut deep into his skin. Despite his efforts to pull himself out of them, their grip only grew tighter, worsening as even more vines began latching onto his legs, snaking their way up his torso, his chest, over his neck, even all the way up to his face until he was essentially covered with them. Then, to make matters worse, the vines themselves began to pull against him, stretching all four of his arms and his legs out wide to the point that he felt as though his limbs were going to be ripped clean out of their sockets. And yet, despite his involuntary cry of agony the sting of the thorns in particular managed to draw out of him, Bill simply let out a smug, triumphant, amused laugh at the fusion’s clear misery. 

“Ah, now THAT’S more like it!” he remarked blithely, even as Stepper voiced another protesting, pained shout. “You know, I really gotta hand it to ya, Rose Tree, you’re putting up way more of a fight than I ever would have imagined out of a soft, baby-faced fusion like you. Too bad that fight ends right here. Playtime is over, boys! Which means now, the fun can REALLY begin…”

Despite this alarming threat, Stepper noticed that the vine latched onto one of his upper arms was finally starting to loosen. He wasted no time in pulling free from it, calling upon a small shield that he swiftly used to cut through the rest of them, pulling them off his body and just as quickly licking one of his hands to heal as many of the wounds they’d left him with as he could. He wasn’t able to take care of too many of them, however, before Bill caught him off guard with a heavy burst of flame. Stepper barely had time to react by throwing up a last-minute shield, though even still, that did little to stop the attack from shoving him back as he took most of the brutal brunt of the blow. This time, however, he didn’t simply continue reeling back through open space; instead he landed hard against something solid, a sideways surface that seemed to possess its own gravity as he landed upon it. 

“W-what…?” Stepper breathed, slowly starting to pick himself up off the new ground, only to be completely baffled by what surrounded him. He found himself on a massive, twisted structure, a mess of colors and shapes and stairs and floors and pillars, each of which was turned and twisted in a completely different direction. As bewildered as he was by this incomprehensible new setting, he didn’t get a chance to try to make sense of it before Bill suddenly appeared before him once more, scaled down dramatically to the point that he was now even smaller than the fusion himself. 

“Welcome to the Quadrangle of Qonfusion, boys! My favorite hangout in the entire Nightmare Realm! I’d give you the grand tour, but you won’t really be needing one since its  is about to become your GRAVE!”

Stepper took a wide step back away from the demon at this, all four of his hands clenched into tight, anxious fists as he tried to maintain his previously calm composure. “G-grave?” he repeated, doing his best to inject an air of cockiness into his tone. “B-but I thought you’d want me alive. I do still have Steven’s‒my gem after all.”

“Ohh don’t you worry about that, Pine Bud!” Bill retorted easily as he resumed his larger size once more. “I’ll make sure to pry that gem outta Rosebud’s cold, dead corpse before I toss that and Pine Tree’s into the endless empty abyss that acts as this dimension’s garbage dump! All I gotta do is rip you to pieces first and everything else will fall perfectly into place!”

At this, the dream demon conjured up his cane out of thin air and took a broad swing right at the fusion as blue flames ignited over the entire length of it. Stepper thankfully hat the wits about him to leap out of its path, deciding his best option was to retreat for now, if only for the sake of gaining a moment to reclaim his own weapon once more. So he rushed into the nearest hallway, getting himself out of Bill’s immediate range as he looked for some sort of refuge. As he ran, he let his gem do the work in bringing forth his shield journal once more, though it nearly fell out of his grasp entirely as gravity suddenly shifted sharply on him. Stepper let out a startled cry as he fell upward onto a set of upside down stairs, forced to reorient himself entirely as his lower set of arms clung onto his journal for dear life. The only positive seemed to be that Bill apparently hadn’t noticed as he glided through the hallway the fusion had just been in, still gripping his flaming cane as he casually called out to the prey he was hunting. 

“You know, it’s pretty sad, Pine Bud,” Bill remarked with no sympathy in his tone whatsoever. “Even if everyone back in your dimension knew where you were and what was happening to you, chances are they wouldn’t even care. I mean, it’s not like anybody even wants either of you around to begin with, right?”

Stepper made sure not to respond to this, knowing that this was likely just a dirty, underhanded tactic to get him to reveal himself. And yet, his silence was soon broken as he heard a new voice entirely ring out not too far away from him.

“Dipper? Steven?’

The fusion gasped, immediately rising to his feet to look to the silhouette standing within the darkness of the doorway in front of him. “N-no…” he stammered, eyes wide with disbelief as he took a small step closer. “I-it can’t be. You’re not supposed to be here!”

“...Neither are you.”

Stepper faltered as the obscured figure finally became clear, tears welling up in his eyes as he reached out toward her. “M-Mabel…”

“Why?” Mabel cut him off, her tone and expression alike uncharacteristically harsh and cold. “Why do you guys keep leaving me behind?”

“...W-what?” Stepper asked, genuinely confused amidst his grief. 

“Every single time you guys fuse, I’m always the one who gets left out!” Mabel accused bitterly. “And even when you’re not fused, you’re always off doing more important things with me, like you think I can’t handle them! Like I’m too stupid and silly to be a part of things! Like I said,” Tears were welling up in her eyes by this point, tears that the fusion mirrored as he stared at her in disbelief. “You’re always leaving me behind, Dipper…”

“N-no…” the fusion shook his head, distraught. “Mabel, of course I don’t think that, I don’t-“

“You always leave me out too, you know.” Stepper flinched, recognizing this new voice instantly. A palpable burst of dread coursed through him as he watched Connie step out of the same doorway Mabel had come from as she came to stand alongside her.  “What, am I not a part of the team too? Do I just not matter to either of you!?”

Stepper paused, dumbstruck as he desperately tried to search for the words to counteract these cruel claims. “Connie, I-”

“Even when we are a part of your disasters, things always go wrong.” As if out of nowhere, Pacifica suddenly stepped in to join Mabel and Connie’s rigid round of allegations. “You always put everyone in danger with your stupid mysteries-”

“And all of that dumb Gem stuff,” Connie added, her toine just as icy. “Maybe we’d all just be better off if you never came back at all. 

“Maybe…” Mabel began, seeming to hesitate for a moment before delivering her remorseless verdict. “Maybe it would just be better if you both left us all behind for good.”

“N-no,” Stepper countered tearfully, taking another small step toward the trio. Toward the people his halves cared so much about even if they weren’t currently giving that care back in return. “I would never, I-I don’t… I’m not going to leave any of you behind, ever. I promise!”

All three of the girls were silent at this, their expressions darkening as they began to turn away from the fusion entirely. Pacifica and Connie soon returned back into the empty doorway they had come out of, but Mabel still lingered behind for one final spiteful statement. “...You already have.”

A small, yet poignant sob escaped Stepper at this, and as Mabel disappeared into the same darkness Connie and Pacifica had, he didn’t hesitate to chase after all three of them. “W-wait!” he called, desperate to reach them, desperate to see if what they’d said to him was actually the truth. And desperately hoping all the while, that it wasn’t.

He passed through the doorway, into a dark, relatively short hallway where gravity turned on him once more, essentially forcing him to walk along the wall until he emerged on the other side of it. What met him was a narrow straight-away, though much to his alarm, none of the girls were anywhere in sight. He panicked, ready to call out for them to find them, to make sure they were alright and unharmed in this dangerous, practically deadly place. Yet before he could, another familiar voice happened to sound out from somewhere behind him. 

“Where do you two think you’re going?” Startled, Stepper turned to see none other than Stan, his arms crossed as he leaned against the doorway the fusion had just come out of. 

“G-Grunkle Pines?” Stepper asked, confused and anxious, especially at just how calm yet callous the conman seemed to be. “W-what are you doing h-”

“You know,” Stan cut him off, his tone and expression both dry as he began to approach the fusion. “This whole wacko world is pretty twisted. But I’d say it’s the perfect place for two freakshow kids fused into an even bigger, four-armed freakshow, wouldn’t you?”

Stepper shuddered, inching back nervously as the conman continued to approach him almost threateningly. “W-wh… why would you say that…?” 

“Cause it’s obvious, kid,” Stan sneered haughtily as he came to stop directly in front of the fusion. “In fact, since you seem to fit right in, why don’t you just stay here?”

Before Stepper even had a chance to react, Stan suddenly reached out and shoved him clean over the edge of the walkway they were both on. The fusion was unable to keep himself from falling over side of it, though as he lost his footing, gravity pulled him in yet another direction, this time hard to his left. He plummeted for what seemed like ages before landing hard against a wide, level floor, one lined with towering pillars on either side of it. However, he just so happened to land exactly on one of his lower arms, which took the brunt of the blow with a spark of excruciating pain accompanied by an audible snap. Stepper was unable to hold back an agonized scream as he cradled his clearly broken arm, though even amidst the tears still brimming in his eyes he did his best to reach the damaged limb up to his mouth. The moment he so much as gently kissed it, instant relief overwhelmed his senses, the brutal break completely repaired by the healing magic he thankfully still had, even while fused, as though the injury had never even happened at all. 

“You can’t just magically heal everything and make it all better.” 

“Even when you’re together, you’re nowhere near strong enough to save anyone.”

“Not even yourselves.”

Stepper already knew the Gems were coming before they even stepped into his field of vision based on these judgemental, cruel remarks alone. Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl alike all looked down at him as he remained on his spot on the ground, already dreading what else they’d have to say to him after everything he’d heard thus far. 

“Why don’t you just give up already, man?” Amethyst began, rolling her eyes at him. “You really think you’re gonna last long here? Quit kidding yourselves.”

“Maybe if you were half the Gem Rose was, you might have had a chance,” Pearl remarked with an ire-filled scowl. “To think that she gave everything up for you, Steven, and then you go and fuse with a simple human just to make yourself even weaker? Disgusting.”

“You’re not a stable fusion,” Garnet added, her tone hollow and cold. “And even if you were, it wouldn’t matter. That’s not enough to save you and it’s not enough to make us, or anyone else, want you. We never did to begin with.”

Stepper jolted at this, his breathing shuddering as he slowly pulled himself to stand. Something wasn’t right here, he knew that much, yet for as strange as these encounters all seemed, his emotions were still managing to work against him all the same. “N-no, that’s not true,” he asserted as firmly as he possibly could, counteracting his fears and grief with memories of just how much the Gems, how much Stan, how much Pacifica, Connie, and Mabel all really cared for him. For both of them. “I… I know it’s not. You said-”

“They were lying.” Stepper froze as the Gems parted ways for Ford to approach, the goldenish gleam reflecting from his glasses obscuring his eyes as he stared at the fusion piercingly. “Everyone does around you, just to keep you two from wasting our time by falling apart. Such fragile, futile things you boys are. It was foolish of me to think I could think I could trust either of you with anything, much less something as important as the rift. Tell me, boys. How do you expect to protect it when you can’t even protect yourselves?”

Stepper shook his head, wanting to argue, wanting to protest these malicious claims, but the words just wouldn’t come. The author and the Gems all continued to glare at him expectantly, saying nothing more though the disdain on each of their faces was perfectly clear. And under the crushing weight of that disdain, Stepper found himself hard-pressed to even try to bear it. 

So he turned, hoping to run, hoping to escape from his own doubts, his own fears, his own shortcomings and faults, as mounting and plentiful as they all were. Yet before he could take so much as a single step, he was stopped by yet another familiar figure, about the very last person, or Gem rather, he could have ever expected to see. 

“Oh, Steven…” Rose Quartz said, her voice every bit the same as he remembered it being from her tape. Yet instead of the gentle kindness and love that had filled it there, the only things emanating from her tone now was bitterness and scorn. “What a disappointment you turned out to be. I had hoped you would have followed in my footsteps to protect the Earth in my absence. But in the end, it looks like your little friend was right.” A sinister, twisted grin filled the pink Gem’s features, especially as Stepper essentially cowered before her in tears and terror. “You really are just… like… ME!”

Suddenly, “Rose’s” eyes flashed yellow, her pupils thin, perfect slits to match Bill’s telltale demented laughter coming out of her mouth. In a sudden flash of blinding light, the pink Gem was gone as the dream demon resumed his usual form, his sadistic masquerade coming to an end as he took a wicked sense of delight in just how shaken the fusion was by it all. 

“N-no,” Stepper breathed tightly, all four of his hands curled into tight, shaking fists. “No! T-that’s not… W-what I said, I-I didn’t mean that!”

“That’s not what I overheard, Pine Bud,” Bill corrected, playing out the offending scene on his flat form. And sure enough, there was Dipper, his tone livid and dead-serious as he shouted at Steven relentlessly. “Like Bill, Steven! You’re just like Bill!”

Stepper wavered at this, half of him practically drowning in guilt over words he desperately wished he could take back. Words he wished with every fiber of his being that he’d never even foolishly, thoughtlessly said in the first place. His gemstone and his birthmark suddenly flashed, conveying that remorse between both of his halves, though it did little to stem the rising tide of anger he could feel against his own regretful grief. “I-I’m sorry!” he begged himself, his upper arms embracing himself tightly as his lower hand remained curled into unyielding fists. “Please, I need you to understand! I was just mad! I-I wasn’t thinking! I just-”

“Sounds to me like Pine Tree is just trying to save his own skin, as usual,” Bill interrupted, casually floating around the distracted, distraught fusion. “You know, Rosebud, he did say he didn’t want your help to begin with, so why even bother? With friends as crummy and ungrateful as he is, you might as well not even have any! In fact, maybe you should just cut him loose completely. You’d sure save yourself a lot of time and effort in trying to fix what’s way past broken if you did!”

By now, Stepper was all but consumed by panic, tears streaking heavily down his face as he continued his painful plea to his other half, who had gone all but silent amidst all this. “I… I’m so, so sorry…” he repeated once more, half of him hating himself for the momentous mistake he’d made. “I said so many horrible things to you, I… m-maybe you should just break things off with me…” He sobbed, softly, sadly as he hung his head in shame as the faintest of white, unfusing lights began to enshroud him. “It’s what I deserve at this point…” 

“No, you don’t.” 

The fusion gasped as he suddenly read his own thoughts, his gem and birthmark both aglow as his other half finally said something to him. He led the way as well as he began wiping his tears, steadying both of them as he guided their shared form to stand once more. “I don’t want to break away from you,” he said aloud, his tone earnest and kind. “Our friendship means so much to me. You mean so much to me! And besides,” He turned his attention to Bill, who was clearly caught off guard by Stepper’s sudden change of demeanor, especially as the fusion stared him down brazenly. “I never leave my friends behind. When someone is in trouble, I help them, no matter what they’ve said or done. And that’s how I know-” His shield journal appeared above his lower arms at this, its pages blazing with bright, powerful light as he readied himself to get right back into the fray. “I am NOTHING like you!” 

Stepper didn’t even give Bill a chance to get a single word in edgewise out as he launched a series of fast-paced shields at the dream demon, several of which landed in full-force. The fusion didn’t hold anything back as he kept his attacks coming, hoping to somehow overwhelm Bill before he could pull any more twisted tricks on him. Sure enough, it seemed as though he might soon get a chance to do just that as he ended up forcing Bill over the edge of the platform they were both on completely. The dream demon crashed down into another one of the Quadrangle’s countless staircases while Stepper remained high above him, his journal hovering above his palm as he stood tall and firm and ready to fight together.

“Try whatever you want,” he said, his tone bold and unflinching as he met the bitter glare Bill was sending his way evenly. This time, it was easy to find the bravery to do so, bravery that had been easily found amidst the unshakable bond that he had been formed through, a bond that refused to be broken so easily. “But you can’t tear us apart!”

Despite the fusion’s brazen verve and steady determination, Bill wasn’t about to back down that quickly either. “Oh, you boys wanna BET?!” he practically screamed as he flew back up to Stepper’s level. He still towered over the fusion in size, but Stepper kept his wits about him as he called upon yet another series of shields to throw at a moment’s notice. “If you twerps won’t come undone the easy way, then I guess we’ll just have to do this THE HARD WAY!”

At this, Stepper let one of his shields fly, though Bill was quick to knock it away. However, as the fusion was distracted by prepping his next move, he failed to notice the dream demon implement one of his earlier tactics until it was too late. Instead, Stepper suddenly found himself yanked back hard as thick, thorny vines secured themselves around each of his wrists once more. They didn’t entangle him this time, though they did secure themselves around each of his limbs as they began to pull him back toward the center of the platform he was on. Stepper did his best to resist their heavy hold, though they refused to give, even as they eventually ended up dragging him down and restraining him against the ground. Even still, the fusion pulled against them as the vines essentially locked his back against the floor, more appearing in turn to further tie him down as Bill appeared floating high above him. 

“You just couldn’t make this simple for me, could ya, Rose Tree?” the dream demon asked, twirling his cane as he looked down at the fusion with disdain. “All I wanted was a nice, hearty helping of revenge, but you had to go and be stubborn. Why is that not surprising? Neither Pine Tree or Rosebud know when to quit. So why should I expect anything different out of their fusion?”

“T-that’s right,” Stepper retorted assertively, despite the rather vulnerable position he now found himself in. “We don’t know when to quit. And we won’t quit, not until we’ve found a way to stop you from hurting the people we care about once and for all!”

Bill instantly let loose a haughty laugh at this, his tone clearly mocking as he leaned against his cane and looked down at Stepper incredulously. “Stop me? YOU actually thought you could stop ME?! Give me a break, kid! Without all your fancy powers keeping you going, you would have been dead from the start! In fact…” Bill paused, repositioning his cane in a way the fusion didn’t quite understand, at least at first. “Why don’t we just nip that problem in the Pine Bud, if you catch my drift…?” Stepper didn’t answer, his eyes widening with sudden alarm as he realized the demon’s cane, awash in bright blue fire, was now hovering directly over him. 

Or rather, directly over his exposed gem.

“It’s a shame I gotta do this to ya, Rose Tree, really, it is!” Bill remarked easily, nonchalantly even, despite the horrific act he was about to commit. “Especially since I promised one of my favorite clients I’d hand that rock on your gut over to them in pristine, perfect, pretty condition. But, I’m sure they’ll understand if there’s a little collateral damage. After all, you know what they say: every deal has a loophole…” 

Stepper only had time to let out the smallest of horrified gasps before it happened. And when it did, it was so quick yet agonizingly slow, all at the same time. Because in an instant, Bill’s cane came down, its tip sharpened to a deadly point as it rushed right for the fusion’s gemstone. 

And, it struck it squarely, with a piercing, sickening crack. 

Shock. That was first, his mouth open, poised for a scream that never came. His back lurched upward involuntarily, the gem on his stomach pierced completely. Fortunately, the cane didn’t dig any deeper than its surface, but that was all it needed to do. For as it retracted away from him and left his gem behind, everything instantly got so much worse. 

Pain. That was what came next, so immense and so incredible that it was a wonder he didn’t fall apart completely from it. It washed over him in waves, each more horrific than the last. It blinded him, deafened him, chased away every thought, ever feeling, everything until there was nothing left at all but pain, pain, pain, pain. 

Cracks. They soon followed, spreading out across his skin in jagged, uneven, unruly pink lines. They glowed brightly against him, casting an inhuman, incomprehensible pallor upon his otherwise largely human appearance. Yet all the while, they soundly mimicked the very same sizable crack that had been so viciously torn across his gemstone, which itself was flashing in bright, erratic alarm. 

He didn’t dare try to move, his body in far too much anguish to even make the attempt if he wanted to. His thoughts were every bit as much of a mess as his body was, disjointed and jumbled and nonsensical as they clashed against each other violently. He lay in a haze, not even noticing as the vines finally pulled themselves away to free up his languished limbs. In fact, he didn’t even react at all as Bill teleported to hover, much smaller now, directly in front of his face. 

“Knock, knock! Earth to Rose Tree!” the demon quipped as cheerfully as ever, knocking a hand against the fusion’s already pounding head. “You still in there? You can’t die on me yet, that would ruin all the fun!”

Stepper didn’t answer, largely since he was completely incapable of doing so. Instead, he lay still, his breathing hoarse and shallow as tears began welling up in his eyes, which themselves were struggling to stay open at all as a bitter chill overtook his immobile body. His thoughts continued beating into each other, overlapping as they burst to life and burnt out almost simultaneously. None of them made any sort of sense, though a few did stand out against the empty void of madness he could feel himself slowly slipping into. 

Hurts. Heal. Have to heal. 

He let out a shuddering breath, prompted into motion by this thought, by the promise that this pain would and could come to an end in just a mere matter of seconds. Bill fortunately slipped out of his frame of vision, strangely allowing him to attempt to sit up. The effort alone was agonizing, his arms shaking violently and his head lolling down despite his best attempts at keeping it up. A small, sharp cough escaped him as he fully sat up, his body wracked by it as his lower hands curled themselves around his damaged gemstone in the hopes of shielding it from any further harm. One of his upper hands slowly drifted to his mouth, and he sloppily spit on it, though the bright red blood that came out along with it wasn’t lost on him. Still, he ignored it to move that hand down to his gemstone, lightly skimming it with his fingertips to let the supposedly healing liquid settle over it. And then, he waited. And waited. 

And waited. 

“W-what…?” he finally spoke, his voice soft and broken to the point that it sounded less like his own and more of that of his two halves. “Why… isn’t it…”

“Oh, did ya not know, Pine Bud?” Bill chimed in somewhere behind him. “Whenever a Gem gets all cracked up like yourself, their powers tend to go on the fritz. Looks like I was right before. Your healing spit really can’t fix everything…”

For what seemed like ages, the most Stepper could do was stare down at his gemstone and the wide, gaping rift torn across its surface in disbelief and despair. His breathing harshened, his body tensed, and as panic overtook him, he found himself unable to keep himself from falling into another hacking fit once more. He coughed into his hand this time, and when he finally was able to stop and pull it away, he wasn’t very surprised to find it covered in his own warm blood.

“Ohohoh, now isn’t this interesting!?” Bill remarked, apparently intrigued as he scaled his size down enough so he could take a casual seat atop the fusion’s hat. “I’ve seen plenty of space rocks get cracked in my time, but I’ve never seen it happen to one attached to a human before! Much less a mostly-human fusion! Isn’t this exciting? You really are a trailblazer, Rose Tree!”

Stepper still didn’t respond to Bill directly, largely since he couldn’t care less about what he was saying. Instead, he let out a loud, anguished scream, his upper arms wrapping tightly around himself as his lower set still gently cradled his damaged gem. And all the while, his thoughts continued rumbling, rattling, like a brutal thunderstorm wreaking havoc across his already ruined mind. 

Hurts! Can’t heal! Need to heal! Can’t! 

Can’t heal… Cracked… Broken…

Fade… fading… Die… Die? Dying…

“Still, you oughta consider yourself lucky, Pine Bud,” Bill continued, hardly caring about the light starting to fade from the fusion’s eyes as he coughed out yet another bout of blood. “Any other space rock would have shattered on the spot after taking a hit like that! I guess you’re pretty fortunate to be saddled with one of the toughest ones there is, Rose Tree.”

Can’t die… Stepper’s thoughts continued to consume him, beating him between a tide of hope and grief all at once. Home… Need to go home… Can’t go home… Lost… Trapped… Alone… With him…

The absolute misery that came along with such a horrific thought swiftly started to overwhelm the fusion, his sobs coming out in tight, anxious bursts. Certainly, he’d never be able to go home, not like this. He’d never be able to see their friends or family again, not that they even wanted to see him in the first place. He was going to die here, no doubt, a slow, agonizing painful end at the hands of a cruel, careless demon who was more than happy to watch that end play out in full. 

But maybe...

Trapped here… With each other… with you! Need… need to… save you… Need… to unfuse…

Another sharp cry escaped the fusion at this, particularly as a familiar white, unfusing light suddenly covered his form, with only the pink scars strewn across him shining through it. Bill drifted away from Stepper so he could observe with eager, sadistic delight as the fusion began to fall apart at the seams, just as he’d anticipated. Just as he’d planned. 

And yet… 

No! Can’t unfuse! No… please…. Need to unfuse… You’ll die… YOU’ll die! Stay together… Stay… like this… to save you…

Slowly but surely, the light began to fade from the fusion, his form still remaining intact, as largely broken and battered as that form currently was. Tears remained in his eyes, though this time, they carried a different emotion from despair entirely. Especially as his aching heart rang with confusion and determination alike. 

Why…? You know why… 

Despite his gem’s powers being severely limited thanks to the damage it had sustained, there was one thing it was still able to do. It flashed softly as his birthmark did the same, all of his focus going into repeating one single, simple statement that spoke volumes at a moment such as this. 

“Our friendship means so much to me! You mean so much to me!”

“Y-you… stayed with me…” Stepper said to himself, aloud this time. And even though his voice was weak and wavering, it was still filled with warmth and resolve to not let his other half suffer through this unbearable anguish alone. “S-so I’m staying with you…”

Despite the heavy crack torn across his gem, despite those cracks spreading out across his entire body, despite the pain still pervading his every sense, the fusion couldn’t help but smile, a few of his tears falling as he maintained his comforting embrace. Bill, however, was far from moved by his sheer determination, stubbornness even, to stay together. 

“Are you two serious right now?!” he asked hotly, his form flashing a bright, warning shade of angry red. “You know what’ll happen to both of you if you stay like this? You’ll DIE!” 

Stepper was surprisingly calm, even despite his poor condition, as he simply shook his head. “I-I… I’ll be fine…” he whispered, more to himself than to the demon. “We’ll be fine… a-as long as we’re… together…” 

“No, you WON’T!” Bill shouted back, completely livid as massive, deadly flames surrounded both of his hands. “All it would take is one more hit and you’re over, finished, through! SHATTERED!” 

The fusion paused, his thoughts slowly starting to become more focused as he looked up at the demon defiantly. “B-but… that’s not what you want…” he asked, his voice still shaking from the palpable pain coursing through him. Still, he chose to ignore that pain the best he could in the thought of turning the tide of this terrible situation in his favor. “M-my gem isn’t any good to you i-if it’s shattered… I-I bet your ‘client’ d-doesn’t want you h-handing them a bunch of b-broken shards… R-right?” 

For perhaps the first time ever, Bill seemed to be at a complete loss for words. His singular eye stared down at the fusion, wide and unreadable as he remained strangely silent for quite some time. All the while, Stepper returned his gaze evenly, hoping that calling the dream demon’s bluff would somehow work, though to what extent, he had no idea. 

When Bill finally did say something, his tone was surprisingly easygoing as his towering form diminished and his color changed back to its normal shade of yellow. “Well, gee, Pine Bud, you sure do have a swell point there. So instead of going to extremes, why don’t we try something a bit more… civil instead?”

In an instant, the entire Quadrangle of Qonfusion disappeared; either that or Bill had teleported them somewhere away from it. But what surprised Stepper even more was that the piercing pain tearing away at his entire form seemed to come to an abrupt, grinding halt. Instead, it was replaced by a baffling sense of numbness, though it was something the fusion couldn’t help but be grateful for, at least until he happened to glance down at his gemstone. By all accounts, the stone was still just as cracked as it had been before, the same pink cracks still deeply marring his skin as he looked over all four of his arms. And yet, those cracks brought him not a single trace of the agony he’d known only seconds ago, as his movements were free and uninhibited once more. 

“What…?” he asked, his voice singular once more as opposed to disjointed to that of his halves’ as it had previously been. “How did-”

“Feeling better, Rose Tree?” Bill chimed as he appeared before the confused fusion. “You should be! I went ahead and put a little momentary pause on all that unbearable agony you were probably going through. Mostly since I need you to actually be coherent for the little chat I want to have with you…”

“Chat?” Stepper eyed the dream demon distrustfully. “About what?”

“Boy, am I glad you asked!” With a snap of his fingers, Bill suddenly conjured up a stately desk for him to sit behind, essentially forcing Stepper to do the same as he magically pulled up a chair for him on its other side. As bewildered as the fusion was by this bizarre turn of events in general, Bill continued, his manner strangely calm and collected, a stark contrast to the violent fury he’d displayed just moments ago. “You see, Rose Tree, after all that hubbub, I just came up with a much easier way to smooth things over here. All we’d need to do is broker a little deal and-”

“No,” Stepper said immediately, hotly as his upper hands slammed down onto the desk. “If you think for one second that you can rope me into another one of your stupid deals, then you can just forget it. I would NEVER make another deal with you, not after-”

“Yeah, yeah, Pine Bud, we’re all more than well aware about just how much I ‘traumatized’ you before,” Bill rolled his eye as he reclined back into his seat. “But just hear me out. With that crack on your gut, the chances of you lasting long are pretty low, even if I don’t decide I just wanna wipe you outta existence out of sheer annoyance alone. Humans in particular don’t tend to do too well here‒most of the ones who’ve ever gotten stuck here in the ol’ N.R. either ended up starving to death or spiraling into insanity in a matter of days! And as fun as that would be to watch happen to you, Rose Tree, I think we can reach a compromise that might just be able to get you back home instead!”

“W-wait… before, you said you can’t get me back to our dimension,” Stepper remarked dismissively, though he couldn’t deny the brief bout of hope that filled him all the same. “...Can you?”

“As far as you know, I can,” Bill retorted easily. “See, even if I can’t open up one of those reality tears or go to your dimension from the Nightmare Realm myself, that doesn’t mean I can’t send things that are from that dimension back to it with a little bit of… concentration. And hey, you just so happen to fall under the category of things that are from your dimension, kid! And you’re super lucky too, Pine Bud, ‘cause I’m willing to offer you the bargain of a lifetime! A one-way ticket back to your own dimension, in exchange for one tiny, simple thing that’s so trivial and unimportant, I bet you won’t even notice that it’s gone!”

“Let me guess,” Stepper said dryly, knowing this sounded far too familiar for comfort. “My gem?”

“Nope! Not this time!” 

The fusion blinked, genuinely surprised at this as he made another uncertain, anxious assumption. “M-my body? You want to possess my--our body, don’t you?”

“Nah, I’m not much on taking fusions for a spin,” the demon said flippantly. “They’re always too much to contend with in the headspace. Takes all the fun out of possession, if you ask me!”

By now, Stepper was becoming more and more unsettled as he tried to think of what else he had that Bill could possibly want from him. But ultimately, he couldn’t come up with anything. At least not anything that the demon hadn’t tried to or already had taken from him in the past. “S-so… what do you want then?”

If the dream demon could have smiled, he certainly would have been now as he leaned in across the desk toward the uneasy fusion before him. “What I want is something only you can give me, Rose Tree…” he began darkly, ominously even. “And that something is... that fancy-schmancy journal of yours!”

As Bill’s tone turned light and chipper once more, Stepper balked, dumbfounded as he tried to make sense of this unexpected twist. “My… my shield journal?” he asked, one of his lower hands absently drifting down toward his gem, though he made no move to summon the weapon. “What would… why would you want that?”

“Aw, what? It’s a rare read, one of a kind, really!” Bill explained, conjuring up an illusion of a book in question in the middle of the desk. “Plus, it just so happens to be filled with all sorts of juicy tidbits about two of my favorite twerps in the entire multiverse. Can ya really blame me for wanting a copy of my own?”

“That’s not why you want it, and both you and I know that,” Stepper scoffed harshly. “Everything that’s in my journal, I’m sure you already know. You do make it your mission to poke around in other peoples’ business all the time, after all. So stop lying for a change and tell me why you’re really after it.”

“Come on, Pine Bud, you know my talent for lying is one of my best qualities!” the dream demon taunted playfully. “But fine, if you really want the boring old truth, here it is: I just wanna see you lose your prized, precious weapon for good.”

“W-wait…” Stepper paused, a heavy wave of dread washing over him. “S-so… if I give my journal to you then… then I won’t-”

“Nope! You won’t be able to summon it ever again!” Bill confirmed mirthfully. “No more special shield tossing for you, Rose Tree! Guess that would make you a fusion without a weapon, a fundamentally useless one at that! Then again, you wouldn’t be the only one considering Sword Bud is a thing. Still, if you wanna get back home, then all you gotta do is kiss that journal goodbye. Forever! Sounds like a small price to pay to see your friends and family again and NOT die a slow, painful death in a literal nightmare dimension, dontcha think?”

Stepper faltered, unsure of what to say to this awful proposal and everything it entailed. “I… I need time to think…” he muttered, more to himself than to Bill. 

“Hey, take all the time you want, Pine Bud!” Bill surprisingly agreed, spinning around in his chair to give the fusion some “privacy”. “Just keep in mind, time’s not something you really have on your side anymore, not with that crack on your gem set to tear you apart at any given second!”

Stepper sighed, glaring in the demon’s direction disdainfully before stealing a glance down at his own aforementioned gemstone. The crack torn across it was just as prominent and damming as ever, looking so misplaced and wrong against something that was so familiar and fond to him. “What do we do…?” he whispered to himself, lightly tracing a finger over the crevice on the stone. “We can’t trust him, you know we can’t! I do know, but… what other choice do we have? W-we… we’ll keep fighting him! We’ve lasted against him this long, we can-” He stopped himself, shaking his head. “We can what? We’re cracked! We won’t last long like this, even if we do stay together… We can’t heal ourselves… But… m-maybe… if we go home… The Gems might be able to find a way to help us.”

He rubbed his temples, frustrated and distraught at the impossible position he’d found himself in. “B-but… our journal,” he countered morosely. “Never being able to summon it again is… I know, I don’t like it either. Our journal is one of my favorite things about us. But… you’re more important to me than any book… A-and I’d rather lose that book forever then lose you forever…” For what felt like the millionth time since he’d been pulled into the Nightmare Realm, he could feel tears finding a place in his eyes once more as his upper arms held onto him lightly. “...Same here…” he said softly, yet sadly all the same. “So… we’re doing this…? I don’t want to, but… if we don’t have any other choice…”

“You DON’T!” Bill suddenly interrupted, spinning back around to face the fusion. “So, since your mind’s all made up, let’s get to summoning that journal for the last time so we can really seal this deal, huh?”

Stepper was quick to meet the demon’s callous remarks with a stern glare, wanting to make sure that he knew exactly what he was getting himself into here. “The only thing you want is my shield journal,” he began firmly. “That’s it, right? Nothing more along with it? No strings attached?”

“None at all, Rose Tree!” Bill assured evenly, extending a blue flame-covered hand for him to shake. “All you gotta do is fork over that journal and you’ll be home before you know it! I promise.”

“Tch, as if your promises ever even mean anything,” Stepper deadpanned crossly. “But… if all I stand to lose is my shield journal for a chance to go home and get as far away from you as possible, then…” He sighed, already regretting this decision and already anticipating that it would go horribly wrong somehow. But even then, he thought, whatever was about to happen had to be at least somewhat better than the alternative of being trapped here with Bill forever. “I’ll take it.”

With this, Stepper solidly shook the dream demon’s flame-engulfed hand, essentially sealing both the deal and his own fate, whatever that fate without his journal was about to be. “Great!” Bill quipped excitedly as he pulled his hand away. “I knew we’d be able to work something out, Pine Bud. Now… pay up.”

“...C-can I even summon my journal like this…?” Stepper wondered, nervously glancing down at his damaged gem once more. “I can’t heal, so-”

“Yeesh, kid, you worry too much!” Bill rebuffed impatiently. “You’re cracked, not shattered! Some of your powers are still bound to work. Just give it a try and see!”

Stepper scowled at the dream demon, but even so, he did as he said, positioning his lower set of hands just below his gem. He took in a deep, steadying breath, closing his eyes in the hopes that this would still somehow work. And though it took a moment of deep concentration, sure enough it did, as his gem, even as cracked as it currently was, began to take on a gentle, familiar sort of glow. From that glow, his shield journal emerged, though from the very start it was glitching in and out of existence in reaction to the damage he had sustained. Unable to float on its own, the book fell out of the air, though fortunately he managed to narrowly catch it in his lower set of arms. 

As he pulled it up closer to him, Stepper couldn’t help but frown, even as the journal began to stabilize in his grip. Though it had taken him time to learn to appreciate his weapon when he’d first fused, by now, he’d come to realize just how special and unique his shield journal really was. It was powerful, it was versatile, but even more than that, it was reflective of him, of his halves and who they were, both together and apart. And yet, here he was, ready to give it all away without a chance at ever getting it back. It was a heartbreaking decision, but a necessary one. One that both of his halves knew they had to make if they ever hoped to save each other. 

“Alright, Rose Tree,” Bill remarked, already extending a hand out to retrieve the book. “Hand it over.”

Stepper sighed, resigning himself to that decision as he pulled his sights away from the journal to stare Bill down brazenly. And, with his movements slow and steady, the fusion lifted his shield journal up, offering it to the dream demon as he prepared to part ways with it permanently. 

Without skipping a single beat, Bill swiftly snatched the journal away from Stepper. The effect was immediate, for as soon as the shield journal left his hands, the fusion took in a sharp gasp, his former agony returning in full force as his gem, birthmark, and cracks strewn across his skin all flashed a vibrant, garish pink. As that flash died down every bit as quickly, his eyes began to roll back in his head, one of his hands involuntarily reaching out toward the journal that Bill had already taken away from him. But that hand fell away as the fusion drifted off into a deep, unconscious void, lost to his pain and perhaps, to something else entirely. 

“Well, that takes care of that!” Bill concluded brightly, sending the fusion’s journal away with a mere snap of his fingers. “Now, all we need is a…” At that exact moment, the Nightmare Realm itself rippled with a sudden, forign energy, one that tore open a rift in the dimension’s already chaotic plane. A rift that happened to form into a portal not too far away from where the dream demon happened to be floating. “Aha! Perfect timing!” 

Bill quickly pulled Stepper’s limp, listless form toward the newly-created portal, one that, sure enough, led right to the very dimension the fusion was from. “Looks like you’re getting your ticket home after all, Rose Tree!” the dream demon quipped, shaking the unconscious fusion roughly. “Ohoho!” Bill’s interest peaked as he stole another brief glance through the portal beside him. “And you’ll even get your own welcoming party too! How nice!”

This ‘welcoming party’ was, in truth, more of a search party, one composed of the Gems and Mabel as they all frantically combed through the woods for none other than Steven and Dipper themselves. It was a search that had been ongoing for quite some time now, and after several restless nights of the boys’ mysterious absence, stress and exhaustion was weighing heavily upon them all as their relatively fruitless effort continued. 

“I just don’t understand!” Pearl huffed, exasperated as she peered around yet another tree. “How did they just… completely disappear without a trace?! Nothing about this makes any sense!”

“You sure your future vision hasn’t seen anything about where they’re at, G?” Amethyst asked, looking to Garnet almost pleadingly. 

The Gem leader took pause at this, adjusting her shades before letting out a disappointed sigh. “No,” she reported tiredly. “Nothing.”

“B-But they’ve been gone for three days now!” Mabel explained, her tone deeply fretful. The growing bags under her eyes were telling of the fact that she hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep since the boys had vanished, and by all accounts, she had no intentions of even trying to get any until they were safe and found. “Steven and Dipper wouldn’t just… leave without telling anyone! Something must have happened to them! We’ve gotta find them, please!”

“Don’t worry,” Garnet assured, placing a comforting hand on the girl’s shoulder. “We’re not going to stop looking until we do. No matter how far we have to go, we’ll-”

“Actually, Fuse Box, you won’t have to go that far to find ‘em…”

The entire group let out a shared, startled gasp upon hearing this all-too familiar voice echo through the nearby forest. It instantly drew their attention to the surprising portal torn near a tree just a ways ahead of them, and floating within the void it contained was none other than Bill Cipher himself. 

“Y-you!” Pearl shouted as her, Garnet, and Amethyst all swiftly summoned their weapons. “What are you doing here?!”

“Yeah, get lost, chump!” Amethyst yelled just as bitterly, ready to lash out with her whip at a moment’s notice. 

“We have no time to deal with you right now, Bill,” Garnet added rigidly, her gauntlets curled into tight fists. “We have something much more important we need to take care of.”

“Oh really?” the demon retorted casually. “You mean you don’t have any time… for him?”

Another heavy round of shock, one even stronger and piercing than the last, ran through the group as Bill suddenly hoisted a certain, unconscious four-armed figure up for them all to see. “S-Stepper!” Mabel cried, tears already springing up in her eyes. She didn’t hesitate to try to rush to him, though Amethyst made sure to hold her back just before she could. “W-what is he… h-how did he get-”

“How’d he get here? To the cozy little corner of the multiverse I call home? Great question, Shooting Star!” Bill piped up. “Ya see, poor Pine Tree and Rosebud here tumbled through a randomly-occurring interdimensional tear, just like this one right here! Ohoho boy, if you all could have only SEEN the look of sheer terror on their faces when they realized where they were! What a pair of spineless little-”

“Quiet!” Pearl snapped hotly, angrily tossing her spear, which struck the tree just above where the portal hung. “What did you do to them, you monster?!”

“I didn’t do much of anything to them,” the demon remarked with faux innocence. “Well, aside from put them in their place for being dumb enough to think they could stand up to me, of course. But I’ve had my fun with Rose Tree here, and better yet, I’ve gotten what I wanted outta him, so I think I’ll just do you all a solid and toss him back over to you. Free of charge!”

“W-what… what do you mean you got what you wanted out of him…?” Mabel asked, frightened by the sheer vagueness of that statement alone. 

“Wouldn’t YOU like to know, kid,” Bill scoffed, rolling his eye. “Still, I’m sure you’ll figure it out soon enough. Or not. Doesn’t really matter to me if you do either way. Anyway here, take your empty-headed Pine Bud back.” Without much warning at all, the demon suddenly threw Stepper forward, sending him tumbling through the portal and back into his own dimension with little effort or care at all. Though Amethyst, Pearl, and Mabel all gasped in shared surprise at his sudden return, Garnet was the first to react, rushing in to catch the comatose fusion before he could hit the ground. 

“Cipher!” the Gem leader shouted furiously as she glared up at the portal before her. 

“Good to see you all again too!” Bill replied, offering the group a cheerful wave as said portal began to seal itself back up. “I have a feeling it won’t be long before the next time we meet up. Maybe we’ll do lunch! But until then, remember: I’ll be WATCHING you!” 

The dream demon let out another insane, sadistic laugh that echoed through the woods even after the portal itself was gone. Amethyst and Pearl leapt forward in an attempt to keep it from closing so they could properly attack Bill, but their chance was gone before they could even try it. 

“Ugh! I hate that guy!” Amethyst groaned, severely annoyed as her whip disappeared. 

“It’s safe to say we all do by this point…” Pearl agreed just as disdainfully. “B-but, let’s look on the bright side: at least we… ‘found’ Steven and Dipper!”

A sudden gasp from Garnet cut through this small bout of relief entirely as she got a chance to properly look over the limp fusion lying in her arms. “N-no…” she whispered, her visor disappearing to reveal the tears welling up in all three of her eyes. 

“G-Garnet….?” Mabel took a cautious step forward. “I-is… is he ok?”

By now, Pearl and Amethyst had caught onto what had Garnet so distraught, and likewise, their panic was just as palpable. The white Gem collapsed to her knees, tears finding a place in her eyes as well as she moved a trembling hand to cover her mouth. The purple Gem was absolutely shaken, though she still managed to rush over to Mabel, hoping to pull her away before she could see what had truly become of her brother and best friend. 

“Uh, h-hey, Mabel!” she exclaimed, throwing on a forced smile as she turned the girl around. “Why don’t we, um… h-head back to the shack a-and tell Stan and Ford the good news?”

“No!” Mabel protested, pulling herself away. “I-I want to see him!” None of the Gems were really able to stop her as she rushed to Stepper’s side, though the moment she caught sight of his gem, she practically fell ill. “H-his… his gem…” she began, a sob slipping out as she knelt down beside him. “I-it’s…”

“Cracked…” Garnet finished, her tone awash in grief. 

“AUGH!” Amethyst suddenly shouted, absolutely infuriated as she slammed her fist against the nearest tree. “He did this to them, that stupid triangle piece of-”

“AMETHYST!” Pearl cut her off just in time. 

Meanwhile, Mabel placed a gentle, shaking hand against the unconscious fusion’s arm, noticing the jagged pink lines torn across it, only adding to just how disheveled and damaged he looked overall between his torn and tattered clothes and countless scratches and scrapes. “D-Dipper… Steven…” she whispered, her heart aching as she noticed the traces of pain in his otherwise empty expression. “S-Stepper…”

At this, the fusion suddenly began to stir, much to everyone’s surprise, especially as he let out a soft, exhausted groan. “M-Mabel…?” he spoke, his voice his own yet still so broken in an entirely different way all the same. 

“Stepper!” Mabel and the Gems all exclaimed in unison as they began to crowd around him. At least until Garnet put a swift stop to it. 

“Give him some space,” she ordered her teammates, looking down at the fusion in her arms earnestly as he addressed her. 

“G-Garnet… i-is… is that… you?” he asked, clearly agonized by the effort alone as he remained limp in her hold. 

“Yes,” Garnet couldn’t help but smile, overwhelmed with relief to see that he was still alive at all after what he’d been through. “Stepper, y-you… your gem is badly damaged. But don’t worry. We’re going to take care of you.”

Stepper didn’t respond, his eyes bleary as he tried and failed to focus on the Gem leader. His thoughts were all a distant haze, enshrouded by the immense, unending pain that he felt like he had been drowning in for ages now. So instead, he let his eyes slowly slip shut once more, content to let Mabel and the Gems do whatever they could to help, even if he didn’t know how he’d ended up among them to begin with. 

“C-can’t he just heal himself?!” Mabel asked, frantic. “Stepper, just use your healing powers on your gem and-”

“M-Mabel, he’s… cra--damaged,” Pearl interjected, shuddering even as she spoke the horrific word. “His powers probably aren’t working right. W-well have to help him some other way.”

“We’ll take him to Rose’s fountain,” Garnet concluded, her tone firm as her shades appeared once more. Slowly and carefully, she stood with Stepper still in her arms, carrying his languid form as comfortably as she could. “It’s waters should be able to fix his gem. In the meantime, Amethyst, go get Stan and Ford and bring them there. They need to know what happened to Dipper.”

“Right,” Amethyst nodded, not even hesitating to turn and rush back through the forest toward the shack. At the same time, Garnet, Pearl, and Mabel wasted no time in setting off as well, marching swiftly through the woods to get back to the temple as fast as possible. Despite Garnet’s steady pace, Mabel did her best to keep up with her, if only so she could keep a comforting hold on one of Stepper’s lower hands all the while. 

“I-it’s ok, Ste-bro,” she whispered to him tearfully, trying to muster a smile even if he couldn’t currently see it. “You’re gonna be o-ok… We’ll fix you right up, you’ll see. I-I promise.”

For his part, Stepper could barely even hear her, much less the anxious conversation stirring up between Garnet and Pearl along the way. He only briefly caught bits and pieces of it; the word “cracked” in particular came up over and over again, though given his current condition that was hardly surprising. Largely, Stepper spent the bulk of their brisk trip back to the temple wavering in and out of consciousness, steeped in dull, familiar agony all the while. Yet strangely, he happened to find some comfort amidst that agony: the brief, blurry flashes of war, sunlight sparkling through the trees high above him, the secure, safe hold Garnet had on him as she held him close in a protective carry, the soft, gentle grip Mabel made sure to keep his hand within, one that he wished he could return, even if he didn’t have the strength for it. 

After what seemed like years, the group finally burst into the temple, making a beeline for the warp pad. Stepper didn’t register its activation, nor was he aware for anything at all until they arrived at a familiar, serene setting. 

The air around Rose’s iconic fountain was always warm and sweet, smelling of the pink blossoms that flourished all around it. That beauty was lost on the group as they ran toward it however, their purpose grim and their hopes high that its waters could somehow work another miracle, just as it had so many before. There was no deliberation as Garnet reached the fountain first, repositioning Stepper before she gently, carefully lowered him down into its sparkling, rejuvenating water, allowing him to sink into it until it covered his cracked gemstone completely. 

For a moment, the most any of them could do was wait. The fountain’s waters grew still, the fusion floating within them just as still too, at least until a warm, radiant light began to surround him. Garnet, Pearl, and Amethyst all watched with wide, wondering eyes as that light became practically blinding, and even still they were kept waiting as it slowly faded away. At least until Stepper splashed up out of the fountain’s waters with a startled, heavy gasp. 

“Stepper!” Mabel cried, rushing for him immediately. Before the fusion even had time to properly orient himself, she barreled into him, knocking him back into the water with a tight, elated hug. “I-I’m so glad you’re ok! Don’t ever scare me like that again!”

“M-Mabel,” Stepper couldn’t help but let out a soft chuckle as he returned her embrace. “I’m glad to see you too.”

“Oh, thank goodness, you’re alright!” Pearl chimed in as her and Garnet remained at the edge of the fountain. “You’re-” She stopped short, her relief whiplashing right back into alarm as Stepper began to climb out of the fountain himself. “I-it… it can’t be… Y-you… you’re gem i-is still…”

Stepper’s stunned gasp filled in the blanks as he looked down to the gemstone, only to find that, sure enough, it was every bit as cracked as it had been before. And even more than that, it was strangely duller somehow, its usual bright pink muted to a very noticeable degree. While most of the cracks scarring his skin had disappeared, a few still remained, mostly all congregated around the gemstone itself as they retained the same sort of dull pink pallor. “W-what…?” he asked, quite frightened as one of his lower arms reached for the damaged stone. “B-but how…?”

“T-this should have worked!” Mabel exclaimed, distraught as she took in the sight of the stone herself. “It should have healed you! Why didn’t it work!?”

“Stepper,” Garnet interjected, her tone surprisingly steady as she approached the fusion. “Your gem is still cracked, but you appear to be fine. Tell us you’re feeling.”

“Um, w-well… I-I feel fine now,” Stepper shrugged, though his tone was honest all the same. And it was true, all of the pain that had prevailed his senses disappeared the moment his gem so much as touched the fountain’s healing waters. “But… my gem… w-what happened to it…?”

Garnet, Pearl, and Mabel exchanged a confused, concerned glance at this, though the white Gem was ultimately the one to speak up to it. “Y-you mean… you don’t remember?”

Stepper shook his head, his brow furrowing in thought as he tried to think about how his gem might have been so severely damaged, though in the end, nothing came to him. “That’s… troubling…” Garnet remarked, though she didn’t bother explaining any further. At least not at the moment. “Still, even if you feel fine, Stepper, you should unfuse so we can see how each of you are doing on your own.”

Now it was Stepper’s turn to be confused as he looked to the Gem leader as if what she’d just said was the most baffling thing he’d ever heard. Which, at least to him, it was. “Unfuse?” he repeated, raising an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

“Uh, you know, unfuse?” Mabel repeated with a ghost of a smile. “As much as we love having you around, Stepper, we should probably check on Steven and Dipper too.”

A beat of silence that felt like it lasted ages passed at this, with only the fountain’s flowing water filling it in. And all the while, Stepper’s expression was awash in bewilderment, his eyes wide and unknowing as he voiced a simple question that sent shockwaves out the moment it was asked. 

“Who?”

Next: 

[mighty-ant]

A Good Landing, Chapter Twelve

First, Previous 

2004

Crickets chirped in the cool evening air, hidden in tall, dry grass that rustled with every passing breeze. Cutting neatly through the empty field was a long stretch of faded concrete serving as a landing strip with a windsock fluttering limply at the end of it. Beyond the landing strip was small airfield, the structures a brief blot along the gold and crimson horizon.

Every building was dark, hollow in a way that spoke to their emptiness. That is, every building save the plane hangar, where light spilled out of the entrance like a gleaming curtain against the pavement. Inside the hangar a young man was hanging halfway out of the engine of a cherry red vintage biplane, grease stained and lanky. He stuck his head out of the engine long enough to push the hair out of his eyes, getting engine grease on his forehead. His gaze was drawn heavenward by the sound of a powerful engine.

A massive cargo plane thundered overhead, far lower than he’d ever seen an aircraft that size without it landing immediately after. As he watched, the plane’s bay door opened and a figure leapt out. He scarcely had time to gasp before a black parachute billowed out above them, catching them at the last instant and allowing them to drift to a gentle landing in the dry grass.

The plane didn’t land or turn around, and was so large that even after several seconds it still hadn’t faded from sight.

The young man ran out of the hangar, waving his arms.

“Hey, you okay?” he called to the stranger in the field as he approached. The closer he came the more their features became clear in the growing twilight.

An older woman with white hair edging into gray looked up at him as she was in the process of folding her parachute.

“Are you okay, ma’am?” he asked.

“What?” she said. “Yes, yes, I’m fine. That plane just took the only surviving cure for the common cold to be sold to the highest bidder, but yes, I’m fine.”

“Um…do you need me to call someone?” he responded, jerking a thumb back at the hangar. We’ve got the only phone around—”

“This is an airfield,” she realized.

“Yeah, it—“

“And you’re a pilot?” she asked.

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Well I don’t have my license yet but I’ve been flying with my folks since almost before I could walk—”

“Can you follow the plane that just passed overhead?” she demanded.

“Yeah, sure, they’ll be leaving a smoke trail for miles—”

“Wonderful! Let’s go,” she said, setting off at a brisk march in the direction of the hangar.

“Oh, uh, okay!” he replied, nearly tripping trying to keep up with her. “Wait, where are we going?”

“We’re going after the pirates that just booted me off my own plane,” she groused. She glanced over at him. “Only if you’re up to it, of course. I’m hardly going to force you to fly me anywhere. Though I needn’t remind you that the health and safety of humanity may be at state.”

He laughed brightly. “Oh, I’m totally in! I haven’t even gotten a crash in today, so it all works out.”

“Crash?” she repeated as they reached the hangar.

He ignored the vintage plane he’d been repairing in favor of the far more modern stunt biplane beside it, this one a cheerful orange and yellow with the words Flying McQuacks painted on the side in bold, ornate lettering.

“McQuack, is it?” the woman asked as she climbed into the passenger’s seat.

The young man smiled, strapping on an aviator cap. “Launchpad McQuack, ma’am! And you?”

“Call me Agent 22,” she replied, considering him with a smile.

2005

The windows on the uppermost floors of S.H.U.S.H.’s London headquarters looked out onto the dark waters of the Thames, set glittering by the colorful cruise boats drifting by and the lights of the city around it. Rain pattered against the glass, turning the view of a distantly glowing Big Ben and the London Eye into a neon watercolor mosaic.

However, Launchpad wasn’t taking in the sights.

In his hand was a photograph taken last Thanksgiving of his family smiling around the dinner table. Loopy was standing on a chair and using his head as an armrest, Birdie was reaching behind her in an attempt to push Loopy back into her seat without looking away from the camera, and Ripcord was standing proudly over the roasted brisket he’d spent hours toiling over. The photo was taken just a few seconds before Ripcord sliced his thumb open while cutting into the brisket and they’d all piled into the car to rush him to the hospital. They got back home so late that they barely had the energy to store all of their carefully prepared food in Quackerware, and they had a make-up Thanksgiving at breakfast the next morning.

The Launchpad McQuack in the picture was seventeen years old, lanky and lean, the rest of his body still catching up to his sudden growth spurt. The furthest he’d ever traveled from Des Moines was the Minneapolis Airshow.

The Launchpad McQuack that stood in the headquarters of an international espionage agency was of a different breed. Eighteen years old and dressed in a suit more expensive that anything he’d ever owned, his body had begun to fill out with muscle after more than a year and a half of rigorous training. He didn’t grow his hair long anymore and instead had it cut neatly at the nape, with no baseball hat or aviator cap to be seen.

At his back, loud, jovial voices and music trickled out faintly from behind the door at the end of the hall. Outside, thunder rumbled lowly, and Launchpad swept a thumb across the surface of the photograph. His features were bathed in flickering neon lights, making his pensive expression seem more shadowed than it was.

The door opened behind him, and the sound of the party grew riotous for a moment before it was closed again.

“What are you doing out here? I thought you’d be celebrating.”

Launchpad smiled, tucking the photo in his jacket pocket before turning around.

“Just needed a little break. Gryzlikoff keeps trying to get me to drink some of that ‘real’ vodka he makes in his basement. Y’know, the one that smells like paint thinner?” he said. “And what about you, Agent ‘Life of the Party’ 22?”

“I haven’t foggiest idea what you’re talking about,” Beakley replied, perfectly demure as she walked over to Launchpad’s side, a drink in each hand.

Launchpad chuckled. “Really? ‘Cause I’ve heard stories about an annual McDuck Christmas party. That’s not Scrooge McDuck, is it?”

Beakley sighed fondly.

“Ah, the annual Christmas party. They would’ve gone on, I think, had the Beagle Boys not made a habit of ransacking them every year,” she said, as usual answering just one part of the question and ignoring the other.

She handed Launchpad one of the drinks she was holding. A year ago, he would’ve been sitting in a friend’s garage drinking cheap beer out of a red plastic cup and yelling at whatever sports game was on their boxy television set. Now he was drinking champagne out of crystal flutes on the other side of the world while he and a dozen other agents celebrated their acceptance into S.H.U.S.H., the world’s foremost secret intelligence agency.

He took a sip out of his glass, staring out of the window. Beakley joined him in companionable silence, the strengthening patter of rain a startling contrast to the revelry less than fifteen feet away.

“So, Double-O-Duck, is it?” Beakley asked.

Launchpad shrugged, laughing lightly.

“Hey, it wasn’t my idea.”

“Hm. Yes, well, coming up with names was never Director Hooter’s specially. Director Von Drake on the other hand...”

She glanced over at Launchpad.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

“For what?” Launchpad replied, “The adventure of a lifetime? Going to interesting places, meeting interesting people, and fighting them?”

Beakley rolled her eyes, but he’d known her long enough to recognize the fondness in her expression.

“Yes, that,” she said dryly.

“Honestly? I can’t wait, Mrs. B,” he said, his voice softening. “Helping people, stopping bad guys? That’s what I’ve wanted to do since I was a little kid.”

Beakley nodded thoughtfully. “It’s an admirable career, being an agent of S.H.U.S.H. But not one without sacrifices. When’s the last time you spoke to your family?”

Launchpad shrugged, raising his champagne glass to his beak.

“A few weeks ago?” he replied, “they still think I’ve been contracted as a pilot for some top secret government stuff, which isn’t too far from the truth, really. They get that I can’t call too often.”

“It was your father’s birthday last week, wasn’t it?” Beakley asked, though it was obvious by the question that she already knew the answer.

Launchpad turned to face Beakley fully, meeting her gaze with an open, earnest expression.

“I know what you’re thinking, Mrs. B,” he said, “And I know that I’m...softer that most of the people you’ve trained. But a little homesickness isn’t gonna make me give this up. I’m in this for the long haul. I want to be a S.H.U.S.H. agent, more than I’ve wanted anything.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Beakley said, reaching up to briefly clasp his shoulder.  “It’s difficult to tell sometimes, you’re always smiling. Now, Double-O-Duck, I believe you have a party to attend?”

“Y’know, I think it’s growing on me.”

“What on earth are you babbling about?”

Launchpad shrugged, his posture as loose and comfortable as the grip around his gun. “My codename. I don't mind it so much anymore.”

Graves rolled his eyes scornfully as he crouched in front of the safe, planting the decryption device against the door.

“Shut up and stand guard, McQuack,” he snapped, “if Goldfinch’s men find us before I can get the plans it’ll be your head.”

Launchpad straightened in the doorway, expression sharpening as he looked out into the empty hall. He remained affable as he replied, “I mean, Double-O-Duck? You’ve gotta admit it’s a bit much. But maybe it’s the sort of thing you grow into? Like a sweater your grandma sends you that’s just a little too big. Your grandma do stuff like that, partner?”

Graves glared at the numbers ticking by on the decryptor screen like they had personally wronged him.

“My grandmother sends me cursed Javanese daggers,” he said. “And we’re not partners. I’m just the ignoramus who got stuck with a rookie agent.”

“Well, yeah, I guess if you look at it that way—”

The device beeped, and the safe door unlocked under Graves’ hands. He reached in and pulled out a series of rolled up blueprints, unfurling them on the ground.

He nodded once, decisive.

“These are the plans,” he said, a smirk teasing the corner of his beak.

“Awesome!” Launchpad said. “Now they won’t be able to fire that giant laser they’ve got up in space!”

“No, that was last week. These are the plans for the nuclear bomb Goldfinch was planning on setting off inside Fort Knox.”

“Huh,” Launchpad replied.

“Hey!” a burly guard barked at the end of the hall. “What’re you doing over here?”

Launchpad stepped out in front of Graves as the latter fit the blueprints into a poster tube carrying case, slipping the strap over his shoulder.

“Definitely not breaking into your boss’s safe and stealing the blueprints for his master plan,” Launchpad said.

“Nice save,” Graves retorted sarcastically as guards began thundering down the hall.

Launchpad stepped out of the room first, his gun raised, so he could cover Graves. “Figured they wouldn’t believe we were just really well-dressed janitors,” he replied, firing a series of warning shots at the ground in front of the guards and at the lights above them, leaving them momentarily stumbling in the sudden dark.

Graves ran past him, and Launchpad wasn’t far behind. There was an ornate art nouveau style window at the end of the hall that was to be their way out. The guards began firing guns of their own, and bullets whizzed over Launchpad and Graves’ heads, closely followed by their outraged shouts.

“Thin the herd!” Graves bellowed, when a bullet grazed his arm.

Launchpad reared his arm back and threw his gun with all his might at the guard nearest to the front. It hit the dog square in the face with so much force he was knocked backwards, tripping up three other guards in the process.

Graves gawked at him.

“What was that?”

“Clip was empty!” Launchpad lied.

Without pausing, Graves ducked his head and dove through the window with an explosion of shattering glass. Launchpad wasn’t long to follow, throwing his arms over his face and letting their bulletproof suits take the brunt of the damage.

They were in freefall for several exhilarating seconds before they landed in the river cutting through Goldfinch’s property. Launchpad resurfaced laughing, while Graves’ expression had somehow grown even more sour than before. They paddled to the opposite shore where their ride awaited them, just a little banged up from being driven headfirst into a tree.

“Well that wasn’t so bad,” Launchpad said cheerily as they heaved themselves onto the grass, sopping wet.

“You’re paying my drycleaning bill,” Graves replied icily.

2008

As one of their youngest agents in five decades, Launchpad didn’t go on his first solo mission until three years after joining S.H.U.S.H.

His assignment would be a four-month long stint in Macaw, shadowing a local vigilante organization. That was the technical term for Mazu, the heavily armed neighborhood watch that protected Macaw’s streets from power hungry crime families who would happily use the region as their personal playground, nevermind the civilians that would get caught in the crossfire. Macaw’s police and government officials had long since been paid off or quietly replaced by the more entrepreneurial crime lords, leaving Mazu as the only source of law and order.

In the initial weeks his only contact was Ziyi da Rosa Silva Chan, a Macawnese emerald dove, and the youngest of Mazu’s clan heads. She was dedicated and breathtakingly driven, both to their cause and proving her worth, and when she met him out on the tarmac on that first night she leveled him and the wreckage of the plane he’d climbed out of with such an unimpressed look he had to fight the urge to turn right back around.

“You’re the best S.H.U.S.H. had to offer?” she asked, and she was so diminutive her head barely reached the middle of his torso. But every inch of her was brimming with toned, dense muscle, and he didn’t have any trouble believing that she could lay him out and toss him over her shoulder if she so desired.

Launchpad bowed slightly and stuck his hand out, keeping the smile on his face.

“Double-O-Duck, at your service,” he said brightly, “but, uh, you can just call me Launchpad McQuack.”

Ziyi accepted his handshake with a raised eyebrow.

“I hope you know what you’ve gotten yourself into, Mr. McQuack.”

“Me too,” he replied honestly.

They spent the first week on stakeouts outside darkened warehouses, dingy, abandoned docks, and even brightly lit office buildings. Ziyi had a hunch that the crime families, usually at each others’ throats, had put aside their differences for once so they could carry out the one goal they all had in common: the elimination of Mazu. Launchpad was there to be a second set of eyes, extra muscle in a fight; S.H.U.S.H. wasn’t on point here, Ziyi was.

She was taciturn and stern, but she always seems surprised when he followed her orders without fanfare, or phrased his questions as respectfully as he was able.

“You’re not the first S.H.U.S.H. agent they’ve sent,” she explained out of the blue one night, perched on a dark, frigid rooftop outside of the bustling city center. Here, the buildings were rundown and crumbling and it was where too much of the regular citizenry lived, within spitting distance of the opulent hotels and casinos and the wealthy tourists therein. They were waiting to catch an arms deal between the Gwok and Loeng families, notorious enemies, which would lead further credence to Ziyi’s theory.

“Oh yeah?” Launchpad responded, surprised. He hadn’t been informed of any other agents in the region.

Ziyi nodded once. “It was about three months ago, when all this nonsense with the families first started. They sent a senior agent to help, so we were expecting someone polished. Someone professional. Instead we received Derek Blunt.”

Launchpad made a show of wincing, and he was rewarded with the first laugh he’d ever heard leaving Ziyi’s beak.

Blunt was notorious around the S.H.U.S.H. watercooler for being, for lack of a better word, a huge tool. He was insufferable to work with, talk to, or even be in the vicinity of. What made it even worse was that he was an excellent agent, with a track record to match that of Agent 22.

“You know what I mean then,” Ziyi said, giving Launchpad a dry look as the barest hint of a smile curled her beak.

 “He was disrespectful from the start, acting like he knew the city better than we did. He wouldn’t listen to a word I or any Mazu leader said unless they were a man, and even then only rarely. He nearly compromised our mission with his refusal to listen, so we contacted your director to have him sent back. He told us that he would be sending a replacement agent, one with ‘people skills’.”

She glanced at Launchpad again, more genuine amusement settling on her features. The sight of her softened expression had his heart skipping a beat.  

Launchpad rubbed the back of his neck, chuckling softly.

“I’m happy to help. But to tell you the truth, I don’t think you need it. I know my opinion isn’t worth much, but I think you’re a pretty amazing leader, Ms. Chan. You don’t need me or S.H.U.S.H. to protect your city.”

Ziyi blinked, looking taken aback for a moment.

“No, your opinion isn’t worth anything to me,” she said, and Launchpad ducked his head with an embarrassed laugh.

“But,” she went on, tone gentling, “I do appreciate your intention. Thank you, Mr. McQuack.”

“You can call me Launchpad,” he blurted. “If—if you want.”

She smiled, reaching out into the space between them with an open palm.

“Then you may call me Ziyi,” she replied, as Launchpad shook her hand.

There was the sound of a scuffle below, and they parted in a flash to peer over the roof’s edge.

“Is it one of the families?” Launchpad asked, but even as he asked he knew that his guess was offbase. On the sidewalk there were three large men—two pandas and a toad—brutish and threatening in the way of street thugs, encroaching on an elderly goose.

“No,” Ziyi replied anyway, her voice coming out a hiss. She unsheathed the pair of dao at her hip, sinking into a crouch on the ledge. “Nor will I spare any mercy for them.”

She leapt off the roof silent as a breeze, landing among the thugs before they could even think to look up. Launchpad watched in awe as she pummeled a man three times her weight, her smile luminous in the light of the moon.

Determined not to let her have all the fun, Launchpad jumped into the fray.

Four months went by in a blur, and Launchpad couldn’t remember a time he’d been happier.

Sure there was almost-daily peril, crime lords to hunt down and paperwork to fill out, but there was also Ziyi, and the rest of clan Mazu for him to meet, once he was considered trustworthy enough.

And there was Ziyi.

He loved S.H.U.S.H., but it was a solitary job. Partners came and went, missions were long and sporadic, and he was constantly moving. To be a S.H.U.S.H. agent was to be alone in the middle of the most bustling cities in the world, always other, always apart. Ironically, it was on his first solo mission that he would enjoy genuine company for the first time in recent memory.

Mazu welcomed him with open arms once he had Ziyi’s approval, and it was like joining fifteen huge new families, if all families had members with combat and weapons training. In between stakeouts and stings and planned assaults on the compounds of Macaw’s crime families, he was invited to loud, grand dinners where he amused children and grandparents alike by trying any and everything they put on his plate. He was allowed to sit in on training sessions and eventually join them, and Ziyi took advantage by flipping him onto his back and pinning him to the mat at least a dozen times before he learned how to counter her.

Launchpad hadn’t been in a serious relationship for some time, his globetrotting making it difficult to get to know anyone before he had to leave again. But he had that time now with Ziyi, to make it meaningful, to make it matter. So he told her about his family, a million miles away, who he hadn’t seen in two years. She told him about how she felt daunted by the legacy she had to match, her mother whose position in the clan she now occupied. They exchanged kisses in empty rooms and did more than kiss in her quarters, and they watched each other's backs whenever they went out.

When four months had gone by and the criminal empires had been sufficiently dismantled and S.H.U.S.H. called him away, he saw no reason why their relationship couldn’t continue.

But as they stood on the same tarmac they had met, Ziyi cupped his face between her hands, standing on her toes to reach him, her expression somber but resolute.

“I care for you deeply, Launchpad,” she said, “but our relationship must end here. For both of our sakes.”

His heart sunk in his chest like a lead balloon, landing heavily in his gut.

“I—I don’t understand,” he said, reaching up to cradle one of her hands against his cheek. “If you still lo—like me, we can’t we try long distance?”

Ziyi lowered her hand from his cheek, taking his hand with her.

“It wouldn’t be fair to either of us,” she answered softly. “You are an agent for an international intelligence agency. A spy constantly moving from one mission to the next. I need stability from my partners, to know that I always have them at my back. You need someone who will wait for you. And I hope you find them.”

She lifted Launchpad’s hand to her beak, kissing his knuckles chastely.

“Go in peace, Double-O-Duck. And know that the friendship of Mazu goes with you.”

Reluctantly, and though it pained him to do it, Launchpad let go of her hand.

“Hey, if those crime families give you any more trouble, at least you know not to ask for Blunt’s help,” he joked weakly as he took a step back toward the plane.

“Should we need it, we know which S.H.U.S.H. agent to call for aid,” Ziyi replied warmly.

“Always,” Launchpad said, pretending he didn’t feel cut off and adrift.

He turned and boarded the plane he’d been repairing, on and off, for the last four months. The pride he’d enjoyed at his handiwork felt foolish and insipid now, as his eyes burned with tears he didn’t shed. He waved goodbye from the cockpit as he took off, and continued waving for a minute more.

It was going to be a long, lonely flight back to London.

Almost the minute he arrived back at headquarters he was shipped off to Birdbados to investigate whether a chemical company was dumping toxins into the locals’ drinking water.

Then he and a team were to establish peaceful relations with the underwater city of Nautilus that only S.H.U.S.H. and a few world governments were apprised of the existence of. Princess Oceanika took a liking to him, and he to her, which had the added bonus of smoothing out tensions between the land and ocean dwelling nations. There were some concerns about her trying to drown Launchpad when he had to leave, but she let him go with a kiss on the cheek and a promise that he would always be her love, even as their lives parted like the great ocean currents.

From there he was sent to ensure the success of an uprising in Panama among two rival alphas in a werewolf pack. S.H.U.S.H. needed to maintain amiable relations with the supernatural entities in South America and as the current alpha, Caesar Draven enacted a mission of terror that had essentially cut S.H.U.S.H. off from all of them. But reports described how he led even his own pack with a heavy hand, and that one Ralphina Lupe had risen to challenge him. 

Launchpad’s assignment was technically to observe, but interfere if he deemed it necessary. He found quickly that his presence hadn’t been required at all, as Lupe became alpha with little trouble once Draven realized the entire pack was against him. 

But in the few weeks he spent with them he grew close with one of the pack members, a wereduck named Arche Monde. They went hiking and camping together and laid down on a blanket far from the lights of any city and they pointed out to Launchpad all the constellations he hadn’t thought about since his mother had last taken him stargazing as a child.

When his assignment was up he and Arche parted ways amicably, though he felt no less bereft.

In all, it was another six months before he was able to return to his rarely-used quarters at S.H.U.S.H. London, after almost a year of only the most minimal communication with headquarters. Which meant that he wouldn’t learn that Beakley had left S.H.U.S.H. until four months after the fact.

2009

Launchpad had never been to Calisota before, not even for a mission. He never thought he’d be there scant days before the end of Hanukkah, his parents’ card and gift sitting cold in the dummy P.O. Box he’d given them.

It was a grim revelation to come to when standing alone in the frigid cold on the other side of the country, but he actually could have gone home for the holidays this year, what with the month-long reprieve he’d been given. Well, home had little meaning now, but he had the chance to go to the old farmhouse, to stand in the kitchen made warm by the oven and surrounded by the smell of cranberry and frying latkes.

His first December at S.H.U.S.H. he’d been locked in training, inescapable and exciting at the time. The second he’d spent in a Thrushian gulag, which while inescapable he wouldn’t exactly call exciting. He was battling his own clone the third year, then teaching him that he was his own person, and then helping him get instituted in S.H.U.S.H. as Bruno von Beak.

This was the fourth year, and he’d given his parents his usual excuse about work getting in the way before he’d even stopped to think about it. He could call them right now, tell them his schedule had cleared, that he could be there in five hours, six tops, and to not light the last candle on the menorah until he got there.

Launchpad cupped his gloves hands over his beak, exhaling deeply in an attempt to warm his face.

Or maybe...maybe it would be best if he didn’t go. He would have to lie, more than he was already doing. Lie about his job, exactly what it was he did. Lie about being happy. He wasn’t the same kid they remembered, and he didn’t know what to do with that knowledge beside let the truth of it bounce around his head.

Launchpad glanced around the park, looking for any sign of life.

He’d followed the directions on his phone to one Coot Park, and it was a veritable ocean of white to rival the opaque sky. The trees were sparse and spindly, black stick figures against a pure white sheet. The paths hadn’t been swept, and Launchpad had found himself knee deep in snow more often than not.

A glance at his watch told him he’d been waiting half an hour. He sighed, kicking at a nearby pile of snow and nearly slipping on some ice from his troubles. Once he’d regained his balance he stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jacket, hunching his shoulders as he made to brave the walk back to his car.

“I didn’t think you’d come.”

Launchpad whirled around, easily sinking into a defensive pose. But he forgot about the ice and his leg flew out from under him, sending him flailing backward in a small explosion of snow.

Beakley walked over to him while he lay in the snow, her dry expression amused and familiar. From upside down he took in her visage for the first time in a year. What he first noted was how tired she looked. Her usually tight bun actually held a few loose strands, and the bags under her eyes were so dark they were nearly purple.

“Does this count as a crash?” she asked, voice wry.

“Y’know, I’m not sure,” Launchpad replied. “I’ve never crashed a me before.”

She offered her gloved hand for him to take, and he accepted the help gratefully.

“And of course I came,” he said, standing clumsily and brushing the snow off his clothes. 

“I had no idea what happened to you! I went to ask J. Gander if he knew whether you were still down for our yearly Yay We’re All Still Alive poker game when he told me you’d left S.H.U.S.H.! And that’s all he would tell me! I didn’t even know you could leave S.H.U.S.H.”

“I would have told you sooner, but you were on assignment,” she explained, wiping away the snow he’d missed on the back of his jacket. “And for a while, well...I wasn’t sure who I could trust.”

Launchpad looked at her with wide eyes. “Beakley, why did you leave S.H.U.S.H.?”

She scowled, folding her arms over her chest. Looking out over the flat, white expanse of the park she said, “A number of reasons. My cover was blown, for one. And I had a...family dilemma to attend to.”

“Your cover was... how?” he said, gobsmacked. His breath clouded in the air and he couldn’t help but stare. Beakley was the most fastidious agent he knew, the most experienced, the most powerful, the most anything. If someone like her could have her cover blown, what did it mean for the rest of them?

Beakley shook her head once, a sharp, furious movement.

“We suspect Falcon Graves is the one behind it. For years he’s been selling S.H.U.S.H. secrets to the highest bidder. He went underground five months ago, and we’ve yet to dig him up.”

“Graves?” Launchpad said, the cold air seeping into his bones, encasing his heart and lungs and making it difficult to breathe. “Beakley, he knows me. My family, they could be in danger—”

She grabbed him by the shoulder, her grip firm and grounding.

“Your family is safe, Launchpad, I promise you that,” she said fiercely. “There is nothing connecting Launchpad McQuack to the Flying McQuacks aside from the coincidence of a shared last name. I made sure of it.”

He took a deep breath, pressing a hand against his forehead.

“Right,” he muttered, “right. But, Mrs. B, what’re you gonna do now?”

Beakley smiled, and the tension in her features softened. “Don’t you go worrying about me, Double-O-Duck. I’ve found a place for myself, rest assured.”

Launchpad breathed a sigh of relief, meeting her smile with one of his own.

“That’s good to hear,” he said. Before he could talk himself out of it, he stepped forward and engulfed Beakley in a hug. He felt her muscles bunch in anticipation of an attack, but luckily she didn’t immediately punch him. Rather, he felt her hands settle hesitantly on his back, a tentative pressure.

“Launchpad,” she began quietly, “are you alright?”

He laughed once, a hoarser sound than he’d intended.

“Sure I’m alright,” he replied, already letting her go. “Just wanted to get a quick hug in, just in case I don’t see you for another year.”

“Now you’re just being dramatic,” she said snippily, but a smile tempered the heat in her words.

She was right, of course. In reality, he wouldn’t see her for three years.

2011

Launchpad wasn’t sure what data Dr. Bellum’s machines were collecting, but he’d long since learned he was better off not asking.

Instead, he sat patiently in her lab despite the dozen electrodes stuck to his face and head, while she stared intently at the readout on the computer beside him. It was the third time Bellum had made him sit through this procedure after a run-in with Major Synapse, each time more convinced than the last that he would come out of the encounter with psychic powers.

She’d already ran him through a series of tests, lighting a match with his mind, making a balloon levitate, even basic mind reading, and he failed them all just like the first two times. Bellum had looked so disappointed he was starting to think she actually wanted him to be psychic.

He’d almost be worried about her building some sort of ray gun to give him powers, but J. Gander had banned her from experimenting on agents after the incident with the pie bazooka.

“Alright, that’s enough for today,” Dr. Bellum said sourly, pushing her chair away from the desk. She began plucking the electrodes off of him before he could attempt to do it himself, slapping his hand away when he tried to help.

“Sorry I don’t have superpowers, Doc,” Launchpad said, smiling wryly.

Dr. Bellum rolled her eyes.

“Yet,” she corrected, “it’s always a matter of time with you field agents.”

She yanked the last electrode off his temple, taking at least a few feathers with it. Before he could make a big deal by wincing about it for too long, she’d pulled a lollipop out of her desk drawer.

“Your payment,” she said, offering it to him. “I know you’re on medical leave right now, so I appreciate you still coming in.”

Her gaze drifted down to his right arm, bandaged and resting in a sling after he dislocated his shoulder getting thrown off a catwalk on his last mission. Not minding her pointed gaze, Launchpad eagerly took the lollipop, unwrapping it immediately.

“Aw, it’s no problem, Dr. Bellum,” he said, talking around the lollipop in his bill, “always happy to help.”

“I know you are,” she said, slowly at first, “which is why I have a favor to ask.”

“I’m not telling you what the agents are saying behind your back again,” Launchpad replied at once, pointing at her with his lollipop. “It only made you want to enact grim vengeance on them, which is against S.H.U.S.H. protocol.”

“It’s not that,” Dr. Bellum said dismissively, “although, thank you for reminding me to listen to the recording devices I’ve hidden around the building. No, an old colleague from WIT reached out to me. He’s in the field of aeronautics looking for input on some top-secret super jet he’s building or something. He can’t go to his own colleagues because of the sensitive nature of his work, and aeronautics were never my thing. But you know planes better than anyone I know, and work for an agency that doesn’t technically exist, so I was wondering if you’d go in my place.”

Launchpad shrugged, smiling.

“Sure, I’ll go. Between a school of smarty-pants and Gryzlikoff making me do my paperwork, it’s no contest. But, uh,” he hesitated, rubbing the back of his neck, “you know that I’m not good with the...the technical stuff, right? Like, the math and science of it. I can take a plane apart and put it back together good as new, but I even have trouble remembering the names of things sometimes.”

Dr. Bellum waved a hand at him. “Oh no, the plane’s built already. Owlbrien is just paranoid and doesn’t want to show it to his investors until he’s a hundred percent sure on the design.”

Launchpad blinked. “I...okay!”

“So you’ll go? Because I already told him you’d be there at three tomorrow.”

He laughed.

“Yeah, I’ll be there, Doc.”

Launchpad had met his fair share of scientists, both mad and otherwise, since his tenure with S.H.U.S.H. began. Some of them thoughtlessly cruel, others with egos large enough to fill a room, they often followed a familiar format.

Miles Owlbrien was...not like any other scientist he’d met.

After following a series of superbly unhelpful directions from the receptionist at the entrance, Launchpad found himself in what he could only imagine was a laboratory based on the sheer volume of gadgetry he saw inside. He only need hover awkwardly in the doorway for a moment before a muffled explosion had him sinking into a fighter’s pose. 

He recounted the number of entrances and exits in the room, (the door at his back was a guaranteed exit, the closed door at the other end was an unknown as was the portion of the lab hidden behind a jutting wall) before an owl stumbled around the corner coughing, a cloud of smoke following him. His feathers and lab coat alike were blackened by smoke.

“Oh!” he said, blinking behind soot stained goggles that made his luminous amber eyes appear even larger. “You must be Sara B’s friend!”

Launchpad, frozen with his arms still halfway raised in front of him, responded with an intelligent, “Buh?”

“Sorry about all that,” the owl went on, gesturing behind him in an offhand way, “I’ve been having some trouble synthesizing more fuel. Something off with the last batch of sunflower oil, I think. But anyway, introductions!”

He stuck out his hand, his palm just as filthy as the rest of him, and grinned brightly.

“Miles Owlbrien,” he said, “I really appreciate you coming out to help me with this.”

Launchpad regained use of his limbs and moved to shake Miles’ hand.

“Launchpad McQuack,” he responded, a genuine smile tugging at his beak. “Happy to be here.”

Launchpad had been apart from the world for six years before he met Miles.

With S.H.U.S.H. he’d learned to count time as moving from one mission to the next, to travel the world and remain separate from it. Any moment he wasn’t on assignment he slept or trained or more rarely, called his parents. His friends were the similarly trapped, the ones with no other life to go back to.

But Miles was part of the world, and he beckoned Launchpad back into the light.

During the month of his medical leave, he and Miles tinkered on his super jet (McX, Launchpad, come on!), but Miles invited him out too.

They went to bars in downtown Boston, parks on brightly lit, sharply cold spring days. Launchpad wasn’t hunting a target or evading capture from Bosnian pirates, he wasn’t an observer or intruder. He was meant to be there, had every right to be, talking loudly with Miles about everyday inanity, like Launchpad forgetting a jacket for the third time in a row, or how Miles always without fail pronounced the “p” in the word receipt. It was perfectly normal for their hands to brush as they walked, for Launchpad to gather his courage and lace their fingers together. 

It was easy as breathing in fact, to enjoy the way Miles stuttered briefly, a blush glancing over the top of his high cheekbones, before he continued his rant about his dissatisfaction with the recent Mouse Wars movies and squeezed Launchpad’s hand.

They had their first kiss in the aisle of a supermarket, and the sheer normalcy of it near brought him to tears. It was early evening, and Miles had wanted to cook something in his apartment, so there they were, awash in fluorescent lights that made their feathers pale, standing by the spices. The only witnesses were the cumin and rosemary, but it wasn’t something to hide. It wasn’t sneaking around between strategy meetings or going behind the back of an irritable king. It was just them, two ordinary people, out in the world.

Launchpad dreaded the end of his medical leave, because even in so short a time he had learned to cherish the casual chatter, Miles’ arm around his waist. He’d spoken to his parents more in the last month than he had in the last year.

Even so, the day the sling came off for good Launchpad visited Miles for what he expected to be the last time.

“I’ll probably be leaving soon and with my job y’see, I don’t really know when I’ll be back,” he said clumsily, standing half under Miles’ umbrella on the sidewalk outside his apartment. Launchpad’s back and most of his right shoulder were gradually getting soaked through, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to accept the cover Miles was providing.

“I know how that sounds, believe me,” Launchpad rushed on, “but I didn’t want to leave without saying anything, or worse make you feel like you had to wait for me or something—”

“Do you want to try long distance?” Miles interrupted, his smile gentle, like a secret.

“Do I—” Launchpad stopped, gaping. “Do—do you want to?”

Miles chuckled, stepping closer to Launchpad so that he was more shielded by the umbrella.

“I’m the one who asked, aren’t I?” he responded wryly. “I figured, y��know, what with the whole spy thing.”

“Yeah,” Launchpad said, relieved. A beat later, he processed what was wrong with the rest of Miles’ statement. “Wait, you knew? For how long? How did you find out?”

Miles laughed again, so hard and for so long that he nearly lost his grip on his umbrella, sending the black canopy tilting  over their heads.

“Sara told me,” he replied, stepping closer to Launchpad. He laid a hand on Launchpad’s arm.

“She told you I was a spy?”

“No,” Miles said, grinning, “she told me she was a spy, almost the same day they recruited her. I was basically Sara’s only friend, and she had to brag about it to someone.”

Launchpad shook his head incredulously.

“I still can’t believe that you call her Sara,” he said, lowering his head so that the space between their beaks narrowed to inches. “I once saw her use a freeze ray on someone who forgot to use the ‘Doctor’ in her title.”

“I've known her since she had braces,” Miles replied, a little breathlessly. “I have unilateral rights on every piece of blackmail material she’s ever tried to hide. There’s a second grade performance of Swan Lake that I have video evidence of, if you want to see it.”

“Thanks,” Launchpad murmured, “but I’m pretty sure Dr. Bellum will be able to sense that we’re laughing at her and I don’t want to get stuck in a glacier a second time.”

“Big baby,” Miles said.

They kissed in the rain under Miles’ umbrella, shadowed and cool, as the storm continued to rage overhead.

Though they hesitated to put a name to their relationship, what with Launchpad’s job making it possible and even highly probable that he would have to fly off to parts unknown at a moment’s notice, Launchpad knew that above all else, Miles was a confidante.

They would talk whenever they could. Text messages and phone calls when Launchpad was on leave but Miles had a conference or a symposium to attend. Heavily encrypted messages in old chat rooms when Launchpad was on assignment and it wouldn’t blow his cover.

The messages were simple things, sometimes.

Man, if ten-year-old me could see this! Real DASA shuttles! Can you even imagine it, being up in space?

Eh, kinda overrated to be honest! And those spacesuits get really stuffy.

Do you think half a burrito counts as breakfast?

Drink some orange juice, Launchpad, eat a vegetable, I’m begging you

Other times...other times they were less simple.

I’m honestly terrified. The McX is my life’s work; I’ve put everything I have into building her. If the board rejects my proposal, I...I’ll be out of options. My funding will vanish. I think I’d have two months before I’m homeless.

I haven’t even been here for ten years. I feel like I’m complaining over nothing, like, there’s pros here who’ve been agents for twenty, thirty years. And this is their life; they eat, sleep and breathe S.H—spy stuff. They’ll die agents. But I can barely imagine another month of this. I’m… I wake up tired, every day. And every day I force myself to keep going but I feel like I lost it, the thing that makes me look forward to waking up.

And then there were times when the messages were simplicity itself.

I miss you.

I can’t wait to see you again.

2012

Launchpad’s latest mission had him going deep undercover for six months with a band of sky pirates, meaning he had to go completely radio silent with S.H.U.S.H. and with Miles.

He usually hated undercover assignments, hated lying, but this time he found himself too tired for that. The days with the sky pirates bled too easily into weeks, until the six months were passing by in a mire of choreographed music numbers and elaborate midair thievery that seemed endless. Throughout, he donned the jaunty pirate persona he’d built for himself like one did an elaborate costume, a mask shaped like his own face. It never slipped, not even once, and the mask he wore befriended countless of the pirates, while the agent beneath plotted how to betray every each one of them. 

As the solitude stretched on Launchpad felt a part of himself crack beneath the mask.

Returning to cold, gray London felt like a slap to the face. He’d gotten used to sleeping in a room beside the airship’s boiler room, bunking with two other pirates. The creaks and groans of a ship in motion had lulled him to sleep. By comparison, London was either too loud or not loud enough.

He showered, got a hair cut, and put on a new suit. He checked the encrypted line he used to communicate with Miles before he went into his debriefing.

There were a handful of messages, all of them a few months old, wishing you luck and I know you won’t see this for ages, I wanted to tell you that my investors accepted my proposal! The McX is officially in development!

It was evening by the time he was released from his debrief with J. Gander and the other S.H.U.S.H. department heads. It was exhausting work, recounting six months worth of supply routes, drop off locations, hierarchy structure. Going so deeply undercover had its caveats, and guilt gnawed at his stomach as he recounted all of the pirates’ secrets when a part of him had thought of them as friends.

He was ready to sleep for a week by the time it was over, and trudged to his quarters accordingly. He was so tired, in fact, that he almost didn’t notice Dr. Bellum standing outside his door until he nearly ran into her. He’d never known her not to simply barge into his room when she wanted something, nevermind his vocal protests.

“Launchpad,” she exclaimed, clutching her hands in front of her in a gesture of nervousness he’d never seen from her. “You’re—you’re back.”

“Yeah,” he replied tiredly, sparing her a smile, “just this morning. What were you doing outside my room if you didn’t know I was back?”

She squeezed her hands together until her knuckles jutted out from beneath her brown feathers.

“I wasn’t...I didn’t know if you knew,” she said stiffly. Her gaze didn’t stray from a spot on the wall somewhere over his left shoulder. “I didn’t know if I wanted to be the one to tell you.”

“Tell me what?” Launchpad asked slowly, but he could already feel a familiar dread settling over him like a shroud. He forced himself to joke, to ease his nerves if nothing else. “If you’re gonna tell me I actually do have psychic powers your diagnosis is coming in a little late, Doc.”

“Launchpad,” she started to say, voice sharp, but she looked away and exhaled sharply through her nose. Her expression was carefully controlled

He hesitated, the dread solidifying, a boulder pressing down on his ribs.

“What is it, Sa—”

“There was an accident,” she said, not looking at him. Launchpad wasn’t even sure if she was breathing. “Miles was driving home after a shareholders meeting.”

“What happened?”

The words tripped off his tongue, but he didn’t remember uttering them. He felt very far away suddenly, like he was a passerby, an observer floating above the conversation, above the hallway, above S.H.U.S.H. headquarters.

“Someone, some kid, they ran the light when Miles was crossing an intersection,” Dr. Bellum said, almost matter-of-fact if it weren’t for the sheen in her eyes. “They ran it at a high speed.”

“Sara, is he alright?” he said, numbness overtaking him.

“No. No he’s not.”

It was late at night when he crashed his plane on the front lawn.

The old farmhouse before him was a thing of beauty, even in the dark. Newly painted, with accents of board and batten siding, metal roofing and decorative wood trim adorning it, all of the changes they had talked about for years but never had the time or money to see through. It was Launchpad’s first time visiting since the renovations he’d paid for took place.

As he stumbled out of the wreckage, the porchlight turned on.

Over the ringing in his ears he didn’t hear the front door open, but a woman’s voice pierced through, clear as a bell.

“—aunchpad? Launchpad! Ripcord, it’s Launchpad!”

His vision swam, dark and light and the red of his mother’s graying hair, her baby blue robe, blending together like a reflection in water. She was clutching his hands, squeezing his arm, and though his mind was muddied and muddled, learned instinct had him lowering his head so she could brush the hair out of his eyes, pressing her palm to his forehead.

“Talk to me, sweetheart,” Birdie was saying gently, “What’s wrong?”

His throat felt thick, like it was stuck shut. When he reached up to clutch at his mother’s hand he brushed against the wetness on his cheek and realized that he was crying. He couldn’t remember when he’d started.

Another presence, broader and just as reassuring, appeared at Birdie’s back. A hand on Launchpad’s shoulder, supporting him.

“Take a breath, son,” came Ripcord’s rough timbre, “We’re here. You’re home.”

The farmhouse hadn’t been home since he was eighteen years old and the rest of the world fell away in exchange for one he thought to be grander. He was struck then by all the time he had lost; his parents looked old in a way he’d never known, their hair more gray than not, lines and wrinkles on their faces that hadn’t been there before.

His knees gave out and his mother and father followed him down to the damp grass.

“Two months,” he said, in between long, rattling breaths that made his body shake and his eyes burn with tears, “I was two months late. If—if I’d come back sooner, if I’d never left, w-we could’ve had more time.”

Birdie carded her hand through his hair, cradling his cheek with the other.

“Oh, sweetheart,” she murmured, her voice breaking. “Sweetheart, I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head, clenching his eyes shut.

“I barely knew him but he stayed. He stayed, Ma. I always have to leave but he was the first one who waited for me to come back.”

Launchpad pressed his hand over his eyes, hunching over, as if he could will himself out of existence by making himself smaller. Ripcord’s arms were wrapped around him and Birdie both, rubbing Launchpad’s back like he used to do when Launchpad was little.

His tears growing cold on his cheeks, Launchpad exhaled tremulously.

“I’m tired,” he muttered, “I think...I think I’ve been tired for a long time.”

“Then rest,” Ripcord murmured, “you’ve earned it, kid. You can rest now.”

In the span of a single evening, Double-O-Duck’s seven year tenure as an agent of S.H.U.S.H. came to an end. Launchpad McQuack was left to pick up the pieces.

2013

Beakley didn’t like him living so close to St. Canard.

“That city is a den of hoodlums and mad men,” she said, on one of her oddly frequent phone calls. “Hardly the place for someone looking to start a new life.”

“And here I assumed you’d think I’d fit right in,” he replied, and had been rewarded by one of her exasperated sighs, the sort that said she would snap him in two over her knee if they weren’t friends.

“At the very least, please tell me you’re reading through those briefing packets I’ve been sending you,” she said.

“You know me too well,” he said with a dramatic sigh. He’d been thumbing through it before she even called, out of habit of nothing else. “Killer clowns, renegade mole people, and talking shrubs. Even without S.H.U.S.H. I still find the crazy, huh?”

“Except this time you won’t be fighting them,” Beakly replied, almost stiffly, the way she usually did whenever the agency was brought up. Not a moment later she would be asking him what he thought about that museum break in, what was the world coming to, and wouldn’t he like to move somewhere calmer, like Duckburg?

“Ever since, well. Since Mr. McDuck retired from adventuring, it’s been much quieter than it used to be. The perfect place to settle down,” she said carefully.

“You know...the position is still available, should you change your mind. Under any other circumstances, being Scrooge McDuck’s driver would be one of the most dangerous jobs on Earth, but that’s no longer the case. Your safety would never be called into question, though I can’t say the same for your actual driving.”

Each time Launchpad turned her down, he wondered when Beakley would stop feeling so guilty. Guilty for the part she played in getting him to join S.H.U.S.H. in the first place, the constant danger it put him in.

At the same time, he understood her reasoning, considering she went well out of her way to find him after he phoned J. Gander in a grief blind daze to inform him that he was resigning, effective immediately, and would be at the New York office within the day to fill out the necessary paperwork. Beakley found him in the same place she found him the first time, in his family’s hangar. He was curled up in the front seat of his vintage Joyrider, abandoned for years but carefully tended by his sister, blank-faced and silent.

Beakley didn’t accompany him to New York but she was there he got back, rumpled and drained. She’d broken into his parents' home while they were away, and he found her waiting for him at the kitchen table with a bottle of scotch whisky and two glasses.

“To your health,” she said. “And to Miles Owlbrien,” she continued, raising her glass, “by all accounts, an exemplary young man.”

They drank, and it burned all the way down, warming Launchpad for the first time in days.

Beakley then told him everything she’d kept secret from him since her career with S.H.U.S.H. came to an abrupt end. The deaths of her daughter and son-in-law, being entrusted with the care of her granddaughter, and now working as housekeeper/bodyguard for the richest duck in the world.

Launchpad chuckled weakly. “So those were McDuck Christmas parties. You’ve been holding out on me, B.”

“Picking up the threads of an old life can be difficult enough, but you never had the chance to even start one,” she said seriously. “Whatever it is you decide to do, I’ll be there to help.”

And she was, at every turn. When Launchpad left his parents’ house, despite their protests, she offered him a plethora of living and employment opportunities: as a delivery pilot in Cape Suzette, self-defense instructor in Mouseton, chauffeur in Duckburg. All of them safe, stable jobs where the only threat to his person would be his own driving skills.

But it wasn’t danger that he dreaded, like Beakley seemed to think. Danger was an old friend since he crashed his high chair trying to fly like his parents. He’d known it crashing his first biplane into the neighbor’s barn when he was fifteen, knew it long before he knew of the existence of S.H.U.S.H.

What he feared was a life of loneliness, of dissatisfaction and solitude. He feared living a life without ever really living. S.H.U.S.H. provided all the adventure he had ever dreamed of, all the danger he could ever want, but as his years with the agency grew longer he began to suspect that the price he paid for a life of danger had been too steep. 

He thought of his parents, stunt pilots for all their lives, keeping copious friends, still settling down and starting a family that they loved. He wondered why he couldn’t have that too.

So he took exactly none of Beakley’s suggestions and bought an old plane hangar on the outskirts of St. Canard, because nothing screamed danger quite like the most crime-riddled city in the country.

There he opened a garage and repaired vehicles of all kinds, charging next to nothing, even for those he had no experience with. He only needed to get a look at the inner workings of something once before he knew how to repair it, something that the nearby farms, with their tractors and millers, greatly appreciated. He had high profile customers too, snappily dressed men and women in limousines and Thunderclutch sports cars, who he was certain Beakley had sent to check up on him out here in the boonies.

The months he spent there were monotonous, but ultimately good for him. The ache of loneliness was tamped down by weekly calls with his parents, ambush communications with Beakley on random days of the week. He was slowly but surely coming back to himself, becoming one with the world he had so long stood apart from.

And then Darkwing Duck came crashing through his ceiling one night.

Launchpad wouldn’t have known Darkwing Duck really existed if it weren’t for the reports Beakley sent him. The vigilante was little more than a myth in the news, a ghost story, and most media outlets weren’t sure if he was one person or multiple people, if he was even real. But nearly every S.H.U.S.H. crime report he read cited Darkwing Duck as the one stopping the litany of petty thievery and insane supervillainy that plagued St. Canard. For all intents and purposes, he was a real-life superhero, the first Launchpad had ever heard of.

On long, lonely nights when the darkness outside seemed vast and sleep proved elusive, he wondered about the life of a vigilante.

He wondered about Darkwing Duck, responsible for putting away countless crooks, but at the same time always knowing that they were but a drop in the ocean that was city’s criminal cesspool. He wondered what kind of tenacity, or insanity, had someone going out night after night for what many would call a zero sum game.

And then he met Darkwing Duck, and didn’t have to wonder anymore.

Launchpad knew that his punches packed a wallop—many a night watchman had been felled after a single hit—but Darkwing rolled with his swing, minimizing the damage, all while frantically waving his arms and insisting that he was a good guy. The battle haze Launchpad had fallen into when he thought he was being attacked began to lift, and he hesitated midswing.

Darkwing reacted then, moving faster than Launchpad could’ve expected, and knocked his feet out from under him. Launchpad hit the ground hard, seeing stars, and opened his eyes to Darkwing pinning him down with a knee in his gut and his gas gun in his face.

“I’m a good guy, all right?” Darkwing said, panting. “We don’t have to fight. Unless you’re actually a bad guy, in which case I rescind my previous statement.”

“No argument here,” Launchpad wheezed, as he slowly raised his arms over his head.

Darkwing got off of him, stowing his gas gun before offering him a hand up.

“Sorry about tackling you and all that, Darkwing,” Launchpad said, chuckling weakly, “You just surprised me.”

Darkwing grimaced, casting a glance around his dingy hangar.

“Well, I didn’t exactly mean to drop in unannounced—wait a minute.” He whirled back to face Launchpad, expression agog. “You know who I am?”

“Uh,” Launchpad replied, his mind going blank. “Yeah. I’m—I’m a fan.”

“I didn’t know I had fans,” Darkwing muttered under his breath.

“Well I—I’d heard rumors about a superhero, I just never expected to actually see you, especially not all the way out here,” Launchpad said quickly. “What are you even doing all the way out here?”

Darkwing’s stunned expression morphed into one of profound annoyance. “That’s classified. But let’s just say a very evil man is going to keep doing very evil things because I let his goons get away with the theft of something that will make it that much easier for him to keep doing those evil things.”

Launchpad wondered if he should give J. Gander a call. Certainly he’d appreciate the heads up?

“Do you need a ride?” Launchpad offered, rubbing the back of his neck. “Maybe you can still catch them?”

Darkwing started to shake his head.

“No, I don’t think that’ll do any—wait a minute.” He looked around wildly, taking in the high ceiling with the Darkwing Duck shaped hole in it and the biplane Launchpad was standing in front of.

“Is this a plane hangar?” he asked, so incredulous he was almost on the brink of laughter, “Are you a pilot?”

Something Launchpad hadn’t felt in years took root in his chest, making his heart beat double time and send sparks trailing down his fingertips. It felt like bad luck to name it, but then again he’d almost forgotten what excitement felt like; how he used to look forward to every adventure.  

He grinned, and it felt like he was standing on a precipice, unafraid of all that awaited him in the unknown below.

“You bet,” he replied, meeting Darkwing’s gaze with a raised eyebrow. “Still wanna say no to that ride?”

After their failed attempt at getting the Ramrod back on that first night, thwarted by Tantalus, Bulba’s robotic condor drone, Darkwing had been prepared for them to go their separate ways.

But Launchpad, who hadn’t felt such a sense of purpose in years, who found he liked being around Darkwing, was quick to offer an alternative solution.

“Thank you for your help, uh, citizen,” Darkwing was saying, cape singed from their unexpected crash, and speaking in a faltering, self-important voice, “and sorry about your plane. But Darkwing Duck can take it from here!”

“It’s Launchpad,” Launchpad replied cheerily, wading out of the wreckage. “And not without a plane, you can’t.”

Darkwing sputtered. “Excuse me?”

Launchpad pointed heavenward at the faint trail of smoke the rocket attached to the train car had left behind.

“I’m guessing you’re used to fighting guys who stick close to the ground. We barely caught up with them in my old Joyrider, but if you had a jet we might be telling a different story.”

“And I suppose you’ve got a spare jet in your pocket?” Darkwing demanded, arms akimbo.

Launchpad laughed. “Course not. Shrinking tech is notoriously unreliable. I’d build you one.”

Darkwing blinked at him.

“Did you say you can build a jet?”

“Sure did!” Launchpad replied, picking up the Joyrider’s propeller to scrutinize. “It’ll take me a little less than...two weeks? Yeah, two weeks. And I can be your pilot!” he cleared his throat, giving the propeller more attention than it deserved. “If you don’t already have someone in mind, of course.”

Darkwing stepped in front of him, and Launchpad lowered the propeller to meet his gaze.

“Why do you want to help me?” Darkwing asked, features almost grave and tone uncompromising. “Who even are you?”

Launchpad smiled faintly.

“I’m Launchpad McQuack,” he said, “I’m a pilot. And I’ve been sort of...lost, for a while. I kind of had to reinvent myself, y’know, and I’m still trying to figure out who I am. But one thing I know is that I want to help people. I want to help you help people. Does that make sense?”

“Not really,” Darkwing replied guardedly, “And while I’m pretty sure you’re not a spy sent by Bulba to thwart my mission, Darkwing Duck still works alone.”

“Just give me two weeks,” Launchpad insisted, tossing the propeller over his shoulder. “I’ll have your plane built and you can make your final decision then.”

Darkwing considered him for a long moment. In the empty fields around them, crickets sang and a gentle breeze wafted the smoke from the crashed Joyrider over their heads, veiling the stars.

“Fine,” he eventually said, “two weeks.”

“Holy crow,” was the first thing out of Darkwing’s beak when he laid eyes on the Thunderquack, hovering beside the rooftop he was standing on. “You weren’t kidding when you said you could build a plane.”

Launchpad chuckled from within the open cockpit. “Little known fact about me, I’m a terrible liar,” he said. “Wanna take it for a spin?”

“Definitely!” Darkwing said at once, grinning almost boyishly. Launchpad’s heart gave a funny skip at the sight. But then Darkwing flushed slightly under his mask, seeming to reign in his enthusiasm as he clambered inside the Thunderquack. “I mean, that—that sounds good, Launchpad.”

“Welcome aboard, DW,” Launchpad said, clearing his throat dramatically once Darkwing was seated and he’d sealed the cockpit again. “This is your captain speaking! Please fasten your seatbelts, stow your tray tables, put away all electronic devices, and hold on tight!”

“That’s Darkwiiiiiinnggg!” he retorted as Launchpad gunned the engine, sending the previously motionless Thunderquack careening through the air at bruising speed.

Darkwing Duck’s hideout was a fascinating sight to behold, cavernous and dark and perfectly poised in one of the towers of the Audubon Bay Bridge.

Launchpad had been here dozens of times since his and Darkwing’s partnership began, doing maintenance on the Thunderquack or the Ratcatcher in between nightly patrols of the city. It wasn’t the sort of work Launchpad was used to, but it was fulfilling in a way he’d never known. Whether he was helping a lost child find their parents or busting a drug ring, the sense of accomplishment was the same. He’d almost never done such direct good as an agent of S.H.U.S.H., and he found he liked it.

The company certainly helped.

Darkwing was quite unlike anyone else he’d ever met, and that was saying something. Acerbic and sardonic one moment, enthusiastic and bright the next, he was a mosaic of complicated emotion and expert martial arts. Launchpad was quick to consider him a friend, and while he wasn’t sure if Darkwing shared the feeling, he found he didn’t mind. He was used to the one-sidedness of his relationships, the brevity of them. It was only a matter of time before Darkwing told him it was time to move on, thanked him for his help (if he was lucky) and for the plane. So he resolved to just enjoy his time shadowing Darkwing Duck for however long it lasted.

But not every night of daring heroics ended in celebratory breakfast, especially when Darkwing made a point of trying to hide his more grievous injuries.

“Alright, DW, easy does it,” Launchpad said, helping Darkwing into the padded chair in front of the crime analysis computer.

Darkwing was bleeding heavily from a cut above his temple that probably looked worse than it was, but Launchpad hadn’t even realized he was hurt until they got to the Tower and he nearly face planted trying to climb out of the Thunderquack. He’d been hiding the wound under his hat, and now it weeped steadily, staining his mask and the feathers of his temple and cheek crimson.

If that had been the worst of it, Launchpad wouldn’t have been too worried. But on top of the head wound Darkwing almost certainly had a concussion based on the way he couldn’t stand without swaying, kept his eyes closed against the already muted lights of the Tower, and when Launchpad asked him what day it was, he rattled off last month’s date.

Launchpad dropped the industrial sized first aid kit on the counter beside him and fished out a water bottle. He rinsed the area around the wound, scrubbing away at the dried blood so he could see the extent of the injury. Once that was done the cut still bled sluggishly, so he reached for a packaged piece of sterile gauze. He pressed it tightly against the cut to stop the bleeding, and almost without thinking rubbed Darkwing’s temple with his thumb in what he hoped was a soothing gesture.

Darkwing was almost alarmingly silent the entire time, sitting with his eyes clenched tightly shut, and Launchpad’s gut churned worriedly. Usually it was a struggle to get Darkwing to accept any sort of first aid, so this utter compliance was more than a little unnerving. Keeping one hand pressing the gauze to Darkwing’s forehead, Launchpad grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him as gently as he was able.

“Need you to stay awake, bud. Sorry I gotta do this again, I promise I know who you are—do you know what your name is?”

Darkwing grumbled a series of sounds that might’ve started out as words but ended up as a jumble of consonants. He opened his eyes to slits, glaring at Launchpad and his general surroundings, though Launchpad wondered how much he could actually see.

“Drake Mallard,” Darkwing eventually muttered, and Launchpad’s heart near stopped in his chest.

“Alright, buddy,” Launchpad murmured, squeezing Darkwing’s shoulder. “I’ll pretend I never heard that. Do you know where you are?”

“The Tower. And I’m not delirious, LP,” Darkwing muttered, making Launchpad jump, both at the nickname and his mental clarity. He opened his eyes again, so narrowly they might as well have been closed. “You can’t tell me you haven’t wondered who’s stupid enough to put on a mask and a cape and fight crime in the most crime-infested city in the country.”

“Darkwing Duck isn’t stupid,” Launchpad said firmly, “it’s admirable, what you’re doing. It matters.”

Darkwing rolled his eyes. “Yeah well, becoming Darkwing is probably the first worthwhile thing I ever did with my life. I’m not exactly a popular guy, if you couldn’t tell.”

Launchpad had guessed from their first meeting that Darkwing Duck lived a solitary lifestyle, that perhaps Darkwing Duck was all he was, with no life outside of the mask. The Tower’s fully stocked kitchen, sparse bedroom, and washer and dryer in a tucked away corner spoke to that, the lack of a life apart from the job, the persona, not unlike how Double-O-Duck had threatened to subsume Launchpad McQuack over the years.

“I lied, before,” Darkwing said. “When we first met. I know what it’s like to be lost. To have to reinvent yourself. I didn’t want to be Drake Mallard, so I became Darkwing Duck instead. Not that it’s done me any good.”

Launchpad dragged another chair over with his foot and sat down across from Darkwing. He kept the gauze pressed firmly against his wound all the while.

“What was so wrong about Drake Mallard?” he asked curiously.

Darkwing closed his eyes with a sigh.

“Oh, the usual. I was the classic dweeby kid turned dweeby theater kid. I got beat up a lot, but not until after I transitioned so I guess you gotta hand it to them for their commitment to gender stereotypes. Let’s see, parents kicked me out when I was eighteen but jokes on them ‘cause I was planning on leaving anyway so it doesn’t count. You know what, I didn’t mean to say all of that. I might actually be delirious.”

Launchpad rubbed Drake’s temple with the pad of him thumb and tamped down the urge to hold his hand, sitting limply in his lap.

“You definitely have a concussion. And I’m sorry that happened to you,” he said sincerely, “but none of that tells me why Drake Mallard is any less worthwhile than Darkwing Duck.”

Darkwing opened his eyes so he could scowl at Launchpad.

“Don’t you get it?” he demanded. “Drake Mallard was—I was a loser. I wasn’t the guy anyone stuck around for, I was the one they told to get lost. It’s only a matter of time before you decide to leave too.”

He groaned, letting his head fall back against the headrest, and it was everything Launchpad could do to keep holding the gauze against his head.

“Forget I said that, too,” Darkwing grumbled.

But hope and understanding were ballooning beneath Launchpad’s breastbone, and he smiled warmly.

“I’m not going anywhere, DW,” Launchpad said seriously. He gave into the urge and reached out to take his hand, squeezing tightly. “I promise, Drake. I won’t leave until you tell me to.”

Drake grumbled, but beneath his mask a pleased flush spread across his face.

“Like that’ll ever happen,” he muttered gruffly, and Launchpad had to blink back tears.

He looked away, giving the computer banks more attention than they deserved in the hopes of gaining mastery of his emotions. There are still five minutes left on the gauze he was holding to Drake’s wound before they could start icing it.

In an attempt to distract himself from the deluge of emotions, Launchpad fished for something to say. He glanced over at the rows of advanced computers again, as well as the forensic lab around the corner.

“By the way, DW,” he began, “I’ve been wondering, how do you even afford all this stuff? Is Drake Mallard a millionaire or something?”

Drake barked a laugh, though it lacked his usual spirit . “HA! I wish. Nah, I’m a consultant with S.H.U.S.H. They’re this spy—”

Launchpad didn’t hear the rest. He burst into laughter so intense it brought tears to his eyes all over again and nearly drowned out Drake’s plaintive cries of, “What? What’s so funny!”

At that moment in time, Launchpad knew four things to be irrefutable fact.

One: leather was not machine washable. He’d lost more jackets to the spin cycle than all of his most fiery crashes combined.

Two: Taurus Bulba was still operating his gangs from inside prison. And while he was in prison, he not only orchestrated the murder of prominent scientist Emmet Waddlemeyer but also the theft of his invention, the Waddlemeyer Ramrod, the location of which was still unknown.

Three: scientists were disappearing from all over the city. All of them were physicists or engineers who left their homes in the morning and were never seen or heard from again.

Four: he was Darkwing Duck’s partner. And he was falling in love with Drake Mallard.

Over the course of three months since Darkwing Duck crashed through his ceiling, they had been on countless stakeouts, patrols, and emergency room visits. Though he still had his garage, Launchpad spent most mornings in the Tower following a night of crime fighting, and he’d lost count of the times Drake would wander into the kitchen at midday, sometimes still half dressed in his costume, beckoned by a fresh pot of coffee and the smell of bacon sizzling on the stove.

It was these quiet mornings Launchpad cherished over their adrenaline fueled, high risk adventures.

Launchpad knew danger, revelled in it, but he wasn’t familiar with the softer moments. Handing a zombie-like Drake a mug of strong black coffee in a glittery mug that read ‘DIVA’ on the side. Running maintenance on the Thunderquack and having Drake sit beside him, handing him the tools he needed, while in the same breath complaining about the Fearsome Four getting more organized, too organized if you asked him! Clapping Drake on the shoulder after a mission well done and wishing he could simply lower his head and kiss him.

All the soft moments Launchpad had experienced with his significant others had the specter of S.H.U.S.H. looming over them, a death knell that only grew in volume. He was only with them for as long as the mission allowed him to be, and then they were fine with letting him go.

But Drake didn’t want him to leave. He might not have meant it romantically, but that hardly mattered. Drake was the best friend Launchpad had ever had, possibly his only friend. He would gladly take whatever Drake offered, so long as he didn’t lose those quiet mornings.

It was morning now, though only technically. Dawn was their time to retire from the streets of St. Canard and take stock of the night’s injuries, determining whether any of them warranted a visit to the emergency room. If they were lucky, they could turn in and sleep for as long as their exhausted, battered bodies would allow them.

They weren’t lucky very often.

Today it was Launchpad’s turn in the hot seat, with Drake in possession of the first aid kit. He was shirtless, the left side of his torso a patchwork of mottled bruises, and he forced himself to sit still as Drake gently palpated his ribs and wrapped his chest in gauze to keep the ice pack in place.

“Are you sure you don’t want to get this looked at, LP?” Drake asked, his brow furrowed as he focused on bandaging Launchpad’s chest.

It was an ironic question, considering the fact that to get Drake to a hospital he had to be dragged in or already be unconscious. But Launchpad decided not to point this out, as a curious crimson flush had worked itself up into Drake’s cheeks almost from the moment he started bandaging his chest, and Launchpad worried that he might be fighting off a cold. Drake had gotten tossed into the bay yesterday, after all.

“Nah, I’m sure it’ll be fine, DW,” Launchpad replied, declining to mention that he knew what broken ribs felt like, and this wasn’t it. “I may have to give up the rowing team, but I’ll bounce back.”

“Ha ha,” Drake muttered with a roll of his eyes, but when he leaned back to meet Launchpad’s gaze he was smiling. “You said it doesn’t it hurt when you breathe, right? How do you feel?”

“I feel like I got hit with a comically large mallet,” Launchpad said with a chuckle, and immediately winced. “Do you ever feel like we live in a cartoon?”

Drake sighed in aggravation. “Well, with Quackerjack in the mix you wouldn’t be too far off the mark,” he said. He tied off the gauze near Launchpad’s shoulder and reached for a pair of scissors from the first aid kit. He cut off the excess with a flourish and smiled at Launchpad.

“All done,” Drake announced, clasping his bare arm, “how does it feel?”

“Feels good for a couple bruised ribs,” Launchpad replied easily. A furrow wrinkled his brow as he reached for the bandages around Drake’s temples. “How’s your head, DW?”

Drake ducked out from under Launchpad’s hand, reaching up to clasp it between both of his.

“My head is fine,” he said firmly, “what about you? I seem to remember someone else catching Quackerjack’s jack-in-the-box to the face too.”

Launchpad chuckled, glancing away. “Aw, I’m fine, DW. I don’t think it even left a mark…”

He trailed off as Drake let go of his hand to cup his cheek, gently running his thumb along his cheekbone. He watched, wide-eyed, as Drake smiled up at him, expression hesitant and warm. His blush was brilliant.

“You’re right,” Drake said softly, “there’s isn’t a scratch on ya.”

His hand drifted back, far enough that the tips of his fingers carded through Launchpad’s hair. He tugged gently on the back of Launchpad’s head, arching up towards him at the same time. Between them, their hands remained clasped.

As Drake moved closer, Launchpad felt as though his chest was in a vice that had nothing to do with his bruised ribs. Their beaks were mere inches apart, and he fought the urge to grab Drake by the front of his uniform and drag him forward. Confusion and panic warred with his every heartsick fantasy and he exhaled shakily, his breath mingling with Drake’s.

“What are you doing?” he asked in a whisper, when Drake was close enough to touch, and he ached to take him in his arms.

Drake pulled away, eyes blinking wide and startled.

“I...I thought,” he stammered, and the longer Launchpad looked at him the redder his face became. He looked away, brow knitted, but Launchpad recognized embarrassment in the rigid line of Drake’s shoulders.

“Sorry,” Drake bit out, scrambling to get out of his seat, “Just forget it, Launchpad, I’m sorry.”

Panic, unlike anything Launchpad had ever known, flooded him with choking force. Before he knew what he was doing, he’d stopped Drake with a hand around his wrist.

“Wait,” Launchpad said, breathless with nerves, his voice weak. “Wait, Drake. I’m not....I’m not firing on all cylinders right now.”

Drake was already standing, but he didn’t make a move to leave or shake Launchpad off. After a beat he quietly responded, “Okay.”  

“What I mean is you need to walk me through this,” Launchpad said shakily. “You were trying to kiss me, right?”

“Emphasis on try,” Drake replied with a weak smile, his voice so strained that the joke fell flat between them.

Launchpad stuttered for a moment, his throat bobbing as he struggled for words.

“Can you try again?” he finally asked, voice breaking.

Drake looked at Launchpad fully, and his breath left him in a rush at whatever expression he saw there. He sat down and wiggled his wrist out of Launchpad’s grip so he could squeeze his hand instead.

“Launchpad,” Drake murmured, leaning in close. He placed his free hand on Launchpad’s chest, over the bandages. “You know how much you mean to me, right?”

“I, uh,” Launchpad replied. It was his turn to blush.

“You’re irreplaceable, big guy,” Drake said, brimming with conviction, as his hand drifted up Launchpad’s chest and up around to the back of his neck.

“Are you trying to make me cry?” Launchpad demanded weakly, bashfully avoiding Drake’s gaze and already blinking back tears. His hand trembled as he laid it on Drake’s waist.

“No,” Drake replied softly, nudging Launchpad’s bill so he would look up at him, “I’m just trying to do it right this time.”

Their beaks met, without fanfare, without chaos. Outside the Tower, the sun peered out over the bay, sending the sky alight with lilac, gold and blue. Inside, Drake rose from his chair so he could cradle Launchpad’s face in between his palms, humming against Launchpad’s beak. Launchpad’s hand was fisted in the back of Drake’s costume, pressing against the small of his back and urging him closer until they were nearly slotted together. His head was tilted back slightly so he could reach Drake’s beak, who while standing was just slightly taller than him seated, and he arched upward, cupping Drake’s jaw with his free hand like one would handle delicate glass.

A new dawn rose over St. Canard.

 2014

When all the banks in St. Canard remained firmly rooted to the ground they realized that for whatever reason, Taurus Bulba was unable to use the Waddlemeyer Ramrod. It also explained the vast quantity of missing scientists—he was trying to find someone to fix the problem.

After yet another fruitless stakeout brought them nowhere closer to uncovering where Bulba was stashing the scientists, if they were even still alive, Launchpad wondered aloud whether Waddlemeyer had an assistant, a partner, anyone in his life who might’ve had some knowledge of his inventions and be a potential target.

So Drake dove into Waddlemeyer’s file, as provided by S.H.U.S.H., desperate for a lead. They found that he kept few friends and worked alone and was survived by his only living relative: his granddaughter, Gosalyn Waddlemeyer.

“This is perfect!” Drake announced, pushing away from their strategy table and beginning to pace excitedly. “If Bulba hasn’t gotten the Ramrod working yet then he knows he probably never will, and he’ll start getting desperate. So we follow the granddaughter for a few weeks, keep an eye on her, and once Bulba’s men come knocking we get them to tell us where to find Big Blue.”

“Uh, only one problem with that plan, DW,” Launchpad said hesitantly, picking up the file Drake had discarded. He flipped it around so Drake could see a photograph taken of Waddlemeyer accepting some sort of award. Huddled close to his side was a little brown-feathered duck with thick, wavy red hair tugging unhappily on her dress.

“I think this is Gosalyn,” Launchpad said, pointing at the girl.

“Well,” Drake replied, “that certainly complicates things.”

Drake was supposed to be scoping out Gosalyn Waddlemeyer’s foster home, just basic recon to determine whether Bulba already had eyes on her. But Launchpad had barely started on a load of laundry back at the Tower when he received a frantic phone call from his partner.

“What do you mean Bulba’s men were already there?” Launchpad demanded, dropping the laundry basket and dashing for the Thunderquack’s landing pad.

“I mean Bulba’s men were already there!” Drake snapped, around discordant sounds of the city making it through the speaker. “It looks like we all came to the same brilliant idea at the same time. We’re heading to the Tower now, it’s the one plane I know she’ll be safe from—get down!”

The staccato patter of gunfire seemed especially loud to Launchpad, and it echoed between his ears until long after it had ended.

“DW,” Launchpad said, his voice controlled even as his heart raced in his throat, “are you—”

“We’re fine!” Drake responded at once, “the dastardly delinquents thought they could get the drop on Darkwing Duck, but the terror that flaps in the night is not so easily caught!”

Launchpad breathed a near silent sigh of relief, slumping against the side of the Thunderquack.

“They got stuck at a red light, didn’t they?” he asked, smiling knowingly.

“Maybe,” Drake muttered.

“And hey, what’s all this ‘we’ stuff?” Launchpad went on, “did you get a sidekick without telling me?”

“Ooh, I’d be the perfect sidekick!” a child’s voice exclaimed, “I already have a name picked out and everything!”

Drake furiously shushed them, as if demanding their silence would make Launchpad forget what he’d heard.

He facepalmed with an incredulous smile.

“DW,” Launchpad said, “did you kidnap our only lead?”

“I prefer the term rescued.”

Gosalyn Waddlemeyer was a spitfire, nine years old and brimming with inexhaustible energy and a curiosity that had her zipping to every corner of the Tower. Drake spent the first hour just chasing after her, before finally managing to wrangle her into a seat at the kitchen table so they could explain why they had so thoroughly turned her life upside down.

“A supervillain is out to get me?” she asked, looking startled, before grinning. “That is so cool.”

Drake threw his hands in the air, an effect made more dramatic by the fact he was still in full costume.

“No! Not cool!” he stressed, “in fact, it is the exact opposite of cool.”

“Bulba probably thinks you have the code he needs to arm the Ramrod,” Launchpad said, resting his folded arms on the back of a kitchen chair beside Gosalyn. “He’s already hurt a lot of people trying to get it. Did your grandpa leave you anything like that, or tell you something about it?”

Some of Gosalyn’s exuberance dulled at the mention of Waddlemeyer, and she slumped forward a little on the table, crossing her arms atop it.

“I, um...I know it was the last thing Grandpa worked on,” she said quietly. “He was gonna give it, like, a key and a lever or something to start it, but I told him that was boring and he should put rainbow buttons instead. We called it the Rainbow Rod.”

Gosalyn sniffed, and looked away as she rubbed the side of her beak.

“But—but he never told me a code or anything,” she said firmly.

Drake sighed, running a hand down his face. He joined Gosalyn at the table, taking the seat on her other side.

“We believe you,” he said quietly, “but Taurus Bulba won’t be so easily convinced. The guys he sent after you are bad news, and they aren’t going to give up so easily. They’ll be searching for you, and you won’t be safe until...well, until they’re out of the picture.”

Gosalyn looked up at him with wide eyes.

“Are you gonna kill them?” she whispered, aghast.

“What?” Drake yelped. “No!”  

Launchpad muffled a startled burst of laughter against the back of his hand.

“I might rough them up a little, but I always make sure criminals face justice at the hands of the proper authorities,” Drake continued insistently, but by this point Gosalyn was giggling too.

“I’m just messing with you, dude,” she said, smiling bright and unrepentantly.

Drake propped his elbow on the table and let his face fall into his open palm.

“Right, of course,” he muttered, “I totally knew that...dude.”

“But do you understand what we’re saying, kiddo?” Launchpad asked. He pulled out the chair he’d been leaning against and took a seat, peering worriedly at Gosalyn. “It won’t be for too long, but you’re going to have to hide until we’re sure Bulba or his goons can’t get to you. That means you won’t be able to see your friends or family for a little bit, not until it’s safe.”

Gosalyn shrugged, fiddling with a loose string on the sleeve of her hoodie.

“Well I don’t have those, so I’ll be fine.”

Launchpad and Drake shared a perturbed glance over her head.

“What do you mean?” Drake asked carefully. “Won’t your foster family be worried about you?”

Gosalyn’s shrug was weaker this time, and she lowered her head until her bangs obscured much of her face.

“Kids only get sent to Mrs. Cavanaugh’s when the other foster homes don’t want ‘em,” she muttered. “Imagine a house with ten more of me running around. They probably won’t even notice I’m gone.”

“Still,” Drake said after a long moment, his expression a thundercloud. “We’ll have to let—Mrs. Cavanaugh was it? We’ll have to let her know where you are. Er…” He glanced down at his costume. “Or maybe I’ll get someone from S.H.U.S.H. to do it. Yeah.”

“What am I supposed to do until you catch the bad guys?” Gosalyn pressed. “Am I going into witness protection?”

“Nothing so dramatic,” Drake said. He met Launchpad’s gaze as he continued speaking, as though judging his reaction. “If you want, you can stay with us. The Tower is secure and Launchpad or I would be with you the entire time. Or...or we can take you to a secure facility—”

“Could I really stay with you?” she interrupted, surprisingly subdued, looking from Drake to Launchpad and back again.

Drake opened his beak to answer but hesitated. He looked at Launchpad again, expression oddly vulnerable, and it took Launchpad a few seconds to realize Drake was waiting for his opinion. He nodded at once, unable to imagine a scenario where he denied such a request, and the affectionate look Drake gave him made something in him melt.

“Of course,” Drake replied confidently, sitting up tall. “There’s nowhere safer than the lair of St. Canard’s very own—oof!”

Gosalyn threw her arms around Drake’s middle, hugging him tightly and cutting him off once again.

“Thanks, Darkwing,” she said sincere and shy.

Drake’s arms hovered awkwardly in the air for a few seconds, during which he sent Launchpad several panicked glances. But he gradually lowered his arms and delicately patted Gosalyn on the back.

“Uh, yeah, no problem, kiddo. It’s the least we could do.”

Drake pulled Launchpad off to the side the first chance he got, worrying a hand through his head feathers.

“Would you mind watching Gosalyn for a few hours?  I wanted to scope out Hannigan’s location, see if we can’t just use him to lead us to Bulba. Then I need to pick up groceries, and clothes for Gosalyn and a toothbrush and socks and—and—what else do little girls need?”

“Well a friend of mine used to say that a butterfly knife was a girl’s best friend, but Gosalyn might be a little young for that. So probably PJs,” Launchpad replied. He laid his hands on Drake’s shoulders and smoothed them down his arms, drawing Drake closer so he could drop a kiss on his forehead.

“Do what you need to do. Gosalyn and I can get to know each other. Just remember to check in—”

“Every half hour, on the hour,” Drake finished for him, smiling wryly. “You know, I thought we’d be further along in our relationship before we added kids to the mix.”

Launchpad jerked back, his breath catching.

Drake stared at him with a deer-in-headlights expression, looking unaccountably afraid.

“I, um,” he said.

“Drake,” Launchpad said very softly, his heart beating almost painfully hard.

Gosalyn’s voice drifted out of the kitchen doorway behind Launchpad. “Is this a clock radio? What’re you guys, fifty?”

“No, don’t touch that!” Drake cried, dashing past Launchpad, and the moment was ruined.

All too soon, Drake was peeling away from the Tower on the revving back of the Ratcatcher, leaving Gosalyn and Launchpad together in the kitchen.

She didn’t seem to know what to make of him, judging by the way she quietly avoided his gaze.

“Um,” she began haltingly, “so…”

“You hungry?” Launchpad asked.

She finally looked at him, if only to blink uncomprehendingly. “Huh?”

Launchpad shrugged. “I know that I’m always starving after a near-death experience. I thought you might be the same.”

Gosalyn leaned back in her seat, considering him with a hand under her beak.

“That depends,” she said, “what’s for dinner?”

“Frozen pizza?” Launchpad offered, and beamed when Gosalyn whooped and punched the air.

As he busied himself with preheating the oven and getting out the right pan, Gosalyn followed him around the kitchen.

“Are you Darkwing’s boyfriend?” she asked curiously.

Launchpad was unsure of how to answer at first. While he knew that Drake cared about him, and vice versa, they’d never discussed putting a name to what they had between them. And even as their relationship lengthened from weeks to months, there was only one thing he was certain of.

“We’re partners,” he replied.

Gosalyn squinted at him.

“Does that mean you’re married?”

Launchpad nearly dropped the pizza as he pulled it out of the freezer.

“No, no,” he said, fighting a tremor in his voice. It didn’t stop his hands from shaking slightly as he set the package down and began to open it. “We’re not partners like that. We’re not married.”

Gosalyn clung to the underside of the kitchen counter and leaned back on her heels.

“How’d you even meet Darkwing?”

Launchpad chuckled, willing away the last of his nerves.

“What is this, twenty questions?” he responded playfully.

“Hey, I’m a little kid, you should be encouraging me to ask questions,” she retorted immediately, her grin matching his own. “I didn’t even know Darkwing Duck existed before today,” she went on, “I thought he was a myth, like good grades in math class or how Scrooge McDuck used to be an adventurer.”

“How did you meet Darkwing?” Launchpad countered, putting the pizza in the oven.

“Well,” Gosalyn began with a graceless laugh, looking down at her shoes. “I might’ve possibly tried to fight him when I thought he was a bad guy. And maybe punched him in the gut.”

“Hey, me too!” Launchpad said brightly, making Gosalyn giggle. “But I thought he was breaking into my plane hangar.”

“You have a plane?” she asked at once.

“I have the plane,” he replied. “Remind me to show you after dinner.”

As his time with S.H.U.S.H. bled into years, Launchpad would sometimes wonder if he was ruined for a normal life.

When he was as young as eighteen, he’d be shadowing a target in a crowded area, sidearm hidden beneath his jacket, earpiece hidden under his feathers, and he’d see a group of people his own age goofing off, smiling, enjoying each other’s company. Even then, he knew that he had given up a life with the mundanities of school, work, and interpersonal connection. As Double-O-Duck he was a ghost, and ghosts didn’t have anyone waiting for them to come home.

Launchpad had been young, and inexperienced in love outside of the brief high school fling. His parents were his only model, their love strong and true for over two decades, and he longed for that stability as he was shipped back and forth across the world, from the harshest deserts to the most barren tundras. Every time he thought he’d found someone, someone to try with, it turned out to be temporary and while Launchpad would happily have waited for any of them, no one was willing to do the same for him.

Until Miles Owlbrien.

He still regretted that it took him losing Miles to realize he needed to leave S.H.U.S.H. to make a life for himself. After so much time on his own, all the violence he watched be committed and committed himself, Launchpad feared he was too different, too stunted, to be worth anyone’s time.

But his parents lifted him back up from where he’d fallen, despite the years he spent keeping them at arm’s length. Dr. Bellum sent him ridiculous holiday cards for everything from Valentines to Boxing Day, some of them with brief messages, others just signed Sara.

So, any psychic powers yet?

What are you doing in St. Canard? That place is a dump.

Gryzlikoff’s turned into a real hardass since you left. I think you mellowed him out through sheer niceness.

Drake trusted him as his partner, in more ways than one. He trusted Launchpad with his name, with his identity beyond the mask. He welcomed Launchpad into his home and into his bed, and he slept curled around Launchpad nearly every night, his arm solid and secure around Launchpad’s waist.

Gosalyn’s stay with them extended into its second week, and nearly every morning she helped him make breakfast or distracted Drake when he brought his mission files with him to the kitchen table. On the nights Drake had patrol, Launchpad took her on short trips out of the Tower so she wouldn’t go stir crazy, soaring over the city in the Thunderquack and taking sharp turns and sudden dives to make her shriek with laughter. They would stop to get ice cream or go to the beach after leaving the jet on the roof of a nearby building.

They were in a quiet book store one evening, Gosalyn on the hunt for the most recent issue of a comic and Launchpad a new coloring book. Gosalyn meandered through the stacks, gnawing on a cookie from the bakery, when she said, quite apropos of nothing, “I know this whole thing’s supposed scary and all, but I’m gonna miss you guys when this is over.”

And Launchpad fought against the sudden burn of tears in that brightly lit aisle, because he had been thinking exactly the same.

The last two weeks with Gosalyn were perhaps some of the best in Launchpad’s memory. Her presence filled an empty space in his life that he never knew existed until her, and though he wanted her to be safe more than anything, he dreaded the day she wouldn’t be with them anymore.

“Hey,” he said, kneeling down beside her. She made a show of feigning interest in the back of a random autobiography she pulled off the shelf as he placed a hand on her shoulder.

“We can always visit,” he assured her, the words sticking in his throat. “DW isn’t just gonna disappear. Not even with his smoke bombs.”

Gosalyn’s smile was brief, and instead of looking reassured as he’d intended she turned her head to peer up at him intently, her gaze steely.

“What about you?” she asked bluntly, “will I see you again?”

“Me?” he said, rocking back a little in the wake of his surprise. “I...of course, Gosalyn. If—if that’s what you want.”

Gosalyn sniffed, roughly wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

“Of course that’s what I want,” she muttered, turning to bury her face in his chest. She wrapped her arms as far around him as they would go, dropping the book she’d been holding.

Launchpad enfolded her in his embrace, tucking her head under his chin. She was so slight, so fragile in his arms, in direct contrast to her astonishing spirit, and he knew that it would kill him, just a little, when she finally found a family who recognized that.

When they parted Gosalyn cleared her throat and buried her hands in the pockets of her hoodie, almost adult in her awkwardness.

“Anyway,” she said, and Launchpad couldn’t stop smiling if he tried, “what’s this comic you were talking about?”

“Oh, Captain Courage?” he said at once. “It’s about this spaceship captain from the future! They rebooted the series since I was a kid, but my dad used to read them to me every night before I went to bed.”

It was Launchpad’s turn to be embarrassed as he rose to his feet, rubbing the back of his neck. “But, uh, that’s probably a little too babyish for you, isn’t it?”

“Grandpa used to sing me a lullaby when I had nightmares,” Gosalyn said at once, and Launchpad’s expression softened.

“Oh yeah?” he replied gently. “Was he a good singer?”

There were tears in Gosalyn’s eyes as she smiled.

“The worst,” she said fondly.

Launchpad would recall this conversation a few days later, only hours after the entire city watched Taurus Bulba’s flying fortress rise out of the ruins of Stones Penitentiary.

Neither Drake or Launchpad were going on patrol, nerves running too high for either of them to even consider leaving Gosalyn’s side.

Not even Gosalyn was unaffected, as evening dwindled into late night and she was still unable to fall asleep. Though she never said as much, Bulba’s newfound freedom had clearly rattled her, and it was a struggle even getting her into the storage room turned makeshift bedroom they had outfitted for her.

Drake and Launchpad sat on opposite sides at the end of her bed, each in their own rumpled state of disarray. Launchpad was in his striped pajamas and leather jacket, and Drake had been in his Darkwing uniform all day, but he had long since stopped wearing the hat or mask around Gosalyn.

“Kiddo,” Drake was saying, “you’ve gotta get some rest. I know you’re worried, but—”

“I’m not worried,” she said at once, sitting atop the covers with her arms crossed stubbornly over her chest, “I just can’t sleep. Haven’t you ever heard of insomnia?”

Drake rubbed his forehead with a tired laugh. “You’re too young to have insomnia.”

“What if we sang you a lullaby?” Launchpad said.

Drake glanced over at him, startled, but Gosalyn brightened.

“Really?” she blurted, looking elated for a brief moment, before embarrassment reared its ugly head and she continued off-handedly, “I mean, I guess if you think it’ll work.”

“A lullaby,” Drake repeated, looking to Launchpad for confirmation. “Okay. Um. I don’t know...any...lullabies. LP?”

The only songs that his traitorous mind would come up with were old drinking songs he learned when stationed in Crowków, and those weren’t in English nor were they child appropriate.

“How about you teach us one of your Grandpa’s songs and we can sing it back to you?” Launchpad suggested, in a spur of genius.

Gosalyn eyed him suspiciously for a brief moment but eventually agreed. She sang terribly, in the high, pitchy voice of a child, and Launchpad melted a little at the sound of it.

Close your eyes, little girl blue,

Inside of you lies a rainbow.

Yellow, blue, red blue,

purple too,

Blue, purple and green,

then the yellow.

Drake cleared his throat once she finished singing. “Alright, let me give it a shot,” he said, smiling a little nervously.

Rest your head, little girl blue,

Come paint your dreams on your pillow.

I'll be near to chase away fear…

Drake trailed off, looking a little lost before he turned to Launchpad. “Hey, LP,” he said softly, “I could use your help here.”

Launchpad blinked, startled, and sat up a little straighter.

“Yeah, of course,” he replied, and smiled down at Gosalyn. “Just give me a sec…”

He began to sing, hesitantly at first, and more confidently once Drake joined him on the reprise.

I'll be near to chase away fear…

So sleep now and dream 'til tomorrow,

I'll be near to chase away fear,

So sleep now and dream 'til tomorrow.

They sang the lullaby once more as they eased Gosalyn beneath her blankets. She had grown heavy and lethargic with sleep since they began their song, and she herself be tucked in willingly.

They stood from the bed as one and headed for the door as quietly as they could, avoiding the mess of stuff Gosalyn had somehow already accumulated in the few weeks she had spent with them.

Drake grabbed Launchpad’s hand as they walked out, lacing their fingers together. Launchpad squeezed his hand back, but didn’t say anything as they stepped out into the shadowed hallway, closing Gosalyn’s door behind them. He turned in the direction of their own room, but Drake didn’t move, anchoring Launchpad in place with their hands tightly clasped together.

Launchpad looked back at him, concerned, but Drake’s expression was shuttered and pensive and he looked off to the side without seeing anything.

“Hey,” Launchpad murmured, tugging gently on Drake’s hand. “Don’t beat yourself up over the song. I thought we did pretty good.”

Drake snorted softly, taking the bait.

“We did,” he confirmed, speaking just as quietly.

“Then what’s bugging you?” Launchpad responded.

Drake looked away again, but he answered much more quickly.

“I don’t...I don’t think I’m ready to say goodbye to Gosalyn when this is over,” he said, looking at the ground. His fingers trembled against Launchpad’s.

Launchpad moved a step closer, tightening his grip on Drake’s hand. “Are you thinking of adopting her?” he asked quietly, like the words might float away if he spoke them too loudly.

“I—yes,” Drake said, so firmly he seemed to surprise himself. Launchpad watched his doubt set in almost immediately. “But I how can I even be thinking about adopting a kid? I mean, look at me! I’m hardly well-adjusted!”

Launchpad breathed a quiet laugh, even as some hidden, aching part of him was left feeling bereft.

“Drake,” he said, gentle but adamant, “you would make a great parent. Gosalyn loves you, and I know she’d be so, so happy to have you as her dad.”

Drake looked taken aback for a moment, but then something muted and pained began to leech into his expression, deepening the shadows under his eyes and tugging on the downward curve of the corners of his beak.

“You don’t…” he began haltingly, “I thought you would want…”

Launchpad frowned worriedly, reaching for Drake’s arm with his free hand.

“DW?” he prompted.

But there was lightning without thunder flashing outside the windows, filling the Tower with stark white light, and the conversation was forgotten in the wake of Taurus Bulba’s threats.

The steady beep of the heart monitor was a reassuring sound in the otherwise dead quiet of the hospital room.

Heavily bandaged and finally sleeping of his own volition, Drake had come out the worst of them in their first and final confrontation with Taurus Bulba. Burns and bruises, cracked ribs and broken bones, Launchpad’s injuries were nothing by comparison and most of them gained from digging Drake out of the rubble. A cut above his eye from a lucky uppercut by Hammerhead, a burn on his shoulder where searing metal had pierced through his jacket, and his palms scraped bloody from when his desperate search had unearthed Drake’s limp hand, and then the rest of his pale, dirty form.

As uncomfortable as being in a S.H.U.S.H. hospital made him, Launchpad would sit in a hundred S.H.U.S.H. hospital rooms, hell he’d sit in J. Gander’s office, if it meant Drake would be alright. By all accounts he would be, but Launchpad wasn’t going to get the image of Canard Tower exploding in fire and smoke any time soon.

It was late, Launchpad didn’t even know what time, and he was the only one still awake. Gosalyn had climbed onto Drake’s bed and cuddled up to his least injured side hours ago, and had yet to move. Drake had briefly been awake then, and welcomed her with a smile and a shaking hand brushing the bangs out of her eyes.

As if his thoughts had awoken him, the heart monitor faltered in its constant rhythm as the larger of the two figures in the bed began to shift. Launchpad remained still, relatively hidden in the gloom, in the hopes that Drake would be able to fall back asleep.

His actions had the opposite of the desired effect, as Drake’s voice rose thready and panicked from his hospital bed.

“Launchpad?” he said, “Launchpad, are you there?”

“I’m here,” Launchpad rushed to say, dragging his chair closer so Drake needn’t lift his head to see him. His throat felt raw. “I’m here, sorry.”

Drake had bright white bandages wrapped around his head, seeming to glow in the near-dark. Under his eye was a purple, half moon bruise. When he smiled at Launchpad it was damn near the most stunning sight he had ever seen. Greater than the glittering, underwater citadels and sharply jutting spires of Nautilus, the Macaw’s millions of gleaming lights reflecting off the dark waves of the Pearl River, or even the endless golden fields around his family’s plane hangar.

“Hey, sweetheart,” Drake whispered, and Launchpad laughed breathlessly.

“Hey,” he replied. “You should be resting.”

“I know,” Drake said, rolling his eyes. He tried to sit up, grunting slightly with the effort of moving and doing so in a way that wouldn’t jostle Gosalyn sleeping beside him. “But I have something I need to tell you.”

Launchpad stilled him with a hand against his chest.

“You can tell me later,” he assured him, but Drake shook his head. Fortunately, though, he stopped trying to move.

“Nope,” he said, his familiar stubbornness making Launchpad want to cry all over again. “This is important.”

“Okay,” Launchpad allowed, moving his hand from Drake’s chest to his cheek, sweeping his fingers gently through his tousled feathers.

“I want to adopt Gosalyn,” Drake started, breathtaking in his conviction. “And...well, do you...will you raise her with me?”

Launchpad stilled in his careful ministrations, frozen down to his very core. He could hear the blood rushing in his head and little else.

“What?” he distantly heard himself say.

Drake’s voice steadily lost confidence the longer he spoke, devolving into the rambling mess he knew so well.

“I know we’ve never talked about kids, or—or a life outside of getting dangerous, but you and Gos have made me think that a normal life might be possible, not for Darkwing but for Drake Mallard. And I’d like you to be part of it.”

Drake flexed his good hand, the one not in a cast. His voice roughened with restrained emotion and he looked away from Launchpad’s shocked, silent face.

“You don’t need to decide now,” he said. “I—I can wait. I don’t mind, waiting for you.”

Launchpad came back to himself, all the aching, secret parts of himself he had hidden and masked singing at once in mingled joy and pain. He nudged Drake’s cheek so he would turn back to face him.

Drake’s eyes went wide when he saw the tears that shone in Launchpad’s.

“You and Gos are my family,” he said, “that’s a no-brainer. But it’s on me for not saying something sooner, for not letting you know every day how much you mean to me, Drake. So thank you. But my answer is always going to be yes.”

Drake swallowed thickly, blinking back tears.

“I see how it is,” he said accusingly, “trying to one-up my romantic confession when I’m in several casts. I know your game, McQuack.”

Launchpad laughed, exhausted, breathless and giddy. He felt like he might be dreaming, but his body hurt far too much for that. He leaned forward and kissed Drake briefly, pulling away after a moment despite Drake’s muffled sounds of protest.

“There is one thing you should know before anything else,” Launchpad said, huddling close to Drake’s head and combing his fingers through his feathers.

“What’s that?” Drake replied distractedly, closing his eyes and melting a little under Launchpad’s gentle care.

Launchpad saw a decade laid out before him, friends and lovers and enemies made and lost, a secret no one else knew.

“What have you heard about Double-O-Duck?”  

[nataliecarsonsuniverse]

The Mistakes Not Made Under the Moonlight

Summary:During Basic RV Repair and Palmistry, Jeff sneaks out of the RV late at night unable to sleep only to find that one of the other Greendale seven couldn't sleep either. 

Pairing: Jeff Winger x Annie Edison

The RV was cold. Frigid cold to be exact. Jeff had expected it to be cold, they were after all stranded in an RV with no battery in the middle of the Colorado Rocky Mountains. But still for May it was far too cold. The group had divided up places to sleep there wasn’t enough room for everyone to have comfortable spot, so he got stuck with the bench by the table. He tried to protest but he didn’t win. Jeff used to win court cases, with no degree. But now he couldn’t even win a stupid argument with a group of community college students. Maybe he had gone soft. Especially since the idea of referring to them only as community college students made him angry for some reason. He was far too tall to be trying to sleep on a couch that was made for midgets. Then again he could barely stand up in the RV without his hair touching the ceiling.

The only sound in the RV was the sound of someone snoring. He wasn’t sure exactly who it was. He glanced around at all of his friends who were fast asleep trying to identify who it was. It wasn’t Britta, he had spent the night with Britta enough to know what her snoring sounded like, and it wasn’t as cute sounding as the one that filled the empty space right now.

Jeff got out of the little booth careful not to step on Frankie who was laying on the ground right underneath him. He tiptoes around her to the door which he unlocked and opened as quietly as he could. The moonlight flood into the trailer illuminating everyone. He made a mental note of the way Annie was fast asleep in the chair in the kitchen, if you could even call that little space a kitchen. There was little bit of drool on the side of her mouth. Any other girl and Jeff would’ve thought that was disgusting. But with Annie for some reason, it made her somehow more attractive. If that was even if possible

Outside the air was brisk, but no more cold than it was in the RV. The wind whipped through his sweatshirt and his hair. Instinctively he wrapped his arms around himself trying to produce any sort of heat. There wasn’t a cloud in sight, the moonlight and stars shined so bright it felt as if the sun itself was out. He didn’t know exactly where they were, but there was not a single light in sight. They must have been in the middle of nowhere. As scary as it was, the idea of being stranded in the Rocky Mountains, there was something peaceful about it, almost calming.

Jeff shuffled his feet slightly in the gravel, creating a noise to drown out the crickets. Dean was not lying when he said it would be hard place to do stand up, not that the rational of doing stand up in the middle of nowhere made any sense at all to Jeff.

The door to the RV opened, the sound of it swinging on it’s rusty hinges stood out like a sore thumb in the undeniably quiet night. He turned to see Annie stepping out of it, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She closed the door behind her before approaching him.

“Hey.” She whispered. “What are you doing out here?” She was shivering and it made a part of Jeff’s heart swell. He wasn’t quite sure why, but the idea of her being any condition less than perfectly content made him angry.

“I don’t know.” He admitted honestly. “I was having trouble sleeping. I’m way too tall to be sleeping like that. Plus I have become accustomed to at least an 800 thread count sheet. What about you?” he asked

Annie laughed slightly. Of course he couldn’t sleep because there were no soft sheets. “Well I woke up, when I heard the door open. I’m a light sleeper. Any sudden movement and I’m awake. I think it comes from living in a bad neighborhood for all those years.” She looked out over the mountains. “It’s really nice out here.”

“Yeah it is.” Jeff agreed. “Not stuffy like it was in the trailer.” Annie nodded in agreement. “Plus” Jeff continued. “Someone in there was snoring.”

“Oh that was probably me.” Annie said. “Britta and Abed both say that I snore at night. But at least I don't talk in my sleep like Britta does.”

“She does do that! I had completely forgot about that!” Jeff said, but the second he said it he wished he could have taken it back. It wasn’t very often that the group talked about the fact that him and Britta had slept together and oftentimes if it was mentioned, especially in front of Annie, Jeff felt bad. Almost as if he had cheated on Annie, which was absurd because him and Annie had never, and probably will never even really date. It was an idea that kept him up at night sometimes.

Annie looked back out over the mountains. There was a calming sense standing underneath the moonlight with him. She shivered slightly as the wind blew through the hollow blanket. Jeff must have noticed because he reached out and wrapped his arms around her shoulder. She leaned into his side, and tried to convince herself that there was nothing romantic about their current situation. Yet her brain could not ignore the faint scent of cologne radiating from him.

Besides it’s not like anything romantic ever happened under the moonlight. She couldn’t help but notice the way his jaw line was drawn under the given light. He looked different at the school, in the study room, under all the fluorescent lights. But out here there was something that she hadn’t really noticed before. He looked down at her, making eye contact and his eyes seemed to be a thousand shades bluer than usual. Maybe this is why in all the romantic comedies the big moment happens underneath the stars.

She couldn’t help but to wonder what it would feel like if he leaned down right now to kiss her. If he took a leap of faith and lightly pressed his lips to hers. Then again, she could also take a leap of faith. Maybe the fact that something hasn’t happened between the two of them wasn’t all his fault. “It’s cold out here” She whispered.

“It is.” He agreed as he pulled her closer to him. She opened the blanket and wrapped her arms around his torso. She wrapped the blanket around him as best as she could. He tucked her head under his chin and she rested her head on his chest. She tried over and over again to tell herself that it was platonic, but it was getting harder and harder to believe.

She felt good in his arms and he hated to admit that. A part of him was terrified at the way that he was holding her. Partly because he knew that eventually he would have to let go. Eventually the sun would rise and the moment would be over. Everything always seemed different in the light of day. It was like when the sun went down so did his rational thinking. He always seemed to make the mistakes that he had been dying to make during the day at night. He started swaying back and forth, while still holding her in his arms. The movement helped to bring feeling back into his legs.

She allowed herself to move the same way he did. “Are you okay?” She whispered. With her head resting on his chest she could hear his heartbeat, and it was beating faster than what she assumed a heart should beat. The two of them kept swaying in the dark.

“I’m okay.” He whispered back voice kind of hoarse trying to not spill the thoughts that were actually on his mind. That he wasn’t really okay, because she wasn’t his. He moved his hand further down her back to rest on the small of her back. He felt her lean in closer to him, causing him to sign slightly.

She felt the goosebumps on her skin, goosebumps that were in no way there from the cold. Even Annie couldn’t deny that. A part of her couldn’t believe this was real, she had been dreaming about this moment since that first day freshman year. Back when the only girl in the group he cared about sleeping with was Britta. Annie cheeks grew slightly red at the idea of him wanting to sleep with her. Her. It was like highschool all over again, only this time the cutest most popular boy wanted her, and it wasn’t that out of the question that maybe they would get together.

Annie moved her hands from his torso, where she was gripping, maybe just a little to hard, up to his neck. She laced her fingers in between each other, playing with the hairs on the back of his neck. When she moved her hands the blanket had fallen to the ground, but neither of them seemed to mind. She kept her head exactly where it was listening to sound of his heart beat.

The crickets outside continues to chirp, although they seemed slightly louder than they had before. The two of them were still swaying back and forth when Annie whispered “I’m really cold.” Jeff took one of her hands that had been around his neck. He let her go for a second and spun her out before pulling her back in.

“Then let's keep moving.” Jeff seid. Gradually their swaying turned into real dancing. Although neither one of them really knew how to dance they seemed to be in sync with each other. In the quiet of the night the only rhythm was his heartbeat and the crickets that never quite seemed to stop. Annie could’ve sworn that if she really listened she could hear a river running somewhere in the background.

Slowly they returned to swaying back and forth, her standing on his shoes. When she glanced up at him they made eye contact. And neither one of them looked away. His eyes glanced down to her lips as she licked them ever so slightly. He moved one hand from her waist to her face where he caressed her check, before leaning down a softly kissing her. Annie thought for a moment that in the distance she could hear fireworks, but it was just her imagination.

She didn’t hold back as she kissed him the same way she had during the debate, or after the tranny dance. The only key difference was that this didn’t seemed rushed. He took his time brushing his tonuge over her bottom lip. It was the kind of kiss where if it was the last she would’ve been okay with that. If he stopped right now and never kissed or touched her again, she wouldn’t die out of lust. At this point however, she had given up on the idea that they could ever be anything close to resembling platonic. She would always want him, and she was starting to think that he would always want her.

When Jeff pulled away Annie did feel a ping of sadness. “I, Can't-.” he said stammering to get the words out of his mouth. He looked down at her with the sad puppy dog eyes that she herself had mastered a long time ago. He let her go slightly. She was still close enough to him to see all of his features, but not close enough to stand on her tiptoes and kiss him again.

“Can’t what?” She asked partially afraid of the answer she would get. She had told herself she would be okay if it was the last kiss not that she wanted it to be the last kiss.

“I can’t do this with you tonight.” He said his voice low. Although he was trying to sound tough and cool, Annie could tell that he was hiding something. Over the years Annie had grown exceptionally good at reading him.

“Why not?” She asked looking up to him with her puppy dog eyes, which were far better than his, if she did say so herself.

“Because pretty soon, I am not going to be able to stop with just your lips.” His voice was dripping with desire and his eyes were a shade darker than she had ever seen before. He glanced down at her lips before he allowed his eyes to begin to roam all over her body. “The things that I want to do to you, I can not do with all of our friends sitting in the RV.” He gestured to the rv that was parked right behind them.

Annie could feel the blood rusing to her cheeks and was grateful for the fact that people were color blind at night and red was the last color most people could see. “But I-.” She stopped herself before she said something she would regret. Part of her wanted to jump his bones right here, right now. But she also knew that long term she would regret that. “Okay.” she finished. She started to pull away from him. Much like Jeff, if Annie stayed here much longer she wasn’t going to be able to stop herself.

Jeff grabbed her by the wrist before she could get too far away. “Just so you know, tomorrow when we make it back to Greendale, we have to finish this conversation.” He dropped her wrist by her side.

“Maybe if we find a rest area on the way home.” Annie said with a hint of hope in her voice.

“No.” he said without a single hint of doubt in his voice. “You are better than some crappy rest area, and you are worth waiting for.

Annie once again blushed at the idea of her being worth waiting for. Annie Edison being worth waiting for according to Jeff Winger. “I’m. I’m going to go inside.” She said to him

“Okay.” He said looking down at her. “I’m going to stay out here for a little bit longer.” He watched her walking to the RV and climb up the steps before she went inside she turned around to whisper goodnight.

Jeff stayed outside for a little while longer admiring the view of the Rocky Mountain Overpass road they were on. It was a gorgeous view, but yet it wasn’t the prettiest thing he had seen in the last 24 hours.

[movesliketacitus]

More than a Number

My name is Lily, and on the Eugenic Scale, I am ranked a 4 out of 10. 

Immediately after birth, each baby is tested for common mutations known to evoke certain disorders, and the results are used to quantify the child’s fitness and future usefulness in society on the Eugenic Scale. 

As a 4, I am classified as a “detriment”, or someone whose undesirable genes and medical needs will cause them to leech off the public’s resources more so than produce them. 

7s and above are the creme of the crop– a dream come true for any parent. A child ranked below a 5, on the other hand, is a punch in the stomach; few resources are allocated towards healthcare nowadays due to the heightened military budget, and it is considered kinder to have such children terminated before their predicted ailments mercilessly consume them. 

The rare parent will refuse to yield their newborn to the lethal injection table, as was the case with my own mother. 

I have never met either of my parents, and I doubt that I ever will. But I am grateful for their decision. I now live in a foster home with other detriments like me, and my life is a hurricane of blood-stained hospital gowns, pillows soaked with burning tears, acquaintances made and lost in weeks, and the constant, all-consuming fear of my ever-nearing future. And yet I am grateful still. 

Because I am a 4. Not a 1 or a 2, fated to die young as my body rapidly disintegrates from the wretched poison bubbling within. 

My genotyping results came back positive for Huntington’s Disease, where the nerve cells that coordinate my movement, speech, and memory are defective and will gradually consume themselves until my body gives out between the age of 50 to 60– 70 if I’m lucky. That gives me decades to enjoy the beauty of this world– almost a full-fledged life. And so I am grateful. 

Sometimes, in the dark of the night when nothing but my own thoughts are awake to occupy me, I wonder what it will feel like when the icy grip of my disease triumphs to finally claim my voice, my limbs, and eventually, my mind. What will it be like to watch my own body forget how to laugh, to know that everyone in my life may suddenly become strangers to me when I wake up the next morning, to lose everything and everyone I have lived for? Who will be the last person I ever hug before my arms lie forever limp by my sides? 

I used to languish over this constantly, as if I could somehow will my future away or cleverly plan out an escape. But why suffer the sensation of my death now, when I am still in good health, when it will certainly come someday anyway?  

I live alongside several other detriments who, like me, struggle with their prognoses from time to time. But we are still able to laugh; we still find joy in everything from the rich smell of undergrowth and pine that permeates through the air every spring to the sly winks of the stars during those tranquil, cloudless nights when even the wind seems to gasp faintly in awe. And so I am grateful. 

The first friend I recall ever having was named Adrian. He was radiant, his warm presence saturating every corner of the room until even the gloomiest of souls could be found hiding a shy smile. 

We met at a precipice that overlooks the city where the genetically acceptable families live and work. Every night, I would watch the town light up at sundown, mesmerized by the tiny cars zooming across winding highways and the billboards glittering with flashes of pinks and golds in the distance. I observed the liveliness down below with an unquenchable longing, until I met Adrian. 

He was gaunt for a fourteen-year-old, but I forgot about his appearance the moment he smiled and stuck out his hand. It was a toothy grin, and yet his eyes captured the glow of the city, his unkempt hair tussling with the mountain wind. His frail body swayed, but his sprightly spirit was interwoven with the world around him. At the recognition of the melancholy in my demeanor, he asked me why I lusted after the synthetic glitter of the city when an endless array of stars danced right above our own heads. I laughed then, but from that night onwards, we lay together on the grass, making up ridiculous constellations and dozing off to the lull of crickets chirping and nearby streams gushing. 

We never told anyone about this, but, once the sun had set every Christmas Eve, we both would put on our most expensive clothes, sneak a little money from our savings into our pockets, and head for the city. The journey down was always streaked with a tinge of fear, the petrifying nightmare of getting caught and maligned for entering an “uncontaminated” space constantly looming in our heads. But once we were safe within the main gates, oh man. 

The town was always cloaked with a delicate white blanket of snow; sleigh bells tied to door fronts tinkled as the breeze carried their music to our ears. 

We caught snowflakes on our fingertips. Watched toy trains filled with laughing children snake around the downtown ice rink. Sat in empty coffee shops scalding our tongues with overly-saccharine peppermint teas. Pulled our coats snug around our shoulders while strolling past bustling bakeries, the fresh scent of gingerbread and hazelnut enveloping us in a cozy joy. Hid bittersweet tears trying to swallow the fact that we were never meant to see any of this. 

Returning home was snapping awake from a dazzling but implausible dream. Each step forward felt infected with the dreary lilt of shackles, and when we reached the top of our mountain, the city was once more a mere twinkle in the distance. 

A fictional world untainted from our presence once more. 

A reminder that we were the sick. The unwanted. The worthless. The detriments. 

But we would always get back on our feet eventually. Anyone on the mountain can tell you a detriment’s life is teeming with hurdles and disparities. Yet we still persist. We laugh, we sing, we love, together. 

“Hey! Lily! Did you know that our stomachs can dissolve steel? Isn’t that nuts?”

Adrian was full of the wildest facts, thirsting for anything he knew would make us smile. He could tell you how long the smallest snake in existence was (4 inches) and theorize about the creation of the universe for hours. 

“”Yo Lils! Did you know that 40,000 Americans die from toilets each year?”

Somehow, basic lessons from class escaped him, but he could memorize the periodic table song backwards in half an hour. 

“Lily! Lilyyy– hey, wait up! I just– *cough*– wanted to thank you– *cough*– for helping me study for my math test last weekend. I’m pretty sure I saw Mr. Valdez give me a thumbs up after class!” 

He was sweet. But life wasn’t kind back to him. 

“Lils. Hey Lils, look at me. It’s all– *gasp•–  gonna be all right.” 

He was a blazing star, all the way until the end. The brightness gleaming in his eyes never wavered, even as his body quivered with fragility. 

*Pant. Pant. Pant. Pant.* 

On his last night, Adrian stared at the ceiling, his crackling breathing heavy and brisk. In the dim light, I could see that his forehead was speckled with droplets of sweat and that, for the first time since I had met him, he looked exhausted. His face had hollowed, and his eyes were nestled above dark bags. At 2:37 AM that night, his chest rose one last time, and those beautiful eyes faded forever. 

We all used to think Adrian was lucky. You see, Adrian had hope. More so than any of us, at least. On the normal genetic scale, he would probably be at least a 6, possibly even an 8. He should have been perfect. He should have lived. 

But his mother had smoked. Heavily. All throughout her pregnancy. He was born a measly five pounds with an abnormally small heart and a diagnosis of chronic lung disease. No one knew when he would die, or even how: would his feeble heart be the one to fail him, or would his lungs collapse to strangle him first? Either way, his body was too weak to function “normally”. So he was sent to us, where he transformed an overstuffed facility of forgettable children into a snug home with hope. 

I still lay on the grass at night, albeit alone now, in the hopes of grasping even a fraction of what Adrian understood about this vast universe. Sometimes I see him in the stars, and I wave to him until I feel tears streaming down my cheeks, until my vision blurs and his image dissolves to nothingness. 

Occasionally, I’ll look at my palm. Wiggle my fingers. Make a fist. Crack my knuckles. And smile. My body is in my command, and though it won’t be forever, it is in this moment. So I will live, because my number does not define me. I am a 4, but I am Lily first. I will jump, scream, cry, and laugh because that is what Adrian taught me to do with the beautiful life I have ahead of me. I will live for the both of us, because an angelic soul was seized too early from this bleakening world. And when my time comes, I will have a kingdom of priceless memories to remind me to smile when I meet Adrian this time around. 

And for that, I am grateful.

[haledamage]

Rhitober prompt: Writing Challenge Prompt List, "ansare - to hardly breathe, to be out of breath" for Cait Cousland?

“For what it is worth… I am sorry.”

There was a gentleness in Duncan’s voice that dug at Cait, that made tears prickle at the back of her eyes again. She forced them away and filled the space they left with anger.

She crossed her arms tightly over her chest. “I don’t want your blighted apologies.”

“What do you want?” He asked bluntly.

“Howe’s blighted head on a pike.” Cait thought the answer was pretty obvious.

Duncan turned to her, stopping her in her tracks. He took a step closer and she tensed, ready to fight if need be, but he never made a move to touch her. He simply watched, face impassive, and said in his deep, calm voice, “And will that bring your family back, if he were dead?”

Cait made a wordless noise of frustration and shoved him away with all her might. He barely stumbled. It left bloody handprints on his shiny Grey Warden armor. She shouted at him, voice raw and harsh. “Save your blighted platitudes, all right? I’ve had enough of them.” 

She was gasping for air like she’d been running for miles, though they’d only been walking at a brisk pace and were barely far enough from Highever to be considered safe. She’d walked farther than this regularly, and was in very good shape besides. It was like she couldn’t get enough air; rage and pain burned in her heart, and every breath fed it like a billows.

She saw something akin to empathy in the old Warden’s eyes, and it just made her angrier. She didn’t want his blighted understanding. If he started to say anything at all that resembled compassion or commiseration, she was going to hit him.

He didn’t. He simply took another slow step toward her. That knowing look stayed in his eyes, but his voice never gentled. “It is not platitude. Revenge is a powerful tool if used properly. I simply want to know for what purpose you want to wield it.”

“Why do you care? I said I’d fight your blighted darkspawn war, what do you care what I do beyond that?” It was hard to breathe past the weight in her chest. Everything still smelled like blood and smoke and she was choking on it, the edges of her vision black and red.

Duncan’s hands landed on her shoulders, firm but not unkind. She tried to shove him away again, but this time he didn’t budge. The breath caught in her chest finally released itself as a sob.

Cait didn’t know when her legs gave out, or how much time passed as she screamed herself hoarse somewhere in the wilderness of northern Ferelden. Duncan never moved to comfort her, but his hands stayed on her shoulders, as steady and implacable as the trees around them.

When next she was aware of herself, Cait lay next to a fire, her head pillowed on her mabari, Byron, who nuzzled her cheek in concern. A cloak was thrown over her - Warden blue, though she couldn’t recall Duncan wearing one.

At least she could breathe again.

Duncan set about making camp and Cait watched him. He didn’t try to speak to her, he didn’t even look her way, but she could feel his eyes on her nonetheless. The night was silent, empty even of birdsong or the chirping of crickets. It eased some of the tension in her shoulders and each breath came a little easier than the last.

It was hours before Duncan spoke again. “Lady Cousland--”

“It’s not Lady anymore, is it?” she interrupted, “I’m just Cait now. The Couslands are dead.”

“If that is what you’d prefer.”

It wasn’t. Of course it wasn’t. She’d prefer to be in her bed, in her home, where Grey Wardens were just stories and her mother always caught her sneaking back to her room, no matter how late it was. But she didn’t say that. She just pouted, feeling petulant and childish and lost. “Yes. Just Cait. Please.”

“As you wish, Cait.” She thought she could hear a smile in his voice, but when she looked up he was as stern as ever. “We will be making a short detour on the road south, if you don’t mind. Have you ever been to the mage’s tower?”

“I… no. We had mages visit sometimes, healers mostly, but Fa…” she paused, bit the inside of her cheek until the spike of pain passed, replaced by the taste of blood, “Father preferred I stay on the northern end of Ferelden. Highever, Amaranthine, Denerim. I’ve been to Redcliffe once or twice, but we never stopped anywhere near Kinloch Hold.”

“With luck, we will not be there long.” Duncan chuckled as she scoffed at that. “I suppose luck has not been on our side so far, has it? Perhaps that will change. There is another promising young recruit among the mages I’d like to meet, since the opportunity presents itself.”

“Sure,” Cait shrugged. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, refusing to point any of her ire at some mage she hadn’t even met. “I hope your mage has an easier time of it than I have.”

[fierycosmos]

FFXV: Gladio Meeting his Date

(I didn't know how to start the story off so i just sorta dropped right at the good stuff aka the action and when they meet)        Crowded ballroom and she accidentally gets shoved/knocked and trips over her feet (and length of dress doesn’t help), but Gladio catches her around the waist - leaning over her slightly as if he was dipping her while dancing “Careful there, it’s fortunate I was here” came a gruff voice of her savior, but she’s too preoccupied with how close she came to falling to meet his face. “Are you alright, miss?” “I’m so sorry - gods, I,” she begins to apologize for being so inappropriate and face her savior for the first time, but her eyes widen as she stares at the handsome man that has his hands clutched around her waist, and she is taken aback. “…hi.” The man can’t help but smile when she faulted in her apology. “Hi, are you hurt?” He asked, fighting his amusement to double check. “Uh, no, I’m okay, thank you…” She continues to hesitate while talking as he lifts her up straight, so she has to focus her attention to looking up at him, as he somewhat towered her even in heels. She looks around and sees that no one seemed to care or really take note of the action. Somewhat, relieved she turns back to thank her savior properly this time, but once again hesitates as she feels somewhat intimidated by his size and handsomeness. “Hi.” She spoke before thinking. “You said the already.” He acknowledges with a smirk. She blushes but bites the inside of her cheek to keep her composure – or rather regain her composure she lost. “… Yes, I did.” She admitted meekly. She takes a breath and then dares to meet his stare head on. “I’m Natalie.” “Gladiolus.” He introduces smoothly, as he nods his head. She smiled at his name. “Thank you, Gladiolus.” Her smile and composure grows. “No thanks required, no need for you to get so acquainted with the floor.” He insists with a grin, and she has bitten her tongue to prevent from laughing too loud at his joke, which he finds amusing. He then debates over something momentarily in his thoughts and leaving him to squeeze Natalie’s waist, which he was still holding onto – and it made her blush. “Though speaking of - how about a dance?” He suggested, as he moved one hand from her waist and moved it out towards the people who were dancing to the music from the orchestra. Her blush deepened. “That is, if you can manage.” He joked again, looking her up and down before gesturing to her feet. She held back an eye-roll.   “I believe I can manage,” she quipped, and it broadened Gladio’s grin. “Yes, I would like that.” She nods her head. Gladio grins and leads her with his hand still on her – though moving to the small of her back – before turning to face her and repositioning his hand on her waist again. He pulls her near and she blushes, but he’s only encouraged as he grabs her left hand and encompasses it into his larger one. She consciously makes the decision to keep her composure once more and places her right hand on his broad chest. She looks up at him, making sure that her doing so was okay, and he smirked at her – again, making her blush. They dance elegantly, that surprised Natalie to some degree, as she was worried that his large stature was cause her to be thrown around the dance floor. But he led her with grace and with a surprising gentleness that made her heart swoon. Seeing her physically relax – both in body and in her face – he took a few chances throughout the dance to spin her around before drawing her closely back to chest. He enjoyed the smile and deepening blush that appeared on her face. They made small talk throughout the motions until the third song they were dancing to ended. Natalie knew she needed a breather, as she was feeling herself too quickly falling for this man she merely met today, and knew if she kept dancing with him and letting him lead, she would do something foolish. “How about a rest?” She asked breathlessly. He stopped from spinning them around and before the fourth song began. She saw some hesitation and disappointment light he features momentarily before he regained his composure and quickly covered. “I don’t think I can keep spinning.” “Alright,” He agreed, though not fully. But despite his wariness of why she would want to stop, he decided to cover up his own nerves and doubts with some more humor. “It would be good not to trip again.” She blushed immediately again, feeling the blush creeping down her neck and towards her collarbone.   “Haha, right.” She cleared her throat and allowed Gladio to lead her from the center of the dance floor to the edge. “How about a breath of fresh air?” He suggested, and she almost physically sighed aloud, finding it great for the cool air to touch her burning skin, but she held back voicing her relief by biting her lip. “Sounds wonderful.” She sighed and smiled up at him, which he returned. He kept his hand on her lower back again and guided her towards the large windowed doorways that led to a balcony, which looked over the entire property of the palace. Though Natalie’s gaze was aimed at the sky, where she got a glorious view of the night sky and all the shimmering stars. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you here before.” “For good reason – I wouldn’t usually attend – though it’s for my brother.” “Oh yeah, and what’s so special about him?” “He’s a newly appointed Kingsglaive member, reason why we’re here tonight.” She smirks slightly. “Quite an honor, congrats.” Gladio tipped his head down at her in a gracious acknowledgment. “Thank you, Bernard has worked hard to get here.” She smiled to herself as she remembered the rigorous training she heard him going through and how he’d collapse onto the couch whenever she saw him. “Bernard? So you’re ‘butternut’?” “What?” Natalie froze and sputtered, her eyes rounding to the size of dinner plates. “You know about me?” “I recommended him. He’s an exceptional fighter worthy of being a Kingsglaive.” Gladio smiled confidently, which did little to put Natalie at ease. “Wow – well, then – please excuse anything you might have heard about me. I’m hoping most of them were lies.” She breathed out exasperatedly. Gladio let out a rich laugh that gave her goose bumps on her arms. Then again, that could be from the slight brisk air out on the balcony. “Haha, nothing horrible came up, I promise.” He mused, holding his hands up in a calming matter. She peered at him from the corner of her eye as she rested her elbows on the balcony’s ledge. “…I don’t believe you, but thanks for putting up a nice front.” She smiled jokingly and then returned her full attention to the view before them. A far off look appeared swimming in her eyes. There was a brief pause as the sounds of the night with crickets chirping from below and the whispering wind dancing around them. Natalie had not expected to have such a pleasant night. She came as a favor to her brother, and of course recognizes the hard work he’s put into being promoted. And yet here she was with a charming and handsome man that was barely working up a sweat to make her heart clench and her stomach do summersaults. “If you’re trying to figure out what he said, I swear – there’s no need to worry.”  Gladio spoke up after a beat, following her lead and leaning his elbows and forearms on the balcony’s ledge with leaning forward. He tried his best to read her face, and she began to blush again.   “No, it’s not that…” She breathed out a laugh and focused her gaze down towards the gardens below. She needed to hind her bashful expression, as she had been caught lost in thought – and she prayed he didn’t suspect she was lost in thought over him. “Whatever it is, I think I can take it.” Gladio challenged and nudged her elbow with his, and then never retracted it. Natalie blushed further at the consistent contact. Even if she couldn’t feel his skin from underneath his suit, she could tell he was well built. Thinking about him out of a suit made the blush she was sporting crawl down her neck and to the tips of her ears. Knowing she wouldn’t be able to keep it together much longer, she inhaled deeply and exhaled once she reached a decision. “Well, I have been trying to figure out a polite and subtle way at letting you know I’d like to see you again, but haven’t come up with anything.” She couldn’t meet his eyes. Of course she could feel his eyes on her, but she couldn’t work up the courage to see his reaction at such a bold statement. What made it worse was that Gladio didn’t immediately respond. “Heh,” He breathed out after a beat, and the noise made Natalie’s shoulders tighten. “Like you had to ask,” Gladio exhaled with a slight laugh. At that response, Natalie worked up the nerve to unfreeze herself and slowly turn her face towards Gladio’s again. She peered into his eyes and found immense sincerity and charm that she knew when she first met him. There was also a deep satisfaction exuberating from him. “Funny enough, I was waiting for a good time to ask you that myself.” Gladio admits with a smirk, as he positions his body so he was facing her fully this time, his shoulders ever broad. Natalie’s blush does not cease, but it doesn’t burn her as much as it did when caught up in the suspense of the moment previously. Despite Gladio confirming his interests in her were matched with hers, she looked down bashfully. She had no idea what to do no that the air had been cleared. Once again, Gladio was mystified by her bashfulness, but didn’t find her any less charming or enjoyable to be around. Though he didn’t want her hiding from him anymore. To get her attention, he moves away from the balcony’s ledge and moves to place a hand on her hip. He could feel her physically tense at the sudden contact, but did not falter in drawing her away from railing and closer to his chest. To his relief, she soon felt him relax in his light grasp as she once again was made to look up at him. A growing blush creeps from her cheeks to her ears, going from tinting them slightly to completely consuming them in a red glow. Gladio smiles at her reaction to his touch and decides to put his chances further. He brushed a loose strand of hair out of her face, even more satisfied at seeing her face completely in the glow of the moonlight. She froze when his eyes transfixed on her own. She gasped, as she forgot how to breathe. Feeling her chest slightly brush against his own, he smile morphs into a confident smirk and grows as he begins to lean in. She knew she was about to get lost into the moment, and she would savor it, but she still had a question on her lips she had to get out before she could have her breath taken away. She uses a free hand to place two fingers to Gladio’s lips. Gladio’s eyes were half-lidded at this point, but at her movement and gentle touch his eyes shot open in surprise and she almost felt bad when some sadness and doubt fluttered across his eyes.   “Tomorrow, dinner - 7?” She asked hesitantly. If Gladio’s eyes could widen further, they would have at how taken aback he was before smirking and squeezing the hand that was still clamped onto her waist. Her smile grows as she removes her fingers from his lips and moves to cup her hand around the side of his neck. The red of her blush leaks into her neck. She has never been so bold before meeting him, but she was glad she was taking such a chance as this.   “Meet me at the front of the castle.” Gladio almost whispered as he continued his path towards her face again. “Perfect.” She whispers as if it was a prayer and she places her other hand on his shoulder. Gladio smirks again for what would be the hundredth time that night since meeting her and closes the gap between them finally to kiss her. Immediately Natalie reciprocates – closing her eyes along with his – and moves the hand that was on his shoulder to join the other up to his neck and her hand goes to reach the hair behind his ear. At her actions, Gladio’s grip on her hip tightens once more while his other arm wraps it’s way around Natalie’s bare back, which brings her flush to his chest. After almost a minute of sharing kisses, each resonating with the same amount of passion and gentleness they both craved, they part and she looks up at him dreamily. Gladio’s smirk has not fazed. “Well, the night’s still young – and I’m not ready to let you go just yet.” Gladio says with a deep rumble that once again gave Natalie tingles. She moved her hands from his neck to his chest. “Who said I was going anywhere?” Natalie replies with a smirk of her own.   “Then let’s keep dancing” Gladio invites while stepping away too quickly for her liking but leaving an arm extended for her. She graciously with a big smile on her face nods her head and loops her arm with his. His other hand not busy linked with her arm finds her hands and he rhythmically rubs his thumb along the top of her hand. He guides her to the door back into the ballroom to continue their magical night.     

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hi, so....i wrote this a while back, but i wanted to post here cuz it’s cute imo :3

it's not perfect as there's no beginning even but what i have feel substantial enough so here you go also this could be treated like an xreader story i just felt kinda the need to add a name to the girl because there were some specifics and i didn't want to put specifics on the reader aka you so i gave the girl a name aka Natalie but again - feel free to insert yourself when reading it hope you like this was fun i have similar scenarios for the other chocobros that i'll post comment please!