#yeah this is probably the time for me to start rereading flat dreams

[thebookofbill]

@pengychan you gotta see this

Flat Dreams took over my life Im gonna go insane

Nora and Bill's human design by @/doodledrawsthings

[tardytothepardy]

hm

Ok, so I've just finished reading through Gakuen Alice, the whole finale and everything, and I kinda feel like it was either rushed, or missing something. There were just weird elements to it, and stuff that doesn't make sense to me.

(massive spoilers for a lot of the series below, just an fyi)

So, in the finale, Mikan's been taken away from Alice Academy, and has been away from it for a couple years. She has no memory of anything from that time, though she sometimes still gets hit by intense emotions unexpectedly, most likely parts of her memory trying to get through. She's a high school student, she's 16 years old, and apparently there's recently been an incident of kidnappings in the area that seem to specifically target girls around her age.

So when she goes down to the beach with her two friends, simply called Sa-chan and Shi-chan, and a bunch of shit starts going down, there's reason to panic, right? Ahh, there's a bunch of men here that I don't know that are going to kidnap me!!! But then, another group of men that she doesn't know show up and beat them up! Whoa! Then, randomly, for some reason, one of her friends just smooshes up her face and suddenly she's an entirely different person. But that's not all. All these new strange men seem to know her, and they have crazy powers! There's one guy who just made all the kidnappers pass out with a wave of his hand! Another guy seemed to just make fire spring out of nowhere! What the fuck??

I just,, the way that Narumi and Tsubasa and Natsume and Tonouchi and fuckin,,, everyone else just seems to think it's so funny and wacky that Mikan, who does not remember any of them, is freaking out and thinking they are going to kidnap her, it bothers me. Like, imagine just going through your day, then a bunch of weird men who act like they know you surround you completely, then just laugh at you when you freak out. What the hell.

I just generally have gripes about how the characters act, basically. It's just fucking weird to me, idk. Could it be due to the fact that I read all of this within the span of maybe three days? Sure. But still.

Starting off, I just have to talk about how Natsume,,, acted? behaved? responded? something,, to Mikan. He fecking grabbed her wrist (and uh, again, she hasn't remembered who any of these people are yet) and just fuggin stares at her. Sure, that does trigger something in Mikan's memory, and she's starting to vaguely re-remember stuff, but then he just??? grabs her chest????? What????? WHy?? Would??? you??? do?? that????? I just,,, I know that he did do shit like that earlier in the series, constantly making comments about how flat her chest was (YOUR HONOR SHE'S FECKING TEN YEARS OLD WHAT'S YOUR DEFENSE) and looking down her shirt or whatever, but,, from around the first Christmas party onwards, he never pulled any of that shit. He never made comments about any of that weird shit, none of that. I (foolishly, apparently) thought that he had,, I dunno,, kinda moved on from that whole,,,, assault,,, thing,,, but no. Guess not.

And like, at this point, idk how old he would be, but probably around 17 ish years old. Wh-- why?? What,, what-- WHY DID HE DO THAT??? WHY DID HE THINK THAT WAS A CORRECT THING TO DO??? It was bad enough when they were younger and actually knew each other, it's fucking gross and uncomfortable now that they're both older and SHE DOESN'T FUCKING REMEMBER WHO THE FUCK HE IS. To her, he's just some random creep who groped her? Ah, teenage romance, what a dream~~

After that.... incident, a few other things happen, but he just fucking grabs her (she still hasn't fully realized what is going on or who any of these random men are) and fukkin yells at her for leaving the school before he woke up, all those years ago. Dude, buddy, pal, friendo, she didn't have any control over any of that shit. She wasn't the reason that Nodacchi brought him back a week or so after Mikan left, she didn't know any of that!! She was waiting that whole time, but she didn't have any control over when Nodacchi would bring back Natsume, I just,,, why. It annoys me immensely.

(i'm rereading through the whole interaction again and uh,, yeah that one panel where he's holding her and just starts talking about shit that she doesn't remember or understand and then fuggin says "You are mine"??? UH,, DUDE?? NO. STOP. Props to Mikan for not losing her shit bc I definitely would. I'd be having a panic attack or something, this is an intensely stressful situation and I just,,, The sighs that I am sighing are so intense. Disappointment is accompanying every exhale, I stg.)

It is only after Mikan absorbs that fragment of her first Alice stone that she even starts to remember stuff and I just,, I do not like it.

Moving on from that, Ruka. What's up with him. What's he been doing this whole time. Idk. He just feels weird to me. Maybe it's the fact that everyone's all grown up and all seem to be experiencing a particularly nasty case of same-face-syndrome, but he just seems so,,, bland? Empty? There's something off about it, I don't get it. I mean, at least Ruka doesn't try to do something to Mikan when she hasn't remembered who tf he is, so he has that going for him.

At least he has a purpose beyond just standing there: it's to give Mikan those earbuds that Hotaru made, and they allow for Mikan to hear Hotaru's voice which spurs her to become determined to find her. (Also apparently whenever this is all taking place, that is actually Mikan's birthday. Some point in the summer, I think? I can't say for sure without checking the wiki.) (ok so I looked at the wiki and it says her birthday is May 17th, so, yeah.)

But yeah I just,, after Mikan remembers everything and agrees that she wants to find Hotaru, the entire Class B from when Mikan was in the Alice Academy is suddenly transported there, and among the things that I saw, I saw that Nobara and Persona,,, had a kid??? What??? I'm confused. Never mind the fact that he's probably like twice her age, easily, but like,,, where tf did that come from? I don't get why that happened. It's weird. Why? Why was that a thing? I'm confused.

I'm not sure that I'm just underwhelmed, I think I'm also kinda disappointed, honestly. The series had been picking up so much steam, there were so many things going on, feelings were developing and growing, and I was completely caught up in it. But after the scene where Hotaru and Subaru sacrifice themselves so that Mikan can be with Natsume in the future I just,, wasn't really feeling it? I mean, I was crying all the way through to when Mikan was being taken out of Alice Academy, that was sad and stuff, but then the last few chapters just felt so rushed. So many things (but it also felt like too few things) were just piled on top of each other, one thing after another, I didn't feel anything. I was expecting to be elated once Mikan and Natsume were reunited, after all, that was the whole reason why Hotaru sacrificed herself. I fuckin watched him die, and I was screaming and rocking around in my chair and hyperventilating, I was caught up in all of that. But when Mikan did remember everything and stuff, I was fine. "Oh, cool. That's nice." I don't even know why, honestly.

I think, really, that (and this sounds questionable) I preferred everyone as kids. Because up to this point, they've all been kids. The way that they act are the ways that kids act (more or less, no kid should be through a fraction of what these kids were through), and I became familiar with them. But now everyone's grown up, they're almost adults, but since this is the finale, there isn't time to show how people have changed, and so they just feel one-dimensional. Like, I think one of the main reasons why Natsume's actions threw me off so much was that, like I said, it seemed like he had dropped that behavior (of um, groping, assaulting, harassment, stuff like that) kinda early on in the story. From at least the first Christmas party and onward, he never made weird comments, he just didn't do weird shit, and that's why it's so weird that that's what he decided to do. "Hey, how I can jog the memory of the girl that I fell in love with all those years ago? Well, I suppose I can grab her chest and comment on how it's bigger. That seems like a solid plan." Dude, what? No.

This whole encounter, of finding Mikan, was a thing that was thought about, almost certainly planned, for who knows how long, but it just kinda feels like they (the entire group) had like, a week, to come up with a plan to find Mikan, try to get her memories back, and then ???? something???

It's weird, I'm tired, and kinda disappointed. Which is really sad, because I really liked the story up until the finale. I almost feel like there's something else, to the story. That chapter 180 isn't the end, but that's as far as I could read it, so that's all I could get from it.

[adenei]

Finding My Way To You - Ch. 11

AO3 || FFN

A/N: In case something looks familiar to you, yes this does include the Day 8 prompt in this chapter with a few slight alterations to fit the rest of the chapter more accurately.

**************

New Endeavors

Ron woke up the following morning to Hermione’s alarm going off. He reached over to her in an attempt to coerce her into having a longer lie-in, but he pulled back when he heard her squeal.

“No, no, no, no, I’m late! This is not good!” she said frantically. She jumped out of bed and ran to the bathroom. 

As much as he didn’t want to see her get moving, he could certainly get used to the sight of her walking around in just her knickers and one of his shirts. Ron closed his eyes as he heard the shower turn on and replayed the night before. After they had cleared the air and spent the rest of the afternoon exploring their new relationship, they’d gone to dinner with her parents. 

Hermione had suggested she spend the day with them today, and Ron was fine with it. He knew it was important to her to reconnect, and some of that needed to be done with just the three of them. So that’s where Hermione was getting ready to head now. He heard the door open and Hermione came out wrapped only in a towel.

“I forgot to grab clothes,” she said in frustration with herself. “Are you sure you’re okay with this?”

“Not if you keep walking around in just a towel, I won’t be,” Ron said. “Are you sure you can’t come back here for a little bit?” He knew she was referring to her leaving him alone all day, but he couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try and get a little extra time with her first.

Hermione had gathered her outfit in her arms and turned around to give him a look. “I’d love to, but I’m already late. And we both know if I crawl back in bed, I may not have the resolve to get up again.” She walked back into the bathroom. “What are you going to do all day?”

“I dunno. I’ll think of something. Don’t worry about me. Have fun with your parents.”

Hermione came out of the bathroom again and walked over to the edge of the bed. “I just feel bad.”

Ron sat up and swung his legs over the side to meet her. “Don’t. You need this time with them. That’s why we came. I’ll find something to do, and I’ll see you later tonight. Just...keep me updated, okay?” Slight worry etched across his face. He knew he was on good terms with her parents, but he still worried that she might not return. 

She must have noticed his concern because she leaned over and kissed him. “I will. I’ll see you tonight.” Ron nodded as he watched her grab her bag and head out the door. He laid in bed a while longer before finally getting up.

After getting ready for the day and finishing his breakfast, Ron made his way to to look through some of the brochures from the Australian Ministry. He nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard the phone on the wall ring. At first he wasn’t sure what to do. It wasn’t like he answered telephones often. He reminded himself not to shout into the receiver like that awful attempt at calling Harry when he was younger.

He picked up the phone and said, “Hello?”

“Hello, Ron? Is that you? This is Graham. Graham Jacobsen. I showed you to your flat when you first arrived.”

Ron had honestly completely forgotten all about the man. Now that he thought about it, they probably should have updated the Australian Ministry days ago. “Er, yes, hi. Is everything alright?” Ron asked.

“Yes, yes, of course! I’m just checking in to see how your search has been going and if you need any assistance!”

“It’s been great, actually. We’ve managed to locate Hermione’s parents, fairly quickly actually, and she’s been spending the last few days getting reacquainted with them.”

“Excellent, excellent! So the resources the Ministry sent over with the muggle teeth cleaners and addresses of Wilkin’s in the surrounding area were no doubt helpful, then?”

“Er, yeah,” Ron said. He wasn’t about to tell Graham that they’d actually stumbled upon Jean and Hugo by accident.

“Great. So anyways, like I said, I was asked to get an update. Since you’ve located them, we were wondering how much longer you were anticipating to stay.”

“I’m not sure. I can talk to Hermione and see if we can get a clearer answer for you tomorrow or the day after if that’s okay.”

“Yes, sure! No rush. It will just help to have an idea to prepare your portkey trip back. Let’s see, let’s see, oh yes! One more thing. You received a letter here from England through the Portkey Post. Wouldn’t want to make owls travel all this way. If you’re available, you can come pick it up at the Ministry anytime.”

A letter? Is everything alright back home? “Sure, yeah, I can actually be down there in fifteen minutes.”

“Excellent, I’ll meet you in the entrance hall. See you in a jif!” Graham said before hanging up.

Ron hung up the phone and immediately began moving around the apartment to grab his things. He figured he could spend a few hours walking around and seeing what else Melbourne had to offer from the magical side of things. Before he knew it, he was apparating to the spot Graham showed them almost a week ago, and walked the short distance to the Ministry entrance.

He had barely stepped a few paces inside when he saw Graham waving frantically. “Ron! Over here!” They met in the middle as Graham said, “So good to see you again! I hope you’ve been enjoying your stay here so far.”

“Yeah, it’s been great,” Ron agreed.

“Here’s the letter that came for you. If you want to send a response, we send our international post out at 13:00 every day. The drop box is over here.”

Ron followed him over to the box that had a small slot in it. He was curious how this system worked. Whether it was his lack of knowledge about other cultures and customs or not, he always assumed the owls just traveled the distance to their destination. Though, for a continent like Australia that was so far away from other places, he supposed this system made sense. It’d be hard for an owl to travel over an ocean with no resting points.

“Thanks.” 

“Absolutely. Well, I must be getting back to my obligations. Like I said, feel free to call if you ever need anything. Just press 9 on your dial pad and it will transfer your call to my office. A little magical touch so you don’t have to memorize a ten digit number. I look forward to hearing from you!”

Graham shook Ron’s hand before walking away. Ron looked at the letter in his hand. He didn’t want to return to the flat just to read it, so he decided to walk around a bit to find a place to sit and read what it said. There was a small park a few blocks away that Ron stumbled upon. He chose one of the vacant benches and sat down. The handwriting looked like Harry’s.

Hey Ron,

I hope you and Hermione are having luck finding her parents. It’s odd here without you two, but I’ve been keeping busy. Listen, I’m not trying to rush the process, but I wanted you to know that I met with Kingsley yesterday, and he said they’re looking for recruits in the Auror program. The other letter that I sent with this is from him. He’s inviting us into the program if we want. I think I’m going to go for it. We have to complete the screening process by the end of the month, so I’m hoping you’ll be back by then to start with me if that’s what you want to do. By the way, are you and Hermione sorted yet? Ginny wants to know. Well, anyways, let me know when you decide. 

Harry

Ron reread Harry’s letter a few times before pulling out the second piece of parchment that he now knew to be from Kingsley. Was this actually an invitation to join the Aurors? Would he be able to achieve his dream? Did he still want to pursue that dream? He slowly peeled off the wax seal and unfolded the official Ministry parchment.

Mr. Weasley,

I hope this finds you well and that you are having success on your current mission. I am reaching out to you to personally invite you to join the Aurors. As you know, we are woefully understaffed as a result of the war, and your integral efforts make you a prime candidate for the program. Typically, the training period is an extensive three years, but given your experiences, you will have an opportunity to pass out of the training program after a year, and be promoted to Junior Auror status. 

I understand that you are predisposed on a mission, but this offer is time sensitive. The Auror department has agreed to honor this offer for select people, yourself included, but they are requiring all candidates to begin on 3 August. Paperwork and a screening, however, must be completed by 1 July. I have attached the preliminary paperwork for you to set up your appointments with the Ministry, and they will be in touch should you be interested in pursuing this avenue. 

Please take the time to think about this, but do not wait too long to reply. The Aurors will be lucky to have someone with your skillset in the department. Best of luck on your continued search. All my best,

Kingsley

Ron’s hands were shaking slightly at the letter. He had a personal invitation from the Minister of Magic to join the Aurors. His finger followed the application that he looked over. It seemed straightforward enough, and the prospect was certainly appealing. He knew deep down that he absolutely wanted to try, but something was preventing him from returning to the Australian Ministry to fill out the paperwork and send it back that same day. 

Ron thought it through to make sure he’d have enough time to discuss with Hermione first. He reviewed the application, and it said he could return his paperwork from Australia, and it said that he could request a timeframe for his appointment. That was good. Maybe he could return next week, but his heart wrenched at the thought of having to leave Hermione here. Ron folded the contents of the two letters and tucked them in his jacket pocket for safekeeping. 

He looked around the park, thinking about what to do next. It was a beautiful, crisp day, just like every other day had been since they’d arrived, even if it was colder. He smiled, thinking Hermione would be cold, but he was perfectly comfortable. The weather here differed so greatly from the weather in England, and Ron was slightly envious of how nice it seemed to be year round.

He finally decided to walk around. This part of Melbourne wasn’t as familiar to him, but Ron figured he could always apparate back to the flat if need be. A smile spread across his lips as he stood up and began walking back towards the Ministry. He’d gone from not knowing what life had in store for him now that the war was over to having a career prospect. Nothing could break his mood as he looked around at the places to explore. 

About an hour later, Ron found himself wandering aimlessly around Melbourne’s streets. He’d gone in several of the shops that interested him along the way, and had just finished up a light meal he’d gotten at a cafe. The food was great, and he wished Hermione had been there to. He told her he was fine with today’s plan, but he still missed her. They’d been spending so much time together that it felt odd to be apart from her, even if it was just for the day. Even when her mum had whisked her away to shop, he still knew exactly when he’d see her next.

As he made his way down another new street, Ron stopped outside the window of a unique looking jewelry shop. He knew it was still early in their relationship, but he walked inside anyways to see what the display cases held. Most everything would probably be out of his price range, but maybe he’d gather an idea or two for Hermione.

“Good afternoon,” a bright and energetic salesperson said to him.

“Hello,” Ron said.

“Is there anything I can help you find today?”

“Oh, er, not really. Just looking,” his ears turned red. 

“Not a problem at all! I’ll be around if you need anything,” she smiled and went back to her work.

As he walked around slowly, browsing the selection, he was appreciative that there seemed to be a wide variety of items and price ranges. Ron avoided the section with the rings. It was way too early for that, and he didn’t want to get his hopes up with wishful thinking. So, he found his way over to the earrings, which he was pretty sure she never wore often, though he was certain her ears were pierced, and then the necklaces. He shuddered at the recollection of Lavender giving him that horrifying ‘sweetheart locket’ back in sixth year, and swore to himself that he wouldn’t get anything like that for Hermione. 

Once he’d finished circling the perimeter of glass cases, he moved to the center displays, which appeared to be bracelets. There was a small display among them that had a variety of blank bracelets and little pieces scattered all around. 

Ron looked around and caught the salesperson’s attention. “Find something I can help you with?”

“Er, yes. What are these?” Ron asked her.

“Oh! Great question. These are charm bracelets! Are you familiar with them?” she asked kindly.

“No, not really,” Ron admitted.

“No matter! You see, you pick out a bracelet first, though I’m sure you would have gathered that, and then you have all of these amazing charms to choose from. We have hundreds of them on this display for you to choose from.”

“So, the charms are like symbols, then?” Ron asked for clarification.

“Precisely! They are becoming increasingly popular.”

Ron nodded as an idea was forming in his mind. He was unable to get anything for Hermione’s last birthday, and Christmas for that matter. Maybe this could be the way to make it up to her. “How much?”

“The bracelets are 50 dollars, and then the charms range anywhere between 15 and 50 depending on what you’re looking for.”

Ron thought about what the salesperson said as he felt the wallet in his pocket. Bill and George had both given him money before he’d left. He was determined not to use it unless he had to, since he felt guilty that he was taking it to begin with. Maybe he’d splurge a bit, and when they got back to England, he’d take up a part-time job at the shop with George in order to pay him back, and then earn a little spending money of his own.

In truth, he was about to use it to pay for their posh dinner the other night, but Hermione had insisted she use her parent’s card. He’d need to make it up to them, too, at some point. Focus, Ron. Okay, I could get her the bracelet, and a few charms. No more than five. He knew if he didn’t set a limit, he’d blow all his money on this one gift.

“Okay, I’d like the silver bracelet, I think. Is there a list of charms, or will I need to look through all these individually?” Not that he minded, since he had nowhere else to be today.

“We have a list right here!” There was a stack of laminated papers that she grabbed one from and handed to him. “When you’ve decided what you’d like, I can take them out for you and we can put them on the bracelet at the register.”

“Great, thanks!” Ron said as he began to work his way through the list. 

She wasn’t kidding when she said there were hundreds. They were broken down into categories on the double sided sheet. He knew he definitely wanted to get her the book charm. That was without a doubt. He saw that there was also a heart with roses engraved in it. It looked fancier than the other charms, but he figured he could splurge a bit on it since it held a special meaning for them both. 

As his eyes skimmed the list he noticed an assortment of animals. I wonder…, he thought. He saw there was definitely a dog, which he wasn’t surprised by, but he was even more pleased to see that there was an otter charm! “Well, they are quite cute,” he muttered to himself. 

Four charms down, one more. He initially looked for an elf, but didn’t have any luck there. He wasn’t surprised, and he worried that even if he saw one, it’d be one of those Christmas looking ones. Giving up on that, Ron ended up finding a seashell charm which instantly brought him back to Shell Cottage. That was no doubt the turning point in their relationship, and it also represented the place where Dobby was buried. It could definitely serve a double meaning, for sure.

He brought the paper up to the counter and told the kind salesperson his choices, watching as she bustled around to collect everything. She rang the items up, and Ron pulled out his wallet to pay for the items. He carefully tucked the receipt away so he could keep track of his purchases.

“Would you like this wrapped up in a gift bag?” she asked him.

“Yes, please,” he said, glad to have her assistance.

He asked if the charms could be arranged the following way on the bracelet: book, otter, terrier, seashell, and heart. It represented the chronological order of the charm’s meanings to their relationship. The salesperson finished wrapping up the bracelet and handed him the gift bag when she was finished. “Thank you so much for your business, and best of luck. I’m sure your special someone is going to love this!”

“Thanks for your help,” Ron said as he exited the shop.

He figured he should probably head back before he spent any more money that day. Ron could watch the telly, and there was enough food for him to make something at the flat. There was an alley nearby that he decided to turn into, so he could apparate back to the flat. Better to be safe than sorry, since he really had no idea where he was. He turned on the spot and appeared at the apparition point nearby. He approached the building, typed in the code and let himself into the foyer. 

When he made it up the stairs, he unlocked the door and walked into the main living area, just as a silvery ball floated toward him. At first, his heart constricted and he immediately became on edge. He was even more worried for Hermione’s safety when the ball transformed into Hermione’s otter patronus.

A moment later he could hear Hermione’s nervous voice. “Hi! I hope this works. It’s the first time I’ve tried to send a patronus message. Anyways, I’m having dinner with my parents and will be back after. Most likely between seven and eight. I hope you don’t mind. See you soon.” 

The silver otter pranced over to him and moved in a figure eight pattern around his legs before nuzzling him and disappearing into a wisp. Ron couldn’t help but smile with pride. Hermione was okay, and she’d produced her first corporeal patronus complete with a message. He checked his watch as he set the bag down on the table. Only a few hours until he could see her again.

[ghosttotheparty]

say my name and say it twice (cotton candy skies)

20. also on AO3 chapter nineteen

Lucas’s face falls as he rereads the words on his screen. 

Call ended.

He lets himself deflate, his shoulders dropping as he sighs, closing his eyes. He puts his elbows on his desk in front of him, holding his face in his hands as he squeezes his eyes shut, tensing his face and shoulders before collapsing, dropping so his head rests on his forearms, crossing on the cold surface of his desk. He feels it against his skin, the sleeves of his worn sweater rolled up past his elbows, and he embraces it, focuses on it, lets it consume him, until he lifts his head, pulling his sleeves down over his hands, tugging them past his fingers and gripping them in his fists, the material twisted around his fingers. He lifts his hands and rubs the material on his face, letting it scratch gently, his eyes still closed.

He lets himself be alone.

The flat is empty, Zoë and Senne off somewhere, Milan on a lunch date, and it’s silent, except for the hum of his heater and the quiet sounds of the flat settling, creaks in the wood floor and doors. His hands drift from his face, crossing over his chest to cradle his shoulders, which are slightly shrugged up, uncomfortable and stiff. 

He doesn’t notice his feet tapping the ground anxiously, hitting against the wood of the floor and of the leg of his char, doesn’t notice his teeth tugging at his bottom lip, biting the skin, doesn’t notice how it hurts. He doesn’t hear anything. 

So he jumps when he hears his computer chime loudly, after who knows how long, and he looks up when it continues, the screen glowing, letting him know that Ralph is calling him. 

He lets go of himself, pushing his shoulders down and rubbing his face quickly, taking a deep breath before he answers, forcing a smile. 

“Hey.”

“Hello, my love!” Ralph is grinning, his arms crossed on the table in front of him, a table Lucas doesn’t recognise. He doesn’t recognise the room behind Ralph either, the wall that sunlight is streaming across, or the fixture hanging from the ceiling. “Are you okay?” 

Lucas looks from the fixture to Ralph and sees that his smile has dropped slightly, his brows furrowed. 

“Yeah, I’m good,” he lies. “Uhm, where are you?” 

“I’m in Norway, visiting a friend.” Ralph looks over his computer screen and waves a hand. 

Another man joins him, tossing an arm around Ralph’s shoulders. He has short strawberry blonde hair. He looks kind of like a fairy. 

“Hi, I’m Eskild,” he says in English, and Lucas smiles, waving. 

“Hey,” Lucas says, pointing at him, suddenly recognising him. “You were at that party in Utrecht, right?” 

Eskild nods, grinning. 

“I’m Lucas.”

“Ralph has told me all about you, he loves you.” 

“Aw.” Lucas grins as Ralph shoves at Eskild. (There’s a “Shut up!” that Lucas almost misses.) 

“You said you had to tell me something?” Ralph asks when Eskild lets go of him, stepping to the side. 

“Yeah, so—”

“Is it okay that I’m here?” Eskild interrupts, holding his hands up. “I can leave if you want.”

“Oh, no, it’s fine. Actually you’ll probably be happy too, you guys seem to be kindred spirits.” 

Eskild coos excitedly, pulling a chair up next to Ralph’s and Ralph moves over. Lucas waits as they get situated. 

“Okay, tell us,” Ralph says, and they both look up at him. 

“So…” Lucas takes a deep breath. He pauses, hearing a creak in the floor, and waits for a few seconds, listening, and continues when he doesn’t hear anything else. “I have a boyfriend.” 

“You have a what?” Ralph practically yells and Eskild exclaims and claps. Lucas giggles, covering his face. “Wait, say that again, I wanna hear it again.”

“I have a boyfriend.” 

“Oh my god.” Ralph takes a heavy breath and looks away before looking back. “Do you remember when you told me—” “Ralph, sto-o-op.” 

“—that you didn’t think you’d ever find someone?” 

Eskild watches them, his jaw dropped, his hands still clasped in front of him. 

Lucas sighs, smiling, and looks away, exasperated. 

“I think I was…” 

“What?” Eskild prompts when he trails off, and Lucas pauses before finishing his thought. 

“I think I was waiting for him.” 

They both squeal loudly, grabbing at each other, and Lucas laughs. 

“That’s so fucking cute, oh my god,” Ralph says, shoving Eskild’s shoulder.

“I know.”

“What’s his name?” Ralph asks, leaning over, his elbows in the table.

“Jens.” Lucas can feel his face burning, can feel his cheeks flushing bright, and it only makes his smile more. 

“Jens,” Ralph sighs. “Tell us about him, is he pretty?” 

“Yes.” 

They both snicker. 

“How did you meet?” Eskild asks. 

“Uhm… So I just kind of wander the city a lot, and one day I happened to be outside his dance studio when he was finishing practise.” 

“Wait, his what studio?” Ralph asks, his jaw dropped and his eyes wide. 

“Dance? He’s a ballerina.” 

They both start yelling, grabbing at each other again, a mess of  “Oh my go-o-o-od!” and “Ballerina!”, and Lucas laughs again, pressing his sweater-covered hands over his mouth. 

“Lucas, you are… living my dream,” Eskild says when they manage to calm down, and Lucas laughs harder, not knowing what to say. 

“How long have you guys been together?” Ralph asks. 

“Uhm, a few weeks? I don’t really know what actually like, was the start of the relationship, if that makes sense.”

“Explain, please.” 

“Like…” Lucas sighs. “When we first started hanging out, we were already kind of… flirty?” They both are smiling at him, and he keeps talking, trying to ignore it. “Like teasing and stuff, and then holding hands and playing with each other’s hair. And we went on a few dates.” “Where to?” Ralph asks. 

“A cafe, skateparks. Honestly, just us hanging out outside his studio felt like dates.” 

“That’s precious,” Eskild says. 

“Who made the first move?” Ralph asks, setting his chin on his palm. 

“Uhm,” Lucas pauses, thinking. “I asked to hang out first. And then I kissed him, but we didn’t talk about it at all. And then I told him to kiss me because he was taking too long.”

“Ooo, Lucas is bold.” 

He shrugs, smiling bashfully. 

“Wait, have you guys…” Ralph doesn’t finish the question, lowering his chin and raising his eyebrows as Eskild punches his shoulder.

“Ralph…” Lucas looks away, feeling like he just shoved his face into a pool of lava, suppressing a smile. 

“I can’t tell if that’s a yes or a no.” 

“No, we haven’t.” 

“Okay,” Ralph says, holding his hands up like he’s surrendering. “Not a problem.” 

“Do you want to?” Eskild asks, curiosity clearly getting the best of him.

“I mean…” Lucas sighs. “I guess, yeah. But if he doesn’t want to, like if it doesn’t happen, I won’t be upset, you know?” 

“You’re an angel, Lucas van der Heijden,” Ralph says, and Lucas’s smile grows again. 

He doesn’t feel as sad anymore.

Ralph seems to remember at the same time as him. 

“Hey, did something happen before I called? You seemed… off.”

“I, uhm…” He pauses, contemplating whether or not to tell them. “I’d been talking to Jayden.”

“Jayden, skater Jayden?” 

Lucas chuckles at this, the way Ralph has managed to remember his friends that he doesn’t know well. Skater Jayden, Skater Kes, Liv’s Noah, Liv’s Isa, etc.

“That’s the one.”

“Who’s Jayden?” Eskild asks, looking confused. 

“One of Luc’s friends in Utrecht.” 

Eskild nods, looking back to Lucas. 

“Tell us,” Ralph says, and Lucas almost laughs at the seriousness of it all, at how they’re both looking at him like they’re his dads.

“I don’t know, I haven’t really been keeping up with him or Kes. Or anyone, really, except you and Noah. And we just happened to be online at the same time so he asked if I wanted to call and I said yeah, so…” He pauses, rubbing his face, feeling them both looking at him. “It was awkward at first, just because we haven’t been talking, and then it was fine, and then—” He cuts himself off, huffing and tossing his hands, suddenly frustrated. Pissed. 

“What happened?” Eskild presses softy. 

“I don’t know, he just… He started acting weird and then he kind of made a comment that like… that I’ve changed. And I tried to just shrug it off and I made a joke about moving countries, and he acted like… Like it was weird.” 

“What the hell?” Ralph drops his hand and makes a face. “Did he say anything?” 

“He said ‘You’ve changed,’ and then ‘Why are you acting like this?’ but when I asked what he meant he just changed the subject. And when we hung up it was just really uncomfortable and weird, and I just…” 

“What the hell?” Ralph repeats.  

“He seemed upset,” Lucas adds, his voice small, and for a second he thinks they couldn’t hear him. 

“He can’t be upset about that,” Eskild says suddenly, looking at Ralph and then Lucas on the screen. “That’s what people do.” 

“Yeah, exactly,” Ralph says, pointing at him. “That’s basically the meaning of life. The whole point of existence is change and growth.” Lucas listens intently. “And he may not know it but the way that you’ve changed has been growth. Every time we’ve talked since you moved to Antwerp, you seem more and more at ease with yourself, and you seem happier and happier.” 

Lucas smiles. 

“He can’t be mad that you’re changing,” Ralph continues, looking angry. “If you walk into a forest and find a sprig, you can’t be mad when you go back five years later and find a tree. That’s not—” He huffs and Eskild places a hand on his forearm. 

“He has no reason to be upset,” Eskild continues for him. “It’s not like he hasn’t changed at all, right?” 

“His hair is longer,” Lucas contributes. “And he has a new earring.”

“There you go, are you mad about it?” 

Lucas laughs. 

“No.” 

“Exactly. Jayden’s a dummy.” 

Lucas and Ralph laugh again, shaking their heads at Eskild. 

“And why haven’t you been talking to them, was it just, like…” Ralph asks. 

“I don’t know, when I first moved we talked a lot and kept up, but eventually it felt like I was the only one actually trying. Like, all their texts felt dry, and I just felt like they didn’t want to talk to me.” They nod. “Which could just be anxiety, but I stopped texting first as much and it just dwindled.” 

“So none of them really talk to you?” Ralph says, looking surprised, and Lucas shakes his head. 

“Not really.” 

“You can’t give a hundred percent in a relationship with someone who won’t even give fifty,” Eskild says, and Ralph nods, pointing at him. 

“Yeah,” Lucas sighs. “I’m kind of  over it, I’m not that mad.”

They both look at him, looking sympathetic, their eyes soft. 

“I mean, it hurt at first. But I’ve got Jens. And you guys, and Noah. And some friends here. It’ll be fine.”

Ralph smiles sadly. 

“That’s true. You’ll always have people.” 

“I’ll always have people.” 

There’s a moment of silence and then Lucas snickers quietly. 

“You guys are good… what’s the word I’m looking for, mentors? Confidants?”

“Gurus,” they say simultaneously, and then exclaim and point at each other excitedly as Lucas says, “That’s  it!” 

Ralph and Eskild laugh hysterically, and Lucas can’t help but laugh with them. 

He gets Eskild’s phone number and Instagram before they hang up. 

[srsly-messed-up-fruitloop]

Tug of War (Ch 4)

ch 1 - prev - next

Word Count: 2,816

Final exam season had finally come. To say the seniors of Casper High were stressed was an understatement, college application deadlines were also quickly approaching.

Wes Weston however, was stressed for a whole other reason. His attempt before winter break to awaken the angry ghostliness in Fenton wasn’t enough. He only saw Fenton ripping out all the decorations, without glowing green eyes or anything else ghostly he could catch on camera. And to make manners worse, the school’s caretaker blamed him for leaving shattered ornaments in the halls so he winded up with detention. It wasn’t even his fault!

Read on AO3 or under the cut

Stealing another glance at the classroom’s wall clock, he scowled when he realized that he still had twenty minutes to burn until his computer science exam ended. 

Might as well not let this time go to waste. Pushing aside his completed exam, he grabbed a scrap piece of paper and began to brainstorm other ways to infuriate Fenton. He stole a glance at Fenton’s sidekick, Foley, hastily writing away. Frowning, he turned back to his page. 

Meanwhile, for Danny, he has never felt this anxious ever before in his life. 

Before, when he was barely scraping by in class, he was beginning to accept that his dreams would remain as that. Just dreams. Protecting the town would always come first. He became indifferent to his grades because 1) he’d convinced himself that he was a bad student, nothing could change that, and 2) it wasn’t that important anyways. He could deal with his parents’ disappointment. 

However, after dealing with his exhausting responsibilities for a few years now, he finally learned to properly manage his time. And it showed when he found out he ended last year with a B+ average.

He told himself it was just a fluke, there’s no way Danny Fenton could get those grades. At most, he was a C- student. Yet, a tiny spark of hope flared up and drove Danny to try harder this year. Perhaps it was just a fluke, but who knows? What if it happened again?

And when it kept happening, sometimes even getting back A’s on his tests, then it hit him. He was actually capable of doing well in school. 

Allowing himself to believe that meant that his childhood aspirations were possible. But, there was always that question in the back of his mind: What if this all was just a fluke? His luck could run out anytime. He could easily fail all his exams and lose his chances. And what then?

He could not come back after letting himself believe that he had a future to look forward to. Of all the times he had barely escaped being destroyed by his enemies, it didn’t compare to the mounting fear he had of not getting into college. 

That fear was only accentuated by his stressed classmates. Danny felt ill every time he heard Star talking about all the schools her brother was rejected from, Mikey and Nathan discussing admission cutoffs, and practically everyone going into a panic when their average lowered. Even Dash was worried about meeting his minimum requirement for his football scholarship.

Thing is, Danny couldn’t even look forward to college itself. Don’t get him wrong, he likes learning, especially about space. But he would have to endure four more years of school, plus another two for a masters. 

At first, he just told himself to suck it up. It was a necessary sacrifice.

Now though, he was conflicted. He had to do his undergrad in some science-related college program to be eligible for the space program. However, what if he ended up in an undergrad program he didn’t like? He’d be stuck with it. What if college is too hard for him? He could very well fail everything and get kicked out. Then he wouldn’t even be able to continue to get a masters. And of course, the biggest question of them all: would he able to handle juggling his ghostly responsibilities and college for the next six years? Heck, with how stressed out Jazz seems these days, how much worse would it be for him?

Danny was simultaneously afraid of both getting in and not getting into college.

“Hey Danny, you alright?” asked Sam.

Like always, he pushed these worries away into that overcrowded space in the back of his mind. “Yeah, ‘m fine,” he mumbled before rereading the same sentence in his textbook for the twentieth time.

“Are you sure? We could just take a bre—”

Suddenly, his ghost sense went off.

~

Danny gripped his bleeding forearm. He just needed it to clot, then his self-healing would eventually kick in. But it wasn’t clotting. He worriedly watched as his blood tinged with ectoplasm dripped onto the floor. This wasn’t good.

He looked up at Sam with desperate eyes, who bit her lip. “Hang on, I think have something that’ll help. Be right back,” she assured before scurrying from their secluded refuge under the staircase.

She returned not even a minute later, holding a flat square object wrapped in colourful plastic. Danny’s eyes widened and before he could even protest, she unpackaged and wrapped it around his wound.

Sam’s gaze hardened when he started squirming away. “Danny, it’s just a pad.”

“Bu—”

“It’s either this or one of your socks. Now relax, we need to get the bleeding to stop before next period.”

“What’s next period?”

“Bio exam, remember?”

“Dammit.” He thumped his head against the wall.

“It’s okay, we’ve still got a bit of time bef—”

The two teens tensed as they heard footsteps coming from the height of the staircase.

“Danny, quick, hide it!” she said in a panicked whisper.

“How am I supposed to hide a bleeding arm?!” he quietly exclaimed.

She huffed at his reply before swiftly releasing her pressure on his arm, rolling up his sweater sleeve over the pad, and using his other hand to press on the wound again through his sweater.

“Ah, hello Mr. Fenton, just the man I was looking for. And Ms. Manson,” Lancer greeted, suspiciously eyeing how close the two teens were sitting. He wasn’t naive, he was aware of what some of his students get up to in these secluded areas of the school. “I’m sorry to interrupt, can I have a word with you Daniel?”

“Mr. Lancer, I swear I-I...”

“Relax, you’re not in trouble. I’d just like a moment to speak with you.”

“Uh…” Danny hesitated.

“If this is not the best time, you can always speak to me later. Although, I implore you that you should see me sooner than later on this matter.”

“Oh…okay.” He glanced at Sam, who was frowning in worry. Forcing a reassuring smile on his face, he stood up from her and followed Lancer to his classroom.

As they walked through the halls, he tried to arrange his arms in a more casual position while placing a little more pressure on the wound.

“Mr. Fenton, I recall reading that you aspire to become an astronaut from one of your essays in 9th grade,” Lancer mentioned as he unlocked his classroom’s door.

Following him into the classroom, Danny replied warily, “Uh...yeah?” How the heck did Lancer remember something so miniscule from something he wrote ages ago?

His English teacher approached his desk and grabbed something from a drawer. “Have you heard of the Young Astronauts program?” he asked, presenting a pamphlet to him.

“No?” Danny momentarily released his hold on his injured arm to accept it, only to regret when he felt something warm drip down his arm. Shit! He held the pamphlet with his index and middle finger while quickly resuming his hold, praying for nothing to bleed through his sleeve. Why won’t it clot already??

Meanwhile, Lancer scrutinized his unusual movements for a moment before continuing, “I’ve been informed that this program fast tracks you to becoming an astronaut at NASA. Though it’s very competitive, once in, you only have to complete a four year practical program before you’re fully eligible for the space program.”

“Really?” He used his thumb to flip through the brochure, getting more excited as he read the outline of the program. However, once he reached the admission requirements section, his excitement suddenly deflated. “What makes you think I can get in?”

“Daniel, if you maintain what you have right now, your grades will be good enough for the requirements. Also, I’d be more than happy to write that letter of reference for you,” he smiled warmly.

His teacher’s sincerity caught him by surprise. “Oh, uh...thanks Mr. Lancer.”

“Anytime. Now, I think there’s an email at the back to contact if you have any questions. I won’t steal anymore of your precious studying time.”

Right when Danny’s foot was out the door, Lancer spoke up again, “Actually, there’s one more thing I mean to ask. Is your arm okay?”

His question stopped Danny right in his tracks. “What do you m-mean?” he nervously asked, voice cracking.

“Well, I can’t help but notice how you’re holding your arm there,” he commented.

“I…” Danny’s brain frantically searched for an excuse. 

Lancer frowned at his hesitation. 

“It’s...it’s a temporary tattoo,” he blurted.

“Pardon?”

“Y-you know those stick-on tattoos you have to press down for like a minute? I-yeah,” Danny improvised.

Lancer blinked. He did not expect that reply at all from the boy. Though, it did make sense. “Ah, very well. See you later Daniel. Good luck on your finals.”

Danny uttered out a goodbye before he all but ran to the bathroom to check his arm.

~

Danny jumped when he felt someone poking him. Turning around, he realized it was only Sam.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“About what happened yesterday, I think you need this.” She thrusted a big first-aid kit in his arms. “We really shouldn’t resort to using my pads anymore,” she chuckled.

“But, I already have one at home though?”

“Yeah, but I think we need one here. Just keep it in your locker, okay?”

“Uh…” He suddenly thought of Wes. Would he even stoop that low to use this as evidence? Probably. Danny sighed, he better not mess with it. This kit looked pretty expensive…

“Sam, you didn’t have to go and buy this.”

“It’s no big deal. I wanted to.”

“Bu—”

“Danny, I don’t have time for this. Stop being stubborn and just take it,” she insisted.

“Fine.” He unhappily grabbed the first-aid kit. “One day I’m paying you back for everything.”

“You honestly don’t have to. Anyways, gotta go!” she blurted before hurrying to her English exam. Two seconds later, the bell rang.

Shit, their English exam! He quickly dumped the kit at the bottom of his locker and ran after her. Hopefully Wes wouldn’t make too big of a deal out of the kit.

~~

Danny turned the corner of the hall and halted in his step when he saw Wes at their locker. Nope, he wasn’t dealing with him today. There was way too much on his mind with the start of the new semester. Calculus was already proving to be the bane of his existence.

He was about to turn around but had to do a double take when he noticed Paulina was there too. Talking to Wes. Weird.

He was too far to hear what they were saying, but Danny’s former crush seemed to be really excited for some reason. Wes then pulled an envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. Danny swore he saw Paulina discreetly slip a wad of cash into his other hand before accepting the envelope.

What the heck. What could Wes possibly have that Paulina would pay that kind of money for? You know what, he wasn’t even gonna ask. He needs to start heading to chemistry. Wes could be selling drugs for all he knows; he doesn’t care. 

~

Seeing Wes that morning almost completely slipped from Danny’s mind until he approached his locker after school, this time with a backpack full of textbooks from his new classes. 

He instantly spotted a yellow sticky note on the door which read “MEET ME @ BACK FIELD - DASH” in a hastily scrawled blocky script.

The two most popular kids at Casper High both reached out to Wes today. That doesn’t just happen to anyone, especially someone like Wes. Danny couldn’t help but feel a little curious. 

Selling drugs seems a little too out-of-character for him. He’s the type of person to expose the school’s drug dealers instead of being one himself. What else could he be selling then? Test answers? No, the semester just started. 

As Danny placed his books on the top shelf, he paused when he noticed a small envelope in the very back. Squinting a bit, he saw that it had “Dash” written on it in tiny letters. Upon grabbing it, it felt like it contained something like cardstock. 

Wait. After flipping it, he realized the envelope wasn’t sealed up. And he caught the slight shine of photos peeking from inside.

Last time he heard, neither Dash nor Paulina were interested in photography...

Before he could even act on his now burning curiosity, an all too familiar voice startled him, causing him to drop the envelope in his hands. Its contents spilled all over the floor.

“Fenton, what are you doing?!” screamed Wes before stomping over to him.

“I…” Danny’s reply was lost to him when he stared in bewilderment at the photos lying on the floor. They all...they were of him. Specifically, him during a fight with Ember last week. What shocked him even more was their quality. There was one where he was kneeling, smirking almost directly at the camera while both of his hands held bright green ectoenergy, casting his face in an eerie yet alluring glow.

“You’ve been selling pictures of me??”

“What the hell Fenton? These are supposed to be for Dash!” Wes yelled angrily before crouching, carefully putting back the photos in the envelope.

“Did you not hear me? Wh—how long have you been doing this?”

“None of your business. The photos are mine, I can do what I want with them,” Wes arrogantly asserted.

Danny couldn’t even fathom the audacity of this guy. He knew Wes sometimes stalked him while he was out as Phantom. Sometimes he annoyingly distracted him with the flash of his camera. However, over time he’d realized there was really no harm to it, as long as Wes stayed out of the way. He only seemed to use the footage for his so-called “evidence”. Rather than wasting his energy getting him to leave, Danny understood that there were bigger things he should be focusing on. 

This was just crossing a line though. Danny usually doesn’t mind people making money off of his ghost half. In fact, he himself is probably the one who buys most of the unlicensed Phantom merch at Amity’s souvenir shops. But something about seeing Wes doing it too infuriated him to no end.

Instantly, Danny lunged at him to grab the envelope. Unfortunately, Wes reflexively sidestepped out of the way, and held it behind his back like a basketball a defender was trying to steal. Danny fumed, “Wes, you didn’t even bother to ask to take them! Give them back!” 

Wes kept nothing more than an irritated expression on his face as he continued to hold back the envelope.

Just before Danny was about to take another leap at the red-haired creep, he suddenly heard Dash’s voice from behind.

“Hey Fenturd, get outta the way. I need to talk to Weasel for a sec.”

Danny snapped his head around to see the school’s quarterback standing there impatiently. Fortunately, because of his growth spurt a year or so back, Dash no longer towered over him. Also, around that time, the bully has gradually moved on to harassing the smaller newer kids at Casper. Dash really wasn’t a problem at all for Danny anymore, though he still couldn’t help feeling at edge around him after all this time. He unconsciously took a few steps away from him.

Meanwhile, Wes scowled at his nickname. “Hey, don’t call me that. Otherwise the deal’s off,” he stated in an annoyed tone.

Dash huffed, “Fine.” He pulled out a fifty from his letterman jacket and handed it to Wes, who freely gave the envelope in exchange.

“Those demos I showed you last week plus a few extras are all in there,” Wes said while he sifted through the envelope.

“Looks good,” Dash commented, unable to keep the giddy smile from appearing on his face. He genuinely thanked Wes before slipping the photos into his pocket and leaving.

After a moment, Wes sneered, “Fenton, I’ll stop when you reveal yourself to everyone. Besides, why the heck should Danny Fenton be concerned about me selling photos I took of Danny Phantom without his consent?”

Danny’s glare only hardened as he watched Wes walk off.

[saiilorstars]

Stars Dance

Ch. 12: Hopeful Painting

Fandom: Doctor Who Pairing: 11th Doctor x Original Female Character

(Previous chapters)

Fairy Tale Memoirs (Companion story)

~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0

Chapter summary: On a trip to a museum, the gang realize there's something just not right with Vincent Van Gogh's artwork so they must go back and meet him. It brings about some new details that Avalon hadn't been intending on sharing with anyone...ever.

The Doctor, Avalon, and Amy walked through an museum exhibition room displaying Vincent Van Gogh's artwork. While Avalon seemed a bit bored - it was why she was lingering behind - Amy moved around with her guidebook in hand. She was so excited and she had already warned the Doctor and Avalon that she would be seeing every last artwork in the room. Van Gogh was just one of her most favorite artists!

"Thanks for bringing us," Amy looked back at the Doctor who gave her a smiling nod in return. "Well, me," Amy glanced at Avalon who was making a crinkled-nose face at something. She suspected Avalon had found yet another annoying visitor. She'd found at least three in the last 10 minutes, claiming they were so loud for nothing. "Cos Avalon would pretty much rather be anywhere else."

"You are pretty much right," Avalon confirmed and laughed, "I'm not one for arts."

"Well, I asked if you'd rather choose another place instead," Amy reminded, though the mere idea of leaving the museum without checking out everything on her list wasn't very appealing.

"I'm good," Avalon looked around with a smile, shrugging carelessly. "I'm very, very, good." The museum wasn't her first choice but she wasn't about to make Amy leave just because she didn't agree with all their art opinions. Everyone had their different artists, Amy loved art and Avalon preferred stories. Plus, the museum did have some nice artwork, Avalon just didn't get the point of staring at them for so long. She assumed it was like when she read a book and wanted to go to reread it because it was just so good. But how do you do that with art? It's just one page? She'd get bored fast, and she did.

But one day wouldn't kill her. It would test her patience, but it wouldn't kill her. Let Amy stare at her one-paged artwork.

Amy was staring at artwork, but she also noticed other things. The main thing she noticed right now was how Avalon would drift away and suddenly the Doctor would too. Amy didn't mind looking at the artwork on her own. Actually, she didn't mind at all. The Doctor was such a commentator on everything. He made it impossible to look at an artwork without wanting to kill him.

So, Amy gladly watched the Doctor follow Avalon to another portrait. It was actually a common thing now. Ever since Amy caught them in the media room dancing together, they'd been closer. They still bickered but it was that playful bickering and not that murderous type Avalon often did. Something had changed and as curious as Amy was, she would not ask them about it for fear of ruining it. It was really nice seeing them get along and she wanted it to last.

Though that might be changing again...

Avalon was gazing at a painting and talking to the Doctor only to realize the bloody alien wasn't even listening! He was looking back at two boys in front of another painting, talking about a doctor. Avalon rolled her eyes. The ego, she thought and slapped his arm, making him jump and look back at her, "I was talking!" she frowned.

"Hm? Oh, right, I completely agree," the Doctor made an effort to seem like he'd been paying attention. He had no idea what she'd been saying...

"Oh really, you agree with everything I just said?" Avalon crossed her arms, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Yes, I complete agree," the Doctor nodded. He didn't want to irritate her and ruin their relationship that had actually been going so well lately. It been so nice and him not listening might be the reason she gets all sad again. Sad Avalon was not a version he liked.

"Okay then," Avalon held her hand out with a sly smile, "Hand over the TARDIS key."

"What!?"

"Well, you just said I could go back and learn how drive it while you and Amy look around," Avalon wiggled her fingers, "So c'mon, hand it over."

The Doctor nervously laughed and quickly moved beside her, throwing an arm around her shoulders, "Let's save that for later, shall we? We can spend quality time with Amy and-"

"You weren't listening at all, just say it," Avalon crossed her arms again, sending hin a flat-eyed expression.

"I wasn't listening at all," he gave up and sighed. Another way to avoid conflict was to always say the truth with her.

Avalon rolled her eyes and shook his arm off her. "Next time just say so or who knows what you might end up giving up to me. The TARDIS...the screwdriver..."

"I'm gonna stop you right there," the Doctor pointed.

"Or the watch!"

The Doctor slapped a hand over his watch on his wrist. "I don't think so! It is my favorite watch!" He found it almost as soon as he got back to the TARDIS after his most recent regeneration and he almost smacked himself for never noticing it. It was such a cool watch. "I would never agree to give it up, much less to the likes of you!"

Avalon smirked. "Keep up the not listening and one of these days it'll end up on my wrist." She raised her left wrist and passed her fingers over it. "Lovely wrist, right here."

"Keep dreaming, Reynolds."

"Are you two arguing?" Amy walked by the pair, shooting them both scolding eyes.

"He started it!" Avalon was quick to gesture at the Doctor.

"No I didn't!"

"You weren't listening!"

The Doctor opened his mouth to keep on arguing but she actually made a good point. "Oh...yeah, maybe I did." Avalon hummed in agreement, satisfied that he'd taken his fault.

"You two, I swear..." Amy mumbled under her breath and nodded for them to follow her. "Look at this one," she stopped them in front of a painting with an odd building, least that's what Avalon said it was which elicited an offended gasp from Amy and the Doctor. "It's 'The Church at Auvers!"

"Sorry," Avalon raised her hands in defense.

"Honestly, Avalon!"

"What? It's not like it's a big deal-"

"Doctor, tell her something!"

But the Doctor had found something curious about the painting that he was sure shouldn't have been on there. Avalon noticed his eyes squinting at something and she wondered, or perhaps dared to think, there was something out of place.

"Look at that," he finally told them and raised a finger to what he was looking at. One of the church's windows had a small dark figure painting in it.

Amy leaned forwards and stared more intently, "Is it a face?"

"And not a nice one," Avalon looked back at the Doctor with a bright smile, "Does that mean we get to leave now?"

The Doctor made a 'stop talking' motion with his hand and noticed one of the lecturers nearby, Dr. Black, and quickly headed over.

"Did he just give me 'the hand'?" Avalon blinked with a mouth half-open, "Amy?"

Amy put a hand on Avalon's arm, gripping it so she would be forced to stay still, "Let's not kill the man who's our only ride."

"Hm," Avalon huffed and started walking after the Doctor anyways, pulling Amy who yelped with the girl's strength.

They caught up with the Doctor just as he was asking Dr. Black about the painting, "Do you know when that picture of the church was painted?"

"Ah, what an interesting question. Most people..."

"I'm going to have to hurry you," the Doctor cut in as he saw the man taking his sweet time to answer, "When was it?"

"Exactly?"

"As exactly as you can. Without a long speech, if poss. I'm in a hurry."

"Well, in that case, probably somewhere between the 1st and 3rd of June."

"What year?"

"1890. Less than a year before he killed himself."

"Thank you, sir. Very helpful indeed. Nice bow-tie," the Doctor pointed to the man's own bow tie and looked back at the gingers behind him, "Bow-ties are cool."

"Not really," Avalon whispered sarcastically to Amy who snickered.

"Yours is very..." Dr. Black also pointed to the Doctor's bow-tie.

"Oh, thank you. Keep telling them stuff," the Doctor turned to Avalon and Amy, although before he could say anything, Avalon interrupted.

"And we get to leave, yes!" she cheered and clapped her hands, "Meet you there!" she waved and ran off.

"She really does not like museums," the Doctor blinked at such haste.

"Mhm," Amy agreed and so they followed.

~ 0 ~

The group stepped out of the TARDIS to find themselves under a dark night and in a solitary alleyway of a town. The Doctor led the women through the alleyway while explaining the 'plan' he'd come up with, "Right, so here's the plan. We find Vincent and he leads us straight to the church and our nasty friend. "

"Easy peasy," Amy shrugged.

"Have you met the Doctor?" Avalon scoffed, the man about to defend himself but realized she was absolutely right and therefore shut his mouth, "Not to mention Van Gogh's own problems," she continued, "We'll be lucky if he even accepts our friendship."

"Well, we can always hope and try," Amy shrugged.

Avalon scoffed, "'Hope', that's a good one. It doesn't exist," she muttered and moved on with arms crossed.

The Doctor and Amy silently followed after Avalon, both of them glum due to Avalon's words. They arrived at the local cafe of the town where they figured Vincent Van Gogh would most likely be at the moment.

The Doctor approached the cafe and saw the owner by the entrance, "Good evening," he greeted, "Does the name Vincent Van Gogh ring a bell?"

"Don't mention that man to me," the owner muttered and walked into the cafe.

The Doctor turned to the waitresses clearing up the tables outside the cafe and tried one more time, "Excuse me. Do you know Vincent Van Gogh?"

The waitress closest to him made a distasteful face, "Unfortunately."

"Unfortunately?" Amy walked over to the entrance of the cafe where the Doctor stood.

"He's drunk, he's mad and he never pays his bills."

"And yet he paints marvelously, doesn't he?" Avalon asked. Her answer was the laughter of the waitresses combined with the customers at the tables.

"I thought you didn't like art," the Doctor moved to Avalon, a bit dejected from the laughter.

"Just because I don't like art doesn't mean I don't recognize the talent," Avalon explained quietly, still shooting the waitresses a hard look for laughing.

"Come on! Come on!" they heard a man's pleads from the inside of the cafe, slowly carrying over as the voices grew closer to the door, "One painting for one drink. That's not a bad deal."

The owner emerged from the cafe holding a canvas and turned around just as a second man came out. Amy, who stood across Avalon and the Doctor and therefore closer to Vincent Van Gogh, nearly hopped up and down from excitement. The Doctor gave her a thumbs-up while Avalon playfully rolled her eyes and took a seat at an empty table. She presumed this had been her when the Doctor took her to visit Mary Costa.

"It wouldn't be a bad deal if the painting were any good," the owner argued, "I can't hang that up on my walls. It'd scare the customers half to death," he waved Vincent's self-portrait painting without a care in the world. "It's bad enough having you in here in person, let alone looming over the customers day and night in a stupid hat. You pay money or you get out."

"It's not a stupid hat you know," Avalon joined the conversation, or argument, "And I wouldn't make a fashion statement while wearing that," she pointed to the attire of the owner.

"What my good friend meant to say-" the Doctor began a bit nervously.

But Avalon cut him off with a loud scoff. "I meant what I said," she informed and promptly received a hand over her mouth, making her glare at the Doctor.

"Anyways," the Doctor gave a bright smile, "We'll pay if you'd like."

"What?" the owner turned to them, still eyeing Avalon coldly for her rude comments.

"Well, if you like. We'll pay for the drink. Or we'll pay for the painting and you can use the money to pay for the drink."

Vincent turned to the pair with confusion, "Exactly who are you?"

"We're...new in town."

"Well, in that case, you don't know three things. One, I pay for my own drinks, thank you," Vincent was startled by the immediate laughter of everyone nearby, "Two, no-one ever buys any of my paintings or they would be laughed out of town, so if you want to stay in town, I suggest you keep your cash to yourself. And three, your friends are cute," he pointed to Avalon and Amy behind him, "But that one-" he pointed at Avalon again, "-looks like she's about to kill you."

"That's common," was all the Doctor had to say, glancing at Avalon for some kind of opinion until he realized he was still covering her mouth, "Sorry," he mumbled and took his hand back. Well, at least this time she didn't bite him. That was a win!

"I really was," Avalon agreed with Vincent, "So," she looked at the owner, "How's about you let the man have another drink and you'll be paid tomorrow."

"No," the owner spat at her.

"Or, on the other hand," Vincent looked at him again, "Slightly more compassionately, yes."

"Or, on the other hand, to protect my business from madmen, no."

"Or-"

Amy had enough and stepped in between the two men, "Oh, look, just shut up the pair of you!" she pushed them apart and turned to the owner, "I would like a bottle of wine, please, which I will then share with whomever..." she glanced at Vincent, "...I choose."

Vincent smiled, "That could be good.'

The owner shrugged, seeing himself being paid either way, "That's good by me," he walked off into the cafe again.

"Good," Amy proudly said and followed.

~ 0 ~

After receiving the bottle of wine, Amy had taken a seat beside Vincent at the table Avalon had chosen to sit in earlier. She'd placed the wine and glasses on the table for everyone and had gotten along rather well with Vincent.

"That accent of yours. You from Holland like me?" Vincent asked her

"No," Amy shook her head at the same time the Doctor had answered 'yes' with a nod.

"Why don't we start again?" Avalon suggested and leaned back on her chair, "Hi, my name is Avalon. That's Amy, and that's the Doctor-"

"I knew it!" Vincent startled Avalon with his near shout.

"I'm sorry?" she frowned.

"My brother's always sending doctors, but you won't be able to help," Vincent warned with a finger at the Doctor.

"No, not that kind of doctor," the Doctor chuckled and noticed one of the Vincent's unfinished paintings on his side and pointed, "That's incredible, don't you think, Amy? Avalon?"

"Absolutely. One of my favorites," Amy nodded while Avalon merely gave a shrug and sip her wine.

"One of my favorite whats?" Vincent suspiciously looked at Amy, "You've never seen my work before."

While Amy went into a state of stutters, Avalon calmly set her wine glass on the table and sighed, "She means it's the best painting she's seen in her life," Amy quickly nodded.

Vincent sighed, "Then she can't have seen many paintings, then."

"Oh no, she's seen many," Avalon shot the ginger a mock-glare, "I know because she's dragged Mels and I to every last museum she's ever heard of."

"I have not," Amy leaned on the table.

Avalon scoffed, "Your lying is becoming a sickness, Amy. Don't you feel shame lying in front of Vincent?"

"You are over exaggerating!"

"Am not. If Mels were here, she'd back me up," Avalon smirked.

"Your hair is orange," Vincent cut in and made both gingers look at him, though Avalon saw the comment hadn't been for her but for Amy instead.

Avalon scoffed again and crossed her arms, leaning back on her chair, "Going to have to step up your flirting, Vincent."

"I think he's doing just fine," Amy shot her a mock-scowl and leaned closer to Vincent, "Your hair's also orange."

"Yes. It was more orange, but now is, of course, less."

"So, Vincent, painted any churches recently?" the Doctor had to intervene. He didn't know what would be worse: hearing Avalon and Amy bickering or the flirting between the painter and the Scott, "Any churchy plans? Are churches, chapels, religiousy stuff like that, something you'd like to get into? You know, fairly soon?"

"Way to be subtle," Avalon mumbled.

Vincent was too focused on Amy to notice the insistence on the painting, "Well, there is one church I'm thinking of painting when the weather is right."

"That is very good news," the Doctor gave Avalon a smile, only to see her reaching for more wine. He smacked her hand away and ignored the death glare she had for him. He could only imagine how much her temper would be emphasized with alcohol and that was something he'd rather not see any time soon.

A woman came running down from an alley screaming, "She's been murdered! Help me!"

"That doesn't sound good," Avalon bolted out from her chair and ran towards the screaming woman but not before smacking the Doctor upside the head.

"That woman is incredibly strong," the Doctor rubbed his head as he glumly stood up, ignoring the laughter from Amy and Vincent by running after Avalon and the screams.

They found Avalon pushing her way through a crowd of local townsfolk and all saw a young girl's corpse laying on the ground. The Doctor quickly dropped to the girl's side and checked for any vital...before he saw the corpse was actually dismembered.

"Oh my god," Avalon breathed and put a hand over her mouth, "She's been ripped...to shreds."

That didn't look like anything a normal...'murder' should look like. It didn't seem like the town had animals roaming around and if anything, the nearby locals would've heard the roars of an animal. It had to be something different, something...not human.

Amy moved closer to Avalon and tried looking away from the corpse while Vincent moved to the Doctor's side. However, the women found themselves pushed to the side by a middle-aged woman shouting at the group, "Away, all of you vultures! This is my daughter," she knelt beside her daughter's corpse, "Giselle. What monster could have done this?" she shooed away the Doctor and Vincent, "Get away from her!"

"OK, OK," the Doctor stood up and backed away with Vincent.

"Get that madman out of here!" the mother glared at Vincent and picked up a nearby rock to throw at him, "You bring this on us. Your madness! You! He's to blame!"

The rest of the crowd started throwing rocks at the group and forced them to run from the spot. They ended up on the other side of the alleyway to catch their breaths,

"Are you alright?" the Doctor looked at Vincent.

"Yes, I'm used to it," Vincent nodded.

"I know the feeling," Avalon mumbled and sighed.

The Doctor looked at her for a minute, confused and yet surprised by her words. He glanced at Amy and immediately the ginger looked away as if trying to avoid something. "Vincent, has anything like this murder happened here before?" he returned to the moment at the sound of Avalon asking the painter.

"Only a week ago. It's a terrible time," Vincent sighed.

"One could say it's a monstrosity," Avalon glanced at the Doctor and nodded with her head to the painter.

"Come on, we'd better get you home," the Doctor clapped a hand on Vincent's shoulder.

"Where are you staying tonight?"

"What a gentleman," Avalon grinned, "We accept, don't we Doctor?"

"Completely," he agreed and moved to link arms with her, both heading off and leaving a stunned painter and nervous ginger.

Amy smiled at Vincent and quickly hurried to catch up to her friends. Vincent put on his hat and walked after the group, no idea what had just happened.

~ 0 ~

"Dark night, very starry," the Doctor remarked as he looked up at the sky.

Avalon pulled him by the jacket before he crashed into a wall, muttering, "Idiot," as she caught them up to Amy and Vincent.

"It's not much. I live on my own," Vincent was saying to Amy, "But you should be OK for one night. One night."

"We're going to stay with him?" Avalon whispered to the Doctor.

"Until he paints that church."

Vincent entered his cottage first and lighted a lamp, "Watch out," he called to them, "That one's wet!"

"What?" Amy hadn't caught his warning but soon noticed the painting 'Bedroom in Arles' at the doorstep and paused to look at it, letting the others pass by. If she wasn't careful, her eyes might be popping out of her head anytime soon.

"Sorry about the clutter," Vincent was going around the cottage lighting up more lamps, each additional light allowing the trio to see more and more of his artwork, the same artwork that they'd been looking at in the museum.

"Some clutter," the Doctor raised his eyebrows at all the soon-to-be priceless artworks hung around so carelessly.

"I've come to accept the only person who's going to love my paintings is me," Vincent sighed.

"Mm, you may want to revise that sentence," Avalon crossed her arms and nodded back to Amy who was slowly going around the paintings in fascination, "You may have your number one fan right here."

Vincent merely smiled at the comments and headed over to another room, "Coffee, anyone?"

"Not for me, actually," the Doctor followed and was horrified to see Vincent putting down a coffee pitcher on one of his paintings, 'Still Life: Basket with Six Oranges' like it was a simple table, "You know, you should be careful with these. They're..." he winced as Vincent wiped off the coffee stain from the painting with a couple fingers, "...precious."

Vincent scoffed, "Precious to me. Not precious to anyone else."

Avalon cleared her throat as she entered and pulled Amy with her, "Like I said, number one fan," she nodded to Amy.

"They're precious to me!" Amy agreed.

"Well, you're very kind. And kindness is most welcome," Vincent walked out to the main room again and went to sticks of wood around for the wood.

"Right, so, this church, then. Near here, is it?" the Doctor followed him out, Avalon and Amy walking behind him.

"What is it with you and the church?" Vincent gave the alien an odd look.

"Oh, just casually interested in it, you know," the Doctor shrugged.

"Far from casual. Seems to me. you never talk about anything else," Vincent remarked and looked at the gingers, "He's a strange one."

Avalon scoffed, "That is probably the understatement of his life," she smirked at the Doctor who opened his mouth to retaliate but quickly shut it when he figured it was true.

She'd been making a lot of good points about him today it seemed. He'd get her back the next day.

Avalon did a look-over of the room again with a small smile, "I'd ask what you like Vincent but I think it's pretty obvious. Art."

Vincent nodded, "Just a bit, eh?" she nodded and chuckled, "For me, it seems to me there's so much more to the world than the average eye is allowed to see. I believe, if you look hard, there are more wonders in this universe than you could ever have dreamed of."

"You don't have to tell me," the Doctor agreed with a content sigh. He'd seen so many of those wonders and they never seemed to end. There was always something new to see each day.

~ 0 ~

A while later would find the Doctor sitting on a chair listening to Vincent, or rather being forced to listen after the cups of coffee the painter had taken. Vincent was pacing back and forth, passionately talking about his view of art, "It's color. Color that holds the key. I can hear the colors. Listen to them. Every time I step outside, I feel nature is shouting at me. 'Come on. Come and get me. Come on. Come on!" he grabbed the Doctor by the lapels of his jacket and shouted, "'Capture my mystery!'"

"Maybe you've had enough coffee now," the Doctor slowly removed the painter's hands from his jacket, "How about some nice calming tea? Avalon makes good cups of tea, Avalon..." he trailed off when he noticed Avalon, who'd grabbed a chair and placed it across him, was fast asleep.

He frowned and stood up, forgetting the tea, and walked up to the ginger. It seemed like despite the time that passed, Avalon simply could not sleep. He'd even taken custom of taking 'late-night trips' with her because she always ended up coming into the console a couple hours after she and Amy excused themselves for sleep. He had wanted to really look into that, her insomnia, but every time he asked about it Avalon would become irritated and defensive, something that wouldn't help their relationship. He just didn't want to push her. But looking at how easy she fell asleep and in such a poor posture...it seemed like she was on the verge of breaking. He knew it was wrong, and an invasion of privacy, but he wanted and needed to know what was keeping his friend up every single night. Only then he could help her.

"What are you...?" Vincent tilted his head in confusion as the Doctor quietly reached to press his fingers on Avalon's temples.

"Sh!" the Doctor quickly cut the painter off.

But right before he could touch her, Avalon's eyes snapped open with a deep gasp. And, for a split second, the Doctor saw a terrible fear in her eyes. "Avalon," he frowned, even more concerned than he already was, "What's wro-" but a scream of Amy's cut him off.

"Amy!?" Avalon jumped out of her chair, nearly knocking the Doctor down, and ran out the doors with Vincent behind her.

The trio found Amy in the backyard on her knees, struggling to get up. She looked terrified and out of breath, like she'd been running around. Avalon rushed and helped her up, "What happened?"

"I was having a look at the paintings out here when something hit me from behind," Amy put a hand on her back, breathing heavily as she tried calming down.

"It's OK. He's gone now and we're here," the Doctor assured her, unaware of the sudden reaction Vincent was having behind him.

"No!" the painter shouted and backed away.

"Take it easy," the Doctor turned, confused, "Take it easy!"

"What's happening? What's he doing?" Avalon watched Vincent grow more and more frantic.

"I don't know," the Doctor was also watching, displeased when the painter grabbed a large wooden fork.

"Why's he grabbing the big fork?" Avalon frowned.

"I don't know..."

And then Vincent charged towards them.

"But I think I may know why he's coming towards us..." Avalon pulled Amy and the Doctor back as Vincent ran past them.

"Run. Run!" the painter shouted.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not a bad idea," the Doctor agreed and promptly pushed the two gingers towards the house, "Avalon, Amy, get back. He's having some kind of fit. I'll try to calm him down."

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Avalon asked while Amy ran inside the cottage.

"Nope!" the Doctor shrugged then pushed her as well.

With a roll of the eyes, Avalon hurried to where Amy was at the doorway of the house, turning to watch what she suspected wouldn't be a good spectacle.

"Easy, Vincent, easy. Look, look. It's me, it's me, it's me," the Doctor held his hands in front of him as he spoke to Vincent, the painter still frantic over something. "It's the Doctor, look. No one else is here. So, Vincent..."

"Look out!" Vincent pointed.

The Doctor only had time to look over his shoulder before he was thrown to the ground, able to hear a roaring and screams of his companions.

"We can't see anything!" Amy shouted then screamed in terror when a nearby painting was shred to pieces by something.

"What the hell is it?" Avalon looked around at the empty yard. There was clearly something in the yard that none of them except Vincent could see.

"That is a good question," the Doctor scrambled up to his feet and snatched a nearby stick to join Vincent who was fighting, "Let me help you."

"You can see him, too?" Vincent blinked, seeming relieved.

The Doctor started going off in the opposite direction trying to fight the invisible creature with his stick, "Yes. Ish. Well, no. Not really," however there was more roaring and the Doctor found himself being thrown over a table and landing at Vincent's feet.

Vincent looked down, not too surprised, "You couldn't see him?"

"No," the Doctor frowned and stood up again, "Oi!" he called to the creature. He picked up his stick and started fighting again.

Meanwhile, Vincent had walked a bit away from him and apparently hurt the creature enough to make it leave. Avalon and Amy looked at each other with a smile of relief. Of course it turned into amusement when they saw the Doctor still fighting off the creature. Vincent slowly backtracked to the gingers and was about to tell the Doctor it was safe when Avalon wagged a finger and took his fork.

She motioned for him and Amy to stay quiet as she walked to where the Doctor was and promptly poked him on the back with the fork, making the man spin around, and upon seeing the fork aimed at him he dropped the stick and raised his arms, "Don't you ever try to get into my head," Avalon warned and threw the fork to the side.

He winced at being caught and sighed, "I'm sorry, I just...I wanted to help."

"I don't need it," she muttered and turned away.

~ 0 ~

Vincent was drawing a sketch of the invisible creature for the group, sadly over a painting of irises. Once done, he held the canvas to the group and allowed them to see a strange, birdlike creature with a beak and talons and even a bit reptilian.

"OK. OK," the Doctor took the sketch from Vincent and studied it for a moment, "Right. Avalon, Amy, make Mr Van Gogh comfortable. Don't let any invisible monsters in through the front door."

"But it could be outside, waiting," Amy reminded.

"Don't worry, I'll risk it. What's the worst that can happen?"

"Well you could get torn into pieces by a monster you can't see," Avalon pointed out while absently studying her nails.

"Still upset I see," the Doctor sighed.

She looked up and shook her head, "Oh no, this time I'm being quite serious. The creature is invisible and doesn't seem too nice so the odds of being ripped to shreds is like 99.9%."

"Well as long as you're caring for me," the Doctor smirked and made Avalon smile.

"Like it any other way?" she smirked back after a moment.

Amy raised an eyebrow as she crossed her arms and looked between the two with a small smirk, "Did you just flirt?" she'd never been more amused than at that moment when the two went into sputters.

"What!? We-we did n-not...no!" the Doctor shook his head fairly fast.

"I would never!" came Avalon's response as she also shook her head.

And for some reason, the Doctor tool offense to that, "Oh, so you'd never want to flirt with me?"

"Are we really going to argue about this?" Avalon raised an eyebrow, stepping forwards.

The Doctor paused and evaluated his words, finding himself blushing, "Good point," he held up Vincent's sketch and faced the other ginger and painter instead, "I'll be back before you can say, "Where's he got to now?" and he quickly ran off.

Avalon turned to Amy with a big frown, "I hate you," she declared.

Before Amy could answer back, the Doctor returned with a purposely loud voice, "Not that fast!" both gingers flinched and turned to him, "But pretty fast. See you around," he waved and left.

And before Amy could even open her mouth, she was smacked on the arm by her ginger friend, "OW!" she turned to Avalon, "Well that was rude."

"I'm not nice," Avalon casually shrugged and moved away to gaze at more paintings.

And so, while they waited for the Doctor to return, the two gingers lounged around Vincent's cottage, the painter having excused himself for sleep. Just because they apparently wouldn't sleep over a monster didn't mean he had to stay awake too. Amy even found herself taking a nap in the meantime. However, she woke up to find Avalon bright and awake in the kitchen.

"Okay, what are you doing?" Amy asked as Avalon poured herself tea into a cup.

"I think it's pretty obvious," Avalon gestured to her cup in her hands.

"I meant why are you not sleeping?"

"I could ask you the same question," Avalon countered and walked back to the main room, taking a calm sip of her tea.

"I did take a nap," Amy pointed out as she followed Avalon out, "But I woke up. You, on the other hand, didn't sleep a wink. And I'm pretty sure it's not the first night."

"I just have a lot on my mind," Avalon shrugged and sat down on a chair, "Plus, you know me, I tend not to sleep anyways."

"Right, insomnia," Amy agreed and sat across her, "But even then you still managed to sleep. Now you just look..." Avalon stopped her sipping to look up, Amy debating whether or not she should speak about the bags under Avalon's eyes, not to mention the many, many times Avalon nearly fell asleep in broad daylight during their trips through space.

"Look like what?" Avalon raised an eyebrow.

"Just...really sleepy," Amy shortened the story and nervously smiled.

Avalon sighed and swallowed hard. There was no point hiding it around Amy. "There is...something new to my insomnia," she admitted.

"Like what?"

Avalon tapped her fingers on her teacup and swallowed again. She wasn't going to talk about her awful nightmares, but there was something else that had been bothering her lately that she did want to talk about with someone. "My journal," she began as she set her cup on a table nearby.

"What about it?"

"There's a lot of...blank spaces," Avalon sighed, "Pages where I know I've written things but I just can't remember what about."

"How do you know you didn't leave it blank? No offense but that journal is old," Amy shook her head, "Falling apart, almost. There's bound to be some missing pictures and whatnot. They probably fell out.

"This is something more than just worn out pages," Avalon insisted, "Where I've written there are blank lines and I know they had something but...I don't know what. It's driving me crazy!"

"And making you sleep even less," Amy concluded, "We need to talk to the Doctor about this. Maybe he can-"

"No!" Avalon shouted, startling Amy, "I don't want to give him another reason to want to get into my head. He nearly did that to me tonight and I won't have a second go."

"He's just trying to help," Amy shrugged, "I've noticed you've grown closer with each other lately. He really just wants to help. Why won't you accept it? I mean, you always droned on and on about the Doctor-"

Avalon's snort made Amy wince. "Was I the only one, dear Amy?"

"Alright, we both did," Amy amended and continued on with her point. "You always talked about how he was saving planets and people. You idolized him, you loved him for what he did. Why won't you let him save you?"

Avalon leaned against the counter. "I...I'm not used to it. I've always been the one to try and help others - in my own ways of course - when they need me. If I need help, I'd take care of it on my own."

"There's some things you can't take care on your own, Avalon," Amy said, meaning as comfort than a warning.

"Well this one I can," Avalon said with determination. "And I'm asking you as a friend not to mention this to the Doctor, nor to anyone else."

"Fine," Amy sighed. She didn't want to start arguing with Avalon now, but it didn't mean Avalon was off the hook. "But if this starts getting to dangerous roots the deal's off," she warned.

"It won't," Avalon assured and then headed for the doors.

"Where are you going?" Amy quickly followed her.

"To get the Doctor back, duh."

"But he said stay here."

"And listen to Vincent Van Gogh snore?" Avalon shook her head, "I did not travel through space and time to hear more snoring. Dad and Gavin do that all the time," she rolled her eyes and walked out, Amy shrugging and going along with it.

~ 0 ~

As it turned out, not much to Avalon's nor Amy's surprise, the Doctor had a bit of another run-in with the invisible creature while heading out of the TARDIS. He hadn't been too pleased to find both his companions out of Vincent's cottage but was relieved to know the creature hadn't gone after them.

So, they'd returned to Vincent's cottage where Amy had decided to come up with a little surprise for the painter...

The Doctor entered Vincent's room, ignoring the snores of the painter, "Wake, wakey. Rise and shine! Breakfast is served in the courtyard," he headed for the windows and opened them up,"Whoa! What a morning," he clapped his bands and went to get Vincent up, "Come on. And Amy's got a little surprise for you."

Vincent stood at the windows to see his yard covered in sunflowers, Amy sitting at the table while Avalon poured herself tea.

"I thought I'd brighten things up to thank you for saving me last night," Amy called with a bright smile. "I thought you might like, you know, possibly paint them or something? Might be a thought."

Avalon quietly scoffed, "Yea, because covering the man's yard with sunflowers was very subtle."

"Shush," the Doctor scolded as he joined them in the yard, Vincent still up in the room looking at the sunflowers.

"They're not my favorite flower, actually," Vincent was saying to Amy as he studied one close to the window.

That made the trio look up, stunned, "You don't like sunflowers?" Amy was the one to ask.

"No, it's not that I don't like them. I find them complex. Always somewhere between living and dying. Half-human as they turn to the sun. A little disgusting. But, you know, they are a challenge."

"I like poppies," Avalon casually remarked, making the Doctor stiffen. Those had been Lena's favorite flowers as well. "The bright red ones," Avalon continued, "Because, you know..." she poked her hair, making Amy and Vincent laugh, "...it matches."

"Moving on," the Doctor cleared his throat, "There's something I need to show you."

The trio went back into the house where Vincent finally joined them. The Doctor had brought from the TARDIS a printout of the actual creature, and held it to Vincent to make sure it was the same creature they were dealing with. Upon seeing the picture, Vincent fell back on his chair, amazed that it was actually real and not just a figment of his imagination, "That's him. And the eyes. Without mercy."

"This is a creature called the Krafayis," the Doctor began, "They travel in space, they travel as a pack. Scavenging across the universe. Sometimes one of them gets left behind and because they are a brutal race, the others never come back. So, dotted all around the universe are individual, utterly merciless, utterly abandoned Krafayis. And what they do is... Well, kill, until they're killed. Which they usually aren't. Because other creatures can't see them."

"But I can," Vincent looked up.

"Yes. And that's why we are in a unique position today, my friend, to end this reign of terror. So, feeling like painting the church today?"

"Doctor, you may want to explain the reason behind painting church," Avalon sighed as she looked at the confused painter.

"Oh, right," the Doctor caught on and went ahead explain, "Take my word for it Vincent, if you paint the church, the creature will come."

Vincent nodded and stood up, "OK. I'll get my things."

"In your own time. I promise you, we'll be out of your hair by this time tomorrow," the Doctor took his place on the chair as Vincent headed for the doorway, not seeing the hesitation the painter had upon hearing those words. After he finally left, the Doctor let out a sigh, "This is risky."

"Riskier than normal?" Avalon pointed out, "Your life doesn't exactly scream 'safe and sound'."

He rolled his eyes and stood up, glancing back to see if Vincent was still around, "Well, think about it. This is the middle of Vincent Van Gogh's greatest year of painting. If we're not careful, the result of our trip could be the brutal murder of the greatest artist who ever lived. Half the pictures on the wall of the Musee D'Orsay will disappear. And it will be our fault."

~ 0 ~

"Vincent? Vincent!" the Doctor knocked on Vincent's bedroom door.

They'd been waiting for Vincent for quite a while now so the Doctor offered to go and make sure everything was alright. Unfortunately, he saw things were so not right. Vincent laid faced-down on his bed, sobbing.

"Vincent, can I help?" the Doctor slowly approached the man.

"It's so clear you cannot help. And when you leave, and everyone always leaves, I will be left once more with an empty heart and no hope," Vincent rolled back to look at the Doctor.

"My experience is that there is, you know, surprisingly, always hope."

"Then your experience is incomplete," Vincent snapped, "I know how it will end, and it will not end well."

"Come on," the Doctor insisted and clapped Vincent's back, "Come out, let's go outside."

But Vincent exploded into frantic shouts, "Out! You get out. What are you doing here? What are you doing here?"

The Doctor quickly backed away towards the door, "Very well. I'll leave. I'll leave you." And indeed he did leave the sobbing painter, shutting the door behind him.

"What's happening?" Avalon startled him by the stairs, Amy behind her. They'd both heard the shouts coming from the room and decided to go up and see what was happening.

"We're leaving," the Doctor declared as he leaned on the staircase rails, somber, "Everyone knows he's a delicate man. Just months from now he'll...he'll take his own life."

"Don't say that," Amy scowled, "Don't you ever say that."

"C'mon," he ignored them and went down the steps.

"No," Avalon snapped, "I will not leave a man to his death." And before anyone could say more, she quickly entered Vincent's room and shut the door behind her.

"Avalon!" Amy hurried to get her out when the Doctor stopped her, "What are you doing? We can't leave her alone!"

"Just...let's give her a minute," the Doctor offered and looked at the door. He knew that little attitude from Avalon stemmed from her mother's death, and maybe even from Lena's death (even if she couldn't remember it). He had wanted to talk to Avalon about her recent problems with her sleep, theorizing they could also be stemming from those deaths. He wondered if perhaps Vincent could be the one to help...it was a longshot, but...still possible.

~ 0 ~

"I said get out!" Vincent kept crying to Avalon, the ginger standing beside his bed with her arms crossed, pretty adamant about staying, "I just want to be alone!"

"Well tough, because I have quite a temper and when I make a decision no man on earth can make me change it," she declared. She grabbed a chair and put it beside the bed, sitting down and staring at Vincent, "I can relate to you, you know."

Vincent scoffed, "I don't need your pity."

"It's not pity," she said quietly, "I can understand your position quite better than anyone else, even the Doctor himself. It's pretty clear that we're not from this...area," she gestured, "I won't be born for centuries more, on another planet. I live in a small town called Leadworth where everyone knows each other, everyone is friends with each other...except with me," her eyes drifted to the side as she forced herself of her past. Being aboard the TARDIS had given her some time to finally get away from the town but it didn't make all the memories go away. "My name is Avalon Reynolds and if you say you're friends with me, a lot of people in that town will laugh at you."

Vincent sobered up a bit upon seeing the girl tearing up, "Why?" he decided to ask as he sat up.

"I'm not a nice person," Avalon sighed, "I've been in jail several times for, um, robbery, trespassing, being chaotic..." she let out a small, bitter laugh, "...funny thing is, I can't even recall some of those times. I've been in a cell for so many reasons I'm beginning to forget them."

"You don't look like a criminal," Vincent concluded just by looking at the frilly-like clothes Avalon was dressed in.

Avalon scoffed, "That's the image you get when you first see me. And if you live in Leadworth, you'd be one of those people that would be insulted for believing that of me. When I walk out of my house, a lot of people point at me and go 'that's the girl' or 'that's the Reynolds' girl, the criminal'. I get mocked, I get insulted, I get laughed at without even getting the chance to explain myself," she swallowed hard and closed her eyes to stop herself from crying, "Hardly anyone likes me back home. I'm a criminal, I'm the girl all parents want to keep their children from. I got lucky with Amy and Mels, their parents are dead. Their guardians didn't really care much for their safety. I grew up with nothing except my fairytales, much like you with your paintings," she opened her eyes and looked at the paintings hung on the walls with a smile, "Beautiful paintings."

"Seems like only you and your friends think that of them," Vincent sighed.

"Because they are," Avalon clarified, "And I get it, I understand how lonely you feel. You step out and it's the same story, you're pointed at, you're laughed and insulted. I get it. There's nothing to hold onto, not even hope. I don't believe in hope," she confessed, finding it unusually easy to say all these things to the painter, never having experienced someone who understood her so well, "I thought I did but when my mother passed away I stopped. There is no belief that can help us, Vincent. I don't believe in deities or Gods of any sort. Because if you do, you just have rules and expectations from everyone and because you're different you still get laughed at," she shook her head, "Don't cling onto hope, Vincent. You want to feel better? Stick with your paintings. Paint your feelings and only believe in that. Believe in how beautiful they are."

"And what do you do, then?" Vincent wondered, taking her words to heart. It really was true, the belief system only served to get insulted by the others.

"I'm a girl, Vincent," she sheepishly smiled, "I cling to my fairytales. I pretend I'm free like, um, I don't know a butterfly," she blushed, "And I look at the worlds written in stories and try to imagine myself there, try to even imagine a new world for me," she looked at him, now fully embarrassed, "I have this journal, and inside of it...I write the world I'd like to live in. I capture everything I can from this world, everything I find genuinely beautiful and I put it down in my journal. It's my escape, my 'paintings'."

"I'm sure they are beautiful creations," Vincent smiled, reaching to take Avalon's hand, "And in it they must capture all the pain and grief you have."

"Yeah, a lot of them include my mum," Avalon nodded, "She ends up being the Queen or the fairy godmother," she chuckled to herself.

But Vincent grew serious, "I am so sorry for your losses."

"Losses?" Avalon stiffened, "What do you mean? I lost my mum, that was it."

"It's alright," Vincent half-smiled and patted her hand, "I thank you for your help, Avalon. It really is nice to talk to someone who seems to understand. People can be cruel, they judge and hurt when they don't understand someone."

"I know," Avalon nodded, sighing, "And I wish I could say it will get better but 'hope' doesn't change people at all. It's done by action. I left my own home, well, the Doctor took me away, thankfully. Perhaps you could move too."

"I don't plan leaving anytime soon," Vincent shook his head, "But I do plan on helping you and your friends with the monster."

"You will?" Avalon beamed.

"You're right, actions help much better than 'hope'. I'm going to take action and help before the monster kills more innocent people."

"Vincent, thank you!" Avalon stood up and hugged the painter, "I'll go tell the others while you get ready!"

"Alright then," Vincent nodded and so Avalon rushed off.

~ 0 ~

The group walked along the village lane, Amy walking beside Vincent on one side with Avalon on his other side, the Doctor walking behind them all carrying a case in his hand.

"I'm sorry you're so sad," Amy said to Vincent while holding his paint case, Avalon holding the canvas.

"But I'm not. Sometimes these moods torture me for weeks, for months. But I'm good now," Vincent nodded, "If Avalon Reynolds and Amy Pond can soldier on, then so can Vincent Van Gogh."

"Okay, you keep saying that but I still don't understand," Avalon shook her head.

"Yeah, I'm not soldiering on," Amy had to agree, "We're fine."

"I hear the songs of your sadness," Vincent sighed, "You've lost people, I think."

"I'm not sad," Amy repeated and looked at Avalon for help, but Avalon was staring ahead, seemingly lost in thoughts now.

"They why are you crying?" she heard Vincent ask.

She quickly put a finger on her hand and felt the tear on her cheek. She quickly looked at Avalon and found the girl also wearing tears on her face.

Vincent just faintly smiled, "It's all right. I understand."

"But I don't," Avalon frowned as she quickly wiped her face, "One more thing I don't understand."

Neither of them saw the Doctor behind with a grim face. While Amy's subconscious seemed to remember Rory, Avalon seemed to be on the brink of remembering, like all her memories of Lena and Rory were on the surface of her mind. It should be impossible and yet here they were; just one more thing that didn't make sense with Avalon Reynolds.

~ 0 ~

After the Doctor had finished explaining the 'plan' Vincent set up his utensils in front of the church and started painting. They would have to wait for the monster to show up and then the Doctor would apparently deal with it using the case he carried.

But as the time went by...the Doctor grew more...and more...irritating.

Avalon and Amy watched as Vincent finished the outline of the top of the church, the painter beginning to color in the sky. The Doctor paced behind them, rambling away, "I remember watching Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel. Wow! What a whinger. I said to him, "'If you're scared of heights, you shouldn't have taken the job.'"

"Shh!" Amy cut him off with a finger to her lips.

And that worked...for another hour or so...

Vincent had added more details to his painting, trying his best to ignore the Doctor who was standing right behind him, rambling again, "And Picasso. What a ghastly old goat. I kept telling him, 'Concentrate, Pablo, it's one eye, either side of the face.'"

"Be quiet," Avalon sighed wearily.

The Doctor huffed and moved to sit away from the group. And so passed about an hour more or when Vincent was nearly done with the church.

"Is this how time normally passes?" the Doctor whined from his spot on the ground, "Reeeeally slowly. In the right order," he stood up and walked away, "If there's one thing I can't stand, it's an unpunctual alien attack."

"If I didn't know any better I would say you're nervous," Avalon followed him.

"There's something not right and I can't quite put my finger on it."

"Let's see, there's a painter who's not...quite there, and who's being haunted by an invisible creature only he can see. Yeah there's a lot of things that aren't right here."

"There," Vincent cut their conversation short and made them turn back to the church, "He's at the window."

"Where?" the Doctor hurried back.

"There, on the right."

"As I thought. Come on. I'm going in."

"Well, I'm coming, too," Vincent let his painting utensils drop to move to follow the Doctor.

"No," the Doctor quickly stopped him, "You're Vincent Van Gogh. No."

"But you're not armed."

"I am."

"What with?"

"Overconfidence, this," the Doctor tapped his case, "And a small screwdriver. I'm absolutely sorted. Just have to find the right crosactic setting, and stun him with it. Sonic never fails. Anyway, Avalon, Amy, only one thought, one simple instruction - don't follow me under any circumstances."

"I won't," Amy said.

The Doctor looked over at Avalon who innocently looked away, "Avalon?"

"Amy said she wouldn't," Avalon shrugged.

"Avalon I don't have time," the Doctor, in frustration, exclaimed.

"Whatever," Avalon shrugged and motioned for him to go in. The Doctor warningly pointed at her before walking towards the church.

"Will you follow him?" Vincent looked between the two gingers.

"Of course," they both answered.

"I love you," Vincent was fondly looking at Amy.

Avalon laughed, "Before you snog, let's wait for the Doctor to get himself into trouble," she turned to them, "I bet money on this!"

"Five quid?" Amy raised an eyebrow.

"He gets into trouble in less than five minutes!"

"Deal," Amy shook hands with her, both looking back at the church to await the screams.

And in less than five minutes, as predicted by Avalon, they heard the growls of the creature followed by the cries of the Doctor.

Avalon grinned and pointed at Amy, "You owe me!" and she ran off.

"Damn," Amy muttered and quickly ran after her.

"Amy! Avalon!" Vincent ran as well.

~ 0 ~

"Doctor!" Avalon ran into the church, finding the Doctor aiming the screwdriver at air.

"Argh! I thought I told you... Never mind," he shook his head, not even surprised to see Amy catching up, "We'll talk about it later. Quick, in here."

Avalon pulled Amy towards a confessional, cramming into one side while the Doctor hid in the other side. They stayed quiet as they heard the Krafayis moved around the room.

"Absolutely quiet," the Doctor whispered to the women and slid the door over the grill between, "Whoever is breathing like that, breathe quieter!"

"It's Amy," Avalon grumbled.

"I can't help it," Amy defended herself and lifted the curtain on their side, "He's gone past."

"Shh," the Doctor said.

The Krafayis growled and blew the gratting on the ginger's side off, making them scream.

"I think he heard us," the Doctor winced, "Impressive hearing he's got, though."

Avalon winced as another part of the confessional was ripped off, "What's less impressive are our chances of survival," she snapped.

"Hey, are you looking for me, sonny?" Vincent ran into the room with a chair in front of him as a weapon, "Come on. Over here. Because I'm right here waiting for you," as the creature tried to fight him, he looked over to the others, "Come on. Quickly! Get behind me."

As the gingers ran behind Vincent, the Doctor tried using the screwdriver on the creature, "Doing anything?" he asked Vincent who shook his head as a 'no'. They backed away into another part of the church, "Where is he?" the Doctor looked around frantically.

"Where do you think he is, you idiot? Use your head," Vincent snapped.

"Anything?"

"Okay," Avalon pushed the screwdriver down, "I think we've established the fact that screwdrivers are not effective. Maybe it's time for another tactic."

"Like running!" Amy exclaimed.

And so they did manage to split up a little, the Doctor having the usual luck of his to have the creature after him now. Vincent was giving him instructions to avoid the creature's blow, "Duck!" he called and the Doctor went down, "Left!" and then the Doctor was swatted to the side and slammed into a wall, "Oops, right, sorry."

Avalon and Amy went to help the Doctor up while Vincent used his chair to defend them.

"This is no good at all. Run like crazy and regroup," the Doctor suggested as he stood up.

"Oh, come on, in here," Amy led them into another building of the church.

They went into a room and tried closing a large door together, though the Krafayis blocked the way with a leg until Vincent managed to stomp on it and make it jerk it away.

"Right. OK," the Doctor turned on his back as did everyone to keep the door closed, "Here's the plan. Avalon, Amy, Rory, Len-"

"Who?" both gingers looked at him with confusion.

"Sorry, um, Vincent," the Doctor mended.

"What's the plan?" Avalon asked.

"I don't know, actually. But in future, I'm just using this screwdriver for screwing in screws," he quickly put away the screwdriver.

"Best decision of your life," Avalon sighed and earned a mock-glare.

"Give me a second. I'll be back," Vincent said and ran away.

"I suppose we could try talking to him," the Doctor looked back at the door.

"Talking to him?!" Amy blinked.

"Well, yes. Might be interesting to know his side of the story. Yes, though maybe he's not really in the mood for conversation right at this precise moment," the Krafayis growled and banged on the door, "Well, no harm trying. Listen. Listen!" and finally the creature stopped, ''I know you can understand me," he turned to the door, "Even though I know you won't understand why you can understand me. I also know that no-one's talked to you for a pretty long stretch, but please... listen. I also don't belong on this planet. I also am alone. If you trust me, I'm sure we can come to some kind of, you know, understanding. And then, and then, who knows?"

The window across them shattered as the creature found another way in. The trio looked across and watched the objects in the room fly about as the creature moved around.

"Over here, mate!" Vincent returned with a new weapon in his hands, his easel

The trio moved behind the painter, "What's it up to now?" the Doctor asked.

"It's moving round the room. Feeling its way around," Vincent explained as he and the gingers moved behind a sarcophagus.

"What?" the Doctor blinked, now behind a column.

"It's like it's trapped. It's moving round the edges of the room."

"I can't see a thing," Amy shook her head.

"I am really stupid," the Doctor sighed.

"Oh get a grip," Avalon called, "Pick another time to re-evaluate your self-esteem."

"No, I am really stupid and I'm growing old," he shook his head, "Why does it attack, but never eat its victims?" he moved to the sarcophagus, " And why was it abandoned by its pack and left here to die? Why is it feeling its way helplessly around the walls of the room? It can't see, it's blind. That explains why it has such perfect hearing!"

Vincent blinked, "Which unfortunately also explains why it is now turning around and heading straight for us," he stepped forwards and held his easel's sharp ends in front of him as a weapon.

"Vincent. Vincent, what's happening?" the Doctor quickly asked.

"It's charging now. Get back. Get back!"

Vincent ran forwards and impaled the creature with the easel. He held onto the weapon as he was lifted from the air by the creature who was in clear pain and anger. When he let go, he fell to the floor as did t he creature. Vincent sat up and looked at the impaled creature, "He wasn't without mercy at all. He was without sight. I didn't mean that to happen. I only meant to wound it, I never meant to..."

"It's okay," Avalon whispered and helped him up.

The Doctor knelt down beside the body, "He's trying to say something."

"What is it?" Vincent asked.

"I'm having trouble making it out, but I think he's saying, 'I'm afraid. I'm afraid'," the Doctor patted the poor creature, "There, there. It's OK. You'll be fine. Ssh."

"He was frightened…and he lashed out," Vincent sighed, "Like humans, who lash out when they're frightened. Like the villagers who scream at me. Like the children who throw stones at me."

"Sometimes winning - winning is no fun at all," the Doctor muttered and left the place.

~ 0 ~

For some reason, the grassy field seemed more beautiful under the starry sky. Despite the group's loss, the peace of the scenery managed to bring peace to each of them. Vincent decided to stop walking and offered to take Amy's hand so they could sit down. Amy thought it was weird but then again, when was she ever going to get the chance to sit with Vincent Van Gogh? Absolutely never!

The Doctor offered his hand to Avalon but the ginger shook her head at him. "Don't think I've forgotten you tried getting into my head when I was asleep."

The Doctor winced. He had forgotten that bit. He never really apologized with everything that'd happened. "I'm sorry," he offered, hoping it would change her mind and totally not revert their relationship back to what it used to be. And judging by Avalon merely rolling her eyes without saying a word, the chance was getting bigger. "I'm very worried about you, Ava. I would never go into your mind without permission unless I had a huge reason."

"That you're worried?" Avalon scoffed lightly and moved past him, only for him to grab her arm and bring her back. She might have ended up a closer than what he intended on but he wasn't going to let it become a distraction.

Why would it even be a distraction? He suddenly questioned himself. With only a few seconds after, he decided he didn't want to think about the answer.

"Hey, I have a right to be worried when a good friend of mine can't, for the life of her, sleep. I'm sorry, but please don't be angry with me. I don't want to go back to that."

Avalon's expression softened when she realized what he meant. Sometimes he was just too...himself. "Oh Fairy Tale Man, you're being dramatic. I'm upset but it's not the end of the world." Before the Doctor could say something, she took his hand and led them to where Amy and Vincent had laid down. "Comfortable. Mind if we join?"

Vincent patted the empty spots beside them. Avalon smiled at the Doctor as the two found their spots on the mushy grass. They joined their free hands to Amy and Vincent and gazed up at the dark, starry sky.

"Try to see what I see," Vincent softly pleaded them. "We are so lucky we are still alive to see this beautiful world. Look at the sky. It's not dark and black and without character. The black is in fact deep blue. And over there, lighter blue. And blowing through the blueness and the blackness, the wind swirling through the air and then, shining, burning, bursting through - the stars! Can you see how they roar their light? Everywhere we look, the complex magic of nature blazes before our eyes."

"I've seen many things, my friend," the Doctor smiled, "But you're right. Nothing quite as wonderful as the things you see."

"You know the reason I don't like painting as much as writing is because I always thought that a painting only tells you one page of the story..." Avalon paused as she truly focused on the sky like Vincent was, though she doubted she was even half of what he saw, "But I've been looking at it all wrong. It's a whole story in one page."

"I will miss you terribly," Vincent sighed as he looked from the gingers to the alien, knowing that soon they would all be gone again and he would be once more alone.

~ 0 ~

"I only wish I had something of real value to give you," Vincent watched the Doctor hold one of his paintings, Self Portrait with Straw Hat, in the morning.

The Doctor chucked, "Oh, no, no. I could never accept such an extraordinary gift," he set down the painting on a table.

"Very well. You are not the first to decline the offer," Vincent sighed and held his arms for Amy, "Amy, the blessed, the wonderful," they hugged and Amy kissed his cheek.

"Be good to yourself and be kind to yourself," Amy whispered.

"I'll try my best."

"And maybe give the beard a little trim before you next kiss someone," Amy laughed and rubbed her cheek.

"I will. I will. And if you tire of this Doctor and Avalon, return, And we will have children by the dozen."

"Eek!" Amy laughed again.

"Why would she be tired of me?" Avalon pretended to be irritated, "What are you trying to say, Vincent?"

"Goodbye, Avalon," Vincent held his arms for the next ginger instead of answering.

Avalon playfully rolled her eyes, "Smart move, Vincent," she hugged him.

"Thank you for you words of advice," he pulled away.

"Yeah, I'm not sure if they were the best, but...it's what I've been doing," Avalon shrugged.

Vincent patted her shoulders, "I think it's going to get better for you," he smiled as he looked behind her to the Doctor and Amy. But Avalon just scoffed quietly and moved away so the Doctor could bid goodbye to the painter, "Doctor, my friend," Vincent shook the Doctor's hand, "We have fought monsters together and we have won. On my own, I fear I may not do as well," and the two hugged goodbye.

~ 0 ~

As the trio walked away from Vincent's cottage, the Doctor though of an idea that could perhaps make things just a bit better for their painter friend. When he stopped walking, both Avalon and Amy looked back with confusion.

"What are you doing?" Avalon asked.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" he smiled.

"No, that's sort of why I just asked what were you doing."

He rolled his eyes and turned back to hurry to the cottage, calling for Vincent as the women caught up, "Vincent!" the painter poked his head out the window without a shirt and a brush in hand, "Got something I'd like to show you. Maybe just tidy yourself up a bit first."

"What are we doing?" Amy whispered but the Doctor waved her off as they waited for Vincent to come out.

Once the Doctor had brought them all back to modern day Paris, things started to get a little more clear...for everyone but Vincent anyways.

"Where are we?" Vincent asked the moment he stepped out of the TARDIS and no longer saw the alleyway in which the box had been in only a couple minutes ago.

"Paris. 2010 AD. And this is the mighty Musee D'Orsay, home to many of the greatest paintings in history," the Doctor nodded to the museum up ahead.

"Oh, that's wonderful," Vincent nodded but was distracted when two boys passed by with an electronic in hands.

"Ignore that. I've got something more important to show you," the Doctor said and pulled the painter towards the museum, the gingers following alongside them.

~ 0 ~

They led Vincent all the way up to his own exhibition, passing by other great painters where Vincent seemed to be staying behind to look at. Amy and Avalon pulled him by the arms and brought him into his exhibition room. Vincent was stunned to see all his paintings hanging on the walls.

The Doctor noticed Dr. Black lecturing a group nearby and walked up to him, "Dr. Black, we met a few days ago. I asked you about the church at Auvers."

Discreetly, the gingers brought Vincent closer to hear the conversation.

"Oh, yes. Glad to be of help. You were nice about my tie," Dr, Black remembered.

"Yes. And today is another cracker if I may say so," the Doctor pointed at the new bow-tie the human wore, "I just wondered, between you and me, in 100 words, where do you think Van Gogh rates in the history of art?"

"Well, big question. But, to me, Van Gogh is the finest painter of them all," Dr, Black got to thinking more thoroughly, "Certainly, the most popular, great painter of all time, the most beloved. His command of color, the most magnificent. He transformed the pain of his tormented life into ecstatic beauty. Pain is easy to portray, but to use your passion and pain to portray the ecstasy and joy and magnificence of our world - no-one had ever done it before. Perhaps no-one ever will again. To my mind, that strange, wild man who roamed the fields of Provence was not only the world's greatest artist, but also one of the greatest men who ever lived."

The Doctor's smile faded when he saw Vincent with red eyes and a face stained of tears. He quickly moved back to the them, giving Vincent a hug, "Vincent. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Is it too much?"

"No. They are tears of joy," Vincent left the group to go to Dr. Black, giving him a Gallic kiss and a hug, "Thank you, sir. Thank you."

"You're welcome. You're welcome," Dr. Black nodded as Vincent pulled away.

"Sorry about the beard," Vincent apologized quietly as he returned back to the trio.

~ 0 ~

The TARDIS materialized back on the field in Vincent's time, Vincent stepping out first of the box, "This changes everything. I'll step out tomorrow with my easel on my back a different man. I still can't believe that one of the haystacks was in the museum. How embarrassing."

"It's been a great adventure and a great honor," the Doctor shook Vincent's hand.

"You've turned out to be the first doctor ever actually to make a difference to my life."

"I'm delighted. I won't ever forget you," the Doctor waved and headed back inside the TARDIS.

"And you are sure marriage is out of the question?" Vincent tried again with Amy, making both she and Avalon laugh.

"This time," Amy moved to hug him, "I'm not really the marrying kind."

"So, I lied," Avalon said as Amy pulled away, "Perhaps there can be hope for some people," she hugged Vincent next.

"That would include you too," Vincent said and pulled away.

"Yeah, not for me," Avalon shook his head, "It's completely out of the market for me."

"No, but you are free," he pointed out, "In there," he nodded to the TARDIS, "Free as a bird...or, butterfly," he whispered and made her laugh.

"Goodbye, Vincent," she waved and moved into the TARDIS with Amy, Amy requesting to go back to the gallery for one more look.

~ 0 ~

As soon as the TARDIS materialized back at the museum, Amy running out, heavily excited, "Time can be re-written. I know it can. Come on!"

Avalon shrugged and went to follow her friend, neither noticing the indulgent face the Doctor had behind.

"Oh, the long life of Vincent Van Gogh. There'll be hundreds of new paintings," Amy cheered as she ran up the stairs.

"I'm not sure there will," the Doctor said calmly.

"Come on!" Amy entered the exhibit and looked at the paintings on the walls, finding them to be the same ones and the only ones around.

"We have here the last work of Vincent Van Gogh, who committed suicide at only 37..." Dr. Black's voice carried over as if on cue.

Amy closed her eyes, her excitement gone. Avalon stepped up and gave her a hug, "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"So, you were right," Amy looked back at the Doctor as the hug ended, "No new paintings. We didn't make a difference at all."

"I wouldn't say that," the Doctor shook his head, "The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things. Hey," he hugged her, "The good things don't always soften the bad things. But, vice versa - the bad things don't necessarily spoil the good things or make them unimportant," he ended the hug but held her head, "And we definitely added to his pile of good things."

"I suppose..." Amy smiled a little then noticed Avalon was missing, "...Avalon?" she looked around.

Avalon had gone to the painting of the church and looked back at the call of her name, "Hm? Oh sorry, I was just looking at the difference we made for Vincent," she pointed at the church with a smile, "I think we did good, come and look."

The Doctor took Amy over to the painting and indeed noticed the change they had made to the painting.

"No Krafayis," Amy breathed with joy.

"Exactly," Avalon grinned.

Amy moved away from the pair and walked to the center, noticing something ahead of her, a small alcove displaying two paintings. She started walking towards it without a word. The Doctor saw and pulled Avalon behind.

Amy saw the painting of the 'Still Life: Vase With Twelve Sunflowers' with a small signature on the vase dedicating it to her, "Oh my..." she smiled and looked at the next painting.

"That's not..." Avalon blinked, moving to the painting, "...it can't be," she was looking at the painting of "Still Life:Poppies and Butterflies" which bore a signature dedicating it to her, just like it had been for Amy.

"Seems like other differences had been made," the Doctor remarked as he eyed both paintings.

"I don't like paintings..." Avalon smiled at the brilliant red poppies, "...but I do like this one."

"Your hair does match them," Amy teased through her tears.

Avalon chuckled, "Says the mother of an ultimate ginge with Vincent Van Gogh," she countered and moved to hug her.

The Doctor watched them with a small smile and suddenly found himself being pulled into the hug by both, "Okay," was all he had to say and hugged them both, hearing their muffled laughter.

[campbellatoner]

“And thus concludes our final meeting before winter break. Thank you for meeting with us, and we’ll see you all in January!”

With that, the room full of teachers all got up out of their seats. Cody popped his back, feeling cracks and pops run down his back with a twist before he reached for his phone to check for any notifications or messages.

He made his way towards the door, giving everyone a “bye, see you later, happy holidays!” before he was suddenly stopped by the principal of all people.

“Uh, Mr. Hatcher, sir. Can we speak for a moment? Alone?”

He blinked at him for a moment, “Oh, sure, yeah”

Principal Stauber’s office was very clean, with a cold grey interior and only the light hum of a humidifier and the buzz of the fluorescent lights above them to break the silence.

Cody hadn’t been called into the office much since he’d started working at the school, only a few times if a student was being trouble in his class and the principal absolutely had to get involved. But he was more familiar with the office with the old principal, Mrs. Muntz, with her warmer colored office, but an even colder looking expression.

He sat back in his seat, waiting for any sort of response from Principal Stauber. The man kept quiet as he was simply going through some files, almost as if he was killing time for something.

Cody scratched the back of his neck, “so, uh, is everything alright?”

The man looked back at him, adjusting his glasses a wee bit before going back to his papers. “Just wait for the Vice Principal to join us, Mr. Hatcher”

“Oh, okay”

Okay, so he was waiting. That certainly didn’t make him feel any better. It was like he was having war flashbacks to all those times he was called into Mrs. Muntz’ office, and waiting for some sort of punishment before they’d have to call his parents.

He fidgeted with the zipper on his fleece jacket, slowly and quietly to keep him from being any more bothered than he already seemed.

Soon enough, the Vice Principal, Ms. Gayle, arrived with a breifcase and a somber expression.

Cody felt his stomach twinge, like it knew what was coming before he did.

He licked his lips anxiously.

“Mr. Hatcher, I’m going to keep this short and simple as I don’t want to waste your or our time on winter break,” she stated, placing the breifcase down on the desk and popping it open, fishing out papers and handing them to Cody.

“But we were tipped into giving you a background check a little after fall break”

Oh God. Oh God.

Cody glanced at the papers, he already knew what they said, though. It was the pink slip, a game over, a big ol L for the biggest loser in Sleepy Peak.

His voice croaked in his throat before he could make any kind of defense, this was all moving too fast.

“I-I can explain, wait, p-please-”

“Mr. Hatcher, we pride ourselves on the safety of our students here, and to know that not only have you harmed one of the students in the past, but that she’s in one of your classes would only be endangering her further. For the safety of our students and for the concern of our parents, we’re going to have to let you go”

His expression dropped, and his stomach fell further. The room felt colder than it was going in, and it was so quiet, it felt like the likes were screaming.

He took a good look at the papers, constantly going over the lines ‘notice of termination of employment’ and rereading the stated reason over and over again.

Did he want to cry? Could he cry? He deserved this, he did hurt Elise well over a year ago, and yet...

All his dreams, all the hard work he put into being a math teacher, all down the fucking drain. And it was only his fault. He was the one that hurt her, he was the one that flat out abused her that day, he...

...wait.

“Wait, who tipped you into doing a background check?” he asked with a light furrow to his brows. He held the pink slip tightly.

Ms. Gayle raised her own brows, “well, for the safety of our employees-”

“I asked you a damn question, Gayle.”

Her expression fell, “Mr. Hatcher, I will not tolerate that beha-”

“Cut the shit, Gayle. What’re you gonna do, fire me again? Just answer the question so I can leave”

“Your uncle, Sean, the gym teacher, was it?” Said Mr. Stauber as he stood up. Gayle looked at him with a light look of betrayal, and Cody looked pissed.

“He let us know of some information he’d gotten about you, and advised us to look into your personal and criminal records. You turned yourself in last year, didn’t you? Only to be bailed out by an aunt of yours?”

With a shaken breath, Cody nodded, fists clenched tightly.

“It was also on file that you did go to therapy, but unfortunately, this termination isn’t really about your past, but more about the fact you’re in the same space with the girl you hurt”

“M-My sister,” he added.

“She isn’t in your custody from the looks of it, but for her safety, we can’t have you working in this school district with her, or really any of the other students. We’re sorry we have to do this to you on such short notice, but we can’t risk anything” Gayle said, finally closing the breifcase as if this were all over.

Gayle quickly left without much left to say, and the room went back to being quiet.

“Mr. Hatcher, I’ll allow you the rest of the weekend to to pack your things, but I advise you to stray away from any students here on campus unless you want trouble with security,” Principal Stauber advised, handing Cody more papers that he’d probably need, but he wouldn’t bother checking out until much later.

Cody forced out a huff, and it shook and staggered out of him as he got up. He held the papers tightly against his side as he went for the door, but not before he looked at the principal.

“You know I have a wife and a kid on the way, r-right?”

“Good for you, Mr. Hatcher.”

“...I have to go home and tell her all about this”

“And your sister had to learn under the wing of someone who hurt her, now please leave”

Okay... Ouch.

On his way out to the parking lot with a box full of his crap (not like he had much to pack at all, seeing as he was only working there for a few months.) he stopped none other than his own uncle.

Sean was leaning against his truck, looking up at the sky with a cigarette between his lips. Sean spotted Cody, and he had an expression Cody couldn’t quite read correctly. It was a mix of disappointment and shame, maybe with some guilt and fear mixed in, too.

“Dakota, I-”

“Don’t fucking talk to me, doucebag,” Cody barked.

He quickly shoved his keys into his own car before he tossed the box of crap in, then he shut it, loud enough to leave a loud ‘BANG’ through the parking lot.

Sean looked at him, taking the cigarette out of his mouth, “listen buddy, I just want to-”

“No, NO! You don’t get to tell me SHIT. You did enough already, and now I’ve gotta go home and tell my wife that I just lost my fucking job!!”

Sean looked ashamed, his brows furrowed as he looked away from his nephew.

“Do you even know what that’s like? To have a family back at home that you need to support? Because, frankly, you don’t. You’re just a pathetic old man who’s going to die alone because he pulls bullshit like this!”

Sean looked over at him, like a spark inside of him lit, but Cody was quick to blow it out.

“You know, there’s a fucking reason my dad cut ties with you and the rest of those fucking asswipes 16 years ago. If I were him, I wouldn’t wanna have a brother like you, either.”

And that was the line that stung Sean the most, and Cody wouldn’t even give him the honor of an apology seeing as he was already getting in and buckling up before he drove out of that parking lot with a middle finger stuck out to the world.

It felt good to yell, and he was sure it’d be even better once he was alone in his own driveway to scream out into the world and sob the night away before he was to tell Octavia what had happened.

[orwocolor]

borhap boys reading your favourite book

y/f/b = your favourite book

AN: these got a bit long-ish so the other boys are under the cut, enjoy!

Gwilym

you told gwilym about your favourite book on one of your dates

and when you say “told”, you mean “gushed about it for ten minutes straight, not letting him utter a single word”

‘cause when you started talking about your fave book, you were unstoppable

“what?” you asked when you noticed him looking at you affectionally

“you seem to really like that book”

“like? more like adore, love, cherish, or dreaming about marrying it, really”

he chuckled at that and told you how much he loved you

and when one early morning you find him sitting in his chair, your favourite book in his hands, and his glasses on his nose, you release a gleeful squeal

you hop over to him and hug his side, pressing a loud kiss against the top of his head

“have I told you you’re the best?”

“many times; now let me read this in peace so that I can tell how much I like it, okay?” he smiles and you plant another kiss on his cheek

you make yourself breakfast and sit down on the sofa

"what’s happening right now?”

“I’m still at the beginning, love, be patient”

easier said than done

you are restless, your leg jerking slightly, and you keep reminding yourself not to bite your teeth, which you totally itch to do

you’re stealing glances at gwil, trying to decipher what he’s currently reading from his face

you open your phone for a bit, mindlessly scrolling through your social media, but it doesn’t help

you need to know which part he’s at

you stare at him and squint, looking for the slightest change in his expression

he chuckles out loud

“which part, which part?”

he erupts in laughter as he looks at you

“just you! stop it, I can see you staring!”

“what?! no, I’m not”

“gosh, you’re so adorable” he smiles at you lovingly and you return the smile

“c’mere” he motions for you to come to him and open his arms

you leap to your feet and sit into his lap

embraced by his warmth, you read with him, every now and then planting a kiss on his stubble and turning the pages

and even though there are times when you can’t help yourself and you turn your face to see his reaction every time he gets to a good part, he tickles your sides as your punishment

Joe

“hey,” joe starts one day as you eat breakfast peacefully, breaking the silence”

“hmm,” you look up at him from the papers

“the other day, I saw you were reading this book? it had a colourful front cover”

“you mean y/f/b? oh it’s amazing, probably the best book I’ve ever read”

“yeah?” he asks tentatively

“what? wanna read it?” you smile at him when you see his eager face

“sure! if you love it, I bet I will as well”

“great, I’ll go grab it”

it’s sunday, so you’re both home, and he immediately starts reading

“okay, what’s this girl’s problem?” he sneaks up behind you and you almost jump out of your skin as you’re watering your plants

“not gonna lie, but I think I am lowkey in love with the main guy” joe enters the bathroom while you’re taking the shower

he opens the curtain

“he’s a good guy and apparently also quite good looking based on the description”

“god, joe! I’m showering! either join in or go, you idiot” you grin

next day, you’re at one of your lectures and you’ve turned the sound off on your phone but it’s sat on your desk and it keeps lighting up every minute, notifying you of a new text

it distracts you immensely and you can’t follow the lecturer’s explanation of the material

so you grasp the phone and drop it into your bag

when the lecture ends, you pull it out and see three missed calls and fourteen texts

14!

“call me, honey, I just reached that part you told me about” “call me, I need to talk to you” “I bet he’s not gonna do it” “OMG he did it” “bastard”

you had to giggle, what a cutie

you instantly dial his number and go out to sit on one of the benches outside the lecture hall

“ok, darling, tell me everything”

Ben

“oh my god, you have y/f/b!”

“what?” you yell from the kitchen where you’re digging through drawers to find a corkscrew

“I said,” Ben enters the kitchen, “that you have y/f/b”

he holds up the book in question and your breath hitches

it’s your most favourite book ever

“I’ve always wanted to read it, it’s supposed to be really good”

“yeah, I guess” you say reservedly

the truth is you love the book, absolutely fricking adore it, it’s one of those books that changed your perception of the world, the book you always love returning to, like an old friend of yours

the spine of the book is full of little white veins, since you’ve held it in your hands so many times, rereading it again and again

there were several dog-ears since you’ve always marked your favourite passages

and even though you couldn’t see them right now, you were aware of the scribbles in the margins that you’ve written down during those many years, always adding a new thought that occurred to you while reading it

but the book is so close to your heart, you already feel anxious about ben reading it

‘cause if he doesn’t appreciate it, you might have a problem

“may I borrow it?”

“yeah, sure” you say indifferently, doing your best to seem unbothered by it all

"red or white?” you ask, holding two wine bottles and changing the subject

for the next few days, ben doesn’t call

he doesn’t even text you

just nothing

you’re about to call him yourself when you hear a doorbell

ben stands behind your door, your favourite book clasped in his hands on his chest

“I finally finished it”

“it has 800 pages”

“I know, I just couldn’t put it down, it’s fantastic”

you lose your composure immediately and toss your arms around his neck as you crash into him, the book digging into your chest

“you like it! oh my god, you have no idea how happy I am”

“you really love this book, don’t you?”

“I do” you say earnestly, a wide grin on your face

“well,” ben says and pulls you closer to him, “I love it, too”

he kisses your forehead

“you do?”

“of course I do, it’s bloody amazing!”

you laugh at that and squeeze him in your embrace

“and I think it was your scribbles that have made me love you even more”

Rami

“what about this one?”

rami shows you the paperback that’s caught his eye

there is a skimpily clad woman stretching his arms to a broody looking dark-haired man

“oh my god, put it down, we’re not buying any bodice ripper romances” you laugh

he just smirks and returns the book to the shelf

you’re in a bookstore, trying to find a birthday gift for a mutual friend

“oh, I think I’ve heard about this one” rami suddenly exclaims from the neighbouring aisle and you pop your head from behind the corner

“you better” you say when you turn the corner and find him with y/f/b opened on the very first page “it’s my most favourite”

“ahhh” he smiles at you “I knew it” he examines the cover “should we take it?”

“sure, it’s the best book in the whole world, probably in the galaxy as well”

when you stand at the cashier, rami asks out of nowhere “do you still have your copy?”

“it’s at my parents’, I think”

“okay, hold on a second”

he runs off and is back immediately, carrying another copy

“what are you doing?” you ask

“buying a copy for us, obviously; I want to read it”

he pays and you return to your shared flat

he makes a pot of coffee for both of you and grabs the book from the plastic bag

you sit down on the couch, clutching a cup of coffee in your hands, trying to warm them up a bit

he follows the suit and sits down

“can you read it to me?”

“you want me to read it to you?” you ask him with disbelief in your voice

“well, you love it, I think if you read it to me, it’s gonna be like reading it with your eyes, you’ll give it your own perspective”

“okay” you agree and he lays his head into your lap

you start reading, the familiar feeling warming your heart as you realise you’ve got the whole book memorized

he stops you from time to time to ask you some question, but they all relate to the story so you’re not even mad

you hold the book in one hand and play with rami’s hair with the other

he listens intently and brings your hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to your knuckles in thanks

[minhoinator-writes]

One to a Hundred (~2900 words) read on AO3 // AFF

A/N: Sorta inspired by the Friends episode where Chandler kept accidentally kissing Monica after they get back from London....so I'm sure you can guess where this is gonna go lol I swear I'm working on the next BMS chapter, but it's just been a super stressful week for me and I needed a quick one-shot to get me back in the writing mood lol 

"It's gonna be weird, isn't it?"

"Hm?"

"Going home."

Minho sighed as he pressed his forehead into Kibum's shoulder, closing his eyes tightly. Right, their managers for Surprise Vacation would be coming to pick them up to go to the airport soon. Which, that was why Kibum was at his rented flat in the first place, so they wouldn't have to take two separate cars to the airports.

That was the only reason, as far as their managers were aware.

But, in reality, they were spending their last night together before they would have to return to Korea and the close-quarters of the dorm. This…development in their relationship was quite new, but the feelings behind it definitely were not.

After the cameras were off and they left the pizza place off of the ice rink, Kibum grabbed his hand and stole him away from the crew, and together they explored London for themselves. Truth be told, it was the best part of the entire trip, blessedly undocumented by the crew.

Some things were best kept to themselves.

Minho kissed along the plane of Kibum's bare shoulder, smiling when Kibum snuggled closer to his warmth.

"Isn't it?"

"What?"

Kibum scoffed. "Of course you weren't fucking listening to me."

"When do I ever?" Minho sniffed a laugh, his fingers toying with the waistband of Kibum's boxers. When did he put those on?

"All the time. You're really attentive, actually."

Minho blinked, his hand stilling on Kibum's stomach. This was part of the new development...more genuine compliments thrown into their usual banter. It was taking some getting used to, but he wasn't complaining. "Sorry, baby, I'm still tired."

He could hear the soft smile in Kibum's sigh. Another new thing...Kibum liked it when he called him baby. Minho relaxed on his pillow when Kibum started to turn around, doing his best to stay in Minho's arms. "You're not planning on telling the others, right?"

Minho shook his head. They had already discussed this, after their first kiss on the bridge overlooking the Thames that night they had snuck away. This would be their secret for as long as they could keep it. "Are you sure?"

Kibum searched his expression, his eyes dazzlingly beautiful for this early in the morning. "About?"

"That...that you want us to be together after we leave?"

His expression softened and he took Minho's hand in his, looking down at it as he started to fiddle with his hand. "Of course. I…" he shook his head, pursing his lips.

"What?"

Kibum grimaced. "It's stupid and cheesy." Minho grinned, shifting a bit closer to him. Kibum speared him with an exasperated look that melted into a shy smile. "Now that...we're together -- "

"Finally."

"Yes, finally, shut up, Min." Minho laughed and Kibum closed his eyes, shaking his head. "Now that we're together, I can't, like, imagine facing the world without you, you know, beside me." Kibum glanced up at him only to suppress his smile and immediately look back down at their hands between them. "Stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?" Kibum shook his head and Minho smiled, slipping his hand out of Kibum's limp grasp to raise his chin with an extended finger until their eyes met. "You're so cute when you get shy. I've always thought so."

"Shut up."

"Make me."

The mischievous glint in Kibum's eyes was Minho's only warning before he surged forward to silence him with a kiss. Minho smiled into it, holding Kibum close as he relaxed further into his pillow.

Honestly, if every morning began like this, he might be more of a morning person.

But, unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. The knocking of one of their managers pushed them apart, both hurrying to get pajamas on so their managers would be none the wiser.

And, so, it began.

The flight back to Korea was long and arduous. In between sleeping and eating, they both decided to work on the lyrics for their upcoming comeback. During the ManU game, Jeon Gandi emailed him the draft of Dream Girl, their next title song. He was supposed to write his rap for it, and after he finished eating his lunch, he got out his phone to start brainstorming ideas.

"Do you want my help?"

Minho glanced over at Kibum, noting the bags under his eyes and how sleepy he looked. He was a light sleeper, usually, so getting restful sleep on planes was more than a little difficult for him.

"It's okay, go ahead and try to sleep."

Kibum fought it, focusing instead on the lyrics Minho was starting to type...and backspace...and retype. He mumbled his ideas until he finally rested his head on Minho's shoulder, letting sleep claim him.

Minho smiled when he heard the first of Kibum's snores, and glanced down at the top of his head. After a furtive glance around, he placed a quick kiss on the crown of Kibum's head and refocused on writing.

It was a good song, really cute, in his opinion. He could already almost hear the upbeat tempo and the tune of it in his head. He read the lyrics again, and, maybe it was because their relationship was so new, but Minho couldn't help but think of Kibum.

"My heart makes me go after you in secret," he whispered aloud, glancing down at Kibum again. He read up to the point where his rap would come in, then reread it once more before he started to write his lyrics with Kibum fully in mind. The words flowed easily and once he was finished, he read over it again, making a few edits before he sent it back to Gandi.

Kibum stirred when Minho set his phone down. "Did you finish?"

"Mhm."

"Can I see?" Minho unlocked his phone and opened the email before passing it to Kibum. He watched his profile as he read over the rap, releasing a huff of a sigh when Kibum started to smile. "I like it."

"It's about you," Minho started to say but was cut off by the arrival of their manager bringing them a snack.

The comeback was a whirlwind of preparation that started almost as soon as they stepped off the plane. It swept them all up -- with regular meetings with him, Kibum, Jonghyun, and the other songwriters so they could finalize the tracks for the album, perfecting the choreography for the title track, photoshoots and the filming of the music video...it was a wonder they had any time to themselves to sleep or eat.

It wasn't a surprise that they had yet to be able to spend any time, alone, together, since their return to Korea. They did, however, tend to gravitate toward each other, no matter what they were doing, maintaining their connection through subtle glances and fleeting touches.

It was quite easy to hide their affection for each other from the others during a comeback. Everyone was too tired to focus on anything besides sleeping and how nice of a concept that was.

"Good night," Jinki mumbled as he pulled himself up from where he was nodding off on the couch. Minho glanced away from the television to watch him go before his attention shifted to Kibum, who was curled up in the chair by the hallway, reading a book.

"Night," Kibum said absently, and Minho went back to mindlessly playing his video game. Until Kibum's book snapped closed. He looked back, smiling as Kibum stretched in his seat. "I thought he'd never leave."

"Oh?"

Kibum smirked. "Mhm."

"We should probably go to sleep. Long day tomorrow."

"Today, technically."

Minho looked over at the clock. It was a little past midnight. "Yeah."

"Let's go to bed, huh?"

Minho nodded, turning off the TV and following Kibum down the hallway, turning sideways to move past him once Kibum stopped at his door. He grabbed Minho's hand before he got too far away. "What?"

"Aren't you coming?"

Minho blinked. "Where?"

"To bed." Minho blinked rapidly, his tired confusion clouding his mind. He pointed to his and Jonghyun's bedroom in answer. "I meant with me."

Minho's eyes widened. "What about Taemin?"

"He's with his parents tonight." Kibum cracked the door open and looked back at Minho with the same twinkle in his eye that had been there all those weeks ago in London.

Minho couldn't help but follow him inside.

* * * * * * * * * *

"So how'd you sleep?"

Kibum paused and glanced at Jonghyun before he took a tentative sip of his coffee. The question seemed innocuous enough, but there was something in his tone that made him slightly suspicious. "Fine. You?"

"Oh, you know me. Up later than I should be."

Jonghyun smirked, almost devilishly. Kibum squinted at him, the checked down the hallway when he heard footsteps. It was only Jinki. If Minho wasn't up in five minutes he'd have to go wake him up so they wouldn't be late for their schedules today.

They murmured good morning to each other as Jinki sat down beside him, grabbing the mug Jonghyun set down for him and staring at it blearily. A door opened and Kibum leaned back in his chair, smiling at Minho as he walked down to the bathroom at the far end of the hall.

"Hey, Jinki," Jonghyun said, glaring at the box of cereal on the top shelf of the cupboard. His favorite cereal. "Could you reach this for me?"

"I wonder who moved that," Kibum said, trying not to smile.

"Some tall asshole."

The door to the bathroom opened again, and Minho emerged in his running gear. He smiled sleepily at Kibum as he made his way toward him, and once he reached him, he said, "Good morning!" as he bent down to kiss him.

If this were any other situation, it would have been a sweet gesture. Kibum would have definitely kissed him back. But, instead, he just sat there in shock as Minho pulled away from him. His eyes were blown wide, and Minho's soon was too when he heard the clatter of a spoon in a bowl.

Both Jonghyun and Jinki were watching them, equally wide-eyed -- though Jonghyun was sporting a growing smile. Any possible excuse for Minho to be kissing Kibum that wasn't the fact that they were a couple completely left his brain. He would have stammered something, though, if Minho hadn't walked over to where they were, shaking his head slightly as he wrapped Jonghyun up in his arms.

"Good morning!" he said with strained cheer as he kissed him, and then again with Jinki. None of them moved after Minho left them, and Minho didn't turn around as he made his way toward the door. If his ears were anywhere near the color of his face, he was visibly embarrassed. "I'll be back! Taking a quick run!"

He took off before the door closed behind him, and Kibum's gaze immediately darted back to Jinki and Jonghyun.

"Well," Jinki said, picking up his bowl of cereal. "If I wasn't awake before, I certainly am now."

Before Jonghyun could comment, Kibum sprang from his seat and muttered something about going to get ready to leave.

As soon as he got into his room, his phone chimed. Kibum closed the door behind himself and went over to where it had been charging, unsurprised to find a flurry of texts from Minho.

Mino 5:13 // omg i'm so sorry 5:14 // i don't know what i was thinking i didn't even notice they were there at first 5:14 // were they mad at me? 5:15 // are you mad at me?? 5:15 // did they figure it out???

Kibum smiled at his screen as he started to type.

5:16 // Jjong might have but i don't know for sure 5:16 // and no, i'm not mad at you

He paused, internally debating before he sent hurry back.

5:18 // thank god 5:18 // wait why is there something wrong?

He could picture him clearly, standing there on the sidewalk, his phone in hand and his brow furrowed with concern as he stared at his screen, waiting for Kibum's reply. And, before Kibum could second guess himself or talk himself out of it…

5:18 // i miss you

He tossed his phone away immediately, and it landed with a soft thump on his bed. A moment later, it chimed twice then fell silent. Kibum watched it, waiting for several minutes for another notification. When none came, he slowly made his way over to his bed, picking it up to peek at the texts.

5:19 // awwww~ 5:19 // okay hold on

Kibum could feel the heat coloring his face as he tossed his phone back on his bed. He smiled as he sorted through his closet, picking an outfit that would be passable as fashionable enough for a radio show and a fan meet afterward. As he was fiddling with his beret in the mirror, figuring out its placement on his head, there came a knock on his door.

"Yeah."

The door opened, and a slightly breathless Minho poked his head in. "Hey, can you help me pick out an outfit?"

Kibum stared at him, then blink. "That was a really quick run."

"Someone asked me to hurry, so I did." He gave Kibum a cheeky wink and grin as he slipped away, probably heading for his bedroom next door. Kibum placed the beret without another thought and followed him. By the time he reached Minho's room, his shirt was discarded and he was sifting through his clothes. He smiled as Kibum stared, a little too smugly for Kibum's liking, but he couldn't tear his eyes away long enough to snap at him.

Sure, he had seen Minho shirtless before. Many times. They'd lived together as a group far too long for him not to. But, it was different now. Before, he wouldn't have been caught staring at him, not this blatantly. He didn't want to freak Minho out with his feelings for him, but now that he knew, and they were alone…

"Hey, my eyes are up here," Minho said, a smile in his voice.

"Yeah, I've seen them before." Minho snorted and Kibum finally looked up, sighing involuntarily. "Sorry."

"I don't mind. Come here." Kibum stepped further into the closet, his attention shifting from Minho to the clothes. "What about these?"

He held up two options that were clearly not designed to go together and he knew it, and Kibum sucked his teeth before playfully slapping Minho's shoulder. "Stop it."

"These?" Another terrible choice.

He rolled his eyes as Minho just laughed. "Fuck, just let me do it."

As Kibum stepped up to seriously inspect Minho's clothes, Minho slipped behind him and wrapped his arms around him before resting his head against his. Kibum hummed in appreciation at the warmth and closeness, but as he started to pick out some outfits, Minho started to distract him by kissing down his neck.

As much as Kibum would have liked to allow himself to get lost in the moment, in the security of being wrapped up in Minho's arms, in the way each time Minho's lips brushed against his skin made his heart flutter… They had places to be, and soon. He pulled a pair of skinny jeans, a black t-shirt, and a jacket off the rack and slipped out of his arms.

"You have to go shower or else we'll be late," he said.

"Okay."

Kibum searched Minho's expression, smiling softly at the affection radiating from his gaze. Before he could stop himself, he cupped Minho's face with both hands and pulled him into a kiss that was soon cut short by someone clearing their throat. They broke apart, both looking at a half-amused, half-confused Jonghyun.

"What the fuck is up with you two?"

"Nothing," they said at the same time.

"He's gonna go shower before the van gets here," Kibum said, hastily leaving the closet. "I'm gonna go finish my breakfast. What about you?"

"I was...gonna change out of my pajamas?"

"Good luck!" he said, slipping away from Minho, he patted Jonghyun on the shoulder, and after steeling himself, cupped his face much like he had just done with Minho and gave Jonghyun a firm kiss. "Okay, see you guys out...there…"

He hurried out the door, smacking his palm over his eyes after the door closed behind him. Yes, today was their first slip up since coming back from London, but there were bound to be more. Lots more… Something had to happen...change...if they were going to continue to be together.

And Kibum very much wanted that.

Maybe they should move out of the dorm. No, that would be way too suspicious, especially now. He started down the hallway toward the kitchen when he heard the jiggle of the knob behind him and he didn't look back when someone -- probably Minho -- walked out into the hallway.

If not one of them, then himself. It would be nice to have his own space. More room to fit his clothes, and all that. He stirred his now soggy cereal, grimacing at it. That was something to think about, but for now, he pushed the thought away.

It'd have to wait until the end of their comeback.

[darkmindsthinktwistedthoughts]

Echo pt1

A very happy birthday to Kat @kthomas325 I hope you enjoy this little Modern/fantasy tale. 

Warning: This is a little dark. There is blood, death, Strong Language and yeah ... please read with caution. **Still not sure what direction this is taking so I should add a warning for Author with no plot **

Masterlist

---

Echo part 1

The move had been hectic. Boxes everywhere stacked high in her office like some sort of interactive Tetris game. When they got the word that they were to relocate and join forces with another team she had hoped for a bit more time. Still, missions to be undertaken at a moment’s notice with frustratingly tight time frames that had required superhuman capabilities to accomplish were nothing new to her. Thank god she could handle high levels of stress in the workplace because otherwise, she was a likely candidate to be sent off to the looney farm.

Pretty much all of her team had already managed to settle in, she was the last. The trouble with being a partly freelance brain for hire was you tended to get sent tasks on the side that took up valuable time. This is exactly what happened the day she received the orders to move.

It had been a normal boring day pouring over the latest data from some tests on the guys that had just come back from overseas and her internal email pinged.

Notice for the attention of Dr K response required ASAP

If she hadn’t been bored out of her proverbial tree, she might have groaned a little more when she saw the familiar sender’s address. It wouldn’t be the first time her friend in the Met had abused his powers of friendship in calling for her help, but these little cases of his had a way of snowballing.

Clicking the attachment on the email her eyes scanned the words like a barcode. It was meticulous and read exactly as she was expecting it too, except for one little detail.

Undetectable traces of blood.

She reread it to make sure she hadn’t missed something before reaching for her Cell phone and searching her contacts. Fingers gliding over the screen she dialled the number for her friend. The line didn’t even manage to ring two times before it was answered a bright voice on the other end speaking.

“That was faster than I thought. Slow news day or were you just that desperate to speak to me?” There was the sound of rustling papers in the background which told her she wasn’t the only one burning the midnight oil.

“Right the first time. You sent me the complete report, right?” She asked in a way that sounded like she was accusing him of trying to pull a bad practical joke on her. Her brow creased as she looked again at the text illuminated on her monitor.

“After the lecture you gave me last time where you chewed me out over lack of information? Course I sent it all.” His adamant reply just seemed to add to the rising tension she felt.

“What does it mean where you wrote the bodies had no traces of blood? You mean at the scene or…”

“Scene and autopsy. I mean there was nothing. Not a damn drop. Bodies were fresh as far as the guys in the coroner’s office could tell. They weren’t marked in any way and yet they were as empty as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard.” He chuckled at his own bad joke.

“And that was seriously it? Nothing else?” She clicked at the attachments but they were only the basic preliminary photos the police took of the scene.

“Why are you asking like it’s obvious there should be?”

“Because this is all like a bad dream.” It was strange, she was logical and rational to the point of being accused of being almost robotic at times. And here she was looking at something that probably has a totally scientific explanation for it, feeling like she was being targeted. Something that was lying in the back of her mind dormant was setting off alarms.

“… Hey. Are you ok there? You know I hate it when you go quiet.” She had zoned out and the concern in the man’s voice as he spoke reminded her of the fact he was still on the line.

“Yeah. Let me know the minute you find anything else. And I want to see the full report from the medical examiner, toxicology and photos.” She knew he was making a note on something because she heard him cuss under his breath about how he could never find a pen when he needed one.

“So, you’re taking the case?”

“What do you think?”

Hanging up the phone the silence that was once comforting in her office was suddenly oppressive. The shadows felt like they were cold and creeping, prowling around her. It had been a long time since she had felt this. Getting up from behind her desk she went in search of coffee to try to distract herself with a warm drink.

There was a ringing in her ears that was low like a buzz from a hive. Her head started to pound behind her eyes at the contrast between the soft lighting in her office and the phosphorescent lighting in the building’s corridors that was harsh and bright. She rubbed her eyes in an attempt to acclimatise herself as she walked to the break room.

*

Time had no place here, at least not the kind of time that other realms had. The twin suns had set long ago allowing the triple moons to rise high into the indigo velvet sky. The crimson rock gleamed deep and dark with a foreboding subliminal idea that it was rich with blood. The rocks here always looked fluid; the veins of magical deposits threaded their way through them giving the land underfoot a pulse.

Moving swiftly with soundless ease a single figure clad in a white cloak slipped out of a dense tree line and continued forward to a crossroads. The marker there pointed them in the direction of tonight’s meeting place, a symbol visible only to those who carried the sigil to reveal it. After following its direction for a time, a fracture in the bedrock of the Mesa that ran along the border.

The veins in the deep red rock glowed as the figure entered illuminating their journey into the flat-topped hill better than any lantern. Voices began to bounce around them, the glow becoming brighter before the walls of the narrow pathway disappeared. 

A void in the rock created a natural cathedral. The stone couldn’t have followed a more structured path if it had been carved by hand. The ceiling was vaulted and appeared almost black as it was so far away from them. In the centre of this space sat the heads of some of the largest households in the known lands. With the arrival of the figure in white that made six.

“You kept us waiting.” A strong imperial voice from a black-haired man carried over the group setting a heavy silence in the air. His red-trimmed robes wrapped around his figure as it sat on a rock by the fire in the same way he would perch on his own throne.

“My apologies. It took slightly longer than planned to leave the castle.” The cloaked figure made a theatrical bow after speaking.

“You weren’t followed?” The man sitting to the left of the regal one had a slightly less polished appearance. His sandy brown hair looked a little frazzled, no doubt a result of running their fingers through it in moments of agitation as was their habit.

The cloaked figure was more than aware of the eyes of the gathering being focused on them but they showed no sign of reacting to it.

“Naturally. If I hadn’t, I would have been disappointed. But I was able to give them the slip, otherwise I would not be here at all.”

“What is the news?” A rather impatient man sporting a different style of dress and an eye patch interjected. The loose-fitting clothing was clearly easier to move around in which allowed for a better range of motion in a fight. Something the man was renowned for in the realms. The wild chestnut brown hair on his head seemed to reflect the spark of energy in his singular blue eye.

“The throne remains unchallenged. In fact, it would appear that the dear Queen is in possession of new strength.”

“What?” Their collective outcry reverberated for a moment before falling flat again.

“How could she get that?” One of the younger men gathered grumbled his question. His emerald eyes flashed for a moment with worry.

“I can only think of one way in which she might find such a thing now. With supplies into the land limited from each of ours…” The silver-haired Lord produced a ledger from inside one of his pockets and began talking as he flicked through the pages checking details of something written in an almost indecipherable font.

“She’s found a fault line.” The black-haired Lord leaned back elegantly, an amused wicked smile on his face and his crimson eyes flashed. He looked entertained but the atmosphere around him told a different tale.

“But there were no fault lines. She searched before and turned up empty it was why she arranged for trade negotiations to start with.” The concerned Lord to his left dragged his hand through his hair leaving it to settle on his neck. He had every right to be worried as they all were but it was his land that bordered closer to the Queen.

“What we gain from our harvesting in our own territory is always greater than what we would gain by trade. We are attuned to the land after all.” The young lord with emerald eyes tossed out his words factually with a sigh.

“Yes, but for her to gain such a noticeable increase that is should be sensed by others…” a crystal tipped quill scratched over a page on the notebook the ink appeared magically on the paper filling the space quickly making it appear almost completely black.

“She isn’t just feeding.”

“Keep a close eye on her. Depending on what you find our plans may change.”

“Of course.” The figure in the white cloak bowed once more before turning on heel and leaving as they had come.

No one said this was going to be easy. They had all known what they were signing up for, but the development of the Queen’s new hunting ground after the loss of the King was not one they could have foreseen.

---

After unlocking her front door, she pushed it open with her hip before entering with a large box in her arms and closed it with her foot. The box made a heavy thud sound on the coffee table the files, documents and other office records had a layer of dust on top of them that she failed to remove before tossing them in and bringing them back with her.

The dates on the files were all from around nearly 30 years ago. It had been a little shocking how many there were given the few cases there had been but that is what happens when several governing bodies investigate at once. Each department has its own methods and documents them eventually you have them accumulated together by one department into a file that could be used in court if you were at a point of prosecution for the offence.

She wasn’t interested in combined facts abbreviated for a jury and judge she wanted complete records, which was how she came to raid the archives on-site before leaving work. Dumping her bag next to the box she went straight into the kitchen and rummaged around in the cupboards there looking for the ground coffee.

The kitchen was a room every house had but here it seemed a little bit of a waste. She wasn’t home enough to cook meals so there was typically next to no food in the place. There was a microwave and coffeemaker on the countertop and that was all. The rest of the property suffered the same neglected fate. There were enough furnishings to be comfortable but it was not what you could call a warm environment.

This was what happens when you spend more time at work than you do at home. She sighed a little as she listened to the water boil in the coffee maker. The buzzing in her head hadn’t gone away and had brought with it a tingling sensation she could feel in her bones.

She glanced up and caught sight of herself in the reflection of the window. Something about it looked different but she couldn’t place it. A nagging feeling of something she had missed was gnawing at the back of her mind. Abandoning the coffee maker, she went over and grabbed a file hoping that the answer she wanted was somewhere in all this mess.

---

[outerspaceisbetterthannothing]

Blame [Surgeon!Calum AU] Ch.3

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7

Summary: What do you do if the only person you feel the connection to is the person you blamed for your sibling’s death?

A/N: This thing came up from my headass asks to wonderful Summer about neonatal surgeon!Calum au, which you can see here and here and here to understand the concept. I didn’t plan to do it at all, but the idea stuck in my mind and with support and encouragement from Summer, I came up with that. This is my first time publishing anything on Tumblr, so the feedback is extremely appreciated. Enjoy

Warnings: much less angst (I promised it’ll get better very soon), couple curse words, lack of proofreading

Chapter 3

The morning was gloomy just like Anna’s mood. She yawned again and switched off the stove, her fried eggs almost ready. She grimaced, moving them to the plate and sitting at the table. She didn’t like fried eggs, but that was basically the last piece of food in her fridge.

She remembered yesterday’s wish to cook something for dinner. Like there was anything to actually cook.

She added grocery shopping to the to-do list she was currently making up in her head and winced at too bitter taste of coffee. She ran out of milk… when exactly? Last week?

Anna wasn’t typically so bad at housekeeping. But last week’s events really messed with her routine. If things had gone differently, she wouldn’t have sat here having breakfast out of the last two eggs from her fridge. She would have been staying at Staten Island with her parents, helping around the house. She’d planned to be back to her flat the very morning of her first classes and purposefully emptied her fridge not really wishing to deal with spoilt leftovers. Now she had to adapt to new circumstances.

She finished her eggs and gave it another thought. It was Thursday morning. She was about to leave to her parents’ the next afternoon and stay at their house for as long as possible. Was it reasonable to go grocery shopping now? Or better fall back into the sinful habit of takeaways?

The very moment she was tossing between those two options, her phone vibrated shortly.

Anna took a deep breath and checked her messages. It was Ally. Anna felt her heart slowing down. Of course it was just Allie and not him.

“Jo’s cooking lasagna tonight, so I thought about grabbing some Thai food. What do u say? Noodles and wine?”

Anna couldn’t help smirking to that. Jo had an Italian Grandma, who she’d never seen in her life. Grandma Falsetti died pretty young, couple years before Jo’s Mom and Dad even met. Nevertheless Jo felt some deep connection to her late Grandma Falsetti. This connection came out in a peculiar idea that Jo had a secret talent to cook true Italian lasagna. How and when that idea settled in Jo’s eccentric mind girls had no idea. But every now and then Jo tried to prove her secret and probably yet sleeping cooking talent. She bought everything the little Italian grocery shop nearby could offer and started another crusade towards her dream dish. It would have been probably an easier task if she’d ever looked up any lasagna recipes. But Jo didn’t believe in online cookbooks and instead had an absolute faith in her spiritual connection to Grandma Falsetti. Allie and Anna never questioned that connection. They learned after the first lasagna dinner that Jo was her own fiercest critic, and every result of her desperate attempts to wake up her Italian roots was eventually thrown away. And every lasagna dinner was easily turned into a pizza dinner. Or Chinese dinner. Today it was Thai. Anna particularly adored lasagna dinners for their optimistic spirit. Jo, being a crazy passionate optimist, was never taken down by her failures in the kitchen and kept repeating that every experience was an experience. At least now she knew several wrong ways to cook lasagna, which only brought her closer to the right one.

Today’s invitation, being welcoming and well-timed on its own, also solved her grocery shopping dilemma.

Annabelle typed back “Sure! Will be there by 8. Wine’s on me” and wanted to switch off the phone but halted, her gaze settled at the contact name of the next dialogue. Her heartbeat picked up its pace again. She opened the tab, scrolled up to the very beginning and started rereading their messages. As if she hadn’t already learned them by heart.

She remember last night’s hesitation and sudden urge to text him. Still hadn’t quite understood what made her do it. And of course the first ever idea of what to type was exactly as silly as all her words said or sent to him so far.

23.46 “What would’ve happened if I’d taken a coffee?”

Even several hours later she still blushed rereading that. Why couldn’t she have started with simple “Hi” or “It’s Anna, sorry to bother”? Why her subconscious was making her look ridiculous?

23.47 “There would’ve been one coffee less on the table in the on-call room”

The speed and simplicity of his answer was calming and exciting at the same time. He stated that just like they were continuing a conversation they’d paused a minute ago and not fifteen hours. It made her almost dizzy. To the point of completely losing her mind judging by her next questions.

23.48 “That easy?”

23.49 “That easy”

23.49 “And nothing more?”

23.50 “And nothing more”

Anna dropped her phone on the table and hid her face in her hands, groaning quietly. Such a dumbass…

She recalled staring at his short unimaginative responses last night for couple minutes. After which she’d remembered about good manners.

23.54 “Sorry for the late night messages”

“Especially so stupid ones,” she thought now.

23.55 “I’ve at least 8 more hours on a shift so not so late night for me”

23.55 “Oh, ok”

The sounds, that were Anna’s reaction to that fine piece of epistolary genre, were hardly human.

23.56 “Working tmrrw too?”

23.57 “No, days off till Sat. Y?”

Anna’s hands started shaking again, almost like last night when she was typing her next message, praying at the same time for an alien invasion which would instantly block all the mobile connection and stop her from finishing her question. Whatever impediment this insane world could offer would actually do, she’d thought, cause she wasn’t able to stop her fingers from typing and feared to death to actually ask him what she was about to ask.

23.59 “Could we maybe meet up? For a coffee or sth? I really need to talk to you”

She still couldn’t believe she wrote about coffee. But as usual realisation came after she pressed send. She’d sat on her bed after that biting her fingers nervously and looking at three little dots showing on his side of the screen.

00.00 “Sure. Fri noon ok?”

Annabelle hadn’t noticed she’d hold her breath till she got that text. She’d gasped for air and almost jumped on her bed.

00.01 “Yeah, totaly”

00.02 “Let’s hold on to that, but i’ll confirm tomorrow evening in case they call me in overnight”

00.02 “Yeah, cool”

00.03 “Goodnight then”

Anna exhaled loudly rereading that last message from him for a thousandth time at least.

Why that simple sign of politeness was raising such sensation in her? Why did she see something more than just politeness behind those two words? And why everything about that man was so damn intense?

***

“It’s all about the right mood,” Jo repeated for the third time, putting her future masterpiece in the oven.

“Whose mood exactly?” mocked her Allie. Jo continued staring into the oven through the thick glass and didn't pay much attention to her friend’s words.

“Yeah, Jo, whose mood?” joined Anna, “A cook’s?”

“Or maybe guest’s?”

“No, no, no, I know! It’s all about the lasagna’s mood!” Anna started giggling, mostly because of her fair share of wine, consumed while Jo was cooking.

Jo smirked, standing up. “You are absolute bitches today, ladies! Congratulations!”

Anna and Allie raised glasses in a joky toast from the opposite side of a kitchen island.

“So, how are your parents?” Allie asked in much more serious tone.

Anna put her glass down and shrugged silently. Jo sent Allie disapproval look.

“You’ve seen my Mom in the hospital. She tries to act normal. But of course it’s hard. It’s hard for everyone,” finally said Anna. “I don’t even know what is worse, the way she acts now, or if she spent all her time alone and crying and mourning.”

“Of course second option is worse, darling,” said Jo softly.

“But shouldn’t you like… go through it. You know, anger, depression, all that stuff. I feel like she’s stuck in her denial phase. What if she’s actually harming herself that way?”

Jo was obviously lost for words. Allie sighed deeply and noted, “Everybody copes their own way. Knowing Jennifer, it’s quite understandable that she doesn’t want other people to see her grief. She’s exactly that type of woman who’d cry for three days and then stand up and go on with her life. She was never the one to dwell.”

Anna nodded, took another sip of her wine. “I get it. And you right. It’s just. I don’t know, I feel like I miss on something. The way they react… We did have time to prepare to any outcome, knowing about Grayson’s heart condition for some time. But… I sometimes feel like they overcame it in like couple hours. I know they actually didn’t, they do grieve. But the fact that they don’t really show it leaves me confused. Because I don’t understand anything. What should I do? Should I cry? Should I be angry? Should I let go and act it like there were no baby at all? I cried with my Mom the very first day, I had my gush of anger. But now…” she shook her head. “I’m literally at a loss. And my emotions are at a verge. One moment I’m completely alright, the next I’m sobbing in the middle of a parking lot. I mean, what is wrong with me?”

“Hey, nothing is wrong with you,” reassured her Jo, while Allie simply hugged Anna and stayed like that. “There is no instruction that will tell you how you should feel. Because there’s no should, Belle. You just feel, the way you do. And if it means crying in the middle of the fucking parking lot, then fine!”

Anna snorted to that, feeling tears in her eyes. “I just feel like a freak.”

“You’re not. You are hurting. It’ll take time. Just give it some time,” almost whispered Allie.

“Guess, you’re right.”

Anna took another sip of her wine and went faster, like she just remembered it. “About Saturday, there’ll be no funeral. Mom wanted cremation. So it’ll be just a little memorial-ish stuff at our house, nothing official at all. Only family and closest friends. Will you come anyway?’

“Of course, darling,” confirmed Allie. “Noon?”

“Yeah.”

They kept silence for some time, drinking and not looking at each other. Then Jo, visibly hesitating, decided to ask. “Belle, is Bryan going to come?”

Allie rolled her eyes to that question and Anna snorted.

“Yes, Jo, I’m sorry to upset you, but Bryan is going to be there. We messaged yesterday and he confirmed, that he won’t leave for school till Monday.”

“Messaged?” Jo asked in slight confusion. “You didn't talk to him?”

Anna shrugged nonchalantly, than added. “Wasn't feeling like talking.” And set her gaze at the wine glass she was twisting in her fingers.

Jo looked at Allie, who shook her head asking Jo to drop the topic. Jo widened her eyes in fake innocence when Anna sighed and gave in. “Say it,” she stated firmly.

“What?” Jo decided to continue acting innocent.

“Whatever you wanted to say. Just say it.”

“I just-” Jo hesitated for a moment, which made Anna look up at her friend in mild surprise. If there was one thing Jo could never be accused of it was hesitation. “Don't you think it's rather odd, Belle? He’s your boyfriend of more than three years and you wasn't feeling like talking to him in the probably darkest moment of you life.”

Anna frowned and looked at Allie. “Do you think it's odd too?”

Allie shook her head finishing her wine. “Can you please keep me out of this conversation?” she said, when realised that her friends’ gazes didn't move from her.

“No?” Anna raised her eyebrows.

Allie rolled her eyes at Jo and looked at her empty glass. “Well, I guess, it is a little odd. I guess if I was in the relationship I would want the guy to take care of me in such moment,” she shrugged. “But everybody's different. And if you feel like being alone, it seems totally fine to me,” she concluded, stressing her last words and looking at Jo again.

“Well, I'm sorry for being so hard-heartedly honest, but it doesn't really seems fine to me,” stated Jo.

A loud sound struck in the settled silence. Anna looked back at the couch where she left her phone. “To tell the truth, Jo, Bryan is definitely the last of my problems right now.”

She stood up and stepped to the couch to check the message. She was intended to keep her face emotionless not to give much away (mostly because there was literally nothing to give away), but she couldn't help her smile when she saw the contact name.

“Still up for that coffee?”

Her fingers started typing before she even thought about her reply. She waited a moment till he sent her an address of a little coffee shop next to the NY public library, switched her screen off, went back to the kitchen island and realised that girls’ gazes were on her all that time.

“What?” she played dumb under Jo’s questioning look.

“Who was that?” Jo obviously had a hard time trying to suppress her curiosity. Anna looked at her, then at Allie, who as usual wasn't giving much away, but was definitely interested too.

“That was…” Anna stumbled. How would she explain all of it?

“Don't say that was nobody!” exclaimed Jo. “I swear, Belle, if you say it was nobody, I'll steal you phone and look.”

Anna was taken aback. “Hey, chill, would you? Why does it even matter?”

“Because you smiled,” quietly said Allie and Anna felt almost betrayed.

“And not just smiled! You smiled your special little smile,” continued Jo as she started to slightly bounce on her tiptoes impatiently.

“Special smile? I don't have any special smiles, what are you even talking about?”

“You do,” noted Allie matter of factly.

“See? Thank you, Allie! Now spill the beans!”

“There's nothing to spill. It was Dr. Hood.” She took a bottle and poured herself more wine, but mostly just to occupy herself with something cause she suddenly felt awkward.

“Dr. Hood?” Jo repeated in disbelief and Allie almost choked on her wine. “Is it that hot doctor we saw staring at you at the hospital?”

“Well, yes,” Anna confirmed, still not risking to look at her friends.

Jo shrieked and spinned throwing her arms up in the air. “I knew it!” she yelled looking at Anna with excitement. “I knew there was something between the two of you!”

“There’s literally nothing between us, I swear,” Anna said holding her hands up in calming gesture.

“Wait, first things first! How did it even happen that you text?” bursted Allie being as excited as Jo, to Anna’s utter bewilderment.

“Well, he gave us his card, you know, just in case, when Mom only got to the hospital,” Anna explained.

Jo gave a whistle. “So it was you who texted first? I can say that I've never been so proud of you, my little Belle!”

Anna sighed and hid her head in her hands. “It’s absolutely not like that, Jo!” she groaned. “Can you not, please?”

“Then just tell us!” begged Jo.

“I shouted at him, okay?” Anna confessed, still hiding her face. Then she took a deep breath, took her hand off of her face and met two shocked stares. “The gush of anger I had,” she started explaining. “It was the very night Grayson died. I'd been hiding in the hospital corridors for some time, needed some privacy to bail my eyes out, you know. And then I decided to come back to my Mom's room and I saw him in a hall. And… it was really awful. I blamed him for everything, said he hadn't saved my brother, that it was his fault. Then started crying again. An absolute mess.”

Anna shook her head on the unwanted memory.

“What did he do?” Allie asked softly.

“Nothing much. He held me the whole time I was crying, ‘s all.”

The room was silent for some time.

“So why did you text him?” finally asked Jo.

Anna looked up at her. “I asked him to meet me. I need to apologize properly for what a horrible person I was to him.”

“Anna,” Allie gasped putting her hand on Anna’s back and stroking her soothingly. “You aren't a horrible person. You were devastated by your loss. What you did is more than understandable.”

Anna chuckled bitterly. “It wasn't actually the only shit thing I did.”

“What?”

“The day you came to visit my Mom, I was sitting on the bench in front of the hospital that morning. I was sitting there every morning before entering, actually. Needed a moment to myself, you know. So he sat next to me and offered coffee he’d bought for me. And I just shoved him off like a total bitch. And he just tried to be friendly.”

“Belle, I'm sure he understands,” tried to reassure her Jo.

“Of course, he does,” Annabelle agreed. “But that's not the point at all. The way I acted, that's not me. I'm not that person and I need him to know it. I can't explain, but I just can't leave it like that. I owe him an apology no matter what reasons I had.”

“When are you meeting?” Jo asked a moment later.

“Tomorrow noon,” she answered as Jo’s oven alarm went off.

Jo bounced again in anticipation and picked potholders. “Finally!” she breathed out, opening the oven.

They understood something was wrong as soon as Jo started cutting it in portions. The dish was basically breaking under her knife with loud crunching. Allie and Anna looked at each other too scared to say a word. Jo groaned, mumbled something about “the fucking fuck” and threw another result of her cooking into her trash bin. Then she looked up at girls and asked, looking tired and pissed, “So, what did you bring today?”

“Thai,” confessed Allie with shy smile. “But we need to heat it up.”

“Well, you know how to use my microwave,” Jo shrugged waving to Anna. “Belle, give me that damn bottle, will you? I need to drink up that disaster.”

Annabelle giggled, handing Jo wine and smiling at the visibly lightening mood. She couldn't help but thought that no matter what was happening in her life, lasagna dinners would always be there to save her from all the troubles. And at that moment she couldn't be more grateful for that.

***

“Are you sure you wanna go today?” her dad asked for at least fourth time. “Traffic’s gonna be awful.”

Anna smiled. “Dad, it's New York, traffic’s gonna be awful no matter when I decide to come.”

He chuckled lightly. “Okay, sweetheart. You gonna stay for the whole weekend?”

“No, actually I was about to stay till Tuesday. I've got first class in the afternoon so I could leave in the morning.”

“You sure?”

“Well, yeah. As long as you okay with me bothering you for so long,” she joked.

“Don't be silly.” Annabelle could see her Dad’s frown right now and smiled wider. “I just thought as it’s your last weekend before school starts you’d want…”

Anna didn't let him finish. “There’s no other place I’d rather be right now, Dad.”

“Sure thing, Anna.”

“I'll text you when I set off, ‘kay? Don't start dinner without me!”

“Can't promise you anything, sweetheart. Your Mom’s cooking curry tonight so…”

“I won't speak to you ever again if you start without me!” she threatened, giggling.

“I'm just saying I wouldn't waste much time for packing if I were you,” Mark teased again.

“I’m leaving right now,” Anna heard her father chuckle again and the sound made her heart shrink. Or maybe it was the sight of a tall man in black shirt and black jeans waiting for her outside of a quite busy coffee shop. Anna felt her hands starting to shake. “Dad, I have to go, but I'll text you later.”

“Okay, darling. I love you.”

“Love you too. See you tonight,” Anna mumbled and finished her call.

That very moment he saw her and put his phone he was scrolling through while waiting in the pocket of his jeans.

Anna felt her heart setting off in a running pace. Say Hi or Hello? Smile or better not? What was more appropriate in conversation with a man she’d accused of the most horrible things?

“I thought of buying us coffee, but realised you’ve never actually told me,” he said with a ghost of a smile on his lips, saving her from struggling with her first words.

“Never told you what?” Anna felt lost at this.

“What coffee you prefer,” he explained and let smile touch his face finally.

Anna widened her eyes half because of the fact that she didn't understand that herself, half because he wanted to buy her coffee even after she shoved him off the last time he did. “Er, cappuccino would be fine, but you don't have to buy me coffee,” she shook her head frowning a little.

He shrugged and stepped into the coffee shop without sparing her another word. Anna followed him just to see the barista noticing him and raising an eyebrow in a silent question.

“I was right,” told him Dr. Hood leaving Anna even more at a loss.

The barista guy smirked and handed him two coffee cups, giving Anna an examining look.

Dr. Hood turned back to Anna and gestured her to go back to the street.

“There are tables in the park across the street,” he showed her. “We can sit there and talk. And here's your cappuccino,” he handed her a cup and stepped towards the said park.

“So you did buy me coffee,” she concluded looking at his back and following him suit.

He shrugged and Anna thought she heard him snort. “It was a lucky shot. You just seemed like a cappuccino type,” he said and looked at her as they entered the park.

“A cappuccino type,” Anna murmured to herself having close to no clue what he was actually talking about. What was a cappuccino type after all?

“Well thanks for the coffee,” she said as they settled at a table next to a big tree and as far away from the walking paths as possible. She noted his lips twitch a little. “And thank you for not commenting on it further,” she sighed, looking away from him.

“Any time,” he answered, took a sip of his coffee and asked, “How have you been?”

Anna shrugged. What could she answer to that? Was she alright? She wasn’t even sure what alright was anymore. She looked back at him, taking slightly aback by the unexpected seriousness in his eyes. She shrugged again and saw his nod of understanding. He wasn’t looking at her with sympathy or pity, wasn’t judgemental or embarrassed by the pain behind that shrug. He just understood. And surprisingly it was exactly what she needed right now.

“So why did you wanna see me?” he asked after another minute of sitting there in silence.

Anna felt tears coming up to her eyes and took a deep breath. She wasn’t going to cry in front of him, not again. She gathered all the courage she had left in her and breathed out, “Dr. Hood, I-”

“It’s Calum,” he interrupted her with a shy smile.

Anna looked up at him again. “Um, what?”

“My name is Calum,” he repeated, his smile widening. “We’re no longer in doctor-patient relationship. Truth to be told we’ve never actually were. But anyway, call me Calum, please. Dr. Hood still has me a little uncomfortable,” he admitted.

“Oh, okay,” Annabelle mumbled, cursing herself again for the stupid childish answers. “Well, Calum, I just wanted to apologize,” she stated, looking at her hands, started picking on her nail polish out of nervousness. “For the night it all happened and for the Wednesday morning too. I had no right to blame you for what happened, I know you’ve done everything that was possible. And I’m sorry I was a total bitch to you when you just tried to be friendly. And-”

“Hey, don’t,” he stopped her again and suddenly Anna felt his right hand gripping on hers. His hand was hot and soft and so big, with three letters tattooed between his thumb and index finger. He waited till she looked back at him and said softly, “You don’t have to apologize. I totally understand.”

Anna shook her head and leaned back on her chair, her hands are still in his grip. She noticed with her side sight a little girl in pretty pink dress running excitedly around a woman several meters behind Calum and felt tears coming up again. “It doesn’t matter if I had a reason or not. I’m thankful you understand, but I still had no right to act like I did towards you. And I’m so sorry that I did. And I really hope you could forgive me, cause honestly words cannot even start to explain how grateful I am for everything you did.”

Calum smiled again and started with, “Anna, you-” but this time he was interrupted.

Two tiny hands gripped on his left arm and a chubby cheek pressed to his tattooed biceps. Calum turned his look to the little intruder. Annabelle freed her hands from his grip and looked at a little girl in confusion. Pretty pink dress with a flowery print told her it was the same girl she noticed couple minutes ago. The girl was about three, had pretty curls the color of milk chocolate and big blue eyes, which were fixed on Calum’s still slightly surprised face.

“And who is that here?” he chuckled, big smile on his face.

“It’s just me, doctah Cawum,” she replied and giggled, not looking anywhere but at him. “I made a wish I meet you today,” she revealed shyly and giggled again.

“Seems like a real magic to me,” Calum chuckled again, standing up from his chair and bending down to the girl. “Now, I guess I deserve my hug.”

The girl laughed happily, as he lifted her up and spinned couple of times, squeezing her in his massive arms. They stopped and the girl pulled back a little, settling comfortable on his hip. That was exactly when a woman the girl was with came up to them, she looked a little embarrassed and angry.

“Aubrie, how many times do I need to tell you not to run away from me?” she nagged little girl in a rather soft voice.

“But I saw doctah Cawum!” Aubrie stated, like it was totally indulging. The woman snorted, looking at the man holding her little daughter. “Of course you did,” she sighed. “Hello, Calum! And I’m sorry we interrupted you,” she looked apologetically at Anna.

Calum hugged her with his free arm with no hesitation. “Don’t be ridiculous, I’m always glad to see you. This is Anna, by the way,” he looked back at Annabelle. Anna smiled at the woman. “And these are Laura and my favourite patient Princess Aubrie,” he introduced them, bouncing Aubrie on his hip.

“I’m not a patient, I’m your friend!” exclaimed Aubrie and hid her face in his neck.

“Oh, I’m so silly! I’m sorry, princess, of course you’re my friend!” he agreed easily and moved his gaze to Laura. “You were at the hospital? How is our little girl?”

“Yeah, we were at the usual checking. Dr. Irwin said she’s absolutely okay. Even approved on dancing classes,” she smiled, stroking Aubries curls.

“Will you come to my concert when I be dancin’ pwincess?” Aubrie asked, pulling away and looking at Calum with eyes full of adoration.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” he promised, hugging her again.

“Okay, angel, we have to go,” her mother sighed. “Hug doctor Calum goodbye and let’s go.”

“No, Mama,” whined Aubrie and clung on Calum’s neck with both hands, making him laugh quietly.

“Remember you wanted to buy those beautiful cups for your garden party? If we go now we’ll probably have enough time to do it today,” traded Laura with a mischievous grin.

Her trick obviously worked, as Aubrie let go off Calum’s neck with a sad expression on her face.

“Will you come to my garden party?” she asked him, before letting him put her down.

“Well, if your Mom and Dad are okay with that,” he hold back for a moment.

“Come on, Calum, you know, you are always a welcome guest in our house,” smiled Laura at him.

“I will most definitely come,” Calum promised to the little girl in his arms. “When is it going to be?”

“Next Saturday, at around three,” said Laura, as Aubrie struggled with answering, probably not very good with days and time yet.

“Then I’ll see you there, right, princess?” Calum asked Aubrie, and she nodded excitedly, glowing with happiness.

He hugged Aubrie one more time, they said their goodbyes with Laura, who shared one more smile with Anna, and with that they left.

Calum stood there for a moment more, looking after them, and then sat back down on his chair, shy smile still on his lips.

“Sorry about that,” he mumbled, looking at Anna.

“That’s okay,” she smiled back, even though her heart was aching from the sight of a happy little kid. “Did you treat her?”

Callum hummed admittedly.

“Tell me about it,” Anna asked.

Calum frowned, her request took him by surprise.

“Well, Aubrie was one of my first patients after I started operating after couple of years of residency. She was born premature and had a heart condition.”

“Like my brother?”

“Not exactly,” he shook his head, his stare not leaving Anna’s face for a moment. “There was a little problem with her cardiac valve, it’s rather easier than what your brother had. She was operated on the third day after her birth and spent almost four weeks after that in an NICU. She needs regular check ups now. Although her chances of living a healthy life without any other operations are very high.”

“You aren’t the one who checks up on her?” Anna asked, slightly confused.

“No, my job is finished after the first month of their life,” Calum explained. “Then we pass our little patients on to pediatrics. But I do like to follow their progress,” he finished quietly.

Anna nodded, not really knowing what to say to that.

“Why’d you ask?”

She looked straight at Calum and felt a lonely tear fall down her cheek.

“I don’t really know,” she said, wiping a tear with her hand and smiling apologetically. “Just needed some good story, I guess.”

“Hey,” Calum stretched his arm forward and grabbed her hand again, making her shake a little. “There’ll be plenty of them in your life. Just give them some time.”

She smiled back at him and sniffed. She squeezed his hand in silent thank you and offered, “Do you, maybe, wanna walk a little? Of course, if you’re not-”

“I’m not,” he smirked, standing and pulling her up by her hand, “whatever you wanted to say next.”

Anna let him snake his arm around her shoulders and lead up the street. She was dazed by his easiness and by the way her heart felt lighter. She couldn’t even try to explain all the things she felt, too overwhelmed by his presence. But she was absolutely positive about one thing. She wanted nothing more than to spend the rest of the day with his arm around her shoulders.

Taglist: @dancingonanemptywallet @5saucewho

[ayearofpike]

The Lost Mind

Pocket Books, 1995 213 pages, 16 chapters + epilogue ISBN 0-671-87269-9 LOC: PS3566.I486 L6 1995 OCLC: 32826282 Released August 1, 1995 (per B&N)

A girl is dead in the woods. Unfortunately, the person who finds her is no help, because not only does she not know where she is or how to find help, but she also doesn’t know anything about herself. All she knows, instinctively, is that she shouldn’t let on where she was or that she found the body first, at least not until she can learn some more about what happened and how they both ended up where they did.

I was really looking forward to this reread, and I’m disappointed that it sort of falls flat. Pike does that thing where he perfectly captures the tone I want — the sinister anxiety of not knowing, the ultimate unreliable narrator who doesn’t even know her family, let alone what happened to have her wake up next to a murdered girl — but in the end doesn’t give enough details to satisfy the plot resolution. And honestly, I’m kind of torn about it. Part of what makes entertainment “good” for me is how much I am trusted to put together the pieces and figure things out over the course of the story. But it shouldn’t be on me to CREATE a major piece that fits into the hole in the puzzle. 

It seems a little bit like a wasted opportunity, to be honest. This book is not only shorter than a lot of what he’s written so far, but I could swear that the type size is larger too. There was room to put in some of the things that I thought were missing, but I guess he just didn’t think of them as needing to be included. But I’m ripping this story down before I’ve actually recapped anything, and I need to do that to get there. (On the upside, they’ve gotten rid of the die-cut covers that shred on your bookshelf.)

We start, as mentioned in the woods. Our main character awakes as though from the dead, unusually cold and covered in blood, though she’s not seriously cut anywhere. The blood, it seems comes from the blonde girl lying nearby, who has been stabbed multiple times in the chest. And the knife that probably did it is within arm’s reach. As our protagonist racks her brain trying to think of where she was or what she did the night before, she comes to an unsettling realization: she can’t remember anything. And by “anything,” we mean

where she is

who she is

where she lives

where she comes from

NOTHING.

All she’s sure of is that she didn’t kill this girl, but that if she tries to report anything she’s the immediate and only suspect. And going to jail is worse than having no memory or personality. (Except she does, as we’ll see, which ... we’ll get there.) So she pockets the knife and blunders her way out of the woods, where she finds a car. The key is in her pocket, and there’s a clean sweat suit in the trunk. But she’s not ready to admit culpability in the blonde’s killing — she just wants to stay clear. She rinses off as much blood as she can in a pond before changing and climbing into the car, where she finds a purse with her ID. Apparently she’s Jennifer Hobbs from Carlsrue, Oregon, but none of this rings a bell or turns on any lights. All she can do is drive, toward the hint of lights in the distance that she thinks may be her town.

You might be thinking there’s a first suspicious plot question here. Why wouldn’t she drive AWAY from the town if she didn’t know anybody or anything, rather than putting herself at risk of implication in the death? I didn’t actually have a problem with this. Obviously it was a huge shock to wake up with no memories, and it makes sense to me that she wants to try to find them again, maybe through immersion in where she’s from.

So Jen calls home and talks to her mom, who wants to know if she’s with Crystal. She assuages her mom’s worries, sort of, but doesn’t go straight home because she doesn’t want to be questioned about her change of clothes. Instead, she gets a snack at Denny’s, where they ask why she’s out so late without Crystal, then finds a trash bin behind a store to dump off her bloody clothes. By the time she gets home, her mom is asleep, but she doesn’t know which room is hers and accidentally wakes her little brother, who insists they share a donut and talk about stuff that Jen doesn’t remember or understand. 

Jen quickly falls asleep after this and dreams of a fortune teller near a wide river, who she torments with a sharp knife after smoking a powerful drug that dissociates her from her body. She is woken by her mom at the door, who asks if she’ll drive her little brother to school. Another slip: Mom refers to the kid by his name, but apparently Jen’s always only called him by a nickname, Gator, after his propensity to bite as a toddler. She gets him to guide her to school by letting him sit on her lap and steer, which is another weird thing for him, but hey, nine-year-old gets to drive so he’s not arguing too much.

The first person she encounters at her school is her boyfriend, a football meathead who immediately asks her for three hundred dollars. Obviously she doesn’t know why or remember agreeing to help with this, but she says that she might have an easier time finding the money if he walks her to all her classes. Only halfway through the day she has to bail because she’s learning more about Crystal, i.e. that she’s not in school and her teachers think it’s weird that Jen doesn’t know why. So she goes home and finds last year’s yearbook, and learns what we already suspect: Crystal is the dead body in the woods.

This realization hits Jen like a ton of bricks. She’s crying and she’s not totally sure why, seeing as she doesn’t remember anything. When she eventually calms down and reaches for her phone, she sees that she has messages on her answering machine. Three are from Crystal’s mom, growing increasingly frantic. The fourth is Amir, who wants to talk about last night. Finally, someone who was there and can help her figure out what happened! Amir is worried that Crystal might have run away, for obvious reasons. When Jen doesn’t get it, he says it’s because Crystal found out about their affair. So now not only was she the last person to see Crystal, and the one person in the world who’s closer to her than anyone else, and she woke up next to her body and a knife, but now Jen has a motive.

She calls the police and anonymously reports the body in the woods, then hides the knife in a nearby park. Denny’s calls and wonders why she’s not at work, and then her boyfriend calls and wants to pick up his money. She puts them both off, because she knows that the police are going to be around eventually, probably sooner than later. When they show up, she realizes that telling the truth (that she doesn’t remember last night at all) isn’t going to help her stay out of jail. So she makes up a whole bunch of details that probably create a story with more holes than if she were just to say hey, we went to Crystal’s boyfriend’s house and got so drunk that I woke up at like 2 without any memory of what happened. The detective is all over her on the inconsistencies and lapses in her memory (what is Jen’s boyfriend’s last name?), and ultimately she asks him to leave. Which he does, with the warning that he’ll be back with a warrant.

Her little brother asks why she’s having trouble remembering things. She says that this has to be a secret between them, and then she goes to read her diary and try to put some pieces together. She doesn’t really like the person she’s reading about, but she does learn that her boyfriend is in major gambling debt and that Amir has only been around for two months but that he wouldn’t let Crystal introduce him to Jen for some reason. Before she can get much farther, her boyfriend shows up asking for the money. Obviously Jen has been preoccupied and doesn’t have it handy, and while she’s scrounging it up her boyfriend takes off his clothes and stretches out on her bed, thinking of either a consolatory (sorry your friend is dead) or celebratory (I can pay off my bookies) screw. As Jen no longer has the baggage of actually knowing this person that she’s apparently been dating for two years, she can send him packing without remorse.

Amir shows up almost as soon as the now-ex is gone, in tears because a) his girlfriend is dead and b) the cops came and grilled him on suspicion of her murder. He thinks he’s being unfairly targeted as a brown Muslim, which ... yeah, probably, but also he was her boyfriend and one of the last people to see her alive. But Amir’s story to the police exposes the holes in Jen’s made-up facts even worse. Plus, he told the cops how he was planning to break up with Crystal for Jen. It pretty much totally screws her, but weirdly at that moment her dream comes back to her, and she asks Amir about Egypt and drugs. He says that hashish was common, but that he never did it because of what it did to his sisters, how it put them in a vulnerable position to be murdered. 

When he’s gone, Jen falls asleep again and dreams of Egypt, of an ancient graveyard dominated by a statue of three warring demons, and of the same mystic refusing to give her information about the truth of the soul, but she gets her knife out and torments her more. Again she wakes up to her mom, who is sitting on the bed this time. Her mom wants her to get a lawyer, but Jen doesn’t want to, for ... reasons. Instead, she goes to see Crystal’s parents, to sit in her room and try to understand their relationship. Crystal’s diary is sitting on the desk, and there’s a recent entry about a dream she had. About an ancient graveyard and an old witch and a sharp knife.

Next she goes to Amir’s apartment. He’s out, but she talks to the landlady, who laments the loud arguments that Amir and Crystal were having near the end and how he seemed sick but insisted on watching movies in her living room the night Crystal was killed. She lets Jen into his apartment, where sure enough she finds a hash pipe. Only there’s no way he could have done it, because he has an airtight alibi of actually being somewhere else.

Jen gets home to find the police in her house. They give her a hard time about not being there, and produce a warrant to take her clothes and her shoes from the previous night, as well as searching her room and her car. It’s not looking good for not going to jail for murder; the detective tells her that he’ll be back in the morning, probably with a warrant for her arrest. She does take a minute to enlist Gator to sneak out and steal Crystal’s diary out of her room, which he does because he hopes it’ll help her prove she didn’t kill Crystal. Comparing and cross-referencing the diaries, Jen learns that yes, Crystal and Amir were fighting but that no, she never actually slept with him. Why would Amir lie about this? What does he know?

There’s only one way Jen can think to figure this out: dream some more. In the dream, the mystic tells her about how the human soul is too grand to be born into one body. It takes three, but the three parts are never incarnated in the same place, because terrible things can happen if they all come together. The three-demon statue is symbolic of this: an explosion of uncontrollable evil. However, dream-Jen is not deterred by this. If anything, she wants to make it happen even more, to the point where she’s willing to kill the witch to stop her enforcing her considerable will and magic on her son to stop him going. 

Apparently dreaming works, because Jen wakes up knowing what to do. She starts by writing a suicide note. There’s a police officer guarding her house, but she knocks him out by mixing him up a fresh thermos of coffee with a couple sleeping pills mixed in. She pockets the rest, takes the officer’s gun, and heads over to Amir’s place, where she forces him into her car at gunpoint. They drive out to a certain spot in the woods, where she makes him lie facedown on the ground while she swallows the rest of the sleeping pills. Then she ties him up and marches him to the spot where they found Crystal’s body and makes him explain.

Amir confesses that he smokes hashish to try to reach his soul, which is part of why he came to Oregon to seek out the other parts of it. He’d flipped on Crystal, going from amazing love to deepest hate (which is a sides-of-the-heart discussion that Pike’s brought up before, maybe from Hinduism) and thought maybe Jen would be his correct answer. Only when they all came into his apartment that night, the demon door opened and everyone’s souls left their bodies. Amir managed to gain control, not just of himself but of Jen’s body. He forced her to drive Crystal to the woods and murder her, all while he sat in his landlady’s living room. And then he brought his soul back to his body, but Jen’s was totally gone.

And here’s the big hole that I’m left trying to fill myself. If Jen’s soul departed when it was forced out of her body, what the hell is in there now? Like, SOMETHING is giving her emotions and desires and needs to act upon. SOMETHING is motivating her to stay out of jail, to protect her friend and her family, to try to teach her degenerate ex-boyfriend a lesson. What is it? Is it the physical memories of having spent time with these people, manifesting in her mind as a placeholder? Is it just a blank slate from nowhere? Is it part of Crystal’s soul that flew out or broke off when Jen was stabbing her to death, too traumatized to remember anything? There’s no answer, and it’s unsatisfactory. Like, if her soul is just gone, then what is driving her to keep saving her own life?

Also, without actually knowing that this was something that could work, Jen sure did take a massive risk overdosing on sleeping pills before switching bodies with Amir. She says she’s going to kill him with ultimate suffering, so he can feel a fraction of the fear that Crystal had, and she pulls out a syringe and stabs it into his neck, saying she’s about to put a bubble in his vein. This is the act that finally frightens him out of his body and forces him into hers, where he then gloats about winning and leaves her to die in Amir’s body, tied up in the woods.

What he doesn’t know is what kills him. Jen planted the knife just underground, by where she tied Amir’s body, and it’s not hard for her to dig it up and cut herself free. She is amazed to find Jen’s body in the car, a long way to make it on thirty phenobarbitol pills. She drives it home, puts the body in bed, waits for it to stop breathing, and then walks back to Amir’s apartment, sad but relieved.

The epilogue is Crystal and Jen’s joint funeral. Jen’s mom shows Amir the suicide note, which insists that she didn’t kill Crystal but that this is her only way out, and Amir suggests she should believe the note. Then he goes to find Gator, who is confused when Amir calls him by that name but then joyfully realizes that Jen perhaps didn’t die after all, that maybe she just needed to remember in a different way.

And that’s The Lost Mind! Better than a lot of stuff from this era, but still with some holes (and at least one is a monster). I don’t mind figuring some stuff out for myself, and I don’t mind an author keeping me in the dark until the appropriate moment. But eventually, they better turn on the lights, because it’s not my job to write the story, and ultimately that’s what happened here. I love the idea, and I love the tone. But who is Jennifer Hobbs? We don’t ever actually learn this, and the whole story suffers as a result.

[littlepuddingsugg]

Scavenger Hunt

Request: Joe creates a scavenger hunt for Y/N for him to purpose.

You felt your peaceful dream slip away from you as the sound of muffled laughter slowly brought you back to reality. You closed your eyes tighter as you moved your foot back to nudge Joe who you had assumed was the one who was laughing, but when your foot hit nothing but the empty space beside you, you slowly blinked yourself awake.

“Bloody hell boys!” You said noticing Oli and Byron standing over you as you slept, a smile plastered on both of their faces.

“Sorry Y/N.” Byron said as his smile grew.

“Did you know that you smile in your sleep?” Oli asked as he pointed his vlog camera back towards you as you pulled the duvet up to your chin.

“I was having a good dream which you two ruined….why are you in here anyway? Where’s Joe?” You asked.

“You’ll have to find him.” Byron said handing you a pastel colored envelope with your name on it written in Joe’s hand writing.

“What is this?” You asked, sitting up and taking the envelope, looking questionably at the boys who exchanged smiles to each other, “It’s too early for these games Sugg.” You said out loud as you ripped open the seam.

“He’s not here Y/N” Oli laughed.

“And where is he?” You asked rhetorically as you continued to unwrap the contents of the envelope.

“Read it out loud so the people at home know what it says!” Oli said as you unfolded the piece of paper that was tucked inside.

“Dearest Y/N….” You read, pausing to look strangely up at the camera, “Sometimes I feel like our life together isn’t exciting enough so I thought ‘Hey! Let’s do a scavenger hunt!’ As you are aware (hopefully) you woke up to Oli and Byron, their job is to help you find the 7 other envelopes that I have hidden and vlog your progress. When you have found all the envelopes, you’ll be given a prize, that prize being yours truly as I’m sure you’ve already asked where I was. Not sure how long it will take you to find all the envelopes but I’ll see you soon.” You continued to read out loud.

“A scavenger hunt?”

“Yep so let’s go!!” Oli said as he panned the camera back and forth from you, Bryon and himself to show the excitement.

“Umm….there’s no clue as to where the next envelope is in here.” You said as you scanned back over the note, turning it over even to make sure you didn’t miss anything.

“Just go get ready.” Byron said unphased that you had no prompt as to what to do next.

“Are you just going to keep filming the entire time?” You asked Oli as you realized he was still filming.

“Mhmm.”

“...is there an envelope somewhere in here?” You asked them both.

With no answer, the two boys parted leaving you with a direct sight line to the bathroom, “Is it in there?”

Getting nothing once again, you sighed as you pushed the duvet off of your body and headed over to the bathroom, flicking on the light to find another pastel colored envelope, this time with the number ‘2’ written on it, taped to the mirror.

You turned around and noticed the boys had followed you and were now standing in the door frame, watching as you ripped through the paper.

“Congratulations! You have found the second clue. Take this time to get ready for the day. Make sure not to skip over any part of your Saturday routine or you’ll miss the next clue.” You read.

“Any ideas where the next one could be?” Oli asked.

“Nope, but I’ll let you know when I do.” You said giving the boys and the camera a smile before closing the bathroom door on them.

-

The next thirty minutes or so was spent in the shower and in your wardrobe where you thoroughly searched for another envelope. With no luck, you threw on some clothes and a bit of makeup as you would every Saturday you supposed.

Oli and Byron glanced up at you at you walked down the stairs but they made no effort to get off the couch which meant they knew where the envelopes where hidden and you were nowhere close to find the next one.

Just as Joe had told you to, you began doing everything you typically did Saturday mornings. You began by making yourself some breakfast, unloading and loading the dishwasher and opened your laptop to check for any emails that may have came in late last night or early this morning.

“So are you two going to give me a clue as to where the next clue is or just sit on my couch?” You ask.

“You’re haven’t done everything you usually do on Saturdays.” Oli said without looking up from his phone.

“How do you know what I do on my Saturdays?”

“Y/N, think really hard. You’re forgetting something and they won’t be very happy with you later….” Byron said as he looked at you, his eyes shifting to the floor beside where you stood in the kitchen.

Your eyes followed his gaze to the potted plant that sat on the ground, “It’s in a plant? We have like 50 plants in this house!”

“Better get watering.” Oli said putting his phone down and pulling out the camera.

You silently cursed Joe’s name for letting him talk you into getting so many plants as you began filling the watercan that you grabbed from under the kitchen sink.

For the next 10 mins the boys followed you through the house as you watered each plant, keeping your eye out for an abnormally place piece of paper. With no luck inside, you headed outside and began watering those plants where you found the pastel paper hidden behind the tall grass of Joe’s favorite plant.

“Number 3…” You said tearing the clue open. “Got mail?”

“Well that was a shit clue Joe!” Oli said from behind you has he and Byron laughed.

>>>

“What did the clue say to order?” Byron asked as the three of you entered the coffee shop the sixth clue had told you to go to.

“My favorite drink.” You said looking around the busy shop for anything that remotely resembled an envelope, “Do you guys want anything?”

The three of you stood in line of the coffee shop Joe had asked you to come to shortly after the two of you had met four years ago. You hadn’t been in here much since that day but it still looked and smelt the same which made you smile. You glanced over that the large storefront windows that were lined with booths that were surprisingly unoccupied including the booth that you and Joe had sat in the day ages ago.

“And can I get a name for these?” The barista asked you.

“Y/N.” You said giving her a smile before you left to join Oli and Byron at the booth, “So now what?”

“Read the clue again.” Oli told you as he pulled back out the camera and brought it up to speed.

“You’re almost finished love. The penultimate clue is one of my favorites. It’s the only place that can satisfy your sweet-tooth. Order your favorite drink and sit at our booth.” You read.

“Y/N.” The barista said as she set the last of your order of drinks on the counter.

“Okay...so I have my drink, now what?” You said placing the three drinks on the table and sliding back into your seat.

“Read it again.”

“Oli there’s nothing in this clue! Just a rhyme that probably took Joe ages to come up with!” You said rereading the clue.

“Lemme see that.” Byron said as you gladly handed in the piece of paper, “Alright….congratulations...blah blah blah….order your favorite drink and sit at our booth. Okay, so you have your drink…-”

“And we are sitting at the booth.” You interrupted.

“Are you sure this is the correct booth?” Byron asked.

“Yes, it was the only one open that day and we continued to sit at this one every time we came in here because….” You trailed off as you remember why this booth was so special.

“Because why?” Oli asked as he continued to point the camera in your direction.

“The table.” You said as you started to feel around the underneath of the table, “There was a sticky note stuck to the underneath of this table that day that said something about being happy….” You paused as your hand ran over was what felt like an envelope.

“Wow Joseph, that was a good one.” Oli said surprised as you blushed and ripped open the clue.

“‘You make me happy in a way that no one else can’ is what the quote said. Back then I didn’t really think about that too much but as I got to know you and love you over the years, I realize that not only were we meant to find that sticky note but that it was talking about us. You make me so incredibly happy Y/N, even on the days where I don’t feel like smiling at all.” You said as you continued to stare at the paper for a few seconds after you finished reading before smiling and sliding yourself out of the booth, “C’mon boys, let’s go find Joe.”

The three of you walked the short walk from the coffee shop the the park where you and Joe had first met.

~ You were on your way home from work, dazed with an oncoming headache and just general stress when the next think you knew you were being caught from falling on your ass by the object that sent you tumbling.

“Sorry, sorry. Are you alright?” The man who was holding onto you asked.

“Um yeah I think so. Are you?” You asked finding yourself becoming lost in the man’s blue eyes.

“Yeah but I’m not the one who nearly fell to the floor.”

“Just the one who knocked me over.” You laughed as the stranger brought your back upright.

“Yeah again I’m sorry about that. I guess I wasn’t paying attention. I’ve had a pretty shit day actually and I was trying to sort things out rather than paying attention to where I was going.” The man stopped as he realized he was rambling, “And now I’ve just unloaded all of that onto a stranger. I’m sorry again.”

“It’s alright. I’m Y/N by the way.” You said giving him a soft smile.

You watched the man’s face swift from worry into an equally soft smile, “Joe.”

“Well Joe, it looks like we are no longer strangers are we?” You laughed.

“No I guess we aren’t. Hey, are you busy right now? There’s a nice little coffee shop down the road, I don’t know if you’d like to grab a coffee or something.” Joe asked.

“That’d be really nice actually.” ~

“So this is the infamous park!” Byron said as the three of you walked further into the park, “I’ve only heard stories about this place.”

“It’s hardly a park, just a shortcut from work to my old flat really.” You laughed as you turned left at a fork, “And right up here is where is all happened.” You said and smile creeped across your face as you noticed the figure that was sitting on a bench was your boyfriend.

“Hello love! I’ve been looking for you all morning!” Joe said as he stood up and pulled you into a hug.

“What was all this about? I’d say our life together is pretty exciting.” You said.

“I suppose it’s exciting but it’s just missing something.”

“And what is that?” You questioned as you watched Joe’s eyes shift to look past you.

You turned around and found the rest of the boys walking backwards as they carried something that they clearly didn’t want you to see yet. You watched as Byron ran over to help the boys as Oli stood back, his camera still pointing in your direction.

“A promise.” Joe said from behind you as he wrapped his arms around your waist, resting his chin on your shoulder as you continued to watch the boys, “A promise that I will love you forever and ever and no matter what. Because like that quote said, you make me happy in a way that no one else can and I don’t even want to test that theory out because I don’t want to risk losing you.”

Joe let his hands fall from your body as the boys finally made it to a reasonably distance. Byron backed away from the boys, giving them a thumbs up before they all turned around revealing what they were carrying. A large banner was stretched between them that read in big letters; ‘Will you marry me?’.

You turned around to Joe to find him down on one knee, a velvet box open in his palm.

“Y/N Y/L/N, will you mar-”

“Yes!!” You interrupted him with excitement, “Yes Joe, oh my god!”

Joe let out a small laugh as he stood back up, sliding the ring onto your finger before pulling you into a hug as the boys began to cheer behind you.

“That was a lot of work for a proposal.” You laughed before placing a kiss on his lips.

“I know and you didn’t even let me finish asking the question.” He laughed.

“I’m sorry, you can ask it again if you want.”

“Nope, nope. Moment’s over.” Joe said pushing you away before pulling you back in with a  laugh before giving you another kiss.

[carry-on-kissing-snowbaz]

Falling Asleep

Just a little snowbaz fluff and bed sharing. Hope you enjoy! <3

Word Count: 1795

Simon

When Simon had agreed to help Baz find his mother’s killer, he had expected violent chases through the wavering wood, travels into unexplored areas of the catacombs, and even searching for the nursery she had died in. What he hadn’t expected was hours and hours of reading through old newspapers and books. Somehow, the most mysterious and important quest Simon had ever had handed to him had become the most boring.

“Can’t we check the catacombs?” Simon asked.

Penny scrunched up her nose, expression confused.

“Didn’t you search through all of it during fifth year?” She asked.

Baz glanced at him and smirked.

“Yeah,” Simon responded, cheeks warm, “but I wasn’t looking for clues about Headmistress Pitch, I was looking for, well, Baz.”

Baz threw his hand up over his forehead, fluttering his eyelashes dramatically.

“Oh how you make me swoon Snow.”

Simon glared at him.

“Simon I know this is boring but until winter break, this is all we can do,” Penny said.

“And you? Are you satisfied with just sitting around?” Simon asked, eyes on Baz.

Something flickered in Baz’s eyes. He wanted action as much as Simon did, probably more than Simon did. This was his mother’s killer they were looking for after all; he would be out for blood.

“No,” Baz said reluctantly as if agreeing with Simon was the worse thing possible, “but Bunce is right. For now, this is all we can do.”

“Plus, reading is fun,” Penny said.

“And enriching,” Baz said.

“Nerds,” Simon muttered. 

They spent the rest of the night scouring the texts that Baz had stolen for them that week. Eventually, Simon’s vision was blurring on the words and he kept rereading the same sentence. Baz acted like he was unaffected, but Simon noticed the way his eyelids kept shutting briefly between pages. Even Penny looked like she was struggling a bit.

“I’m going to finish this book in my room, if I wait much later then I’ll be spotted leaving,” Penny said.

“Then I’m going to bed,” Simon said.

Penny slapped her hand flat across the pages of the book Simon had open in his lap, preventing him from snapping it shut.

“Oh no you won’t. You need to finish that by tonight.”

Simon felt like growling, or whining.

“I’ll make sure he gets it done,” Baz said.

“You’re not my baby sitter.”

Penny rose and grabbed all of her things. With one last warning glance for the both of them, she threw on her cape and left.

“That was all a ploy right? You just said that to make her leave so we could sleep,” Simon said.

“As much as I want to sleep right now, the books are more important,” Baz said.

Simon groaned. 

“This is the one time I was grateful for your plotting skills.”

Baz looked at his own bed, piled with books that Penny had already finished and discarded. Then he glanced over at Simon’s bed and it’s virtually uncluttered duvet cover. 

“Yes you can leave the book shelf that used to be your bed and sit with me,” Simon said.

Baz didn’t say thank you but he did walk over and sit as far away from Simon as he could on the bed.

“All right, let’s get this done Snow.”

Simon wasn’t sure when, but at some point his eyes had shut and hadn’t reopened.

Baz

Baz felt warm. In fact, he was not used to waking up feeling so warm. Sleepily, he scooted closer to the source of the warmth. He had the dizzy feeling that he was curled up around the sun. Then, as he started to wake up more clearly, he realized that he was wrapped around clothing. More than that, he was wrapped around someone.

His eyes flew open.

Snow’s moles were up close and personal, his eyes shut in deep sleep. One of his arms was wrapped around Baz and one of Baz’s legs was slung over Snow’s. For one blissful second, Baz felt a surge of happiness. He had dreamt about this very thing, but real life was so much more satisfying than a murky dream.

Then, as he remembered who he and Snow were, Baz felt his stomach drop out of him.

Before he could move Snow’s eyelids opened, sleep fuzzy. The sight tore at something inside of Baz but he didn’t let it show.

“Could you remove your club of an arm from me so I can breath?” Baz hissed.

Snow’s eyes widened. Within seconds his face went deathly pale and then a deep red. 

“B-Baz, what…?”

Baz did not want to hear all the things Snow would say. He didn’t want to know how embarrassed or freaked out he was. He wanted to end this experience before it could be tarnished.

“We fell asleep you git! And now we’re behind on all the reading we were supposed to do,” Baz snapped.

Snow sat up and away, eyes bugging out of his head.

“I…how can you even be concerned with that right now?” He asked.

“You mean, why am I not having a meltdown over having woken up in your arms?” Baz asked.

“It was one arm, not both of them,” Snow said, defensively.

Trust Snow to nitpick that detail.

“We’re searching for my mother’s killer. Waking up fully clothed and rested is hardly the most troubling thing on my mind at the moment.”

Snow’s expression softened.

“You’re right. I was being stupid. I just-“

Baz cut him off.

“Oh don’t worry Snow, I plan to retch over the memory later. As soon as my mother’s killer is dead, you’ll have my full attention.”

Snow glared at him.

“I’m going to get breakfast,” He muttered.

“Probably a good idea,” Baz said, tiredly.

Once Snow was dressed and out the door Baz fell back onto the bed. He curled into the duvet and closed his eyes. I slept with Simon Snow he thought. And it really had been just sleeping, but it had been better than anything he could have imagined.

Simon

Two days. It had been two days since the sleeping incident. Simon hadn’t been able to put it out of his mind. Baz seemed to have managed just that. He gave no indication that he cared about or was even thinking of the experience. Penny hadn’t even caught on yet, which was saying something. If Baz didn’t care and Penny didn’t suspect something, then surely Simon could move past it.

But he couldn’t. He kept replaying the moment of waking up in his mind. Before he had opened his eyes, he had felt a cozy body under his arm. He’d wanted to squeeze closer, to press his nose into the hair that had been tickling his collarbone, but he’d opened his eyes instead. Even as he’d seen the look of sheer hostility in Baz’s eyes, for a moment Simon had felt a burst of warmth.

This was his worst enemy. But he was also the guy Simon had spent the night with.

It was late at night and Penny was on her last batch of books. Simon envied her; his stack had grown steadily over the last two days. Baz was only just behind Penny.

“Simon I need you to start reading more, I’ll have to start taking on some of the books in your stack if you don’t get further along soon,” Penny said.

Simon glanced at her.

“Because you would hate that so much,” He said.

Penny’s glare softened.

“Well, it still isn’t an efficient way to get through all of the books.”

Baz smiled at them; a real smile, not the sharp edged smirk he usually wore.

Simon felt his heart thump unevenly.

“Let’s call it a night,” Baz said, “I think Snow’s brain will explode if we don’t.”

Penny shrugged, obviously irritated, but didn’t argue. Simon suspected that even she wanted to go to her room and sleep.

“This would work a lot better if you’d just let me sleep here on research nights,” Penny said.

Baz and Simon both said no at the same time. 

Simon froze, eyes locked with Baz’s. He’d seen a look slither across his face, and he could have sworn it was nervousness. 

“Okay,” Penny said, eyes darting back and forth between them, “See you two tomorrow, I guess.”

When she was out the door Simon started to speak and was promptly cut off.

“Don’t,” Baz said.

Simon growled.

“Why not? It’s not as if you aren’t thinking about it.”

Baz swung around to face him, grey eyes cold and angry.

“We fell asleep on your bed. Why are you trying to make this weird? Can’t we just move on?” Baz demanded.

“But…” 

“But?’ 

Simon looked away.

“I don’t want to move on,” Simon said.

He looked up and saw that Baz had gone rigid.

“I-I liked it,” Simon whispered.

Baz

He’d liked it. Simon fucking Snow had been thinking about their night spent together and he’d liked it. Baz was sure he was stuck in a dream, or some sort of alternate reality. 

“What do you mean Snow? You liked procrastinating on your reading? Because that isn’t very helpful.”

Snow’s jaw hardened.

“I am not talking about books,” He said.

“Then what are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about how nice it was waking up with you in my arms!” Simon said.

Baz stared at him.

“Snow…”

Blue eyes were all Baz could see. Snow had liked it. But what did that mean? Baz couldn’t let himself get too caught up.

“Baz can you please say something?”

Baz shook his head.

“I’m not sure what to say Snow.”

Snow took a step towards him.

“Say you liked it too,” Snow whispered.

Baz felt himself caving.

“Say that you enjoyed waking up together,” He continued.

Baz’s knees felt weak.

“Say you like me,” Snow finished.

Baz let Snow snake their hands together.

“Simon I-I don’t know about this.”

Snow’s eyes sparked.

“I like it when you say my name,” He said.

Baz felt like he was under a spell.

“Simon,” Baz repeated.

Simon leaned forward just slightly and pressed his lips against Baz’s. It wasn’t the wild make-outs of his dreams, or the passionate kiss they sometimes shared before they were killed in his nightmares. It was just the softest press of lips to lips, the sweetest pressure Baz had ever felt.

“Let’s go to sleep,” Simon said.

Baz nodded.

They stumbled towards Simon’s bed and awkwardly got under the covers. For a moment, neither one of them moved from their respective edges of the bed; but then Snow was jutting forward, warm hands gathering Baz up against him. Baz relaxed against him and wrapped his arm around Snow’s chest. 

They were finally right where they wanted to be.

[paranoidwino]

the horse in my dreams

You can read this also on AO3 Please leave a comment!

Happy birthday @ragwitch !!!

Thank you so much for being you and I hope this day is filled with joy and happiness! I hope you like it! :D

“You have 2 new messages!”

Darcy tried really hard not to lunge at her phone; Jane was still there after all.

But she had messages, two new messages.

She looked at the clock surreptitiously, 2.45pm. She deflated immediately. Of course it was just Nene and Bells’ updates. Meh.

Every day since the dawn of time Bells would wake up, bat her cute blonde eyelashes and rise with her golden wings. The sun would rise and Nene would lower the moon and… possibly get into bed? She had never asked what they did after that. It wasn’t even a difficult job, they just needed to give the things a light push. The sun and moon were as self sufficient as her dawn.

She reached for her phone slowly, tapped in the pin and slammed her thumb on the ‘Gate’ app with more force than necessary.

It was a simple app, with just a big red button in the center, and it was exactly that.

Like the useless box, Gate consisted of a button that was created to be pressed at will without any real use. Unless you were Darcy, of course.

She counted the minutes slowly, and as soon as the display signaled the go ahead, swished her thumb again on the red button. A question popped up immediately. “Would you like to proceed?”

Well, yes, or Bells will destroy me… she sighed. Confirm.

“Dawn successful.”

Yay… job done. Was she supposed to feel proud? Like, yay, you pressed the correct button, dawn is coming and humanity will not suddenly wonder why the sun is up at night?

Three more messages had come her way checking if everything was okay.

Darcy huffed.

‘No one panic, all is okay!’ and then she felt guilty, because she wasn’t any more patient than they were. So she added a quick ‘how’s everyone doing?’

The first replies came from the family gods, followed by a slew of ‘I’m okay, how are you?’ from all the minor critters. The big Kahunas didn’t peep at all, but they were always busy (case in point, she didn’t remember the last time they met all together?). Sometimes she wondered what it was like, always being needed and wanted.

Oh, Darcy did have her glory days, back when there were no cars and the only way to move were horses. Ah, the glory of being the goddess of horses during the past five thousand years.

Those times were over, though, and horses were nothing more than a luxury now. She still had to oversee them once in awhile, but now her duties were exclusively composed of ‘making dawn happen’ and ‘protect the heroes’.

And because never let it be said that the Zorya of protection didn’t know how to do her job, she’d planted herself right smack in the middle of it all, at Avengersland.

Okay, it had been completely accidental, but come on! No one should question her methods, seriously.

Avengers Tower was the best place. She’d lived all over the world and in every kind of abode, but this really really took the cake. Well, live was a big word, she mostly crashed into Jane’s apartment. She had her own flat, far from JARVIS and Tony’s prying eyes, but still. Jane wasn’t complaining about her company and she got to cook for everyone in the mornings and have the best view of the city.  

“Darcy?” Jane’s voice roused her from her thoughts. “Have you seen Jacob the spectrometer?”

“...You killed Jacob two days ago, Janey. Cannibalized to build Jack, the new and improved version.”

“Oh.” Jane blinked. “And where is Jack?”

“I’ll go fetch it for you.” Darcy huffed. She needed to text a bit more anyways.

‘I need you to step in the Red Zone a bit tonight.’

Darcy gaped.

Reread the message.

Nope, it was still the same.

Her jaw clenched a bit and she clicked her tongue twice.

Had she been in a less public place, she’d have screamed. But she wasn’t. So she waited the end of the day with the same grimace painted on her face.

The moment the door of her apartment closed behind her, however, she wasted no time pressing the ‘recall’ button.

“Hello, you have reached Shira’s voicemail, please leave-”

“Don’t you even dare, you sugary porcupine!” She threatened slowly.

“a message after the beep.”

How dare she!

Darcy hung up and took a big breath. This was not the moment to freak out.

It wasn’t the first time the goddess of immortality, the pink confetti porcupine (who would forever be called ‘slave driver’!), sprung a sudden switch of shifts on her, but this was taking it a bit too far.

One, the Red Zone was in Europe, and she was totally not. Two, it was already night in Europe!

What was she thinking. There was no way she could be in Europe in two seconds without borrowing some serious wind power-up, and she owed the Buyany one favour too many.

No, going in person to patrol the areas between Russia and Austria was not an option.

The only option left was… No. Nope, no.

They had apps now for this, no regalia was necessary to do their job. Heck, she’d dumped the giant shield and double-bed-sized cloak the moment Toth developed the Gate.

As if summoned, the Shield vibrated from its hiding spot in the sealed trunk under her floorboards, making the flat shudder a bit. The neighbours woke up with a gasp, wondering about earthquakes.

Darcy was too classy a god to giggle. Nah, who was she kidding.

But the problem wasn’t solving itself. And the more she waited, the longer the Red Zone would be left unchecked, and this wasn’t ideal.

She checked her phone. Nope, Gate was closed until 2pm for her. Rude.

She groaned. She’d have to do it ‘old school’.

List lied.

They all did.

All these people with their ugly minds and their disgusting paws and their beady eyes.

Wanda was done with them.

She put her hands on the wall that she shared with her brother’s prison and pressed her face into it. They didn’t let them talk to each other, they couldn’t even see each other.

But these mad men watched. They saw everything.

Pietro and Wanda’s rooms were glass cubes for Hydra, the only walls separating them from each other and from the outside. She supposed she was lucky. Her room had a tiny bolt hole that made it possible to look outside. It almost made up for the lack of toilet or privacy.

...Who was she kidding.

She was seventeen, and these soldiers and scientists had seen her in various states of undress, they’d stared at her as she ate, probably ogled her while she slept.

She fought a wave of nausea.

Suddenly the little window at the top of her cell seemed the only good thing of this place of torture.

Liberation Front for Sokovia my ass, she despaired.

She and Pietro had thought this was the answer. They were finally doing something for their country, this was what their parents would have wanted.

But it wasn’t true.

They’d been played like the kids they were and now it was just them out of over 200 candidates for the List procedure, the remaining 198 killed by the Sceptre.

The Sceptre. She shivered.

It had shown her everything, a new life and a purpose. It had given her powers.

But it probably didn’t intend to give her such a power, because she could see and feel its machinations behind the kind words, and after a while she stopped responding to them.

She didn’t show it, lest they start torturing her again, but she was free.

And she was going to free her brother too.

Wanda watched with trepidation as the last of her handlers fell asleep. They usually did that. Sleep and presumably wake up when she was asleep. They never bothered with security cameras either, since the whole cage was all glass panels and there was nowhere they could hide.

No matter, tonight, she was going to peek from the window and plan her escape.

Only, there was no light outside, no moon to show her the way, and her cubicle was so bright the contrast didn’t really allow for any kind of visual.

She cursed in Sokovian and refrained from spitting on the floor.

It was then that she saw it.

A magnificent, shining horse, as big as the mountains surrounding her beautiful Sokovia, trotting slowly across the forest with his huge legs. He was made of smoke, or wisps of light, she didn’t know, but he was silent as a grave and his hooves didn’t make the ground tremble after him. Maybe she was dreaming, after all.

But it didn’t look like a dream. It didn’t feel like one.

And before she knew it, the horse became rosy and red and golden, reached the horizon line, and it was dawning already.

She lowered herself to her cot, pleased that no one had noticed, and contemplated the exceptional event.

There was only so much her brain could have made up. If, and it was a big if, she wasn’t dreaming, if this was real and the horse had been real too, there was only one explanation that made sense.

It was a very shaken Wanda Maximoff that, for the first time in years, curled into a corner and prayed.

Thousands of miles afar, Gate was opened again.

“You have one message.”

Huh.

That was weird. Like, really weird.

Darcy glanced at her clock, it was still obscenely early for Nene to start bitching at her, he should be recharging the moon in… five hours? Six, maybe? She was totally not responsible this time: dawn was not happening for another good fifteen hours.

It wasn’t Nene, or Bells. It so wasn’t. Darcy almost dropped from the chair she was sitting on, attracting Jane and Natasha’s attention.

“Is everything alright?” Natasha asked, sipping at her drink with an elegance one wouldn’t give to a Russian with vodka.

Evening drinks between girls were the shit, seriously, and Jane was a STEM major, she had the best friends and the best recipes when it came to experimental alcohol.

“Yeah, yeah.” Darcy laughed nervously. “It’s just… Nothing, nothing!”

Natasha looked at her curiously for a moment longer, but then went back to talking with Pepper about Tony and apparently that was that (she didn’t believe that for a second, Nat had a perfect track record at being inconspicuous. She’d have to warn the dreams god, just in case).

But this… this hadn’t happened to her since, well, at least since cars were invented, maybe even earlier!

Someone had prayed. Like this was an honest to ...could she even say ‘honest to God’?, well, anyway, this was an official request, a 100% legit message. For her!

She could think of nothing else all night long, and it came almost as a relief when everyone bade each other goodnight and they all went their separate ways (‘I’m taking a cab, Nat, I am not going home alone, promise!’...As if).

She swiped her hand over the Gate, excited for the first time to open the dreaded app. Of course, the excitement lasted for all of three seconds. She had expected a prayer for a horse, maaaaybe a thank you for the most beautiful dawn of all times, but her stomach bottomed out in panic when she read the three words.

‘Please, save us.’

It was signed as ‘Wanda Maximoff, 17’ and followed by an information overload about her whereabouts and past. Toth had done his job alright with this app, she hardly had to do anything at all to find the believer.

Darcy’s heart broke at the story behind the girl… Young woman, she amended. One doesn’t suffer this much without becoming a woman, and she wished she could solve all of her problems with a simple waving of her hand. She couldn’t.

There had been a time, when she’d been the strongest of protectors, when she could have wielded her Shield and instilled terror on the assailants of the poor and weak, when she could have taken her Cloak and protected everyone. These times were long over. No one asked for this kind of help anymore, no one fed her with power to do it.

But the idea of leaving this girl, who had probably swallowed more pride than she was allowed to, and that was probably scared witless with no hope to escape, to die cold and alone made tears spring to her eyes (and she was not a pretty crier, despite what the bards had said about her and morning dew… yeah nope).

Her Shield rattled from under her floor. The lamps flickered.

No, she couldn’t abandon Wanda and pretend nothing had happened. “I… suppose I could ask Nene for help… He’s bound to owe me one in the next few centuries.”

With a nod she moved her bed and the wooden planks that separated her from her trunk. The Shield was too impatient, however, and with one last rattle, ecstatic to be so close to its master, broke free of the containment measures put upon it and rolled at her feet.

She huffed and stroked it affectionately. It hummed a bit, as if purring.

“You impatient little thing”, she scolded him playfully. “Looks like we’re going into battle once again.”

“Oh? Are you?”

Crap.

“Ah!” She jumped at the sound and scrambled on her feet.

“So,” Clint started out from the window he was perched on, “Nat tells me to check on you because you might have gotten in some trouble and here you are, with a ...is that a Shield at your feet?”

“...If I told you nothing is happening and that even if I don’t come back by tomorrow everything is cool as cucumber, would you believe me and report these exact words to Nat?” His eyebrows reached the hairline of his incredulous face. “Yeah, didn’t think so.” She gestured vaguely at the bed, “Come in, it’s already a mess without you falling from the windowsill.”

Clint pouted. “There’s the fire escape under the window, I’m fine.”

“Right.” She deadpanned. “We’ll just say the last four times were all calculated.”

His pout cleared and he shrugged, but he still entered her room and sat on the bed.

They looked at each other in silence for a few minutes.

And a few minutes was already too much time she was losing there.

“Look.” She started awkwardly, “if you’re done staring, I really need to get going. I’ve got an appointment to sell my soul, yeah?”

That shocked him into moving again. “Sell your soul? To who?”

“Nene.” She replied absentmindedly. The trunk was still unlocked under the floor, so she reached forward and physically dove into it to look for her Cloak.

“Who’s Nenay?”

Darcy’s head poked from the lid of the trunk. “Nene.” She repeated, louder. “He’s the god of the moon.”

Clint blinked.“...Okay. Why are you selling your soul to the god of the moon?”

Darcy huffed, closed the trunk with a snap (no trace of her Cloak, go figure, prissy thing) and looked at him, then made a ‘ta-da’ gesture with her fingers. “I don’t… think I’m going to sell my soul, like, whole soul, but man I’m going to owe him after tonight.” She looked meaningfully at the trunk. “If I manage to leave somewhere in the next century.”

“Why are you selling your soul?” He looked serious now. Whole body forcefully relaxed and eyes fully focused on her.

“...Fine.” She sighed and ruffled her hair. “I received the first real prayer since… I don’t know, maybe 1760? Ish? Later? I can’t remember, but I didn’t have believers at all and this girl needs my help and I need to reach the other side of the world tonight and unless I sell my firstborn to Nene there’s no way I’ll be able to penetrate an enemy base and leave with two mortals.”

“You’re a god.” He was… very cool about it, considering the last ‘god’ he’d met was an Alien prince that wanted to kill mankind. She nodded. “I... I’m just trying to do my job. I need to do my job. And that girl needs me.”

He mulled it over a bit, and then clapped his hands. The bed bounced with his sudden movement. “Okay, where are we going?”

Reasoning with Clint about party members’ veto was like championing to discuss reason with a goldfish. Useless and counterproductive.

“You’re not going” turned into “You’re not going alone” and then “Oh my God okay you’re coming but only because Nat is coming too” and again “Fine, but there will be no blowing up stuff.”

He wasn’t extremely cooperative on that point, either.

In the end, Darcy was persuaded that waiting another day would not kill the poor girl (she had received another two messages from Wanda in the last three hours, so far the situation hadn’t changed… much) and that Natasha’s expertise with Hydra (who was not dead, apparently!) and the Red Zone would be invaluable while planning a rescue.

Rogers and Tony were away from the base and it was best not to bother them, Thor was who knew where and Bruce was best left in the Tower in case they needed a ‘doctor’ of the Avengers variety upon their return.

Natasha was supremely unconcerned with Darcy’s weird request, like being asked to reach a country to storm a base where children were tortured was hardly a Wednesday activity. Considering who the woman was, she was probably right.

They hit the first snag when Clint said the words ‘stealing a jet’ all in the same sentence.

“We’re not stealing a jet,” Darcy said with finality.

The two spies looked at her sideways. “Darcy,” Natasha started slowly, “if you want to keep this op under wraps, not announcing it on paper is the safest idea. We can always make up a story later.” She added reassuringly. Clint was nodding beside her.

“No no no, no one is stealing anything to get to Sokovia. We don’t need to anyways. It’s night.”

Natasha looked at her with sudden understanding. Her eyes widened a fraction and flitted all around her.

“...And just how did you plan to get there?” Clint said challengingly.

“Are you an immortal?” Asked Natasha at the same time.

They looked at each other and there was some kind of silent conversation there, because Clint raised his hands and Natasha started with her questions again.

“Are you immortal?” Darcy nodded. The spy nodded back. “Are you able to guarantee your package complete immunity?”

Darcy thought about her Shield, which was not able to withstand a bullet barrage but was very willing to try, and her Cloak which was indeed able to resist such a thing, but wasn’t willing to leave the trunk at all, and shook her head.

“Okay, we need contingencies for this.”

“Are we going to address how to get there?” Clint asked loudly.

“We’re using the horse, of course.” said Natasha immediately.

“What horse?!”

The horse, as Nat had playfully called it, was at least ten times the size of a quinjet. Who was he kidding, it was probably as big as a mountain.

Wispy and evanescent, the horse of the goddess of dawn was truly a majestic thing.

Unfortunately, Clint had no idea of how to pet it… he was barely as tall as its hooves.

Darcy, or whatever she was called, he supposed, was openly laughing at his awestruck face.

“Don’t worry,” she winked. “He can shrink.” She raised a hand, and the horse became smaller. Still big, for he was as big as an elephant, but definitely more manageable than what he was before.

The horse’s intelligent eyes darted all around, looking for threats. Finding none, he started chewing on the grass (or tried, because evanescent ghost horses could not eat real world grass, apparently).  

“How is a horse of this size even going around unnoticed?”

Darcy’s smile dimmed a bit, “no one really believes in us anymore, Clint. We’re myths.”

Oh.

“...Are you going to disappear if this ‘only prayer’ dies?”

Darcy shrugged. “Nah. The universe needs its order. You can’t kill one of us without killing everyone else in the process, and there’s always someone believing in Life or Death, if not in a superior God that is Good versus Evil. It’s an all or nothing kind of thing.” She seemed extremely dismissive of the possible disappearance of her species, but Clint supposed it was fair.

Despite believing there was no God, no one could deny that Death was very much a thing.

“That’s…convenient.”

The goddess flashed him a smile and preened a bit. “We try. We did invent an app to do the job for us, after all!”

She put a hand in the horse’s mane, prompting him to turn his head, and stared into his milky white eyes. “Fly fast, my dearest, sali sali sali.”

The horse neighed loudly, and maybe it was him, but had the wind picked up?

“Come.” Darcy’s voice sounded different, and when had she mounted the horse anyway?

She extended her right hand to Nat and helped her climb up.

“Come, Clint.” She said next.

Well… he’d never been horse riding before.

Flying was always awesome.

Pity she couldn’t do it often, what with being very busy and all.

They were flying as fast as her horse’s magic was carrying them, invisible to anyone under the thick cover of his misty fur. They’d reach Sokovia soon enough, and hopefully before Nene and Bells had reasons to complain (‘they’re the big shots in my line of work, okay? like… ugh. Yeah, the jerks.’).

“Wasn’t the creature following the Sun supposed to be a dog?” Asked Natasha from behind her. “Ah… maybe? Then again, I heard stories of me being married to the Sun, who is my father, and carrying his spawn.” That was the story, right?

“Isn’t it true?”

“Nope.” She popped the p. “The ‘Sun’ is a girl, she’s very much not interested into a relationship with me, she’s got a kid who I’m pretty sure is a vampire… and last I checked I didn’t have kids. I do, however, have the cutest dog called Baker!” she added.

“Huh, you kept that dog from New Mexico.” Clint mumbled from behind.

“Yeah yeah… and hey, look, we’re here!”

“We’ve barely flown for one hour!”

“...Have we? Damn, I’m going to owe the winds my firstborn.”

Ten minutes out, two guards in, two guards out, ten minutes...

Wanda Maximoff was going crazy.

But she couldn’t stop counting for a second, or she’d lose the all important moments once again. Every four hours and thirty two minutes, the guards would switch and make a slightly longer round  across the lab, and that was the moment she had to strike.

She pressed her hands together. If only her powers were consistent and controllable in any way.

In the cell beside her, she heard her brother scream as another bout of whatever the Sceptre had done to him attacked him.

Pietro.

She may not be the eldest, but she was done waiting for these madmen to kill them or brainwash them into compliance. She’d save her brother herself.

Seven more seconds and the shift would be over. Six… Five… Four… Three

BOOM.

Strucker’s castle shook with force and everything around her trembled.

The walls behind her creaked in agony and she gripped at the solid bars of the tiny bolt hole she’d used as a window.

The guards had all left shouting in languages she didn’t understand.

Outside of the castle, the huge horse of mist stood proudly in front of List’s and Strucker’s men, mockingly unruffled by the pellets and bullets he was being shot with.

How was it even possible that they could see him so clearly when just three days ago they hadn’t batted an eye at his passage.

The grunts of someone outside her cell had her whirl around. She should have been running already!

But it was a Hydra henchman who was grunting in pain, as the well shaped thighs of a redhead in an expensive tac-suit choked him from behind.

A man with strong arms and a petite woman wielding a shield bigger than her followed suit.

“I said no explosions Clint, it wasn’t hard!” The tiny woman was grouching in English. Wanda’s English wasn’t great, but she could get by. These were not Hydra, she could tell.

“Who are you?” She called in accented English, her hands sparking a bit with her power. If they meant harm, she’d deal with them.

The woman’s head whirled toward her and her face transfigured into an expression of pure joy. “Wanda? Is that you?”

Wanda frowned. “You know me?”

The woman nodded fervently, so fast it looked like her head might detach from her body at any minute. She studied the glass cage in front of her, prowled around it like a lion, then pressed her lips into a thin line, brandished her shield with both of her hands, and just… hit it.

And the glass in front of her broke to bits and she was free.

“Yes!” The woman’s arms embraced her and Wanda couldn’t understand why. “Of course I know you! You sent for me!”

Wanda’s eyes widened, because this woman, she couldn’t possibly be…

“I’m Darcy.” Darcy smiled. “Patron of horses, dawn and protectors. It’s so good to meet my most important -and only- believer.”

Life continued and soon everyone was back to their routine.

Pietro and Wanda had settled in nicely, Clint being a constant presence in their life and probably best moral compass they could find, especially until they managed to fully control their powers.

For her part, Darcy kept her jobs of Avengers-herder and divine powers as she had.

The fact that she now had a couple of faithfuls didn’t really change anything (yeah, she’d hoped in something… more?), apart from the weirdest messages.

“You have one new message!”

Darcy didn’t even look, this time. She swiped her cell phone and pressed on Gate absentmindedly.

The gate was closed.

She frowned and looked at the time. Yeah… it was a bit too soon to start her job. Whoops.

She checked her phone and smiled.

Dinner with us? Pietro is cooking. Wanda

[krakenator]

CHAPTER 9 aka “Let’s go lesbians!”

SPOILERS are sprinkled around extremely liberally for The Property of Hate

Masterpost here

Melody and Julienne join The Party! A singer, a dancer, and an actor make a triple threat baby!

Though the true triple threats out there are the people who can do all those things. I would put myself as an example but said Real Threats are people who can do it all well

…y’know we haven’t seen RGB dance but… it would not surprise me. My god. That’s why he’s so strong. He dances

Maybe the real triple threat was the object-heads we met along the way

Still on that opening page though, have I talked enough yet about Melody’s dialogue? Because a glissando is an excellent way to convey and agreeable hum.

Wow parents really were right that tv would rot my brain look at this poor doggo

Yo yo yo that’s the snail from the Pool of Tears in chapter 2!

So all I need to do to get Inspired is to lick a technicolor dream-snail, got it

Oh damn it, it’s a bright idea

Ey the picture frame clouds are back. Wow they are moving fast- heckuva wind

Oh yeah and TOby’s there. Enjoy the view lil buddy

Looks like the armchair Hero slept in at the House of Paint’s become more realized as a What. Wonder why it’s heading down to/past the Pool of Tears

How often do you think someone in this world goes to, like, hang their coat only to realize the coat-racks missing and just go “oh damnit it went sentient and wandered off. Well. Inconvenient. But godspeed I guess”

So I know the ball and chain Hero’s fashioned for her TV guide (FUCKIN JUST REALIZED THAT ONE) is rolled like like a yarn ball, but my boat-brain looked and it and said “monkeyfist. Big ol’ monkeyfirst for swinging around. Throw RGB REAL far”

How is modmad so good at speechbubbles. RGB’s shaken text/box is hilarious. Melody’s notes are connected by a beam, she’s beaming

rekted for the 11th time in 4 days

This is a good opportunity to take a moment for me to appreciate modmad’s HANDS. RGB’s hands are always exquisitely drawn. Like, the third panel especially, goddamn. Second appreciation is how damn expressive RGB is. I gushed about my love for the wives designs last chapter, I guess it’s finally time for RGB’s turn

For having NO ACTUAL FACE the man is supremely easy to read as a character. He doesn’t have eyes, yet you know when he’s smiling for real anyway! Looking back at the first few pages, that’s SUCH a fakey-fakers smile to the genuine ones seen throughout the rest of the comic. Combined with his body language- just fantastic

And then! The drooling! The initial reason I wanted to do a more thorough reread was when I realized the colors correspond to emotions and whatever RGB is feeling most strongly in any given moment, those are the colors he drips. Which is! Fantastic! It gives yet another avenue by which to see RGB’s character and an excellent supplement when the man is, again, emoting with NOT-A-FACE

His antenna crack me up. They start the comic so straight. So ironed out and spiffy and like 3 days into his newest Hero they are chronically crinkled up like tissue paper. It gives him this impression of being completely frazzled at all times, which. accurate

Back to your daily scheduled TPoH though; eeey, Assok’s speech-texture has some black triangles in here for copying Julienne’s words!

Yikes. RGB’s tried to take Heroes back before huh. Considering he hasn’t given up on his “save this doomed world” plan after all this time, how absolutely/repeatedly disastrous was “get my friend back home” for him to concede it as impossible??

Aaaand we’re off to the races Market!

RGB: LETS GO LESBIANS LETS GO!!

BIG DAMN SMOOCH! YES!! LOVELY! Also Julienne’s resting the blunt side of her knife on Melody’s head and I’m die

Melody’s dialogue is the symbol for a “natural” note. She’s replying “naturally, duh” to RGB’s question

If Julienne wasn’t already married to Melody I’d seduce that big instrument lady myself

Accept the compliment Assok! You did good!!

Random thought and back to RGB being stealth STRONK- Hero found the [—–] to be heavier than it looks and yet RGB is walking around with it all tied to one foot completely unimpeded

Im fucking snorting. The way RGB says “…that’s the sea.” Like he can’t believe Hero is being this dumb. If course it’s the sea! Obviously!

NO RGB, NOT OBVIOUSLY

D’you think if RGB saw how water and seas behave in our world he’s be equally bewildered as I was the first time I read this page

So I took the time to look up Julienne’s name and now im BIG MAD. Julienne is a way of cutting things into long thin strips! It’s a fucking culinary pun!!

Y-yo… that’s just a big damn eye.

AND/OR an impact crater. Except the ground they’re standing on wouldn’t be flat if that were the case

But it is also DEFINITELY a fairy ring, as the next page describes this is EXACTLY how fairy rings work

K so this entire page is just that one verse from “Cover is Not the Book”

Bruh. This looks like myelin sheaths on nerve axons. Myelin is an insulator just like [—–] is described to be! Except the metaphor ends there because myelin is supposed to be there and protects the axon/accelerates signal speed. Assok is basically chewing nodes of ranvier into existence instead of the breaks between myelin forming naturally. And that’s my degree put to use for the week

Also HEY. I had the thought earlier that the sick tree might be a Yggdrasil thing but didn’t put said thought down cause there wasn’t a whole lot behind it save for “big tree, big big tree”. But NOW it turns out there was a small SERPENTINE creature CHEWING AT ITS ROOTS

ASSOK’S THE NIDHOGGR

Everyone: RGB smart?? as if. RGB: EXCUSE-

absolutely huge mood there buddy

HEY MODMAD. TURN ON YOUR LOCATION WE GOTTA TALK ABOUT PAGE 162 FORESHADOWING HOW RGB BELIEVES THE SUCCESSFUL HERO’S JOURNEY HAS TO END

Hero is the flower that will die even though she’s saved the World >:(

“all flowers must die to complete their purpose” is also a funny phrase to be throwing around when Negative’s presence sprouts blue roses which shatter apart when he leaves

“Flowers need roots to live”, further implicating Negative as the (ha ha) root cause of the blue roses and vines. and we again see here, the flowers die but the branches they bloomed from remain

ALSO consider the flowers seen around characters heads when they dream/are asleep- those flowers also must go away when people wake up

Taking this a step further, Negative can be further associated with RGB’s subconscious/being unconscious by his flower-spawning

Lesbians Fight TV-Dad for Custody of Daughter

It’s “make fun of RGB hour” on TPoH and im living. Sharp, sour, cheesy poop indeed

Gotta remember to contrast this against when Hero actually drinks his colors later

gotta remember that this is 4 PEOPLE THAT RGB HAS FUCKED OVER BANDING TOGETHER TO GIVE HIM SHIT. LIKE, HE’S KIDNAPPED THEM ALL, HE CAN’T COMPLAIN

Under the sea, under the seeea~

Uh oh. UH OH THAT’S A SCISSOR BLADE

UH OH

Melody shouted in sforzando but it’s already too late ;_;

Oh! And the notation on top- that tells you to use a mute. God dammit

I knew this was coming and yet I am devastated anyway. goodbye my sweet wives your time was too short. Please come back one day

It’s also notable that Hate cut them out right at the border before the third and final protection on the Market begins. We know later that the darkness blots them entirely out of Hate’s view, so if they’d made it just a bit further She wouldn’t have been able to capture them like she just has

D’you think RGB knows exactly what’s happened to them?

If bodies of water are another form of Good Protection, then Fears hanging around the Pool of Tears is doubly weird

Yikes tho good thing Hero hopped off, can you imagine if Hero had gotten snipped away alongside her moms?? Terrible

Jeebs are you telling me that Hero would have eventually started to fade if she’d carried that pile of [—–] long enough?! RGB! BAD DAD! GET ‘IM HERO

Then again, this means he was probably planning to carry it himself most of the way. He has certain advantages after all- he overgenerates color for himself. It’s probably why he lasts as long in the storm of Nothing as he does…

Oh no OH NOOOOO ASSOK HEARD MELODY’S SHOUT

Is that-? Could it be-? By jove, it is. RGB IS INITIATING AFFECTION AND COMFORT EVERYONE! YEEEEEEAH, MAKE UP FOR THAT BAD-DAD BEHAVIOR!

HEY NOW WAIT THE FUCK A MINUTE THERE- BUTTERFLY SHADOW

HEY. Her schism’s opening back up! Nothing on page 166, but once Julienne and Melody are gone in page 167 we see it starting to open back up

!! RGB OFFERS HER HIS HAND? HIS PHYSICAL, ACTUAL HAND?? HELLO????

And the third return of “just this once” is killing me dude

Poor Assok get scronch

Girl what makes you think TOBY and JULIENNE trust RGB?! Additionally, why are you including Dial on the list?! Is he just That Charming?

IN FACT,  every single person Hero just listed? RGB has personally ruined their life! he’s killed ALL of them! HERO I UNDERSTAND YOU’RE 6 BUT

Hero trusts Dial oh no. this can only result in bad things

Butterfly, flying off in defeat: goddamn fucking idealistic children making it hard for me to steal them away and end their story, come on! Dump the chump and let me end you!!!!

Back on that schism though- it opened up once they started fighting at the sun tree, and just now when the wives disappeared. I would say it’s ripped open by experiencing fear, but it definitely was not open when Hero saw Neggy Boi wrecking shop

Join me in the next chapter when our intrepid duo speedrun Pajama Sam: No Need to Hide When It’s Dark Outside!