#hours spent watching the slime drip by and even more hours spent looking for the goddamn exit

[dandelionandkrindle]

WORLD OF WARCRAFT • LOCATIONS (6/?) Undercity

#world of warcraft #warcraft #wowedit #gamingedit #wowlocations #ah the memories #hours spent watching the slime drip by and even more hours spent looking for the goddamn exit

[circethesinner]

the puppeteer ✿ the upside down - chapter 4 ✿

pairing: steve harrington x original female character (can be read as x reader)

warning(s): strong language, descriptions of violence, mature themes  

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Bambi really wasn't sure where she would shower after this, but she was already looking forward to it. The slime was cold and sticky as it dripped down her hair and onto her forehead. It felt disgusting, but it didn't stop her.

On the other end of the tunnel was a clearing. It looked like the forest she'd just come from but... wrong. There was some sort of spore or dust particles floating in the air; she almost choked as she breathed them in; they caught in her throat and made her lungs feel heavy.

Instead of doing the logical thing of turning around and crawling back through the tree, Bambi walked forward. In her hand, the flashlight flashed on and off, on and off, on and off, until eventually, it turned off for good.

"Fucking cheap batteries waste of money bullshit." She hissed quietly, hitting the flashlight in the palm of her hand as if that would magically fix it. It didn't.

Bambi was thankful she had the hindsight to pack the spares and quickly leant against the closest tree as she got the spares out and swapped them. She smiled when the flashlight turned on again, but the smile was very quickly wiped off of her face as the flashlight proceeded to do the same thing it had before.

On, then off, then on, then off.

'Okay, so maybe it wasn't the batteries?' Bambi thought. Turning around to return through the portal that led her to whatever this hellscape of a forest was, she tripped over a root of some sort. She tried to hold her hands out to break her fall, but the ground squelched under her fingers and seemed to swallow them up. Desperately, she tried to pull them away and stand up again, now completely determined to get the hell out of there.

Bambi hadn't even taken one full step forward before she stopped again. Between her and the tree that she'd crawled through stood the monster that had plagued her nightmares. It was more horrifying in person, standing impossibly tall. She hoped it was facing the opposite direction to her, though from her dreams, she knew it had no face, so she couldn't quite tell.

She watched in horror as the monster, despite its giant stature, crawled through the small gap in the base of the tree and out into the world she called home.

In a state of pure panic, she ran. She ran in the opposite direction, not giving a moment's thought to where she was going. All she knew was that there was no way she would be going through that portal again while that thing was on the other side.

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Lost.

She was completely and utterly lost.

Bambi cursed herself for being so stupid. Why had she just run? Surely it would have been wiser to stick around by the tree? Maybe on the opposite side, so it wouldn't see her, but she'd be able to see it return and then get the hell out of there.

Now, she was curled up at the base of a different tree, waiting. She wasn't sure what she was waiting for, but there was nothing more she could do. With every minute she spent there, she felt weaker and weaker. According to her watch, she'd been there for around two hours.

The books they were allowed in the rainbow room were very selective. Many of the kids couldn't read anyway; they never went out of their way to teach any of them to read. The older kids and the ones who had been brought in at later ages were the only ones who could read. She remembered how Three had tried to teach her once, but she just couldn't understand it at the time. Despite being brutally punished for it, she didn't regret stealing the skill from that boy, even if she hadn't meant to.

The lab was still careful when selecting books for the few who could read. They weren't allowed any books that had people who came to save the protagonists. They didn't want to fill their heads with the idea that someone out there might someday come to rescue them from the lab.

But one day, they accidentally let a book slide. In the book, a handsome and charming prince came to save the princess from imprisonment in a tower, and they lived happily ever after.

Bambi wasn't a princess. No handsome prince was coming to save her.

Then she saw her.

In the distance, she watched as a girl crawled through a tree. Bambi almost laughed as she realised how short the distance she'd run had been; no wonder she'd never made the track team if she'd given up after what appeared to only be 100ft at best.

Now, she knew where the gate was, and she wasn't going to take her eyes off of it until she got there. With a wave of determination washing over her, Bambi stood up, clutching her bag, and she sprinted. She felt the gun slip out of her pocket, but she didn't have the time to turn around and pick it up. She'd buy George a new one if she got out of there alive.

Had she looked only a few feet to the right of the girl, she would have seen the monster. But she didn't see it until it was too late. The monster spun around to look at her as she clumsily ran almost directly into it, only just stopping herself from toppling over onto the now dead deer that it had been eating.

This was it; this was the day Bambi would die.

The other girl took a step back, slowly trying to get away from the monster. In doing so, she ended up stepping on some sort of twig which cracked beneath her feet. For a split second, the monster was distracted as it snapped its head which had now opened up to look like some sort of demonic fleshy flower with teeth. Taking the opportunity, Bambi ran around it and, with agility she didn't know she possessed, grabbed the hand of the now screaming girl as they ran.

She heard a man's voice, distant and echoing, calling the name 'Nancy'. The girl whose hand was now tightly clasped in hers called out in return.

"Jonathan! Jonathan! Jonathan! Jonathan, I'm right here!" She looked around desperately; Bambi didn't know what to do as they both stopped in their tracks, taking deep breaths.

The man who Bambi assumed must be Jonathan was still calling out, instructing the girl she now assumed was Nancy to follow his voice. Bambi let go of her hand, suddenly aware she might be holding her back from running.

Nancy looked back to see if she was still there and screamed, Bambi looked around, realising the monster was right behind them, and once again, they ran. Bambi watched as Nancy ducked behind a tree, and Bambi followed her lead, ducking behind one only a few feet away.

The monster was so close that she could hear its horrid gurgles as though they were right in her ear. Bambi didn't dare look out from behind the tree; she just turned her head to see if Nancy was okay. Nancy looked back at her, then at the tree that Bambi was ducking behind. The brunette girl nodded at the tree and dashed towards it; Bambi peered out and watched her quickly disappear into the hole on the opposite side. The monster hadn't noticed yet, so Bambi followed as fast as she could, still holding onto her bag as tight as she could. She heard screaming from the other side as she crawled through, reaching her hand out to try and drag herself out as the tunnel closed around her.

Before Bambi knew it, she was being pulled out by two strong pairs of hands just as the tunnel closed around her left foot, taking her sneaker with it.

Struggling to catch her breath, she held her bag close to her chest as she tried to make sense of what the hell had just happened. She was vaguely aware of Nancy and Jonathan, cradled together next to her, talking in hushed but desperate whispers. Her ears were ringing, and she couldn't make out any words.

"Are you okay?" Jonathan asked, louder than he'd been talking a second before. The words took a moment for Bambi to register, the ringing slowly dying down. Bambi looked up to confirm if he was talking to her. He was looking at her, so she made the assumption that he was indeed talking to her and not Nancy.

"I think- Yeah- I...." She couldn't find the right words. She wasn't okay, but she was alive. "Thank you." She managed to choke out, holding back tears. They sat in heavy silence for a moment. The threat felt like it had gone along with the portal to what Bambi decided was likely hell.

Bambi would have died in there had it not been for them. She was struggling to come to terms with what exactly just happened; she knew it would take a while.

"Who are you?" Nancy finally asked, breaking the silence.

"Bambi." It probably wasn't the answer that Nancy wanted, but it was a start. Bambi had to hold herself back from making a joke in poor taste that she was luckier than the other deer but managed to hold off. Humour was her defence mechanism in most situations, and it probably wouldn't go down well with the strangers she'd just shared a near-death experience with.

"We should get out of here in case that thing comes back." Jonathan stood up, helping Nancy up with him. He held a hand out to Bambi, which she gratefully accepted. In an unspoken agreement, Bambi walked with the two. They reached a car, and Jonathan nodded at her to hop in the back seat. Something flashed over her mind about getting into a car with a stranger, but something told her that these strangers wouldn't kidnap her. Jonathan didn't start the car up right away.

"Why were you in there?" Nancy questioned, looking back at her. Bambi didn't know the answer to that or at least one that made sense. She wasn't sure why she'd gone in; it was just that stupid pull. But, she couldn't exactly tell them that, so she considered things for a moment and went with what was technically the truth, but not the whole truth.

"I was trying to find my sister, and I found that hole in the tree; I went to investigate it in case she was hiding in there and I got stuck in that place," Bambi explained. "I walked for a bit, and my flashlight went off, then I turned around to go back, and I watched that... That thing go through the hole, and I knew I couldn't leave because it would be on the other side. I panicked, and I just ran and hid until I saw you."

"Your sister is missing?" Jonathan asked; Bambi couldn't quite read the tone in his voice. It wasn't one of those questions that people ask just out of curiosity; there was something else behind it.

"Kind of?" Again, Bambi considered what she would tell the pair before she spoke. She decided on the same story she'd told George. "Our dad is a piece of shit, kept us as... I guess you could say, prisoners? Anyway, he kept us captive our whole lives. I got out a couple of years ago, but I couldn't get her out with me, not safely. I think... I think she's out now, but I don't know where she is. I know it sounds stupid that I'm wandering the forests to try and find her, but I don't know where else to look."

"My brother is missing," Jonathan looked at Bambi through the rearview mirror. "Nancy's friend is too. We were out there looking for them."

"Are you from around here?" Nancy asked sceptically; Bambi couldn't blame her.

"Yes and no, my dad works at the lab around here," Technically not a lie. "I ended up in that forest when I escaped; I'm not sure where my dad's house is. I just ran when I got out. I hoped my sister had done the same and might still be around here." Also, technically not a lie.

"Where are you staying now? Do you have a place we can drop you?" Jonathan asked, starting up the car. Bambi didn't realise how much she was shivering from the cold until the hot air from the car's heater hit her.

"I'm going to sleep in my van until I find her. I think it's parked near the quarry?" She had been banking on being able to retrace her steps through the forest to find her van since she wasn't entirely sure if she'd marked the right area on the map. "You can drop me off there and I'll try and find it." Bambi suddenly realised that she'd dropped the flashlight in that place when she'd fallen over. That means she'd be walking in the dark and wouldn't have a weapon to protect her since she'd also dropped the gun there.

"Do you want to stay at mine tonight?" Nancy asked. Bambi saw Jonathan give her that 'what the hell are you doing?' look, but Nancy brushed it off. "You shouldn't be wandering around at night with that thing out there."

Bambi considered turning down the offer. It was weird to just sleep over at a stranger's house. Sensing her hesitation, Nancy spoke again.

"I assume you don't have a shower in your van so you could at least clean up at mine?" That was all Bambi needed to hear. She nodded and mustered up as best a smile as she could.

"Yeah, that would be good. Thank you."  

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sorry besties but if y'all came to this fic to find a strong and powerful oc who can kill someone with a single flick of the wrist you are looking in the wrong place, bambi is so clumsy and the fact that she's survived this long is a miracle and I love her endlessly

likes are very much appreciated and I will give each and every one of you little kisses on the forehead for each comment you write :)

#steveharrington #steve harrington #steve harrington x original character #steve harrington x oc #steve harrington x reader #stranger things #strangerthings #stranger things fanfiction #steve harrington fanfic #fanfiction #fanfic

[beneathshadedbower]

1. Cross(ing)

Sunlight broke through the trees above, dancing on the water's surface. Pollen motes floated about on the breeze, shaken loose from the cattail on the riverbank.  Beads of sweat formed on the young elf's temples and now threatened to drip into her eyes. Angry welts marched in bright pink lines across her stomach, a result of hours spent belly down on the rough wood. The muscles in her back and neck ached in protest. She'd been dangling off the bridge at Alder's Crossing for some time, not daring to move a muscle. Watching. Waiting.

A flash of movement caught her eye. Tiny eyes over a bright yellow beak peeked out from the reeds below. The duckling looked first one way, then the other before taking a hesitant step forward. It was small, far too young to be separated from its mother. How it'd survived this long was nothing short of a miracle.

Patience, she thought. Just a little further.

Another cautious step forward, then another. She held her breath in fear of alerting the critter to her presence. The duckling paused, whipping its head to gaze back at the reeds. 

Now.

She lunged, landing feet first in the silt below, slender fingers grasping for the small creature. A series of high pitched, frantic quacks emanated from her cupped hand. Relief washed over her; she'd caught her quarry. The sudden rush of blood leaving her head made her dizzy. Just how long had she been hanging off that bridge? 

"Now now, hush up. There's no need for all that," she murmured, settling down in the shade beneath the bridge. The relief was instant and most welcome. It was an unseasonably hot day in the Shroud, even for the height of summer. Birdsong filled the forest, the smell of honeysuckle hung thick in the air. Dragonflies flitted about, chasing along the water's surface. The pain in her back and legs spoke of sunburn and bug bites.

"You," she said, raising the little duckling aloft, "are more slippery than you appear."

Beady black eyes met brilliant blue. The duck was scrawny, even for one so young. Its feathers, a brilliant shade of white, were smeared with muck and grime. A small wound was visible on its right wing, which hung limp between her fingers. The quacking had subsided, and it now stared at her quietly. "I don't know what happened to your mama, but I'll take care of you now. Okay?"

Using her left arm as leverage, she attempted to pry herself from the silt, the mud making a quiet sucking noise when she finally freed herself of its grip. Looking down, all she could do was chuckle. Mom was sure to have a fit. Her slender frame was covered in thick brown slime from head to toe.

"Well, this'll be a story to tell, eh?" The duckling offered no response, which seemed to only amuse the elf more. "Let us be about it, then. It's a long walk home."

#ffxivwrite

[yandere-sins]

I just finished reading all your Haikyuu Kitsune fics and I am obsessed. I was wondering what would happen if kitsune Suna just kidnapped the reader one night and she just wakes up in his Kitsune village tied up lol.

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Glad you enjoyed them! Thanks for reading & requesting ^-^

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You were awake for a while already, pondering, when you finally heard the door to the basement open again. Even though you felt exhausted and anxious after the last few hours that you spent alone in the dark, you still mustered up the strength to glare, enough hatred in your gaze that the person entering the basement should have dropped dead if looks could kill. Person? Entity? You weren’t sure how to title him, but any name that came to mind wasn’t a very friendly one.

“You’re scrunching up your face... again,” he noted, and now pointed out, you grimaced even more. Suna either didn’t want to understand why you were looking at him, clearly finding discomfort in your gaze as he opted to avoid your eyes, or he decided to play dumb. Whichever it was, it only made you angrier!

“Seriously...” he mumbled, sighing deeply before placing down the tray he had been carrying, on a barrel next to the stairs. The whole basement was stuffed with things that seemed like they had been standing there for a while, unused and covered in thick layers of dust. Some of the stuff looked like ancient versions of modern tools for farming, but with that man nearby, your whereabouts were your slightest worry.

“I got you some food.”

Placing a spoon into the bowl he had brought, he stirred it briefly, a gooey, thick substance dripping of the cutlery when he lifted it into the light of the candle accompanying him. You, right away, felt anything but hungry, even if you assumed it was just oatmeal. Still, judging from the looks of it, you couldn’t find even one thing that was appetizing about it.

Taking the bowl with him, he walked over to you, a hand reaching out towards your face as you reacted, pushing yourself backwards until your back hit another barrel behind you. The metal chains wrapped around your wrists rattled upon your stir, making Suna flinch away for a second, his whole body stiffening as he looked back over his shoulder and up the staircase. He remained silent for a moment as if he waited for the door to open, but nothing happened.

“Don’t be too loud,” he reminded you for what must have been the fiftieth time since he threw you over his shoulder and made a run for it to this place, a strange, abandoned village in the forest. “They could hear you. Just be warned that other than me, my kin might eat you on the spot.”

Part of you wanted to call this a bluff—just a trick to keep you quiet. But knowing how unpredictable he was, you didn’t want to get to know any other ‘of his kin’ either. This time, you drilled a hole into the hand slowly approaching your face, strained your neck to get it off you. But lastly, he managed to pull on the cloth wrapped around your head and gagging you, making you fear more scratches from the claws on his fingers.

You didn’t know it was possible to feel sore around your mouth but being free of the gag it was the painful reality you were facing. “Eat,” Suna decided, gathering the gunk of a meal on his spoon before lifting it to your lips. “Fuck off!” you hissed at him quickly, turning your head away and making him struggle to hold the spoon properly, dripping its contents everywhere.

“I am doing this for you, you know?” he growled as you two fought over whether you were going to eat or not. Until Suna had enough, his second hand much quicker and less careful in its approach as it clipped over your nose, pulling you forward. You didn’t have enough time to see it coming, gasping as he cut off your air supply and tugged, making you open your mouth wide enough for him to press the spoon forward.

The taste of unseasoned oats and the wooden spoon mixed with your saliva while you tried not to gag from the slime that seemed to slip right down your throat. Before you knew it, Suna let go of your nose, and you didn’t hesitate to spit out whatever hadn’t been forwarded to your stomach yet, the mass spilling all over the floor.

Disgusted, Suna watched you as you coughed, wishing the taste would pass immediately, not even a hint of understanding in his gaze. “For someone so worried about food, you’re very wasteful. Open up, come on.”

You barely had time to recover as he scooped up another mouthful, but this time you felt ready nonetheless. Clenching your teeth together, you waited for him to do the trick again, deciding you’d rather suffocate than accept any food from him, especially one that you couldn’t be sure where, when, and how it was made.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he pressed the spoon up to your teeth, growing impatient as you wouldn’t open up no matter how much pressure he applied. Suna even gripped your chin from below, trying to slam both forces together, but you persisted. You would have been mighty proud of yourself for resisting if not for the oatmeal getting plastered all over your face, its consistency running down your cheeks and lips as Suna threw away the spoon in frustration.

“Fine!” he gnarled. “You want to show me how tough you are? I can do that too!”

As if on cue, the light flickered before going out, but even just the three seconds that you were able to see his bared teeth - his pointy fangs looking even longer than you imagined them from that time he bit you - scared you. It was the first time, but certainly not the last, that you felt yourself submit to him. Like an animal who tugged in its tail, you flinched away, ducking lightly until all you could see were his golden, shining eyes in the dark. Even if it was just a spur-of-the-moment action, you instantly felt embarrassed and upset you reacted the way you did.

“Good,” he appraised your recoiling motion before he moved closer. You felt his body leaning towards you, the warmth impossible to ignore as his arms caged you on either side, barrel in the back and fox in the front. You felt something wet and rough drag over your chin, lips, and cheek before you felt it trying to intrude on your mouth. Even if you wanted to complain, scream even, you found yourself cut off by Suna exploring the inside and catching your voice, the damn taste of oatmeal back on your tongue with no way of spitting it out.

His arms closed in on your hands, long fingers wrapping around the metal restraints and pulling your shoulders down until your hands pressed against the dirty ground, making it almost impossible to move your body like you wanted. The kiss continued, mouths opening for quick breathers in between, and you had to realize that these fangs weren’t optimal to be used for kissing, your teeth colliding with his a few times, and your lips getting caught on the fangs. It wasn’t enough to hurt, but every time it happened, you felt a spark of pain going through you.

The sounds very quickly changed from sloppy to passionate on his side, soft whines and groans escaping him in the breaks. You felt like you were going to die from either shame or the pain of him ending up dislocating your shoulders as Suna kept pressing in further and further, his chest soon enough resting on yours while your hands hurt from being caught in his grip and bracing against the ground.

All that was left when he very suddenly, very unpredictably, pulled away was the taste of iron as his fang finally managed to rip open a small part of your lip. You cursed inwardly as you took deep breaths, trying to regain air and your composure, while you barely heard him whisper something under his own breath. “... too much,” you made out, coming from him before he turned around, taking deep breaths.

“What the fuck--!” you cursed, but Suna was quick to return to you, clasping his hand over your mouth before listening intently. “Shhh!” he hissed, listening again, just like before. However, this time, you collected all the courage you had in you to bite him in the hand, catching a finger to latch on to. Suna noticeably flinched before he pulled away, seemingly looking at his hand for a split moment in an emotion you couldn’t make out. Still, before long, he clicked his tongue and pressed the gag he had taken off you back in place.

Even if you struggled now, he was stronger than you as well as relentless, and after tying a knot in the back, his hands lingered on each side of your head briefly. You could only see his eyes coming closer, but next thing you knew, you felt another kiss to your exposed lips before he seemed to notice the blood, his tongue coming forth to lick the wound tenderly, different from how he treated you before. “Fuck...” he whispered before he finally let you go and got up, his feet barely making any sound as he moved away.

“I’ll be back in the morning, don’t make a sound if you want to survive the night,” were his last words before he swiftly walked up the stairs and out the door, again leaving you behind all by yourself.

What were you supposed to make out of the situation? Why did he bring you here anyway if he was just going to leave you alone? What was ‘too much’, and why did he kiss you again and again? It felt like every time you saw him, you had more questions left unanswered than before. All you knew was that you wanted to go home.

And hopefully, this was just a very awful nightmare you’d soon wake up from.

#Suna #Suna Rintarou #suna haikyuu #kitsune!suna #yandere suna #yandere!suna #Haikyuu!! #Haikyuu #HQ!! #yandere haikyuu #yandere!haikyuu #yandere hq #yandere!hq #yandere #yandere imagines #yandere headcanons #yandere scenarios #yandere fanfiction #yandere writing #yandere stories #yandere oneshots #yandere oneshot #yandere drabble #yandere x reader #yandere x darling #Yandere TW

[semischarmed]

Mine

Many coaches have come and taught the many iterations of our university team. Over the years, these coaches, like players, come and go. Good ones are hard to come by. Great ones are once in a lifetime. That was our Coach James.

He had a fatherly quality to him. There was a warmth in his training, a brightness when he would teach us. When we succeeded, he helped bring us up further and when we failed he softened the blow with his wisdom. Coach was great like that. Strictly professional, of course, but with a layer of genuine friendliness and a desire to watch us all succeed. He really was the perfect coach and we were blessed to have him. Still, in my lust, in my pure selfishness, I knew I had to have him- all of him to me and me alone. One long summer day, I ask for some one-on-one training. Never one to turn down a teaching opportunity, he complies. Like I said, he was a great coach.

I decide this would be the day. I run, but not too well. I throw, but haphazardly. That’s all it took for him to lean in. That’s all it took to get him close. Of course, he came with pure intentions- I did not. 

When he is right above me, when I feel the vibration in the air from his chest, when I feel his raw power and vitality. That is when I strike. I fuck up my throwing position a little more, and he guides it proper. Fuck yeah. Jesus, I could stay like this forever. I feel the resonance of his deep voice within my very soul. Beckoning to me. “Become me. You want this. You deserve this,” it taunts. He was still coaching me, sure, but my mind is preoccupied with dark intent. 

These gentle breaths as he speaks- these steady hands guiding mine to a better position. These would be my truths now. A most intimate of trainings. Coach James would be training me-sure- he would be training me to use that bod. I stare at him with longing. He would never look at me that way. God, I wanted him so bad. We glisten with the sweat of the midday sun. I could melt just like this. And in fact, I do.

In that grasp, in that teaching moment, I decide to teach coach a couple tricks myself. I look up at his face. Earnest. Strong. Patient. I watch his lips- they’re still moving- he’s still guiding me. Good. He hasn’t noticed my body begin liquifying. He continues on, unfazed. Unconcerned. He always did have that humble strength about him. 

I am drawn to those plump lips, to his perfect smile and the void behind them, to the force of his breath over me, and to the very vibration that created them. I am drawn to that body which I would make mine. I wrap his thick arms around me. Those goddamn arms. They pulse and tense in surprise. He finally catches on. “- Hey. What are you doing? What.. What is this?” I pay no mind. A breeze picks up and his scent fills me. I wrap myself in it. Old spice deodorant layered over the pungent, musk of a man. My man. My scent, soon enough. The air was ripe in pheromones. Testosterone. James. I inhale deeply, trying to catch as much of him as I could. His skin is nice, too. It’s a bit damp, a bit hot from the heat, but nice. I feel them stretch taught, struggling to contain the mass of muscle beneath. I draw his shocked embrace even closer, uncomfortably close. I feel him between concern over my melting form and a need to push me away. Works for me. I continue to liquify further. Faster. You will be mine, Coach.

The world stops for a moment- at least for me. Maybe adrenaline, maybe my imagination. I commit this scene to memory, the scene where I become something greater. The scene where the real Coach James is born.

I shoot up his nose and flood his mouth. His body is forced to gorge itself with my mass. With every breath he attempts to draw, he pulls the liquid me instead. He retches, attempting to vomit me out, but I just draw myself further in. Flooding and flooding, I saturate coach with myself. When all but the last of me is a dribbling of slime upon his cheek, I disperse inside him. I drill into his every crevice, swim through his bloodstream, bond with his ever piece. I settle deeper and deeper inside my coach. Until his body no longer recognizes my presence as foreign. Until I am coach. I incubate into him, my pieces dormant. 

Coach James awakes in the grass to the odd sight of a star-filled sky and a cold night breeze. “What the fuck...” he ponders, rubbing his head in confusion. He aches all over, yet he isn’t hungry. He digs into his memory, attempting to piece together the past few hours. I just spent them digesting this afternoon so he would have no success. 

Unclear on the past events, yet unfazed, he walks back to his car and heads home.

———

That first night was magical-for me. As for coach, I’m not quite sure. I am ever present in his dreams. Pleasure, I think, is how I’d describe what being inside James was like. In his dreams, in his deepest thoughts, I lay there to witness them. These were thoughts, these were ideas, these were emotions that only I would be sole witness to, along coach. Ecstasy. This was a piece of him we would share alone. I was like a part of him, and only I would know him fully to this extent. 

In the next few days after the events of that afternoon, Coach appeared a little more vain, a little more irritable. To my teammates he just seemed off. They catch glimpses of him checking himself out. They hear the barely audible moans from his office as he delicately feels his every part. 

“What the fuck was up with coach” They say. Little did they know the real question to ask was ‘what was up’ IN their coach. Little did they know it was the influence of their missing teammate, ingraining himself deeper and deeper into his beloved James.

Despite the changes, my coach resists me. The further I try to bond, the more his body rejects me. It is a 3 day affair. A push and pull. With every push, I gain momentary connection to that bod, only to have that fulfillment ripped from my now non-existent hands. He was a coach, after all. I should have known it would be a battle of wills. Still, there was someone I had that coach didn’t have-yet. My mind. I had a cleverness match-made for that hot bod. A cleverness he deserved. A cleverness that I would utilize to the fullest to make that match a reality. Coach was a happy, content man. I was not. He needed my ambition, my cleverness, my lust. That body deserved better.

I let up the assault on his mind. He feels himself winning, backing my parts into a corner. It’s here where I apologize profusely inside him. He accepts because, James was the kind of guy to pick someone up when they’re down. He accepts my apology foolishly as we decide upon the best way I may leave him. A chance. We decide to do so in the privacy of his home- for my sake, of course. Little did he know, I felt his resistance weakest there. He readies himself for my exit, relaxing so I may flow out of him. I ready myself for one final push. It was in that moment that I surround coach with my psyche, encapsulate his very soul.

 Coach James wakes up making an odd face his body has never made. It was a lustful, sinful grin. It was my grin. I start chuckling. My voice is deep, booming. We moan together as my dormant parts stir. We moan as it starts convulsing. The shaking was harsh. I puppet this body still and eager to accept more of me. It takes some resistance but it finally yields. Nothing good comes easy, after all. I stick my parts take their rightful places. Those bulging, slick arms? Mine. Powerful, vascular legs? Also mine. That thick, veiny cock? Fucking. Mine. I feel them inside me- I alight as his energy becomes mine. We tickle. We feel great. At long last, this body was mine. 

No. Further. I want everything he ever is, ever was. James was gonna give me that. I wanted permanence. No one would ever tear us apart. I decide on his soul. I decide on becoming that as well. I string his soul up, prisoner in its own body, unable to do much of anything until transformed by the poison of my very being. In the meantime, I pleasure my new self to grant him a taste of what we could have, what we could be, once he yielded. I use those thick python arms as my own. I gingerly trace my a newly muscular inner thigh. I shiver in delight. Fuck. We were sensitive. Who knew?

I stare at myself in the mirror. Oh god, oh god this was real, he was truly mine. “Here’s how to use this bod correctly” I mock in that gentle, instructive tone he had. I rush up to the mirror and start making out with myself. It’s cold. It warms up as I continue to lap at it with my tongue, as I continue to smear with these new plump lips of mine. “Fuck yeah, that’s the stuff, coach” I moan as him. The room is humid, dripping with pheromone, hot from the heat I am emanating in wearing my beloved coach. I touch my new dick for the first time, feeling his soul rile up. I feel his teaching sensibilities corrupt with my desire. As any good coach knows, never let them have a chance to fight back. Before he has a chance to react to my newfound control or my actions, I pump quickly, determinedly. Yeah. Yeah. Fuck. Yeah. Coach’s body was fucking hot. This was a fucking dream- Oh My god. “Oh. Oh. oh” Our moans ring like music to my new ears. And in that final resonance, I release with only one thought: “I’m Coach James”. His hand shakes in resistance. This was it. I force the hand still. Command it. It was my hand after-all. I scoop our cum in my hand. I give my hot new reflection a playful wink. “Bottoms up” I say to us both. Sweet Nectar. My Nectar. With every taste and of his own milk, he perverts own senses, dilutes his very self. He has obviously never tasted himself to this capacity- because I finally feel his soul reflexively bond to mine. He tries to pull back. Like I’d let him. I greedily keep us tethered together. Then, he relents. There’s my James. 

When he finally yields I feel his memories, his feelings, hopes open up. I take them all. Distort them. I take all of him into me, meld them with myself until we were but one soul. They were me, now. My memories, sure. My senses. My feelings- fuck yeah, but inundated, saturated with my lust. Hopes- not a fucking chance. My hopes and dreams for this body are far greater. Coach James was greater that that. I was greater than that. I am the James the world deserves. 

I am left panting by the end of it. Ecstasy reverberates. It’s all me in here, baby. My coach- I was reborn. Tears stream down my cheeks. “Call me James” I say with newfound truth and intent. That name came naturally to me. I was fully him, after all.

———

‘New James’ is fucking kinky. Dirty. Narcissistic. As much as I love bossing around the kids, I love playing with myself even more. I got some great parts. Look at this fucking bicep. Teaching? Fuck that. Fuck the team. New James is ripe with ambition and power. “James Harrison got better fucking things to do that teach some stupid fucking kids,” I spit in the mirror as caress myself. Yeah. This bod’s a fucking power trip. So much more New James can do with his time. 

“New” might be a bit of a misnomer. I am James, in body mind and soul. I am James, in past-present and future. All he ever was? All he ever will be? Me. I am James, forever. And I aint no fucking coach.

-End-

Just a quick one.

#male possession

[caelimonoceros]

moonlight — childe

pairing: childe x gn!reader

wc: 1.9k

tags: fluff, it’s just fluff, established relationship, i guess a lil light angst if you squint, childe lovable dork number one

notes: of course my first piece is about childe my one and only…my beloved…please come give me some constellations <3 pls enjoy! i’m planning on writing some more similar pieces with some other characters but i really wanted to post this one now tehe…interacts/reblogs appreciated!

Just as the moon guides the tides in and out of the shore, she pulls you to him—Childe, quiet in his solitude and unsuspectingly calm on the beach.

You find him on the beach just north of Liyue Harbor, on a long stretch of tan sand with a sheet spread out under him. Uneven rocks pin down the corners of the makeshift sand-protection, and you can make out the shape of the Harbinger’s jacket and boots settled next to him.

Upon hearing your soft footsteps crunching on the sand, Childe perks up. The slight curve of his posture, betraying a weeks-old exhaustion, straightens into a bright smile and a cheery wave, the welcoming facade he throws around to unsuspecting strangers who won’t ever make the plunge into the depths of his heart. Blue eyes, blue like the ocean and the cosmos and the frost on your skin after too many hours spent trekking around Dragonspine, pierce the dim night, only lit up by the small lantern next to him and the faint blue glow of his vision. They give his skin an unearthly glow, the warm light of the lantern bringing out copper highlights in his hair while the blue of his vision drives deep shadows into the far side of his face.

The night is peaceful in its simplicity, watched by the careful eyes of the moon and her starry companions. Childe’s smile brightens as you settle next to him, kicking off your own shoes and stretching out across the oversized blanket. Your own bag, full of warm midnight snacks and soft blankets, hits the ground as you do, and rolls with a soft thud.

“You made it,” Childe inches closer, quick to put his hand over yours and fold your fingers together. You let him, settling your joined hands over one of your thighs and sitting to lean against his shoulder.

“Yea. The slimes didn’t drench me.” You huff, eyes pointed out towards the water; then slowly drifting over to him.

“Well, since the slimes didn’t get to you, I was thinking…” Childe rubs a gloved thumb over the back of your hand, directing your attention. The leather is rough against your skin, worn equally from working a weapon and signing bank documents.

“Your ideas are always awful. I wanna know,” you lean into him.

“Midnight swim!” He says cheerfully, pointing out towards the water with his free hand. “The weather has been so warm lately that I’m sure the water will be as well. Plus, it’s just the two of us! Wouldn't that be nice?” Oh, you don’t want to crush his dreams and his eager, giddy smile, but you are not going in that water. No thanks, you are perfectly content to stay warm and dry on your big, spread out blanket and watch Childe make a shivering fool of himself before he comes back and soaks his half of the blanket.

“I’m not going in the water, especially not in my clothes, Childe. It’s cold out.” Childe blinks at you, as if he doesn’t understand the problem for a moment before sighing, as if he knew this would be your answer.

“Fine. But I’m going to go in, and I'm sure you’ll join me in no less than five minutes!” He says it so confidently, living up to his namesake so easily that it makes you swallow down laughter. The tall Fatui makes sure to blow you a dramatic kiss from the water’s edge, before he turns his back entirely. Really, you are completely content to watch him enjoy himself in the shallows. It’s refreshing to see him so light on his feet and in his words.

The soft moonlight illuminates his back, drawing out the folds of his dark shirt. The metal accessories around his belt glimmer in the cool light as well, twinkling like stars at you, but you’re almost mesmerized as you chase the patterns of moonlight across his ever-moving form. The water is so clear, reflecting him and the mountains situated behind you, every trace of silvery-white light that dances down an uneven slope or a curving tree branch rippling amongst your lover’s own reflection.

“You know, the water’s still warm!” Childe calls after a few minutes of peace. He’s rolled his pants up to just under his knees, but they’re still being soaked by waves of water. From your warm, dry, position on the shore you’re inclined to protest, but a shimmer in cerulean eyes not brought on by the moon or stars cuts your words before they can begin. He begins making his way over to you, sloshing through the water and then up onto the sand.

“C’mon, just stick your feet in. I promise I won’t let you drown.” You roll your eyes at his proposition; the way he walks so arrogantly over to you and crouches ever so slightly, extending a hand to you. He’s tracked wet sand onto your clean, safe haven, and his wet pants are dripping seawater on your bare shins, but you still hold your tongue all the same.

“Please? It’ll be fun. You don’t have to, but I think you’d enjoy it.” The Fatui offers his hand with a little bit of a wave this time, and you give in to his easy smile and comforting presence. It’s hard not to, hard to resist the way he sweeps you into the ocean, the same way he’s already swept you away entirely like a pebble torn from shore.

The water is still warm, but it’s still much cooler than your skin and you shudder as you’re exposed to it much too quickly. Childe’s grip on your hand is too tight, his excitement adorably obvious as you come to a halt some ten feet into the water, where it rises just above your hips.

“See? It’s not bad at all.” Childe leans down, his face mere inches from yours, and sticks his tongue out playfully. You resist the urge to pinch it between your thumb and forefinger, instead flicking his forehead gently, just enough for him to recoil as if you’ve shot him and dramatically clasp a hand over his head.

“It’s not bad at all,” you mimic, unable to stop yourself from laughing at the ginger’s over-the-top reaction. Cute, he’s so cute sometimes and you doubt he truly knows it, cute when he drops something from his chopsticks or shoots an arrow into the ground or trips over a loose rock when he’s pretending not to stare at you. Cute when his guard is down, when he’s not a battle-hardened warrior and traces of the myth you know to be named Ajax are allowed through the ever-present cracks in his facade. Just as you’re lost in thought, a spray of salty water meets your face, and you close your eyes and cross an arm over your forehead quickly.

“That was uncalled for!” You complain, but it trails off into laughter as you return the splash back at Childe.

“Hey, your aim’s not half bad!” He’s even quicker to fire back, and soon the water around you both churns enough to drown out your shared laughter. Your clumsy feet, weighed down by your movements kick up sand and cloud the water, and you brush grit from your face and hair after a particularly well-aimed splash flattens it down your back.

“That’s practically an insult, coming from you.”

“My aim isn’t that bad!” Fake offense riddles his tone, one hand placed over his poor, scandalized heart.

“Will you be less arrogant if I tell you I’m enjoying myself?” You dodge most of another splash, but even when you’re complaining you find your jaw beginning to ache from a wide smile.

“So much for staying out of the water,” Childe taunts, gesturing to the soaking mess you’ve become. He’s no better, water dripping down his face in rivulets, blinking the salt away from his eyes instinctively and pushing the wet hair back from his view.

“This is your fault, you know,” you tell him, but the complaint holds little water. He lets you splash him again, a full wave that hits against his chest, and you take another step closer to him—just close enough for him to hook a gangly leg around your own and pull you down, spinning gracefully and catching you just as your hair begins to fan out in the water. One arm holds securely under the middle of your back, while the other settles on your hip.

“You just can’t stay away from me, I know.” The smug confidence he wears is equally endearing and enraging. You begin to counter him with an asshole—, one hand moving up to poke his cheek, but before you can make contact he completely retracts his arms and you submerge with a shriek. When you come up moments later, coughing and spluttering in surprise, Childe is laughing so hard that he’s bent over with his hands on his knees. He’s completely unsuspecting, the perfect target for you to grab the back of his head and shove his face into the water, too.

Except, Childe topples over his own long legs, the two of you falling down messily and his head bumping against your knee as you land flat on your butt. He makes a face, rubbing his cheeks as he kneels. Despite how you joke around, it’s clear that the bump actually hurt, and you can’t help but feel a little pang of guilt at the genuine pain he displayed. Holding his head, Childe moves closer, until he’s easily looming over you with your hands braced against the sand and the water level just under your chin.

“You’re so difficult,” he sighs, your foreheads pressed together. The feeling of salt grinding between your skin is just on the edge of unpleasant, but nowhere near enough to make you back away. “Nearly gave me a black eye there.”

“Aren’t we both?” You smile in response, cupping a cool, wet hand over the cheek he’d hit on your leg. His eyes flutter closed, and he breathes out a sigh against your nose as tension visibly drains from his shoulders. It’s like the final traces of his daily life have fallen away with just your touch—gone is the hedonistic Childe, the calculating Tartaglia, leaving only the scattered fragments of a Snezhnayan boy far from home. Even at peace, there’s a longing in the way he looks at you—eyes wide as if in disbelief, unable to hold your gaze with all of his defenses stripped down.

“Yea. We are,” he concedes—so quiet that you barely make out the words over the sound of the wind and the soft movements of water. Difficult, and he’s right: nothing involving a Fatui Harbinger will ever be easy.

“I think you’re well worth the trouble,” you confess, letting your eyes meet his. They don’t shy away this time, there’s a blue fire blazing somewhere in the back of his soul that warms your cheeks and has your free hand clenching the sand underneath. Certainly well worth the trouble, for all of the moments he looks at you like this—holding the intensity of a thousand suns and all of the love and guidance offered by the moon, an entire universe dancing in his usually lifeless eyes.

And the trouble is most worth it when Ajax—not Childe, not Tartaglia, but Ajax, closes the miniscule gap and kisses you under the witness of the moon—you can be at ease.

“I am?” He teases, a whisper against your lips. You roll your eyes before the hand on his cheek slips to the back of his head, and you pull him close once more.

#viv writes #genshin x reader #genshin x reader fluff #genshin #childe #childe x reader #gn!reader #fluff #genshin fluff #short fic

[blazogirlsoneshots]

The Intimacy of Doing Another's Hair (Hermione Granger x Reader)

The air in the tent was cold and stale as night gently fell around the clearing. The once warm stars seemed cold and heartless while the ambient noise of the forest had all of the inhabits of the tent on edge. It seemed like the slime of despair dripped off of every surface in the interior.

It had been a hard couple of months for the group, what with death eaters constantly chasing them and Ron’s abandonment and all. It definitely didn’t help that they traded sessions of wearing a piece of Voldemort’s soul around their necks. Every day it got harder and harder to find a bright side and Y/N was constantly fighting off the urge to simply feel nothing. At least that would be easier, right?

Y/N sighed as they got up from their spot at the table and walked over to the stove to fetch some water for another cup of tea. Only Hermonie was inside, curled up in her bunk with a lifeless look in her eyes, Harry was on watch for the next couple of hours.

Ever since Ron had left, Hermione had turned into a ghost. She barely ate or spoke and simply spent her days floating from research, guard watch, and setting protection spells in whatever new haunt they found. The once bright eyes were now lifeless as the seemingly perfect girl began to break. Both Harry and Y/N had tried to get through to the girl but to no avail. All they could do was watch.

“‘Mione? Do you want anything?” Y/N set their mug and walked over to Hermione’s bunk. Hermione made no recognition that she had even heard their voice. “Hermione?”

“I’m fine,” She whispered, not looking away from that one fascinating spot on the wall.

“When was the last time you ate? Showered? Did anything that seemed remotely like living?” Y/N asked, internally cursing the panic growing in their voice.

“I’m fine,” Hermione repeated.

“No, you’re not and I am not going to just sit here and watch my best friend whether away. Come on, get up, and at least let me do your hair. I know how much you loved it when I would do that.” Hermione seemed to snap out of her daze and finally looked up at Y/N. Back at school, whenever Hermione would drown herself in school work Y/N would always hunt her down and drag her away from the books long enough to restore her hair to its normal state of being. Usually, by the time Y/N was done Hermione was relaxed enough to take a short nap and actually eat something.

“I don’t even have any of my stuff,” Hermione said.

“What if I told you that a couple days ago I went out and got you some?” Y/N smirked.

Hermione sighed, “Well then I guess I couldn’t stop you, could I?”

“Nope, now come on I found that conditioner you really like.” Hermione smiled softly as Y/N helped her out of her cocoon of sorrow. “I also found the really soft robe that I think you’ll love and before you get on my case about how I should waste all of these things all on you, I figured we could all use it.”

“You didn’t have to do this.” Y/N gave Hermione a sad smile as she headed to the shower.

“But I wanted to, now,” Y/N stuck out her hand, “Give me Horcrux. I don’t think we’re supposed to get it wet and you’ve had it on long enough already.”

Hermione slowly unclasped the necklace and gingerly placed it in Y/N’s palm. She tried not to let the relief of the release of the weight show on her face as Y/N grimaced when they put it on.

“Now, go. All of the stuff is on the counter and I even found a deep conditioning mask if you want to use that as well.” Y/N shooed Hermione off as they began preparing a small meal for the two of them.

Y/N quickly became immersed in their work as they set about making the perfect grilled cheese for Hermione. They couldn’t get their hands on that one soup that Hermione really liked, but they did find a pack of muggle cookies that Hermione had always wanted to try. During late nights she would often lament on the sweets she never got to experience growing up, seeing as her parents were dentists and health nuts.

Hermione emerged from the steaming bathroom feeling lighter and more solid. For the first time in weeks, a true smile broke across her face as she gazed across the kitchen. Somewhere in the cooking process, Y/N had turned on the radio so soft cheer music filled the tent. String lights were strung about the room giving it a cheery glow. Two plates were laid out on the table with the food arranged in the shape of a smiley face and mugs set next to them with steam dancing in the air.

A rustle from the entrance of the tent caused Hermione to spin around as Y/N emerged from outside.

“Oh, hey you’re all done,” Y/N grinned. “I thought Harry would like some, so…” Y/N gestured wildly to outside.

“Thank you, it looks so good.”

“Yeah, I figured we could eat while we wait for the mask to finish,” Y/N shrugged. Hermione reached up to the cap on her head and let out a small chuckle.

“Might as well.”

The pair ate in comfortable silence as Hermione let the peace of the moment wash over her. If she closed her eyes, she could see herself back in the Gryffindor common room next to the fireplace surrounded by the comfort of her books and far away from the stress of today. It was hard to believe that period of her life was only a few months ago. On the run every day felt like several years. She wouldn’t be surprised if she had grey hair already.

They finished their meal rather quickly and Y/N cleared the table while Hermione went back to the bathroom to wash out the mask. She returned with a comb and settled in a chair as Y/N go to work brushing out her hair.

Y/N took extra care to be gentle with their friend as they slowly battled the army of knots that had built up in her hair. Years of doing this had taught Y/N to pick up on when they were hurting Hermione and exactly how much force to use. After all of Hermione’s long hair was detangled, Y/N parted her hair and got to work on two Dutch braids. This was always Hermione’s favorite part of the process. There was something so calming and so intimate about someone running their fingers through their hair as they intertwined the strands.

“Do you want me to lay your edges?” Y/N asked as they twirled the baby hairs around.

“Might as well,” Hermione had to push down the butterflies growing in her stomach. This was always the most difficult part, with Y/N so close to her face that she could see the depts of their eyes with their breath on her lips.

It was almost too much.

“There you go,” Y/N leaned back as Hermione’s eye’s fluttered open. “What do you think?”

Hermione couldn’t quite breathe yet and could only stare at them.

“‘Mione? Are you-” Hermione cut them off by lean in a capturing their lips with her own. Y/N’s eyes fluttered close as their arms wrapped around Hermione’s waist.

“It’s perfect,” Hermione whispered as she slowly pulled away. Everything was perfect.

A/N: What's this? Poppy actually writing something after a year?

masterlist

#hermione x reader #hermione granger x reader #hermione #hermione granger #harry potter #x reader #fic: hermione granger

[solreefs]

<- Previous part Next Part ->

A note on Elnor’s pronouns: Elnor’s pronouns are kie/kir/kir/kirs/kirself. Conjugation examples will be after the story.

Warnings: Food mention, coughing, slime, a short flashback (though it isn’t scary or violent, just surprising) and also the plotline of the entire story revolves around memory loss/alteration, so don’t read if that’s an issue.

Taglist: @jolieharkness, @della-vacker-supremacy, @gay-otlc, @raiinyrxse, @pencilwritesshiz47, lmk if you want to be added or removed!

Part Two

“Arli,” the voice echoed. “Nice name.”

Slowly, Arli’s vision cleared, and she was able to see the person speaking for the first time. They were tall, that was clear even though they were kneeling, with frizzy red hair and a scar reaching from their forehead to their jawline. They had a nose piercing and were wearing mostly casual, practical clothes; a knee-length pleated green skirt, a belt, work boots, and black leggings. But their dark gray jacket with several colorful pins on the chest looked to be part of a uniform the rest of their clothes were not from. The pins themselves were either various wing symbols she didn’t know the meaning of or buttons etched with swirly glyphs she couldn’t read.

Why couldn’t she read them?

Should she be able to?

The person cleared their throat, having noticed Arli staring. “You’re awake now,” they said. “So let’s get you out of that pod.” They reached into the transport pod Arli hadn’t even registered she was in until now, and lifted her out. Sticky slime dripped from Arli’s clothes and hair and onto their once-pristine jacket. Why was it sticky? Was transport pod gel normally sticky?

“Your pins-”

“Just name and pronoun pins.”

“What do they say?”

“Elnor, kie/kir.”

“Hmm,” Arli replied. “Where are-” she was interrupted by another coughing fit.

Elnor sighed. “Look, I promise you’ll get answers soon, but right now, you can barely ask your questions. You need rest, and a lot of it.”

Arli would have protested, but she couldn’t stop coughing long enough to get the words out. Besides, deep down, she knew kie was right. Long periods spent in transportation pods weakened passengers substantially.

How long had she been in the pod for?

It took Arli a moment to realize Elnor was still talking. “The ship has an extra room,” kie was saying. “So that’s where you’ll stay until we can get to Europa.”

Arli’s coughing finally subsided. “Why Europa?” she asked.

“We won’t be there long,” Elnor said, which didn’t really answer her question. “Here’s your room,” kie added, ducking beneath the doorframe and setting Arli down on the bunk built into the wall of the small space. “Rest for now, and I’ll show you around later.”

Arli laid down, closed her eyes, and was asleep in minutes.

She woke up an unknown time later, feeling more alert and in far less pain. Arli swung herself out of the bunk and stood on still-unsteady legs. Right. Time to figure out what was going on.

She made her way down the corridor, leaning on the wall most of the way, and found what seemed to be the kitchen. She peeked inside and saw Elnor sitting at the table, reading a book and occasionally taking bites of toast.

“Ah,” kie said, getting to kir feet, “you’re up! Hungry?”

Arli shook her head. Now that she was fully aware of her surroundings, she found it hard to talk to Elnor, and especially since she knew nothing about kir.

“Well, we take off in an hour.” Elnor finished the rest of kir toast in one bite and brushed crumbs off kir skirt. “So you should probably shower while we still have gravity.”

“Shower?”

“I assume you don’t want to leave that pod slime in your hair.”

Arli was suddenly very aware of the sticky gel still in her hair and clinging to her clothes. “Oh my god!” She swiped at the congealing patches of slime on her sleeves.

Elnor watched with mild amusement. “You’ll probably want to throw those clothes out.”

She stopped violently scrubbing her cheek with her sleeve. “Through my clothes out?”

“There’s spare clothes in the hall closet.” Elnor set kir plate in the sink. “And we can buy you some more on Europa if we have time.”

Arli stared at Elnor. “You don’t get it, do you?”

Kie arched an eyebrow. “I don’t get what?”

“I can’t throw these out!” The words burst from her with an urgency even she didn’t understand. “I- they’re too important.”

“Do not lose this.”

“Yes, Commander,” Arli says, giving a small, facetious salute and sliding the box onto her belt.

Zyla laughs. “No need for that.”

“Arli?” Elnor snapped kir fingers. “Arli.”

She shook her head to clear it. “Uh- what?”

“You just spaced out on me,” Elnor said, sounding concerned. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, sure.” Arli tugged at her sticky sleeve. “I’ll shower, but I’m not getting rid of these clothes.”

Elnor seemed like kie was about to protest, but just replied, “Okay. Be quick, I need to turn off the water soon.”

Arli nodded and left the kitchen, turning right on instinct.

“The bathroom’s the other way,” Elnor called.

Arli sighed and turned around.

—————

Pronoun conjugation:

They went to the park -> Kie went to the park. I talked to them -> I talked to kir. That is their pencil -> That is kir pencil. The fries are theirs -> The fries are kirs. They laughed at themself -> Kie laughed at kirself.

#tw coughing #tw food mention #tw memory loss #tw flashbacks #tw slime #space wizards!! #falling stars #Ann writes #ask me about elnor’s pronouns if you have any more questions

[izzyfandoms]

Intrulogical (platonic or romantic) : Forest!God Remus (moss, decay, insects, underbrush darkness, mold, slime ect) meeting Sky!God Logan (Stars, constellations, clean rain, thunderstorm fury, knowledge divined from clouds) and having a complementary relationship with his foil. (It shouldn’t surprise Logan as much as it does. The forest needs rain to grow and flourish- just as the heavens needs the earth to shine. The sky needs the trees to breathe. The plants need the air to live. As is nature)

(Okay, so, this prompt is fucking amazing. I spent much longer working on it that I usually do with prompts and I would absolutely LOVE to write more things in this au (whether it’s intrulogical or another ship). Therefore I’m gonna tag this as ‘clouds and moss au’ which i’ll tag anything else i write in this au as. Also, i only just remembered i have a taglist so i’ll start adding it to my short prompt things from now on. Also this mentions all the other sides once.)

General Taglist - @quillfics42 @ajdraws0430 @phantomofthesanderssides @creativity-killed-thekitten @phlying-squirrel @sly-is-my-name-loving-is-my-game

Intrulogical - Clouds and Moss

Masterpost

Clouds and Moss AU Masterpost

Remus and Logan never really had a first meeting. None of the gods did.

At first, they didn’t exist, and then, one day, they did.

And when they did, they knew their purposes immediately. They knew of the other gods, and they knew, well, everything.

They didn’t need to meet, they interacted with each other through the interactions of their creations.

Humans cooked and danced with fire, and, through them, Patton felt Roman’s warmth.

Janus collected the numerous souls of the drowned, and, through them, he felt Virgil’s waves in his own lungs.

Plants flourished and grew as every drop of rain gave them life. Through them, Remus felt Logan’s gentle touch, like fingertips brushing against his skin. He never knew how much they paled in comparison to the real thing.

“I didn’t know you ever left the clouds.”

Logan glanced up from the tree he was studying, startled. He looked over Remus: the forest god leaning against a mossy tree trunk. It was hard to tell where the moss ended and Remus begun. There wasn’t a difference, really.

The sky god bowed, respectful, before straightening up and adjusting his glasses. Remus wondered why he needed them.

“Good morning, Remus,” He greeted. “I trust you’re having a pleasant day?”

Remus shrugged, wriggling his toes as a beetle crawled over his foot. He watched a butterfly land on a nearby branch. It didn’t know it was in the presence of two gods, and there was something nice about that.

Logan watched it, too. He didn’t seem to mind the silence.

“There will be a thunderstorm in exactly thirty-seven minutes and twenty-three seconds. I hope it doesn’t disturb any of your plans,” Logan said eventually, and that was that.

He disappeared, and a sillouette-shaped cloud lingered for a moment or two, before it, too, disappeared.

Remus sunk into the mud, until he became the mud, and took a nap.

He didn’t know how long it took until he saw Logan again. Gods lived longer than mortals, so most had a rather crooked sense of time. Some moments lasted years; some years lasted moments.

Logan seemed to be an exception to that rule.

“Good morning, Remus.”

Remus sat up. He hit the side of his head a few times, and a few bugs fell out the opposite ear. They hit the ground and scattered. Remus watched them run, and wondered how long it would take for something bigger to come along and squash them.

He didn’t speak for almost a minute, before he finally glanced up at his guest.

Logan was sitting cross-legged, floating a few feet above the ground. He, too, was watching the insects, with an odd look of fascination on his face.

“Why are you floating?” Remus asked, after a minute of watching the other god. “Afraid of a little mud?”

Logan looked up from the ground, meeting Remus’s eyes.

Blue. Logan’s eyes were blue.

Fitting.

“I do not want to get dirty.”

Remus stared at him for a few moments, and then slowly and deliberately - without losing eye contact - picked up a handful of mud. He then threw it at Logan, hitting him in the centre of the chest.

If he was honest, he’d expected the sky god to leave after that - maybe reciting the exact time of the next storm, beforehand, if he wasn’t too irritated at the forest god, but leaving nonetheless.

Instead, the corners of his lips twitched upwards, and he slowly lowered himself onto the ground, until he was sitting in the mud opposite Remus. He placed his hand close to the forest god’s, feeling the mud ooze between his fingers, and gave him a small nod.

Remus, a little perplexed, nodded back.

They sat there in silence for some time, until there was a rumble of thunder overhead, and Logan disappeared as quickly as he’d appeared.

It wouldn’t be accurate to say that Remus began counting the days after that. He had no interest in keeping track of the time. However, he had been watching the sky more, unintentionally keeping track of the days and nights through that.

It took fifty-seven days for Logan to come visit after that.

“Hey, Logan, how are the clouds?”

Logan gave him an amused look, adjusting the glasses that he absolutely didn’t need.

“They are adequate. There shall be some light precipitation in four hours, twelve minutes and three seconds.”

“Cool, cool, cool,” Remus waved his hand. “Why do you wear glasses? You don’t need them.”

Logan blinked a few times, before glancing away, a light blush dusting his cheeks. The red was a stark contrast to the cool blue colours that decorated the rest of his body.

Remus tilted his head, and decided that that colour suited him.

“I, uh… I just like them.”

He said that as if it was a crime, something to be ashamed of, and Remus paused for a moment, watching the flustered sky god, before reaching out and plucking the glasses right off his nose. He then placed them on his own face.

Remus looked around at their surroundings. They looked the same; the glasses altered nothing.

“Hmm,” Remus blinked owlishly at Logan. “I don’t get it.”

The corners of Logan’s lips twitched upwards, and he leant forwards, his face impossibly close to Remus’s. He carefully took his glasses back.

“They’re upside down.” He righted them, and then slid them back onto the forest god’s face. “Here.”

Logan’s fingertips brushed against Remus’s cheeks. They were soft, so soft, as gentle as the raindrops that landed on leaves and stayed there for hours. But Logan’s touch didn’t stay there for hours, no, it was gone within moments, and Remus found himself desperate for more, more, as the sky god pulled away and looked at him expectantly.

“It’s, uh… it’s the same,” Remus said awkwardly. “You really don’t need these, do you?”

Logan shook his head. Little droplets of water fell from his hair and landed on the ground. Remus felt them as if they’d landed on his own skin.

And his hair, oh, his hair. It was as black as night and looked as soft as clouds and Remus wanted desperately to hold him close and run his fingers through it.

Remus took off the glasses, and then carefully - more carefully than he did anything else - pushed them back onto Logan’s face. He let his touch linger, before pulling away.

There was mud on the sky god’s face now, and his glasses were lopsided.

Logan took a moment to correct them, but he made no move to get rid of the mud. The two stared at each other for an unknown amount of time, before Logan’s eyes drifted elsewhere, landing somewhere behind Remus.

The forest god didn’t even need to turn around. He had eyes everywhere, so he knew Logan was admiring a patch of flowers beside a tree.

Remus’s moustache twitched, and the prettiest blue flower appeared in his hand. He reached out and tucked it behind Logan’s ear. His fingertips brushed against a lock of hair; it was exactly as soft as it looked.

Logan’s lips parted slightly in surprise, and he reached up to touch the flower, his hand coming in contact with Remus’s, sending a shiver up his arm and down his spine.

There were a few moments of silence, before Logan suddenly disappeared, and then the rain began. Had it really already been four hours?

Remus turned his face to the sky, feeling the rain hit his skin and run down his body. If he closed his eyes, it wasn’t difficult to imagine that it was Logan’s hands on him instead.

The next time he saw Logan was much sooner than the last.

“Good evening, Remus,” Logan said, appearing behind the other god and peering curiously over his shoulder. “What are you working on?”

“This tree is dying,” He answered, laying his hand on the mossy trunk, feeling the life drain out of it like blood dripping from an open wound.

“Oh.”

Logan placed his hand on Remus’s shoulder. The forest god turned around, opening his mouth to speak again, but the words slipped back down his throat when he saw the other god’s face.

Oh, what a fool he’d been, when he’d called Logan’s eyes blue.

Logan’s eyes were the sky.

They weren’t just like the sky, they were the sky.

They were soft blue during the daytime, sure, but a harsh grey during storms. At night, the irises were dark blue - barely distinguishable from the black of his pupils - speckled with numerous bright white stars. Remus was sure that if you were close enough, you would be able to make out the constellations in his eyes.

And, right now, as the sun began to set over the horizon, his eyes were filled with the soft pinks and oranges of sunset.

Consciously or subconsciously - neither could tell - Remus began to lean closer to Logan, their faces only inches apart.

And then, Logan crossed the gap, and kissed him.

As soon as their lips met, rain began to pour from the clouds. The sky met the forest and it was impossible to tell where they ended and the gods began, but the duo didn’t seem to care.

Remus wrapped his arms around Logan, pulling him closer, pressing their bodies together and deepening the kiss. Time either flew by or crawled at a snail’s pace, neither god felt the need to keep track.

When Logan eventually pulled away, Remus let out an involuntary whine, and the sky god’s eyes - his gorgeous, gorgeous eyes - were wide, his lips parted in surprise at his own actions.

Remus glanced up at the sky, at the passionate storm that raged above them, and then back at Logan.

“Was that planned?” He asked, soft and breathless, and even he didn’t know if he was referring to the storm or the kiss.

Logan looked up, too, as if he’d only just noticed the rain, and then laughed. It rang through the air like bells and Remus silently declared it his new favourite sound. He looked back at the forest god, looking happier than he’d ever seemed before.

“No, it wasn’t.”

The other gods soon learned of the lovers, of course; rumours spread like wildfire. They talked and they talked and they especially loved to say that every drop of rain that hit the forest was a kiss shared between Logan and Remus.

When asked, Logan called the idea prepostorous - basing something as constant as the weather cycle on something as fickle as kisses would be foolish.

But, privately, he knew that they weren’t that far off.

#me #ask #writing #clouds and moss au #intrulogical #sanders sides #remus sanders #sympathetic remus #logan sanders #gods au

[bird-in-a-cage]

Zombie

Do not provoke the patient.

Do not touch the patient.

Do not ask any leading questions that could cause trauma to the patient.

If the patient touches you at any time you will be pulled from the room for decontamination and not permitted to return.

Do not pass anything to the patient. If caught doing so you will be arrested and charged with tampering with government properly.

Steve stared down at his hands on the table, under two layers of latex up to his elbows. He'd been forced to wash them three times until they were pink and raw. Thoroughly decontaminated.

When Max had handed him the very official looking letter, shaking with tears right in the middle of Family Video he knew it was serious.

He didn't think it would be this serious.

The room he'd been taken too was plain. Had no windows and only two doors. A table in the middle with two chairs. All of it bolted to the floor. It was cold stainless steel, not that Steve could really feel it through all the layers. Opposite was a large mirror that took up most of the wall. Clearly two way. The room behind probably full of officials and scientists, all very proper looking with ID badges and miles of abbreviations after all their names.

Apparently Neil had wanted to burn the letter. Ignore it completely like it never existed. Max had snatched it away and ran. Skitched behind a bus nearly the whole way with little care for safety. Robin read the letter first. Let Steve try and calm Max down somehow. The full severity of the situation hit home even harder when Robin's eyes blew wide, like she couldn't believe what she was reading.

Billy Hargrove was alive.

The room smelt overly sterile. Steve tapped his sneakers in plastic bags on the floor, waiting. They bounced hollow with no squeak. The door he hadn't come through was pushed open, and someone wearing a lab coat and a white mask walked inside with the ‘patient’. Set him down in the opposite chair on the other side of the table, and left without a word or even a passing glance.

Steve was shocked into silence.

This wasn't Billy Hargrove.

He remembered Billy being full of life and fire, eyes that could pierce at a thousand yards, a dangerous tanned frame, and a quick tongue within a mouth that was too smart for his own good.

The person in front of him was none of those things.

His hair was completely gone. Shaved short. His eyes looked black and bruised with fatigue, those once deep ocean blues sunk in and hidden, staring down at the empty table top. He was pale. Thin. Gaunt.

This wasn't Billy Hargrove. This wasn't the boy he'd known, had a whole secret life with away from the gossips of high school. Had spent nights with at the quarry getting high, drinking and talking, listening to mixtapes in each others’ cars. Playflighting about Billy’s love of metal and Steve’s love of anything that wasn’t. Making out in backseats in the rain.

This felt like meeting a stranger.

"I had a feelin' she'd ask you to come," Billy spoke. His voice cracked like it hadn't been used for a while. He raised his head and dared to smile, but it didn't look right. He felt forced and it was too big for his new face. Wasn't bright or menacing. Just felt like a mask. Hiding the pain underneath.

"She tried. Wasn't allowed in." Steve just watched as Billy rolled his shoulders in a silent laugh to himself, pulled his arms up with some effort to rest them on the table. They were lined with white scars and tracks, poked with obvious needle marks. His wrists were thin. Steve could see the tendons shift in the back of his hands when he moved his fingers. Rolled his hands into fists and released.

It made Steve’s heart fall into his stomach.

"H-how have you been?" Steve winced at his own question. It was obvious to see how Billy had been but he couldn't think of anything else to ask. Two days ago he, and the rest of Hawkins, believed Billy had died in Starcourt. The town chose to ignore the whole thing, not knowing the true story. It was just a terrible electrical fire that had spread too wild before it could be controlled. The government forbade Steve from talking to anyone about it aside from his specially appointed therapist once a fortnight.

It didn’t do very much. 

It’s hard to talk through being tortured by Russians in a secret underground base in the town that used to be your home but now just feels like a shell and all the memories you made there feel like lies. It’s hard to talk through fighting monsters and having to make split second decisions to either save your own life or a bunch of kids’ you barely know. It’s hard to talk through nightmares that are just endlessly long tunnels and a snarling noise and rows and rows and rows of teeth dripping slime clamping around your face and eating you alive soft parts first.

It’s hard to talk through losing the one person who understood you inside and out, even if you never completely opened up to them, but you just didn’t have too because you were both on the same page of the same chapter of the same book somehow. And that was all that mattered.

Steve had slowly made peace with the fact he was never going to see Billy again. Quietly. Alone in his home that he now felt like a ghost walking through. Acting like nothing had happened. It had taken months but he was slowly getting over his fear of the dark again. Was getting over waking up alone again.

Seeing Billy though, even as small and un-Billy like as he was sat on the other side of the table in a strange building it had taken three hours driving through the middle of nowhere to get too, with Max in the passenger seat bouncing her knees and going between wanting to throw up, cry or just scream out the window, had ripped open every wound Steve had tried to let heal.

It was the most alive he’d felt since July.

“I’ve been better,” Billy answered, with a small coy smile. “Been worse too.”

Steve blinked and he was back at the mall. Back when it was all over. The air thick with gunpowder and smoke. A single wail of despair echoing from a soul too young to deal with something so horrible.

They were all too young to deal with something so horrible.

Billy on the ground. Lifeless. Nearly torn in two. Cold eyes at the sky. Covered in black and blood. Laying in a puddle of indistinguishable fluid.

Yet here he was. Clean. Breathing. Alive. Eyes still bright despite obvious pain. It was a miracle.

"How?" Was all Steve could think to ask next. 

Billy shrugged, bony shoulders within hospital clothes. A pale mint coloured loose fitting top and matching pants. He didn't have shoes.

"I try not to think about it. They say it's not good for me to think about it. Causes too much stress."

They. The government. Doctors. The Russians. The monsters that could still very well live under Hawkins. The monster that was inside Billy the whole time unseen by those who should have cared enough to notice.

Steve would never forgive himself for that.

"But I fell asleep there. And woke up here. Only way I can put it."

It was November now. Thanksgiving was in two weeks. Billy had been three hours away for five months. If the letter had never been sent no one would have ever known. If Neil had burnt it no one would have ever known. His eyes flashed dull for a moment, dragged down to the table keeping them apart, looking at his own reflection or trying not to get pulled into remembering something awful Steve couldn’t tell.

His fingers itched within the layers of latex. To just reach over and touch and confirm this was all real and not some crazy hallucination. To feel Billy, alive Billy, breathing Billy again. Hold Samson and will his power back. Will all of this to be over for good. Kidnap and smuggle him out of here somehow so they could run away from nightmares and monsters and Hawkins forever. Start again somewhere where it never got cold. Where they could both get tans and be happy.

“Max says hi,” Steve said instead, keeping his hands between his knees. “Well, she says more than hi…”

Billy chuckled like a cough, matching Steve’s eyes. “I figured.” He slowly rubbed his chest like every heartbeat was aching.

Do not ask the patient about any procedures.

You have been asked to come here to stimulate cortexes within the patient’s brain. Sight alone should be sufficient but we understand you may wish to exchange a few words.

“Do you know if you’ll ever be out of here?”

Do not ask any leading questions.

Billy’s face fell. He tapped his fingers on the table. Thinking. His voice was small and sad. 

“No.”

Steve released his hands from being clamped down where it was safe and put them on the table, slowly inched over until it just barely touched Billy’s fingertip. Blue eyes sparkled a little. Felt like home seeing them like that again.

Do not touch the patient.

“I miss you,” he said quietly, forcing down a self pitying sob, focusing straight ahead. He heard a door behind him swing open. Billy rolled his hand over the latex. Squeezed tight. The door behind Billy swung open too. The doctor started coming towards them.

Do not touch the patient.

“I miss you too. Tell Max I love her, okay?” Billy smiled so genuinely as he put his hands up in surrender. Looked like he was practiced in that movement now. He was marched away without a glance back. The door was closed sharply and it was like nothing had ever happened. 

Steve had just spoken to a ghost.

Outside in the car Max was still in the passenger seat, waiting for news. Steve’s hands were even pinker after more decontamination cleaning. They tingled but he still felt the weight of Billy’s hand somehow. Felt the slight compression. She stared wide eyed at him getting in and slipping the keys into the ignition so they could return to Hawkins and pretend none of this had ever happened once again. One more lie wouldn’t hurt.

“He’s okay.” 

#harringrove #billy x steve #billy hargrove #steve harrington #my writings

[paperhatcollection]

A Duke and A Dad.

A fanic based solely on THIS picture by @honeycapp

To be fair, it’s not like they’d set out to get along from the beginning.

Which, and let’s continue to be fair here, wasn’t even the beginning from the start. But after years of ignorance and denial and paranoid thoughts that whispered across the mind at four in the morning- you had to start building a relationship back up from somewhere, and sometimes that work began in the middle of the story. Sometimes you had to dust out old cobwebs, and clean out the clutter, and find the cracked frame of a portrait you forgot you even had. Because remembering was painful, and it was the natural instinct of any part-of-a-human to avoid painful situations at all cost... or so you thought. So you thought.

You also thought nobody would ever willingly put another thinking, feeling being in pain when they had the power to help. But repression could be dangerous, and ignorance tenfold.

At first, nobody even knew where Patton had gone until he’d burst from Remus’s room in a full panic, with nothing but the echo of the Duke’s laughter following him down the hall. The idea had been quite simple in the beginning, really. Patton had wanted to meet a side of Thomas’s that he’d ignored and pushed down for far too long, had wanted to understand him in a way that wouldn’t leave him grasping for straws at every intrusive thought that wiggled and wormed its way into Thomas’s head. Remus had been excited at the thought of disturbing someone he’d never gotten a chance to disturb before, a side that (in his mind) had previously sat so ‘high and mighty’ atop a throne of acceptance, no matter what he seemed to do.

But then Patton came back and sat down on the only clean spot on Remus’s bed, ignored the way something was licking his ankles, and asked Remus through nervously gritted teeth where exactly he’d gotten the idea to wear an octopus on his head from, it was really- no thank you, he really doesn't want any blood. Yes, yes… he was very sure.

Patton didn’t know what he’d been hoping for, at the time. Peace, maybe. Of the mind, or the heart, or in general. He didn’t know. He’d been coming to realize he hadn’t known a lot of things, lately. More important things than he’d thought, anyways… Sometimes, out of the corner of his eye, he’d catch Janus watching him closely, but every time he’d turn his head to look, the snake-boi would have returned his attention to whatever else he had seemed to be doing. Patton had considered approaching Janus and asking him but- whenever he thought about it, his mouth felt dry and his throat felt closed off, and he was positive it had nothing to do with Janus’s own abilities at play. Remus would be… there, too. Not that he ever paid Patton any attention. 

But to be fair, no one gave anyone Remus any attention back. He was there. Always in the background, a consistent chatter to be tuned out, never the focus.

The next time Patton visited Remus, he took a stab in the dark and brought some homemade spaghetti, along with some garlic bread in his other hand. He watched Remus turn the tub of pasta over in his hands, as if trying to figure out what the hippity hoppity Patton had just given him. Then he’d popped off the lid, grabbed a handful of noodles, and shoved them into his mouth while grinning at Patton with far too many teeth. Patton had simply smiled back and remembered the last time he’d given Roman pasta. Sometimes, the twins looked more alike than they seemed to realize. After realizing he wasn’t getting too Patton this time, Remus had huffed and started to pick at the garlic bread, occasionally tossing chunks towards his dresser where they were snatched up by the jaws of… something Patton would rather not get a closer look at. Besides, who was he to go snooping in Remus underwear drawer?

(Remus caught him staring anyways, and figured hey if that’s what you wanna see pops- Patton excused himself while Remus was half undressed, but this time he left at a much calmer pace. He once again came back, at first to ask for the tupperware back, but spent all of five seconds watching Remus through the doorway before telling him he could keep it.)

It was a start, he supposed, and Patton soon turned it into tradition. He brought little gifts with him- first things based on what he knew Roman liked, but soon turning to things he guessed the Duke would enjoy, based on their slowly growing conversations and the things he saw littered around Remus’s room. (And Patton thought he’d been the messy side…). He’d tried bringing him a color book, but Remus had just eaten all the crayons and still somehow colored all the pictures in to be inappropriate images, and he’d tried giving Remus a fidget spinner but within five minutes of him having the thing it was made of knives and had an eyeball in the middle and followed Patton’s movements around the room. He swore it was blinking at him.

Then he tried branching out into a different direction- he brought Remus this newfangled thing he’d found called a ‘squishy’- this one designed for you to put slime inside so that when you squeezed it it came out through the mouth like… you know. And if when Remus squeezed it, it smelled a little too foul to be slime, well, his room kinda already smelled bad as it was. And then, after making a questionable gift decision at four in the morning, he got Remus a coffee mug shaped like a toilet. That very same morning, Remus showed up to breakfast drinking what Patton really hoped was coffee from that exact same mug. He’d also gotten Remus a plush shaped like an octopus with a little mustache, but he didn’t see it again the next time he’d visited, so he figured Remus must have torn it to shreds.

 One day, Patton had an idea that he… really wasn’t sure would work, but he figured it was worth the shot. Instead of bringing Remus something, he’d grabbed Remus and brought him to an empty room with some paint cans. Patton had handed him one- a green can of paint, and told him he’d always wanted to try just throwing around paint and seeing what would happen. So of course Remus threw the can of paint directly onto Patton.

So Patton threw a can of blue back on Remus in retaliation. And then Remus had laughed- dripping with blue paint, pushing it out of his face and winking at Patton, before tipping directly backwards and hitting the ground. Remus had spread his arms and legs back and forth- he was making a paint angel, Patton had realized, and he could only laugh cause… seriously, that was the most innocent thing he’d seen the Duke do up to that point. 

And if the two of them received a couple odd stares when they finally left the room a couple hours later- gosh the time had flown by- covered in more colors than Patton had thought possible, laughing at a joke that only made sense between the two of them... well, it was worth it in the name of mental health. Except… 

Patton wasn’t sure when something had changed.

Maybe it was when Remus had stopped waiting in the shadows of his room, under his bed or clinging to the ceiling above his door. Stopped watching every move Patton made, his eyes never leaving the moral side, morning star clutched a-little-too-tightly to his chest despite the little-too-wide grin he always wore. When instead his door would fly open when Patton got near it, or when Remus shoving a fistful of bugs in his face had shifted from trying to scare Patton to a genuine excitement at the new little… scuttle friends he’d found to add to the collection. Maybe it was the time he’d accidentally walked in on Remus sleeping- and yeah, it was always a surprise to see someone as chaotic and bursting with energy as Remus sleeping- and found him clutching a plush octopus to his chest, stitched up and patched where it had been ripped before.

Or maybe it was those times when Remus would find wherever Patton happened to be- sitting on the couch with a nice book, or stirring something in the kitchen, or at work trying to corral some of Thomas’s more runaway emotions- and suddenly Remus would be curled up at his side, clutching at Pattons arm, or his shirt, and not say a word. And slowly, piece by piece, Patton learned how to help Remus- push Remus too much, and you’d get snarls and scratches and screeching while the lights flickered. But a little nudge here, and a guiding hand here, and somewhere it wasn’t too bright and wasn’t too quiet- he’d found that Remus hated silence far more than he ever hated sudden or apprasive noises- and it would… help. Not magically make everything better all at once, but help.

Maybe it was that day Patton hadn’t been able to make it out of bed- everything had been too heavy. His arms, his legs, his eyelids, his thoughts. All he could do was wear his cat hoodie and fiddle with the edges of the sleeves, wondering if he should be feeling more… more something than the icky, heavy stone settled somewhere deep in his heart. When he’d been screaming at himself to get up, to do anything, as he watched the shadows slowly crawl their way across his wall. And then there had been a knock at the door- a quiet, timid knock, and then there was someone in there with him. A hand on his forehead, and then his cheek, and red eyes looking into him. And arms wrapped around him, and a warmth that made him shutter and cling to it, running his hands down fabric covered in glitter that clung to his hands and made them sparkle like a scattering of stars.

Maybe it was the time Remus had snuck up behind him once, in the living room, and grabbed Patton suddenly to spin him around in a circle. And Patton had just laughed, and called out Remus voice in a voice as cheerful as a bell, and everyone had suddenly looked at him like they suddenly realized something Patton didn’t. Maybe it was the way Remus would act around him- loud noises and sudden movements and grabbing his hands to bolt to the other side of the house just to watch Remus throw himself headfirst into the trash- maybe it was the way Remus never treated Patton like he’d break if he rose his voice a little too loudly. 

Maybe it was the time Patton had casually mentioned that he didn’t really know how to dance, and Remus had laughed, all high pitches and barking, and said that it was easy. That he could teach Patton lickity-split. Then he’d licked Patton’s cheek. And Patton had accepted, cause why not, while rubbing the drool off his face with the back of his hand, and when he’d finished doing that he’d looked up to realize they were suddenly in a ballroom. And Remus had taken his hands, and led him through the basic steps- except Remus had two left feet, probably literally, and Patton couldn’t help but think of an old saying about the blind leading the blind. And Patton had laughed, and pulled Remus closer, and hummed an old disney song as he fell in rhythm. And maybe they weren't the best dancers- maybe they stumbled and occasionally tripped over each other, and had to brush themselves off and start from the beginning- maybe they weren't perfect. But maybe.

Maybe.

Maybe sometimes you’ve cleaned out the cobwebs, and rebuilt the walls, and fixed the frame- and you make something new, and better, and something you cherish so much more than all the old things you miss.

Maybe you can make something magical, between a joke-cracking side and a side-spliting Duke. Maybe

Only one way to find out.

#sanders sides #remus sanders #patton sanders #intruality #remus being remus

[geraskierficrecs]

okay but aside from the witcher soldier gimme some of the witcher trapped in a curse forcing him to push jaskier away (thats what forced him to say the thing on the mountain maybe?) and he breaks the curse somehow and just pulled jaskier close for a kiss and everything is better okay byw

Okay, so I thought about this prompt and it got really dark.  Hope it hits your angsty heart right.

______________________________

Geralt walks out of the inn with a smile twitching at his lips.

The smile is only the latest of a seemingly endless list of of strange things that have occurred since he first met Jaskier.  He had been so convinced that loneliness was just another part of the Path, as inevitable as the monsters he was called upon to hunt.  It had been obvious, aching, and constant, but he told himself that he would accept it.

And then, Jaskier.

Jaskier with his quick smiles and fumbling affections.  Jaskier who never shied away from the blood and death that clung to him like shadows.  A man that had seen the worst of Geralt’s sins only to choose to remain at his side.  

Falling for the bard had been slow and steady--the final slide towards something close to happiness.  As implacable as gravity.  

Geralt wasn’t proud of how long it had taken him to see it, but now...

Now he knew the taste of Jaskier’s love on his tongue, the way his eyes flared dark with lust and bone deep happiness, and how perfect the bard felt against him.  It was, all of it, perfect.

The kiss had been unexpected--as most things regarding Jaskier seemed to be.  He’d been careful around the bard since all the venom he’d spat at him on the mountain.  Too damn grateful and terrified of what could happen if Jaskier realized that Geralt was only capable of bringing pain to risk upsetting the human again.

But then he’d woken to find Jaskier curled along his side like he belonged there and the scratchy sheets and sounds of other humans in the tavern below them became meaningless.

Geralt let himself fall.

Now he walks away from the tavern with happiness thrumming in his chest like the wings of some songbird trapped within his ribcage.  Jaskier had been sleepy and warm when he’d left, smiling softly at Geralt’s explanation that he intended to finish off the drowners nearby and use the money to get them another night here and some food.

“Hurry back,” the bard murmured and settled languidly on sheets that smelled like the two of them.

Geralt’s feet move faster at the reminder, his mind torn between the hunt and the man waiting for him back at the end.  For the first time, Yennefer’s rejection feels meaningless.  He’ll be tied to her forever, but not the way he is tied to Jaskier.  Loving Jaskier will be a choice he never regrets.

He’s almost out of sight of the village when a voice calls out from behind him, “Witcher!  Geralt of Rivia!”

He turns and feels the dull crackle of magic sink deep into his chest and freeze him in place.

Yellow eyes go wide with surprise and fury, but he can do nothing as a woman dressed in plain black robes closes the distance between them.  She appears unfazed by the raging Witcher caught in her spell and steps closer to examine him more closely. Whether she was truly looking at him was hard to determine as a gauzy scarf was tied around her eyes, blocking them completely from sight.

Geralt glares at her, still trying to fight the compulsion to stay still.  She smiles, “I’ve been looking for you for some time, Witcher.”

A growl rips itself free from his chest.

“Yes, you are a vicious thing, aren’t you?  But can you also speak?”

Abruptly the vise around him is loosen enough that he can move his jaw.  He licks his lips--torn between getting answers and not wanting to give her the pleasure of doing as she asked.

“What the fuck do you want, witch?”

She sighs, moving close enough to run her fingers over the front of his armor.  He grits his teeth when he catches the scent of her--rot and blood.  Her fingers are stained at the tips as though she never manages to clean away the remains of her victims.

“It’s unfortunate, Witcher, that we must meet this way,” she says with a fake pout, “I feel like we could be great friends-”  The way she says friends makes him want to vomit.  “-but I’m afraid I need your services now.”

“I already have a job--go find another Witcher.”

“Ah, but you’re the only Witcher--or man, for that matter--who has managed to ensnare the lovely Yennefer of Vengerberg’s heart.”

Geralt stares, a cold knot twisting in his stomach.  “What do you want with Yenn?”

Somehow he feels the moment the eyes beneath the scarf turn to him.  They drift over his face, trailing slime and filth in their wake.  He shudders and she smiles again.

“I want to make her pay.”

____________________________________

His feet move with the inevitability of the damned.  Past the venomous laughter of the mage.  Back towards the tavern with a sick sense of dread.

He fights each flex and pull of his muscles to no avail.  Just as he tries to fight the words that echo in his mind with every beat of his heart.

Find the one your heart aches for and make them suffer.

Bile pools in his throat as each step takes him closer and closer to the person he has already hurt too many times.  Only it isn’t Yennefer’s proud, broken expression that fuels his cursed focus--it’s Jaskier.

He walks through the streets with the ghost of the happiness he’d felt this morning nipping at his heals.  He can feel the way his fingers are aching for soft skin and flesh that will bloom dark purples and blues when he wraps them around Jaskier’s fragile ne--

Geralt gives a full bodied shudder and vomits bile and the last of his supper into the street.  Someone shouts angrily at the mess, but Geralt can’t even stop long enough to snarl back.  His feet are already pulling him back to the path that will lead him to Jaskier.

In desperation, Geralt yanks weakly at the straps of his weapons until they fall with dull clanks to the ground.  His mind whirls, searching for loopholes in the command like an animal caught in a trap.  Suffering can mean so many things, after all.  Without his weapons, he can at least ensure that the bard isn’t permanently harmed.  All he needs is time.  Time enough for his Witcher abilities to eat through the power fueling the compulsion and spell that keeps him moving forward.

Beneath his feet, the floorboards of the old tavern creak irritably at his weight.  His mind whirls.  Perhaps he’ll be lucky and Jaskier has disappeared into the town to spend the day among the market stalls.  It’s only been an hour or so since Geralt left him in their room.  He shouldn’t be expecting the Witcher to return for at least a few hours and--

“Geralt?”

Jaskier’s voice feels like a death knell instead of the salvation it usually brings.

Geralt bites his tongue bloody when the bard opens the door to their room wider and smiles, bright and beautiful and so damn trusting.  He looks delighted at the thought that the Witcher has returned so quickly to him.

“Well, my dear Witcher,” he says as Geralt steps forward on numb feet, “this is an unexpected pleasure.  I thought you were going to be hunting for the rest of the day?  Or did you just miss me?” Jaskier’s eyes are dancing with laughter and love and--

“Now why would I do that?”

Jaskier stops, surprised and looks back at Geralt.  “What--what do you mean?”

The words drip like poison from Geralt’s lips even as his horrified mind tries to order them away, tries to clench his jaw--anything to keep this from happening. He can feel the spell settling into his skin and bones like a disease, eager to fulfill the compulsion of the blind witch.

Make them suffer.

“Did you think last night meant something to me, little bard?” he asks, despite the screaming in Geralt’s head, “That I actually wanted more from you.”

The bard is still now, only a slight tremble in his hands.

“Why would I ever want anything from you?” he continues, speaking slowly like Jaskier is too stupid to understand the lies spilling from his mouth, “You.  An insignificant bard whose only claim to fame is the fact that you follow after me like a lost puppy and pick up every scrap of affection I throw your way.”

Geralt wants to scream.

He wants to grab Jaskier close and whisper that he loves him over and over again until it’s all he can remember.

He wants to find the witch and find some way to make her suffer before he rips her shriveled heart out of her chest.

But all he can do is watch every bit of eager happiness leach away from Jaskier’s body like sun behind a cloud.

“But,” Jaskier’s voice is rough and Geralt thrashes within his mind against the compulsion with the need to cradle him close, “...what about last night?”

Geralt feels his fingers twitch and he’s so elated by the realization that the spell is weakening, that he doesn’t notice his lips forming the words that destroy every bit of the happiness he’d found at his bard’s side.

“I was bored and you were always so willing to spread your legs for anyone--I figured I could finally see what all the fuss was about.”

And here, here is the worst of it all.

Because Jaskier doesn’t turn on him.  Doesn’t snap or snarl at the hateful words Geralt says.  Doesn’t slap the Witcher across the face like he deserves.

No, he goes still and quiet.  There is no surprise in his features, nor any of the usual good humor and quick wit.  He straightens as best he can and nods to himself.

“I see,” he says in a brittle voice, “well, I think I understand now.”

He reaches for the pack beside the bed and stuffs his clothes in roughly while Geralt watches helplessly.  The Witcher’s fingers twitch again at his side, but it does nothing to stop Jaskier’s jerking movements as he pulls on his boots and walks past him to the door.  

There he stops and tilts his head so that Geralt can’t see the tears dampening the collar of his shirt.

“Goodbye, Geralt.”

The door closes behind him with a soft click and Geralt is left staring at the wooden lute left quiet and alone on the bed still tousled from the night they’d spent together. 

Jaskier doesn’t come back.

_______________________________

I know I usually promise a happy ending, but the angst really got me here.  I may come back and write another chapter if y’all want more.  Until then, I’ll just be over here crying.

[commorsicoclub]

The Commorisco Club (3)

If you were waiting for the real vore to begin, here it is people. 

Soft, unwilling, male pred, male prey, belly bulges, teasing, fear play and brief mentioning of peanut allergies. 

Chapter three: The Waiting Game

Archeon left them to contemplate their new roles with a promise that food would soon be delivered to them to aid in their recovery. Just before closing the door shut, he paused and peered at them through the crack, his red eyes glimmering with want. “Rest well, morsels.”

Once the teal door had shut closed and they were sealed inside, the velvet drapes fell again and they were left alone.  

“If we don’t eat then we won’t get our strength back,” Michael said in a hushed whisper. “And then they won’t eat us.”

“You think that’s really gonna stop them?” James asked, irritated and angry. “That the big-fucking-giant-demon-monster things won’t just get pissed and eat us anyway?”

“We have to eat eventually,” Erin added despondently. She pressed the back of her head against the velvet covered wall. “And what’s the point in playing hunger strike chicken with those things? James is right. They’d just wolf us down anyway.”  

“What are we going to do?” Valarie said, her voice trembling. “I-I don’t want to be eaten again...”

“Yeah, fuck that!” Michael said, disregarding his previous volume. “Neither do I!”

“No one does,” James said as he tried to crawl on his hands and knees back to one of the cushions and having a difficult time doing it. “If the plan is escape, we can’t when were all like this...”

“But by the time we’re better, they’re gonna be ready for suppertime!” Michael whined. “What are we supposed to do?”

Erin copied James and began to make the slow crawl back to her cushion. She was so tired and her head hurt and all she wanted was to sleep. By the time she made it to her velvet covered bed, she was crying. She heard the others still talking and their voices were raising and it sounded like James and Michael were arguing. She curled up, wishing she had the covers from her bed back in her dorm room. The room was not cold, but she missed the feeling of the soft cotton against her skin.  

I have a math exam I need to study for, she thought inanely. It did not matter now, she supposed. Anything. There was nothing for them to do but wait. Wait for the demons to return, for them to grab them all up, and swallow them down again. She could almost feel the slime covered walls of the thing’s belly and she shuddered at the memory and forcibly shutting it down.

Eventually everyone became silent and she could hear their measured breathing as they all slept. But she remained awake. Despite the bone deep fatigue and the absolute desire to sleep...she couldn’t. Insomnia was not a new experience for her, but it was never this bad. If she had trouble sleeping she would normally go to the college’s 24 hour gym and run a mile or two so she could wear herself and her brain out enough to sleep. But now…she couldn’t even stand.

There was no concept of time in the room and it did not seem long at all after everyone had fallen asleep that the sound of the curtains pulling away could be heard. She sat up abruptly, her heart in her throat and every muscle tensed as she watched the door, waiting for it to swing open. Instead, a secondary and much smaller door set into the wood opened up – almost like a doggy door – and a squat and fat toad like demon waddled inside. It didn’t seem to have a neck, just a wide flat head that immediately attached to a rotund wide body all supported on stick thin legs and long flat feet. It had large yellow eyes draped with bumpy eyelids and stared ahead almost listlessly. It looked nothing like the other demons, there was nothing humanoid about him aside from being bipedal.

“Need to be opennin’ yur peepers, Meat,” it said in a low craggy voice, making its way closer to the cloister of humans with ambling steps. His wide flat feet making slapping sounds on the ground. “Master says I bring ya’s food so’s ya ready fer th’ eatin’. So’s foods I got.”

It’s lip-less mouth stretched alarmingly wide and it tilted it’s head back, revealing rows and rows of serrated teeth and a dark throat. Erin screamed and jolted the others awake and upon seeing the mud colored demon with its mouth agape and it’s hideous teeth, they too began to scream. The drama student who had passed out during Archeon’s vist sat bolt upright with a panicked cry and then looked around confused. Upon seeing the toad demon, his screams of panic joined the others.

The ugly toad hunkered down and with a disgusting squelching sound, regurgitated a metal box that shot up into the air and landed in between the cushions that James and Valarie were occupying.

“Oh my god, that is disgusting!” Valarie shrieked, inching away from slime covered thing.  

“What the ever loving fuck is that?” Michael demanded. Whether he was referring to the toad demon or the box was unknown, but both seemed to upset him in equal measure.

The demon closed it’s mouth, sealing away its many teeth. “Likes I says: Master says I bring ya’s food so’s ya ready fer th’ eatin’.”    

“Get the fuck away from us!” James yelled before falling off the back edge of his cushion and floundering to right himself.

“If you even think about trying to eat me,” Michael wailed. “I will kick you in your fucking demon nads!”

The toad demon did not seem to care how the humans around him were reacting and his yellow eyes did not seem to be focusing on anything in particular and seemed quite board. “Meat is all a hoolerin’ an’ a hollerin’ fer nothin’. Master says I ain’t supose t’ gobble ya’s ‘cause ya’s special no eatin’ meats. Says he’d be gobblin’ me if I’s be gobblin’ any of ya’s.”

“You mean Archeon?” Erin asked warily, eyeing the box. “Is...is he your master?”

“No’s!” said the toad in the first showing any real emotion. It looked almost insulted. “Archeon no master a’ nothin’. Master Rolland be master a’ Gobbler.”

“...G-Gobbler?” the drama student asked. He was pale and shivering.

“Gobbler is be me,” the toad grumbled as it turned back towards the door and began to waddle away, mumbling in displeasure. “Stupid meats not know nothin’. Archeon no master ‘a Gobbler...”

The smaller door shut with a bang and the draped fell back to their places.

“What...what the hell is going on?” the drama student asked. “Where’s the other guy? D-did….di I get eaten again?”

“No, you just kind of fainted,” James said. “And that...thing apparently was Gobbler. Archeon left a while ago.”

“...A-Archeon?”

“Big guy with horns,” Erin said. “You kind of missed introductions.”

Michael was crawling towards the regurgitated box, his face a mixture of disgust and curiosity. It was a munitions box with faded Chinese writing on the side. He reached out to try and flip the latch open, but pulled his hand back in revulsion as a thick cord of Gobbler spit draped from his hand back to the box. Michael began to fervently wipe his hand against James’s cushion.

“Augh! Gross, man!” James whined.

Michael ignored him and tried once more, using the tips of his fingers to finally flip the latch. It popped open easily and out spilled an impressive amount of prepackaged sandwiches. Despite the saliva and goo covered crate, the packages inside were untouched.  

“Did that guy just swallow everything at a 7-11 or something?” James asked, reaching out to grab one of the sandwiches. He tiled the black plastic to read the label and then dropped it. “Ew, tuna.”

Erin slowly stood up, her legs only feeling slightly wobbly, and walked over to examine the pile herself. The others were doing something similar. She picked one up, a ham and cheese on wheat, and looked at the label. “They’re not even expired.”

“Seriously,” the drama student was saying. “We’re dead right? This...this is all bonkers.”

“I don’t know anything anymore,” Valarie said, pealing the plastic apart and tucking into a roast beef. She took a large bite and chewed methodically, tears starting to drip off her chin. “I’m so fucking scared and I’m tired and my head hurts and I’m so hungry...”

The drama student was picking idly through the offerings. “Anyone see any that says allergen free?”

“Why? You allergic to gluten or something?” Michael asked mockingly with his mouth full.

“No, just peanuts. I mean, so long as I don’t eat one I’m fine, but I don’t have my inhaler so if I have a bad reaction I’ll just die.”

Michael had the decency to look shame faced.

“Here,” James said, tossing a green plastic package over to the drama student. “It says allergen free on it.”

The drama student looked down at the label and shrugged tiredly. “Oh well. I guess beggars can’t be choosers...”

Michael was unwrapping a second sandwich, looking around their prison in idle fascination. “You know what?” he asked. “This room kinda looks like a stomach...”

Everyone froze mid-chew to take a moment to look about. After swallowing, they all looked at the remains of their sandwiches, appetites suddenly lost.

“Hey, blue hoodie kid,” James asked. “What’s your name?”

The drama student raised his eyes brows. “Huh? Oh, I’m Danny.”

“I’m James.”

“Michael.”

“Valarie.”

“Erin.”

“Just warning you Danny,” Michael added, his appetite abruptly revived as he took another bite. “Since we didn’t know your name at the time, Archeon said he was just gonna call you Snack.”

Danny scowled and averted his eyes and took a few moments to pick at the wilted lettuce in his sandwich. They ate in silence. Erin felt like she had a good idea of where their minds were at. She could already tell her energy was returning and now that they had food...well It was almost a matter of time now, she supposed. Feeling as though a great big clock hung over all their heads, counting down, they spent the next half hour eating their fill and waiting.

Waiting for the demons to come have their lunch...

…………………………………..

Only Erin and Danny were still awake. The others were quietly snoozing with Michael every so often making a loud snort and rolling over.

“Can’t sleep?” Danny asked her.

She shook her head. “Insomnia.”

“Pre-existing condition or newly acquired?”

Erin felt her face crack into a sardonic smile. “I’ve had it for a few years.”

Danny nodded, staring off into space. “How long do you think it’ll take? For them to come back.”

“Don’t know,” she replied with a sigh. “Archeon said they won’t come to feed on us until we’ve got all our strength back. I wonder how they can tell.”

“Maybe the can smell it,” Danny offered. A thunderous snore from Michael drew his attention and he added, “All I smell is bologna and Michael’s feet.”

Erin cracked another smile. She was beginning to really like Danny. Away from Archeon, he was witty and sweet. Not a whimpering mess that fainted when a giant demon flashed his teeth at him. Though she was sure she was no better. Like her, he was petite for their age, hitting their last real growth spurt before their metabolism could adjust. His blue hoodie was two sizes too big and he had his arms and legs tucked inside.

“If they just suck our energy,” he wondered aloud. “Why do they have to swallow us to do it?”

“Archeon said that’s how it’s done,” she replied, his words echoing in her head. In order for us to ingest your energy, we need to ingest you. She felt a shiver down her spine and the two sandwiches she had eaten sat heavily in her stomach.

“Archeon,” Danny said, the word seemed to quiver on his lips. “He...he’s the guy that ate me, right? So what about the others?”

“He never told us their names,” she replied. “But Gobbler said Rolland was his master. I suppose he’s one of them.”

“Gee, I wonder which of us is the luck meal,” he said sarcastically and then winced. “Ah, ignore me. The weird part of my brain’s kicking in. When I’m nervous I start saying stupid shit.”

“It’s alright,” she said and offered him a grateful smile. “I appreciate the attempt to lighten the mood.”

“So, what major are you?” he asked.  

“Biology,” Erin replied and seeing the expression on Danny’s face, added, “It’s OK to laugh.”

“No,” he mumbled, biting his lips in an attempt to quell his amused grin. “I’m good.”

She shook her head. “You’re in the drama department right? Are you a theater major?”

“Nah,” he answered, pulling his arms and legs from his hoodie and standing up to stretch. “Music major. I’m in the orchestra that does all the theater department shows.”

She blinked in surprise and found herself smiling. “Oh really? What do you play?”

“I’m first chair guitar,” he said. “But I play a bunch of other stringed instruments.”

“Too bad you don’t have one with you here,” she said. “Some music sounds really nice right now.”

“When Valarie wakes up we might convince her to sing,” Danny said. “I’m pretty sure she’s a music major too. Vocals. I’m bad with faces since I spend most of the shows in the pit, but I think I remember her playing Fatine in last semester’s Les Miz production.”

She nodded and sighed.

“Man, I miss my ipod,” Erin lamented. “And my bed and blanket.”

“I miss not having to wait for a monster to come and eat me,” Danny said flatly. “It’s like all your worse nightmares from when you were a kid. Except real.”

Erin froze as the velvet drapes began to rustle and pull away. The teal door was already opening and in the blackness of the beyond, peered two glowing red eyes. Her mouth fell open and she flapped her hand at Danny in warning, unable to form words. He looked at her bizarrely and then understanding hit. He whirled around just as Archeon stepped into the room, his eyes glowing with hunger and teeth bared from behind grinning lips. His long coat was gone and he was rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, jeweled fingers catching the light of the orb above them and sending small flecks of diffused light bounces around the walls. “Snack time, boy.”

“Fuck!” Danny said, scrambling to try and make a run to the covering of the metal shelf, but he floundered and slipped on the plush cushion.  Archeon easily stepped over the other sleeping humans to reach down and sweep a many ringed hand under to catch Danny around his middle just as he was about to face plant onto the floor. He was lifted up easily and he began to struggle and yell. The commotion had alerted the others and bleary eyes snapped open and they started scrambling back away from the demon, crying out in alarm. Archeon ignored them all, devoting his attention to his squirming prey as he dangled Danny above his face. The demon licked his lips idly and hummed in anticipation.

“I’ve had you on my mind all day, Snack,” he purred, lowering his hand just enough to flick his tongue out to give Danny’s feet a quick sampling. Danny pulled his feet away as best he could, but there was no where to go where the demon’s seeking tongue could not easily reach him. “The taste of you. The feel of you wiggling on my tongue. The delicious squirms as you settle in my belly...”

To emphasis this, he patted his stomach.

“Fuck!” Danny whined, trying again to keep his feet out of Archeon’s mouth. “Let go of me, man!”

“Heh heh. No,” Archeon replied with a grin and turned back towards the teal door. “You’re mine for the next few hours, Snack.”

From her spot under the overhang, Erin could see Danny still struggling in the large demon’s grip and could only watch and cry out for her friend as Archeon prepared to devour him for a second time. With a dark chuckled, the demon pulled the human closer. “In you go...”

Great jaws parted and threads of saliva hung from sharp teeth as Danny was thrust into the open maw.

“NO! Don’t do it! Don’t – mmph!” His cries were cut off as Archeon practically stuffed the boy inside, his hand pulling away as his lips pressed around Danny’s middle to leave his legs to kick and flail freely. His great horned head titled back and he opened his jaws again, Danny’s frightened cries becoming more audible for all of one moment before the Demon used his tongue to lift and pull more of his meal into his mouth. Just as the teal door closed, Erin heard the throaty chuckle and then a gulp. The door closed, the velvet drapes fell back, and Danny was gone. They were left alone with one of their number gone, on his way down to Archeon’s belly.  

………………………………………

The next demon came only a few minutes after Archeon left. No one had moved or said anything as they waited, huddled close under the metal shelf. It was no real protection, but it felt safer than being out in the open. When the drapes pulled back again, everyone tensed up, sucking in shuddering breaths, and trembling.

The door opened and a new demon entered. Her skin was a shade of blushing pink and long white hair fell down around her shoulders and two bone white opalescent horns poked out from atop her head and curled around like a ram’s. He eyes were a brilliant deep blue and like Archeon before her, they glowed with clear predatory hunger. A large blood red jewel was set into a choker around her neck and she wore a short white blouse that exposed her flat belly and form fitting black pants that showed of her elegant curves.

“Hello,” she said, her voice sultry and disarming. “Poor little humans, you look so frightened.”

She knelt down and crawled on her hands and knees towards them, her head swaying back and forth like a snake, but her eyes never left the form of one particular human. Michael looked ready to bolt at any moment, suddenly finding himself face to face with the demon who had swallowed him once before.  

“Don’t worry, though,” she said to Michael, shoulders hunching to make her breasts push out and she stared at him in a coy and flirtatious manner. “I don’t bite.”

“It’s not your bite that I’m worried about!” Michael squeaked.  

Her eyes seemed to sparkle with amusement. “No? Oh you don’t mean that you don’t want me to eat you, little man?”

“Yes! Yes, that very much, please!”

“Oh, but I’m not so bad,” she said, pressing closer still and using her hands to cut Michael off from escape. Her fingers traced along his chest in teasing circles. “I’ll be much gentler this time. And I’m oh so soft inside, I think you’ll find my tummy to be very cozy.”

“FAT CHANCE OF THAT LADY!” Michael was wild with hysteria and as he tried to run, her fingers wrapped around him. “Oh sweet Jesus!”

“But you look so yummy,” she purred, pulling him closer to her face where she nuzzled him. “You smell good too. I was so happy when we met the other night. You made me feel so good. Fuller than any of those lower ghouls ever did. I want that feeling again. Of you inside me, wiggling. I want to taste you...” her tongue slipped out and drew a slimy line down the side of Michael’s face. “Mmmm…oh you’re as delicious as I remember.”

Michael was incoherent in his panicked ramblings and could do no more than fruitlessly struggle. He was not a small guy and the Demoness seemed to have no trouble at all keeping a firm handle on him.

“Be good for me, darling,” she whispered to him. “I’ll make this quick.”

Her mouth opened wide and in Michael went, her saliva coated tongue peeking out the sides of her mouth as she tasted him with open relish. She kept a firm grip on Michael’s legs and made her first swallow. He sank into her gullet and before he could react, she swallowed again. It only took her four swallows to down all of the broad shouldered athlete and the captive and horrified audience watched as her smooth flat middle sank with her meal’s weight. It began to jiggle and sway as Michael made his protests known. She pressed a hand to her belly and sighed in delight, eyes closing as she concentrated on the delicious feeling of live, wiggling prey. “There we are, my little human. Nice and cozy, like I promised.”  

She carefully stood up, one hand cradling her stomach and she licked the fingers of her other hand. “It’s no wonder you humans are so prized. Your flavor is divine.”

“You’re monsters,” Valarie sobbed, covering her face.

The Demoness tuned her head to look at the girl and she smiled sweetly, licking her lips. “And you’re yummy.”

With an energetic sway of her hips, the Demoness sauntered back to the teal door. She stopped and turned back to the remaining humans.

“Oh! And I’m Lyra by the way. Forgot to introduce myself. Forgive me, I can never recall my manners when I’m famished,” she said, both hands leisurely petting her bulging belly, seeming to relish each kick or jerk of her meal. “Egan should be paying you all a visit shortly. Ta-ta!”

The door closed, the velvet drapes fell, and then they were three.

#NDCC #CH 3 #soft vore #endosoma #swallowing #male pred #demon pred #male prey #teasing #bellies #female pred #demoness #giantess vore #Erin #Valarie #Michael #Danny #James #Archeon #Lyra #g/t #unwilling

[cozykhaos]

A New Sun Part 13

Saturday morning I woke up to my head throbbing, my vision blurred every time I moved. My stomach lurched if I moved too quickly and my mouth tasted and felt like I had licked the field from one end of the farm to the other. After brushing my teeth several times and many cups of coffee I started to feel normal again. I spent the rest of the day in the Community Center writing lists of what I need to find. I realized I would need help. What was a Fiddlehead Fern? Where would I find an Eel? I obviously needed animals on the farm. Did someone have 25,000G laying around? I sure didn’t. How the hell do you grow a pomegranate?

I laid back on the floor, the ground underneath me groaned with my weight and the carpet squished against my body. I dug my palms into my eyes, what had I gotten myself into? Asher put his head on my shoulder and sighed.

“You’re telling me,” I looked at him. He had spent the days chasing the Junimos, every time he was close enough to catch them they would disappear in a cloud of sparkles. My dog would stare at the spot in confusion, once they reappeared they would start the game over.

I frowned at the list, if I had checked the mail sooner I would already have two bundles done. At this point it would a year before I finished. I pinched the bridge of my nose and headed out. Tomorrow was the first day of Summer and I wasn’t prepared at all. I would have enough money to buy seeds but until my first harvest it would be tight. Sitting on the front porch of my house I looked across the fields, the sun was starting to melt behind trees, the crickets started to chirp.

I remembered coming here the first day of my Summer vacation. Grandpa would always buy corn seeds, telling me how they lasted all the way through Fall. The fields would be blossoming with life.

Blueberries, melons, sunflowers, peppers, radishes, tomatoes. It was a lot of work, but now I was starting to realize that grandpa didn’t make me do that much. He would always let me go off and hang out with the others. Letting me enjoy my Summer.

Eos Farm wouldn’t have half that life this Summer.

Next year. The little voice inside me said and I agreed with it. With that in mind I went inside and rested up for the next day.

I made sure to be waiting outside of Pierre’s when it opened. I had a long day ahead of me and I was ready to get to work. As soon as the door unlocked I pulled it open, Asher darted inside, Pierre looked at me, shock written across his face.

“Good morning Kit!” He said.

“Morning!” I shoved a to go cup of coffee at him.

“Oh, thank you,” he took the cup. Ash had found a bone on one of the lower shelves, he marched up to me, drool already all over the bone. I frowned. “Not like we can put it back now.”

I picked up the seeds I needed, remembering the bundles I pulled out my list. My frown deepen.

“Everything okay?” Pierre asked from behind the counter.

I looked at him from over the shelf and gave him a thumbs up. I needed tomatoes and hot peppers to complete the bundle, I hadn’t considered budgeting for them. I put back a couple of corn seed packets.

I went to the front and paid.

It will all be worth it. The voice encouraged as I walked back home, bag in hand. Ash paraded in front of me, bone in mouth. My footsteps came to a halt as I noticed a black pick up parked outside the farm gate. Ash was now at my heels as I ran the rest of the way.

“Hey there Sunshine!” My dad waved from the front porch. I blinked back the tears that were threatening to fall. “What are you standing around for, let’s get to work.”

We sat on the porch the sun was melting behind the trees. We drank water infused with mint and lemons and ate cucumber and ranch sandwiches. The was valley was still, a few birds nested on my fence post, chirping.

“You know, this farming thing is hard,” my dad spoke in between bites of his sandwich.

“Yeah it is,” I nodded. “I thought I knew what I was getting myself into, helping grandpa out all those years. Turns out I have no fucking idea what I’m doing.”

“I don’t know, it looks like you have some fucking idea,” Dad nudged me with his elbow, shoving his chin towards the field. We had planted in neat rows, each mound damp with water. I had made little signs for each row and carved the name of the crop then shoved them deep into the soil.

“I wish I would of paid more attention when I was here. I wish I would of helped him more,” my voice broke.

“Sunshine, you were the light of your grandfather’s life and he appreciated you so much. He lived for these summers.”

Then you stopped coming.

Then he died.

Then Eos died.

I shook my head and focused on my fields, my farm.

“You’re going to be alright,” Dad said.

I looked at him and smiled. “Yeah, yeah I am.”

I slept that night in my old sleeping bag, Ash betrayed me and snuggled up to my dad who snuggled the pup to his chest and kissed his forehead goodnight. I don’t blame him, the bed was way more comfortable than the floor. One day I’d need a guest bedroom and a bigger bed.

My internal alarm didn’t fail me and woke me up before the actual alarm did. I woke dad up by pulling the pillow out from under his head. He bolted upright, Ash fell to the floor, scrambling under the bed. Dad had his gun out and was aiming it at no one. He blinked up at me. “Why would you do that!?”

“Power hour!” I yelled and started squatting, my knees popped loudly in protest.

His eyes went wide before he burst into laughter. I did my morning routine and met dad outside, he was  sitting on the porch with Ash, coffee cup in hand.

“Sunrises are something else here.”

I looked towards the horizon, it was ablaze with golds and burst of pink.

“There is something else about the Valley.”

Dad left that afternoon, deciding that I had everything under control. His fair Irish skin was burned, his red hair disheveled and red beard was already grown out. I called him a pansy and hugged him goodbye. I finished weeding the field, and broke down more stones adding them to the pile next to my house. Sweat dripped down my forehead and into my eyes, stinging them. I pulled my boots off and set them by the front door. Ash stuck his head in one immediately pulling it back out and rubbed his nose on the ground.

“I’m gross, why would you even do that?” I asked him. He responded with a sneeze. I headed towards the mountains, barefoot. I’d search for the Foraging bundle that I needed for the Community Center. It was just the start of Summer and the heat was overbearing. The dry heat pressed down and very little of the ocean breeze reached the farm.

I passed in front of Robin’s house, I hadn’t talked to Linus since the Egg Festival and still wasn’t sure about the older man. I paused spying my dark haired friend in front of the mountain lake, looking out over the still glassy water. I thought back to when we would spend the morning in that lake, then running to the beach in the afternoon, ice creams in hand. I started running towards the water, passed Sebastian and canon balled into the lake. I heard a cry of surprise as I plunged downward into the crisp, cool water. I let myself sink to the bottom of the lake then kicked back to the surface. Sebastian was kneeling down, cigarette between two fingers. “A little warning next time?”

I beamed at him and swam to the edge of the lake. Ash and Asha were just off the shore playing together.

“Next time I scream while I’m running through the mountains.”

“Oh yeah, really set off the small town murder vibe,” he took a drag off his cigarette. “You know that water is gross.”

“Yeah, I heard fish pee in here,” I scrunched up my face in disgust. Sebastian cocked an eyebrow at me, but let out a little chuckle. “But seriously, I was disgusting just a few minutes ago, my stench alone probably killed a few plants on the way over.”

This time he snorted and shook his head. The dogs stopped at the sound, observing us then going back to their play time.

“So you came all this way to swim?” Sebastian asked. He was still kneeling down, his face hovered right above mine. I could easily grab him by the front of his shirt, pull his face down to mine..

STOP IT.

I shook the thoughts from my head. “I was actually looking for some things.”

“Ooh, scavenger hunt.”

“Not an exciting one.”

“Can we go into the mines?” Sebastian asked.

“Maybe later,” I thought back to my list that was in my bag at home. There was a lot I could use from the mine, slime, solar essence, quartz, a copper, iron and gold bar. “Right now I just need a grape, spice berry and sweet pea.”

Sebastian furrowed together in confusion. “What?”

I raised my voice. “A GRAPE, A SPICE BERRY AND A SWEET PEA.”

“Damn woman I heard you, I’m just confused.” Sebastian rubbed his ears. I chuckled, letting go of the side and floated backwards.

“A girl has to eat.”

“Can you even eat sweet peas?”

I thought back to a show I had watched the other night, ‘Living off the Land’ sweet peas were edible, but had no benefits. I shrugged then swam back over to the side and pulled myself out of the water. My clothes clung to me and water puddled around my feet. “So, are we going on this adventure?” I asked Sebastian.

He didn’t answer. I felt his dark eyes drag over my curves, roam over my body, ending at my bare toes.

“Bash?” My voice was barely a whisper, suddenly gone under his gaze.

“Kit,” my name coming from his lips caused a zip to run up my spine. “Kit,” he echoed and his eyes snapped to mine. “Towel?”

“Oh uh,” I looked down at toes, wiggling them in the puddle. Ash came over and licked at my legs. I glanced up and noticed Sebastian swallow and suddenly become extremely interested in a near by plant. “I can just go home and change, I probably should before I catch a cold.”

“Yeah,” Sebastian let out a nervous laugh. “We have to go by Marnie and Leah’s any ways. Best place to look is in that field.”

I was surprised, I expected him to back out. We walked back towards Eos, in silence but a comfortable one. At one point our hands bumped together, Sebastian withdrew his and buried them into his pockets. My heart clenched. Rejection. My greatest fear.

#A New Sun #Stardew Valley #Stardew Valley Fanfic #Stardew Valley Sebastian #Sebastian Stardew Valley #sdv sebastian #Sebastian SDV #Stardew Valley OC #Sebastian Stardew Valley Fanfiction #Sebastian x Farmer #Sebastian x OC

[loopyhoopywrites]

Departments and Dragons

Months ago, @kindaresilient mentioned wanting more Malec Office/Corporate AUs. This is 100% not what you asked for, but I hope you like it anyway, because you deserve all the nice things. The setting is completely stolen from The Portable Door by Tom Holt, so don’t blame me if it makes zero sense.

Read on AO3.

Contrary to popular belief, Alec’s job as head of Pest Control was 90% paperwork.

Also contrary to popular belief, paperwork was the part of his job Alec enjoyed the most. There was a strange sort of thrill that came from correctly filling out a QW-1627M form for the acquisition of an eighteenth century lance, or finding the perfect wording for his post-business trip report justifying the use of noxious gas in a public area, or signing his name on an eviction warrant so airtight the stock markets would be safe for the next thousand years. To everyone else, the never-ending paperwork was a necessary evil. To Alec, it was quiet, orderly, and the sort of mental challenge that kept his mind as sharp as the weaponry he’d just successfully obtained.

The other 10% of his job was a wholly different sort of challenge.

“The dragon give you trouble?”

“No.” Alec replied, face blank as he stood smouldering in the foyer. “The dragon was fine. Her mate wasn’t too happy with me though.”

Safely behind the reception desk, Maia winced, but Alec wasn’t finished.

“Neither were their six children.”

Maia’s eyebrows shot up, and her hands flew to cover her mouth. Her shock would have been more convincing had Alec not been able to hear her sniggers from the other side of the room.

“That would explain the…”

“Dragon guts?” Alec provided in response to the hand waved in his general direction. A large glob of green slime detached itself from his elbow and oozed its way to the floor. The rest stayed stubbornly attached to his body.

“Gross.”

Alec shrugged, then immediately regretted it as the movement caused a string of slime that had been nestled in his hair to fall into his ear. Gritting his teeth, he closed his eyes, and breathed.

“Tell the bank to expect an invoice within the next few days.” He said, without opening his eyes. “And tell them I’m charging them triple.”

“Triple? Isn’t that a little harsh?”

“Six. Baby. Dragons.” Alec hissed, eyes snapping open. Usually, he would consider himself a fairly patient person. He had to be, working for this company, but right now he’d just spent five hours removing a family of very angry dragons from a pile of money they’d claimed as their hoard but the bank was pretty keen to have back, he was covered in the remains of said dragons, and he was fairly sure his favourite leather jacket was still on fire.

“Triple it is.” Maia said quickly, giving Alec a double thumbs up and then wondering why she’d thought that would be a good idea. Alec just rolled his eyes.

“I’m going to shower.” He said. “And then-”

“Paperwork.” Maia chorused along with him, laughing as Alec glared at her. “You’re nothing if not predictable, Lightwood. Now go, you’re scaring off our clients.”

Grumbling, Alec did as he was told, leaving a trail of green ooze behind him as he made his way to the elevators. Maia scrunched up her nose in disgust, turning back to her computer to fire off an email to the cleaning crew, when something suddenly occurred to her.

“Alec!” She called, spinning back around just in time to see the elevator doors close. For a moment she considered calling Alec’s mobile, but by the time she’d dialled the number he’d be stepping into his office, and it would be too late.

Nothing I can do about it now, she thought as she returned to her emails, although what I wouldn’t give to be a fly on that wall.

                                                        * * * * *

 Alec stepped into his office with a sigh, dropping his still smoking jacket into the incinerator by the door and making a mental note to add it to his expenses. His shirt quickly followed, and Alec made a half-hearted attempt to wipe off the globs of slime that had somehow soaked through his layers before giving up and reaching for the zipper of his jeans.

“Maybe save that for our second date, daring.”

Alec jumped, instinct taking over as he grabbed his sword out of the umbrella stand and spun to face the intruder. A man was sat in the high-backed chair behind his desk, raising both his arms and an eyebrow as he took in the sight of Alec; half naked and dripping with foul-smelling ooze. Alec stared back, wondering what he’d managed to do to piss off the universe this badly.

Because the man was gorgeous. Alec was suddenly all too aware of his own appearance, and briefly wondered if it was too late to run and hide in the bathroom. Any inclination to flee was quickly overtaken though, by thoughts that were significantly more important. Like I wonder if he likes Italian food or how soon is too soon to ask him on a date or, most importantly, does his lipstick taste as good as it looks? He didn’t say any of that aloud, however.

What he actually said instead was,

“Who the hell are you?”

“Magnus Bane.” The man said, seemingly unoffended by Alec’s tone as he stood, rounding the desk and stopping a safe distance away. “I’d shake your hand, but, well.”

“Dragons.” Alec explained automatically, running a hand through his hair without thinking. A small stream of slime seemed to object to this, and decided to slide its way into his eye.

“What are you doing in my office?” Asked Alec, trying to subtly blink the slime from his eye without crying. He wasn’t convinced he was successful.

“I was informed we had a meeting arranged.” Magnus replied, ignoring the fact the Alec’s idea of subtlety looked a little like having a seizure, “That is, assuming you are Alexander Lightwood, head of the Pest Control department?”

“I, um, yes?”

Silently, Alec groaned, and gave himself a mental slap around the head.

“Yes.” He repeated, managing not to make it sound like a question this time, “Although everyone calls me Alec.”

“Pleasure.” Magnus replied, “I’ve been told we’ll be working together rather frequently, and I can’t say I’m disappointed.”

“Right.” Said Alec, confused about a) why they would be working together, and b) the fact that Magnus appeared to be flirting with him. Quickly dismissing the second point, he decided to focus on clearing up the first.

“What exactly do you do around here?”

“My apologies,” Magnus said, “I’m the new head of PR.”

“Oh.” Said Alec, “That’s… nice.”

Alec had never been a fan of the PR department. He couldn’t deny the need for it, goodness knows how much terror would erupt if it was up to Alec’s people skills to tactfully inform a bank manager that a dragon had adopted their vaults as its new hoard, but interactions with PR always made Alec slightly uncomfortable. The department’s main income came from its clients; more money than sense celebrities wanting glamours that would make them appear more charismatic, more intelligent, more beautiful, or all three. Usually the latter. Those who worked at PR were experts at illusion magic, and consequently Alec could never trust that was he was seeing was actually the truth.

In Magnus’ case though, he couldn’t quite bring himself to mind.

“As much as I’m enjoying the view,” Magnus said, finally realising Alec didn’t plan on expanding his earlier comment, “I suspect you’re enjoying this whole situation rather less than I am. Shall I suggest we rearrange this meeting to a time more suitable?”

“I- yeah.” Alec stammered, having somehow forgotten his state of undress, “I’m free tomorrow morning, if that works for you?” He suggested, before a fit of confidence had him adding, “We could go out for coffee?”

“I love coffee.” Magnus replied, smiling, “There’s a place on the corner I’ve been dying to try. Shall we say nine?”

Alec nodded, and Magnus’ smile grew even wider.

“In that case, darling, I shall see you tomorrow.”

Magnus nodded a goodbye, and headed for the door. Alec watched him leave, waiting until he’d disappeared down the corridor before giving in and burying his head in his still ooze-covered hands.

“Oh, and Alexander?”

Alec’s head snapped back up, finding Magnus grinning as he peered around Alec’s doorway.

“Feel free to forgo the shirt again tomorrow.”

A wink, and Magnus was gone. Alec waited, but his doorway remained empty, leaving Alec with nothing but flushed cheeks and the conviction that yes.

Magnus had definitely been flirting with him.

#long post #malec fic #Magnus Bane #Alec Lightwood #malec #shadowhunters #office au #magic au

[burtlederp]

Writing Blurb 8

This is not my best piece of writing, but I’ve been itching for a couple days now to post something else. This is also pt 1 of the third draft of this friggin writing blurb I’ve written, I just wanted to get validation for it now. XD Enjoy, and welcome a new character (well, recycled old character), Damien!

TW: blood, gore, burns

“Oh, gods, I’m so sick…” Damien muttered to himself, relying heavily on the slippery railing to ascend the icy steps to his apartment door. He took some time to retrieve his keys from one of many pockets, and even more time to get the key into the lock, fingers so numb that he might as well have been drunk--which, honestly, would be preferable. The door to his dark, lonely apartment swung open, and he quickly closed it behind himself. He pulled his bag off his shoulder and hung it on the coat rack, except that he missed, it fell to the hardwood floor beneath. But he didn’t notice, stumbling into the living room. He knelt, or rather fell, in front of the cold fireplace, shivering as he pulled off his gloves.

“Another damn sprite… Why… Why’d it have to be now? In th’dead of winter? In fuckin’... Alaska…” He muttered darkly as he pulled logs off the stack by the hearth and heaped them in the ash from that morning’s fire. He paused, trying to remember what came next, and reached for the box of matches. He paused again. “No, I need… Alcohol, then matches…” He held his freezing, shaking hands over the logs, palms down, and tried to summon to mind the chemical formula for ethyl alcohol. And yet, though it was a substance he knew through and through how to create spontaneously from his hands, he could not, for the life of him, remember its chemical make-up. He sat there in his empty apartment, cold, hungry, sick, and tired, hands held out over the wood uselessly. 

He drew his hands back close to himself, shuddering, then keeled over as his stomach suddenly cramped painfully, gasping. He curled up tightly, squeezing his eyes shut. Something was in him, twisting his stomach and yanking at his intestines and pulling on his organs like harp strings, and it was awful. He had no way to stop it, he just had to stay still and hope it passed quickly.

Luckily, it didn’t last too long, soon leaving him feeling even weaker and colder than before, his brain feeling like mush. He unsteadily rose back onto his knees, wearily looking down at the still cold, unlit logs, wishing fire would just appear there, and he could be warm. Summoning the energy from somewhere inside himself, he once again held his hands over the hearth, and tried to think, closing his eyes. He took a deep breath.

“C-c...two…” He said to himself. It starts with carbon, right? “H… He? No, no, H...five. H-five. O… No, no! N! N… th-three?” His teeth were chattering, arms aching from the cold. “Fuck it, it’s got hydrogen in it, it’s gotta be flammable…” He growled, and a clear, pungent liquid dribbled from his hands, spattering atop the logs. Tired and desperate for the fire, he didn’t really register that the fluid didn’t smell much like alcohol, and put what he thought was a satisfactory amount on the wood, shaking the last of it from his hands as he reached for the matches. Excited for fire, he quickly pulled out a couple matchsticks, knowing it was going to take a couple to light anyways. He lit one and brought it down to the log.

The damn fireplace exploded. His slow, foggy mind didn’t register the initial reaction, instead he was only aware that one second he was kneeling in front of the supposedly-alcohol-laden logs, freezing his ass off, and the next, he had been thrown across the room into the wall, ears ringing, and he was burning. Flames seemed to have covered the room in an instant, and panic, as fierce as the explosion had been, rose in his throat. He rolled, putting out the flames that danced on his clothes, and got to his feet, thrusting forth his hands as jets of water spouted from his palms. The fire hissed and went out, quickly extinguished by the heavy dousing the whole apartment received. 

Soon, no fire remained, the water stopped. Damien, shakily, looked at his hands with wide eyes, then fell to his knees, screaming. He had been burned, badly, he could feel it on his face, certain spots on his singed clothes where the heat had penetrated and cooked the flesh beneath, and his back and head ached from being thrown back so far--but it all paled in comparison to his poor, crippled hands. The skin covering his hands, and some of his knees, was a patchwork of white and black char, huge pieces of flesh actively beginning to snap as they cooled and curl back. 

He felt sick. He felt light-headed. He couldn’t think, only stare at his mutilated hands, his gasps more like pained, choked cries. He couldn’t draw enough air into his lungs, his mind whirling, but only a single thought present: What the fuck had he lit?

He didn’t have time to ponder it, his eyes rolling up into his head as he collapsed sideways.

--- 

Hovering above him was a gloopy, oozing mass of angry purple slime, large eyeballs and goop inexplicably, unceasingly generating at its top and rolling down, dripping, but nothing ever landed on Damien’s face directly beneath it. Behind it, a large aura of pitch black, with bright white rays glowing out from it in a very simplistic flower pattern. Damien met those constantly rolling, constantly shrinking eyes with his own bored, somewhat exasperated expression. It didn’t really look terribly proud of him. He sighed, resting his arm over his face.

“What the hell did I light?” He groaned.

“C2H5N3, otherwise known as ethyl azide, or azidoethane. It is incredibly explosive and dangerous. And you produced almost a liter of it and lit it point-blank.” The creature replied with a deep, rumbling voice that had no discernible origin. “Damien, how the fuck did you forget the chemical formula for alcohol? Where did you get nitrogen from?!”

“Oh shut up! There’s a new asshole who’s been bouncing around my body all day, fucking up my insides, and you know that!” Damien hissed, sitting up and getting to his feet. “Where is the bitch, anyways?” 

“I don’t know, it’s your mind.” The floating ball of goop responded shortly.

“And you live here, Atom.” Damien snapped, walking away, the creature, ‘Atom,’ following him. 

Damien was no longer within his apartment. Well, he was, his body still lay on the soaked, charred carpets, but his mind did not rest anymore when he had fled the waking world. He spent most of his unconscious hours wandering his mindscape, trying to keep the many residents of his body under control. Some days it was easy, some days it was hard, and some days, there was somebody new.

“Damien, Damien!” A high-pitched voice called, quiet and far away, and Damien looked down to see a mouse carrying a spool of red thread, a needle in its other hand, its giant ears perked towards him. “It’s at the hollow!”

“Thanks, Des,” Damien leaned down, holding out his hand, and the mouse named Despereaux hopped on, skittering up his arm. He moved fast through his own mind, the world warping around him as he ran towards the hollow. 

The hollow was not just a general hollow one would find in any woods--it was a particular one, a place that Damien knew very well in the world outside his skull. Many a summer day and even a few wintry ones he had spent in that lush, well-forested spot, where the earth fell down into a flat clearing of moss and soft grasses, shaded generously by a thick canopy high above. He and friends who had long forgotten him had spent the days when they were free from school here in this place, climbing trees, weaving around the tightly-spaced trunks, gorging themselves on the wild berries that grew in abundance just outside its thick walls of wood. It was, subconsciously, a kind of home for Damien, a comforting memory. A time when life had been so sweet, and not so bitter as it was now. 

He slowed as he approached the trunks that formed the outer rim of the hollow. His eyes scanned the undergrowth for any movement, any sign of something that wasn’t supposed to be there. He was tense, waiting, fists clenched.

“Damien, there--!” Despereaux squeaked suddenly, Damien’s head snapping around just in time to see it, but not in time to react. A huge, golden lion bore down on him, slamming him into the dirt. He was dazed, and it sunk its teeth into his neck, tearing his throat free from him. Damien didn’t scream, he couldn’t, choking on blood as he kicked the monster off himself. The lion flew back, hitting a tree and falling to the ground. It rose to its paws, hissing and baring its huge fangs as Damien got to his feet, hand clutching his throat, from which blood poured. He glared at the lion, and realized it was not one, not entirely. Rising from its two-color mane was a proud set of antlers, on its back a huge pair of blue and green feathers with gold spots, a matching plume on the end of its long tail, and a dappled pattern of various shades of gold covering its flank. It was, in short, a very fancy lion, but Damien didn’t care. 

He scowled, leaning on a tree, looking down at his blood-covered hand, the wound starting to stretch itself back over the empty space where his windpipe was supposed to be, healing rapidly. “This isn’t my first time doing this kind of thing, you bitch,” He rasped, his voice slurred as he gargled blood, throwing himself towards the monster, his own teeth bared. The creature ran at him as well, trying to swipe with one large paw, but he ducked. A sword materialized in his hand and he slashed the monster across the chest. It yowled, dodging his next attack, and snapped at his middle, though its jaws closed on air. 

Atom and Despereaux stood on the sidelines, watching as Damien took a harsh blow to the torso. They did not step in to help Damien: they couldn’t, not really. Damien had made it clear in the past that he did not want their help. This wasn’t their body, nor their mind, it was Damien’s, so it was his fight alone, he insisted. They didn’t need to help anyways, not with this one, as was soon apparent as Damien dropped the sword in favor of clasping his hands together and smashing the lion’s jaw shut so hard that the end of its forked tongue was cut clean off. As it staggered backwards, trying to keep its footing, Damien stepped forwards, took hold of one of its great antlers, and yanked, snapping it in half. The lion reeled away, and took off into the undergrowth.

“This ain’t over!” He screeched after it, his voice hoarse, leaning heavily on a tree, blood still trickling from his throat. He lowered his head, gingerly feeling his neck, that familiar, terribly unpleasant exhaustion that he could only get from wounds he sustained here creeping into himself.

“Are you alright?” Atom asked gently. 

“Yeah… I’m fine…” Damien wheezed. “Gods, I’m going to be so sick when I wake up…”

“Yes, about that,” Atom floated into his view, that odd dark aura obscuring the forest behind him. Distantly, an alarm was ringing, the ground beneath his feet vibrating. “You probably ought to do that now.”

#writing blurb #writing #my writing #tw: blood #tw: gore #tw: burn #tw: burns #damien #superhero #superhero character #my oc #mine #oc #this is only the beginning of his bad day #it only gets worse from here friends