#who looks like a zombie almost while still living and he realizes that someone CURSED THIS CHILD | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

harcove · 3 years

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hiiiii! <33 i dont know if you are taking any requests but can you write a leon x reader in which the reader gets bitten? (i love drama lmaoo)

love uuuuuu<3333

Okay so I do have like a bunch of other stuff to finish in my inbox, but I tend to not do things in order of when I get them, I do them in the order of whatever I get done first (since I start them all whenever I get them and work on them over time) and whatever I'm getting the most inspiration for at the moment, and this baby right here: chefs kiss right now. I LOVE angst so much, it is my favourite thing to write.

Also I'm always open for requests! It's just a matter of when they get done, since like I said above, and also my final year of uni just started so oof. ALSO: Decided to do RE2 Leon oop... I hope that's okay!

I LOVE YOU TOO! Here you go bb,

Warnings: angst, blood/gore, injury, character death

Length: 2.8k (I- oop.)

Request: in the ask!

RE2 Leon Kennedy x Reader - Not you.

Your hand squeezed your thigh with as much strength as you could muster. It wasn't that it was hurting too much yet, you were still running off the shock and adrenaline from the events moments before that the pain hadn't yet settled. Dark blood oozed between your shaking fingers and coated your hand like you had just decided to dip your hand into a bucket of red paint. It was hardly sanitary considering the situation you were in, dirty and sweaty, having been going through the sewers earlier.

The undead man who had done the deed lay a few feet away with your survival knife Leon had given you stuck in his temple. You could see your own blood and flesh on his face, in his mouth. It was unnerving, and you usually wouldn't have noticed such a detail, except that it was your skin. Your blood. Your body.

You inched yourself towards the corpse and used the tip of your foot to make sure it wasn't still going to get back up. When it did nothing after a few pushes, you deemed it safe enough to take your knife back. With a few hard tugs, it dislodged itself with a squelch and you fell back against the wall behind you, exhausted.

The sudden sharp pain that run up your leg into your spine and made you arch your back for a moment as you stopped breathing forced you to pay attention to the wound on your leg. Hesitantly, you moved your shaking fingers away from the bite on your leg to take a peak.

There wasn't really a point to looking at it, you realized moments after you laid eyes on it. It wasn't going to fix anything, and there was nothing for you to assess. A bite was a bite, and you knew what it meant. Leon and you had seen what happened to Marvin. You yourself had seen a friend turn after being bit before you had gone to the RPD. So you knew.

The skin near the bite was incredibly hot to the touch, and even without touching it, you could feel the heat coming off your skin. Your jeans sported a hole where the bite was and you wondered if there was anything in your bag to cover it with. It was ugly to look at, and scary.

You let out of deep sigh as you closed your eyes. There wasn't much you could do but sit there. Leon was somewhere inside the NEST, and you were at the entrance. You weren't sure if you wanted Leon to find you dead or alive, but all you knew was that this was not something you nor him could fix.

It felt like hours had passed when Leon had shown up. But in reality, it had only been about half of an hour. Whatever was in the bite, whatever the virus really was, had done a number on you as you felt sweat bead at your forehead and slowly trickle down the side of your face. The furrow in your brow from the pain almost felt like it was permanent.

"Y/N!" He called out when he spotted you. He looked worse for wear, that was for sure. The way his shirt had been ripped on the sleeves, and the bandage you could see just beneath his shirt and RPD vest. He was caked in blood, sweat, and dirt too.

And yet he was a welcome sight for your tired eyes.

He quickly slid onto his knees and if you weren't in so much pain yourself, you would've winced at how harshly he landed on the hard floor, but it didn't seem like he was affected by it.

"I'm so glad I found you," he said breathily; he reminded you of a little puppy, and it made you want to squeeze him close to you, "what happened, what-"

Your hand squeezed your leg unconsciously and he looked down when you did so, his beautiful blue eyes resting on your bloodied hand and whatever you were covering up. His eyes looked back up to you almost hesitantly, asking to look. When a half-smile was your only response, he looked back down and focused on your leg.

His hands gently pried your fingers off your leg and he carefully let your hand go on your lap, giving them a squeeze.

"I'm..." he seemed at a loss for words, you would've been too, "I have to... Cut this away to see it better, okay? It's..."

Carefully he used his own survival knife to cut away at the pieces of your jeans, which were dyed deep red around the wound, so he could see it better. Your hand came up to his shoulder as he did so, peeling the bloody fabric away from it as much as he could without hurting you, and you squeezed his shoulder so tightly, fighting the urge to scream in pain. But he didn't seem to notice, or care, about the harsh grip you had on his shoulder.

"Oh. God..." it was said softly, almost as if he had no air left inside him to breathe, let alone speak.

"It's really ugly, I know," you tried to make the situation less dire, but it didn't seem to work, because Leon just looked at you with his big eyes, full of so many negative emotions.

"It's not..." even Leon didn't know what he was doing to say as he trailed off. He began searching through his pockets till he came up with a bottle of antiseptic that looked half empty.

"It's gonna be okay," he finally spoke again as he started to open the bottle, but your hand reached up and seized his own holding the open bottle above your leg.

"Don't use that," you pushed it closer to him and further from your leg, "you can't afford to waste that."

"I'm not wasting it."

You hadn't heard him sound so sure of his words, so... Angry. You hadn't known the boy long, but that was the first time you'd seen him react that way to anything. It made your push your lips together in a thin line, but you kept your hand on him, stopping him from using the antiseptic.

"I'm pretty sure we both know how this ends," you prompted slowly, "I don't think an antiseptic is going to fix it."

"The vaccine is here somewhere, it has to be," he stated firmly, "we just need to find it. It's going to be okay."

It wasn't that you didn't trust him, or that you didn't believe him. But how long was it going to take to find a vaccine? And how did you truly know you were going to find one? You didn't even know if it would work.

You didn't have much say when Leon moved to put your arm over his shoulder, and looked at you, counting to three before he helped you off the ground.

It worked initially: you had managed to stand up with the help of the rookie cop beside you, who kicked the zombie that had done the deed further from you two when you had gotten up. But it didn't last long, as pain shot through your leg and seemed to spread through your entire body. You could barely keep yourself upright even with his help, your body felt too weak to even function.

"Leon, I can't," you cried, falling back against the wall, "I can't."

"Damnit," Leon cursed under his breath, looking around him urgently before he left you against the wall to open a door across from the two of you.

He was missing for less than a minute when he came back out from the room and quickly came back to you. One of his arms reached under your legs while the other went to your back.

"I'm going to pick you up, okay?"

Ever the gentleman, even when you were definitely dying.

"My hero," you smiled softly but it came out as more of a grimace as he lifted you up like you weighed nothing.

You supposed training to be a police officer meant he wouldn't have trouble carrying fully grown human beings.

The room was dimly lit by a single lamp. There was a bed right across from the door, and a desk close to the door. Someone must've used this room as not just a study but a place to sleep. Like a bedroom.

Leon gently placed you on the bed in the room, being careful on how he placed you, and never taking his focus away from your leg.

"Okay," he breathed out pulling back, "I'm going to go find the vaccine. And then we're going to get out of here. Together."

It was a wonderful thought. It was the dream, right? For everything to be okay, for you to be fine, and for the two of you to get out of Raccoon city and away from this mess. Together.

And yet you knew it wasn't going to happen, you knew you weren't getting out of there. You knew you were dead. And it was a scary thought to have to face alone because you wanted so badly to live. To live with him.

He would've been out that door had you not reached your hand out and grabbed his hand as best you could, squeezing it as hard as you could.

"Don't," your voice cracked as you swallowed hard, the ache in your chest only growing when his pained expression met yours, "don't leave me. Leon..."

"But I need to..."

It was blatantly obvious to not only yourself but also to him that there wasn't anything he could do. Not anything he could do in time for you. He didn't even know what he'd be looking for exactly, but he'd go find it if he could. He'd do anything to help you. To save you, and keep you near, but there wasn't anything he could do. It was a cold hard truth, and one he so desperately wanted to avoid.

But he couldn't.

Not when he looked at you, and really looked. Not just second glances over your form and your leg that lasted seconds as his blue eyes frantically moved like they were trying to find something they couldn't. No, when he really stopped and stared at you, he couldn't avoid it.

Your skin was ashen and you were covered in a thin layer of sweat. Your eyes somehow looked like they had sunken in a bit, and looked dull compared to what they usually looked like. The way you breathed was alarming, it was shallow and sounded tiring, and then some moments it would speed up only to slow down moments later. You were in pain, and you were hardly there anymore.

"Y/N..." Leon's voice cracked, and you never thought you were going to see him cry. He held your hand back tightly and noted your fingertips felt cooler, "This isn't happening. Not to you."

"I should've paid more attention..." you said softly, "I don't... I don't want to die."

"I should've been here, I should've..." he exhaled through his nose, "damnit!"

"I'm not letting you blame yourself," you sternly interrupted him and squeezed his hand as best as you could, "not now. Not ever. None of this is your fault..."

Leon said nothing as he took to the ground beside the bed, kneeling right beside you. His face was close to your own as he leaned forward, his hand still holding your own tightly, which he brought up to your chest where your intertwined hands sat.

"Just..." you knew what you wanted to say but you didn't want to make the hurt worse, "just... promise you won't forget about me? And promise... Promise you're going to get out of here. Alive."

"I could never forget you," he said hurriedly as if he was offended you would have even thought he could forget you, "even if I wanted to, I could never..."

There was something there, between the two of you, that was trying to lay itself bare, but something was stopping it. There was something unsaid, simple words that were hard to say and had so much meaning, so much weight. But neither of you could say it.

If you did, not only would it be the first time, but also, the last time.

With your remaining strength you slipped a ring off your finger; it was an old thing, something that you had for a while and you didn't even remember why you got it or where you got it, but you always wore it just because. It had no sentimental meaning, but now it did as you pushed it into his hands. The look of confusion on his pained face made you smile slightly.

"So you always have a piece of me," you said, "and if you ever try to pawn that off I will come back and find you, Kennedy..."

His eyes trained themselves of the silver ring in his hands, it was so plain, just a band. But it was yours. It was you. It was all he could keep of you, he realized because this wasn't going to end with your life. Pocketing the ring, he took your hand again.

"I might just sell it then if you show up," he tried to make you smile, which it worked, but he also felt the need to reassure you, "I won't get rid of it. Ever."

"Good to know," you let go of his hand again and pulled out the gun in the holster that he had found for you in the station, inside was a round of ammo that you wouldn't need. Pulling out the ammo, save for one of the bullets, you gave him the rounds.

"What? What are you-"

"I'm not... Going to need this," you said, slightly out of breath from the pain you were in, "and I know they fit Matilda. But I'm keeping the gun, and one of the bullets."

It seemed to dawn on him what you meant by your final sentence and he frantically began to protest.

"Hey, wait, no," he shook his head, "no. I can... You don't have to... Let me."

It was the idea that you would have to shoot yourself that made him uncomfortable. The idea that you would need to take your own life upset him. But if you didn't want to turn into one of them, he would do it for you. He would... He...

"We both know you can't," you justified, "and I don't want you to. I could never ask you to. So, you go. You leave Leon, and you find that virus. You get out of here, and you live. You don't do anything stupid or reckless, and you make these bastards pay."

You were adamant, and you left absolutely no room for argument. Even if he wanted to argue, he couldn't. And he wanted to argue. But denial would get him killed, and you wanted him to live. And some part of him wanted to live for you.

"Alright," his voice didn't waver this time as he spoke, "Alright."

He placed his head against yours for a moment when he stood up and squeezed your hand a little tighter in his own when he grabbed it again. Softly, you placed a small kiss on the corner of his mouth and ushered him to leave. It felt like he was walking on hot coals the whole time as he walked out the door, he regretted it when he looked back at you at the door, like he was waiting for you to get up and go with him. It just made closing the door behind him a lot harder.

He hadn't really been keeping watch of the time since he arrived in the RPD. He didn't really realize how fast or how slow time was going. But at that moment, outside that door, he really felt the way time flowed. It was impossibly slow, agonizingly so, and it was deadly quiet. Something that happened in only moments felt like it had taken an eternity.

He was used to the sound of a gun by now. It didn't make him flinch anymore. But this time it did. It made his stomach clench and his jaw tighten, his body stiffens. He hated how it sounded more than he ever had before.

The piece of metal in his pocket weighed heavy as he ghosted his hand over it.

Leon was going to find who did this. He was going to make sure nothing like this ever happened again. But most of all, he was going to make them pay.

#leon kennedy x reader #leon s kennedy #resident evil imagine #resident evil fanfiction #resident evil #resident evil x reader #resident evil 2 #re2 #re2 remake #leon kennedy #leon s. kennedy #re2 leon #re #mine #amy writes #delicious ANGST #now i gotta sleep or try to cause i have class at 8 and its 2 am aha #i hope this is okay oof sorry #AND I WILL DO THE OTHER STUFF I ALREADY STARTED THEM I JUST FINISHED THIS ONE FIRST OOF

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votederpycausemufins · 3 years

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Welp, made another thing for @petrichormeraki ‘s Hermit!tommy au. be warned that this is only a part 1 cause i haven’t finished the whole thing and i need to get my computer looked at so i won’t be able to finish it yet but here’s some of it at least

Disclaimers here are that I only know the general idea of Xisuma’s base and that there’s a honey farm somewhere, but I took liberties with how it is for the story. Also, headcanon that I made specifically just because I want it to happen, canon deaths that don’t end up with a ghost make the person lose a piece of their soul until it can’t support them fully anymore. Then that piece ends up somewhere else. Maybe that’s why the compasses work. But more I just want something like what happens in this fic. For the hurt/comfort.

When Tommy first joined the Hermits accidentally, he hated being around Xisuma. Not only was he the admin of the server, the one who held the most power, but for whatever reason, this guy decided to look like a bee. It was worse when Tommy learned he almost changed up to look like a Strider, but then just went back to a bee. At the very least it wasn’t easy to run into the guy.

It was more the problem of his base. The coolest places and the ones Tommy most liked to visit were the ones in the jungle, especially since the old base he was living in was built there. With no elytra, at least not one he used for more than gliding, Tommy got lost when in the more natural parts of the biomes. And when that happened, he tended to accidentally find Xisuma’s base.

So much of it was bee themed that Tommy disliked it. It reminded him too much of what he left behind, but couldn’t get back. Having the compass was as much as Tommy was willing to have to remind him.

But one day Tommy got killed when he wasn’t being careful. He wasn’t too worried about it, especially after a message in his new communicator had a message from a hermit who picked up his stuff and put it in a chest. They didn’t really have the inventory space to bring it to him and we’re busy enough they couldn’t stay, but it was fine. A chest was the standard.

But right now, the problem was getting to the chest. Not only was it somewhere in the jungle, but it was also most of his gear. Tommy didn’t really have many good backups, never wanting something that someone could take, even though he knows the hermits would never do that. Probably. He’s still wary just to be safe. The most he has in storage is some gold armor for when he goes into the nether.

Tommy donned a mixture of gold and worn iron armor and a mostly used sword to get his stuff. He’s sure he knows the way to his gear until he doesn’t. With the monsters tougher than at his old home, Tommy is worried about dying again as the sun starts to set. He rushed through the jungle a bit faster until he ran into it. Xisuma’s base. Tommy was going to pass it by when monsters started to spawn, with him getting really unlucky and one zombie spawning with full enchanted armor.

Not wanting to die, Tommy scrambled his way into Xisuma’s base. He sighed once he was in a safe place, though upset that he would have to spend the night in such a place.

With nothing much better to do other than sitting, which Tommy hated doing, he started to walk around and explore Xisuma’s base. Close up, it was actually okay. The bee theme designs weren’t as prominent, and all the towers and buildings had farms inside them which were fun to watch. The one problem was the honey farm. This one definitely had a lot to do with bees. Tommy was going to just run by it when a bee popped out.

Tommy actually paused at that. Then smiled. Bees only game out during the day, which meant he could leave. He smiled and ran out of there and went outside to see… it was still night?

Now confused, Tommy went back to the bee farm. He was beginning to think maybe he just imagined it, but then he saw the bee still there. He watched as it kept bopping its head against the glass, ignoring the flower with it and not going back in its hive.

Puzzled, Tommy just watched the bee until he heard the noise of someone using a firework. The sound caught Tommy’s attention, and he looked away. When he turned back, the bee was gone. After looking there for a few seconds, Tommy shrugged and started to walk away. But even then, he still kept looking back, so much that he didn’t notice Xisuma until he ran into the man.

Tommy froze up when he saw the admin standing in front of him, but instead of anything Dream might have done or said, Xisuma spoke in a kind voice. “Oh, sorry Tommy, I didn’t see you there. Were you looking for me?”

Tommy didn’t speak for a little bit until he heard the pop of a bee leaving its hive. “Uh, I just got lost and holed up here, cus I died and was trying to get to my stuff and that one guy isn’t around to sleep. Also one of your bees is fuckin’ weird.”

Xisuma scolded the boy for cussing, then offered to help Tommy get to his stuff. He mostly ignored the bee comment until there was the noise of something softly hitting glass again. Xisuma walked over to the farm and Tommy followed.

“See! Isn’t it supposed to not do that?” Tommy asked, to confused by the mob to be scared of Xisuma or want to leave the bee area.

Xisuma nodded slightly, watching the bee’s odd behavior. “Maybe it somehow got linked to another hive or nest and is trying to get there.”

“So what, you’re gonna let it out?” Tommy asked, bristling a little at the idea.

Xisuma nodded again. “It’s probably the only way we could be sure. I can always breed up another if it leaves.”

The admin took out a silk touch pick and broke the glass. The bee flew out and the glass was replaced so the other bees that had not left the hive just yet wouldn't also escape. Instead of the bee trying to fly out of the base, it flew towards Tommy and hovered around him.

Tommy went rigid as the bee flew towards him. He was sure it would keep going, but instead it stuck around him. “What the fuck do you want then?” He asked the mob even though it couldn’t respond. “I don’t have any of those prissy flowers so bug off.”

But the bee didn’t listen. It seemed quite pleased to stick with him. Tommy nearly drew his sword to kill it, but he wasn’t sure he could bring himself to actually his the thing with what it represented to him. Plus Xisuma might get mad and it could break his farm. “Can you just help me get my stuff, maybe it’ll leave once we’re outside.”

Not knowing what else he could say, Xisuma agreed to that. He could tell that something about bees was a sore subject for Tommy. The way he stiffened up around them and also around him. It was part of why he was so surprised to see the boy.

After a bit of walking, Tommy reached the chest of his gear and equipped and stored everything in his inventory. The bee happily bopped up against him and once again Tommy thought about killing it. But instead he just started wandering home, the bee following right behind.

The following day, Xisuma showed up to check on Tommy. While he wasn’t please to see the admin, Tommy at least accepted the gift of a bee hive, especially after his apparent new pet bee would not stop bopping its head against him. Hopefully the hive would give it somewhere to live and it would stop.

Tommy thanked Xisuma for the gift before shoving him out the door, glad for the lack of resistance the admin gave. Then, turning back to the rest of the hobbit hole he moved into, Tommy plopped down the hive right in the middle of the room. “There. Go in there and stop bothering me.”

But the bee didn’t listen, it just kept bopping it’s little fuzzy head against Tommy. Angry now, Tommy grabbed the bee, held it eye level, and looked right into its eyes. “You’re going to stop annoying me and go in that hive, got it?! I’m sick of you flying around me!”

He then let the now trembling mob go and it flew into the new hive. Tommy almost felt regretful about yelling at it. Almost. Grumbling, he went over to his bed to rest now that there wasn’t much to keep him up. Tommy set down his gear nearby, and placed his closed compass on the bed.

With all this bee stuff, Tommy couldn’t help but look at the object. After hesitating for a few moments, he grabbed the item and opened the lid. Inside, the needle danced wildly, not sure how to point with its location in another dimension. Tommy gave a sad sigh and was about to close it again when the needle stopped spinning. It clearly pointed in one direction for a few seconds. Tommy’s eyes widened and he started to turn towards where the needle was trying to guide him, but then it went back to dancing about.

Tommy looked at it confused, before realizing it still might change again. Tubbo may have found a way here. He ran in the direction the needle had been pointing and tripped over the new hive he had placed, cursing as he hit the floor. He looked back up at it to hit it once or something, but the compass has steadied itself again, the needle pointing the other direction, right towards the hive.

#hermitcraft #hermit!tommy au #hermitblr #mcyt #tommyinnit #tubbo #minecraft bees #xisuma #dream smp

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soobadnoonecanstopher · 3 years

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Touch it for Real, Part 7

Genre: Humor / Fluff / Angst / (Eventual) Smut 18+

Warnings: OMG they were roommates / slice of life / slow burn / mutual pining / crude humor / cursing / virgin!baek / idiots to lovers / unresolved sexual tension

A/N: DON'T YELL AT ME ABOUT THE TENSION. I KNOW IT!!! Be nice.

Characters: Baekhyun X You/Female Reader

Description: You teach Baekhyun how to date. (Basically the Get You Alone M/V)

Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5 , Part 6 , Part 7 , Part 8

Nothing had changed.

Nothing outwardly had changed. Baekhyun moved about as he always did.

Nothing had changed at all about your home life and yet you had been stumbling around on two unsteady feet for the past week with this new and terrible ache building inside of your belly and yet, nothing had actually changed. It was a longing. A desire to possess something that you could not have.

It was as if the realization that you loved him and had loved him for a long time had turned up the brightness on your view of him. He was luminous. You’d been wearing dark shades for so long and when you took them off you were blinded by him.

You were aware that you were acting weird around him. How could you not be aware; it was turning into an obsession at this point. You woke early and slept late, eager to find any reason to be around him for the simple pleasure of watching him.

Things you’d found annoying in the past, his crazed deafening outbursts while gaming; the sloppy way he took too-big bites and stuffed his cheeks with food as he chewed, barely able to close his lips; the half dazed foot shuffles through your home at two in the afternoon when he’d just rolled out of his bed and moved like a zombie toward the fridge for water and sausages from the cupboards; all of these things that made you roll your eyes before were now doing something else to you that you couldn't excuse. You found yourself smiling just thinking about him. You were looking at him now with new eyes. Eyes that were biased and eyes that were crazy.

You were so very drawn to him.

It felt like a new hobby; 5am wake up with a buzzing alarm on your phone, shower, change, slip over to his door and press an ear to the wood for a chance to catch the sounds of his voice speaking into an ear piece to someone on the other side of the world. A soft knock against the wood and a low voice, his grunted voice returning your knock and you’d slip into his space for what you could only describe as a sick voyeuristic chance to watch him play his game. You just wanted to look at him. The urge was so strong; to see him. You just wanted to look at nothing but him; the first thing you saw in the morning and the last thing you saw at night.

Baekhyun would turn around to look at you as you crawled sleepily into his bed and you’d pretend to fall asleep until he turned back to his game and then you would just watch him.

You liked the shape of him when he sat at his desk. You liked the broadness of his shoulders and the curve of the back of his head. How could his back be so attractive? He had a strong and reliable back. You felt an immeasurable comfort in the rapid, rhythmic sound of his fingers typing on his keyboard and the way he lowered his voice into his headset when he thought you were sleeping in his bed behind him. Sometimes you’d actually drift off though. Lulled into a deep comfortable sleep that felt so much better than any sleep you’d managed in your own bed until you’d be lightly roused by a hand on your shoulders and the sound of his voice calling your name in a whisper.

“Bug, it’s almost time for work,” he would urge and you would groan and stretch, surprised that you had slept so well.

You’d stay there every possible second until you had to report to your work on your own computer.

It was late in the afternoon on a Thursday. The weather had been cold and miserable all week but through your window for the first time all season you felt the warm sun rays landing against your face. How long had it been since you felt the sunshine? You thought perhaps this called for a celebration. Maybe winter would be short this year and you could celebrate a little early with a dinner time barbecue out on the terrace. You knew the wind might still be cold despite that warm sunshine that peeked through the cloud cover but you could handle that much.

It was your turn to make dinner and you hit the final keys on your work assignments and rushed through your room getting ready for a quick trip to the market. You’d get some meat for grilling, some delicious fresh veggies and maybe a bottle of alcohol to sip on. Nothing too crazy, you didn't really trust yourself drunk.

Outside, the air was crisp but at least it wasn’t raining, or worse, snowing. This would do just fine.

When you returned from the market with your arms full of shopping bags your happiness about the unseasonably warm weather outside and your excitement for a tiny cook-out spread rapidly to your roommate who was happily pulling on a soft cable-knit sweater to go outside with his little bluetooth speaker as he set up the portable grill out on the patio table.

The buzz you felt inside of your chest while watching him was incomparable. His smile was wide and beautiful. His teeth were white and perfect and the way his eyes closed up when he really got to smiling wide made your heart do little flips. You couldn't contain your own wide smile when his eyes bounced over to touch yours and that smile on his lips pulled even wider — it sent a jolt straight through you — he was electric. He was a lightning bolt and you felt so high up, of course you were hit first.

The meat was sizzling on the grill and Baekhyun was sitting across the table from you just watching as you snipped the long strips of pork and beef into smaller bite size chunks with scissors and flipped them with long cooking tongs when they started to turn brown.

He was unusually quiet as you worked and it took nearly all of your fortitude to keep from staring at his face openly with an obvious love struck expression. You were thankful that it was your turn to cook this dinner and Baekhyun didn’t even try to take the tongs away from you and take over the grilling. At least you had something to do that wasn’t just staring into the softness you caught in his eyes across the table. You wondered what had to be on his mind that made him look at you this way.

Some of the meat was done and you moved it toward a cooler section of the grill pan, motioning with your tongs toward the quiet man to grab it and eat it but he just sat there with a disconnected look on his face.

He was moving so slowly today. Maybe he wasn't that hungry. You hoped it wasn’t getting too cold out here now that the sun was slipping lower in the sky.

When he didn't immediately move, you sighed and grabbed a piece of lettuce, wrapping the meat inside with some veggies and some of the fillings you knew he liked and you stood up in your seat, holding the wrap up to his face, expecting him to lean forward and grab it with his hands and begin eating already.

When he finally did move it was preceded by a bright smile and he leaned forward and opened his mouth, grabbing the food firmly between his lips, he bit down with his teeth and you felt the brush of his soft lips against your fingertips as he took the bite of food into his mouth straight from your hand.

You could feel the warmth and it was instant. As if someone had turned on a space heater in front of your chest and turned it on full blast.

The ghost of that tiny brush of his lips against your fingers lingered and your mind grabbed hold of it, echoing the sensation again and again with each pound your heart made inside of your chest.

Baekhyun was chewing and he hummed out in appreciation at the deliciousness of the meal you’d provided. You lifted your glass of wine to your lips to hide the smile that took over your face and you noticed he finally picked up his own chopsticks and began building himself another bite to eat. He was grabbing meat, two pieces, added a dab of sauce on top and grabbed a few delicious additions and he was carefully wrapping the tasty package into a tight ball with his fingertips.

You’d just swallowed the wine and had looked down to flip the meat when you caught his movement. He stood from his chair and he leaned, in the exact same way as you had done and you laughed out loud at the sweet expression you saw on his face as he held the food up to your face.

“Ahh,” he said and you leaned forward to receive his offering.

When your lips parted, his fingers pushed forward and your brain buzzed in chaos when his thumb grazed slowly along your bottom lip. He moved too slowly. His fingertips lingered. You let out a breath of air through your nose and his fingers did not break contact with your lips until you’d closed your mouth up and started to chew the food he’d given you.

You felt as if your face was burning. You chewed quickly, hardly even tasting the food that was in your mouth as your eyes tracked his movement; you could not look away from him if you tried. He sat back in his chair with his empty hand held up and the pad of his thumb brushing back and forth over his fingertips, the fingers that had just touched your mouth so carelessly and as he sank into his seat he brought his hand up to absentmindedly touch along his bottom lip.

Your thoughts were fuzzy. Everything outside of his brown eyes took on a soft dreamlike blur.

The eye contact he was holding broke suddenly and he inhaled sharply and closed his eyes, dropped his hand from his lips and looked down at the table of food spread out before you both.

He had a glass of ice water beside him and he lifted it to pull the cooling liquid into his mouth.

You watched the way his jaw worked when he swallowed. You watched the steady rise and fall of his chest as he breathed in and out.

You had lived with Baekhyun for more than two years and you’d never been quite this affected by the man having a drink of water before.

He set the empty glass down roughly on the table and the noisy thud the glass made woke you from the silent reverie. It sharpened your mind and lit a match under your tongue fueled by a growing curiosity that had been filling up your every waking thought lately.

“Baekhyun,” your voice came out a whisper and the sound of his name made his eyebrows lift and he looked across the table at you. “Have you ever fallen in love?”

You weren’t sure where this question came from or why you were suddenly so bold to ask him such a thing, but you were burning with curiosity about the man. Maybe it was the half of a glass of wine that had already made its way into your bloodstream as you sat here and picked at this delicious meal you shared with him.

He was chewing now and the corners of his lips had turned up into a small smile as he looked across the table at you.

There was a strange pause in his movement to reach for the water pitcher so he could refill his glass.

“Yes,” he said softly after he swallowed his food he continued his reaching, finding the pitcher and pouring more water inside his empty glass. His small answer quenched a small bit of the thirst you had inside of you and this new found knowledge about him made you feel warm inside.

He drank and you smiled wide and genuine, somehow elated at the idea that he’d felt this wonderful feeling at one point in his life. The idea that this beautiful man knew exactly how good this feeling of love was; it made your head swim.

You reached for your wine again, draining the rest of your glass and immediately followed it with a big spoon of rice to somehow combat the alcohol with the only weapon you had to fight it. If only the wine hadn’t tasted so damn sweet on your tongue. You’d drank the glass too quickly and you considered the waiting bottle that sat beside you on the table, begging you to give in to just one more glass.

“Have you?”

It was Baekhyun’s turn to ask now and you turned away from the begging bottle to look into that tempting softness he had in his eyes. What was this mood he had fallen into? Was it the sunset? The clouds rolling in front of the setting sun created a beautiful scene. You saw purple, blue, red, and bright orange. The view was absolutely perfect.

“Have you ever fallen in love?”

His voice was so quiet and the warmth of his tone was enveloping you entirely.

“Yes,” you said. You reached for the bottle and tapped into some source of super-human self control you hadn’t known you had in you; you poured only half a glass.

This one, you would sip. For your own good, for the love of God, you would sip it.

“How do you love someone?” Baekhyun had leaned forward in his seat and his eyes tracked the movement of your glass as you lifted it to your lips and you took your first sip. Sweet wine, sweet man with sweet looks in his eyes and sweet questions on his lips. For the first time you wondered if you might be in real danger of making a mistake tonight.

Your brain kicked in. He was asking you important life questions now and you looked upward toward the darkening sky as you pondered this. This must be one of his life lesson questions. Maybe he wanted some advice on how to treat a girl he loved properly. You considered your words thoughtfully.

“Umm...I think...people show they love someone by—”

“No, not that,” he interrupted your answer, stopping you with a raised hand. Then he pointed a finger across the table toward you, “not other people. How do you love someone, Bug? What is your love like?”

Oh.

It was such a raw question.

You were suddenly thankful for the wine you’d already had to drink because you’d never been asked something like this. Not by him or by anyone. In fact, you’d never even thought about it.

How were you, when you were in love. What kind of a lover were you? He was watching you as you considered and your lips opened and closed twice as you tried to think of the perfect answer to this very difficult question.

You thought about your past relationships. Honestly it was hard to remember the good in hindsight. The bad times seemed to jump out at you. The childish way you sometimes acted, the selfish things you’d done and blamed it all on love at the time. Maybe you had been too young to really know what love was. This was part of the reason why you felt so resistant to it. You’d never had a love that hadn't turned bad and burned you from the inside. Maybe you just weren't cut out for love.

And now, with him, the pining, the scheming, the watching, and daydreaming. The fantasies of his touch, of his laugh, of his kiss. Going out of your way to make him smile. Little things you would do just to get him to look at you. The ache you felt in your fingers to touch him. The sweet satisfaction of actually doing it. You’d do anything for it. For him. You’d been doing anything; slipping into his bed just to smell him all around you.

“Shameless,” you said out loud — because you’d do anything. You didn’t even know what you were capable of yet, but you felt like a dangerous woman just thinking about it.

His focus drifted and he exhaled a puff of air through his lips. You heard the smallest chuckle from his throat and a smile pulled at his lips.

“Shameless?” He asked with a bounce of his eyebrows. His water glass was in his hand and he lifted and poured the last few drops into his mouth. It had been hardly anything at all and you watched him curiously as you forced another bite of rice down your throat.

“What does that mean? How do you love shamelessly? Explain that to me.”

You’d been watching his hands as he talked. There was an electricity buzzing around in his eyes that felt almost challenging and you’d expected him to reach for the water pitcher again to add another tiny sip to his glass and make a big show of drinking it down but instead of reaching for it, his hand shot across the table to grip around the neck of the wine bottle.

You were positively transfixed. He lifted the bottle and brought it to his side of the table and you heard the glass spout clink against the rim of his empty glass and the steady glug glug glug of liquid poured too fast through the small opening and he filled his glass most of the way full with deep blood-red liquid.

It was at least as much as you had had to drink already.

Baekhyun was drinking with you. He lifted the glass to his lips and took a long pull of the alcohol into his mouth and he swallowed roughly with his eyes closed. You felt amused by the sight. Strangely comforted by his company even more now that he had joined you inside this bottle of wine.

When he looked up into your face, your shocked expression must have been funny to him because he laughed just once before opening his mouth to speak again.

“Go on,” he said as he lifted his hand across the table toward you. You couldn't tell if he meant you should drink your wine too or if you should answer his question so you lifted your glass to your lips for a big swallow and then you opened your mouth to put your thoughts into words.

Baekhyun was still drinking the wine in his glass and you hoped his full belly of meat and veggies would keep him from becoming too wasted too quickly. You were enjoying his company too much for him to suddenly hit the table and pass out. You were also pretty sure it would be difficult to carry his body into his bedroom if he was unable to walk himself. While you’d never seen him wasted, you’d always assumed he abstained from drinking simply because he could not handle the alcohol.

“I’m shameless, I mean,” you began, trying to find the words to explain what a disaster you were when you fell in love without incriminating yourself too much, “I’m dumb. I’m jealous. I’m clingy and needy and desperate.” This was sounding awful. Why were you such a mess when you fell in love. “I’m probably very annoying to whichever poor soul...”

Baekhyun had emptied his glass as you talked and he licked his lips, leaving behind a telltale red hue along his bottom lip. “Sounds brave to me,” he said quietly to the inside of his glass.

“But, Peanut I thought you couldn’t drink.”

“I never said I can’t.”

The wind changed suddenly and a surprising gust flew over the table, taking a napkin and tossing it across the surface of the table. You reached for it at the same time as he reached and his reaction time was faster. As he gripped the cloth, your hand landed over the back of his warm hand and the surprise of that unintended warmth of his smooth hand made you recoil quickly.

If he noticed he didn’t react. For all you knew this struggle was taking place entirely inside your head. Baekhyun was just having a casual dinner conversation with his dumb roommate who had just acted like his hand was fire as she’d just been singed.

“But you don’t,” you said carefully, coming to some new realization about the man’s habits in self control. In his own personal dos and don’ts.

With this Baekhyun smirked and nodded his head once.

“Not usually, no. I try not to, at least.” His lips pulled wide. It wasn’t a smile, but more of a grimace. When he moved again he was gripping around the wine bottle once more and you left him to it. He refilled his own glass and your eyes followed the movement as he tipped the bottle over your wine glass and emptied the remaining liquid into yours.

So much for only one drink. (OKAY, one and a half. Shut up…)

“So what’s got you drinking tonight?”

It occurred to you that while you had been lost in the ocean of your silly crush on him, Baekhyun might actually have something on his mind that was troubling him.

Something that had turned his mood quiet like this and something that had bothered him enough to be drinking half of your bottle of wine tonight.

The last time you’d seen him drink wine was after he’d bombed that first phone call with Mia. The taste of her name on the back of your tongue soured the sweetness of the wine some.

“Nerves, I guess.” His small confession traveled on the chilly wind and you felt a tiny raindrop on your cheek that signaled trouble.

Baekhyun lifted his glass to his lips once more. It was almost empty now. The light in his eyes was much dimmer than when this evening started. He pulled his lips wide with a wince, “the date...on Saturday.”

His words were sticky as they made their way across the table and you felt another cold rain drop. Was he feeling this too or was it just you.

He must not have felt what you did because he kept talking, “do you know I’ve been stood-up before?”

The wine seemed to have loosened his jaw. Baekhyun didn’t usually talk openly about the embarrassing dating failures he’s had. He definitely didn’t smile ruefully with a deep wounded sadness in his eyes as he did it.

The sad smile pulled his lips wider and he found your eyes across from the table as he lifted both of his hands and raised his fingers. He was counting something. Showing you a number with seven fingers raised and he mouthed silently, “seven times,” and he licked his lips and bit down on his bottom lip and hung his head with his chin down to his chest.

You were shaking your head widely. Madness, that any woman in her right mind would look at this man and find enough fault to stand him up. That someone with half a brain in her head wouldn't jump at the chance to go out with him.

“What if,” he mumbled and the wind picked up again blowing your sweater tightly around your arms and your chest.

“She will come.” You said confidently, interrupting his anxious thoughts with your determined certainty at what you were positive was true. Mia liked Baekhyun at least as much, if not more, as Baekhyun liked Mia.

He was watching your face now. Waiting for the cold wind to die down enough for you to hear what he was saying to you without having to raise his voice.

“What if she doesn’t?”

You didn’t like the defeatist attitude he was sporting now. He was losing this fight without having ever set foot on the battlefield. It filled you with even more determination than you had when you started this whole dating coach thing.

“If she doesn’t show then she’s a fucking idiot and we’ll just have to ditch Ben and go have our own hot date; just me and you.”

At last he laughed. It was a single guffaw straight from his chest and it sounded glorious. Somewhere off in the horizon you caught a flash in the clouds. A storm was coming.

“You’d do that for me, Bug? What if I’m too upset to be any fun? What if I get bad again?”

At the mention of his moods you felt a pang in your heart. The darkness that sometimes followed him around when he stayed locked in his room for days, hardly ate anything and refused all attempts you’d made to coax him out.

It hadn’t happened since you’d grown close to him and you had begun to think you’d dreamed such occurrences that felt like such a distant memory to you.

“I won’t let you. I’ll do whatever you need me to do to make you feel better. Hell we can even practice making-out in the back of the theatre.”

This made him laugh harder. His cheeks were pink and his smile was beautiful.

“That would certainly take my mind off of anything, LoveBug.”

You knew he said it as a joke. He was laughing and everything when he said it. Yet the words he said paired with the nickname that always sent your heart racing had a rapid effect on you. Your breath quickened and you were so thankful that the sun had gone down and taken with it all of its incriminating lighting that would allow him to see you clearly. You were certain that you were blushing and you’d now gone completely silent.

But Baekhyun was still giggling to himself at the thought and you felt the smallest tinge of disappointment that he found the idea of making out with you in the back of a movie theater like a couple of high school kids so hilarious that he was still laughing about it. You lifted your wine glass and shook the last few drops into your open mouth. The bottle was empty and you were consumed by a mountain of regret at only buying the one.

It happened in an instant. The cold air quickly picked up speed around you took on a crisp fragrance and in that same moment there was a flash of bright light with an instantaneous loud boom that echoed inside your eardrums and made you scream as you covered your head from the loud scary noise. It echoed inside your chest and you could feel the shaking inside of you at the shock. It had been so fucking close you could feel the hairs on your arm standing upright. Without realizing it, your scream had turned into a quiet cry of fear and you could feel the trembling in your fingertips as you tried to wrap your arms around your body protectively.

“Shh...Let’s go inside,” you could hear Baekhyun’s voice against your ear and you could feel the warmth of his arms wrapped around your shoulders. His arms were rubbing calming motions up and down your back as he steered you carefully around the corner toward the doorway that led to your bedrooms. As quickly as the lightning strike had filled you with a trembling terror happened the skies then opened up and a thunderous deluge of freezing water fell from the heavens and instantly soaked you both from head to toe.

“Shit,” he cursed out loud. Ice cold rainwater slapped hard against your skin. Frigid winds whipped the streams of rain over your head, biting and stinging against your face and you both ran for cover as his hands found the door and pushed it open in front of you and you stepped inside the silent darkness of his bedroom with two or three steps in with Baekhyun pushing through the doorway behind you. You heard the grunt and the effort behind you as he pulled the door closed tightly and when the door was shut you were bathed in complete still blackness.

“The power’s out,” you heard him say through chattering teeth and after a second of rustling sounds a beam of light from his raised cellphone illuminated the darkened space.

It felt so foreign to you. This room was always a hum of lights and sounds and noise and everything was just dead. The plug pulled; the life snuffed out, you were overwhelmed by just how loud the silence in this room felt. It was suffocating.

You were shaking where you stood. Too cold and still trembling too hard from the close call with the lightning to feel comfortable moving, you jumped and yelped when the sounds of Baekhyun moving around his room shocked you again. He was moving through the darkness, using the flashlight from his cell phone to see. You heard so much movement but could hardly make out what all was happening until you felt someone tugging at the soaking wet hoodie you wore.

“Take this off before you catch a cold.” Baekhyun was speaking to you in the darkness and you felt cold slim fingers pushing dry garments into your hands.

The light from his phone went out and you were bathed in darkness again.

“Hurry and change, you’re shaking too much.”

You could hardly grip the hem of your soaked sweater with how badly your hands were shaking and you had dropped the warm dry clothes he had given you somewhere down at your feet.

“B-Baek, I d-drop-ped — c-can’t s-see,” the chattering of your teeth felt violent. You felt as if you could bite off your tongue or crack a molar with as hard as they were chattering. Was this just the cold or had you been hit by that lightning outside and were you about to drop dead from the electric currents running through your body?

A person appeared before you. You felt him there. Your eyes were beginning to adjust to the blackness and occasionally flashes of lightning through the window would illuminate bits here and there. You could make out the outline of his broad shoulders. There was a flash were you saw his skin. Another flash with a fresh shirt pulled over his head and you were beginning to feel numb to the cold. Numb and dizzy feeling all over; like you could drop to the floor right here.

“Lift your hands.” His voice called to you and you did as you were told, feeling the sticky way your clothes clung to you and tried to hold on. Your skin below was icy and bare. Fingers that were so much warmer than your own slipped down your hips, pushing wet garments down. Heavy soaked jeans. Wet panties. You even dropped your arms to let your bra fall to the floor at your feet and a warm fluffy towel wrapped you up quickly as he rubbed over the surface of you, drying your skin and warming you with the friction.

It felt like life. Like you might just make it.

“I don't have any underwear for you, I’m sorry. Just put these warm pants on.” You stepped into the legs of the pants and looked down at the sight of him crouched down on his knees before your nakedness. A flash of light illuminated the room for a fraction of a second. Just long enough for you to catch the drift of his eyes. Just long enough for his eyes to lift into your own and you knew that flash had been enough to imprint the image of you completely bare before him into his memory.

You did not have enough heat in you to blush. He was moving faster, pulling a long sleeve sweatshirt over your head, covering your breasts and belly with the soft warm fleece.

“Come lay down,” you were pulled by both arms. Your bare feet felt like ice cubes but they moved where you were led to lay down under the warm covers of his bed.

Despite the fluffy blankets and the soft mattress below your feet, you still shivered. It was awful. Nothing you tried seemed to make you warm and Baekhyun had disappeared somewhere in the darkness.

“Baek,” you called into the black but it was silent. He did not respond. You could feel a fearful panic begin to rise up. You just couldn't get warm enough. Where was he?

The wind shifted and you heard the rain hitting the windows of his bedroom harder and somewhere in the distance you heard a sound. It sounded like a struggle between a man and a patio door. Banging and thumping and cursing right out loud and then he barged back into his bedroom breathing hard and soaking wet again.

“Here Bug, catch.”

Something was coming. You felt panic then. You absolutely could not see anything in front of you and he’d just said the word catch which told you he was about to throw something at you and you screamed and buried your head deeper under his covers.

You felt a light thump land over your chest. Something small. How dare he throw something at you during a blackout. You slipped your hand out cautiously and felt a plastic cylinder. It was a small flashlight.

You turned it on and shone it across the room and Baekhyun was standing in the center of his room with his arms tight around his stomach, dripping wet from head to toe again from whatever he felt he needed to go back outside for.

You could hear his heavy breathing and the shaking from across the room.

“Baekhyun, get over here. You’re shaking.” His teeth chattered audibly and he rocked back and forth on his legs where he stood but he still wouldn’t move.

“I h-had t-to get th-the st-st-stove—”

You didn't need his explanations right now. He needed to get those wet clothes off and get under this blanket with you right now before he died of hypothermia.

“Byun Baekhyun shut the fuck up and take off the wet clothes right now. Come here and get warm. I swear to God if you die—”

Finally he was moving. Your threats must have sounded serious enough for him to move close to the bed. The will to survive was strong. You clicked the flashlight off when he pulled off his shirt. Through the limited light from the windows you caught the drop of his pants and you pulled your focus up on the blackness of the ceiling above you when you felt the blanket move and the bed beside you dipped.

The temperature of his body was a shock. He was so cold. All over; his skin was absolutely freezing and you turned into him as soon as you felt it. You laid your arms and legs over him and pulled his bare shoulders into your chest in a tight embrace. The hair on top of his head was very wet and you used the blanket to rub over his head, hoping the friction would help some; hoping to dry some of the wetness.

He was shaking so hard. Small vocalizations came from his throat with every other tremble as he tried to control it and you tried not to jump when you felt his icy fingertips make contact with your bare stomach when he’d reached for your warmth and the loose sweatshirt you wore had shifted to expose your skin. His fingers did not pull away. The desire for your warmth was too strong and his entire palm laid over your bare skin. Cold. So cold. You shifted then, moving your own hand over his own to cover where he was frozen. To warm him back up. The spot of your skin where his hand laid had lost too much heat and you gripped his hand in yours and placed it up higher on your rib cage where you had more warmth for him.

You knew this was about survival.

He was warming up. You could feel the change as his chest stopped shaking and he stopped moving his hand up higher on your skin. He’d stopped just short of your breast and your heart was racing so fast in your chest you figured he had to be able to feel it.

The desire was a raging fire inside of you. His hands were warmer now and yet he was still touching so much of your bare skin. His legs had given up the vibrating tremble and you still felt the tightness of his thighs holding your legs hostage.

The storm roared outside and inside here you both cocooned under this warm blanket in this shared bed and slowly, little by little you felt the warmth return to his body as it had returned to yours.

He had gone motionless when his shaking stopped and his breathing evened out. You’d briefly considered that he might have fallen asleep until you felt a slight flex in his fingertips. His hand flinched and moved and you felt a delicate sweeping motion in his fingertips that touched the warm skin over your rib cage.

Your eyes were closed as you focused on that movement and a small gasp of breath betrayed you when his thumb brushed along the underside of your bare breast.

You had to breathe. You had to inhale to stay alive and the act brought with it the heady fragrance of his body that joined you under this blanket.

You longed for more. You craved it. Shamelessness. With your eyes closed and his body heat pressed against you this way, what you wouldn't give to succumb to the desires that were flooding your body with more warmth than you could stand right now.

You moved a hand then, trailing your fingertips lightly up his shoulder, curving toward his neck to lightly touch the softness of his cheek.

His face turned with the feeling of your touch and you felt the hot breath from his parted lips that you touched with your fingertips. His breathing was heavy and it matched the labored breaths that came from your own chest.

Baekhyun’s lips were soft to touch. You felt the motion of them as he pursed them lightly and kissed the tip of your fingers that touched his mouth so freely like this.

You couldn't even remember what it felt like to be cold now. Every inch of your skin felt like it was burning.

“I’m...dizzy,” his low whisper filled the air with more warmth and on his voice was a whining complaint, “I...think I am drunk.”

His words made you pull your hand back down from his lips and you rested it over his chest as your mind whirled.

Baekhyun rarely drank any alcohol at all. He’d consumed a half a bottle of wine, had an encounter with near hypothermic temperatures and now you had him naked in his bed with truly wicked and shameless intentions. While it didn't start out that way, the situation had quickly escalated and you’d done nothing to stop it.

You were at war. Your desires and your conscience and you knew, you knew which one was on the right side.

“You feel so warm,” his whisper was back and he leaned into you as he said it against your ear. Against your neck he breathed in deep and spoke again, “mmm...fuck — you smell so good. I feel like I am making a mistake. This is a mistake. Please, not like this — not drunk.”

You had never felt this frustrated and this turned on in your entire life.

He shifted then and you felt the dip as the bed moved and Baekhyun pushed up with his arms and pushed with his legs and he rolled over you on the bed, placing a knee between your legs. As he rolled you felt the push of his hips where they landed perfectly between your thighs.

You wanted him. He felt so good on top of you. He fit perfectly between your parted legs, you wanted him.

You wanted to kiss him and hold him and you wanted the sex; you wanted to wrap your arms and your legs around his waist and pull him down into you but his words were protesting. You knew, you knew this could not happen.

You wouldn't do that to him. You would not, absolutely would not let his first time be a drunken mistake. You had more self control than that.

Something on the bed rolled when he moved and it knocked against your hand. Something hard and plastic. You reached for the flashlight and clicked the button, sending a burst of illumination up into his face where he hovered over you on the bed.

His eyes shaped shut at the sudden brightness and you struggled to keep yours open.

“Baekhyun,” you said through clenched teeth. Your own breathing was too ragged to try and sound calm as you spoke and he dropped his face, turning away from the bright light.

“We can’t.”

You bit down on your bottom lip. You were insane. You had lost your entire mind. You were in love with him, he was so beautiful and he was practically begging, begging you to fuck him right now. You felt the push of his hips between your legs and everything. But his words. And when his eyes opened you could see how glassy and disconnected his focus was. He was drunk and you would not do that to him.

“We can’t do this.”

It took a palm placed gently on his face for him to look into your eyes with any real focus and realization. “You know we can’t.”

With his chest heaving and his cheeks pink and flushed he looked into your eyes and nodded his head, knowing that you were right. Knowing that this had been a weak moment brought on by alcohol, made worse by the storm and the compromising position you had found yourself in and you felt him shift and push himself off of you.

You turned off the flashlight as he moved; in some attempt to save your sanity from having to relive the beautiful image of his naked body positioned on top of yours. It didn't really help. You were a mess anyway.

When he was off of you and covered on his bed, your only course of action was to leave this place. You could not stay so close to the temptation that had nearly undone everything. You could not even imagine waking up the next morning after such a drunken occurrence had occurred. At least you were leaving with your pride still intact. At least you would be able to look him in the eyes tomorrow morning and still feel like you were a good person.

You sat on the edge of his bed for a moment. Willing the chaos inside of your body to slow down some so you would not stumble as you walked out of here.

It took some doing. You could still feel it all over your body and you turned to look behind you at the man laying on his bed fighting whatever internal battle he was fighting and you found his eyes open, watching you.

He moved a hand and laid it over your own, squeezing lightly with his fingers.

“Thank you,” he said, “I’m sorry,” he added with a wince on his pretty face.

A wave of distaste rose inside at the sight; a feeling so powerful it led your movement down to him.

You leaned into him and you pressed your lips into the softness of his cheek, kissing him once. It took considerable strength to pull your lips away from him. It took even more strength to push yourself into a standing position and walk out of his bedroom, but you did it. You would even be okay eventually. After a shower and a glass of cold water, you would get past this and you would be able to keep living here without having fucked up the only good thing in your life during a moment of weakness.

You would be okay.

Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5 , Part 6 , Part 7 , Part 8

Tag list: @j-pping @blahblahblah-boo @his-mochi-cheeks @amyeonzing@littleflowercrown13 @baekinmylife @insta1010 @nana-banana @f4ncyvelvet@bbhbeth @totallynerdstuff @byunbabybaek @maijinki @bbyunz@theclawofaraven @kingkushdealer @uhobob

#baekhyun #exo #baekhyun Fic #baekhyun fanfic #exo fic #exo fanfic #baekhyun fluff #exo fluff #baekhyun smut #exo smut #baekhyun series #exo series

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mrswhozeewhatsis · 3 years

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Soft

A/N: This is for both the @spnfanficpond's S14 Weekly Episode Challenge, week 20, and also this month's Alpha Reader Program with @deanwinchesterswitch! Kym is a great Alpha reader, putting up with so much babbling of ideas with me!!

Summary: Chuck is depowered, Jack de-poofed Eileen and Y/N, and they all rescued Cas from the Empty. (The finale never happened fight me.) Now, with no more Big Bads on the horizon, Dean needs to figure out what his happily ever after looks like. Once he does, then he needs to go get it.

Pairing: Destiel x reader

Warnings: Pining. Idjits in love. Canon-divergent after 15x19. Fluff.

Word count: 4311 words

Prompt: "I'll stop talking." "Probably a good idea."

Dean watches her throw her arms around Cas’s waist and really snuggle into his embrace. It’s done. Chuck is depowered, Jack is in charge, Y/N is back, and now Cas is back. Everything is as it should be. Dean pats Cas on the shoulder, meeting his gaze with a smile he can feel is strained, locks eyes for a second with Y/N, and heads towards his room via the drink trolley. A little time resting in the only soft thing he’s ever been allowed to keep is definitely in order.

Sitting on his bed, back propped against the headboard and whiskey bottle in hand, he forces himself to consider everything he’s been trying not to think about for far too long. Cas will want to talk at some point, and Dean knows he can’t get it wrong. Well, no, he actually could get it all very disastrously wrong, but this time, he doesn’t want to.

And he has so very much to think about if he wants any chance to get this right. First, he needs to decide what “right” looks like.

If you’d asked him a few years ago what a good life looked like, he would have denied Cas’s place in it. There were just so many reasons why Cas couldn’t be a part of any picture he’d have painted back then. That was before, though. Before Cas told him, unequivocally, that he loved Dean in a way he thought he couldn’t have.

Maybe a year ago, if Cas had said those same words, Dean would have jumped into his arms and kissed the hell out of him. At that point, he’d finally admitted to himself that Cas was more to him. That Cas meant more than Dean’s fear of someone thinking he liked dick. Cas meant more than his hang-ups about how sex worked with a dude. Cas was more than a guy, and not simply because he wasn’t human. Angel or not, Cas was Dean’s person.

That was before, though. Before Mary died. Before Chuck had his little hissy fit. Before Dean acted like an ass… again. Before Y/N.

Now, Dean sits on his bed, not drinking the whiskey in his hand because he knows it won’t help. He needs to think clearly. He needs to decide how he feels. He’s loved Cas for years. But he’s beginning to think that maybe he loves her, too.

She appeared with the army of hunters that had arrived when Chuck opened Hell. She was relatively new to hunting, so when her partner died early on, she needed an experienced partner. With Dean barely speaking to him, Cas needed something to focus on, and he took her under his wing, so to speak. Which meant Dean barely spoke to her, either, outside of barking orders.

He was just so angry at the time, and it spilled onto her. Dean didn’t want Cas around him, but then he didn’t want Cas focusing on her, either. Or giving her that squinty head tilt. Hugging her while she grieved her partner. Talking to her about lore and weapons and sigils.

With Jack and Rowena dead, Y/N filled the fourth seat in the Impala just a little too quickly for Dean’s liking. And it had nothing to do with how fondly Cas looked at her when she fell asleep on his shoulder. Yeah, he understood that she needed training and experience, but there were a million other hunters fighting ghosts and zombies with them that she could have joined.

Dean was so mad, Cas left. And she went with him. And no, Dean did not spend several sleepless nights wondering about the sexual orientation of angels.

She and Cas were hunting partners for a while, but then Cas went to Heaven, so she moved into the bunker and never left. Dean tried not to dump his shit on her, knowing that it was his shit and not hers and he was being a dick, but she was everywhere—cooking in the kitchen, beating up the heavy bag in the gym, shooting curse words into the paper targets in the range. Dean didn’t want to laugh when she slapped one on his chest that read “DICK” as she walked out the door. He also didn’t want to deck Fancypants Dean from the other world when he asked her to go with them to Rio and then kissed her, dipped her like a 50’s heroine and everything, right in front of him!

And he definitely didn’t want to miss her when she left again with Cas. They were gone, again. Alone. Soon, he realized that he missed the smell of her cooking. He stared at the taped-over hole she left in the heavy bag when she tried attacking it while wearing heels. He tried to forget how lethal she was in the gun range. He failed to stop wondering how many beds were in the motel room they were sharing each night.

He got better about not being a dick to her when they returned. He even shared his pie. The first time she gave him one of her hundred-watt smiles, he nearly melted. She offered to help wash Baby, and he accepted. Not being a dick got easier as they became friends.

Then Chuck killed her. Just poofed her into nothing. A finger snap and Dean felt like he was back on the rack, a knife slicing into his heart. Why? Watching Cas mourn her was almost as hard as admitting that he felt the same way. He shouldn’t feel this way. They were friends. But the pain and grief in Cas’s eyes were mirrored in his chest. Not that he could say that to anyone. She was Cas’s… something.

Yet, before the Shadow swallowed him and Billie whole, Cas still said that his moment of complete happiness was loving Dean.

After Cas was gone, Dean sat on the floor in the dungeon and wondered at the complete lack of black goo anywhere. It had seemed to be everywhere but had left no trace. His mind bounced against the image of Cas getting swallowed whole and ricocheted into the image of Y/N poofing into thin air. Sam’s face when he picked up Eileen’s car keys, phone, and wallet. Jack’s face burning brightly when Chuck killed him in the graveyard. Mom’s face when he wrapped a shroud around the body that wasn’t hers. Charlie’s face as she lay in that awful motel bathtub. Bobby’s face as he called them idjits one last time. Dad’s face when the doctors tried to revive him, but he was already long gone.

Dean went on autopilot. He got up from the floor, drove to Sam and Jack, and then, he … did what needed to be done. On the drive away from Chuck’s defeat, Dean tried to imagine the life ahead of him without Chuck’s influence. Just him and Sam and Jack. He pictured them in the bunker, all in black and white like the old photos of the Men of Letters in the archives. Nothing big to fight, only little hunts. Maybe there would be the occasional trip to Hell to visit Rowena. Maybe Rowena could use a hand down there? Hell sounded nice, this time of year. You know, when everyone else is dead….

Dean didn’t let himself complete that thought. He still had Sam.

Then Jack brought back Y/N and Eileen. Color returned to Dean’s world. It wasn’t perfect, but it was better than Heaven or Hell. With Y/N in his arms, all he could think about was Cas. Dean needed Cas back, even if it meant watching them ride off into the sunset together. When Jack said he couldn’t get Cas as easily as he’d gotten Y/N and Eileen, she ended up crying in Dean’s arms, letting him comfort her. She comforted him. They comforted each other.

Before the big rescue, Dean decided that if Cas and Y/N chose to go off and live a happy life together, he’d wish them well, even if it meant drowning himself in whiskey.

But now they’re both here. When their departure was hypothetical, it was easy to convince himself that he could be supportive. Now that he was up against the reality of it, he could barely breathe. Yes, the two of them alive and happy together without him is better than the two of them dead, but….

Dean puts down the whiskey and grabs an open bottle of what is probably very stale water off his desk. He drinks it down and then stares at the whiskey bottle. He tries to breathe through the pain in his chest caused by the prospect of visiting Cas and Y/N in their little country cottage with the white picket fence and beehives in the backyard. Oh, how he wants to drink something stronger than water and make this pain stop.

No. He needs to say this to himself completely sober.

“I want them,” he announces to the room, quietly enough that no one outside could hear, but the words still echo in his ears. “No, I don’t just want them. I want a bacon double cheeseburger with extra onions and a slice of apple pie with a scoop of ice cream on top. I need them. I need Cas, and I need her, and I need to stop acting like I don’t.”

Picturing the little country cottage once more, he shakes his head. “I have to try. Cas said he loved me. Y/N at least doesn’t think I’m a dick. I can’t do nothing, anymore. I have to try. I have to tell them both and at least ask them to give me a chance.”

Dean pulls at his hair and sighs. “But that’s not how the world works. I can’t have them both. I need to decide who to talk to first. I need to choose.”

The angel that literally saved him from Hell but wears a vessel Dean doesn’t know how to handle, or the woman who would be the complete package if he weren’t already in love with Cas.

“How do I choose?”

And that’s all assuming that either of them even (still) wants him. Cas may have changed his mind after Dean stood there stupidly and said freaking nothing while the Empty swallowed him whole. And she’s never really indicated that she wanted anyone but Cas. And Cas has always seemed perfectly happy to indulge her attentions. Hell, maybe they will go off together to that cottage in the country and leave him alone. After the way he’s acted, it’s the least he deserves.

“If I even have a choice, I can’t choose.”

Pacing the room, he kneads the problem in his mind like a baker would knead dough. After only a couple of minutes, he tires of rolling around a thousand “what ifs” in his head and stops in front of his bedroom door, hand almost grabbing the knob to turn it.

“What’s the worst that could happen?” he asks himself, trying to give himself the courage to move. “They both say they don’t want me, they only want each other, and I’m left alone, like I’ve always been. Nothing changes for me.”

Swallowing down the blast of grief that idea causes, he takes a deep breath and watches from outside of his body as he turns the doorknob and walks down the hallway.

He hears her voice coming from her room long before he reaches it, but he’s almost in the doorway before he can make out the words she’s saying. She’s chattering in that way she does when she’s excited or nervous about something, and his heart clenches as he wonders what’s got her so jittery.

“It’s just that there’s so much to consider and so many possibilities and I’ve been waiting until now to think about it and oh god now I’m rambling and we really need to come up with a better phrase for that now that Chuck’s not in power andfuckinghellIthinkI’llstoptalking.”

Dean watches her put a hand over her mouth to stop the flow of words and can’t stop his smile. She’s adorable.

Cas sees Dean in the doorway, gives her a gentle smile, and says, “That’s probably a good idea.” He nods his head towards Dean, and she turns to look at him. They’re both sitting on the side of the bed, one of her hands is encased in both of his, and Dean feels his heart wrench at what that might mean.

He tries to read their expressions, get a feel for what’s happening in the room, but his own feelings are overwhelming him. They’re both right here, staring at him, while he’s staring at them, and no one is saying anything!

“Uh,” he starts —oh, you’re doing great there, Dean, so eloquent— before clearing his throat and taking a steadying breath, “I don’t want to interrupt you guys?”

Cas smiles, but Y/N gulps and shakes her head.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says in that way that always makes Dean feel warm inside. “It’s okay. What do you need?”

Dean tries again to read their expressions, but all he can feel is tension. Is it coming from him? “I, uh, need you,” he says to both of them, bouncing his gaze back and forth between them.

Cas stands up, letting go of Y/N’s hands, and pats her on the shoulder. “I’ll let you guys have some time alone. We can finish this later, right?”

Y/N nods, but Dean stops Cas from leaving the room with a hand on his arm. “No, Cas, I mean both of you.” Wishing that he could simply snap his fingers and have both of them automatically understand, he stares into Cas’s eyes like he’s done so many times before, trying to will his jumble of thoughts into the angel’s head.

Cas must only get static, though, because he smiles his same old fond smile, puts his hand on Dean’s left shoulder like he always does, and replies, “Of course, Dean. I’m always here when you need me. How can I help?”

Dean groans, wiping down his face with his hand while his shoulders droop. “Fuck, this is hard,” he mutters, then leads Cas back to where he’d been sitting on the bed, drags over the desk chair, and sits facing them both. “Look, I don’t do chick flick stuff, and you guys both know that, so bear with me, okay?”

Cas and Y/N both nod, and Dean wishes he had the whiskey bottle with him. Maybe a little in vino veritas would help him get through this. Staring at the two of them, he doesn’t even know where to start. He looks back and forth at each of them again, noting that they’re holding hands once more, and focuses on that.

“Look, guys, I know you two are,” he waves a hand around trying to indicate what he means, “together? Involved? Whatever you want to call it since we’re not in high school and we’ve all worked to derail an apocalypse or two. And I don’t want to mess with that. Well, not exactly. Wait, that’s not what I meant.” He takes a steadying breath and mutters, “Fuck, this is hard,” yet again.

He looks up and finally notices that both Cas and Y/N are now considerably less relaxed than they were a minute ago. Both sit stiff-backed, trying to look at anything but each other, and their hands are no longer linked.

“Wait, you guys are together, right?” Dean asks, suddenly questioning every moment he’s ever seen between them.

Y/N clears her throat and replies, “Well, that’s kind of what I was trying to talk to Cas about when you came in.” Her eyes bounce between Cas and Dean nervously and she shifts her position on the bed a little so she’s facing towards Cas a little more. “Cas, part of what I was trying to say is that I have, you know, feelings for you, that are, well, more than friendship.” Her words rush faster and faster until she gets to the end. “I held it in for so long, and then I was dead, and you were dead, and it was all awful, but now we’re back, and we’re here, and I can’t keep pretending I don’t feel what I feel.” She ends with a small gasp of much-needed air and then stares fearfully at the angel while she carefully exhales.

Cas tilts his head and squints, and Y/N slowly deflates a little bit more with every moment Cas takes to reply. Dean had no idea what he was walking into but somehow feels a little better knowing he’s not the only one feeling the need to put things on the table. The only concern now is that he might be watching the two people he wants so very much get together right in front of him, without him. Well, I’ll always have Sammy and visits to Rowena in Hell, he thinks.

“Cas? Please say something,” Y/N pleads, the panic becoming clear to Dean as her breathing quickens and her hands fumble in her lap.

“I thought you were in love with Dean?” Cas blurts out, leaving all three of them exchanging looks between them.

Dean sits up straighter and glances between Cas and Y/N, but focuses more on Y/N. “Really?” He can’t stop the word from leaving his mouth. He’s too excited by the possibility. Doing the math in his head, his heart starts to race happily. Half a chance Cas really loves him like he said, half a chance Y/N loves him like Cas said, that equals a whole chance he might actually get at least half of what he wants.

Completely ignorant to the social graces surrounding admitting other people’s feelings for other people to those other people, Cas just keeps going, turning to Dean. “Yes. I’ve noticed her engaging in some of the social actions that usually indicate romantic affection towards you. I assumed that meant she had feelings for you.”

Dean looks at Cas, then throws his hands up in the air. “Well, I’ve been watching the two of you cuddle up together all the time like two peas in a damn pod, so I knew she had feelings for you! And you’ve been cuddling right back, so I figured that meant the two of you were a thing, no matter what you said!”

Face glowing a bright red, Y/N interrupted the staring contest between the two men. “Well, I’ve been watching all the eye-fucking between you two since day one, so I thought you two were a thing! I mean, seriously, you two need to kiss or fuck or something so the rest of us can breathe clear air, again!”

Both Dean and Cas turn to stare at Y/N.

“What? You two had no problem talking about my feelings! Turnabout’s fair play!”

Cas takes hold of Y/N’s hand to ground her and says, “So, you have romantic feelings for both of us, then?”

Fear washes over her face as she nods, nervously glancing between the two of them.

Cas smiles. “And I have romantic feelings for both of you,” he states. The two of them smile at each other for a moment and then turn to Dean in unison. Their hands are clutched together, knuckles white with tension.

With two pairs of striking eyes staring at him, Dean squirms.

“Dean, we would very much appreciate you telling us what you’re thinking and feeling, right now,” Cas said, using his calmest and most caring voice. “I believe the phrase is, ‘this is a safe space.’”

Dean takes a steadying breath, looks at each of them individually, and decides there’s no use running now. He’s here. He knows there will be a soft landing when he jumps. He’s jumped into worse with less and come out winning. He can do this.

Dean takes Y/N’s free hand in one of his and squeezes it while he decides what words to use. She relaxes, her shoulders dropping, but Dean notices Cas stiffen out of the corner of his eye. Dean stiffens right along with him, bringing his eyes up just in time to see the flash of disappointment in Cas’s eyes before it disappears.

Fuck, he’s screwing this all up, already.

Words are still foreign things he can’t seem to grasp, so he decides to act instead. Still holding Y/N’s hand, he reaches with his other hand to grasp Cas’s neck and pull him in.

The kiss is awkward as hell. Cas’s eyes are wide open when Dean closes his, and then teeth clash, and Cas stays frozen while Dean tries to gently kiss some life into him. Right before Dean is about to pull away and question all his life choices, Cas melts. Cas’s hand is suddenly in Dean’s hair, pulling Dean closer as the kiss turns into the warmest, loveliest kiss Dean’s ever experienced. Cas’s lips are as soft as Dean ever imagined, the little bit of rough stubble a new but not awful feeling, and Dean’s pretty sure he could do this for hours and never come up for air. Maybe it would kill him, but he’d be okay dying this way.

Eventually, the kiss turns to little nibbles, and then they simply sit there for a moment, foreheads together and eyes closed, feeling the warmth of each other.

“I didn’t think you could feel what I feel,” Dean whispered. “And then you said you could, and you did, and then you were gone, and it was too late.” He shifts only enough to press his lips to Cas’s again one more time. “You can have everything you want, angel,” he says, pulling back enough to look Cas in the eyes.

Cas’s smile is as wide and happy as Dean’s ever seen it. They stare at each other for another one of those long moments where Dean swears Cas must be able to freeze time. Cas’s eyes shift away from Dean, and he’s reminded that he’s staring at only half of his happiness.

The other half is still holding his hand, watching him and Cas with wide eyes and a shy smile. With nothing left to lose, Dean leans in and feels the rest of his world click into place as his lips settle perfectly on hers. The kiss with her is different, and yet also the same in how right it feels. She opens her mouth a little, and their tongues slide together like they’ve done this a hundred times before. When they finally break apart, he doesn’t know what to say, so he just lets his smile loose. She smiles back, and he knows she understands.

Everything in him wants to keep going back and forth, kissing them both, but there’s always that little voice inside his head —which sounds a bit like Chuck, these days— that tells him that this isn’t real. It makes him slow down a bit, lean back in his chair, and enjoy looking at the two people in front of him. He watches the two of them kiss and is surprised when his gut doesn’t churn with jealousy this time.

Each time he had imagined what they did behind closed doors, he was miserable. Yet, here he is, watching them kiss, feeling happy. The part of him that was jealous and hurt now knows that they both want him, too. He’s not on the outside looking in, anymore.

The little voice that sounds like Chuck gets a little louder. ‘What is this, a three-way roll in the hay like with the Doublemint twins back before Hell, or those triplets with Lee? Yeah, this isn’t how real life works, pal.’

Cas and Y/N finally pull away from each other but continue to stare into each other’s eyes for a long moment. Now, Dean knows how other people have felt while he’s stared at Cas in the past. Part of him wants to laugh at that, but that evil little voice has convinced him that this is temporary. They’re all holding hands, now, like some kind of hippie prayer circle or Zen meditation thing, grinning like idiots at each other, and it can’t last.

Dean’s smile falters, and he looks down at their hands, trying to memorize this moment before it all comes crashing down. Before he has to choose. Before they have to choose. Before he loses everything.

Cas lets go of his hand and uses it to lift Dean’s chin so he sees Cas’s face again. “You can have this, Dean. We can have this, exactly like this. We don’t have to choose. It won’t be easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is, right?” Cas’s hand drops down and grasps his hand, again. “Polyamory is not unheard of and is accepted in many cultures.”

Dean looks back and forth between Cas and Y/N, gauging their feelings about this from their expressions.

Y/N giggles and shrugs when Dean looks at her, questions in his eyes. “I’m game to try if you are. I’m guessing it’s going to involve a lot of honesty and talking, but I could never choose between you.”

Dean’s shoulders relax and he takes what feels like the first deep breath of his life. He’s fallen, hard and fast, expecting the pain of a crash landing, but found a safety net instead. It’s thrilling, it’s scary, and his heart wants to burst out of his chest, but it’s all good.

Squeezing both of their hands, he grins. “Let’s do this, then.”

Later, when he and Y/N are curled into Cas in bed, who’s reading a book because he doesn’t sleep, Dean squeezes her hand on the broad chest between them and smiles when she squeezes back. When he’s asleep and dreaming about hunts and fights and beating the Devil, for the first time, when he falls, he lands softly.

#pond s14 weekly challenge #alpha reader program #mrswhozeewhatsis writes #incoherent babbling by mrswhozeewhatsis #destiel x reader #dean x reader #destiel fluff #dean fluff

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c-r-ash-crash · 3 years

Text

New Life Ch 3

Bdubs’ communicator exploded with vibrations as messages flooded into the chat. Most of them were some variation of demanding to know exactly what the Boogeyman was. Bdubs was curious too, but he noticed that the server had sent him a private message. Quietly, he checked it and his eyes scanned over what it said.

“You are the boogeyman. You must by any means kill a green or yellow life by direct action to be cured of the curse. If you fail, next session, you will become a red name. All loyalties and friendships are removed while you are the boogeyman.”

Bdubs ran his tongue over his lips nervously. Oh. As subtely as he could, he glanced down at his wrist. Four hearts were still there, marked in dark green ink. He tilted his comm slightly to check the color of his eyes. They were still dark brown as always. He blew out a breath. The bloodlust hadn’t started yet. He had a few hours at most to get away from everyone else on the server. To warn them.

Then, he read over the message again. “If you fail, next session, you will become a red name.” Slowly, the meaning sunk in. Unless he killed someone within the next nine days, he would kill everyone. Then, he glanced up at Etho. He was so, so screwed.

Scott trailed behind Pearl as she clambered over the hill, looking for a good place to set up their base. He rubbed at the skin on his wrist, but stopped once he realized what he was doing. He closed his eyes and tried to shut out the sight of Jimmy’s smiling face, hands rubbing over his palm. Jimmy had always rubbed at his wrist like that whenever he was stressed. He had promised Scott that he himself would die before he let anyone take a single life from Scott. Guess he had been right.

Scott missed him. He missed the sunshine that would come with the blonde as soon as he entered the room. He missed the bright smile and bubbly laughter. He missed being able to smile, missed those fleeting moments where he thought everything might be okay. As long as he had Jimmy by his side, nothing could go wrong. His crown sat heavy against his brows.

Suddenly, a voice startled him out of his thoughts. “Scott?” Pearl called out from the top of the hill. “You alright?” Scott’s eyes snapped open, and he met Pearl’s concerned expression. “Oh, yes, I’m fine,” he replied, plastering a small smile onto his own face. Pearl didn’t buy it. “Scott, if you need a moment, we can stop for a bit.” “No, no,” Scott assured her. “Really, Pearl. I’m fine.”

Then, his eyes caught on a small smudge of bright red against the green grass. He cupped the flower gently in his hand. Then he plucked it and tucked the poppy behind his ear. “Let’s go,” he said, marching on.

Bdubs’ pick dug into the iron ore, pulling the metal free. He picked up the item drops and tucked them into his bag. “Oh, so I figured out what that boogeyman thing was about,” Etho said from the other end of the cave, startling Bdubs into dropping his pick. “Oh, sorry,” Etho said. “Anyways, that boogeyman thing. Basically, we have to kill someone else or else we get down to our red life.” “Wow,” Bdubs said, voice even. “Glad neither of us got that then.” “Well, you can’t be sure of that,” Etho said. “For all you know, the server could have chosen me.” Bdubs chuckled lightly. “C’mon, don’t joke about that. Sounds like you basically have to act like a red life or else you actually become one. If you ask me, that sounds like some pretty serious pain.”

“Yeah, no doubt,” Etho said, pocketing more coal drops. “But if I were the boogeyman, I could kill you right now if I wanted to.” Bdubs’ heart skipped a beat. He was the boogeyman. Etho didn’t have to kill anyone. Besides, he was still on his green life, or rather his dark green life. The bloodlust wouldn’t have started yet.

Suddenly, a pickaxe embedded itself into the stone next to Bdubs’ head. He whirled around to see Etho’s hand on the hilt. “What the heck, Etho?” he exploded. “You almost hit me!” “But I didn’t,” Etho said with a shrug. “Wasn’t planning too anyways. Just wanted to scare you.” “W-well you did a great job of that,” Bdubs spluttered.

Suddenly, he realized how close at hand his sword was, how close Etho’s unarmored chest was. He shoved the thought down. He wasn’t on his red life yet. He couldn’t kill anyone yet. He wouldn’t kill anyone. His stomach began to turn in knots, and he turned his attention back to mining, trying to quiet the pounding headache that had sprung up. He wouldn’t kill anyone. He wouldn’t. Then his hands began shaking.

“I think I’m gonna go get some food,” he mumbled, stumbling back up the mineshaft he and Etho had made. Once he reached the little shelter they had made for themselves, he slid down against the wall, grateful for the feeling of cool stone against his feverish skin. Shakily, he pulled out his comm and re-read the boogeyman message for the thousandth time. A single word jumped out at him. “Cured.” Unless he killed someone, he would die.

Grian slipped through the dark trees, watching for a zombie and listening for the telltale hiss of a creeper or a bow being drawn. The forest was quiet, and any hint of monsters was far off. He still didn’t remove the cloth covering his small lantern. Then, from in front of him came the sound of loud cheerful singing.

He picked up his pace as he recognized the sound of the voice. “Scar!” he called. The singing stopped. “Grian?” Scar asked nervously, as the light of a small lantern flooded the forest. Grian uncovered his own lantern just a smidge, and caught a flash of light blue. He froze. “Is that diamond armor?” he asked, stunned. “You like it?” Scar asked, spreading his arms wide once Grian came into sight. “How did you of all people end up the first in diamond armor?” Grian asked incredulously. “Just lucky I guess,” Scar said with a shrug. Then Grian noticed the six pack etched into the diamond.

He couldn’t help the small smile that tugged at his lips. “That’s not diamond armor is it?” “What?” Scar said exaggeratedly. “Of course it is!” “Armor doesn’t have six packs engraved into it.” Scar’s brow furrowed in disappointment. “Is it really that obvious?” he pouted. “Only ‘cause of the obviously fake muscles,” Grian teased. “What is that made out of anyways?” Scar shrugged. “Cloth. Had some tailor make it for me before we moved to Season eight.” “So you mean if I hit you, it won’t give you any protection?” “Of course it will,” Scar said. “No need to test it out.” Grian punched him in the chest.

Scar stumbled back, winded. “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Grian muttered to himself. “How do you hit so hard, dude?” Scar wheezed. “You have like no muscle on those arms.” “Says the man with a fake six pack engraved into his armor,” Grian shot back. “But seriously, don’t underestimate me.” “I don’t,” Scar said, recovering somewhat. “I only survived the game because I had you on my side.”

Grian’s lips pressed into a thin line. “What is it?” Scar asked, mood plummeting instantly. “Scar,” Grian began, tone dead serious. “Everything that happened last time, it’s all null and void. Our old alliance...it’s dead.” “So you mean I can’t put you on a llama and take you to the desert?” Scar joked. Grian didn’t smile. “You really mean that?” Scar asked, crestfallen. Grian nodded tightly. “New round, new rules.” Then he perked up. “Which speaking of, have you tried the give life command?”

“The what command?” Scar said, slightly startled by the sudden change in topics. “Yeah,” Grian said excitedly. “Apparently we can give each other lives, this round. Which, when you think about it, explains why we all got a random amount of lives. And it explains why some of us even got four lives.” “That actually makes a lot of sense,” Scar mused. “But who would I even try the command on?” he asked. “Well, you’ve got me,” Grian suggested. “I’ll give it right back, I promise. I just want to see how it works.”

Scar hesitated for a moment, searching Grian’s face. But then he said: “Alright, how do I do this give life command.” “Say this,” Grian said, typing something into his communicator. Scar’s own comm buzzed. “Why can’t I just repeat after you?” Scar asked. “Because then I’d give you a life,” Grian explained. “And if I did that, I’d be on my red life. And I really, really don’t want that.” “That makes sense,” Scar said with a nod. Then, he began reading off the comm.

“ᓭꖎᔑᓭ⍑ ⊣╎⍊ᒷ ꖎ╎⎓ᒷ”

Golden light enveloped Grian and Scar, and their feet lifted off the ground. The light drifted from Scar, wrapping itself around Grian, settling in his bones, and etching another heart into his wrist. The ink turned a vibrant lime green, and suddenly both Grian and Scar dropped to the ground.

Grian stumbled for a moment, then he regained his bearings. “That was something,” Scar muttered, still trying to regain his balance. Then, Grian glanced down at his communicator. He reached to turn it off, but glanced down at the list of player names. His hands stopped as he realized Scar’s name was dark green. “Scar, it’s still saying you have four lives here.” “No, I have five left,” Scar said, proffering his wrist for Grian to see. There were indeed five dark green hearts there. Grian’s brow furrowed. “Wait, but that would mean...you started with six lives?” he asked, jaw dropping. Scar nodded. “Like I said, I’m just lucky.” Grian shook his head, clearing the whirlwind of questions that had sprung up.

“Yeah, I’m not giving this back,” he said. “What-no!” Scar exclaimed, reaching for Grian, but he was already sprinting away through the forest, laughter echoing off the trees.

Jimmy bounced along, skipping over the grass, tossing his spyglass between his hands. He reached the peak of the hill, and stretched. He hadn’t exactly gotten a good night’s sleep last night, worrying about what it meant that he was back in the game, and trying to figure out what this new boogeyman thing was. Besides, a small hole in the side of a mountain never made for a great shelter.

Suddenly, he heard voices drifting up the hill. He stopped, tucking his spyglass into his pocket, just in case. Two faces appeared over the top of the hill. He recognized Pearl’s dark colored hoodie and Scott’s bright blue hair. “Hey!” he called out, waving. Pearl returned it. Scott was a bit more hesitant, but his eyes lit up when he recognized Jimmy. “Hey!” he called back. A bolt of joy shot through Jimmy, but he ignored it. He and Scott couldn’t ally this round. He didn’t want to risk another incarnation of Dogwarts deciding the two of them were a threat.

“How are you?” Pearl asked, smile bright and enthusiastic. Scott was smiling too, the one he reserved just for Jimmy. Jimmy squashed down the butterflies in his stomach. He couldn’t think of Scott like that. Not anymore.

“Pretty good,” Jimmy replied, nonchalantly. “Were you guys able to find shelter last night?” Pearl nodded. “I actually found something else this morning,” Scott said, reaching behind his ear. It was just now that Jimmy noticed the crown tucked over Scott’s hair. He wondered where it had come from. He certainly hadn’t had it on Empires.

“Figured you’d like it,” Scott continued, proffering something to Jimmy. It was a bright red poppy. A pang of longing shot through Jimmy’s heart. He ignored it. Scott’s expression fell slightly when he saw that Jimmy wasn’t taking the flower. “It’s a poppy!” he said. “Just like last time, when you-” “I know,” Jimmy said gently, cutting him off. He pushed Scott’s hand down, and Scott’s smile fell. “I know, Scott. But I can’t do this. Not again.” “But-but...” Scott protested.

“New round, new rules,” Jimmy said sadly. “Besides I can’t...I can’t risk losing you again. And I don’t want you to have to lose me. We’re both on our yellow lives. I can’t go through that again. And it’s not fair to ask you to.” He hesitated for a moment, but then he gathered himself and marched past Scott and Pearl.

Scott watched him go, staring dumbly at Jimmy’s retreating form, hand curled tightly around the poppy. Then, his heart shattered.

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blossom-hwa · 3 years

Text

Light the Pyres |Burn| - SUNGYOON

This chapter hurt so much I'm really sorry

Pairing: Sungyoon x gender neutral!reader

Genre: angst, bits of fluff, apocalypse!au

Triggers: cursing, implied death, semi-graphic depictions of blood

Word Count: 7.9k

As the world burns its last goodbyes, you find a jewel amidst the ashes.

Previous: Rise >> Burn

Golden Child Masterlist

If times were normal, three weeks stuck in the same space with anyone but Daeyeol or your mother would probably drive you insane. Only seeing one other person’s face for days after days on end? You’d almost rather be alone.

But whether it be because you have shared memories and common grief or simply because you’re compatible human beings, Sungyoon isn’t difficult to live with, not in the slightest. You don’t fight over food or water or living in the same space. His voice doesn’t grate on your nerves, even after a week of him being the only person you can talk to. He isn’t almost pleasant company anymore – he’s just pleasant.

Maybe even a little more than that.

Over one, two, then three weeks, you come apart to each other, exposing small bits of yourselves from beneath threads frayed by the apocalypse. Sungyoon craves coffee more than anything in the world. He used to be the fastest runner on his high school track team. He tells you his favorite color is black, and just to keep the conversation going you decide that black isn’t a real color since it’s technically the absence of all color, which sparks a debate that maybe grows a little too loud every once in a while but by the end, you’re laughing at Sungyoon’s indignant expression that slowly cracks into a smile.

Laughing. Not smirking. At something not morbid or deadly.

It feels almost surreal, being able to smile at a topic so inane.

“What’s your credibility, huh?” Sungyoon asks when you’ve stopped laughing, having given into a grudging smile himself. It makes his face look sweeter, gentler. “What makes you an expert on colors or the absence of them?”

“I did mechanical engineering in university,” you say, leaning back against the wall. Memories threaten to flood your mind but you keep them at bay, closing your eyes against the onslaught. “Took a few chemistry classes as a requirement. We learned about colors at some point.” You open your eyes and shrug. “It was kind of interesting, but not enough for me to change my major.”

“Mechanical engineering,” Sungyoon echoes, staring up at the ceiling. You kind of have to give it to him – you might be bored sitting around in this empty house sometimes, but he’s confined to the bed if he isn’t using the bathroom and he hasn’t complained yet. “That’s cool. Is that how you got that car to work before?”

“Yeah.” You swallow, a slightly bitter taste in your mouth at the memories of your almost finished second degree. “Mom was a mechanic. I grew up around cars and machines. I was almost done with my master’s when…”

When the apocalypse began and I started out across the country to find my mom.

From Sungyoon’s silence, you gather that he understands what you haven’t said. He also seems to understand you don’t want to talk about it and thankfully changes the topic. “I did sports medicine,” he says. “And I minored in music.”

You sit up. “Music? What did you play?”

“I can play a little piano, but I mostly sing – sang,” he corrects himself, a faraway look coming into his eyes.

You don’t miss the switch from present to past tense. Mood dampened, you both sit in silence for a moment, mourning the loss of your lives before they’d barely begun.

“I used to play piano,” you finally say, trying to salvage the conversation. “I wonder if it’s still at home,” you mumble, more to yourself than anybody.

“If it’s any consolation, people aren’t really looking for valuables at a time like this.” Sungyoon gives you a lopsided smile. “Assuming… well, even if people have broken in, I don’t think the piano would be the first thing they were looking for.”

You know Sungyoon means to comfort you, but the implication that anything happened to your house, to your home makes your heart stutter. It’s not a strange thing, people breaking into houses. Oftentimes they’re already open, the occupants either dead or fled.

But it’s your house, your home, and the thought that anything might’ve happened to it with your mom there flips your stomach.

Hypocrite. You’re sitting in one of those stolen homes right now, but you have a problem with people sitting in yours.

“Y/N?”

You look over to see Sungyoon staring back, concern in his expression. Swallowing, you try to smile. “Sorry, what?”

“Nothing,” he says. “You just went quiet for a bit.” He raises an eyebrow. “Thoughts?”

What do you say? Do you tell Sungyoon what you’re really thinking? Do you tell him you’re terrified of coming home to a house that’s been ransacked and laid bare? Do you tell him you’re scared of finding your mom in an empty home with nothing around her left, that you’re even more scared of finding an empty home with no mother inside?

You curve your lips, trusting Sungyoon won’t ask even if he sees that the smile doesn’t reach your eyes. “No,” you lie. “It’s nothing. So.” You look at him, your smile turning a little more genuine. “You sing?”

. . . . .

He does. He sings.

Beautifully.

His voice breaks sometimes, of course. Weeks of forced silence have taken tolls on both of your throats, and even speaking hurts if you talk too long. But the longer he sings, the longer his song fills your ears, the stronger his voice grows, rich and powerful even in his hushed melodies. It wraps around you like a blanket or a shawl, warming your skin in a way even the sun can’t.

When he first spoke to you so many weeks ago, told you not to hurt yourself by kicking the car down that one horrible day, you thought he could be a singer, thought that his voice was smooth, clear. Like Daeyeol’s. You hated it then, when it only reminded you of your best friend and what he was no longer around to do, what you had lost trying to save this boy with a nice voice who didn’t deserve it.

You still hear hints of Daeyeol’s clarity in Sungyoon’s quiet song. Even more obvious is the love of music in Sungyoon’s eyes that perfectly matches that of your dead friend. The few times Daeyeol hummed old songs to get you to sleep when the sun was still up, he always wore that look in his eyes. It fit him like a second skin, that soft love for music dancing in his expression, and you would try to keep that look in mind as he soothed you into sleep. It brought you both back to better times, when death didn’t lurk around every corner.

It hurts a little to see this look in Sungyoon’s face, for sure, but it also soothes another pain, the pain of knowing that you’ll never see Daeyeol ever again until it’s your turn to go. Because even though you’ll never gaze on his face again during your time on this earth, you’ll still see bits of him, hear parts of him in Sungyoon’s eyes and voice. Where that reminder might’ve felt like a stab in the chest before, it now smooths a blanket over your body, wrapping you in the knowledge that Daeyeol will always live with you, in your memories and in Sungyoon’s voice.

Sungyoon doesn’t ask why you’re crying when he finishes his song, even though he can definitely see you wiping away tears from your perch at the foot of his bed. You don’t make an effort to hide it, really – you’ve done worse things in front of him than cry, and besides, he looks a little teary himself. For a moment, you only sit in your respective positions, trying to rein in your tears until he breaks the silence again.

“That was my sister’s favorite song,” he whispers. “She played it so much that Bomin once threatened to delete it off of her playlist.”

You swallow at the mention of his sister and her boyfriend, guilt snaking its way up your chest. It’s a little easier to ignore right now, though, especially when you realize that this is the first time Sungyoon’s put a name to either of the two people you shot. “Bomin was her boyfriend?” you ask.

He nods. “I never said?”

As you shake your head, it only just occurs to you how little you know of Sungyoon’s family. You haven’t said that much – he knows about your mom and Daeyeol, but little of anyone else – but even that seems like a lot compared to what little he has (more like hasn’t) said about his family. You don’t even know his sister’s name.

You’re not even sure you want to. Putting a name to dead faces, faces that you shot bullets through…

Swallowing, you shake your head again, this time more trying to clear your head than say no. “No, you never mentioned it.”

“Oh.” He pauses. “Bomin was Sumin’s boyfriend. Sumin was my sister.”

Bomin. Sumin. The addition of two names to your repertoire (and the past tense for Bomin) nearly makes your head spin. Bomin with dyed, pale hair, Sumin with dark. Bomin with chiseled, handsome features marred by white skin and dark veins. Sumin with a round, soft face and eyes that probably would’ve looked lovely with a smile had they not been shrunken with disease.

You didn’t know either of them at all, which just makes the fact that you put a bullet through each of their heads even worse.

In fact, you pressured Sungyoon into letting you do it.

Both of you agreed not to apologize anymore. But the only words hanging on the tip of your tongue consist of I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Sungyoon, I’m sorry –

“It wasn’t your fault.”

You blink. “What?”

“It wasn’t your fault.” Sungyoon’s eyes bore into yours softly, understanding and reproachful all at once. “That’s what you were thinking, wasn’t it? Bomin and Sumin.”

Despite everything, a wry little smile curls the corner of your mouth. “Was it that obvious?”

“Only to someone who saw what happened.” Sungyoon shifts on the bed, sitting up against the wall. “You didn’t kill them, Y/N. The zombies did.”

“See, I know that.” You stare at your hands, the smile wiped from your lips. “Logically. But –”

“Your brain won’t let you,” Sungyoon finishes. “Yeah, I know. It’s the same with me and… you know.” He leans forward, fixing your gaze with his. “So I’ll keep saying it until your brain finally figures it out. Okay?”

The tears try to come again, but this time, you hold them back. “Same for you,” you manage, hoping the wobble in your voice isn’t as prominent as it feels to you. “It wasn’t your fault. It never was. And I’ll keep saying that until you know it too.”

Sungyoon turns away. You don’t try to follow his gaze, to probe at his expression. You don’t need to.

It’s enough, this understanding that hangs quiet in the air.

. . . . .

On week three, when Sungyoon’s finally started to limp around the house, Lady Luck puts you in her good graces and you find a source of transportation far better than your legs. You don’t thank her too much, though, since you literally found the two bikes after being chased twice around the same building by a small, though vicious group of zombies.

Even then, a little bit of excitement sparks in your still-racing heart when you pedal up to the front of the house and dump the first bike indoors. Sungyoon pokes his head out through the bedroom at your call.

You grin. “Remember how to ride a bike?”

It takes a second dangerous trip to bring the other one back but you manage, since Sungyoon is still slow on his feet. When Sungyoon feels ready to try it out, you watch closely as he slings himself onto the cracked seat, ready to catch him if he falls.

He does, twice. But the third time, he actually starts wobbling up and down the front of the house, pedaling slowly but steadily.

A cry almost escapes your throat when he turns around on the street, pedaling back with sparkling eyes and lips curving in a rare smile of success. But though you stifle the sound, you can’t help but run up and hug him when he dismounts, one hand holding the bike steady as you wrap the other around his chest.

Sungyoon’s breath catches. The little gasp in his throat reminds you of what you’re doing, that he might be uncomfortable, and you go to apologize and pull away, insides curdling with embarrassment.

But then he wraps both of his arms around you, bringing you in closer with a gentle, uncertain grip, hands locked loosely at your waist. And it’s your turn to catch your breath at the subtle warmth of Sungyoon’s thin body, a warmth more comforting than even the rays of afternoon sun beginning to set in the sky.

Human touch. Human comfort. Human warmth. You bury yourself in Sungyoon and he buries himself in you, earlier excitement forgotten in favor of the comforting warmth of the other’s touch.

You don’t say anything about it, even after you let go. You only part naturally, smiling at each other as your arms fall to your sides before finally reentering the house. Sungyoon goes back to lying on the little couch, resting his leg, while you carefully stand the bike by the door and go to find something to eat. Conversation is quiet. Not awkward, not stilted, just quiet. You still don’t mention the hug.

But later that night, after you’ve barricaded the door and freshened up as best you can, Sungyoon is still sitting up in the bedroom. You pause in the doorway. “Sungyoon?”

“It isn’t comfortable on the floor, is it?” he asks, voice strangely stilted. He doesn’t wait for an answer before rushing on. “Come up here. It’ll be easier on your back.”

It takes several moments to process his words before you start protesting, saying the floor isn’t that bad and that you read something about how sleeping on hard surfaces is actually better for your back, but your voice dies away when Sungyoon holds out his arms in the dark, shifting to make room for you on the threadbare mattress.

Something about this feels like it should be wrong. Taking comfort in someone who isn’t Daeyeol or your mom or even one of the friends you left behind, probably never to see any of them ever again. You’ve only known Sungyoon for a matter of weeks. Daeyeol you knew for over twenty years. Your mom, even longer.

And now you’re taking comfort in someone when none of them are around to experience it themselves. Guilt simmers in your chest.

But walking into Sungyoon’s arms sweeps it away.

His touch is just as soft and unsure as it was earlier under the afternoon sun, but if anything, it feels warmer in the dark. And as you gain a little courage, letting him curl closer into you as your breaths begin to even from exhaustion, the touch becomes a little more certain, a little firmer and stronger as he loosens against your body.

One brave hand reaches up, tangles briefly through Sungyoon’s hair. “Goodnight,” you whisper.

He squeezes you once, gently. “Goodnight.”

. . . . .

The fourth week has passed by the time Sungyoon walks without a limp. You really would have wanted to go the first day he could put weight on his leg, but if you had, you wouldn’t have found the bikes. And considering the fact that you only have two bullets left, you’re thankful for a method of quick escape.

“We need to get out of the city,” you say, swinging one leg over your bike. “There are too many zombies here. Just follow me, I think I’ve mapped out how to get to the highway. It’ll probably be smoother from there.”

Sungyoon nods. “Let’s go, then.”

Your heart pounds as you pedal down the streets, quickly, quietly. The rusty bikes creak a little under your weight and with every weird noise you tense, pedaling faster, but street after street, you and Sungyoon ride without too much trouble.

Until you turn a corner and the faint sound of dead groans echoes from farther down the street.

Both of you stop. Sungyoon looks over. “Is there another way?”

“I mean, probably.” You swallow. “But they’re in the direction of the highway and regardless, we’ll have to go past. I don’t… I’m not sure…”

The groans grow louder.

“Let’s see if we can loop around,” you decide, trying to picture the general layout of buildings. “Just… be ready to ride fast.”

Sungyoon almost smirks. “That wasn’t a given?”

You hit him, even as you stifle a smile. But that smile disappears quickly as you ride closer and closer to the sounds of groans.

The first zombie lurches out from behind a collapsed home. It stumbles over the sidewalk, clawing forward, but you and Sungyoon move too fast and leave it quickly behind.

But then a second pops out in the distance. And a third.

Behind you, Sungyoon mutters a curse. You don’t blame him. Much worse words are running through your mind. “Through the cars,” you hiss, weaving between several vehicles stranded on the road. “Harder for them to get us.”

The sound of limbs slapping against metal and glass makes you want to hurl. Groans and shrieks echo off the sides of the cars, overpowering the creaking of your bike and filling your ears with their sickening sound. You pedal fast, fast, faster, swerving between a last car into open road –

Sungyoon races past, surpassing you as a zombie just misses grabbing the wheel of his bike. You pedal harder to catch up, staring straight ahead towards the entrance of the highway that’s finally in sight.

Something brushes your arm. You shriek, almost tipping off balance as dead white fingers flash in your peripherals, but a backwards glance from Sungyoon forces you to stay upright and you pedal forward with a last rush of speed, rolling onto a smooth, zombie-free road.

You ride for what feels like hours until you have to call it quits. Stumbling behind an abandoned truck, you collapse in the shade, legs shaking with exertion and adrenaline. Sungyoon follows quickly, dropping his bike onto the asphalt to sit next to you.

For a moment, you only sit in silence, panting under the hot sun.

Then you heave a shaky breath and start to laugh.

It starts out as a gasp, really. That first breath doesn’t fully go out the way you want it to and you wheeze a gasp, then another, and another and another until your wheezes turn into breathless laughter that treads the line of hysteria but then Sungyoon is starting to laugh too and all you can do is revel in the fact that you can laugh, snort, giggle because you’re alive. You made it out of that infested city alive, alive despite that horde at the end, and God, now you’re trembling because even though you’ve had close encounters with the undead before, you can still feel cold, peeling skin just dragging against your shirt –

You start crying.

Adrenaline seeps out of your body like blood from a wound. Your stomach hurts from laughing. Your eyes ache with tears. You keep feeling that feather light, deathly cold touch brushing your arm, almost like a wisp of wind curling against your skin but so much colder, like ice freezing your veins even under the burning sun.

Cold. Cold. Cold. And no one, not Daeyeol, not your mother, no one to help you out of this icy sun –

Sungyoon’s shaking arms wrap around you, and you remember what it feels like to be warm again.

You grip him tight, tight, tighter, holding onto this last piece of human life. Everyone else you know is dead or probably dead and only Sungyoon is a constant, still here and alive despite the fact that you could’ve split up all those weeks ago.

Until the day you die, you’ll be grateful you chose not to.

He holds you and you hold him until both of you finally stop trembling in the hot shade of the truck, but even then, you latch on just a little bit longer, memorizing the weight of his thin body pressed against yours. Hunger has hollowed his skin and yours, eaten away the muscle that used to cushion your bones, but Sungyoon’s arms still hold a fragile strength that slowly bleeds into you, giving you the courage to wipe away the tears.

That night, after hours of riding on quiet roads, no silent, tentative question hangs in the air like it always has when Sungyoon slumps against your sitting figure, head falling into your lap as you fight to keep your eyes open for first watch. Without hesitation, you tangle your fingers through his curly hair, soothing him into sleep.

Sungyoon is your warmth, just as you are his. Reminders to each other that even in this blackened world of death and ashes, both of you are still alive.

. . . . .

The closer you get to home, the harder sleep comes. You don’t know why. It should be the opposite, right? You’re closer to your goal. Closer to your mom.

But that also means you’re closer to uncertainty. Closer to the Schrodinger’s cat-type limbo where you don’t know whether or not your mom is still alive. Only with Schrodinger’s cat, there’s an exactly fifty percent chance that the animal is dead. Or so you think. It’s been some time since you had time to think about quantum mechanics.

Doesn’t matter. Odds are now, the scale’s been tipped a little further in that direction.

You don’t know what you’ll do if she’s dead.

Scratch that. You kind of know what you’ll do. Scream. Cry, probably. Either that or just go silent.

You don’t know what you’ll do if she’s just disappeared.

Because then there’s Schrodinger’s cat again, constantly hovering between life and death. Knowing at least gives you facts – you’ll be certain as to whether she’s dead or alive.

Not knowing will rip you apart.

Sungyoon decides it’s enough when you wake up the third time during his second watch, chest heaving from nightmares where you return home alone and there’s no one. Not him, not your mom, not even a single zombie. There’s no blood on the floor or anything to indicate struggle. The house is perfect, just as you left it when you went back to university the last time.

But it’s empty. Cold.

And only silence answers your calls.

“Okay, that’s it.” Sungyoon’s tone is softer than his sharp words. He gently grips your shoulders, pulling you up in the darkness. “What’s wrong? What are you dreaming of?”

You shiver even in his hold, remembering the chill of the empty house, the choking silence that greeted your calls. How do you begin to describe that, the fear of not knowing whether or not your mother is alive?

Then it hits you.

Sungyoon will understand. He has to. He walked back to a zombie infested city on an injured leg to find his sister and her boyfriend, Sumin and Bomin, all the while not knowing if they were alive or dead.

“What if she’s not there?”

His grip slackens. “What?”

You swallow. “What if my mom isn’t there?”

For a long moment, both of you stay silent. In the dark, you can’t even make out the expression on Sungyoon’s face.

“I don’t know,” he finally replies. “What will you do?”

Fear ices your throat. You can’t speak. What will you do? If it turns out you came all this way, across an entire country, for nothing?

“What did you do?” you manage once it feels like your vocal cords have thawed. “When you went back and…?” A wince of guilt and shame keeps you from saying more.

Sungyoon falls quiet. You recognize this silence not as brooding, not as angry, but thinking. Contemplative. It eases the tightness in your chest.

“It felt like everything was lost to me,” he finally says. “They were all I had left. When it finally hit me that they were gone…” He shakes his head. “But that’s not what you meant, right? You’re asking about before. When I didn’t know.”

You nod, curling closer into him. “Yeah.”

“I don’t know,” Sungyoon says. “Honestly, I don’t know how I dealt with it. All I know is that it was eating at me so much that I had to go back and find out myself. So I was an idiot.”

There’s a little smile in his voice, a twitch of the lips that you can hear in his last few words. Your mouth almost curves, too. “But what if we go back and I still don’t know?” you ask. “What if she’s just… gone?”

“It’ll be your choice whether or not you want to leave it at that or keep looking,” Sungyoon answers after a pause. “I can’t make the decision for you. But…”

You look up. “But?”

“You know what kept me going after all of that?” He doesn’t wait for a reply. “The fact that you offered to let me come with you, despite what had happened. It was the fact that someone, more or less a stranger, gave me a place with them.”

“Really? I honestly thought you were going to laugh in my face as soon as I said it,” you admit. “I’d just… done that, and a few hours later, I was asking you to walk across an entire country with me.” You wince. “Not exactly bonding material.”

“I won’t lie, I kind of considered it.” Sungyoon seems to shrug in the darkness. “But even then, I knew you weren’t evil, regardless of what happened. You still lost a friend. You were still trying to stay alive. And when you talked about your mom…” He sighs. “What I’m saying is you were there for me, Y/N.” His grip on your hand tightens softly. “And whatever happens when we get to your home, I’ll still be there for you.”

The lump in your throat refuses to let you speak, so you only sink further into Sungyoon’s body, trying to hold back the tears threatening to escape your eyes. He seems to understand. His fingers rise and card through your hair, stroking smooth against your scalp.

If this is how Daeyeol felt every time you did this when he was sick, you now understand why he asked for head pats whenever he wasn’t doing well. It soothes you, even if one or two tears do make their way down your face at the thought of your best friend.

Fuck. You close your eyes. Daeyeol would have found a good friend in Sungyoon, you’re sure. Your mom would probably love him too. More than anything, you wish they were here.

But you still have someone. You have Sungyoon. You have someone you trust, someone you rely on, someone you can hold close at times like this when you start to spiral and can’t force yourself out of your mind.

You’d like to say that Sungyoon feels the same.

“Is that okay?” Sungyoon asks softly, breaking into your thoughts. His fingers keep stroking your hair gently, softly.

Your eyes are starting to close again, weighed down by sleep. Nightmares might be waiting, but Sungyoon’s words and warmth make you think they might stay at bay. You nod against his chest. “Yes,” you murmur. “More than okay.”

“Good.” His hands don’t stop. “Now sleep. There are only a few hours before dawn.”

You don’t need to be told twice, only curl further into him and shut your eyes. As sleep finally begins to roll over you in waves, you sigh. “Thank you,” you whisper.

His breath stirs your hair. “For what?”

A small smile curves your lips.

“For being here.”

. . . . .

The buildings start looking familiar two weeks and five zombie attacks later. There are more undead here, probably because you’re closer to the site of the explosion. Even though you’re still several states away, the virus spread more quickly here than on the other side of the country.

At some point after the third attack, you try to apologize while patching up several scrapes on Sungyoon’s arms. There isn’t even time to stay – you need to keep riding, find a place to take shelter for the night before zombies find you. He doesn’t deserve this.

“You don’t either,” he points out. “Neither of us ever deserved this.”

“But I have to deal with it to get home. You don’t.”

“And I signed up for the ride.” Sungyoon pats a bandage more firmly in place before taking your outstretched hand and standing up. He squeezes your fingers. “Come on, let’s get moving.”

Your heart pounds painfully as you ride down the last stretch of highway, faded signs bearing the name of your hometown. Everything almost looks the same, if you ignore the dried blood spattered along the sidewalks and panes of shattered glass on the streets.

And the zombies milling about at the base of the exit.

Sungyoon stops when you do, frowning when he sees the faint outlines of white skin and blackened veins. “Great.”

You snort, hysteria building in your throat. “Great” is the perfect way to put it. So close, yet so far – separated from your home by a throng of the undead.

There are only a few right now. From here, up on the highway, you can only count four or five. Zombies don’t move fast and if it’s just those few, you could probably outstrip them.

But they’re definitely not the only ones. And you have no way of knowing just how many are left in the city.

Think, think, think! You hit your head lightly. You grew up here, explored the entire city, walked all the roads by the time you went off to college the first time. Even though things have probably changed, they can’t be too drastically different. Any small nooks, any back roads or alleys you can find where zombies aren’t likely to be…

“What do you think will be more zombie infested?” you ask. “Residential roads or the actual city?”

“… City,” Sungyoon says. “More densely packed people, right?”

You bite your lip. He’s right. The highway leads to a road that cuts straight through the middle of the city and it would probably be faster to follow it straight down and just make a few appropriate turns before reaching your home, but it’ll probably be safer to take the longer local path.

Local it is. God, you hope your sense of direction is as good as it used to be.

“We’re going straight down now before more zombies come,” you say, swinging a leg over your bike. “As fast as you can. We turn left at that first traffic light and then be ready to follow me.”

The downward slope of the highway gives you a burst of speed you dearly need once you reach the road. You speed past abandoned cars and several milling zombies that turn to give chase, but you and Sungyoon are already turning left, racing down a street of empty shops and cafes. You used to hang out there with Daeyeol and a few of your friends before –

Not the time. You pedal faster. The groans of chasing zombies has grown fainter, which is good, but there are definitely more.

As if on cue, several sets of gangly, white limbs pop out from behind a building, lurching towards Sungyoon’s bike. He swerves around a car and you grit your teeth to avoid crying out. “Keep going!” you shout, pedaling faster. Faster.

Street signs whiz past. You almost miss the first turn, jerking sharply to the right at the last minute. Sungyoon curses and you look back but he’s following, still following, weaving around zombies and cars as he keeps racing forward.

Right. Left. Straight. Left. More zombies join the chase, relentless even as you and Sungyoon leave them behind, legs straining to keep the speed.

Left, left, straight. Pedaling uphill is a pain. Your thighs burn and your chest aches but then you’re rolling downhill and you catch your breath before straining once more.

Straight. Right. Right. Left. You pass by your old high school, grass trampled and overgrown in the front.

Left, right. You race down a street lined with houses you used to envy – if you lived closer to school, you wouldn’t have had to get up early for the bus every morning.

Straight. You pedal past a small plaza. Clubs used to congregate in the restaurants for end of year celebrations. It’s where you went with your friends on the last day of high school and where you had dinner with your mom the next day after graduation.

Mom. Mom. You go right, then left, racing past aching memories, all the while conscious of zombies groaning in the background and Sungyoon panting by your side. Mom, I’m almost there. Almost home.

Please be there.

The last street comes into sight. You swing around a last building and a last car, finding yourself on a familiar street that you haven’t seen in years. You pedal slower, slower, until you stop in front of your house.

Memories almost paralyze you. This was where you met Daeyeol when he first moved in. This was where you almost got hit by a speeding car when you were out playing as a child. This was where you walked from every day to the bus stop for over five years to get to school –

Sungyoon grabs your wrist, glancing behind. Already, the sound of groans is growing louder. “Is this it?” he asks, nodding at the front door.

“Yeah,” you breathe. You squeeze your eyes shut, shake yourself out of your daze. “Yeah. Come on.”

With each step forward, you feel like you’re walking back in time. You grow younger and younger, smaller and smaller, until you’re finally pulling out the house key you’ve kept in your bag for so long, waiting for this moment –

You stop, key held uselessly between your fingers as you take in the scuff marks around the doorknob and the lock.

The door has already been forced open at least once.

Sungyoon notices the marks, notices your silence. He pulls open the door anyway and shoves you inside, slamming it shut behind you.

He plucks the key from your hand. Locks the door with a faint, familiar click.

You look around in a daze, taking in overturned furniture, books and magazines strewn over the floor, cabinets left open from what you can see in the kitchen. Clouds of dust spring up where you step.

You sneeze. The sound brings you back to the present.

Your home has been ransacked. Someone broke in and took what they thought was worth taking, leaving behind furniture and books and the piano standing against the wall. Someone broke in and either spared your mother or killed her –

Or she wasn’t there in the first place.

You can feel Sungyoon’s eyes following your movements as you step forward, slow and cautious. Dust itches your throat and burns your eyes but you keep moving, surveying the damage. “Mom?”

There’s no sign of human life. Not a footprint in the dust, not a handprint on the wall. But there’s also no blood. No sign of struggle.

So where is she?

“Mom?”

Panic seizes your chest and you walk forward faster, looking into the kitchen as if she’ll be hiding somewhere there. When she doesn’t appear, you turn into the bathroom, the bedrooms, but only a mess of dust and objects meets your eyes. “Mom?”

No one replies.

She’s not here.

You try to reason it away. Maybe she’s out looking for food. Maybe she’s hiding. But you don’t have a basement or second floor so there’s nowhere she could be, and why would she be hiding, anyway? As for food…

Dust comes away on your fingertips as you drag them along the floor. Somewhere along the way, you sank down against the wall, alone in the hallway. Bits of dust rise with every breath you take.

If she was just looking for food, the house would still appear lived in. There wouldn’t be so much dust and dirt everywhere.

But she might have had to leave when people broke into the house. Right?

Or not. You swallow, tears starting to flow down your face. There was no sign of struggle, no blood or cracks in the wall. Just overturned furniture, probably from someone’s careless movements while looking for necessities.

Which means she isn’t here.

Not here. Not here. Not here not here not here not here – you came all this way and survived so many attacks and even lost Daeyeol and she’s not here –

And –

Daeyeol –

A cracked, broken sound emerges from your throat and your pounding head falls into your hands. You came this whole way and watched Daeyeol shoot himself just to find the dusty, empty house from your nightmares –

“Y/N.”

You turn your head to see Sungyoon in the hallway, holding a piece of paper in one hand. His face is pale.

He holds out the paper before you can work through the lump in your throat to ask what’s wrong. “I think you should read this.”

. . . . .

It’s long past dark and you still can’t sleep. Sungyoon drifted off about an hour ago, but even though you lie under the same sheet next to him on the floor, not even his warmth can lull you into dreamland this time.

Well. Probably more like nightmare land. The piece of paper crinkles in your hand, as if to remind you of what you’ve lost.

You try to close your eyes against the words that seem to flash in your vision. No use. They’ve tattooed themselves to the backs of your eyelids, trembling letters written in your mother’s familiar scrawl…

Y/N, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry. I’m most likely dead.

Why did she feel the need to apologize for being dead? If anything, it’s your fault for not getting here fast enough.

Of course, there is the chance that I’m just out looking for food and will come back soon, but if I’m not home by night, it isn’t likely.

Night has gone and passed. It’s probably closer to morning.

Every time I leave the house, I put out this note. That way, in case you manage to find your way back, you’ll have this much left from me.

Tears start to build up again behind your still puffy eyes.

I heard you on that phone call. I knew you would come back or at least die trying. Because that’s who you are, Y/N, my strong, darling child. Brave to the last.

Brave. Ha. If only she knew how much you relied on others to keep you sane. First Daeyeol, then Sungyoon…

I miss you. Every day I miss you. But I have hope that you will come home one day, return to this house, even if I’m not there to welcome you.

She wasn’t.

If you are reading this note and I am not there, don’t blame yourself. It isn’t your fault. Nothing is certain, especially not our lives, not mine, not yours. If it was my time, then it was my time. Don’t hurt yourself, thinking you should have gotten here before.

But you could have. Maybe you should have. Sungyoon certainly thought so, judging from his silence as you read the note. He read it too, before you, and you know he was thinking you should have left him and his fractured leg back at that house in the city infested with zombies, left him and come back four weeks earlier to hopefully find your mother, alive and whole –

You don’t think you could’ve chosen differently, though. Sungyoon was there, right in front of you, injured and broken and you couldn’t just leave him behind. Even if your mother had still been here then (which you don’t think she was – the thick layer of dust all over the house speaks of over a month of disuse), would you even have made it back? Or, alone, would you have fallen to the trap of your own mind?

And even if you had returned in time, how would she have thought of you, knowing you left an injured person behind? You wouldn’t have been able to keep it from her. It would’ve spilled out, sometime.

Your heart clenches. Even though there logically wasn’t much you could do, it still hurts to think that you might’ve had a last chance to see her before she went.

Always remember that I love you, Y/N. You have always been the pride of my life. You are strong and brave, and if anyone is to survive this disaster, I pray it is you, both as my child and as a ray of hope for the future. We know something like this can’t happen again. I know you. I know you will help prevent it.

The tears start to spill. Again.

I love you. I miss you. I hope I will see you soon, but not before it is truly your time.

- Your loving mother

Tears fall harder, faster. You turn, pulling yourself out of the blanket so you won’t wake Sungyoon, and sit there, shaking with silent sobs.

I love you too. And I miss you even more.

You have little left of your mother but this note. All her clothes were taken from her room, the sheets of her bed pulled away, even her toolbox laid empty. Trinkets from shelves and tables lay smashed on the floor, fallen from careless searching. A few framed pictures survived. Little more. You don’t even have her body – you can’t even bury her, your mom, your hero, you can’t even give her the same respects you paid Daeyeol –

Your watery eyes light on the shadow of the piano, hidden in the darkness. The lid covering the keys is still closed, protecting them from dust, just the way you left it when you went back to university.

As if in a trance, you stand, walking towards the piano and settling on the dusty bench. You haven’t grown in the years since you’ve been at school and it’s still pulled the same distance back, leaving just enough space for you to stretch your hands out on the keys once you’ve lifted the lid. Dust billows and you cough, batting it away, but you put your hands back on the keyboard.

And begin to play.

It’s your mother’s favorite piece, a sonata’s slow second movement that she said never failed to calm her after a long day. But you don’t play it well – your fingers slip. You don’t remember all the notes. Rhythms are wrong, the melodies stilted, and you stop playing, resting your elbows on the edge of the instrument as you grind the heels of your palms into your eyes, tears beginning to pound once more. You couldn’t bury her so you thought you could give her a little music, but holy fuck, you can’t even properly give this tribute because you can’t play the fucking piece –

Sungyoon sits on the edge of the bench. You jump – you never realized he was awake, and you open your mouth to apologize for waking him up – but he just looks at you with a softness you can feel even in the dark. “Keep playing.”

Fingers trembling, you put them back on the keyboard. It doesn’t get better – missed notes and wrong rhythms still plague the piece – but Sungyoon nudges you every time you falter, pushing you to finish. And when you do, tears falling to the dust onto your lap, he pulls you over and wraps an arm around you, letting your head fall to his shoulder as you cry.

He holds you until the sun rises and you finally fall asleep.

. . . . .

As much as you want to leave as soon as you wake, you stay at home another day. Both of you need a break before you keep going west, now that there’s no time crunch, and there don’t seem to be many zombies walking up and down the street. As long as you and Sungyoon keep the window blinds shut, you consider yourself about as safe as you can get.

The security helps a little. Takes away a bit of anxiety. But wherever you go, no matter how messy the rooms are, you always know that you’re in the same house you grew up in. Just with the most important people of your childhood missing.

But Sungyoon is important, and Sungyoon is here. It helps, a little. Though when you find him staring at the few family photos left on a table, photos with you and your mother and one even with Daeyeol’s family, you have to leave the room because it just reminds you that Sungyoon lost everyone and has little beyond his sister’s earrings, as far as you know, to remember them by. And he had to take them from her body, when in any other “normal” situation of death he would’ve left them in for her burial…

Sungyoon cried over the earrings several weeks ago. Just looking at the pictures, comparing the memories they hold to two little gold hoops that can’t even fit around Sungyoon’s fifth finger, almost makes you want to smash the frames to the ground.

You almost don’t take them with you. It’s only when Sungyoon holds out the thin frames that you remember them, two-dimensional faces of people you lost, smiling with a joy that you don’t think you’ll feel ever again.

“You’ll want them,” Sungyoon says quietly. “It hurts now, but you will. Trust me.”

The weight behind his words convinces you.

In the end, you put them in your bag, stuffing your mother’s note into one of the frames. Sungyoon helps you cushion them with your spare clothes. When you’ve finally packed them away, you walk with him to the front of the house before hesitating in the doorway.

Sungyoon glances at you. “Ready?”

You don’t turn around, but you let your eyes wander over what of the living room you can see from here. You’ve left this house many times, both times when you went to university and every time you left after a break, but you always came back. Even when everything happened, you came back. You still came back.

This time, you don’t think you’ll ever return.

“Y/N?”

You hear Sungyoon, but you still say nothing, riveting your gaze to the door. Once you leave this house, you won’t come back. You can’t even hope for it.

But you think it’ll be okay, because home isn’t just a place. It’s with people, too. And though you will never forget your original home with your mom and Daeyeol, you think you’ve found the beginnings of another home with Sungyoon.

You take Sungyoon’s hand, tangle your fingers through his. He looks at you with some concern but you don’t look back, just blink your eyes and take a breath.

You’re leaving your original home for a less certain one, a home bound solely in human attachment without the solid root of a house. It’s a little tenuous, a little shaky, but with your hands joined like this, you think there’s a possibility things might be okay.

It’s a chance you’re willing to take.

“Yeah.” You finally look up, squeezing his fingers once. You twist the doorknob. “Let’s go.”

If you enjoyed, please don’t forget to reblog and leave a comment to tell me what you thought! Thank you for reading and have a lovely day <3

(1 reblog = 1 prayer for a certain two characters to stay alive)

36 notes · View notes

beomglocks · 4 years

Text

unlikely allies ; txt x reader

part: one ,, next chapter / previous chapter

plot: when a zombie apocalypse breaks out in your town, you're forced to team up with a group of boys from very different social standards in your school.

genre: fluff, angst, horror i guess?, not really that scary but alright, some funny moments

w/c: 3.6K

warnings: blood, gruesome scenes (kind of really detailed), cursing, everyone hates each other, definitely some major injuries, zombies duh, everyone kinda pining for mc

︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵︵

he sighs looking at the both of you. "if we wanna make it out of here alive...we're gonna have to fight."

silence. the room was engulfed in silence, save for the growling and moaning of the monsters outside the door. you and yeonjun stared wide-eyed at taehyun who was mirroring your expressions.

"excuse me what?" yeonjun blurted. "we don't even know what those things are and you wanna go out there and risk getting torn to shreds like the nurse? are you crazy?" all you could do was shake your head in fear. you were still shaken up from watching someone get eaten alive.

"s-she...i saw her get eaten and then she just s-stood up? she came back to life somehow?" you questioned out loud. the boys looked at you with fear in their eyes. yeonjun stared at your shaken state and frowned turning to taehyun. "see? if go out there we're gonna die!"

"well do you have any other suggestions? if we stay here we starve to death or something like that, it's better to go out looking for help and finding others before more of them corner us here!" taehyun was making a lot of points right now but going out there? where you just saw a woman die and come back to life? that would happen to you guys if you weren't prepared.

you tried to calm yourself by taking a deep breath, "ok i agree with taehyun...but we need to be really prepared. we may not be capable of murder at this moment but we can take them on enough to get away right?"

taehyun nods but yeonjun just paces around the room anxiously. "you guys are insane. i can't believe i'm gonna die here of all places." you and taehyun watch yeonjun tug at his blonde hair. he suddenly pauses. "i have an idea. what if we don't actually try to take them on." he looked at you both expectedly.

"what do you mean?" you asked. he rolled his eyes, "we could try to just trap them in here and make our escape." taehyun nods at yeonjun's vague plan, "i get what you mean. before we start though we should take some stuff with us. we got lucky that we're in the nurse's office, we can take stuff in case we get injured."

all three of you split up around the office to pick up anything that might be helpful. "its a good thing i brought my bookbag with me," taehyun chuckles dryly. you pack up all the stuff you grabbed and help him zip up the bag. "ok so here's how we'll go forward with the plan."

•• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ ••

yeonjun sighs shakily as he crouches behind the door. "this was my plan so why do i have to be the one to open the door?!" he angrily whispers to you. you're hiding behind the nurse's desk which is right beside the door, glaring at him, "just shut up and wait for taehyun's cue. if they hear you, we're screwed."

"will you two stop arguing. if anything i'm the one with the risker job," taehyun glares at you both. he's standing in the middle of the office, just a little bit away from the desk. "let's go over the plan just one more time so nothing unexpected happens," he's nervous and you can hear it in his voice. he's trying to act brave like earlier. yeonjun starts, "simple, i open the door letting the monsters in. they won't notice me since i'm crouched below the window." you sigh, continuing, "once the monsters come running in, i pull the stethoscope attached that chair other there as hard as i can. they'll trip over it sending them tumbling."

taehyun takes a deep breath, "and i'll be standing here as bait. once i see that they're both down, that should give me enough time to run out and shut the door on them." yeonjun bites his lip, "i hope this works...my heart is racing seriously."

since taehyun is now visible from the one lamp shining down on him, the monsters outside now have new adrenaline in them, viciously gnawing at the door's window. you don't realize it but you all take a deep breath.

"3″

"2″

"1!"

as soon as taehyun yells, yeonjun swings the door open. the zombies pretty much bum rush through it to get to taehyun as soon as a slither of it was cracked open, effectively managing to swing the door all the way to the wall. you watch it hit yeonjun's arm roughly and flinch. he tries to hold back a gasp and squeezes his eyes shut.

you turn your attention to your task and pull on the stethoscope. thankfully it's stretchy enough to cause the zombies to trip over it. they tumble over each other and skid across the floor. you get up to run out the door and pull yeonjun with you who's clutching his arm.

however, when you look back taehyun is not behind you, instead, he's scrambling to the nurse's closet. apparently you overestimated the recovery time of a simple stumble to the floor. they managed to get up quickly enough to chase after taehyun who thankfully was also quick enough to notice a flawed plan. "shit!" you yell out before you could think. the zombies turn their attention to you and yeonjun who are standing by the door.

they come running at you but you slam the door shut in their faces. great, now taehyun was in there and you both were out here. not to mention, he's the one with all the supplies.

"damn it!" yeonjun kicks the door in frustration. the zombies are tweaking out watching you both from inside the office. thankfully they don't notice the closet door slowly creep open.

taehyun sneaks out of the closet in a painfully slow manner, as to not get detected. he ducks behind the desk, holding his breath. he waits a moment before rising from his hiding spot and hurling a pack of unopened pens at where the cots are located. you watch the zombies whip their heads toward the sound and clamber in that direction. taehyun crawls out from behind the desk and runs toward the door. the lunch lady, who is behind the nurse, notices taehyun and runs toward him and at full blown speed.

your heart is pounding so fast, it genuinely feels like time is going in slow motion. the monster is only like a foot behind the red-haired boy. you throw the door open for taehyun and he launches himself like the outside hallway is home base. you and yeonjun once again slam the door closed on the zombie who face plants into it with a groan.

you let out a breath you didn't even know you were holding. sliding down to sit on the floor, you glance at taehyun. he's recovering from literally upper body diving out of the room but you figure he's fine since he's used to it from playing baseball so long. yeonjun seems fine too since he's not holding onto his arm anymore.

after a moment, you speak up, "are you ok?" it's not exactly a question directed at either of the two boys. you kind of are just asking yourself that but yeonjun answers anyways, "i think i'm ok, my arm is aching though. the door slammed on me pretty hard but im ok."

taehyun backs himself against the lockers opposite from you too. "i'm fine too." you examine him though you can't see him from the distance and the dimming hallway lights. his face is riddled in sweat and you can kind of see tears running down his face but he notices you staring and harshly wipes them away. he sighs letting his head rest on the lockers.

"i thought that would be easier...i thought i was gonna die back there. thanks for not leaving me," you feel like he means that so you make a noise of acknowledgment. yeonjun also nods at him but doesn't say anything.

it's dead silent in the hallway and you hope it's because the rest of the school is hiding not because they're dead. if you don't think of the circumstances you'd think it's somewhat peaceful.

taehyun breaks the silence, "what if there are other people in here in that same situation." he's not looking at you, he's looking into the abyss of darkness that is your school's hallway. once buzzing with students who you wished would shut the fuck up and move to their next class is now a ghost town. it's eerie and it leaves you with an unsettling feeling just thinking about what hides beyond the darkness.

"fuck no," yeonjun says. he's calm and you hope he doesn't lash out at what taehyun's suggesting. "taehyun..." you mumble. you don't want to say it out loud because you hate how it will sound. well, yeonjun says it for you, "did you hit your head on the way out. you almost died, dude! i know you're having some kind of epiphany about helping others and what not but think about this: those two zombie things aren't the only ones in this school. we could really die in here so we need to get o-"

"shut the fuck up!" taehyun spits. you can tell he's trying not to yell just in case there really are other zombies out here. "do you seriously only care about yourself? what if there really are other people waiting to be helped? we can't just leave them to die in this stupid ass school!" he gets up with some struggle, clutching his wrists again.

"look im not saying you have to help them but it would be really cool if you did...the more people that are alive the more likely we are to survive," with that he starts walking down into the darkness of the hallway. yeonjun scoffs and looks at you. you bite your lip. "i know it's risky...risking our lives for other people but i would feel like shit if i just let people die here while i run off like a coward."

yeonjun watches you run after taehyun. he's now left alone standing outside of the nurse's office. the zombies haven't quieted down and he wonders how much energy they have. he sighs dramatically, running after you both, "hey wait up!"

•·················•·················•

"so where are we headed?" your school isn't that big but it isn't that small either. there are three floors in total but most of the important rooms are on the first floor where you guys are located. taehyun clears his throat, "i was thinking we should get some weapons just in case. the gym's locker room/storage closet is where the team's baseball bats are located, we should be fine against those things if we manage to snag the metal ones."

once he answers you the silence surrounds you three again. you had been walking quite slowly since you didn't know if you'd encounter another zombie soon. it would be better if you could see but the power in the lights seemed to have died out. the school really did feel scarier when the lights were off.

"isn't it still day time outside?" yeonjun randomly asks. now that you think about it, he's right. if you were thinking about the time you took yeonjun to the nurse's office it was around 2 pm. "wait you're right," taehyun stops and turns around. "it was last period when you guys got to the nurse's office."

"damn it, i left my phone in my bookbag," you mumble. you thought it would be a quick trip to the nurse's office so you left it back in the class. yeonjun pats himself down and grumbles, "mine must've fallen out of my pocket during the fight. man, i fucking hate soobin! if i ever see him again he's dead."

you ignore yeonjun and look at taehyun expectantly, "sorry mines dead. i was playing with it while i was waiting for the nurse to come back," he answers sheepishly. you sigh, "we could've called for help since it's not late we could've called our parents or better yet, the police."

"don't worry, i'm sure they'll worry that we aren't coming back from school yet," yeonjun reassures. "i had practice today and my mom doesn't know i broke my wrist so she won't be expecting me home until after practice so i don't think she'll be worried until then."

yeonjun suddenly grabs taehyun's arm. you look at him in alarm because that was really random. this boy has just been full of spontaneous actions lately. "if you had practice today doesn't that mean the team would've been gathered in the gym by now?" a look of realization hits taehyun but he masks it quickly. "they're capable... they wouldn't have been turned into zombies, i'm sure there are some survivors," he sounds like he's trying to convince himself more than you guys.

as you're growing closer to the gym though, taehyun doesn't tell you that he's the best player on the team. he doesn't tell you that none of his other teammates can properly wield a bat. yes, any idiot can hold a bat but to properly swing it for the hit to have an impact takes real practice, practice that his teammates just haven't mastered. he doesn't tell you that he really doesn't think anyone in that gym has survived.

"you hear that?" yeonjun whispers stepping closer to the gym doors. there it goes again, the unmistakable moaning and groaning of the zombies. the sounds are harsher and louder being that there seem to be a lot of people in the gym at once. "damn that must be the team," you mutter. "there's no way anyone in there survived."

"we-we have to try and find out," taehyun tries. you eye him. you really don't think you'll get out of this one alive but you don't tell him that.

"we can cause some kind of distraction like last time," yeonjun suggests. "yeahhh no, im not doing that ever again," taehyun deadpans. "i think he means like what you did with the pens. that seemed to work...i think they react a lot to loud sounds."

there's a moment of silence where you all are just thinking. "your phone!" you turn to taehyun. he raises an eyebrow at you, "it's dead y/n." you shake your head, "look since it's dead and you really won't be needing it, we can just throw it somewhere in the gym. the impact of the phone hitting the wall will alert the zombies and they'll move. then we can maneuver ourselves through the darkness of the gym into the storage room to see if anyone's in there!"

both boys are staring at you with a weird look in their eyes but none of them say what they're really thinking. "that's... actually not a bad idea. the gym is big so there's no way we'll run into one. and since it looks like the lights are off they won't see us if we keep close to the walls," taehyun reiterates.

"ok so let's just get this over with," yeonjun mutters. you look at yeonjun who's staring into the gym, "you didn't have to come with us." you don't wanna sound rude but if he's just gonna complain the whole time then you'd rather be with just taehyun. "yeah right as if i'd venture off on my own in a school full of flesh-eating monsters," he rolls his eyes. "plus i'm the one who comes up with all the good plans, you guys need me."

"whatever," taehyun answers dryly. he's already starting to open the door to the gym, telling you guys that that's your cue to shut up. walking behind yeonjun, who's behind taehyun, you all crouch in a stealthy manner. you wouldn't call yourself the most athletic person but damn, why are your thighs starting to hurt? yeonjun cranes his neck to look back at you and when he sees you struggling to keep up, he slows down.

"what the fuck are you doing?" he whisper-yells. you don't know if the zombies can hear him but that sounded quite loud to you. you glare at him when the groans in the gym increase slightly in volume. "my thighs hurt, just- just leave me alone and tell taehyun to throw the damn phone." you see yeonjun purse his lips but turn to taehyun, telling him to get on with the plan. taehyun looks over to you with confusion and ?concern? written all over his face and all you do is nod at him.

he gets up slightly from his crouched position on the ground, still kind of in a half squat. he lets out a breath, preparing himself to pitch his phone. you watch in awe as you see taehyun get in the zone. you know this is a serious moment and everything but he looks good when he's focused.his eyes are trained on where he's made a mental target to throw to. even in this weird setting of a gym full of zombies of his own teammates, you can see that his breathing is steady. you wonder why you'd never been to any of the school's home baseball games when you realize that taehyun had somewhat of a cult following. right, just like yeonjun everyone liked him and you just figured it was for nothing or that he was overhyped but you can see why now.

drawing you out of your thoughts was the sound of taehyun's phone crashing against the gym's wall. at the moment in which you were daydreaming about him, he must've thrown it. "ok cmon we gotta hurry, that might not keep them that occupied," taehyun whispers. you turn to look at the zombies which, thankfully, fell for your trick. they were all gathered in the direction where taehyun had thrown his phone. you all rose from your crouched positions and ran the rest of the way to the gym's locker room.

once inside you all let out a breath. "i can't believe that worked," you sigh. "i'm glad it did," yeonjun also sighs. "ok let's go get those bats, once we have them then we might be safe," taehyun leads you both to where he knows they are. walking down the locker room's hallway is even creepier than walking down the normal hallway. there are no windows plus the lights are out so it's even darker in here. once again you're the behind yeonjun who's behind taehyun. you feel uncomfortable and almost feeling like there's an eerie presence behind you. you never liked to be last; the shiver you get through your spine from the mere thought of something following you was weird.

just then you whip your body around but you feel it before you see it. a zombie that must've been in the locker room before you got here hovering over you. you're not sure what happened but it must've flown at you hard enough to knock your body to the ground. it was snapping and snarling in your face trying to get a bite. your eyes were closed but all your other sensed were heightened and you could definitely hear yourself shrieking wildly. you weren't sure what taehyun and yeonjun were doing but you guessed they were standing and staring in shock and horror. you are surely gonna die here.

just then, the back of the zombie's skull was knocked in with so much force that it came out through the front, effectively landing on the upper half of your body and face. just like that, it was no longer trying to devour you, instead, slumping down onto you like a lifeless doll.

you wanted to throw up but you bit it back. you figured the image of you on the floor with blood and a bashed brain spilling out of a once alive human on you was enough.

the body was thrown off you in an instant and there stood choi beomgyu looking over you with so much concern that you were scared you turned into a zombie and were about to suffer the same fate as the corpse next to you. "oh my god y/n," his eyebrows are furrowed and his mouth is agape. he kneels down to wipe the brain remnants off you but he does it hastily and not that gentle really. you flinch and he pauses, "s-sorry its just that...well i don't know. i didn't think anyone else was alive and then i see you but you're about to get eaten so i mean-." you cut him off with a shaky hand lifted when you realize he's rambling.

he wants to go in to hug you and shout for joy that thankfully his crush- i mean... thankfully you are alive but yeonjun steps in, "dude oh my god y/n, are you okay?" you don't turn around to look at him or taehyun because frankly, you're too shaken up to even stand.

"thank you beomgyu," you whisper the expression and you kind of hope it sounds spiteful towards the other two boys for not really doing anything to help. taehyun looks down and bites his lip and yeonjun just looks at you. beomgyu smiles lightly and helps you stand and when you turn around you see the other two boys flinch at what you look like.

you know you must look horrifying with blood all over you and you want to cry. not because you look absolutely disgusting in front of the two of the most popular boys at your school but because you almost died in front of them. you let out a sob and taehyun steps forward but beomgyu is already ahead of him. "oh y/n... it's ok. look," he wipes your face with his shirt and you feel even worse. "we're alive, you're alive, it's gonna be ok."

✼ •• ┈┈┈┈┈┈┈┈┈┈┈┈ •• ✼

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grumpyhedgehogs · 3 years

Text

Compartmentalization

Ada Wong tries to keep her work as a mercenary far fro her private life--and very, very far away from her secret girlfriend, Claire Redfield. Her clients don't know about Claire, Claire doesn't know about her clients, and Ada likes it that way.

Raccoon City blows that all to hell.

Or: Resident evil 2 if Ada and Claire were girlfriends before the game started.

Warnings: Canon-typical violence, guns, blood, death, spoilers.

AO3.

“You,” Ada tells the zombie lurching after her, “are ruining my date.”

The zombie gurgles on its own blood and Ada dispatches it with minimal disgusted grunting. To be fair, he isn’t actually interrupting her date--that honor goes to the mission as a whole. Damn it, but she’d promised she’d take Claire out on a road trip to celebrate her finishing her final exams this year. Well, Ada would let Claire take her on a road trip, because Ada Wong did not do long sweaty hours stuck in a car in traffic with nothing to do. Long sweaty hours stuck to Claire on the back of her girlfriend’s bike? Now that Ada could do.

But she isn’t doing that, and it is entirely her client’s fault. “ Capitalism ,” Ada spits, echoing Claire’s voice in her head. Against her better judgement, she feels the corners of her mouth lift. Smiling about a girl even when she’s alone? God, she’s hopeless. “Get a grip , Wong. That sample has to be around here somewhere.”

“You’re FBI?”

“Yes,” Ada snaps testily, folding her fake badge up and slipping it back into her coat pocket. “And you're interrupting a private investigation.”

The cop frowns, eyes darting to the dog’s body on the concrete two feet from his face and the blood spatters on the walls. Any second now, another dead body might smash its way through another wall and be upon them. His thoughts are written clear across his face-- there’s a few better things for them to worry about than an investigation.

The guy is a rookie, through and through. His face is open and unlined. While he’s healthy and unscathed, he’s also obviously awkward in such a life-threatening situation. He’s never done this before, never brushed with death on the daily. He looks like a kicked puppy. Ada’s almost tempted to put him down right here and now, just to save him the pain and herself the trouble.

Claire would be pissed if she ever found out. Not that she would, but still. She’d want to know the cop’s name and where he’s from and how he got here. Claire would want to help him.

(Claire was never supposed to factor into Ada’s decision making. She was supposed to be a fling, someone to take the edge off and help Ada destress a little between missions. She wasn’t supposed to wriggle her way into Ada’s head, wasn’t supposed to slip through the chinks of Ada’s armor, and yet, here Claire is. She's with Ada without even being present. Claire is somehow essential for Ada to continue living. Love, Ada thinks, is a bitch .)

“Right,” Ada grumbles, and pulls her sunglasses off. He seems more comfortable when he can see her eyes, even if Ada rolls them as he releases the tension from his shoulders. “We’d better work together here.”

“This isn’t a game!” Ada snaps. Leon bristles but subsides.

“I know, alright? There were so many more of us--survivors--before, and now…”

His eyes are far away and Ada snorts. “Don’t worry, Rookie, I’m sure whatever little girlfriend you have got the hell out of town. Which is what you should be doing.”

His mouth falls open but he doesn’t look like he’s on the brink of tears anymore, so Ada considers it a win. Hysterics are the last thing she needs right now. No, what Ada needs right now is a goddamn breakthrough with this mission if she wants to go home in one piece. “She’s not my--”

“Yeah, yeah, save it. You know that’s twice I’ve saved your ass now?”

“I didn’t realize you were keeping score.”

“We need to terminate her before she turns.”

The words taste like ash in her mouth. Leon shifts anxiously beside her. Ada feels bile rise in her throat. She used to be able to hold her gun up without her trigger finger trembling.

(What would Ada do if it were the one person she cares about half-dead and turning?)

“Ada...Leave them be,” Leon murmurs.

She lowers the gun and resolutely does not think about Claire's skin going grey.

If she gets out of this, Ada Wong is going to absolutely tear her client apart for sending her into this mess. No sample is worth listening to Leon drone on about all the people he’s worried about.

“What about you?” Leon looks up from rummaging through a safe box for ammunition. Ada hums, tapping at the keyboard in front of her. They seem to be just above the Umbrella building she needs to get into; if they call the tram, they should be down there in just a few minutes. “Do you have anyone you’re here for?”

“No.” Thank God. Claire is still back on the coast, waiting in her dorm room for Ada to come back from her “last minute work trip.” She’d promised Ada she would wait for her to come back before starting her road trip, so they could go together. Ada’s been hoping to get some of her own research done before she gets back to Claire anyway; something about Claire’s brother disappearing into radio silence in this very city rubs her very much the wrong way. Claire could be walking straight into a trap. So yeah, maybe there was an ulterior motive for Ada taking this mission, if only to scout ahead and save her girlfriend the trouble of getting herself killed by the dead.

Good thing she has Ada to look after her.

“Oh. Well, that’s good, I guess. No family? Friends?”

“I’m here for the mission, Leon.”

Ada’d almost left him for dead many times; what good would he do her? Leon’s been an unexpected boon in the city, but he’ll run out of usefulness eventually. They all do. (But Claire would like him. He’s got the same fire. Ada settles for muttering darkly to herself about how soft she’s becoming for one redhead with a temper.)

“Yeah,” he concedes glumly. Damn it, it looks like the tram is manually operated; they’ll have to get down to the platform to power it up; Ada can’t call it to them from here. She’s so busy fuming she almost misses his next comment. “Still, there are innocent people in this city who are going to need our help to get out of this mess. Like the girl I came here with. I hope she’s found her brother…”

What? No.

No, it can’t be. There are so many people living--or undead, now--in Raccoon City. Claire is at college, a million miles away, and she’s smart. She wouldn’t come out to the middle of nowhere in the Midwest in the middle of the night after Ada asked her not to. She’s safe.

(She’s safe. She has to stay safe, because Claire is just about the only thing Ada has that isn’t part of her cover. She’s Ada’s . Ada’s to love, Ada’s to spoil, Ada’s to annoy, Ada’s to protect. She’s got to be safe.)

(But that doesn’t stop Ada’s blood from running cold. How many missing brothers can Raccoon City boast?)

Leon passes out from his wounds. The Claire voice in the back of her head won’t let Ada leave him to die; her stomach curdles at the thought of Claire finding out what she’s done, how ruthless Ada can really be. So Ada gives him her coat and resolves not to let herself think about how soft she’s getting until she’s curled up in the apartment no one but Claire knows about with a certain pretty redhead under her arm.

Ada ends up with a shard of scrap metal through her leg for going to the trouble of helping Leon.

Typical.

The rookie, to his credit, does come to save her. His face screws up when she gets up to limp her way to the tram with him but Ada shakes off his desperate attempts to help. She’s tired of this: she’s tired of being dirty and grimy, she’s tired of gunshots and blood spatter, she’s tired of not finishing her mission on time, and she’s tired of worrying about what Claire must be thinking right about now.

Claire isn’t even here!

(She’s tired of ignoring the increasingly loud thought that if Claire weren’t safe Ada would lose her mind.)

The tram is grey and drab and the most comfortable, safest place she’s been in since coming to this godforsaken city. Ada slumps gratefully into her seat and lets Leon fuss at her on the ride down. Her leg aches, pain radiating up the base of her spine and pulsing at the back of her skull. (What if the wound is infected-- )

Leon is still so young, a puppy dog through and through. It’s too easy to convince him to bring her the virus with a kiss.

(Thank God Claire isn’t here.)

(Her handler told her there’s another way to get the G-Virus if Leon can’t do the work for her, but even for Ada it’s distasteful. Sherry Birkin is as old as Emma was, and if she couldn’t pull the trigger when Emma was clearly dying, could she trust herself to do it when faced with a perfectly healthy little girl?)

Leon pulls a gun on her. Fantastic. Will this mission ever fucking end?

“Leon, please! We don’t have a lot of time--”

“As much as I wanted to trust you,” Leon snaps, scowling, “I didn’t.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Ada mutters to herself. Leon’s eyes don’t widen when her gun raises to match his. The facility shakes around them and the walkway rumbles beneath their feet. Ada curses whatever possessed her to wear heels tonight.

“Hey!” A voice that sends ice through her veins shouts from behind the man Ada has lined up in her sights. Leon’s shoulders are too broad to glimpse around, but she must have heard wrong, it can’t be--

“Whoever you are, you’d better get moving, this place is about to blow!”

Not taking his eyes off of her, Leon turns his head. “Claire?”

“Wha--Leon?”

“ No. ” Ada whispers, numb.

“Claire, get out of here!”

Claire is here. Claire didn’t listen to her. Claire came to Raccoon City to find her brother. Claire isn’t safe. Claire is coming up to stand shoulder to shoulder with Leon, eyes wide and darting between the two of them.

Claire sees Ada.

“Ada?” Claire jolts forward before curling a hand around Leon’s uninjured shoulder. “Leon, don’t hurt her! I know her--”

“No you don’t.” Leon says. Something deep in Ada’s core is shivering. Her throat has locked up, the muscles there spasming. Her mind is blank. How can this be happening? Claire isn’t supposed to be here. She isn’t supposed to see Ada like this. She isn’t supposed to know . “You may think you know her, Claire, but she’s a liar. I bet you think she’s FBI, huh?”

“I…” There’s a clang and a small, childish squeak and Claire whirls around, throwing out her hand. Behind her, a blonde girl Ada only saw in photographs before dropping into the city huddles on the nearest platform. “S-stay back! We’ll--let us just sort this out and then we’ll get out of here.”

Of course. Claire wouldn’t have left without trying to save a kid. This stupid, reckless, noble woman. (Ada loves her so , so much, so much that it makes her sick.)

“She isn’t FBI.” Leon spits, his eyes sparking. Ada sneers at him as best she can while her world turns upside down. Her feet are frozen to the floor even as it rolls beneath them. “She’s a mercenary and a liar. She tried to trick me into giving her the G-Virus so she can sell it to the top bidder.”

“No, no, you’re--you’ve got to be wrong.” Claire turns and her eyes are so green and wide and Ada can feel her heart cracking in her chest. “Ada, tell him he’s wrong. You’re not--you’re here to help, right? You’re here to help me.”

“Yes,” Ada says, but it scraps at the lining of her throat on the way up, comes out mangled and false. She’s never been this bad a liar before. But she’s got to keep trying; she’s hanging onto a ledge by her fingertips and if Claire turns from her, if she goes away, Ada will have nothing left to hold on to. Nothing matters now, not the G-Virus or Leon and his gun or the mission or the city set to explode around them. Nothing matters but Claire’s green eyes staring uncertainly into her own. ”Yes, that's right, Claire. I--I had to cut work short and I was worried you’d gone ahead to Raccoon City without me--”

“That’s a lie! Claire, she’s never once mentioned you. She’s only been lying to you. She wasn’t on a work trip before she got here, she came here for the virus and nothing else. Did you tell Claire you were FBI too, Ada? Or did you save that one for me?”

“Claire, who are you going to believe?” Ada asks, desperation clawing at her veins. But Claire’s gaze has shifted to the blood drops Ada can feel flaking against the skin of her cheeks and chest, to the gun in her hands she’s holding too steadily not to be trained in firearms. Claire’s always been too smart for her own good. “Your girlfriend or some rookie cop who’s in too far over his head and snapped under the pressure?”

“Sure didn’t seem like you had a girlfriend when you kissed me.”

“Shut up!”

She can’t be losing her cool like this. It’s dangerous, and while Ada likes danger, it’s also stupid. An amatuer move. How has she fallen this far?

Claire reels back a step. “Wh--what?”

“It’s not what you think,” Ada switches tactics. Denial isn’t working. But if she can twist this back around on Leon, maybe Claire will listen to her long enough for Ada to get them out of here. She can call her extraction team and, provided she’s snagged the virus off of either Leon or Sherry, hold it for ransom so they’ll let her take Claire to safety too. She’s in a rush, though, and getting sloppier by the second. In moments they won’t have a walkway to stand on as the NEST tumbles down around them. “I just needed to get to you as fast as possible. I’d do anything for you Claire.” (She really, really would.) “Let’s--let’s just take Sherry and go. Leon can keep the virus, I only wanted to make sure it was destroyed to protect you, but he can keep it if I know you’re with me and safe. Come on, get Sherry and we can leave.”

She knows as soon as she stops talking, breath bated, that she’s said the wrong thing. Claire takes tone, two, three slow steps back. “I never told you Sherry’s name.” Claire says quietly.

Leon speaks then, chiming in with more incrimination and defamation and any other accusation he can hurl at Ada, but it doesn’t matter. Ada can see the light that’s gone out of Claire’s eyes, can see the poison spreading through her mind like black veins. She’s adding up the late nights, the strange bruises, the way Ada is squirrely about work, all the times she’s used kisses and sex as distraction on Claire before. Damn Kennedy and his big mouth. Ada never should have saved him.

The three of them waver there on the precipice. Ada’s gun does not lower and neither does Leon’s. Claire doesn’t blink, her eyes never leaving Ada's, her face crumpled and confused and war-torn. Ada stares back, holding her gaze as if through sheer force of will she can make all of this stop happening, as if she could smooth this all over if she just keeps looking into Claire's eyes. For a second, no one moves, no one speaks.

The NEST makes their choice for them, though, as it crumbles, blocks of concrete crashing into their walkway and the platforms beyond. Sherry screams. Claire is thrown against the railing and Ada’s gun spirals out of her hands as the metal below her begins to give way. Ada almost screams herself when the floor really does disappear and her feet meet open air. Only Leon’s quick reflexes stop her from falling.

Her heart breaks open, a hot wave of something too strong to be sadness and too sweet to be defeat when Claire stumbles away. The redhead looks back once, a long, lingering look that Ada feels all the way down to her bones. Claire hesitates; Ada sees her shifting on the balls of her feet, moving to take a single step back towards where Ada dangles from Leon's fingertips. For the first time in a long time, Ada isn't sure of what Claire is thinking.

Sherry screams again. Claire's mouth opens and even though Ada can't hear over shrieking metal and growing fires, the sob Claire lets out shakes her to her core. Then Claire bundles the little girl into her arms and turns from her.

Ada looks up at Leon, who sweats and shakes and holds onto her for dear life not even a second after threatening to kill her.

“Take care of Claire for me,” Ada tells him, and lets go.

Later, holding on to the rope ladder swinging from the extraction helicopter her client sent for her, Ada wonders how long she’ll have to wait before she meets Claire Redfield again. If Ada has it her way, it won’t be long.

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villainousshakespeare · 3 years

Text

Putting It Back Together Chapter 2

Chapter 1

Adam/OFC

Rated M (will probably change to E) - Grief, angst, eventual smut, mention of characters dead before the start of the story, blood, slow burn

Summary: Since the death of his beloved Eve, Adam had been barely living, only alive due to a promise he made to her. Then one night he meets his new neighbor, a woman dealing with grief of her own. Will they help each other heal or drive each other crazy?

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Hunched over his desk, Adam scowled at the blank staff on the music composition page before him. In his mind he could hear the notes that he had composed two nights ago but when he tried to concentrate and write them down they refused to stay clear in his brain. Twice already he had crumpled up the dried out old paper and hurled it across the room. Now, after his pen scratched through another mistake, he swept the entire pile of paper off the desk.

Leaning back in his wingchair, he glared across the room. It was all the fault of that thing. There against the wall, clashing with his dark hued room, sat a garishly bright neon yellow tool bag. It was not just that it was an eye sore, though that was bad enough. Really, who in their right mind would purchase anything so hideous? It was the knowledge that it belonged to her. That horrid, sobbing girl who had cried all over him last night.

Adam suppressed a shiver as he remembered it. She had clung to him like a python, face buried in his chest has he flailed to find a way to calm her. He had been so startled by the way she melted into him he had not known what to do. He was no longer, he realized, used to experiencing any form of physical contact.

She was tiny. That had been his first, irrelevant observation. Her watery face had only come up to the middle of his chest. She was also surprisingly warm. Holding her felt so different, so very different than holding Eve had felt. His late wife had been nearly as tall as he was, and like him she lacked the blood pumping through her veins to warm her in the night air.

Blood. That was the next, unshakable realization. She was full of throbbing, pulsing blood. Adam could sense it coursing through her, adding a flush to her face and a beat to the chest pressed against his stomach. With her hair piled as it was on top of her head he could see clearly the blue tinted vein running down her long neck. Staring at it, he felt his animal side begin to stir within him.

It had been ten years since Adam had eaten from a living person. On that desperate night in Tangier it had been a matter of life or death, him or the young woman unfortunate enough to cross his path when he was literally starving. He had turned the girl, and Eve had done the same to her lover. They had given them immortality, curse or gift depending on your mindset. In the end, it hadn't mattered. Both of them had died along with Eve when tainted blood had been sold to them. Adam would have been dead too, had he not been out scouring a rare bookshop for a gift for his beloved.

Years later, the proximity of a carotid artery, just there for the taking, caused a physical sensations within him. Adam could feel his fangs fighting to descend. Alarmingly, he could also feel his cock hardening in his jeans. Live feeding was not the only thing he had gone without for years. The small woman in his arms, so helpless and so unaware of her peril, was all but begging to be devoured in all sorts of ways. He could imagine tearing away her clothes and sinking into her, first his cock then his fangs, as he satisfied his cravings upon her unsuspecting body. Had Adam been other than what he was, had he not had all of those centuries with Eve to civilize him, she would have been done for.

Instead, he had clumsily patted her on the back, eyes rolling in his head as he did so. He could not quite bring himself to mouth the platitudes he knew she would expect of him, but he did his best to bite back the sarcasm that was his defensive habit. She had lost someone herself, and while the pain of losing someone known only for one short lifetime could never compare to the loss he had suffered, it still touched a chord within him. He knew the deep, unending pain of love taken too soon.

When at last she had managed to breath regularly again, Adam had quickly walked her back to the hatch that led to her own home. She had uttered a ceaseless string of apologies that he neither wanted nor needed, and he had mumbled something inane in return, sounding for all the world like just another zombie. The relief he felt when he shut the hatch behind her had almost brought him to his knees. And yet...

She had been so very warm. So warm and so alive. Irritating and encroaching, yes, but her questions about his electric system had been intelligent, and her observations startlingly apt. He was used to zombies being disinterested, focused so inward on their own petty problems that they didn't see what was right in front of their faces.

Her face had been pretty, the thought ran through his head. A little older than he had expected at first, though they all seemed young to him. Big eyes, full lips, high, almost elfin cheekbones.

With a growl, Adam stood up and stalked over to the offensive yellow tool bag. He should have left it up on the roof. She would have realized it was missing eventually and gone back up for it. But the skies had looked threatening, and he didn't want her tools to rust. It was a matter of conservation, he assured himself. Not wanting to do something nice for a zombie. Certainly not that.

He obviously was not going to be able to concentrate with the hideous thing in his home. He would take it back over to her. The home she lived in had a double style doorway; if he was lucky the outer door would be open and he could leave it between them. No need to see her again. The last thing he needed was to be dragged into another encounter with her.

Pulling his leather jacket on without bothering with a shirt, Adam grabbed the tool bag and headed for his front door. Best to get this over with. Yanking open the door in his rush, he collided with something soft and with a shock watched the very person he had been hoping to avoid fall backwards off of his front stoop.

"Fuck!" she yelped, as she toppled down.

Adam blinked as she looked up at him from the ground where she sat inelegantly on her ass.

"Are you alright?" he asked as sense returned to him.

"Oh, yeah, I'm fine," she smiled unconvincingly at him. "Luckily I don't have too far to fall."

"I was going out and didn't expect you to be there," he mumbled.

He heard the accusation in his voice, but didn't seem to be able to help it. What the hell had she been doing there?

"Of course not," she blushed. "Um... would you mind?"

She held out her hand and Adam gasped. Her palm was scratched from breaking her fall, and a small pattern of blood was beading up on the skin. Instinctively he took a step back at the same time his head moved forward with a will of its own. The woman looked at him with confusion, and he forced himself calm down. Why the fuck hadn't he put on gloves?

Working hard to control the trembling of his hands, he reached out and helped her to stand. Hyper aware of the siren call of her blood he pulled his hands back as fast as he possibly could, hoping she didn't notice the way they trembled. Fortunately for him she seemed too concentrated on her own discomfort.

"Did you want something?" he asked brusquely when she had gotten her balance back.

"Not really. Well, I mean, yes. To... to apologize. For last night. For crying all over you. Sorry."

"No need," he told her "Forget about it. I have."

"Oh. Well, okay then," she stood for a moment worrying at her lower lip, and he noticed again how full her mouth was. "Were you going somewhere?"

"Out," he said tersely, old habits dying hard. As he saw her flinch, he made his tone soften. "Actually, I was going to see you."

"Really?" he eyes lit up, and Adam felt a panic that he could not place.

"Yes. You left this on the roof last night. I thought you might want it back."

"Oh," she said again, face falling once more. "Thanks."

"Think nothing of it," he said, grimacing. Why was she just standing there? "Well, see you."

"Yeah," she blinked up at him.

"Alright then."

Honestly, wasn't she ever going to move? Giving up, Adam gave her the closest he could muster to a half smile and turned back inside, shutting the door behind him in her face.

Only when the wood was solid between them did he shakily raise his hand in front of his face. There, crimson in the dim light of his apartment, was a smear of her blood. Unable to control himself any longer, he brought his hand to his mouth and desperately sucked the sticky liquid off, moaning with the taste of it. So fresh, so pure, so sweet.

Falling back on the sofa conveniently behind him, he realized he was hard again. Licking to make sure he had gotten every last drop, he stroked himself with his other hand. If he was picturing a certain set of wide eyes and lush lips, it was only because their owner's blood was still hot in his mouth. There could not possibly be any other reason.

***

Well, that had been an unmitigated disaster.

Lilly held the bag of frozen peas to her ass and tried not to dwell on how thoroughly she had humiliated herself. If that was an example of her improving her image she obviously needed to never leave the house again. She was not fit to be around other people. Certainly not fit to be around someone so flawless as her neighbor.

Good lord, when he had walked out the door and into her, it was like being hit with a load of bricks. Lying there on her backside staring up at him, Lilly had been almost stuck dumb by the sight. She had thought he was beautiful from a distance, or in the dark light of the roof. Standing as he was in a halo of porch light he was almost god-like. It did not help that his black leather jacket was parted to reveal a very well muscled chest and abdomen. Lilly's eyes traveled the length of him from the bob of his adam's apple, over his defined pecs and six pack, and down to the thin trail of hair and the vee that drew her eyes past the edge of his low slung jeans.

Sweet bajeebas, but he was perfect. She was hardly the same species. What had she been thinking?

The playing began sometime later that night, around midnight. Lilly was hunched of a jigsaw puzzle she had found in a cupboard. Her Grandmother had loved to do them, and Lilly had caught the bug. She had lost count of the number of nights she had stayed up obsessively putting them together, unable to go to bed until she had found just one more piece, only to see the sun rise as she finished it.

The wail of a guitar came through the wall, sounding plaintive and introspective. Lilly had been drawn to all of the music she had heard from him so far. His melodies were complex, and he seemed to favor minor keys. Her Grandmother would have liked it as well. No doubt she had enjoyed hearing the strains come through the thin walls. Certainly she would have preferred it to the fighting and drunken antics of the students that had always assailed them before.

Lilly found herself humming along to his playing. She loved music, even if she was self-conscious of her voice. Having a Grandmother who had made a career of crooning songs in smoky clubs made her all too aware of her own deficiency.

There was something so comforting about music. It was almost mathematical in the way it worked. Patterns created and repeated, only to be subverted and return in a new and unexpected ways. If the composer was good, that was. Her neighbor was very good.

Of course he would be good. God forbid he be less than perfect at anything.

So when he kept reaching the end of a delicate passage, only to end on a note that didn't quite resolve the phrase. Lilly could hear the frustration in his fingers clearly through the layers of sheet rock that separated them. At first it amused her; so he was fallible after all. Good. She allowed herself to take a superior pleasure in his failure.

By the time it was approaching two in the morning, she was ready to scream. She was over halfway done with her puzzle - a scene of Paris at night, all lit up - but was finding it increasingly hard to concentrate. Her gorgeous, grouchy neighbor must have played through the piece a hundred times, and every time it ended wrong. It was driving her insane. He was so close to finishing it. Every time he hit the not quite right note she felt her entire body twitch. She could only imagine how he was feeling.

It started one more time. Lilly held her breath, willing him to find what was right there, waiting to be put in place. The final phrase started, she scrunched her face, waiting to hear it fixed. The note he played was achingly close, but not quite what the song cried out for.

"Half a step lower!" she screamed out, unable to resist any longer.

The music stopped. Everything went silent on the other side of the wall. Now she had done it. Lilly could see him, glaring at the wall with that intense, closed off set of blue eyes. She was inordinately happy now that a solid hunk of material kept them apart. Any hope of a friendship developing between her and her haughty crush had surely been dashed now. And all because she could not control her stupid impulses.

After a stretch that seemed like forever, a length of time where Lilly died and was forced back into existence repeatedly, the music started up again. She made herself a small lump in the corner of her sofa, as if somehow she could hide even though it was impossible for him to see her. If she could have fit below the cushions she would have.

He reached to end and after the slightest of pauses he played the note she had suggested. It sounded perfect. The chord rang out, slowly fading, and she felt a small smile fighting to exist on her lips.

The music stopped abruptly again, and for the rest of the night only silence greeted her through the wall between them.

#olla #olla fic #Adam #adam olla #Tom Hiddleston #Fic #fan fic #angst #vampires #mentions of death #grief #slow burn #eventual smut #pining #crush #music #romance #some swearing

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the-witty-pen-name · 3 years

Text

Rest Pt. 1

Mando x F!Morellian! Reader

Word Count: 3k

Summary: 3rd person; When the Mandolorian is searching for parts on Arvala-7, he encounters someone who may be able to help him on his journey.

Warnings: none/mentions of injury and brief mention of character death; 18+ in later chapters

A/N: This was meant to be a one shot but this probably going to be 3 parts. I also ignored canon for this one. I tried my best to research Morellians for this fic to make sure its accurate, but it may not be perfectly accurate to canon. I just wrote this up cause I wanted to write today, but take a break from Deadbeat, even though you can expect Part 7 very soon!

If I miss something that I should include as a warning, please let me know!

This is also unedited!

Tags and Requests are OPEN

He was so tired, all the time. It was such a constant feeling that he had forgotten what it felt like getting a good night’s rest. He’d allow himself to sleep a few hours here and there, but his normal was pushing his body constantly until he was exhausted and then some.

It was caused by many things- the nature of his job, his own paranoia, and even just the sheer uncomfortableness of his small bunk on the Crest. Now, there was the Child. The little green creature taking his free moments of rest more and more. In his mind, it was never a debate- the kid always came first. He didn’t give a second thought to how he was sacrificing his own wellness, and frankly if he did ever think about it, he’d come to the conclusion that he wouldn’t care.

His ability to sleep had gotten worse, with his inability to stop worrying about the Child. He would now force himself to stay awake for several days on end, too worried about if something would happen while he was asleep and his guard was down. The Child would sleep through the night, and Mando would sit up on his bunk, just watching the little creature’s breaths rise and fall, and he would have his eyes glued to the closed door of his bunk prepared for a threat that never came.

When the pair reached Arvala-7, he was in a zombie like state from lack of sleep. His body was on autopilot as his feet dragged across the planet’s surface, the Child securely following behind in his floating pram. The Mandolorian was very hyperaware of the heaviness of his armor, and the way the helmet irritated his skin more than normal. From his outward appearance, no one would know just how close he was to falling over from exhaustion. For the sake of the Child, he kept pushing himself forward, always making false promises of rest if he could just make it to the next location.

“You need rest,” Kuiil declared as he observed the Mandolorian walk towards him.

“I’m fine,” Mando deflected, a little annoyed at how well the Ugnaught could read him, even hidden under his armor.

“I have spoken.” Mando sighed, the exhale of air distorted by the modulator of his helmet. He walks past his friend and walks into his small domicile, with the baby not far behind him.

“I shall watch the Child,” Kuiil states affirmatively before Mando can object. Mando nods, defeated, finally realizing he will rest whether he wants to or not. “I will feed him and wake you when it is time,” he continues.

Mando doesn’t even remember falling asleep. He didn’t dream and he wakes up with a terrible crick in his neck. He doesn’t feel rested, just stressed and his body is still tense. He stirs from his spot and walks back out. He’s panicked because Kuiil and the Child are no where in sight. He only relaxes when he sees the two of them outside, Kuiil tinkering on a project and the Child playing with some parts Kuiil had discarded on the ground.

“You must rest,” Kuiil reiterated. Mando shook his head. He didn’t know how long he had been asleep for but he imagined it was long enough. “It hasn’t been even twenty minutes.”

“I just needed a power nap,” Mando says, not letting his friend talk him into another nap. He was fine. He just needed to work on the ship and he’d rest when they were back on course. “I need to work on the ship, I need to go get some parts,” he states. “Please watch him, I will be back tonight.”

Kuiil doesn’t say anything, just nods, knowing that no matter what he says the Mandolorian was too stubborn for his own good. He borrows Kuiil’s land speeder, and heads to the very small almost abandoned town that’s a decent trek away from Kuiil’s moisture farm. The air is very heavy, and the heat was weighing heavy on his eyelids. He felt like there was a pressure around him that was pushing him to sleep, but he was successful in avoiding it.

He looks over and sees there’s one establishment that looks like its open. He decides to wander in and see if anyone knows where he can buy the parts he needs. As the door to the establishment slides open, he realizes that it is some sort of cantina, with low lights and low music playing from a live band in the corner of the room.

There’s a circular bar in the center of the space, and he approaches the bartender. His mind his hazy, and he almost forgets why he’s there in the first place. Fortunately, his outer appearance makes him look more menacing than he feels in this moment. Customers at the bar speak in hushed tones as he approaches. He doesn’t even notice, the fogginess caused by his lack of sleep is affecting his power of observation.

“Where can I go to get ship parts?” he asks.

“Jawas,” the man chuckles sarcastically, like the question itself was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard.

“There’s no where else?” He asks, frustrated.

“Not anywhere you can travel to in a day,” the man replies. Mando sighs, realizing he’d have to return to the ship empty handed. He can’t let it go another day. He needed to get off this planet.

“Give me directions.”

“There’s no where besides here that can offer you lodging, you can’t make it there on a speeder without stopping.”

“Directions.”

The man sighs and reluctantly gives the Mandolorian the coordinates he needs. With a gruff thank you, the Mandolorian leaves the bar, and gets back to the speeder. Kuiil would understand. Kuiil probably already knew the journey ahead of him and Mando was too stubborn to take his friend’s advice before leaving.

If he didn’t stop to rest, Mando figured he could get to the location by the next day if he drove fast. It seemed like a good idea to him at the time. It was the most time effective option he had. It was entirely different in practice, driving alone in the dark and his eyes becoming more and more heavy. He also never anticipated the wear it would cause the speeder, and he cursed as the thing was gradually slowing down until it came to a complete stop.

It was too dark to try to work on fixing it, even though he tried anyways. Even with his visor aiding his vision in the darkness, it was fruitless. He’d have to wait it out. He couldn’t allow himself to sleep. What if he was found by Jawas and they’d strip the speeder, or maybe they would steal his armor. It wasn’t something that he was willing to risk. So, he stupidly decided to work on the speeder without being able to see properly and assess his surroundings.

His thoughts were only on the Child and returning to him as quickly as possible. It made his actions irrational and careless. Which is why he scraps his arm on the metal of the speeder as he tinkered. The cut is deep, and it stings. He curses at his own stupidity and desperately tries to just apply pressure to his arm with his other hand. The material was old, dirty and rusted and it caused a deep wound.

He sits down on the ground, trying to make himself a tourniquet by ripping at his underclothes. He’s breathing heavy, and he knows that he is losing blood and he had no way to clean out the wound. He’s stranded and he can only think about the Child. Needing to just stay conscious long enough to think himself a plan out of this situation, and that’s the last thing he remembers.

He thrashes when he awakes, taking in his new unknown surroundings. It was a similar abode to Kuiil’s but it was obviously not the farm he was familiar with. He looks down at his arm, seeing the wound has been bandaged and treated, and his glove, and other pieces of his armor that needed to be removed to treat the injury sat on the floor waiting for him. He felt lighter, and more aware. Hell, he felt awake for the first time in a while. He felt rested. If it weren’t for the worry of waking up in a strange place, he’d feel good.

Before he was able to decide if he wanted to venture out of this bedroom, his thoughts were interrupted when another figure walked in. They were moving quietly, and Mando knew they were moving so that they wouldn’t disturb him. He sat up, letting them know he was awake and then he turned to look at them.

The young woman was standing holding a tray of food. She was nervous, but not scared of him, Mando was able to observe. It had also been a long time since he was in the presence of someone so easy on the eyes, and it made him nervous as well. She was very pretty, and easily one of the best things he’s got to see in a long time. He wasn’t sure what to say, not wanting to scare her off, so he waited for her to speak first.

“I didn’t want to wake you,” she said apologizing. “But I wanted to bring you this.” She leaves the tray on a small table next to the bed.

“T-thanks,” he stuttered, not sure what questions he could think to ask first.

“You were passed out next to your speeder,” she explained. “I found you early this morning. Your speeder is outside. You’ve been asleep here for about twelve hours… I don’t know how long you were outside before that.”

He nods, trying to still wrap his head around the situation.

“I’m sorry for taking off the armor,” she continues, “I didn’t take off your helmet! I know Mandolorians keep those on, I wasn’t sure if it was okay that I took off the pieces I needed to get to your cut.”

“That’s fine,” he said softly, “Thank you. It is really just the helmet that I can’t take off.”

“All of your stuff is there,” she points to where his bag and pieces of armor sit on the floor in a neat pile. He nods.

“Um, that’s pretty much it,” she says awkwardly trying to remember if there was something else that she needed to tell him. “You’re wound is fine, once it was cleaned up it wasn’t as bad as I thought. You really were just exhausted over anything else; I think. I’ll let you eat, I promise I won’t come back in until you tell me, so you can take off your helmet… There’s no one else here but me so you’re safe- you can even lock yourself in if you want. I don’t mind.”

“You’re being really accommodating,” he says suspiciously, not use to the hospitality. It worried him.

“Oh,” she exclaimed, his words reminding her of what she forgot, “I had contacted by Kuiil- told me to look out for you, that a friend of his- a Mandolorian would be coming my way in need of lodging. When you never came, that’s when I went looking for you.”

“You know Kuiil?” he asks, relieved he wasn’t completely with a stranger. He was, obviously, but he was at ease knowing he was with someone Kuiil trusted.

She nodded. “You can stay as long as you need. He said your son can stay with him as long as you need. I’ll let you eat,” she said, leaving the room and closing the door behind her.

He was taken aback at how kind she was towards him. She was so trusting and just let him into her home and helped him. Granted, it was because he was vouched for by Kuiil, but still. He also was flushed at how attractive she was. It made him nervous, he was so used to being along that he didn’t know how to handle himself around a woman- especially one that he thought was just so- so nice to look at. He felt foolish, and he was so confused at how easily that girl flustered him. It was just that she was kind, he tries to reason with himself. He’s just not use to the hospitality. He wasn’t flustered cause she was pretty, no absolutely not.

He took a moment and then resolved it was safe to take off his helmet so he could eat. He usually rushed through meals, just so he could get the helmet secured back on his head. But he felt comfortable here, and he allowed himself the luxury of taking his time, enjoying the unfiltered air. He looked around the room, and it was mostly bare, which isn’t surprising. The bed was comfortable, much better than his bunk on the Crest and better than the little spot in Kuiil’s dwelling.

He just felt guilty. He shouldn’t be resting when the Child is waiting for his return, and he still hasn’t retrieved parts for the ship. And here he was getting comfortable like was on some vacation. He quickly finished his food and put on his armor, ignoring the sting putting it on affected the cut under the bandages. He placed his helmet on and then left the bedroom.

“They’ll be here soon,” she announces when he emerges from the room. It stops him dead in his tracks. He didn’t know what you meant.

“Who?”

“Kuiil and your son,” she explains, “I just reached out to Kuiil, letting you know you were awake. He insisted he’d bring the kid to you. He thought you’d leave and strain yourself trying to get back too early. They’ll be here tomorrow.”

He chuckles, and is astonished at how well his friend seems to be able to anticipate his every move. “He’s right,” he sighed, sitting down across from her at the small dining table.

“He’s very wise,” she agrees. There are a few minutes of silence that cause an awkward tension to arise between the two of them.

“I’m (y/n),” she says. “Just realized I never introduced myself,” she says sheepishly.

“You can call me Mando,” he replies. She nods. There’s a mutual understanding between the two that says there’s no need for small talk.

“Is your child also a Mandolorian?” she asks curiously.

“No, he’s not,” he responds. He’s used to people pestering him with questions but he usually gets annoyed. He actually this time was happy that she wanted to know about him, and he was asking about the kid. For some reason, it felt different. There was no judgement or fear, just her genuine curiosity. She doesn’t press him to elaborate, which puts his mind at ease, and he’s relaxed.

“Are you married?” she asks next.

“No- no,” he says hurriedly. He feels foolish for how the question flusters him. It’s a perfectly reasonable question. It was just the natural assumption when she knows he has a kid, but not the context of how he’s a father. He also feels embarrassed at the desire to let her know he’s single. It’s stupid, he chastises himself. He was being ridiculous.

“He’s a foundling,” he explains simply. “He’s not actually mine. I’m not married.”

“Can Mandolorians get married?” she follows up.

“Yes, of course,” he says. She nods, and gets up from her seat.

“I have to check on the vaporators,” she announces. “I suggest you try to get more rest, but if you want to follow, you’re more than welcome to.”

When she moves, he notices the odd, cylindrical weapon fixed on the side of her hip. He trusts her, so it doesn’t worry him, but it is something he wants to ask her about.

“What is that?” he asks, following her out of her house and out into the dry air. She looks to where the gaze of his visor is fixated.

“It’s my light saber,” she says simply, not expanding on her answer much like how he did.

“Are- are you a Jedi?” he asks, his head tilting.

“I’m a moisture farmer,” she chuckles.

“I thought all the Jedi were gone,” he says, his eyes following her.

“They are,” you explained simply, “I’m not a Jedi anymore.”

“Did you fight in the war?” he asks. She looked young, and he was incredibly puzzled. Maybe her species was humanoid, but she aged slowly, like the Child.

“Clone Wars,” she states, confirming his suspicion. She was older than him, but she looked younger. “I’m Morellian. We don’t age the same as humans.”

“How old are you?”

“Forties? I don’t know. I haven’t really done the math in a while,” she shrugs. He chuckles, he felt the same way about his own age. He hadn’t thought about it in a long time, but he was fairly certain that they were roughly the same age, even though his signs of aging showed on his skin more than her.

“How long have you been here?” He asks.

“How long has it been since the end of the Clone Wars?”

“That long?”

“All the Jedi needed to go into hiding,” she states.

“Are you the only one?”

“I don’t know. The only man I knew I heard died, killed by Vadar,” she says solemnly. “Supposedly, he took on a new apprentice, but I don’t know where I could find him if I wanted to.”

“Can you use the Force?” he asks, thinking now about his own task that lays before him with the Child.

“Yes,” she replies simply, holding back a smile and a sarcastic comment.

“The Child- my son,” he says, a little overwhelmed how easily he stumbled upon you. “I’m supposed to bring him to a Jedi- bring him back to his people.”

“You need to bring him to a Jedi?” she asks skeptically. He nods.

“He has- these, um, powers,” he tries to explain, “Moving things that are physically impossible, healing- it’s nothing I have ever seen.”

“I’ll help you.”

“You said you aren’t a Jedi.”

“But I’m probably the closest you’ll find.”

Part Two

#mando x reader #the mandolorian #mandolorian imagine #mando x you #mando x y/n #mandolorian one shot #din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin x y/n #pedro pascal imagine #pedro pascal characters #x reader #star wars imagine #star wars one shot

36 notes · View notes

jeeperso · 3 years

Text

D&D Quotes Without context

Miscellaneous Edition, for those quotable lines from between sessions

"All I wanna do, is fork a giant woman! A giant woman!" "Jonni, I'm pretty sure she is some type of undead, probably a vampire. Are you sure that is a good idea?" "If I don’t get turned into a blueberry it won’t be my worst date." "Okay, but if you have to defend yourself just don't burn the place down for once." "Oh, Nyx. Sweet summer child. I never make promises we both know I won’t even try to keep." "Jonni, if I wake up to my bed surrounded in flames again I'm short-sheeting your next bed every night for at least a month." "I know you're trying to score here, but Lady Dimitrescu's daughters are literally vampires AND bugs. I can overlook one, but as a Paladin, it is my sacred duty to burn this place to the ground and stir the ashes."

"We don't let Marshall make breakfast anymore." "Those waffles are well-fortified." "I'm going to be charitable and call it hardtack." "We can use these waffles as melee weapons." "Well if we need to deflect siege engines they'll be good to have." "This is still carbon based and digestible by human systems without any poisons." "I can't serve this. It'll cause ... death." "Marshal we've been over this. This Pizza has 10% less of a lethal amount of grease." "Plus they signed the waivers when they bought a ticket. It's fine." "And don't forget to push the Cakeon." "Cakeon being slices of cake wrapped in bacon." "The special sauce is a mixture of mayonnaise, ketchup, mustard, ranch, horseradish, cheddar cheese, sour cream, and anything unfortunate enough to fall into the mixing vat."

"You do have a copy of the legal code I requested in my letter? As landed gentry you should actually have legal avenues to... I'm sorry did you say Burning child?"

"First I'm going to nail a crossbow bolt through your heart. Then I'm going to mount your balls to walls on opposite sides of this chamber." "I need Three Barrels of Butter" "Are you serious? Those Claws could crush an elephant in full plate!" "You're Right!" *Turns to first person* "We might need more than three barrels of butter."

"So Ioun is the patron of poor college kids. that scans "

"its hardtack or a mug of molten cheese-fried... something in a woven mug of bacon. your choice."

"Welp, all this coke ain't gonna snort itself..."

"Right hand me that dress and the bail money. I'll get Jonni." OOC: Well I mean they allow men in the city. Its just no men live in the city. "I stand by my statement. I'm allowed to look pretty every now and then." OOC: And dragons are the most unprejudiced lovers of anyone after bards.

OOC: Well I mean come on, its Ravenloft: saying a place is of death and madness is like making the observation the day ends in y. "Going out. Getting laid." "Jonni, she’s a werewolf." "Going out, forking a werewolf." OOC: Well Lycanthropy isn't usually sexually transmitted. Its just that Mercedes is a biter. OOC: ...I don't have an appropriate response to that.

"You seriously think I’d turn on my friends for a pile of gold?!?" "sigh I’ll show you my tits. "Hot damn, let’s get these murders done!" "No, Jonni, stay good. Besides, there are plenty of other girls who will do that without asking you to murder us." "Hmmmm… this is the moral quandary of my life…" "I’ll give you five bucks." "Scales tipped!" "Phew, I thought I was going to have to cover her next trip to the topless bar." "No, no, I have the bail money right here."

Nyx: So what’s the inside of Jonni’s head like? Edmund (with thousand yard stare): Imagine every ladies only smut magazine you’ve ever heard of going on forever into infinity while everything is on fire. Food was good though.

"It’s cool. They stole it." "And you know this how?" "Magic." “90% of Ravenloft deaths are mysterious vanishings.” "Why does everything come out covered in glitter and … is that …" "Lube. I’ve got a few theories." "Please don’t share them."

OOC: This is a plan that ends with Strahd having fewer brides, his castle is in flames, and he’s lost his cape.

OOC: Our team consists of a horny pyromancer, a gnome who can fillete you in five seconds, an HP lovecraft protagonist with actual magic backing them up, a literal slab of iron with a face, and a guy with a "I went to the eternal city of Ryleth and all I got was PTSD and this lousy T shirt". Gorbash smashing his shield into their face: "Have! You! Considered! Therapy!" OOC: Good news is you guys will no longer be the most conspicuous guys at the masquerade now. Jonni: Challenge accepted! "Nyx, the bounty on stealing his fake mustache is still on."

"Vanilla is the king of flavors. What does it say about society where vanilla is considered just 'regular'?" "That they have a lot of vanilla." Lash: "Don’t you want wishes?" Jonni: "Do I need wishes to get to see you naked?" Lash: "No?" Jonni: "Fuck ‘em." Vesh: "Oh dammit its my arranged fiance." Pit Fiend: "Milady." Vesh: "An extra wish to whoever punches this douchecanoe in the nards." Jonni: "I wish…for Bigby’s clenched fist of nard punching."

Soth: "Oh, gods, why am I on fire and why is Immigrant Song playing?" Jonni: "Take a guess." Hazlik: "Okay, so its a partridge, stuffed inside a chicken, stuffed inside a duck, stuffed inside a turkey, and the whole thing is fried on a stick. Congratulations, that's the most horrible thing I have ever seen, and I once crossbred an elephant and an owl." "I give him the 'itis, and we run like we stole something." OOC: ...weirdly Curse of Strahd has stats for Strahd zombies but not Strahd Skeletons. Or Strahd's skeletal Steed. Strahd once went to a branding seminar hosted by Bane and it changed his life.

"Are we on a high enough floor that if I throw him through the window he'll be killed by the fall?" "Oh, but when I say stuff like that it’s all 'Jonni, murder is wrong.'" "When they say pick your battles they don't mean to pick all of them. That's too many battles Jonni. Put some back." OOC: He's technically already got a symbiote. OOC: They can get married. Gorbash: "I'm increasing the rent." Venom: "Can I keep the pool table?" Gorbash: "I'm not a monster." Giant Brain: "Jonni… I have summoned you here for… WHY AM I ALREADY ON FIRE! PUT ME OUT! PUT ME OUT!"

"Hello We're the party-crashers. This is Jonni, she's here to steal your women and burn your shit down. That's Nyx, she's going to repatriate certain items from the premise. Marshal over there, is here to studiously ignore our shenanigans. This is the New Guy. He seems pretty chill. I'm Gorbash... and I have been distracting you."

"Will you walk into my parlour?" said a spider to a fly. Jonni: "Hold up. Trying to sex a spider." Nyx: (throws her hands up) And then Jonni wakes up with a spider venom hangover webbed to a wall waiting to be eaten. Jonni: "Eh, I’ve had worse one night stands. I’m not a fucking blueberry." OOC 1: Hey, where does your weed elf grow [her] crops? OOC 2: She probably just grows them in the room she hasn’t paid rent on. OOC 3: Because I was also considering a circle of spores druid tortle. OOC 2: We could be partners! We could turn this into road to el dorado staring Cheech and Chong. OOC: Wait, I just realized five people are hanging out in a pirate bar, and none of us are rogues. We are gonna need someone to get thieves tools. OOC: We have a barbarian with a big stick.

"Are we Foxhound now? Blunderbuss Octopus." OOC1: You want to put the stoner in charge of food. OOC2: Eyup. OOC1: I see no way this can go wrong! OOC3: We need the four basic food groups. Beans, Bacon, Whisky, and Lard. “We pray to Almighty Darkseid! Give us a sign! Thumbs up, for the triumph of the human spirit! Thumbs down to begin the everlasting reign of darkness!” “Where did you find this guy?” “Me? I thought you hired him.” OOC: Yup, nature, arcana, history, investigation and religon at +6. MJ got baked and watched the Discovery Orb a lot. Tordek: "But we have a cleric, Jozan, over there." Strahd: *sigh* Snaps fingers, and suddenly one of Strahd's brides sucks Jozan out the window, cue screaming. "Oh look, you suddenly have an opening, how fortunate." Tordek: "We also have a druid...." Vadania: "SHUT UP, TORDEK!" Edmund: "I think the first order of business may be to discuss your Human Resources strategy..." Strahd: "I have a guy for that too."

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"When someone as smart as him talks with himself, it's not crazy...They call it monologing." "I thought it was soliloquy?" "No, soliloquy is when you're talk at someone else when your talking to yourself." "Most people would run from a demon, you run towards it to study it." Professor: "THIS IS ABSOLUTELY FASCINATING! A FROGHEMOTH, AND RIGHT UP CLOSE, IT WILL BE AMAZING TO SEE THIS PERFECT KILLING MACHINE IN ACTION." OOC: Also note the Professor is Lawful Good, Archie is Chaotic Good, so collectively they balance out to Neutral good. OOC: That's good. "The incinerations will continue until morale improves!" “You never incinerate the women!” “Because I’m fucking them!” “I… was not expecting you to be so honest about that…”

"You got what you wanted....but you lost what you had...." "Yes, I'm familiar with how capitalism works."

OOC: Dragons are like, “That’s Krandor the shiney. He only fucks other dragons. Weirdo.”

Gorbash: "D'awww, so tiny... perfect size... FOR PUNTING!" *boots tiny mind-flayer into the horizon*

"Dracula hasn't been spotted in almost recently. Whats he gonna do, destroy all we know and love like he definitely can?" "... my god you people are too stupid to live." "What are you doing in my house?" Gorbash: "...well Edmund has been reading your books, I've been sorting through your armory, Nyx and Irost has been going through your other shinies, Marshal has been cleaving anything monstrous that gets too close, and Jonni has been lighting things on fire to stave off boredom." Gorbash: "Okay Marshal, Jonni. Rock, paper, scissors over who gets [to kill] the bishop."

Jonni: "Did you really think this would make up for what you did?" Nima: "I… killed everyone you grew up with." Jonni: "Yeah, and I’m still not forgiving you for what you did to Eddie." Nima: "I am missing some key context here…" Nima: "Also I committed identity theft on you by having my new undead army tell everyone you are running the show." Jonni: "Oh, no. You’ve fooled the boar tribe. Who still haven’t figured out shitting in a hole." Nima: "Yeah I noticed that. I ruined two pairs of shoes attacking their camps."

#dungeons and dragons #dnd 5e #quotes without context #ravenloft #castlevania #resident evil village #ooc

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weasleydream · 3 years

Text

dreams are my reality - part 1

Here is the first part! I’m so glad it’s finally out and i really really hope you’ll enjoy reading as much as i enjoyed writing it!

As usual, feel free to like, comment, reblog and enjoy!

Masterlist

~ as if it’s meant to be ~

Summer had always been my favourite period of the year. When I was a child, it was because my parents would always bring me to this lake they had discovered when they were teenagers, and we would spend the day swimming and fishing. During my Hogwarts years, the traditional camping night with the Marauders and later Lily became another reason for my impatience. But I had to admit that Sirius agreeing to spend the afternoon with me on this beautiful beach of the south of France was a whole other level of pleasure associated with summer. His messy hair, his tan skin, his muscles shining with the water, and the-

“Sirius, what the hell is that?”

He was playing with a shapeless pile of jelly, touching it with the tip of a stick I had thought was his wand. He looked up to me, a shade of surprise underneath his goofy grin.

“Never seen a jellyfish before?”

“A jellyfish? And you’re playing with it?”

“I wasn’t playing! Just trying to see if it was still alive.” Sirius’ eyes fell once more on the animal, and I realized how obvious it was that it wasn’t just a pile of jelly.

“And?” I asked, leaning forward to see it better.

I looked up when Sirius didn’t answer and found him pointing at the sun.

“Time of death: approximately 4 p.m, give or take an hour.”

I was going to reply that it wasn’t very precise when a wave stronger than what we had anticipated crashed on the sand, sending the jellyfish right on my feet. I jumped backwards, a high-pitched scream I couldn’t contain escaping my mouth. In an instant, Sirius was next to me and in another split second, he had dragged me on the dry sand, fussing over me like a soccer mum.

“Did it touch you? Y/N, do your feet hurt?”

“I- I don’t think so…”

Sirius seemed as surprised as I was, and after looking at me like he didn’t know if he should drop it or betray the whole wizarding world by apparating away from a beach full of muggles, he sighed.

“Then why the hell did you scream so loud?”

“Because I was scared!” I tried to defend myself, even though I knew I had a bit overreacted - just a bit.

Sirius rolled his eyes and slipped an arm around my waist as we began to head back to where we had let our stuff.

“You’ll be the death of me one day, that I can tell you.” he eventually murmured in my ear. “I mean, you’ve almost bee already but-”

“Sirius.” Any trace of joy had left my voice, it was all replaced by shame and this visceral fear I never wanted to experience again. “You know I don’t want to talk about it. Sirius, you almost died because of me, I just- I don��t want to think about it ever again.”

“We shouldn’t try to forget it,” said Sirius, who put his hands on my hips and rested his forehead against mine. “Love, dying to save you would have been an honour, the best way to leave this world. I would do it again if I had to.”

“Then it’s a good thing that it won’t happen, right?”

This need of reassurance had never left me, it was still here, not so well hidden since the end of the war. The mess that had been our lives for so long had left scars, deep and dirty wounds I was ready to keep hidden until the end of my life. But how could I leave that part of my life behind if I didn’t know for sure it was over? Everything had been so strange, so sudden, that I was fearing the day Voldemort would come back, stronger and angrier than ever, the day we would have to fight again, the day Sirius would risk his life for me again… The possibility that my life at the moment was a dream, an illusion, it was too much to bear.

“A very good thing, actually!” Sirius was back to his joyous self, and had this goofy grin that had become his signature over the years. “Or else I wouldn’t have been able to do that.”

He was going through our bag, throwing away everything that was going in his way, my clothes included. I watched silently as my top joined my short in the sand, knowing better than trying to stop Sirius. I would have ended up in the sand too, or maybe just ignored, it was a fifty-fifty. I eventually decided to say something though, because there was no way I would let him waste my cookies like that. Chocolate cookies, dispersed on the sand, can you believe it?

“Sirius, love, what are you-”

I stopped suddenly, because Sirius had obviously found what he was looking for. My completely unready mind tried to find a reason for why he had gotten down on one knee, but I couldn’t come up with anything and just looked at him speechless as he opened the box.

“Y/N, love, life hasn’t exactly always been a piece of cake, but you always made it easier and I want to share the rest of mine with you. The past three years with you have been just perfect, and every second I’m not with you, touching you, hearing the sound of your voice, it’s just a big waste of time.” He stopped a second, inhaling deeply. “I- I could keep rambling about how perfect you are because right now I’m fucking nervous but if you say yes, I’ll have a lifetime to tell you how I adore you. So, Y/N, will you marry me?”

I didn’t trust my throat enough to produce anything else than a strangled sound, so instead I blinked the tears away and fell on my knees in front of him. My shaky hands reached for his cheeks. The second he realized what it meant, Sirius' little smile widened in an overjoyed grin, and his lips crashed on mine. If at some point we rolled on the floor, if our hair ended up matted with sand while we were in the middle of a crowded beach, none of that ever mattered. I was in Sirius’ arms, I was going to marry him, things couldn’t have been better for me, and the little boy who said it was dirty or the guy that called loudly for someone called like me couldn’t have done anything to disturb that.

_ _ _

We had spent a wonderful day and an even more wonderful evening, yet my nightmares had never been more vivid. The dark alley of this cursed muggle village, the screams, the light, the blood… I was living it again, this night I almost lost Sirius. It all felt too real, from the pain in my muscles to my heartbeat still frenetic, and even his arms wrapping strongly around me couldn’t get me out of the hell of this night.

“Y/N! Y/N, can you hear me?”

The voice was far from me, my mind wouldn’t even acknowledge it.

“We’re going to get killed!”

This voice, though, would stay forever engraved in my brain.

I had known since the beginning the idea was fucking bad. James had insisted, “It will be fun!”, he had said, and Sirius had smiled like an idiot. It was safe to say that they were the only two ready to venture in this bloody village, bloody in the literal sense of the word. Something was here, something the muggles used to call a monster, but we knew better and this something had inherited the sweet nickname of “a son of a bitch of Death Eater”, found by Sirius, obviously.

Nothing had been decided yet, but James and Sirius already acted like they had clocked the man and come back heroes. Peter was completely opposed to this idea, and it was one more example of me completely agreeing with him. Both Remus and Lily were torn between the two options they had, and I suspected them to think that it was worth the risk. The number of victims in this village had risen up to seventeen the previous day, and even though there were members of the Order closer to the location than us, Dumbledore had asked us to go and take a look.

“A mission for the best,” he had added, which had seemed to decide James and Sirius.

They wanted to take that mission.

And it was definitely a very bad idea.

_ _ _

“Wow, Y/N you look like a zombie. You sure you’re okay?” asked James in disbelief when he opened the door.

“Zombie! Zombie!”

Something pushed James unceremoniously and jumped on me. It was Harry of course. The little black haired tornado was now tugging at my hair, giggling with every roll of my eyes. Or maybe it was because Sirius was making faces behind my back; I wasn’t totally sure. Anyways, that gave me the perfect excuse to avoid James’ question because I certainly didn’t want to tell him I couldn’t sleep, that what should have been one of the best days of my life had brought back the worst of my nightmares and that it seemed like I was going insane.

“You little devil, you’re getting taller and taller every time I see you!” exclaimed Sirius cheerfully, and Harry extended his arms toward him.

“You know the last time you saw him was a week ago, right?” James mocked, diverting his attention from me in the process.

He was watching proudly as Harry and Sirius were having a very serious conversation about the banana the boy had eaten an hour ago, and he missed the wink my fiancé shot me. I smiled, grateful for his help, and at the moment I could have sworn I was feeling his comforting touch on my cheek.

Remus arrived half an hour later, and we had to wait another hour before Peter’s entrance, his arms full of candies as every single time he was at the Potter’s. “Half for Harry, half for me, the rest for you!”, he always said, but it usually ended in Remus stealing all the chocolate only to give it piece by piece to Harry while Peter and James were arguing on what was the best between cauldron cakes and jelly slugs. Not today though, and Sirius had made sure of that in his own way.

“I’m glad you’re all here, no Peter, cauldron cakes do not taste better than jelly slugs and Remus, share the chocolate with Harry.” he suddenly declared, making Peter jump on the couch, to Harry’s great amusement. “We have an announcement.”

Without moving the rest of his body, Sirius grabbed my hand and pulled me to him. All eyes were on us, and if Sirius’ nervousness was only betrayed by his stillness, mine was definitely visible with my dark red face.

“But before I say anything, I warn you: no blubbering. Right, James?”

Lily suppressed a chuckle as James nodded in a very serious way, his hands folded underneath his chin and his eyes squinting. The others were less dramatic but as curious, and I looked up to Sirius only to see him biting his bottom lip. If this view was incredibly sexy, I didn’t have even a second to think more about it before he dropped the news.

“Y/N and I are going to get married.”

I was pretty sure my voice wasn’t as high-pitched as Lily’s now when she had told me she would marry James. Between Oh my god!’s and I knew it!’s, she managed to put Harry down and to hug me, and we began to hobble like two children. We only stopped when Lily pushed me back, asking desperately to see the engagement ring, and I caught a glance of James wiping a tear away - “That’s why we said no blubbering, Prongs!” I shouted with a smirk, to which James answered with a playful and tearful glare - and Remus and Sirius sharing a strong embrace while Peter was trying to explain to Harry what this mess meant.

“How did it happen? When? By Merlin Y/N, why didn’t you tell me before?”

Lily was so excited I couldn’t help but giggle at her bright eyes, and Remus snuck next to us to hear the story. Before diving straight into my monologue, I threw a look at Sirius and found him grinning from ear to ear, with James’ hand on his shoulder and Peter wondering out loud what they could do for his bachelor party.

“Come on Y/N, we want to know!” whined Remus.

I rolled my eyes playfully, installed a more and more tired Harry on my knees and began the story.

“This dumbass was playing with a jellyfish - a jellyfish, seriously, is there a single mentally stable person that can have the idea to play with a dead jellyfish? Anyways, I asked him what he was doing and-”

I finally shut up almost fifteen minutes later. By the time I was done, Harry had fallen asleep and seemed to be quite comfy, all snuggled he was against me. Lily was beaming, and if her eyes hadn’t actually taken the shape of two hearts, I could perfectly see the image. Remus and James, who had joined us with Sirius and Peter five minutes ago, were still making fun of my fiancé.

“Come on Pads, admitting that you’re nervous is a rookie move!”

Peter was the first to decide we should toast to our future wedding. He grabbed seven glasses, filled them all with orange juice as Lily had forbidden alcohol in Harry’s presence and we all held our glasses high.

“To the wedding!” exclaimed cheerfully Remus.

“It was about time,” added Peter. “It’s been years since you’ve begun to like each other, I was beginning to fear it would never happen!”

“Amen, brother. Wait a minute!” Suddenly, James’ eyes lit up and the smirk he was arbouring when he looked at me was quite worrying. “That’s why you’re looking like a zombie, Y/N, you celebrated the news quite well!”

He winked at me and I snorted, too embarrassed to find anything to say.

To be continued...

#Harry Potter #harry potter imagines #harry potter imagine #marauder era #marauders era #marauders imagine #Sirius Black #sirius black x reader #sirius black imagine #sirius black x you #sirius black x y/n

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mxillusion · 4 years

Text

Just let me love you.

➝ pairing: im jaebum x reader

➝ genre/warnings: angsty fluff, roommate!AU

➝ words count: 2600+

➝ summary: After sharing one bed with your flatmate, everything seems to be different. You try your best to not show your confusion, but another incident makes everything even worse. Yet here you are, with a racing heart and dead certainty he’ll break your heart. Read the prequel here!

It's only been two days. Two days and you weren't able to think straight anymore. Jaebum was on your mind twenty-four-seven lately, and there was nothing you could do about it. In actual fact, this was nothing new to you, but since he spent the night in your bed - somehow cuddled up to you - your head was spinning. You expected you wouldn't get any sleep this night, but as soon as you woke up the next morning, you realized you'd slept like a baby in his arms.

He was awake already, looking at you with a soft smile on his lips as you slowly opened your eyes. You still laid in his arms, able to hear his uneven heartbeat while his scent was indulging your senses. Feeling his warm body so close to yours was somehow hard to handle, your mind too tired to be able to process.

Jaebum's fingertips ran up and down your arm while he was only looking at you. You blushed under his gaze, furtively closing your eyes again to savor this intimate moment. It just felt like heaven on earth.

But soon, it got awkward for no reason. Neither of you knew what to do now. You had spent the night together, and even though it has been absolutely PG-13, you somehow felt overwhelmed. And so did he. After what felt like an eternity of silence, you managed to leave the bed, excusing yourself with some lame plea. In record time, you rushed through the bathroom only to leave your apartment without looking at him again.

Great.

The day has been just as awkward as the morning, as you came back home pretty late. Jaebum was sitting in the living room, watching some tv, yet you immediately gained his full attention as soon as you walked in. You managed to exchange a few words but ended up hiding in your room, hoping he would even leave you be.

And so he did.

You didn't get a wink of sleep that night, debating with yourself if you should ask him to sleep at your place again. But since you had no idea how to accomplish that, you refrained from it. There was no way to ask for this without looking like a total idiot since you, in a way, ditched him in the morning.

Today you felt horrible because of the lack of sleep and walked through your day like a zombie. You hurried, so you would be back home before he was.

With a sigh, you closed the door behind you, leaning against it as you closed your eyes for a second. Your heart was racing just by the thought of your flatmate, and soon you realized, you had to do something. And you only had two options: pretending as nothing happened, or straightaway confess.

Your head started spinning again, so you decided to take a quick shower as long as you were alone. Thoughtlessly you threw a few of your clothes directly onto the couch while you made your way to the bathroom. You locked the door behind you, stripping off your underwear to step into the shower.

The warm water ran down your frame while your forehead rested against the cold tilework, your eyes closed. In your mind's eye, you saw him smiling his unique smile, which made your heart jump in excitement. Whenever he was smiling at you, you somehow forgot how to breathe. If you had to be honest, you had a crush on him since forever, but you were able to hide it pretty well. But that one night changed everything.

As you stepped out of the shower, infinite time later, you firstly heard sounds out of the living room, immediately knowing what caused them. Or, to be more exact, who.

And that's when you realized you had made a big mistake. Your clothes were still in the living room, where you left them, just as Jaebum was by now. Shit. You forgot to pick new clothes, and now you were locked up in here with nothing but a towel and old underwear laying on the floor.

Great.

Frantically, you thought about what to do now. But quickly, you concluded there was nothing much you could do besides stepping out of the bathroom and run for dear life. So you wrapped your towel around your body as tight as possible, hoping it would stay at its place long enough for you to get yourself out of harm's way.

Carefully, you opened the door, hoping he wouldn't even notice you. Maybe he was watching tv or listening to music on his phone like he did most of the time, so either way, he wouldn't be able to notice you.

However, he did none of this. Jaebum was standing in front of the windows, staring through the glass into the distance. He seemed in deep thoughts, making you assume you'd be safe.

"Can I talk to you for a second?"

You were halfway there, just as he turned around, his eyes widened as they caught you. He gulped, surreptitiously biting his lip while he constrained himself to look away.

"I'm sorry, I, uh, had no idea..."

Your face turned bright red as your fingers almost painfully clung on to the fabric wrapped around your body. Thank god it was big enough to cover most of your skin, even though there were some parts it couldn't quite reach. It seemed to be barely enough back in the bathroom, but now, you felt exposed, as if you would stand in front of him in your birthday suit. - Which was pretty accurate, in some way.

"L-let me put on s-some clothes real quick, okay?" you gasped, praying to God Jaebum would just let you be. This whole thing between you was embarrassing enough, yet it didn't need to get any worse.

"Okay."

You perceived an audible sigh out of his direction, turning away from you just to spun around again a second later.

"No, sorry. I have to say this now before I don't have the guts anymore."

Awkwardly, you tried to adjust yourself while standing there, shifting from one foot to another. This whole scene was beyond embarrassing, no matter how hard you tried to keep cool.

Jaebum ran a hand through his already messed up hair, visibly searching for the right words. Just a few seconds ago, he was quite sure he would be courageous enough to spill the tea. However, he now felt mesmerized, unable to think straight anymore.

"So, what is it?" you dared to ask, even if you weren't sure you wanted to hear the answer.

"About the other night. I just wanted to say -" He let out another sigh, because, once again, he was unable to express his feelings for you. Why the hell did this have to be so damn hard?

These few words made your heart beat a lot faster, unwillingly giving you a glimpse of hope he maybe would feel the same about you. The next second, however, this hope was smashed into pieces as he shook his head in silence.

"Ah, its nothing. Let's forget about that. Okay?"

Your heart was aching painfully, in the act of consent tacitly. Staring at Jaebum with widened eyes, you felt like an idiot for having any hope at all. He just slept in your bed, yet nothing happened that night. So what were you expecting now?

"Sure," you breathed before you hurried to disappear in your room.

Closing the door behind you, you leaned against it, closing your eyes as your head was resting on the wooden frame.

Fuck!

This whole thing has gotten worse and worse. Suddenly you cursed that stupid night no matter how good it felt that second, it seemed to be nothing more but a big mistake. You never intended to let things get out of hand, yet here you were with a heart that was beating to your neck, although it got shattered to pieces a few seconds ago.

At this point, it felt quite impossible to get back on track with him again. Jaebum was acting differently now, so you were pretty sure it wouldn't turn anywhere near normal again.

You managed to put on some clothes and somehow get ready to leave the apartment directly afterward. There was no way you would stay here, acting like nothing ever happened. You were way too emotional to hide any sort of emotion from anyone.

As you fastly walked through the flat, you felt his gaze on your back, but you acted like you wouldn't notice. You had to get out of here before he would have the chance to become aware of anything.

Jaebum was staring at the door after you slammed it shut behind you.

"Fuck," he hissed, kicking the bookshelf nearby him. He knew he screwed it all up by now, even though he tried so hard not to. However, it felt like mission impossible at this point. It always looked so simple in any movie, yet here he was, feeling like a total idiot.

He never would've guessed he'd fell in love with his flatmate, basically because he always tried to control his passions and think straight before falling for someone head over heels. Yet this was just what happened with you.

It was already late at night, as you finally came home again. Simultaneously as you opened the door, you've been looking out for him, yet he was nowhere in sight. You concluded, he had left the apartment too.

Thank god.

Actually, you wanted to stay the night by a friend, but sadly she hasn't been home, so you had no other choice but to walk home again. Maybe you were lucky enough to be alone this night, anyway. Maybe Jaebum would stay away instead.

You lay awake the whole night, unable to control your thoughts or emotions in the slightest. He was still on your mind like he was before, maybe even more after that incident earlier.

Somewhere along the line, you heard a noise outside your room. Of course, Jaebum had to come home again, but you'd hoped so bad it wouldn't be tonight.

You held your breath as if he wouldn't be able to tell you were home too.

As it knocked at your door, you flinched while your heart was about to leap out of your chest. You had no intention at all to talk to your flatmate now, so you decided to simply not respond.

But he was knocking again, silently calling out your name.

"Go away," you sighed, hoping this would be enough to get rid of him again.

"Please, can I come in?" he asked, his voice muffled through the wood.

"I'm already sleeping."

"No, you're not."

You sighed, pulling your blanket over your head as if you'd be able to disappear. A part of you wanted to hear what he had to say, but you felt way too anxious at this point, so you didn't dare to answer again.

That's when the door opened a crack, Jaebum's head peeking inside. "Y/N? Please?" He sounded agonized, almost begging you to give him a second chance to explain himself.

"What is it, Jae?" You slowly got yourself out of bed to approach him, keeping a little distance between you.

"I'm sorry," he pleaded, hanging his head.

"About?"

He exhaled heavily. "Everything."

You felt another sting deep in your chest, right where your heart was. Whatever Jaebum was about to say now, would only make it worse, you were sure of it.

"You don't have to be. It's okay."

He shook his head a little too rashly. "No, it's not. Listen, I never wanted things to get that difficult between us. I feel like I ruined everything by acting like a total idiot."

Something in the way he was looking at you, caused you to feel his pain too. Jaebum was suffering in a way you couldn't quite comprehend yet.

"It's okay. Really. Now go get some sleep."

"You don't get it. I can't! I'm unable to fall asleep. Not since we slept together," he babbled, causing your eyes to widen. The way he was talking almost implied you two had sex that night, even though both of you knew you hadn't.

"I don't mean... Well, I guess you know what I mean."

Muted, you simply nodded, incapable of saying or reacting in any other way. You only hoped he would hurry up now. He was about to break your heart, at least that's what you thought, and you were pretty sure it would be best to make it fast.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked you to stay. I was too dizzy, still half asleep, and - obviously - I didn't think before I spoke."

Now it was his heart that shattered a little. Why would you say that? Was he that wrong with reading between the lines?

"What? No, I -"

"I get it. It didn't mean anything to you, and that's fine. Let's just don't make a big deal out of it, okay?"

Jaebum blinked in confusion. "Can you please hear me out now?"

You just nodded, still preparing yourself for the worst. At this point, it was pure torture, and your heart barely couldn't take it anymore.

"It is a big deal for me, okay?"

"W-what?"

Silence spread across the room while you two were eyeing each other. Out of a sudden, a part of you was scared, yet the other part didn't seem to get what was happening right now.

You felt his hand on your waist, and everything was happening quite fast. Jaebum spun you around to turn your back against the wall. He stepped up to you to pin you against it. And that's when his lips crashed upon yours.

Immediately, your body was reacting on his own. You placed your palms on his shoulders, your fingers clung on to the collar of his shirt, while he kissed you hungrily. His body was pushing you closer to the wall, it almost hurt, yet you couldn't care less.

One of his hands placed next to you against the wall to support himself, the other still on your hips. Slowly it ran down your waist, along your thigh only to grab it so he could wrap it around his middle.

You clung on to him for dear life while he deepened the kiss a little more, making your legs shake. Everything he wasn't capable of saying, now mirrored in the way he kissed you. There was no doubt anymore that this night meant a lot to him, and finally, you realized he indeed felt just the same as you did.

Infinite time later, he pulled away, leaving you both breathless and panting for air. Your body was trembling while you were glancing up at him as he brushed your hair out of your face.

"I'm sorry," he repeated himself. "I wanted to say so much to you, but I just couldn't. Not when you look at me like that." He chuckled lightly, tilting his head. "And especially not when you're standing in front of me in nothing but a towel."

You had to laugh as you felt heat rushing in your cheeks while you thought about that stupid situation from earlier. Jaebum was right. Maybe this hasn't been the best moment to confess to you.

"Don't worry. You already made it up to me by now," you breathed before you quickly kissed him again.

Jaebum smiled against your lips before wrapping his arms around your frame, lifting you to carry you to your bed. There was no way any of you would spend this night alone anymore.

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bvidzsoo · 3 years

Text

Abiding Darkness (XVII)

Author: bvidzsoo

Warning: violence and cursing

Pairing: Oh Sehun x OC

Word Count: 3, 912

Summary: Belikov Bora is living in Seoul at her grandparents as she had gotten her long awaited scholarship. She’s not new to this world but she’s also not really interested in the famous people of it…so maybe that’s why she gets the shock of her life when a zombie apocalypse begins and she’s stuck with Oh Sehun.

The deafening sound of the siren sent my heart into a frenzy as I tried thinking logically. Jian looked just as scared as I felt and I clutched her hand, trying to give her any form of comfort. Here we are safe, but if that’s the case, why are these sirens going off? Suddenly, a male deep voice boomed through the speakers hung in the room, one I didn’t notice before.

“Everyone pick anything that could serve as a weapon and head immediately to the Hall room, we are under attack. I repeat, we are under attack and it’s not an exercise!”

Jian and I looked at each other and simultaneously jumped up from the bed, a hiss leaving my lips when I put too much pressure on my broken shin.

“Get dressed as fast as possible!” I threw Jian’s old clothes at her as I tried taking deep breaths to stay calm. This isn’t the first time I have to fight the Affected ones, I know what to do to keep us safe. And here, we have weapons, there are soldiers here who know what to do. All I have to do is get Jian and me safely to the Hall room.

The clothes I arrived in here still had dirt and bloodstains on them but I couldn’t fight in loose fitted pants and a simple sweater. Jian ran to my side and I gripped her hand in mine as I placed my crutch underneath my armpit, ready to take off. But before we could get to the door it got kicked open and we both froze. A bloodied, deformed face and black eyes were staring back at us. The Affected one snared and shot forward, taking us by surprise, but it was enough to wake me up from my initial shock. We survive tonight and I’ll do anything it takes.

“Hide in the bathroom, Jian!” I rushed out as I raised my crutch at swung it at the Affected one. It jumped back, cleverly avoiding my attack. I glared at it but quickly glanced back to see if Jian listened to me, which was a mistake. Before I could react, I was tackled onto the bed and the Affected one was snarling in my face. A guttural growl left my throat when the Affected one went to clutch at my neck and I delivered the hardest punch I could at its face. Its head shot up and blood dripped on my face, it disgusted me, but I took the moment of weakness of the Affected one to my advantage and kicked it off of me. However, this one seemed very determined to get me so it was back on its feet in a few seconds, leaving me no time to pick up my crutch and swing at it. For a second we just stared at each other in silence and that’s when I remembered these were people before they turned into these monsters. I was killing once innocent people, people who didn’t deserve to die. My thoughts were all forgotten when the Affected one snarled once again and went to lunge at me. I leaned down a bit and ran towards the creature, hooking my arms around its torso and slamming it against the wall. There was a cracking sound and I dropped to the ground to pick up my crutch before the Affected one could recover from my attack. I raised the crutch and using all the force I had I swung at its head, once again a cracking sound echoed in the room. I winced but swung at it again, harder this time, but the Affected one ducked. I shrieked in frustration and the creature only snarled before kicking my broken shin. A scream full of pain left my lips, the pain just as unbearable as the first time I broke it, but I didn’t back down. If I die, it gets to Jian, and I won’t let that happen. So with a deadly glare, knees shaking, my crutch went through the stomach of the Affected one, pinning it up to the wall.

“Die, bitch” I snarled at it as it continued kicking around until it just stopped moving. With shaky hands, I pushed the hair that had fallen into my eyes away and turned around to go for Jian. I yelped when I placed pressure on my broken shin but I couldn’t give up, not now.

“Jian” I called out as I barged inside the bathroom.

“I thought I wouldn’t see you again” Jian cried when she saw me walking inside the bathroom and I opened my arms as she ran into them, “When you screamed--”

“Shh, it’s okay. I would never leave you alone, don’t ever forget that” I gave her a reassuring smile and a kiss on her forehead, “I don’t know how many Affected ones are in here, you have to stay in this bathroom--”

“No, I can’t stay alone--”

“Jian, if we both go and there’s too many of them, I...I won’t be able to save you, please” Tears filled the little girl’s eyes and I sighed as I felt my heart breaking. I didn’t want to leave her here either, but I had no choice. If I had to die today, at least I die protecting someone.

“I’ll stay here” Jian’s eyes turned hard, a look I haven’t seen on her before and it made me ache that she had to be tough at such a young age, “Give me a weapon”

I looked around the room frantically for anything that could be used as a weapon when I noticed the metal piece that was used as a shelf for the toothpaste and toothbrushes. I hopped to it and ripped it off the wall creating a loud commotion. Jian took it from my hands and gave me a firm nod. I smiled at her and rushed her into the shower stall pulling the curtain so that it would hide her from unwanted eyes.

“When this is all over, I’ll come back for you” I muttered through the curtain and I could see Jian’s head moving in a nod.

“Go, I’ve got this” Her voice was strong but reassuring at the same time. I sighed and with a last glance at her, I exited the bathroom and closed the door, locking it. No one would get to her, not if that depended on me. My eyes fell on the gruesome scene of the dead Affected one and I limped over, yanking my crutch out of the creature’s stomach, watching as it fell limply to the ground. Good, I have to get to the Hall room now and fight off these creatures until none is left.

The silence in the hallway was deadly as I inched closer to the door and I gulped loudly before exiting the safety of my room that it once offered. My foot was only halfway out of the door when I was tackled into a tight hug, so surprised that I didn’t react.

“You’re alive” The voice was quiet as my brain registered who was hugging me and I inhaled sharply, returning the tight hug.

“Jian is in the bathroom, we can’t take her with us...not until we know it’s safe” I whispered as Sehun took a step back, arms falling from around me. I craved his warmth, I wanted him to throw his arms around me once again, I wanted to forget about the wailing sirens and about the snarls that were loud in the distance, I just wanted to be with Sehun and him only.

“I heard a scream and I--”

“The Affected one kicked my shin, I’m fine. But are you--”

“Good. I’m good, let’s go” Sehun’s eyes hardened once again, all warmth disappearing and I sighed quietly to myself. He still didn’t forgive me, he was just scared something happened to us and that’s why he came to check. But I didn’t mind as long as he stayed by my side, I didn’t care if he hated me, I didn’t care if he fed me to the Affected ones to save himself, he was safe for now and that’s what truly matters to me.

The hallways were empty, a sight we didn’t expect. Sehun held onto tightly the bloody metal rod, before he came to check on Jian and I, he had to fight three Affected ones. I tried not to hiss at every step I took, Adrenaline wasn’t as high to take away the pain I felt due to my broken shin. The cast cracked a bit and only just now I realized how strong these creatures are. One kick was enough to create a crack in my cast, no wonder my whole leg was throbing in pain. The sight of my bloody crutch made me dizzy and with a sharp inhale I stopped walking, feeling dizzy I leaned up against the wall. Sehun didn’t stop, he probably didn’t notice my reaction, only when he was almost at the end of the hallway. But I didn’t care, my lungs were on fire, my body was in pain and I would die. For the first time since we got into this deadly situation, I realized that I would actually die. I had no way out, no one would save me. The soldiers had to protect everyone, didn’t have the luxury to protect just me. One moment of them not paying attention to me and I’m dead. Hell, if we get to the Hall room, that is. And I left Jian alone, what was I thinking? She’d be safest with us and in the Hall room not left alone in our room’s bathroom, with a locked door on top of all.

“Hey, are you listening to me?” Sehun’s voice seemed far away and I closed my eyes tightly, “No, you can’t have a pannic attack right now, Bora, focus on my voice”

But it was really hard, I could barely breathe at this point, “We...are...going...to...die”

I heard and saw nothing, until I felt warmness on my cheeks. I couldn’t open my eyes, that would have made me throw up, the lightning was too much, and there was this high pitched sound coming from the now silent alarms that was making my head throbe.

“We are not dying, listen to me” Sehun’s voice sounded stern but pannicked, “Count with me”

I can’t even think straight and he wants me to count with him?

“One, two, three, four…” His voice was warm, just like his hands, as he counted with me while taking deep breaths. I started following him, his voice sounding closer this time, but I still couldn’t open my eyes. My lungs were on fire but I could breathe again, it hurt.

“Twenty” I whispered as I started coughing, the needed oxygen entering my system once again.

“Twenty” Sehun whispered after me, “We are not dying”

My eyes opened at the harshness of his voice and I was no longer blinded by the lights, the high pitched sound was gone. His face was just an inch away from mine, his breath was fanning over my face and I was taken aback. I wanted to kiss him, I didn’t care if he hated me, I didn’t care if he fed me to the Affected ones once we stumbled upon them, but I wanted to kiss him one last time. So I did, I pushed my lips against his warm and chapped ones, eyes closing at the fire that spread through my body. I was desperate but so were his lips. He clutched onto my cheeks and pulled my face harder against his, making my lips ache at the force. But I didn’t care, this is what I wanted and he wanted it too. I was the one to initiate the kiss and I was the one to end it. I pulled back, lungs screaming for oxygen once again as I inhaled longly, eyes staring into his. He didn’t say anything, he didn’t pull away. His dark eyes were shining with an emotion I have never seen before and it made me cry, but I couldn’t, not now. So I softly pushed him back and leaned down to take my crutch back into my hands and took off. I didn’t look back, I knew he was following me, but I didn’t look back because if I did, I knew I’d break down.

~~~

It was safe to say that Sehun and I were lost, we had no idea where the Hall room was so we were just running around, limping in my case, around this bunker. There were many compartments and none were the one we had to find. Sehun let out a frustrated sigh as he kicked his metal rod while walking in front of me. I was getting tired, the pain got worse and if we continued like this I wouldn’t be able to fight by the time we find the Hall room. Sehun stopped walking suddenly and I ran into him.

“What are you--” My words died in my mouth when I peaked over his shoulder, double doors open and snarls and gun shots echoed down the whole hallway. The place was full of them, even with our guns, we’d die. I sighed and closed my eyes to curse quietly.

“We have to help them, my hyungs are there--”

“Yeah, I know Sehun” I muttered and walked past him, pushing away the pain shooting up my leg. If I die might as well die doing something. Sehun started mumbling behind me that he couldn’t let me go inside injured, that I couldn’t fight. I didn’t care, Jian is still back in that room, she still needs to survive.

“Stop trying to fight me on this one, Sehun” I spoke up tiredly as I gazed at the open doors, “If I do die, I’m sorry that I lied to you. If you don’t want to see past your own prejudice and accept the fact that I was trying to make you happy, it’s fine. But don’t think that I was ever your or EXO’s fan”

Before he could say something, his eyebrows furrowed, I turned around and stepped inside the room. It was chaos, what I saw in front of my eyes was pure chaos. An affected one hurried towards me so I raised my crutch and swung at it with all my force, sending it to the ground. There was a loud cracking sound next to me and when I glanced there, Sehun was glaring at another creature that tried to get to me, his metal rod bloodier than before. My eyes looked around for familiar faces and when I saw Baekhyun waving his arm crazily in the air I gripped Sehun’s arm and started running. I cried out in pain, but I didn’t stop. They were hiding behind some tables that were supposed to keep the Affected ones away from them, but it wasn’t working out as Chanyeol was beating one to death with a frying pan. We were barely a few steps away from them when I was yanked back by my hair, a shriek leaving my lips. The crutch fell from my hand and I pannicked, no crutch means I’m dead. I tried to untagle myself from the creature’s grip when I heard its snarl right next to my ear. It was going to bite me, immune or not, if I bleed to death what did I do? Nothing.

“Bora!” Sehun’s desperate voice snapped me out of my thoughts and I looked at him. His friends were holding him back, he was trying to fight them off but three held him. Of course they wouldn’t let him save me, he was more precious than I am. And that’s alright. But I’m not dying today.

I elbowed the Affected one hard in the stomach and ducked, my scalp hurting as it still held onto my hair, I yelped loudly. I turned and kicked it in the knees, sending the creature down to the ground and went to grab my crutch. But suddenly there were shots fired at the Affected one and I jumped as I watched it still its movements. It was dead. I quickly grabbed my crutch and crawled to Sehun, who had his hands out to grab onto me and pull me behind shelter. Once I was behind the tables his fingers interwined with mine and when I tried to pull my hand away he growled and threw me a glare. Did he forgive me? Or was this just because we survived out there together and felt a certain need to protect each other. I hope Jian is alright, I can’t imagine what she must feel right now.

“Where’s Jongdae?” I suddenly heard Sehun speaking as he looked over his friends, “No. Did we--did he--”

“He’s alive” Xiumin was quick to answer Sehun as he lowered back down to change his ammunition, “They realized that a certain frequency is harmful to the Affected ones, he’s trying to discover which one with a few engineers in the sound room”

“Are they alone?” Sehun’s eyebrows were furrowed in worry and I gave his hand a reassuring squeeze.

“No, soldiers are there with them” Lay answered instead of Xiumin this time as he went back to shooting.

“That’s what I was hearing…” I muttered to myself as I remembered the high pitched sound.

“What are you talking about?” Sehun asked confused as Baekhyun tried moving the table to offer us more shelter.

“When I had the panick attack there was a ringing I kept hearing…” I answered Sehun, who nodded looking visibly more relaxed.

“Where’s princess?” Baekhyun asked as he looked around, eyes finding mine and Sehun’s one at a time.

“I locked her in my bedroom’s bathroom”

“What? We are the most safest here, she’s not--”

“Are we really that safe here?” I snapped, fear of losing Jian crawling over my body. Baekhyun is wrong.

“Look around, Baekhyun, Bora did good leaving Jian behind, we could die at any time” Sehun came to my aid and I nodded along his words. Baekhyun was chewing his lower lip nervously before shaking his head and scooting away from us.

“You did the right thing, Bora” Sehun whispered and I nodded back. Suddenly, Xiumin cursed and ducked down, eyebrows furrowed.

“We don’t have any ammunition left here!” He called out and the boys looked at each other. The deep voice of the commander was heard from our left.

“We are running out of ammunition here too!” We are screwed.

Junmyeon’s eyebrows furrowed and he suddenly grabbed the gun from Xiumin, “Everyone grab something to use as weapon! If Jongdae doesn’t hurry up, I’m afraid we won’t hold on for too long…”

I was already raising to my feet, pulling the crutch out from underneath my armpit, ready to fight for our lives. But Sehun tugged on my arm and I clumsily fell and cried out, feeling as if something cracked inside my shin. I was about to yell at Sehun but he spoke words I never thought I’d hear from him.

“I love you” He said, eyes boring into mine. And just like that, I felt like it was once again just the two of us. No one around us, no Affected ones that were about to kill us all if Jongdae didn’t find the right frequency, no cries coming from the people around us that they have run out of ammunition.

“I love you” I whispered back and his eyes widdened before he pulled me up, a determined look crossing his feature. In that moment I knew Sehun decided he’d do anything to keep me, his friends, and himself alive.

But before the Affected ones could get any closer, they started crying out, their voices horrifying as they echoed around the room. They started clutching their heads and suddenly, one by one, fell to the ground. Everyone looked around, confused, until we saw some men in lab coats running inside the room, with Jongdae behind them clutching a machine gun, eyes wide.

“We did it” We heard him say and everyone started cheering. I let out a breath and my eyes glossed over, I survived. Sehun survived, Jian survived. I turned my head and Sehun was already looking at me, a few tears rolling down his cheeks. I chuckled and he shook his head, pulling me into another tight hug. We were gonna get through this. We could kill all Affected ones now that we know how to stop them. We would survive.

Three months later

The smell of freshly cooked food was everywhere in the house. As I descended the stairs a smile etched itself on my lips at the loud chatter coming from the dining room.

Things haven’t been easy after Jongdae discovered how to stop the Affected ones. Scientists worked hard on finding a cure and last month they did, so now instead of killing all remaining Affected ones they were trying to catch them and return them to their old selves. It wasn’t easy, especially for them, but progress was visible. People were less afraid to go out and we started building back up the city and the nature that was destroyed. I was actually leading one of the nature restoring organization, getting a lot of help from Jian’s father. Jian was lucky enough, her father was found and once he got the cure he returned to his old self. It was hard for him, he refused to speak to anyone and see people, but soon enough with the help of others and a good psychologist, he was ready to return to his old life and to his loving daughter. The news on having lost his wife wasn’t easy on him, but he came around. Now, Jian and I hung out daily and Jian’s father, Yesung, even allowed Jian to stay with us whenever she wanted to. He was really grateful for saving his daughter and keeping her alive. Jian became my little sister.

My parents moved to South Korea to be closer and to help. My father joined the army here and helped catch other Affected ones meanwhile my mother stayed at home with me and helped out whenever she could. As for Sehun and I…

“Slept well?” His low voice was loud in my ear and I grinned as I turned my head to look at him. He lowered his head and pressed a long kiss on my lips. Sehun’s family was well, they were found hiding out in a cabin in the woods a few kilometers away from the city. They moved back into the city once things were better and now Sehun and I lived together in the house my parents bought for the time they were here. After they leave we’d move in to Sehun’s apartment, but right now we enjoyed living as one big family.

“Splendidly, you?” Sehun chuckled and shook his head.

“You know I did too” I rolled my eyes at the wink and cocky smile on his face and cleared my throat to make our presence known.

“Oh, come have breakfast dears!” My mother’s chirpy voice called out and I smiled as Sehun took my hand in his and lead me to the table.

Things were finally good. No more secrets, no more diary entries.

The End

A/N: Hello everyone, the long awaited last chapter is here, after a year of not posting it! Sorry for that, for making you all way for so long, but I had a lot going on. I was in my last year of high school so I really needed to study and now I’m in university so once again I have to study even more. Truth be told, I’m kind of done with writing fanfiction as my inspiration was gone for a long time now, and I probably have a major writers block as well. But hey, who knows when it’ll return. I still write fanfiction, it just takes longer to write them. Thank you for following the story of Belikov Bora and Oh Sehun, consider this as my Christmas present for you all! Merry Chirstmas once again guys!

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