#And he's been in a junkyard for over a decade so what better way to develop him

[insomniac-dot-ink]

By the Morning Light

Rory chased off two junkyard dogs on his way into the salvage yard that morning. He called one of them Pesto (short for Pest) and the other Barnaby because Rory thought it a hateful name. “Serves you right, Barnaby,” he groused. The creature always stuck his nose in Rory’s crotch and nosed his pockets for food. None here, Pesto. It was early and the only sounds came from squawking birds and snuffling animals.

This scrap yard had been abandoned decades before Rory was alive. The only things left were the carcasses of 90’s computers and the plastic frames of microwaves. Metal and filaments and anything smaller than a breadbox had already been scooped up. There weren't even flies left. But Rory was small and if he went alone, he figured he might have better luck.

Rory swung his stick back forth, poking stray office chairs and wilted carboard boxes. He made it halfway across the fenced area. Then the air filled with charms. The corner of his eyes prickled and his throat closed. Something sang out. Maybe because the scrap yard was empty. Maybe because spring began in earnest. Maybe because he was the unlucky sort.

There was a glow like sun off fresh snow and the scent of rain. She asked for blood.

“Hello?” His voice sounded brittle to his own ears. Rory clenched down and called louder, “You want something?” He wiped away the stray tears and squared his shoulders. Too damn early for this. Following the noise, he rounded a mossy refrigerator.

Time seemed to draw to a halt. His eyes went wide. It was like something out of the bible or a fairy tale–though Rory hadn’t read much of either. He tilted his head all the way back. She was long and twisty like inverted smoke, glowing white instead of charcoal. Her form zigzagged across the space, stark against the piles of junk and drab trees. Dogs yapped in the distance and birds took flight behind her head.

She spoke again. Rory winced.

“Excuse me?” he asked, voice shaking only a little. His hearing wasn’t very good and a part of him was hoping he’d blink and she would be gone. That it wouldn’t speak again. That angel’s asking for blood was a onetime thing and she’d lose interest.

The thing looked like a headache brewing in your frontal lobe. He tried not to look too closely. Two pairs of eyes became twenty. Snaky arms became branches that became trees. Wings stretched so big you forget the sky.

She spoke again. Her voice was chimes and gongs and things that reverberated through your bones. Not words at all but you knew what they meant. She asked for blood.

“Right now?” Rory rubbed his arm. The thing should know that he wasn’t a bible man. Even if this was normal from biblical times, but he didn’t go around losing his mind or asking for favors. He squinted into the angel's face. “I'm kind of busy. Find a priest maybe? I’m not one of yours.”

He bowed his head slightly, trying not to offend her. It was one of those ugly-beautiful things. Like how people describe Abraham Lincoln in their journals. Rory’s dad had a thing about old Abe, but he supposed you have to be about something.

Rory wasn’t interested in finding his thing right then– such as feeding Angel’s blood.

She said something and the sentence took a whole minute to form. An offering. Rory narrowed his eyes, gripping the stick in his hand tighter. “What would I want your blood for?” Blood for blood. That didn’t seem like much of a deal for someone who didn’t drink the stuff. He took a step back. “You one of those demons they go on about? Like, a disguised one?” The angel’s entire form rippled. She reached out a long and splintering hand, fracturing in light like bolts of lightning. He covered his eyes to stop white spots from filling his vision. She said her name and he doubled over. A real headache thumped behind his eyes.

“Alright, alright!” he called out, covering his ears and gasping for air. “You’re an angel. I hear you.” Luckily, she didn’t say her name again. Though she asked for blood.

“And what if I don’t get it for you?” he griped. He he didn’t visit junkyards to adopt stray dogs or feed holy animals. The whole damn world wants something.

The smoke rippled and the angel’s form seemed to shudder. She pulled back and Rory drew closer, yielding his stick like a shield. The angel seemed to be springing from an old truck. A terrible rusty beast with the tires popped, the front half crushed, and hood sprouting grass.

The angel appeared to grow from the inside like a plant as something silvery coated the seats. She repeated her plea.

Rory wrinkled his nose. “Tell me what you want it for.” Unbelievable. Bargaining with the devil. His dad would love this one if he didn’t interrogate him about being alone out here. Because that’s how you get the good stuff, dad.

He kind of wished his dad was there now. The angel cocked her head to the side and there was something deeply human about the movement. A sickness washed over him and Rory shuddered. The chimes clamored inside his skull.

“Okay, okay! You're not a demon!” He put up his hands. “I don’t need your name again, jeez.”

Rory huffed, studying the creature. He wondered if it was here because of a shrine built on the hill once upon a time or if because of the remoteness. Scavengers and nature alike had stripped it of most things. Trees growing up through stray tires and vines growing up through the bones of bicycles. He jutted his chin out.

“This isn’t really angel country.” The thing had to know that the people who prayed to angels were in the cities. Single mothers and television personalities and Los Vegas gamblers on a hot streak. He wanted to tell the angel to go find them, but instead he asked, “Do you really grant miracles? Is that how this works?”

The smoke of the angel rippled and the voice coursed through him. The ugly-beautifulness of it like rain slick days where puddles filled with oily rainbows. Or how his father cried at the TV show MASH every night for a week.

Rory looked up. “Promise?”

The angel promised. He searched his pockets and rounded the truck, keeping the creature in view. Fourteen and he’d have to add “encounters” to his bullshit stories no one would believe. His neighbor Florence would love that– she’d been abducted in ‘93 she swore. Right before her husband passed away in the crash.

Rory held out his hand. “Only a little.” The angel twisted in place, looming overhead like the sun. Rory held his breath. Time seemed to slow, and he studied the headache of her face. He held the knife to his palm. “Just a little . . .” he repeated.

She opened her maw. There were teeth somewhere and a light so immense that itched down your throat and into your palms. Something twinkled within and collapsed within a blink. Glittering and cold, the mouth opened wide.

A bird called from somewhere and Rory paused. He was lucky.

A junkyard dog jumped on the roof of the car. Rory barely had time to react. “Don’t!”

The smoke cleared and he knew then, he knew. Rory fell to his knees. Tears sprang to his eyes and fell freely. "Wait!"

The angel caught the dog in both hands and the mouth that wasn’t a mouth bit down. The dog didn’t bleed. It was reduced to a tiny whining ball of fur. The puppy kicked its feet to the air. The angel twisted its splintering hands. A grown ancient hound bayed to the heavens.

Elderly dog to puppy and back again, expanding and collapsing all at once. The air burned a silvery-white. Rory's ears rang. Singing and roaring and weeping in a way that was singing. And then nothing.

He wiped at his eyes, pressing his palms into the sockets. He found the spots wouldn’t disappear. The minutes slowly sank back in. Grass imprinted against his cheek. A stray cicada called. His muscles ached and he realized he was curled up on the ground. An earthy smell and something a bit rotted reminded him to breath.

A lone car passed in the distance. Rory flexed his hands over and over and unlocked his knees. He turned onto his side, inhaling in and out.

The ancient truck had disappeared. A broken stove and several keyboards were stacked in place of the angel. Dogs barked from somewhere and the sun warmed Rory’s face. His ears rang and when he got to his feet, his knees shook.

He ran all the way home. His dad grabbed his shoulders on the way in and studied his face. Rory never found the words to explain the shaking or why he might not stop. Instead, he sat on the couch drinking warm milk and watched MASH for a fourth time. Watching his father from the corner of eye. What if I hadn't come home? He stopped going to the junkyard alone.

Several weeks passed before he found out. A family had died in a car crash in ‘93. The fact burned like a sunburn in his head. That’s what Florence had said about the crash–his Florence. This Florence said they got lucky. Everyone gets lucky sometimes, she said.

Rory’s tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth at that.

He didn’t start going to church even if he should have. Fear and belief wrapping into one.

Rory started adopting dogs from off the street. Wrapping them in his arms and carrying them all the way home even as they kicked and nipped. Pesto was first. She shook as he untangled her long fur, wrapping the sores on her paws and shaving off the mats. He asked her if she remembered. If there were two of them. God, he murmured. He hoped so. Little creatures have to stick together.

—————-

Thanks for reading!! If you enjoyed the story please consider buying me a coffee, and check out my Sapphic urban fantasy book 🌸

#supernatural story #short story #flash fiction #angels and demons #writing #writeblr #long post #spooky story

[dreamdstate]

── ( cis woman, she & her. ) recently seen standing dramatically, a step too close with hands in pockets in a worrying nature overlooking at the cliffside: enter ETHEL JANE OTTOMAN. twenty - eight years old & a sagittarius, usually observed in prairie dresses littered with dirt and mud, fucked up kicks that are sizes too big and only strapped down by too - tight laces and a prayer ; ethel is a devotion visitor known within their circle as LOYAL + DEPENDABLE, a perpetual hum of mona lisa by j soloman on salted mouth. something of the PESSIMISTIC + RASH follows, regardless … something to do with the indescribable yearning of wanting to leave a place you didn’t want to come to begin with, perhaps ? strange, what a HUMAN can get up to. they’ve been heard waxing lyrical about a dream they had recently, a strange tale of never ending dogs chasing, their teeth centimeters from ankles — she’s not a runner nor a track star, the feeling of walls closing in constant. the need to escape into a world that’s better than where she is, however, always disappointed when she wakes. pay no mind to fanciful star - gazing, though: rather, mind the tangible. the overbearing sadness she brings to the function, ruining the whole vibe, sad man crooning a - la the national playing over speaks when she gets the aux ; an old toyota tacoma that on it’s last leg but she can’t bare the thought of leaving it in a junkyard ( inanimate objects having feelings or not, it’d be sad ) . overalls with nothing underneath, ripped and tatted enough to barely being considered clothes.

warnings for accidental + parental death, living off the grid type of things.

full name — ethel jane ottoman.

nickname(s) — none currently, except any expletives her cousin nala throws her way.

date of birth & age — december 5th, 1995.

gender / pronouns — cis woman / she & her.

sexuality — unknown, but definitely not straight.

species — human.

occupation — currently works as a garden assistant at her family's store, more tbd.

notable features — noticeable scar on the side of her left cheek, from childhood. various others across body.

for all intents and purposes, the ottoman family is known around devotion. their reputation precedes them, usually in a good manner, thanks to their store, edmunds. named after her great great grandfather who moved to devotion decades ago, they soon became decades long owners and founders of a prominent local hardware store turned garden center combo and created to help farmers, fishermen and others alike gather supplies with little need to leave the quiet town. it's been since passed down to each eldest son to carry on it's legacy --- some more inclined to the idea than others.

her father, wilbur, was the youngest son of five -- he was never meant to carry the heavy mantle that came with the ottoman territory, nor did he have any kind of interest in picking it up. instead, eyes were set on the closing horizon ; his biggest aspiration was to get out of devotion and set sail to .. really anywhere. an unsettling feeling of wanderlust even as a child made it's home in the bones of him and never let go. everyone chastised him, saying it's not in the family nature to leave. to disappear, to do their own things. wilbur was never one to really give into the status quo. by the time he turned 18, wilbur was out of here. a caravan full of his belongings and the small amount of cash he had left over after working at edmunds, nothing but family left behind.

wilbur settled in the middle of idaho, making camp and finally running out of funds he so desperately clung onto for as long as possible. it was here where he met a woman named delilah -- the two fell in love and the rest? was history. or, that's how the story normally goes. delilah was a child of those who created a small villiage out of an abandoned campground. originally, it was created by delilah's own family, and soon turned into a place where those who didn't want to deal with the burdens of modern society could live in peace. they farmed, harvested, did everything on their own. solar panels to created what little electricity they used, planting and cutting down trees for warmth in the death of winter. by the time the two were wed, wilbur was already a functioning member of this small society --- though welcome, he was held at an arm's length, like all 'outsiders' who married in were considered. he was the one who went into town for things they weren't able to get themselves, considering his own dealings as a previous outsider.

ethel was born there. it's all she'd ever truly known. raised by the community moreso than an actual school ( the group had elected a more montessori type of learning than workbooks, etc ) and figuring out everything she could within childhood, it was ideal, to her, at least. she was content to stay there for the rest of her life --- only, mostly, interacting with those within the community instead of the modern world. wilbur had other plans.

without warning, the family up and moved. parents and their baby girl moved farther into the forest, a cabin he'd been slowly working on. he wanted a place of their own, without the rules of the society they'd been living in. she was 13 and leaving the only place she'd never known. it was from then on solely the 3 of them, only making the two hour trek to and from town whenever they were unable to create what they needed and then some. though happy her father seemed more relaxed in his own space, ethel was lonely. she'd make friends with the fishes in the creek and the owls in the trees, but with both her parents spending all their days working to create resources for their small brood, it was a lonely life. social skills declined and she became a somewhat - version of her own rapunzel. though not trapped, it was be until she was 28 that she'd leave her cage.

PARENTAL DEATH / they die on their way back from town -- ethel is sparred the details, but the police give their condolences after spending hours finding the cabin. she's not sure what to do -- despite her the loneliness she felt for years in her chest, she'd never been actually alone. an island of her own, surrounded by so much, yet given so little. so, she continues on. wilbur taught her how to drive and the route to the small town they frequented. she was adopted by some of the local shop owners, taken under her wing and given a sense of community, despite her awkward nature. years and years and years go by. it's easy to keep going when that's all she knows.

a nice man who owns the deli in the town offers to help her find other family. they attempt to get to the small community, but their doors were effectively shut, in particular due to their grief over delilah. gears then switched to the other side -- the ottoman family in devotion. she'd never been, perhaps once or twice as a small infant, but the names thrown around in documents kept secret in her fathers office are somewhat familiar -- rants overheard when things would begin to break, about how he should've fought harris or clobbered donald over god knows what. a year, two, go by until things begin to pick up in this aspect. ethel was starting to think her writings got lost in the mail. an uncle makes an invitation to come join them in his guest house -- an unexpected one, letters sent with information and what could be awaiting her there. the cabin is sold, essentially, to that deli - owner for safe keeping in case she ever wanted to come back, for one reason or another. there's not enough room in her small tacoma to hold everything, so he keeps it safe.

now playing — none. who is going to introduce her to spotify?

last watched — none. movie night ???

inspo — tbd.

has only been in devotion, actually, for around two months --- she's still relatively new and trying to get her footing. nala ( and the other ottomans ) are her cousins from her father's side, though she currently has disagreements with the other about things.

she is genuinely just sooooo kind. not a mean bone in there, i'm afraid. but she is so so so afraid. a little dear in my mind. truthfully, she's really skittish the first few hundred times you interact .. but i think she'll warm up pretty quickly as long as you're ( seemingly ) kind. pls excuse her, she's learning.

a bit of a dummy, but she doesn't mean to be. truthfully is naive in the highest degree, and doesn't know exactly how to gain the knowledge her cousin seems to weld so easily.

but once you get to know her and her trust, she will make ur brain explode with knowledge of shit you will never care about ever again. loves to talk, even if just to herself, and is strong in her own convictions even if they go against the grain.

has had very little interaction with modern media -- she much prefers going out and making her own entertainment and not starring at screens, or anything of the sort, really. would much rather go out exploring and finding things to do than deal with things that will make her brain rot.

currently holds a job at edmunds, to keep herself from falling into a pit of not knowing what to do. she essentially just waters flowers for hours at a time -- catch her at the right time and she can make suggestions to, squeaking out the right soil and conditions to grow perfect plans. they're kind of her special interest.

love love love love loves animals. will inundate you with animal facts.

has never ever been kissed!! never held hands, no nothing.

has an eternal guilt for not going out with her parents that day, instead staying to attend to her 'job', the garden and harvest for the trio. it's still something she doesn't speak about - doesn't have the vocabulary to explain her grief, nor does she want to worry any of her new found friends with a burden such as that.

#devotion.intro

[storiesofstratos]

Chapter 6: What Lies Below

Our heroes find something under the surface of the junkyard...

To say I was surprised by what just happened would have been the understatement of the decade. This had to be the most insane thing in the world! Some secret lab, hidden under the Stratos City Junkyard? It was like something out of a superhero movie. The screens flickered with various views of the city, the largest screen showing a map with a bunch of dots all over the place. Some were red, some were blue, and some were other assorted colors. The screen had some sort of legend, but it was hard to follow. It was reporting something called "PT Activity". What was this PT thing? Was it dangerous? What could be so dangerous that it would warrant a city wide monitoring for activity of it. Was it a virus or something? The thought alone made my skin crawl.

    "Man," Daniel spoke up, putting his hands on the desk. "This is really crazy, isn't it? It feels like we're in some kind of comic book or something," He casually started pushing buttons, but Nico came in and grabbed his wrist.

    "Hey, what do you think you're doing?" She said as she gave him an annoyed look. "Who knows what kind of stuff you could break if you just go randomly tapping away at buttons? We don't even know what this place was for." She was giving him a stern look, but Daniel simply laughed it off.

    "Ah, come on, if it's been abandoned for this long, there's no way they've left anything important, right? What's the harm if I--" He pushed a button, and something began to whir to life behind us. "Oh shit, I think I've summoned the robot death army. If we all die, that's my bad."

He said it so casually I couldn't help but let out a chuckle. We all turned around instinctively to see a pedestal slowly rising up from the ground. Whatever it was, it must have been something important to put it up on a pedestal like that. From the pedestal, a cover slowly slid upward, revealing its contents: A pair of metallic gloves. To be more specific, they looked like gauntlets that covered most of the forearm. They were armored on one side, no doubt to offer some form of protection. That was definitely something new.

    "Whoa, check this out," Daniel, of course, was the first one to approach and inspect the gauntlets, looking over at them. "Says here these are called the impact gauntlets." He tapped the plaque just below them, which seemed to describe the item in question.

    "It says here they were meant for..." I squinted a bit, trying to get a better view of the words. "Absorbing the impact of blows from a user with extreme strength. In addition to that, they have various functions, such as a smokescreen, a flash grenade, and a sonic disruptor. Are these some sort of weapon?"

    "What else could it be?" Nico questioned as she stepped up next to me, inspecting the gauntlets. "Either way, we probably shouldn't mess with it. We could probably cause some serious damage. If it's implying what I think it's implying, someone who wears these could hit harder than even the world's toughest boxer. We should probably put it back for now. What button did you push to get it out here, Daniel?"

    "Uh," Daniel jogged over to her. "I think it was this one."

    "You're probably right," I said, turning back and pulling out my phone. Damn, was that the time already? "We should probably get out of here. Our parents are probably wondering where we are now, since it's almost six," I put my phone away as they pushed the button to slowly lower the gauntlets back down into their container. "Either way, I think we've found a new lair. We could totally hang out here after school. Our own secret place, yeah?"

    "Hey, yeah," Daniel perked up at that. "I like the way you think, man. Maybe we could set up like, a living area here. There's probably a bunch of old couches and televisions and stuff around here, right? We could totally get a couple of them and set up a place to play games over there."

    "Right?" Nico let out a laugh, seemingly excited by the idea. "Maybe we could even get a couple of mini fridges in here or something. Fill them with snacks and drinks for whenever we come down here. It'll be like our own secret club."

The idea itself seemed dumb, but with what we had found, it was like a little kid's dream come true. A secret base where we could read comics, play games, eat copious amounts of junk food? I can't say I hate the idea.

    "Why don't we talk more about it on the school camping trip this weekend?" Daniel offered the idea as we closed the big industrial door. "I mean, what else are we gonna do, right? Camping is kind of boring."

    "I don't think camping is boring," I objected, looking over at him. "If you think it's so boring, why are you going?"

    "Uh, duh." He said in that smartass tone of voice. "Obviously I'm going because I wanna hang out with you guys. Why else would I go? To get eaten up by mosquitos? Yeah, like I'm gonna do something like that for fun."

    "God, you never fail to impress me with how much of a nerd you are," Nico said with a laugh. "I swear, if you could find a way to stop using the bathroom so you could spend more time playing video games, you would."

    "Who says I haven't?" Daniel grinned, which already told me he was about to say something stupid. "I mean, I've got all those empty water bottles in my room--"

    "Ugh," Nico shoved him away from her, but the laughter between them made it obvious they were just messing around. "You're so gross dude."

    "You're just mad that you didn't think of it first," Daniel shot right back at her as he closed the door behind us all, covering the knob with junk like it had been when we found it. "I guess it probably is time to call it a day. See you guys at school tomorrow?"

    "Wouldn't miss it." I responded with a hint of sarcasm in my voice.

    "Of course. See you guys later, yeah?" Nico smiled through her answer.

Waving each other off, we eventually parted ways, heading back toward our respective houses to reflect on the absolutely mental events of that day. I didn't think anything crazier could possibly happen to us.

#Hero's Dawn Arc #Jack POV

[pastelwitchling]

3x07 coda.

Michael was exhausted. He didn’t know if it was the strain on his muscles from almost dying, or the nag of thoughts going through the millionth next step, or just finding out that his father was a man with his brother’s face.

It all sounded like some kind of cosmic joke when he tried to make it into a coherent thought, which was why he tried not to think about it at all. All he could do was force his mind back to the six-pack he had next to his bed and his bonfire and his bed.

In his passenger seat, his phone sat. More than once, since the moment he’d left Isobel, Liz, and Rosa at the diner, since the second Jones had dared to call him son in fact, he’d itched to call Alex. He’d needed to call Alex, to tell him what had happened, to see him scoff about it like it was no big deal. Because it assured Michael that he was still good in his eyes, that he was still . . . Michael.

But it was late, and he’d hardly seen Alex since he’d called him to the cell tower. He didn’t think Alex would want to hear from him now, and if he was honest with himself, he was terrified Alex wouldn’t want to talk to him and he would be forced to recognize that the distance between them had been intentional all this time.

That was why, when he pulled up to the junkyard, he was startled to see Alex himself, sitting on the front steps of his airstream, chin rested on his knees. He was wearing a thick black jacket that made him look like a prince of the Underworld, and seemed lost in thought. Michael approached him warily.

Alex offered him half a smile, and up close, Michael saw that he looked as tired as he himself felt.

“I need your help,” he said.

That was how, ten minutes later, Michael and Alex were in front of the lit bonfire, Michael handing Alex a steaming cup of tea.

Alex murmured a “thank you,” and hugged his mug with his hands.

For a long minute, Michael stared at Alex who was staring, unseeing, into the flames, his lips pursed. He realized conflict was an emotion he’d been seeing way too often on Alex’s face.

“Private,” he said softly, afraid of scaring him away, “what’s going on?”

Alex swallowed, looking everywhere at once. “My whole life,” he said slowly, “I’ve been at a crossroads. Whether or not to enlist, whether or not to – to stay.” He said this last part while avoiding Michael’s gaze. “Whether or not to leave the Air Force.”

Michael frowned, straightening. “You left the Air Force?”

“About a month ago,” Alex muttered, looking down. “I was going to tell you, I just – I needed a minute to . . .” he shook his head. “I don’t know what I needed.” He shrugged a shoulder. “To know that I’d made the right decision?”

Michael huffed an incredulous chuckle. “So you’re really out.”

“Full honors,” Alex said without any of the satisfaction or pride that Michael would’ve imagined him having after a decade of his life and what it had meant.

“Well,” Michael held up his mug. “I’ll drink to that.” He took a long gulp and found Alex was staring at him, brows pinched, studying him.

“Something’s wrong with you,” he noted.

Michael smirked humorlessly, scratching the side of his cup with his thumb. “You could sense that? No one else could.”

“I know you better than everyone else,” Alex said with a surety that made Michael’s heart thrash violently. “Even better than you know yourself. What is it?”

“Trust me, Private, it’s not the night. Wait, I guess I shouldn’t call you that anymore, huh?”

“No,” he shook his head. “Please do, I – I like it. Feels like a nickname just for me.” He blushed furiously, and Michael found himself watching the color rise up his cheeks and the tips of his ears with a traitorous hope that he couldn’t dampen no matter how hard he tried.

Alex heaved a sigh, rubbing his face. “I’m at another crossroads now,” he said. “I have a decision to make, and I . . . can’t ask Kyle.” He shook his head, his eyes falling shut. “And I’m tired of regretting my path.”

“Kyle . . .” Michael’s shoulders fell. “Look, I – Alex, I know you care about him more than I do, I shouldn’t have –”

“I found him,” Alex said, the flames reflected in his eyes. “He’s safe.”

Michael stilled. “Y-You did? He is? Well, great, where is he?”

Alex said nothing.

“You won’t tell me.” It was not a question.

“He’s safe,” Alex repeated firmly, then held Michael’s gaze for the first time that night. “You trust me, don’t you?”

“With my life,” Michael said without a second’s hesitation. He swallowed, settling back into his chair, and repeated, “With my life.”

Alex nodded, his lips tugging into a miserable smile. “And I trust you with mine. I have a choice to make now, and it could change everything.”

“A choice to do what?” he leaned in. “Alex, why did you leave the Air Force?”

“I found a better way to get answers,” Alex said.

“Answers to what?”

“Everything,” he whispered. “But it’s a bargain, Guerin. If I don’t do it, I could be closing the doors on something big. If I do . . .”

“Let me guess,” Michael gathered, “there’s gonna be a lot more behind the scenes that I won’t be allowed near.”

“I don’t want you near it,” Alex said fiercely. “I don’t want you near me if I accept it. I can’t trust that you’ll be safe.”

Then no, Michael almost instinctively said. No more crap that pushes us apart.

And he wanted to say it, he wanted to keep Alex beside him, especially now. But one look at him, the way his knuckles turned white on his mug, the way his jaw clenched, his eyes glassy as he waited desperately for an answer, and Michael knew that it wasn’t what he needed to hear.

“Guerin,” he asked, helpless. “What do I do?”

Michael stared, a lump forming in his throat. “You really want this, don’t you?”

Alex shrugged, as if to say he had no idea what he wanted. Then I guess, Michael thought with half a smile, I know you better than you know yourself, too.

“You already made your choice, Private,” he said.

Alex looked down at his tea, brows furrowed. “What about you? I don’t want to push away for anything, not anymore.”

Michael smiled in full at that, even as his eyes burned. “What was it you told me? ‘If you give up, it’s on you.’” He leaned in closer this time, his tone serious. “If you really think that I’m letting anyone keep us apart again, then I guess you just don’t know me as well as you think you do.”

Alex searched his face, probably looking for the doubt or fear that’s always been there. Michael didn’t have it this time. After everything he’d learned tonight, losing Alex didn’t feel like an option. He didn’t think it had ever been.

Finally, Alex exhaled shakily and said, “I know enough to know that something’s bothering you. What happened, Guerin?”

Michael smirked bitterly. What was the point in hiding it from Alex? There was nothing, after all, he wanted less right now. Might as well get the pain over with. “Jones is my father.”

Alex’s eyes widened fractionally, and he looked to the bonfire. Then his shoulders slumped and he stood. For a horrible second, Michael thought Alex was going to leave and his face fell. Then Alex adjusted his lawn chair so that it was right against Michael’s.

Alex settled back in his chair with a sigh, and he patted Michael’s leg. He said, “We’ll figure it out,” and took another calm sip of his drink.

Michael stared. Alex wasn’t faking the indifference, his brows pinched like he was already considering what to do next. How to save Michael again. He was always better at the hero stuff anyway.

When Michael spoke next, his words were a croak. “Really?”

Alex smiled wearily. “I told you I’d burn the world down for you, didn’t I?” His eyes darkened. “An evil father, I can handle.”

#alex manes #michael guerin #malex #malex fic #malex fanfic #malex fanfiction #roswell new mexico #roswell nm #malex angst #malex fluff #tyler blackburn #michael vlamis

[notsowrites]

No Place Else I Could Be (But Here In Your Arms)

A 3x10 Malex Coda

I got an anon prompt asking if I could write the couch sex. This is not that... well, not exactly. There’s sex, just not that specific sex. So I wrote this, and then in typical fashion, worried about it until I remembered something someone told me once: "in the time you're spending worry about it, they've already taken their pants off.”

{AO3 Link)

So here ya go, enjoy! <3

--------

Michael wakes slowly, acutely aware of Alex sleeping next to him. Legs tangled, Alex has his face buried against Michael's shoulder, tiny exhales as he sleeps blowing cool air across Michael's skin. They'd somehow managed to fall asleep on the couch afterwards, the afghan pulled over their naked bodies.

He’s beautiful, he’s perfect, he’s home, Michael thinks as he watches Alex sleep.

Last night had been different from anything that had happened before between them. Michael had made the decision, especially after everything with Alex the last couple days, and particularly in regards to trying to learn how to let go of his anger with the past, to finally tell Alex this is what he'd been working towards, this had been the mission he'd referred to the night he'd kissed him at the Pony. To finally be able to answer the question Alex had posed in the song he'd sung a year ago, to finally be able to say he was home.

Max, Isobel… Dallas - they were family. He knew he'd only just met Dallas, but after their talk on the pier, he wanted to get to know him more. To explore that hope Theo had expressed that they would form their own triad.

It's all broken without three, Max had once slurred out in the midst of a bender on their 21st birthday. And maybe Michael hadn't realized it at the time just how true that statement actually was. Because he had a triad, he's had Max and Isobel since the moment they emerged from the pods. But he also had another triad in Isobel and Dallas, one that was brand new and he couldn't wait to explore more. 

Alex had been right, he did need to start letting go of his anger about his childhood. But he's relied on it for so long, it's been a constant companion to him almost since the moment they came out of the pods. It's not going to be easy, but he had realized today he needed to start putting in the work. And in the bunker, Alex had listened as he'd broken apart, giving him the details he'd never shared before about that part of his life. As the tears had fallen down his cheeks, Alex had been there to wipe them away. To remind him that the past didn't define him. He'd rolled up the sleeve of his jacket, exposing his arm and the faded scar of a long healed burn. Alex had reached out, fingertips tracing along the skin.

I'd thought it was just a junkyard accident. I never asked.

Michael also knows that before today, he never would have answered with the truth. 

He'd seen his own pain reflected back in Alex's eyes, a kind of tether between them he still didn't fully understand. Because it wasn't the first time he thought it appeared as though Alex was able to feel the pain he was experiencing, though it's the first time he thinks to explore it and understand it. It was one of the reasons, on the list of many, that had kept him awake at night over the last decade, curious about their connection, about what it meant and how to exactly describe it.

Cosmic had fit the way no other word had. The vast reaches of the universe, the galaxy, the cosmos. There was too much of it, it was impossible to truly put into words, to quantify - and that's how his connection with Alex felt. 

Indescribable and infinite.

Dallas had asked, afterwards. He's more than the guy who fixed our parents' machine, isn't he. Michael had, at first, been floored by the recognition. That Dallas had picked up on that already. But for the first time he's eager to answer in the affirmative, to be able to say that, yes Alex is more than that to him. It's the way you look at him.

He'd told Alex later as they'd sat here, how easy they were for everyone else to read. And he'd watched as Alex had smiled as he spoke, staring back at him with a bit of a knowing look. You should ask him about it, next time you talk. At first, he hadn't understood the meaning, why he needed to ask Dallas how he knew, why it mattered. But as the night progressed between them, it wasn't until they were skin to skin, coming down from their orgasms, that it hit Michael.

Dallas has his own Alex.

He hears the change in Alex's breathing a moment before Alex is pressing his nose to the skin of his chest, slowly waking up himself.

"I love the way you smell," Alex says, the words spoken against his lips. "Like after a rainstorm, but with a hint of motor oil and grease. The rain always makes me think of you."

"Every time it rains?" He knows Alex has mentioned the smell before, made a joke about it that day they'd been investigating at the Long Farm. But no one else has ever said anything, commented on the way he smells before - well, about the grease and motor oil they have, sometimes a comment about how he would smell better if he showered more. But Alex is the only one to mention a rainstorm.

Alex nods, propping himself up on Michael's chest so they can look at one another. Michael reaches up, pushing Alex's hair back off his face, watching as Alex leans into his palm.

"In a way, I was glad it doesn't rain very often in the Middle East. It meant something of you didn't follow me to distract me."

Michael smiles. "I'm a distraction?"

It's the way Alex smiles in return, it's the way he leans forward and pushes their mouths together, pulling Michael's lip between his own. It's the way Michael has his arm wrapped around Alex, his hand resting on his back, slowly moving up and down against his skin. It's the way Alex trails a hand down his chest, fingers dancing across his chest hair as Alex continues kissing him.

Alex wraps a hand around his dick, palm against the sensitive skin, their lips still moving together, and Michael can't stop the gasp that escapes at the sensation. He reaches up, his hand going to the back of Alex's neck, pulling him in and closer, closer, closer as Alex's hand moves. Their foreheads stay pressed together, they breathe the same air as Michael feels his dick harden under Alex's careful motions.

It disappears in the next moment though, Michael opening his eyes just as Alex is pushing up and off his chest. He's about to protest, about to ask what Alex is doing, when Alex straddles his hips.

"Alex," he whines, hands immediately moving to Alex's hips, fingers pressing into the skin and muscle. He watches helplessly as Alex reaches behind himself, a second later feeling Alex's hand on him again, his dick pressing against Alex's hole. He's about to protest, because he would enjoy nothing more this morning than being able to finger Alex open, to hear his particular moans and groans, when Alex pushes down, because Michael is unable to focus on anything except the feeling of tight muscle and heat, and Alex.

Closing his eyes, he gives himself over to the feelings, fingers tightening slightly on Alex's hips before he feels a set of hands on his face. He opens his eyes to see Alex in front of him a moment before their lips collide, their foreheads pushing together. He kisses back, pulling Alex's lip between his own, sucking on it, running his tongue along it. Slowly, Alex starts to move, small gyrations of his hips, and Michael slides his hands down to grab onto the flesh of his ass, urging him, encouraging him, to move faster.

But Alex keeps his dizzyingly slow pace, their lips pressed together, and Michael goes. He gives himself to the heat building low in his belly, the way he can feel his balls tightening. Focuses on Alex's lips against him, Alex's body against his, until he can't take it anymore.

He pushes up, guiding Alex with him, and gently flips their positions on the couch. He pulls Alex's legs up around him, and pushes back into him, sealing their lips back together as he thrusts forward.

"Michael-"

He doesn't answer, not with words, just holds himself above Alex as he chases every feeling that is building up inside him. Michael feels his arm shaking again, they'd done the same thing last night when he'd been overwhelmed by everything happening as he’d held himself up above Alex. Because it's been months upon months since he's had Alex like this. And if he's being honest, also never quite like this. Everything feels better now, he doesn't have the impending sense that when this is done, when they're sated and letting their bodies cool, that it won't mean one of them is planning their escape. Because he's home, and neither of them are leaving now. There was last night and waking up this morning and Michael knows that there is going to be a tonight as well.

A future.

He leans down, pressing his lips to Alex's chest, to the space near his heart where he'd been injured by the crazed bootmaker. Michael slows his thrusts enough to find the scar - small and barely visible but another constant reminder of how close he came to losing Alex forever - and kisses it again. He doesn't know if Alex knows what he's doing, until Alex slides a hand up his neck and into the hair at his nape, guiding him up to kiss him again that Michael thinks he does.

"I'm right here," Alex breathes against his lips, short kisses over and over, their foreheads pressed together tightly. "I got you." 

His hips jerk faster, and he feels Alex tighten around him as he spills onto his stomach. Michael presses down towards him, keeping their foreheads pressed together, catching every sound that escapes Alex’s lips. He feels Alex’s hands on his back, gripping his ass, fingers digging into the skin and muscle, urging him on. It doesn’t take much longer before Michael’s own orgasm hits, ripping through him with one final thrust, Alex holding him still as he spills into him. He chokes out an embarrassingly loud moan into Alex’s mouth, overwhelmed by everything he is feeling, before sealing his lips around Alex’s own.

Neither moves right away, and Michael feels Alex’s hands on his back, fingers tracing patterns along the skin as their lips continue to brush together. Gently, he falls forward, his arm no longer caring to support him, and he tucks his face into Alex’s neck, pressing a kiss to the underside of his chin. Alex shifts his arms, one hand moving up to bury itself in his curls, and Michael leans into the touch.

He doesn’t want to move, doesn’t want to stop touching Alex, not yet. Maybe not ever. But there’s cum cooling on Alex’s chest, and Michael allows himself to be pulled back to the present, that they should probably clean up first.

But it's that thought which has him thinking about last night again, and this morning, and how eventually they're going to get dressed, and they're going to have to face whatever the day brings. But tonight, when it's all said and done - he won't be going back to the junkyard to an empty trailer. No, tonight will be different. Tonight will mark their new beginning, new steps forward in their relationship.

On the coffee table, his cell phone buzzes from where he'd left it last night. Whatever and whoever it is can wait a little longer, he thinks. He has something - someone - more important to take care of first.

#roswell new mexico #malex #malex fic #alex manes #michael guerin #notso writes fanfic #hope you like this anon <3 #itried.gif

[thesquidkid]

I was the match and you were the rock

This was supposed to be a very different fic, but Things We Lost In The Fire by Bastille came on, and this was born (also I listened to the song on repeat, so there may be some lyrics scattered around 😂)

It is also quite sad (at least I have tears in my eyes writing it), so I guess sorry? Anyway, I hope you'll enjoy it! 😂 (Also on ao3)

Oh and there might be spoilers for the finale? With everything happening with the airstream.

Michael was sitting on the ground, back against his truck, in the middle of the junkyard, looking at his trailer go up in flames. All the people he cared about were besides him, Alex sitting on his right, rubbing his thigh. He had his arm around the other man, the two of them mourning the airstream and all the moments shared.

But more than just memories with Alex, the trailer held Michael’s life for over a decade. He knew the others were sad, but overall they all shared the same sense of joy - Jones was no more a threat. And as much as Michael wanted to celebrate, he also mentally counted how much everything would cost to replace, if he could live with Alex until he found a solution, how many other vehicles had been touched, how deep in debt Sanders Auto would be in.

“Out.” Sanders said, not leaving any place for discussion. He was standing, leaning against Michael’s truck, his leg touching Michael’s shoulder, a comforting presence.

When Michael had fallen to the ground seeing the flames, Sanders had kept standing, head high. But deep down, he was in a similar state to Michael - teary eye(s) and wet cheek(s), calculating the loss of money, the loss of small sentimental value. Because even if there wasn’t much in the airstream, it was all Michael’s, and Sanders had grown used to it being there, was even attached to the poor thing.

This is why he was asking everyone to leave. They didn’t belong in this place, and didn't understand what was truly happening. They wanted to celebrate the win against Jones - as they should - but they didn’t feel the same loss that Michael did.

Michael didn’t even register Sanders’ word, didn’t even hear the cars leaving, his ears still ringing from the explosion. He had gone into the airstream, to try to save anything, but it was too late, most of the inside had burnt down already, the outside shell starting to melt.

I will burn down everything you care about, Jones had said when they defeated him. At first, Michael didn’t understand. Alex was standing next to him, seemingly not on fire, Isobel and Max in a similar state. He even checked in with Sanders, called the old man to make sure he was okay, when the explosion happened. Michael had driven as fast as he could, rushing to the airstream, Alex shouting after him.

He didn’t see Alex running after him, forgetting for a moment that Michael was fireproof. It was only when Alex grabbed Michael’s hand inside the airstream, that Michael registered the dangerousity of Alex being here. Using his powers, he had pushed Alex out of there, but that didn’t stop both of them to still be coughing and Alex’s prosthetic needing to be replaced.

But neither of those things were at the front of Alex’s mind in that instant. Sitting on the ground, his leg in front of him, still hot from the fire, coughing once in a while, his only focus was Michael. Michael was okay, physically. The flames hadn’t burned him, and the coughing had stopped after a while. Emotionally, on the other hand, he knew that Michael was not okay. Even if he couldn’t fully understand how much the airstream meant to Michael, he knew that he was hurting, and wanted nothing more than to be there to comfort his boyfriend.

And so he stayed. When Sanders told the others to go, he looked up to the older man, who was only looking at the flames. He wondered if he should leave the two to be alone, to mourn, to check the damage, but he also knew that he was not going to leave Michael’s side for a few days, especially not after what happened with Jones.

The firefighters came, eventually. By then, nothing could be saved. Luckily, Michael had used his powers to push the remaining cars and various other inflammable objects present in the junkyard to the side.

When the firefighters left, having checked Alex, Michael and Sanders and advising them to go get checked out at the hospital, the three men were alone, the airstream’s creaking cutting through the night.

“You should head home,” Michael whispered to Alex, his eyes never leaving the airstream, “you need to rest your leg, I’ll join you in a bit.” He turned his head to meet Alex, who could see all the desperation, the sadness and the anger present in those golden eyes.

“You’re sure?” Alex asked, even though he already knew the answer.

Michael nodded, turning back to the airstream with a sniff. “We need to check for what can be covered by insurance, and what we’ll lose,” Sanders said with a gruff, turning his back to the airstream for the first time since the explosion.

Michael wiped his cheeks and turned around, facing Alex properly, who was sitting on the bed of the truck. From where he stood, Michael could see the airstream from the corner of his eye, could smell the burnt metal, could hear the cracks. He took Alex’s hands in his, “I’ll be home in a bit,” he said, his voice breaking, “I just need -” he went on in a sobb, dropping his head into Alex’s shoulder, who put his hand to Michael’s hair, in a comforting gesture.

It broke Alex’s heart to see this, to see Michael be so desperate, so lost, in such pain. “You need to make a list of what burned down,” Alex finished, knowing that this was important to Michael, both financially, and sentimentally. Who knew if Sanders Auto would even recover from such havoc. Alex just knew that he would do everything he could so that Michael wasn’t alone.

Michael sniffed into Alex’s shoulder, breaking Alex’s heart a little more, before standing up. He wiped his face with his hand, and breathed deeply, his hands still holding onto Alex’s.

Alex drove back home, putting his leg through one last painful challenge, before taking it off as soon as he sat on his couch, before texting Michael to let him know he had made it safe and sound.

Examining the prosthetic under a proper light, he could see that it was crooked, parts of it having melted in the heat. His stump was bright red and swollen, he made his way to the bathroom and warmed himself a bath, setting an alarm clock to get out of the water.

When the alarm rang, he dried himself and got dressed for bed, each step made with a wince. After taking two painkillers, he made his way to his bed, falling asleep as soon as he was under the covers.

He woke up when he felt a warm body slide next to him under the covers. When he opened his eyes, he saw Michael, curls still wet from the shower he had just taken, eyes still puffy. Alex scooted closer to Michael, wrapping him in his arms. They could talk in the morning, about Jones, about the airstream and the junkyard, but right now, both needed the rest and the comfort of each other.

In the morning, when Michael woke up, he found himself in an empty bed. He got out with a smile, eyes still puffy from the night before, but not crying anymore (not that he had any tears left in the first place), and walked to Alex’s living room, where he could hear some noise.

Getting closer, he could hear Alex on the phone, finishing up a conversation, “Yeah okay, I will, thanks.” He was sitting on the couch, his leg propped up on top of a pillow, the prosthetic off. On the table were laying a jar of cometquiles spread and some flying sauce-cakes, making Michael chuckle, remembering the last time those were on that exact table.

“Arthuro called and asked what you wanted, he heard about -” Alex said, going off at the end, not wanting to say it, but knowing that they needed to talk about it, the explosion.

“How’s your knee?” Michael asked instead, taking a cake and sitting next to Alex, worry clear on his face. The airstream was gone, the damage already caused at the junkyard, he and Sanders had already talked about their next possible moves, right now the only thing he could act on was Alex. Whether it was a massage, fixing the prosthetic, anything Alex needed, wanted.

“It has known better days,” Alex answered, leaning his head on Michael’s shoulder while he ate. They were silent for a few minutes, Michael enjoying breakfast, Alex texting Kyle about his leg. Once Michael finished eating, he spoke up.

“So, uh, we made a list?” Michael started, hesitantly. “Of all the things we lost in the fire. A few cars were touched, so that’s gonna cost a lot with the clients. Hopefully we can get insurance, but I don’t think that’ll be enough. There’s also a lot of old junk that burnt, which sucks since we wanted to sort through it and melt the metal parts together. Now it’s just a bunch of useless shit, so we’ll have to throw that out. We’ll also need to replace the heavy tools, a lot of them are melted or burnt. So all in all, the bill is high.”

He sighed, “Too high,” he added at the end, a whisper, as if saying the words at louf would make them more real. After the pandemic, the junkyard was slowly building itself back up monetarily, but they still weren’t out of the red. And the explosion only made things harder.

Alex rubbed his hand up and down Michael’s back, listening in silence, being a comforting presence. One Michael finished speaking, Alex talked, voice low, testing the waters if Michael wasn’t ready to talk about it now.

“Did you make a list for the airstream?” he asked, full of concern.

Michael nodded, and suddenly it was as if the dam had broken. When last night Michael was mostly in shock, he was fully sobbing, turning to Alex, who held him tight in the embrace.

“I lost -” Michael sobbed, “I lost everything, Alex.”

Alex held him, tried to make him feel calmer. Except, this was all new territory, seeing Michael brake like that, Alex had never witnessed it. Like everyone else, anger was mostly the emotion he had attributed to Michael in the past. And that anger was still there, now, sobbing into Alex’s chest. Except it was controlled, and surrounded by sadness and pain, that Alex didn’t need to be psychic to feel.

Before, Alex might have taken Michael’s comment personally, told him that he didn’t lose everything, that Alex was still there. But this was past Alex, present Alex knew that Michael had built his life in that airstream, it was his first real home, the first safe place that was his and his only. Because where the truck was technically speaking the first thing Michael owned, the trailer was the first object he built from the ground up.

So yes, Michael had lost everything. Everything he owned, everything he built, the countless drawings and projects that scattered the walls of the airstream and the entire bunker, the photographs he kept hidden in a box.

Where people would see a piece of trash, some place that was unsanitary and dirty, some place that wouldn’t be comfortable to live in, Michael had seen a home for many years. And as much as Alex was Michael’s home, nothing could replace the airstream.

“I know,” Alex whispered into Michael’s hair, “I’m sorry”.

The two stayed in that position for a while, until Alex’s phone rang. Michael stood straight, wiped his eyes and his nose, and grabbed another cake, while Alex talked to Eduardo, giving a fast review of what happened with the Lockhart machine, but keeping it vague enough to not out Dallas.

“Seriously,” Alex laughed out after hanging up, “the Valenti’s need to stop calling me.” At Michael’s confused raised eyebrow, he continued, “I was talking to Kyle earlier, he was worried about my leg, telling me not to put it under pressure. As if I couldn’t make that decision myself. And now, Eduardo is giving me a week off, to, I quote, ‘rest’. I am a grown ass man, I can do that myself!”

Michael giggled at that, turning into a laugh. “What?” Alex asked with a smile, not understanding what was funny.

“Babe,” Michael said, leaning close, “you do need people to tell you to rest.” He kissed Alex’s cheek as the other man chuckled, “That’s fair,” Alex replied, turning to look at Michael.

He was not yet in a good state, his eyes were still puffy and red, his cheeks beard the path of dried tears, his curls were all over the place, and his eyes were still heartbreaking. The sadness and the pain were clear in them.

But when Alex looked deep into Michael’s eyes, he could see that it was going to be okay. That Michael would hurt, for a long time even, and it would be hard to recover financially, but Michael’s eyes had something in them that he had desperately tried to get rid of. Hope.

And that was enough for Alex to believe that they were going to be okay. That Michael was going to be okay. The fight wasn’t over. The other’s may not be fighting Jones anymore, but Michael and Alex weren't done. In more ways than once.

They still had to deal with the damages in the junkyard. Help Sanders with his auto shop. And deal with their personal fears, Michael’s fears about his father.

The fire had destroyed Michael’s home, but from the ashes, a new one was being built.

#i made myself cry with my own fic lmao #and when i mean it was supposed to be different #i had planned a fic where the pod squad is happy alive and hugs #and i ended up with michael crying #i blame it all on the song #michael guerin #alex manes #walt sanders #rnm fic #rnm spoilers #again idk if it really counts as spoilers? #im gonna assume so to be on the safe side #thesquidkid writes

[gunpowdville]

The Great Flesh-Eating Cake Incident of Year [REDACTED] (Not to be Confused With the Bifrost Incident)

Chapters: 1/2

Words: 3502

Relationships: Drumbot Brian - Raphaella la Cognizi (queerplatonic), Gunpowder Tim/Lyfrassir Edda/Marius von Raum, The Aurora/Nastya Rasputina (although most don’t show up until the second chapter)

Other Things: genderfluid tim, she/her tim, he/fae marius :)

Summary: Brian and Raph bake a cake. Or, they try to. It doesn't exactly go well. (aka, Why Raphaella la Cognizi Should Never Be Allowed in the Kitchen)

read on ao3 here or read below the cut for people who don't like ao3 (i will post the second chapter. at some point. hopefully soon)

Chapter 1

“Try it now.”

“Is it safe?”

“Does that matter?”

Brian gives her what she calls his teacher look, a combination of calm exasperation and gentle chiding. “I would prefer to not fry myself from the inside out, if I can help it.”

“Boring,” Raphaella accuses, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “And you know I’d fix you if you did.” Well actually, she would get Nastya to fix him, as Raph herself has absolutely no self control when it comes to the prospect of tinkering with a complex mechanism and Brian hates being tinkered on without his permission.

“Yes, of course, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t hurt like hell,” Brian points out. “Not to mention how horrendously it would fuck up my systems.”

Raphaella pouts. “So I installed the flamethrower for nothing?”

Brian hesitates. “...I didn’t say that.”

Raphaella perks up immediately, turning her full attention from the clattered worktable to her partner. Brian straightens up and faces away from her, focusing at the blank wall at one end of the lab. He pokes his tongue around the inside of his mouth a little, probing at the new addition in the back. He tests out flipping its settings, making sure everything flows smoothly, then steels himself and opens his mouth, turning it on. Nothing happens.

Raphaella throws up her hands in exasperation. “I don’t understand! That should have worked! It-”

Brian yelps suddenly, clapping his hands to his throat as the back of it heats up rapidly, too rapidly, the heat growing from gently uncomfortable to unbearable in a matter of seconds. Luckily, his systems react before he can, shutting off the new attachment the second it could cause potential harm. The heat fades almost as quickly as it had swelled.

“Ow,” Brian says mildly.

“That was about to work,” Raphaella huffs, hands on her hips, eyes fixed somewhat accusingly on Brian. “If you had just waited a moment longer.”

“It was about to melt my vocal cords,” Brian points out in retort. Raphaella throws up her hands again.

“My husband is a coward,” she declares to no one in particular, with no actual insult behind it. Brian can’t help but smile softly at the endearment. They’re not married, technically, but for all intents and purposes they might as well be.

“I’ve started to become convinced that you’re simply trying to kill me,” Brian remarks to her as she turns back to the notes on her lab table. She shoots him a brightly malicious look, one backed heavily with fondness. “Maybe I am.”

He sits down on the stool beside the lab table and reaches for her, catching her waist from behind and pulling her onto his lap. She leans back into him as he wraps his arms around her, and he rests his chin on her shoulder so he can peer down at the pages of notes in her hands.

“Here, tell me what I’m doing wrong,” Raphaella holds up the notes so Brian can get a better look at them. He hums thoughtfully as he scans her delicate sketch of his body, each part individually labelled with possible enhancements to be added in Raph’s lacy handwriting. Brian’s own handwriting, cramped and blocky, annotates the science officer’s notes with his own observations of measurements and possible difficulties.

In his mind, Brian overlays the sketch on top of the official schematics the doc left in there, focusing on his throat and the new addition, checking for anywhere where it isn’t wired properly or messing with any of his other systems. Nothing. He bites his lip, a very natural bad habit that he’s never been able to shake, despite it splitting the rubber badly. Raphaella hits him lightly in the side of the head when she notices him doing it.

“I don’t think it’s anything you’ve done,” Brian says finally, leaning back slightly on the stool. “I think it’s simply a matter of too much heat.”

Raphaella ‘hmphs’, taking her notes back from him and setting them back on the table. She turns her head to study Brian’s face, placing her hands atop his where they rest over her stomach. He quirks an eyebrow at her, and she regards him silently. He can tell that she’s thinking through what next to work on, now that their flamethrower experiment is a bust.

He gives her stomach a light pat. “If you don’t mind, I was going to go bake something. Tim’s been complaining that there aren’t enough ‘munchies’ onboard. And yes, that is the word xe used.”

Raphaella slaps a hand to her heart melodramatically, the gesture accompanied by a theatrical gasp. “Leaving me for Tim, are we? Scandal.”

Brian chuckles gently as he rises to his feet, dislodging Raph in the process. “Yes, I’ve decided you’re much too cruel and brutal for me, and I’d be much happier feeding Tim for the rest of eternity.”

Raphaella tosses her hair and turns away from him, crossing her arms over her chest and tilting her chin up imperiously. “Good riddance.”

“Good riddance indeed,” Brian agrees drily, with no heat behind it. Raph glaces over her shoulder at him and grins, and he smiles back as he slips out the lab door, tipping his hat as he goes.

Ivy’s reading at the kitchen counter when he enters. She doesn’t look up as he makes his way into the kitchen proper, wrangling his hair into a wiry ponytail and tossing his hat on the counter. He peeks at the cover of her book and makes an intrigued little noise when he notices it’s about prophets and oracles throughout space and time.

“I was going to give it you when I was finished,” Ivy says without looking up. “I thought it might interest you.”

“It does,” Brian tells her, and she smirks, proud of herself. She still doesn’t take her eyes off the pages. Brian leans over, resting his elbows on the counter, and knocks his forehead briefly against hers, a somewhat awkward sign of affection that’s he’s developed with some members of the crew. She responds by patting his head absentmindedly, still not looking up from her book. He smiles, and turns back to the kitchen.

After a couple minutes of rummaging around in cabinets, Brian becomes aware of Raphaella’s presence leaning against the counter to his left.

“Missed me?” he asks teasingly. She rolls her eyes and pokes him in the arm. “You promised you’d teach me to bake.”

Brian pauses, replaying the last ten minutes in his mind to confirm that he has not, in fact, promised her this. And then he realizes that she’s referring to a time quite a few decades ago, when the two of them had been left back on the ship while the others had been out pillaging a nigh-extinct planet. They’d been sharing some pastries that Brian had been experimenting with, and Raphaella had asked him how he’d made them. He had launched straight into a detailed explanation of exactly which ingredients he had used and what amounts of each, and how he had played with the measurements and tweaked the recipe to see how he could improve it. Raph had listened with utter fascination, and after he had finished she had mentioned that it seemed a bit like her experiments, only with slightly different materials. He had offered to teach her a little, if she’d like, and she had said she would love to learn. And now here they are.

“I did do that, didn’t I,” Brian muses. He studies Raph, leaning against the counter, a sparkle in her eyes that both makes him excited to see what she has in store and fear for his life.

“So?” Raphaella raises an eyebrow. Brian considers.

“We are making a cake,” he tells her, keeping his voice slow, steady, and serious. “A basic cake. We are not going to put anything in it that is not on the ingredients list. We are going to follow the recipe. To the letter. And we are not, I repeat, we are not going to burn down my kitchen.”

My kitchen, Aurora corrects him gently.

“Our kitchen,” he concedes.

Raphaella steps forward and takes Brian’s hands, looking him solemnly in the eyes. “I won’t let you down,” she promises. “Trust me.”

“Phee, I love you to death, and I always will” Brian tells her, lifting her hand to his mouth and kissing the back of it. “But I draw the line at trusting you.”

“Rude,” Raph sniffs, while Ivy tries to cover up a snort.

“Practical,” Brian shoots back, letting go of her hands and reaching past her to pluck the recipe from the counter. With a flourish, he deposits it in her hands. “Find me these ingredients.”

Raphaella mutters something about ‘bossybitch Brian’ as she turns away from him and marches purposefully toward the cupboards. He watches her fondly for a moment, before busying himself gathering pans and setting up his beloved electric mixer, something he’d found being sold for scraps on a junkyard planet and had lovingly repaired and repainted with his own two hands. Its name is Small Brian, and it remains one of his most prized possessions.

“Bri, which eggs are we using?” Raphaella calls to him, her head buried deep in the disorganized fridge. Brian abandons Small Brian for just a moment and pokes his head in beside hers.

“Ah, not those,” he says, indicating a half dozen of jet-black eggs glowing faintly from within. “Those are Ashes’. They will supposedly hatch into a rare breed of fire-breathing corvid.”

“And those?” Raphaella points to the other carton of eggs.

“We’re using those,” Brian confirms, pulling the carton out. “Ah. Wait. Not this one.” Carefully, he removes a small, round, green orb from the carton and places it gently on the counter. “An octokitten laid this. We think.”

Raphaella leans over and picks it up, holding it in the palm of her hand and bringing it up close to her eyes. She looks suspiciously like she’s about to slip it into her pocket, so Brian plucks it from her hands before she gets a chance to. She sticks her tongue out at him. He waves her off to go collect the rest of the ingredients, reminding her that the lovely ceramic pot labeled ‘sugar’ is in fact actually filled with gunpowder, and the sugar is in the cabinet to its right. Meanwhile he goes back to fussing over Small Brian.

The mixer isn’t starting up properly, it keeps stuttering and stopping whenever he tries to turn it on. Brian frowns, tapping the top of it with a metal finger. “Come on, love,” he says softly to Small Brian. “Don’t give up on me now. Not after all we’ve been through.”

“Raph,” Ivy speaks up from her place at the counter, her tone amused. “Brian’s talking to the appliances again.”

“If either of you make a joke comparing me to an appliance, I will kill you,” Brian warns both of them placidly, fiddling with Small Brian’s mechanisms until the machine whines and starts up properly. “Good lad,” Brian says, patting the appliance lovingly.

“I saw that,” he adds when he catches the look Ivy and Raphaella share over the counter. Raphaella rolls her eyes and gestures to him to come approve the ingredients she’s gathered. She hooks her arm through his and tips her head onto his shoulder while he checks each one off against the recipe.

“Excellent, that’s everything. Thank you.” he says, kissing her on the top of the head. “ Now we can begin.”

Raphaella, as always, is a very attentive student, listening well and asking questions when necessary. He suspects that she asks some of the questions just to listen to him talk about something he loves, and he adores her for it. They work very well together, the two of them, bantering back and forth as they do. Ivy chimes in on occasion, never taking her eyes off of her book.

Jonny strolls into the kitchen at one point, zeroing in on the chocolate chips scattered across the counter with a predator’s precision. As soon as he spots the first mate, Brian sweeps a knife into his hand and points it at him. “Out.”

Jonny backs away, throwing his hands up in surrender. He’s been killed enough times over messing around in the kitchen that he knows by now that the best thing to do is back off.

All in all, it’s a shockingly peaceful time. Brian hums to himself as he stirs ingredients together, and Raphaella goes through the cupboards, looking for something to play with. She reaches to open one in the back, and Brian notices too late which one it is. Raphaella stops, tilting her head in curiosity as she stares at the contents of the cupboard.

“Oh, Briiiiiiiiaaan?” she calls in a singsong voice, which is usually a sign that Brian is about to either be taken apart or assist in taking apart someone else. “What is this?”

Brian sighs and sets down the bowl, making his way slowly over to her. She raises an eyebrow at him as he gazes silently for a moment at the dismantled skeleton shoved into the back of the cupboard. “Those… are my bones.”

“Your… bones.”

“My bones.”

“Why…?”

Brian shrugs. “It’s not like I’m using them.”

“Right.” Raphaella studies the skeleton for a moment longer, before declaring, “I’m going to make soup out of them.”

Brian starts. “I’m sorry?”

“Your bones. I’m going to make soup out of them.”

“You are not.”

“Bone broth is a thing, isn’t it? Ivy?”

“It is,” Ivy confirms, casually turning a page.

Raphaella grins, gathering the bones into her arms. “Brian soup.”

“Brian s- no!”

“Brian soup Brian soup Brian soup Brian soup-”

“NO.”

“I thought the doc took your bones,” Ivy mentions, as Brian attempts to gently cajole his partner into giving him back said bones.

“I asked her to let me keep some of them,” Brian explains, tugging a rib out of Raph’s arms and dislodging about three more, which clatter to the floor unceremoniously. “They are mine, after all.”

“It’s unusually sentimental of me, I know,” he adds as Raphaella ducks under his arm, executing a perfect twirl to get the bones out of his reach, “I’m not quite sure why I wanted them.”

“For soup,” Raphaella quips, and Ivy snorts as Brian throws himself at the science officer. Raph yelps and scrambles away from him, and so begins an epic chase around the kitchen, Raph struggling to run away while clutching an armful of bones, the owner of said bones following a step behind her, playfully angry.

Brian doesn’t realize he’s started humming to himself until Raphaella turns to face him, jogging backwards, and asks what song it is.

“It’s a new one I’m working on,” he says, using her moment of distraction as an opportunity to trap her in the kitchen, the wraparound counter devoid of exits besides the one that he is currently standing in front of. “It’s called ‘Raphaella Please Don’t Make Soup Out of My Bones.’”

“I hate it,” Raphaella decides, still backing away. She’s almost hit the counter, and Brian smirks at his inevitable victory.

“You’ve barely heard it,” he argues, and begins humming louder. Raphaella’s back hits the counter, and Brian stops. Standing in the middle of the kitchen, he begins tapping his foot along to the tune.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Raphaella starts, but the other foot has already begun to move as well. Just tapping at first, tap tap tapping to a beat in Brian’s head, but the footwork quickly becomes more and more complicated as he eases into the song. Ivy picks it up quickly and starts tapping her fingers on the counter, taking charge of the beat while Brian continues humming the melody.

Raphaella shakes her head, refusing to let his shenanigans charm her, but Brian refuses to give up. He dances his way smoothly across the floor to her, finishing with an elegant twirl and an extended hand. Raphaella regards him with reluctant defeat, then rolls her eyes and takes Brian’s hand.

He waltzes her out into the middle of the floor, two steps forward, one step back. He spins her out, then spins her back in so they’re swaying with her back pressed to his chest. “You’re a master manipulator, you know,” she says to him. He smiles. She twirls him out, then twirls him back in and dips him, effortlessly holding up his mass of metal.

“I don’t remember this step of the cake recipe,” Ivy comments drily. She’s finally looking up from her book and is watching the two of them with an expression that is equal parts exasperated and amused.

“Which step, the bone soup or the dancing?” Brian returns, just as dry. Ivy is saved from having to respond by the arrival of Marius, who comes striding through the door like an invading general, arms spread wide in greeting.

“Well, if it isn’t my three favorite delinquents,” fae says, grinning like a maniac. “Dancing in the kitchen like- wait. Why is Raph in the kitchen?”

“I’m helping,” Raph says proudly, tossing her hair over her shoulder in a decidedly smug fashion as Brian collects his bones and returns them to their cupboard. “How can we help you?”

Marius pulls up a stool and takes a seat next to Ivy, scanning the pages of her book idly. “Tim stole my partner.”

“To be fair, Tim is also dating your partner,” Brian points out, handing the bowl of cake batter to Raph to finish stirring and put in the oven.

“Sure, but she’s being smug about it. So I’m pouting,” Marius replies, metal fingers tapping on the counter. “Oh, also: Tim wanted me to tell you. She/her for the time being.”

Brian nods, taking note of the pronouns. “Well, when you feel like speaking to Tim again, you can tell her that a cake is on its way.”

Marius raises an eyebrow. “You mean that cake that Raph just slipped something into behind your back?”

Honestly, Brian is surprised that this didn’t happen earlier. Slowly, he turns to Raphaella, who meets his eyes with a mischievous smirk as she slips an empty vial back into her pocket.

“What was in that?” he asks gently, not mad, just curious.

“Just a little something I whipped up,” Raphaella says, giving the batter an experimental stir. An odd squelching noise escapes from the bowl, and she quickly lets go of the wooden spoon as a dark tendril of… something curls up around it, possessive and hungry. “Oh. That’s interesting.”

“What the fuck was that?” Marius leans forward over the counter, curiosity evident on faer features.

Raphaella sets the bowl carefully on the floor and steps away from it, circling around it to Brian’s side. He gives her a questioning look, and she shrugs cheerfully, indicating that she has no idea whatsoever the effect of whatever she put in may be. With somewhat tired resignation, Brian steps forward to investigate what has become of his simple chocolate cake.

It’s… alive. The dark, viscous substance in the bowl has begun to writhe and bubble in a distinctively sentient manner, tendrils forming reaching out, looking to grab hold of something. The tendrils feel their way around tentatively, like a newborn animal learning to walk for the first time. The substance itself has an oddly familiar shimmer to it, the nearly oil-black surface revealing colors of every hue and nature when the light hits it.

“That looks like…” Marius frowns, clambering over the counter and dropping next to Brian as what was meant to be a cake slowly drags itself out of the bowl and onto the floor. “Oh, Raph, you didn’t!”

“Don’t touch it,” Brian advises as Marius crouches near the thing to get a better look.

Marius gives the Drumbot a scathing look. “I’m not a moron, Brian, I’m not going to-”

“Mare, get back,” Brian snaps, but it’s too late. The crawling blob has already reached the violinists foot and has clamped on tightly, wrapping its tentacles up and around his leg. He stares down at it in mild concern for a moment, then says: “Fuck.”

What happens next is hard to describe. The viscous thing sort of… stretches itself, until it covers Marius’ entire body, undulating and pulsing, then collapses in on itself, returning to its smaller form, leaving nothing but a slightly steaming metal arm left where the ship’s doctor once stood.

“What the hell did you do?” Brian demands, staring at the (now slightly larger) creation as it drags its way across the floor.

Raphaella doesn’t respond. “I think it ate faer,” she says instead. Then, “where is it going?”

Brian glances at the floor just in time to see the thing disappear into the vents. He lets out a cry, but it is much to late. It’s gone.

“Well,” Ivy says, staring with vague concern at the open vent. “Fuck.”

#fic #my fic #mechs fic #formatting like this bc there are some people i know who might want to read it who don't like ao3 #drumbot brian #raphaella la cognizi #marius von raum #gunpowder tim #ivy alexandria #my writing #long post #very long post

[gra-sonas]

When Michael pulled up to the house, he was surprised but also happy to see Alex’s car already parked in the driveway. They’d talked about leaving work early during breakfast, but Alex hadn’t been sure whether he’d be able to. Looked like his meeting with a cyber security client went smoothly. 

Even though Alex was home and they didn’t have to worry about Jesse anymore, Michael knew better than to simply unlock the door with his mind. He turned the security key in the lock of the front door and entered the house. 

“Honey, I’m home,” he singsonged loudly to announce his presence, while he tapped in the code for the alarm system on the touchscreen by the door. He took off his hat and put it on the hook that Alex had mounted there for this exact purpose shortly after they’d started dating.

It still thrilled Michael, that his hat had its own hook in this house, even though it was no longer just Alex’s house, but theirs. Michael had struggled to accept that he’d been listed as a joint owner after they’d gotten married, but Alex had insisted. 

“Please, Michael, this is our house. You’ve made so many improvements over time, you built a winter garden for us, the garden itself is the Garden of Eden because of your green thumbs - no alien pun intended - hell, you’ve been paying your share for maintenance since the day you moved. in. This house is as much yours as it is mine.”

It had been a huge step for him to sign the papers, but Alex had held his hand when he did, and the soft press of Alex’s hand, and the comforting weight of the wedding band on his left ring finger had given him the final push. 

Who would’ve thought that Michael Guerin, do-no-good foster kid and known town drunk would one day own a house? Or work on his master’s thesis in agricultural engineering in his free time? Because that’s something he was currently doing, just to keep his brain occupied. He was still working full time at the junkyard (he was actually the owner now, because Sanders had also made him sign papers - ”you’re doing me a great favor, kid”). 

Michael chuckled to himself. Mere five years ago his life had been a complete mess, and here he was now, half a decade later, a happily married man, a small business owner, a home owner, and once he was done with his thesis, he’d even tackle a doctorate. Not because he needed it, but because he could. And that was just a damn good feeling.

He toed off his boots and made his way down the hall on socked feet. Where was Alex?

Michael entered the living room, but there was no sign of his husband. Maybe he was in the music room? The door to the room was half open, and when Michael entered, his heart nearly stopped. Why was Alex sitting on the floor? Was he hurt?

“Alex, Alex, are you okay?” In a heartbeat Michael was across the room and barely managed to stop in front of Alex. Damn the stupid socks. 

Alex looked unharmed, though. He was wearing a comfy pink sweatshirt and rolled up jeans. He was still wearing the prosthetic, his left foot was bare, and he was flipping through a book with a black cover. If Michael hadn’t been so worried, he’d have admired how good Alex looked, the afternoon sun streaming through the windows, not quite reaching him, but making him look all soft and lovely.

When Alex looked up at Michael, his eyes were glistening as if he’d been crying. He looked... sad and a little lost. He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed, still holding the open book.

“Alex, what’s going on? Are you okay?” Michael’s voice was soft. He bent down and reached for Alex to help him up from the floor. 

“Come here, darlin’.” He pulled Alex into a standing position, carefully supporting him with his telekinesis until Alex was secure in his arms. Michael tugged at the book in Alex’s hand with a thought and floated it over to the piano where it landed on top of a pile of sheet music with a soft thud.

With both hands free, Alex wrapped his arms around Michael and sank into the comforting hug Michael offered, the scent of rain and Michael washing over him. He let go of another deep sigh but didn’t say anything. Michael forced himself to be patient. Alex didn’t seem to be hurt, he obviously just needed some time to calm down. Then he’d tell Michael what was bothering him.

After a long while, Alex pulled back a little and kissed Michael. “Thanks for holding me, I just needed a moment. Let’s go sit down in the living room.”

Reluctantly, Michael let go of Alex, who grabbed the book from the piano, then he took Michael’s hand to lead him back into the living room, where they sat down on the couch. Alex winced.

“Do you want to take the leg off?” Michael asked. Alex shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. Sitting on the floor was just not very comfortable for my butt.”

“Why were you sitting on the floor, then?” 

Alex handed Michael the book. “Mom sent this to me.” Michael opened the book and flipped through a couple of pages. The book contained photos of Alex as a baby, Alex as a toddler, Alex’s first day at kindergarten and so on. Alex with his brothers, Alex in the arms of his mom. Not a single picture depicted Jesse, Michael noticed. He was grateful that Mindy had been so thoughtful about the selection of pictures.

“Alex, this is wonderful. There are so many pictures I’ve never seen. Look at how cute you look here!” He pointed at a picture of Alex at around age two eating a bowl of ice cream. There was ice cream all over his face, and yet he looked so happy. Michael struggled to tamp down the anger he felt towards Jesse Manes for killing that happy spark in Alex’s eyes. He took a calming breath and turned back around to Alex.

“This is a beautiful gift your mom sent you. Why the floor, though?”

Alex blushed. “Honestly, the sun was hitting that spot when I entered the room and for some reason, the floor looked inviting and comfy.” 

Michael laughed. “Okay, next time the floor looks inviting, remember this day and decide to sit on the couch instead. Or at least get a cushion to sit on.” He kissed Alex on the cheek. “Want to tell me what made you so emotional?”

Alex sighed. “Looking at myself being so happy and carefree, I guess? I know it’s dumb--” “It’s not dumb, Alex,” Michael interrupted. “It is not dumb,” he repeated for emphasis. 

Alex looked at Michael. “But it is. At least I have pictures of myself from when I was that small. Then I thought of you and how you don’t have any. And that made me feel like an ungrateful ass.”

Michael pulled Alex into his arms until Alex’s head was pillowed comfortably on Michael’s chest. Alex felt Michael’s heart beat slowly and steadily and he relaxed. Michael pressed a kiss into Alex’s hair.

“It’s not a competition, Alex. We’re long past this game of ‘who had it worse’. We were both dealt a shitty hand in the childhood department. And none of it is our fault. What’s way more important is, that we found each other, and that we’re building a future together that is bright and happy and full of love. And when we have kids one day, they will never doubt how much they are wanted and loved.”

When Michael felt hot tears seep through the fabric of his shirt, he lifted Alex’s chin to make him look up. Then he leaned down and kissed the tears from Alex’s eyes, kissed Alex’s nose, his cheeks, his mouth. It only took this one kiss on the mouth for Alex to kiss back, and for a while they just reveled in the feeling of loving each other so deeply, so completely, that there was no room for any sad memories.

When Alex pulled back a little, his lips were kiss-swollen, his cheeks flushed a rosy pink, and his eyes were shining. But they were no longer shining with tears. They were bright and he looked as happy as Michael had seen him earlier in his baby pictures. Michael’s heart did a little somersault in his chest because he knew that he’d put that happiness back in Alex’s eyes.

Just as much as Alex always managed to calm him down, to make his head go quiet and change his entropy, Michael was able to make Alex happy, to make the dark clouds that sometimes hung over Alex’s head go away. They complimented each other in the most beautiful way.

“I love you,” Michael whispered. “I love you, too,” Alex whispered back. And really, that was all that mattered.

#malex #alex manes #michael guerin #rnm fic #malex fic #my fic #malex forever #malex forever drop

[spell-cleaver]

Astrophilia

This is my project for @star-wars-wlweek! 

Leia and Qi'ra can fight others and each other with words and weapons easily enough, but trust in themselves is harder to come by, and may be what keeps them apart.

Or: five universes in which they almost, but not quite, find each other, and one universe where they do.

Read it on AO3 or FFN instead.

*

Day 1: Gay Awakening | Pirate AU

The gay awakening in this isn’t quite as clear as I wanted it to be, nor is the gay super clear; I’m not great at writing romance. I hope you enjoy it anyway :D

In one universe of many, Qi’ra boarded a covert attack ship named the Striker.

Bring me the little rich rat, Lady Proxima had told Qi’ra, her decadent jewellery glinting in the dim, murky light of her pool. If there were any rich rats around here, Qi’ra couldn’t help but think, it was her. She and her senator father want to ‘clean us up,’ drive out the gangs. She needs taking care of.

Not necessarily murder, she knew, though Qi’ra had certainly done worse in her years of servitude. Han, the big softie, never liked the dirtier jobs, but Qi’ra still had her eyes on the role of enforcer and she wouldn’t get that if she played nice. Whatever Proxima wanted done to this Princess of Alderaan, she would do it.

Better her than Qi’ra.

And the job came with some perks, as well. She’d been allowed into a ship off-planet for the first time ever. Corellia was putrid on the ground level, but seeing it from above was a different matter: seas of grey-green waste, textured tumbles of built-up civilisation that had been run down three centuries ago, the white-capped poles blemished with black and grey.

Everyone around her was oohing and aahing at the skies and the million stars that Corellia’s piss-coloured lights washed away. But Qi’ra kept her eyes on the planet below.

She had never seen another world but she knew her own was a shit hole. There was no point forgetting that—especially when she had a job to do.

Corellia’s junkyard that passed for rings was an ideal place to hide a scrappy pirate ship, bartered from the Hutts and fixed up with spit and miracles. Qi’ra fingered the small blaster she’d been trusted with for this mission, gripping the accompanying stun baton tightly.

Han shot her a grin from the co-pilot’s seat but she ignored it. The Worms’ primary pilot grunted at him to focus.

Qi’ra focused too. The Tantive IV, the diplomatic ship captained by Raymus Antilles, owned by Senator Bail Organa, used by Princess Leia Organa on her numerous sanctimonious relief missions. Corellia, as one of Alderaan’s nearest neighbours, was getting the brunt of some of her efforts first, and if she managed to get enough relief and policing there, she might even shut down the White Worms.

They couldn’t do that. Qi’ra had fought so hard, all these years, to be where she was now. She wouldn’t lose it.

The Tantive IV winked into realspace on the edge of Corellian airspace and Han hacked their comms with barely a thought.

“—Princess Leia Organa, here for the scheduled relief mission—”

Even her voice was pretentious and fake. She’d be easy to kidnap, then hopefully easy for Proxima to intimidate. Actually, killing a Core world princess might be problematic politically, but it was amazing what the Empire would turn a blind eye to if they didn’t like the politician.

Tank, the Aqualan leader of the mission, grunted his instructions. “Attack. Now.”

Han jammed the Tantive’s comms. Qi’ra finally replied to his grin with a grim smile as he patted her on the shoulder, then stood with the boarding team as the Striker careened towards the Tantive and opened fire.

The next few minutes were a blur. The ships jerked as they connected, the Striker seizing the Tantive’s airlock like a snake seized a rat between its jaws. Qi’ra rocked with the motion and was one of the first fighters on the ground when the doors hissed open.

They met fierce resistance from the bodyguards. Bolts flew, blew molten plasma across the metal walls, but there were more intruders than defenders and soon they were retreating back down the corridor, shooting haphazardly over their shoulders.

“Secure the escape pods!” came Tank’s shout. “Locate the target!”

Qi’ra sprinted down the corridor and took the first left where everyone else fanned out across the ship. A few men Qi’ra didn’t know followed her. She kept an eye on them as she went: one blue-skinned Twi’lek and one gruff human. She trusted neither of them not to try to steal glory for themselves, but she could take them if they did.

They came upon the first escape pod and shot the controls, disabling it. Then the next. Then the next. The engine room and other guts of the ship expanded on their right, and it took everything in her not to jump at shadows.

She did jump when the bolt came.

It struck the human man in the chest; he went down instantaneously. Qi’ra whipped her head around and returned fire, forcing the attacker to retreat to where their aim was less deadly.

The Twi’lek wasn’t so wise. He grunted and barged forwards, punching out shots in a rapid staccato, but in a few moments he was nailed in the lek, then the forehead. Qi’ra grimaced at the splatter of blood and brains.

That was a mistake. Her moment of distraction saw her attacker dive with range again; they shot right through her ponytail and left her hair a sticky mess. She did the only thing she could do: she brawled.

They weren’t expecting her to leap. Qi’ra’s fist landed right in a chest—where she’d thought the abdomen would be, but her attacker was smaller than expected. She used that: yanked them towards her, under the glaring lights, before they could shoot again.

She stared.

Her assailant—a young woman with intricate braids and a stony expression—pulled herself up to her full, diminutive height and glared.

She was, Qi’ra hated to admit, highly attractive.

She brought up her blaster. Qi’ra kicked it out of her grip and was backhanded for her troubles. Small hands gripped her own blaster fiercely and she twisted away, snarled—tossed the blaster aside rather than give it up. It scattered into the next escape pod.

The woman—Princess Organa, it had to be—dived for it. Qi’ra tackled her. They rolled across the floor, faces inches apart, and Qi’ra tried to fight the paralysis when they locked eyes.

She lifted her hands to punch again, but Organa gripped her wrists.

“Who are you people,” she hissed. “Why are you attacking!?”

“I just need another mission under my belt, Princess,” Qi’ra grunted, trying to free herself. Organa’s grip was strong. “’Else I’m back out on the streets.”

“That’s why we’re here, I’m here to help—”

“I can’t trust help from a stranger.”

“Then get out of my way.”

Organa struck Qi’ra across the face and she fell to the side, cursing. She scrambled for the escape pod.

“Oh no you don’t,” she hissed, but Organa already had the blaster. Qi’ra leapt in after her and rolled to duck the bolt that soared past her ear.

It struck the button to detach instead.

No.

No.

Organa smiled grimly and pulled a lever. The airlock disengaged. They were floating in space, untethered.

“I have no interest in being captured by whoever you work for,” Organa spat.

“Captured? Pah. Lady Proxima just wants you and your relief efforts out of the way.” Qi’ra eyed the blaster but didn’t dive for it again. She glanced at the controls, the ship—the shots from the Striker just missing their pod. “We had orders to fire on any escape pods that were released.”

Organa went white. “You’re saying we’re going to die.”

“You’ve killed us both, yeah.”

Organa swore in a language Qi’ra didn’t know. “I hate you.”

“It’s mutual, trust me.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“Likewise.”

“But sit your sorry backside down there.” Organa grabbed her arm and frogmarched her to the only seat in the escape pod. “And steer.”

“Steer?”

“I’m going to escaped this. I want to live.” Organa eyed the Tantive and the Striker getting smaller with every spiralling moment. Bright shots shattered out from them and puckered their hull. “My question is: do you?”

When Qi’ra laid hands on the controls, they were hot and shaking under her touch.

#qi'ra #leia organa #leia x qi'ra #starwarswlweek2021 #my writing #random words on a page #astrophilia #flash fiction #flash fiction: star wars

[masterwords]

Digging Up Bones

Summary: Set immediately after 01x08 “Natural Born Killer”, Perotta in the junkyard got a little further under Hotch’s skin than he let on.  One minute he’s pounding beers with Derek, the next he’s having an anxiety attack.  Jason Gideon saves the day.  

Pairings: None

Warnings: anxiety attack, child abuse (past), Vince Perotta, strangled/bruised

Words: 3.2k

**

As much as Aaron hated to admit it, Vince Perotta had gotten to him. Had opened up something inside of him that hadn't seen the light of day in years.  He knew he should have stayed to finish up his paperwork, shouldn't have blown Gideon off when he asked him to come by his office, but being in that building was suffocating and he just needed to breathe so without saying a word to anyone, he vanished. Slipped into the shadows and out into the cover of the inky black night.  He wasn't going anywhere in particular, he'd left his phone on his desk, didn't want to be found.  Just needed to go.  No one would miss him anyway, not even Haley who would be sleeping by now in her bed with the baby twisting and turning wildly in her belly.  He felt disconnected from that, unworthy of its beauty, so he avoided it.  He pulled his coat tight around him, hugged his arms to his chest, felt the familiar sensation of panic pulsing through his fingertips.  His jaw ached, his neck was raw, his tie was tight again even after Gideon had loosened it – there was comfort in his silk noose.  

The neon light advertising cheap beer in a half burned out football caught his eye and something about it drew him in.  Not his usual haunt, he wouldn't run into anyone he knew.  The bar smelled like cigarettes and stale beer, his shoes stuck to the floor as he walked making squeaky squelching sounds.  He pulled his coat tighter around him, approaching the bar – he was in the mood for beer.  Bad, cheap beer, the kind that Haley never wanted to keep in the house because it reminded her of too many youthful hangovers.  When the amber liquid was poured, a foamy warm pitcher of whatever they had on special that night, he made his way to a darkened table in the back corner with a view of a pool table that had seen better decades and a jukebox pumping out Randy Travis.   Maybe it was broken, he thought, or maybe it was just the bar tender's favorite, but it was song after song in that same deep, soulful voice.  He didn't mind, it was helping.  The televisions played repeats of football games from the 1970s, he could tell by the uniforms.  He was mesmerized.  He contemplated drinking straight from the pitcher, the way his father always had, night after night in bars while he was hustling on the pool tables and Aaron and Sean sat in a booth working on their homework so their mother could have her book clubs and her church groups without disturbance.  She never seemed to mind them spending so much time in smoky pool halls, and once Aaron was old enough he understood it all.  They were in public, and he wouldn't lay a hand on them there, so a few nights a week they were all safe.   Secondhand smoke was nothing compared to what their father could do to them.  

“Hotch?” came a loud, familiar voice from across the bar and he looked up from his silent reverie to see Derek grabbing a drink from the bar tender – a gin and tonic, from the looks of it.  Aaron waved, just a small gesture, and poured the beer from the pitcher into his glass finally. He'd be civilized, this time.  He'd almost let go, been free, but Derek sucked him back in.  The beer almost foamed over the top but teetered there, hovering dangerously, and he lost himself for a moment staring into it.  Derek sat down across the table from him, sinking heavily into the overstuffed vinyl cushions.  Without even trying, he looked like he'd been there all night.  “Didn't think I'd run into anyone here.”

“Me neither,” Aaron muttered in a raspy, broken voice, taking a sip now, feeling the bubbles tickle against the tip of his nose.  He winced as the beer slid down his sore throat, foam stinging his swollen lip. He wiped his face with his hand afterward in an almost childlike way.    

“That dude...” Derek said softly, swirling his straws inside of his drink, listening to the ice clink against the glass.  “I've seen a lot of monsters but man.”  Of course, he was trying to escape the images Perotta had left behind as well.  They might all end up at this bar tonight, each looking to leave it behind and wallow alone, each finding that the other had the same thought. Aaron wrinkled his nose at the idea of Elle or JJ wandering in next, like an orphan in the night looking to drown out everything they'd seen that day.   It was bad enough that he couldn't be alone, but he knew if anyone else showed up he'd become the sounding board like always.   He wasn't sure he could hold himself together the way they would all need him to.    

“Yeah,” Aaron agreed, staring deep into the foam now.  He wanted to be alone, to lose himself in the pitcher until he couldn't see straight and needed to call a cab.  Or have a cab called for him.  Until he stumbled in his front door and passed out on the couch so Haley wouldn't see him in such a state.  It was one of those nights.  Derek looked like he felt the same, Aaron noted, and he struggled to turn away someone else's suffering, even if he needed time to indulge in his own.  He was, so far, holding what he knew was a mounting anxiety attack at bay, just barely.  He'd been holding it at bay since Perotta held him, since he could smell the man's foul breath on his cheek and the tender flesh of his neck tearing, his throat collapsing under the larger man's strength.  Beer was the cure he sought, silent, foamy, amber release.  

“You wanted to be alone...” Derek said, taking a sip of his drink finally.  “I know.  I'll finish this up and get outta your hair, don't worry.”

“No, Morgan, it's fine...really.”

“Like hell it is.  You got the shit kicked out of you tonight, man, in more ways than one...I know damn well why you came to this bar and it wasn't to hang out with me.  I shouldn't have come over but I guess I just wanted a friendly face for a minute.”

Aaron regarded that statement with a frown and gulped down half of his glass of beer, opening his throat and letting it just slide down like he'd done in college.  It hurt, but the pain almost pleased him and he did it again, finishing the glass.  He poured another.  Derek watched him cautiously, and for all of the times he'd been out drinking with Sean and wondering how they could possibly be related, he saw it now.  He imagined both of them together, pounding beer after beer, getting sloppy and loud, ending the night with black eyes and split lips.   The Hotchners liked to throw fists – even Aaron wasn't immune to it every so often, he had a longer fuse than the rest of them but he could hold his own.  Sean had told enough stories of getting into trouble in school and needing his big brother to come to his rescue, only to find their angry father at home ready to show Aaron how wrong it was to fight in the school yard.   Sean may not have seen his father's rage often, but he harbored all the guilt of knowing he'd brought it out on his brother more than once.  

“No, Morgan, I didn't come to hang out with you but you're here and it's fine.  Stay or go, doesn't matter to me.”  

“That's more like it.”

“Mmmhmmmm,” Aaron hummed, tossing back most of his second glass.  It was getting easier now and the pain in his neck was letting up as the beer settled into his system.  He could feel his heart racing, knew he'd feel it thundering against his ribs if he set his hand there and all he wanted was another beer.  It would help.  The next beer would help.  

“You wanna talk about it?”

“Nope.” His vision blurred as he reached for the pitcher so he pulled his hand back, tucked it in close to keep Morgan from seeing it shake. He tried to take a deep breath but it just rattled around, catching in his throat, never reaching his lungs.    

“You know Gideon's gonna make you see someone about it if you don't.”

“Yup.” He turned his eyes down now to the table, biting into his lip, desperately trying to hold on to the last threads of breath his lungs still held.  

“You'd rather sit with one of those talking heads than just tell me?”

“Morgan,” Aaron started, pressing his hand to his painful jaw, feeling the spreading bruise and tenderness.  He was starting to feel lightheaded, and he pushed his fingertips into the soft swelling at his jaw to try and focus on something.  It didn't work.  The blood was pounding behind his ears and the room swam before his eyes, losing all focus  and suddenly, he couldn't breathe at all.  His lungs were filled with dust and he choked.  He gasped for air but still he tried to hold it together, tried to make it seem like the air was just too smoky.  Morgan leaned in, regarding him curiously. Couldn't tell what was going on but it looked bad.  He'd pushed too far, he knew it.  The pang of instant regret rattled in his stomach.

“Hotch?” Morgan asked, watching as Aaron's hands flew to his throat, tried to loosen his tie but they were shaking so bad he couldn't get a grip and just desperately fumbled around like a toddler trying to tie a shoelace.  Morgan slipped around the table and slid into the booth beside Aaron, reaching over to loosen the tie with his steady hands. He slipped it off and set it on the table, unbuttoning the other man's shirt a little to get him some air.  The deep purple bruising around his neck was shocking against the bright white of his shirt and he recoiled a little from the sight.  

“Hotch?” he asked again, resting his hand firmly against his friend's back, right between his shoulder blades.  He could feel the beating of Aaron's heart, it was thundering wildly, it was almost scary.  

“Gideon,” Hotch gasped, raking his hands desperately over his face, dragging through the sweat.  “Gideon...”

“You want me to call Gideon?”  Aaron nodded.  Without hesitation, Derek pulled out his phone and dialed Gideon's number – the man answered right away, of course.  

“Gideon, it's Hotch...”

“You're with him?  Tell me where you're at, now.”

“Laces Out, the little sports bar down the road from the office...you know why I'm calling?”

“It was written all over his face after Perotta was hauled off.  I told him to come to my office,” Gideon was huffing now, like he was running.  “Keep him there, tell him to breathe.  I'll be right there.”

The line went dead and Derek set his phone down, leaning in closer to Hotch who was pale and sweaty, in his eyes was what could only be described as sheer terror.  Like he thought he was dying.  Was he dying?  Derek had no idea.  

“Breath, man, just breathe...Gideon is coming...”  

Aaron nodded.  Desperately, quickly, but he didn't look like he believed it.  He gulped and gasped for breath again, squeezing his eyes shut against the throbbing pain in his head.  His ribs felt like they were cracking, flying apart, lungs incinerated and turned to ash inside of him.  At some point, he knew this would pass and humiliation would follow close behind, and then finally exhaustion.  Haley couldn't see this, he couldn't go home.  She was pregnant and this was the last thing she needed on her plate.   He thought of the baby, all the ways he could and would fail him, was already failing.  The thoughts swirled faster than he could grab them.  He heard unfamiliar voices beside him – the bar tender worried about medical emergencies and other patrons asking if they could help, then finally, Gideon's voice.  Soon Gideon's arms circling him.  

“Breathe,” he whispered into Aaron's ear, one hand squeezing his arm, the other resting against his chest.  “You're okay, everything is okay just find your breath.”  

“He's fine,” Derek said to the bartender, pushing people away as fast as they'd come.  “Had a rough day at work, he's okay.”

“You gotta get him outta here, okay?  He's scaring people.” the bartender said, and Derek nodded.  He understood, but it made him mad anyway.  He settled up the tab and asked for a glass of water while he waited, watching as Gideon somehow brought Aaron back from the brink of whatever terrifying place he'd gone.   He wasn't sure what he was watching, but he felt like he was intruding on something so intimate, something that Aaron would never want anyone else to see.  

“He's okay?” Morgan asked, quietly, leaning over the table to slide the water in front of the other men.  Gideon nodded, but kept his eyes trained on Aaron, his entire focus there.  From the looks of it, this was something that Gideon knew inside and out, everything he did seemed carefully planned out like he had a numbered list in his head. Finally, he saw a change in Aaron – it came first in his eyes, the terror faded, then his chest rose and fell slower and slower, his shoulders released their tension and he slumped over, falling into Gideon's arms, burying his face in the other man's chest.  Tears came next, rivers of diamond tears shimmering under the yellow lamp hanging above the table.  Morgan sat down across from them, watching as Aaron's body was racked with sobs and Gideon just held him, held him impossibly tight.  

“My place is just down the street,” Derek offered.  “Two blocks.  I didn't drive.”  

“Walking will do him good,” Gideon said quietly.  “In a minute.”

The tears dried up after a bit and he wiped at his cheeks with shaking hands, reaching for the glass of water and taking a couple of trembling sips.  He avoided eye contact with Derek, kept his eyes trained on the table, flooded with shame.  This was his cycle.  This was his lot.  He peered up at Gideon, lifted his chin just slightly, pursing his lips.  Gideon nodded back.  The silent thanks, a lifetime of worthlessness and humiliation.  He put on his suit and tie, played the part, could fake all of the confidence he needed, but this was him at the end of the day.  In hotel showers while on the road, in his office at home, it didn't matter where, the same fate sought him wherever he was.  Without words, the three men stood and walked out of the bar, Aaron flanked by his friends, his legs weak but carrying him because he'd already been far enough down the path of public humiliation for one night.  They walked in silence, every so often Gideon reaching up just to pat Aaron on the back, a gentle reminder that he wasn't alone, wasn't ever alone.  It was a brisk walk but short, Derek didn't live far away.  His apartment was neat and clean, in guest ready order at all times, but not extravagant. Gideon and Aaron took their seats on his sofa while Derek made his way for the kitchen to grab them all drinks.  

“You okay kid?” Gideon asked, leaning in close to Aaron, who still hadn't said a word since he'd shown up.  Aaron nodded, but he couldn't speak.  He was holding himself together by a thread, talking might snap it.  Gideon just acknowledged it and leaned back into the cushion, observing Derek's apartment, the dark colors and crisp lines of everything.  Derek came back with sparkling waters for everyone, but a side offer of drinks came with, he'd brought out a bottle of whiskey and set it before them.   Aaron had never wanted a whiskey so badly in all his life and he couldn't even say it, just sipped at his bubbly water.

“How are you doing, Derek?” Gideon asked, turning away from Aaron for a moment to look at the other man in the room, the man who had also been trying to drink his pain away.  Gideon had known his team was in a rough place after the day they'd had, he'd have to make sure they were all good in his own time.  “You okay?”

“I guess so,” he replied, sipping his water.  He crossed his legs and peered across the room, looking through the two men he'd never imagined he'd ever host in his home.  

“What's eating at you?”

“Honestly? I wish I'd put a bullet through his eyes when he was holding Hotch, man.  We found that cop on our own, that guy deserved a bullet.”  

Gideon nodded.  “I understand,” he said softly.  “We did what we had to.  Hotch is okay, Jimmy is okay, Perotta is behind bars.  We can't dwell on what we wish we'd done differently, and it isn't our job to play executioner.”

“I know, man, I know,” Derek sighed.  He reached for the bottle of whiskey he'd brought out and poured some into a glass, offering to Gideon and Aaron who both nodded.  The first sip of whiskey burned terribly as it slipped down Aaron's raw throat, but the way it spread through him, coursing through his icy veins with its spreading warmth was worth it entirely.  He sipped again, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath of relief.  He felt his resolve strengthen, felt his voice come back to him, felt the shame crawl back into its hiding place, slowly curling itself up between his ribs.  

“Thank you,” he whispered, finally looking up and meeting Derek's eyes with his own.  “I'm sorry you had to see that, Derek.  I have no right to ask this of you, but I would...appreciate your discretion.”

“Hotch,” Derek started, sinking back in his chair and shaking his head.  He let a smile slip over his lips.  “Man, I go out drinking with your brother, you think I don't already know you're not perfect?”

Aaron looked like a deer in headlights for a moment, but settled into the gentle sway of the whiskey.   “I'm not?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow, and Derek chuckled.  The mood shifted, even Gideon settled into his spot a little, still peering at Aaron out of the corner of his eye but less and less often.  

“It's okay.  We can't all be Derek Morgan.”  

“True,” Aaron answered softly, swirling the whiskey in his glass before gulping the last of it.  He let out the last ragged sigh he had in him.  “Thank you, both.  I owe you.”  

“No, Hotch,” Gideon muttered, setting his empty glass on the table and standing up.  “You already give us too much.  We're in your debt. If you'll excuse me, I have some work left to do at the office – Aaron, would you like me to pop by on my way out and give you a lift home?”

“Sure, Gideon...thanks.”  

“Good. Have another glass or two, relax.  Don't talk about work.”

#aaron hotchner #derek morgan #jason gideon

[litwitlady]

to shift the stars

Winter has come and gone. The snow melted and washed away. Alex is at the junkyard. Surrounded by newly bloomed wildflowers, bumble bees buzzing past, and the comforting warmth of the springtime sunshine.

He wraps his jacket around him tighter. Because he is still cold.

The airstream’s generator is purring quietly. But Michael’s truck is gone. He knocks anyway. Once, twice. And the door pops open. Unlocked and begging him to enter. So, he does.

Inside looks the same as always. Neatly cluttered. Clean and soaked in the smell of rain. The humidity from Michael’s last shower still clinging to air, dense and close. Alex sends him a text. A simple – at your trailer. Settles down into Michael’s bed to wait.

It’s not the first time he’s waited here for Michael. But he’s hoping for a better outcome. Even though they haven’t spoken to each other in several weeks. But things are different now. In what way, he’s not sure. Some tiny shift in the stars maybe. Or a cosmic imbalance finally tilting true.

He glances down at his phone. No response yet. There’s a box on the bed next to him. From what Alex can see, it’s filled with various odds and ends. Scraps of paper with faded calculations, a picture of Michael with his siblings, half-used pencil stubs and more than one empty whisky bottle. All little jagged tiles in the mosaic of Michael’s life.

Alex slides the box closer, meaning to get a better look at the picture. But something beneath a dented belt buckle catches his eye instead. It’s another picture – this one taken so long ago. Him and Michael, the desert, and two guitars. He tugs the photo free and finds a yellow sticky note attached. His own handwriting.

Stopped by. AM

His breath catches. A lost memory from over a year ago now. Michael’s we’re not good for each other speech suddenly playing on repeat in his head. He chucks the picture and the note back into the box and rises to leave. The air hanging too dense – too close.

Swinging the door open, his prosthetic shifts awkwardly in his rush to escape and he falters, stumbling down the steps. Landing in Michael’s outstretched arms. ‘Jesus, Alex. Are you okay?’

Alex steadies himself against Michael’s chest, reaching down to readjust his leg. ‘I’m fine. Just tripped.’

Michael holds onto him until his balance has fully returned. ‘I got your text.’

‘Yeah, um, I was just dropping by. Hadn’t seen you in a while. I’ll get out of your hair.’ But he doesn’t move. Rooted to the pull of Michael after so long.

‘Come inside. Rest your leg.’ Michael hops up into the airstream and reaches out his hand. Alex gives one last fleeting glance to Explorer and then lets Michael help him inside.

Alex collapses onto Michael’s bed again. Back beside the box. Picture and note taunting him. He can’t shift his eyes away and Michael immediately notices.

‘That’s just some old crap I’ve been meaning to toss out. Most everything in there’s broken.’ He shrugs his shoulder and throws a pen in the box. ‘Out of ink.’

‘You could buy more ink.’ Alex’s voice is dripping with ire – a swell of unexpected fury hollowing out his chest.

Michael furrows his brow, frowns. ‘Okay. You sure you’re alright? Did you really just come here to talk or are we back to the yelling part again?’

The last time they’d seen each other had been a blowout. In the middle of the Wild Pony, no less. Maria literally dragging them out the backdoor, metaphorically kicking them to the curb. Their most weaponized words still tattooed on Alex’s heart.

Alex sighs. ‘I don’t want to fight.’ His eyes dart back to the box.

‘Why were you running away earlier? Looked like you’d seen a ghost.’ He sits down beside Alex, dumping the box onto the floor.

And he had, hadn’t he? Seen a ghost. A spiteful ghoul armed with their darkest memories – that sharp-edged knife of their looping past. Alex looks down at his boots but all he can see is that mocking, leering piece of yellow paper.

Michael bends over and snatches up the picture, tearing the sticky note away. He holds both up to Alex. ‘I guess you found my ‘I miss Alex’ mementos.’

Alex snorts. ‘Right. Mementos. Lovingly stashed in your garbage box.’

‘Yes. My sentimental garbage box that I’ve been meaning to toss for over a decade.’ He sighs and places both items back where they belong, kicking the box underneath his tiny table. ‘I can’t believe you saw a picture of us I’d saved for over a decade and a sticky note I’d kept just because it had your handwriting on it and thought I guess Michael doesn’t love me anymore.’

‘Yeah, well, evidence keeps adding up.’ Alex hangs his head and picks at his cuticles.

Michael slips his hand between Alex’s, lacing their fingers together. ‘You’re wrong. And I believe I yelled that in front of half the townies just a few weeks ago.’

‘I’m sorry –‘

‘Don’t apologize –‘

They both fall silent. Looking down at their intertwined fingers. Shoulders slowly sliding together. ‘I just don’t know what we are, Guerin. So, I don’t know how to read anything right. Or even how to talk to you anymore.’

‘We’re a hot fucking mess. Same as always.’ He smiles and pokes Alex lightly with his elbow. ‘But we’re other things, too. A hot fucking mess, a work in progress, and each other’s future.’

Alex inhales sharply, cutting his eyes at Michael. ‘Future?’

Michael nods. ‘Isn’t that why you’re really here?’

And it is. Of course, it is.

They have hours, days, years ahead of them to fill with conversation – real actual communication. And they’ll get there this time. Ready now to lay it all out and love it all back together. But in this first moment, Alex chooses to press his lips to Michael’s, slow and sweet.

A touch, a taste, and then coming home. Those shifting stars and that cosmic imbalance finally tilting true.

#malex #malex fic #alex manes #michael guerin #angst to fluff #a soft landing

[peridottea91]

Chapter 1

Summary: Everyone has secrets, some good and some bad. Bree Wildes, a witch and god-daughter to the late Bobby Singer, is keeping far too many for Dean’s liking, leaving Sam torn between giving her the benefit of the doubt and his brother’s suspicions. But what happens when the holidays cause Bree to come crashing down? Sometimes, we need someone to lean on, even if it breaks us.

Pairing: Sam x Witch!OFC

Word Count: 3,657

Warnings: angst, eventual fluff, eventual smut, mutual pining, mentions of depression, mentions of attempted sexual assault (nothing happens though), mentions of familial loss, asshole!Dean, mentions of past drug use, depictions of PTSD, mentions of past trauma, eventual holiday cheer

Beta’d by: @wingedcatninja​

Divider by: @firefly-in-darkness​ / @firefly-graphics​

A/N: Story takes place in s12, beginning just before “LOTUS”, and then diverging canon from there.

THIS WORK IS 18+ ONLY. DO NOT REPOST MY WORK ON ANY OTHER SITES.

MAIN MASTERLIST - SERIES MASTERLIST

Bree shuffled sleepily towards the bunker’s kitchen.  The concrete floors felt cold beneath her feet despite her extra fuzzy socks, and she could really use a steaming hot cup of eggnog coffee.  Aside from her groans at being awake and the soft padding of her feet down the corridor, the bunker was completely silent.  Sam and Dean had taken off on some hunt gods-know-where and weren’t due to return for a few more days.  The case was either in Colorado or Montana, but honestly Bree was still half-asleep when Sam had woken her up a few days prior and let her know they were leaving.

Unsurprisingly, Dean had been iffy about leaving Bree alone for the better part of a week, saying that he didn’t trust a witch not to blow up the place while they were away.  Thankfully, Sam had placated his brother by offering to take full responsibility for her.  He had also firmly reminded the distrustful hunter that Bobby had trusted Bree implicitly, and that that should be more than enough for them.

All things considered, Bree should have known that Dean would be cautious around her.  Before Bobby died, the pair of them fought like cats and dogs; something about Bree’s very existence seemed to grind Dean’s gears.  Sam, on the other hand, had been far more trusting, albeit a little hot-and-cold due to Dean’s constant complaining.  It certainly didn’t help that ever since Bree had shown back up in the Winchester’s lives almost a year ago, it had been anything but smooth.  She turned up one day at their motel room in Wisconsin, bloodied, bruised, and on the run.  Naturally, trouble wasn’t too far behind her.

Without hesitation, Sam and Dean sprang into action, whisking Bree away to the safety of the bunker.  It was ironic, really, a witch being hunted by other witches.  But then again, apparently, they didn’t take too well to one of their own helping hunters.  As much as she hated to admit it, Bree was a hunter herself, although she preferred to stay off the field.  Didn’t matter to Bobby Singer, though; he trusted her regardless.

Things had come a long way since their early days back at Bobby’s junkyard.  Back then, Bree and Dean would always bicker over trivial things, mostly because they were both far too sarcastic and mouthy for their own good.  However, Bobby always made sure to keep things copacetic between them, and helped Dean get over his initial distrust, for the most part.  

But now, just under a decade later, those trust issues only seemed to have worsened.  Ever since Purgatory and the Mark, Dean was so much colder to anyone supernaturally inclined, with a few exceptions—Bree was not one of them.  Dean swore up and down that she was hiding something from them, keeping secrets, and constantly berated Sam for playing referee.  As a result, the younger Winchester often withdrew from Bree, affected by his brother’s comments.

It certainly didn’t help that the last time Bree had seen the Winchesters, before Bobby’s death, she had sworn to return in just two weeks.  She had gotten a call from an old contact overseas who needed help with a potential case and didn’t know who to turn to.  The contact wasn’t a hunter, but they were familiar with the things that went bump in the night.  Unfortunately, two weeks snowballed into months, and then years, after Bree fell down a rabbit hole of conspiracy, witchcraft, and the British Men of Letters.

Bree tried to leave messages for the hunters she left behind, letting them know what was going on.  It wasn’t until she received a call from Garth a few months later that Bree even knew that Bobby was dead.  The news tore her apart and sent her spiraling into a depressive episode.  After Garth filled her in on the Winchester’s going off-grid because of Leviathans and being on the FBI’s Most Wanted List (again), Bree decided to stay away.  So, for the next few years, Bree bounced around Europe and Asia, actively working against a witch cult, demons, and ducking from the British Men of Letters.  In all that time, she only managed to return to the States maybe twice.

When Bree finally did return for good and gave the Winchesters the run-down of her current situation, the hunters agreed to make her safety top priority.  However, Dean was suspicious, especially after the growing realization that, despite how long they had known each other, he and Sam still knew next to nothing about Bree.  As a result, her relationship with the Winchesters was now mixed, at best.  

Dean, ever mercurial, would banter and seemingly joke with her one minute, only to eye her suspiciously while taking jabs at her the next.  He was trying to keep Bree on her toes, both subtly and not-so-subtly reminding her that despite their history and her relationship to Bobby, he didn’t trust her.  And, unfortunately, this meant that Sam was now stuck in the middle, playing devil’s advocate.

Staring blankly at the coffee pot before her, it took Bree a moment to comprehend where she was.  She was so exhausted that she couldn’t even remember walking into the kitchen.  It wasn’t until one of the fluorescent lights overhead began flickering that she snapped to attention.  Under normal circumstances, flickering lights would have been cause for alarm, but in this case, it was merely a short in one of the ancient bulbs.  Unamused by the momentary heart attack, Bree sighed in annoyance and flicked her finger as if flipping a switch, instantly steadying the light.

Setting about her mission for a morning pick-me-up, Bree was surprised to receive phone notifications from both Winchesters.  Dean’s was the typical “you better not have gone in my room” and “so help me, the bunker better still be standing when we get home”.  Nothing like a Dean Winchester morning message to make a girl feel welcome.  Bree rolled her eyes with a huff and shot off a quick “shut up and hunt” before turning her attention to Sam’s message.

SAM: Morning Bree. Wrapped up the case early and are headed home. Should be back sometime tomorrow afternoon.

Bree stared blankly at her phone a moment.  She had once developed strong feelings for the younger Winchester.  But, after years of emotional whiplash at the hands of him and Dean, Bree had started to feel apathetic.  Sure, they flirted a bit, but since the death of her godfather, the young witch’s walls built back up and her self-confidence faltered.  The last time she let Sam in was when he was in a state-run mental hospital in Indiana almost six years prior.  Since then, Bree kept both brothers at arms-length.  Why should she trust them when they constantly made her feel like dirt?  Like she had no one in her corner?  Instead, Bree slowly succumbed to the numbness and put on a fake smile.

BREE: thanks for the warning LOL

SAM: How much of the bunker is still standing?

BREE: none of it. Your hubris has failed you!

BREE: I’ve burned the house down

Bree smirked to herself as she sent off a picture to him of a creepy little girl grinning in front of a burning house (yeah, you know the one).  It always surprised her how well she could fake friendly conversation, even one over text.  It was probably something to be concerned about, but at this time of morning, Bree couldn’t really be bothered to care.

SAM: Good to know that over 50yrs worth of dust bunnies have finally been exterminated

SAM: Dean’s allergies will be thrilled

BREE: Nah. I magicked them to life. Now they’re hiding under his bed and in his porn collection

SAM: Careful. He might just believe you

BREE: shit you’re right…

SAM: I’m Sam Fucking Winchester.

SAM: Of course, I’m right.

Bree couldn’t help but chuckle despite herself at Sam’s response.  It was rare for him to act so cocky, but when he did it was always entertaining.  Sam was in prime form today, which either meant that the case must’ve gone well or that Dean lost a bet.  Personally, Bree hoped for the latter.

Shaking her head in mild amusement, Bree locked her phone and meandered down to the library, already on her second cup of coffee.  If the boys were home, Dean would have made fun of her for how “girly” she took her coffee.  Sam would have laughed but secretly snuck some of her flavored creamers when he thought nobody was looking.  He may have been Mr. Health Nut and preached good eating every chance he got, but Sam Winchester was also a man with a secret sweet tooth.  

Standing beneath one of the library’s archways, Bree thoughtfully sipped her coffee while she looked around the room.  For as much stuff as the bunker held, it still felt barren at times—despite the numerous books and displays, the lamps, and warm, wooden tables, the stone-grey walls, pillars, and floors oftentimes made the bunker feel like a military base.  Or, a more accurate description in Bree’s case, like a prison.  So much for the most wonderful time of the year.

Bree paused at the thought, reminiscing on once forgotten childhood holiday memories and traditions she shared with her dad.  When Bree was little, her dad would have begun decorating the house the weekend after Thanksgiving.  Christmas had always been his favorite holiday, between the lights and trees and traditions.  Every year, he would set up an antique, Lionel train set underneath the tree along with a Christmas village.  It was a tradition Bree’s grandmother started, and that her father had continued.  But that was what felt like a lifetime ago.  

Now, it was already December 1st, and there were no holiday decorations in sight, not that the Winchesters were big on holidays anyways.  It had been almost two decades since Bree celebrated any semblance of a holiday.  A loving family, holiday cheer, comfort—just wasn’t really something Bree got to experience and hadn’t been for a long time.  The longer she thought about it, the more Bree could feel a familiar pain and longing in her chest.

Perhaps that was what Bree really needed, the chance to pretend like everything was okay, even if just for a little while.  She had felt a familiar emptiness growing for weeks, maybe even months.  Depression had long been a struggle for Bree; unsurprising given her past, a past that she kept locked away and refused to let anyone near.  Pushing away the stinging sensation in her eyes and the wave of stomach knots, Bree turned her attention back towards the bunker.  Without color, plants, fresh air, or sunlight, the Winchester’s home could be a tad depressing at times.  A little holiday cheer could be what everyone needed, not just Bree.  Fishing her phone out of the pocket of her plum-colored, flannel, pajama pants, Bree quickly shot off another text to Sam.

BREE: December

SAM: Yes, it is

BREE: Christmas?

SAM: Is a holiday

Bree rolled her eyes and huffed.  Sam was trying to mess with her again.  Usually, when Sam got in a facetious mood, Bree was grateful for a moment of reprieve and reveled in it.  Right now, however, she was on a mission.

BREE: Can we?

SAM: Can we what? Celebrate it?

BREE: YES!!!

SAM: You’re Wiccan though? You don’t celebrate Christmas.

BREE: ACTUALLY, Samuel I celebrate both Christmas AND Yule

BREE: And I’m not Wiccan. I’m an Agnostic Witch... Sorta...

BREE: It’s complicated

SAM: Ah. Right

SAM: And it’s Sam

BREE: Sammy

SAM: ...

Bree snickered at Sam’s obvious annoyance.  She could just imagine the look on his face as he read her messages.

BREE: so, can we?

SAM: So, can we what?

BREE: CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS!!!

Bree waited anxiously for Sam to respond.  She hoped that he would agree to celebrate the holidays, but at times Sam could be as much of a scrooge as his brother was.  Eventually, his next text came through but, upon reading it, Bree felt herself begin to deflate.

SAM: Uhhh...  Dean and I don’t really do the holidays

SAM: Last time we did was right before he went to hell

BREE: I know but that’s exactly why I think we should celebrate it!

BREE: You’re both here. I’m here. We’re alive. So, what’s stopping us?

SAM: Are you sure now is really the best time?

SAM: I’m assuming you forgot about the British MOL? And the witches hunting you?

BREE: No, I haven’t. But twisting our bones about it isn’t gonna help anyone

BREE: Everyone loves Christmas

BREE: Please Sam?

SAM: …

Bree held her breath, watching the three, lingering, little dots indicating Sam was typing his answer.  In the pit of her stomach, Bree knew what it most likely would be, but she still hoped he would say otherwise.

SAM: Asked Dean. He says no.

Bree’s shoulders drooped, and she let herself slump into one of the stray armchairs in the library.  Why was she even surprised?  It’s not like she was particularly close with the Winchesters, despite them having known each other for so long.  Dean never trusted her and with Sam things were… well Bree honestly didn’t know what the hell to think anymore.  While they had offered her a safe place to stay, they constantly made Bree feel like the butt of every joke.  Add being stuck in the militaristic bunker, unable to leave without a chaperone, Bree was left to feel simultaneously trapped and unwelcome.  She hid it well, though… Almost too well.  Getting shut down without seemingly so much as a second thought from Dean only made her feel worse.  

What did she expect?  The man made it a point to remind her that she was a witch, something they would hunt normally.  She wasn’t useful like Rowena, Dean made that very clear.  Hell, he even treated the King of Hell better than he did her.  It just made her miss Bobby even more.

Bree wallowed for a few minutes before her phone lit up once more.  This time, however, Sam was calling rather than texting.  Slapping her hand heavily on the phone and tabletop next to her, Bree bleakly answered the call. 

“Hello?”

“Oh, don’t fucking pout,” Dean’s gruff voice commanded, “You’ve got two minutes to make your case.  So, go.”

Bree froze a moment in both surprise and confusion.  For Dean to even consider letting her argue in favor of the holidays meant that Sam must have nagged his ear off and guilt-tripped him hard.  The younger Winchester could honestly persuade his brother to do just about anything, within reason.  Still, it came as a shock considering that Sam wasn’t exactly Mr. Holidays himself, either.  Combine that with the whiplash he gave her on the daily, Bree honestly hadn’t expected to even be given a chance to try and change their minds.

“Hello?” Dean asked impatiently, waiting for the witch to make her pitch.

Snapped out of her shock, Bree didn’t hesitate, “Right!  Sorry!  I, uh, I was just thinking that doing something for the holidays would maybe do us all a bit of good.  Y’all have been working just about non-stop.  I’ve been cooped up in the bunker for months.  Honestly, who couldn’t use a bit of holiday cheer?” she pitched, “I haven’t gotten to celebrate in, well, years because… reasons… but I think it’s really important that we do this year.”

Sam and Dean exchanged looks on the other end of the line.  There was still a lot that the pair didn’t know about their witchy companion.  So, the fact that she had her heart set on celebrating the holidays admittedly came as a bit of a shock.  It also, however, provided them a rare opportunity to catch a glimpse behind the wall she kept between them.  Both Winchesters would be lying if they said it hadn’t piqued their interests.

“Look, I’m not asking y’all to help, or clean, or do anything,” She continued with a soft sigh, “I’ll take care of everything myself.  I’m just asking that you let me… spruce up the place a little for the holidays.”

“Who says that the bunker needs sprucing?” Dean asked indignantly.

“Nothing, if you like concrete man caves,” Bree retorted as she glanced around the library again.

“Pfft.  Our secret base is just fine, thank you very- OW!”

Sam elbowed his brother in the ribs and gave him a stern look.  Dean did, after all, promise to cooperate.

“Guys, I get it, okay?  The bunker is your home and enough people have screwed with it already.  But it’s the holiday season!  I’m not asking to do anything permanent…”

Bree was getting increasingly disheartened with the conversation.  Dean was stubborn as hell—once he made up his mind, good luck trying to convince him to change it.  Sam was stubborn in his own right but could typically be swayed when appealed to logically or emotionally.  Dean, not so much, especially if Bree was involved.

“Why is this really an issue with you?  Why are you so dead set on celebrating?” Dean asked bluntly, earning another look from his brother, which he ignored.

Bree hesitated a moment, biting her lip as she warred internally over how to respond.  Typically, she hated talking about herself and anything personal.  She hated the stares and looks of pity and sympathy that usually followed, as if she was a pathetic, sad, little girl.  That was, if they even believed her in the first place, which was a whole other issue.  Not to mention, she had a strong sense of self-preservation after the events of the past few years.  But, if Bree wanted any sort of Christmas, she knew she was going to have to concede a little.

“My dad,” she finally answered meekly, “What few memories I have of him, they’re mostly from Christmastime.  It was his favorite, and he always made sure he was home.  After he…” Bree swallowed hard, struggling with the words and feeling horribly exposed.  She never told the boys about what happened, nor did she necessarily intend to, “Anyways, he always made sure the holidays were special.  So full of life and color.”

“And you’re saying it’s not now?” Sam asked for clarification.

“Seriously?  You have to ask?” Bree asked rhetorically, “C’mon guys, I know I came to y’all for help, and I appreciate you letting me stay here, but…”

“But?”

“It feels like I shouldn’t have bothered…”  Bree’s voice was barely above a whisper, but the boys still heard it.  The implication of her words hung heavy over them.

Since coming to stay at the bunker all those months ago, Bree had ventured out on maybe a handful of cases.  And never without at least one of the Winchesters with her.  It had been maybe a month or two into their living situation when they found out that the British Men of Letters were also interested in getting their hands on Bree.  None of them had realized exactly how widespread their influence was around the globe.  At least, not until the last case Bree accompanied the Winchesters on.  After barely escaping the last attempt on her life, which almost cost Sam his, Bree was put on restriction.  If she thought she had little freedom before, it was nothing compared to the way things were now.  When Sam and Dean Winchester invested themselves in a protection detail, they certainly went all out.

That being said, the two hunters admittedly sometimes neglected to consider how Bree felt about the whole situation.  True, she did come to them for help, but the witch-turned-hunter never expected to be placed on lock-down.  At first, she had fought tooth and nail against being pent-up and left behind all the time.  But over the past month or so, both Sam and Dean noticed that their companion seemed to lose interest in a lot of things she once was passionate about.  Sam had attempted to get Bree to talk but was once again met with a familiar wall.  It’s not like he could really blame her, with all the contention between them.  This, in turn, had led to several arguments while he and Dean were out on the road, away from any eavesdroppers.

Bree couldn’t see it, being stuck in the bunker hundreds of miles away, but Sam and Dean were having one of their infamous, silent conversations.  Dean may not entirely trust her, but never wanted the bunker to feel like a prison (unless they were in the dungeon, but that was a different story).  Bree may be a witch, but she was also a hunter… and their friend, whether Dean wanted to admit it or not.

After what felt like an eternity, Dean finally spoke again, seemingly placated by her response, “If we’re gonna let you decorate, there’s gonna be a few ground rules.”

“What?”

“Nothing cheesy or cartoony.  Keep it classy.  Don’t choke us out with Hallmark Channel decorations and too much cinnamon and shit,” Dean continued, making sure to keep their house guest reigned in, “And I know your weird, hippie, witchy ass is gonna wanna do lots of shit with plants and whatever, but keep it to a minimum.  Sammy gets hay fever.”

“You’re-you’re serious?”

“Oh, yeah.  Dude’s like some sort of weird, pollen magnet.  Doesn’t matter what season—if there’s even a little pollen, his face gets puffy and his eyes water and there’s all this snot-”

“OKAY DEAN!” Sam shouted, effectively interrupting him as his cheeks burned with embarrassment, “Yes, Bree, we’re serious.  Just promise you won’t go too overboard, alright?”

“Yes!  Yes!  Of course!!” Bree stood up eagerly, eyes sparkling with excitement.

“And kid, if you break any of the rules, we’re taking it all down.  Got it?” Dean added as a final warning.

“DEAL!”

And just like that, the line disconnected.  Sam and Dean looked at each other and then the phone a moment before either of them spoke again.

“What the hell did we just unleash on the bunker?”

#sam x ofc #sam winchester x ofc #Sam Winchester #witch!ofc #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #spn fic #spn fanfic #yuletide memories #spn holiday fic

[angrycowboy]

LOL, what is it about Maria and Alex's friendship that you think is so exceptional? Like this is the woman who told her BFF that her dalliance with the guy he loved meant nothing & then went behind his back to pursue him anyway. I'm not suggesting that Alex has dibs on Michael or that Maria should have sacrificed her feelings, but a conversation was sorely required. The fact that she didnt tell Alex was selfish. So why is Alex/Maria's friendship so great and above all other Alex's relationships?

I've been sitting on this for a while, because really, it pissed me off. And I wanted to take a step back from dealing with this fandom and it's asinine opinions about Maria and Alex. 

People are selfish, and that's one of the great things about this show, is that we get to see characters who are flawed, and not perfect. Who fuck up and have to deal with the consequences. But we also get to see adults having adult relationships, and learning how to navigate them. 

Maria has had feelings for Michael for a long time, whether or not she verbally admitted to them, her interaction with Alex in 1x02, and her flirty banter with Michael in 1x04 shows us she has thought about it. The M(alex) fandom has chosen to ignore those interactions, citing "no chemistry" and "Miluca are better as friends who banter." Which, ignoring canon is fine - we all do whatever to make things more enjoyable to us. But the disconnect exists where people then start treating FANON interpretations as CANON, and get angry when they don't come to fruition on screen.

Maria resisted her feelings for Michael, even as she was flirting with him - and sleeping with him in 1x09 opened the floodgates, so to speak. Now she knew she was fucked. But Alex came to the Pony in 1x10 holding more cards than Maria, because at the time she still didn't know Michael was the guy Alex had been in love with in high school. Maria may have still been trying to resist what she was feeling, but those feelings were still there. And Alex is there to talk specifically about Michael knowing something happened between them. Alex even admits to her "how could you [know]?" because he is aware that he is the one who kept that vital piece of information that it was Michael Guerin he fell in love with. 

I love Alex Manes to pieces, but he's a bit stunted emotionally (which is also why I love him). He's been dealing with his own demons, and he's still not comfortable being out. But keeping Michael at arms length, he's learned, hasn't done them and their relationship any favors, and Alex knows he loves Michael. As with their conversation in the junkyard, Alex feels like they need to learn the little things about one another, and rely on more than just sex and that indescribable connection. Because he's broken up with Michael twice (technically three times, if you count "it can't happen again” in 1x02), and he's starting to realize he can't keep walking away and showing back up like he has been. Because now he sees Michael attempting, for the first time in ten years, to move on. And Alex starts to recognize that as a result of his own actions in regards to Michael.

It's truly astonishing to place all the blame on Maria, who resisted her feelings for Michael for so long, who in 1x11, admitted with tears in her eyes, how much she enjoyed him showing up for her. Who told Liz in 1x13 that she felt guilty for falling for the guy Alex fell in love with in high school. She did not invite Michael to the Pony at the end of 1x13 - he showed up on his own. And as far as Maria knew, Michael and Alex hadn't been a thing since high school. Furthermore, at no point does Alex seem to clear the air either that he is looking to rekindle his relationship with Michael. 

Kissing the guy you like, who is unattached and not in a relationship with anyone is not a crime. There's no "going behind Alex's back" happening here when Maria believed there was nothing going on between Michael and Alex based on things both of them told her. 

What makes Alex and Maria's friendship great is that they don't let something like another guy be the thing that destroy their relationship. The foundation is shown to be much stronger than that, especially between 2x05 and 2x06. Don't forget Alex knew in 2x04 that Maria had found out about aliens, and he appears to be the only one she'd talked to while blocking out everyone else. She knew he knew about aliens and had been in on keeping her in the dark and still spoke to him (don't forget she shut Liz and Michael out completely during that time). And when she was ready, she went to him to talk. She didn't go to Liz first, she went to Alex. Did she go in armed with an excuse (the computer) just in case? Yes, but it's not hard to believe she wanted something to fall back on - a safety net if needed. Plus, don’t forget, she went to Alex for help in tracking down what happened to her mom - Maria took that first step in asking for the help she rarely let herself do before, and it was Alex she went to.

Alex recognizes she is allowed to be angry at being kept in the dark, and Maria acknowledges that Alex is allowed to be angry at her for not bringing up Michael and her feelings for him. The conversation is two adult friends, admitting they fucked up in regards to each other. And the show had established in 1x02 that not only had Alex been back in town for a while (and his showing up at the Pony was out of place, but the way she greeted him indicated they had seen and spoken prior to that interaction) but that Alex and Maria have kept in touch over the years (she makes no mention of his injury and doesn't even acknowledge it, which indicates they've already spoken about it). In 1x07, Alex goes to Liz because he knows Maria is silently struggling with her mom, and Liz has been absent getting caught up in her work. It can be inferred from that episode that Alex has perhaps also been helping Maria with Mimi as much as possible - probably in looking into the care facility they later take her to. 

One thing I see fandom focusing on is Alex helps Maria but Maria doesn't help Alex, which indicates that equally reciprocal friendships are the only type that are valid. It ignores Alex as an established character, who prefers to handle problems himself and work them out on his own, as well as someone who prefers to show his love for others through spending time with them. Maria has largely been on her own over that decade, and has trouble accepting help from others because of that isolation. Alex recognizes it, and that's how he effectively gets the day outing for Mimi to happen, by recruiting Liz and turning it into a mini-reunion day of sorts.

Alex and Maria are both selfish - in fact, every character on the show has shown to be selfish at one time or another. None of them are perfect and all of them are flawed. So why the focus specifically on Maria's selfishness? Where is the equal treatment on Alex for also being selfish? The show even addresses it in 2x05 and 2x06. More specifically with Maria still harboring doubt about her friendship with Alex if she chooses to forgive Michael and enter back into a relationship with him. In the truck, she asks because she believes for a moment that it could be the thing that creates a rift between them, despite all the years they've been friends, and despite Alex even assuring her in 2x05 "the mess between [Michael and Alex] will never be [Maria's] fault." And Alex recognizes that insecurity, and tells her, "nothing could ever make me stop loving you." Plus, don't forget Alex had spoken more candidly about his own internalized homophobia and the effects his father's toxic masculinity has had on him, with Maria, than he has with perhaps any other character (and I'd argue it's why in 2x08 he is comfortable opening up to Forrest, because he knows he's already got Maria in his corner, he's already talked this out with her).

In regards to it being "better" than his other relationships, I believe the tag was that their friendship was better than the romantic relationships they are involved in - and I still stand by that. Because while a romantic relationship can pull me in, it's usually the ensemble, and the friendships and relationships between the characters that keeps me interested. Because not everything needs to be or should be just about romance, friendships are just as important to portray in media.

#yes this is about rnm #fandom nonsense #malexa #thanks for the ask! #notso writes meta #Anonymous

[spaceskam]

From A Whisper To A Scream (4/10)

warnings: torture basically, sprinkle in a little trauma

1 | 2 | 3 |

ao3

“Alright, you got five seconds to come out of there.”

Michael froze, laying on the backseat of the broken-down ‘97 Audi. He was hoping if he stayed still enough, Sanders would forget he ever saw any kind of movement. Did he move? He couldn’t remember. He must’ve dozed off.

“Now, I ain’t about to tell you again. Get out of there.”

Michael closed his eyes and cursed under his breath. He’d been trying at the junkyard for a couple of weeks now with no problem. He knew it was too good to be true. Slowly, he sat up and made eye contact with Old Manes Sanders. He gestured for Michael to get out and Michael listened. 

“You gonna tell me why you’re in there at 7 in the morning or am I supposed to read your mind?” Sanders asked. Michael just stared straight ahead.

“I’ll leave, don’t worry about it,” Michael said. Sanders snorted a laugh.

“You ain’t goin’ nowhere until you tell me what’s goin’ on,” Sanders told him. Michael glared. At fifteen, he wasn’t as tall as Sanders, but he was nothing if not willing to overcompensate with anger. 

“I’m not telling you shit.”

“Don’t get snappy with me, boy,” Sanders said, “When’s the last time you ate?”

“Why the fuck do you care?” Michael snapped. Sanders took a deep breath, giving him a very unimpressed look. But it wasn’t pity either. That was the only thing keeping him from storming off.

“Look, you ain’t gotta tell me specifics, but, that home you’re supposed to be at, it’s so bad that you’re sleepin’ in the junkyard? Or is it you just feeling rebellious?” Sanders asked. Anger boiled beneath Michael’s skin at the insinuation that he was overreacting. Max did that stuff even when he was well-meaning. Just because he didn’t spill every tiny detail didn’t mean he was a liar.

Despite his better judgment, Michael pulled up his sleeve and showed the healing burn mark on his arm that had directly covered an older burn scar they put there before. Forever engraved with a cross, reminding him that he was a freak of nature when it came to these humans. But he wasn’t about to let Sanders drag him back.

“Come inside, eat somethin’ ‘cause you look like a sack of bones, and then we’re headin’ over to that house.”

“No!” Michael yelled, a little more desperation in his voice than he intended.

“We’re gonna head over there,” Sanders repeated, louder and firmer, “So you can get your shit. Then we’re gonna find your social worker and figure out what we need to do to make sure you stay out of places like that.”

“What?” Michael scoffed, “You don’t think they’re gonna just throw me somewhere else for running? Juvie, this time, probably.”

“Well, if things go like they should’ve gone damn near a decade ago now, you’ll stay with me and I ain’t gonna put up with the running away shit,” Sanders said. It shut Michael right up.

He didn’t understand what he was being told. It almost sounded like someone wanted to keep him around. 

“Why?” Michael asked cautiously.

Sanders sighed and looked everywhere but at him.

“Long time ago, I met a nice lady who took care of me like I was her own and she showed me where her own actually was. Made a promise I’d keep an eye out for him and I ain’t about to break it now,” he said, leaving out far too many details. Michael felt like he got punched in the gut and his head spun. He didn’t understand.

“Wait, does that mean you know‒” my mom, what I am, where I’m from, what I’m capable of, if I’m dangerous, “That I‒”

“You want breakfast or not?” Sanders asked gruffly, already walking away.

Michael ran after him.

-

Michael gasped back into consciousness and Eff stood over him with confused eyes and an acupuncture needle in his hand.

“What’d you see?” Eff asked.

“When my dad decided he was gonna adopt me,” Michael said. Eff made a face like that was disappointing, but he nodded and took a few steps back to record it in his notebook. Michael lifted a shaky hand to rub the nearly invisible hole on his left temple.

Apparently, aliens had very similarly placed pressure points to humans, but they did very different things. Provoking them could trigger powers or memories or any number of things that the brain could do in someone’s subconscious. It took them a few tries to find the exact point on Michael’s head to stab a needle into, but, when he found it, he was thrown back to being just a kid.

“Let’s test your telekinetic limit again, see if that affected it in any way,” Eff said, taking the gloves off and dropping the needle into a glass of some ambiguously clear substance to sterilize it. 

Michael stood to his feet, feeling a little dizzy from the memory. Eff gave him the space to do so and waited for him to get steady before they walked outside.

Eff’s workplace of choice was a small shed in the middle of nowhere. No one lived for miles in any direction and the only way someone could find it is if they knew where it was and they were willing to drive 45 minutes into the desert. It had a couch, a cot, a bathroom, and a kitchen area. Most of the shed, though, was covered in equipment to test on Michael.

It turns out, though, that everything got a lot less scary the more he was there. Yeah, Eff was still mean and he never let Michael truly forget that he didn’t see him as an equal, but, for the most part, it wasn’t that bad. Or at least he’d focused on the bright side. This was the first person who was allowing and actively encouraging Michael to explore things about himself that he’d never gotten the chance to. If this was his fate, it wasn’t the worst.

So what if it was slightly off his game and tired and hadn’t had nearly enough alone time with Alex. It was better than having none of those at all.

“Alright, lift the truck again,” Eff said, pulling out his stopwatch, “And I swear to God, if you drop it again, I’m going to kick your ass.”

Rolling his eyes, Michael held out his hand and focused. The 5,000lb truck was definitely a strain on his abilities, but it felt so nice. It was like an itch that he’d been waiting to scratch, a muscle being stretched, a lung filling with air. This was what he needed. Yesterday, he’d been able to hold it up for 45 seconds before he got a nosebleed and dropped it. Before the needle, he’d again only got to 45 seconds before he had to put it down to prevent dropping it again. No nosebleed.

Now, a little stretched out and a little more excited about what he could do, he fought through the shakiness and ignored the itchy feeling of an oncoming bloody nose. He breathed steadily and just focused. Eventually, though, he gave out and put the car down, dropping to his knees and catching his breath. He wiped his nose and caught his breath.

“One minute, seven seconds. Not bad,” Eff said. Michael smiled. “Now throw the ball.”

Michael took a few extra seconds to breathe before slowly getting back to his feet. He turned his attention to the steel ball that was somewhere around 100lbs, give or take. Michael breathed in deep before picking it up and hurling it as hard as his body would allow at a mat that was propped up 20 yards away that was only there to stop it from going too far.

“Only 35mph,” Eff said.

“You didn’t give me enough time to recover,” Michael argued.

“Doesn’t excuse your shitty number,” he said. Michael clenched his jaw. And he was almost doing good. “Get inside, we’re doing a few more pressure points.”

“Do you know when you’ll let me go home? I have homework,” Michael said, still staring out into the distance.

“Why are you doing homework still?” Eff scoffed.

Michael was about to ask why he wouldn’t, but then he remembered who he was talking to. Eff didn’t see a need because he didn’t think Michael would have a future.

He’d be the one personally making sure he didn’t.

-

Alex walked into the Crashdown with his eyes tied to his phone.

Ever since last Saturday had ended in him holding Michael all night, things had been a little weird. He couldn’t put his finger on it exactly, just that Michael’s mind wasn’t always with him. He wasn’t begging Alex to come over every night like he usually did, simply satisfied with making out in the back of the truck before Alex had to go home. Tuesday Alex had gone to his house to surprise him only to be told Michael wasn’t home. It’d caused so much embarrassment Alex refused to even drive in that direction unless Michael specifically asked ever again.

Alex didn’t want to push or assume or be that guy. Being with Michael was fun and nice, but there was clearly something going on with him and if he was having second thoughts about them, Alex wasn’t about to try and beg him to stay. Besides, it might not even be that. He might be embarrassed for breaking down or there might be a football thing Alex didn’t know about or any number of things. He didn’t know, he hadn’t really gotten the chance to ask. He wasn’t going to act like Michael was pulling away until he knew for sure. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t stare at his phone.

Good timing, too, because it rang.

“Hello, littlest brother,” Flint said loudly into the phone, clearly on speaker with the sound of a car running in the background. Alex smiled just as Arturo, the owner of the Crashdown, came up to take his order.

“Hey, give me one second,” he said, moving the phone to tell Arturo his order. He nodded and told him to tell Flint that he said hi. “Mr. Ortecho said hi.”

“Hello, Mr. Ortecho!” Flint said loud enough that Arturo heard it. He chuckled and walked back into the kitchen. “So, I got some good news.”

“What is it? You finally got that stick surgically removed from your ass?”

“I’m personally offended by that. I thought we were on the same team when it came to the stick being in Clay’s ass,” Flint said. Alex huffed a laugh. “No, but I’m coming into town soon.”

“Wait, for real?” Alex asked, excitement coursing through his system. As much as his brothers annoyed him and he thought Flint was just as lame for listening to their father, he loved them. He also loved not having to be alone with his dad all the time. “When?”

“I’m thinking Monday or Tuesday? Soon, I’ll keep you updated so we can make plans,” Flint said, “Gotta give some shit to Dad.”

“Okay, yeah, can’t wait,” Alex said.

“Tell me something fun, though, what’s going on with you? Anything new?” Flint asked.

Alex bit down on his lip and wondered if he should mention Michael. He wanted to. He never really came out to Flint, but he was pretty sure Flint knew and didn’t care. Either way, he wanted to share like he shared with Maria and Liz even if it was just because he wanted to say “hey look at this thing I got even though Dad said no”. Even though he was kind of unsure about where exactly they stood, this was still an achievement. This was still his. That counted.

“I’ve, uh,” he said, glancing around quickly. There was a table of cheerleaders from his school in the corner, but they were too far to hear. “I’ve kinda been talking to someone.”

“Oh, what? My baby brother is suddenly not such a baby?” Flint teased. Alex smiled and rolled his eyes.

“My not being a baby has nothing to do with having a relationship. I haven’t been a baby for a long time.”

“Yeah, okay, I’ll believe that one day, maybe,” Flint said, “So, tell me about them.”

“It’s not, like, super serious or anything,” Alex said, hesitating just a little as he considered if he was ready to officially come out via pronouns, “But… he’s really nice and smart and I like him a lot. I think you’d like him, he’s got the same rebellious-but-not-really vibe you do.”

“Oh, so you chose someone with the same vibe as me? Glad I showed you what good taste was,” Flint said. Alex laughed. When Arturo brought his tray over, he mouthed his thanks. “Well, is he making you happy? Does he know you have a brother who will kick his ass if he isn’t?”

“He does make me happy, yeah,” Alex promised, “But I’m not telling him your threats.”

“Fair enough,” he said, “Maybe I can tell him myself when I come to see you.”

Alex chewed on his lip for a second. “I don’t know, I’d have to ask him.”

“Well, do that. We’ll even go somewhere outside of Roswell if it makes you two feel a little better.”

“I’ll ask,” Alex repeated, “And, uh, thanks. For being cool.”

“You say that like I’m not the coolest person you know,” Flint said, “Alright, weirdo, I’ll let you eat. Call you later. Love you.”

“Love you too.”

Alex put his phone down, feeling more confident that he had in a few days. He probably wasn’t actually going to ask Michael. Things were already a little weird and he didn’t want to press, so he’d probably just lie and say Michael wasn’t ready for all that. But, still, it was nice to know that Flint asked. He was interested.

It gave him enough confidence to text Michael first, deciding that it wasn’t too needy to reach out instead of waiting for Michael to do it. He sent a simple hey and then got to his food.

“Hey, Alex,” a sing-songy voice said. Alex looked towards it to see one of the cheerleaders. He furrowed his eyebrows, chewing slower as she sat on the stool beside him. She had never said a word to him before. He didn’t even know her name.

“Uh, hi?”

“Sorry if I’m bothering you, but I wanted to come talk to you. I mean, we’re friends, right?” she said. Alex felt like he was falling into a trap.

“I guess.”

“I just wanted to let you know that when you come to the games, you can sit up front with the rest of the guys’ girlfriends,” she said. Alex kept staring at her with a confused expression. “If you come, I mean. I haven’t seen you at any of the games before.”

“Why would I go to a football game?” Alex asked slowly. She smiled even wider.

“To watch Michael play, silly,” she said, “It’s a part of dating a football player.”

“I’m not dating a football player,” Alex said. And he wasn’t. Or, at least, not that she needed to know. He didn’t owe any of them that knowledge.

“Come on, you can tell me,” she pressed. He just stared. “I’m just letting you know that you’re welcome to sit by us. We can all gossip. We’d love to hear what it’s like to actually date Michael. He’s always been super interested in just really quiet hookups. I guess I can see why.”

“Yeah, well,” Alex said. He still couldn’t quite tell if she was making fun of him or not. The rest of the girls at the table weren’t laughing, but…

“You don’t have to,” she said, flashing the biggest smile it felt like he’d ever seen, “I just wanted you to know that we think it’s super cool we finally have a gay football player. We think you guys are just so cute.”

Alex wondered how many more times he could listen to people call Michael gay when they knew literally nothing about him before he lost it.

“How are we cute when we’re not together?” Alex asked. She rolled her eyes playfully.

“You know what I mean. The whole two separate looks, it’s perfect,” she said. Alex’s phone saved him by going off and Alex immediately gave it his attention.

Michael: i was just thinking about you where are you

Alex: Crashdown

Michael: room for 1 more?

Alex: For you? Always

Michael: 😍

“Is that Michael?” the girl asked, bringing him back to the conversation. He looked at her.

“Yeah,” he said honestly. He didn’t want to be rude. She wasn’t technically being rude. But, still, he wasn’t sure if she was or not. “Thanks for the offer, by the way, but I’m fine. You don’t have to sit with me.”

“Okay, okay,” she said, holding up her hands in surrender, “It was nice talking to you.”

“Mhm,” Alex hummed. He spared her a glance as she walked back to her friends and saw them giggling which wasn’t a good sign. He took a deep breath and tried to focus on his food.

Within the next couple minutes, the bell above the door dinged and a warm presence sat close beside Alex. He looked up to see Michael standing beside him. He had on a big smile despite the fact that his eyes had dark circles beneath them. It again had him questioning if something was actually going on and not just him questioning their relationship.

“Hey,” Alex said.

“Hey,” Michael said back, reaching over him to grab a fry from his tray.

“Get your own,” Alex said, unsuccessfully trying to stop him from shoving the fry into his mouth. Michael just smiled as he chewed and Alex was too charmed to be irritated. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever.”

“Me too, this week has been a lot,” Michael said softly, sitting down on the stool beside him and pulling it close, “But I wanna see you more. What are your plans tonight?”

“I gotta have the car back by 8, but I can sneak out if you wanna come get me,” Alex suggested. Michael nodded.

“Yeah, we can do that,” he said, reaching over to steal more of Alex’s fries. 

“Dude, do you want to order food?” Alex laughed. He shook his head.

“I’ll just eat yours.”

Alex rolled his eyes, but he didn’t argue. Instead, he stared at him as they ate. Not only did he have dark circles under his eyes, but he was also chewing slow and seeming to zone out just by sitting there. And Alex was beginning to really think that it had nothing to do with their relationship.

“Hey,” Alex said, “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Michael said.

Alex considered just leaving it. But he left it last time and things had clearly not gotten any better. His eyes drifted over to the girls at the table, noticing that they were not-so-subtly watching them as if they were an exhibit in a zoo. He tried not to let it bother him as he leaned a little closer.

“Seriously, what’s going on? You’re worrying me,” Alex told him quietly. Michael made eye contact with him and gave him that little tiny smile that felt like it was only for him. Maybe it was. “Stop it, tell me. Are you sick or something? Is something going on?” 

“You are my favorite person in the whole world, Alex Manes,” he said. Alex tilted his head in that no-nonsense way that just made Michael smile wider. “I’ve been helping Max fix his car, sorry I didn’t really let you know. It’s been taking up my time. And it’s just been one of those weeks. I’m okay.”

“So you’re not just trying to get rid of me either?” Alex clarified. It was honestly relieving to see that it wasn’t anything too bad. Michael’s eyes widened a little bit.

“No, absolutely not. I want to see you more, this week has sucked without you,” he said, batting those eyelashes, “It’s really hard to sleep well without you anymore.”

“Mm, well, maybe I’ll help you get to some good sleep tonight,” Alex said, a suggestive tone in his voice. Michael grinned, his tongue pressing to the back of his teeth.

“Can I touch you in public or is that a no go?” Michael asked. Alex again found himself looking over to the cheerleaders. “No?”

“They were asking me about us earlier,” Alex said, “Told me I could sit with the other guys’ girlfriends and we could all gossip. And that we’re so cute.”

“I think we’re pretty cute,” Michael told him, still smiling. When Alex didn’t respond right away, it faded. “Were they bothering you?”

“No, I just…” Alex said, trying to find the right words. He didn’t have them. Instead, he thought about his conversation with Flint and how good that felt to just be. To talk and act like there was nothing to even think about. He wanted that. “Yeah, you can touch me.”

“You sure?” Michael said. Alex nodded.

“Nothing too extreme.”

“Obviously, that’s for later,” he said. Alex snorted, but let Michael just move closer and rest his head on his shoulder. He could feel the way his body immediately released some tension. 

He couldn’t wait to get him alone so he could remove the rest.

-

“Michael.”

“Nope, not talking about this with you.”

“Michael! This isn’t just about you! This affects us! Stop fucking avoiding us so you can do what you want!”

Michael sighed, bowing his head. He took a few deep breaths and opened his eyes slowly, looking at the engine he was working on. It helped to work with his hands. All the shit he was doing with Eff was too much with his mind and it was nice to just turn it off and use his hands. And, besides, this was the one day it seemed Eff had no interest in doing tests. He planned to just work on this car until Alex could come back over. 

But apparently, he had to still use his brain today.

“What do you want me to say?” Michael asked as he turned to face Max and Isobel. They both looked angry at him. Which was fair. He’d been avoiding them as much as possible. He didn’t want Eff to get any interest in them. They were going to have a future. They weren’t going to end up like him. 

And, besides, he should’ve known this was coming. People were talking about him and Alex. He had no drive to stop them. He had way bigger problems than people gossiping about his love life even if that meant having his siblings find out through someone else.

“Well, first off, why aren’t you talking to us? Did you think we wouldn’t notice?” Isobel asked.

“And are you actually dating Alex? Because what happens when something goes wrong? What happens when he gets hurt?” Max added.

“Or what happens when you get hurt?” Isobel said, “If he breaks up with you or realizes you’re lying to him? Because you are lying to him.”

“And don’t even think about telling him. This isn’t some small little thing, Michael, this is our lives.”

“You don’t think I know that?” Michael asked. He intended for it to have more bite than it actually did. He wanted to be angry with them, but it was hard when they weren’t wrong. Michael was stupid. It was how he ended up being the one caught by Eff. “Look, I’m being safe.”

“Michael,” Isobel said, stepping up to him. She had that concerned look in her eye that made it hard not to listen. “We don’t lie to each other, okay? That’s not something we can do when it’s just the three of us. We were there when you decided to join the football team and I helped you fake all your physicals, you remember? We’re not trying to hold you back. This is something extremely serious.”

“I know it is,” Michael said, “I just… I like him, Isobel. He makes me feel good. I don’t want to give that up just because I’m not human.”

“But we said‒”

“I know what we said,” Michael sighed, looking to Max and then back to Isobel before he closed his eyes, “But, I can promise you, it’s okay. We’re not toxic to them. Nothing has happened to Alex or the girls I’ve slept with. They’re all fine. We don’t have to be alone like this.”

They stared at him, unreadable expressions. He was anticipating them to yell at him and he was prepared to bury himself in a hole until he felt better. But they didn’t yell. They just stared.

“How long have you known?” Max asked. Michael took a deep breath.

“About two years,” he answered honestly. Max scoffed.

“So, what, I kept away from Liz for no reason?” he asked. Michael didn’t have the heart to tell him that he didn’t think he would’ve gone after Liz anyway. 

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Isobel wondered.

“I didn’t want you to be mad at me for breaking the deal,” Michael admitted, rubbing his eye, “I, I should’ve told you. A while ago. That wasn’t fair of me and I’m sorry. And I’m sorry for ignoring you, I’ve been stressed lately and I don’t want to affect you guys.”

“But you still didn’t have an answer for what happens when he realizes you’re lying to him. You can’t tell him what we are,” Max insisted. Michael immediately shook his head.

“I swear, I won’t. You two come first always.”

“Do we? Because It doesn’t sound like it.”

He swallowed harshly, closing his eyes. He thought about the other day when Eff had pricked him with that needle on his wrist and it had triggered waves of power that he couldn’t control that had sent him into a seizure-like state or when he pricked the one on his neck and that same power paralyzed him until he cried, both times immediately followed by Eff bringing him outside to test again. At the moment, it hadn’t seemed like it was that bad. He was still free and still had Alex. He still wouldn’t wish it onto Max and Isobel.

“Trust me,” Michael said, “You come first.”

“This is bullshit, Michael. You’re being stupid,” Max scolded.

“Max,” Isobel said, “Come on, this is good news, isn’t it? We can be normal.”

“Normal,” Max echoed, huffing a laugh, “I can never be normal."

"But, normal enough, right? College, wife, kids, white picket fence?" Michael pointed out, "You can have that. It's safe."

"Since when have you wanted that?" Max scoffed. And Michael didn't want that. It had always sounded boring. But with his current circumstances, that was an unachievable paradise. He wanted Max and Isobel to take it and run with it.

"I don't, but you guys do," he offered lamely.

"You really like Alex that much?" Isobel asked, "That you're finally telling us this?"

"Yeah, I do," Michael said. It wasn't a lie. He did like Alex that much. Just… it wasn't the entire reason. 

"And you're happy?"

Somehow, that felt like a trick question.

"Yes," he said.

"Then we're happy," Isobel said, "Shut up, Max."

Michael wished that was a sign everything would be that easy. That maybe when it came out that he lied to them again about something a million times worse that they wouldn't be angry. He just had to tell himself that.

But, later, when Alex came over again, he still found himself feeling wrong and off. He was wondering if he was always going to feel wrong and off for the rest of his life.

Alex, however, was a nice distraction from the bullshit. He was reading a book for class and Michael had wedged himself between his legs, his knees hooked over his shoulders and his head resting comfortably between his thighs. If he stayed right there, nothing could hurt him.

He breathed slow and closed his eyes, trying to convince himself that this was worth every single mistake. Alex's warm skin against his cheeks, the grounding presence of his feet on his stomach, his hand in his hair, the door and the window locked, and nothing but the sound of the AC and Alex turning pages filling his mind. This was the safest space in the world. He refused to believe differently.

Michael dozed in and out of consciousness, his mind drained and wanting sleep more than he was able to give. He was almost actually asleep until the sky decided to be a bitch and thunder loud enough to wake him up. He slowly dragged his eyes open, his fingers gliding over the unrealistically soft hair on his thigh. He pressed his nose into his skin, breathing him in. Then he pressed his lips there and reveled in the way Alex shifted a little in response. It wasn't until he parted his lips and carefully bit into the sweet skin of his inner thigh that Alex actually reacted. He tightened his legs around him, giving him a little squeeze that was way hotter than it was meant to be.

"Excuse you," Alex scolded, voice soft and a little deeper than usual as if he'd fallen asleep too. It made Michael smile. This really was safe. 

"It's right here in my face, what do you want from me? I only have so much self-control," Michael said. Alex chuckled, his hand taking through his curls before tugging a little.

He spread his legs wider and urged Michael up to move up. Michael complied, laying beside him and accepting the kiss he gave. He didn't want tomorrow to come. Tomorrow meant more Eff, more work, more stress. Today meant this.

"Hey, can I ask you something?" Alex asked, "You can say no and I won't be mad even a little."

"What's up?" Michael asked. He couldn't imagine telling Alex no.

"You remember that brother I told you about? He's coming into town," Alex said, not really making eye contact. Michael hummed. "Would you wanna meet him?"

"You want me to meet your brother?" Michael asked. Alex shrugged and nodded.

"It could be fun. He said we could go somewhere outside of Roswell so it won't be too bad," Alex urged, "You can say no."

Michael stared at him and weighed his options. He didn't mind saying yes. If it was before he ran into Eff, he would've said yes in a heartbeat. But now things were a little different and he didn't want to make such important plans when he had no idea when he would steal him for the evening.

"Um, can I say yes but pull out if I need to?" Michael asked. Alex eyed him but nodded slowly. 

"You really can just say no."

"I want to go, though. Things have just been weird lately and something might come up. I'll let you know if it does, though," Michael said.

"Like what?" Alex asked.

"Like if Sanders needs me to help him or Isobel needs me to come get her. I'm surrounded by needy people lately and it's making it really hard for me to be needy towards you," Michael teased. Alex smiled and reached out, touching his cheek softly.

"Okay, whatever works," he said, "He just wants to meet you."

"And I want to meet him," Michael promised, "But, uh, does this mean you're my boyfriend? 'Cause this feels awfully official."

Alex grinned and rolled his eyes, pushing himself into Michael for a long kiss. Michael pulled him even closer.

It was the nicest yes he'd ever gotten.

#malex #malex fic #michael guerin #alex manes #rnm fic #my fic #verse: from a whisper to a scream #and now i go get my car fixed after having no window for 3 months

[pastelwitchling]

FanScription - Caulfield

Let’s pretend, for a moment, that Caulfield was as important as it was made to seem. Let’s pretend they hadn’t introduced it in the same episode in which they destroyed it. Let’s pretend this building that held Michael’s mother and so many more aliens inside for decades didn’t appear only to be blown up a few minutes later.

Let’s pretend that Caulfield was given the amount of respect it deserved.

Imagine if Caulfield had first been brought up in 1x02.

What if Max, starting from the pilot, was already mindlessly writing about Caulfield? We know he loves writing, well what if it’s been something that’s often taken hold of him? Something he couldn’t help but do when he was remembering something from his forgotten past that has to do with where he and his siblings came from?

Imagine we always saw Max writing something in his journal, though we never understood what. Neither, evidently, did Max. He would just be jotting things down, and all of a sudden, it would be as if the words had taken control, and Max would wake from a kind of trance in which he looks down on his paper and sees random words put together that he doesn’t remember writing, and that seemingly make no sense.

This is not the first time Max has written this paragraph without realizing it. With a sigh, he tears this picture out and tosses it on a pile of other pieces of paper on which he’s written the exact same thing, older paragraphs written in crayon, some in marker, some in pen, to mark the passage of time. Of years spent with Max writing this paragraph, never understanding why, but unable to ever get rid of the paper, unable to explain the reasoning behind it even to himself.

It means something, he’d always think.

(The fact that Max always kept this paper signified that, despite telling his siblings that they ought not to worry about where they really came from, he himself has been curious and unable to forget or keep from wondering. This would’ve been meaningful because it shows a connection between Max and Michael in a time when they both -- Michael especially -- feel they have nothing at all in common, and therefore there’s no link between them.)

Moving on. Upon Liz’s return, because his feelings are on overdrive, and because all of their feelings are connected to their powers, Max’s dreams become clearer, more vivid. Max starts seeing tortured people, people he doesn’t know but feels a certain kinship with. And there’s a woman, beaten and bloody, asking for her son. She wants her son to hear her, to stay safe.

This woman is Nora, Michael’s mother. Max, of course, doesn’t know who she is, and begins to wonder whether or not it’s his own mother he sees.

Max tells Isobel of his visions, something he’d discussed with his siblings over the years, but as they’d never seemed to lead anywhere, nothing was ever done about them. This time, though, things are different. Max considers telling Michael what he’d seen, but as usual, he gets into an argument with his brother almost the minute he sets foot at the junkyard. Max realizes that Michael is too resentful already of the luck Max has had, and decides that mentioning that he may have seen his mother would tip the scales on his relationship with his brother for the worst. So he doesn’t say anything.

As the episodes go on, Max and Liz have their moments with the occasional scenes of Max jotting down that same paragraph, scenes that seemingly aren’t important. We also get far more Team Human moments (for another fanscription), much more of them working together.

In 1x09, instead of getting They-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named at the end, we have Jenna letting herself into Max’s house. He told her where the spare key was so she could leave behind sheriff reports to fill out and other documents. She can’t get hold of Max’s cellphone because there’s no reception where he is, and she comes by this time to leave him a note for when he gets back, as well as some Project Shepherd documents. She’s telling him that Jesse Manes has been keeping tabs on him and his siblings, and that he needed to get in touch with her as soon as possible.

Jenna’s about to leave, but then she catches sight of the bundle of torn paper, all scribbled with the same encrypted message that makes no sense. Something about it seems familiar, but she can’t figure out what. This turns out to be the same encrypted messages Jim had written about in his final few weeks, messages all about Caulfield. When Max gets back, Jenna is practically waiting for him. She’s holding a few of the papers and while Max greets her with a curious and wary, “Hey,” Jenna firmly responds with, “I think Alex Manes will know what to do with these.”

Max, feeling discouraged after his failed road trip, tries to wave Jenna off. He tells her he’s been writing that stuff since he was a kid, that it doesn’t mean anything. But Jenna tells him she thinks she’s seen it somewhere before. When Max asks her what she means, she explains about Project Shepherd and Alex Manes’s role in everything.

“Did you say, Alex Manes?” Max says, startled at the thought of this man, and the coincidental timing as he and his brother had talked about him not that long ago.

“He’ll know what this means,” Jenna says confidently, and Max wants to put his faith in his trusted friend.

He goes to see Alex who’s surprised and confused as to why Michael’s brother would come to him for help, and with a glance at Jenna, Max tells him everything he knows. Alex asks Max why he would trust him. Max merely says that it’s because of what Alex means to Michael.

Alex says he’ll try to decipher the message, but that he won’t go forward with anything until Max tells Michael about it all.

“One of us should be honest with him,” Alex says. (It’s supposed to be meaningful because it signifies just how much of a liar Alex feels like whenever he walks away from Michael, when in reality, it’s his own fear that forces him away. He feels like, with every cold word, he’s lying to Michael’s face, not doing what he wants to do more than anything, and just be with Michael. He doesn’t want to feel like Michael’s brother is lying to him, too. It’s a confession and shows the reality of Alex’s feelings and thoughts towards Michael without expressly saying them.)

So Max gathers his siblings at the bunker and tells them everything. Michael keeps glancing at Alex who is busy at the computer attempting to decipher the paragraph Max has given him.

The information then leads them to Caulfield, but this time, Team Human and the Pod Squad go. Together, they all disable the security (which there should’ve been a lot more of) and make their way inside.

(It’s ridiculous to me that in an entire facility filled with aliens, only one member of the Pod Squad was there. I -- what? Also, Noah is knocked out completely, so they just have Liz monitoring him with more yellow pollen, just in case. She knows how important this is to them, and it’s essential they all go, as they all have personal attachments to this mission.)

Similarly to the episode, they find their way inside, and there’s a moment when the Pod Squad look through the cells through which all its residents have come to their glass doors to witness these younger aliens. Max and Isobel don’t know who to go towards first (Max is wondering where the blonde woman from his dreams is), but Michael feels himself guided by an invisible force, pulling him along to Nora’s cell. They all discover very quickly that this woman is Michael’s mother, and not Max’s.

(It’s meant to be a sweet moment because Michael has had to live with the reality of Max being chosen over and over, Max with the luck, Max who’s the most beloved. But at the sight of his mother, he cries because all the years of losing to Max seem pointless in this moment.)

Same as the episode -- Michael attempts to break through the glass (this time despite his brother’s warning), and the alarms go off. Alex is with Flint while Jenna tries to get information on where Charlie is through a flash drive that Alex created that would allow her to access Caulfield’s databases, but Kyle runs back to tell him exactly what he’d told him in 1x12.

Kyle resolves to go get Jenna while Alex goes to get the Pod Squad. Alex gets to the cells to find Max unable to malfunction the circuits without quickening the countdown. Neither of Michael’s siblings can free any of the other aliens, nor can they convince Michael to leave; he won’t even look at them as he tries to free his mother.

Cue Alex, “you’re my family,” and “I don’t look away.” Michael realizes that Alex won’t go if he doesn’t. He has his final moment with his mother, and both Team Human and the Pod Squad make it out.

As Michael stares down the remains of Caulfield, Max and Isobel stand beside him, all gazing upon the ruins of their people, and the camera stills on the three of them, together, watching the destruction of all they never knew they’d needed. Max looks at his brother and sister and realizes; the time for pretending is over. They can’t go on anymore without knowing the truth about who they are.

This was my first fanscription, I don’t know how many more of these I’ll do. It depends on whether or not it’s received well, I suppose. I usually think of ways the show could’ve made more sense, how certain storylines could’ve flowed better. That’s always a big thing for me, so I’m glad I was able to share it this time. Let me know if you’d want to see more fanscriptions, and tell me what you thought of this one! Did you like my version of things, did you prefer the original, did you have your own ideas for this storyline? Whatever you have to say.

All right. It’s late, and I’m dying. I’m going to bed.

#rnm fanscription #max evans #alex manes #michael guerin #malex #isobel evans #jenna cameron #the pod squad #team human #roswell new mexico #roswell nm

[nostalgiaruinedme]

For the ficlet starters: 5, for the 2012 turtles, I can’t really think of a specific character or ship to go with it though, hope that’s okay

Prompt: “What the hell did I just walk into?”

Characters: Raphael and Donatello

Summary: Raph catches his little brother stressing himself out and pulling yet another all nighter

Tcest DNI

Sorry this took so long anon lol, I kept changing what I wanted to write for this and then made it a lot longer than I initially planned because I have a problem with doing that. But anyways... Hope you enjoy!

"Okay, you have two seconds to explain. What the hell did I just walk into?"

 Raph saw the fear flash through Donnie's eyes as his little brother realized he had been caught. He jumped and stared at Raph, a deer caught in the headlights and not expecting it at all. But really, it shouldn't have been a surprise. Even Raph knew it was a bad idea to leave your lights on in the middle of the night (er, day) when they were all supposed to be asleep, especially if your door was cracked open too. That was just asking for someone to wander in and catch you missing more sleep than you're supposed to. 

"Oh, hey Raph," Donnie grinned nervously, staring at his brother from his spot at his desk. "What are you doing up?"

"I'm pretty sure I just asked you that."

"Uh..." 

Raph stared at Donnie's lab—if you could even call it that anymore. With the piles of scrap metal, crumpled up papers, mixed up containers, and trash, you could tell Raphael that it was an abandoned junkyard and he'd almost believe you. It was a mess. But as bad as it was, the condition was still nothing compared to the state his little brother was in. 

His eyes were bloodshot, and his mask had been pulled up slightly. A rare occurrence on its own, but it revealed the dark circles under his eyes that aged him by decades. Donnie slouched over and rested his cheek on his hand, blinking a second too long and struggling to keep his eyes open each time. If it weren't for the scattered cans of energy drinks and coffee mugs surrounding him, he'd have already passed out where he was; Raphael was sure of it.

"You gonna explain what this is?"

"I'm busy." Donnie crossed his arms, defensive. Raph rolled his eyes.

"You're not pulling another all nighter, are you?" He asked. He blinked when the trash can besides his desk caught his eye, or rather the empty energy drink cans inside it did. "Don, you better not have been pulling two all nighters."

Donnie grimaced, "I didn't!"

"Really?"

"Okay," He admitted, "But I have good reason, I swear. This new upgrade for the shellraiser-"

"-can wait," Raph finished for him. standing up and walking over to Donnie. The purple clad turtle shrunk back slightly, jaw clenched and eyes narrowed in determination. Raph crossed his arms across his plastron.

"You can finish whatever the hell you're doing tomorrow. You're going to bed."

"No I'm not!" Donnie exclaimed, springing out of his seat. His hand flew to the shelf besides him and clutched on it tightly as he blinked several times, swaying slightly. Raphael glared.

"Dude, you just got dizzy the second you stood up. Have you done anything but sit there and work today?"

"I got more coffee..." Donnie mumbled. And Raph made his decision.

"That's it, you're going to bed."

Grabbing his little brother by the back of the shell, Raph dragged him over to the lab exit. Donnie flared indignantly and hit his arm several times, trying to pull away, but Raph moved too quickly for it to be of any use.

"Raph! Seriously?!"

"You're going to bed before you pass out," Raph said, shoving him inside his bedroom. Donnie rarely spent any time in here, compared to his lab. Aside from his bed, everything looked practically brand new. He lived in his lab anyways. Donnie was never one for decoration as it was, so personalizing and appreciating one's bedroom just wasn't necessary for him, for some reason. 

Raph didn't really get it, but that was a problem for another day.

Donnie stood up, crossing his arms and trying to leave the room. Raph refused to move from his spot in front of the door, effectively blocking the exit, and his brother sighed.

"I'm not getting out of this, am I?"

"Nope."

"Fine, whatever. I'll sleep for a half hour." Donnie compromised.

"Don't think I won't barricade your door."

"Okay!" Donnie threw up his hands in defeat, "Fine, you win! I'll sleep for the day. You happy?"

Raph didn't move, making sure to see Donnie actually lay down on his bed before he relaxed. Donnie was sneaky and would try and get back to his tech at any cost, but Raph knew he was absolutely exhausted too, even if he pretended otherwise. Raph wasn't that tired. If necessary, he'd fight him over it gladly, and Donnie knew it.

Even if Donnie wasn't particularly happy about the situation, he knew there was no way of getting around Raph when he got like this. He reluctantly crawled into bed, facing the wall with his shell to his brother. Raph nodded in approval, and turned to leave.

The situation was dealt with, Donnie was going to sleep. Raph was perfectly happy with the situation as it was—he could go back to his own room now. 

"Hey Raph?"

The red turtle paused in the doorway, glancing back over his shoulder and making a small "hmm?" sound. Nothing happened for several long seconds, and Raph wondered if Donnie had fallen asleep on him. 

But then the quiet whisper came from his direction.

"Thanks."

Raph hesitated, smiling slightly (it was safe to, since Donnie wasn't facing him anyways. No one could prove it happened). He huffed out a small chuckle.

"No problem, nerd. Now get some sleep."

#tmnt #tmnt 2012 #teenage mutant ninja turtles #tmnt fic #tmnt donnie #tmnt raphael #tmnt raph #tmnt donatello