#I do have a window in my cell so I can still watch the bald man play

[alavestineneas]

i can feel the soil falling over my head; no people are here, just the void in my chest

pairing: Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen x fem!reader summary: Harkonnen men rarely wed; they just take what they capture—men and women—and turn them into slaves. Some, if particularly sweet, are reserved for fucking. There are no special songs for that; there isn't a specific word in their native tongue for wife, either. warnings: mentions of death, violence, implied/referenced child abuse, religious symbolism, daddy and sister issues, bald men chapter 1 - chapter 2 word count: 6,5K

author's note: hi beautiful people! this chapter may be classified as a prologue (yes, I am aware of its size, sorry, lol), but it is still integral to the story. we love evil people, especially evil bald people, in this house, so have fun and don't forget to wash your hands before reading! also, if you see things that are not canon, just know that me and the books are two parallel lines and we do not cross. feel free to point out grammar mistakes, though - english is not my first. love you!

Kaitain, 10176 AG

The violent streaks of light fight with the heavy cloth of drapes to find their way into the small, stifling chambers. The time was slowly crawling towards noon in the heavy summer heat, and the woman lying on the heavily decorated sheets was battling to get a breath in. Whether because of the annoying star, or the poisoning waiting, the patterns of sweat stained her tired face with esculent ornaments. Her lips, formed into a thin line, gleamed with small spots of dried crimson.

''Where is the messenger?'' The woman's voice was barely above a whisper, her eyes glued to the dancing light filtering through the window. ''The girl is strong; I can't hold her for much longer.''

The black figure on the chair in the corner slightly shifted at words. She was veiled, despite the heat—like a black hole, she seemed to suck the little air left. ''Forbearance,'' her raspy voice cuts through the room. ''The child makes you impatient. Control yourself.''

''I've waited, and waited long enough,'' the woman snapped, her frustration evident in her trembling hands. ''A few more minutes and all that is left of her will be a corpse.''

''Be quiet, Echidna. The child will live. If not, she was never meant to be part of our world in the first place.''

The woman clenched her jaw in a wave of pain and nodded. The girl ought to see the light of this planet today. Deep in her thoughts, she almost missed the rushed steps behind the door.

One of the Emperor's guards burst into the room, his eyes almost frantic. ''Lady Anirul has graced the Imperium with a daughter.''

Echidna smiled in relief, but her expression quickly changed as a beast-like cry pierced the air. The child was coming, with little care for the damage it caused to her aching womb. She tore the tissue down to the individual cells, gnawing her way with fists and elbows, moving the bones aside with brute force. Soon, her own cries were answered by much louder ones, as the head of the girl showed itself, covered in a thick layer of almost black blood. Just for a moment, the woman wished it would not steal another breath from the room, but she sharply composed herself. With a final push, the child left her body forever, leaving it a raw wound.

The small creature shrieked when the black figure approached, and slender, wrinkled arms took it from the warmth of rufous-red liquid. Echidna watched as the figure carried the girl away, resting her hurting body against the soaked pillows. She fulfilled her duty; she granted Bene   Gesserit the daughter they wanted. She is bleeding under a beautiful sun; she is holding the ghost of her child in her arms—the real one was never hers anyway. Echidna knows the Emperor will not come. From now on, it is just her and her never-passing pain. Thus, Kaitain, home to the Corrino dynasty, was warmed by the light of a new sun—Princess Irulan, an heiress to the Imperium—and chilled by the shadow of her sister, born a few minutes later.

-

The calmness of the gardens was disturbed only by the soft strokes of brushes against a thick canvas. YN sighed, her eyes still fixed on the tree nearby, its young branches swaying with the wind. Her body ached from stillness, the tension in her neck from holding her head slightly bowed spreading down to her small back. They posed for a portrait of what seemed like an eternity to a child, and was almost it to an adult who dared to inquire; the painter, while satisfied with the draft, looked at the group of young girls almost in fear—no normal child of that age would be unmoving for three hours. And yet, they were.

YN felt one of her sisters shift even through the thick fabric of her silver dress. Small Chalice turned, her cheeks red from the heat or tiredness, her lips forming a pout—the child was tired, sleepingly rubbing her eyes. YN thought for a moment, debating if the punishment would be worth it, or if her sisters could wait just a little bit more until the man with colours would end the session for today. She noticed how Irulan's face was starting to droop, her eyes fluttering closed and opening just a second later. Their youngest, Wensicia, was already asleep in Irulan's arms; her golden hair spread across her and YN's laps as a beautiful cover, shining under the faint sun.

''I am tired, Master Chen. We should end the painting for today,'' YN finally spoke; her voice was almost a whisper. She did not know whether it was not to awaken her sister or out of fear of the Emperor's anger; it did not matter. The man nodded and left, taking his canvases with him, leaving only a few drafts behind. Then, the sisters were left alone in the garden.

''Thank you,'' Irulan said softly, placing her head on YN's shoulder.

YN only nodded. Her eyes found the paper not so far away, her gaze studying the strokes of the pencil with interest. Wensicia, a beautiful girl of two, was smiling brightly, holding an olive branch in her chubby hands, her small feet peeking under the hem of her white dress. Small Chalice was at the opposite end of her, her curly hair surrounding her head like a halo as she leaned forward, holding a small dove inside her palms. Then, sitting at the bench, surrounded by lush greenery and bushes, they. Irulan and the Other.

YN was placed just a step away from her older sister, her head turned away from the gaze of the viewer. The delicate folds of her silver dress carefully cascaded down, creating an air of mist around them. Her hands were empty; she did not know if the artist hadn't decided with each object to grace her with, or left them hollow intently. She looked like a shadow—a ghost, maybe; her eyes were escaping the viewer as if hiding a secret.

Irulan was different. She was a sun-kissed creature, her head facing straight ahead. Her eyes, as if inviting for a challenge, were made from duty, steel. With a burning star on her regal forehead, crowning the streaks of golden hair, Irulan was water and air, dulcet and ever-bending; her figure held the place and her pose was distinct and commanding.

YN looked at the girl beside her, who was now quiet nearby. Irualn was wise, the wisest of the sisters; her eyes were all-seeing, her heart all-knowing. She was created in the shape of a mother since they could walk, and the small ones bathed in her light, drinking her till the last drop —like flowers following the warm embrace of the sun. The only one who could not enjoy the love was her, the Other. The other sister, the other half. For they have been too close in age, too similar to let each other pretend the burden was not a heavy one to bear.

When Irulan was natural in her all-caring shape, YN had to claw her way to the only role left—the father. An unbent tree, a silent soldier—she was not born to fit as one, but wishing for a different order of things was almost blasphemy. That's how it always was with them—out of two, one was the protector, the other - the protected. "Husband," Irulan humorously called her often. She smiled, and, for a moment, the wave of resentment in YN's soul calmed. She never called her wife in return: Irulan was too whole to be one, too proud to be moulded into. She stood alone, on a higher pedestal than all of them, closest to the Emperor, whom the Other was to call father, and closest to the Truth. No, Irulan was God.

God does not know how to love someone who is not his servant, because there is no one who would refuse to serve him; it is the only way. God guides, despite all one's protests. God gives, and God takes. God demands; Irulan demands—silent obedience without a need to explain or answer. That, she takes from their father. So, the Other takes a blade into her hand without compassion for her dead wishes and learns to wield it in God's name. She is the one little ones turn to when the world is too wicked for their fragile souls when the creatures under their beds lose all of their human form and turn violent. She takes their sins and bears the punishments, for they are not deserving of such cruelty. YN thinks not of her own guilt—what difference would one scourage make to one who counts in centuries? And when the sun shone, and God smiled, the Other almost forgot of the bruises she carried.

-

The first time he saw her, it was not supposed to happen at all. Feyd-Rautha just closed the door to Maester's chambers with such force that it shook against lean walls; the grumble echoed in the long corridors of Giedi Prime's fortness. The ache in his body was muted, but still present; the torn flesh inside his heart howled and clawed, slicing the ribcage in half. He would've screamed, or perhaps beat his hands bloody against the concrete until the dull pain turned into something as sharp as his knife's blade. Maybe he would've drowned himself in a small water bowl by his nightstand and done anything to escape the shame and humiliation that consumed him from within. But instead, Feyd-Rautha stood still, his jaw clenched tight and his breathing shallow. One day, it will pass. One day, he will see the world choke on its own spit.

That's when he noticed a small, shadow-like figure at the end of the hallway staring at him. A girl, not older than him, was in a dress so foreign to him that it hurt his eyes. The daughter of the Emperor, he guessed. One of many—only then would the golden stitching on her sleeve would make sense.

''What are you doing here?'' he barked, caring little for the common courtesy. Of course, she was a guest almost as prized as her father, but she was in his territory and dared to look at him for long enough without averting her eyes. Long enough to notice the bruising on his pale skin and a swelness surrounding his lips. Long enough to hear him cry.

''I was walking with my mother, but then I turned into the wrong hall,'' she shrugged. ''Will you be kind enough to show me the way out? Or should I find it myself?"

Feyd-Rautha ignored her question. What a weird creature she was—with cascades of hair and eyes that seemed to see too much. ''It is dangerous to walk these halls without guard, Princess.'' It is dangerous to be here, alone with him and the weapon strapped to his hip, but he did not add it.

''There is no use of guards if the one who wishes to kill you is their master.'' The girl took a step forward, pointing to the weapon at his side. "I am not afraid."

Feyd-Rautha laughed. It came out more as howling than human sounds, the abrupt nature of it ringing with high notes, tip-toeing down to hysterical; it sounded creaky, like his throat was not made for such sounds; yet here he was, laughing. ''Come,'' he gestured to her, his hand moving quickly, like ordering a slave around. ''I will show you why you should be.''

So, they walked. Inside the grandiose chambers and small rooms, filled with ancient artefacts or the newest technology Harkonnens came up with; inside the green lavish garden inside the dim castle and the training grounds, Feyd-Rautha showed every place that was built to display the greatness of his house and bestone fear inside both guests and people inhibiting it. He wanted to see the horror in the girl's eyes, to make her eyes water and her frame flee. Instead, he listened to her steady breathing just a step behind him, her curious questioning satisfying another need he did not know his heart possessed: reverence.

He was the youngest member of the ruling line, the smallest stone in the castle of power his uncle had built. His title meant nothing within these walls; he was too small in comparison to the Baron and his authority. Feyd-Rautha was feared, despite only being nine; he was the shadow in the corner that grew longer as the sun set, the whispered name that sent shivers down spines. But here, in the hallway he led the girl into, he turned out to be something else.

''Stunning,'' the girl whispered beside him.

Weapons. The walls, from the floor to the high ceilings, were covered in ritual and fighting blades. The pride of house Harkonnen, the tree of their dynasty, black, silver, golden, and steel knives, swords, and daggers gleamed in the dim light. Feyd-Rautha smiled, revealing a row of sharp teeth. "Welcome to our burial ground."

They stopped near every one, his voice briefly covering the story of each blade and his owner; barons that came before him; fighters and rules that defined their legacy. Some still have blood on them—the highest honour; some look almost virgin. The small signs underneath them tell the names of people who wielded these weapons, their stories forever immortalised in the cold metal. ''Each Harkonnen ruler is crafted a blade of his own, the one he is to honour in battle.''

The girl nodded, her fingers tracing the shape of the last blade carefully. Her palms danced around the sharp edge, taking in the ancient symbols she had no chance of knowing. ''Will you have to kill Baron Vladimir in order to have one, like he did with his father before?''

Feyd-Rautha paused. Of course, he has thought about it before. The idea he repeated like a mantra in his head for all of his short life, the belief that spread burning flames down his spine. The words left his mouth for the first time but felt almost natural against his cracked lips. ''I dream of the day I have the chance to.''

The pair of foreign eyes that stared back at him held a glint of intrigue that quickly changed with a flash of acknowledgement. Feyd-Rautha held the gaze; not a single thing about it was hard. Still, he was the first to turn away; the burning sensation of being  seen  made him want to tear his flesh apart. ''Let me escort you to your rooms, Princess. The walls grow colder as the evening approaches.''

-

The weather on the planet leaves too few guards out of their breath, Irulan notes. The striking sun burns through the rounded windows of man-built walls, the frankly depressing landscape of huge boxes constructed with little intent for anything else but utilitarianism. She must not fear, while those lands will also be under her power with time, but the dreadful atmosphere of the lonely planet makes her skin break out in hives.

She believes the people here are more terrifying. White, hairless creatures with eyes as dark as the sun above them speak with just nods and courseys, paying little to no attention to the world around them, save for the concrete floors.  ''Tell them to set themselves on fire, and they will,''  Irulan recalls Baron Vladimir telling her father over the banquet. She believed it to be a simple boast at first, but now, after a few days in the strange world, the words make greater sense.

Perhaps, the harsh weather made people here hardened. Perhaps, such cruelty is necessary for survival. What terrorised her more was her sister—the one who now silently reads nearby, her long dress carelessly spread on the floor. Irulan would never allow her dress to wrinkle before the concluding dinner, but she is not Irulan. Despite them being demisisters, they shared fewer similarities than one could guess. Two lambs, as many in court would call them—the white and black ones. They knew one another better than anything else; where one went, the other followed. Where Irulan failed, her sister succeeded. What was allowed for her sister, was fobility towards Irulan. No one was embedded in their small circle; no one could get close enough to understand the bond they shared—together, they were whole.

Yet as they grew older, the bond seemed to thin. The path to the mind of her sister was more often closed to her now, her thoughts veiled by the silence rooted deep into her veins. Irulan knows they are just growing up, trying to find their path in the unknown. But she is scared; what would be of her without her sister? What use would the river have without fish to fill it?

''I shall go,'' her sister says, closing the book. ''The dinner starts soon, and I wanted to return the book before it.''

''Is it the one Na-Baron recommended?'' Irulan voices. Truth be told, she would never touch anything that Baron or his family possessed, even more recommended, but her sister seemed to enjoy the ancient text.

''It is. Rather interesting are the traditions of these people. Did you know their slaves have no tongues?''

Irulan feels sick to her stomach; the thought of having slaves brings the small bits of her recent meal to her very present tongue. ''Can I come with you?'' she asks, instead of answering. Irulan does not want to leave the faint safety of her rooms, but even more, she does not want to be left alone. She feels vulnerable—she is not of power here, despite being the embodiment of it in all of the other corners of the Imperium.

''You know I walk without guards.''

Irulan knows. While she is not able as much as bathe without the presence of someone with fighting knowledge, the rules do not seem to apply to her younger sister; she can move freely, as she wishes. Was it because she carried a thin blade with her and knew how to use it, or because of the lack of care from their father? Irulan was not sure. What she was sure of, was that no woman of twelve should leave her sister alone in the halls of Harkonnens' fort.

''It is just to the reading room and back, is it not?''

''Yes,'' her sister nods.  ''I'll take you,''  it means.

So, they walk. Fortunately, the guards usually waiting outside are nowhere to be found, and they manage to slip away unnoticed. Irulan holds the hand of her sister tightly, with each noise from the outside digging her nails deeper into her soft palm. Her sister says nothing; she steps calmly into the labyrinth of corridors, navigating them without much evident trouble. Soon, they find themselves in front of a huge black door, incarnated with words Irulan hold no knowledge of.

Inside, the chamber is massive; it forms a beautiful, round circle with ceilings so high that the air in it is always chilly. Rows of books and manuscripts fill the shelves out of oxidant, contrasting starkly with the white wall. The black circle table of cold stone is filled with replicas and ancient artefacts, each emitting a soft glow.

Who knew the small, desert planet held such treasures inside? Irulan forgets about her sister entirely—the texts call to her, golden lettering shining under the light. Irulan follows the names on the covers: legends, myths, histories, and art overviews. Some even contained gardening and soil research; Baron likely held those for a good laugh.

Irulan travels deeper and deeper until the voice of her sister addressing the only library keeper almost disappears, consumed by tall bookcases. The section she finds herself in is solely dedicated to martial arts; where, if not here, would the hundreds of books on such a topic be stored? Some of them are used; the spines are slightly older; others look brand new.

Irulan is brought to her senses only when she notices a black figure moving in the corner of her vision. She puts the book back and Listens. Just like the Sisters taught her, her inner ear picks up the faint voice of her sister, and the moving of two sandaled feet—the slave handling the books. She feels something else, too. A presence familiar enough to recognise but not enough to name.

''We have to go,'' she says, grabbing her sister by the shoulder and pressing. ''We will be late,'' she explains to the slave. Not that it would question the whims of the princess.

''Why?'' her sister turns to her, confused. ''I was looking at some other books. Weren't you also?''

''Please,'' Irulan whispers. ''We spent enough time here as it is.''

Just as her sister was about to answer, the atmosphere shifted. The air, sitting in its calmness, heavied. The silent before slave turned on its feet, its eyes burning holes in Irulan's body. It lurches towards them, opening its obsidian mouth to show the blackened void inside—indeed, it possesses no tongue.

Irulan freezes. The void seems to suck her in, the sharp mouth growing wider as its owner approaches her body. The fear paralyses her, planting her otherwise quick feet deep into the ground. Now, her training as Bene Gesserit should awaken—she should oppose, or at the very least dodge, the attack. But the black mouth continues to draw her in, clouding her thoughts with terror.

The body beside her shifts; her sister is quick. With one strong thrust, she pushes Irulan aside. '' Hide ,'' the voice within her head commands, and Irulan has no force to object to the technique. She crawls under the heavy stone, frantically looking for something—anything—to protect herself with.

Despite the long skirts, her sister moves like Adam's wine; she bends and turns, and strikes the man far taller than her, but he seems determined on the idea of killing her. Her sister grunts under the heavy hits; one sits in her abdomen, and another lands on her knees. The slave's nails leave a trace on her skin, rough enough to pierce the young dermis.

Eventually, her sister grows tired; the slave pushes her to the ground, pressing his slender body on top and closing its white, almost translucent hands on her throat. Irulan clasps the found sharp cutting instrument to her chest, desperately trying to calm the wave of fear forming there.  ''I must not fear. Fear is a mind killer,''  she whispers again and again.

She watches as her sister's hand slips under her clothes and emerges an illicit, slender blade—it shines under the light just as lettering did on the books a minute ago. To Irulan, it feels like a year's hundred. ''No!'' she wants to shout as her sister raises the steel and preys it into the eye of the slave, but the words are unable to leave her throat. Like a waterfall, crimson covers her sister's face, staining her light grey dress in hot circles.

The slave falls on his back, his hands leaving their place on her sister's neck.

''Enough, please! Sister, stop!'' Irulan cries, crawling out of her hiding spot but daring not to get closer.

Her sister doesn't hear; she lurches towards the man in a slick puddle and takes his life quickly, cutting his throat in one swift motion. The blood from his arteria leaves the body in pulsations; they spatter everywhere, some drops going as far as touching the shelves.

The silence settles in the chamber once again; only the sound of weakly flowing blood disturbs the stillness. Her sister does not shed a tear; she meticulously cleans the blade with the slave's white cloth and slips it back into the folds of her gown.

''What have you done?'' Irulan whispers. Her hands tremble; the sight before her crawls into the deepest corners of her mind and tears everything there down. How can one kill so easily? How can one be so cold and calculating, as if it were nothing more than a daily chore? How could that one be her sister, the one she shared a life with?

''I protected.'' Her sister's voice is hoarse, but firm. There is no remorse in her tone, only weariness. ''What have you  done?'' She turns to face her. Her hair, carefully braided by servants for dinner, is undone; the wet strands of it grip her face like a vice, framing the unseeing eyes.

Like that, she looks like a woman mad. Irulan backs into the safety of the doors, feeling her fear turn into something much greater. ''Do not come near me,'' she commands. Just as the heavy doors close behind her, she sets off running.

-

YN waits until the footsteps of her sister are no longer heard, and only then does she come out of the reading room. She pays the body on the ground little attention; no one would bet an eye on the death of a useless creature like that. It did not intend to kill; rather, someone made it do it. Who, in their right mind, would try to harm the heir of the Emperor? How would they know that Irulan would follow her there?

Irulan. The one who watched as the Other almost gave her life for hers, the one who had the nerve to be repulsed by the blood on her hands—the blood she spilt protecting her. What do you do when you are not allowed to be angry at God? Why does God shame one for the will she herself inflicted on one to bestone? YN would ask the sun, but it hid behind the walls of the fort. She would ask, but no one would answer.

So, she does what she is meant to do—finds her way into the large dining hall, where everyone, of course, is starting to gather. The Emperor would be dissatisfied to find her not there on time; she has no time to fix her appearance. In light of the slight possibility of shaming their House with her muddled hairstyle or suffering yet another punishment for being even late, she chooses the first option.

The guards let her in without saying a word. YNr watches as the shield slides open, revealing a full hall. Rows and rows of tables, filled with foods one would imagine never would have made their way to the Giedi Prime, and laughter not so usual for a harsh realm.

''Princess...'' the servant starts, announcing her arrival, but she shushes him with a slight wave of her palm. She does not notice the crimson liquid staining it.

The Other makes her way to her seat calmly, careless of the way people around her stumble and twist their faces in shock. The only eyes that watch her without fear at the Emperor's table are those of Lady Echidna. Her face betrays no emotion at all—hidden by her veiled black cloth, it only slightly moves when the YN passes her seat.

She holds the angry gaze of the Emperor calmly. He will demand an answer, of course if Irulan has not whispered the truth into his aged ears already. Her sister probably would do no such thing; in that, she would admit to disobeying the orders bestowed upon her. YN is puzzled at the attention directed towards her humble figure—the first thing a Bene Gessarite in training learns is not to be repulsed by the anatomy of her body. Why be grossed out by the liquid coursing through her veins—the liquid she carries all her life? Why be scared of death, when it is always at your doorstep? In the sway of her thoughts, the Other also seems not to perceive the pair of icy blue eyes glued to her figure as she finds her seat and takes her place.

-

"The boy follows you around like a dog." The mother's tone stands not in judgment but rather simply states the truth.

Lady Echidna is not veiled now; her heavy hair is still tightly braided out of her face. Just a small black ribbon highlights her status as one of the Emperor's senior concubines, a position most would bear with honour. To her, it was yet another stain on her earthly body—the body she could not call her to possess. The black sun of Giedi Prime is finally long behind them; nothing but a few light orbs floating around illuminate the chamber, yet her intense gaze seems to pierce right through the girl that sits across her.

"I know, mother. His steps are heavy; his thoughts are even heavier; they follow me much more often."

The woman's fingers stop working on an intricate needlework for a moment, before continuing as it was. "You are to call me Sister, girl," she speaks, her voice low.

YN drags her teeth across her tongue, feeling the anger flow through the veins in her body. She wishes to be far away from this small chamber, to run and never face the woman's eyes again. "The girl has a name, Sister. Or do you fear to voice it?"

Lady Echidna places the cloth on the table beside her gracefully, as if paying no attention to the words spoken. But YN can sense can feel the resentment that burns inside her mother's stomach, spreading its molecules to her throat. "A name holds meaning; for a person to have a name, one must first be of character and substance. You are none."

YN bit the soft flesh inside her mouth; it tasted bitter. It was better if her mother shouted, if she hit her if she did anything to prove YN is still here in her eyes, that she was not just a void the woman spoke her riddles into. Maybe then the pain inside her would have a meaning, would have a reason better than just childish hurt. "Did I not have a beating heart when I left your womb, Sister? Did you not hear it loud and clear? What kind of proof is needed more of me?"

"My daughter died that day, screaming. You took her place. So do not bother me with your foolish talks anymore, for we both know they just waste the air we breathe. Am I heard?"

She was. The tears dried on YN's face before having the chance to spill, and she turned to her studies. Once more, a feeling of ever-lasting cold surrounded her shoulders. The never-leaving vision in her mind appeared once again—her mother's quick steps as she walked away in another corridor of Giedi Prime's fort, her head straight ahead as YN pleaded not to leave her alone, her legs glued to the command spoken. It was a blessing that the boy found her earlier than his uncle.

-

Time has passed since the first time YN's eyes saw the black sun of the foreign planet so far from hers. The Other trained, restlessly, in the tongues of ancient warriors and the most prominent whisperers, slowly earning the right to bear Knowledge in her crown-empty head. She had much yet to learn, but the prospect did not frighten her; with every passing day, she felt power building in her hands and soul. Patience, the greatest virtue of all. She was alone now, without her half of a sister; alone, in her solitude, the heavy bearings seemed not as heavy—she had no one to enlighten about her battles. Still, God was on her mind; YN felt her presence near, her watchful eyes guiding her. Like the tight, dampened cloth on her bruised knuckles, her sister was stuck to her open wound of a soul.

Irulan has grown. Her complexion changed; she no longer looked like a bright-faced girl who left her sister alone in Harkonnen's library; the plump cheeks were gone, and so was fear. At the Other stared a sole statue of power she bloomed into. Silver collars, light blue waves of fabric—the cut is, as always, straight. The Other eyed her up and down, taking in each detail of the painting-like sight. Irulan did the same—a slight disgust at the Other's simple tunic and pants, creased from the sparring. Irulan did not need to be broken in order to be a Sister in the Bene Gesserit; they wanted her Corrino first, and a servant second. The Other, however, held no such value—a child carried not by the lawful wife, a second, a spare. So, there would be no bone in her body left untouched by the lessons, no string in her soul unharmed by the knowledge. They crushed her cartilage in grey sand and forced her to swallow the bitter truths of their ways. Yet, God remains undisturbed—stoic. Eternal.

''Will you not eat again?'' Irulan musses, putting another piece of dish in her mouth.

The Other would take it as a cruel joke from anyone else, but not from God. She shakes her head instead. ''I am forbidden.''

Irulan hums. It was not the first time YN would be disciplined this way; the cycle of punishment and forgiveness was all too familiar to her. The room is silent; there is no one but the two of them. She could offer to eat, and no one would know she did, but Irulan won't offer. The Other does not expect her to; pity is not something a sister can possess.

''How are your lessons going? A fresh knowledge, perhaps?''

YN nods. If she opens her mouth now, her voice will betray her. She could cry all she wanted in the presence of a sister, but it is not appropriate for a thirteen-year-old to behave this way in front of God. The Other is reminded of that with an absence of bruises on Irulan's skin; her hands were never cut by the sharp blades, and her mouth was never starved. ''Why was I summoned from training?'' She asked, directing her eyes to the figure in front of her.

''I am here as a messenger from the Emperor.''

YN's eyes narrowed. ''And what does our dear Emperor desire to tell me now?'' She wishes not to hear anything he has to say; the Other is perfectly content here, amongst her Sisters. Here, she is of cost.

''Recently, Baron Vladimir turned to our House for guidance. He and na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen felt misled by the House Artreidis, and their promise of a bride that did not come. Our father has graciously offered to negotiate the conflict and pay the needed price for the Baron's cooperation.''

''Of course, he did. With all of our might, we are still afraid of the savages that made Arrakis their home. With what advice, may I ask, did the Emperor provide the Baron?''

Irulan's lips turn into a straight line, with the small wrinkle on her forehead appearing. Something that she carried with her through childhood. Something that still reminded of home. ''With the proposal of a woman of our House to na-Baron Feyd-Rautha.''

''A gift? Irulan, I am so sorry.''

Sure, the bridge between them was long forgotten, growing with tall grass and wildflowers, but the weight of their shared history still lingered in the air. Irulan was still her sister, no matter how many times the Other tried to tell herself otherwise. And no woman sane would consider giving her sister to the inhumane brutes that were Harkonnens—the people even Bene Gessarit wished to observe from afar; the people so ruthless mothers told stories about them to their small offspring in an attempt to instil fear and obedience.

Irulan does not answer. She hides her gaze, her eyes following the wooden panels of the quarters.

''What is it, sister?  Speak .''

''The offer Emperor found the most fitting would be of your hand, not mine.''

The Other exhales. As if a heavy stone were put on her chest, she fights to bring much-needed oxygen to her bloodstream. She almost feels the erythrocytes scatter from her face into her neck, hidden by the cloth, and gather there in an attempt to regrow their might. Her throat twists and closes, its muscles compressing until not even an ounce of air can get in. All of her organs, from heart to stomach, made their presence known; one by one, they tensed and burned, forcing the otherwise relaxed hands to grip them.

It was supposed to be Irulan. The first one to marry is the oldest sister; the title high enough to satisfy the ambitious Harkonnes would be hers, no less. Yet, here she stands, not even looking at the one taking her place as she sentences her to an ultimate death. No matter how much power the Corrino name held, on Giedi Prime, she would consider herself fortunate enough if she were to meet her end quickly.

''Why, Irulan? Have I not been a loyal servant to you all those years? Have I not followed every order without question? ''

Irulan is unmoved in her position. ''We can not risk the Harkonnen blood getting on the throne, you know it.''

''You mean we can not risk you? We are not eight anymore, dear Irulan; you can speak truthfully now. Do you really think the Emperor will treasure you more if you say nothing now? We are no sons, Irulan; we are sisters, you and I. Please, spare me this fate.''

''Yes,'' the girl lifts her eyes, taking a step closer. ''We are no sons; you knew that one day we would marry for the peace of the Imperium. Why do you shout now?''

''Married, yes, but not murdered for the sake of the fucking old man who could not hold his promise. They are monsters, Irulan, spilling innocent blood for the fun of it. I beg of you, sister, show me the mercy I know you are capable of.''

''You are worried about blood? What could one more splash of blood mean to you? You have been no sister for a long time; I order you, as an heir of the Emperor and as the messenger of his will here, to comply. Do not make it harder than it has to be.''

The Other smiled—she would not grant the pleasure of tears. ''Very well, then. Someone needs to go first. I'll go; I'll be first, at least here. Tell the Emperor that I will comply with any of his wishes, whether it be to throw me to the sharks or to feed me to the sandworms. As a confirmation of my undying loyalty, you may show him this:''

She slaps her. She slaps her not like a warrior, not like the trained assassin she was raised to be; she slaps her like a sister, bitterly, harshly. For the first time in her short life, YN raises a hand on something she deems holy—the God's shocked face brings a sense of satisfaction to the Other's veins, even if the same blood courses through them. She turns on her heels and walks away, leaving the forsaken room behind. Leaving God behind.

#dune 2 #dune movie #feyd rautha #feyd x reader #feyd x you #feyd rautha harkonnen #house harkonnen #imagine #character x you #feyd oneshot #dune 2024 #feyd rautha fanfiction #feyd rautha imagine #feyd rautha fic #dune fanfiction #bene gesserit #reader #yn #princess irulan #irulan corrino #house corrino #giedi prime #arrakis

[slowtravelingcat]

Hopping cats and the Grand Canyon

Sunday, October 4th, 2020

CAL - I am waking up alone for the 2nd day in a row. On Friday afternoon the large, bald one left with a medium sized bag. I knew that I was going to be solo for some time, and judging from the size of her bag, I guessed that it would be approximately 2 days. She tried to act like nothing was happening, but I’ve been around long enough to recognize preparations for a weekend trip. I mirrored her aloof attitude, but as the door closed, I knew that I would miss her greatly.

Knowing that I had at least a day and a half to myself, I did not rush to get anything done. I started out with an extra long nap. It was nice to nap without being disturbed, for once. By the time I finally woke up, it was dark outside and I had the longest, most satisfying stretch of my life. I made a few rounds of the camper to make sure that everything was in order. Next I took the opportunity to jump on the kitchen counter, something I would never do with the large, bald one present. I spent most of the night smelling this newly accessed area. I also deposited a few tufts of fur. Even though I do not go onto the counters in her presence, I would still like her to know that I could, if I wanted. 

The next day, I slept in again. It was glorious, I have not slept like this since I was kitten! Near sunset I was spending some time by my favorite window, when it happened. A moment that would change my memory of Meadview forever… I saw a new kind of cat, one that I have never seen before. It was gray with a very short and puffy tail. It had long ears, which laid flat on its head. If the tail and ears where not strange enough, the way that it moved was truly fascinating. It had four legs, but it did not walk like a normal cat, instead it hopped. A hopping cat! I did not know these existed. I watched, utterly transfixed, until the strange cat finally hopped out of sight. Later that night, around sunset, the strange cat returned, but this time there was more than one. By the time the sun fully set I counted 6 hopping cats. 

All of last night I dreamt of the hopping cats. I can hardly wait until Michele comes back so that I can show her. Currently, I am waiting dutifully by the front door. I want to her to know that I missed her when she returns. 

MICHELE - I am returning home after an exciting weekend at the Grand Canyon. I left Meadview at noon on Friday and arrived at the Grand Canyon with plenty of time to get a good view of the canyon at Mather Point, next to he visitor’s center and buy snacks and a T-shirt at the campground marketplace. I checked into my hotel, the Kachina Lodge, around sunset. 

While the hotel is located on the rim of the Grand Canyon, I was a little surprised to learn that my room did not have a balcony. In fact, the entire hotel felt a little rundown and outdated. But, I have to say, I was only steps from the Bright Angel trailhead and that is pretty cool. 

Around 7pm I went to the main restaurant for dinner and was surprised again by the 2 hour wait to be seated. Yikes, I had wait though, it was the only restaurant that was open. Around 9pm I finally sat down for dinner and I did not waste my time in that dining room. I had a Caesar salad, filet mignon and a creme brûlée for dessert. I accompanied my meal with a glass of red wine. There was no wifi or cell service in the dining room, so I shamelessly looked around at the other diners and listened into any conversation I could hear. 

The next morning, I woke up extra early to start the Bright Angel trail at 6:30am. The entire trail is 15.5 miles long with elevation difference of 4500 feet. My plan was to only do part of the trail. As a solo hiker with minimal experience, I knew it was best to be conservative. As I started down the trail, I quickly realized how steep it was. At 1.5 miles in, I hit the first rest stop. The sun was starting to emerge and out of an abundance of caution, I made the decision to head back up. I was back at the trailhead by 8:30am. Well, now what? 

I went to breakfast and spent most of the day on the Desert View scenic drive. At 2pm I decided to take a break and ended up napping until almost 6pm. At that point, I went to the market to buy dinner and spent the rest of the night in my hotel room. I know this sounds boring, but I can assure you that the rest was badly needed. 

The next morning I excitedly jumped out of bed when the alarm clock rang. This is the day that I finally go on a Grand Canyon mule ride! I could not have been be happier. I've wanted to ride a Grand Canyon mule for as long as I can remember.

I drove to the mule barn and after a painfully long safety talk, I was paired with a mule named Reno. The ride lasted about 2 hours and went along the canyon rim. Most of the morning was silent and the landscape was stunningly beautiful. At one point, I was literally moved to tears by the view and the peaceful setting. Near the middle of the ride our guide gave a soliloquy on why he loves mules. His love and admiration for the Grand Canyon mules was so touching that I had to fight back tears for the second time. I thought of Cal and wished that he could be there to appreciate these magnificent animals (though part of me suspects that he would just think of them as oversized cats). 

Once the mule ride was over, I started the drive back to Meadview. I strategically stopped at the grocery store on the way back into town and when I arrived Cal was waiting by the door to greet me. I wonder what he’s been up to. 

#cats #slow travel #digital nomad #travel #grand canyon

[maximons]

All Is Lost

Summary: Zombies have taken over the world, humanity on the edge of extinction. All hope was lost. Despite that, Wanda couldn’t seem to let go of Y/n, who had fallen victim to the plague herself.

Word Count: 2,263

Genre: Angst

Requested?: No

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, death, cannibalism, suicide, mentions of blood. Spoilers for Ep. 5 of What If...?

A/N: I know, I know, I’m gonna get into the stuff I promised soon. But for now, the Zombies episode inspired me and this came out. If you haven’t seen the episode yet, go watch it. Its amazing and depressing. Also this is DARK guys, probably the darkest thing I’ve ever written, so...Happy Reading!

The Zombie apocalypse was always something everyone joked about, but never something that anyone could actually predict.

Everything happened so quickly, Wanda could barely keep up. It’s hard to believe that everything was so normal only two weeks ago. Now, she was locked away with Vision in an abandoned military base in New Jersey. Desperate to survive for as long as possible while Vision worked on a cure.

Some of his experiments had been a success, most notably Scott Lang who he was able to revert back from his zombified state. However, the man was now only a severed head.

Despite the success, Vision was less than optimistic. For one, Scott was one of the first infected. While the cure worked on him, the android theorized that the disease has mutated greatly since then, and it was likely impossible to cure everyone. And even if he could, the technology to do so is beyond human comprehension and therefore doesn’t exist.

Vision might have all but given up hope, but Wanda didn’t. She couldn’t. She refused to give up on you.

Wanda and you have been best friends for as long as Wanda had been an Avenger. You were already a member of the team and greeted her with an open mind and open arms, despite all she had done. You had fire powers, and while your powers weren’t identical to Wanda’s, you still offered some basic tips and tricks to keep such explosive powers at bay.

It wasn’t a surprise that she fell in love with you.

But her stupid fear had to get in the way, and when you came to confess your own feelings for her, she panicked and rejected you. You were so heartbroken, Wanda didn’t need to read your mind to know that.

And it kills her everyday knowing that that was the last interaction she had with you. The last one with you as yourself anyway.

All that remained now was the flesh hungry, blood thirsty monster that wore your, now rotting, skin.

This wasn’t you, she knows that. She looked into your mind and saw no trace of the woman you once were, the one she loved with all her heart. She couldn’t feel you, you were gone.

Despite this, Wanda couldn’t let you go. She couldn’t handle losing you entirely. She already lost almost everyone.

She managed to convince Vision to keep you in the base for testing. You were locked behind a large steel door, with only a window to see you through. But you were here, and that’s all Wanda cared about.

The cure wasn’t working for you. Your powers caused it to incinerate when it entered your system, proving it to be ineffective. Still, she refused to give up.

Vision thought it best to terminate you after the failed tests, but Wanda begged him not to. Knowing he couldn’t overpower her, and sensing his friend’s distress with anything that comes to you, he agreed. As long as Wanda had it under control.

She doubted he knew that she was luring innocent survivors into the base so you could feed on them, but she did what she had to do.

Wanda spent most of her days sitting outside of your cell. The first few days, you were ravenous. Banging on the walls and trying to burn them down, growling and screeching with the inhuman noise that took over your vocal chords, but you didn’t manage to break free. After a while, it seemed you have given up, and just sat in place. Only moving when Wanda opened the cell and let some of your ‘food’ in.

There were times where Wanda thought that maybe, just maybe, the cure was working more than they thought. You seemed to have recognized her, your facial expressions formed into ones that she had recognized and missed dearly. But that hope quickly died when she would peek into your head and still sense nothing.

“Hey, Y/n.” Wanda walked up to outside your cell and sat cross-legged like she did everyday. Your head rose, staring at her with your now glowing yellow eyes. “Still no progress on the cure, but don’t worry, I’m not giving up yet.” You offered no response, not that she expected one. “It’s hard. It’s only getting worse out there...” She sighed as she trailed off. She raised her hand to the glass, like she always did. “I’m going to figure it out...we’re gonna get you back to normal, and I’m going to tell you every day how much I love you. I miss you so much, but...we’re almost there. I can feel it...” Wanda’s voice started choking up, as tears ran down her face. “We deserve our happy ending.”

Her hand was still pressed against the glass as she finished her speech. She was about to lower it, but then something unexpected happened. You stared at her hand curiously, beginning to raise your own. Wanda watched, smile forming on her face as your arm made it’s way to the glass. 

“Wanda! Please come here, we have a situation.” You had almost pressed your hand against Wanda’s, when Vision’s voice interrupted. Your attention turned to the direction it came from and you let out a growl, clearly angry at the interruption. Wanda sighed in disappointment, but she tried not to let it take over. You still showed massive improvement, something worth reporting back to Vision. “It’s okay.” She soothed you. “I’m going to go see what he wants then I’ll be right back, okay? I know you’re hungry, I’ll get you some food too.” You didn’t offer a response as she walked off.

“Vis! I have to tell you-” Wanda began as she walked into the main room, but cut herself off at the new faces. She didn’t recognize the bald woman with the spear or the wimpy looking man in a workers uniform, but she was familiar with Peter. What surprised her most though, was Bruce Banner. A man she hasn’t seen in over three years. “What is going on?”

“I ran into them outside the premises. Apparently word has gotten out about the cure.” Vision answered before turning his attention back to the guests. “As I told you, I am afraid we cannot help you. The cure seems to be a moot point.”

“Well, what about-” Peter began, but he was interrupted by a new voice.

“For something you have no hope for, you sure don’t have a problem bringing in new test subjects.” Wanda recognized Bucky Barnes’ voice. She turned around, and her eyes widened as she saw King T’challa on his arm, struggling to stand on his one remaining leg.

Shit.

“My king! We thought you dead.” The bald woman exclaimed in relief and surprise.

“Your highness. I was not aware you were in the base.” Vision said, confused on how that got by him. It didn’t take him long to figure out why. “Wanda...”

“I’m sorry.” Wanda whispered, knowing she was caught. “The cure wasn’t working on Y/n, and in order to keep her at bay, I had to feed her.”

“So you fed her our King?” A spear was raised to her throat, threateningly.

“It was nothing personal, I promise. I have her under control and the cure is starting to work, I know it. We just need a little more time!”

“Why not just kill her? You lured innocent people to their deaths just for her when there a couple million more Zombies out there that you could use for testing. Ones that have a chance of being cured.” The whole room went quiet after Bucky said that.

“Uh oh. Shouldn’t have said that.” Wanda heard Scott say, but she was too busy glaring at Bucky. Her eyes started to go red, but before she could do anything, she noticed the spear held to her throat begin to glow red and melt. The woman dropped the spear as it began to burn her hands.

“Did it just suddenly get like, super hot?” Peter asked as he began to fan himself.

“Oh no...” Wanda trailed off. She looked up to notice the steal walls that led to your cell begin to melt. “You’ve done it now...she hasn’t eaten in days.” Before anyone could respond, the steel doors melted completely. The man in the uniform was unfortunate enough to be standing in front of it, as a strong burst of flame shot out and incinerated him on the spot. Only a second later, you flew out the door, covered in flames as you hovered above everyone.

Wanda watched in horror as you began to fight everyone. They weren’t holding up very well, and that’s when Wanda finally realized what she had done. This wasn’t you, and if you were still here, you would hate to see your body be used to attack and kill others.

“Vision! Get us out of here!” She heard Bruce yell, and Vision shot a blast towards the wall, blowing it up and letting everyone out. Wanda turned her focus back to you, you watched them starting to escape and you began to fly after them, but a red mist surrounded you before you could. You turned your head, starting to growl, but stopped when you saw it was Wanda.

“Y/n. Stop...” You tilted your head, still struggling to move as Wanda came closer. She took a chance and reached up, gently placing a hand on your face. “I am so sorry...you never deserved this...” Your face softened at the touch, beginning to show the signs of emotion that Wanda desperately held onto. However, it was clear now that it was too late.

You snapped out of it, as you managed to break free from Wanda’s hold. You opened your mouth wide, intent on biting and feeding on her, but something stopped you. You hesitated, and Wanda noticed. You settled for pushing her aside to the ground as you reignited yourself and flew out of the base.

Wanda picked herself up after a moment, intent on stopping you. She ran past Okoye’s body, charred and eaten, but she was sure there was little time until she turned. She ran faster to where you were, now facing off against Bucky. She sprinted further, about to take off and fly when she paused.

Vision was face down on the ground. She kneeled next to him, glowing red hand turning over his body, afraid of what she’ll see. Once he was turned, Wanda gasped at the sight. The mind stone was torn out of his head.

“Oh no...no, no, no...” She held his body, tears slowly building as she mourned the loss of her best friend. She had officially lost everything. “I am so sorry Vis...I’m going to make this right, I promise.”

She heard Bucky scream. She looked over to see you start to feed on him. She saw Bruce, Peter, Scott and T’challa in the distance, making their way to the jet. They were your next target.

No. Wanda wasn’t going to let that happen. It ends now.

She used her powers to propel herself forward, landing directly in your path. You growled at her yet again as she used her powers to hold you. “Y/n...please, stop.” You struggled to get out of the hold, but Wanda held on. “This isn’t you...you wouldn’t want this...I love you more than anything, and I’m so sorry...I hope one day, you’ll forgive me.” 

Wanda used her powers to grab the gun laying by Bucky’s side. She held in to your head, ready to pull the trigger...but she couldn’t. She let out a scream of frustration and dropped her hold on both you and the gun. The gun fell to the ground, but you haven’t moved.

“I can’t do it...I...I’m not strong enough...” Wanda began crying, shutting her eyes and waited for you to finish her off. She failed everyone, no one deserved death more than her. She opened her eyes when nothing came. You stood, staring at her with a tilt of your head. The yellow of your eyes dimming as you stared.

“W....Wan...” You struggled to let out, but it was enough for Wanda to hear. She cried even harder. She was right, you were almost there...but it was too late now.

You took in your surroundings as best you could, you didn’t have a lot of awareness, but you knew enough to piece everything together. You saw the influx of zombies starting to enter to base.  Everyone needed to get away. You turned back to Wanda, and you knew what you had to do. You felt the little control you had start to slip away.

You bent down and picked up the discarded gun. You shakily pointed it to your temple, the control slipping away faster and faster. “Love....you....I...sorry...” You managed to croak out. Before you could lose control completely, you pulled the trigger.

Wanda watched in horror as you shot yourself in the head. Pieces of your brain landing on her, your blood drenching her. She looked down to see your body, half your face still together, but you were gone. Truly gone.

She knelt down sobbing, as she held your body. After a moment she looked up to see the Hulk appear as the zombies began to overwhelm the base. She saw the jet take off, and she gave a weak smile. They got away. Wanda’s job was done. This is where her story ends. All was lost for her.

So when the zombies finally reached her, she didn’t fight back. Accepting her death with open arms.

Epilogue

#wanda maximoff #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff x you

[whitesparrows97]

Underdog – Part 1

Pairing: Dog Shifter!Taehyung x Human!Reader/Kim Taehyung x Reader

Genre: Shifter AU/Hybrid AU

Summary: Even though humans and shifters coexist in one world, it’s still a rarity for hybrids to openly show themselves. One evening, when you hit a stray dog with your car, you feel so guilty that you bring him home with you. But you don’t realize until much later that you let a stranger into your house.

Warnings: Angst, being in a car accident 

Word Count: 7.8K

Next

Authors note: Hello, hello! I had this story in my drafts for months now (thanks overthinking me) and I really wanted to get at least the first chapter out before Taehyung’s birthday. I’m not sure how many chapters this story will have, but I’m aiming for around four. I really hope you’ll like this story and this chapter and I’d be happy about every kind of feedback from you guys! Thank you so much for reading! 

. . .

With a gasp you woke up from a dreamless sleep. You were confused for a moment as you let your gaze glide through the dark room and could only make out the outlines of your living room. When you looked outside the window, you realized that it had already become dark.

Crap. 

You only wanted to take a short nap after work before going grocery shopping. Your refrigerator and the cupboards in your kitchen were devastatingly empty. But, as was so often the case, your nap turned into a deep sleep which left you even more exhausted than before.

In the dark, you searched for your cell phone, which you had placed on the small coffee table before falling asleep. When your fingers finally hit the small, square device and enclosed it, you breathed a sigh of relief. But the relief disappeared just as quickly and gave way to the hectic when you saw how late it already was. You had about half an hour before the supermarket would close. By car, it took you about fifteen minutes… maybe ten if you were lucky with the traffic lights.

You closed your eyes again for a short moment and thought about whether it was really worth the stress to rush off. If you were thinking about your bank account, which was already in the red, you knew that you could not afford to order food. You puffed out the air in frustration and got up from the sofa. In record time you put on your shoes and jacket and grabbed your bag before you were in your car a few minutes later. When you stopped at a red light, your fingers drummed a rhythm on the steering wheel while you kept your eyes focused on the light.

Impatient, you honked at the person in front of you when they didn’t start moving as soon as the light turned green. When you made a turn and could see the park, which was only illuminated by the moonlight and the few street lamps, you exhaled with relief. All you had to do was drive past it, take the next right before you–

The suffocated scream got stuck in your throat when you pressed your foot on the brake. Your fingers clutched firmly into the steering wheel and you tried to yank the car to the side, but then you heard the dull thud that shook your car. With screeching tires, your car came to a halt and only the roar of the engine mixed with your loud heartbeat pumping blood through your body filled your ears.

Panic rose inside you as your eyes looked out at the road ahead, hoping to see something in the light of your headlights. You hoped that you had only imagined the small, dark tuft of fur that had run in front of your car. Perhaps a hallucination due to your lack of sleep? Maybe you had also imagined the impact. You were sure you had read about it on the Internet before.

Your cramped fingers hurt when you peeled them off the steering wheel and you noticed how they trembled – you didn’t know whether it was fear or overexertion – when you tried to loosen your seat belt. It took you three attempts until the belt finally rolled back and you were able to get out of the car. Immediately, your legs buckled under you and you had to support yourself against the door. In the cold of the late evening you could see your own breath, but still you were sweating. Hesitantly you tried to look around the fender of the car, hoping to see only the asphalt there. Unfortunately, fate did not seem to be on your side tonight.

You managed to stifle a sob when you saw the dog lying in front of your car. As fast as your shaky legs carried you, you ran to the huddled figure. You scratched your knees open as you let yourself fall next to him, but you hardly felt the pain. He showed no reaction to your presence and kept his eyes firmly shut. You looked up hoping to see his owner coming out of the park. But the path to the park was empty, as were the area around you. You were completely on your own and more than overwhelmed by that.

There was nothing else you could do. Without a second thought, you slid your hands under the dog’s body and grimaced when your knuckles scraped across the asphalt. But the dull pain in your hands was immediately forgotten when the dog whimpered softly. It was as if this sound loosened your rigidity and immediately hot tears streamed down your face. You lifted him up and brought him as fast as possible to your car where you carefully laid him on the back seat. 

“I’m so sorry,” you brought out between sobs before you stroked his fur briefly and took a seat behind the wheel again. You blinked away the tears, even when new ones immediately took their place, and dialed your best friend’s phone number. While it was ringing, you started the car and made your way to the practice. 

“Come on, Hoseok,” you mumbled and bit your lower lip to stop your teeth from clattering. You wiped tears from your face again with the back of your hand as the road in front of you blurred and slowed down. One accident would be more than enough for today. When you heard the familiar crack of the line as Hoseok answered the call, tears of relief mixed in. 

“Y/N? Why are you calling so late–”

“Hobi!” you interrupted him and you could hear the panic in your own voice. “I’m on my way to your practice. I just hit a dog and I don’t know how badly he is hurt. Oh God, he’s not moving and he was just whimpering. I don’t know what to do.” Another sob escaped you. 

“Hey, hey, it’s all right,” Hoseok tried to calm you down “I’m going straight to the practice, okay? It’ll be fine, you hear?” When you didn’t answer and suppressed more sobs, Hoseok asked again, “Okay, Y/N?”

You nodded. When you realized he couldn’t see that through the phone, you answered his question and hung up. Worried, you glanced over your shoulder at the brown dog who was still taking shallow breaths and lying motionless on your back seat. “It will be all right,” you repeated Hoseok’s words. Whether you wanted to calm the dog down or yourself, you didn’t know.

𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁

“I came as fast as I could,” Hoseok greeted you and opened the small veterinary practice. It had been his childhood dream to become a veterinarian and unlike many others in that age who had the same dream but dropped it when they’d grown older, his desire only grew stronger. Now, more than twenty years later, not only did he have nearly six years of training behind him, but he even had two employees working under him.

Tonight, however, the practice was empty and dark; hours ago, it had treated its last patient. “Lay him on here,” Hoseok said as he put on a gown and gloves and additionally disinfected his hands. Carefully you laid the dog on the hard table and a chill ran down your spine as you touched the cold metal. Immediately you wanted to pull him right into your arms again. But you knew you were here so Hoseok could help him.

“Let’s see what the little one has,” Hoseok said, more to himself than to you. You watched Hoseok palpate the dog before he pulled up his eyelids with his practiced movements and pointed a flashlight into his eyes. “He doesn’t appear to have a concussion.”

Relieved, you exhaled.

“But he seems to have broken one paw and at least one,” he palpated his torso again, “no, probably two ribs,” Hoseok finished his diagnosis for now. You wanted to throw up, so guilty you felt. “Could you hold him for a moment, just in case he suddenly moves? I’ll get the x-ray.” He looked up at you from the dog and immediately stepped towards you. “Is everything okay? Are you feeling dizzy? You look like you’re gonna faint.”

You shook your head, but which of his questions you denied you didn’t know. The tears that you had had under control ran down your cheeks again. When Hoseok saw this, he bridged the last steps to you and squeezed your shoulders tightly. “We can do this, Y/N. It’s nothing serious, I promise you. Almost daily we have people here who have hit an animal. It happens more often than you think.”

“Okay,” you answered quietly and Hoseok hurried to get the x-ray machine from the next room. Hesitantly, you stepped closer to the metal table and stretched out your hand. The dog’s fur was tattered and you even saw some bald spots where the fur was completely missing. You let Hoseok know as soon as he came back and pulled the device clattering behind him into the room.

“I know, I noticed that too. Seems like he had been living outside for a long time. At least a few months, if not more.” He plugged in the device and immediately the room was filled with the constant whirring of the lamp. “Put this on,” Hoseok said, holding out a dark blue gown. When you reached for it, you were surprised at how heavy it was. “Protects you from the radiation,” Hoseok explained, wearing the same gown and matching gloves. He pressed numerous buttons before he fixed the dog’s legs and started the machine. 

It didn’t take more than ten minutes, but you were so restless that it felt like hours watching the dog lying lifeless in front of you. Hoseok turned the machine off and moved it to the side when the process was complete. Your eyes were still on the dog when he suddenly opened his eyes. Two dark orbs stared at you and you froze in place staring right back at him.

“We were lucky,” Hoseok said, and you flinched as his voice cut loudly through the oppressive silence. “His paw is only sprained, as is one of his ribs. One rib though is broken but this should heal on its own with rest and medication.”

Hoseok reached into a drawer and pulled out a small device that looked like a magnifying glass, but was made entirely of gray plastic. He moved it straight over the dog’s neck and after a few seconds he clicked his tongue in frustration. “He has no chip.”

“What does that mean?” You chewed on your lower lip and tasted the blood as one spot ripped open.

“That he has no owner, or at least we can’t find out who his owner is. The only thing I can do is check to see if a dog has been reported missing.” Hoseok began applying a bandage around the dog’s torso and, when he was finished, pressed a pack of medicine into your hand. “Three times a day, morning, noon, and in the evening. Just mix this into his food.”

Hoseok sat down at the computer and started to enter some data. Confused, you looked at the package in your hand. “What should I do with it?”

“Huh?” Hoseok asked over his shoulder. 

“The medicine, what am I supposed to do with it?” You waved the little package in question in the air for him to see.

Now, Hoseok turned completely around to you. “You’re supposed to give those to him,” he answered, as if it were a matter of course.

“Hobi, I can’t take him home,” you clarified. “I have no experience with dogs. I have no food at home, no basket and no toys. And I have a job, how will that work?”

Hoseok sighed and let his head fall forward. When he looked up again, he had a mischievous smile on his lips. “He is not reported missing. If you don’t take him in, I’ll have to take him to a shelter.”

You didn’t say anything because you knew exactly what Hoseok was talking about.

“And you know what it’s like with animals that are injured. Many people shy away from taking on such an animal because of unexpected costs–”

“Yes, all right,” you interrupted your best friend and a triumphant smile spread across his face. “But I still don’t know how I’m going to manage all this,” you said with concern.

“Don’t worry about it,” Hoseok reassured you and he got up from his chair to approach you. “We have some dog food here and I’m sure I saw a toy somewhere. You can use a couple of blankets and pillows as a bedding, that’s enough for one night. And about work…” He rummaged in one of the many cupboards and took out two cans of dog food, “Didn't you say that you were going to work part-time? You have a big garden, so he can be alone for five hours. He won’t feel the need to run around much for the next few weeks anyway.”

When Hoseok told you all these things, you found it hard to say anything to him. He was right – you had a small, cozy house all to yourself, which you could never fill out alone. The garden was hidden behind the house and fenced in on all sides and you didn’t have to worry in your neighborhood anyway. You also had a secure job that brought you halfway good money… 

With a smile, Hoseok handed you a small toy dog before carrying the real dog to your car. You put the two cans of dog food in the footwell and placed the toy dog right in front of the dog’s nose. Your heart began to beat faster when you watched his nose move and he picked up the scent of what were probably other dogs who had already played with the toy.

“He’s an Australian Kelpie by the way,” Hoseok said as you were about to get into your car. “Very intelligent animals and once he trusts you, very affectionate.”

You nodded. You knew what Hoseok was getting at. 

You knew your best friend long enough to know that he would never forgive you if you took the dog to a shelter. But he didn’t have to worry – you felt way too guilty. You wouldn’t hit an animal and then dump him at the next opportunity in an animal shelter; out of sight, out of mind. You were not like that and you were not raised like that. You had always taken responsibility for your deeds – and also mistakes – and now would be no different. 

Exhausted, you leaned back in your seat when you were on your way home. When you looked in your rear-view mirror and saw only two pointed ears, a little smile was stealing onto your face. But it fell right out of your face a second later as you turned back in shock. Indeed, the dog was no longer lying on the back seat, but had meanwhile sat up and looked at you.

“Hey, you are supposed to rest!” you scolded him as if he could understand what you were saying. “Not that you’re going to hurt yourself even more.” Anything else would have surprised you, but the dog stubbornly continued to sit and look at you. Two dark eyes watching your every move. Each of your facial features as you nervously chewed your lip or slid restlessly back and forth in your seat at a red light.

You were happy when you finally drove up your driveway to the house. “Here we are,” you told him and turned off the engine. You decided to check the damage to your car tomorrow morning before work. You didn’t know whether a visit to the repair shop was financially feasible at the moment. You doubted it when you looked at the dog behind you. It would not be cheap to buy all the necessary things for a dog. But it would be worth it for the fact that the house was no longer as quiet and deserted. 

And slowly, very slowly, your guilt was replaced by another feeling; excitement. 

𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁

You had to blink a few times to get the sleep out of your eyes and get used to the sun that was shining through your window. For a brief, calm moment, everything was like twenty-four hours ago. Your thoughts had not yet caught up with you and were still hanging on to the confusing dream that slowly sank further and further into oblivion. After a few more seconds, you had completely forgotten what it had been about. 

You stretched and your bones cracked. It probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to do some exercise again. But… what would be an even better idea would be a big cup of coffee and a nice breakfast. By nice, you meant a bowl of the cheap cereal that was on sale at the supermarket last week. After your first bite a few days earlier, you could imagine why it had been on sale. It was amazing that cereal could taste like cardboard, but you never stopped learning, right?

You straightened up and let your legs dangle from the bed before you put them on the floor. At least you wanted to, but instead of the cold, hard laminate floor, you stepped on something fluffy and soft.

Immediately you pulled your legs up and leaned forward to look over the edge of the bed. Right. How could you have forgotten that? It really seemed that thirty seconds after waking up you didn’t remember anything. 

You let your gaze glide over the bundle of dark brown fur that had curled up into a ball and had buried its nose almost protectively under its paws. Almost as if he wanted to hide from the world. 

You stretched out your hand slowly. You had such a strong need to let your fingers slide through his fur. But in the middle of your movement you paused when you saw two eyes staring right at you between his paws.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” you muttered and pulled your hand back again. He had probably woken up when you almost stepped on him by mistake. You just didn’t seem to have any luck with the little four-legged friend. “Are you hungry?” you asked, hoping that he would forgive you your little mishaps with some food.

Immediately he pulled his head out from under his paws and raised his head. “You hungry?” you repeated and he tilted his head. You assumed that he still knew the word from his former owner and that he recognized it now. “Let’s go,” you said and stood up. You were careful to keep some distance between you and the dog. You didn’t know what he had experienced and if he liked physical proximity. But what you knew was that he was still watching you with a skeptical look.

You put on warm and cozy socks, which were still lying on the floor next to your bed from the previous evening, and made your way to the kitchen. When you took a bowl out of the kitchen cupboard and opened the can of dog food, your eyes fell on the dog, who was standing a few meters away and watching you. “What should I name you? I can no longer call you just dog.”

You went over some names in your head while you filled the food into the bowl. You put it on the floor and prepared your own breakfast. You didn’t have much choice anyway, so you were left with the cardboard flavoured cereal. Sighing, you pressed the button on the coffee machine and breathed in the scent that filled the room. 

As you sipped from your cup, you watched the dog as he hesitantly paced towards the bowl. His nose picked up the smell of food in front of him, then he shook himself and nudged the bowl away from him. Astonished, you put the cup down on the worktop. “Don’t you like your food?”

The dog snorted and looked at you as if it was an impertinence that you even asked such a question. 

“But you must eat something. I promise you, I’ll go shopping later and bring you something better. But for now, this will have to do, I’m sorry,” you explained to him. You knew he didn’t understand you, but you hoped that he could tell by the tone of your voice what you were trying to tell him. 

The dog stared at you for a moment longer before making a sound that sounded almost like a sigh and he reluctantly walked towards the bowl. He sniffed at the indefinable mass once more before he hesitantly started to eat from it.

“Well, there you go,” you whispered and began to choke down your no less appetizing-looking breakfast. “And I’ll bring something for me, too. I swear, I wouldn’t be surprised if the packaging tastes better than the cereal itself,” you whispered in frustration.

When you put your empty bowl in the sink, you noticed that the dog had eaten his food too. He took a few steps back when you approached him to put the bowl away as well. Immediately you felt the lump in your throat and stopped moving. Slowly you let yourself sink into a crouch and carefully extended your hand.

His gaze was fixed on your hand, which was gripping the bowl. Just as slowly you straightened up again. You were already dreading it when you thought of the upcoming walk. How could this work when he hardly let you within a radius of less than one meter? You were surprised that he had even accepted to sleep beside you. But he probably had been too exhausted yesterday and hadn’t had the strength to move the blankets or find another place to sleep.

You supported yourself with your hands on the worktop and looked out the patio door into the garden. You could see even from a distance how the grass was covered with a blanket of fresh morning dew. The fog was still hanging in the treetops of the adjacent forest so early in the morning and it would probably take a few more hours before it disappeared. 

Maybe it would be better if you only let him into the garden? At least there he would have the possibility to keep some distance to you. And that would probably also be better for his injury. Your lips were pressed into a straight line when your gaze fell on the white bandage around his one front paw and his torso. 

You dispelled the guilt that was building up inside you and pushed yourself off the countertop to go to the patio door. “Would you like to get some fresh air?” You flinched at the loud noise the door made when you opened it. But the birds chirping their first songs brought a smile to your face as the sun carefully sent its rays over the trees.

You turned around to the dog, who also had his eyes on the garden. His tail swung slowly from side to side and you grinned. “Go ahead, you can go out,” you encouraged him and stepped aside so that there was enough space between you as he slowly walked towards the door. He looked at you once more before he put one of his paws first on the terrace and then followed with the other three. You watched him briefly as he explored the garden and slowly looked at the various bushes, shrubs and plants. 

Your parents had always been keen on a well-tended garden. Even if it was not the biggest, it certainly offered enough work for one person. A narrow paved path divided the various flower beds from the small green area where you had always splashed in a small inflatable pool as a child. The path led to a garden gate that was built into the fence. This fence surrounded the entire garden, so you didn’t have to worry about unauthorized people entering the property or animals from the adjacent forest suddenly appearing in front of your patio door.

That’s why you checked one last time on the dog before you went into the bathroom. You wouldn’t want to be watched either during your morning business, so you gave him the few minutes of discovery and privacy. You needed the time to get ready before you had to go to the office as well. 

To be honest, you often had a bad feeling in the pit of your stomach when you were on your way to work. You knew that these were probably not the best conditions for a healthy working atmosphere and that you might need to find a new job. However, that was easier said than done. The job prospects were rather bad in the small town, which was why you had been more than happy when you found this job right after your graduation. 

Why exactly the job was available was something you experienced first-hand on your first day of work. You had just said introduced yourself to your new colleagues when they had already warned you about your new boss. Phrases like ‘absolute choleric’, ‘lazy bastard’ and other, far more vicious insults had been uttered even before they had told you their own names.

The fact that you had lasted so long at all was probably not very healthy for your overall well-being. But as soon as you had something new in sight, you would be gone faster than the insults of your boss yelled at you would reach you.

Almost automatically, you went back into your bedroom and put on your dark blue pinstripe pants and a plain white blouse. You looked at the crumpled up pile of blankets and pillows that you had made a makeshift bed. With a small smile and absorbed in thought, you loosened the pillows and rearranged the blankets neatly so that no bald spots formed in between and the dog had to sleep on the cold floor. 

You went back into the kitchen and let your gaze wander over the various bushes in the garden and frowned. You leaned forward to catch a glimpse under the leaves of the bushes, but everything seemed quiet and your eyes didn’t notice any movement in the small rectangle.

Immediately your heart beat faster as you stepped onto the terrace and frantically continued to search the garden. “Doggie?” you asked quietly and more to yourself. “Where are you?” you asked louder this time and stepped onto the wet lawn. You felt the panic rising inside you and took quick steps towards the garden gate. You reached for the latch, but the lock was still in place. So it definitely could not have blown open or someone had stolen the dog from the garden.

Almost to tears, you turned back and flinched when the dog suddenly stood in front of you not even a meter away. “There you are!” you exclaimed in relief. You would love to bend down to him and fluff through his fur. But you held yourself back. “I was looking for you, I thought you had disappeared.”

You were almost embarrassed how weepy your voice sounded, although you had held back the tears well until now. Yet you couldn’t deny the pure relief that passed through you as he looked back at you. 

“Shall we go back inside?”

When the both of you were back inside, you looked at your watch and knew that you should leave. You put another bowl of water for the dog, grabbed your bag and kept an eye out for him. This time you found him quickly. All you had to do was take a peek into your bedroom and hold back your laughter.

“Just so we’re clear,” you said gently, “this is my bed and I’m only allowing you to sleep in it today.” 

He didn’t even look up, he just turned to the other side and you saw that as a clear sign to leave him alone and drive to work.

𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁

Five hours later you stepped out of the multi-story office building and could finally breathe again. The atmosphere in the small office, where you were all squeezed together, had once again been almost unbearable. In fact, it was already so bad that you considered a working day successful when your boss had paid no attention to you at all. Most of the time he sat in his own office, which took up a good third of the entire office.

The only thing you liked about your work were your colleagues. You were a sworn team and you allied yourselves against your boss when he went crazy again. It seemed there was something to the saying that a common enemy made you friends. At least you knew that the others were always behind you when your boss yelled at you. You also knew, purely rationally, that it had nothing to do with you as a person, but that it was his fault. But that didn’t make the situations any better when you’d rather hop into your car and drive home after one of his outbursts. 

But then you didn’t even have to show up the next day. 

When you sat down in your car and entered the destination in your cell phone, you had to smile despite everything. At least now you had something to look forward to at home. Someone would be waiting for you; or at least you hoped he would. He still seemed to be rather sceptical about you. But you were sure that this would change with time. 

You pulled into the large parking lot of the shopping mall and already saw the large pet store. You were a bit excited when you took the note out of your bag on which you had written down the essential things you had to buy today. The store was well sorted and fortunately had everything you needed.

You were a bit overwhelmed with the food you had to choose. It felt like there were hundreds of different kinds of food, fish, beef, pork… how were you supposed to know which tasted good and which didn’t?

Your eyes fell on the bottom row of the shelf, in the very corner were a few cans, which were different in color from the others. You rolled your shopping cart to the side and crouched down to read the label on the cans. But you didn’t get a chance to read the label when you heard someone clearing their throat next to you. Immediately you turned your head and looked at the employee.

He moved the glasses that were sitting on his nose and had slipped down a bit back into place and gave you a nervous smile. “Can I help you?”

Surprised, you straightened up again. “Actually, yes, I’m a little overwhelmed, to be honest.”

“I understand,” he replied sympathetically, “hybrids are very complex beings. If you don’t give them the attention they need, they can be very resentful.” He pointed to the cans in front of you and you jumped aside in surprise to make room for him. 

“Wait a minute, you’re talking about a hybrid?” you began wondering. 

The man had taken your position in front of the shelf and grabbed one of the cans from the shelf. “You were in front of the shelf for hybrids, I thought… I thought you had a hybrid.” His smile was gone, what remained was a confused frown.

“Oh no, no,” you made yourself clear and waved your arms wildly in front of your torso, hoping to underline your statement. “He’s an Australian Kelpie, just an ordinary dog.” You threw him a smile, hoping to make the situation a little less awkward.

“Ah, okay,” he said and put the can back in its place, “Then you’re free to choose,” he went on and made a broad arm movement to the rest of the shelf.

“You don’t have much choice for hybrids,” you noted as you glanced again over the countless cans, almost dwarfing the handful of cans for hybrids by comparison. 

The employee sighed, which made you turn your attention back to him. “You don’t know much about hybrids, do you?” Your expression seemed to alarm him because he promptly added, “No offense.”

“None taken, I just didn’t think it was that obvious,” you reassured him and took the can he handed you. 

“This is perfect for Australian Kelpies. Especially for puppies to strengthen their bone structure.”

“Oh, he’s not a puppy anymore. To be honest, I don’t even know how old he is. But he’s definitely full-grown.”

“Oh, I see. You adopted a dog from a shelter. That’s very commendable. Then I recommend this one,” he said and handed you another can. “I also recommend a beef or veal bone, that will keep him busy for a while. And I would supplement the food with a simple but high-quality dry food.”

“Perfect, thank you so much! I just hope he likes the food. This morning he barely wanted to eat. Almost as if he was disgusted.”

“Hm, funny,” he replied, “normally they are very easy to care for and don’t have too high demands on their food. But dogs also have different personalities, maybe you have a little diva at home.”

You laughed and lifted the heavy bag of dry food into the cart. “I hope not.”

𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁𐄙𐄁

One hour and a car packed with groceries for you and your new resident later, you made your way home exhausted. The horrendous amounts of money you spent today you pushed far back and out of your consciousness. If need be, you had a little something put aside that you could fall back on if the money ran out at the end of the month.

“I’m back!” you shouted into the dead quiet house as you closed the door behind you and the purchases took up the entire entrance. You climbed over the dog bed and carried the groceries into the kitchen. You stowed everything in the refrigerator and the cupboards and were just about to go back into the hallway to get the rest when your eyes fell on the sink.

Your eyebrows were drawn together as you looked at the two bowls and the spoon that were on the tray for draining. Had you washed the dishes this morning? You were convinced that you had only put them in the sink. But maybe this process was already so automated in your brain that you hadn’t even noticed it.

Without a second thought, you grabbed the dog bed and dragged it into your bedroom. Your bed was deserted, so you just quickly picked up the blankets and pillows from the floor and put the dog bed in its place instead. You looked at the position for a moment before you pushed it with your foot half a meter away from your bed. You didn’t want to make the same mistake tomorrow morning, if you were still not used to having a dog sharing your room from now on. 

“Where are you?” you shouted as you left the bedroom, looking for the dog in every room on the first floor. The house was not infinitely large, so it couldn’t be that difficult to find him. You paused for a moment and listened if you could hear the paws tripping somewhere, but the house was quiet.

With careful steps you climbed up the stairs. Most of the doors were locked and you actually thought you had closed all the doors. However, one of them was ajar, so that you headed towards it. “You in here, doggie?”

Carefully you pushed the door open and the question popped into your head how he had fitted through the slit. But this thought was displaced by the feeling that spread through you when you took a look into the room behind the door. 

Your father had used this room as an office and you had hardly had the time (and money) to decorate the room the way you wanted it to be. Therefore there was only a simple desk in the room, numerous shelves that you had more or less filled with your things and documents, an easel with a blank canvas on it and your mother’s old piano that she had left you when she moved out. As a child, you had taken lessons twice a week, but hadn’t played in ages now.

Right in front of this dusty piano the dog stood on his hind legs. His front paws he had supported on the cushion of the seat. “What are you doing there?” you asked laughing and the dog’s head moved around to you. He must have pulled the seat out because you were sure you had never pulled it out from under the piano. 

You crouched down and hesitantly stretched out your hands. To your surprise, he pushed himself off the chair and slowly came towards you. He stopped just before you and you waited a moment longer to see if he changed his mind and backed out. But he still stood in front of you and looked at you waiting. Slowly you approached one hand to his nose and held it out to him so he could sniff it. 

But he ducked away from your hand and came another step closer so that his nose almost touched your upper body when he looked up at you. “Do you want me to pet you?” you asked, your voice no more than a whisper for fear he might shy away from the sound. Of course, no answer came back, so you let your hand, which was still hovering in the air, sink slowly. Gently your fingers came into contact with the fur on his back. You knew that once you had washed him, his fur would soften. Right now it was still ruffled and dirty from the weather outside. Who knew how long the poor guy was out there on his own…

You moved your hand up and down his back for a few more seconds before you slowly straightened up so as not to frighten him. “Shall we go outside?”

Immediately, his head rushed to you and a blink of an eye later he started jumping up and down. You had to laugh. “Not so fast, not that you hurt yourself,” you warned him, but by then he was already on his way to the stairs. You only heard his paws on the wood and hurried after him. When you came downstairs, his nose was already halfway into the shopping bags that contained the cans of his dog food. With a smile, you grabbed the harness from a bag to which you attached the leash. 

You were relieved that the time alone had apparently done him good and that he had warmed up a little with you in the meantime. This would make things a lot easier if you tried to put the harness on him. You called him to you and were amazed at how well he obeyed you. Whoever his former owners had been, they must have raised him well. Without resistance, he had the harness put on.

You too became a little more courageous and stroked his chin. “I have thought of a name for you in the meantime, too,” you said and he tilted his head. “There was once a children’s series about a bear who got into trouble from time to time. You also look like you like to make some trouble.” He turned his head to the other side, as if to say: Me and trouble? Never.

“Anyway, you remind me of a bear, and grizzly didn’t quite fit. So how about Paddington?”

The dog in front of you almost snorted contemptuously and your smile disappeared. You had thought about it the whole time at work and found the name fitting. “Don’t you like Paddington?” Another snort, this time followed by a shake of his whole body. “Okay, okay, all right,” you said thoughtfully. “But you look like a slightly undersized bear and I think you like Winnie the Pooh even less.” This time the dog showed no reaction at all, just stared at you from his almost black eyes. “I’m just kidding, Baby Bear,” you reassured him and immediately his head shot up. “Oh, you like that nickname?” He took a step forward and licked your hand. “But it’s just a nickname, we still have to think of a real name. But it can wait.”

You straightened up with the leash in your hand and grabbed your keys. You both left the house through the patio door and went through the garden gate towards the adjacent forest. As a small child, you had often been afraid of the dark pines and large deciduous trees, which filtered much of the daylight with their canopy of leaves. Nowadays you loved the silence that surrounded you as soon as you stepped into the forest. It felt like a different world, all the stress was forgotten for a few minutes and the noise of the city fell silent. Instead, the songs of the birds, the rustling of the leaves in the wind and the sticks cracking under your feet as you stepped on them embraced you. 

And you felt even better now that you had a little four-legged friend by your side. 

You watched him stop here and there to smell plants or pick up a stick to drop it a few meters later when something else caught his attention. Normally at this time, and in general in this part of the forest, you did not meet a soul. That’s why the blood froze in your veins when the dog suddenly stopped as if frozen, so you staggered back a little when the leash was stretched. You didn’t realize that he had stopped, but when you saw his expression, you knew something was wrong.

You didn’t dare to ask what it was. Even if he couldn’t answer, you wanted to draw his attention back to you. Maybe he had just smelled a rabbit or heard a noise in the distance. The fact that he pointed his tail straight back and snarled his teeth did not necessarily mean that something was wrong. Or at least that’s what you tried to tell yourself. 

You backed off a few steps so that you stood behind him and you half-heartedly pulled the leash to lead him back to the house. When you turned around, you could still see the top of the roof of your house between the trees. When you turned back, you thought you saw a silhouette standing between the trees. Immediately a shiver ran through you and the hairs on your arms stood up.

“Let’s go,” you whispered, that was all you were capable of. Again you pulled on the leash, but this time the dog growled in front of you. Still he had not turned his gaze away from his intended target. But when you looked in the same direction, you couldn’t see more than the small forest path leading into the gloom of the forest. But that changed a second later when a figure stepped out of the bushes. At first you only heard the rustling of the leaves, then you saw the branches being pushed aside as a big grey wolf came towards you.

Instinctively you recoiled, you had the leash so tightly wrapped around you that your fingers hurt. You tried to pull the dog towards you, but he did not move a bit. You thought about running back to the house alone. Maybe you could call Hoseok, but even that wouldn’t help you at this moment. You didn’t want to leave the dog alone with the wolf. Maybe they would get into a fight or he would run away in front of a car of the next speeder.

No. You kept clutching the leash and trying to remember what you had read, how to react when a wolf was facing you. You were sure that the majority had assured you that wolves were so shy that they avoided humans. So why this wolf came closer and closer to you was a mystery to you. You were unsure whether you should continue to stand there as if rooted in the ground or chase him away with loud noises. 

But even if you wanted to make a sound – it did not work. Not even the smallest sound came out of you. You couldn’t even breathe properly when you watched the wolf stop right in front of you. His gaze lay on your dog and the two of them seemed to be having a staring contest. Whether this was a good sign or meant that they would start attacking at any moment, you did not know. But you were sure that you would find out at any moment. 

The wolf gave a deep growl of itself, which went through your marrow and leg and you had to suppress a shiver. Your dog also gave another growl and he took a confident step forward. You were pulled along and gave a choked gasp of fear. This did not go unheard by the two animals in front of you and suddenly the attention of the wolf was on you. 

You dodged his gaze and turned your head to the side, hoping to turn his attention away from you as quickly as possible. You flinched as your dog growled again, this time louder and slowly backed away. You took this as an unspoken invitation to imitate him and to go backwards as well. Step by step you brought more and more distance between you and the wolf, which turned around after a few steps and disappeared back into the forest. 

You ran as fast as your feet carried you back to the house. Startled, you cried out when you almost ran over a rabbit, which hopped back into the bushes. But you had no room in you to feel guilty. Too great was the fear inside you. You could only exhale with relief when you had closed and locked both the garden gate and the patio door behind you. But for the rest of the afternoon and evening you felt as if the inhabitants of the forest were watching you and the tops of the trees gently swaying in the wind were laughing at your naivety.

#taehyung x reader #dog hybrid!taehyung #hybrid!taehyung x reader #bts smut #bts angst #bts hybrid au #bangtanarmynet #thebtswritersclub #hybridbtsnetwork #hybrid taehyung x reader #bts fanfic

[hawthornewhisperer]

epiphanies

Some DILF!Draco for @ambpersand. Currently 1,500 words and rated T, but I hope to add a second chapter tonight/tomorrow/soon that would be rated M. This will stay tumblr-only until I have that second chapter ready, then I'll put the whole shebang up on Ao3.

Inspired by this incredible fanart by @mignon-chignon and thank you to @bgonemydear for her on-the-spot betaing.

Hermione hadn’t even finished getting dressed when the owl from the Ministry arrived. She scanned the note, swore under her breath, and dashed off a reply. If the Mitford hearing had been moved up, that meant she needed the files and she needed them today.

She had last seen them in Malfoy's briefcase as he went home two days ago, but he'd been out of the office ever since. She hurried up the stairs to her building’s owlery, scribbled a note to Malfoy and returned to her flat, hoping against hope she was wrong.

His return owl arrived when she was halfway through her toast and she groaned under her breath. Mitford files are at my place. I’ll leave them in the Floo Parlor.

That was it, not even his initials as a sign off. “Rude prat,” she grumbled under her breath. Malfoy had been working at the firm with her for the past six months, and while he was no longer the sneering bully she remembered from Hogwarts, he was an exceedingly grumpy arsehole most of the time. Everything he said was clipped and sardonic, and he seemed to have a deathly allergy to saying thank you. She would have hated working with him if he wasn’t so bloody good at his job, which had downgraded her feelings towards him from “loathe completely” to “tolerate grudgingly.”

Hermione always did have a weakness for competence.

She grabbed her blazer and joined the queue in the lobby for the floo, still piling her hair into a bun on the top of her head when she took her turn.

Malfoy’s Floo Parlor was immaculate. It looked like a magazine spread, tastefully decorated and without even a speck of dust. In contrast, her tiny flat looked like a library had exploded in it, largely because one basically had.

But of course Malfoy’s was neat and tidy and...empty. The Mitford files were nowhere to be seen. She let loose a swear that would have made her ex-husband proud and steeled herself to walk into Malfoy’s apartment proper, wishing she had had time for an extra cup of tea if she was going to have to deal with his surly face before nine am.

She pushed open the door to the rest of his flat, ready to snap at him, and froze.

He had his back to her, looking out the expansive window that framed much of London, and the first thing she noticed was he had a very nice back.

A very nice bare back, because he was shirtless. Shirtless and holding a baby.

She knew he had a child, of course. He had one framed photo of the boy on his desk— the only photo of any kind in his entire office, which otherwise resembled a prison cell with a very fancy sofa— but Malfoy did not talk about personal matters at work. All she knew was his name— Scorpius— and that he was approximately Albus Potter’s age.

The little boy shared his father’s blond hair, but there was a soft curl to the ends that must have come from his mother. The Malfoy-Greengrass divorce had been the subject of more than one gossip page article, but Hermione hadn’t read any of them— she didn’t like how exploitative they felt, turning people’s pain into sport for entertainment.

Not that she cared much about Malfoy’s pain, per se, but it was the principle of the thing.

Scorpius’s eyes were red rimmed and his cheeks looked sticky with tears as he eyed her over his father’s shoulder. His father’s exceptionally muscled, well defined, bare shoulder. The boy pawed at his eye with a chubby fist and she watched as Draco pressed a soft kiss to the side of his son’s head, the sort of careless affection she was used to seeing from Harry with his boys but she had never once thought she would see from Malfoy. “It’s okay buddy, I know. It hurts,” she heard him murmur, and she realized she had been staring for entirely too long.

She cleared her throat and he turned with a start. “Fuck, the Mitford files,” he said, the soft look on his face vanishing in an instant.

Hermione felt an odd sort of loss when his familiar cold mask slipped into place, like she had gotten a glimpse of something she would never see again.

Why she wanted to see that look on his face again was a mystery she didn't much feel like solving.

“They’re in my study, hold on,” he added, shifting Scorpius higher on his hip and padding barefoot towards a closed door.

Hermione used his absence to compose herself. She was just thrown by seeing her coworker out of context, that was all.

Out of context and shirtless with an unfairly sculpted chest, plus a pair of joggers slung low across his hips. Did all men have muscles that arrowed down from their hips like that? That was not something she had seen in the flesh before, and it had her flustered.

By the time he returned with the Mitford file, she was thoroughly uncomposed. “You know if you’re going to be off work you really shouldn’t take home client files that can’t be owled,” she snapped.

Anger flashed across his face. “I’ll be sure to have Scorpius schedule his sleep regressions and teething fits with you next time,” he growled.

“It’s nothing to do with him,” she said, doing her best to keep her eyes anywhere but where they wanted to be, which was staring at the play of morning light on the planes of his chest. “These files are supposed to stay at the office for a reason, Malfoy.”

Exhaustion abruptly flooded his features. He pressed his thumb and forefinger into his eyes and Scorpius nuzzled into his neck. “I know,” he said, broad shoulders slumping. “Look, this week has been hell. I didn’t think I would be out this long. I’m sorry,” he added, and quite frankly, she never thought Draco Malfoy would ever apologize to her for anything.

The shock from hearing those two words was the only explanation for what came out of her mouth next. “When was the last time you showered?”

Something that was almost a smile tugged the corner of his mouth up. “I look that bad, huh?”

Actually he looked like a Greek god carved out of marble but she wasn’t about to tell him that. And he did have rather alarming purple shadows under his eyes, plus stubble that indicated it had been several days since he shaved. “You’ve looked better,” she said, reaching out and plucking Scorpius from his arm. “I don’t have to be in for a bit. Go shower.”

He hesitated, but Scorpius was already interestedly pulling at her hair. “Okay,” Malfoy said, something unreadable in his grey eyes. “It’ll only be a minute.”

Hermione stuck her tongue out at Scorpius, who giggled. “Take your time.”

By the time Malfoy emerged from his bedroom, freshly showered and shaved and in jeans and a white v-neck shirt, Hermione and Scorpius were on the living room floor while he clambered all over her like a muggle jungle gym. Scorpius was fascinated by her hair and was sitting next to her while she laid flat on her back, grabbing chubby fistfuls and yanking on it.

“Careful, he’ll skin you bald if you let him,” Malfoy drawled.

She pushed herself up to sitting, at first grateful Draco had put on a shirt and then disappointed as it meant his chest was now hidden from view. But then he crossed his arms and the muscles in his biceps strained against the sleeve of his shirt, and she circled back to grateful again.

“There’s plenty to go around,” she said, gently prying Scorpius’s hand from her hair and retying it into a bun. Draco's gaze rested on her as she did, and an unaccountable blush started crawling up her neck.

“Sorry about earlier,” he said, sitting down on the couch, lifting Scorpius into his lap and bringing the total number of apologies she had ever heard from his lips to two.

She shrugged. “Honestly? You’ve been worse.”

He huffed, a noise that almost sounded like a laugh. “I have been a prat, haven’t I? Between the divorce and Scorpius, I’ve been an arsehole at the office. I’ll try and do better,” he said.

The utter sincerity of his words drew her up short. “Actually, I was talking about Hogwarts but yes, you have been a prat at the office.”

Draco blinked. “Fuck, I— I never apologized for that, did I?”

“You didn’t, but it’s okay,” she said surprising herself. Apologies were nice, but they didn't mean much if the person didn't actually try to improve. She wasn’t sure when, exactly, but at some point in the last six months she had stopped thinking of who Malfoy used to be and accepted that he had changed for the better.

“It’s not, though,” he said. “Again, with the divorce and everything I’ve been— it’s isolating, is all. I'm sorry.”

“Pity there’s no one else in this room who knows what it’s like to go through a divorce,” she said drily.

His eyebrows shot up. “Are you saying I can come to you for tea and sympathy, Granger?”

“I’m saying you don’t have to do this all alone,” she said gently, and stood. “McAvoy will be waiting on the Mitford brief though. I should get going.”

He stood, Scorpius once again snuggling into his chest. “Thanks, Granger. I owe you one,” he said.

Hermione leaned over to place a kiss on Scorpius’s soft curls without even thinking. She could smell Draco’s skin that close, the soap and shampoo from his shower filling her nostrils. “I’ll hold you to that,” she said, and headed towards the Floo Parlor, Mitford files safely in hand.

She only wished she could say the same for her hormones.

#dramione #dramione fic #draco x hermione #single dad!draco #divorced!hermione

[swan-of-sunrise]

The Winter Soldier (Chapter Six)

Summary: (Y/N) and the others successfully abduct a high-level Hydra operative, who provides them with information on Hydra’s bone-chilling plan.

Pairing: Steve Rogers X Reader

Word Count: 1.9k

Warnings/Disclaimers: Brief description of a panic attack

A/N: Hope you all enjoy!

Chapter Six (Previous Chapter)

“How in the hell did you come up with this plan?”

(Y/N) and Natasha were using binoculars to stare out the window of an abandoned apartment at a small courtyard situated between a tall building and a crowded outdoor café, where Sam was currently sitting and enjoying an iced tea; Steve was sitting in Sam’s car and parked around the corner, at the ready just in case the plan didn’t work. Once (Y/N) told the others her plan to abduct Sitwell and they’d taken a quick trip to Fort Meade for the EXO-7 Falcon pack, Natasha had hacked into the Hydra operative’s digital planner; she discovered in his itinerary that he’d be in a meeting with Senator Stern all morning in the building across the street, and then she’d managed to remotely clone Director Pierce’s cell phone.

Glancing away from her binoculars, (Y/N) flashed Natasha a bright smile. “It wasn’t that hard; part of it’s from a scene in my novel, actually. This is how Amelia – she’s the main character, by the way – tricks an enemy agent into giving her important information on her case.” She pulled the laser pointer integral to their plan out of her pocket and twirled it around her fingers. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“You’re in the wrong line of work, (Y/L/N). You’d make a good spy.”

(Y/N) chuckled bashfully and turned back to her binoculars. “Thanks, but I think I’ll stick to writing. Less of a risk of being shot at, you know.”

“Well, not many writers would just up and volunteer to try and take down a covert terrorist organization.” Although she said it in an off-hand manner, (Y/N) could tell that Natasha was genuinely curious about her off-the-cuff decision.

“I’m not usually an impulsive person, but what I said earlier was true: I have no right to do any less than what the three of you are doing. I won’t sit by and watch as Hydra destroys everything we know, especially knowing that there are ways I could help stop them. Besides, Sam and I are a team, have been for over a year now. I can’t let my best friend put himself in danger without being by his side.” (Y/N) rolled her eyes at herself and gave the spy an embarrassed smile. “But please don’t tell him I said that, Nat, it would only inflate his already-enormous ego.”

“Secret’s safe with me, hot-shot.” Natasha paused for a moment. “You remind me a lot of Rogers. To tell you the truth, I think that’s half the reason why he let you onto the team.”

(Y/N) frowned at her comment, her eyes still looking through her binoculars. “What’s the other half-?” Just then, a group of men walked out of the building across the street. “Wait, is that Sitwell?”

Natasha looked through her own binoculars and nodded. “Yeah, the bald guy with the glasses.” She quickly set down the binoculars and typed out a quick text on her phone. “Time to see if your plan works, 007.”

Through the binoculars, (Y/N) saw Sam glance down at his phone and dial a number from his seat at the café. The group of men headed towards the parking lot, leaving Sitwell alone on the building’s steps. (Y/N) smiled to herself as she watched him pull out his phone and press it to his ear; he became skittish as he listened to Sam talk. Watching Sitwell’s lips, she carefully aimed her laser pointer and pressed the button just as he asked, “And why would I do that?”

She let out a triumphant laugh when Sitwell glanced at the red light on his tie and looked around in fear before hanging up the phone and walking towards Sam. “Yes!” She punched the air and put down her laser pointer and binoculars. “Dynamite with a laser beam!”

“‘Killer Queen,’ yeah?” Natasha grinned and nodded appreciatively. “Steve was right, you’ve got a great taste in music. C’mon, we’d better head down to the car…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fifteen minutes later, Steve was throwing Sitwell across the rooftop of an apartment building; Natasha strode confidently after him, and (Y/N) tried her best to hide her unease as she trailed behind them. Although she’d thoroughly researched torture methods for her novel, she wasn’t quite sure she could stomach seeing them performed in real life. Stay calm, Captain America wouldn’t do those things to someone else, she thought to herself, fiddling with the edge of her grey leather jacket, although he did mention that they might do that one thing if Sitwell doesn’t talk. She looked up from her combat boots in time to see Steve say, “Tell me about Zola’s algorithm.”

“Never heard of it.”

“What were you doing on the Lemurian Star?”

“I was throwing up, I get seasick.” Steve grabbed Sitwell roughly by the collar and forced him to the edge of the rooftop, but the man only smiled condescendingly up at the super-soldier. “Is this little display meant to insinuate that you’re gonna throw me off the roof? Because that’s not really your style, Rogers.”

(Y/N) couldn’t see Steve’s face, but she assumed that he was smiling as he smoothed out the crumpled lapels of Sitwell’s jacket. “You’re right. It’s not. It’s hers.” After quickly stepping aside, Steve watched calmly as Natasha kicked Sitwell directly in the chest and he toppled off the roof, screaming the whole way down. Despite (Y/N) knowing what their plan was, she still felt her stomach lurch uncomfortably as the man’s screams grew fainter the longer he fell; she’d never mentioned her extreme fear of heights to any of them, but in that moment she wished she had.

Natasha turned to Steve. “Oh wait, what about that girl from Accounting, Laura…?”

“Lilian. Lip piercing, right?”

“Yeah, she’s cute.”

Steve shook his head and looked down. “Yeah, I’m not ready for that.”

(Y/N)’s confusion and slight jealousy at their conversation shifted to awe as Sam suddenly flew up and threw Sitwell back onto the roof while he landed gracefully on his feet. (Y/N) rolled her eyes in amusement as her best friend flashed her a wink, his wings quickly folding back into his pack as he approached them.

Sitwell, no longer composed and condescending, was shaking with fear on the rooftop as he held his hands up. “Zola’s algorithm is a program for choosing Insight’s targets!”

“What targets?” (Y/N) asked, an uneasy feeling settling in the pit of her stomach.

To her surprise, Sitwell sneered. “And who the hell are you? The personal assistant?”

Steve grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and squeezed until he began wincing. “What targets?”

“You! A TV anchor in Cairo, the Undersecretary of Defense, a high school valedictorian in Iowa City, a first-time novelist writing about the Cold War in D.C…” Everyone’s eyes snapped to (Y/N)’s, and she could feel the blood leaving her face as she fully registered his words. “Bruce Banner, Stephen Strange, anyone who’s a threat to Hydra! Now, or in the future.”

Natasha, her face grim, drew closer to Sitwell. “The future? How could it know?”

“How could it not? The twenty-first century is a digital book. Zola taught Hydra how to read it. Your bank records, medical histories, voting patterns, e-mails, phone calls, your damn SAT scores. Zola’s algorithm evaluates people’s past to predict their future.”

“And what then?”

Sitwell rubbed his temple agitatedly. “Oh my God, Pierce is gonna kill me.”

Steve shook him again. “What then?”

“…then the Insight helicarriers scratch people off the list. A few million at a time.”

A heavy silence hung over the group as they all absorbed what Sitwell had said; millions of people around the world are going to be killed by Hydra if we don’t stop them, (Y/N) realized in horror. She tried to avoid thinking about it, but she couldn’t help but replay Sitwell’s words over and over in her head: A first-time novelist writing about the Cold War in D.C., a first-time novelist writing about the Cold War in D.C., a first-time novelist writing about the Cold War in D.C…

“Okay, time to head out.” After yanking Sitwell roughly to his feet, Steve turned to Natasha and Sam. “You two mind escorting him back to the car?”

“’Course not, Cap,” Natasha smirked as she and Sam grabbed Sitwell’s arms and dragged him towards the rooftop doorway, Sam throwing a concerned glance at (Y/N) as he went.

“You okay, (Y/N)?”

As Steve’s words left his mouth, (Y/N) registered the ringing in her ears and that she was taking rapid and shallow breaths; her heart hammered in her chest and through her clouded vision, she could barely make out Steve’s worried face right before her. “Can’t…can’t breathe…”

“Okay, it’s okay, um, here,” Stepping forward, he reached for her hand but stopped himself short. “Is it okay if I hold your hand?” (Y/N) gave a short nod and he took her hand, gently placing her palm against his chest so she could feel his strong heartbeat. “You’re okay, just try and slow your heartbeat to match mine. Can you do that for me? Breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth, like this.” He began doing the breathing exercise, and she shakily began copying him. “You’re doing great, (Y/N), just keep breathing.” To her surprise, he stopped the breathing exercise and began quietly humming a familiar tune; it was so faint beneath the dim ringing in her ears that she could’ve dismissed it as her mind tricking her if not for the feeling of reverberation in his chest. (Y/N) gradually felt her body responding positively; her breathing began to even out and as her heartbeat returned to normal, her vision cleared and the ringing faded away into nothing.

Once his humming came to an end, she looked up at him with an insecure smile. “‘Smoke Gets In Your Eyes,’ The Platters. Thank you. I-I don’t know what came over me, I was fine until…well, you know. All at once, everything suddenly became very…real for me.”

Steve nodded solemnly. “No one will think any less of you if you decide to go home. You’ll be safer, and-”

“No, no way.” She firmly shook her head, her mouth set in a determined line. “I’m staying. Just because I found out I’m a possible Insight target and had a panic attack doesn’t mean that I’m suddenly okay with sitting back while Hydra plans to kill millions; if anything, I’m even more invested in this fight than I was before.” She felt the corners of her mouth lift into a smirk. “If you’re trying to get rid of me, Rogers, then you’re going to have to try a little harder than that.”

When she finally stopped talking, she registered something akin to admiration in Steve’s small smile, and she willed herself not to blush. They stared into each other’s eyes for a few more moments, and that’s when (Y/N) realized that one of Steve’s hands was still resting on her waist and the other was gently holding her hand against his chest, his thumb absentmindedly rubbing small circles over her knuckles.

Steve seemed to realize the same thing because a moment later, he quickly let go of her and took a couple of steps back. With a pinkish tint to his cheeks, he glanced toward the rooftop doorway and replied, “Well, if you’re sure that you’re okay then let’s go. We’ve got a launch to stop.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

A/N: Thank you so much for reading! I’ve created a Spotify playlist inspired by this series, and I’ll be updating it every time I upload a new chapter. Enjoy! 

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4BenknAqQQnOWY8NmSa23V

Tagging: @mrs-obrien @lahoete @awkward117​ @cminr​ @momc95​ @awkwardnesshabitat​ @marinettepotterandplagg​ @khuang3​ @supersouthy​ @benakenalove​ @brooke0297​ @hufflepeople​ @becausewelie​​ @outoftheregular @supreme-tantrum​

Chapter Seven

“The Winter Soldier” Masterlist

#steve rogers x reader #captain america x reader #steve rogers #captain america #sam wilson #falcon #natasha romanoff #black widow #captain america fic #captain america the winter soldier

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

She [3]

Warnings: non-consent sex (series)

This is dark! Steve and explicit. 18+ only.

Series Synopsis: Steve Rogers’ life is turned upside down by a reporter.

Chapter Summary: The reader finds herself at the center of even more unwanted attention

Note: This is a slow slow creep but that’s always the best kind. Thanks everyone who is reading this. The series is in full 10 chapters and they are all DONE! So we will have a smooth ride from here on out.

Thanks to everyone for their patience and feedback. :)

I really hope you enjoy. 💋

<3 Let me know what you think with a like or reblog or reply or an ask! Love ya!

Reader

The morning was more hectic than any before. There was a brief lull, right after the story drop. The long wait for the verdict. Was it a hit or a flop? You sat at your desk, typing away at your latest assignment. Nothing so glorious as the famous super soldier. Merely a fluff piece on a local foundation for children in need. The usual fare.

Then it began. The comment section on the article was overwhelming and the coverage of the printed article was just as fervent. The Google alerts on your phone threatened to drain the battery and the stationary phone on your desk began to flash. You answered.

“My office. Now.” Poppy’s demand was followed by a click.

You stood and tucked your cell up your blazer sleeve. You knocked on her transparent door and she waved you in as she remained sitting. One leg was crossed over the other as she leaned back and swiveled back and forth.

“Do you know what you’ve done?” She asked. Your eyes rounded. “You’ve set the world on fire. I have been on the phone all morning and who do you think I’ve been talking about?”

“I don’t--” You began.

“You. And Steve Rogers.” She trilled. “Even heroes must be mindful of the press.”

“What do you--?”

“Tell me haven’t been divulging in all that praise, hun,” She chimed. “What are you working on right now?”

“Um, well, I just went down the Centre for Advocacy and Assistance and I’m--”

“Drop it. Throw it on an intern’s desk,” She interrupted again. “You’ll be much too busy for that.”

“What do you mean?” You stood just behind the acrylic chair.

“Interviews!” She almost shouted. “Everyone wants to know what it was like to face down Captain America.”

“Interviews? No, no. It wasn’t like that.”

“You know what you wrote,” She jabbed a pointed nail in the air. “I think you might be as hot a commodity as he is.”

“I don’t want to be interviewed.” You said. “I’m a reporter. I don’t--”

“This is an opportunity,” She insisted. 

“It’s one article. I can’t just depend on that.” You said.

“Think about it.” She said. “Even so, clear out your desk. We’re moving you to the features department. I hope you know what that means.”

You nodded. That was a win at least.

“Long hours. Better pay.” She leaned an arm on her desk. “But it’s hard work. One wrong pitch and your back down to blurbs.”

“I know,” You assured her. “Thank you.”

“Thank me if you make it a year,” She adjusted her glasses. “And keep those eyes open. You might not want the attention, but you’re going to get it.”

🖋️

You headed out for your usual midweek lunch. As you stepped out the front doors, you were surprised by a lens. In your effort to find the card to collect stamps for your sandwiches, you stumbled and your bag fell to the pavement. You knelt to gather the scattered contents and quickly righted yourself.

You flitted past the photographer as he called after you. “Miss, miss, are you afraid of Steve Rogers?”

You rolled your eyes at the question and dipped into the sandwich shop. You got your usual turkey club on rye but not to go. Instead, you ate in, still on edge at your run-in. As a member of the press, it was startling to get a taste of the other side. You were determined in your work, but never the one to unnecessarily hound a subject.

You wiped your mouth and sat back as you checked the time. You wondered how bad it was for him. You had underestimated yourself; your article. You had ignored Poppy’s prediction that the article would be a best-seller and let your self-doubt get the best of you. And now, it was all a mess.

You hadn’t meant to villianize Steve Rogers, merely humanise him. To make him more than the man behind the perfect smile and golden hair. You thought a glimpse into his internal dilemma would be grounding, not ostracizing. You were wildly mistaken.

You tidied up and threw away your garbage. You set off back to work and passed another photographer, her curly hair barely contained under a wool cap.

“Miss, why did you smear Steve Rogers?” She asked as you tried your best to ignore her. “Can you confirm--”

You hurried through the front doors and tripped on your own foot as you entered the lobby. You cursed under your breath and caught the elevator before it could close. Your bag shook as your phone began to dance once more. You cringed and gripped the slender strap of your purse. You didn’t feel too sorry for yourself, you were sure it was much worse for him.

🖋️

The rest of your day dragged on. You were greeted by the same probing photographers but evaded them in the subway. The crowded train had you even more on edge than usual. You kept your eyes on the phone, your notifications muted but for your work e-mail. You played the little farming game as you waited for your stop.

The same walk as any other day. Short but it saw the sky greying by the time you reached your building. Your keys jingled with the overzealous keychains and attachments, an empty bottle of sanitizer clung to the mess.

You climbed up the stairs, one at a time. The wood was old and warped beneath the mats. Your door jammed and you fought the thick barrier until you forced your way inside. You flipped on the lights and locked the door behind you. You kicked off your shoes and dropped your purse. You wriggled out of your blazer and stretched as you looked around the cramped space.

You went to the buzzing refrigerator and pulled out your leftover shawarma plate from the night before and a can of sparkling water. You popped open the styrofoam and took out your phone. You leaned on the counter and at the chicken and rice cold and scraped up the last of the pickled turnip and cabbage.

Poppy wanted you in early the next morning. That couldn’t be good. Your junk box was quickly filling too as you redirected e-mails from your cohorts asking for statements and explanations. You didn’t feel the need or desire to justify what you wrote. It was the truth.

You thought of how quickly the meeting with Steve Rogers had turned tense. The mere mention of his old friend was enough to rile him but you had continued to poke. Well, that was your job. To follow the scent until you could latch onto the sinew of a story.

You tossed the container and went to the couch. You turned on the television and stretched out. You listened to the re-run of an early 00s sitcom and your eyes slowly closed. You were exhausted and expected to be more so after tomorrow. You only hoped the news cycle spat you out sooner than later.

You turned onto your side as the breeze rattled the fire escape outside your window. You switched the channel as the credits rolled and yawned against the pillow. As tired as you were, you knew you’d spend too much of your night on the couch; wakeless and watching episodes you’d seen a dozen times before.

🖋️

You knew something was off as you walked into the office. It was earlier than your usual start time but several others were already at their desks. You wondered if a few had even left the night before. You passed your old desk and looked at your vibrating phone.

‘Where are you?’ Poppy’s text popped up and you didn’t even stop to stare at the shell of your former workspace.

You continued onto her office and froze as you peered through her transparent wall. A man stood by her desk, his back to you and a bald head with a crooked thin strap around it. His long leather jacket hung to his knees and Poppy sat upright as she watched him tinker with the hummingbird ornament she kept on the corner.

You held back a gasp and continued forward. You raised your fist to knock but Poppy caught the movement with her seafoam eyes. She pushed her glasses up her nose and waved you in impatiently. The man turned to watch as you entered.

“Hey?” You said confused. “What’s--”

“Ma’am,” The man interjected and looked back at Poppy. “This is her?”

Poppy nodded as her lips formed a thin line.

“Hello, I’m--”

“Nick Fury.” You finished for him. “And I assume you know who I am already.”

“I know who everyone is.” He assured you and held out his hand. You shook it and felt a crushing strength in his grip. “And you know why I’m here?”

“About the article but I don’t know what you would want from me.” You said.

Poppy’s eyes widened. You’d never seen her so rattled. It was usually her doing the rattling.

“A conversation.” He said. “I understand you must be busy but I’m certain you can spare me a couple minutes.”

“I guess,” You shrugged.

“If you find yourself too busy, I can return with a subpoena.” He offered.

“A subpoena? Really?” You blinked at him. “I don’t think that’s necessary.”

“I would agree,” He put a hand on his hip and you spied the sidearm there. Was that intentional? “Is there somewhere private we might talk?”

“Take the conference room,” Poppy offered. “Just over there.” She pointed through the wall.

Fury nodded and you turned back to the door. He followed, his boots heavy on the floor behind you. You led him to the conference room and he closed the door swiftly. You didn’t sit as he began to pace around the long table. You stayed by the wall and hugged your purse.

“Look, I don’t know what you want. The article’s already out there and I didn’t write anything by the truth.” You said nervously. “I can’t control how people react to--”

“You have the recording still?” He asked as he stopped sharply. You nodded. “Good. Can I listen?”

It wasn’t really a question. He stared you down with his single eye and you took out your phone. You searched the files and hit play. You set the phone on the table as it began. You listened silently as your voice began and Steve replied. 

The conversation filled the airy conference and Fury crossed his arms as he listened. He wasn’t happy as Steve’s tone deepened and his words turned venomous. You felt a chill roll along your spine. You’d almost forgotten how hateful he’d sounded. You felt as if he was there now, his eyes boring into you as his lip curled.

As it ended, Fury nodded and rubbed his chin.

“Well,” He snatched your phone off the table. “Thank you.”

“What?” You neared the table as he tucked your cell in his pocket. “Wait, that’s my phone. I need that!”

“Your phone? Under the authority of… well, me, I am seizing it.” He declared. “For your security and every one else.”

“You can’t be serious.” You huffed.

“I can’t have this leaking.” He said. “I hear Best Buy’s having a promotion on iPhone’s. Looks like you need an upgrade anyways.”

You frowned and kept your lips sealed. He didn’t need to know about your cloud back-up. You’d have enough time to download the file before he could find it for himself. You rolled your eyes.

“Is that it?” You asked.

“I got what I wanted, like I always do,” He said. “But there is one more thing.”

You watched him. He was worse than any nosy photographer or internet troll.

“I don’t take these things lightly. You’ve sidelined one of my best men and compromised my team.” He hooked his thumb in his pants pocket. “But we’ve taken note of you and we are always vigilant of our enemies.”

“Enemies?” You shook your head.

“I suggest you steer clear of any public statements,” He warned. “Or I would consider some legal representation in the near future.”

You squinted at him in disbelief. You rubbed your forehead, tired and unprepared for your early morning interrogation. You still had a full day ahead of you. 

“Are we done?” You uttered. “I know my work isn’t as important as yours but I do have a job.”

“For now,” He said. “The public has a short attention span, miss, I suggest you find a new subject soon.”

With that he rounded the table and left you in the conference room. You sighed and grabbed the back of a chair. What the fuck were going to do without your phone?

🖋️

With your back-up done and a five minutes crash course in being a features writer from a new cohort, you felt entirely lost. You hid the flash drive in your purse and headed out on the guise of research. No one seemed to care very much, they all just thought you were off to search out a pitch to keep hold of your new position.

What you were truly off to do was sit in line for one of only three mobile associates at the electronics shop. When it was finally your turn, you asked for the most affordable yet reliable option. You brushed away the offer for the latest Apple shill and walked out with something a lot more comfortable next to your wallet.

You dreaded a return to the office. You were thankful for your sudden step-up as it meant a longer leash. You could check in once a week at most as long as you presented something to explain your absence. You weren’t so concerned about that anyway. 

You were more worried about getting this phone set-up. Oh, and creating new accounts because as it was, Fury and his people now had every drop of info on you. That meant, at some point, you would have to visit IT and get a new ID. For now, you forwarded all your messages to your new private e-mail and stopped by the coffee shop around the corner from your building.

You hated this new normal. Not only did you have to be aware of those who thought they could jump on your cloud, but those who would label you an enemy of the people. You were certain Fury would be keeping tabs on you and judging by the influx of bings from your phone, you were fairly certain the blow back was building by the second.

You didn’t bother delving into the chaos of the comments section. People arguing with each other over your exposure of the heroes versus those who felt it was a betrayal and misrepresentation. You had never expected the spotlight to include you but you were centre stage alongside the American hero. You only assumed it was much worse for him.

You thought on what Fury said. ‘Sidelined’. Did that mean Steve Rogers was no longer an Avenger? Had he stepped down or been forced out? Hmm… you were tempted to dive down that rabbit hole but did the flames need any more fuel? And yet, it was your job to prod and poke at the vague. 

However, it would be better to steer away from that and not rely on that one trick. Besides, you didn’t truly think there was anything particularly deceptive about Steve or his associates. They were secretive only because they had to be. They were doing their jobs as you did yours.

You sat by the window and picked at the curled lip of the paper cup. What would you pitch then? If you couldn’t grasp onto your momentary high, you might find the way down steep. You leaned your chin in your hand and watched the steam rise. The door chimed and you kept your eyes on the dark brew.

Maybe it was best to move along and sniff out your next bone. It would help you forget about the mess you had created while keeping your career alive. The only thing you could do was move forward and hope that this was all just buried by the next headline.

#Steve Rogers #dark steve rogers #dark!steve rogers #steve rogers x reader #dark steve rogers x reader #dark!steve rogers x reader #dark fic #she #dark!fic #fic #series #au #mcu #marvel #captain america

[superman86to99]

Superman #84 (December 1993)

Superman takes a short Paris vacation! Like, one day short. What's the worst that could happen?

Oh, man.

So, for the past few issues, we've been hearing about children being abducted in Metropolis. Now we see that they're being kept inside a giant toy house by some creepy bald man in Quasimodo clothes who seems to be obsessed with toys -- a "Man of Toys," if you will. Side note: no wonder the children haven't been found... all the articles about them are just gibberish! (See clip below.)

The kidnapper thinks that these kids' parents don't deserve them, and that they're much better off here, in an underground hideout with a man who threatens to starve them if they don't play with him. (And I do mean literally play, with action figures and stuff.) Meanwhile, as these children cry for help, Superman is having the time of his life. While helping move a stranded ship with some huge-ass chains, Superman spots a sunken galleon with a treasure chest inside and fantasizes about keeping the booty...

...before turning it over to the authorities anyway, the big boy scout. Then, he wakes up Lois at 6 AM and tells her they should go to Paris right now, which usually means your significant other is having a mental breakdown, but in this case they can actually do it. And so, after deciding that he deserves to use his powers for fun every once in a while, Superman and Lois drop everything and fly to France with super-speed for the rest of the day/issue.

Anyway: back to the child abduction! Cat Grant and her son Adam attend a Halloween party at Adam's school, but there's a disturbed weirdo in a hideous costume lurking among the crowd. Yes, I'm talking about Jimmy Olsen in his Turtle Boy suit.

Shortly after that, a guy in a dinosaur costume (see, all the creeps are dressed as reptiles) lures Adam out of the party with the promise of "superb video games." What child could resist that? Of course, that turns out to be the kidnapper and Adam ends up in his hideout along with the rest of the missing children and, worst of all, not a single "Lextendo" console.

The kidnapper gets angry at Adam when he refers to the toys at the hideout as "old-fashioned junk" (he was REALLY looking forward to those video games), and even angrier when Adam tries to free the other kids. Adam is brave and puts up a good fight, but...

And those were Adam Morgan's final words. "Uh-oh."

Next, we have a pretty harrowing scene of Detective Turpin letting Cat know Adam’s body was found, and Jimmy and Perry White taking her to the morgue to identify the body (most people probably wouldn't bring their former boss to something like that, but Perry sadly knows more than most about losing a kid). As for Lois and Clark, they were gone so long that the Daily Planet had time to print a headline about the murders. The issue ends when the lovebirds walk into the office smiling like two people who just spent the night fooling around in Paris... only to feel like jackasses when they find out what happened.

To be continued!

Character-Watch:

And that's it for little Adam Morgan who, unlike the also tragically diseased Jerry White, didn't even get any post-death appearances. Adam went from a little kid scared of Superman, to a huge brat, to a character who was approaching likeability as of last week. That's why I hate it when DC kills off young characters like Adam or Liam Harper: in long-form storytelling, children represent potential. Look at how much Wally West or Dick Grayson evolved over the years compared to their mentors! Sure, there's a huge probability that Adam would have ended up disappearing from comics for 25 years anyway, but who knows, maybe we'd now know him as Teen Gangbuster or something. GangbusTEEN.

This issue also represents a turning point for the kidnapper, who is never named or seen clearly in the story itself but I don't think I'm shocking anyone by spoiling the fact that he's Toyman (it's in the cover, for one thing). In his last two appearances before this storyline, Toyman helped Superman save some kids from Sleez and looked genuinely sad to learn about Superman's death, so this is a pretty dramatic change for the character. We'll find out why he went from big softy to child killer in Superman #85 (but don't get your hopes up).

Plotline-Watch:

The most disturbing part of the issue, all things considered, is still the part where Toyman climbs into a giant crib and hugs a huge stuffed bunny. Look at serial killer Tommy Pickles here:

Don Sparrow says:  “Even with the upgrade, Toyman is still just a man in a suit, a common complaint about Superman’s rogues gallery.” Funny you should say that, because I JUST shared an old Wizard interview in our Twitter in which Dan Jurgens talks about how Doomsday came out of his frustration with the fact that most Superman villains are dudes in suits (plus other interesting tidbits from the era, like how it was actually Roger Stern’s idea to bring back Hank Henshaw, so check out that link!).

Don again: “The entire Superman storyline of this issue feels like filler. Diving for buried treasure and soaring off to Paris -- it all feels like wasted time next to the Adam storyline.” I have a theory that the entire ship sequence is there as an excuse to put Superman in those big chains and make that Spawn joke (which I didn’t get until now, since I’ve always read this issue in Spanish).

Superman says that pulling that big ship was "a little easier than expected" -- that's either another hint that there's something going on with Superman's powers since he came back, or a subtle dig at the state of American ship manufacturing.

Another adorable "window tap" scene for the books, and this is the sexiest one so far. Is it me or has Jurgens started copying more than just Teri Hatcher's hairdo from Lois & Clark? (For anyone who thinks Lois has gotten implants, I refer you to this clip.)

While in Paris, Lois asks Clark if he's ever wondered what would happen if his rocket had landed in other countries. Don: “Clark’s conversation with Lois sounds like a bunch of concepts for Elseworlds stories. We eventually would see a Russian Superman, and a British Superman, but not yet the French Superman. (Hire us, DC!)” Yep, got my French Superman pitch ready, Jim Lee. Or just let us do Russian Superman again, since Red Son wasn’t even the first time you published that idea.

Don once more: “Another thing that makes no sense about the ‘new’ Toyman is his resentment of technological toys—when in previous appearances he himself had deadly high-tech toys to vex Superman over the years.” I especially resent his hatred of video game consoles. Incidentally, I wonder what types of games are available for Adam’s beloved Lextendo. Star Lex 64? Mega Man Lex? Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles & Lex?

No one is more upset at Lois and Clark for going AWOL than Whit. NO ONE. He's so furious that his usually grey mustache turned black.

Patreon-Watch:

As always, shout out to our patrons, Aaron, Murray Qualie, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Samuel Doran, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush and Raphael Fischer! Last month’s exclusive Patreon article was about the recently unearthed sequel to Superman 64 for the PlayStation, featuring Metallo, Parasite, and Lois looking even hotter than in this issue:

Hot damn. Find out more at https://www.patreon.com/superman86to99!

And believe it or not, Don Sparrow has even more to say about this issue. Read his section after the jump:

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow​):

I should start off my section with a big caveat:  I flat out hate this issue. There were several weird decisions made in the post-Death-and-Return era (most of them along the same lines of making the Superman titles more grim-and-gritty), and this story was one of the worst of them.  My theory is that, despite the praise and record-breaking sales of the Death and Return storyline, the Superman creative team felt pressure to have more extreme storylines, perhaps in response to the wildly successful Image books coming out at the time.  Between this story, and the upcoming “Spilled Blood” storyline, the Super books take a hard—but temporary--turn into more violent and upsetting storytelling—even though these stories are by the same writers as the previous few years. While death has always been a part of comics, and Superman comics was no exception, there is a jarring glibness and unfeeling toward the way violence is handled in these pages that is quite different from the stories that preceded it.  It’s made all the more jarring by the fact that well-established personalities suddenly veer wildly out of character, Toyman chief among them.  

We start with the cover, and while it is technically well-drawn (by the familiar team of Jurgens and Breeding) it’s also a very upsetting visual.  I think they should have gone with the pieta type pose with Adam and Superman, OR the scary badass bowie-knife Toyman (who apparently has a Cheshire cat smile now) but not both.  But the cover is a good hint at the tonal dissonance of the comic within.

We open with a splash of the now-extreme 90s looking Toyman, with his serial killer shaved head and spooky cloak, ignoring the pleas of hungry kids he has locked up in a tiny jail cell for days at a time (if that sentence doesn’t ring alarm bells for how wrong this is for a Superman story, I don’t know what will). For much of the issue Toyman’s eyes are obscured by glare on his lenses, further de-humanizing a character who was once one of Superman’s more empathetic bad guys.

We cut to Superman tugboating a huge tanker with giant chains and it’s a cool visual (one repeated in the Batman V Superman film).  It feels especially out of place to focus on, given how upsetting this issue is otherwise, but throughout the whole comic, Lois is drawn smoking hot, especially on the two page spread on pages 9-10.

The scenes depicting the actual murder, while still wildly out of place in a Superman comic, are well done, and give a real sense of darkness and menace, which I suppose is the intent.  Perhaps my least favourite visual is the Big Bird stuffie, silently bearing witness to what’s about to occur.

The edges of the panels on get more slashy and off-kilter (to me, looking very much like the layouts more typically seen in Image comics of the day) and I suppose I appreciate the restraint of how little Dan Jurgens shows of the death of a child, showing only a bloody slash on a black background.  This is still a pretty baroque image for a Superman comic, but certainly less violent than it could be, given what is happening.

Cat Grant’s silent horror is well staged, and powerful in its way.   Lastly, Clark Kent bending in sorrow and regret is a powerful image.

While this issue is handled marginally better, and more maturely than other comics on the shelf at this time, I still believe it is one of the biggest mistakes of the era.  Giving a long-established character an unceremonious death for shock value is gross on its own, but making it a child definitely crosses a line for me.  Making it worse is that, while the Toyman is a criminal and a killer, he has shown in past issues (a similar kidnapping storyline involving Sleez) that he genuinely cares for the well-being of children.  So for a long-time reader, this also felt like a betrayal of a long-established, fully developed character.   Adding to the ugliness of this is that Adam dies heroically, trying to free the children who have been caged, unfed, for days, but even in that regard, he fails.  The headline at the end of the issue confirms all the children are dead.  Adam’s death did not buy the other kids enough time to get away. It was all for nothing. Had Adam died, but the other children lived, maybe this issue wouldn’t leave quite as bad a taste. [Max: It’s weird because it’s all told in a way where it’s told in a way where it would make sense, narratively and within the story universe, that the other kids survived, but then it’s almost casually revealed that nope, they died too. A scene of one of the kids relaying Adam’s heroism to Cat in a future issue would have gone a long way.]

Superman doesn’t come off well in these pages, either.  It’s honestly the type of story they should just stay away from, because the more you think about all the calamity that is going on around the clock, the less defensible the whole Clark Kent persona becomes. Superman carving out time to romance his fiancée directly led to the preventable deaths of innocent children—how do you come back from that?

STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

I’m always looking for hints that perhaps Jimmy or Perry know Superman’s secret identity deep down, and Jimmy’s anger at Lois and Clark on their return to the Daily Planet offices would seem to give that theory some credence, as he’s as angry at them as if he knew Clark really were Superman.  Either that, or he’s ticked that it fell to him, and none of them to escort Cat into the morgue. [Max: Has this issue finally converted you to the “Jimmy is terrible” side now, Don?]

I don’t think I’m the only one who disliked the new Toyman—SPOILERS BE HERE: years later, in Action Comics #865, Geoff Johns retconned this whole story, reverting Schott into the criminal who over-relates to kids, rather than the child-killer of this story.  Apparently the infantile Schott, who speaks to “Mother” a la Norman Bates, is a robot so lifelike it fools even Superman, and the “Mother” he’s constantly replying to was the real Winslow Schott trying to recall the malfunctioning robot. [Max: That’s one Geoff Johns retcon I really didn’t mind, even if it felt kind of derivative of his similar “all the Brainiacs are robots made by the real Brainiac” reveal.]

#superman #dan jurgens #josef rubinstein #toyman #cat grant #adam morgan #dan turpin #whit #gangbusteen #super luthor fighter ii turbo championship edition

[pitiless-achilles-wept]

2020 Can Take My Hair, But Not My Hope

My hair started falling out on election night.

I thought at first it might be the anxiety, that I was literally pulling my hair out with worry over numbers I already knew were not going to be definitive before the night wore into morning but which I stayed up until 3:30am watching anyway. I tweeted rapidly, reassuring my jittery timeline that not only had we all known that the night would bring no results but that we had even expected Trump to lead in key states because of the greater number of mail-in ballots from urban areas that would largely count for Biden. We knew. We all knew. But we were all terrified, flashing back to 2016 and already dreading another four years of living life on high alert, in constant survival mode.

I posted a selfie with a tweet that read, "Could be the last presidential election I vote in (blah blah stage 4 cancer blah blah) and I wish it were better and clearer than this but it's a crucial privilege to have voted. Remember, whatever the outcome, the last thing they can take from you is your hope."

To me that last sentence has been a mantra for these years and for my treatment. I have consistently refused, despite overwhelmingly terrible odds, to lose hope. The story of Pandora's Box tells us that the very last thing left inside was Hope--that even once all the demons were out in the world there was that tiny, feathered creature left to hang on to. It hasn't been easy, but I am one of the most stubborn people you will ever meet (and if you doubt this just ask anyone who's ever fought me on anything!) and it has turned out to be a saving grace rather than an irritating personality trait. Feeling like the world was trying to take my hope away made me angry. And when I get angry I will fight back.

I know I'm not alone in feeling like we entered some kind of alternate nightmare timeline on election night 2016. To that point, despite periods of immense personal difficulty, nothing truly terrible had happened to me. Then, in short order, my marriage ended and I was diagnosed with and began being treated for a terminal illness, all against the backdrop of a regime so deliberately hateful that it was truly incomprehensible to me. Then, a global pandemic and national crisis swept away the small consolations I'd found in my new life with cancer. The temptation to feel hopeless was strong and I struggled with it, particularly in the isolation of quarantine. I'm struggling with it now, facing a winter of further lockdowns, social isolation, continued chemo, and the added indignity (and chilliness!) of not having any hair. But somehow the coincidence of my hair loss with election night seemed like a good omen for the future, if a sad thing for the present.

I heard the news that they had called Pennsylvania for Biden at a peaceful Airbnb in the Catskills after stepping out of a shower where lost hair in handfuls. It felt oddly like a sacrifice I had made personally. I joked about this with friends on the text chains that lit up and that (despite my promise to myself and my writing partner that we'd "go off the grid") I responded to immediately. Instant replies, with emojis and GIFs, participated in the fiction: "Thank you for your service!!!"; "We ALL appreciate your sacrifice!"; "Who among us would NOT give up their hair for no more Trump?". The feeling was real for me, though. It was as though the good news demanded some kind of karmic offering. You never get something for nothing, I thought, and really it was a small price to pay.

The rest of the weekend passed too quickly, with absorption in the novel I plan (madly, given that I also work full-time) to work on for "National Novel Writing Month" (NaNoWriMo), walks in the unseasonably warm woods, and nighttime drinks on the back deck under the stars, watching my hair blow off in fine strands and drift through the sodium porch light. My friend and I read tarot and both our layouts contained The Tower, the card for new beginnings from total annihilation, the moment of destruction in which (as the novel's title says) everything is illuminated. "This might sound dumb," he said, "but maybe yours is about your hair." It did not sound dumb.

[shaved heads, the 2020 election, and a couple pics under the cut]

There is probably no more iconic visual shorthand for cancer than hair loss. It happens because chemo agents target fast-proliferating cells, which tend to inhabit things that grow rapidly by nature (hair, fingernails), or that we need to replenish often (cells in the gut), as well as out-of-control cancer cells. But not all cancer treatments, not even all chemotherapies, cause hair loss. In my 20 months of being treated for cancer and my three previous treatments (four, if you count the surgery I had) nothing had yet affected my hair beyond a bit of thinning. This despite the fact that my first-ever treatment (Taxol) was widely known to cause hair loss for "everyone." I had been fortunate with this particular side effect in a narrow way that I have absolutely not been on a broader scale. "Maybe," I had let myself think, "I can have this one thing." The odds were in my favor too; only 38% of people in clinical trials being treated with Saci lost their hair. I liked the odds of being in the 62% who didn't. But--as we all felt deep in our gut while they counted votes in battleground states--odds aren't everything.

I had come to treat the "strength" of my hair as a kind of relative consolation (though as with everything cancer "strength," "weakness," and the rhetoric of battle have nothing to do with outcomes). I treasured still having it, not just out of vanity (though I have always loved my hair whatever length, style, or color it has been) but because it allowed me to pass among regular people as one of them. I had no visible markers of the illness that is killing me, concealed as first the tumor and then the scars were by my clothing. "You look wonderful," people would tell me, even when I suffered from stress fractures from nothing more than running or sneezing; muscle spasms in my shoulder and nerve death in my fingertips; nausea that I swallowed with swigs from my water bottle that just made me look all the more like a hydration-conscious athlete; and profound, constant, and debilitating fatigue. Invisible illness had its own perils but I would take them--take all of them at once if necessary!--if only I could keep my hair and look normal.

It was not to be. A part of me had known this, since a lifetime with metastatic cancer means a lifetime of treatments a solid proportion of which result in hair loss. But I had hoped. And I had liked the odds.

The hardest thing for me is having to give up this particular consolation before knowing whether or not my new treatment is also working on my cancer. Unfortunately, there really isn't a correlation between side effects like hair loss and effectiveness of treatment. If it is working then I will feel that--like the election to which I felt I had karmically contributed--it was all completely worth it. Yet, even in this best case scenario, there's a new reality for me which is that while I am on this treatment I will stay bald. When you are a chronic patient you hope for a treatment that will work well with manageable side effects. And if this treatment works--and if the other side effects are as ok-ish as they are now--then I will remain on it.

It's that future that I am furious about more than anything else. I want to continue to live my life, of course, but I don't want to have to do it bald! In part that is because I don't want to register to people constantly as an archetypal "cancer patient" when I know that I am so much more. It is also in part because I don't want to think of myself as being ill, and living every day having to disguise my absent hair will make that all the tougher. I have already noticed that I feel, physically, as though I am sicker because of my constantly shedding hair. How could I not, in some ways, when every move I make and every glance at myself (including in endless Zoom windows) shows me this highly visible change?

For that reason, I'm shaving my remaining hair tomorrow (Wednesday). It's a way to feel less disempowered--less like hair loss is happening to me--and wrest control of the situation back. I will try to find agreeable things about it: wigs, scarves, cozy caps, bright lipstick, statement earrings, and a general punk/Mad Max vibe that is appropriate to 2020. But I don't want anyone to think for a second that I find this agreeable, or even acceptable, or that I don't mind. I mind a whole hell of a lot. My hair was my consolation prize, my camouflage, my vanity, my folly, and my battle cry.

I dyed it purple when I was first diagnosed because I knew (or thought I knew) that I would be losing it soon. I didn't, and I came to cherish it as a symbol of my boldness in the face of circumstances trying to oppress me, to make me shrink, to tempt me to become invisible. I refused and used it to "shout" all the louder in response. Because of what it came to mean to me, I'm nearly as sad about losing the purple as I am about losing the hair itself. It both symbolized the weight I was carrying and also that I would not let that weight grind me down. It was my act of resistance and my sign resilience all at once.

I sent a text to my friends, explaining this and offering, as an idea, that I could "pass the purple" to them in some way, small or large. It would feel more like handing off a torch or a weight (or the One Ring) than anyone shaving their head in solidarity. (After all, if they did that it would just remind me as I watched theirs grow back that, in fact, our positions were very different.) You're welcome to do it if you'd like too, internet friends, with temporary or permanent dye or a wig or a headband or one of those terrible 90s hairwraps or whatever. But I don't require that anyone do it because I feel support from you all in myriad ways, all the time. (But if you do, please send me pictures!)

It's November 2020. The election is over and Joe Biden has won. I still have cancer and I'll be bald tomorrow. I hope it's a turning point, both personal and global, because it feels like one. We've given up a lot in the last four years and I cannot say that I feel in any way peaceful or accepting about having to give up yet one more thing. But in losing my hair I absolutely refuse to also give up my hope.

(On our walk we did also seem to find a version of The Tower, all that was left of an abandoned house)

#life update #my life as a cancer patient #stage 4 #mbc #metastatic breast cancer #losing my hair #unfair things #election 2020 #I just have a lot of feelings #the tower #us politics

[rollingthunderthighs]

Daredevil - Haikyuu x Reader

Summary: Tanaka (y/n), younger sister of Tanaka Ryunosuke! You’ve been watching your brother play volleyball since you both we just kids. You found your own passion, which you quickly gave up on due to... reasons. It happened halfway through your last year of middle school, then having to go to Ryu’s practices after school to wait to walk home with him. After spending your last year along side him and the team, you’ve come to cherish your time with Karasuno’s Volleyball Club. Now that you’re entering high school, you decided you wouldn’t go back to the past and stick with your new found interest; to help Kiyoko with managing the team of lovely crows! However, these other first years are something else; will you be able to handle them? Will you be able to handle your over protective brother? Most importantly, can you find your own wings while helping the others fly high? The past can’t stayed buried forever after all.

Pairings: Karasuno First Years x Reader; Kei Tsukkishima x Reader; Tadashi Yamaguchi x Reader; Tobio Kageyama x Reader; Shoyo Hinata x Reader

Warnings: Cursing

MASTERLIST

-----

Chapter 1 - First Day Back

-----

“Oni-chan,” you sigh, irritated at your brother as he put his jacket on, “Can you hurry up?”

Your brother simply waved you off, glancing at you with sleep still prominent in his eyes. You sigh again, louder just so he could hear it.

You love Ryu, you do, but having to deal with him in the morning was nothing short of a pain; he was always half asleep, always slow. Half of the time you would start to walk without him, having to contain an eye roll as he’d run to catch up with you. Even though he was a year older than you, he had insisted on being a good big brother and walking you to Oujitsu Middle. However, now that was all different, you were finally attending Karasuno along with him so he didn’t have to worry about taking you to school and running to his own. 

Once he finally decided to move his lazy ass, you both left the house with silent goodbye to your sleeping elder sister. You smooth your skirt, glaring at him from the corner of your eye. 

“Oni-chan, it’s my first day you know, you could’ve tried to put in a little more effort to leave early so we wouldn’t be late.”

“Ah, sorry (y/n)-chan. It’s just hard to wake up in the mornings, yanno?” He yawns loudly, arms raised high as he stretches.

“Maybe you should go to bed sooner, instead of kissing photos of Kiyoko-senpai all night long-”

“Hah, shut up punk I do not!”

He threw his arms around you, trapping you against his chest as he brought a hand up to give you a noogie.

“RYU YOU JERK, LET ME GO!”

“THEN DON’T MAKE OF YOUR AWESOME BIG BROTHER!”

You swat his hands away as he laughs at the mess of your hair.

“Ne, that’s a good look for you, (y/n)-chan~” He teases.

“You’re worse than nee-chan.” 

He shudders at the mention of your guys’ sister, and you take that moment while he’s distracted to strike; you smack the back of Ryu’s shaven head, the sound loud and sharp.

“Ouch, what the hell!?” He whines, rubbing his head tenderly.

“That’s what you get,” you huff, fixing your appearance before sticking your tongue out at him, “not my fault you decided to go bald, jerk-suke!”

“You’re so lame, nerd-(/n),” he grunts, shoving you lightly as the gates appear in your line of sight, “Now get to class before I kick your ass. You want help on where to go, need me to walk you?”

He stops at the gate in hopes you’d accept, but pouts as you continue walking and wave him off.

“Nope, I’m good. Thanks anyway, oni-chan, I’ll see you after school.”

“We’re practicing at the gym right after!” He yells out, sighing as you only wave him off once more.

Tanaka clicks his tongue, a little worried about you, but overall knowing you’d be fine. With what happened after last year, he felt bad that you felt as if you had to stick with him at his own club, but if that’s what you wanted then he wouldn’t push it.

As long as you were happy, he didn’t care; it also helped that he wouldn’t have to worry anymore, knowing you’d be a couple feet away.

After walking away from your brother, you head up to the board to see the class lists posted, trying to find your class. You spot your name on the roster and head towards class four, still a little in shock of how you made it to the college prep class, your exam scores not only shocking you but the rest of your family. Your two older idiot siblings had always managed to just barely scrape together passing scores; well you had to give Saeko some credit, she was in college after all-even if she really didn’t care about her core classes.

You got to your class with no problems, but were somewhat dreading the idea of walking in since you expected it to be somewhat full with classes starting soon. You weren’t late, per say, but you were by no means early.

‘Thanks oni-chan.’ You think bitterly, sighing as you slide the doors open.

To your frustration, your assumption was correct; the classroom was already full of first years, and you had to hold back an irritated groan as all the good spots were taken. Glancing around, you spot a seat that was going to have to be the next best thing for now; it was somewhat towards the back of the class, the next seat over from the window-the seat you truly wanted. Slipping off your bag from your shoulder, you hang it on the hook beneath your proclaimed desk as you sit down with a gentle breath of relief. 

Light music catches your attention, moving your head ever-so-slightly to peer at the boy sitting next to you. His headphones were playing loud music, the genre hard to catch as it was muffled just enough to leave the people around him wondering what it could be. You take in his appearance, short blond locks and thin framed glasses that hid his eyes; he was also pretty tall, even though he was sitting down you could tell. He looked as bored as you knew you were going to be as the day progressed-

Hell, you were already bored and the day hasn’t even started yet.

You had intended to turn away right after the initial glance, when his sharp gaze met your own; you had been taken aback by that single look, his face remaining unchanging but those now visible amber eyes overflowing in emotion.

The contrast intrigued you.

You purse your lips, overall unaffected by his stare, before turning to look back towards the front of the classroom. A grunt of distaste fills your ears, and you bite your tongue to hold in a retort. You continue to tell yourself to ignore him, not wanting to get caught up in drama on the first day.

Your eyes unintentionally flutter back over to the boy as his music comes out crisper, his headphones sliding off his head to rest on his shoulders. 

It wasn’t like you were trying to stare, it was just the music had caught your attention.. 

So when his eyes instantly caught your gaze again, eyes now a harsh glare, you knew that you wouldn’t avoid the drama this time. 

“What do you want.”

You raise a brow, his voice sounding calm despite the look on his face.

“Nothing?”

“Then, could you stop looking at me.” His tone turned upbeat, a sickly sweet smile on his face.

You wanted to gag at how fake it was.

You click your tongue instead, giving him a once over before staring straight back into his eyes with your own steady gaze. You weren’t going to lose this, whatever it was.

“Then could you keep it down next time? I, and I’m sure anyone else, wouldn’t want to look at you without reason. Thanks.” You shoot him the same fake smile he gave you.

You saw his smile falter, and you just stare, amused at his crumbling facade. 

“You must’ve had a good reason then, since this wasn’t the first look, midget.”

“Hah,” you both glare at each other, the tension rising, “you’ve got some nerve-”

“Nerve, smarts, height. Everything you don’t.”

You felt your face contort, knowing your inner Tanaka-special-look was shining through. This guy looked anything but intimidated, looking down at you with amusement instead.

“Seems like I have all the looks too, what an ugly face you’re making there, chibi-chan. Is that why you’ve been staring at me, hm?”

The anger coursed through your body, about to push yourself to stand when a brunette sitting in front of the blond turned around, waving his arms.

“Tsukki, you shouldn’t tease like that,” he glanced at you with a shy smile, “S-sorry about that, please don’t take any offence.”

You raise a brow in question, looking at both boys before sighing out as you settled into your seat again. Your gaze turns from the freckled boy, who looked distressed and exasperated all at once, and towards the blond asshole to your left. 

“Tch, make sure you keep your sass to yourself, Tsukki.”

“Don’t call me that.” He snapped, and you only snicker at his frustration.

“Or what? What are you going to do, Tsukki-chan~.”

The sensei walked in right after, cutting off anything he was going to say.

It was always to get the last word in, especially when you got looks like that; amber eyes burning in annoyance. 

-----

The rest of class went by without a hitch; the welcoming ceremony was held right after lunch, and you felt yourself snickering as you saw the-painfully obvious-wig atop your vice’s head. However unfortunately, you were forced to stand next to Tsukki, being his desk neighbor and all.

“You laugh at the most idiotic things, chibi-chan. You must only have a few functioning brain cells.” He gave a smug smile.

“Oi, do you ever shut up? Attention wh-”

“Y-you guys might want to quiet it down..” Yamaguchi, as you learned during the lunch period you spent with them, whispered from in front of the both of you.

You had decided to stay in your seat for lunch and, to your dismay, the grumpy blond giant and his friend had the same idea. You didn’t want to hurt your pride by seeming like a coward, so you stayed in your seat and faced him head on instead of getting up and running away.

The entire lunch period was full of insults and fighting between the both of you, to which poor Yamaguchi had tried to defuse. You realized you liked the brunette, he was nice-maybe a little dumb considering he was friends with the asshole, but nice. Although, he did join in on throwing some teases your way, but you thought they were more cute than anything. He had blushed when you said it out loud, and you could only laugh at his flustered expression. 

“Ah, sorry Yamaguchi-kun.” You sigh loudly, causing other students to look at the scene. 

Yamaguchi flushed at the attention, turning back to the speeches as Tsukkishima huffed another insult under his breath; an insult you gracefully ignored, not wanting to get in trouble on your first day for yelling in the auditorium.

-----

Once the academic school day ended, you felt a slight amount of excitement shoot through your body, knowing your brother had practice and you’d get to see everyone again. As soon as the bell rang you sprung out of your seat, rushing down to the changing rooms and changing into one of your old track suits. You brought it with you because you really didn’t feel like wearing the schools, plus this one was much cuter anyways. 

You hadn’t worn it in a while, not since..

You shake your head, pushing those old memories from your mind as you head down to the club room, hoping to find your brother, but spotting someone even better.

“Suga-kun!” You wave excitedly as he comes down the stairs.

His shocked expression quickly turns into a smile as you meet him at the bottom. 

“My my, (y/n)-chan,” he laughs while pinching your cheek, “It’s been a while hasn’t it, look at you!”

You blush at his antics, brushing his hand off with a giggle. Sugawara had been kind to you from day one, even though you were just the little sister who sat in the gym while waiting for her brother to finish practice. He, along with the rest of the team, welcomed you with open arms. 

You only met them halfway along in the school year, the first part spent at your old club activities in middle school, until that happened.

Ever since that day you had to go wait for your brother at Karasuno, instead of him picking you up from practice, so you quickly had to get used to all the crazy yet wonderful people you met;

Which is why you were finally glad to be back, being surrounded by really amazing people, no one with false intentions. 

“Suga-kun, that hurts!”

He laughs again, only to be cut off by a loud whine.

“(y/n), why don’t you ever smile at me like that. I’m your brother, not Suga-san!” Ryu pouts, walking down the steps with the captain, your eyes widening at the sight of him while you ignore your brother.

“Daichi-kun!”

Diachi laughs at Ryu’s deflated look, walking over and placing a hand on your head. 

“Long time no see, trouble-maker,” his laughter stops as he looks at you closely, a teasing smile appearing on his face, “Say, have you grown since last time?”

You place your hands on your hips, grinning cheekily.

“You noticed huh, I’ve grown a few cm, now I’m officially 155cm!”

Your happiness was cut short when Suga and Daichi raised a hand to stifle their laughter, and you pushed off the hand resting atop your head.

“Don’t laugh, you asked!”

“Ah poor little sister, you got stuck with the short genes.”

“I’m almost as tall as nee-chan-”

“You’re both short, (y/n).”

“Says the loser who can’t even reach 180cm!”

“Oi-”

“Alright you two, knock it off,” Daichi chuckled, lightly bopping you on the head while being a little more forceful to your brother, “Let’s get going. You ready for your first actual year being a club member, kiddo?”

“Oh yea, now I get to actually actively help instead of being forced to listen to oni-chan yelling with nothing to distract me.”

“Hey-”

“I bet Kiyoko will be thrilled to have you this year too.” Suga smiled, cutting off your brother who just grumbled angrily under his breath.

You all were making your way to the gym when Daichi pulled out a few papers from his club jacket. 

“I agree, hopefully the new recruits won’t stop by too late, we have an interesting person joining after all.”

“Oh? Who would that be?” Suga questioned.

“The one kid we saw at the middle school matches, Kageyama Tobio.”

“The first setter of Kitagawa is going to join the team?”

“Huh? But, that guy is totally cocky.” Ryu sneered, thinking back to the matches he saw him in.

You remember the kid briefly, going with your brother and the other two to the games. Kitagawa was a powerhouse middle school, most of those kids ended up going to other powerhouse high schools, which wasn’t Karasuno.

Yet.

“He was pretty good though, from what I could tell,” you chime in, “I’m just surprised someone like him didn’t go to some high-end school in the prefecture. He seemed like he could totally get in.”

“Look at you,” Ryu cooed, trying to bring you into a noogie, “Thinking you know all about volleyball and the skills~”

“I know some things, idiot!”

“Quit it you two.”

“Okay…” You both agreed, knowing how scary the third year captain could be when he wanted to be. 

“You better not try to intimidate the Kitagawa kid either, okay Tanaka.” Suga teased, changing the subject back to the matter at hand.

“I-I wouldn’t do something like that.” He grumbled, causing you to snicker.

“Ha, yea oni-chan-”

“You either, (y/n)-chan. You can be just as bad.”

Now it was your turn to pout and grumble while your brother laughed at you.

The gym doors were already open to your surprise, after getting the proper footwear on and heading inside, you spot two kids you haven’t seen before.

“Hello.” The taller male exclaims, and you snap your fingers together as you realize he was the kid you were just talking about.

“It’s him.”

“Oi, oi, oi,  who said you could waltz in here-”

Your brother was cut off as Daichi grabbed the back of his jacket, yanking him backwards.

“You’re Kageyama, right?”

“Osu.” Kageyama agrees, standing straight and still as the boys approach him. 

You stay behind them, only looking out from the back of your brother. You take in his features, and notice how intimidating he looked up close; he was tall-taller than Daichi even, eyes holding a sharp concentration, and as you glanced at his lips pulled in a taut line, you wondered if he could smile. A flash of orange caught your attention, glancing behind Kageyama to see another student sneaking besides the others. He starts to head over behind your friends, towards you, and doesn’t notice you until he’s standing almost directly beside you. He glances over and jumps, red spreading across his face as he yells out a greeting.

“H-hello!”

The others were too engrossed in their conversation, so you smiled politely back and gave him a small nod in greeting.

“Hello-”

“HELLO!” He shouts again louder, another shy blush spreading across his cheeks as he repeats himself once more. You laugh, catching the attention of the boys and they look at you.

“Huh, who are-OH, YOU!” Ryu shouts and points, causing Hinata to squeak and back away from you.

“M-me?”

“SHORTY NUMBER ONE!”

“You’re the other applicant, Hinata Shoyo.. I’m a little surprised.” Daichi smacks your brothers hand away, giving a welcoming smile to Hinata.

“Uh.. hm?” He bites his lip, confused.

“Oh,” you point at him suddenly, causing the blush to come back as he jumped back even further, “you’re the orange who jumped super high!” 

The captain and vice held back snickers at the name, but it just made Hinata grow tongue tied.

“I-I, uh, huh?”

“We saw your match last year.” Suga clarified.

“You’re way short, and sucked pretty bad. But you’ve got guts, yanno?” Tanaka nodded. 

“Ah, thanks!” Hinata grinned, beaming at the attention. 

“Your jumps were awesome, right (y/n)-chan?” 

“Right,” you agree with Suga, an excited gleam in your eye, “it was sooo cool to see! You looked like you were flying!”

“TH-THANKS!”

“But it looks like you haven’t grown so much since then,” Ryu measured out with his hand, “At least he’s taller than you, (y/n).”

“Oi, I’m not that short-”

“I may be little, but I can jump,” Hinata interjected, looking at the three members before looking at you, “I’ll become Karasuno’s ace!” 

You flush at the way his eyes stared determinedly stare into your own.

“Ace huh..”

“Oi, oi… The newbie says he’s going to be the ace? Making that declaration to my sister no less, what are you getting at, you’ve got some nerve, boy.”  Tanaka’s face twists into something scary, glaring down at the boy who froze up, slowly turning his head to make eye contact with your brother.

“S-s-sister? I-UH, I-I DIDN’T MEAN IT LIKE, UM, LIKE THAT!” He waves his arms in a panic.

“It’s good to be ambitious, right?” Suga swoops in to save the kid from further embarrassment.

Hinata sighed, agreeing and apologizing at the same time.

“Hey,” Kageyama’s voice pierces the conversation, “If you want to be the ace, I hope you’ve improved. If you goof around, you’ll waste another three years.”

That’s when all hell broke loose.

They began to fight, bickering back and forth about growth and how neither one has been wasting their time. Hinata lost his happy-go-lucky aura and Kageyama’s face was even scarier, each glaring at each other with just as much loathing. You were now standing between your brother and captain, hearing the latter sigh as he tried to diffuse the situation. You gulp down your nerves as they cut him off, watching how Daichi’s smile grew tight and his eyebrows furrowed. 

Oh lord, here it comes.

“Oi, Daichi-san is talking to you!”

“Yeah, you should listen to your captain, yanno!” You throw in your two cents after your brother, only to feel annoyed when they both ignored you.

“What’s the commotion, volleyball club?”

You freeze, slowly turning your head to see the vice principal walking inside the gym.

“Yikes, the vice!” You and Ryu gasp.

“Sensei.” Suga hastily corrects you both.

“S-sensei.. Right.”

You purse your lips together, looking down at the court hoping you can this time contain your laughter. 

“You’d better not be fighting.”

The duo, who were totally not fighting, had paused momentarily as the vice walked towards the crowd. 

“Of course not,” Daichi gave the man a convincing grin, motioning to the two first years, “just a little friendly rivalry, right?”

“Hey, the vice likes to make trouble for us, so keep it down.” Tanaka Hisses, and you nod along while raising your hand to your mouth to mimic your brother.

“You don’t want the club to get in trouble now right?”

Hinata’s brown eyes lock on yours and he nods meekly. You let out a smile, glad he was finally calming down, when Kageyama tsk’s and gives Hinata an ugly look. You sigh, looking over at the taller boy to see a dark look on his face, it was almost scary.

“Server! And I’ll return them all!”

You facepalm as Hinata took the bait, your brother raging at them from beside you, the tension growing thick in the gym. The vice wasn’t amused as they continued fighting, if the sharp glance he gave to Daichi was any indication anyway. 

The two idiots went to serve and receive, and you could only watch an awe as Kageyama went to do a jump serve. Sure, this wasn’t the time for such things, but not many people you knew could do a jump serve, it was cool to watch one up close. The force he used to smack the ball was plentiful, jaw dropping as Hinata barely dodges and the sound echoes when the ball makes contact on the floor.  

Hinata stands back up, yelling for another when Daichi tells them to knock it off, only to be ignored again. You knew it was coming, hopefully the vice would leave soon so you could watch Daichi blow up on them with front row tickets-

You gasp as the ball, the second attempt that Hinata didn’t dodge, smacked against his arms, flew up into his face, before ricocheting off and hitting the vice square in the face. It was as if time slowed down, the ball hitting the vice’s cheek, his head snapping with enough force to pop his wig into the air. You watched, eyes glued to the head piece that went up and up till it came down, landing straight on-

Your lips part to laugh, thankfully Sugawara noticed and slapped his hand over your mouth to stifle the bellows you wished to release. Everyone stood frozen in shock as the hair piece landed atop the one and only, Daichi. 

“He was wearing a wig?” Kageyama muttered, eyes blown open wide.

“You just noticed?” Hinata snickers, amused at the sight.

“You guys,” Ryu was trying to hush his own giggles, “shut up!”

“Tanaka, you shut up too!” Suga scolds, hand still on your mouth as you shake from silenced laughter.

“Sawamura-kun, I’d like a word with you.”

Once they left the gym, Suga let you go only to have you clutch your sides in laughter. Your brother was no better, practically passed out on the floor as tears escaped his eyes. The scene replayed itself over and over in your mind, the lack of oxygen making you woozy. However, as soon as you heard a chuckle coming from Hinata, you Tanaka siblings stopped laughing. 

“That was sure stupid of you,” Ryu cracks his knuckles, giving his scary face, “you’re going to regret not listening to Daichi-san.”

Hinata looks to you for help, surprising you, but you just shrug.

“Oni-chan is right, you’ve done it now. Good luck you two.”

“Wait, why am I going to be punished for something he did!?” Kageyama glares at you, and you shudder slightly.

There was no reason to be upset at you, but the way he was looking at you caused you to look away nervously. 

“You both were the issue.” Ryu huffs, arms crossing to give his own glare at the taller first year.

“This is all your fault!”

“Huh, me!?”

The boys began to argue, leaving Ryu to shake his head and Suga to rub his temple with an exasperated smile. 

What a fun first day back, you can’t wait to see what else was to come.

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[esabri]

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necessary scharf sharp Flügel wing schaffen create Nachbar neighbor Wasch wash Fledermaus bat eher rather Menge crowd mais corn vergleichen compare Gedicht poem Schnur string Glocke bell abhängen depend Fleisch meat einreiben rub Rohr tube berühmt famous Dollar dollar Strom stream Angst fear Blick sight dünn thin Dreieck triangle Erde planet Eile hurry Chef chief Kolonie colony Uhr clock Mine mine Krawatte tie eingeben enter Dur major frisch fresh Suche search senden send gelb yellow Pistole gun erlauben allow Druck print tot dead Stelle spot Wüste desert Anzug suit Strom current Aufzug lift stiegen rose ankommen arrive Stamm master Spur track Elternteil parent Ufer shore Teilung division Blatt sheet Substanz substance begünstigen favor verbinden connect nach post verbringen spend Akkord chord Fett fat froh glad Original original Aktie share Station station Papa dad Brot bread aufladen charge richtig proper Leiste bar Angebot offer Segment segment Sklave slave ente duck Augenblick instant Markt market Grad degree besiedeln populate küken chick liebe dear Feind enemy antworten reply Getränk drink auftreten occur Unterstützung support Rede speech Natur nature Angebot range Dampf steam Bewegung motion Weg path Flüssigkeit liquid protokollieren log gemeint meant Quotient quotient Gebiss teeth Schale shell Hals neck Sauerstoff oxygen Zucker sugar Tod death ziemlich pretty Geschicklichkeit skill Frauen women Saison season Lösung solution Magnet magnet Silber silver danken thank Zweig branch Spiel match Suffix suffix insbesondere especially Feige fig ängstlich afraid riesig huge Schwester sister Stahl steel diskutieren discuss vorwärts forward ähnlich similar führen guide Erfahrung experience Partitur score apfel apple gekauft bought geführt led Tonhöhe pitch Mantel coat Masse mass Karte card Band band Seil rope Rutsch slip gewinnen win träumen dream Abend evening Zustand condition Futtermittel feed Werkzeug tool gesamt total Basis basic Geruch smell Tal valley noch nor doppelt double Sitz seat fortsetzen continue Block block Tabelle chart Hut hat verkaufen sell Erfolg success Firma company subtrahieren subtract Veranstaltung event besondere particular viel deal schwimmen swim Begriff term Gegenteil opposite Frau wife Schuh shoe Schulter shoulder Verbreitung spread arrangieren arrange Lager camp erfinden invent Baumwolle cotton geboren born bestimmen determine Quart quart neun nine Lastwagen truck Lärm noise Ebene level Chance chance sammeln gather Geschäft shop Stretch stretch werfen throw Glanz shine Immobilien property Spalte column Molekül molecule wählen select falsch wrong grau gray Wiederholung repeat erfordern require breit broad vorbereiten prepare Salz salt Nase nose mehreren plural Zorn anger Anspruch claim Kontinent continent

[superblizzardfire]

Green is the New Black (Bruce & Dylan)

Written for Writer’s Month 2020 Day 21: Family 

(AO3 Link)

They'd allowed him one phone call, so Bruce had called his brother.

Now he waited, perched on his cell bunk and twiddling his thumbs. At first he’d been grateful that New York facilities didn’t give out orange uniforms, but now he wondered if this dark green one was worse.

Dylan had promised he’d be there “soon”, but it had been nearly an hour. FBI work kept him busy, and Hulk had probably decimated a few roads in the last fight. But Bruce was starting to get nervous, and that never ended well.

When three men in khaki showed up, Bruce's heart sank. 'Doctor Banner? We need you to come with us.'

Hulk growled in his mind. 'Why?' he asked.

‘If you resist, we will be required to use force.'

Bruce chuckled darkly. 'That wouldn’t end well for you.' But if they tranquilised him before he could change...

'Hey! Who authorised you to come down here?' a voice called down the corridor.

Bruce smiled.

Moments later, a man with curly brown hair, stubble and a scowl marched into view. He was the spitting image of Bruce, and his suit and tie were ruffled as if he’d been running. ‘I asked you a question. Whose orders are you under? I want a name.'

The biggest of the three puffed up. 'We're under strict orders from General Ross to move him to a secure facility.'

'Why are we even holding him in the first place? Cowan?' He turned.

A balding agent with glasses stepped up behind him. ‘They brought him in under public indecency. Rhodes, you can’t just walk – '

'You know who he is, right? I assume you've watched the news at some point during the last six months? Hulk can’t exactly carry a spare pair of pants.' Dylan finally looked at Bruce. ‘You okay? They give you any trouble?’

Bruce shrugged. ‘I’ve stayed in worse motels.’

The soldiers were waiting. ‘With respect sir, I have orders – ‘

‘Yeah? And I have mine.’ Dylan glared at Cowan. ‘I’m taking my brother home. Now move.’

Cowan stepped away, with much grumbling about “lack of procedure”. Dylan unlocked the door and squeezed Bruce's shoulder. ‘Came as quick as I could,’ he murmured, his glare softening. The tough-guy agent thing was all an act, and one he was very good at. ‘Come on.’

Dylan set off briskly down the corridor and Bruce followed eagerly, throwing a final glance over his shoulder. 'Give the general my regards,' he called to the frustrated soldiers.

‘Put these on.’ Dylan grabbed a pile of clothes from a chair in the lobby. ‘I’m not walking you out of here like you’re a criminal. I’ll have Cowan’s ass for this…’

In the bathroom, Bruce quickly got changed. These were definitely his brother’s clothes; Dylan was broader and bulkier, so the shirt was a little big on him.

Outside, military vehicles surrounded the FBI headquarters. Dylan shooed off the trigger-happy paparazzi and took Bruce by the elbow, steering him towards the sports car parked nearby.

Tony rolled the window down. 'Nicely done.'

Bruce clambered in. It was a bit of a squeeze; Natasha, Steve, Thor and Clint were all here too, still in full battle gear. 'What are you all doing here?'

Natasha smiled. 'Oh, we were plan B in case things went sour.’

Clint leaned over to ruffle his hair. ‘Ross can suck it, you’re ours Doc.’

Dylan got in beside him and Tony drove them away. Bruce gave his brother a grateful smile. ‘Thanks. That could have gotten awkward.’

Dylan smiled back at him warmly. ‘Hey, I can’t help you fight aliens but I can keep you out of trouble. What else is family for?’

Bruce looked at his fellow Avengers, who had squished into the car ready to win him back if necessary. ‘Yeah,’ he said softly. ‘I’ve got a good family.’

Tony glanced in the mirror. ‘Hey Dylan, you ever tried shawarma?’

Dylan grinned. ‘I have a feeling I’m about to.’

#Bruce Banner #Dylan Rhodes #Now You See Me #writersmonth2020 #blizzard writes stuff

[kiliinstinct]

Flame’s Desire: Ch 11

Rating: T Pairing: Nalu FF.Net || AO3

[Ch: 1] ||| [Prev] | [Next] 

-Tag List-

@cobblepottantrum @pbfanart @lovelyluce @yuldragneel @bearpluscat @millennial-star-gazer @caandleworks @kaycha1989 @just-another-dream-girl @whatdidyasayiamdaydreaming @hanahathefluffydragon @dlshieldss @gingerthesnap @acidrain1698 @clockworkassassino @caranikki-blog @doginshoe @squeep123 @unwei @moeruhoshi @mykingdomforachocolatecookie @melissa827 @littlejinxed @softscream @moonlitstargazerforever

---

Lucy saw the cove through the cracked stone window of her room. Grey skies, Roma and Romni she recognized bustling about one direction to the other and many others she had never seen before. Some didn’t hold the mark of the clan. Not in places she could see. The cove looked to reach around a wide stretch of a closed off bay, with salty ocean water moving along the tides and it’s scent struck her with every gust of wind.  It was a beautiful sight, something new that she had never seen before. She wanted to see more, but the doors to her room had been locked tight, much like a prison. Scorch marks and ash residue stained the door served as a reminder of Natsu’s poor opinion to this change. She gave a tired grin at the sight of it. It helped to reassure her that, despite everything they learned over the last two days, he still believed in her, no matter what was said otherwise. Lucy remembered what lead to this point and the decision she made that sealed itl:

“Ya’ can’t just lock her up!” The day her fever broke had been a day full of shouting and bitter words. Lucy remembered waking to the sound of snarling as Natsu blocked the path to her cot. “So what if that Kagu - whatever his name is- said she’s dangerous! She hasn’t done a damn thing to us!”

“Natsu, there’s more to it than that,” Erza snapped from the doorway, her voice calm in comparison. It was steely and brook no grounds for argument. “We have to take into account what Laxus heard from Jose-”

Natsu’s interruption felt like an explosion of force as a burst of hot air filled the room, “I couldn’t give a damn what THAT bastard says! Since when did we ever trust that snake?!”

“That’s enough, Natsu!” Makarov shouted, silencing them both. He stood between them with arms crossed and mustache bristling. “You know as well as anyone that I wouldn’t trust that man with the life of a slug, but we can’t take any risks until we have more information.” Lucy’s eyes had opened by then, viewing Natsu before her as he attempted to block the Chief's view. Makarov’s expression did not fit one of a leader protecting his clan from danger, but of a tired man, riddled in guilt. His narrowed brows made his expression harsher than the downcast of his eyes, but they met hers with shame,  “Considering her condition, Lucy won't be leaving this room for a few days, this is just a precaution.”  He didn’t bring attention towards her waking up.. Instead, the elder forced his gaze to meet Natsu’s, whose entire frame had grown stiff.  

“How is locking her up like some kinda criminal a precaution? Are ya losing your mind, gramps?!” 

“Natsu!” Erza interjected, stepping from her position she grasped the pommel of her sword, “You will show the Master the respect he deserves or be punished by my ha-”

A flare of fire and heat surged from Natsu’s feet, drowning out the sound of Lucy’s surprise. “Just try it Erza, I don’t care that you can pummel my face into the dirt- you draw that sword and I won't hesitate to melt it!”

“Quiet! Both of you!” Makarov barked, causing them to jump as a heavy pressure emanated from the smaller man’s body. The weight pressed against Lucy like weights and her weak body struggled to breathe at the onslaught. It rippled away as fast as it struck and Makarov cleared his throat, eyes meeting hers again in apology. Makarov straightened his back, motioning his fingers for the female warrior to retreat back to the doorway.. “I’ll not have you threatening Natsu for doing what he thinks is right. He’s attached to the girl and for good reason. Even I would rather protect her in some way that didn’t involve locking her up.”

“Protect her?” The two warriors, perplexed, questioned in unison. 

“ - but you said she was gonna get locked up,” Natsu wavered, his earlier tenacity simmering. He took a step back to Lucy’s bed, “what are you talkin’ about?”

Makarov rubbed his temples, lips thinned in consternation as he grumbled, “Listen here, you knucklehead. For some reason, Jose and his men are looking for the girl. We don’t know why, but it’s enough for them to risk entering our woods and feeding information to Laxus. We know he would never allow something to threaten our home. Corroborating that information is the young man in our cells, Kage. Rather than give that information up himself, he implied what Laxus knew to already be fact. Something is amiss here, and I don’t want to leave anything to chance!”

“Yes, exactly.” Erza nodded, her expression as fierce as ever.

Natsu snarled, his fury rekindled, “and how does treating Lucy like some kinda criminal, protect her?”

“Natsu, use your head for a moment, would you?” Makarov groaned. “They are trying to make us give her up without attempting to break through our defenses. Whether they’re speaking the truth or not is not the issue. They want her and have already made it clear they will attack us to get her. In her state, if they somehow managed to break in, do you think she could fight them off as she is? Until we get answers, she’s safer where we can keep an eye on her.”

The words sunk in, filling the room with a permeable silence that was suffocating. Natsu’ back was still  facing Lucy, but she could imagine the expression on his face, mouth open as he struggled for words- his dark eyes glittering fiercely. Erza’s features had softened, no longer attempting to intimidate the Draconis into submission One that spoke of a quiet remorse that matched their Chief.

“I just,” Natsu swallowed, tongue swiping along his lips as he put his thoughts to vocalization, “I don’t get how that’s fair to her, that’s... That’s all.” 

The tension broke, all shoulders relaxed and Makarov’s smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Perhaps it’s not, but she needs rest and a way to stay safe for now. I don’t intend for her to stay in these stone walls forever, you know. That’s not a life for anyone.”

“... but-” 

His eyes twinkled knowingly, “Perhaps Lucy can tell us what she thinks?” 

His gaze met hers once again while two heads twisted to look back, Natsu’s cheeks were flushed from emotion, eyes wide. “You’re awake? Is the fever broke? Are you better?!” Lucy blinked owlishly and wondered if Natsu realized just how loud they were being to expect her to still be sleeping. Carefully, she sat up, fingers twisting the thin blankets that covered her. “Yes and I heard everything, Natsu.”

The discussion that followed lead to a tantrum from Natsu. He never expected Lucy to agree to the terms and his agitated shouts still echoed through her mind. When the Draconis left, his heated hand slammed against the wall at his exit. Lucy could still smell the charred door frame upon examination even after the few days that passed.

 Her leg throbbed where she stood, but Lucy ignored it. It wasn’t an ideal situation, but she couldn’t deny the logic. If they felt this was the best course of action, then her best option was to listen and hope for the best.  How else could she prove her innocence? Truthfully, being distrusted due to some rumors being spread, struck her heart like knives, but she couldn’t blame them for being careful. They didn’t know her. Not really. Blinking back a sting of emotion, her pale fingers clenched tightly together. 

“It’s not as if they are my family,” She sighed, “they can’t be expected to trust me that easy.” 

Except, they did trust her. So many assured her as they passed by to deliver food, water or to provide other needs. Natsu more than most. He visited for hours at a time. As did Cana, Wendy and Mirajane. Even Gray shuffled by her window at times to check in on her. All those she had spent the end of Summer and Fall with, attempted to give her company at any moment they could spare. It was heartwarming, but not enough for the rest. Not yet. 

Lucy hadn’t realized the clan would be so large, or so full of people who didn’t travel all year round. The cove was like their own village, working together just as any other, and not everyone carried a source of magic within them. Mirajane had tried to answer a few other questions during her visits, but while the knowledge had been interesting, it wasn’t the same as experience.

Watching a few waves crash against the beach, Lucy’s lip trembled and she struggled to hold back a wave of tears. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come with them, after all.” 

“And what makes you think that?”  A voice came from below and Lucy yelped. She jumped away and narrowly grazing her hair against the upper window frame.  “Goodness, your observation skills need some work, don’t they?”

“M-Makarov-?” She asked, breathless, blood pounded in her ears and she struggled to calm her heart rate. Resisting the urge to step away further, she tilted her gaze downward for the interloper, surprised to find the Clan Chief seated calmly beneath her.

Makarov sat comfortably on the cool, dead grass, arms crossed under his fur cloak, the top of his balding head the only thing she could see from her angle. Sputtering, the Romni cleared her throat and wondered how long he’d been there. Did he do this often? 

“I didn’t think anyone would sit there,” She admitted, “then again, most people don’t think to look under their windows.”

He chuckled and tilted his gaze up to grin at her, “Of course they don’t. Now then, are you going to answer my question or aren’t you?”

“Question?” She deadpanned, only just processing the words that had startled her. “Isn’t that answer a little obvious? You welcomed me to stay as long as I wanted, but look where it got me. Stuck in a small room. The view is lovely, but that doesn’t really make up for it.”

“Ah yes,” He said, pushing himself up to face her, “I knew you were putting on a brave face for the others. I wish it hadn’t come to this.” “I know.” Lucy said, eyes moving away from his. The look on his face was full of pity. She couldn’t bare to see it. “I know why you did it, I just…” She couldn’t help how she felt, the words dropping before she could finish, hanging in the air and dispersing, but the elder understood. He gripped his staff and inhaled slowly, as if mentally counting the seconds before he spoke. 

“You’re a strong, girl.” He said, “Though I don’t think you realize it yet. I’ve noticed many of the others visiting you. They seem to accept you just fine, haven’t you noticed?” Lucy made no effort to respond, unwilling to state her fear of the opposite. She didn’t have a family, and this new clan couldn’t trust her. What right did she have to hope for more?  Licking her lips, she looked over Makarov’s head, searching for a new subject.  “Where’s Natsu?”

She missed him, strangely enough He often poked his head through the window as if he could fit right through it. (His shoulders were too too broad, but that didn’t stop him any.) The day they had locked her in, he had complained and dug his heels in, refusing to give an inch- even more so when she agreed to it. His anger at her decision was clear, but that never stopped him from visiting. However, she hadn’t seen him since the night before, and it left her anxious. Was he still upset?

“He’s on patrol today.” Makarov  broke through her thoughts, full of amusement, “I’m sure the minute he returns he’ll be trying to dive through your window again, don’t worry about that.”

“Patrol?” Somehow, Lucy had never thought the need for patrolling would be necessary. 

“Hmm, yes- while Erza and a few others are tracking down the men who attacked, he’s part of another group that’s keeping watch over all entrances. He’ll be back once off rotation.”

It was then that Lucy remembered Natsu was one of the many warriors and hunters in the clan. She’d become so used to having him near, watching out for her, that the day they had met was almost a distant memory. The revelation left an empty feeling inside. Not a day went by that she didn’t recall the days and nights with the slavers, but the singular night that lead to her escape had somehow become a blurred vision. Had she grown so used to the clan? Had her guard been lowered?

“Now, I did have a reason for my visit,” Makarov pulled her from her reverie once again and she flushed at being caught distracted twice. His mustache twitched in amusement, but his eyes were narrowed: serious. “Do you recall what I told you when you first awoke from your fever?”

Her eyes lit up, “Yes?” After accepting his order to be shut in, Lucy had asked about the man they’d captured. In her state, she missed far too many things.  Who was Jose? And what were they told to make them distrust her so? When she asked, Natsu and Erza had stiffened, their expressions cloudy. Makarov was undeterred and shook his head. “I’d rather not reopen old wounds by repeating them to you. Just know it has raised many concerns that need looking into if we’re to keep you here.”

It wasn’t the answer she wanted, but at his order, no one would tell her otherwise and she knew it. Looking upon the Chief now, she hoped he was ready to give her the answers she requested. No, the answers she needed and deserved to know. “I’m still not telling you what was said.”  She deflated instantly, but he raised a hand to interrupt an outburst.  “Lucy, I need you to trust me.  I know it’s hard to feel as if we’re on the same side, but I assure you that all my decisions have been made in your interest, not just my own. What was mentioned spoke of the deaths of your family, and I won’t force you to relive that telling again.”

She bit her lip enough to draw blood and winced, her own brows knit together as she shook in silent fury. “I’m sorry, Makarov, but I have WANTED to trust you since I was saved. I’ve wanted to heal and to feel safe and, and- “ to find a new home! She couldn’t finish the words as a strangled sob burst through her. Lucy’s knuckles hurt from her as she slammed the flat of her fists against the stone, “h-how do you expect me to do that when you wont even tell me what I’m being locked up for?”

He let her talk, calmly watching as she shook and poured forth her frustration and feelings of helplessness, but when she fell silent- his gaze no longer held the pity it once had. “You were accused of something dreadful, and I won’t lay that burden on you.”  She opened her mouth to speak, but his voice turned harsh, “Lucy! I need you to be quiet and listen!”

Her mouth ran dry, eyes wide while emotions boiled over into more tears that clouded her vision. “What is it?”

“I don’t believe what that man told Laxus is true. I refuse to believe it!” The passion in his words surprised her, belied everything said before, it filled her with jarring confusion. “That being said, I still have to make absolute certain that my own intuition is correct. I have to ask this of you, Lucy. One more time, please tell me that you gave me and Natsu the full truth about the attack on your Clan.. Tell me you gave every. last. detail.”

Lucy froze.  So that was it. Whatever this Jose had said, whatever this Kage intended when he attacked, it all had made her sound as if she had something to hide. Air left her as her lungs constricted, refusing to breathe and her eyes stung with tears she couldn’t contain. Swallowing thickly, her mind ran through her previous account: the route they had traveled, the sudden attack, the wagon that covered her… surviving, listless and alone, traveling like a wilting corpse until … 

The men that caught her, outside of a town, as if they had known exactly where to find her. Had she lied? Emotions and memory flurried together in her heart and mind; they whispered and circled, giving visions of memories she had forgotten or dreamt of nightly. Had she hidden some terrible truth? Did Makarov know something she didn't about her own family?

Lucy met his gaze, her voice cold and gaze blazing. Lucy answered with every emotion she could feel boiling beneath her skin, throbbing in her knee, “I told you everything I know.”

That was the truth and she prayed he would feel her earnest emotions and know them for what they were. He grew silent as the wind grew in force, rustling empty branches and dying leaves across the turf as sand from the beach scattered against the stone wall.  His gaze searched hers, as if burrowing into her eyes to pick apart her brain, but the Romni refused to turn her eyes away. 

The tension faded, melting into a sigh of relief and a small smile crinkled the corners of his eyes, “That’s all I needed, Lucy. Thank you.” 

She didn’t know what string had pulled taut inside her, but it snapped- releasing the tension in her body as the last ounce of energy inside her faded. Limbs felt boneless and her knee panged like an electric shock. Lucy mustered what strength she had in her to hold herself up and looked towards the village beyond. She felt as if she’d been put through her paces and took a deep breath to fill her shuddering lungs. 

“I don’t know what I did to ease your mind,” She said, “but you’re welcome, I suppose.”

“Never you mind that,” he replied, reclasping his cloak as he turned from her, “Your eyes told me all I needed. I’m sorry I had to put you through that. Now rest up, please. “

She didn’t move as he left, a lightness to his steps she hadn’t noticed until then. Lucy pursed her lips, her heart still raw from their discussion. She refused to rest, not until he had left her sight, but Makarov didn’t remain alone for long. Joining him at a nearby corner was a tall blond man she had yet to meet. He spoke with the chief before narrowed eyes looked her way. Lucy felt rather than heard the threat that came from his stare. 

He didn’t trust her and wouldn’t hesitate to strike her down if he had to; that she knew. Though the expression on his face was difficult to distinguish from a distance, she knew the intense feel of it. It was the same look she had given the slaver’s when captured. A look she never expected to have aimed at herself. 

“That… must be Laxus,” She surmised, exhaustion forced her to finally drift from the window to fall against the ragged cot that was her bed, “It almost felt like an angry bear was staring me down.”

Lucy laughed, her voice empty, and closed her eyes. She wouldn’t sleep, not now. Lucy felt she had slept long enough in recent days and the Romni refused to succumb to further daytime napping. She would rest her body and wait to rise again. Maybe her next visitor would give her a reason to smile and hope, rather than jump through emotional hoops. 

Her breathing began to even out, but the wind and sounds of others  rushing by her window, echoed in and out of her ears, keeping her aware. With each intake of oxygen, her limbs grew heavier- the release of all tension in her body relieved Lucy and allowed the last vestiges of tears to fall, stain her cheeks and dampen her pillow. Only a few, and her crying stopped after a few stricken gasps. 

She didn’t want to think anymore, only listen.

… forgive us…. 

What?

We didn’t mean to hurt you.

She couldn’t open her eyes, but the voices whispered in her mind as if beside her, it caused goosebumps to travel up her arm.  ‘Who are you?’ Lucy froze, realizing that while her mouth moved- she couldn’t hear herself. Muted, quiet, no voice to echo along the walls of her room. 

‘What’s going on?’

Don’t you remember us, yet?

We wanted to help. 

It’s our fault… please… please…

‘Wait, I can’t-’ Lucy struggled for the words to come, but the barrage of voices continued echoing through her skull. Memories of Natsu rushing off to fight without her flooded her senses, the sudden ability to see his every move, the aches in her head the… 

The voices…

Forgive us! 

The sudden paralysis broke and Lucy shot up from her bed to shout furiously. “Tell me who you are already!” 

Lucy’s words echoed off the stone walls with brilliant vibrations and her chest heaved from the exertion. The voices scattered, dispersing as quickly as they came and a strange pressure in her skull released. Lucy blinked the vestiges of sleep from her eyes and gasped. Why was this happening so much?

“Last I checked I was the same as I always was. Do I sound different to you or something?”  As if the world was set to continue throwing surprise visitors at her, Natsu’s familiar voice struck Lucy like cannon fire and in her sudden fright, she slipped from the cot with a loud thud. 

“Ow! - W-when did you get here?!” She whined as her fingers searched for the nearby cane to pull herself up. 

“Just now.” He said, beaming from the window as he watched, but the smile was forced. “You doing all right? That didn’t hurt you did it?” 

“I’m fine!” She shouted, teeth ground together as she managed to stand, “Just perfect!” Rubbing her stiff knee, Lucy gripped her cane tighty. Makarov sounded as if he would be gone for most of the day, what brought Natsu back so soon? She was about to ask, but froze mid-sentence when she realized the sun was well-beyond the horizon behind Natsu’s head.

“-But, I wasn’t sleeping, how did-” She stammered, looking back from her cot and towards the window again. Was all that just a dream? The Draconis at her window watched her with a deep interest, nose scrunched as she looked between them. His lips pulled back under his teeth as he examined her from the distance.

“And you’re sure you didn’t hit your head?” He asked quizzically, one pink brow lifting into his fringe. “Cause you’re sounding a little strange right now, Lucy.”

“I said I was fine, Natsu,” She snapped as she trudged back towards the window. His hair was a mess, much like the time she’d picked leaves from it. His outfit had changed as well. No longer clothed in just a vest and pants- a loose shirt was worn beneath. She ignored the appreciative voice in her head that enjoyed the view of its open neck. Clearing her throat, she tore her eyes away and sighed, “Sorry, you didn’t deserve that.”

Natsu used his forearms to hold himself up pushing  partially through the window with feet splayed out behind him. Not for the first time, it looked as if he would attempt to crawl through. Instead, he hung in the air, head closer to hers while his frown deepened. “Nah, I probably do.”

“Natsu?” 

His eyes were solemn, a dark brooding simmered in the depths of them. The past few days were full of the Draconis bouncing between anger and energized movement; Each time he came, he either threatened to break down her doors and pull her free or bring her new items from the village to look at. She saw nothing on his person today, but the dirt and scuff marks on his clothing told a clear story. He’d run straight to her from his patrol. Lucy felt a lightness in her chest at the realization, but ignored it too. He was too close, even if he was barely through the opening. 

“I couldn’t convince them to let ya’ out,” His rumbling complaint turned to a low growl, full of frustration, “And instead of bustin’ the doors down like I should be doin’, I’m just letting them keep ya here.”

“It makes me sick!”  Lucy flinched at his fervor, it dripped in bitter toxicity and spewed from his mouth like hissing fire. His gaze darkened as he shifted back to his feet and he ground his teeth together, sucking in air to calm himself. 

Lucy hated seeing him like this, closing in the distance to reach out. He froze at her touch, her hand cupping his cheek and lightly rubbing his skin and unseen stubble.His focus turned back to her with wide and blinking eyes. She knew he’d been against Makarov’s decision from the start, but she never realized just how much he placed the blame on himself for it. “No, you’re not. I agreed to it, remember?”

His dark gaze melded with her own, the simple effect of her hand against him made his shoulders relax and the Roma relaxed further, tilting his head to nudge into her palm before moving away. He reached out and flicked her on the nose. “Ya shouldn’t have, that’s my whole point!”

“H-hey!” She recoiled instantly, but avenged herself seconds after by pinching his nose with enough force to make his eyes cross. “Don’t be rude! I only agreed to it because I know it’s not going to be forever! You’d know that too if you had any faith in me!”

“Oi! I do have faith, why else would I think you shouldn’t be stuck in here?!”

“I don’t know, maybe because you don’t think everything through?”

“Now you’re just being mean, Lucy!”

“No, I’m being practical! You should try it sometime!”

Breathing mingled together as they continued their back and forth. It was a tug-o-war match over who could make the other retreat from the window first, but neither did. A few more well-placed barbs and the two fell silent, glowering at each other in mock offense. A cricket chirped, interrupting the moment and their downturned expressions lifted to a fit of giggles instead.  They leaned against the sil, laughing and gasping for air as they wiped their watery eyes. 

“I needed that.” Lucy admitted, her quiet chortles became muffled behind her hand and Natsu’s fanged grin grew wide as he agreed. But he fell silent faster than her, his expression pensieve. The silent consideration sobered her and she stared in confusion. What was it now? 

“You know what?” He asked, leaning further into her personal space, eyes gleamed with a sudden, mischievous light, “I think you need a better view. What do you say?”

Lucy blinked, casting her eyes to the frame of the window and around the landscape between them. All things considered, her view was fairly decent, if not limited, “And how am I supposed to get that?” She asked, her arms crossed. “Are you going to make me a new window?”

“Nope!” He exclaimed, pointing pass her towards a stool in the corner, “Bring that over and stand on it.”

Not understanding his intentions, but seeing no reason to disagree, Lucy hobbled to do as requested. The stool was lighter than it looked, and wobbled when she placed her foot upon it. After a few adjustments, she managed to stand, balancing on the seat while it boosted her an extra foot: the view was extraordinary.

“I never thought I’d see a wall this close up.” She said dryly. 

Natsu snickered, “Don’t be weird and bend down through the window. It’s too narrow for me, but your shoulders should fit through just fine!”

His plan finally dawned on her, “Wait, are you wanting me to sneak out?” What other reason could he have? Curiosity urged her to follow his instructions, feeling just a graze of the stone frame brush across her shoulders. Natsu was right, she could fit through, but the stool wobbled and her balance faltered. “N-Natsu this is- I shouldn’t be doing this!”

He used a steady hand to hold her by the shoulders. “Don’t worry, I’ll help you get back in again,. Just trust me, will you?” With guided movements, he pulled her through, clicking his tongue as she wriggled through the opening. The pain of her knee was a dull throb in response to the movement, but to Lucy’s surprise, Natsu’s grip did not falter and he swung her gently down to place her on solid ground without fuss. 

She smelled the woods on him as her fingers searched for purchase in the hem of his vest to hold herself. “If I can’t get back in later, I’m blaming you. What are you planning?”

“Keh, I’ll take the blame no problem!” Natsu’s chest puffed and he turned to look towards the starlit beach. “Not everyone sleeps early, but you still haven’t got much of a tour yet have you? Let’s change that.”

A part of her knew that it was better to have him help her crawl right back into her locked room. To be patient and wait for Makarov to release her, but soft whispers, familiar and unheard, spoke into her mind and urged her to listen. Grasping his hand - her cane forgotten in the confines of her room- Lucy smiled. 

The stars were bright. It felt like their own brilliant glitter agreed with the voice inside her. 

“I’d like that.”

Natsu’s only response was to smile so brightly, it was like the sun was still shining.

#FT Fanfiction #Nalu Fanfiction #Fairy Tail Fanfiction #Mira's Fanfiction #Nalu #NatsuxLucy #Natsu #Lucy #Flame's Desire #Chapter 11 #Fairy Tail #FT #Multi-Chapter #Fanfiction

[blackberd]

Always Trust a Madman with a Plan (Part 1 of 2)

It all started with a simple game, and Jervis Tetch never saw it coming.

Enjoy!

~~~

“Alright, Valeska,” the guard outside the secluded cell called out, clanking his nightstick against the metal door. “It’s your lucky day, you get to make a request.”

Leisurely laying in his cot, Jerome grinned as the door was unlocked and pulled open. The pudgy guard waited expectantly with a hand ready at his holster. Jerome, still lounging, lazily turned to him, a lock of ginger hair sweepingly fell onto his forehead.

“Don’t tell me it’s my birthday, Chubby,” he said, mockingly puzzled.

The guard, unimpressed, smiled dryly. “If you ain’t interested, there are plenty o’ other inmates dyin’ to be bumped up the wait-list.”

“Now, now, Chubby,” chastened Jerome, making a show of getting up and exaggerating a deep stretch. “Have a sense of humor. Forty hours per week in a place like this can really make ya forget how to take a joke, huh? Try living here!” He released a screeching cackle and patted the guard on the back once he reached him.

Not many Arkham inmates possessed the power of laying a single digit on any of the prison guards without being hurled to the floor for attempted assault. Jerome knew this, too, and was careful with the way he exploited his strengths. He knew how to get to people, how to make them talk; he couldn’t deny the seamless witty charm he’d perfected to a fault. It was all a matter of unveiling their motivations, what made them tick. One thing Jerome learned over the years was that there’s a bit of bad in every good, and the bad had a habit of always outweighing the good when given the right push.

Chubby, for instance, was a respectable long-time prison guard whose name was, in fact, not Chubby, but something Jerome had long replaced with a nickname more suitable to the man’s physical appearance. Through mere conversation over the weeks, Jerome came to find out about Chubby’s spiraling down debts and child support payments. With a few pretty words, he’d convinced Chubby to write his name at the top of the wait-list with the promise of being rewarded a hefty sum of green dollar bills. With charm came cleverness, and with cleverness came powerful friends, and Jerome sure as hell valued them. Guards were always payed, and their loyalty never ceased to grow. In short, Jerome got what he wanted in the end. Always.

Money, Jerome rolled his eyes at the word as Chubby ushered him down a miserable hallway. It’s always money with these folks. They’ll fight claw and fang for it and then gamble it all away in one night, and still they call me the crazy one. Hah!

Jerome worked it all out years ago, long before he started trading money for special favors. It was easy, laughably so. He started his very own not-so-under-the-table trust fund at Arkham Asylum, the first of its kind, and people would be heavily in the wrong to assume it held the traditional definition of the term. It was anything but.

‘Fund me if you trust me!’, was his comical campaign, a funny little play-on-words which actually meant: Fund me or else.

Fortunately, half the prison inmates were so brain dead that they mindlessly payed their dues from earned wages month after month in hopes to stay clear of Jerome’s radar. In a way, they were buying their safety, because Jerome was not the sort of man you wanted breathing down your neck. What’s worse was when he had one of his loyal cronies do it for him while he casually watched with a mouth full of buttered popcorn. Those who didn’t pay up were often made into spectacles to alert others of the dire consequences that came to those who ignored the fund. Jerome never gave second chances. He ruled with fear, never mercy.

‘You had it coming, Dietrich, you sly dog,’ Jerome thought to himself with a slimy grin.

Guards, of course, knew about the fund though they never interfered. Why should they? They each had the chance to earn a wad of extra money should Jerome ever wake up with a favor in mind. It was a dirty game in which Jerome was always winning, and he just loved to win.

Chubby led him to a confrontational room with nothing but a metal table and a single chair in the center. After being shackled to the table with handcuffs, Chubby left the room and Jerome sat in absolute silence. His grin never fell, and his fingers tapped in time to the catchy tune in his head.

“Jerome Valeska,” a voice came from the speakers.

“Present.”

“In front of you is an envelope. Inside, you will find a Request for Property. Do you understand?”

Annoyed, Jerome stared into the tinted black window where he knew people were observing him from.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to write it all down for me in plain, simple words.”

“Jerome,” says the voice, exasperated. “This is no time to be funny.”

“It never is,” Jerome grumbled to himself.

“Unseal the envelope, carefully read our conditions, and state your request. We urge you to take this seriously because requests that violate our conditions are immediately vetoed.”

Jerome stopped listening the second he grew bored. With a suppressed yawn, he ripped the envelope open and unfolded the form within. He didn’t bother reading it.

“Boring, boring, boring,” he sang under his breath as he scribbled down what he wanted by using two little words with a chained pen. Only after he finished signing his name at the bottom of the form did he mentally unmute the voice that had been calling to him.

“Jerome Valeska!” it bellowed angrily. “We told you to unseal, not rip! This leads to an automatic rejection!”

Jerome pushed the pen away and shrugged. “Rip, unseal, they’re both the same to me. You people know I have trouble understanding, don’t you? You said so yourselves. Should’ve drawn me a picture to follow or something.”

“Did you read the conditions?”

“Yes.”

A short pause.

“Are you telling the truth?”

“No.”

A faint ruckus came from the speakers and some frustrated man kept ordering: “Get him out of there. Just get him out of my face. Fucking wasting our time...”

Chubby was let back into the room with a key to unlock the cuffs from around Jerome’s wrists. Sorely rubbing at the tender skin, Jerome stood to flauntingly bow at the invisible audience behind the window.

“Always a pleasure doing business with you,” he said amiably and followed Chubby out into the hall.

“Shouldn’t have done that,” Chubby reprimanded. “Would’ve done ya good to listen to them. That form’s going straight to the trash. You messed up, Clown Boy.”

Jerome, unrestrained, walked alongside the guard without care, as though the two were close buddies. With a soft hum, he smiled to himself. It was small, and people who didn’t know him would mistake it for his scar, but this was the smile Jerome wore when he knew something others didn’t.

“On the contrary, my fat friend. I’d say this is all going according to plan.”

And it was, because Jerome had written more than just his request on that form. He’d initiated a simple offer to the head of Unit Staff, a man who gave the final say in whether or not a prisoner’s request was accepted. Jerome couldn’t remember his name and thus dubbed him ‘Curly’; a mocking nickname, given that the head of Unit Staff was a bald man with not a hair on his shiny, shiny head.

Jerome knew that the form would be dismissed, but he also knew that Curly wouldn’t refuse an offer from a man known for keeping his end of the bargain. Curly, thanks to his severe gambling addiction, would adhere to Jerome’s request without having it bonded to a set of nonsensical conditions. Hilariously, there was no need for Jerome to do any of this. He could’ve been civil and read the forty-something conditions, and he could’ve lied and said that he did, in fact, read them. His request might’ve been peculiar, but it was certainly a harmless one. It didn’t oppose a single health or safety violation, but he had a reputation to withhold, and he, of course, wanted powerful people to be his friends, such as Curly the Bald-Headed Chief.

A Request for Property was typically approved within a few weeks. The request itself wasn’t delivered to the requestee until much longer than that. When it came to Jerome Valeska, however, his request was delivered to his cell the very next morning before breakfast.

Upon unwrapping the newspaper packaging, his eyes lit up fervently just as the toothiest, wayward grin spread across his face from ear-to-ear.

“Well then, a very happy birthday to me!”

~~~

(To be continued )

#jerome valeska #jervis tetch #jonathan crane #joker #gotham #arkham asylum #fanfiction

[lirusstories]

New Beginnings: The Jailbird Flies Free

I FINALLY FINISHED THIS. This work is inspired by @oh-itskitkat​‘s  I know why the Jailbird sings  I hope you enjoy it.

The language Yan speaks is Void Speak.

Warning: Mentions of child abuse but nothing descriptive. Accidental misgendering because Yancy doesn’t Know Yan goes by They/Them

A/N: It took me like five days to finish this but now I’m gonna focus on the rest of the ego’s for the ego weeks and Marvin’s birthday and another One-Shot. And I am also sorry about the lack of lists I don’t know what happened but I just suddenly crashed so hopefully I can start getting those up again. Also during the part Yancy sings, it’s Yan’s POV.

These are the Outfits they wear because I was procrastinating. Anti and Liru, Robbie and Yan

(Word Count: 3796)  

I have no Idea how to write Yancy’s accent.

Yancy awakens to the sound of small shoes running energetically down the hallway, standing out from the sound of rain hitting the ground outside the window. He grunts annoyed and rubs his eyes slightly sitting up and looking out to the lit up hallway a bit confused on why the light is on so late at night. The shoes get closer and closer and just as Yancy stands up a blur of pink, black, tan and red runs by before stopping also a second later. He jumps a little when it runs by and goes to approach when a child with unnatural red hair shuffles to in front of the cell looking up at with interest before stopping in front of him.

He looks over the child, girl obviously. She can’t be older than five, tan skin with blood red wavy hair that went down to just above her chin and… Magenta eyes? While also wearing a pink dress with black leggings and sweater and pink sneakers. She tilts her head staring up at him and the only thing the inmate can do is stare back.

“Hello!” She chirps happily with a bright smile on her face that reminds him so much of his kids' smiles that it makes Yancy want to laugh and cry at the same time but instead he chokes out and awkward, “Uhh, hi?”

She laughs and bounces in her spot saying to him, “Your accent is funny!” His mouth twitches slightly, threatening to turn into a smile as she watches her rock back and forth on her heels.

“W-” He clears his throat when his voice catches, “What are youse doin heres kiddo.” 

“‘M explorin.” She smiles again, her oddly colored eyes twinkle with mischief.

“Uh-huh.” He shifts slightly before crouching down to her height but doesn’t move any closer. He doesn’t want to scare the poor kid. “What’s yous’ names kiddo.”

“I’m Yan!” She states proudly puffing out her chest a little. He can’t stop the small smile that spreads across his face watching her. “What's your name mister?”

“Yancy. Nice ta meet ya Yan” She giggles, “Nice to meet ya too!” He smiles softly at the small child, watching as she continues to rock back and forth.

“Hey Yan, can I ask yous a question?”

“Mhm!” She nods, smiling and still rocking.

“Wheres are youse parent’s?” He’s glad to see she lights up at the mention of them, good, he doesn’t know how intimidated they would be by a man who's behind bars but he was prepared to give them a piece of his mind if he had to.

“Mama and Papa are with the bald man with glasses.” She stops rocking before bringing her hands up and making circles around her eyes while looking at him.

“The Warden?” He asks. She nods in confirmation, dropping her hands at her sides and begins rocking again “Robbie’s with them too!”

He raises an eyebrow at that, an uncle perhaps? Officer? “Who’s Robbie.”

“My big brother! He has purple hair.” Well he wasn’t expecting that or the hair thing but he guess it wouldn’t be that weird that the kid’s parents dyed their other kids hair.

“Purple hairs huh?” She nods with another “Mhm!”. It’s quiet for a few seconds as Yancy thinks of something to say before Yan breaks the silence with an odd question,

“Do ya sing?” He’s a little taken aback by the question, wondering where that came from before he slowly nods, “I do’s. Why?” She grins and jumps and claps, squealing a little as she does before Yancy quickly shushes her.

“Hey, hey hey keep it downs, everyone else is asleep alright?” She giggles and stops as she begins to sway,

“It’s okay they can’t hear me!” Yancy just chuckles slightly, assuming that it was just another kid thing not knowing how literal she was being. He moves so he’s sitting and just wraps his arms loosely at the top of his needs as he watches her.

“So why did youse wants to know if I’s could sing?”

“If you sing me a song I’ll tell you!” Oh? A little bargainer in the making he sees.

“Promise?”

“Mhm!” He looks at her, his eyes playfully narrowed while she grins happily and playfully back.

“Well alright, then. Yous gotta song in mind?” She gains a thinking face, which he finds absolutely adorable with how her nose crutches up and pursers her lips as she stares off into space for a few seconds before he can practically see the light bulb above her head go off.

“A Dream is a Wish!” She nearly shouts before Yancy shushes her again which she responds with a grin, seeming unfazed by it.

“Are youse sures?” He asks, a little hesitant to sing that song in particular but she just nods making an “Uh-huh,” sound as she leans against the bar’s, which now that she is, he can see how easy it would be for her to slide in through the bars. It makes him a little uneasy that someone so small was wandering the penitentiary all alone. Maybe he should have a… talk, with her parents. He takes a deep breath and focuses on the wall behind her before he begins to sing.

“A dream is a wish your heart makes

When you’re fast asleep.” 

His voice is low, melodic and soft and Yan loves it, it’s like their Papa’s! They wonder if he can sound like her Mama's too!

“In dreams you will lose your heartaches

Whatever you wish for, you keep,”

Oh that sounds sad, they wonder if he’s missing someone. Oh! Idea! They can ask Mama and Hosty to find them!

“Have faith in your dreams and someday

Your rainbow will come smiling through

No matter how your heart is grieving

If you keep on believing

The dream that you wish will come true,”

Yan watches the man who looks like he’s a thousand miles away, looking as though he’s lost. It reminds them a lot like their parents when Robbie went missing for the week. Their Mama was really angry when she found out grandma took him.

“A dream is a wish your heart makes

When you’re feeling small

Alone in the night you whisper

Thinking no one can hear you at all,”

OH! They know what it is! He has his own Yan and Robbie! But then, where are they? Why isn’t he with them instead of being here? Hmmm.

“You wake with the morning sunlight

To find fortune that is smiling on you

Don’t let your heart be filled with sorrow

For all you know, tomorrow

The dream that you wish will come true,”

Yan slips through the bar still watching the inmate that’s nice to them and not in a weird way like others were in the past. They walk a few steps before sitting down criss cross and grabbing their ankles as they do, swaying with the song.

“A dream is a wish your heart makes

When you’re fast asleep

In dreams you will lose your heartaches

Whatever you wish for, you keep,”

They begin to hum along quietly, finding his voice relaxing enough to be able to.

“You wake with the morning sunlight

To find that fortune that is smiling on you

Don’t let your heart be filled with sorrow

For all you know, tomorrow

The dream that you wish will come true,”

Looking up at the man, they hope their Mama and Papa will take him in.

“No how your heart is grieving

If you keep on believing

The dream that you wish will come true

Come true.”

As he finishes the last of the lyrics it’s like a flip switches and suddenly he’s focusing on the world again rather than his memories only to see the little girl sitting inside the cell with him. Inside the cell. What the FUCK!

“Uhhh, kid? How dids youse get in here?” He hopes he manages to keep his voice level and calm because right now he’s trying not to freak the fuck out.

“I went through the bars!” She says as if she were proud of it. Well… he guesses she is small enough to slip through the bars then.

“Alright then.” He replies awkwardly, not sure on what to do in this position. Yan, not noticing the awkwardness, smiles up at him, “Thank you for singing for me, you sounded like my Papa!”

Well he wasn’t expecting that, but he’ll take it. “Well… thanks youse I hope.”

She gives him a toothy grin beginning to rock in place, “I like it when Papa sings.” Well that’s good.

Just then the sound of people walking down the hallway grabs his attention and the little girl seems to vibrate with excitement before jumping up. The quickness of the action startled him, nearly making fall over before she turns to the bars and slips through them.

‘Guess that must be her parents.’ He thinks as she runs down the direction of the quiet voices while he stands.

“Mama! Papa!” He hears her shout and the sound of a woman greeting the child. He hears them talking but he doesn’t listen, intending to just go back to sleep if he can. Just as he sits on his bed the little girl runs and stops in front of his cell and points at him and being’s excitedly speaking in a language he doesn’t understand,

“Eem! Eem mak di unce sec fato ni!” A woman is the first thing to come into view and holy shit if she’s not the prettiest person he’s ever seen then he doesn’t know what could be. She has the same tan skin of the child and soft roundish almond eyes that are the deep blue of the night sky, slightly squinted from her smile and a small dimple at the corner of her mouth from it.

“Now Yan,” Yancy’s heart flutters at the sound of her voice, soft, smooth and kind, “It’s rude to point at people like that.”

Yan smiles sheepishly up at the woman grabbing the sides of her dress and bouncing in place a little as she laughs before turning to him, “Sorry mister!”

The woman smiles down at her daughter before turning her attention to the inmate sitting on the bed. 

“Now then you shouldn’t go bothering the prisoners,” Comes the warden’s voice almost startling Yancy, “They need to be sleeping.” He says as he steps into view giving Yancy a look. Yancy feels his face heat up from embarrassment, it’s not like he was expecting to wake up to a little kid running down the hall and then singing for said child. 

He suddenly hears a new voice with an Irish accent mutter something as another man comes into view, just as pretty as the woman with dark forest green hair on top and a darker shade of brown on the side’s that seemed to be shaved, pale skin that honestly reminds him of a star and beautiful multicolored eyes, one a bright almost glowing green and the other a beautiful blue that reminds him of that Lapis Lazuli ring that he had stolen from his mom when he was younger. He’s shorter than the woman maybe by 3 or so inches but it’s noticeable enough to be kinda adorable if you ask him.

He notices that the new man is holding a pale child with purple hair, watching him with… purple eyes? That's odd. That must be Robbie then which most likely means the gorgeous man with green hair is his and Yan’s father which mostly likely mean that he’s married to the gorgeous woman and looking at their hands he can see them both wearing wedding rings. The man with a gold and ruby snake wrapped around his finger and the woman with a green and black ring on the hand resting on a diamond(?) top cane.

The woman turns to Yancy and smiles, “Hello there, thank you for entertaining my child.”

“Uh, no problem?” It sounds more like a question and his heart jumps to his throat at the adorable little laugh that leaves the man. The warden behind her looks exasperated,

“Now miss-”

“What's your name?” The woman interrupts, ignoring the warden's rather annoyed look and watching Yancy.

“Yancy,” He says almost hesitantly, but the way the woman’s eyes light up makes his cheeks heat up as he stands up and steps towards the bars.

“Picani?” She asks and his stomach flips from fear this time, how does she know his name?

“Yes,” The answer is much more hesitant and quiet. 

“Oh good,” Her face is very similar to the way Yan’s lights up, “You’re who we’re here for!” Yancy freezes, suddenly confused. Out of the corner of his eye he can see the green haired man's face flicker to confusion that disappears as quickly as it appears, replaced with a small smile. The warden however, begins to sputter out protests.

“Now you can’t just come here and-”

“Anti, Angel,” She says cutting the warden off whose face turns the color of a ripe tomato while she faces the green haired man who is apparently named Anti, “could you take the kids and you and the warden bring up the paperwork needed?”

Anti nods a little, the small smile never leaving his face while she reaches into her pockets and produces to plushes, handing a small purple zombie lama to Yan and a black an yellow cartoon character in a dress and horns to the little boy, Robbie if he remembers correctly. Yan takes it eagerly and giggles hugging it to her chest while the boy who is chewing on something purple that hangs around his neck by the way, takes it and hugs it to his chest still leaning against his father.

“Now listen here-” The warden cuts himself off when she turns to him, going from red to ghostly white and terrified. Yancy almost doesn’t want to know the look she gave him with how he looks.

“F-Follow me, I’ll bring up the paperwork right away.” He quickly walks off with Anti following him after giving a glance towards the woman then to Yancy making his heart jump into his stomach flip. Yan looks up at her mom with a questioning look and she smiles down at her, the two of them seeming to have a silent conversation before the little girl smiles and giggles holding the stuffed animal to her chest and running off after the warden and her father.

Turning to Yancy the woman smiles before speaking warmly, “It’s nice to meet you Mr. Picani your kids talk a lot about you.”

Yancy tenses and can feel fear and… hope(?) boiling up. “What are youse talkin about?” His voice comes out harsher than he intended but the woman does nothing but smile softer.

“Your kids, I see them almost everyday and they always talk about you,” She then frowns, “They haven’t been under the best care until recently.”

Yancy feels a boiling rage overcome that he had to refrain from punching something. The only reason he’s in this fucking place to begin with was because his kids were getting hurt! The woman watches him, leaning black a little while looking rather surprised but it quickly turns into a sharp smile which only increases his rage until what she says next causing it to be replaced with confusion,

“Well, I’ve never seen someone turn red and that hot that fast before.” She tilts her head to the side a little as she eyes up and down, “But that's beside the point, as I said they were under less than pleasant care until recently where my husband and I adopted them.”

Any rage dies with his confusion as the feeling of despair takes over him and he quickly blinks back tears, refusing to cry in front of this woman. The woman frowns now and mutters “Blue…” under her breath. 

“What do you want.” He hates how defeated he sounds while he leans against the bars on the bed. He’s looking at the floor, not wanting to look at the woman anymore.

She tilts her head watching the man with a frown. “I’m here to take you with me to your children.” His head snaps up at her suddenly confused again and feeling something akin to hope before it quickly dies again.

“This isn’t funny youse knows?” He wants to be angry, he really does he just feels nothing but despair after hearing what happened, “Even ifs youse were really here to do’s that, youse think they’d let me out? Do youse have any idea what put me in here?” 

The woman narrows her eyes as he pushes off the bed frame and approaches the bars in front of her. “Even ifs youse were here for what youse say, they wont let me out. Can you guess what I’s did? I deserve to be ins here.”

She smirks her head tilting only a little this time as she looks at him and annoyance and frustration begin to boil in his chest. “Of course I know.” She puts her hand through the bars, palm face up as she looks at him expectantly while the inmate back up a little, looking from her hand to her face, confusion clearly written all over his face before he reluctantly sets his hand on hers. She grabs his hand in a tight but painless vice as Yancy freezes, watching as veins of space fly up his arms from underneath her finger and dancing purple and red flowers move up her hand and under her sleeve.

“I used to live next door to you and your parents,” His heart drops before her grip becomes gentle, gently pulling him back towards her. And with a soft glow and a feeling of a lover's hug, her mark settles from part of his back up to right below his right eye. And from beneath her coat and shirt he can see a red glow bloom on the opposite side of her heart before disappearing.

“I heard everything as it happened,” He desperately digs through his memories, trying to remember anything about a blonde girl that lived next door when a faint memory of a girl, probably around 10 when he was around 13, pops into his head. She had her back turned to him and she was talking to and green and black blurry blob(?) of something that vaguely resembled a person. He barely remembers the blob talking, remembering that it had a distinctly Irish accent talking to her.

The woman tucks her cane under her arm with her free hand before pulling his hand through the bars towards her. Flipping his hand so his palm is facing upwards, she grabs his wrist softly, rubbing her thumb in small circles on it and taking three fingers and gently dragging them across his palm to his own finger tips in a way that's strangely intimate and so gentle that Yancy wants to cry, although from what he is unsure of. The touch almost burns at the unfamiliar feeling of being touched after so long of not being. “They deserved what happened to them.” 

Her voice is quieter, but far from shy or meek, if anything she holds a protective tone as she watches their hand while he continues to try and rack his brain for her name. He knows he’s heard it before, he’s had to have to if he lived next to her for so long.

“And besides,” She turns his hand over again, holding it with both hands before bringing it up to her mouth and kissing no softer than a butterfly's wings as she looks him in the eyes. Oh, that's what the feeling is, she cares about. Even though they haven’t seen each other in almost 5 years, even then they barely knew each other. She cares. She gently sets his hand down before letting go and Yancy yearns for her to hold it again and to never let go.

“I’d be a hypocrite if I let you rot in here for killing them.” Her smile gains a mischievous feel to it before it goes back to be soft of the look of shock and horror on his face. “No need to look shocked honey, they deserve what happened to them. After all they are, or were actually, no better than your’s was.”

He feels a little sick at the thought of the sweet and shy little girl that used to live next to him being abused the same way he was. A sick part of him wondering what finally pushed her over the edge and wondered how she got away with it. The admission manages to shock his brain for a second, bringing up an old memory from almost ten years ago before whispering out in disbelief that the regal woman in front of him was the shy little girl that would always talk to animals or that blob. “Liru…”

She smiles widely and nods, “I’m glad you remembered, it’s nice to finally see you again now we’re no longer separated by thorn bushes and a fence.” Her tone is playful as she watches him and Yancy suddenly feels very bare in front of her as the reality of who she is, one of his soulmates. How many does he fucking have.

“I can’t imagine how confusing this must be so I’ll leave you alone for now,” Yancy’s anxiety spikes as his hand shots through the bars grabbing her wrist in what he hopes isn’t a bruising grip. She appears surprised for a few seconds before she relaxes and smiles. She grabs his hand again with her free one, the burning sensation that brings a sense of fulfillment and joy, unhooking it from her wrist and bringing it up to her mouth and kissing the knuckles softly.

“It’s alright honey,” She looks at him lowering their hands while reaching one through the bars and cupping the cheek with the soulmark. Her soulmark, Yancy doesn’t think he would ever get used to the feeling if the way his skin heats up to her touch. “We’ll be back tomorrow, and then we can go home and you can finally see your kids again. Alright?”

He swallows nervously, at a loss for words before nodding quickly. She smiles before pulling her hands away leaving Yancy yearning for more.

“We’ll be back, I promise. But for now,” She looks him in the eyes as she puts her cane back on the floor, a loose grip on the stop, eyes changing from blue to space, “You should get some sleep.”

And the next thing Yancy knows, he’s dreaming of a better tomorrow.

Translation:

“Eem! Eem mak di unce sec fato ni!” = Him! He’s the one who sang for me!

Liru’s eyes turned to this.

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#New Beginnings #Yancy #Antisepticeye #Robbie the Zombie #Yandereiplier #The Warden #Liru Sokdere #our stuff

[grim-faux]

4 - Committed to Survival

Rather fix the camera in its hoister now, I’d wait until I wasn’t around the water.  The path out of this place felt long and oppressive, the sharp smell of mildew at this point drilling a painful ache in my head.  I shut the mesh door behind me and trudged up the stairs to the first landing, where a tolerable light source awaited.

MKULTRA program, CIA document no. 190691, p. 1, excerpt  To: File  Subject: Hypnotic Experimentation and Research, Febuary 10, 1954  On Wednesday, 10 Febuary, 1954, hypnotic experimentation and research work was continued in Building 13 of the Mount Massive Preserve in Colorado using the following subjects.

  <material abridged> 

1. A posthypnotic of the night before (pointed finger, you will sleep) was enacted. Misses Jackson and Pierce immediately progressed to a deep hypnotic state with no further suggestion.  Miss Pierce was then instructed (having previously expressed a fear of firearms in any fashion) that she would use every method at her disposal to awaken miss Jackson (now in a deep hypnotic sleep), and failing this, she would pick up a nearby pistol and fire it at Miss Jackson. She was instructed that her rage would be so great that she would not hesitate to “kill” Jackson for failing to awaken. 

2. Miss Pierce carried out these suggestions to the letter including firing the (unloaded pneumatic pistol) gun at Jackson and then proceeding to fall into a deep sleep. After proper suggestions were made, both were awakened and expressed complete amnesia for the entire sequence. Miss Pierce was again handed the gun, which she refused (in an awakened state) to pick up or accept from the operator.  She expressed absolute denial that the foregoing sequence had happened.” In the least my little souvenir was interesting.  Hypnoses to cure fears, or force a person to perform a desired function.  I read files on this but the fancy didn’t strike me, people liked to read those sorts of articles but I wasn’t prime on reporting them. I left the file on the landing and made the ground floor.  I exhaled a breath of relief to see my surroundings unchanged, whether good or bad.  At least the big fucker had left most of the building intact.  I made my uneventful trek back to the Security room, I didn’t like the idea of a gaping hole behind me at this point, but I wasn’t about to prop that heavy metal door up with that little rolling chair. Call me lazy, I just wanted to get the doors open and put a fuck lot of distance between here, and the remnants of my healthy psyche.  I wasn’t going to be normal after this, alright? The terminal looked like it would still function, some of the monitors seemed to be spazing out from the abrupt shut down.  The main root, system controls, was up and ready to go. I managed to type in the first half of Security before someone crashed into me from behind, I didn’t even hear them enter.  I tried to push back and throw them off but they had braced a knee into the back of my leg, the edge of the terminal bit into my bruised thigh.  I already knew who it was even before he braced his arms over my chest, pain rippled up my side as he wrenched my head up.  Something metal flashed across my vision.  A needle! It was jammed into the base of my neck, my vision flashed as whatever the hypodermic was filled with drowned my senses.  He released me and I collapsed against the desk, my forehead started to tingle and I immediately worried over what was in that needle.  I leaned against my arms struggling to drag my failing strength back, but it was impossible.  The blue chair rolled over the clean portion of the floor as he nudged it aside, and moved close beside me.  I turned my head to watch his movement, his foul black robe swelled along my peripheral vision.  Getting hard to focus.  Felt like my legs were turning into jello. “I’m sorry, my son, I didn’t want to have to do this to you.”  He revealed the needle and grasped my hand.  “But you can’t leave, not yet.”  I jerked my hand away from his clammy grasp and brushed him off.  I tried to turn, push him away.  I want nothing to do with you.  Nothing!  Just let me Leave!   Without the support of the desk my legs gave out.  The Priest caught me under the arms and lowered me to my knees.  My shoulder pressed into the side of the metal desk as I stared up into his face.  He was bald, with wild eyes that frightened me.  “There is so much yet for you to witness.”   Oh god. “Will you see it?  Can you?”  With one arm latched to my side, he used the other hand to turn my head towards a gray video feed.  My thoughts were muddled, it was a room.  Camera looking down in a room, with a desk, wall with windows.  Bright windows.  Everything in that room was bright.  A symbol.  Rings on the floor.  Sharp ovals.  People in the room.  Holding guns.  Looked like MHS cops.  The guy I watched die.  I tried to get out…. “Our lord the Walrider, tearing His truth into the unbelievers.”  They were dying.  My eyes drooped but I fought to keep focus, what was killing them?  Dragging them off, throttling them, blood everywhere.  This place was turning red, full of blood.  Blood up to my knees, I was running from my shadow.  What did they see?  What was killing them?  What did he put into me? “The only way out of this place is the truth.”  My head rolled back to him.  The drugs made me weak and heavy, and I couldn’t care less for what he was saying.  The lights dimmed and I sank to my side.  His last words rang through my mind.   “Accept the gospel and all doors will open before you.” The dark. There was safety in the dark.  There was comfort in the dark.  The dark was the unknown.  The dark was all encompassing.  The dark was unmovable. Unless there was light.  That terrible light. I awoke once, enveloped in white, everything was bright and painful to bear.  By my side was a dark shape, the Priest.  I blinked and he was outside the door, it looked like he was speaking to a man with ants crawling on his face. Maybe it was a dream.  The road was very long, and it was already night.  It didn’t matter what time visiting hours ended, I planned to snoop around the grounds anyway and pick up whatever looked incriminating.  But I had to film something concrete, or my contacts would just scoff. When I arrived, the patients were wandering the front lawn in white shrouds.  Something without form was tearing through them, tossing their bodies like broken toys against the walls, muscle and lungs were tangled in the barbed wire.  Amidst them was Chris Walker, the other patients had bowed before him.  It didn’t look like he cared.  His face was splint back in a cruel grin, but his eyes were milky and dead. Once I had gotten away from the Asylum, I collapsed in the woods.  Everything hurt, my body was broken.  Death wasn’t the punishment anymore.  I didn’t have to worry about paying the bills, a boyfriend, my next job - nothing mattered.  The fight was over.  I curled up in the wet leaves and sank into a deep sleep, the dead of winter closed in, but not even the cold could reach me.  There was just the indiscriminate black that awaited at the end of it all. A soft groan escaped me as I roused, clearing the short rest from my stiff lungs.  I opened my eyes to view murky shapes, odd lines in the white walls.  The damn light was too bright, I turned my head and felt the dull pain in my neck reminding me of the previous events.  Everything felt muggy and pointless to my mind, but at least I was alone.    It felt like I had slept on the world’s hardest substance, the material crinkled nastily as I shifted.  Smelt like a retirement homes bad day, but at this point I didn’t give a damn.  Same scenario if you were drunk off your ass, you didn’t give a damn where you passed out.  I put a hand to my collar and brought it back.  No blood.  Probably bruised like hell, but otherwise fine.  My brain was still working out the crap that guy injected me with, should probably be the least of my worries.   For a while I lay on that stiff cot, staring at the walls until they came into focus.  Crosses and words scrawled everywhere.  Some of it in blood.  I took it this was His cell. I didn’t feel ready to resume my personal vendetta for freedom, but options were a luxury I feared I was now banned from.  Time was my worst enemy, and my chances of walking out alive dwindled the longer I wavered.  Either way, I didn’t want to be here when He returned. Slowly I sat up, making mental note of the injuries that had set into my body.  I coughed a bit of blood onto my sleeve, but that didn’t alarm me.  But I would check in to the hospital first chance I had.  A real hospital. Very considerate of the Priest to leave the camera, but he had reinforced his desires into me that I was to be his Apostle.  I flipped the visor open and raised it to the walls. “The priest, FATHER MARTIN brought me here to show me something. Thinks I’m going to be a witness for whatever batshit crazy he’s trying to sell me. This DR. WERNICKE is at the center of whatever went wrong here. But he died more than ten years ago. ‘Rest in Peace,’ says the blood on the wall.“ Fuck the story, when I get out of here I was going to write a New York Times best seller.  “How I Survived the Worst Tip in my Career.”  By Miles Upshur.  In your face, Oprah. The door had no visible lock or latch mechanism.  How did I get out?  Maybe if I pushed. That didn’t seem to work, but as I peered out of the small window a face shot into the lens of my camera startling me.  A click echoed, and the figure darted off.  Though the door was now wide open, I waited.  I had no idea what was out there, let alone where the hell I was NOW.  I hadn’t seen much before he unlocked the cell.  But the question I needed answered immediately, where was I in this god awful place?  Far from the safest exit, of course! Tentatively, I crept forward, but what was I going to do if someone decided to come in next?  I wasn’t hiding in here. This was better than Disney land.  I think every ghost hunter in the world would donate a kidney, just to spend a night in this place.  It was the main ward of the asylum, its heart, where all the crazies hung out.   Below, I saw a few of the frequents.  One man patrolling, smashing his skull into blood stained concrete with bone cracking force.  I winced with each impact. “Back!  Get back!”  To my right a man lunged at a segregation gate rattling at the bars, shrieking his lungs out.  “Get the fuck away from me!  Rrah!  Huh…don’t look at me.  Don’t you dare….” I whirled away from him, relying fully on the doors capacity to withstand his violence, even if fate did not favor me this hour.  I walked along the bland and gray wall, glancing down to the people on the lower floor.  Had they been this messed up before Murkoff got ahold of them?  They were using dream therapy to alter their higher cognitive functions of the mind, didn’t look like these people had that treatment.  Even if they had, I still wouldn’t be able to distinguish them from your typical lunatic. I shuddered to think if Murkoff had been trying to cure their mental deficiency in order to use them for further experimentation later on. The smell.  Like all the filthy alley ways and slums in every city in the world.  I could hardly breathe without gaging, filth was everywhere.  It was a miracle these people weren’t dead from contamination.  Or maybe it was some sort of curse.  This was no sort of life for a human. The window parallel to my face burst open and a hand shot out, grabbing for my head as I ducked.  I smashed against the rail and stared up as the arm continued to grope blindly for nothing, then withdrew.  The shock wore off quickly and I stood up to gaze on the face that met mine. Skin had been cut and moved, tacked down in cruel areas.  It looked like his right eyelid had been removed, the eye now a shriveled sack in the socket.  Despite his earlier ‘attack,’ I think I felt sorry for him. I was still glad his door was locked. The next door was open, but I could change that. “Said he shouldn’t hurt you,” a voiced hummed from within. Inside, opposite to a blood splashed corner, stood a man pawing at his face.  He too had been mutualized by some form of surgery, one eye stitched shut and his face scarred by malpractice.  “Is what he said.” I glanced around, then turned back to him and raised the camera.  “Father Martin?” “Our Father,” he corrected.  “Told him not to hurt you.  But when the cat’s away….Hmmmm….Mmmmm.” Everything in me screamed, slam that door now.  But I didn’t.  Quietly, I backed away and left him as he was.  If he was a danger, he was the least of my concerns.  Shutting the door might agitate him, and there were people on the floor below that seemed to not have noticed my presence yet. I slipped around the pillar of the next corner and walked towards the metal door on this side of the level. “Who’s this?” I stopped in my tracks and stared at the speaker, cloaked by shadow.  That was all they were cloaked by. “Maybe…Farther Martin’s man.” “Maybe.”  The first seemed excited by my presence.  My hair stood on end and I knew without a doubt, I should not be near them. The thick metal gate stood between us and presumably was locked, but I couldn’t make that gamble.  Even without the NV I could distinguish their lack of apparel, their shapes were tall and sinewy, and they appeared to be identical twins.  Splattered with blood. “He looks nervous.” “I would like to kill him.” I hid behind the pillar a little more. “As would I…”  His voice made the task sound tedious.  I really didn’t want to be here at this particular moment. “The preacher asked us not to.” “It would be impolite.” “Not here.” They paused. “We give him a running start?” “There’s an idea.” “And when we kill him, we kill him slow.” “Such patience.” I was done.  I was gone.  I was staggering down the steps searching for a way out of this mad house.  “I want his tongue.  And liver.” “They are yours.” Was there a way out?  Not from down here, the only route I could see had the camera shy freak and my new fan club.  They were giving me a running start.  What the FUCK did that mean?! “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”  Said the man staring at a pillar.  I decided from this point on, for the safety of my psyche and my body parts I did NOT need to speak with ANYONE.  They could talk to me, I was not going to converse back. Someone darted from the group into an open door, and slammed it.  One less to worry over.  Two men still roamed, there was a third sitting in a wheelchair.  I didn’t trust anyone in a wheelchair anymore. The two rooms on either side of the stairs had nothing to offer, no tools or messages, or items of interest.  I had a fear of standing in the doorways, unless someone opened the door from the outside I could be locked in.  The man staring at his pillar, he had been the one to let me out in the first place.  I didn’t want to ask if there was a way out of this area. The Priest had brought me here, how the hell did he get out?  Unless, he was still here…. “Don’t trust them.”  I jerked away from the man in the wheelchair, I had given him his distance though it was doubtful he could do much.  His mutilation went beyond the laws of humanity, scars and broken flesh healed over.   I raised my camera and knelt down, but I refused to get too close.  “They’ll tell you it’s science but it’s not.  They were…waiting for us.  In this place.  Billy understood.  They’ve always been here.” I wanted to ask him about Billy.  About the experiments and the Walrider, and what he meant by ‘they.’  But I was frightened by what he might say.  If he said any more.  Uttering this information had seemed to exhaust him, and his head wilted to his shoulder.  Briefly, I wondered if he had fallen asleep or had he finally escaped this place. I shivered and stood.  A way out that involved my body and I escaping together, and in one piece.  That seemed like a naive dream. I didn’t bother with the door behind him, or the one after that.  Though, as I passed by a face appeared in the glass.  I stared, and ‘he’ stared back.  My mind was attempting to fathom how someone without a mouth could survive, unless there was a tube in his nose, but even his nostrils were compromised.  It looked like there was an opening in his throat, reminiscent to smokers that suffered cancer and had their larynx removed. This place was god awful.  I had to keep reminding myself that, the more I looked around, the more I felt.  Even for a clutch of crazy people, murderers, whatever.  I think the worst ones were the men and women that consciously decided they were going to mangle the part of them that wasn’t broken beyond function.  Then, crack their minds open and figure out to what extent they could fuck their thoughts up even more. I was between feeling terrible and feeling like bitter justice was served.  Everything was a whirling mess of gray with globs of black. One room I entered on the far side had a patient curled up on his cot, trembling.  I knelt down to film him through the nightvision feed, taking in the details of his misshapen face.  Many of the patients I had encountered thus far had scars or wounds of unknown origin, from experiments Murkoff was performing on them.  It was briefly mentioned in Chris Walker’s file, many of his injuries were self-inflicted, but the report indicated not all.  Were the patient’s the one mutilating their bodies, prior to Murkoff’s fall?  Not all of them shared these injuries, some appeared almost normal or unharmed.   It must have been a part of the process Murkoff was putting them through.  But what sort of process I couldn’t begin to imagine.  Some of the scars appeared almost like chemical burns in theory.  What sort of monster would give an order to maim humans? “Too many voices.  They followed me back.”  He stumbled into me as I swayed to get out of his way.  “No more sleep.”  He grabbed my collar and forced me aside, and then continued on toward a bloody spot on the wall without pause.  Wack. Smack! Crack! Clack! “They’re in my blood and they want to get out.  Can feel….” I continued to back away until I was a safe distance, concealed in shadows.  My back pressed against the cold wall and I slid down to sit. “We angered Him with our science.  He only wanted faith.” The voice sounded very close, but when I turned my camera to find him, he was a few feet away curled up tightly in a corner.  I sat there for what felt like a long time observing the habits of these people, lost in madness.  Eventually the man whom stared at pillar did move, at first leaning on his subject matter, then slipping down until he was on his side facing the cold concrete structure.  I turned my attention back to the man in wheelchair, but he had not yet moved since he spoke.  I wondered if he did indeed die.  It made no difference to me, not at this time, but I did feel a unique chill in my veins at the thought.  How many people have I watched die today? “Voices in my head follow me back!”  When the head banger made his third round, I decided it was time to find a way out. Without a word of farewell to the squatter, I crossed to the other side of the wall to doors that had not been examined.  I was beginning to despair, surrendering resolve to the idea of returning to the upper level, to the twins. It was very likely they would open the door only to murder me.  There was no place for me to run, or hide.  Especially with the two of them, they’d corner me with little effort if I tried.  My heart thudded against the stress, and that persistent pain in my chest.  I needed a doctor. A door I opened finally offered some promise, the back of the room was shattered revealing a crack into an open work space.  A shred of concern did remain in me to enter a room in which I could not open from the inside, but I didn’t give a damn at this point.  I squeezed through the gap and pulled up the nightvision, it sounded like someone was struggling. I wasn’t confident in facing the source, if I had someplace to run I might felt more assured.  Truth was safety was an illusion in Mount Massive, my only hope for survival was my capacity to elude danger.   There wasn’t much to see in the work hall, pipes for water, pipes for gas, I couldn’t tell which from the static green NV feed.  The noises were muffled but grew louder as I moved through the work space.  I didn’t like the sound of them.  Overhead the cement had been torn out, where the debris was removed to remained a mystery but it was a direction to take. I climbed onto a crate and made sure it was sturdy before leaping up to an overhead ledge.  For a span I was completely blind in the dark, the camera strap I stuck in my mouth rather the case so I could reach it quicker.  Once I had pulled myself onto the floor I knelt and took it up, looking immediately into the visor. A face covered in ants stared back. I gave a sharp yelp and toppled sideways, catching the jagged edge with my elbows before I fell through, my legs swung beneath me and I struggled not to drop the camera in my hand.  Groaning, I pulled myself back up and crawled away before checking once more. “Agh!  God damnit!  What the fuck is the matter with you?”  One of the patients had plastered himself against a wall and was fixing his shirt.  He wasn’t wearing pants.  On the floor across from him was a bloodied and decapitated body, nude, in a…suggestive position. “You weren’t invited to this, you god damned sicko.” Just….This place needed to go to hell.  Some of the people here did deserve what they got. “What, you like to watch?”  He pointed directly at me and reaffirmed his diagnosis.  “It’s sick.  You’re sick.” And thus my pledge, not to speak to any of these people, was solidified.  You couldn’t stage better propaganda. “Fuck this place. Seriously, just fuck this place. Dying keeps moving lower on the list of the worst things that could happen to me here.” I jogged down the hall, an otherwise good mood literally—No, no.  I needed to forget.  Positive thoughts, healthy thoughts.  I was terribly fucking lost, had no map, two naked men were admitted into my fan club, and dying was no longer top of the list of shitty ways to ruin this day. Or night.  I had no fucking idea. “Hey!  Hey!”  I stopped in an intersecting hall when someone called for me, and rattled a gate.  He was on the other side, which made me happy.  “You… Oh.  I….”  By the time I had my camera zoomed in he had already spun about and was running away.  The small event had me smirking despite everything, who did he think I was?  A friend? Lord give me strength, I was just mistaken for a loony.  And I thought it was funny.

#outlast #outlast novelized #miles upshure #outlast fanfiction