#I slept horribly last night and when I did eventually sleep I had a nightmare about having a baby | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

alxndryngs · 1 year

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Alright I've got a prompt for you: RE8 women (including mother miranda) have a nightmare, how does the reader deal with it?

If you keep making me write fluff like stuff about Miranda, you might just succeed with your mission 😂 But yes, absolutely. Here we go!

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Alcina:

She was never one to stir much when she slept. Once she had found a comfortable position, which most of the times was behind you with her arms wrapped around you, she would most likely not move again until she woke up.

It was one of the first nights in winter when the snow began to stick when it happened, when your wife began to squirm in her sleep.

The sounds of her whimpers, her rough handling on you and the moving of hers woke you. Squinting, you turned your head to take a look at the taller woman behind you.

"Cina?" You whispered, even in the dark you could see the layer of sweat covering her.

Turning over to face her, you sat up in bed and gently began to shake her arm to wake her from whatever bad dream she was having.

This hadn't been the first time she seemed to be getting a bad nights sleep, but this was the first time she was actually seeming to be having a nightmare.

Even the thought of Alcina going through something horrible in her dream made you frown. She was strong, but in the dream world? God knows what was happening.

The gasps and shallow breaths coming from her spurred you on to shake her a tad harder, eyebrows furrowing with worry.

"Alcina, draga."

Nothing. Her squirming continued.

Turning back for a split moment, you turned on the small lamp on your bedside table before turning back to your wife, almost gasping at the sight of her. Hair was sticking to her sweat covered forehead, just like her nightgown clung to her body. The mattress beneath her was absolutely drenched, as well as the sheets on pillow.

"Alcina damn it! Wake up, you're dreaming!"

You couldnt deny the fact that you had began panicking, especially after seeing your wife in the state she was in. Alcina never broke a sweat, not even after a trail ride in the middle of June with the scorching sun shining down on you both.

"Draga mea, why are you panting like that? I am positive even the girls back at the castle can hear you."

"Nothing, I'm just- incredibly hot."

Your wife grinned, her nude painted lips stretching into a smile.

"Well," She mused. "That I know, but-"

"Oh gods! I am sweating Alcina."

"Oh yes, of course. Of course."

Holding her damp face in your hands, you yelled her name once more before she finally opened her eyes with a loud gasp. Before you could even ask her what was wrong, what had happened, she pulled you against her sweaty body. Her arms were holding you so strongly, you thought she might squish you like a blueberry.

"The girls, the girls." She breathed, repeating herself over and over before eventually shooting out of bed, leaving you behind to follow which you did as soon as you could process what was happening.

On her way out, she grabbed her shawl and pulled it over before she began chasing the wind through the castle.

As fast as your human legs could carry you, you followed your wife through the dark castle. No chandelier was lit, no candle, nothing. The only source of light had been the moon shining through the windows.

It was like watching her chase a ghost through the corridors of her home with how fast she was walking.

As soon as she reached her daughters chambers, she opened the door to Cassandra's room and peeked inside.

First daughter, safe and sound.

Turning to the second door, she checked it the same way, worry slowly leaving her body.

Second daughter, safe and sound.

She checked Daniela's room last. When she found her youngest cuddling the little stuffed animal bat Donna made for her, she let out a relieved sigh and closed that door as well before turning to her wife.

"I had- it was a nightmare- they-" She stuttered and you smiled, pressing a kiss to her hand before leading her to the dining room.

You prepared her a cup of tea, poured a generous amount of blood and sat down with her. You never let go of her hand whilst she told you about the horrid dream she had.

And even though you weren't able to convince her to get back to bed, the both of you took a nice midnight stroll through the woods, even spotting a few fireflies. That was the first time she had called you firefly, and she would continue to for many years to come

Donna:

You knew her to be a very light sleeper. Even when you turned over in bed to cuddle into her, she would wake and smile while wrapping an arm around you to bring you closer.

When one night, Donna didnt bring you closer or let a small chuckle, you looked up at her through your eyelashes and with furrowed brows.

You had always been a very clingy person. At first, Donna never knew how to deal with it since she had been alone for a very long time. But once she found to enjoy the little and sometimes big affectionate touches you gave her, she grew accustomed to it.

"Donna?" You whispered quietly. "Cuddles?"

A small pang of worry hit you when she remained laying on her back, not moving a single bit. You weren't even sure if she was breathing.

"Don?" You frowned, gently nudging your wife's arm as you sat up.

Swallowing the lump building in your throat, you turned your head to the side and called for Angie. Maybe she could tell you if Donna was alright. When not even your shout for Angie woke her, and when Angie hadn't given a snarky remark from another room for waking her, your worry began to become justified.

Turning your head back to her, you gently grabbed her arms and shook her lightly while softly calling her name.

There was no tension in Donnas body whatsoever, you felt it when you shook her. No resistance, nothing. Tears began to burn in your eyes at the thought of her laying next to you in bed, dead.

No, it couldn't be. "Donna!!" You yelled, shaking her roughly this time. You never.. manhandled her like this before. You knew she would've hated it.

When she finally woke, she just opened her eye and stared at the ceiling. You sat in silence, watching and unsure of what to do. Until you heard her voice.

"Coccolona?" She whispered, eyes fixated on the ceiling.

She had begun calling you Coccolona when she found out how much you loved physical touch. She let you know it was in no way a bad thing, but translated into 'Cuddly'.

"Yes? Donna are you-" Before you could finish, she had pulled you down into her embrace and held you close. Her hand sneaked into your hair, running her fingers through it as she continued to stare at the ceiling above.

"A bad dream. That is all it was." She whispered, pressing a small kiss to your hair.

"I-.. I thought you were dead. You didnt react and- and you weren't looking like you were breathing. And Angie didnt answer either and-"

The more you talked, the faster you got. Donna could feel your heartbeat against her own chest, how it hammered against you ribs. She hadn't had a nightmare like this in a long time, where it pulled her down so deep that she wasnt responsive anymore.

Later on she had told you it might've been because she had worked in the garden a lot in the past week and inhaled a lot of the pollen. And even though it didnt have the usual effect on her like on other people, the reason why she never let you in the garden when the flowers were blooming, it still did something to her. And in this case, it was a very vivid and real feeling nightmare it pulled her into.

For the next week you refused to let her into the garden, threatening that if she went, you'd go with her.

From then on, Donna began wearing a mask whenever she worked in the garden to not give you another scare.

Bela:

You hadn't been assigned Lady Bela's maid for long, but when you were, Lady Dimitrescu made sure you had been assigned the room next to her eldest in case she ever needed anything. She did the same to her own maiden.

One particular night, you were up in bed reading. Only recently you had discovered the fairy tale part of the Dimitrescu library and were now reading a few tales of the Grimm Brothers.

It was already incredibly late, past 12, but you were fascinated by the stories written. Halfway through 'Mother Holle', you heard something from Lady Bela's room. Turning your head and furrowing your brows, you pressed your ear to the wall and tried to listen out.

Once you realised it were cries you had heard, you rushed out of your own and into her room. She was wriggling in her sheets, crying in her sleep.

You made haste at trying to wake her, gently shaking her and calling her name a few times before the girl shot up in bed.

Jumping back from it and her, you both stared at each other.

"I heard you crying, my lady." You began, the first to break the uncomfortable silence. "I figured I should come and check on you. You were crying in your sleep. Bad dream?"

The eldest nodded, wiping tears from her face whilst her face flushed with embarrassment.

Whilst you waited for an order from her, perhaps get her a snack or just leave, she began to tell you a bit about what had happened.

"The castle.. it was attacked. Everyone died. I couldn't help them."

She kept it short and simple, you took the hint that she didnt want to go into detail with it since it was very upsetting and unsettling.

"I understand." You said softly, giving a single nod. "It must have been very upsetting."

The girl looked at the book in your hands which you didnt even manage to put down and just dragged along. She nodded to it whilst sitting up, pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them.

"What's that?"

Taking a look down, you held it out to her.

"Grimms fairy tales. I was reading it before I heard you."

The hesitation on her face and in her voice was not to miss. "Would you.. well, read your favourite to me? Mother used to read to us ages ago, but she's gotten so busy.."

You smiled, nodding and taking a seat in the chair by her bed. Whilst you got seated, Bela laid down once again and tried to get comfortable.

Crossing your legs, you laid the book on them and flipped back to the beginning of the chapter.

Clearing your throat, you began reading.

"There once was a widow who had two daughters-- one of whom was pretty and industrious, while the other was ugly and idle."

You smiled at the small chuckle you heard come from underneath the blanket she had tucked into.

"But she was much fonder of the ugly and idle one, because she was her own daughter."

Cassandra:

Walking into her room to serve her a small glass of wine before sleep, you mustered the bookshelf by the wall.

She was just getting into bed when you turned to her with a smile.

"You like Edgar Allen Poe?" She turned, looking at the beaming smile you gave her.

Slowly, she nodded while leaning back in bed.

"I do, yes.." She paused, gnawing on her bottom lip. "Do you?"

"I love his work, my lady." You beamed, coming over and setting the tray you were holding down on the nightstand before pouring her her cup of blood. "If you'd like, I could read you my favourite poem of his."

She seemed to think about it while she took a sip, staring at the bookshelf and then you, before nodding. "I would like that."

So you did. Once she had finished her cup, you retrieved the book from the shelf and flicked through the pages as you took a seat in a chair close to the bed.

Cassandra had already laid down, getting comfortable and closing her eyes as she waited for you to find the page and start reading.

Once you found it, you cleared your throat and checked in on her once more to make sure she was ready.

"Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

"Tis some visiter' I muttered, 'tapping at my chamber door-- only this, and nothing more"

By the time you had finished the long poem, Lady Cassandra was deep asleep. Putting a bookmark between the pages, you closed it and put it on her nightstand before getting up and beginning to clean her room like she's asked you to.

Picking up her laundry, dusting the shelves, sweeping the floor. Just when you were about to finish up, grab the tray and leave, you heard a whine coming from underneath the blanket.

Stopping, you looked at her outline under the blanket.

"Mm, no. No." She muttered, shifting in her sleep.

Your eyebrows furrowed, was she having a nightmare? Quietly, you placed the tray back down and gently pulled the blanket off her face to reveal the pained expression she had.

She repeated her mumbling, shaking her head and clinging onto the blanket.

"My Lady." You said softly, not wanting to leave her suffering in a bad dream.

You tried again. "Lady Cassandra.... Cassandra!"

With a small gasp, the girl woke and looked at you with her eyebrows knit together.

"Where is he?" She asked once gathering herself, grabbing the sickle underneath her pillow and sitting up, looking around the room.

"Where is who, Cassandra?" You asked confused, taking a small step back to get out of reach of her sickle.

"The intruder! Where is he?! Once im done with him, he won't be anything but a bag of bones!"

That's when it hit you, she had a nightmare because of the poem you read her. You tried biting back a small smile whilst placing your hand on her wrist, slowly making her lower her weapon.

"Cassandra, I read you a poem before you went to sleep. You had a dream about it. You are alright. I have been in here ever since you slept in, to clean like you asked me to. No one has entered this room. I just heard your mother call out 'goodnight' a few minutes ago. And she wouldnt sleep if there was danger, would she?"

Considering it, she looked up to meet your eyes and shakes her head. No, her mother wouldn't. She lowered her sickle completely once she was convinced you were right, sliding it back under her pillow.

"Would you like me to read you something a little more joyfu-"

Before you had even finished, she nodded, plopping back down in her pillow.

"Yes."

"Very well."

Little Daniela x mom!y/n: (A/N: Couldn't help myself 😬)

You and Alcina had gone to bed not long after you had put the girls to bed. It was a long day, the girls celebrated their 6th birthday and you and your wife were positively exhausted.

Alcina had the idea of taking them to a theme park and little Daniela had escaped multiple times, ending up somewhere else each time and leaving you and Alcina both carrying one child while running through the theme park like idiots, screaming your lungs out.

At some point Alcina even contemplated buying a leash for her.

"You know, I have seen these people buy leashes for their childre-"

"Alcina. I am not going to put our girl on a leash."

"Right. Well, just a thought, my dear."

Alcina had slept in as soon as her head hit the pillow. No wonder, you thought. She refused to wear sneakers and ran through the park in high heels. Her back and feet were killing her, she said. You just about managed to hold back the 'I told you so' at the tip of your tongue.

Just when you were about to doze off, nuzzling into your wife's arms, you heard one of the girls cry out for you both. Looking up at Alcina and seeing she was gone out of her mind, you got out of bed and made your way to your crying daughter.

Opening the door and peeking in, you saw Daniela, sitting up and crying on the bed. As soon as she saw you, her arms reached out for you whilst she sobbed and cried.

"Sweetheart.. whats wrong?"

You asked while coming over, sitting down on the edge of the bed and wrapping her up in your arms. She cried into your chest as she clung onto you, babbling her words into your skin.

"Sweetie I cant hear you. Look at mama and tell me whats wrong."

Daniela lifts her head, looking up at you with her big sad eyes and wobbling lip.

"I had a- a dweam that someone stole Miss Min-Mouse an now she's GONEEE!"

She wails, throwing her head back into her neck and crying as loud as she possibly could.

"Ohh darling," You coo, rocking her in your arms as you look around the bed, finding her laying close to your feet.

Daniela must've accidentally thrown it out of bed as she slept.

Nudging it up with your foot, you grab it and wrap both arms around her again while a small idea pops into your head.

"Well you know what?" Little Daniela looks at you once more, sniffling hard while shaking her head almost violently.

"Right when I was on my way to you, me and mommy found the guy who took Miss Min-Mouse. She's taking care of him right now to make sure he never steals another stuffed animal from children ever again." You said, smiling at your youngest and holding up the Minnie Mouse for her to see.

She smiled brightly once she saw that her beloved stuffed animal she had gotten today was not gone, but that her mommy and mama rescued her.

"You the best mama.." She sniffled, taking the stuffed animal and nuzzling into your chest. Pressing a kiss to her hairline, you mumbled a 'you're welcome' before tucking her back into bed.

"An mommy's the best too.. tell her, kay?" Looking up at you, she wipes her eye with the back of her hand.

You assure her that you will, smiling at her and wiping her tears.

"But you and Miss Min-Mouse need to sleep now. See how tired she is..? My, she's exhausted! Im sure that if you sleep, she will sleep with you. Okay?"

"Tay Mama. Ni ni"

"Night night, bumblebee"

Mother Miranda:

Tonight was one of the not so many nights where Miranda slept in your shared bed.

The closer Eva's birthday had gotten, the more time she spent in the lab and away from you. You couldnt be mad at her in any way, you understood why she does what she's doing.

She was a mother who's lost her daughter and was willing to give everything in the world to get her back once more.

You were there when Eva was born, when she grew up and then lastly died. Miranda was shattered, lost herself. It took her so long to recover and when she did, she was trying to bring her back.

And even though she never let you see what she was doing, she told you about it. She knew it was wrong, but she couldnt help herself. All she wanted was her daughter back with her.. and you.

During the time when Eva died, you never left her side. You took over everything she couldnt do. Cook, clean, take care of certain things and on some days, herself.

Now Miranda was sleeping next to you, breathing deeply and content. You had woken up when she came to bed a few hours ago and took the opportunity to admire her beauty.

Before she sneaked into bed, she had changed in her black sheer nightgown that ended on her mid thigh and put her hair back in a ponytail.

You took the opportunity when given and decided to stay awake and ogle her a tiny bit.

Gently reaching over, you wrap your arm around her and gently caress the skin between her wings. They flutter for a moment when you did before relaxing once more.

Her body relaxed when you caressed her skin and at some point even wings. You had always loved the feeling of her soft feathers on you skin.

However, you had to cut your ogling short when she began letting out rough breaths and furrowed her eyebrows. You almost immediately recognised what was happening.

She used to have nightmares like these almost every night after Eva died so you learned to recognise it fairly quickly.

Moving your hand from her back to her arm, you gently shook her to wake her up from whatever dream she was having. Her rough breaths turned into small grunts as she writhed in her sleep.

The first few times, she wouldnt wake up when you called her name.

"Randy" You said, voice laced with worry. She seemed to be so deep asleep that the usual shaking and calling her name didnt help.

You did what you were about to do once, and Miranda did not like it. Bracing yourself, you reached for her wings again and wrap your fingers around a big feather of hers before plucking it right out of her wing.

She yelled, shooting up in bed and looking around with the most bewildered look you had ever seen before her eyes fall on you and the feather in your hand that you had plucked from her.

"You-.. You plucked one of my feathers." It was more a statement than anything, but she sounded way more calm than the last time you did this. You turned the last feather into one to write with so the sacrifice hadn't been for nothing. Might as well just do the same with this one.

"I did, I'm sorry. I couldnt get you to wake and-"

Before you could finish, Miranda was all over you. Her arms around your neck, her wings pulling you as close as she could manage while she buried her face into your neck.

Kissing her head, you held her as close as you could possibly manage while again, caressing her wings and whispering sweet nothings to the shaking woman in your arms.

She hadn't said anything close to thank you when you comforted her, but she did deliver breakfast in bed every morning for at least a month after that and tried her best to sleep in the same bed with you most nights since after that one, it showed her how much you truly kept her calm.

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I hope you enjoyed! I had fun writing this. :)

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winter-dayz · 7 months

Text

It's only a dream...

Pairing: Kim Jisoo x Reader College AU; Nightmare on Elm Street AU Genre: Horror Words: 2197 Warnings: implied major character death; implied murder; nightmares; strong language; violence

Masterlist | Fictober Masterpost

Taglist: @soobin-chois

“You think you can run from me?” Her voice echoed through the halls. “So cute~”

You huffed, darting through another open door into another empty room. You could do this. You could escape. Right?

“You can’t~” She giggled. Your footsteps echoed loudly, but hers were somehow totally silent. Her voice constantly floated through the mist, finding you around every corner and seeming to drift into your ear as if she was whispering right to you. “You can keep running, Y/N. But I will always find you~ I will always win.” She hissed, and you felt her nails scratch down your back.

“Stop!” You screamed, jolting upwards in your bed. You felt the sweat drip down your spine, your blankets so warm they felt suffocating.

“Y/N, you okay?” Your roommate called from the kitchen.

You breathed slowly, calming your racing heart. “I um… Yeah, I think so…” You finally called back after a few minutes.

A knock on your door made you jump once more, but you settled when you saw it was just Jisoo checking on you. She looked you over in concern, her eyebrows furrowed and lips pouted. “Are you sure you’re okay? Did you have another nightmare?”

Jisoo and you had met about six months ago. Your previous roommate, Lisa, had moved in with her girlfriend, and unfortunately, you could no longer afford the rent. After weeks of searching, you finally saw a flyer on campus advertising a room for rent on Elm Street. It wasn’t too far from where you had been living, and the rent was ridiculously cheap. So you went to meet the flyer’s owner.

Of course you were hesitant to live with a complete stranger, but after meeting Jisoo, you were pleasantly surprised. She seemed responsible and caring, immediately greeting you with a, ‘It’s so nice to meet you! Have you eaten?’ And as you lived together, you learned that, like you, Jisoo loved video games and snacks—particularly a good burger, ice cream, and iced americanos. The only quirk you really noticed was how much the girl slept. Truth be told, there were days you didn’t think she even left her bed. But regardless, she was an amazing roommate and became a fast friend.

“I’m okay, Soo…” You sighed, standing slowly. You felt a bit dizzy; you always did after those nightmares. And your back stung where your sleep shirt brushed against it. There would be scratches; you were sure of it… There always were when those horrible nails caught you. “And yeah… Another one…”

She pouted at you, “Aw… Do you want to talk about it, precious?”

“Not this time, I just really need to get a shower and to class…” You gathered your bathroom items, but noticed Jisoo still hovered in your door. “Did you need something, Soo?”

“Hm?” She had been staring at you blankly, but at your question, her eyes widened, “Oh, no… I was just wondering if you wanted to hang out this evening? But maybe if you’ve been having such bad nightmares, you should get some extra rest… Head to bed early, precious. I’m worried about you.”

You nodded in agreement, and Jisoo gave you one last pouty smile before heading to her own room.

🎃

The day passed quickly with your classes keeping you adequately distracted from the creepy visions that were floating in the back of your mind. However, before you knew it, night had fallen again, and you laid in your bed more exhausted than that morning.

You tried to keep your eyes open for as long as possible, hoping that it would somehow ward away the nightmares, but eventually you succumbed to the darkness.

And once again you found yourself in a smoky hallway with unending doors. Something was different though. This hall wasn’t neverending with more and more halls attached to empty rooms. It wasn’t a messy maze meant for you to be chased through. It was a single path.

The doors—all still open—were nothing but a black abyss when you peeked through them, as if in a video game that hadn’t finished rendering an area. You meandered slowly, as quietly as you could, down the singular hallway. One door stood at the end, closed, with light beaming through.

The door looked so familiar, but you couldn’t quite place where you had seen it. Breathing out steadily and building your nerve, you slowly turned the handle. It surprised you that it was unlocked, but it terrified you when you saw what was inside.

The room was yours. You stared down at yourself, asleep in bed. You had passed out with the light on, that’s why there was light beaming through…

How was this possible? How were you awake but asleep? Could you wake yourself up from here? What was going on?

You took a gentle step toward your bed, barely brushing a finger over your cheek before long nails swiped down your back. You cried out in pain, watching your sleeping doppelganger whimper as well, and whirled around to find the culprit.

Cackling.

The laughter echoed and bounced down the hall, beckoning you to follow. To finally solve the mystery of your tormentor. To finally end your nightmare.

You ran.

Not away from it like you normally would. No, you ran towards the demon. It was time to face whatever was haunting you. This was a dream. A nightmare. It couldn’t actually hurt you… right?

Your steps faltered at the thought. You reached back and felt the wetness of your shirt where you had bled into it from the demon’s cut marks.

“C’mon Y/N… Don’t you want to chase me?” The voice floated from one of the open doors, no longer a black abyss behind it. “Don’t you want to solve your little mystery?”

You glared down the hall before making up your mind. You sprinted back towards your room, reaching your bed and shaking yourself awake. When you grabbed your own shoulders, you could feel the raised skin on the other you. “No! Stop that!” The voice screamed getting closer. It reminded you of someone, but you didn’t have time to dwell. You lifted your hand and struck across your own cheek, the slap reverberating and hurting the “awake” you as well. But it did the trick. “I won’t let you win!”

As you jolted awake, the pain hit you like a train. It took all you could to not scream or cry out. Instead, you scrambled out of bed and locked your bedroom door.

You couldn’t stay here.

“I won’t let you win!”

The last words you heard before you woke up bounced around your mind.

You had heard those words more than once during late night gaming sessions.

Your roommate was your nightmare.

Which wouldn’t normally freak you out so much except for the fact that you had really never had nightmares, or even dreams, before you moved here. Except for the fact that your hand and your cheek were stinging from that slap. Except for the fact that the gashes on your back and the tears in your shirt were definitely made by your nightmare’s nails.

With a heavy breath, and silent tears streaming, you threw together a duffel bag. You hadn’t heard Jisoo stirring about the kitchen yet and knew now was your chance to escape.

Moving in here had always seemed too perfect. Now you suspected why. You needed to get out.

Even if you were crazy. Making it all up in your head. You didn’t think you could face Jisoo in this mindset. Her voice, her laugh, her perfect manicure. It would trigger you.

“Just a few days…” You whispered as you slipped out of your room and darted for the front door. You hesitated, turning to look down the hallway towards her room, but shook your head and left.

You were probably being irrational. There’s no way she was somehow controlling your dreams, and even if she was, why would she have any reason to? But, you needed to feel safe right now, and unfortunately, you just didn’t in that apartment. Jisoo would understand…

🎃

You weren’t being irrational.

After your spontaneous trip to your parents’ house an hour away, the nightmares stopped. The strange cuts and injuries stopped. The fear stopped.

Jisoo had promptly messaged you that morning asking your whereabouts, and you had lied about a family emergency. She had left you on read.

Now, you were sure you weren’t crazy, and you were also sure you needed to move.

You had researched what had been happening to you. At first, you simply found a lot of articles and blogs to decipher dream meanings, but then that led to studies on sleep paralysis, which led you to old folklore about “dream demons.”

Mares—also called maere, mara, mahr, mahrts, and marts—in old Germanic, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse folklore were evil spirits that would sneak into people’s rooms at night and give them bad dreams to drain their vitality while they slept and feed on their victims’ fear. They were known for their psychological and physical abuse of humans, going so far as to injure them in their dreams, which would manifest in real life. Some even would commit murder, killing the victim in their nightmare, which killed them in the waking world as well.

Spiraling down the rabbit hole of your research, you found a blog thread of someone claiming that their aunt was the victim of a dream demon in the ‘80s. Some child-murderer named Freddy had made a pact with the demonic entities. They bestowed their power to him in exchange for his help to cross over into reality.

Of course the thread was bashed by other commenters saying that the man they were referencing was killed in a fire in the late ‘60s, and they were just trying to tell scary stories.

The story, though, sounded familiar enough to you that you believed them. Right down to the location’s name… Elm Street.

Fuck. You definitely weren’t crazy. Even though you kind of wish you were.

You really needed to move. You needed to get out of that place. You needed to get away from “Jisoo,” or whatever her name really was.

But you didn’t want to go back. You couldn’t. You were afraid if you stepped foot in that apartment again, she’d never let you leave.

No, instead, you would send some movers or something to pack up your things. It seemed reasonable. You would call them first thing in the morning.

You just needed to get some sleep.

You needed to rest.

And in the morning, this would all be over.

You’d be away from that demon.

“I thought I told you that you can’t get away from me, Y/N.” Jisoo walked towards you menacingly.

You tried to back away, but the hallway seemed to continue stretching on and on. More open doors, more empty rooms, all leading back to the same long misty hallway. She continued to stalk towards you, hands raising up, her nails looked longer than you’d ever seen, and sharp enough that they were cutting into the plaster. She was going to kill you. She was going to shred you to bits. You were fucked.

As if reading your thoughts, her lips curled into a horrifying smile. “That’s right, precious. Be afraid. Your distress tastes delicious~”

You wanted to scream; you wanted to run. But suddenly, you found that the hallway had shortened to a small box, the doors had all disappeared, and Jisoo stood in front of you. Her normally well-manicured nails stretched into long, knife-like claws.

“I told you I always win here, Y/N. Your nightmares are my creations. My realm. I control what happens here. I feed off your fear. But if you think you can just run away, you are so, so wrong.” Jisoo was furious, and she had you cornered.

You had thought you could escape her in the waking world, but her connection to you was too strong. You had lost before you even knew you were a part of her game.

She stepped closer to you, and you pressed your back against the cold, solid cement. There was nowhere to go. You really were fucked this time around. All you could do was try to calm your erratic heart and not feed into the fear any further. But that was easier said than done when you felt her grasping your wrists. Her grip was stronger than you thought possible, and you were sure you could feel your bones on the brink of fracture.

One of her hands trailed up your arm, almost as if caressing you, but the pointed ends of her nails left clean slices in their wake. Your blood gently spilled in small rivulets, dripping down your arm in a mirror to the tears streaming your cheeks.

“It’s only a dream…” You cried helplessly as her hand wrapped around your neck, her razor nails beginning to press into your artery. “A nightmare!” Jisoo closed in, whispering right in your ear as she had done so many times before to terrorize you and feed on your fear. “Come to Jisoo, precious.”

#blackpink #kim jisoo #reader #kim jisoo x reader #blackpink x reader #horror #college au #nightmare on elm street au #oneshot #fictober

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vitos-ordination-song · 6 months

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Sobriety has been weird. I could discuss it further but for now I’ll just focus on how breaking my psychological dependency on all substances has coincided with an ability to sleep. My earliest memories, going all the way back to when I was a toddler, are of not being able to sleep. It started when my parents adopted my second brother and they moved me to a room of my own. I was terrified to sleep alone. I never had nightmares really, though I can remember that being how adults explained what was happening to me. What I had was sleep anxiety—anxiety about the period before sleep. In third grade, it got so bad that I don’t think I slept more than a couple hours a night the entire year.

Some of it stemmed from fear, little kid fears, which are actually deeper and longer lasting than most people realize. I had a kind of existential dread and terror of the unknown which I still recall vividly. It’s also connected to being unable to stop thinking, and being unable to give up conscious control. I can remember having loop after loop as a kid where I would realize I was falling asleep, and just realizing it would prevent me from sleeping. I started to dread going to bed—it built up into such a huge thing in my mind and I would be nervous about it all day.

Finally, my parents completely mismanaged the situation and made it way worse. I’m not sure why they’re like this but they genuinely believed that everything their kids did that bothered them was on purpose. My brothers were punished for wetting the bed, and I was punished for not sleeping. There was a literal panopticon situation going on where they would check on us all night and get mad if we weren’t sleeping. How relaxing. When I started seriously freaking out about sleep, all I got was annoyance. I had many a long night standing completely frozen outside the living room, listening to my parents talk (often shit talk about their kids actually), until one of them got up to get more alcohol, saw me, and shoed me away to bed. It got so bad that I eventually asked them if I was demon possessed, completely seriously. Christian brain will do that to you.

Anyway, I kept having sleep issues to varying degrees as I grew up. I was chronically exhausted during my miserable high school years. The overt anxiety lessened, but I had an aversion to going to bed—I used to wish and wish that I didn’t have to sleep, that I could just have all those hours to myself. Growing up in a controlling home with three siblings probably had something to do with it; I reclaimed the night as my time to make myself feel better, after long days of unhappy work.

A lot of my troubles started with that awful stay in a mental hospital. Family issues forced me in and I was only allowed out if I took the drugs. Lexapro sent me into a horrible sleepless night. My concentration broke, I couldn’t focus, I felt scared, disoriented, dizzy, and I wanted off the damn things. When I complained that the drug was just making me sick, the doctors just prescribed me seraquel, a powerful antipsychotic, to make me sleep. And make me sleep it did! I was highly sensitive to it, actually halving the low dose they gave me. If I took one at 6pm, I would fall asleep around 9, sleep the full night, and be up in time for my freshman college courses. It was a relief to be able to sleep, even if they were a bit too powerful for me, and I took them a long time after I stopped Lexapro. I’m definitely weird bc I hear that other ppl had a lot of side effects from it but it only ever made me sleep.

So that was where the association of using a drug to solve my night time problem began, I suppose. I never liked the Kaiser psychiatrist so I stopped going even before I distanced myself from my family. I also didn’t like that seraquel would take up so much of my day—I would sleep 10-12 hours on it, and I’d also have to take them early because otherwise I couldn’t wake up. I ended up only using them to ensure a night’s sleep when I really needed it, and I’ve long since run out.

In 2019, my life went off the rails, and I started drinking. I was doing weed before that, but drinking is where things really went haywire. Notably, in both cases, I’ve only ever used at night. The anxiety was there—like, I’m not gonna be okay unless I’m doing a drug at night. Only the drug will help me cope with the time I have to kill before bed. A lot of that had to do with loneliness and the many problems in my life. Drinking would just put me to sleep with no problem, while weed would help me dissociate.

Even this last year when I’ve been more sober, only doing weed on the weekends, I still haven’t been sleeping the other days. I just never wanted to. I resisted it. And I never felt like going to bed, I never got sleepy, sleep was rarely appealing to me, except in the mornings when I had to get up for work.

I’ve been thinking about getting sober, taking a long term break from all substances and doing them more sparingly, ending my psychological dependence, for some time. It tends to happen all of a sudden for me, and I’m glad it’s finally clicked. I’ve been feeling really good, healthy, more energetic despite recovering from sickness. I knew I’d be healthier if I stopped doing weed regularly. But I was not expecting to have the sleep problem solved. That goes back so far in my psyche.

It must be that I’m healing the thing that caused both my addiction and my sleep problems. I feel more and more mature lately. I’ve been thinking about maturing for a long time, thinking about changing myself, but I had many frustrating years where my desires weren’t aligning with my actions. All of a sudden, things are clicking into place. The fear is subsiding. The deep rift in my personality is closing (this is where I could talk more about how weed actually helped on this front but I’ll leave it. Suffice it to say that getting sober was the last stage in the process). I’m letting go of control, learning to relax, and becoming more in tune with my body. I can sleep now. I want to sleep now. I want to dream. I want to have flying dreams like I had when I was a child.

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slightlypossessed · 3 years

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Can I Wash Your Hair? // Loki

Summary: Loki returns from a long day, tired and exhausted both mentally and physically. Deep talk leads to some tears and a pep talk, then eventually hair washing and lovemaking.

Warning: Sad Loki, but also soft Loki so hope that makes up for it. some cuss words, adult themes - nothing major tho. Maybe some grammar and spelling mistakes.

Word Count: 2,5k+

A/n: Midnight writing is always a surprise, when morning comes it'll tell whether this was good writing or not. Hope you like it either way!

Loki has had a long week.

He couldn't help but feel on the verge of exhausted tears as he made his way through the elevator door and into the floor you and he shared.

Today, he'd woken up at six in the morning to attend his strength training with Stark, Steve, Bucky, and Natasha, which lasted for close to two hours.

Two, very long, tedious, and unnecessary hours.

Afterward, he ran to the kitchen to eat a quick breakfast to avoid passing out and then ran to attend his abilities training with Wanda.

Normally, you'd attend this training session with them, but seeing as you were gone for a month-long mission and only returned last night, it seemed appropriate to take a day or two off.

After he was done with his training with Wanda, he transported to the SHIELD headquarter to attend to his assigned duties: a courtesy of SHIELD'S "redemption" program.

He helped train the interns alongside Steve and then scurried off to file and archive mission reports.

Another long, tedious, and unnecessary obligation.

After he was done, he was too exhausted to transport back to the tower, prompting him to ride with Steve in the SHIELD-provided vehicle. The thirty-minute-long ride was filled with Loki attempting to ignore the awkward silence and the judge-y looks the driver kept throwing at him.

By the time he'd arrived at the tower, Loki was both mentally and physically exhausted.

It didn't help at all that he had barely slept the night before: a virtue of his ever-reoccurring nightmares.

By the time his body slipped into an exhausted comatose state, it was already almost five in the morning, and by the time his body started venturing into the realm of REM sleep, his alarm was blaring through his room, startling him awake and out of bed -- a frustratingly horrible beginning to his day.

Loki scuffled towards where you were sitting on the couch with a book in hand.

He moved to lay on the long end of the L-shaped sofa, stretching his body slightly as he let out a groan.

"Long day?" your voice softly breaks through the silence.

"The longest" Loki whines in reply as he turns his body to face you. Despite the clear exhaustion written on his face, he still manages to look effortlessly flawless.

His green eyes sparkle with adoration as he looks at you, but you can still make out the fatigue in them, causing you to frown in concern. Loki isn't usually that worn out after a day, no matter how long it was.

Your eyes trail down his body, taking in the sight of his tight shoulder muscles and set jaw, you also notice how his thighs seem to lay on the couch anxiously tense as if he isn't able to relax them.

A bruise on his ankle catches your eye, causing you to lean forward towards it to take a good look.

"That looks like it hurts, love," you begin, " want me to get you some bruise salve for this?" you suggest as you point to his ankle.

"I'd love that. I got some other bruises that might need the salve too," he mumbles back quietly.

You nod and stand up to get the salve from the kitchen

It was used so often by both of you that instead of dedicating a particular place to keep it, the salve tub just laid on the kitchen counter: a place easy to reach.

"Geez, Lokes. How hard did you train today?" you ask as you walk back toward him, opening the tub as you move.

As you move towards him, you begin to really notice how fatigued he is. Even from a distance, his eye bags are noticeable, and despite his shoulder muscles being tensed from a long day of training, they're also sagging slightly in a manner you could only describe as defeated.

His feet are slightly swollen, an indication that he's stood on them for too long, and his bruised ankles an indication of how tough the training was today.

You begin to notice some other bruises on his shoulders and forearms as you sit beside him on the couch.

His sullen, bruised figure makes your heart clench. You wish you could take away his pain, both emotional and physical.

Loki chooses not to directly answer and instead says,

"They don't like me."

His eyes stare emptily at the ceiling as they brim red with unshed tears.

You begin to rub the salve onto the bruises on his forearm softly and quietly, giving him space to talk about what's on his mind.

"And I understand, I really do, but I just wish that they understood too," he continues, "I wish they understood that if I could go back and change what happened — if I could take away their memories and trauma, I would do it. I would do it without hesitation."

His voice is quiet, and it breaks often, but it has this urgency to it as if he's begging you to understand.

But he doesn't have to, never had to.

You understand him, you always have.

"I never wanted any of this to happen, do you know?" he adds.

"I know," you murmur back, your tone soft, not wanting to disturb this moment of vulnerability.

"Besides you, Wanda understands me best. She understands what it means to be young and misguided, to be built up for something great only to find out it's all been a lie, that you've been brainwashed the whole time,"

You understood what he meant, that he was speaking of Odin's betrayal & lies, and of Thanos' "Glorious purpose".

All lies, all acts that Loki was puppeteered on a string throughout.

All deception and brainwashing, not being able to control his own actions against the influence of the mind stone.

"James gets it too. He knows what brainwashing can lead to, but he never approaches me or even acknowledges me." Loki continues to speak his mind, "I try to pretend that I don't care, but it still hurts, and probably more than any of the offenses from the rest of the team."

He takes a deep breath, trying to control his breathing which has gone slightly erratic.

"He understands me, he knows what I've been through, and he gets it, yet his attitude always indicates hatred, and I always wonder 'is what I've done so bad and unforgivable that even those who understand still can't find it in them to forgive me for it?'"

At this point tears have already started streaming from the corners of his eyes, slowly trailing down and stopping as they make contact with your hands, which by now have stopped rubbing the salve onto his arms and are massaging his shoulders instead.

"Wanda is nice to me, at least, but she still won't speak to me outside of training or if you're not around, and it makes me wonder if she actually hates me too, but is just good at hiding it?"

He sighs, closing his eyes as he does.

"Maybe that's why they train me so hard. Natasha seems to be unable to look me in the eyes, and all Stark and the captain do is scowl at me. I know they hate me, Y/N, they don't even try to hide it." He reopens his eyes and tilts his head to look at you, "I think...they use training as an excuse to take out the anger they have towards me." he finishes.

You stand up and move towards where his feet are, raising them as you sit and plop them on your lap as you begin rubbing the salve on them too.

"They understand, Loki. Believe me, they do." you begin, "They just don't know how to work around all the trauma they got from New York, especially when it's your face they see in those haunting memories." you continue as you give his calf a soft squeeze in reassurance.

"Bucky is just scared, Lokes."

Loki stays silent for a moment, his body curves into itself slightly, as if trying to ward off a sudden pain.

"From...from me?" he questions, his voice timid and sad, his lips trembling slightly.

Shit, no.

"No! No Loki, not like that," you clarify, " he wonders the same thing you do. He and Stark aren't exactly the most civil, same thing with Nat. For them, Bucky is a reminder of a horrible time they suffered, much like you are to them."

"I guess so," he quietly agrees, his body loosening.

"So, he's cared that...I don't know, that their opinions of him might've influenced you and that if he tried to talk to you, you'd dismiss or reject him," you explain to Loki quietly.

He nods at you in understanding, motioning for you to continue.

"It's the same fear you have, bub, he's just worried that the one person who could understand him most would shun him and kick him to the curb. He doesn't hate you Lokes, he's just as scared as you are."

He hums at you while nodding once more, then says "You're right, dove."

"I always am." you tease with a smile.

"But...but what of Wanda?" Loki asks as he returns to the same timid tone he used moments ago.

"She's just a kid, Lokes. She gets you but she also worries about what Steve and the rest would think; she doesn't fully understand the tension between you and them but she tries to stay on the good side of both parties because she's scared of losing this home, Lokes," you reply.

Loki sighs once more then sits up and uses his hands to maneuver backward so that his back rests on the back of the couch, his ankles slipping off your lap in the process.

"You're right once again, darling," Loki replies.

You chuckle, and so does he, the atmosphere now turns sombre and warm, the sadness from earlier fading away, for the most part.

"Talk to them Loki," you suggest, "Start with bucky and Wanda, they'll understand you most. Talk to them at breakfast or after training. Talk about how training went or their duties or even talk about the weather. Once they start warming up to you, the others will follow in suit. You could also ask for Thor for help once he returns from Asgard."

He opens his mouth to object but you raise your hand and cut him off.

"No, Loki. I know you don't like asking for help but he's your brother and the team trusts and loves him and will take his word, even more than they'd do mine. That doesn't mean I won't put in my input, but he'd be more helpful and you know it."

He sighs for the third time this night, this time defeatedly, moving to run his hand through his still sweaty and slightly matted hair, grimacing slightly as he does.

An idea pops into your head, making you smile slyly.

"How about I wash your hair, hmm?" you ask as you grin widely at him.

"Yeah?" he asks with a small smile as he locks eyes with you.

"Yeah." you reply

__________

Loki sits in the tub filled with warm and soapy water, helping him relax from his long, tiring day.

The bathroom smells of his apple shower gel, a scent that you love oh, so much.

You reach forward and grab his apple shampoo, a complementary product to his beloved shower gel.

You sit back behind him, on the thick marble surrounding the tub as you squeeze a generous amount of the shampoo out onto your hand, then set the bottle aside and lather the shampoo in your hands before reaching out and intertwining your hand in Loki's dark, wet locks.

Slowly and tenderly, you begin to massage his scalp, cleaning it of all the day's dirt and sweat.

Loki groans and leans his head back slightly, his eyes closed in pleasure.

You continue to massage his scalp, moving your fingers in small circles as you press your nails gently onto his skin, making him moan.

Afterward, you start to run your fingers down his hair, stopping at his ends, which were floating in the tub water, then lifting your fingers back up to massage his scalp.

Loki leans his head back entirely as he sinks deeper into the tub, having to bend his knees slightly to fit.

He opens his eyes and locks them straight with yours, giving you a soft smile in the process.

"You know I love you, right?" he asks in a faint whisper.

"I know," you whisper back, "I love you too, so much."

Loki's smile widens and he releases a small giggle as he closes his eyes lightly, a result of the loving, euphoric warmth he feels throughout his chest whenever he's around you. The sound makes your heart flutter and your stomach fill with butterflies.

Loki re-opens his eyes and lifts himself upwards slightly as he stretches a hand behind your head, entangling it into your hair, and pulls you down to kiss you softly.

His lips tangle with yours tenderly, moving at a slow pace that sets your heart alight.

His lips are smooth and warm as they suck at your lips.

You use your hand on his jaw to slowly ease his mouth open, deepening the kiss as you caress his tongue with yours, prompting a deep moan from his throat.

You bite his lower lip as you pull back to look at him, releasing it once you're far enough to see his face.

Loki slowly re-opens his eyes, and when they do open entirely, they are a clear, beautiful green, reflecting his adoration for you.

His figure lays in the tub in a carefree haze, a small love-struck smile playing on his lips.

He looks like he's high.

But good, a good high.

Loki moves upwards once more as he closes his eyes and plants another, hotter kiss on your lips. He deepens this kiss almost instantly.

His lips move at a more feverish pace this time, his motions frantic as if he's trying to mold your faces into one.

He pulls back once more, breathing heavily, his eyes a much darker shade now.

"I think...you should join me in the tub, dove," Loki murmurs as he glances at your lips then back to your eyes.

"Aren't you tired, Lokes?" you question.

"No, not anymore," he smirks, "besides, I have tomorrow off."

"Is that so?" you reply teasingly as you look into his hooded eyes.

"Yeah, it is," he answers as he moves to kiss you once more, this time slower, making your head spin with need.

He pulls you closer, beginning to pull your shirt off.

"I love you," he murmurs against your lips between kisses.

"I love you, too." you gasp back.

He pulls you alongside the tub, waiting as you take your clothes off, then helps ease you into the tub, his arms on your waist.

Then softly, tenderly, begins to make love to you, showing you exactly how grateful he is for you, expressing the love he harbors for you as he brings you to intoxicating highs, murmuring soft confessions of love along your neck and chest.

MASTERLIST

1K notes · View notes

luimagines · 3 years

Note

RQ: He’s upset and needs comforting

Masterlist

Ya'll want angst? Because I have some angst.

Very hurt/comfort

Set platonically and within the group since there was no specification. Hope that’s ok! Sorry it took awhile, it got away from me again. I think this may be a trend.

Scenario under the cut! It’s super long so take caution!

Sky

It took a while for you to notice but eventually you do.

Sky has been acting weird all day.

It was only clipped responses at first, then it was was the lack of attention where Sky would have been the first to comment or act otherwise. What really tipped you off finally was how he seemed to be evading the whole group. Not necessarily stepping away and out of sight but he didn’t interact with anyone and when they approached him, he didn’t make eye contact, seemingly trying to cut the conversation short.

No one has said anything.

You mention it to Twilight about his out of character behavior but he says that it maybe a bad day, or he slept wrong, or some other reason that you stopped listening to because it didn’t make any sense.

Sky was always trying to be friendly no matter his mood and it took a lot to shake him up.

What was eating at the Chosen Hero?

Soon, the uncertainty begins to eat at you too and you wait for night fall, once everyone is asleep to strike.

Strike up a conversation that is.

Sky usually takes the last watch because he’s usually the first one out regardless of what activities for the day so you strive to wake up early.

It works for the most part, your internal clock doing what you want it to do when you blink your eyes open. Part of you begins to drift off again so you sit up and nearly fall asleep that way.

A hand comes up on your back and rubs a small circle. “Nightmare?”

It’s Sky and he’s looking at you with mild concern.

You smile and shake your head. “No. I’m alright but I think I’ll stay up with you if you don’t mind.”

“I wouldn’t mind the company.” He moves out of your space and back to where he sat.

You follow, still groggy from just waking from your slumber but succeed in not stepping on any of your friends or waking them up as well with the added noise. you sit next to the Hero of the Skies with little fan fare and let the moment settle on the both of you before looking skyward.

“Can I ask you something?” You don’t look at Sky and continue star gazing even if they’re a little harder to spot as the sun travels closer for it’s shift.

Sky hums in agreement and follows your gaze upwards.

“Are you ok? You seemed a little off lately.”

Sky doesn’t say anything for the first few seconds and you suspect that maybe he didn’t hear you. With him spacing out so much and the fact that you whispered for the sake of your still sleeping friends, you’re inclined to repeat yourself but Sky answers in time.

“Just thinking a lot, I suppose. Nothing serious.”

“Yeah?” You don’t look his way. This is casual. This is friendly. This is not a big deal. “Rupee for your thoughts?”

“It’s not that interesting.”

You shrug. “Hit me with it anyway. It’s got to be something if it’s throwing you off your rocker. Maybe a new perspective will help clear some of it up?”

Sky frowns at your attempts, once again retreating into his mind. You let the offer hang in the air and let it sink in.

You’re disinclined to bring it up anymore. Your brain is still tired and you’re wondering your effectiveness when half of your thoughts are still muddled with sleep and fatigue. You could have totally slept in some more. What on earth made you think this was a good idea?

“Time mentioned something earlier that I can’t seem to let go of.” Sky begins.

You hum back and let him keep talking.

“I never fought this Ganon guy they all so talk so much about. I fought the God Demise. Before I could land the final blow, he cast a curse on me, on us, that some cycle would continue. His hatred would last forever and my blood line and Zelda’s will be cursed to deal with constant darkness caused by him.” Sky admits, looking now at his intertwined hands. “I finished him soon after that but... I wonder... Am I the cause-... Is this all my fault? Am I the reason that we’re all here right now? That everyone has gone through so much? So many thing happened that should have never occurred. Time and Legend and Wild have all suffered so much.... more than I can possibly ever imagine and it seems like it’s never ending. Everyone starts they’re adventures so young... If I had killed him sooner... If I had just got it over with... If I had just shut him up-”

“Hey.” Your hand lands on his shoulder, cutting off his tirade. “None of this is anyone’s fault. The only people to blame are Ganon and now, this Demise guy. You did what you could. You still got the job done and no one here will ever blame you for what has happened to them or to Hyrule. You were young too... you’re still young. Give yourself a little kindness and understanding, just as you do with everyone here. You didn’t deserve it either. It’s not like you asked to fight a God.”

“Well...”

“Sky you know what I mean.”

“I should have been faster. If-”

“There’s no use in worrying about what if’s.” You shove him slightly. “This is our life. Even if you ask, no one is capable of giving you the answers. I get it. It’s hard to know if the path you took is the right one if it’s all you’ve ever known and you can’t see where the other would have lead... But... Even if horrible things happen, I’m still glad to have met you. I’m glad I met the others. I’m happy to be here with you and with them, and I’m glad that it’s not just me anymore.”

You let the words sink in before leaning down wards and trying to get him to look you in the eye. “I can’t answer your questions. But what happened, happened and the best thing we can do is learn how to play with the cards we’re dealt.”

He take a deep breath and finally looks in your direction. “I know you’re right.”

“Naturally.”

“But I can’t help but feel responsible for being-”

“But you’re not responsible for their pain or any of this Sky. If Ganon has anything to do with Demise then it’s all Demise’ fault. His and his only. Understand?” You stress. “I wish... I wish I could do something more to help.”

Sky places his hand over yours where you still have it on his shoulder and sends you a small smile. “I know. Me too.”

Wild

“Zelda, would you please drop it!” You hear the Champion yell, his voice carrying over the wind and somehow getting louder. “We’ve had this conversation before and it’s not the time to have it again. I have things to do excuse me.”

Wild storms into his house and shuts the door behind, blocking it with all his weight and waits for the indignant shrieking on the other side to go away. The voice ends with a frustrated huff and after a moment of silence, Wild relaxes and steps away from the door and further into the house.

You’re almost scared for the moment. You’ve not known Wild to yell, even less so for a Link to be on bad terms with Zelda no matter the universe. To make matters worse, you were the only that was actually within the house at the moment and you weren’t entirely sure how to proceed from here.

“Trouble in paradise?”

That probably wasn’t the way to go, if you were being honest with yourself.

Wild groans, loud and exaggerated and sits at the table in front of you with as much fan fair.

“Do not...call it that.” He sounds tired.

“Sorry.” You amend with an apologetic shrug. “That-” You reference to the scene outside. “-Didn’t sound ideal.”

“No. It’s not.” Wild sighs and places his face in his hands with his elbows on the table. Bad table manners, a small voice in your head pipes up. But it’s his house, so you bite your tongue.

“Can I ask what it was about?” You hesitatingly venture.

Wild takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out. “I wanted to live a simple life.” He starts. “Everything was over now, right? That was the idea I had. Defeat the evil and get to finally live as a normal man. Maybe explore more of my home and show Zelda all the cool things I’ve seen and done. Everything I knew, everything I remembered is gone and has been gone for a while. No one alive misses it. No one alive even knows about it. This is the world they were born into and they wouldn’t have it any other way. I was prepared to accept that and join them.”

Your face twists in sympathy as you nod along. “I take it that’s the issue here.”

“When I defeated Calamity Ganon and reunited with Zelda, she seemed so full of hope and purpose.” Wild continues. “I saw it in her eyes. She wanted a different thing to what I wanted.”

“And what’s that?”

Wild gives you a pained look. “Zelda wants to try and rebuild the kingdom. Make it into what she remembers it to be. She wants to strengthen relationships with the other nations and reestablish the royal family and a whole lot of other things that I cannot begin to think of how long it would both take and last considering all the damage that already been done. She wants to be Queen. And over what? Hyrule Kingdom is no more. Can’t be a Queen without a kingdom to rule and there’s not a lot of Hylians left that would agree to being ruled over or even enough of them to count as a kingdom to begin with.”

“I suppose it’s not a bad goal to have but you do make a point.” You try and add to the conversation, feeling wildly out of your depth. “Does she know that you-”

“Yes. And she thinks I’m crazy for it. She thinks that I’ve given up on my friends and the past and the future and- uugghhh.” Wild leaned forward and slams his head on the table with enough force to make you jump.

“That look like it hurt.”

“I’ve had worse.”

“I believe you.” A small smile covers your face.

A beat passes before Wild continues to talk with his head still on top of the table. “I don’t think she realizes that I’ve changed after everything. Maybe if I had my memories to begin with, or maybe if I had managed to defeat Calamity Ganon sooner, I’d be more inclined to agree with her, but I’ve experienced so much and done so much that I don’t want to go back to how things were. I’m a different man now.” Wild looks up at you. “She’s different too but I don’t think she’s ready for that conversation.”

“So you’re stuck with this one?”

“Yes.”

“That sucks man.” You shift in your seat. “Anything I can do to help?”

“Not if you can change the past.” He pouts.

“Shame. I’m fresh out of past changing wishing powder.”

“That’s not a thing.” He pouts even more.

You chuckle at the display before sobering up ever so slightly. “Do you want me to talk to her?”

“What good will that do?”

“Maybe a third person party has to step in. It could be that it’s because you’re the one who saying that she isn’t listening.” You shrug. “I think you’re right but I’m willing to give her chance to tell her side of the story while you cool down in here. I can be a distraction so you can sneak out quietly and she won’t know you’re here anymore! It’s a win win! And maybe you guys can come to an agreement when you both see each other again with new perspectives.”

Wild gives you another tired look and leans into his hand. “I doubt it would work. Zelda is incredibly stubborn, one of the most stubborn people I’ve ever met. But if you think it would help, I won’t stop you. I’ve run out of arguments and I’m done hearing hers.”

“Ok.” You say getting up and moving around the table. “I think it’s worth a shot. There’s a saying where I’m from that goes, ‘it’ll all be alright in the end, and if it’s not alright, then it’s not the end.’”

You give Wild a hug around his shoulder and squeeze him tight. “I have faith that you’ll pull through and get to live peacefully, but until then, you’ve got us on your side ok?”

He leans in your direction and wraps his arms around your own. “I know. I figured as much.”

“Good man.”

“I’m definitely sneaking out of here though.”

“That’s fair. Go hide.”

“I will... And thanks for listening to me. I didn’t mean to go off like that.”

“That’s what I’m here for.”

Four

"I'm sorry, what?" Four snaps his head up to stare at the Champion.

"What?" Wild tilts his head. "What? There's no stuff in the grass in my Hyrule. Just crickets and lizards...you know normal stuff. I don't know why there's tools and rupees in all of yours."

"You don't-" Four cut himself off with a click of his teeth, a piece in his mind clicking into place. He stands suddenly, clearly upset and tense as he processes the information.

"Four?" You call out to him but he doesn't respond to you, nor does he look back.

"Four!" Hyrule calls as well. "Where are you going?"

No reply.

"I'll go with him. Just in case." You stand up in a rush and nearly knock over the equipment at your feet in the process. "Don't wait up for us."

You follow him.

Four is fast and quiet and it takes very little time to lose him- or rather, for him to lose you.

Before you knew it, there's no trace of him and there's nothing within the forest that would give you a hint to his whereabouts.

"Great." You hiss and look around.

Nothing.

"Four!" If he won't show himself, you'll just have to make some noise. "Four! Four! Show me a sign so I know you're not dead!"

You wait.

"Don't make me get Wolfie!"

Nothing.

"Four!" You scream a little louder and begin to run. Now that you've said it out loud, despite being a joke in the beginning, the thought of Four being dead somewhere spikes your panic and anxiety and it fuels your quest.

It's only been a few minutes and Four can handle himself just fine but you don't think about that.

"FOUR!"

"Why are you screaming?" A voice come just beyond you.

You sprint toward it and find Four in a small clearing, crouched down and appearing to hold something in the palm of his hand.

"I was calling you." You don't know how you find it in you scold him. "A response would have been nice."

"Sorry." He shrugs. "I was having a conversation, it would be rude to drop it."

You get on your tip toes to look around him and find nothing. "With... With what?"

Four looks down into his hand and places it, ever so gently, on the ground, pausing and standing up to see you. "You can't see them?"

"See who?" You step over to him. "Four? Are you ok?"

His face twists in annoyance before sighing. "I'm fine."

"No offence, but I doubt that."

"It... a group of creatures that can only be seen by good children. They were important on my quests and have helped me greatly. Children usually stop seeing them around the time when they turn sixteen."

"Would it be easy for me to chalk it all up to magic?" You bit your lip.

"Probably. If it'll help you sleep at night." Four sighs and looks down to the ground, a small smile on his lips before it twists into a painfully and... he looks seconds from crying.

"I did so much to help them... and they helped me.... They leave gifts in the grass to help travelers and us heroes alike and yet... Wild says it doesn't happen anymore..." Four gulps and looks away from you and what ever is by his foot. "They wouldn't stop.... They're incredibly kind and hospitable and... There's no reason for them... Why are they gone?"

"Four." You reach out and place a hand on his shoulder.

"What happens to them?" His Adam's apple bobs a bit as he sucks in a breath. "It just means there was no one to help them."

"Oh Four." You pull him into a hug and nearly crush him with it.

"There's nothing I can do to help them, is there?" He sniffles into your chest.

"No, I... I don't think so Four. Not that far out into the future." You shake your head and begin to rub circles on his back.

You don't think he's crying but he might be fighting it because he does begin shaking.

He doesn't say anything else and you're loath to let him go when he's so emotionally charged. So you hold him. You hold him for as long as he needs and you wait for him to pull away first.

When he does, you keep your hands on his shoulders and he stays within your reach. Four begins to take deep calming breaths with his eyes closed and you instinctually run your hands through his bangs and push some of the loose hairs from his face.

Minutes continue to pass and the sounds of nature around you fill the void.

"I'm sorry." You say. "I wish I could help you but I don't know how."

Four nods and rubs his eyes. "I don't doubt that. Thank you. I'll be ok."

You don't think he's ready to go back to the group just yet, not after all that. "Tell me more about these friends of yours. How did they help you? How did you help them? What are they exactly?"

It earns you a small laugh and he grins up at you with a watery smile. "Sit down. And let me tell you about the Picori."

Twilight

“You almost died and for what?!” Twilight screams at Wild for the umpteenth time.

It startles you to hear his voice reach such volumes but you’re inclined to agree with him this time around. After Wild’s stunt with taking a hit to the head for Wind, you’d been on the look out for his more... self sacrificing behavior. You knew he wouldn’t think twice to do it and you tried to make it so there wouldn’t even be a chance for him to make such a decision.

This time though, in this last fight, you took your eyes off of him for only a moment and that’s when he broke his streak of uneventful fights.

Twilight, of course, is livid and has no regard for the poor creatures of the forest that have to endure his tirade as he unleashes his concern and worry in the form of rage and over exaggerated gestures.

When Hyrule finishes healing your more minor wounds, you slink away from the soon to be screaming match since Wild is very much still conscious, if a little roughed up. You don’t intended to stray as far as you go but you don’t find it in yourself to care for the time being.

Being around so many people for so long is taxing. You make the executive decision to remove yourself for the time being while tensions are high, to both cool off and to avoid getting hit in the crossfire.

There’s a small creek nearby, you find, and decide to make a small space for yourself there until dinner comes rolling around. The birds and the babbling waters calm your soul and snuffle out the last of the adrenaline. You don’t know how long you sit there, but you can faintly hear the screaming match in the distance that you dipped out of.

You don’t regret it.

More time passes and you find that you may or may not have taken a small nap in the meantime. If the position of the sun is anything to go by.

Despite the pain in your back from sleeping against a tree, the slight ache in your neck from the angle you slept in, you feel better. Clearer, even.

You hope your absence wasn’t entirely noticed but you can’t seem to regret leaving either.

Footsteps creep closer to you and you huddle into a small ball out of habit to avoid detection.

It’s Twilight.

He walks near the creek and takes a heavy seat next to it. He looks both pale or red faced at the same time but exhaustion is laced in his entire body from what you can tell.

He doesn’t notice you.

You uncurl and set your legs out in front of you. Leaning forward a little, as quietly as you can, you see that he’s upset. It doesn’t surprise you. But seeing as you don’t how to deal with an upset Twilight and you can’t really sneak away without crossing his line of sight or making any miniscule noise, you still yourself and wait.

And wait.

Twilight calls your name. Quietly and hollow- like he’s not all there. Or in the way one would talk to a memory.

It’s immediately unsettling. Both in how he sounds and how he knew you were there without you doing anything. But you suppose Twilight can just sense things like that from times to time. It’s certainly not the first time he’s done it.

“I’m here.” You reply.

“How long?”

“A few hours I think. Longer than you were here that’s for sure.” You shrug and slowly crawl out of your hidey hole. “I think I fell asleep....The sun wasn’t over there when I first got here.”

Twilights hums in what you think is agreement but it’s really only a sound. “It’s a nice spot.”

You smile. It’s tense and little fake, but he’s not looking at you so you don’t care for authenticity. “Good thing it’s big enough for the both of us huh?”

“Yeah.” He looked into the distance again, noting that the sun is beginning to set and takes a deep breath. “Do you ever feel a strange sadness as dusk falls?”

“Can’t say that I have.” You move closer to him, aiming to sit by his side. “I’ve always enjoyed sun sets and I find them calming to watch but hearing someone finding them sad is a new one. Do you feel sad as dusk falls?”

He hums again. “They say it’s the only time their world interacts with ours.”

“Whos?”

“Lingering spirits I suppose...” Twilight tilts his head upwards before twisting it to look at you. “It’s nothing. I’m just reminiscing about my life before my adventure is all. My... father told me those words and I haven’t forgotten them since.”

You hum this time and lean back to mirror him. “Wanna tell me why?”

“That Champion reminds me so much of myself and yet... he’s ten times worse.” Twilight falls backwards with a soft thump. “I know why he does it but I...”

“You care about him and don’t want to see him hurt.” You shrug. “It’s not exactly a new concept.”

“Tell that to him.”

“Maybe I will. He gets just as upset as you do when this happens, you know.” You shift your weight to make it easier to stand up later.

“Does he? You’d think that he’d get the point to stop doing then.” He growls.

“Maybe he’s scared of losing more friends.” You blurt before you can stop yourself. That was something Wild told you in confidence and while he didn’t say you couldn’t tell anyone- that was kinda implied.

Twilight stills for a moment, the fight leaving him again in a single breath as he considers your words. They don’t seem to be new news to him.

Wild is pretty close to Twilight...Maybe he already knew.

“I still think I’m entitled to not like it.” He settles.

“It’s not he’s asking you to be ok with it. I know I’m not.”

“I guess that’s fair then.” Twilight sits up again and stands up in one fluid motion that you envy. With a turn on his heel, he holds his hand out to you to take.

You take it and feel him effortlessly lift you off of the ground with that one hand.

You don’t comment on it.

“Come on.” He says. “I’m going to need you for moral support.”

“Why?”

“If I yelled in front of him of the whole group, I should apologize to him in front of the whole group.” He admits and wraps his arm around your shoulders. “But I might need an excuse to get close to him again after all the things I’ve said.”

“I get your desert and you’ve got yourself a deal. I left to not get involved and here you are... involving me.” You tease. “I demand payment.”

“One desert? I can do that.”

Hyrule

“I can’t do this.” You snap your head to the sound of the voice and see Hyrule with his arms cross and shaking.

“What? What’s happening? Hyrule?” You step closer to him as you’re the only one within arms reach. “What do I need to do? How can I help?”

“There’s nothing. Nothing you can do, that can make this better.” Hyrule takes one ground step before throwing his arms down. “Don’t you see them? With all their tools and experience and then there’s- me. Just me. Some magic later and a old man with a sword and I found myself trying to save my princess and defeat some evil, but these guys...”

You look around, trying to see if Legend or Sky are close enough to give you back up, or better yet, take over. You suppose it’s better than a panic attack but it’s so left field that you’re stunned and floundering to catch this hot potato of a conversation.

He keep talking.

“For all that is good and holy, they are heroes. Do you see them? Some of them have training, and families and skills and I....was just a boy in a grave yard. How can I even compete with them? I don’t, that’s how. But how can they consider me an equal? When I was in town and listened to the elders and their stories, they would tell me of a legendary hero from the past who courageously defended our home until the very end and who was virtually undefeated in all his adventures. And then I meet Legend....and he’s so much cooler than all those stories combined.”

“Link.” You call out to him and back to the real world. “You need to slow down for me honey because you’re too fast for me to keep up. What do you mean how can they see you as an equal? You defeated Ganon just as they did. You stood up for your home just as they did. You did it all on your own just as they did. Why wouldn’t they consider you an equal? No one cares about where you’re from, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”

“But they can do so many things even without the sword!” He exclaims. “They all have a place to go to, a person who cares about them, a title or a skill and a world that’s not on the brink of collapse-”

“Ok, whoa, hey.” You step into his space and take his face into your hands, bringing it up for him to look you in the eyes.

“I have no idea what brought this up but I won’t stand for anyone talking bad about you. And that includes you. We... can talk about your home with clearer heads later, ok? Maybe the others can help with that when we get there, yeah? And well....” You’re sinking. You don’t know what to do with all this information and you have even less of an idea about how to address it.

“Good golly, when it rains, it pours with you lot, doesn’t it?” You hiss under your breath and bite the bullet. With a strong grip, you wrap your arms around the Traveler and pull him close. You try to keep your grip strong without fear of hurting him, but it hits you then how thin he is. How light he actually is. You can feel the hint of armor under his tunic and it does little to quell your fears.

“Clearly there’s a lot on your mind. And... I’m probably not the person to help you through this. If you want to talk about not belonging though, I’m free to listen. I’m the only one here who’s not a Link, if you haven’t noticed.” You try to joke but it falls a little flat. “You though... You belong here with all of us... all of them... And if you need more convincing then I’m bringing this up with Legend who’s is over the moon proud of you and what you can do and he told me himself that he couldn’t be happier to have you as his successor-”

“Really?”

“Not in those exact words admittedly,-” You gulp as the word vomit continues to bubble out of you in waves of panic. “-but I know that’s what he meant because he doesn’t stop talking about how cool you are.”

“Hm.”

“And everyone has a different background, ok? Everyone has skills and people that the others don’t have. That’s ok. It’s not a competition. I get worried that one day you guys are going to create some game out of all your trauma. Like... who had it worse and just go around in a circle listing off all the things that happened to each of you... Whoever runs out of things to say or can’t think of something as bad or worse than the others is out. Last man standing wins.”

“Don’t give them ideas.” You feel him chuckle. It’s breathless and small and it doesn’t reach your ears despite your closeness but you feel it.

“Good thing it’s just you and me right now.” You sigh a little in relief and loosen the hug. “Look, just.....whatever you think you can’t do, just know that there is someone who is confidently doing it wrong right now. In the group or not, just keep your eyes and watch. They don’t plan on doing it better either and people are celebrating them for it. Please believe in your own excellence as much as they believe in their mediocrity.”

“Big words.”

“You’re awesome for trying. Others are not and don’t plan to. You’re already better than them.” You amend, stepping away to look him in the eye again. “The group can’t do magic like you can. That’s all you. They all have items sure but no one can do what you do... and you’re self taught, right? That’s incredible! You have just as much as a reason to be here as the others. I swear it.”

Hyrule sighs and gulps. He doesn’t believe you. It’s not enough.

You knew it wouldn’t be and it’s definitely doesn’t scratch the tip of the iceberg of the bomb he just dropped on you but... step by step. Little by little. you have a plan.

“Screw it. Let’s catch up with Wind and Warrior and get them to tell you how awesome you are, since you won’t listen to me. And if you’re still a nonbeliever then we move on to the next pair. We’ll go down the line if we have to.” You nod and grab his hand, beginning to drag him along.

He laughs after you, a little hysterical and in disbelief. “You’re crazy.”

“That is not new information.” You reply, hiding your grin. “I say it’s Hyrule loving hours and I’m gonna get everyone to join.”

“You’re not joking are you.” It’s a statement. He already knows the answer.

“Nope!”

Legend

It was your turn on watch for the night. In an hour or two you were supposed to wake the Veteran for his shift and finally catch some sleep.

The others snored and slept away without a care in the world. It was just you and cackling fire that was active but you’d kill for something to help your mind get passed the boredom.

Anything but monsters or an attack that is. You’d hate to jinx your good luck so far.

In the corner of your eye, while fighting to keep your head up, you see Legend shift. Not necessarily unusual. You’re inclined to ignore it.

But then he shifts again, whimpering like he’s been hurt and a white knuckled grip on the blanket.

You still and begin to wonder what’s your level of care here.

Part of you, in kindness, wants to go wake him. The lack of sleep seems more merciful than letting him suffer a prison of his own making.

But you also don’t know how he’ll react.

You know he’d hate to be seen as weak for whatever normal reason and he’s been inclined to wake up swinging in the right circumstance.

Twilight suffered a broken nose for the whole night because he was disinclined to wake up Hyrule or take a potion.

Not you’d make the same decision and suffer the whole night in the same manner but it certainly fails to sound appealing.

Just as your about to appeal to your better nature and force yourself to go wake him before it gets worse, he shoots up into a sitting position with a strangled scream. The job seems to have been done for you- but in the worse way.

He’s breathing hard with his hand gripping his chest. Legend begins to frantically look around and slowly begins to piece together where he is and what’s happened. He never looks behind him, where you are, before running a hand through his hair a little harder than you think reasonable and getting to his feet.

You cough slightly, leaning away from the fire and back into previous position. You hadn’t realized you leaned into his direction as you watched him, inches from putting your face into the flame.

He startles at the sound and whips around, one hand poised to reach the sword he’s not equipped with.

“It’s just me.” You wave. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

He calms somewhat and you can see his jaw flex. “Well, goodnight to you.”

His voice is croaked- from disuse or an overwhelming emotion, you’re not sure.

“For me maybe. But you? That was quite a scare you gave me as well.” You play it off. You can at least pretend that you weren’t watching him. That you would have saved him a little earlier and took your sweet time doing it. You offer a peace offering to your morals. “Want to talk about it?”

“What’s there to talk about?” He snaps, furiously rubbing his face. “It’s nothing new. We all deal with it one way or another.”

“True. But it’ll be easier to let it go, and let the experience float up into the air and never return. Otherwise it’ll fester and grow.” You shrug. “But I won’t force you. I know you’re not exactly fond of me.”

Legend glares into the fire as you talk and refuses to look at you. Once you finish though, he moves his head away, still not in your direction but visually drops more tension from his shoulders.

He doesn’t say anything.

“There’s a spot next to me with your name on it if you want it.” You offer. “A little company wouldn’t hurt.”

He takes more time to respond and you resolve to go back to staring at the fire.

A moment or two passes and you hear the faint sound of crunched foliage. It takes of your will power to not look up as he approaches and even more so when he decidedly sits next to you.

The fabric of his tunic brushes your leg for a minute and it strikes you odd that he sat that close despite the rest of the log at his disposal.

It must have been bad if he wants to be close to someone right after. The thought enters your mind. Once it’s there you don’t chase it away and instead casually lean back with your hand behind you.

If the angle causes you to lean closer to him in the process, you don’t say anything.

And if Legend notices, he doesn’t say anything either.

A moment of time passes in silence, the only sounds through the whole forest are crickets and a passing owl with the occasional whisper through the trees.

“How do you do it?” He asks.

“Do what?” You tilt your head in his direction.

He’s still not looking at you.

“Keep going.”

The answer shocks momentarily but you’re not surprised that it’s coming from him out of the whole group. “Legend-”

“I’m tired.” He says instead. “I hate this. I hate that sword. I hate that pig demon. I hate that I can’t be done.”

You hand comes up to his shoulder and you force him to look at you.

He lets you and he looks up to you with tears building up in his eyes and for a moment you’re struck by the odd balance of how old he sounds but how young he looks- is.

You stuck floundering for a response to answer him with but he asks one more thing. “Why can’t I be done?”

You pull him into a hug before you can stop yourself. “I don’t know. I don’t know Link.”

You find yourself wanting to cry as well once Legend collapses into the hug. He’s not hugging you back but he’s being held for the first time in... you don’t know how long. Your grip tightens.

“But I do know is that you’re not alone. Not anymore. And maybe....maybe this is the final fight. That’s why we’re all together right? A darkness so evil ahead that every hero is required and then....rest. For each and every one of you.”

You sniffle, carding your fingers through his hair without a moments hesitation. “If it’s not then I’ll fight everything for you from then on. I’ll take your place you hear me. I’ll take your job and title and you won’t have to do this anymore.”

“I’m the Hero of Legend. That’s not exactly an easy thing-”

“No. I am the hero now. I’ve decided it.” You hide the tears in his hair to the best of your ability.

Legend snorted, loud and wet but you elected to ignore it just as you were ignoring the ever growing wet spot on your shoulder. “I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“It does now. I said so.”

A beat.

“...Ok.” He sniffled and rubbed his head on your shirt. He took a deep breath and exhaled, letting the night take over the atmosphere again. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

“Don’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t tell anyone.”

He nods once, definitive and final. Your expecting him to let go now and return to his roll, already electing to take over his shift as well and just push through the next day.

Except he doesn’t.

Legend calls your name, testing the waters and lifts his head up ever so slightly. “...It’s not that I’m... not... fond of you-”

“Save it for a rainy day.” You grin. “I think you’ve had your fill of emotions for the night.”

He nods and eventually slips into sleep with his head on your chest, no doubt lulled by your heartbeat.

With tearful eyes, you stare back into the fire.

Time

Time marched from the stunned group the same way a parent does after making a scathing remark instead of a lecture.

You know the one.

“I’m not mad. Just disappointed.”

The poor boys suddenly didn’t know what to so with themselves or how to get back into Time’s good graces.

You felt for them and their awkward meandering through the camp. So, with your pride swallowed, you follow in the vague direction where Time went off to and decided to at least talk him down.

He is... decidedly harder to find than you previous imagined.

Just as your starting to think the Old Man doesn’t want to be found, you hear subtle swing. It’s to your left and it sounds heavy.

So naturally you follow it

Which leads you to a small clearing just beyond a bunch of bushes.

Time is there, full armor still on and swinging his giant sword forcefully, each swing stronger than the last. It’s as if it weighs only as much as Four. You’ve wondered in the past what it would like if he decided to actually throw the smallest ones of the group but out of fear, do not voice your ideas.

Just because Time won’t doesn’t mean that the others won’t try.

It’s hard being the responsible one when there are nine Links to take care of, each as much as a gremlin as the last. It must be hell on Time’s back to carry the group.

You see where he’s coming from and yet...

“You can stand to be a little more patient with them.”

The words are out of your mouth before you can actually stop them.

Time stops abruptly, in both the figurative and literal sense, before the man turns to you with that same face of neutral disappointment.

“They are heroes.”

“They are also children, Time. I think that it’s because they are heroes that they deserve to act their age every now and then.”

“Slacking won’t divert the evil away from our home.”

“Running face first into the problem won’t solve it either.” You sigh and walk up the man. He tenses as you approach and slowly lets his weapon down. The Hero of Time is an intimidating creature but you refuse to let that dissuade you.

“Look, I know why you’re upset. I get it. It’s hard to get a job done when you feel like you’re the only one it’s important to... But have a little faith in our group. Please.” You plead and stop right in front of him. You have to look up at him slightly due to the angle but he was forced to acknowledge you here.

His arms cross and he opens his mouth to respond but you cut him off.

“You’re right, they are heroes and there is a job to be done and an evil to be done away with. But they were even younger when they earned the title. They still vanquished the darkness even for their age. You have to trust that they will do the same here.” You reach up and put your hands on his shoulders, getting onto your tip toes to look him in the eye better. “And they will. Because they are heroes. Because they have the spirit of courage. Because they are Link... Just like you.”

He softens his stance ever so slightly but he still doesn’t look pleased.

“It’s not easy I know.” You get down again. “But they look up to you. I think all of them do. And I can’t stand to see how hurt they look when you get upset when they act their age. It’s not like they can help it.”

He takes a deep breath and uncrossed his arms. He takes a minute to respond. Time stared at you intensely before he drops all the tension in his body and finally lets his weapon go. A single hand comes up to pat your head.

“Let’s head back to camp.”

He says nothing else and continues to walk past you and back the way you came.

You don’t ignore the sense of accomplishment and refuse to dampen it when you catch the tiniest slivers of a smile before he turns away from you completely.

Wind

You’re lying peacefully on the dirt when you hear someone sit beside you with more power than would ever be needed.

You don’t open your eyes for the sake of the other person, not really thinking much of it and even forgetting that they were there until you heard the smallest of sniffles.

Now, you’re sitting straight up with wide and concerned eyes locking directly onto the crying form of your beloved pirate.

It’s hard not to feel for him and while you’re not sure what sprung this up, you don’t have it in you to turn him away, or to ignore that he was upset.

Neither of you say anything and you’re almost afraid it make the picture in front of you a little too real.

Instead, you move yourself closer to him and open up your arms.

Wind doesn’t hesitate to throw himself onto you and let his body sag with unwanted emotion.

As sobs silently rack his body, you begin to feel yourself rock back and forth for both his comfort and yours. Soon you start running your hands through his hair and rub small circles on his back.

He cries for a long time and never once gives you a clue why.

You don’t ask either.

Still, once the moment has passed, you continue to hold onto him. He doesn’t make any moves to let go of you any time soon and you’re happy to be there for as long as he’ll let you.

That doesn’t stifle your concern over the cause but you’re loath to bring it up.

Minutes pass with the boy in your arms and it’s only when you shift positions, does he look up at your face. His eyes aren’t as red anymore with the amount of time that’s passes since he’s stopped crying but his face is still a little puffy and his cheeks are both stained in tears and incredibly red.

A small smile creeps onto your face when you look back at him. “Feel better?”

“A little.” He admits and sniffles the last of the tears away, wiping his face with his sleeve. “Thanks.”

“For you? Anytime.”

Warrior

It struck you as odd that it was dinner time the group seemed to be missing someone.

Earlier that day the group had split up to take down some troublesome monsters on the border of some tiny town defenseless town and that was that.

It didn’t seem like big deal nor was it a particularly hard thing to do. The monsters weren’t infected and they didn’t have numbers on their side so your group took care of the pests in a matter of moments.

And yet, when everyone regrouped there was a visible tension.

Some thing had happened on the other side of the fight and no one wanted to fess up, even less so when Time mentioned it.

It worried you.

Now, as it stood the tension was still there but Warrior didn’t want to come out of the wood work. He had left earlier claiming to need to check up on his appearance and no one had questioned him. No one offered to go with him.

It was always dangerous to go alone.

“Hey, has anyone seen Warrior?” You glance around again, hoping it was just a miscount on your part. “It’s been awhile since he left.”

“He takes his sweet time.” Legend snapped. “And you know how narcissistic he is. He’s probably trying to get every single little hair in the right place and working out every little blemish in his stupid uniform-”

“I’m going to look to him.” You stand, placing your cooling food down by your foot. You don’t know what happened or what caused it but at least an idea begins to form. “It’s been too long regardless. Keep my food warm for me, yeah?”

You don’t wait for a response and walk away into the tree line where you think Warrior might be.

“It’s getting dark. Be careful.” Someone calls from behind you, mouth clearly full of food.

“Yes sir.” You reply.

You march on.

When you’re sure you’re far enough away, you begin to call out to Warrior.

It takes a minute to get any results but you’re starting to worry about your friend. The sun is lowering in the horizon as time goes by and you’re beginning to feel silly and frustrated and-

“I’m here.” A tired voice replies.

“Oh thank goodness.” You cross the distance between you two. “I was really starting to worry.”

Warrior puts on a brave face and a small smile that doesn’t reach his eyes greets you when you stop in front of him. His look a little puffy and you think his eyes might be a little red but it easily be the lighting- or lack there of.

“Are you ok?”

“Obviously.”

You doubt him and it must have shown on your face because he immediately begins walking away. “Well look at the time. Crazy how fast the sun goes. Let’s get back to the group and eat. I’m starving-”

You grab his wrist as he pasts you and get a good look at him. “Are you ready to go back to the group? They can wait a little longer if you want them too.”

It irritated you that it’s come to this. How no one went to check on him. How no one offered to go with you. How no one seemed bothered by this. How long that he was alone dealing with something that’s been bothering him. How it took you so long to do something.

“No. It’s fine.” He says. Lying. It must have really bothered him, usually he’s better than this. “It’s about time to head back anyway.”

“They can wait.” Your grip tightens. “The sun can wait. We’re not obligated to be there. What’s wrong? ...If you want to talk about it that is...” You trail off uselessly. It only occurred to you that near the end that he may not even speak about with you. You weren’t the closest in terms of grouping but you can’t stand the thought of someone hurting alone.

“I’m fin-”

“You look like you were crying.” You cut him off. “If you don’t want to talk about it with me, that’s fine, just say it. But you might need more time before you head back anyway if you actually want them to believe you when you say you’re fine.”

He sighs and runs his hand through his hair.

“Warrior?”

“Nothing. It’s nothing.”

“If it bothers you then it’s not nothing.” You push. “But....fine. I won’t force you to talk to me. I just wanted to see if you were ok... You’re not but it’s better than seeing you bleeding I suppose.” You grit your teeth, annoyed by the lack of results. You did tell him that he didn’t have to talk to you and you don’t hurt him further but part of you wants to fix this. Even if you don’t know what it is, your heart calls for justice at his pain.

But he is unwilling.

“Camp is this way by the way.” You mention, looking at the ground. “You were actually farther away than I thought, so it’s a bit of a walk.”

“I just think it’s easier for people when I’m not around.”

You still and slowly turn to face him.

He’s looking at the ground as well, unable to say it and look you in the eye. It’s not what you were expecting and you’re not sure how to follow after that.

It’s a rare moment of vulnerability for him- even rarer that he’s showing it to you and you don’t want to squander the show of trust.

“Back home...there was a lot of... attention on me. A lot of blame... for starting the war. Or at least being the cause of it.” He admits, scuffing his shoe against the dirt. A little bit kicks up and sticks to the toe. He does nothing about it. “People listened to what I had to say because I was some destined hero. At first I didn’t think anything of it because I had thought it was one big mistake and sooner or later people were going to see that I was just some soldier not worth the time of day. It happened to be pure luck that Impa got it right when she gave me this uniform. Zelda made me a captain because of it and suddenly I had all of these men I had to give orders to. And if anything failed or if we lost, it would all have fallen on me. The blame, the guilt, the responsibility of the war...and then we found out why Cia was even opening these portals to begin with-”

You hug him.

“Please don’t cry.” You say into his chest. Your throat is tight and it a little hard to breath but you power through. “I’m not good at this. I never have been.”

“I’m not going to cry. It’s not worth crying.”

“I’ll cry for you then.” You admit and hug him tighter. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. It was no ones fault.” Warrior hugs you back and rests his head on top of yours. His voice seems a little tight too and you’re sorry for all the things that he must have gone through.

You hug him for as long as you deem appropriate before letting your arms go lack and stepping away.

Or... at least you try to.

Warrior suddenly has a grip on you and refuses to let you leave.

“Please... Just stay a little longer.”

You do.

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #linked universe x reader #I had no idea where exactly to go with this one #believe it or not I wrote Legends first.#I didn't know it would get as long as it did #are these a bit generic?#yes.#warrior's is also very long #sorry not sorry #should I have split this one?#probably.#did I?#no.#it took days ya'll #next time I'll split it again

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adonis-koo · 4 years

Text

Blue Spring

| 1 |

↳ Summary: Jeon Jungkook, only well known as the youngest (and hottest) dad at the daycare, he’s got it all, the looks, the sweetheart personality, the body, but here’s what gets everyone- he doesn’t wear a wedding ring. The only problem lies in his fickle one year old daughter that hates just about every daycare worker out there...Well...besides you that is. Which of course leads to Jungkook liking you just as much as his daughter...if not maybe a little too much.

Or in other words...You and Jungkook are secretly crushing on one another but too shy to admit it.

↳ Pairing: Single dad!Jungkook/Reader

↳ Genre: Daycare AU, Slice of life, copious amounts of fluff, a hair of angst, future smut

Word Count: 4K

___ | Next

Seven thirty sharp. Your mind was groggy and you couldn’t stop the yawn that escaped your lips, you had stayed up too late the night before studying due to a test you’d have later today without even thinking about the shift you promised your coworker you’d cover. So here you were at First Steps 7:30 in the morning, coffee in hand and your hair in a messy bun.

You hadn’t even bothered getting changed besides your fitness pants. Outside of that you were still dawned in your oversized university sweatshirt. At least you’d be with the kids most of the day, one of the perks of working at a daycare was you rarely had to get dressed up.

Another perk was during naptime you could squeeze in a little more time to look over your notes, but maybe you shouldn’t get ahead of yourself considering you only slept six hours and currently look like you just rolled out bed.

Opening the door to the entrance you were greeted with the sound of cartoons, a morning routine while all the kids had their breakfast snack and got out their energy while playing. What drowned out the volume however was a familiar loud screech and whine from a little pair of arms that attached herself to the much larger figure.

“Awwwh, poor baby.” You cooed as you kneeled down, your lips quirking into a pout at the all too familiar sight, “Mina! Daddy has to go to work, he’ll be back for you later”

The little one year old suddenly perked up at the sound of your voice making you laugh softly before she quickly toddled over to you as best she could, fat crocodile tears dribbling down her cheeks as she threw herself dramatically against your chest making your lips pull into a big animated pout, “Awh it’s okay baby! Poor thing, it always takes her at least ten minutes to stop crying anytime you go.”

You picked her up, maneuvering her up to your hip as you kept her balanced in one hand, turning to fully face the tall man who you had grown acquainted too, “She’d probably cry the whole time if it weren’t for you Y/n, really thank you.” Jungkook gave an endearing smile as he let his little girl wrap her tiny hand around his finger, tears still dribbling down her cheeks as whines escaped her.

Mina, was a tough one. When new kids came in it was usually guaranteed they’d have a little separation anxiety from their parents, especially if it was the first they had ever done something like this. Usually it was recommended that the parent only leave them for an hour or so at first before they started dropping them off full time but that wasn’t always the case.

Regardless, you were both used to it and trained for it. You could almost always coax a child into looking over at the toy wall to find something they liked, or maybe they liked being read aloud too. And with particularly hard ones, you’d even let them pick out a movie if it was movie hour. But almost always, after a child was initially acquainted to you, they’d let you at least hold them or maybe coax them to play with you.

Mina, was one of the few exceptions. She had major separation anxiety from her dad and did not want any of the workers holding her- even trying to play with her. You had heard plenty about the ‘cryer’ in your work’s group chat as various staff who had worked the days she was here tried to figure out how to handle her. Then, you finally met her.

She looked doe eyed, hugging onto her dad's leg when you kneeled down and introduced yourself with a bright yet sincere smile.

You weren’t sure if it was how you said hello to her, or if it was the way you smelled like your favorite lotion, but for some reason this little girl was stuck to you like glue ever since, “You know you're her favorite right?” Jungkook joked the dimple on his cheek showing as he gave a rather boyish- yet charming smile. He was a sweetheart, through and through, you could tell how much he cared for his daughter and it only added to his charm further.

“Well, it is a part of the job,” You glanced up at him returning a tiny smile of your own as you shrugged.

You’d deny all of your coworkers giggly words and raised eyebrows anytime you were in the same room as them when Jungkook dropped Mina off. You’d also deny that you were almost always flustered in his presence, Jungkook was young, like young. He could have only been five years older than you at most. If not closer to your age.

And it wasn’t like you were blind either, he was obviously attractive. He was the talk of your coworkers day, mainly because he had a child, right? But here’s the thing, he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.

At first you were the rational one, maybe he just had a girlfriend and they were going to tie the knot eventually? Or maybe they were one of those couples that didn’t believe in marriage. Chloe had proposed that maybe he wasn’t a jewelry type of guy and always forgot to put it on. Or maybe they were a couple that did something unorthodox like wedding bracelets.

It was Lisa who chimed in last, reminding you both that this was the dad who had his ears completely punctured with over four piercings on each side. He was definitely a jewelry kind of guy.

So why wouldn’t he wear whatever jewelry they chose as their wedding bond?

Regardless, the reason your coworkers constantly winked in your direction was because it was obvious Mina had taken a liking to you, which meant Jungkook had as well...Maybe a little too well, according to them at least.

The rest was self explanatory.

“Still, Mina’s a big daddy’s girl. I felt awful leaving her here all day the first few weeks.” Jungkook gave a bashful smile as he set the large backpack down, Jeon Mina labeled on the front which held all her favorite snacks, diapers and any possible blankets or stuffies she’d need or want from home. You usually didn’t go digging around through bags but it usually helped if a parent brought in something from home. Especially for ones like Mina who could really benefit from it.

“Oh I can tell,” You gave a laugh as Mina, as if sensing she was being talked about broke into tears again as her little hand tightened on her dad’s finger, “Oh honey, shhh,” You bounced her a little on your hip with a coo before glancing up once more, “But it’s a transitional stage for her, for any of them who tend to have separation anxiety. You might feel awful but I promise it’s fine, it’s something they all go through and adjust to as they get older. I see it all the time.”

Jungkook smiled a little at your reassurance, something about him just looked so endearingly boyish still despite being a fully grown man, maybe it was the little dimple that appeared on his cheek or the beauty mark just beneath his lower lip, “I know, it still doesn’t make it any easier though,” Just as he said those words he sighed a little as he glanced over at the clock, “Anyways I need to head on to work, I will see you later.”

Mina as if sensing his departure immediately began crying once more as he pressed a kiss on her forehead, your heart speeding up a little at him being so close, the strong scent of cologne meeting your nose before quickly disappearing. Mina had tried her best to hold onto her dad’s finger as he easily pulled away, giving a semi guilty smile at the wallowing drama queen he called his daughter as he gave you another smile and nod before exiting.

Setting your coffee down against the counter you sighed, taking a deep breath as you held Mina in both arms, her little face thrown down against your shoulder as she pitifully cried against you. Nothing like being clung to first thing in the morning before you could even drink a full cup of coffee. God you had so much respect for mothers.

“I just think, if the opportunity is there, and if he’s single...why not take it?” Lisa raised her brows as she coaxingly tried to convince you of an honestly, unprofessional idea.

Sighing you pinched the bridge of your nose as Mina colored beside you- well, if scribbling with a colored pencil counted as coloring, “Lisa, that’s a horrible idea. We don’t know if he’s single or not, and honestly? It’s none of my business. Besides he’s a dad, I don’t know….” You paused your words as you glanced around before lowering your voice into a whisper, “I don’t know shit about parenting.”

Chloe clacked her tongue as she leaned back in her seat, the tiny cherry red kids chair which almost all of you sat in rather than fight over who got to sit in the big chair, often making kids think they could sit on it in which they’d be disappointed in the result, “Y/n we work with kids everyday.” She cut into the conversation deadpan.

Leave it to Chloe to point out the obvious but working with kids or not that wasn’t even close to the same thing.

“Yeah, but we don’t live with them, Chloe, we don’t have to discipline them everyday, we don’t have to call the doctor when they get sick or- or tuck them in at night or let them sleep with us when they have a nightmare- being a caretaker and a parent might be similar but they aren’t the same.” You tapped your coloring pencil against the page of the coloring sheet Mina had picked out for you, well more like the first one she could find and drag out before slapping it against the table and pointing at a chair. If she could speak you were certain she’d be demanding for you to sit.

Having a tiny child boss you around all day wasn’t the greatest job in the world but it could certainly be worse.

“Honestly, who said anything about parenting? I mean...a flings a fling-” Chloe paused, glancing over at the four year olds who were all playing before lowering her voice and leaning in a little, “You’ve seen his body and he’s clearly interested in you, how can you not see it?”

You could feel your face flush as you looked away from her, scowling at the table. How can they talk about this in front of his daughter! Albeit she was only one years old and looked perfectly happy scribbling her piece of paper, even going as far as to help you color yours as well.

Swallowing thickly you lowered your voice before exasperatedly hissing, “I am not messing with that! It would be different if he was actively trying to talk to me but I don’t think that’s what he’s going for.”

Lisa raised her brows almost looking offended at your words, had it not been for one of the four year olds calling for her you were positive she would’ve went on a massive rant about how dumb you were, “Uh he always talks to you when he’s here? How much more does he have to beg for your attention Y/n?- Coming Wi Joo.” Standing up she huffed before making her way over to where the kids were.

Speak of the devil you were surprised at who had poked their head through the door, Jungkook had stayed behind watching with a soft smile at his little girl happily coloring beside you, tugging on your finger to make you look at her picture as you nodded, leaning in as you whispered, “I think someone is here for you.” Mina glanced up as you pointed your finger to the door.

You had never seen a toddler look so frantic as she cried in happiness, Jungkook never came by this early so it must have been a treat. Unfortunately Mina was still clumsy on her feet and tripped on her way to her dad before dramatically rolling onto her back as she cried.

“Oh my goodness!” Jungkook exclaimed as he walked in with a chuckle as he glanced down with precious eyes at his baby who glanced up at him with foe crocodile tears, purposely acting like she was hurt so he’d pick her up, “Is my babygirl okay?” He leaned down before effortlessly picking her up, her crying immediately stopped as a giggle bubbled on her lips as if feeling she had successfully tricked her dad into picking her up, “Was she good?”

Jungkook had asked as he turned to you, standing up as you rounded the table with a nod, “Oh yeah! A little fussy this morning but I think it was because she hadn’t had a snack yet, not to mention she was pretty upset for you leaving. I think all is forgiven though since you came by early.”

Laughing Jungkook nodded as he shifted her to his hip, “Yeah I only had a half day at work, so I figured I’d take her to get some lunch before dropping her off at her moms. She’ll probably be mad at me again but what can I do?”

“Uh Y/n- Ji Woo puked, you mind getting us some more paper towels?” You cringed as you looked over at Lisa who had pulled a crying Ji Woo along to the bathroom as Chloe hearded the other kids away from the mess.

“Oh she’ll survive. She loves to be a drama queen though, right Mina?” You poked her cheek making a giggle escape her lips as she grabbed your finger with both of her hands, a bubble escaping her lips as if she were trying her hardest to say something, little brows focused, “M…!” You laughed at her cute little focused expression, her doe eyes glancing at you like her little life depended on it, “Anyways, have a good day guys, I’ll see you later.”

You gave a short wave to them both, intending to go and get more paper towels because the sight of the bile was large and it was clear someone had still been motion sick even after the car ride. God didn’t his mom say she’d stop letting him eat in the car before taking him here?

“Oh uh!”

You turned around at the sound of Jungkook’s almost jumbled words, his eyes wide as if he had forgotten something before sharply forcing his voice to sound more calm, “I was uh wondering….” He suddenly looked a little hesitant, eyes glancing down as you raised your brows, “Umm, I...I promised my boss I’d come in on Saturday to help with a project and I really need a babysitter for Mina....Would you mind...if you aren’t busy of course!” He suddenly rushed. You tilted your head at first, mainly because it looked like he wanted to ask you something else but had changed his mind.

Tugging on a strand of your hair you quickly glanced over at the Chloe who had been telling the younger kids to stay away from the mess despite their ignorance, “Uh yeah! No, as long as you don’t mind me studying while watching her, um. I- uh- I...really need to go over and help...Let me uh-” You grabbed one of First Steps business cards before turning it over and using the back to write down your number, “Here, you can send me the details and we can work out pay a little later.”

Jungkook’s eyes lit up before he smiled, grabbing the card from you as he nodded, “Yes- absolutely! Thank you Y/n, I’ll uh,” He gave a small laugh as he glanced over to your frantic coworker, “I’ll leave you to it, say bye Mina.” He grabbed her little arm as he made her wave making you laugh as you quickly ran over to help Chloe.

Maybe...just maybe your coworkers were onto something.

You swallowed thickly, feeling only slightly intimidated at the size of the house. Jungkook couldn’t have been in his thirties already, right? I mean, you knew he was definitely older than you but still...there was no way someone in their twenties could already afford to live somewhere so nice. Right?

Meanwhile you were stuffed in a small apartment close to the uni with three roommates who all lived on ramen, you included. Fixing the bag over your shoulder you took an inhale before stepping up to the door and knocking, it was only a few moments before the door swung open. Much to your surprise you were met with a wet headed Jungkook, dawned in sweatpants and a loose white shirt that still somehow strapped against his broad shoulders, “Oh good you’re here! Come in.”

Jungkook ushered as he stood aside, carefully you took your shoes off as Jungkook waved you over, “Mina is in the living room right now watching cartoons, she’s never hungry this early in the morning but she has some chocolate milk, um, oh yeah, she’ll probably want breakfast around nine or so. I have some cereal in the dolly if you want an easy way out,” Jungkook had lead you into the kitchen- the very nice kitchen, granite countertops, smooth tile flooring and a spacious middle counter, “But I also have plenty of ingredients if you wanna be adventurous and making pancakes or anything- word of advice she’s picky about eggs.” Jungkook sent a playful wink your way making your face flair up as you gave a laugh- though it felt more nervous than anything.

“Also, feel free to eat as well, I don’t want you to starve while you’re here,” Jungkook continued, eyes genuine as he paused for a moment, making you nod before he gestured you into the living room, the lights were all turned off and the curtains had yet to be drawn making the room much more dark than it appeared except for the TV.

Your heart was ready to melt at the pile of blankets on the couch, Mina was practically buried in them happily, her stuffed bear she always carried with her nestled against her as she sleepily yawned, “I’m not really a restrictive parent when it comes to TV but if it’s grating on your sanity you can feel free to turn it off at any time, she’ll be a little whiney about it but there’s plenty of toys in her room, speaking of,”

You passed into the hallway with Jungkook as he walked all the way down to the end, opening the door into a much brighter and frilly room decked in light princess pink, toys scattered across the floor, “All of her coloring and markers are in her closet, any toy she could possibly need is in here, she might insist it isn’t but trust me- it is. I usually put her down for a nap around after lunch and get her up around three or so before dinner. That pretty much covers everything. Since she’s home she probably won’t cry, I’ll be home around two or so anyways so I’m sure it’ll go by quick for her. Uh do you have any questions or…?”

“No! I mean, it sounds good to me. I wrestle with kids everyday when it comes to nap time so I doubt anything will be any more challenging than that. Uh otherwise I should be fine, I can always call if I have a problem but I’m not worried about it, Mina’s a good kid at daycare so I’m sure she’ll be fine at home. Is there anything you want me to make sure to do?” You asked as you both walked back down the hall

Jungkook gave it some thought for a moment before giving a shrug altogether, “No, I have complete faith you’ll be fine. I know you guys get to deal with a lot of bitchy parents but I’m not really….” he paused for a moment, looking away with a familiar expression to Mina whenever she was focused, “I trust you, that’s all.” Oh...your face flushed a little at his words, both of you paused for a second as you realized how close you were to him at the moment.

Why did this feel so domestic?

Jungkook looked like he just rolled out of bed...and so did you...it almost felt like it another universe rather then coming over to watch his daughter it was like you could be living together- No! No! No! Don’t let your mind go there! Both of you broke out of whatever tranced silence had took over at the gurgle of excitement. Blabber coming from Mina in excitement at the sight of you, her thumb escaping her lips as she dropped her blanket, toddling over to you before hugging your leg, “Awwwh goodmorning honey.” You couldn’t help but coo out, internally squealing at just how cute she was.

God you loved kids.

Picking her up she excitingly bounced against your hip before wrapping her tiny arms around you. Jungkook’s eyes crinkled a little at the sight, “Alright, if you’re set here then I better get going. I’ll be back soon.” He leaned in kissing Mina’s forehead as she cooed softly, clearly in contentment as he smiled once more before exiting the kitchen. Except unlike at daycare she stayed calm the whole time, maybe not even realizing he was gone. Instead, Mina chose to snuggle up against you as you laughed walking back into the living room before carefully sitting on the couch.

Glancing at the entry way you couldn’t help but wonder where Jungkook worked for him to be going in wearing such casual attire. He was usually a little more formal with his clothes, not suit and tie but well fitted jeans and maybe a button up. Clacking your tongue you forced yourself to relax, you were going to be here for over six hours, might as well get comfortable.

The hours did in fact go by fast, you had spent most of the morning studying before going into the kitchen, deciding you’d make plenty of breakfast for both you and Mina while splurging on premade french toast sticks in the freezer while making sausage to go.

Given Mina couldn’t talk yet it had been a little lonely within the hours but it was a good time spent on studying until she was suddenly out of sight and getting into something, or trying to fall off something, or...well...you get the idea.

Naptime was more difficult than you anticipated, especially given how easily she was knocked out at daycare, but then again she also used a lot more energy there when crying. Mina was in the comforts of her home and was not happy to be told it was naptime.

You never could get her in her room but she eventually lost the battle when she cuddled in your lap and eventually fell asleep, your text book in hand as you tiredly rubbed your eyes, yawning before forcing your eyelids back open.

You hadn’t even heard the door open until the sight of Jungkook quietly came into view, he was in silent awe at the sight, you looked picture perfect with Mina sleeping against you, he felt his heartrate spike when you noticed him, giving your own sleepy smile as he sat down next to you, not too close, but enough to get a good look at your tired features, “Was she good?”

You gave a tiny nod as you set the text book down, “Yeah, stubborn about naptime but here we are.”

Jungkook gave a soft laugh, mindful of his voice as he didn’t wanna wake his princess, eyes affectionate as he glanced down, “Sounds about right, I usually get a naptime too when she gets like this. Guess you found out she’s a big cuddler.”

“Oh yeah, she tried to toddle off a few times but she stuck to me most of the day. She’s never been this clingy at daycare but I can understand why.” You carefully shifted in your seat a little, trying to straighten yourself from your sunken position without waking her, it was silent for a moment before you decided to tread carefully, “So uh, where do you work Jungkook? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“Oh no it’s fine, I work as a game developer for Bandai Namco. We’ve been working on a new expansion for the Soul series lately and we’re behind so I’ve been going in extra to try and get us ahead again. I wish I didn’t have too since Saturdays are the only days I get to really spend with Mina…” A twinge of guilt flickered on Jungkook’s face as he pressed his lips together, yet if you looked closer you could see he seemed almost sad, maybe disappointed in himself, “I um, I know you’re studying but...How about you? I’m assuming you’re in university right?”

You gave a small smile as you nodded, “Yeah, I’m studying in nursing right now,” You could tell he seemed a little taken aback by your answer making you laugh, “I know, a lot of people assume I’m in for teaching, especially sense that’s the norm for daycare workers, but…! I am hoping to get in at the children’s hospital, I love working with kids.”

“You’re great with them,” Jungkook hadn’t meant to let it slip from his mouth but it was too late, silence had taken over once more as you gave a shyer smile as Jungkook fumbled, cheeks beginning to dust pink, “I mean...uh! You are! You know how to calm them down and uh…Mina really likes you, so um, that counts for something. She’s really picky with people, you didn’t hear it from me but she really doesn’t even like her mom.”

You tried to laugh yet you couldn’t force it, something felt particularly taboo about laughing at that yet you didn’t know why. You couldn’t help but wonder why Mina’s mom couldn’t watch her. Or why Jungkook seemed so serious despite his joking tone, “Well I think deep down all kids secretly have a favorite parent,” You kept your tone light yet neutral, not wanting to tread on sensitive ground with whatever seemed to be going on with Jungkook’s significant other.

You weren’t sure what the story was but going off his words yesterday at the daycare he must have been divorced if Mina’s mom didn’t live with him. And give his joking- yet serious comment their relations must not have ended kindly.

“Fair enough, maybe it’s just me but I think I’m a pretty awesome dad.” Jungkook boasted with that boyish grin making you stifle your laugh. After the initial ice had been broken you both seemed to hold a conversation easily and before you had knew it the hours had slipped away from you. Mina eventually waking up from her nap only to gurgle in delight at the sight of her dad, crawling into his lap, “Oh I should probably get going,” you had checked your phone only for your eyes to widen at the time, “I promised my friends I’d help get snacks for movie night.”

Shifting in your seat as you stood up, Jungkook mirroring you leaving Mina on the couch with a whine in complaint, “Oh yeah of course! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you…!”

“No! It’s okay,” You rushed out, feeling your cheeks begin to warm as you rubbed your neck, “...I actually enjoyed myself…!” You shuffled in your spot feeling your throat become dry at the silence as you wracked your brain to find something else to say.

Jungkook cleared his throat, feeling a little meek as he rubbed his nose, “W-well um...maybe we can uh...maybe we can do this again sometime?” You felt your face burn at his shy expression, peering up at you hesitantly before continuing, “O-or maybe go out to eat sometime…? With Mina of course!” He rushed, “She’d be a little mad if we left her here.”

You couldn’t help the soft laugh that escaped you despite the nervous butterflies in your stomach, “Of course she would...id...I’d like that a lot..!” Oh god, did he just ask you out? Your brain was wrecked with a million thoughts as you and Jungkook fumbled with your goodbyes. The warm air meeting your lunges with relief as you stepped outside before shoving your face into your hands. He asked you out! Jeon Jungkook, only the hottest dad at the daycare really just asked you out!

Sucking in another breath of air you couldn’t help but let the giddy grin tug on your lips. Maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea. Jungkook obviously liked you enough to try a date and...and why not not! Maybe your friends weren’t wrong after all.

Note: thank you all for being so patient with me! I know Blue Spring has been highly anticipated and the wait is over! It was originally meant to be a oneshot but it just got ridiculously long lmao so by popular choice it’s going to be a four part mini series! Please enjoy and let me know what you think!! 🖤

#bts #jeon jungkook #jungkook #jungkook x reader #jungkook x reader smut #single dad jungkook #jungkook x y/n #jungkook imagine #jungkook au #jungkook x y/n smut #bts au

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amor-immortalem · 3 years

Text

Everything Undesired

Genre: angst, hurt/comfort

Warnings: dead dove: do not eat, heavily implied rape, gross misuse of a pact, dissociation victim blaming

Summary: not all pact masters use their pacts judiciously or in a positive way. What happens when a pact is misused in one of the worst ways possible?

A/N: so a while back I did a comic by the name of ‘Meet Me Under the Azaleas’ I’m no longer happy with the writing I put into it originally so I wanted to rewrite it using the same plot line and adding some extra scenes that weren’t in the original comic which I’ll be taking down tonight. It should work better as a fic anyway.

Chapter 1

“You are ours. We own you.”

Those words rang in his head over and over as he stumbled his way into his room, overstimulated, exhausted- a mess. He knew it was a mistake to answer the call of those witches tonight. The thoughts of what they did, how their hands ran over his body, what they had taken away. It made his stomach churn and tie itself in knots with guilt and shame. It burned just the same as the rope marks on his wrists and ankles- wounds that would heal within the hour.

“You won’t breathe a word of this to anyone- this we command of you, Avatar of Greed.”

Those women -no, they were monsters- abused the innate trust that comes with a demon who enters a pact with a human, multiple in this case. They had violated the boundaries he’d put in place the day he started dating his human. Oh God, what would she think if word ever got out? He had no way of speaking out- to scream the truth until his voice was raw.

He needed to shower, to get the stench of sex and sweat off of him. He had to get their scent off of him. As he entered the bathroom, Mammon tore off his clothes as he started the water. The lights remained off as he couldn’t bare to look at himself after what happened. Not after how he just let them use him like that.

He stepped under the boiling water and just let it run against him. The falling water did nothing to drown out the deafening voices running rampant in his mind.

“Disgusting!” They roared, “Useless! Pathetic! Weak! Whore! ….. Scum!”

He falls to the floor of his shower, hands gripping at his hair as he let out a whimper that eventually turned into quiet sobs. The steamy air making it harder to breathe. Why didn’t he fight against them harder- against their orders. No, he just laid there and took it.

He grabbed the soap and a wash rag and scrubbed his body until every bit of him was raw and even then he wouldn’t stop. It was only when he saw the blood swirling around the drain that Mammon realized what he was doing to himself- how bad the water burned the exposed skin. It felt like hellfire raining down upon him.

He felt horrible as he reached up and switched the water off. He could still hear it in his head as he reached for a towel- all the crying, screaming, begging for them to stop.

He was a pathetic, sorry excuse of a demon, he thinks as he wraps the towel around his waist and travels down the his stairs quietly. It’s early morning now. There was only a few hours left before he would have wake up for school. He contemplated just skipping the entire day. There would be know way he’d be able to function. He could always say he feels sick- its not that far from the truth. He would decide in a few hours, he thought as he crawled into bed. It didn’t take long for her to move closer to him. His naturally warmer body temperature was what drew her to him. His body involuntarily tensing as she nuzzled into his chest, arms slipping around his body. He would only tuck her head under his chin and drape and arm over her side as he let the scent of her shampoo relax him enough to fall into a light sleep.

After a short while, someone's alarm blared among the sheets- whether it his or Arella's, he couldn't be sure. Mammon patted around for the offending phone, just wanting to get five more minutes of shut eye. He eventually succeeded but not without waking his partner.

"Morning, Love," Arella sighed, her voice still laced with the grogginess of sleep.

"Mornin', Treasure," The demon yawns as he curls back up, pulling her closer to his chest. "Sleep well?"

"I did. What time you get back last night?" Arella's voice is soft as her hand slides under his shirt, rubbing gently along his side.

"5 this mornin'." He says as he tries to hide the way his body recoils from her touch, a pang of guilt strikes his heart as she notices. "Sorry... 'm not really feelin' all that great right now..."

"No, that's alright." She removes her hand from his side, choosing instead to rest it against his cheek as she readjusts herself so she's eye-level with him on the pillow. "How selfish of those witches to keep you out so late on a school night..." Its at this point she notices the puffiness and how red his eyes are. "You look like you've been crying... Is everything alright?"

He just shakes his head. Mammon wants so badly to tell her what happened to him the night before- the real reason he got home so late, but unsurprisingly, no words come out. He just closes his eyes, letting himself relax under her gentle touch. "I'm jus' really tired s'all."

"I believe it. You only got a hour and a half's worth of sleep. Would you like to just stay home all day, just the two of us?" Arella moves him so he's resting with his head on her chest.

"That's sounds.... nice," he hums quietly, so close to falling back into the clutches of sleep.

"Alright then. Go on and go back to sleep," She kisses the top of his head, carding her fingers through the soft, fluffy locks the other hand rubbing small circles in the center of his back. "I've got you."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This carried on for months. The witches would summon him and as long as he complied with their wishes, they would hold his secret. By the third time, he would check out- let his mind escape to anywhere but the present until it was over. It became a vicious cycle. They would call, he would go to them, and then he would crawl into his bed for maybe an hour or two before forcing himself to get up for classes that he often fell asleep in. After the tenth, once they had finished with him, he asked why they were doing this and they told him.

“We desire something to bind you to us for the rest of our lives.”

“A child.”

The demon’s eyes widened at that. Never in his life had he been so opposed to the idea of having children. In fact, just before all of this happened he had been daydreaming about what his children with Arella would look like if they were ever so fortunate to have any but a child with one of the witches? It made him sick. A half-demon born from a demon of his status had a high probability of killing its mother- one who he would then have to raise. How could he explain that to his brothers- to Arella? The very thought filled him with dread. How could he ever bring himself to care for a child conceived from a crime? A child that would always be nothing but a constant reminder of the worst nights of his life. They didn’t deserve a life like that.

And so Mammon did the only thing he could think to do: he fled. He ran back to the Devildom, back to House of Lamentation as fast a his legs would carry him. He crashed through the doors of the house. Never had he been so greatful to be the first one home. As he climbed the steps up to his room he vowed to himself never again. He wouldn’t give them what they wanted, consequences be damned.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It had been six months since his last encounter with the witches. There was nothing on their end- absolute radio silence. Part of Mammon wondered if they'd gotten what they wanted from him after all. Everyday was filled with the anxiety of not knowing. His nightmares had gotten worse. Most of them were based around those nights he'd spent with them, others involved everyone finding out a one-sided version of what had happened, all spun in the favor of the witches. He dreamed of Arella leaving him, heart-broken from the implication that he would stray from her and running into the arms of one of his brothers. The worst ones- the ones he would wake up from covered in a cold sweat in the dead of night- consisted of him standing in the witches' home, the sounds of screaming, the smell of blood, the piercing first cries somewhere between the call of a demon and the screams of a human baby infecting his senses. It all felt too real. It felt like a crushing weight on his chest.

Over this time, Mammon had grown distant from both his brothers and Arella, hardly spending anytime with them. He fell apart. The grades he worked so hard to pull up had taken a nose dive, he was hardly eating- choosing only to consume just barely enough to sustain himself. He no longer slept for fear of the nightmares and he instead threw himself into side jobs that would keep him out of the house well passed curfew as well as earn him plentiful amounts of grimm. He couldn't go on like this much longer.

Everyone was worried for him. None of them had ever seen the Avatar of Greed in this manner and the gradual change in his demeanor alarmed them. Despite everyone’s best attempts, Mammon hardly smiled anymore. He just simply didn't seem to enjoy all of the things he once did. They all knew something was wrong but when asked the white haired demon would shrug it off, say he was fine when he very obviously was not. Everything came to a head the night Mammon collapsed, finally falling victim to exhaustion and hunger.

It was after this that Lucifer called the family to a meeting while Arella sat with Mammon in his room as he slept fitfully.

"What do we do, Lucifer?" Asmo seemed distraught with fear. "Our brother is suffering from something and we don't even know where to start in trying to help him."

"We have to get him to talk somehow," Satan quipped, "Perhaps Arella can-"

"If this were any other situation, I would suggest it but right now, I don't think that's a very wise move. If she forces him to talk it could very well damage the bond they share." For the first time in thousands of years, Lucifer didn't know what to do. Whatever was causing this shift in personality was eating away at Mammon. "We'll try to think of a way to fix this- to find out what happened to our dear brother. So let's start at the beginning of all of this. What do we know about what he was doing before this happened?"

"Well, Levi started, "He was getting called up by those witch sisters with more and more frequently. I heard him come home super late- like early morning hours late..."

"And after that is when he practically stopped eating." Beel chimed in.

"And he was having nightmares almost nightly, afterwards." Belphie nodded. "I did my best with my powers to look into them but there were so many mental blocks that he subconsciously put up, I couldn't see or hear anything very well and what I could see didn't make a whole lot of sense. They weren't very clear, but they had something to do with the witches... and I felt an overwhelming sense of guilt associated with them."

"Then obviously something happened while he was with them," Satan said, brow furrowed. "But what that may be, we won't know until he talks."

"Asmo, I see the look on your face." Lucifer called out to the Avatar of Lust. "Is there something, you'd like share with the group?"

Everyone's eyes were locked onto Asmodeus as the demon sat with a contemplative look on his face. He was very slowly starting to piece together what had been going on.

"Not yet, but I may have a hunch." He finally said. "Mammon has a pact with these women, correct?"

Masterlist 2

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mypoisonedvine · 4 years

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how about a dark bucky x naive reader where he always gets nightmares and she is always trying to help him (making him tea, laying with him til he sleeps, etc.) and one night she laying beside him and he’s having a nightmare and he traps her and says “this is the way to help me” and then there’s non/dubcon since she does want to help him 😳🥺

oh my godddd i love this!! anon your mind.... this idea has been living in my brain rent free ever since you sent it it.

noncon, yandere-ish bucky, breeding kink, slight somnophilia and more below the cut people, watch out

he would definitely be really sweet at first, even with his brooding and aura of mystery

so it’s impossible for you to resist trying to get to know him better even as he seems to avoid you sometimes

eventually he opens up enough to tell you about his nightmares, and you feel awful about it. he struggles to get enough sleep and sometimes he’ll try to get you to hang out late and you realize it’s because he’s afraid of trying to sleep at all.

you tell him to spend the night in your room and you guys can hang out and have a classic high school-style sleepover with junk food and movies. you figure maybe it’ll distract him and maybe he’ll stay up so late that when he’s exhausted, he’ll be able to fall asleep easily.

it’s a lot of fun but it doesn’t seem to help much. and it gets awkward when he makes a move on you and you do your best to gently rebuff him. i like you a lot but i don’t like you like that-- i just want to be your friend, if i can

it’s never an easy conversation to have but he seems to take it well, or as well as he could be reasonably expected to

your next solution was tea with melatonin. he got to bed easier but he still had terrible nightmares and you had to wake him up because he nearly choked you out in his sleep.

finally, he asked you to sleep beside him in his bed, and you felt a little conflicted about it.

I know the last time you were around me while I slept went... really poorly... but I promise, I won’t hurt you. I could never hurt you.

you agree only because you want to help him so badly

at first it’s normal, even sweet. you brush your teeth together in the bathroom, you change into your comfiest pajama set and try to ignore that he’s sleeping shirtless.

you fall asleep pretty easily, and hope that he’s doing the same

but not so much later, you wake up to metal fingers pushing up the bottom of your shirt, running over your hips and waist

you mumble through the haze of half-sleep to ask him what’s going on but stop when you feel his hand slide under the fabric and wrap around your breast.

you open your mouth to speak but no words come out. you're totally paralyzed.

he slides closer and you feel his entire body pressed against your back. he's so warm, it's almost hot to the touch. hottest of all is the hard outline of his cock pressing right into your ass.

he rolls his hips against you and lets out an incredibly soft moan-- that's when you realize that he must be having some very strange dream or nightmare, that he isn't meaning to do this to you.

bucky, wake up! you're having a nightmare...I think...

I'm awake, the voice right beside your ear informs you. that or I'm having the best dream of my life.

you stammer because you have no idea what is going on. w-wait...

this is the only thing that's helped. I never told you, but the nights where I tired myself out by jerking off and imagining you, those were the ones where I slept the best. but it didn't fix it completely. I just know if you help me, the nightmares will go away.

before you can even speak again he's talking over you, sounding less sweet and more stern.

don't you wanna help me, doll? don't you wanna help me feel good? don't worry, I'll make you feel good too...

the hairs on the back of your neck are standing up because you know something is horribly wrong, but you want to give him a chance. still, you're unsure. I don't know...

you don't know? you said you were my friend. friends help each other.

you gulp and answer sheepishly, o...okay...

thanks, doll. I knew I could count on you.

he grabs your hand and pulls it down. you gasp as he wraps it around his manhood-- it's thick, and hard yet silky.

you've never touched a cock before have you?

you feel embarrassed, you realize you must be doing something wrong already if he noticed your lack of experience. um, no... I haven’t...

oh I don't mind! it's a good thing. your hands are really soft... so much softer than mine.

you stay still and let him fuck into your hand, your face burning with shame even though you began to feel arousal tingle between your legs.

after a little more of that, he moves you around until he’s hovering over you, his hips between your legs.

I wanna try something different-- it’ll be better.

before you can stop him he’s rubbing his cock against your crotch, through your flimsy little shorts, and the sensation sends shivers up your spine. you had touched yourself before, but this felt totally different.

with him on top of you like this, you feel so small. his body towers over and envelops yours, but even with all that strength his little moans sounded gentle and vulnerable.

he leans down and you can feel his breath on your neck, his long hair falling down and tickling your face while his stubble scratches against your cheek

fuck, I love you, he murmurs into your ear.

what?! you try to recoil but you're trapped between him and the bed.

don't you love me too? I know you do.

you shake your head, you can’t even believe what’s happening. I told you, we're just friends

he grabs your jaw suddenly, forcing you to look at him, and even in the dark you can see his eyes burning with anger.

I know you love me. if you don't, you will.

he starts to move his hips back and pull your pajama shorts to the side, and for all your naivete you know exactly what's about to happen.

bucky, please-- don't put it in me-- no, stop, wait--!

he shoves into you, groaning as your unwilling body is forced to accept him

hnng, you're so tight doll. can't you feel how wet you are? that's how I know you love me. god, you feel so fucking good.

you sob and try to push at his shoulders but he's like fucking granite.

don't fight it, it’s gonna feel good for you soon... you just need time to get used to me.

you can’t imagine how this could ever feel good, it stings and makes you feel nauseous-- that is, until he reaches down and swipes his calloused thumb over your sensitive bud.

your whole body jerks and your fingers dig into his shoulders.

oh, do you like that princess?

you want to deny it but you’re too busy bucking your hips involuntarily, chasing more sensation

fuck, you’re a needy little thing, huh? you need me so bad... don’t worry, I’m here to take care of you. god, you don’t know how long I’ve waited for the chance to take care of you....

suddenly the burn inside you begins to subside and you feel the tip of his cock rubbing against something that makes your walls tighten around him with every thrust.

you hear your whimpers of pain morph into moans of pleasure, and you can hardly believe the noises are coming from you.

feels good, doesn’t it? god, you’re such a tease... inviting me for a sleepover-- you don’t even know what that means for adults, does it?

guilt burns in your stomach as you wonder if you really did lead him on, if it means something different than you thought and that’s why he came onto you.

and before that, spending nearly every day with me and talking with me about things I’d never told anyone before... you may have fooled yourself but I knew you wanted me so damn bad.

had you?? you couldn’t remember now. of course you’d always thought he was cute, that was objectively true, but you were just trying to be his friend...

and now you act so shocked and confused when I fuck you, but within a few minutes you’re moaning and begging for more.

you don’t remember any begging.

his thrusts get a little rougher and you choke on nothing.

I know you want it. I know you need it-- need me.

you can tell you’re going to come, but it doesn’t feel like how it feels when you’re by yourself. it feels so much more intense, electric even, and you’re not sure you’ll be able to handle it.

god, i’m so close-- you’re close too, aren’t you? you feel so good, doll. feel so good around my cock. fuck, you want me to come inside?

no, buck, you can’t-- i’m not--

oh it’s gonna feel so fucking good to fill you up, doll... and i know you’re gonna love how it feels when i come inside you.

you start to cry again, terrified that he’s going to get you pregnant when you’ve never even had sex before now. please-- stop... i’ll help you again tomorrow, i’ll help you whenever you want, just please don’t come inside me...

oh doll, you’re gonna help me every night now, don’t worry about that. gonna fuck you again before the night’s over, more likely than not. gotta keep those nightmares away until I can only dream of you.

against everything in you hoping not to, you come suddenly. you feel yourself tightening and fluttering around him as your whole body convulses.

when your back arches, he slips his arms under you and holds you close, fucking into you with brutal speed and force.

fuck, right there-- fuck, doll, i’m coming, oh fuck!

with a deep growl he pushes his hips against yours as hard as he can, burying himself in your pulsating warmth. you whimper and cry as his cock flexes with each spurt of come emptied into you. it feels like it goes on forever, his come coating your walls while he sucks on the crook where your neck meets your shoulder.

fuck, baby... you’re incredible...

you shiver, waiting for him to pull out and roll off of you, but he just relaxes and kisses all along your collarbone.

god, I could fall asleep like this. I sure as hell couldn’t have any nightmares with you keeping my cock warm in my sleep.

bucky... what if you got me pregnant?

oh, don’t talk like that, he purrs, you’ll get me all worked up and I’ll have to fuck you again.

he kisses you on the nose and it’s so disgustingly intimate.

I think I’ll be able to sleep again, at least for a few hours. come on, let’s move over to my side of the bed and you can be my little spoon.

#Anonymous #dark!bucky x reader #dark!bucky barnes #dark!bucky smut #bucky barnes non con #dark!bucky x you #dark!bucky x y/n #dark!bucky headcanons

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robininthelabyrinth · 3 years

Text

Chapter 5 of The Quiet Room (ao3 or tumblr pt 1, pt 2, pt 3, pt 4)

Nie Mingjue took three tries to wake up.

In all truth, he wasn’t that badly injured – if it hadn’t been for how tangled his spiritual energy already was, steeped in resentment from his wayward cultivation and burned by trying to keep a saber’s pace from within a human body, a night’s rest and some tonics would probably have been enough to put him right. But it was, and he was, and so the concern of his doctors was all the more pronounced.

The first time he woke, it was to Nie Xiaoxuan, a cantankerous old doctor who’d lost all patience with her patients years before Nie Mingjue had been conceived, looking down at him with a scowl, saying, “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? Go back to sleep!”

A needle had descended, leaving him not much choice about the matter – it was a good thing he was used to such rough treatment, or else he might’ve worried. Instead he found some comfort in how some things were always the same, and his Nie sect’s objectively awful bedside manner was one of them.

He slept.

He woke a second time to arguing outside his door in the middle of the night, whispers and hisses that were so loud as to be unworthy of being called lowered voices –

“– the Sect Leader deserves to know!”

“Nie-er-gongzi gave the order, and it was obeyed. There isn’t any need to disturb the Sect Leader’s recuperation over nonsense.”

“Nonsense?! Do you know what the implications will be? Nie-er-gongzi is still young, he doesn’t understand –”

“Sect Leader was once younger still. There is still sect discipline, or are you making an official challenge to his judgment? If so, you should be bothering Nie-er-gongzi, as the one who gave the order, and a council of peers that would be assembled to determine if his judgment was flawed.”

“I - no. I won’t.”

“If there’s no challenge to the quality of Nie-er-gongzi’s judgment, then there’s no reason to talk to the Sect Leader.”

Nie Mingjue smiled, proud of his sect and of his brother – even if he didn’t know exactly what it was that Nie Huaisang had ordered that had caused such a stir – and went back to sleep.

He woke up the third time to the sounds of a guqin.

He’d always been slow to wake from an induced sleep, and this time was no different – his body was heavy, confining, and it was a long time before he managed to open his eyes. A half-shichen at least, and yet the guqin continued steadfastly onwards.

So by the time he did manage to open his eyes, the first words out of Nie Mingjue’s mouth were, “Wangji, please stop making a racket.”

The sound of the guqin paused.

Nie Mingjue turned his head to look at him. Lan Wangji looked better than he had the last time he’d seen him, in that horrible mixture of nightmare and reality that had been their flight from the Cloud Recesses and the terrible strain of flying all the way to Qinghe in a single night. If either of them had been lesser cultivators, they wouldn’t have been able to manage it; even at their level, it was considered highly unwise, and they had known that they were spending life energy rather than spiritual qi to buy them the strength they needed.

At least it had been late enough that both children, initially excited by all the rushing around involved in their escape, had quickly lapsed back into sleep instead of descending to tears.

Still, better was a low bar. By the end of their flight, Lan Wangji had had blood soaking through his white robes, his eye locked on the horizon and unable to focus on anything nearer, his entire body wracked with occasional shudders – if he’d been anyone else, he would have been screaming.

He still look pale and bloodless, his eyes hunted and guilty and tired, stark white bandages visible beneath the pale (but not white) robes that looked like something Nie Huaisang had once owned, but he didn’t look about to expire, so Nie Mingjue would take that as a victory.

“I would have thought,” Lan Wangji said carefully, laying his hands on the guqin chords to stop the sound, “that you would prefer that it not be silent.”

“There’s silence and then there’s silence,” Nie Mingjue said, trying to shrug and abruptly realizing that that was a bad idea. His shoulders and neck and back all hurt – possibly he’d dislocated something in trying to get out of that horrible room. Probably, even. “Not wanting to be locked in a room designed to be as close to nothingness as possible doesn’t necessarily mean that I don’t want some peace and quiet once in a while…I shouldn’t have called your playing a racket. It’s very good. There was just a lot of it.”

Lan Wangji blinked, then shook his head. “I do not take offense,” he said, simply enough that Nie Mingjue believed him. “It is a surprise that you think the way you do about silence, even now. I myself have been…struggling, with the concept.”

“It’s very loud here,” Nie Mingjue said knowingly, and Lan Wangji averted his eyes. “It’s all right if you don’t like it that much, you know. Has Huaisang talked with you about the options for soundproofing?”

“He has,” Lan Wangji said. “I have not yet accepted.”

“Why not?”

“It feels –” he hesitated. “Like a step backwards. My Lan sect has always valued silence, quiet – not just valued, but imposed, even on those for whom it is not appropriate.”

Like you, he meant, or maybe he was thinking about little Lan Jingyi, the orphan he’d stolen away from his own sect – truly stolen, since unlike little Lan Sizhui Lan Wangji had no guardianship rights over him to justify taking him away.

Nie Mingjue hadn’t objected to it, figuring that it didn’t make much difference to the amount of scandal he would undoubtedly causse whether he had taken away one child or two when he convinced the Second Jade of Lan to abandon his ‘seclusion’ in favor of refuge at the Unclean Realm. Anyway, if Lan Wangji had concluded that it would be better for the child to leave, then it probably was – Nie Mingjue trusted his judgment.

Just like you trusted Lan Xichen’s?

“Each sect has a different cultivation style,” he said, deciding not to think about that right now. “With both strengths and weaknesses. My Nie sect has a martial style, aggressive and overpowering; your Lan sect, although it still follows the orthodoxy of sword cultivation, focuses on contemplation, thoughtfulness, and, yes, quiet. Who is to say which is better than the other? They’re just different.”

Lan Wangji was frowning.

“Sometimes I think Wen Mao made a mistake when he abandoned sects based on preference and style in favor of raising up his clan,” Nie Mingjue confessed. “And your ancestors and mine, too, in following his lead. Look at Huaisang – to cultivate a saber is his heritage, his birthright and his duty to our bloodline, and so he must do so despite being clearly unsuited for it.” He paused, then sighed. “Not that he’s all that suitable for anything else, either.”

Lan Wangji shot him a quelling look, disapproving, but in the sort of way that Lans had when they were amused by you.

“Still, we’re all cultivators, each of us fighting against fate,” Nie Mingjue continued. “While we must be guided by our traditions, we must also each find the path that suits us best. You’ve always enjoyed the quiet, Wangji; you welcome peace, prefer order, thrive within the confines of your sect’s rules. Finding the point at which you and your traditions part ways does not mean that you are morally obligated to give up everything about them.”

“Not even when those traditions have caused so much harm?”

“Even so,” Nie Mingjue said firmly. “We’re all on a path, and in choosing to take a new turn, you are not disregarding the past, but adding your wisdom to that of those who came before you. I made changes to my Nie sect’s cultivation style once I became sect leader, just as my father did before me; my brother will make still more when he takes the position after I go. Each of my Nie sect disciples practices the Nie sect style, but each one takes it and makes it their own. Keep what helps, discard what hurts.”

“But in this case, is it not the very same thing?” Lan Wangji asked. His brow was still furrowed, the matter clearly one of great concern to him. “I have always turned to the quiet for comfort and strength, sought seclusion to temper myself and test myself, and yet – in the absence of all noise– I found myself slowly going mad, locked away and alone. You yourself nearly died from it. What lesson can I take from this, if not that the quiet is evil?”

“You can take the lesson that too much quiet can be an evil, in the same way too much medicine can be a poison,” Nie Mingjue said. “I might hate your jingshi, since it doesn’t suit me, but I’m given to understand that it often helps, too. It brings peace to cultivators who are tormented by a mind full of thoughts they cannot quiet and helps them fight the demons in their hearts, it allows those who are too connected to the world to tear themselves away. It was built for a purpose.”

“It was,” Lan Wangji said. “A purpose it has now betrayed.”

Nie Mingjue didn’t have anything to say about that. He’d once told Lan Xichen that he thought his sect’s practice of introducing children to that place until they learned quiet whether they liked it or not was inhumane and cruel, and Lan Xichen – in a rare moment of sarcasm – had asked him if teaching them to cultivate a saber spirit that would eventually consume their minds with rage was somehow meant to be morally superior.

To each their own faults, he supposed. Perhaps the next generation would do better.

(He found himself thinking things like that a great deal, these days. He was only in his twenties, and yet his thoughts resembled an old man’s – the feeling of death stalking his footsteps, the day nearly done, his legacy a book that seemed to be nearly completed.

That had been what had driven him to stop his sessions of Clarity with Jin Guangyao, in fact. He’d been reviewing a plan for renovating the western courtyards of the Unclean Realm as part of a long-term plan to get more air and light in there and he’d found himself thinking I probably won’t be here to see this completed, and that had been when he’d realized that it was time to start seriously planning for succession.)

“Perhaps it is the conflation of different things,” Lan Wangji mused, more to himself than anyone else. “The quiet, being alone, loneliness…and yet you can have quiet without being alone, you can be alone without being lonely, you can be lonely without quiet. A balance between disconnecting from the world and connecting with other people.”

That sounded like poetry, and Nie Mingjue could see Lan Wangji’s fingers twitch towards the guqin – he’d probably been inspired.

Nie Mingjue sighed and put his hand over his eyes. His father had told him that being an elder brother meant a life of sacrifice, and he’d been right. “All right,” he said. “Go ahead and play something. I know you want to.”

Lan Wangji was silent for a few long moments, and then his fingers began to move, the too-familiar sound of the Song of Clarity rising up to fill Nie Mingjue’s ears.

“I didn’t mean for me,” Nie Mingjue clarified, rolling his eyes while his hand was still hiding them. The Lan were always so earnest. “I’m not even meditating right now, Wangji. Don’t waste your effort.”

Lan Wangji’s fingers stilled briefly, then continued.

“Chifeng-zun –”

Nie Mingjue pulled his hand away long enough to give Lan Wangji a stern look – he’d already told him several times to refer to him more casually, and however long or short his stay at the Unclean Realm was, if they were going to endure a scandal together, he was simply going to have to adjust to their ways.

Lan Wangji looked long-suffering.

“Mingjue-xiong,” he conceded, and Nie Mingjue nodded, pleased. “Please pay close attention to my playing. Identify if there are any differences between my rendition and –”

“Wangji,” Nie Mingjue interrupted, feeling pained at the very thought. “I can’t.”

Lan Wangji frowned at him, his eyes showing distress.

Nie Mingjue felt guilty at once, and exhaled a sigh. “Wangji, you know I don’t cultivate with music,” he said. “It’s all just interminable plucking to me.”

Lan Wangji’s eyebrows shot up. “Plucking?” he echoed, and Nie Mingjue winced – he’d probably shocked poor Lan Wangji’s conscience. “Mingjue-xiong…you really don’t like music, do you?”

“Not in the slightest,” Nie Mingjue confessed. “I can more or less follow a beat or rhythm, and military calls are fine no matter what instrument is involved, but the rest is all a mess of pointless noise. I can’t tell if the notes are high or low, which ones go before the others, and apparently there are different tones in music as there are in speech? Except in music, certain of them apparently sporadically considered bad, in a variety of different and exciting ways, sometimes but not others, none of which make the slightest difference – ”

He stopped talking on account of Lan Wangji having started to make an unusual hiccupping sound.

Nie Mingjue squinted. Was Lan Wangji…laughing?

If so, he was sorely out of practice. Though now that he thought it, that seemed to make some sense.

“Forgive me,” Lan Wangji said, shoulders shaking – he’d stopped making audible noise, but he was evidently still suffering from an attack of hilarity. “You speak so well, Mingjue-xiong; I had not realized that you suffered from amusia.” He saw Nie Mingjue’s frown of confusion and clarified, “Tone-deafness.”

“I say so all the time!”

“I had incorrectly assumed, as I suspect many have, that you were using the term colloquially,” Lan Wangji said. “How do you fight alongside my brother? I have seen you do so flawlessly, without any impediment, even when he wields Liebing.”

“I can follow along with what he’s doing with his qi,” Nie Mingjue said. “We have been close for so many years, and his spiritual energy is as familiar to me as my own –”

Lan Wangji flinched.

Nie Mingjue stopped talking.

His heart was heavy in his chest, weighed down with feeling, all those things he’d been so carefully not thinking about suddenly stifling him. Lan Xichen, his childhood friend, his lover, his beloved…

He’d hurt him.

Nie Mingjue couldn’t bring himself to believe that the act had been intentional or malicious, not even when Lan Wangji’s arrival made painfully clear that Lan Xichen hadn’t even bothered to supervise him. It simply wasn’t in Lan Xichen’s nature to do such an underhanded thing –

(You once thought Meng Yao wouldn’t do that sort of thing, either. Do you make a habit of blindness?)

He had known Lan Xichen for such a long time, though. If he didn’t know him, both virtues and faults, what person existed that he could say he understood?

No, Lan Xichen must have been trying to help him, not hurt him. And yet – regardless of his intent – he had.

He had hurt him very badly.

Lan Xichen hadn’t listened to him, had ignored him, disregarded him – Nie Mingjue had been as clear as he could be about how he felt about the quiet room. Perhaps he hadn’t told Lan Xichen about his youthful attempt to see if he could handle it, at first out of simply not wanting to appear weak in front of his lover, but later out of (admittedly petty) principle: shouldn’t his ‘no’ be enough? Shouldn’t Lan Xichen have trusted him?

He hadn’t.

He’d trusted Jin Guangyao instead.

Jin Guangyao with his smiles and slippery manner, with his so-believable excuses and always-present rationalizations, always the victim in every exchange they had – Lan Xichen always went to comfort him first after they had another one of their arguments, Nie Mingjue recalled abruptly. He’d called him on it once, in his anger, but Lan Xichen had explained that he knew how strong Nie Mingjue was, how resilient, and that his “A-Yao” needed his sympathy more.

Nie Mingjue hadn’t thought much of it at the time. He was resilient, and anyway he knew how frightening his rages could be; he’d thought perhaps that Lan Xichen simply wanted the excuse to be elsewhere until he’d had a chance to calm down.

He’d rationalized a lot of things. Maybe too many. But this?

This was too much.

“Mingjue-xiong,” Lan Wangji said hesitantly. “About – about my brother…”

Nie Mingjue grimaced, and Lan Wangji felt silent once more.

Nie Mingjue’s heart cried out for his lover, the kind and gentle man who might be a little too reluctant to express himself, a little prone to going with the will of the majority to avoid confrontation, a little inclined to panic at the thought of disappointing people, but whose faults only made him the more human, the more loveable.

But Nie Mingjue had slept, and slept well, and even if his heart was still tangled, his mind was now clear.

“I have long thought,” he said carefully, painfully cognizant of the fact that Lan Wangji was Lan Xichen’s younger brother, “that fate had arranged for your brother and I to meet, and that we would live the rest of our lives intertwined, our hears and minds filled with thoughts of one another. But it seems to me now that that was perhaps – not our destiny.”

“My brother has wronged you,” Lan Wangji said solemnly.

“I still believe his intent was good,” Nie Mingjue assured him earnestly. “Your brother has – more reason than most, I think, to resent my intransigence on matters of my health, and to suspect – to suspect –”

He stopped, swallowed. He had long been (politely) termed to be a straightforward man; it was not in his character to stutter over his speech, to be unable to say the unvarnished truth no matter how painful. Even if it was his lover who was causing him such pain.

“Wangji,” he said instead, and Lan Wangji looked at him. “You know that my family – does not live long lives.”

Lan Wangji nodded.

“It is not uncommon,” he said carefully, “for those in my family to begin to show signs of decline before the end. A certain rigidity of thought –”

“You are not so far down that path that your thinking has become impaired,” Lan Wangji said abruptly, his voice unexpectedly fierce. “Moreover, your refusal was not new, but consistent with your prior thoughts, your opinion expressed repeatedly and consistently. Do not make excuses for him.”

Nie Mingjue was a little surprised, having expected Lan Wangji to defend his brother, but then he recalled the matter of those thirty-three marks marring Lan Wangji’s back. Even if Lan Wangji’s conduct had been wrong, it had been motivated by love, and at any rate the others in the Lan sect had not died – no one had died, except for Wei Wuxian, and Lan Wangji had only been able to offer his beloved the succor of his presence for a short time before he returned to submit himself to punishment.

Impulsive, hot-headed, passionate – it might not be the actions of a Lan, but, as a Nie, Nie Mingjue found his sympathies lay with Lan Wangji in this matter. Yes, he had defended a murderer from being torn apart by the hands of his victims, and Nie Mingjue would not say that he did not think it was necessary for Wei Wuxian to die, but even those that had been duly tried and sentenced to the worst capital punishment might still be allowed the mercy of a good meal and the touch of their lover’s hand before they were executed, and a bit of disobedience against one’s elders was to be expected in any love affair.

Was fending off a few old men to buy a few shichen of love before its premature end really worth a punishment that would have crippled anyone weaker?

“Actions matter more than intent,” he agreed, wondering how he could convey his thoughts on the subject without being offensive to the Lan sect, “but that doesn’t make intent meaningless. To act from love and affection is still better than for – other reasons.”

He wasn’t sure Lan Wangji had understood his meaning: the other man only lowered his eyes.

Nie Mingjue’s mind reluctantly returned to his own troubles.

“I’ll speak with Xichen,” he decided, even though he knew it was probably a bad idea. Lan Xichen’s conduct, however it was meant, could be understood as having brought him to the very precipice of death – enough justification to start a war, given that Nie Mingjue was a sect leader. Their respective positions meant that a disagreement between them could never be simply personal, but was also political; if Nie Mingjue allowed his soft heart to convince him to forgive Lan Xichen, he would be setting a poor standard for the future. “He can explain what he was thinking. If I find his explanation unsatisfactory, I will – tell him what I told you.”

Nie Mingjue was blunt and direct, sparing no one – not even himself – but he was not so cold as to be able to cut off a relationship that already spanned the majority of his life sign unseen. He would give Lan Xichen one chance to salvage things between them, to be shocked into sobriety by the extent of how things had gotten out of hand, to genuinely apologize –

“I think,” Lan Wangji said, very slowly, eyes still locked on the floor as if there was something fascinating there, “that brother’s explanation may omit that he was distracted by his other lover.”

Nie Mingjue’s heart froze in his chest.

“Other – lover?” he said dumbly. Lan Wangji refused to look at him. “Wangji – are you saying – Xichen has..?”

Lan Xichen wouldn’t. Surely he wouldn’t.

“Lianfeng-zun has told him lies, and Brother accepted them without verification,” Lan Wangji said, and his voice was bitter. “I believe that he feared confronting you on the subject of a man he knew you disliked, and also saw an opportunity to obtain his heart’s desire – to not give up anything and yet gain something he wanted. And Lianfeng-zun is known to be skilled in anticipating people’s desires.”

Nie Mingjue stared at the ceiling in a daze, his mind whirling.

So many little things suddenly made a belated sort of sense.

The way Lan Xichen seemed so certain that all the troubles between them were only temporary, the way that he entreated Nie Mingjue to think kindly of Jin Guangyao as if there was a stronger bond between them than a lost former friendship and a new sworn brotherhood. The way Jin Guangyao acted more intimately with Nie Mingjue whenever Lan Xichen was present, only to return to a more professional remove once they were alone – he’d assumed that was because Jin Guangyao knew that Lan Xichen would protect him if Nie Mingjue got annoyed with him for such familiarities and that Nie Mingjue would not want to upset his beloved by scolding over something so minor.

But if, for instance, Jin Guangyao had told Lan Xichen that they had been lovers once, those public intimacies, and Lan Xichen’s joy in them, all suddenly took on a new flavor –

Surely Lan Xichen knew that Nie Mingjue would never have done that to him?

Skilled in anticipating people’s desires.

Nie Mingjue had noticed Lan Xichen’s fondness for Jin Guangyao from the first, back when Jin Guangyao had been only Meng Yao, and he’d known that Meng Yao had respected and even revered the beautiful, powerful, and chivalrous Zewu-jun. He’d been pleased when they’d become friends, hadn’t minded the occasional light flirtation – he’d been so certain that nothing would come of it, trusted in Lan Xichen’s morality and their love. He himself was not skilled in wordplay the way they were, nor as sensitive to the subtle changes in a conversation, preferring to stay silent rather than risk mis-stepping, a habit formed of too much responsibility and exposure to politics at too early an age. Why shouldn’t Lan Xichen get to enjoy the cut and thrust of charming, clever conversation with an expert at the art?

They had all been friends back then. Nie Mingjue had been so proud of his prized deputy, and pleased beyond measure that Lan Xichen liked him as well; Nie Mingjue had so few friends that the addition of another one was something he treasured. Even if Lan Xichen’s good sense had surely told him that such betrayal was impossible, given Nie Mingjue’s character, he might still in his reckless desires allow himself to be intoxicated by his affections and believe it for just a little while – just long enough to taste Jin Guangyao’s lips, perhaps.

That’d be enough.

Nie Mingjue knew Lan Xichen well; he knew his lover’s faults as well as he knew his virtues. If Lan Xichen had allowed himself to act foolishly for a moment, he would have panicked at the thought of coming to terms with it, and Jin Guangyao was so good at soothing his panic. Too good: where Nie Mingjue, in his harshness, had always advised revisiting mistakes and learning from them, no matter how difficult the process, Jin Guangyao would always recommend being kind to oneself, taking care of oneself, avoiding the pain that came with tackling one’s flaws and erroneous self-conceptions head-on.

Too much care for the self would eventually mean not enough care for others, Nie Mingjue had always thought, rolling his eyes whenever Jin Guangyao earnestly held forth on his views. But Lan Xichen had liked it – and why wouldn’t he? It was easier to put yourself first, to refuse to admit mistakes were mistakes, to rationalize events until you were always the victim and everyone else wrong. It meant you didn’t have to confront your own capacity for cruelty and selfishness, could conceive of yourself as always virtuous and always good and always right.

Right, rather than righteous.

Justified, rather than just.

The way Jin Guangyao always did.

Yes, Lan Xichen might allow himself to kiss Jin Guangyao, or more if Jin Guangyao pushed his advantage – which he would, Nie Mingjue had no doubt of that – and then, after the fog of lust had cleared, Lan Xichen would realize that he’d have to confess the entire thing to Nie Mingjue.

An emotional confrontation of the sort he hated most.

And then, of course, just as Lan Xichen was most upset and vulnerable, Jin Guangyao would offer him a way out – a way for Lan Xichen to continue to see himself as a good person who had done no wrong, who didn’t need confront anything – a way to get a new love alongside the old, to have Jin Guangyao’s clever speech and gentle care while not losing Nie Mingjue’s steadfast affection and support.

It was not uncommon in their times for a man to have more than one wife and entirely possible for him to love them both equally; the idea of a triad was not so strange. But Lan Xichen should have asked.

He didn’t.

He didn’t ask because some part of him knew that the answer would be no, and, just as he had with the quiet room, that was not an answer he wished to accept.

And that…that was not something that could be blamed on Jin Guangyao, as much as Nie Mingjue would prefer to do so.

That was all Lan Xichen.

Lan Xichen...how could you do this to me?

Nie Mingjue closed his eyes in pain. It felt as if all the air had been knocked out of him, like a really good punch might do - he felt hollow, weightless, disconnected, as if he had been struck by a blow that had shattered his bones and he was drifting in that blank space in the moment after the blow landed but before the pain reached his brain.

The full weight of the revelation would hit, eventually. He would feel it all, eventually.

“I see,” he said, and he did. Lan Wangji was upset over it in a way that suggested that he had only recently learned the truth. Given the speed of their travel, that meant he must have discovered it while conversing with Nie Huaisang – and that was another problem, because Nie Huaisang was their father’s son just as Nie Mingjue was, and nothing sparked their rage more than an offense against a loved one. “Thank you for telling me.”

“It is what I should do.”

Nie Mingjue nodded, his throat tight, his chest dull as if there was a knot where his heart had been - yes, he would need some time to deal with this.

“Huaisang is managing well?” he asked, not quite able to bring himself to actually ask for a little more time before he had to return to being the stern and untouchable sect leader, before he had to once again take on the mantle of power and make all the decisions – to force himself to react as a politician rather than a betrayed lover. It would be disgraceful to give into such weakness.

“He is,” Lan Wangji said. “He has given orders that you may not leave your room until the end of the week at the earliest, so as to remind the disciples of the benefit of rest following an injury.”

Nie Mingjue loved his brother.

“Very well,” he said, and decided not to ask about what Nie Huaisang might or might not have gotten into over the last day or so that had led some disciples to think they needed to disturb his rest in order to tell him. It didn’t really matter. They needed to adjust to taking Nie Huaisang’s orders as if he was sect leader in truth – especially if Nie Mingjue’s health continued to deteriorate…

He didn’t have time to think too much on that before Lan Wangji spoke again, saying, “Even if you do not understand music, you can follow the emanations of qi from an instrument, correct?”

“Yes, that’s right,” Nie Mingjue said, a little puzzled by the sudden shift in conversation but deeply relieved to have something to think about - anything, really, as long as it wasn’t the brutal feeling of his heart being torn to shreds within his chest.

“So if I were to utilize musical cultivation, you might be able to determine if I were using the same patterns as you had heard others use?”

“I suppose so,” Nie Mingjue said. It would be extremely irritating to have to pay attention to such small ebbs and flows, especially when he was also trying to meditate and draw the qi into himself for the fullest effect, but he was familiar enough with Clarity by now that he probably could if he really had to. “But why?”

“A suspicion,” Lan Wangji said. “Nie Huaisang has pointed out that Lianfeng-zun’s actions in connection to my brother are suggestive of malice against you, his actions in convincing my brother to lock you into the jingshi doubly so, and yet he comes to visit you regularly, purportedly to improve your health.”

Purportedly.

Nie Mingjue grimaced again, but this time it was with anger at himself – because the suggestion did not shock him the way the information about Lan Xichen had. Meng Yao, Meng Yao, he thought, I wish I didn’t believe this of you. I extended my trust to you twice over, and each time you have disappointed me…it’s my own fault, I suppose, for being arrogant enough to think I could change you.

“Thank you, Wangji,” he said, suddenly tired. “I understand your implication, and we will of course need to examine whether it is correct. But not today.”

“Of course,” Lan Wangji said, and stood up. “I will take my leave and go tell Nie Huaisang to move me into one of the soundproofed rooms. I require time to contemplate the subject of quiet.”

That made Nie Mingjue want to smile, though he couldn’t quite manage it, still twisted by all the revelations that had relentlessly pounded against him since he had awoken. “Good,” he said instead, turning to nod at Lan Wangji in approval. “I hope your meditation on the subject is fruitful.”

“Mm,” Lan Wangji agreed. “As you said, I must find my own path, be guided by tradition but not unduly restricted by it. But there is one point in what you said that was incorrect.”

“Oh?”

“You said that I should not, without consideration, throw out my sect’s traditions,” Lan Wangji said, and he was standing stiffly, at attention, with his face as serious as it ever got. “But at the moment, it is not my sect. You have given me permission to stay here, and I intend to do so.”

Nie Mingjue’s first thought was oh that’s going to have some serious political implications, followed immediately by I guess I did do that didn’t I and someone is going to wring my throat over this, probably Huaisang, but very shortly thereafter with if this is what he needs then so be it.

Still, he could do nothing but watch, stunned, as Lan Wangji lifted his hands to his forehead and very deliberately removed the forehead ribbon that marked him as a member of the Lan sect – the symbol of his family, the symbol of his restraint, which he would normally have never allowed another person outside his family to see him without – and, just as deliberately, wrapped it around Nie Mingjue’s wrist.

“I would ask that you keep this for me, Mingjue-xiong,” Lan Wangji said, and his tone when he said Nie Mingjue’s name was the same as when he called Lan Xichen brother. “Until such time as I decide to reclaim it as my own, or discard it forever.”

“Of course,” Nie Mingjue said, his voice a little faint from shock. “Whatever you need, Wangji.”

Lan Wangji looked at him, grateful, and saluted deeply before leaving.

Nie Mingjue lay back down on the bed and stared at his wrist for a long moment.

This is going to have some serious political implications, he thought a second time. And Lan Xichen won’t ever forgive me for stealing away his little brother.

A moment later, he shook his head at his own foolishness. Lan Xichen had made his choices.

Now he would have to pay for them.

#mdzs #nie mingjue #lan wangji #my fic #my fics #the quiet room

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pastelwitchling · 3 years

Text

Malex Happily Ever After chapter 114 sequel

Part One.

“Yeah,” Alex said into his phone, rubbing his eyes with his other hand. It was noon, but he hadn’t slept all night, consumed instead with his work at the base, his work in dismantling Project Shepherd, his breakup with Forrest, and his desire to talk to Michael about it all.

He had no idea why. It wasn’t like Michael was usually the epitome of comfort, but . . . Alex always thought, stupidly, that once Michael and Maria had ended things, and he and Forrest ended things, and they were both single again, that they would find their way back to each other. But Michael was keeping distance between them and smirking at Alex’s words every now and then, and it just felt a lot like being back where they started.

He plopped down on his couch and hung his head back to stare at the ceiling as Liz kept talking in his ear. She was saying a lot about the lab and bloodwork and finally finding Mr. Jones. Alex was tired, but he kept up fine. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the duffel bag lying halfway under the couch. The duffel bag he’d packed so many months ago when leaving and never coming back had felt like running away. He’d thrown in a few more things over the past year, and constantly found himself looking to it, just barely having forgotten that it was there.

He stopped listening to Liz, thinking about taking that duffel bag now, throwing it in his car, and just driving. It didn’t feel like running away anymore. He’d tried as hard as he could to be with Michael, and now he found himself along again, feeling worse than ever. Because now he knew Michael had loved somebody else. He knew Michael had tried, but not for him.

Alex pinched the bridge of his nose as Liz went on, ending with the question, “So you think you can come by and check it out?”

Alex shook his head. “Er – sorry, come where?”

“Michael’s bunker,” she said. “That’s where we’re testing the serum. No one’s studied the Project Shepherd reports like you have, I’m thinking if anyone can look at the side-effects of the serum and tell us whether or not they match what was done to the prisoners, then –”

“Right,” Alex shut his eyes, not wanting to hear any more about Project Shepherd and the horrible things they’d done. All the things that Michael was still punishing him for by keeping a distance. “I’m on my way.”

Alex did not move for several long minutes, staring instead at the duffel bag. He probably should’ve taken it and left, but hope was annoying that way, and even though a part of him still clung to the idea that he and Michael would end up together, the bigger part growled that if it was going to take this long, and force Alex to endure seeing Michael with anybody else for even a second, then maybe eventually ending up together just wasn’t worth it.

When he finally got to Michael’s bunker, he couldn’t help but remember when Michael had locked that door behind Alex the last time they’d argued in there. Michael never chased after him, and he was just so sick of waiting for him to do it.

He groaned inwardly and rubbed his eyes. Seriously, he thought. What was wrong with him today? He should just be glad the airstream was back in the junkyard. It had gotten really difficult avoiding the Wild Pony for a while.

He made it down the ladder easily enough, and tossed his backpack on the table next to where Michael was working. Michael looked up at him through his glasses and tilted his chin up in silent greeting. Alex was too tired to pretend like that was remotely satisfying, and without responding turned to Liz.

“Hey,” Liz said happily.

“Hi,” Alex crossed his arms. “What’d you want me to take a look at?”

“Well,” Liz handed him some reports, “we wrote down all of the results of the serum.”

“On whom, may I ask?” Alex raised his brow as he took them. “Who was your test subject this time? Max again?”

Instead of answering, Liz’s eyes traveled over to Michael who, until Alex turned to look at him, had been staring at Alex with a pinch in his brows. Alex’s shoulders sagged.

“Tell me you didn’t.”

He shrugged, his smirk humorless. His mask was up again. “We had to get results quick and I was already here.”

“I told you I didn’t want you being experimented on,” Alex argued.

“Mom did it,” he said. “Guess I wanted to see what the big deal was.”

Alex tensed, and Michael’s smirk fell away.

“Yeah, okay.” He took the last of the files and turned to leave.

“Alex, w-wait –”

“Do whatever you want, Guerin,” Alex said. “I’m done trying to talk you down.”

“Alex, come on!” But it was too late. Alex had made it up the ladder and patted his clothes down, heading over to his car. His jaw was clenched and his eyes burned and a suffocating weight sat on his chest, but he walked ahead.

Of course. Of course, Michael would ignore his concerns, of course he’d want to show Alex just how little value his words carried. You’re not her, so I don’t care what you ask me to do. You don’t matter as much as she did, so I don’t care if you worry. You’re not worth trying for, why would you be worth listening to?

“Stop, Private!” Michael caught his arm and turned him around. He still had his glasses on, but he was panting. Eager to ease his guilt, Alex knew, nothing more. When he saw Alex’s face, his own fell. “Are you – are you crying?”

“No,” Alex turned away, wiping his face furiously. Michael stood there, eyes wide, like he never expected to see Alex cry. Oh screw it. “Yes!” Another tear fell, and he didn’t bother wiping it away. “Okay? Yes, I’m crying.”

“B-Because I took a needle?”

“Oh, Guerin, no, it’s not just because of that!” He paced to the end of the airstream and back, then again. He looked up at Michael’s house, and couldn’t help but remember the way it sat so close to the Wild Pony. Because Michael just had to be close to Maria. Alex couldn’t remember Michael ever so much as following him two feet, but he followed Maria?

He came back to stand in front of Michael, his breaths short and painful. “I’ve had a bag ready since I found your damn airstream at the Wild Pony parking lot. I was going to go, and I wasn’t going to come back. I’ve had it ready since you started dating Maria, since Forrest and I broke up, and I still can’t bring myself to just take it and go. I was terrified something would happen to you if you put that damn crap in your veins, and I didn’t want you to end up like the prisoners in Caulfield. You ignored the one thing I asked you to do with a smile on your face like you think it’s funny that I’m scared, and I still can’t just pick up that stupid bag. It’s unfair, Guerin!”

His lower lip trembled, and he looked away, covering his eyes with his hand. “You can move on and love someone else so freaking easily, and I can’t, and it’s so unfair.”

They stood there for a long time, nothing but the wind whistling in their ears and Alex’s quiet cries. Liz seemed to have the good sense to stay in the bunker. Then Michael suddenly came up behind Alex, and wrapped his arms around him tightly.

“Baby,” Michael breathed against the shell of his ear. “I – I didn’t know, Alex,” he whispered, his voice full of pain. “I thought you didn’t care, I thought you wanted me to stay away. I – I was just holding onto easy, no one ever came close to you. I swear, I thought you didn’t want me anymore . . .”

Alex tried to process all of that. Michael sounded sincere, though maybe that was only because Maria had been the one to end things. That’s right, a bitter voice sounded. She ended things. Not him. After he told her he loved her. Then she ended it.

It occurred to Alex then that maybe Michael was holding onto him for a completely different reason.

A disbelieving, miserable chuckle left his lips, and Michael faltered. Alex brought Michael’s hands down. “Just stop it, Guerin,” he said hoarsely, his throat raw. “I already gave you my word that I’d help, I’m not going to stop just because I’m frustrated.” He shook his head, already walking back to his car. He had to get out of here. “You don’t have to pretend to care about me anymore. You’ll still get what you want.”

Before Alex could take in Michael’s shattered expression or read into it, he got in his car, turned it on, and drove away, needing to put as much distance between the man he loved and himself.

Alex woke slowly to the sun just rising. He was surprised he’d made it up so late, but after working through the files last night, he’d passed out just at sunset. He supposed misery, anguish, and a couple of nights of no sleep in a row really put a person out.

He spotted the files on his desk and laid sideways on his bed for a while. He didn’t think he could get back into the nightmares of his family’s past before a good cup of coffee. He stuffed half his face into his pillow and thought of his conversation yesterday with Michael, how unwilling he’d been to eat or drink or do much of anything besides get to work and be useful afterwards. The memory robbed him of even his comfort in bed.

He forced himself up, and when he was washing up in the bathroom, he thought he heard a rustling somewhere outside, but when he turned the faucet off and listened, he didn’t hear anything. Deciding his exhaustion might be making him imagine things that weren’t there, Alex finished up, grabbed his crutches, and made himself a steaming cup of coffee.

He sat down on his couch and rested back, staring at the ceiling. Once again, his eyes fell to the duffel bag halfway hidden. He imagined, yet again, grabbing it now, getting in his car, and driving away without ever coming back. The thought did not make any part of him any happier than he felt now.

There was nothing but the tree branches rustling in the wind, the birds chirping to one another at the morning sun, wheels on gravel in his backyard –

Alex faltered in his thoughts and picked his head up, his brows pinched. He listened closely, and this time, there was no mistaking it; there was someone in his backyard.

“What the hell?” he murmured and set his coffee cup down before grabbing his crutches. He stepped into his backyard, not knowing what he would find (after all, Roswell was a small town, and people were usually good about not bothering military around here), and stopped.

There, behind his circular tables and chairs, was Michael’s airstream. Michael stepped out, wiping his hands on a towel, and smiled at Alex.

He came to stand a foot away from him, his hands twitching at his sides as if eager to reach out and touch. “Can I kiss you good morning?”

Instead of answering, Alex asked, “Guerin, what is this?”

Michael’s smile widened, and he took that as the permission he needed before he closed the distance between them, taking Alex’s face in his hands and kissing his lips both deeply and softly at the same time. He pulled away with a deep sigh, pressing their foreheads together, his eyes closed, as if he could finally breathe.

“I love you,” he whispered, letting his hands fall down Alex’s neck, his shoulders, his arms, and staying on his waist, gripping tightly. “I missed you so much.”

Alex’s eyes started to flutter, but before he could fall into whatever wonderland being around Michael pulled him into, he swallowed and took a step back.

“Why’s your trailer here?” he asked. “What’s going on?”

Michael looked like he hated the distance between them just as much as Alex did, the mask of humor and indifference he usually wore completely gone.

“After Forrest,” he said, “I thought . . . I thought you were better off without me. I thought you wouldn’t want me when you’d already had someone . . . better.” He came closer to Alex, pleading with him to understand. “Alex, I thought you wanted me to stay away. And I was so terrified that I would get too close, and you would hate me, and tell me to leave and not come back. So I stayed a safe distance, and I hated every second of it.”

Alex shook his head. “Why?” he said, his voice breaking despite himself. “Why’d you try so hard for her?”

“It wasn’t for her,” Michael urged. “It was for me. I needed . . . easy. I needed not that bad. I had no idea what I was doing, I acted like Max, I . . .” he shook his head. “Private, I don’t even know who that person was. The only time I felt like myself, like I could actually be myself and still be loved was when I was with you.”

Michael huffed a shaky chuckle, and roughly wiped his face with one hand. “Besides,” he said, “I left that parking lot the next day.” He looked over his shoulder at his airstream as it sat beside Alex’s things, and smiled with such sincerity that Alex hadn’t seen on his face in too long. He looked back at Alex with bright eyes. “But I think this looks good here. Don’t you?”

Alex looked from the airstream to Michael, and he huffed a chuckle. A tear rolled down his cheek, and he sniffed and wiped it away. “I just needed you to show up at my front door.”

Michael laughed, pulling Alex in against him and hugging him tightly. As he buried his face in the crook of Alex’s neck, Alex took his chance to press his face to Michael’s shoulder and inhale his scent.

“I want to do more than show up,” Michael said against his skin. “I want to stay, Alex. I want to stay, please let me stay.”

Alex hugged Michael so closely that nothing could’ve fit between their bodies. He felt Michael’s heart race, Michael’s lips against his neck, Michael whimpering under his breath as he desperately pulled them closer and closer together.

Alex whispered, “Stay, Guerin. I want you to stay.”

***

If you enjoyed reading, even just a little bit, please comment and share/reblog, it always makes the world of a difference ❤

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

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luna-paradoxz · 3 years

Text

How to take care of a tired Qilin.

Summary - When Ganyu is super tired she turns into a small, fluffy and super cute qilin and obviously it is up to Xiao to take care of her.

A/N - You can ready it on FF.net and Ao3. You can support me on Ko-fi or commission me.

Ganyu normally is stable, she can easily control and regulate her forms but there are times when she can't. Today she was tired, very tired, work after the rite of parting had taken a toll on her and when she had finally decided to take rest her body had decided she needs proper rest.

Xiao finds a sleeping qilin under the canopy of trees in Jeyuen Krast where he had come to take care of some work. The small size, the beautiful cold blue fur had given up who the qilin was. He sighed as he shook his head, she had worked herself up to half-death again.

Xiao jumped up to the cliffs and collected the Qingxin flowers that had bloomed there. It took him only 20 mins before he jumped back to where she was and made way to her sleeping form. It has been ages since he has last seen her transform. He sits beside her and carefully starts stroking her very soft fur. She moves then snuggles under his hand and goes back to sleep. For an hour they stay like that, in peace as he enjoys slowly stroking her head and listening to her make small sounds of approval in her sleep.

An hour later her clear pink eyes open and she yawned cutely. She tried to stretch but that was when she noticed a weird thing, her hands were well, not where she expected and felt too small. She blinked her eyes, looked down in surprise, the ground was far too close, her skin was too hot and when she moved her hands she could feel the fur. She took a deep breath and when she looked up, Xiao - who had stopped stroking her fur - stared back at her. His golden eyes met hers and she noticed how big he looked to her right now. She looked down and asked the question she already knew the answer to.

"I turned into my illuminated beast form didn't I?" She sighs as she asks.

He nodded, "You were already changed when I came here." He then crosses his hands, "You should have been careful, you know considering how vulnerable you can be in this form?"

She tries to pout but her mouth is small so it doesn't quite come out the same way still he gets it as he watches her huff cutely "I didn't think I would turn here so suddenly or I would not have come to forests today." She says while looking away and he silently agrees with the voice that says, she is super cute.

He sighs though and instead states "Well today there is some disturbance here, I have cleared it for now but you should go back to the harbour." Ganyu nods, close her eyes and utters the words to change back but when she opens her eyes she is still in her qilin form. With puppy eyes, she looks up to Xiao who shakes his head.

"I have told you when the mind is troubled or tired your body will reflect that." He is scolding her but his voice is kind. She looks down, her little form shaking as she looked like she was going to cry. He looks away feeling a little guilty so he sighs, puts away the issue for now and instead gently picks her up and puts her on his shoulder but that surprises her and she desperately clings to his clothes as she sighs in relief and turns to him pouting.

He explains, "Come on, I will take you to Cloud Retainer, you can take proper rest there." She smiles as she thanks him, he nods at her and asks her to hold him properly. He crunches down and jumps while keeping a gentle hand on her so she doesn't fall off. They jump through the cliffs as he finally reaches the Adeptus abode and stops in front of the long-forgotten stone table. He puts her down on the table where once three sat and took up to call the Adeptus out but no answer was given back to him. He calls out again and then sighs, Ganyu's face falls.

"Looks like she is out." He states the obvious and turns to her while crossing his hands, "What do you want to do now?"

She lets out another cute sigh and takes the forests in, near abode most monsters won't come but who knows how long it will take for Cloud Retainer to come back, at times she would just disappear to try her hand on her new inventions and with no sense of time, she would return days or months later. Surely, she will eventually come back but still, she might as well starve here with no food. She looks up to him, and gives him puppy eyes as she says,

"I can't go back to the harbour, can we head back to your place?" The 'no' was screaming in him but Xiao was not the kind of person who would just leave her here to starve, so, with great conflict (not really), he gave a conflicted sigh and picked her up again and put her on his shoulder. He makes sure she is stable before he moves again. It takes a bit longer but he jumps them down and finally reaches the Washung inn. He heads straight into his room and puts her down on his bed.

She smiles at him, "I am sorry Xiao for the trouble and thank you for helping me."

He silently rolled his eyes and says "I am not going to leave you alone in the wild while you are so weak." She winces but thanks him nonetheless, he sits down near her.

"What do you want to do now?" She looks around to his almost dark room, only lit by a single candle, it was filled with basic furniture and his weapons, nothing more.

She knew that was Xiao's style, she looks up to him and says "I have no work with me so I really have nothing to do right now." He looks down and puts a hand on her head and pushes her gently into the bed.

"Go to sleep, you need that." She looks panicked, not used to resting so much but Xiao glares at her as he lifts his hand and all but commands, "This all happened because you didn't rest, you need to take rest while you can." She whimpers as she nods and with that curls around and lays down, she still stares at him with an eye open and he sighs. He forcefully ignores the screams in his mind about how cute she is and says "I have more work to do so I am leaving, don't leave the room until I am back." He pats her once before he gets up and makes sure the door is closed and goes out and heads to Guili plains to slay more demons. She falls into sleep soon after he leaves as the salty smell of Dihua Marsh fills the room and the chirps of birds just outside. She feels nostalgic for the old centuries and falls into sleep.

He comes back silently as he walks in with airy steps and looks into the darkness to see the qilin sleeping soundly. She was breathing lightly, her mouth open with small snores that he did find cute even if he will never say it out loud. Just like before she was sound asleep so he decided to leave her and headed upstairs to the roof. He sat there below the tree as he looked over Dihua Marsh and took in the wind, he closes his eyes and rests against the bark, slowly examining his wounds today. They were not bad, just a few scratches and bruises so he was sure they will heal up in no time. He watches the clouds drift apart, the silence and the time passing doesn't matter to him. As an Adeptus, he was used to having time pass by him and it did until he came to attention when a certain qilin entered the roof. She looked up to the moon before she looked around trying to find him, it was late in the night so no humans had yet encountered her. As he got up to jump down, a certain manager came in. Ver Goldet came up to the roof, obviously surprised as she took the little Adeptus in, she crouched down and Xiao jumped down in front of them. She looked up and imminently bowed.

"Oh, Xiao-sama I was just checking what was this little animal was doing." She explained, she knew he didn't like it when they encroached on his space.

He turns to the qilin and says "It is ok don't worry she is with me."

The manager was surprised and bowed to the Qilin, she obviously still didn't recognize the secretary and says "Oh, my apologies enlightened Adeptus I didn't mean any rudeness." Ganyu tried to smile as she nods and shakes her head.

"It is quite ok Ver Goldet, and can you get the dinner sent to us in my room?" She nods and takes their order before taking her leave. He turns to her and asks her what she is doing here.

"I noticed you were back so I wanted to check in on you." She looks all over his body, "Are you ok Xiao?" She didn't note any wounds on him. He shakes his head and then turns to the roof and looks at her with an eyebrow raise asking her if she wants to stay here. She nods and he helps her get up the tree barks and they both isolate themselves and get comfortable against the branches. She rubs against the tree and smiles peacefully, the tree feels so alive and healthy.

She then turns out to the marsh and smiled, how beautiful the scene was. Xiao waited for her to fall asleep again, but she had slept quite a lot so she stayed up and stared at the marsh. The past came in flashes as she remembered the past 6 centuries, the war and the people they lost over the years. She remembered the gentle goddess and the Yakshas that lost their lives in a horrible but prideful way. She remembered the adepti that gave their life away for Rex lapis and his building region and the worst thing she remembered was every single day the blood that was spilled by her hands, the blood that still covered her. She turned to Xiao who still suffered because of the war and yet he always seems to take pride in his duties. She wonders how he forgets the blood, the nightmares filled with screams of their victims, she wondered how he forgave his past.

She bites her inner cheek gently as she shakes her head to forget such thoughts. Xiao has lost many people, everyone he got close to has left him, the karma binds him and makes him suffer to this day, she truly can't believe her suffering is more than his. She has it far easier than him she knew. She must stay strong though after all she too was Rex lapis's Adeptus, one of the guardians of Liyue.

She apologises to him silently to think lower of his sufferings before she too let her thoughts go in the wind, they watch the clouds pass until they are called for dinner by the inn lady. She jumps down gracefully and walks alongside him as they walk back to his room and thank her for the dinner. They settle on his simple table as she takes in the small bowl that looks like a cat dish, she pouts as he smirks. She looks up to him and huffs as he chuckles slightly.

"You are the same size as Wei."

She pouts cutely, using all her face muscles and says "You know better than anybody how big Qilins are."

He smirks remembering her illuminated form better than anybody "Well this is the treatment you get when one doesn't take care of oneself."

She whimpers as she agrees with his words. His scolding though was a small jab and he chuckled as he saw her whimpering, Ganyu was far too accepting when people criticized or scolded her, "I have learned my lesson, Xiao." She says as she pouts at him and he gives her a nod while looking away, she was far too cute for her own good.

He eats his almond tofu as she finished her vegetarian albone and he does note it is quite a small portion from what she eats normally, so he lets her finish and then calls out to her and pats a spot on his lap, she jumps and settles down and looks up to him as he half-smiles and scoops little of his almond tofu and offers to her. She looks surprised as she confirms if it's ok, he nods and she slowly nibbles on it. He makes her eat more before he gives her a pat and finishes his own meal.

"You feel better now?" She nods.

She smiles at him, "Thank you for sharing your food, Xiao." He nods and she jumps down as he gets up and puts their plates out as she decides to walk around his room and take it all in. It's the first time she has been inside, after all, it will also probably be the last time too. Everyone knows well Xiao doesn't like anyone in his personal space. She can smell better in this form so she takes in his musky smell, and blushes bright red not that anyone will notice considering her fluffy fur. As she jumps on his storages, he comes back and folds his hands and stares at her with flat eyes.

"What are you investigating Ganyu?" She huffs as she glares at him.

"I was just looking around a bit. I was not poking my nose anywhere."

He gives her another look before he sits down on his bed and picks up his lance and starts cleaning it. She comes near him and settles beside him, as she watches his practised elegant moves as he cleans up his jade lance, they sit there peacefully until he turns and says, "Did you bring your bow?" She nods but since she can't turn back she can't call it out right now. He sighs and instead continues with his lances. The process is calming and she nestles herself on his side as she continues watching his hands. They are quite skilled she notes and blushes when her imagination goes a bit far. She shakes her head in the silence and gets back to watching him. As the calm envelopes her she slowly drifts to slumber without even realising.

He looks down as he finishes his jade lance and sighs, she was asleep again, he wonders truly how long it has been since she has last gotten decent sleep. He slowly pats her head and she unconscious snuggles into it and it makes him slightly blush, his heart once again acting up. It was truly weird feelings, these human emotions that didn't belong to him. He takes away his hand and continues his work, as usual, the Yaksha doesn't sleep but his body does relax as she sleeps at his side. It feels natural, he muses as he works for his hands, it feels so natural to have her on his side. It has been so long since he has spent a whole day with her. It all felt so natural and relaxing and his head has been calm and his pain subdued. This is not the first time he has realised the effect she has on him, they have been fighting by each other side for centuries but this is the first he can fully bathe in that peaceful feeling without having to worry about anything else. He acknowledges the fact that Ganyu was special to him whether he liked it or not she had made herself special to him and now all he can do is to choose whether to act upon the fact or not. He looks down at her, the choice is easy but really hard to make at the same time. He is not a being that deserves happiness and yet it seems destiny doesn't want to play fair to him. Still, he smiles a little, they have time, they always had time so he can make his own choice. He hopes she will wait for him.

The hours pass and as the clock turns 5, a body suddenly appears beside him, snuggling against his shoulder. He does blush as Ganyu, now in her human form decides to still keep snuggling, her hands wound up holding the edges of his shirt as her head naturally fits in the creek of his neck and her body snuggles right up to his shoulder. He takes a deep breath and banishes all the evil thoughts, it was wrong of him to think of Ganyu like that but just like voices they just make themselves heard, his voices laughing maniacally and calling him a beast. He knows that and he should probably detach her, but she looks too comfortable for him to do that and he rationalises she will probably return to work once she is up so he should let her take her rest as much as she can. She already works so hard and as her mentor, the least he can do is make sure she is taking proper rest. So we that reasoning, he lets her nap while taking stolen glances at her and then chiding at himself to act so immorally. It was unbecoming of an Adeptus to act on such basic human desires but he can't hide the heat filling inside him as she keeps snoring on his arm.

His happy times (he will refuse that vehemently) ends when half an hour later Ganyu wakes up and jumps two feet back when she realises the situation. He sighs and schools himself back to his blank look as she blushes wildly and starts apologising. It makes him hurt that she thinks he is some kind of short-fused man, he won't get mad at her for nodding off on him. He doesn't say that as he puts a heavy hand on her head and makes her look up, their eyes meet and all he says.

"Stop apologising."

She nods and he lets her go. He gets up, stretches his muscles, putting away his lances he turns towards her, she definitely looks well-rested. Her skin colour has returned and her muscles don't seem as tense as before. He nods at her and asks her when she is leaving.

"I will probably get breakfast and then head back to the harbour." She bows when he gets up, "Thank you Xiao for letting me stay and rest. I probably would have gotten more tired if I stayed out there."

He sighs and crosses his hands, "Just remember to take rest Ganyu. You work too hard." She sighs in defeat as she nods, "Those humans won't fall apart if you take rest for one day." She nods, as usual he is brash when giving advice, well she is someone who likes that part of him so she can't really say anything. She smiles at him, thanks him and takes her leave. He won't ever admit that he will miss her for the next week while working.

She walks into the Liyue harbour, well-rested and well-fed. The sea breeze greets her morning as the merchants start the day and ships start docking for the day, some greet her and others are too focused to do so. She greets them back and as she walks to Liyue harbour, she stops near the dock area and looks out at the sea, the sea hasn't changed but the city has changed quite a lot. A lot of things have changed in these centuries but some things do remain unchanged she muses as she remembers Xiao, he has remained the same and yet she knows he has changed too, he after all smiled again. She can remember the last time he smiled, it was in the field of glaze lilies beside the gods and Yakshas, their little family back then. Now, she knows he doesn't smile any more but yesterday he had and she hopes she had played a little part in it. She knows these feelings will remain unchanged no matter the centuries and one day she will act upon them, change will come and she can choose to embrace it.

Well, not now though, she knows they can take their time. They have always had plenty of time.

#my writing #genshin impact #xianyu #xiao x ganyu #xiao's birthday gift

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lady-wallace · 2 years

Text

Whumptober Day 27: JJBA

Fugo angst today! This is a pre-series fic when it was just Bruno and Fugo.

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Day 27: I’m Fine. I Prom...

Prompts Used: passing out | vertigo | collapse

Fandom: JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Part 5

Character: Fugo

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~~~~~~~

Fugo shuffled through the last of the documents, making notes, and stacking them neatly to the side for Bucciarati to sign tomorrow—well, actually in about an hour, Fugo realized. He had been working all night long, trying to keep himself distracted. He never slept well—too many nightmares, but there was more to worry about now that he had people counting on him.

While Fugo may have passed Polpo's lighter test, the fact that his Stand was practically unusable had left him feeling somewhat obsolete and useless. Even though Bucciarati assured him that he would eventually get to know his Stand and be better equipped to use it, Fugo could hardly bear to look at the horrific creature, let alone try to figure out what to do with it. Purple Haze reminded him too much of what he felt like, what he truly was on the inside. This horrible, toxic disappointment who ruined everything he touched. He'd warned Bucciarati of that too, but the young man seemed insistent in taking Fugo on despite that.

Which was why Fugo was determined to be useful in some way. He knew Bucciarati had a huge workload, too much for one person, really, and today he'd come back so late from the meeting with Polpo and looked so tired that Fugo had decided to stay up and do the paperwork for him so he wouldn't have to deal with that tomorrow and nothing would be late.

He hadn't realized it would take all night, but it didn't really matter. He actually enjoyed it. It was better this, keeping his mind busy, than lying in bed plagued by nightmares that made him feel like he wanted to claw his skin off.

So, when Bucciarati stumbled out of bed, rubbing his eyes to try and pretend to be awake, Fugo had already made tea and coffee for them, figuring he might as well stay up the rest of the time.

"You finished all of this?" Bucciarati asked, bewildered as he looked at the considerable stack of papers on his desk.

"Yes," Fugo replied. "They are only awaiting your signature. I took notes on everything and I'll share that with you over breakfast if you would like so you don't have to read through them yourself."

Bucciarati looked completely shocked, but he gave Fugo a grateful smile. "You have no idea how helpful this is, Fugo. Thank you."

Fugo ducked his head but felt a warm, unfamiliar something shifting in his chest. Praise. For something he did purposefully to help someone. Someone that he genuinely looked up to. This was new. And Fugo decided he didn't mind the feeling.

However, he wasn't so stupid as to think it would last. He was sure that Bucciarati would only start to expect more and more of him until eventually nothing would be good enough. That was how it always went. But that was okay. Fugo was used to that and until that time, he would enjoy the feeling while it lasted.

XXX

"Fugo, could you please run an errand for me?" Bucciarati asked.

Fugo looked up, slightly groggy from a terrible night's sleep. Well, 'sleep' was perhaps inaccurate as he hadn't done much of that, getting up to work in the office halfway through the night after only horrid nightmares plagued him.

But he was always willing to do something when Bucciarati asked.

"Of course," he said.

"Thank you, I need you to take these to Signore Gallo. You know where his business is?"

Fugo nodded, and took the letters. He would have to go to the other side of town for this, but it was fine. These days, he was looking for anything to distract him—and distract Bucciarati from getting him to train with his Stand. Just the thought of looking at it made him want to vomit.

He delivered the letters and by that time it was around noon. His stomach growled sickly. He realized then that he had missed breakfast, having only a cup of tea, and he hadn't actually eaten that much the night before either. Fugo couldn't recall how many meals he'd missed within the last couple weeks. Certainly, with all the things he and Bucciarati had to do, it was rare they got to sit down for three meals a day, but Fugo had missed more considering his eagerness to work, or, on his worse days, his hiding away in his room at night when everything was done. On those nights, Bucciarati always left him a plate of food, but he always forgot about it the next day.

In the back of his mind, he knew this wasn't sustainable behavior, but he didn't know how to correct it, and, frankly, he didn't have time.

He promised himself he would eat something when he got back to the apartment.

Unfortunately, the second he was back, Bucciarati was already heading out the door, looking grim.

"What happened?" Fugo asked.

"There's a couple people who didn't pay protection this month. Polpo asked me to go make sure they do."

Fugo swallowed hard, knowing well enough what that meant. He'd gone on one of these missions before, and had been somewhat shocked at the cold interior Bucciarati possessed when he needed it, seeming far more seasoned than his young age would imply.

"You don't have to come," Bucciarati told him then, more quietly.

But Fugo blanched. "No! You'll need backup. This is part of the job, right?"

Bucciarati gave him a look Fugo couldn't quite read, but he nodded and the two of them left without a word, climbing into the car they were using currently.

The first one thankfully went without a hitch, the man simply handing over the money, claiming he had forgotten what time of the month it was. The second one though, did not take as kindly to them showing up, or to Bucciarati's threats.

"If Polpo thinks he can send a whelp and an actual child here to shake me down, he can climb his fat ass over here himself," the man growled.

Fugo bristled, but Bucciarati stepped into the man's personal space, eyes dark.

"Signore, I would suggest you do not insult my capo. Moreover, I am here in his place, and because of that I carry his authority. You should be grateful that he allows you to pay protection. I don't think you would like to find out what would happen if you didn't."

"I don't have the damn money," the man snarled. "Come back next week."

"I'm afraid I cannot do that," Bucciarati said. "Pay now, or lose Polpo's business."

"Good riddance," the man spat.

"I will pass on your message then. Enjoy your business for as long as it lasts."

They turned and left, but Fugo heard a shift behind them.

"Hold on a second."

Something grabbed for him, a hand snagging the back of his coat, and Fugo froze, horrid memories surfacing, ones he tried so, so hard to push down.

Purple Haze burst out with a wretched scream and Fugo watched Bucciarati stagger back from reaching out to help Fugo, eyes wide with shock.

The man screamed, the sound soon becoming garbled as Purple Haze grabbed him around the throat and infected him with the toxin. Fugo could only watch as the man melted before his eyes into a horrid puddle.

Fugo was breathing heavily, trying to even fathom what he did.

"Fugo," he heard Bucciarati's calm voice through the pounding in his ears.

He took another shuddering breath, dizziness suddenly assaulting him as he swayed on his feet.

Purple Haze thankfully vanished, and Fugo felt like something had released its hold on him. If it wasn't for the fact that he knew it had just been his own Stand, he probably would have thought he was possessed.

"Fugo? Let's get outside," Bucciarati said, still calm, opening the door.

Fugo took another deep breath and turned, slowly moving toward the door as if he were under water.

Bucciarati had already pulled out his phone and was calling someone, probably for a clean-up. Fugo just stood there, still not knowing what to do, his hands were shaking, he felt sick and light-headed.

"Thank you," Bucciarati said and slipped his phone back into his pocket. "Fugo, we need to go report this to Polpo before he hears it from someone else. You understand?"

Fugo felt the nausea cramp his stomach as he realized exactly what he had done. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…"

"No, he attacked you first. You did what was expected," Bucciarati assured him.

But Fugo was shaking his head, still trying to figure out where he was. Bucciarati didn't approach him, but he did duck his head slightly to get a better look at his face. "Are you okay? Fugo?"

"I—I'm fine," Fugo said, but his voice was weak and he was feeling light-headed again. Another wave of dizziness crashed over him and he swayed.

"Fugo!"

Bucciarati's worried voice was the last thing he had heard before he felt himself falling, a hard impact slamming him into the darkness completely.

XXX

Fugo woke to someone pressing something to his forehead and then felt fingers removing his tie and loosening his collar.

Terror spiked through him and he reached up, grabbing the wrist attached to the hand, eyes flying open.

"It's all right, it's just me, just Bruno," Bucciarati's voice filtered in, despite the fact that Fugo's sight was swimming until he blinked and got a breath in. "I'm just making sure you can breathe."

Fugo took a shuddering breath and finally his eyes cleared, seeing they were back in the apartment. He was lying on the couch and Bucciarati was kneeling beside it, a wet cloth held in one hand.

"What…?" he murmured, trying to recall what happened.

"You passed out after Purple Haze took out that man," Bucciarati told him, reaching out to lay the cloth over Fugo's forehead again, the cool feeling helping to ease some of the headache pounding behind his eyes. "Was it very overwhelming to summon your Stand or, was it…everything else?"

"I…I don't know," Fugo swallowed hard, not wanting to talk about it.

Bucciarati reached for a glass of water and helped prop Fugo's head up to drink. He gulped down the water, realizing then just how thirsty he was.

"Easy," Bucciarati said. "You might make yourself sick."

Fugo's stomach gurgled and he flushed in embarrassment, pressing a hand over his belly, hoping to quell the nausea.

"Are you hungry?" Bucciarati asked with his eyebrows pinched. "You didn't eat anything today, did you?"

Fugo glanced away, but shook his head.

"Did you eat last night?"

"A little," Fugo murmured.

Bucciarati sat back on his heels. "I have noticed that sometimes you don't eat the food I leave for you. Are you eating much at all, Fugo? Because, if I'm being honest, you're looking a little thin. I couldn't help but notice that when I carried you in here."

Fugo didn't know what to say. This was such a stupid conversation that they really shouldn't've had to have. He should know that he needs to eat.

And yet…he had been neglecting that. As well as sleep. It's no wonder a little adrenaline had sent him over the edge.

Bucciarati silently got up and returned a few moments later with a bowl of heated up soup and crackers.

"You might not feel up to eating, but you need to try to get something into your stomach," he insisted.

Fugo pushed himself into a sitting position, mostly not dizzy anymore. He carefully wrapped his hands around the bowl and drank some of the broth. It was hard at first, but after a few sips, his stomach got used to having food in it and by the time he was done, he was warm and felt better.

Bucciarati sat on the coffee table. "I know I forget sometimes too. I have a bad habit of getting busy, not sleeping—I think we're both a lot like that." He smiled wryly. "But just because we have a lot of work, doesn't mean we need to run ourselves into the ground. While it's still only the two of us, let's share the work equally. That means no more working through the night. For either of us."

"I know, I just…I want to be useful," Fugo admitted tiredly.

"Fugo," Bucciarati told him firmly. "You do not have to earn your keep here with me. I value your intelligence above all else. You help me every day just by being here. Take your time to learn about your Stand and if anyone pushes you to do differently, I will have a word with them personally."

Fugo felt that swell of warm gratitude wash through him again and this time, he didn't allow himself to be jaded about it. Bucciarati was not like his parents. Not like everyone else who expected everything from him and when he gave it, only wanted more. He had never had a real friend before, but he thought he could call Bucciarati that. He had a feeling that Bucciarati would never expect more from him than he knew he could give. There was a reason he was the only person in the world who made Fugo feel safe.

"Thank you," he found himself saying sincerely.

"Of course, Pannacotta," Bucciarati said softly, using his given name.

Fugo promised himself then that he would do better. Better by himself, and in that way, he would also be able to do better by Bucciarati.

#whumptober2021 #no.27 #i'm fine i prom...#passing out #vertigo #collapse #jojo's bizarre adventure #jjba part 5 #vento aureo #fanfiction #pannacotta fugo #bruno bucciarati #poor sleeping and eating habits #angst #hurt/comfort #fugo whump #parental bucciarati

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let-it-raines · 3 years

Text

I Hope We Never See October (3/?)

When his personal life and football career go up in flames, Killian Jones escapes England for America, finding seclusion in Martha’s Vineyard in order to hide from his demons. It’s a fresh start, or at the very least a paused moment in his life, and all he needs is a few months alone to allow his heart to heal. He doesn’t count on meeting Emma Swan.

Emma’s life depends on tourists who come to the island every summer. It’s how she makes her money working in restaurants and clubs across the vineyard, but every year, she cannot wait until autumn comes and her life returns to normal. She especially cannot wait for Killian Jones to leave.

Rating: Mature

a/n: Not gonna lie, I forget I'm writing this story, remember, and then the moment I sit down to write, I get called away. But here's part three!

AO3: Beginning | Current

Tumblr: One | Two | Three

-/-

His head is pounding. It’s been awhile since it has pounded like this. Usually, it’s from a lack of sleep from the nightmares or the stress. This morning, he knows it’s from the rum. He did everything he could to cancel it out – coffee, water, food, medicine – but his head is still pounding. He is a bloody lightweight now.

Huh.

Killian is making it sound like that’s a bad thing, when really, it’s good. A week ago he was standing with a beer bottle in his hand early in the morning tempted to drown his entire day away. Last night, he made it the entire day without wanting to get pissed and only had two small drinks to toast his friends goodbye.

That’s progress.

This hangover, though, damn. It’s a sign he’s making progress, but damn.

Or he’s simply getting old, which is something else he doesn’t want to think about.

“Fuck,” Killian moans, pressing his fingers against his temples as he opens his eyes. His neck is also killing him, probably from how he slept on this damn couch all night. He should have driven home, but he didn’t trust himself to. Besides, Ariel had offered the couch before she went to bed.

Emma had too.

He’d nearly left after she offered. She was likely only doing it because she assumed Ariel or Eric already offered. He gets the feeling the woman doesn’t like him, which usually isn’t something that happens with him, and that intrigues him. It also makes him realize how much of an asshole he is.

How has he gotten to a point in his life where he expects women to always fancy his company?

Killian sits up, his muscles aching, and slowly, he rises from the couch. The lights in the house are all off, and he knows he can leave now with no one knowing the wiser that he slept over, that he felt bad enough to not be able to drive home. Or maybe that he didn’t want to spend another night in that giant house by himself.

The floor creaks beneath him with each step he takes, but no one seems to stir. Killian finds a notepad and pen in the kitchen and quickly scribbles a note to Ariel and Eric. He said his goodbyes to them last night, and he’ll talk to them on the phone at some point today. He doesn’t need to stick around to say another goodbye this morning. It’s still early enough that the sun hasn’t risen, and they won’t be up for hours. Killian finishes his note, grabs his wallet and keys from the counter, and heads out the front door to his car. It takes him a moment to find his car, to remember what said of the road they drive on over here, but he eventually spots it across the street under a large tree when a light from the house turns on.

Killian turns to see it’s coming from an upstairs window, and Emma Swan is standing between the curtains. He nods, and he swears he sees the slightest nod in return before the curtains rustle and she turns off the light.

She didn’t get in until two this morning, and she’s up at six. How the hell is she functioning?

Then again, how is he functioning?

Killian’s phone buzzes in his pocket, and after he gets in his Jeep, he checks the message.

Elsa Jones: The girls say thank you for their new Leggo set. My bare feet do not.

Killian laughs and puts his phone back in his pocket. That’s how he’s functioning. He may have flown across an ocean, but he’d never leave Ally and Sophia. They’ve already lost enough, and Liam will have his head, someway and somehow, if he doesn’t do everything he can to make sure all his girls are happy.

To make sure Killian is happy too.

“Bloody hell,” Killian whispers to himself as he cranks the engine, “it’s too early to be thinking like this.”

He should be able to have at least a little reprieve from the voices in his head.

-/-

Killian doesn’t leave the house much over the next few days. He doesn’t have reason to. He’s got everything he could possibly need in the house, including his own private stretch of beach that he walks along a few times a day, but the repetition of nothing begins to drive him mad. He trains in almost the same way as he did when he was playing, and while that takes up a good portion of his day, it’s not enough to keep him occupied. He reads the books that the owners of the house left behind but finds it’s mostly romance novels he can’t stomach. For a day or two, he binges Netflix, leaving a permanent imprint of his ass in the couch cushions, but there’s only so much time he can spend staring at screens.

Elsa and the girls call more than once a day with them being on summer holidays, and he gets a call or two from Scarlet, who finally had the bullocks to ask Belle out to dinner. That was good to hear since Killian has been giving Will shit about doing that for years now, and it’s good to see that people are moving on with their lives.

He’s not, not really, but he’s not trying to move on so much as he’s trying to not be a total disaster every day.

Sitting in this house alone all day every day isn’t helping. Why did anyone think sending him to be alone would be a good idea in the wake of his brother’s death? He knows it’s more so the scum English tabloids would leave him alone and he could fix his public image so he doesn’t go broke before he’s forty from loss of sponsorships and possible opportunities to get involved in the league, but damn, this was a bad idea.

At least he’s not drinking himself to sleep anymore.

Or drinking himself awake. He thinks that feat is slightly more impressive.

Killian puts his bottle of water down and opens the door that leads to the deck. It’s cool out today, the sun hidden behind the clouds, and since he cannot stay here anymore, he decides he’ll go for a run. It’s been years since he ran outside and not on a pitch or a treadmill, but maybe it’ll be a good distraction. He’s noticed more people filling into the houses around him, the summer tourists showing up in large droves now, so at the very least he can pass time watching people while hoping no one watches him.

It takes him little time to get dressed, lace up his trainers, and pop headphones in his ears before he’s out the door. The roads aren’t flat around his house, so he drives the Jeep a few miles until he finds smoother, less crowded ground. Maybe it’s a way to keep him from running that little bit longer, but mostly he knows his knees need the flat surfaces right now.

He really has gotten old, hasn’t he?

Eventually, he finds what looks like a good path behind a long stretch of beach, finds a place to park, and then he starts running.

It’s horrible, which was expected, but he does it anyway. There are families lining the beaches, music playing from speakers and phones, and he watches as boats skip out on the water. Maybe he should rent a boat for a weekend and take it out. It’d be nice to be out on the water again. He hasn’t been since Liam’s death, the fear of something similar happening to him despite the unlikeliness, but maybe one day while he’s here. It’s not as if he has anything better to do.

Killian runs until the endorphins kick in and then again until his legs get tired. He’s an idiot, however, because he doesn’t think to turn around to his Jeep.

Bloody hell.

He stops and reaches his hands over his head, stretching out his shoulders, and looks to see what’s around him. It’s mostly beach, but there are several restaurants and shops a few blocks down. He notices the familiar Blue Dog Tavern sign and the long deck filled with their outside seating. That means he’s minutes away from a populated area of shops and restaurants where he could cool down and catch his breath, but he still walks toward the Blue Dog. There’s another diner around here he went to that was horrible, and he doesn’t feel like taking the chance again. He’s still over his phase of twenty-four-hour diners. He doesn’t think he can handle more sticky tables.

Killian cools down on the walk to the restaurant, taking in the people walking along the sidewalk, and he dodges them until he’s inside and the cool air is hitting against his skin. It’s past the prime of the lunch rush, so the place is mostly empty. He thinks of going to the bar again, but as he wants to stay as out of the way as possible, he asks the hostess to seat him at a booth in the corner.

“Is someone coming to meet you?” she asks, smacking her gum as she hands him a menu.

“I’m afraid not. Just me today.”

She smiles, popping her gum again, and leans forward, casually popping a button on her shirt. Killian tries not to snicker at the obvious attempt, mostly because she is attractive, but the last thing he needs is to burn more bridges at one of the few places in towns he likes. “Well, if you want company, all you have to do is come find me. I’m Marina.”

He raises his brow. “Seems like you were born to work by the ocean then.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because your name is Marina.”

She cocks her head to the side and laughs. “What do you mean?”

“Nothing, love.” Killian smiles and nods toward the front. “I believe you’re needed.”

She jumps and walks away, obviously putting a little sway in her hips when she moves, and in another life, he’d ask her to join him for lunch and meet her after her shift. He nearly does it now, but the man he’s been and the man he’s trying to be war with each other in his mind.

No burning bridges, he reminds himself. He’s done enough of that in his lifetime.

He orders water and coffee and avoids eye contact with Marina as much as possible, especially when she keeps finding ways to come by his table despite there being no other customers in his section. He texts Will and Rob, sends Elsa some pictures of the beach to show the girls, responds to Ariel about him doing another video conference with a hospital back home, and then he puts his phone away and tries to focus on his meal.

Unsurprisingly, it does not take a hell of a lot of focus to eat a sandwich and chips.

The music coming over the intercoms keeps him occupied for awhile, so does the television hanging over the bar until someone changes it to ESPN, and eventually Killian starts fidgeting for headphones and something to do while he waits for his meal to settle and drinks another cup of coffee. He needs to start the trek back to his Jeep, but that’s the last thing he wants to do.

“Heather, I get that you don’t want to be here, but your uncle and your parents want you here. And you either need to take it up with them or start doing some actual work.”

Killian recognizes that voice, and he sinks in his booth. He was hoping to get away with not running into her here today, if only to save himself the headache. He doesn’t have any paper money on hand, so he can’t pay and leave, and he imagines there’s very little chance he’ll avoid her when she’s walking right toward him with Heather, his server from last week.

She’s in those bloody jean shorts again. They barely cover anything and hug her ass to show it off, and the blouse she’s wearing is fitted to her skin. Her hair is down, hitting past midway on her back, and she looks just as gorgeous as she has every other time he’s seen her…which is exactly why he needs her to not notice him.

So, of course, she does.

Right after she teaches Heather how to clean the tables, she looks up and over at Killian, raises both brows, and walks toward him with her arms crossed beneath her chest. “Anything I can help you with today?”

“The check may be nice, Swan. Lovely to see you again.”

“Uh-huh.” She looks over her shoulder, holds up a signal toward Killian’s server, and he hustles to the back, presumably to get the check. “I can recommend other restaurants in the area. This place is great, but I promise there are better ones.”

He shrugs. “I like the food and how calm it is during off hours. Are you enjoying your house with no Fishers in it?”

“I don’t mind when they come to stay.”

It’s a lie if he’s ever heard one. Killian points to his temple and taps. “I know this may surprise you, but I’m actually quite perceptive.”

Her smile is tight, and she tucks her hair behind her ears. “The Fishers are great landlords, and I can’t complain.”

“I’m not going to tell them what you’re saying, love.”

She smiles again, and he can tell she’s still faking it for him. “All I can say is I’m glad not to have strange men scaring me in my kitchen at two in the morning. Now they simply show up at my work.”

He lifts his glass. “It’s good food, and you’re right, I don’t know of many other reliable eateries around here. Some of them seem a little too…made for tourists.”

“And the Blue Dog Tavern doesn’t? I mean, come on. We have a giant blue animated dog cutout outside. We’re on all those lists of ‘Places in Martha’s Vineyard you have to visit.’ We’re made for tourists like you.”

“I am not a tourist.”

“Says the man who is renting one of the big houses out in Edgartown and staying here for the summer. I’m guessing you go to the beach and lounge around the pool and go through way too many of the bad books the owners of the house have on their shelves.”

Killian huffs and crosses his arms over his chest, leaning back in the booth. That was a little too spot on. “How do you know where I’m staying? Wait, no. Ariel, right?”

“Yeah,” Emma smiles, and God, it feels like a hell of an accomplishment to get her to smile. “She went on and on about the great Killian Jones.”

“Ah, so you know who I am then?” He leans forward and waggles his brows, flashing his brightest smile.

“Yeah, a rich British tourist who is friends with my landlords.” Someone calls her name from across the restaurant, and Emma holds one finger up. “Your check will be with you soon. I’ll ask Marina to give you some other restaurant recommendations on your way out. You’ll get sick of this place soon enough.”

“I’m perfectly happy with it, Swan.”

She shrugs and walks away, and Killian chuckles to himself. He doesn’t understand this woman at all, but she intrigues him.

He knows that’s a dangerous game to play.

Killian gets the check, pays it, and before he can escape, Marina corners him to give him more recommendations. She ends up veering into bars and clubs on the island and the surrounding towns, asking him if he wants her to show him around, but he declines and takes the list of places. Maybe he’ll check them out, but the last thing he needs is to go to a club. A bar, maybe, but not a club. He’s learned that there’s a hell of a difference.

He’s also learned that he’s bored to tears in this place, and no amount of calls to Ariel and Elsa can solve that boredom. He finds himself googling pre-season training information, checking up on mates and rivals, and while that’s a bit of a slip-up, he does manage to still stay away from looking himself up. He never used to have the urge to google himself or to read any of the tabloids, but ever since his retirement, he’s been curious. Were people sad? Happy? Did he leave any kind of lasting impact? Or did they all just see him as the drunk, washed up old man with a dirtied past?

That is a path he absolutely cannot go down, and since he’s already run a half marathon today, he decides to shower and get dressed to go to one of the places Marina recommended. If his time alone doesn’t start to get less depressing, he thinks he’s going to have to fly back to London and bother Elsa and the girls until they kick him out. He’ll pay for the remaining time on the house, but he won’t be staying there.

While the sun sets, Killian drives down new roads on the island, going to different towns and neighborhoods to see what others are doing, before ending up at a bar near his house. Marina said it was a spot for locals with good food and a quiet energy, so he doubts Marina has ever stepped foot into it. Killian pushes open the old oak door, and the lights inside are dimmed, the music quiet. There’s a guy playing guitar in the corner hidden between two pillars, and Killian finds himself sitting at the opposite end of the bar on a stool that’s cushion squeaks when he sits down.

Charming.

“You eating, drinking, or both?” The bartender asks, wiping his hands off with a cloth.

“Eating. Have any recommendations?”

“You have an objection to seafood?” the old man asks.

“Not a one.”

“Good. I’ll fix you up with the daily catch.”

Killian nods as the man makes his way through a door behind the bar, and then Killian swivels on his stool, looking around the place. He doesn’t know about the food yet, but Marina was right. It definitely has a quiet energy to it. There are people in nearly every booth and at every table, but there’s a hushed tone except for a laugh in the booth nearest him. His eyes are drawn there, and to both his surprise and horror, he finds Emma Swan with her head tilted back with laughter.

Fuck.

She’s definitely going to think he’s stalking her, and as hungry and bored as he is, he’s still tempted to leave. So of course, that’s when Emma stops laughing and looks directly at him.

Bollocks. Utter bollocks.

She blinks and stares at him a little longer, her brows raising before falling, and then she turns back to whoever is sitting in the booth with her. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see her arms moving, but he turns on the stool until he can see her no longer, wishing at the very least he had a water to nurse.

“Hiya. Come sit in our booth with us.”

Killian twists and looks at the brunette who’s now sitting next to him. “Pardon?”

She sticks out her hand, and he takes it, shaking it. “Ruby Lucas. You’re Killian Jones, the – ”

“There’s no need to – ”

“ – the guy who scared Emma half to death at her house in the middle of the night,” Ruby completes, grinning like the cat who ate the canary. “And I must say, you are much more attractive than she described.”

“So she talked about me then?”

“In her own special Emma way.” Ruby tilts her head back toward their booth. “And in my own special Ruby way, I’m inviting you to eat dinner with us. It’s me, Emma, and this super wholesome woman named Mary Margaret who will take you home and bake you cookies while asking you about your childhood because she had a good one of those.”

Killian chuckles, cheeks still flushed from him thinking Ruby knew who he was earlier – he is a pompous, entitled ass obviously – and from being invited to their table. “I couldn’t intrude.”

“I insist that you do.”

He likes her, he decides. She’s stunning and funny with no filter, but she reminds him too much of a dirtier version of Anna. It’s a rather peculiar comparison, but it’s true. It’s also half the reason he agrees to switch tables, rising from his stool and walking toward the booth. The other half a reason is the blonde woman with her face pressed into her forearms against the table top.

She looks beyond thrilled for him to be joining them.

“Oh, Emma, you were right, he is handsome!”

Emma bangs her head into the table as who he presumes is Mary Margaret smiles at him from across the booth. Killian slides onto the seat and elbows Emma’s side before patting her shoulder. “It’s alright, darling. I told all my mates you were beautiful, so we’re even.”

“Go to hell.”

He laughs, grinning at her, and slowly, she peels herself off the table. “Just so you know, I’m only here because Marina recommended it.”

“Remind me to fire her in the morning.”

“So,” Mary Margaret interrupts, tucking her short hair behind her ear, “tell us about yourself, Killian. Where are you from? What do you do for work? How long are you planning on being here?”

“Good God, Marg,” Emma sighs, slumping down, “give the man some room to breathe.”

“What? I’m curious.”

“You’re nosy is what you are,” Emma corrects.

“Aren’t we all?” Killian shuffles in his seat, hoping they move on to another subject, but when Mary Margaret turns to him, he knows she isn’t one to forget. “So, how long are you staying?”

“I have the keys to the house I’m renting until the first of October, but I imagine I’ll leave sooner.”

“And why’s that?” she asks.

Killian shrugs as the man behind the bar drops off a glass of water at the table and tells Killian his food will be ready in ten minutes. “I’m afraid no matter how nice it is here, I don’t know many people. I miss the people I’m closest to. A man can only spend so much time alone.”

“Then why’d you book a house for so long?”

“I needed to get away.”

“Yeah, but – ”

“Marg,” Emma interrupts, placing her hand over her friend’s, “please. You don’t have to know everything about him. Not everyone wants to reveal their entire life to complete strangers.”

She’s right. He doesn’t. But for some inane reason, he doesn’t think he’d mind revealing most of his life to her.

He has obviously lost his damn mind.

But it’s nice to spend a night with other people, to be included in the conversation, and while Mary Margaret and Ruby are delightful, he finds Emma captures his attention, not that this surprises him.

What does surprise him, however, is how much friendlier she is in this environment. He knows it’s her friends and not him, and maybe the glass of wine she had with dinner, but it’s nice to see her laugh freely and blush when Ruby tells stories of Emma he cannot imagine knowing otherwise. He can’t imagine Emma ever scaling a building to break into an ex’s apartment to get her favorite sweater back, but then again, that seems exactly like something she would do if she wanted it badly enough.

He fancies her.

He has no business fancying her, none at all, but when he ends up driving all three women to their homes because Ruby and Mary Margaret had too much to drink and Emma can’t drive the stick shift in Ruby’s car, he accepts Emma’s invitation inside for a cup of coffee.

He also accepts her invitation upstairs into her bed.

To hell with the consequences and burning bridges. He’ll deal with those in the morning when he isn’t so enticed by the trail of freckles running down Emma’s bare stomach.

-/-

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#I hope we never see october #cs fic #cs ff #cs fanfic #cs fanfiction #captain swan ff #captain swan fic #captain swan fanfic #captain swan fanfiction #captain swan

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angstysebfan · 3 years

Text

What’s Done is Done - Part 3

Pairing: Bucky x reader

Requested by: @joannie95

Your lung had collapsed and you lost a lot of blood, but after examination with Dr. Cho, you were said to make a full recovery. Bucky never felt such relief. Feeling like he was going to lose you, made him realize what a terrible, toxic, asshole he was. Every decision he made when it came to you, over the last several months, were all based on fear. You almost died on that one mission, which made him push you away... and yet here you are. He didn’t save you anyway, but caused you more hurt. He hated himself for it and wondered if there was even a chance for him to get you back.

He sat outside your medbay door, contemplating whether he should go in. The whole team went in when you woke up, but he was too scared. Steve smacked him upside the head telling him fear is his worst trait. It made Bucky think. All he thinks about is fear to the point it has become a huge part of him. He tries to fix things, or do certain actions based on his fear and they never turn out right. He decided that he will no longer let fear drive him.

He stands and walks up to your door and takes a deep breath. He opens the door to see a man sitting next to your bed, holding your hand as you slept. When did Tommy slip passed him? Tommy turned at the sound of the door and looked at Bucky, “She just fell asleep. I’ll tell her you came by,” he said before turning back toward you. Bucky looks at you for a moment before leaving the room. He totally forgot about your boyfriend.

You woke up to feel someone holding your hand. You remember Tommy being there, and figured it was him. When you opened your eyes you were surprised to not see Tommy, but Bucky sitting there holding your hand. He didn’t seem to notice you woke up as he sniffed some tears away, rubbing his thumb against your knuckles. You can’t help the electricity that stems from that action through your body.

Bucky looks up and sees your eyes on him and stops the movement of his thumb. “Uh.. S-sorry,” he says putting your hand down. “What are you doing here?” you ask softly. Bucky sniffs as he feels the tears starting to build already, “I... uh... I had to make sure you were okay,” he says looking at the ground.

Your heart starts to pound, “I didn’t think you cared anymore,” you say, making Bucky’s eyes snap to yours. Bucky opens and closes his mouth for a second before choking on a sob. He leans forward covering his face and allows himself to just cry while you look on in shock. You have seen Bucky cry a few times in your relationship, but you know he considers this a sign of weakness, so to see him so openly sob is... concerning.

“I... I...” he stutters as he tries to catch his breath. You say nothing and just watch as he completely falls apart in front of you. Finally when you can bear it no more, you grab his metal hand making him look up at you. “Why are you crying?” you ask. Bucky looks at you, his blue eyes look more prominent with tears and redness. “You could have died... and you don’t know... you don’t know how much I wish I could take it back,” he says with a shaky voice.

You furrow your brows, “Take what back?” you ask. Bucky sighs, finally reigning his emotions and drops his shoulders in defeat. “I hurt you. I... I broke your heart, but I... I still love you,” he says. Your eye brows shoot up in surprise. “I know. But can I... Can I explain? I know it probably won’t make a difference, but I want you to know. Please?” he asks. You stare at him for a moment before nodding and sitting back.

“Ok... um... Do you remember that mission a few months ago when HYDRA managed to grab you?” he asked. You gulp as you remember the fear you felt and nodded. “Even though we managed to get you back, and though hurt, you were alive... I... I went nuts,” he says. “I kept blaming myself for your capture. That they found out you were special to me and grabbed you,” he says.

You open your mouth to respond, but Bucky cuts you off, “I know it’s stupid. Steve tried to talk me down, but the fear just overtook me. I started to have nightmares every night after that. Thankfully I never hurt you, but I was terrified that I would snap out of a nightmare with you dead beside me. I tried to create some distance between us, but you... you were like a flame and I was the moth. I couldn’t understand why someone as amazing as you, would want to be with me,” he says.

He laughs, “You deserve fucking prince charming, but you got stuck with the Winter Soldier. I’m not good enough to shine your damn shoes, let alone date you. I had been fooling myself that I could be with you. I asked Sam’s permission to marry you, and bought a damn ring! I needed you like I need air,” he says shaking his hand. “But when that damn mission happened it was like the glass shattered and I finally saw the reality. So... that night when I was sitting in the kitchen I was planning how I was going to break up with you, as much as I didn’t want to. But, when you came in to console me, I almost lost my nerve.”

“I... I knew that if I didn’t do it now, I would never do it, so I said those... horrible lies to you. I wanted to die seeing that look in your eyes. When you walked out I knew what you were doing. You were giving me space to think, hoping I would change my mind, which is why I packed your stuff, while sobbing, and locked you out. I... I couldn’t face you again. You needed better than me!” he said.

You sat up, “I needed you! Damnit Bucky! You don’t have the right to decide what is best for me. Who I deserve! I do! You just made that decision because you were scared, but you hurt me worse than HYDRA could! And you paraded those women around in front of me... why?” you ask, tears falling down your cheeks.

“I... I wanted you to keep your distance. I didn’t want you to fight for me. I hated doing it to you, not that it makes it better, but I did,” he said in desperation. You scoff, “Yea, I’m sure sleeping with multiple women was a burden,” you said looking away from him in disgust. “It... it was. Half the time the only way to make it through was thinking of you,” he said. “Ugh, seriously Bucky, I don’t need to hear that,” you snap.

Bucky looks at the ground, knowing it wasn’t going the way he had hoped. “Y/N... if I could change one thing in my life... it would be hurting you. I was clouded by fear, but I know now I can’t let fear decide things for me. I’m so unbelievably sorry. I... I just wanted you to know,” he said standing. You look at him, “Well I appreciate it, but it changes nothing,” you say.

Bucky nods and walks out of the room. You let out the sob you were holding in once the door closes. You knew it was something stupid that made him do this! You knew he was afraid of something! But what kind of person are you who just forgives him when he apologizes? You are not a push over!

Just then the door opens and in walks Tommy. He sees your face and runs to your bed. “Y/N? Are you alright? Are you feeling pain?” he asks. You smile at him, “I’m ok. Just found out some things today that has my mind spinning,” you reply. Tommy lets out the breath he was holding in relief and sits next to you.

“So how are you feeling?” he asks. You nod, “Honestly not bad. This is nothing compared to the last time I got seriously hurt on a mission,” you say with a laugh. “Oh so you get hurt often?” he asks. “No... not often, but I mean my job is dangerous,” you say. “Well the doctor told me that you will need a few weeks rest, so that’s good,” he says.

“Yeah, but I will do my best to keep it short. I hate not going out on missions,” you say watching Tommy’s reaction. He pales at your statement, “I mean... uh... you aren’t going to want to do missions always right? You want to get married and have a family?” he asks. You stare at him, “Well yea, but why do I need to stop missions for get married and have a family?” you ask.

“Well... I don’t know. I didn’t think you would want to put yourself in danger if you know you a family at home,” he says with a shrug. “I... didn’t realize my job bothered you so much,” you say. He shrugs, “I mean this kind of opened my eyes,” he says.

You nodded in understanding. “Listen... I like you Tommy. You have been amazing, but if my job is going to be an issue, then maybe we need to call this what it is,” you say. Tommy looks at you wide eyed, “I mean we have only been dating a short time, and again you’re great, but I’m not giving up my job. And honestly... I think I jumped into this relationship too early,” you say.

“It’s that Sergeant Barnes right?” he asks. “I..” “Y/N, it’s ok. I knew immediately that there was something between you too. He is the one that hurt you though, right?” he asks. You nod silently, “He just told me everything before you came in. I... I can’t forgive him for what he did. He hurt me so badly,” you say looking at your hands.

“Well, take some time... the answer will be clear eventually,” he says standing. “I would like for us to be friends, if you are ok with that?” he says. You smile and nod as he leans in to give you a kiss on the cheek. “I would love nothing more,” you say. “Well let me know when you can leave and I’ll make sure I’m here to help you,” he says. You laugh, “Thanks.”

Tommy gives you a wave goodbye and heads out the door. You look out the window thinking about everything that has transpired over the last hour. Your head hurt thinking about it, honestly. You’re glad Tommy took the break up well. You had not been feeling the relationship for a little while and knew that it wasn’t going to last. Whether if you and Bucky had that conversation today or not.

Now Bucky it a whole other story. You had way too much to process when it comes to him. You didn’t want to deal with it all right now. You felt the tears come to your eyes again. You had to admit it though, it was nice to know he still loved you, but god did a part of you hate him.

Decided to make this a 4 parter after all. Not sure how I feel about this part... what do you think?

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quazartranslates · 3 years

Text

Welcome to the Nightmare Game II - CH48

**This is an edited machine translation. For more information, please [click here]**

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Chapter 48: Star Death Reality Show (XXXI) {cw: misgendering}

"Will Qi Leren be alright?" Dr. Lu, who had already run away, looked at Du Yue behind him in a panic and murmured in a low voice, "I have a bad feeling."

"Qianbei will be fine," Du Yue said confidently.

"No, let's go down and have a look. If he’s in trouble, we can help," Dr. Lu said.

"Okay, let's go." Du Yue was fine with it.

The two people studied the route to find the safest passage. Dr. Lu's sense of direction was bad, and Du Yue wasn’t much better. Two headless flies wandered around the institute and accidentally found intermittent blood on the ground.

The two walked along the blood trail, and finally found the injured Lara in a hidden room. Her injury wasn’t serious, but her spirit was not good. After seeing Du Yue and Dr. Lu, she was silent for a long time, and her voice was hoarse as she asked: "Have you seen Jing Siyu and Jing Sixue?"

The two shook their heads, and Lara sighed: "I'm afraid they’re in danger."

Lara told them what had happened after they ran away. Jing Siyu and Jing Sixue disappeared quickly, but Janet, Alex and Lara were together. They’d had an argument because Francis had been parasitized by an octopus. Janet strongly suspected that Lara was parasitized, and Lara would naturally not admit to such false accusations. During the argument, they met Leviathan, who had been thrown off by Qi Leren once before.

Janet, who was the closest to Leviathan, was the first to be killed. Alex tried to escape, but Leviathan jumped up again. Alex, who was eager to get rid of it, tried to push Lara out, and even stabbed Lara with a dagger. However, Lara had a strong will to survive. She took the dagger regardless of her injury and stabbed Alex’s vitals with a knife. She hid in a room, locked the door, and crawled away from the vents.

After that, Lara tenaciously fled the whole way, and finally came here and met Du Yue and Dr. Lu.

"We also met the monster, and Qi Leren led it away. Here's the thing..." Dr. Lu plainly told the story again, and finally asked, "We’re going to find Qi Leren. Would you like to join us?"

Lara touched the wound on her hand and nodded firmly: "Let's go."

This time, all three people were in a heavy mood. Especially after seeing the incomplete bodies of Jing Siyu and Jing Sixue, Lara cried sadly and asked aloud, "Are we the only ones left? Is Qi still alive?"

Janet and Alex had undoubtedly died by Leviathan's mouth, as well as Jing Siyu and Jing Siyue. Francis, Annie, Mark and Xue Jiahui were all parasitized. He Yi became Leviathan’s host. Only four of them had survived, and among them, Qi Leren’s life and death were still uncertain.

"Of course he’s still alive!" Dr. Lu said firmly. "He must still be alive!"

　　&&&

In the vast underground ice palace.

"Prophet, are you awake?" A blindfolded woman stood up from the chair of carved ice and respectfully saluted him. The ice and snow maids who were responsible for guarding the underground ice palace also bent over in salute.

"Soothsayer? Is it your rotation today?" asked the Prophet.

"It should have been the Iillusionist’s turn, but he had something to do, so we changed it," the Soothsayer replied.

"How is that boy recently?" When it came to the Illusionist, the Prophet's tone was clearly casual.

"Not bad, I heard that he made an interesting new friend, and he played tricks on others all day long." The Soothsayer smiled and asked again, "This time, you slept for a much shorter time than expected. Is something wrong?"

"It's not an accident." The Prophet frowned and looked up at the dome of ice and snow, but his line of sight seemed to pass through the thick layer of ice and look at the vast universe.

The blindfolded Soothsayer could not see his expression at the moment, but she could feel his inner unrest.

"Someone has discovered their original force, and that force is biased towards us," said the Prophet.

The Soothsayer breathed a sigh of relief, smiled, and said, "Isn't this a good thing? Although it’s only the first step, it’s always ahead of the other sentient beings on the starting line. Maybe it will eventually condense a half-field or even a field."

It was only the first step to discover one's original force, and it would take some difficult self-testing to condense a half-field, but this already meant that this person was about to embark on a road different from ordinary players. Any master at the field level started from this first step. Although most people would fall in the long road of experience, everyone who had reached the field level had terrible strength.

The Prophet sighed faintly: "It’s too early to talk about field condensation... Although I’m optimistic about him, I didn’t expect it to be so fast. This may not be a good thing for him. There are still too many problems in his body that have not been solved."

The Soothsayer asked curiously, "Do you know that man? What is his original force?"

The Prophet sensed the new force full of vigor and hope, and gently spoke the answer:

"Rebirth."

　　&&&

In the deep underground glacier wrapped in eternal cold, the temperature was 60 degrees below zero. When human beings were exposed to this environment, it only took a few minutes for the blood in the nose and ears to be unable to maintain circulation because of the cold, and the cells would quickly die.

This underground world without light seemed destined to be forgotten in the cold.

Crushed skull, whole body fracture, ruptured organs, internal and external bleeding... Worse than that, when falling from that height, the speed would return to zero at the moment of contact with the ground, and the body would be deformed instantly under the huge force of the impact. Even the space alien Leviathan, whose vitality was extremely terrible, was seriously injured after falling and fell into a deep sleep.

To say nothing of a human being.

Death was the only outcome.

But suddenly, something moved in the ruinous "tomb" created from broken ice.

And then moved again.

Qi Leren felt as if he was in an icy hell. Every time he breathed, thousands of ice needles punctured his internal organs crazily, which made him feel miserable. He couldn't even think of why he felt so painful and cold, or where he was.

Under this inhuman pain, he only felt that he didn't want to live any longer, but he couldn't even die.

Breathing returned, heartbeat returned, he still couldn't open his eyes, he could only move with all his might. The stones and ice blocks on his arms also moved and collapsed violently, and his sound echoed in the lifeless darkness.

Qi Leren's consciousness gradually returned, and he remembered who he was, but he still didn't realize where he was. He complained crazily in his mind that the air conditioner in his room was too cold, and that he had even accidentally fallen from the bed, and now he couldn't move.

But how could it hurt so much? It was like all his bones were broken.

Qi Leren's confused thinking leaped illogically. He saw many things, and the broken pictures rampaged in front of his eyes, but they just passed away. All he remembered was that he saw a pair of blue eyes.

Blue eyes.

Ning Zhou.

The name suddenly appeared in Qi Leren’s, which was like a spell to unlock the seal on his memories. Countless heavy memories were bearing down, which were more painful than the rose thorn stuck in his heart.

He was going to find Ning Zhou, and he was going to bring him back.

Qi Leren finally recalled his mission, and he began to struggle, struggling to get up from the tomb built from broken ice. Just turning over exhausted his strength, and he had to lie prone on the ground and breathe for a while, only to recover his strength slowly.

He noticed the time. It has been twenty hours since he’d fallen from the ice cliff. It was ten o'clock on the fifth night. The fifth day’s Best of the Day had already been announced, but he didn't know who it was. At the same time, his privacy time has been reset with the new day day, and he had another ten hours.

If you fell from such a high place, the tracking camera should be damaged. If not, the low temperature here should make it unable to work normally. But just to be on the safe side, turn it off.

"Turn off the camera." Qi Leren squeezed his voice out of his dry throat, and coughed wildly as soon as he finished speaking. His mouth was full of the fishy sweetness of blood, which made Qi Leren feel queasy.

Suddenly there was a light sound in the dark, as if a stone had been pushed down.

Qi Leren immediately took out a flashlight from the item bar and shone it in the direction of the sound.

Not far away, there is a mound of rocks and crushed ice, and a tentacle was slowly sticking out from the inside, which was extremely slow and seems to be seriously injured.

That thing wasn't dead yet? Or did it sense the breath of the living again and wake up from hibernation?

Qi Leren struggled from the ground. Although he was mysteriously resurrected, his left hand, which was bitten off by Leviathan, still didn't grow back. If he tried this again, he would only die.

But fortunately, he had a key item that had cooled down.

When the Prophet's Heart was used again, Qi Leren felt subtly different from the last time. The phantom angel falling from the sky came to him and took him away from the terrible world to the carefree Garden of Eden. Under the cover of God's grace, he didn't need to worry, and he didn't feel fear. The world was like sand in his hand, and he could easily knead it into the shape he wanted.

Heavy rocks and ice were pushed away with a flick, exposing Leviathan lying on the ground dying. This horrible monster had a red eye, and this huge eyeball was full of ferocious madness.

There was an invisible giant clock behind him, and the pointer walked quickly. As long as it finished three laps, the power he borrowed would be like the chime of midnight, dissipating all magic.

He had to hurry.

Qi Leren held out his hand and raised his palm in the void. Leviathan floated and began to roar and struggle, but this degree of resistance had no effect before the original force. Moving the palm of his hand slowly, Qi Leren felt that he could easily knead it into pieces, just like what he did to Mark's octopus.

But this was not the only way. Qi Leren felt the mystery of time and carefully explored its secret. A mysterious feeling emerged in his heart. He rubbed his fingers and the sands of time slowly flowed down in his hands.

Leviathan floating in the air as if it had been cast in magic. Its shell was rapidly aging, coated with a layer of rust, and finally it seems to be petrified. Its body was full of cracks, and finally it turned into powder like beach sand, which sprinkled to the ground slowly, leaving a golden treasure chest and a round sphere.

Qi Leren waved his hand, and these two things fell into his hands. The treasure chest was opened, which was an item.

[Lucky Revolver: There are six slots in this gun’s chamber, one of which is loaded with a bullet. Shooting at one's own temple can give one minute of absolute defense within a radius of 500 meters around the locked target, but the absolute defense is invalid for this bullet. Even if you are lucky, God will only give you five minutes. If you are not afraid of death, you can continue for another minute. Locked target: not set.]

Qi Leren immediately decided that this was of no use to him, because he would blow his head off with the first shot, and unless it was matched with S/L, it was a waste.

Disappointed, he looked at the other object, which was an eyeball as big as a bowl. The scarlet pupil seemed familiar. It was called [Leviathan's Eyeball].

What was this thing? There wasn’t even a brief introductory description, which reminded Qi Leren of another prop without a brief introduction, namely, the "Scepter of Hell", which Maria had entrusted him to give to the Prophet.

Time was running out, and the clock representing his time limit only had half a rotation left. The translucent wings behind the Qi Leren lifted him, flying over the deep underground glacier, crossing the collapsed ice tunnel, flying all the way along the coming road, and returning to the iron door at the entrance before time ran out.

"Qi Leren? You’re still alive? That’s great!" "Qianbei! Are you alright? Qianbei! How did you grow wings!" "Qi, are you alright?" The three people wandering around the door with flashlights rushed up in surprise at the sight of Qi Leren.

Prophet's Heart’s time was up, and Qi Leren landed on the ground. After the sacred power retreated, he sat down weakly and walked out of the underground ice cave with the help of the three panicking people.

"It's okay, it's all taken care of. Just in case, we should quickly leave here, seal the exits, and wait for rescue." Although Qi Leren was still in the aftershocks of coming back from the dead, his mind was clear, and he clearly commanded the three people. He was worried about whether there were any octopuses hatching in the research institute, but he was afraid to say it now, for fear that after his mouth moved, his good luck would run out.

Du Yue had great strength, and single handedly carried Qi Leren, who had lost his arm, on his back. He listened to the three people say what had happened after they’d split up, learning that after discovering that the other people had become Leviathan's food, the three people had come to the bottom of the institute to look for Qi Leren. They went in several times, but the temperature inside was horribly low. Unlike Qi Leren who had been blessed by the holy light, they finally had to retreat, worried that Qi Leren was dead.

Qi Leren didn't say that he and Leviathan had fallen off the ice cliff together, only that Leviathan had fallen off, and that he was injured and unconscious for a long time but didn't die. Finally, God blessed him and gave him strength to return to them.

Dr. Lu and Du Yue were very embarrassed, but Lara was very moved. She took Qi Leren's remaining right hand and sincerely said, "When we go back, introduce me to your teachings. I’m willing to be baptized."

Qi Leren, who had no intention of preaching at all, was in a distressing situation. One atheist has destroyed the worldviews of another atheist through acting skills and unscientific miracles—maybe more than one. Should he be sealed as a saint or something?

They left the underground research institute, blocked the exit, left the basement, and returned to the surface. The night was bright and the whole land was covered with white snow and ice. Lara, who was the first to leave the room, pointed to the sky in surprise and shouted: "Look, what is that!"

The three people raised their heads and looked at the approaching black spots.

"Is it... Is the rescue coming?" Dr. Lu was excited.

"Great." Qi Leren also breathed a sigh of relief. The copy was coming to an end, and they could return to the Nightmare World soon.

The spacecraft was getting closer and closer, and before long, they would be able to board the spacecraft safely and leave, but the spacecraft was slow to land. The four people waited anxiously, just like waiting for a late plane.

"It seems like something’s wrong." Lara stood up and looked at more and more spacecrafts that had no intention of landing. "What are they waiting for?"

A thought flashed through Qi Leren's mind: "Are they a civilian spacecrafts?"

"No, these are..." Lara said, her voice stopping abruptly.

A beam more dazzling than sunlight converged on the muzzle of the spacecraft, and the terrible energy was aimed at this planet!

Stunned, the four people watched the devastating attack on the plane beneath their feet, and they couldn't help feeling shocked. They had never thought that, after escaping death from a horrible space alien, they would finally die at the hands of their own people. In order to prevent the octopus from spreading, the army gave up the idea of a rescue landing and blasted the whole planet to pieces at a safe distance, where there was no risk of contact.

At the last second in this copy world, Qi Leren and the others were judged to have completed the task requirement of "surviving until the army arrived", and left the world in the light of the blast.

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Editor’s Notes: Obviously those items can only have positive results, right?

As a bonus for the end of this arc, BMBL wrote a collection of the program audience’s reactions on her Weibo. They’re posted as images so I can’t easily throw them into an mtl, but here’s the link for anyone who wants to take a stab at it: https://weibo.com/1741082525/F4b6D7Upr

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