#Well THAT turned out significantly more terrifying with that filter than I was going for

[lovingperfectionsblog]

I'd Give It All Up

Requested: Yes

Hey, do you think you could write something where the reader is signing to Redbull and she’s Max’s girlfriend. On one race the reader is p1 but Charles cuts the reader’s rightful corner and sends her crashing into a wall, big time. She gets knocked unconscious and is not answering, the car is still running. Leclerc is apologizing through the radio big time as he gets out of the car to check up on the reader, turn off their car, get them out, etc … Max is worried but he still has to finish the race, as he’s p1 now. After the race Max cusses out a very sad and frustrated Leclerc and starts crying in the process as well because he’s so worried about the reader. The reader is fine in the end when she woke up and she thanks Leclerc for turning off her car and comforts Max and they do press together.

Max Verstappen x Reader

Summary: Y/n and Charles end up in an accident and Max has to face the fear of losing the woman he loves.

Warnings: Language, accident, mentions of death, medical bay, angst, fluff.

Word count: 3050

Authors note: Not going to lie, I absolutely got into my fears with this one. It must be unimaginable the fear when there is a bad crash. Hope everyone likes it and can’t wait to hear what you think.

_________

“Be careful out there you hear” Max gave you a stern look as you began putting your helmet on.

“When am I not careful?” you returned with a cheeky grin, earning you a knowing look, which you probably deserved considering how reckless you could be on the track, even worse so than the fiery dutchman.

Truth be told, everyone was terrified when you and Max were having a bad race, between the two of you, they weren’t sure who was worse, and when it came to you two competing against each other? Lord knows that was the worst. Although always healthy competition, it was a fierce one, made only the worse by your intimate knowledge of the other and how each drives.

“You take the fun out of everything Verstappen” you joked, as you climbed into your car.

“Not what you were saying last night” he barked out a laugh after as your crew shot both of you warning looks, hoping neither of you would take it further than it had already gone.

“Listen, can you hear me?” Horners voice filtered through into your ear, knowing he was probably going to give the same speech he does each race, Max getting the significantly worse version of it. For once, you were thankful you were treated slightly differently.

“Loud and clear boss” the smile never leaving your face, excitement bubbling up for the Monaco race, knowing how difficult it is, but loving it all the more for the skill you were required to have.

“Let’s keep this clean yeah, I need both those cars to cross the line with minimal damages, and ideally with a podium from both of you okay? Horner attempted a stern voice with you, and you could only imagine the flowery language Max had gotten in his speech.

“Of course sir, but you better tell Max that, you know he’s worse than me” you joked with your boss, definitely knowing you were probably a bit more reckless than your better half.

“Fat chance he’s worse than you” you were almost sure you heard a chuckle in his voice, “good luck, see you at the finish line” and with that, he had disappeared from your ear, and you were getting into race mode.

_____

“I cannot believe it, we have redbulls Y/n in P1 one, closely followed by Monaco’s home boy, Charles Leclerc, chasing the title for his home race, and both are quickly being caught up by Y/n’s own boyfriend, Max Verstappen, ladies and gentlemen, I know I speak for most viewers when I say I hope we see a redbull fight here today, because nothing provides greater entertainment than when these two lovebirds go at it on the track.”

“Oh no! It looks like the Ferrari tried to take the line! Y/n is into the wall! Charles and Y/n look like they are out of the race! That leaves Verstappen as P1, but this is definitely going to require a safety car and red flag!”

“Has she even moved in that car yet? It doesn’t look like it, that car is definitely still running”

“Is that Charles running over to her car? Wasn’t she able to turn her own car off?”

“Here come’s emergency services, hopefully all will be okay, we still have yet to see Y/n move and Charles is looking for a bit too frantic. Let’s hope she’s going to be alright”

_____

“Don’t stop driving Max, safety car is coming out” GP spoke into Max’s ear.

“Jesus, I told her to be careful” Max sighed as he began slowing down, having briefly witnessed the crash and not fully understating how bad it actually was. “What has she said happened, besides the swearing?” Max half chuckled, assuming you were using fairly colourful language by now.

“I’ll let you know as soon as we get word from her” GP was careful in the words he chooses, knowing how protective max was over you.

“What do you mean when you get word from her? Hasn’t she said anything yet?” Suddenly Max felt sick.

“Max, stay behind the safety car, it’s a red flag, you’ll be in the pits now” GP couldn’t have Max doing something stupid, costing them a penalty and truthfully, he couldn’t have him getting in the way of the ambulance that could potentially help you.

Unfortunately, at that exact moment the safety car slowly lead all the drivers back around, passing the accident between yourself and Charles. First Max saw Charles sitting on the back of the ambulance, shaking his head, refusing to take his eyes off of your car as the paramedics looked him over, and then Max saw you. He caught a glimpse between the curtains they put up to block the view of the cameras, of the paramedics gently lifting you out of the car, your head having to be supported by someone, and as he watched your arm drop limply, he had to fight every single instinct in him not to stop his car and rush over to you.

Next thing he knew he was shrieking, loud enough GP and Horner flinched as the noise in their ears, “IS SHE FUCKING OKAY?” Max was screaming into the headset.

“Is she alive?” the whisper was almost inaudible. Max wasn’t even sure he was prepared for the answer. He wouldn’t be able to survive.

Not if you didn’t.

_____

“Charles, are you okay?” Charles body was aching, and he felt stupid, he knew what he did was risky, but he had to try and take the gap didn’t he?

“Yeah, I’m fine, just a little sore, sorry guys, that one was on me” Charles reassured his team as he began climbing out of his now wrecked car, glancing over towards you.

“Hey, do we know if Y/n is okay?” he was running over towards your car before he had even finished the sentence, noticing how you had yet to turn your car off.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck” Charles was shouting to no one, “she isn’t moving” Charles suddenly was praying. He didn’t know what to do. You were his friend. Oh my god. You were his friend, and he was stupid.

 And he might have just killed you.

“SHE ISN’T FUCKING MOVING”. Tears. Charles couldn’t see. He needed to focus. He shouldn’t touch you. He shouldn’t touch you. He could do more damage. The fucking tears keep getting in the way, “WHT THE FUCK DO I DO?” he lifted your visor, and your eyes were closed.

He was going to be sick.

“Charles, do nothing, paramedics are on their way” his race engineer tried to advise him, tried to get through to the frantic driver, suddenly all too aware of how young Charles truly was and the incredibly guilt he may have to carry for the rest of his life, because they advised him to take the gap.

Next minute he felt someone grabbing him, pulling him away from the accident, “Mr Leclerc, please stand back”

“She isn’t waking up!” Charles was screaming at the paramedics, suddenly everyone around him working significantly faster, curtains suddenly being placed around him, he was being hauled over to the ambulance and bodies were surrounding your limp one.

_____

“What have the medics said?” all Max could focus on was you. It was if it was tunnel vision and all he could focus on was you. P1 one be damned, Racing be damned if it meant he would never have to lose you.

“No news on Y/n yet, but Charles is okay and back in his garage-“ Horner began and truthfully Max couldn’t be arsed what Horner had to say from that point on and he began moving in the direction of the Ferrari Garages, Horner and GP attempting to stop him, Max shrugging them off without any effort, only one goal in mind.

“Charles!” Max shouted the second he had found his rival, in sport and subsequentially in life from this point on.

“Max, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry” Next second Charles was sobbing, but Max couldn’t find it in himself to care, you could be dead, and it would be all Charles fault and if you were, then so was Max.

“She could be fucking dead” it felt like acid in his mouth saying it, “SHE COULD BE FUCKING DEAD” next minute he felt Charles racing suit wrapped between his fingers and he was centimetres away from his face, “DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT! YOU COULD HAVE FUCKING KILLED HER! FOR FUCKING WHAT!” his mouth was dry. He was going to be sick.

Tears.

Charles face was suddenly blurry.

Just the tears.

Anger? Fear? No, from them both.

Charles tried to speak, tried to get anything out, the lump in his throat preventing anything other than “I’m sorry” and sobs from coming out.

He knew that whatever Max did to him now was deserved, he wouldn’t be much different if someone had even looked at the love of his life with any sort of malice, let alone potentially killed them, and if you didn’t walk away from this crash, he might just beg Max to do something to him anyway.

A penance for his sins.

Suddenly Max and Charles were all too aware of the silence in the pits. Everyone having stopped to watch them. Not wanting to intervene, knowing the gravity of the situation.

That was until Max felt a hand on his shoulder, the other hand of Daniel, slowly prying his hands of Charles, slowly, not to aggravate Max any further, knowing the absolute fear that must be gripping him.

“Mate,” Max met Daniels eyes, albeit he was blurry, the tears still hadn’t stopped, “let go Max” Daniel was gentle, he could only imagine what Max was going through and truthfully, he tried not to imagine it, but if he was imagining even a fraction of what Max was feeling, then he needed to get Max away from Charles now.

“I’ll kill him Daniel, I swear” he spoke as if Charles wasn’t there, the man in question not being able to meet anyone’s eyes, watching his own tears drip onto the floor.

“Let’s go Max” finally Max had let go, Daniel had wrapped his arm around Max’s shoulders, pulling him away from Charles and the prying eyes of the cameras.

“Max, back in your car, she’s okay, race is going to start again soon.” Horner sternly told him. Wanting to be sympathetic but knowing he couldn’t distract max any more than he already was, he still had a race to win and if one of his cars was knocked out, then he needed to make sure the other got maximum points.

Max wanted to argue, he didn’t know how they were continuing this race, he didn’t think he could, but if you were okay, he was winning it for you.

_____

“I’ll take the fine, collect the trophy for me” Max shouted towards Horner getting out of his car and sprinting towards the medical bay, leaving no room for Horner to argue.

GP had informed him during the race that you had woken up in the medical bay and they were happy with the tests they had run, and Max felt the slightest bit of relief, knowing he would only feel it completely once he saw you were safe.

And then there you were, sitting up and smiling in the shitty little medical bed.

Max knew in that moment that he was screwed. He knew that he would give up absolutely every single thing for you, all you had to do was ask. You might not even have to ask; he might just do it anyway. Runway with you. Take all his money and just run away with you. Take you away and keep you safe from absolutely everything.

Then you looked at him and smiled that gorgeous smile of yours and he was moving over to the side of your bed, hands on either side of your face and forehead gently pressed against your own.

Max was sure this was the first time he had ever felt grounded in his entire life, and he was never letting you go again.

He was definitely running away with you.

“I love you” he whispered out, and then it was like he couldn’t stop, repeating how he loved you again and again, desperately needing you to know just how much, kissing you in between each reiteration of it, slipping into his native Dutch at someone, his brain going onto auto pilot, being able to think about nothing else other you in his hands right now and how he refused to let you go.

Oh, and about running away.

It was only after a moment that he had realized that you were reassuring him that you were right here, and you loved him too, your voice the only thing being about to get through to him finally.

You both stayed like that for the better part of five minutes, thankful that you were walking away from something that could have easily killed you. Eventually Max sat down next to you, as you cuddled up next to him, soaking each other up as much as you could.

“Is Charles okay” you finally asked, just as concerned for him, not sure how he had faired from the crash.

“For all intents and purposes, dead to us” you could feel Max tense up at the thought of Charles right now.

“Max, that’s not fair” you tried to reason with him, realistically knowing that while you were still sitting in the medical bay there was very little chance of doing that.

“He could have killed you Y/n” Max was not prepared to let this one go. There was no way he could ever forgive Charles for what he did to you.

“It’s the job Max and you know it. Every time either of us get into that car, we know we might not be getting out” Max knew it was the truth, but today it became real. Today he genuinely nearly lived his greatest fear.

“Speaking of, I think we should quit, run away together” Max decided to float the idea by you, it becoming more of a reality as the seconds passed by.

“Like you’d ever give up driving” you laughed, not believing Max would give up racing for anything, not even his own safety.

“For you, I’d give up everything” Max had never spoken more truthfully than he was now.

____

“Y/n, it’s good to see you at the press conference” one of the journalists directed towards you, genuinely thankful to see that you were okay, everyone was, no one ever wanting to see something bad happen out on track.

“Thank you, it’s good to be walking away from a crash like that” you smiled towards Max as you felt him squeeze your hand.

He had refused to let you go since he had gotten to the medical bay, helping you get dressed, helping you walk towards the conference room, even pulling your chair closer to his so he could hold your hand, the entire time trying to convince you to skip media, there was no way they were going to fine you for missing after that, but you wanted to show everyone that you were okay.

“If you don’t mind talking about it, would you mind if we asked what happened” Charles dropped his head, suddenly feeling ashamed.

“An occupational hazard, Charles and I were racing, he saw a gap, he tried to take it, as one does, and I tried to defend it, it just accumulated in a bit of a crash” you threw Charles a reassuring smile, wanting him to know you didn’t blame him, that you understood.

“And Charles-“ God he wasn’t ready for this “- what was going through your mind as you were rushing over to switch off her car?” He couldn’t answer this he was going to be sick.

“You turned off her car?” Max was leaning forwards, directing the question towards Charles, unaware that Charles had tried to help you.

“Of course, I noticed it was still running, got it turned off, thought her arm was trapped or something, only after did I realised she hadn’t moved yet” that same fear suddenly engulfed Charles again, “and then I thought I’d killed her” he was trying really hard to keep the tears away again, it was a fear and guilt unlike any other.

“It’s going to take a lot more than a little bump on the track to kill me” you tried to lighten the mood, not wanting to think back to what happened, knowing you’re probably going to have to see a therapist for this one, all of you are, “but seriously, Charles did what he could to help and at no point did anyone want this to happen. No one goes out there to hurt anyone else and we’re a family, we’re going to help where we can” you really wanted them to drop this topic, squeezing Max’s hand twice, secretly letting him know you wanted out of this topic.

“Exactly, and despite my own emotional outburst earlier, I know Charles is a good man and wouldn’t intentionally hurt Y/n, and honestly, mate, thank you for helping her where you could” Max directed that last bit towards Charles, Charles nodding in return, both as an apology and as a way to accept Max’s own, “Racing is a dangerous sport, and it is something we have to accept when we get out onto the track”.

“But with that being said though, it’s probably a good idea to let everyone know that Y/n and I will officially be retiring and running away” every other driver turned to you shocked, no one expecting this, the entire press conference descending into chaos.

“No, no, no” you tried to calm everyone down through your own laughs, smacking Max on the shoulder, shocked that he had thought this kind of joke was a good idea, knowing what it would do to everyone, “Please, no, calm down, we aren’t retiring” no one was listening, “Max, look what you’ve done” both of you laughing your heads off before Max pulled you closer to whisper in your ear,

“I told you, for you, I’d give up everything”

#Max Verstappen x reader #Max verstappen x you #Max Verstappen oneshot #Max Verstappen imagine #F1 #F1 x reader #F1 x you #Charles Leclerc #Max Verstappen angst #Max Verstappen #MV1 #F1 Fanfic #Monaco #F1 Imagine #f1 #f1 fanfic #f1 imagine #monaco #charles leclerc #max verstappen #f1 x reader #pierre gasly

[esrah-rah-rasputin]

Diversity win! The terrifying people(?) walking towards you are gay

And the non funky colored one

I guess this would be like if they became full avatars, or were obviously more fucked up during the apocalypse

#Well THAT turned out significantly more terrifying with that filter than I was going for #but hey I kinda like it? #also yes this was sort of a wip/sketch but I just wanted to fiddle around with fun filters and some shading #Since it was like…. Four months when I first started this #tma fanart #jonmartin #body horror #blood tw #eyes tw #eye horror tw #I definitely think it could be better #but I don’t really care at the moment? #tma #the Magnus Archives #my art

[gojology]

— Gojo and Nanami | Their Insecurities

pairing : insecure gojo x gender neutral reader, insecure nanami x gender neutral reader warnings : unedited, probably some misspellings, maybe some cursing, i probably dont make sense at all wordcount : 1703 a/n : this is so bad dear god please forgive me for deeming this as content

GOJO SATORU ‧₊˚✩彡.

☆ Gojo’s insecure about his lack of bodyhair. His lack of facial hair and arm hair worries him. Being babyfaced wasn’t something positive in his eyes- no, he wishes he was physically more masculine.

   Your eyes meet his, the sun rays bathing both of you in an orange filtered light. His mouth is slightly opened, skin flush to the touch. After a night of intimacy, your ready for another round, pushing your palm towards his forehead. “Good morning, Satoru.” you say, voice slightly wavering even in the most private presence, without the formalities and what not, he’s surprisingly normal, and it’s taken you a bit to adjust to that. He’s warm, but it’s the good kind of warm, and it shows on his silly, dopey smile.

    You guess it wasn’t the time for more sex, so you resist your urges, directing the energy to something else.

    Gradually, your palms find themselves on his cheeks, and you pinch them slightly, giving him a look you hope is loving- because you really do mean it. Your rest assured, as the curve to his swollen lips grew even wider. The sounds of bird chirped as your fingers danced across his jawline, finally at your final stop, his chin. 

    You tip his chin up, and sure enough, hickeys are adorning his neck. A feeling of joy and honor fills you for a brief second, you were the one that was allowed to see him vulnerable, given the pass into his locked up heart. He finally breaks the silence between the two of you, pushing away your slack hand delicately. 

    It’s peculiar, there’s a tremble to his lips, like he’s scared, or about to burst into a fit of tears. You think it should be the other way around, but here you were, arms held close to your chest, looking at him with a mixture of curiosity and anticipation, bated breath preventing you from questioning the sudden change in tone. 

    “Hey, um, Y/N, weird ass question, but, am I hairy? Like, wooly mammoth hairy?” 

    You can’t tell if it’s sarcasm or not.

    Trying not to make a face, you shrug your shoulders. “Well, I mean, not really. You’re actually pretty nonhairy, in terms of uh... The average-” you pause, realizing how drastically his face fell. “-But I do like non-hairy guys! Who would wanna date a wooly mammoth anyways? Hey, baby..” you coo, giving him a tiny peck on the cheek, fluttering your eyelashes.     “What’s this about? Hey, you know, you can just be straightforward with me, I don’t mind.” 

    He doesn’t take a moment of hesitation, exasperatedly blurting out, “Does my lack of.. Hair, bother you?” but it seems he regrets it, your cheeks puffing up, stifling a giggle. Yet, he maintains the bone-chilling eye contact, his eyes are as vivid as ever, so blue it looked like the entrance to heaven. Your immediately lulled, whatever he was going to say was definitely urgent.

    “W-What? Are you being serious?” covering your mouth, your voice is muffled, but his face looks absolutely terrified, and you relish in how funny he looked. It wasn’t everyday that he was genuinely frightened, well, maybe he didn’t show it often.    “Of course not! Why would I be even remotely worried about bodyhair when I have something way more eye-catching in front of me?”

    The shock turns into a sheepish smile, returning for a second time, your heart melting instantly. He takes a long, deep breath, exhaling the tension away, tugging at the covers to go over his chest. You hadn’t realized that he had stolen more than half of the blanket for himself, but you don’t make a fuss about it. 

    For all the weight he carried on his sagging shoulders, you’re sure the warmth is appreciated. 

NANAMI KENTO ‧₊˚✩彡.

☆ Nanami thinks he’s a boring person, through and through. Outside of work, he doesn’t see why anyone would want him. Some days, he wonders if he should pick up on Gojo’s personality, telling jokes and being sarcastic and what not.

   The fine, white porcelain Nanami had gifted you was beautiful, to say the least. Nanami frequently shone it until it glimmered in the light, wiping any smudge or speck of dirt that dared to get on his beloved tea set that he gifted to you a few months prior. Gold trim, alongside depictions of birds fluttering about, and your favorite flowers. It’s perfect for you, and that’s why he had gotten it. His eyes had instantly brightened, picturing your beaming face as you served the two of you some tea.

   But he wonders, would you be happier if he perhaps gifted you something more up to date in comparison to the porcelain? He had enough money to buy you the world, bags, jewelry, he’d often used to hear stories of his co-workers giving their wives expensive, well, anything, and they’d be over the moon. A sudden realization grew inside of him at the thought of this:    

   Was he too out-of-date?    

   The thought went rampant in his usually collected mind, twisting and turning at night, only the sound of you, deep in sleep, could calm the troubled man down. As a consequence to his overthinking, he got little to no rest, and if he got little to no rest, his eyebags would turn their ugly, sneering faces in his direction.

     And so, as he’s baking tea cakes to go along with the afternoon tea the two of you would routinely drink, he’s going deep into depth of himself. He’s a good worker, good at...

     What was he good at? Aside from work, he can’t see why he’d be of use. Nanami acknowledges he’s stoic, which may be good in some cases, but often, everyone runs away from him because he appears as scary with those cold, calculating eyes. As opposed to Gojo, everyone enjoyed how lenient of a teacher he was. Well, Nanami isn’t sure on that, maybe aside from Megumi, Nobara, and Yuuji, everyone hated that. Regardless, him and Gojo don’t share something in common.

     Gojo has humor, and he doesn’t. 

     So why did you like him? 

     Nanami’s subconsciously drumming his long, bony fingers against the counter, eyes studying the ceiling like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do. Steadily, an acrid smell completely overwhelmed your senses- now, you’re hacking into your arm, and finally, Nanami comes back to Earth. 

     He blinks a few times, like he’s drinking in his surroundings, before he realizes the tea cakes are completely burning into a crisp.

Now, he’s on heightened alert, yanking open the handle to the oven and fanning out the flames with a random oven mitt he had hastily grabbed for. Beads of sweat are developing on his skin, before finally, you rush in, still hacking up a storm with a large pot of freezing water in your shaking hands.

     Nanami curses himself for ever appearing as informal, but then he remembers he’s infront of his significant other, he didn’t have to put on an act. His face relaxes, and he opens his mouth to speak, to apologize, but he’s paused- by you. You raise your palm up at him, the other hand opening up a window looking over the garden.

      “Nana.” he freezes completely, the affectionate nickname was specially reserved for confrontations like this. You spoke softly, which, for some reason, was significantly worse than you screaming into his ear. Your eyes follow suit, staring at his collar, loosening his tie. He winces, but Nanami’s not sure why he does. You had touched him millions of times, so why was it now that he didn’t accept it?

     “Yes, my love?” he finally breathes out, wrapping a strong, gentle arm around your waist just loosely. You place your thumb just below his lower lip, your index finger rubbing his plush lips all at the same time. The exchange is purely affectionate, yet, he’s still tense. 

    “What has gotten into you?” you murmur. 

    “I- Nothing, darling, I’ll bake another-” 

    “No.” is all you say before you grab him by the chin, unwavering. Usually, those piercing eyes of his are emotionless, something shocking. The eyes are the gateway to the soul, so why is it that it’s blocked off? But you guess it wasn’t the case here, he stared back with the same level of intensity, fear and peculiarity. You stay in that position for a little, savoring just how much you must mean to him, it wasn’t everyday he was vulnerable and let you inside.      Your breathing is heavy, eyelids heavy as well due to his routinely ruckus every night, but you’re determined to erase any trace there was left of that.       You kiss him. It’s sloppy, yet chaste. A fight for dominance usually occurs between the two of you, and almost routinely, Nanami wins, but this time, he lets you do the work. 

   Your lips never once trail away from his own. Heavy breathing through nostrils, hands roaming where it shouldn’t at such an early time, but who gave a fuck about the rules? It wasn’t a workplace, and you’d never let it be one. He clings onto your figure, you savor his muscular physique. Not once do his hands not roam, your flesh was his, and his was yours. 

    Finally, you pull away, heat rising to your cheeks, tears are beginning to dawn on your glassy eyes. “I’ve listened to you roll around in bed every night, mumbling shit about how you don’t see why I’d want you. You better donate your eyes and brain to charity right now.” 

   This wasn’t the reaction, or beatdown he was expecting. He flinches at the vivid image he got of you gouging out his eyeballs. “...Why must I do that? 

   “Because, you don’t use them, obviously. If you took a fucking second of your life to look deeper into your personality below the surface level, you’d see how fucking amazing you are and I love you for that.” 

   Shaking your head furiously, you shush him up yet again when he finally decides to speak up, tears are beginning to spill down your cheeks. “Shut up, Nana. Shut. Up.” pulling him in for another kiss, your hands grabbing at his shoulder like he was going to let go. 

   But he never did. 

#jujutsu kaisen #jjk #jujutsu kaisen scenarios #jujutsu kaisen scenario #jjk scenario #jjk scenarios #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsu kaisen x y/n #jujutsu kaisen x you #gojo satoru scenario #gojo satoru #gojo satoru x reader #gojo satoru x y/n #gojo satoru x you #jujutsu kaisen gojo satoru #jjk gojo satoru #nanami kento #nanami kento scenario #nanami kento x reader #nanami kento x y/n #nanami kento x you #jujutsu kaisen nanami kento #jjk nanami kento #gojo satoru x gender neutral reader #nanami kento x gender neutral reader

[robininthelabyrinth]

eeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! Would be awesome if you continued the nmj&wwx sworn brothers fic! I'm not good at giving plot prompts, but I really would just love to see your take on nmj's character, and how he would interact with wwx. I found it interesting that wwx in the untamed was really respectful of nmj when they met, not like how he was in Cloud Recesses. I wanted to see more of how they might interact if they had closer relationship. (Of course also hoping that changes things for the better!)

sequel to this

Wei Wuxian hated to admit it, but being Nie Mingjue’s sworn brother made a world of difference.

People looked him in the eye now, no matter what sort of atrocities were ascribed to him; there was still fear in their gazes, but now it was more like respect – and even more like confidence. He hadn’t realized how many people looked at him as a child, lashing out wildly in all directions, maddened like a rabid dog in his search for vengeance, nor how relieved they would be to know that his sins could be answered for by someone universally viewed as capable enough to keep him down.

It wasn’t just that most people would put money on Baxia against just about everything else – Wei Wuxian counted himself among that crowd – but also, just…Nie Mingjue.

Nie Mingjue was a stern man, short in both temper and speech, but he was straightforward and decisive. He had listened to Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng lay out the benefits of their position, taken an evening to consider, and accepted promptly the next morning; the ceremony had been held at a convenient moment a few days after that, and then he’d invited them both to dinner – Wei Wuxian, as his new brother, and Jiang Cheng as the brother of his brother.

At first, Wei Wuxian couldn’t quite put his finger on what changed after that – it was similar to the way Nie Mingjue had treated them both before, when he was their general and they his lieutenants, but also significantly different. He was still harsh, still fiercely opinionated, still straightforward as ever, as generous in words of discipline as he was sparse in words of praise; was it only that his eyes were softer? That he sometimes felt free to put his hand on Wei Wuxian’s shoulder? That he listened to him, was open to interruptions no matter what time of day or night, asked him for meaningless favors and did them for him in return?

“It almost reminds me of shijie,” Wei Wuxian told Jiang Cheng. “If she were as tall and strong as a bear, and a lot more willing to correct me…almost like Madame Yu, but not as bitter. Yet there’s something of Uncle Jiang there as well: he trusts me to do things, but he’s also there to keep an eye on it – not in an offensive way, you know? Just there in case something goes wrong…it’s very reassuring, somehow. Like having a mountain at your back, keeping you steady.”

“You’re an idiot,” Jiang Cheng said. “All that – you’re just saying he’s acting like he’s your big brother.”

Wei Wuxian stared at him.

Jiang Cheng’s cheeks were red and his eyes averted. “Don’t you know you’re just the same to me?” he muttered, and shoved Wei Wuxian’s shoulder briefly before fleeing, and Wei Wuxian felt a glow of warmth that filled his entire body from head to toe that kept him floating through the next week.

He’s never had a da-ge before, which was probably why he was so slow on the uptake. Nie Mingjue doesn’t so much as blink an eye when Wei Wuxian started calling him that – warily at first, like a bit of mischief that he could play off as a joke if he was rejected, and then quickly enough with confidence, smug and arrogant the way he’d been before the war started, when he’d still had the Jiang sect to hold up the sky for him no matter what he did.

After all, who would dare get in his face with Chifeng-zun at his back?

Nie Huaisang’s frivolity suddenly made a great deal more sense. He was just spoiled!

-

Jiang Cheng benefited as well, which he wouldn’t have necessarily expected but perhaps should have. Wei Wuxian came across them talking, late one night, and sits in a tree to listen the quiet stories they shared – the burden of being Sect Leader, of needing to honor one’s ancestors and keep their traditions alive while also preserving the lives that had been entrusted to them in this lifetime; the crushing emptiness of realizing that the task for which your entire life has been a preparation had suddenly arrived and there was no one else for it but you; the need for vengeance against those who had robbed you of your parents and childhood all in one go.

Even the struggles Wei Wuxian hadn’t known anything about: the lack of respect from elders who thought they knew better because they still saw you as a child, the need to play politics with small sect leaders eager to take advantage of weakness now to benefit later, the isolating realization that almost everyone you met wanted something from you.

“Thank you,” Wei Wuxian said to Nie Mingjue, after, his face solemn in a way it rarely was. “He’s holding up a corner of the world, all by himself, and I didn’t know how to help him.”

Nie Mingjue nodded; he didn’t shrug things off the way Wei Wuxian did, always took things that were meant to be serious as seriously – it had been such a shock when Lan Xichen had mentioned off-handedly that he was only seven years older than they were; he’d been Sect Leader for as long as Wei Wuxian could remember. If someone told Wei Wuxian that Nie Mingjue had been carved from stone rather than born, he would have believed it, excepting only that his heart could not have been stone.

“It’s something I can do, so I did,” he said, meaning that it was nothing when it was everything. “Perhaps one day you’ll tell me what it is that I can do for you.”

Caught, Wei Wuxian gaped, then tried to turn it into a joke, but Nie Mingjue just patted him on the shoulder and went his own way.

He never pressed, never asked, just accepted things as they were. As long as Wei Wuxian’s demonic cultivation was used for righteousness and killing Wens, Nie Mingjue would let him keep any other secrets he might have, pursue any aims, let him do as he liked.

And yet it was that permissiveness that led Wei Wuxian to start to wonder if maybe he should tell Nie Mignjue what he’d done, the choices he’d make, the sacrifices – he didn’t think Nie Mingjue would judge him harshly for it. He might even understand it, especially when the only thing that made the man smile were Nie Huaisang’s occasional letters complaining about having to do all the paperwork back at the Unclean Realm where he was safe.

He still wasn’t sure, though, so he didn’t, holding himself back, and then one evening not long after he had finished forging the Stygian Tiger seal – Jiang Cheng had banished him to Nie Mingjue’s side at once upon realizing the appalling power of it, knowing as well as Wei Wuxian did that the cultivation world would be terrified if they didn’t believe it was firmly under control – Nie Mingjue told him about how his father had died. Not the part that everyone knew, his saber sabotaged, broken during a night hunt, the spiritual effect rebounding on him to drive him six months later into a qi deviation long before his time; but why the sabers were so important to the Nie clan.

The foremost mission of the Qinghe Nie was to suppress evil wherever they found it: to uphold justice and abhor that which stood against it, to strike fearlessly against it no matter what they faced, whether wind or lightning. But such a mission required blood to be spilled, blood and blood again – like the executioner who took upon himself the duty of sending criminals onwards, allowing the rest of the community to sleep untroubled, those who took on such a duty invariably became targets of resentful energy, the final vengeance of the evil they slaughtered to save the innocent.

Invariably, there were times – times of war, as there was now – when it was necessary to wield violence in pursuit of righteousness. For the Nie, unlike other sects, violence was a virtue, and it could not be purged through a retreat from the world, the application of countless treasures and cleansing rituals inaccessible to most; their philosophy did not allow them to close their eyes and ears to injustice.

And so they did not rest. They killed in the name of justice and righteousness, killed and killed again; they cultivated their sabers as spiritual weapons, letting them absorb the resentful energy from beasts and monsters in order to better defeat evil that other sects could not, and at last cultivated the saber spirits, rich in resentful energy of their own but devoted only to defeating evil. The saber spirits were nourished by the cultivation of their chosen master, their resentful energy filtered and cleansed and purified, but that process was a burden, sparking the infamously short tempers of the Nie clan, with both temper and saber spirit held tightly in check only by their iron discipline.

The Nie sect leaders, who bore on their shoulders not only their own karma but that of those who followed them – their lives were a sacrifice, always balanced on the edge of a blade: the need to always control the saber spirit, to appease it and tame it, made them more susceptible than most to qi deviation, and absent one of them breaking the seal of cultivation or some accident, that would be how they would die.

Wei Wuxian touched the Stygian Tiger seal, hidden beneath his clothing in its two halves: he’d only used it once so far, causing a gigantic massacre that had taken down an army nearly entirely on his own. As soon as that had finished, he’d known that the seal was too much for him, even after he’d broken it in two to weaken it – it obeyed any master that would have it, so full of resentful energy that it needed only the barest excuse to break free to kill without discrimination. His demonic cultivation used resentful energy the way a Nie saber spirit did, his soul directly exposed to human evil, not merely animal; he risked possession, corruption, or worse, and only his skill and his determination was enough to control it – that he’d thought was enough to control it, until he’d made the seal.

The seal pulsed angrily under his hand, seething with resentment, hungry for blood, and then unexpectedly there was a response: Baxia, held in Nie Mingjue’s hands to be sharpened, gave a pulse as well, fierce and unyielding spiritual energy rippling out from it like a rock dropped into a lake, and for the first time the seal went quiet, as if momentarily cowed.

“Has my cultivation affected my temperament?” Wei Wuxian asked, considering the possibility seriously for the first time. Lan Wangji had told him several times that demonic cultivation harmed both the body and the heart, but he’d disregarded it – he felt fine, he didn’t frenzy; so what if he was angry? Wouldn’t anyone be, after suffering as he had? How could Lan Wangji ever understand?

(If Wei Wuxian thought about it too long, he might think that Lan Wangji would understand, could understand, did, but that thought was too painful to tolerate. In his heart, he still hoped that Lan Wangji would live untouched by the pain of the world, even if he knew that it was far too late for that.)

“Yes,” Nie Mingjue said simply, and his unshakable simplicity was more troubling than a thousand of Lan Wangji’s pleas. “My Nie clan sacrifices the second half of our lives for the power to make a difference in the first; I find that trade worthwhile, but it is all for nothing if we do not control ourselves. That it is easier for us to become monsters is all the more reason for us to always put righteousness first, personal interest second; our instincts will lie to us, inflame us, and we must be unyielding and strict, trusting in tradition and law to guide us where our instincts will fail us. If you persist in your path, you will need be twice as cautious as you were before: quicker to anger is quicker to act – but once the act is done, it cannot be taken back. Whether that is a sacrifice you are willing to make remains up to you.”

Wei Wuxian’s breath caught in his throat like a sob.

Tomorrow, he promised himself. Tomorrow, he’d tell Nie Mingjue everything, and get his advice on what to do.

-

That night, they received word of a temporary gap in the Wens’ defenses in Yangquan, an opportunity to destroy one of their stockpile while the guard was changing; the source of the information was Lan Xichen, who they all trusted. The opportunity was limited by time and the need for secrecy: Nie Mingjue took a small detachment of Nie cultivators to launch a night attack, with Wei Wuxian following at a distance to capture anyone who ran into the forest to escape Nie blades.

He waited patiently in a tree, Chenqing spinning idly in his hands, his mind more than halfway thinking of ways to refine the compass of evil he’d been working on; he wouldn’t let them escape.

He waited, but nothing happened.

No one came running.

The Stygian Tiger Seal abruptly pulsed again, suddenly active in a way it hadn’t been since Baxia had suppressed it, and a pit formed in Wei Wuxian’s stomach. He stood up at once and abandoned his position, rushing forward – and yet he was still too late.

Yangquan was a trap. Wen Ruohan himself had been there, with all his most trusted soldiers, vastly outnumbering Nie Mingjue’s small force; they had been easily overwhelmed.

Watching from a tree not far from the brightly lit center camp, Wei Wuxian bit his fingers until they bled to keep from screaming: he wouldn’t be able to bear it if he had to do this again, to stand by as a mute witness while the Wen-dogs laughed triumphantly over the bodies of those he knew and loved. The Stygian Tiger Seal was hot under his clothing, resentful, wanting to kill, and he wanted to use it – but the first time had come so desperately close to going out of his control that he didn’t know if he could risk it.

What if he lost control? What if he killed those he wanted to save?

Wei Wuxian was accustomed to arrogance, to confidence, to recklessness even – but Nie Mingjue’s warning was so fresh in his ears that for what might be the first time in his life, he wavered, hesitated.

He had just about decided that he would use the seal, and damn the consequences, when someone in the Wen sect dragged Nie Mingjue forward: he had been very badly beaten, his body twisted in unnatural ways and his head cut open, blood blinding him and Baxia nowhere in sight, but against all odds he was still standing – it was almost a desecration in Wei Wuxian’s eyes to see the Wen cultivators put their hands on him the way they had put their hands on Uncle Jiang, on Madame Yu, on all those Jiang cultivators he’d lost at the Lotus Pier.

The way they had hurt Jiang Cheng, so badly that it still haunted his shidi’s nightmares, a hurt so bad that the only way out was for Wei Wuxian to –

He couldn’t let it happen again.

He didn’t have another golden core to sacrifice. If they were going to execute Nie Mingjue right now, in front of him, he would –

“Take them all back to the Nightless City,” someone ordered, instead, and Wei Wuxian’s fingers, which had wrapped around the Stygian Tiger Seal without him noticing, abruptly relaxed in relief. There was still time to make a decision about whether or not to use the seal, or to see if he could rescue Nie Mingjue and the others without it.

The entire troop moved out.

Wei Wuxian followed.

#mdzs #wei wuxian #nie mingjue #jiang cheng #my fic #my fics #this is the one #this is basically a fic already #guess we'll see if I get more prompts #i like the idea of Wei Wuxian having an overprotective big brother #I also like writing out my version of the Nie saber spirits #this should really just be a fic #Anonymous

[cheri-translates]

Lighthouse (A translated one-shot)

I translated this masterpiece originally written by 白飞飞是我宝贝 on Weibo (with permission)

It’s rare to find a piece of writing that is so immersive and makes the deepest parts of your soul ache. I knew it’d be a tragedy if it isn’t accessible to anyone who doesn’t read Chinese T^T

I’ll be keeping the original writer updated on comments left on this work because she’s the one who deserves all the credit 💕

[1]

Morning sunlight filters in through the curtains and fall on my eyelids, leaving a reddish shadow. I frown slightly, struggling to open my eyes. 

Before me are grey curtains and white walls. The familiar yet foreign decor leave me unable to react. I turn over. 

My head feels like it's filled with water, and the pain sobers me up a little. 

I look at the grey-blue quilt, the grey-blue pillows, and the clean outershirt and T-shirt in the closet...

I shoot up from the bed, ignoring my severe headache. After a quick glance around my surroundings, I finally look down at myself - I’m still in the same outfit as yesterday. Other than it being slightly wrinkled from sleep, not a single button is loose.  

Even so... why am I in Gavin’s house?

I get up with some effort, pressing a hand to my head while the other is against the wall, supporting me as I walk out of the room. On the table sits a glass of soy milk, a glass of fresh milk, steam buns, but no Gavin. 

Sitting at the dining table, I stare dazedly at the warm milk in front of me.

Maybe my body isn’t fully conscious yet, or maybe yesterday’s hangover has left me a little numb. Today, I don’t feel the irritability and gloom that has been torturing me for almost half a month. 

--

Half a month ago, I broke up with Gavin. I initiated it. To my utmost surprise, he didn't refuse. He simply hesitated for a while, and said “okay” in a hoarse voice.

I take a sip of the milk, suddenly recalling the way a coquettish smile had hung on my lips when I was still with him. 

“Gavin, I want to drink the milk you’re holding. Is that okay?”

“It’s not that I dislike soy milk. I like both, so I want to drink it too.”

“But I can’t finish two cups by myself, and I simply enjoy... snatching. Food. From. The. Wolf.”

The tips of Gavin’s ears turn red. With one hand, he grabs me off his body and wraps my entire self into a hug. 

Since then, we would always have a cup of soy milk and a cup of milk for breakfast, with both cups placed in front of me.

He would always wait for me to finish my meal before helping himself to the “leftovers”. I would blush and watch as his thin lips casually stick to the cup where my traces still remain. An inexplicable sweetness would fill me, occupying the entire atrium of my heart. 

The sudden memories are overwhelming. The knuckles gripping the cup have gone white. After taking a deep breath, I feel the first sting in my heart. I resign myself to my fate, forcing my eyes shut, and let the delayed pain and torment swallow me up whole.

[2]

The phone rings, and I pick it up without checking who the caller is.

"This is Gavin."

In my trance, his classic greeting makes me think we are still together.

“Are you awake? If... you are, there’s breakfast on the table.”

"Why am I in your house?" 

My voice sounds strangely hoarse and terrible, like a broken bellow.

"You drank too much yesterday. Minor called me. Your doors and windows were shut, ahem, so...”

"Oh,” my voice is a little dry. “I see, thank you.”

We’re already adults, and even used to be lovers who were attached at the hip. Simply spending a night at his house doesn't warrant me to cause a scene.

What’s more, he is Gavin - the Gavin who has never made things difficult for others.

After finishing breakfast hastily, I tidy the table. I pretend not to see the matching teacups on cabinet. My eyes tremble slightly when they sweep past by the photos we took together. 

Before leaving, I walk to the shelf behind the door to retrieve the key out of sheer habit. When my finger touches the ginkgo leaf pendant, I shirk backwards. 

When I spot the two pairs of cotton slippers - one large and one small - in the shoe cabinet, I feel my heartstring finally snap, and I collapse against the wall. 

The memories in these details are truly terrifying. Donning a harmless appearance, they slowly tear down the defences I had constructed with great difficulty.

These two pairs of cotton slippers were purchased during our early days as a couple. I still remember that it was the first time I saw a sick Gavin. He was leaning against the wall of the hallway - just as I am doing now - his soft bangs covering his tired eyes. 

Trying a new menu in the kitchen, I suddenly feel a searing chest pressed against my back. His chin rests lazily in the crook of my neck, and the warm breath exhaled from his nose reddens my cheeks. 

"Gavin? Why are you back so early today?" I try to ignore my rapid heartbeat, and my speed of cutting the vegetables slows down significantly.

He rubs his head against my shoulder and responds in a muffled voice:

“Dizzy.”

Only then do I notice his abnormally high body temperature. After hastily washing my hands and wiping my apron twice, I place my hand on his forehead.  

He lowers his head obediently and lifts up his bangs, revealing delicate eyebrows. The amber eyes underneath are unnaturally moist, and remind me of a deer in a forest - pure and gentle.

“What happened? Why are you burning up so badly?”

I frown and pull him out of the kitchen, then press him onto the bed without giving him a chance to refuse. 

When I was sick as a child, my dad would always tuck me in tightly. Although it was very hot, I would feel much better after sweating it out. So I also tuck the white quilt around Gavin’s neck. He is very cooperative, but his bright eyes remain wide open and he stares at me without blinking.

"What are you looking at? Close your eyes and go to sleep!" I pretend to be angry. However, upon seeing the abnormal flush on his face and the obvious tiredness between his eyebrows, my heart softens. "Well, you should have a good rest if you’re sick. I'll cook some porridge for you. Take your medicine after eating it, okay?" 

My tone sounds as though I’m pacifying a child. After hearing this, a bright smile appears in his eyes. After a long time, he responds lazily with an “okay”.

But his actions are not as obedient as his words. While I’m busy cooking porridge, he walks out of the bedroom again and hugs me from behind without saying a word, like a huge koala.  

Clearly, a sick Gavin and a normal Gavin are two completely different people. For the first time, I realise that this man, who is unafraid of dying in a shower of bullets, can actually be coquettish to such a degree.

I shake his hand away angrily, but he responds by lifting me up and striding over to the sofa.  

"Gavin! What are you doing!" I instinctively want to pound on his shoulder, but when I think about how he’s still sick, I stop myself. The only thing I can do is raise my voice to sound agitated. 

He places me on the sofa, then leans against me lazily, his strong arms wrapping around my waist, breathing in the scent of my hair.  

"Can you keep me company?" The cold has made his voice deeper, as if a handful of sand has been sprinkled into his voice. "I feel terrible.”

With these few words, the anger that was about to flare vanishes. My heart softens and feels numb, as though there are ants crawling through it. 

“...okay, I'll stay with you." 

He falls asleep on my shoulder in under five minutes. He must have been really tired. I lay him down carefully on the sofa and pull a blanket over him.

At this moment, Gavin, who is more than 1.8 meters tall, is curled up on the sofa looking aggrieved and haggard. The blanket isn’t large enough to cover his feet, and I realise that he has been walking around barefoot.

Although the weather has begun to warm up during this time of year, it’s easy to fall sick between spring and summer. He once dragged me home because I didn’t wear a jacket. But when it comes to himself, he isn’t as meticulous. 

Treading quietly, I leave the house to buy food items from the supermarket downstairs. I also stop by the living area to pick out two pairs of slippers - one big and one small, one blue and one pink, with a wolf and a bunny printed on them. 

They feel soft and warm, and are very comfortable.  

When I reach home, I’m wrapped in a familiar embrace as soon as I open the door. I hear a voice filled with grievances from above my head.

“Where did you go? Why didn't you tell me?"

I break free from his embrace. Lowering my head, I see that he’s still barefoot.

"I went out to get groceries. I’ll make you porridge with preserved eggs and lean meat tonight." 

I kneel down, retrieve the newly bought slippers from the bag. Without looking up, I command:

“Lift your feet.”

Gavin puts them on obediently. I stand up and look at him. “How are they? Do they fit?”

His ears are ridiculously red. He blinks gently. 

“Are these for me?”

"Yes, my Mr Wolf." 

I reply casually, carrying the ingredients into the kitchen.  

Gavin finally settles down peacefully, sitting on the sofa obediently and waiting for my food. Most of the porridge that day ends up in his stomach. After taking the anti-fever medicine, he encases me in his arms and turns the lights off early.

His breathing is especially clear in the dark, and is tainted with scorching heat, ironing the back of my neck in a regular pattern. I can’t bear the numbness and move slightly, but the man behind me holds me even more tightly. I can’t fathom where this sick person derives his strength from. I can't break away at all.  

"Thank you for today," I hear him say suddenly, with a slightly hoarse voice that sounds particularly sultry in the quiet night. "I liked the preserved egg and lean meat porridge you made, I liked the slippers you gave me, and... ahem, anyway, thank you."

I chuckle, rolling over in his arms. I raise my head to meet his crystal-clear eyes in the dim night.

"No need to thank me, Mr Gavin. Because I like you the most."

[3]

When I awake from the memory, I hear the rattle of a key coming from outside the door. Feeling flustered, I have no idea where to put my hands and feet. In the next second, I meet the bright amber eyes from my memory once again.  

Holding a bag of vegetables in his hand, he stands quietly at the door, looking at me silently. When his eyes trail to the high heels on my feet, his brows furrow slightly. 

I bite my lip and break the awkward silence. "Thank you for yesterday. I won’t bother you further. Goodbye.”

I give him a nod. Before I can step outside, he blocks the way. 

Lifting my head, I look at him with a puzzled expression. His neck muscles are tense, and his lips are pressed into a line. The morning light falls on his handsome side profile, softening his sharp features.

"Your complexion looks bad. Rest for a while, and don't force yourself.”

Perhaps I have yet to sober up completely, because I find myself agreeing awkwardly. I change my shoes again and sit down on the sofa. Taking a deep breath, I try to ignore the faint pain from my temples.  

Gavin pours me a cup of hot water. I hold it in my palm and say mindlessly, "I didn't expect that I would be a guest here one day." 

Gavin pauses, and he says nothing.

After retrieving two tomatoes and a piece of tofu from the bag, he walks into the kitchen, which is pretty much a decorative piece to him. 

I arch my eyebrows in surprise. When I hear the stove turning on, I walk over with curiosity.

Gavin has his back towards me, surrounded by sliced ​​tomatoes and tofu, and a bowl of beaten eggs. At a glance, there are no eggshells in it. He flips through a booklet and follows the steps in it meticulously.

I probably guessed what he wanted to do. When he finally stretches out his hand to take the sugar, I stop him in the nick of time. "Gavin, that’s white sugar. The salt is over there. 

His stiffens, the tips of his ears turning redder than the tomatoes in the pot.

Once the soup is prepared, he ladles it into a bowl and brings it to me. 

"Drink a bowl. It’d help you sober up.” His voice is a little soft and obviously lacking in confidence. "I tried it just now... ahem, it's not bad...” 

I smile and take the egg drop soup from his hand. Stirring the soup with a spoon causes bright red tomatoes to bob around. The aroma of green onions instantly dispels the smell of alcohol stuffing my nose.

I take a sip. It really doesn’t taste bad. 

But I can’t understand why such a delicious soup makes me feel as though I’m drinking something bitter.

I stand at the door of the kitchen, taking slow sips. When I can almost see the bottom of the bowl, I force myself to laugh.

"Is this the former police officer who only knew takeaway food and instant noodles? This cooking is a great leap forward." 

The brightness in his eyes dims for a moment, and he responds with a hint of self-mockery. "I’m used to your cooking, so I can no longer eat takeaway food or instant noodles. The only thing I can do now is learn to make it myself.”

I’m left stunned, not expecting that he would say this. He turns back to the kitchen to wash the pots and bowls. I watch his tall figure in a daze, and am suddenly swept up into a whirlpool of memories. 

While heading to the supermarket, I turn my head to Gavin and ask him a question.

“Gavin, what do you like to eat?”

He responds with a faint smile. “Anything. As long as you make it, I will love it.”

I know Gavin always puts me first, and that I would get nowhere if I continued down this line of questioning. I simply change my approach.

“What do you usually eat then?”

After thinking about it carefully, he says, “STF doesn’t have a canteen. I usually eat at a restaurant outside, or have instant noodles. I'm not a picky eater, so it’s fine as long as I can fill my stomach.”

I know that he works hard, but I’m still a little angry at his living habits.

“Without me around, would you be eating instant noodles your entire life?”

When he sees me suddenly frowning, his tone gets slightly flustered.

“I...”

“Hmph, in order to punish you, I’ve decided that..." I reach out angrily and pick out a Chinese cabbage from the freezer. "You have to clear the entire plate tonight, and my boxed lunches in future! Eat well, sleep well, and take care of yourself. Do you understand!”

There is a smile in his amber eyes, and the corners of his mouth rise a little. In the end, he rubs my hair with some helplessness, and obediently says, "okay.” 

Bang.

The sound of the cabinet door closing shut pulls me back to reality. When I meet his eyes, I hurriedly conceal my dazed expression.

“Thank you. I just remembered that I still have things to do at the company, so I’ll make a move.”

I walk towards the entrance, slightly embarrassed. 

When I hear him call my name, I stop.

"Can we talk?”

I stand frozen in place, all the blood draining away the warmth from my heart. It isn’t until I’m surrounded by a broad embrace that I can eventually hear my heart beating again.

Gavin always liked hugging me from behind the most, hanging his head by the side of my ears, his soft sideburns on my face. I would hear his unhurried, gentle breathing.

Just like right now. My back leans against his hard chest, his body temperature wrapping me in a thin cloak. The arms on my waist are strong, and there’s a new scar on it.

The familiar heartache sweeps across me again, unbridled. Before I can react, I hear a breath near my ears.

"If Minor didn’t call me, would I have had no chance to see you again?"

[4] 

I ruminated over why Gavin and I broke up. It always came back to a cliche term - unsuitable.

I’m the boss of a small company, living a standard 9 to 5 life. Although I sometimes work overtime, my life has a fairly regular pattern.

Gavin is a special officer who has no fixed working hours. He runs off whenever there’s danger, and we often lose contact. The longest time we’ve been apart was for nearly a month, and the only communication we had spanned only ten minutes. Most of the time, I was asking, “Is there a signal? Can you hear me?”

But I never felt that our professional life was an obstacle in our love. On the contrary, it was precisely because of our intersecting schedules that I cherished the time with him even more. 

It's just...

When I learned that he had a vacation on the 520 during our early days together as a couple, I excitedly made a travel plan for an overnight stay at the beach.

There was a filming site of a movie that I particularly liked. I lay in his arms enthusiastically and described the reeds, the lighthouse, and the ocean where the first light of day could be seen. Gavin had smiled and listened to me, then dropped a kiss on my forehead.  

But when the time came, I went there alone. 

He had received an urgent task suddenly. After hesitating for a while, he wanted to call and decline. However, I held his phone and shook my head at him. "It's okay, go.”

Then, it was the first Qixi Festival we celebrated together. Gavin had specially adjusted his schedule to keep me company. That day, we walked through the ancient streets lined with lanterns while holding hands. We released a small paper boat by the river together. We also watched a sweet and romantic movie. He watched me smile, our fingers clasped together, warm and powerful.

But when I got up in the morning the very next day, I saw Gavin seated on the sofa with his head down. I whispered his name, and he raised his head to look at me. His eyes were moist and red, and his usually clear voice was hoarse. 

"The teammate who swapped shifts with me yesterday met with an accident during the mission... if it weren’t for me, he would have been fine now...”

I held his hand distressedly and comforted him. It wasn’t his fault. But when I saw the pain in his eyes, I knew that he would shoulder everything himself, and that he would carry on with this self-blame and guilt. 

After that, Gavin became more frequently tasked with missions, and became more frequently injured. In addition to distress, I also felt helpless.  

Then came the Spring Festival. He had accompanied me to my aunt’s house. He wasn’t very good with talking, and his body had unconcealed wounds. My aunt’s expression gradually morphed from enthusiasm to politeness. 

My aunt dragged me to the kitchen and asked me solemnly, in a low voice.

"What does he do? Special police? You know this kind of work is dangerous! Should you marry him in the future, what if... and I’m saying ‘what if’... what if something goes wrong? What would you do?”

I tightened my cuffs, took a deep breath, and said, "Aunt, no matter how dangerous his work is, or how dissatisfied you are with him, he is the person I’ve decided on, and I love him very much.”

My aunt frowned and looked at me. She sighed slowly. "Silly child, you’ll understand later on that the most important thing in marriage is not love, but suitability. Love is just one condiment in life, and life is a big dish. It needs the right dishes to match, supplemented by condiments, in order to have an excellent and delicious presentation."

“I’m not trying to nag at you. I just want you to think this through carefully. I know that Gavin is a good boy, and I can see how much he cares for you. But I can also see that you don’t look as happy as before. I just hope you young ones can live happily.”

After returning home that day, my aunt’s words continued echoing in my ears. I didn’t want to accept my somewhat shaky reality.

In countless nights without Gavin, I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling in a daze. What flashed before my eyes were Gavin’s scars. He never took the initiative to tell me about his injuries, and never mentioned the danger of his missions. 

His solemn and stern eyes told me that every “I’m fine” from his lips had no credibility.

With time after time of heartaches and disappointments, I seemed to suddenly understand what my aunt said.

When he flips through the medicine cabinet in the living room again in the middle of the night, I walk out of the bedroom and turn the lights on with a “click”. 

At first, he’s surprised. Then, he starts panicking as he tries to hide the scar on his left shoulder. Without a word, I take out the hard iodine and gauze from the medicine box, carefully remove the his bloodstained clothes, and gently clean up the wound little by little. 

This time, the wound isn’t deep, but there is a lot of bleeding. I squat down in front of him, the hand holding the tweezers trembling slightly. In contrast, my words are calm. 

"Gavin. Do you know that if I were your teammate, I definitely wouldn't want to see you in this sorry state? It’s only when you take care of yourself that you can protect even more people.”

I throw the napkin away and wrap the gauze around his arm. His muscles are smooth and tight. Even though I’ve seen it so many times, it still gives me heart palpitations. 

"In the future, you have to protect yourself well, understand? Don't let the people who love you feel scared all day. This kind of torture is even more unbearable than physical injuries.”

I tie a neat knot, then sit beside him, hugging him gently. His amber eyes flicker, and within them are waves of pain and struggle.

"Gavin.”

I lean my head on his shoulder, closing my eyes and memorising the warmth of his body.

"Let’s break up.”

[5]

I break free from Gavin’s embrace and leave his house in a hurry after leaving him with a sentence:

“Don't follow me.”

I run in a hurry, because I know that if I hesitate for a second longer, I will fall into his arms completely and become unable to extricate myself.

It's ridiculous.

Even though I keep reminding myself that we have already broken up, I still love his warmth.

The drinks were really worthless. If it weren't for this hangover, I wouldn’t have been so embarrassed, and I wouldn’t have been so easily defeated by mere memories and a hug.

I take a taxi and return home.

The moment I close the door, I finally remove all my forbearances. I throw myself onto the sofa and raise an arm to cover my eyes. Tears trickle down the corners of my eyes, silent and endless. 

[6] 

I must have been crazy to agree to Minor’s invitation to attend the high school reunion. When I see the tall figure walking into the banquet hall, my instinctive reaction is to flee. 

But standing next to me is an old friend. He’s chatting about the past enthusiastically, and I have no choice but to remain still and nod along in agreement.

Gavin’s appearance is akin to throwing a boulder on calm water, and the ripples caused by the waves spread through the entire banquet hall, including my heart.

Although he should have already spotted me, he doesn't talk to me. Instead, he sits two spaces away. His expression is cold and fierce, as though he has come to participate in a serious operation.

No one dared to approach him in high school, and this has remained true even now. To outsiders, he is a lone wolf - indifferent and arrogant, causing everyone to retreat from him. 

I used to see him in the same light, but everything that occurred later overthrew these myopic impressions. I discovered the softness and delicateness hiding under his hard shell.

“Hey, what's the matter with you? Why are you distracted all the time?" 

My old friend waves his hand in front of me, and I apologise with a bit of embarrassment.

After saying a few more words, he suddenly asks, "Do you have a boyfriend now?" 

Hearing this, I choke on my red wine. In the corner, Gavin seems to be frowning at me, his amber eyes bright and scorching, making me subconsciously want to escape.

I avert my eyes and shake my head. "No." 

He becomes a little more interested then, changing the topic from high school to the present.

"Let me tell you - I’m working at LFG now and have bought a car and paid the down payment for a house. Also, my parents don’t live with me, so if you’re...”

"Are you done?” A cold voice interrupts him. My heart trembles and I raise my head, only to see Gavin's cold glare. 

At this moment, nearly half of the eyes in the hall are focused on our conversation. Looking like he doesn’t care about anything, Gavin grabs my arm and pulls me out of the room. I can’t escape from his grasp, and feel frustrated by his inexplicable behaviour. 

He takes me to a small balcony outside the hall, then imprisons me between the wall and his chest. He looks down at me, brows furrowed deeply. There’s an unconcealed anger in his eyes. 

"What are you doing?” I question, unwilling to look at him directly.

The reply I get is a kiss that plunders everything.

His lips press against mine roughly, and his unique scent overwhelms me. There is a collision and friction between our lips and teeth, and there is pain. 

It’s an uncontrolled plunder and invasion. 

He doesn’t let me go until my last breath is violently swept away. I pant heavily, but he embraces me in the next second. 

This time, his embrace is gentle. 

It’s careful, as if he’s protecting a fragile glass flower. His heavy breath brushes my neck, mingling with his low and trembling voice.

"I'm sorry."

[7] 

I don’t deny that I lived a terrible life in the half month after separating from him.

I worked overtime every day, letting work fill all the gaps in my life. I didn’t give myself a chance to relax at all, because it only takes a second for pain and regret to gnaw away at me. 

Minor has been secretly reporting my life to Gavin. I knew that. But I never thought of stopping him, and a ridiculous expectation even started brimming in my heart. 

I wondered if there would be a night, when the lights of the city begin to fade, when he would appear in front of me as he used to. He would wrinkle his beautiful eyebrows and gently bring me into his arms. With a slight touch of reproach, he would ask resignedly, “Why are you working overtime again?”

I also wondered if he would push the office door open anxiously when I’m stricken with another stomach ailment, picking me up sideways without a word. The expression on his face back then was full of anger, but the stream of light in his eyes magnified his distress and tenderness infinitely.

I also wondered, when I have finished my work for the day and am leaning against the wall of the elevator and staring at the changing floors, whether I’d see him as soon as I open the door.

If he did show up, I would put everything down and leap into his arms, and tell him over and over again that I love him. 

But in the half month since our break up, he never appeared once. 

This city is so large that even if two people were once intimate, they may miss each other for a lifetime if they don’t stay in touch. 

So I started to waver again. Why did I live even more unhappily after listening to what my aunt said? 

Why is it that once the seasoning of love is no longer part of this big dish of life, the entire thing tastes like wax?

I don't understand - would I be happier finding someone I’m suitable with but do not love, or consume each other’s love and embrace the friction?

Deep down, I know that if I could abandon everything and make a choice, I would choose the latter without hesitation.  

At least, my life as of now tells me very clearly that the decision I made was wrong.

And this mistake has tortured the both of us beyond recognition.  

[8]

My back is extremely tense and feels like a fully stretched bow. 

The hands around my waist move slightly, and Gavin’s voice falls on my ears, drawing intense pain from my heart. 

With every breath, I can only smell the scent of his body and the sweet aroma of red wine from just now. 

Over his shoulders, I see the bright, brilliant, erosive, and prosperous city. Trapped inside are people all sentenced to life.  

I know that I’m one of them.

Without warning, tears trickle from the corners of my eyes, leaving streaks of cold water on my face.

In my increasingly fuzzy and hot vision, I see Gavin’s somewhat flustered expression. He gently wipes away my tears with his rough finger pads. 

Those eyes, full of anxiety, become the only lighthouse within reach.  

It seems that as long as I look at him, I will never lose my way.  

After a few small sobs, I rush into his arms without a care. I pull at the corners of his clothes and cry until his white T-shirt becomes damp.

He comforts me clumsily, his hands caressing my hair in exchange for the string of muffled "sorry"s flowing from my mouth.

[9] 

I called my aunt.

"Aunt, is suitability really that important in life?" 

"Silly child, suitability is very important. But more importantly, are you happy?"  

“What if I’m with someone who I’m not suitable with, but I feel happy?”

"Then he might be the most suitable person for you.”

[10] 

I stand at the door of the STF office, holding a boxed lunch and looking outside. 

An officer who recognises me greets me with a smile. "Is sister-in-law giving Gavin food again? Just go in and wait. The team is already on their way back. 

I smile and nod. “It doesn't matter. Waiting over here is the same thing.”

Another colleague pats him on the shoulder, as if laughing at his stupidity. "What would you know, you single loner? Sister-in-law wants to see Gavin sooner!" 

I blush, and suddenly see a familiar profile coming in through the door. 

The faint light of dusk outlines his wide shoulders and narrow waist, depicting his side profile clearly. Seeing me, the solemnity and coldness on his face melts into a pool of spring water.

"What are you doing here? Didn't I say you should wait for me at home?" 

He walks up to me and takes what’s in my hand, his tone brisk and clear. 

I crinkle my eyes and smile, saying, "I’m off work early today, and came over since I have nothing to do.” 

We walk all the way to his office. Opening the boxed lunch, he sees that it contains his favourite dishes. 

Gavin takes a whiff in a slightly exaggerated manner, then smiles. "Mm, smells good.”

I quickly hand him the chopsticks. He picks up a piece of beef and brings it into his mouth. After swallowing it, he lowers his eyes and smiles. "I get to eat the food you cook after my mission. I suddenly don't feel tired at all.”

I feel a twinge in my heart. I huff nonchalantly and respond. "If you like it, I’ll prepare and bring you boxed lunches in the future.” 

"No need." He reaches out and tousles my hair. "Be good and wait for me at home. Just knowing that you’re at home makes me feel very contented.”

After work, we walk home together hand in hand. The setting sun filters through the uneven skyline of the city, elongating our shadows.

The summer evening breeze carries the scent of camphor trees across my face, and the temperature of the day finally reveals a tired and lazy side. Dim light reaches the world through the clouds drifting in the sky, bringing a certain tenderness to this steely city.

"Gavin?" I turn my head to look at the man wearing a smile on his mouth, and happen to meet his clear eyes. 

"What's the matter?"

"Your birthday is coming soon. Are there any gifts you want?”

"Anyth-"

“You’re not allowed to say ‘anything’!" I interrupt him with a glare, giving his palm a forceful squeeze.

He smiles compromisingly, and his eyes seem to be filled with scattered gold. 

"Then teach me how to cook a meal. I hope one day in the future, you can return home from work and eat a meal I’ve prepared.”

I’m momentarily startled, and suddenly remember what my aunt said - 

"Then he might be the most suitable person for you.”

I have thought about this question of suitability many, many times. Just like the “unity of opposites” in philosophy, I simply can’t make sense of it. But no one has ever told me that this question doesn’t require thinking. The answer has always been in my heart, and the clues to finding the answer have been scattered throughout my life.

Even the most trivial things in life carries memories belonging only to us. And these small and plain memories will gather into a surging tide when you least expect it, washing away the dust covering the answer in one’s heart. 

Perhaps there has never been such a thing as “unsuitable” to begin with. This so-called “unsuitable” is just used by people looking for an excuse to part ways.

A breeze blows past, and ripples appear on the lake in my heart. When I look at him again, I suddenly feel light and happy both physically and mentally, and that nothing could come between the both of us.

With a big smile, I say, "Okay! I’ll leave the birthday party to you then, Mr Gavin.”

He chuckles softly, his bangs a little messy from the evening breeze. "I will learn properly, and won’t disappoint you.”  

The sunset finally sinks behind the tall buildings. Neon lights and vehicle headlights begin to flicker, and the dim yellow streetlights on the side of the road replace the sunset, continuing to illuminate the long road.

I know that he will hold my hand as we walk, step by step, slowly and steadily, along this path home. 

#mlqc #mlqc gavin

[babycracker]

Echoes In The Forest - Chapter 13

Story Rating: explicit Chapter Rating: teen & up Pairing: adam/f!detective (jordan mills) Word Count: ~4k Warnings: none

--

“I got a bad feeling about this,” Felix murmurs quietly, trudging along between Nate and Mason. Jordan and Adam are walking up ahead close by the boy as he continues wandering through the forest.

“You mean you haven’t felt that way since we got here?” Mason scoffs, not bothering to lift his eyes from the ground in front of him.

“Yeah, but worse now,” Felix answers, and Nate places a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

“It will be alright,” he tries, but somehow Felix doesn’t find himself as reassured as he usually does when Nate attempts to comfort him.

They’d hurriedly packed up their camp and were now following the boy in the hopes that he would lead them to somewhere that may offer some answers about what had happened to him, and where the other kids who’ve gone missing may be. It seems like a long shot to Felix - if the boy is in this state now then it seems unlikely that he would be leading them anywhere important. He very much doubts that the Erlking has any more use for him, if this was even his doing at all.

He glances up at Adam and Jordan, frowning at the way they’re walking as far apart from each other as they can without losing sight of the kid. As if this mission isn’t confusing and stressful enough, now he has those two to worry about as well.

He’d been happy enough to realise that they have feelings for each other, maybe even a little bit excited. Until those feelings started to show themselves and made an absolute mess of things. He’s not sure what’s to become of Unit Bravo if Adam and Jordan can’t sort themselves out. He doesn’t want to lose her, not after all this time. She’s a part of his family now. He can’t lose any more family.

Adam stops suddenly, holding one hand up over his shoulder to signal at the rest of them to follow suit.

“What-” Jordan begins, coming to a halt a few steps ahead of him and grabbing the boy’s arm to stop him from walking. Adam glares at her and holds one finger of his other hand up in her direction, a silent instruction to shut up and Felix almost winces at the death glare that she gives him.

Until he hears what Adam has obviously heard and snaps his attention towards the woods to the side of them, concerns about Jordan’s position within the unit now temporarily forgotten.

“I can’t hear anything,” he vaguely hears Mason whisper beside him, and the wave of panic that hits him over the simple statement is bigger than he would have expected. It really is going to be up to him. He’s slightly comforted by the fact that Adam at least can hear what Felix can see, but it’s hardly the help he hoped he would have after Adam had fed from Jordan.

A loud rustling sound from behind them has both him and Adam spinning around and Felix takes a couple of steps towards the noise, peering into the bushes.

“Felix…” Nate warns, and there are footsteps behind him before Adam’s hand lands on his shoulder.

“Do not run off again.”

“He’s following us,” he looks up at the team leader who just nods in reply, an uncharacteristic amount of concern written all over his face. It’s amplified as he looks back towards Jordan for a moment, who appears positively terrified.

“We have to keep moving,” Adam announces distractedly, making his way over to Jordan and Felix can’t help but notice that he’s walking significantly closer, despite the eye roll she gives him for his efforts.

He loves her, but can’t she put her grudge on hold for just a little while when there are more important things going on?

--

“I need to speak with you once this is dealt with,” Adam blurts out after one of the longest silences ever to take place between them, and Jordan frowns up at him.

He has some nerve, she’ll give him that. To treat her the way he has been and then demand to talk to her while they’re in the middle of something which quite frankly terrifies her. It’s alright for him, she supposes. He’s not the one this thing is after.

“You think I really care what you need?” she mutters in response, noticing the annoyed look he gives her despite the fact that she’s already turned away from him.

“You should. For all of our sakes.”

She can’t help but roll her eyes again at the typical Adam response. Of course he’s going to turn this into something about Unit Bravo as a whole. She understands that it very much affects all of them, but just for once she’d like him to be straightforward with her, she’d like him to acknowledge that this is a him and her problem and it needs to be handled between him and her.

She sighs and doesn’t bother answering him, and he seems to either take it as agreement or as a sign that he shouldn’t push it right now. Either way she’s more than happy to not speak with him for the rest of the afternoon. For the rest of the mission, if possible. They have more important things to deal with.

He glances up at the trees and the significantly smaller amount of light filtering through them after a while and stops again, glancing at her with uncertainty before turning to face Nate, Felix and Mason.

“It’s going to be dark soon. We should stop.”

“And what do you suggest we do with him overnight?” Jordan asks before anyone else can say anything, gesturing down at the boy. “Tie him up?”

Adam actually seems to be considering it for a moment and Jordan’s eyes widen in horror at the thought that he would actually tie a child up like a dog for the night.

“Are you serious? I was being sarcastic.”

“It’s a valid point, though. We can’t let him wander off,” Mason points out, and both Jordan and Nate glare at him.

“We’re close anyway. We probably don’t need him, actually,” Felix points out before an argument can ensue, and Jordan notices his unease for the first time. Too caught up with bloody Adam to have seen it earlier.

He’s bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet, eyes darting nervously around them and his hands fidgeting at his sides. The sight of him makes her all the more nervous, and suddenly walking through the woods at night with four vampires and a near comatose child seems like the less creepy option.

Adam’s right though, as much as she hates to admit it. She’s exhausted and she needs a break or she’s not going to be of any use to anyone.

“So we’re supposed to just let him go?” she protests despite all of that, the idea of letting this little boy wander around on his own in the dead of night not quite sitting right with her.

“Yes,” Adam answers simply, looking at her as though he doesn’t understand her hesitance.

“I don’t think he’s in there anymore,” Nate reasons carefully, and she shakes her head slightly before looking down at the boy.

He’s right and she knows it. His face is completely void of expression, his clouded eyes staring at nothing in particular. He seems to be barely even breathing, and even aside from all that she’s fairly certain that he wouldn’t physically survive the trip back out of the woods anyway.

“Fine,” she snaps, dropping the boy’s arm and turning away from him. There might be nothing left of who the boy once was but she still doesn’t like the idea of watching him walk away from them.

Nate moves to wrap her up in a tight hug, and it takes her a moment but eventually she winds her arms around his waist and returns the gesture. She’s feeling only slightly better about the situation when Nate pulls back suddenly and looks questioningly at Adam, who has come to stand beside them.

“I need a moment with the Detective.”

“I don’t think now is the time…” Nate trails off when the expression on Adam’s face makes it clear that he’s not going to back down this time, and Jordan looks between the two of them wearily.

“Do I get a say?”

“No,” Adam replies, taking a gentle but firm hold of her arm and leading her away, calling over his shoulder to the rest of Unit Bravo, “set the camp up.”

--

Adam’s not stupid, it’s not the right time and he knows it. But his conversation with Mason has been eating at him all day, and he feels that he may explode if he doesn’t get it off of his chest.

He’s a few steps ahead of her, but he can hear her stomping along behind him, deliberately making it obvious to him that she’s not happy as though she thinks it’s going to sway his decision to talk to her. If he’s honest, he is almost tempted to let it be for now but he knows that this up in the air, disastrous tension hanging between them is going to be nothing more than a distraction for the both of them, and neither of them can afford that right now.

“What do you want?”

It isn’t until she speaks and breaks him out of his own thoughts and hesitations that he realises she’s stopped walking, and he turns to find her with her arms crossed over her chest and glaring at him.

“I want to speak with you about yesterday,” he begins and then draws a blank with how to proceed from there.

“Didn’t we do that already? You said I was going crazy, remember?”

“No. I said that your mental state may have been temporarily, but negatively impacted,” he corrects, falling silent when she just stares at him with one eyebrow arched.

“I’ve been made aware of the possibility that I may have…” he pauses, trying to squash down the sudden panic that rises in his chest to be able to finish his sentence, “unintentionally exposed you to certain things.”

“Certain things such as?”

He clears his throat slightly and finds himself averting his gaze, looking everywhere but at her so as to avoid seeing her reaction to finding out that what she’s been feeling actually comes from him.

“Certain emotions.”

He waits for it. Waits for her to press him on which emotions he means. Waits for the disgust, the horror, or the mocking. When none of it comes he looks back up at her and she’s frowning at him, in what looks to be concern.

She opens her mouth to speak, but snaps it shut again when she can’t seem to be able to get the words out and just gives him a small nod in response.

“I can assure you that it was not my intention to do so.”

“So what am I supposed to do about it?”

There’s a question he’s not sure that he knows the answer to. He doesn’t know how deeply she feels the things she’s feeling, he doesn’t know if just ignoring them is a possibility.

“There is nothing you can do. They will fade in time if you don’t dwell on them.”

“So you’re telling me you don’t want them in here?” she pauses and taps the side of her head. “You don’t want me knowing that you feel these things?”

“Yes, that’s what I’m telling you.”

“Bit late, Adam.”

She is impossible. How difficult can it be for her to just go about her life as though they were not there? They’re not even her emotions, she has no idea of where they’ve come from, she’s no need to fixate on them or even acknowledge their existence.

“I need you to do this,” the words come out slightly more desperate than he’d intended, sounding more like a plea than a command and her expressions softens just a little. Not enough to reassure him that she will do her best to ignore the parts of him that he’d unwillingly forced on her, though.

“Why?”

“You have your own emotions to worry about, without needing to focus on mine,” he arches a brow pointedly at her, trying to give her the hint that he can feel as much of her as she can of him, probably more.

Realisation dawns on her face as she clicks on to what he’s said, but to his surprise her frown deepens and she takes a step closer to him. “And is that what you’re doing? Just ignoring them and pretending they don’t exist?”

“Yes.” There is no right answer to such a question, so he refuses to feel any guilt whatsoever at the way her face falls a little at his answer. At least he tries not to feel any guilt, but he knows it’s there, creeping through his gut despite his best attempts to ignore it.

“Just when I thought you were already as big of a jackass as you could get,” she mutters, her focus falling down to the ground for a split second before she glares back up at him.

They don’t have time for this. He wouldn’t have time for it in the best of circumstances let alone with all that is going on already.

“Just deal with it so that we can get back to normal,” he snaps, a little harsher than he means to, his impatience peeking through just a little more than is probably necessary.

“No,” she begins, taking a deep breath and standing a little straighter, “no, you wanted to talk and I let you talk, so now it’s my turn. I think you’re afraid of me finding out how you feel.”

He rolls his eyes and lets out a huff, turning to walk away from her and back towards the new camp site. “That’s preposterous.”

“Hey! Don’t walk away from me,” she’s behind him in an instant, grabbing at his arm to slow him down and then stepping in front of him to prevent him from going anywhere.

“I think you’re afraid that I feel the same,” she continues, letting go of his arm when he glances down at her hand and he falters, unsure how to react to her outright accusation.

“I- we don’t have time for this right now, Detective.”

“I think that’s why you don’t use my name.”

“Jordan,” his voice hitches just a little - not little enough for her to miss it though - when he attempts to prove her wrong, trying to ignore the annoyance bubbling up inside of him at being put on the spot like this.

“I think that’s why you didn’t want it to be you yesterday, I think that’s why you had a problem with me and Mason, and I think that’s why you always look as though it legitimately causes you pain to be close to me.”

She crosses her arms over her chest again and watches him expectantly, clearly ready for an argument and waiting for him to disagree or lose his cool. So, he does neither. She might be looking for a fight but he most certainly is not, so he sidesteps his way around her and tries to leave again.

“I’m talking to you! You can’t just walk away from me in the middle of this,” she grabs his arm again, annoyingly persistent and defiant, and this time he roughly pulls it away, whirling back around to face her.

“I can, and I intend to.”

“Why are you always such a jerk to me?” she steps closer again, the proximity making him incredibly uncomfortable and starting to anger him all at once as he realises it’s unlikely that he’s going to get out of this situation without at least some kind of an argument.

"Because you-" he begins to reply, feeling himself grow angrier by the second as he finds himself at a loss for words once again.

"Me what?" she fires back stubbornly, holding his gaze, her hands balled into fists at her sides.

"-are insufferable." He finally finishes. It’s as good an answer as any, and is certainly better than telling her that he needs to act that way towards her so as not to become too attached.

"Fine," She throws her hands into the air suddenly and moves to walk past him, deliberately hitting his bicep with her shoulder on the way.

"I won't make you suffer me anymore. I quit," she grumbles under her breath, but he hears her and his arm shoots out now to grab hers and he pulls her back closer to him, a little more roughly than he'd meant to.

"You what?" he asks, his eyes piercing into hers unforgivingly.

"I. Quit."

"You cannot."

"Try and stop me."

His grip on her arm tightens as she tries to walk away from him again, and now she is the one to glare down at his hand before arching an eyebrow at him.

"You cannot," he repeats. His stomach tightens up with worry. No, not worry. Fear. His eyes widen slightly at the epiphany. He is afraid to lose her. He's afraid of the part of her that he still feels within himself being the only part he gets. He's afraid of the possibility of never being able to look at her again or be near to her again, never being able to watch her laughing with Felix again.

His face twists into a frown. He is just as afraid of what the fear might mean as he is of the fear itself. He is afraid of how remarkably easy it has been for Jordan to ignite those feelings within him, after no other has succeeded in… well, he can't even remember how long. She's still glaring at him, though her expression has softened, as though she can sense the battle raging inside of him. It irritates him even further, the way this woman pities him.

"Tell me why not." Her voice is barely above a whisper, but the way it pierces the heavy silence surrounding them hurts his ears. The hand not holding onto her twitches at his side before he lifts his arm, the backs of his knuckles just grazing her cheek before he quickly pulls it back and releases her.

"I-"

"Apologise?" she cuts him off, and he falters at the interruption and takes a slight step back.

"Yes."

"No." She steps towards him again despite his attempt to get away from her.

"No?" he asks faintly. Her heart is racing, she's riled up and her body heat is almost scorching. He takes another step away to distance himself before he is overwhelmed but she steps with him, the gap between them remaining virtually non-existent.

"No. I don't accept your apology. Not this time."

He's lost for words, racking his brain for a response. She continues talking before he can articulate his thoughts.

"I don't accept that you feel sorry for feeling something for me. As though it's a bad thing."

"I- do not feel anything for you. You are a member of my unit, that's all. I feel for you as I feel for my other agents."

"Lying."

"And if I did, it would indeed be less than ideal," he continues, deliberately ignoring her rebuttal.

"Why?"

He sighs in exasperation and looks away from her, his gaze shifting up to the high tops of the trees as though he believes that if he looks away from her for long enough she'll disappear. Unfortunately it doesn't work and she's still staring at him expectantly, waiting for his answer.

"Why is of no consequence," he answers and she finally looks away from him to roll her eyes.

"You are such an asshole."

Something snaps inside of him, finally growing tired of biting back his own opinion while she constantly throws her own in his face.

"And you, you are the most stubborn, most unwarrantedly self assured, most irritating, most relentlessly persistent human I have ever met."

"And you are the most arrogant man I've ever met."

"Then why must you persevere in trying to drag emotions of which you are not certain out of me?"

"Because I am certain of them!" She's yelling at him now, loud enough for him to be able to hear the rustling of disturbed birds taking flight from the branches they’ve settled on for the night above them. Her eyes burn into him, her heartbeat almost deafening. She inches closer to him and he tenses, his fingertips seem to burn and itch with a need to touch her but his hands remain by his side.

"You are certain of them too, I know you are. You might not be certain of what to do about them, but you're certain they're there."

He glares down at her, his body tense and the beat of his own heart matching hers. She stands before him, still inappropriately close, her head tilted back a little to be able to hold his gaze, eyes wild and face twisted in frustration.

She opens her mouth to speak again, but Adam has had enough. He doesn't want to hear anymore, he doesn't want to hear the words out loud in case they ring as true as he fears they will.

"Detective-" he tries to cut her off but she shakes her head angrily.

"No, you're going to-"

"Detective Mills!"

"Agent Du Mortain, you will listen-"

Before she can finish her sentence, before he even knows himself what he's doing, his hands are on her hips, pulling her flush against him and he's ducked his head down to press his lips against hers, swallowing whatever she was about to say.

Her body is almost as stiff as his, and his still open eyes search hers, waiting for some kind of reaction. Her hands fly up to either side of his face and he watches her eyes close. He's kissing her. And after a moment she's kissing him back. Why is he kissing her? He feels her tongue tracing his lower lip and jerks his head away from her, though his hands remain on her hips.

They stare at each other in shock, in anger, in something else that Adam's not willing to acknowledge before Jordan lifts onto her tiptoes to reach his lips with hers again. He reciprocates almost immediately, as though it's an automatic response, and his grip on her hips tightens.

This time he allows her tongue to slip into his mouth, a small groan escaping him when the taste of her hits him and all at once it's too much. She's too close, pressed against him too hard. She feels too good in his hands, tastes too good in his mouth, and his mind is becoming far more clouded with thoughts of her than he is happy with.

He pulls away again, straightening up to his full height and jerking his hands off of her hips as hers fall from his face and hang loosely at her sides.

"Adam-"

"It’s dark. We should be getting back to the others,” he cuts her off before she can say anymore, his gaze lingering on her for a split second before he turns and walks away from her.

He hears only silence behind him and resists the urge to turn and ensure that she is alright, but breathes a small sigh of relief when he hears her slowly but surely start to follow him back.

Well. That did not go at all according to plan.

--

tags (let me know if you want to be added or removed): @admdmrtn @masonsfangs @oxjenayxo @mmerengue @agentsunshine @bravomckenzie @freckles-spangledvampire @mistyeyedbi @kelseaaa @ambrosykim @amlovelies @forestcreatures @maraudern05 @kat-tia801 @alyssalauren @vintage-vamp @adamdumorpain @zevorah

#twc fic #the wayhaven chronicles #a du mortain #n sewell #f hauville #agent m #jordan mills #echoes #kat writes

[gwaciechang]

It’s What My Rotting Bones Will Sing

Ship: geraskier

Day 6: monster for @geraltwhumpweek

Medium: Netflix Witcher

Warnings: canon typical violence, some fantastic racism

Summary: He doesn’t hesitate before throwing himself between Jaskier and the arachna’s descending, venom-covered leg.

Word count: 1588

Author’s note: regarding the fantastic racism, a character doesn’t treat the non-human character as well as the human character in a moment of stress, I personally don’t think it warrants the warning, but my editor says it does. Anyway, read below the cut, or here on AO3!

The trick with basilisks is to use fire, the trick with bruxas is to use silver, the trick with ghouls is to draw them out of their nest to fight them two or three at a time, and the trick with kikimoras is to be faster than they are. Unfortunately, that only works if the monster he was contracted to fight is actually the monster he fights. When the nest of kikimoras turned out to be a nest of poisonous arachnas, well, there’s no time to rue the healing potions he left in Roach’s saddlebags.

Geralt steps carelessly around the bones of the villagers’ children as he hacks at the young ones. He winces at the amount of noise they’re making, but only that. They don’t have working venom glands yet, their only danger lies in their tiny pincers that are easily dodged, and the pheromones they release to let their mother know they’re in danger. And, speak of the devil, the ground rumbles.

The full-sized arachna has legs easily the size of Geralt’s body, and he only has his swords and slowly fading black blood in his veins and running down his legs where the baby arachnas had bitten through his armor. Still, he rushes forward and tries his best to kill the arachna before it can get past the cave opening and to Jaskier and the village. He knows he only has a limited amount of time before the fight would send the whole cave down, and it wouldn’t be enough to kill the arachna before it escaped and went toward the village.

It’s the work of a moment to throw down an Aard and block the cave entrance, crushing any arachna young on their way out. Geralt vaguely registers their squeals with satisfaction, while the mother spits acidic venom at his arm and attacks him with renewed effort. His lands a strike directly to her venom gland, which only ends with it being sprayed across his midsection, his legs, the arachna’s own legs, and dissolving part of the cave floor. The remaining arachna young swarm all over him, inflaming the affected patches of skin until he’s gritting his teeth not to scream and risk the entire cave coming down.

Oh, there’s an idea, why hadn’t he done this already? He allows himself a single cry, then begins focusing Aard at the ceiling. It cracks, then cracks more, then rocks start to fall. He continues throwing fading signs into the ceiling until a single ray of moonlight falls on his face. Right, that was why, if the cave came down, it give the arachna mother an escape route.

His legs spasm underneath him as he rises, and he almost falls. The arachna venom was already taking effect, then, making him stumble as he chases the arachna. He prays that he won’t be too late, that this won’t be the time he’s too slow. Jaskier screams, but he’s not running. When Geralt bursts through the trees, he finds Jaskier cowering in front of the campfire. The arachna bellows her victory and snaps her pincers, but Jaskier ducks out of the way, and the arachna finds herself with a mouthful of flame instead. She shrieks in pain and anger, legs slicing through the air. Jaskier’s curled into a ball, as small as he can be, but it’s not enough.

Geralt doesn’t even think before throwing himself in between Jaskier and the arachna’s descending leg. It feels like a red-hot poker going into him, but it’s nothing compared to the extreme cold he feels as it goes out of him.

Jaskier’s scream cuts off into a whimper.

Geralt stabs the arachna with both his swords at once, through the head and through the heart, and twists and twists until the arachna’s legs withdraw into herself. Geralt slides limply off and can’t find the strength to move to brace himself for the fall. He lands hard next to where Jaskier is panting and whimpering, from the same unbearable pain he’s feeling. There are more pokers being pressed his arms as he picks Jaskier up and presses a hand against the bloody wound. Jaskier writhes, making the sort of sounds a human does when they can’t get enough air to scream, and Geralt grits his teeth and can’t get any air at all. Someone’s stabbing knives right into the marrow of his bones, thwarting his attempts to stand, but eventually desperation gives him enough traction on the cobblestones to rise and stagger to the healers’ hut.

She blanches when she sees them. Geralt’s sure he looks terrifying, but he deposits Jaskier onto the nearest flat surface, knocking over some silverware and a glass of wine, before his feet collapse from under him. “Arachna venom,” he growls. “I’ll pay,” he pants from his new vantage point on the floor.

“I only have one antidote, I’m not wasting it on you,” the healer says, pointing to her own eyes and then to Geralt. He doesn’t mind, but he’s regretting not getting some of his healing potions from Roach while he had been upright.

The healer is careful not to jostle Jaskier’s wound as she lifts him and slowly pours the antivenom down Jaskier’s throat, massaging it so he swallows easily. Geralt finds himself relaxing a little when the bard does, and his eyes threaten to close. He wonders if he’s going to die here, if Jaskier would ever come back to sing over his rotting bones.

“Hey, no,” the healer snaps her fingers next to Geralt’s ear. “Where are your potions, then?” she demands.

“Horse,” he grits out. He hears rustling, then nothing, then a feminine shout. A door slams once, twice, and he jerks at that. There’s the sound of not rustling, and he can smell some blood on his saddlebag.

“Which one?” the honey smell gets closer.

Geralt almost knocks it onto the ground, but the healer has fast reflexes, or maybe he’s just slow. She uncorks the bottle, lifts his head, and pours it down his throat. “Do you need another one?” she asks.

He thinks he nods, because she gives him another one before wrapping his side with what seems to be a mile of bandages. Then she leaves him to burn through the venom on his own. He watches, hardly able to move from the pain, while she jumps over Geralt’s body with herbs that she sticks to Jaskier’s wound, and bandages she carefully wraps around his side. Her hands are light and gentle as she touches him, even putting a pillow and a blanket around him where he sleeps on her dining table, and Geralt finally relaxes enough to slip into, if not meditation, then at least semiconsciousness.

Jaskier’s in safe hands, and he’s in his own hands, that’s as good as such a night can end.

“Why are you twitching?” Jaskier demands in the morning. “Why are you on the floor?”

Geralt tries to explain, but the venom is still burning through his body, which is having a harder time filtering it out due to the effects of two potions and severe blood loss.

“I couldn’t lift you, how do you expect me to lift him?” the healer snorts. She takes a bag of coin out and hands it to Geralt. “You should’ve been paid for for the arachna, but the alderman didn’t want to give you any more, so I won’t charge you for my services.”

“Of course you shouldn’t charge!” Jaskier pales and puts a hand on his side. “You didn’t help him at all!”

“I used the last of my arachna antivenom on you,” the healer ignores him. “Be careful with that,” she says, taking out a roll of bandages and handing it to him. “Make sure to clean and rewrap that at least once a day.”

“And what did you do for him?” Jaskier points where where Geralt wishes he would stop twitching.

“Look, all of my knowledge is on how to treat the human body,” the healer snaps.

“She fetched my potions,” Geralt rasps. “It’s not her fault arachnas are deadly.”

“You could’ve at least given him a blanket,” Jaskier glares at her.

“I only have two,” the healer snaps back. “If you’re so unhappy with my treatment, you are free to leave.”

Geralt flops his arms around until he lands on something he can grip with nerveless fingers, but his feet don’t want to cooperate with his attempt to stand up.

“You can stay,” the healer says finally, when it’s clear he won’t be leaving. “You’re not being ungrateful,” she pointedly looks away from Jaskier.

Geralt finds himself smiling as Jaskier sputters indignantly.

“Can you believe her nerve?” Jaskier says, looking at any direction but Geralt.

“She’s not the monster here, I killed the only one to blame for our wounds last night,” Geralt says, wishing he could move and comfort the bard.

His words just make Jaskier retreat further into himself. “She said she only had supplies for one,” he mutters. “You were hurt, too.”

“And I’m healed,” Geralt gestures to his middle, where he’s hoping there’s significantly less blood than there was last night.

Jaskier sighs and gingerly gets off the table. “I’m sure she’ll be glad to have a spot to eat her meals,” he mutters, before lifting Geralt’s head to place his pillow underneath, and draping the blanket over both of them as he lays his own head on Geralt’s chest.

When he wakes, Geralt insists on picking herbs for more arachna antivenom before they leave.

#geraltwhummpweek #hurt geralt #geralt whump #netflix witcher #geraskier #My posts

[grimmseye]

A Bird in the Hand: Chapter Twelve

Read on Ao3 here!

Rating: M

Fandom: Critical Role

Relationships: Mollymauk Tealeaf/Essek Thelyss, Mollymauk Tealeaf/Essek Thelyss/Caleb Widogast (eventual),

Chapter Characters: Mollymauk Tealeaf, Essek Thelyss

Chapter Tags/Warnings: Molly Rez, Amnesiac Mollymauk, Oh My God They Were Roommates, Violence, The best kind of romantic relationships are when you fight big monsters together

— — —

Seeing this side of the world reminded Essek why they were envious of the Empire.

The Ashkeeper peaks, at their southernmost edge, were bright with life. Even in the nighttime, the lands buzzed with a steady drone of noise, small and mundane creatures that would bear them little harm so far from the wastes of Xhorhas.

They didn’t have these luxuries of rich growth and predators that thought you too big to be their next meal. The Dynasty’s lands were long blighted, and what stood today came from centuries of building from scrap.

Essek was not much of a patriot, but he still had some love for his home, and still wanted to see it flourish. Beholding the verdant jungles that spilled out far below, he could not tamp down the resentment for what they’d been denied.

One ear flicked back at the sound of approaching steps. Essek turned as Mollymauk caught up with him, his coat draped between his arms to carry several handfuls of small, round fruit. The smile on his face beamed joy and contentment as he shuffled up to Essek and held out his coat in offering. “Blueberry?”

“Another fruit named after its color,” Essek observed, but reached for a few.

“Make sure to take the firmer ones. A mushy berry will ruin your day,” Molly advised, and Essek rolled back a few that had been soft between his fingers.

They were little blooms of sweetness on his tongue, and he couldn’t help but let a smile spread across his face. Xhorhas struggled to maintain their farms, druids and bards and clerics filtering out to the fields to bless the lands and enrichen the soil. While it let them till the land, magic had a way of leeching the flavor from anything that grew there. It left much to be desired beyond the edible fungi that naturally grew in the wastes.

“Good?” Molly prompted, smiling. “Hey, hey, hand over your bag, will you? I can’t carry these forever.” He reached for Essek’s pack without waiting for real permission, tugging a small pocket open to start shoveling berries inside. “Just let me know when you want some more!”

When the berries were safely offloaded and the pocket closed, they fell into step back along the deer path they’d been following. An arc of one finger sent orbs of light bobbing through the air around him to illuminate their road once again.

They had only been traveling a few hours, his teleportation spell landing them further than he might have liked. Mollymauk took to the mountains with glee, his hooves allowing him to hop up steeper slopes with ease while Essek simply let graviturgy boost him up the hills. It made him feel warm to see Molly scamper up to the crest of another slope and then spin around, absolute delight on his face as he drank in the world below them.

“Mollymauk,” he called, and watched him twitch to attention. “More berries, please.”

“Get your ass up here first,” Molly shouted down. It was a blessing that he didn’t start his usual jeering.

Once Essek had joined him, Molly dutifully opened the pouch, delivering another handful of berries. Several steps down the path, he got a tug on his arm, and the tiefling’s mouth opened wide in expectation.

“You could have gotten your own,” Essek pointed out, but fed him a berry. Teeth closed around his pointer finger, scraping as Essek pulled away.

Molly waggled his eyebrows. Essek turned to walk away.

“Gods’ sake, Essek,” Molly groaned. He caught Essek around the shoulders to pull him down, lips meeting. The hand that didn’t cradle blueberries found Mollymauk’s arm instead, squeezing in expectation for the filthy sort of kisses Molly liked to spring on him these days. Instead he found himself smiling as Molly pressed one, two, three, small pecks to his lips, and then another to his nose, and again to his lips, this time to mumble, “You’re such a hardass.”

“You’ve done nothing to discourage me,” Essek pointed out, and Molly barked out a laugh.

It made travel impossibly slow, but Essek had never enjoyed himself more on this road. Earlier in his career, he had traveled with bands of Kryn soldiers, escorting him under the night, moving quick and quiet with the constant dread of being found out beyond their borders. As he developed his skills and reputation, he’d started coming alone, trusting his own resilience to make a quick escape if needed.

Neither had been enjoyable. Being alone had been an improvement, allowing him the peace to enjoy the change in scenery, but in recent months he’d recognized something that colored all memories of his past: a loneliness that ached to his core.

Now he had Mollymauk.

The Ashkeeper peaks were home to drakes. They weren’t true dragons, lacking their power and intelligence, but hunting one down would fetch a good price in any shaded market. Essek wasn’t here for poaching, though — all he needed were the shed scales that lined their nests.

They reached the peaks a few hours before dawn. The moons had slid out of view, leaving a bright field of stars overhead. He dismissed the lights around them, and they both took a moment to let their eyes adjust to the new darkness.

Mollymauk stuck close from that point forward. His visual range was significantly reduced compared to Essek’s, and he followed close behind. When Essek’s hands drifted to his component pouches, Molly’s swords hissed from their sheathes.

He had been to this drake’s lair a few dozen times already, and knew its patterns. A male, it always left the nest at night to hunt. It dwelled in a cave at the very peak of the Ashkeepers, where snow lined its crest well into summer.

Mollymauk’s steps were near-silent in the frost. Essek cast Message, whispering “Don’t stray from me,” before he set a hand on Molly’s shoulder and cast invisibility on them both.

His grip tightened as Mollymauk’s image slid away. He kept pace, Molly’s tail weighed against his side as the tiefling eased towards the mouth of the cavern. The temperature only dropped further as they passed under its roof. The inside of the cave nearly crystalline with ice. Even invisible, the fog of their path mingled with that which circulated inside.

Essek would give Mollymauk nudges to direct him through the tunnels, the two of them slipping around frozen bends, a veritable maze carved into the mountain. At its end was another cavern, this one with walls and burrows to form an uneven landscape. Essek knew that at the farthest point, the drake’s nest would be tucked away, filled with soft snow and plant matter and any shiny thing the creature could get off the ground.

A low, rumbling sound made both of them freeze. It rolled through the cavern, bouncing off the frozen walls. They held their breaths, counting the seconds of silence before it was chased by a hissing, sucking sound.

Snoring. That was the sound of snoring. The drake was still in its nest.

Molly’s hand replaced his tail, a weight at Essek’s side. He dragged it up, to his arm, his shoulder, skimming fingers along the length of his neck and over his jaw, until he’d found Essek’s ear and held it in place. Heat burned his cheeks as he leaned down and Molly pressed close.

The tiefling’s lips were practically on top of his ear as he whispered, “Still good to go?”

His hand dipped to cup Essek’s cheek, so Molly felt it when he nodded. There was a squeeze to his jaw, and a moment later, Molly slipped away.

The absence terrified him. Essek pulled a piece of iron from his pouch and clutched it in his hand. Even prepared, he was still too far away to cast. He watched Molly’s path through the mist, eyes fixated on every uneven swirl of fog until it grew too dense to parse.

Then his eyes were focused on the drake’s nest, which hovered at the very edge of his vision. He held his breath, blood pumping in his ears.

The edges of the nest were lined with glinting shapes — silver scales. It was the sudden loss of one’s light that alerted him to Molly’s position, watching as a shape lifted, and vanished. Then, seconds later, another. Then a third. All the while, the drake in the nest snored peacefully away.

One by one, Molly plucked the scales from the nest and tucked them safely away. Essek had almost let himself breathe again — and then a scraping sound came from above.

Essek froze. He prayed Molly had done the same, ears straining for the noise. It was the echo of scrabbling talons growing steadily louder, and closer. His eyes widened as he stared at the roof of the cavern, where one of those burrows tunneled up through the mountain to open air, where another silver snout was poking through.

The drake had apparently found itself a mate. Now the new one crawled onto the ceiling, something bloody clutched in its mouth. Its wings spread, bringing it gliding down to the cavern floor, Essek’s heart leaping in his chest as it landed on the edge of the nest. It was not, apparently, on top of Mollymauk, for the drake only siddled back onto the ice and began to scrape at it with its claws.

Mollymauk was invisible. He only needed to stay still and wait for the creature to settle down. Essek repeated this in his head as he watched the chunk of meat — a torn-off deer’s haunch, he was sure — get tucked down in the ice and then blasted with a stream of pure frost from the creature’s throat. It nudged the heap left over, muzzle coming away coated in snow, and for just an instant it looked like it was going to curl up peacefully in its next.

Then its nostrils flared. The pupils dilated, a snarl echoing through the cavern, this time the breath exhaled was more than just snow — it was a cone of jagged ice, to cut and freeze and kill. Essek felt the thread of his spell snap, Mollymauk flickering into view as a silhouette ducking away from the blizzard.

Essek’s feet hit the ground. He moved faster this way, darting forward across ragged ice. The other drake was waking now, as an arc of flaming orbs formed a halo above Essek’s head and then blared jets of fire into its mate.

Molly tried to retreat, scrabbling back. The awoken drake caught sight of him and then shrieked and lunged, the first snap of its jaws missing but talons catching his thigh. Molly snarled. His sword flashed down, Essek threw out a hand. The velocity of his swing doubled just before he struck, driving the blade deep into the meat of the creature’s back.

The second, the male drake, jumped from behind Mollymauk. Essek rushed forward, squeezing the chunk of iron tight enough that it cut into his palm and willing the beast to freeze in place. His magic curled around it for only a moment before it broke free of his grasp. It snapped at Mollymauk with a vengeance, clothes shredding around its teeth and jaws slicked with blood..

Molly couldn’t escape, barred in by two of the beasts. Essek snarled to himself, shifting to an angle where he could line up their thrashing bodies. “Mollymauk,” he called. The tiefling caught his gaze, saw the electricity as it pulled into Essek’s grip, and dove for the female’s tail.

He swung forward. The air pressure dropped, and dark purple lightning burst across the floor. It caught the female in the skull, its mate springing away with a hiss. Molly took the distraction, swinging viciously into the already bloodied drake as it staggered and wailed.

Essek hesitated for only a moment before getting even closer. He could get them out, he just needed to get to Mollymauk first.

And then the female turned, frost billowing between its teeth, and both of them were surrounded by pure cold. Essek shuddered, his legs giving way, knees hitting the ground. Snowflakes clung to his eyelashes, blurring his vision, skin stinging where needles of ice pricked through his flash.

He panted, gulping in a breath before he pushed himself upright. Mollymauk was still on his feet, defending himself against both of the beasts with blood dripping down his chin.

One step forward. Fresh blood drooled from Molly’s eyes, but the tail still caught him in the legs, made him stagger.

Another step. Molly dug one sword into the ice, the other glowing with radiant light. He lunged, dragging a crimson line into metallic scales.

Another step. The drakes both snarled, jaws parting in near unison, two mouths full of ice to expel.

Essek’s hand clamped onto Mollymauk’s shoulder, and he pulled.

They landed outside the cave, several hundred feet down the mountain. The shift in pressure made his ears pop as they collapsed in the grass.

For a moment, they both just caught their breath, adrenaline making his hands shake and his head swim. He listened as Mollymauk regained his bearings, shoving himself onto his knees.

“Can we run one gods- damned errand,” Mollymauk snarled, wrestling Essek’s pack away, “without something getting its teeth into me.”

There was the clink of glass. Essek rolled over, pushing himself to sit up. Mollymauk had pulled out a pair of potions, and was holding both of them out to him.

Essek frowned. “You take one,” he said, lifting a single bottle from his grip. He braced himself and downed it, the grimace from its taste giving way to relief as warmth flushed over his skin again.

Molly shrugged, pinched his nose, and did the same. Essek had to chuckle as Molly gagged and dove for the blueberry pouch.

He watched as Molly crammed a handful past his lips, then threw himself onto the ground. The grunt and groan that followed suggested the potion hadn’t patched everything up just yet.

He chuckled, and then settled his chin in one hand, elbow propped on a knee. “That was unfortunate,” Essek sighed. “I’ll have to go back to making this trip in a group if there’s a pair of them, now.” He was glad they hadn’t actually managed to kill one. If the drakes abandoned that nest, he’d be out of good components. “At least information means the trip wasn’t an utter waste.”

Molly, mouth stained with blueberry juice, suddenly perked up. He gave a wet, food-muffled noise that made Essek grimace before digging into the pockets of his coat. When he pulled his hands free, it was with a bundle of silver scales each.

Essek’s face lit up. He took the scales, even those streaked with blueberry juice, to examine them for a moment and slip them into his component pouch. Excitement thrummed in his chest. That would restore an entire batch of potions and leave him some leftover material for experimentation — he could kiss Mollymauk for that.

He could. That was the truth. Essek peeked back at Molly, to find the tiefling sitting up again with a squinty-eyed grin.

It took a moment to steel his courage before he cupped Molly’s face and pressed a kiss to his lips. The shock and then delight that shone in his eyes after had some odd pride flaring in Essek’s chest.

He’d almost grown comfortable with the arrangement. Mollymauk almost always initiated, pulling him down for kisses or burrowing into his space, clinging in bed when the night was cold. Sometimes he’d push Essek down in that bed and leave marks on his neck that the mantle would hide. Sometimes Essek came home carrying tension in every muscle and Molly would nudge him against the wall and sink to his knees, or lay out across the bed on his belly, tail curling, voice goading.

Turning the tables was fun. Seeing the warmth in Molly’s eyes made his heart do something strange but not quite unpleasant.

“Let’s get a little further out before resting,” Essek suggested, before pulling Molly another five hundred feet down the mountain.

He cast a spell, then, one that Molly had seemed delighted by when he first heard of it. Magnificent Mansion was a requirement for travel. The doorway shimmered into being, and the two of them vanished inside. There were a few plants Essek will need to gather under sunlight come morning, but for now, they could lay in a bed and rest.

And they did. They sank onto a mattress, injuries still too sore to do anything but curl around each other and bask in shared heat after being doused in the mountain’s chill. Meditation was easy to slip into, the deepening of Molly’s breaths becoming the metronome to carry him somewhere beyond conscious thought.

These were moments that made him feel like even in the worst of times, things could still be okay. The yawning pit of his future had given way to a flicker of light.

He was woken by the feeling of a spell shredding through the threads of his magic.

Essek’s heart skipped the moment before he was shunted into another space. He hit the ground in a heap, gasping in one breath before the air became flame.

A scream ripped from his throat. He thought for a moment it was echoing, until he realized Mollymauk was shrieking as well. In the span of seconds, every inch of his flesh was sent crawling with agony, blood pulsing heavy under his skin and leaving him stunned when the inferno fell away.

Arrows had embedded in his body almost without him noticing. He reached for his component pouch, grabbing hold of Mollymauk as they staggered upright. He’d burned too much magic to bring them home, but maybe he could put enough distance, could hide —

The spell crumbled to ash. Essek’s gaze focused on the caster, horror twisting in his gut. Mollymauk met his eyes, then shoved him, barking, “Just run!”

So he ran, dragging Mollymauk behind him. His hand lifted to try again, just one successful cast to save them.

A series of snaps pierced his ears before the bolts drove under his skin. He pitched forward, registering only pain the second before the world turned to black.

Elsewhere, it was raining.

They stood on a hillside, the clouds opened up to a frigid downpour. It wasn’t a storm, yet, but the force of the wind was a warning.

Two pairs of hands dug through slick mud, finding the earth below loose and pliant, the grave they had dug so long ago now revealing itself as empty.

#shadowmauk #mollymauk tealeaf #essek thelyss #mollymauk #essek #cr #cr fic #my writing #queue

[modernagesomniari]

Fic - ‘That’s Not Quite an Answer’

Part of the Mala Suledin Nadas Series.  You can read it on AO3 here.

So this is in fact a retelling of an early romance conversation you have with Solas at Haven.  However, it also morphed with an idea I picked up from some brilliant folks on tumblr - where Solas does yoga/tai chi as exercise.  Damn those thighs....

Maturish (Eli is thirsty af bless her), ~4900 words

**************

Eli woke early, luxuriating in a proper bed after days on the road.  Especially the last few where they’d been up in the mountains.  Aravels had been cold enough in the snow, tents were significantly less insulated.  The bed in her little shack was large and covered with blankets - it may not have been as comfortable as her bed in the aravel, but she doubted the villagers of Haven were up to hunting the birds necessary to stuff their mattresses with the feathers.  The wood was cold against her bare feet as she stood, stretching, padding over to the little area screened off for morning ablutions.  She found the whole concept of a bucket for that sort of thing a bit disgusting, but Cassandra had forbidden her to go to the woods to do it, something about ‘Herald of Andraste’ and ‘propriety’.  One of the servants had brought another bucket last night with fresh water in it and she winced at the cold as she crouched and dangled one hand in it.  Closing her eyes, she allowed the heat of the flames at her fingertips to heat the frigid liquid until steam came off the top and only then did she dip the flannel left for her in the water and quickly wash herself.

She remembered Hearthmistress Ashanaya getting so excited one time when they were skirting Starkhaven because the hunters had come back with some rare herb.  The camp had stunk for three days, but at the end she had made a large quantity of soaps that they had all treasured for their scent.  The soap here felt like it was made of dandelion nectar and bitter roots, but she still felt cleaner for it afterwards.  It made her feel slightly homesick, but that was quite common at the moment.  In a way, she preferred being out on the road than in Haven - people were beginning to think she belonged here.

Varric was at the main fire when she approached him, her bare toes crunching in the snow.  He gave her a large grin and passed her some freshly fried oatcakes and honeyed tea.  At least someone was happy.  He seemed busy, though, sifting through various papers with a crease on his brow, so she kissed him lightly on the forehead and let him be.

She knew who she wanted to go and see.  Their adventures in the Hinterlands had devolved into the territory of nightmares after Redcliffe, but had been illuminating none the less.  There had been a report from one of Leliana’s agents that the scouts who had been sent to Wycome had landed safely in Kirkwall and were making their way northwards, extra Dalish mage in tow.  She hoped Mihris was behaving herself.  She and Solas had been easier with each other since then, although it helped that they had got themselves thoroughly engrossed in searching for fragments of Tyrrda’s legend.  She was beginning to enjoy his company more, to be less afraid that he would suddenly turn on her and her people whenever he was feeling cranky.  True, they avoided certain topics, but even when they had been discussing more general magical theory he had listened and debated her experiences fairly, not jumping to conclusions like he had before.

As she passed the tavern, she caught some of the servers there taking out some rubbish and smiled at them, waving.  She liked that they smiled and waved back rather than look at her fearfully - she’d been working quite hard before they’d left for the Hinterlands to ensure that they would.

“Anything special on the menu tonight?” she called out.  One of them grimaced (Tobias, she thought his name was).

“Not particularly, your worship.  Although the hunters brought some good dried meat back from near Redcliffe.”

She made a face sympathetically - dried meat may be fine on its own, but wasn’t particularly good at being used in dishes.

Hopping up the steps to where Solas did his research, she greeted a few people already waiting in line for Adan and then knocked on the door of Solas’ hut.  When there was no reply, she knocked again - it was quite early in the day, although the sun was most definitely up.  Perhaps he was engrossed in something?

“Your…your worship?”

She turned to find a young elven woman carrying a laundry basket on her hip.  The poor thing looked a bit terrified, so Eli made sure her smile was warm as she inclined her head.

“Just ‘Ellana’ is fine, if that makes you more comfortable.  What’s your name?”

The girl swallowed, eyes wide.

“Um, Jan, your wor….Ellana.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Jan.  I haven’t seen you before.”

“Oh, I came up whilst you were away, miss.  My master wanted to come and speak to the Ambassador, but then I came here and I didn’t want to leave.  Lady Leliana said I could stay if I made myself useful, that you would be happy for me to stay?”

“Of course I’m happy, Jan.  I hope you’re being treated well?”

“Oh yes,” Jan answered, warming up now Eli clearly wasn’t going to smite her with holy flame.  “And it’s good to be doing something that means something, isn’t it?  You being the Herald of Andraste and all.  I always went to Chantry on Sundays, miss.  Always.”

Eli tried not to let her smile fade.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself.  Did you want something?”

“Oh!  Yes, I was wondering if you were looking for your friend?  Messere Solas?”

“I think he prefers just ‘Solas’, as well.”

“Yes, yes of course.  I just wanted to let you know that he left early this morning, went up into the woods above the Chantry?  He wasn’t carrying anything with him, though, so he can’t have gone far.”

Eli smiled at her again, thanking her for letting Eli know.  Jan beamed, blushing as she took her laundry out of the small square.  Eli wished she could rid herself of the nausea that came with people insisting on her being the Herald, wished that she could see a way to rid them of the notion.  Perhaps this was why she wanted to see Solas so much.  It didn’t take much deliberation to decide to follow him - at least she’d get a nice morning walk if she didn’t find him.

The path up into the woods was just behind the Chantry and she took a moment to bow her head at the small clearing where Ghila and Yerevan’s memorial stones were.  Then she was in the trees, the low hustle and bustle of Haven falling away until there was nothing but silence and early morning light.  The pale bark seemed almost as white as the snow that lay on the branches, these small trees quiet and waiting for spring, whatever green they possessed locked tightly up inside them against the cold.  She loved to brush her fingers gently over the rough trunks, imagining she could feel the life pent up inside.  There had been some woods in her life where she could do just that.  She wondered if Solas had ever been there, ever dreamed amongst the evergreen trunks of northern Nevarra, the gentle oaken slopes of Starkhaven, the tangled heat of southern Antivan jungle and old, old forests in places where not even the greatest of shemlen nations could claim any part of it other than a pathetic name in ink on a map.  He still hadn’t told her much about his past or his studies and she was desperate to know, excited to see how his experiences matched with hers.  She couldn’t travel the Fade like he could and so her knowledge was grounded in reality.  What had she seen that he had missed as he slept and what had he done that she never could?  What could their combined experiences tell them both?

She only came across him by accident, just as she was beginning to wonder why she couldn’t see any tracks.  Her eyes had been naturally scanning for them, but perhaps he had just taken a more winding path.  His slow movement had nevertheless been in stark enough comparison to the stillness of the woods that she’d spotted him from quite far away, but the sight once she’d worked out what she was seeing was enough to stop her in her tracks, breath catching slightly in her throat.

He was shifting through a series of movements she half recognised as part of the Vir Atish’an.  Combining many still forms and movements through those forms, it was a method of slow training that was taught to most of the Clan throughout their lives as a way to learn their own body and find peace between themselves and the world around them.  Her brother had always been awful at it being far too impatient, but Eli had come to enjoy it once she had dedicated herself to her own magical talent and future role as First.  Solas was employing forms she had never seen before, with transitions strange yet somehow achingly familiar.  He was amazing, his body moving with such fluidity and grace one moment to poised, anticipating stillness the next.  His eyes were gently shut, the sun filtering through the trees in the small clearing he’d found dappling the light over him.  In front of him was a slope down to the main valley that laid out the whole lake.

He was also, despite the snow, shirtless.  Eli came forward slowly, not wanting to disturb but frankly unable not to come closer.  He’d clearly been working for some time - there was a sheen of sweat over a chest more lean than she’d expected, faint ridges of muscle on his stomach not so defined, but enough that the early morning sunlight played over them in a way Eli found utterly mesmerising.  Gods but he was beautiful.  Her mind and body were at war with themselves - on the one hand she just wanted to continue watching him, seeing him move through the forms of their people with all the expertise of someone who’d been doing it their whole life.  On the other she felt her mouth go dry at the thought of running her tongue over that stomach, to feel the sheen of sweat against her own naked body as she pressed up against him.  She couldn’t help imagining what this tight control would mean in sex, how he would hold himself above her, move her body to where he needed it to be to make her toes curl.  Her breath came out in a stutter as she tried to calm herself - Dread Wolf take her naked in front of the Clan fire but she hadn’t quite realised just how much she wanted him.

The sound of her breath was enough and his eyes opened languidly, fixing straight on her and making her stop in her tracks.  Her hands extended in placation immediately.

“I’m sorry, Solas.  I didn’t mean to intrude.  Please, let me leave you in peace.”

He slowly placed his foot on the ground from where he had been balancing, like he could stand there on one leg through a hurricane if he wished.  He didn’t stop as he spoke, although the next series of movements she recognised as those that would bring one down from the Way, beginning to end the session.

“I was almost finished anyway.”

She greedily took that as tacit permission to stay and decided to lean up against one of the trees near him to try and relearn how to breathe.  Not that she kept her eyes off him as he went through the last of the motions.  He planted both feet solidly on the ground, raising both arms palms down at his chest to push down like he took his own soul and gave it to the earth.  As he moved through this last motion his eyes opened again from where they had closed. They looked directly at her, though he had not watched her move and there was a lazy heat in them that made her swallow.  She had taken lovers in the Clan who had been learning the Way as part of their craft and knowing precisely what sex after such a session could be like was not helping her situation in the slightest.  He would be languid and strong all in one, his senses would be heightened and his consciousness newly extended to encompass all feeling in his body.  She could have him writhing before she came close to his cock, trailing fingers over skin warmed with near sweat to raise the soft hairs at the nape of his neck, scraping the gentlest of nails over his back until he shuddered with it.

He had finished and she should probably say something.  To her credit, she used him turning away to reach for his things to clear her throat a little so she could speak with sounding like he’d half had her already.

“I recognise some of those.  Did you learn it as the Vir Atish’an or did it have another name?”

He looked back at her from taking water from his flask, his attention and obvious curiosity doing nothing to douse whatever flames had taken hold of her body this morning.  The fact that he seemed utterly uncaring of his partial nudity (something she had already tired of amongst the shemlen) did not help.  At all.

“It was part of thethe Vir Atish’an where I learned it, too.  I was not aware the Dalish still practiced it.”

“It’s different in some ways - I didn’t recognise all of the forms but the basic principals seem to be the same.  Not everyone is very good at it, so we don’t demand it of everyone, but it’s generally used as an educational tool first and then a healing tool if need be.”

“Healing?”

“Yes.  Often our Hearthmistress will take any newcomers as students to help them deal with any darkness they have lived through.  Sometimes it takes feeling connected to something to allow for grief to manifest.  And…

“…only when grief manifests can it be taken care of.” Solas finished quietly, something close to a smile in his eyes.  “I am glad such things are still part of your life.”

Eli smiled and nodded, watching him reach for his undershirt and begin to put it on.  It clung to his arms and torso as he did, distractingly enough she almost didn’t hear him.  “Is it something that you enjoy?”

“Yes, actually.  I didn’t at first - too hot-headed.”

He glanced over with a small grin that seemed to suggest this was something he was familiar with.  “After a while though, I got better at it.  It was useful, after…well, I had some trouble with my role when I was younger and the Vir Atish’an helped me focus on trying to work out what it was that I wanted.”

“And did you ever?” he asked, deftly picking up his pack and coming towards her.  She really needed not to be wondering what he would smell like after exertion.

“I don’t know,” she managed to reply.  “I thought I had.  Then…”

He looked up towards where they both knew the Breach was.

“Ah.  Yes I can imagine such a thing rather taking precedence.”

“For all of us, I would guess.”

He inclined his head towards her.

“Indeed.  Shall we?”

They began to walk back together, Eli trying very hard not to be so aware of his body beside hers.  Clearly she didn’t manage it, though, because she caught him catching her looking.  She might have imagined the ghost of a smirk on his face, but she didn’t think so.

“I’d like to know more about you, Solas.” she declared after a few moments’ silence.

“Why?”

She looked over at him, a little dismayed to see naked suspicion on his face.  Where had that come from?

“Why not?”

The frown deepened.

“Privacy?  Caution?  Concern about the direction of this Inquisition once our work is done?”

Oh for all the tits of Sylaise, really?  She pursed her lips, feeling the anger bloom easily in her chest.  Only, they’d talked about this, hadn’t they?  She looked over, really looked over and saw the suspicion hiding the guardedness he’d harboured since she met him.

“Then don’t answer.” She said softly, trying not to sound hurt.  She was a little, but she could understand.  “I wasn’t asking as part of the Inquisition.”

Suspicion faded to mild alarm on his face and she looked away as he clearly had a little war with himself.  

“I’m…sorry.  With so much fear in the air…”

To her surprise, she felt him bump his body gently into hers, the skin of his hand still warm from exercise.  When she looked up she could almost see how much effort it was taking him to be open, something weirdly forced about his smile.  “What would you know of me?”

She let him see her grin, genuinely this time.  Then her excitement got the better of her.

“You said you’d travelled to many different places.  In the Fade?  Whereabouts have you been?”

She’d clearly surprised him.

“You…wish to know of my journeys in the Fade?”

“Of course!  I’ve never met a somniari before - think of all the places and things you could have seen, how much more access you have to things once lost.  Tell me?”

She viewed his obvious attempt not to be charmed as a win on her part, even more so when he allowed the twinkle of enthusiasm he often had when they found ruins together to shine in his eyes.

What he told her was better than she could imagine.  He told it so simply, so beautifully - like he had nothing to prove.  The best thing by far was how easily he warmed to a subject the more questions she asked, like he only wanted to tell someone who was as fascinated by it as he was.  So much of what he said was so different from anything the shemlen wrote or said - there was no underlying morality, no inferences, just what he had seen and how he had interpreted it.  That he had been to Ostagar shocked her - she didn’t know he’d travelled so far south, but the way he told the tales of the spirits he found, at once united and utterly splintered, made her feel the fear and elation in her own heart.

She didn’t want him to stop.  Not just because she loved hearing about his experiences, but she could listen to his voice forever.  She’d go through phases of being completely soothed by it only to then feel it coaxing those embers of desire that hadn’t quite bedded down back into flames again.  It was extremely disconcerting.  She wondered if there had been any others like her, entranced with his magical talent.  Also, whether he’d taken them with him.  Perhaps after all of this she could persuade him to allow her to travel with him too.

When she asked him if he’d always travelled alone, he shot her a strange look before answering, a little smirk on his face that told her he was about to be a shit about something.

“Not at all,” He said, obviously obtusely.  “I have built many lasting friendships.  Spirits of Wisdom, possessed of ancient knowledge, happy to share what they have seen.  Spirits of Purpose helped me search.  Even wisps, curious and playful, would point out treasures I might have missed.”

Eli laughed, delighted at the idea of her grumpy Rift-mage being bugged by little wisps of light, trying as hard not to be charmed by them as he was by her.

“We used to be warned off playing with any wisps, but the ones I found in the forest always seemed harmless enough.  It was the demons that often used them to draw out prey that were the problem.”

“Trapped here on this side of the Veil, such scavenging is only natural.”

“Precisely.  I don’t know of any spirits with the other names, though.”

His face grew soft, the back of his hand gently brushing hers as they started walking down a slope further from the Chantry than they had been before.  She realised they’d come out nearer his hut, the other side of the fence.

“They rarely seek out this world.” He told her, softly.  “When they do, their natures do not often survive exposure to the people they encounter.”

“You sound sad.  What do you mean?” She asked, instinctively stepping closer to him.  He noticed and smiled at her for it.

“Wisdom and Purpose are too easily twisted into Pride and Desire.”

She didn’t like how he read her clearly shocked expression - like he knew that was what she would think and judged her for it.

“So after all of the warnings, you’re saying you became friends with Pride and Desire demons?”

“They were not demons for me.”

His quiet certainty rocked her, something softly devastating about how he simply stated ideas that broke even the Dalish definition of the Fade and demons.  He let them walk in silence for a while, but the more Eli thought about it, the less she was willing to let it go.  She stopped them with a hand to his chest, coming round to face him.

“What does that mean?”

He was sneering at her again.

“You think me foolish?”

“I think you cryptic.  And judging.  Which is unfair, by the way.”

Clearly this was not what he’d expected her to say.  Given how she’d just felt about him, Eli didn’t mind admitting that she found surprising him borderline arousing.  Seeing him off-balance was beginning to become an addiction.  “So explain.  I understand that spirits can be twisted, but how were they not demons?”

The hard look faded and he shrugged.

“I may have been misleading.”

“Mmhmm?  Deliberately so, I’d go as far to say?”

She was teasing him and he knew it.  She much preferred this particular smirk.

“Perhaps.  What I meant is that the Fade reflects the minds of the living, as we’ve spoken about.”

“Yes.”

“Well, if you expect a Spirit of Wisdom to be a pride demon, it will adapt.  And if your mind is free of corrupting influences, if you understand the nature of the spirit, they can be fast friends.”

Eli thought about this for a moment, turning back to their path and clasping her hands behind her back as she began wandering forward.

“Of course, what that means is that most people going into the Fade expect to see demons, which most do.  But you’re saying that even if they met Wisdom, because they expect anything with knowledge to be a pride demon, to be manipulative, the spirit will become that thing?”

“Simply put - yes.”

“But pride demons do try and manipulate people.”

“There is no one answer to this issue.  Some will do so because they believe it is what is expected of them based on their reading of their audience.  Some have become corrupted enough that they have a sense of their own, have decided that this is a course of action they wish to pursue.”

“So you’re not saying that every demon was made by someone misreading them?”

He hummed beside her, considering, then shook his head.

“I do not believe so.  Although, there is always more to learn.”

“I’m impressed, by the way.” She told him, glad that there was still the fence between them and other people.  They would hit the lake first, then come round the front.  

“Impressed?”

“That you could become friends with spirits - I’ve never been able to.”

“Anyone who can dream has the potential.  Few ever try.”

“Hence the pride demons.”

He smiled, allowing the simplified point.  Then his face turned sad again and he moved them off the path so that they walked up a short rise that looked over the lake.  Eli took a deep breath of mountain air, watching the sunlight gleam off the map of ice cracks on the frozen water, the trees on the other side occasionally shedding their snow to leave trailing clouds of mist.

“My friends comforted me in grief and shared my joy,” Solas said softly, after a few moments.  He was looking at the same scene she was, but was somehow also looking somewhere far away.  “Yet, because they exist without form as we understand it, the Chantry declares that spirits are not truly people.”

“They declare a lot of people not truly people.” Eli replied with a  familiar frustration.  “Although I grant you, spirits seem to be the subject of most of their wrath.”

He turned to her, his hands behind his back, standing in that way he did that made her realise how tall he was.

“Is Cassandra defined by her cheekbones and not her faith?  Varric by his chest-hair and not his wit?”

There was something challenging in his voice she didn’t like and told him so.

“You’re testing me again.”

“It is just a question.”

“I don’t like it when you test me.”

“It is just a question.”

He’d gone guarded again and she wasn’t about to let him.  So she smiled, mischief glinting in her eyes off the sunlight and ice.

“You have an interesting way of looking at the world, Solas.”

“I try,” he replied, suspiciously.  “And that isn’t quite an answer.”

She shook her head, still smiling, her hands gently clasped behind her back.  She took another step towards him, on her toes.  Another, and if she leaned just a little closer their bodies would touch from hip to chest.

“I look forward to helping you make new friends.” She told him, keeping her voice soft.  His eyes darted to her lips and back again, slightly parted in his uncertainty.  To her utter delight, he stuttered a little when he spoke.

“That should be, well…”

She grinned, letting him watch her look at his mouth before meeting his eyes again.  They were brilliant grey in the sunshine and a mixture of unsure and aroused.  She loved it.

“That isn’t quite an answer, either.”

Her voice had dropped to something low and intimate and she kept herself balanced on her toes, feeling his breath quicken in his chest.  A thought occurred to her.  “What would I be?”

His eyes took a moment to focus.

“Pardon?”

“If Cassandra is defined by her faith and Varric his wit - how would you define me?”

He took a breath as he understood the question, his face so very close to hers.  If she concentrated she could almost feel the latent heat of his exercise seeping through the wool of his shirt and onto her own skin.  He let their breath mingle in the scant inch between their lips and something flipped in her stomach as she swayed slightly again, feeling like a leaf in the wind next to his solidity.  She only had the briefest of smug twists of his lips to realise he was going to play with her before he leaned ever so slightly forward, his breath caressing her cold cheek.  He held her eyes and his voice was low and almost spoken onto her skin.

“Curiosity.”

When he pulled away it was like a physical wrench and her body actually tipped a little forward in the space where he’d left before she fell back on her heels, letting her intake of breath translate as knowing frustration as she watched him step back and to the side of her.  There was something exhilarating in the way he acknowledged it, a slight dip to his head and repressed grin telling her he knew exactly what kind of a teasing shit he was being.  She chuckled at them both, shaking her head and looking back out at the lake.

“Curiosity?  I think I can take that.”

“There are some who think it dangerous.”

She looked at him, not flinching from the warning in his eyes.  It had less impact when he was smiling at her, anyway.

“Only when you’re not prepared.  And even then, it’s often worth it.”

He laughed a little, shaking his head.  She’d have to address that little tell of disbelief at some point.  Possibly.  Andruil’s fluffy snow-shoes - what was she getting herself into?

“If you like, you could join me tomorrow.  It would be interesting to see how the Vir Atish’an has changed over time.”

She laughed, partly through joy of being asked into this obviously private time for him, partly because of his expression.

“Over time?  How long ago did you learn it?”

There was something bashful in his answering huff of laughter.

“Ah.  The spirit I learned from was an echo of a man long gone.  I’m aware some of the forms may be…archaic.”

“Well, maybe we can compare notes and make a hybrid between the two?  Only maybe not tomorrow - honestly I think I’d rather just move through the forms, it’s the perfect time for it.”

“Because of the Breach?”

She nodded, glad of his gentleness and the understanding in his eyes.

“The Breach.  But truthfully, just as much the Herald of Andraste.  There was this girl today…” She trailed off, not wanting to burden him.  “It doesn’t matter.”

“No.” He said firmly, if softly.  He hooked his fingers gently around her arm to move her into walking beside him.  She was reminded fiercely of her fantasy earlier on for a quick moment.  He would know precisely where to put her.

“No?”

“Tell me.” He urged.  “I wish to know.”

She smiled at him, the heat of desire mixing with the warmth of closeness.  She linked their arms together, pleased when he naturally compensated for the attachment.  And then she told him.  They walked together through the snow, Haven looming above them, but for a brief moment she didn’t feel the weight.

#dragon age #dragon age inquisition #solavellan #solavellan hell #dragon age fic #solaveli #somni #mywriting

[fairiesherefairiesthere]

There’s a light at the end of a hall (Fraxus)

It’s a soulmate au where you share dreams! (I listened to In my dreams from Anastasia on repeat while writing this). 

When Laxus opens his eyes, he knows where he is, although the room is so dark he can't look more than a foot in front of him. Long windows let some moonlight filter into the room and it catches some elements of the scene in the beam, revealing some glasses, the familiar lacquer of a piano and a chandelier. It's quiet too, not a whisper leaves the mouths of the people he knows are surrounding him. Gentlemen haven't ditched their canes to dance with their partner of choice yet. The dresses are still in pristine state, not a ruffle out of place. If he moved, he could probably touch one of the statue-like people, but he fears that they feel lifeless too. He's glad that the darkness hides them from his sight. The most important asset of this particular scene isn't here yet, so with baited breath, the room awaits him.

The familiar clicking of shoes on the tiles alerts Laxus of the other man's entrance and his arrival, breathes life into the room. As though the moonlight lit their wicks, the candles on the chandelier flicker to life and with them, the guests start to move, casting their shadows over the walls and the dancefloor. The still significantly bad lighting, combined with the masks and clothing that covers a lot of skin, makes it incredibly hard to assign distinct features to the humanlike figures moving across the ballroom.

Once in a while one of them laughs or dip another mid-dance, but their movements are too precise, too practiced to convince Laxus that any of them are real human beings. Furthermore, the room is now filled with chatter, but Laxus can't make out a single word. The more he tries, the less intellegible the conversations get, though this place tries to convince him that they are speaking his language and that he's the odd one for not knowing what's being said.

Haunting is the only term that comes to describing the high, trembling notes that the violins bring forth and Laxus wonders if they are trying to drown out some other sound he's not supposed to hear. Whenever he strains to listen past them, they seem to infiltrate his brain, screeching for him to turn elsewhere.

When a masked man stops in front of him, he turns to him. Unlike everything else in this room, his figure is clear as day and when he offers Laxus a calloused hand in a rather elegant manner, he doesn't hesitate to take it. Amidst all the cold, doll-like creations pretending to be human, the warm hand feels like a lifeline, so Laxus clutches to it with all his might.

While following the man in front of him, he lets his gaze travel over his back. Strong shoulders and a head with long green strands of hair. Should he turn around, those locks would frame his elegant facial features in the most refined of manners, granting him a presence alike to a nobleman. As though hearing his thoughts, the man turns around and bestows a little smile upon him before turning around again. The tiny interaction puts Laxus more at ease. He might be among ghosts, but at the very least he's not alone.

In a quiet corner of the grand ballroom, the man lets go of his hand before offering his own again. This time, there's another question behind it and uptill now, Laxus has always rejected. But tonight, he won't. Maybe it's because the music creeps so deep into his soul that he fears that nothing but human contact might erase it, maybe it's because tonight, the other man's features are clearer than ever and his bright blue eyes so hypnotising that Laxus wouldn't be able to deny him a thing.

He still hesitates though and he hates how his own hand twitches and trembles with nerves. In the other's eyes, he can see that he too knows exactly how nervous Laxus is about this, but mercifully, he doesn't say a thing about it. Laxus wonders if they would be able to speak in here or would their words simply vanish into thin air. Once Laxus' hand is properly resting on the other's, the other man tenderly runs his thumb over Laxus' fingers before using their joined hands to tug him close.

Not once in his life has he been a fan of dancing, but here, in this quiet corner with the other man leading him, he feels at peace. The atmosphere around them doesn't change, the puppets don't become beings of flesh and blood and the sounds brought forth by the violins doesn't change into a lilting melody. But the man in front of him radiates with a gentle, undisturbed light that draws him in, a mystery composed of sweet allure that Laxus doesn't even try to turn away from.

For all the times Laxus has danced in his life (very close to zero), he thinks he's doing pretty well. While he's keeping his eyes trained towards the floor to make sure he doesn't step on his partner's toes, the man reaches out and after letting his fingers drag over Laxus' jawline, he tilts his chin up to let their gazes meet. The eyecontact is exhilarating and after a while, they establish a pretty stable pattern of steps, turns and twists.

The man guides him into another whirl that separates the two of them for the briefest of times. Because they've done it a few times already, Laxus knows that he should finish the turn and rejoin the man by taking hold of his outstretched hand. Right before their fingertips touch, the other man drops his arm and hugs it close to his chest, looking at Laxus with wide, dazed eyes. Offering his own hand, Laxus hopes the man will take it. He does not.

Instead, he turns on his heels, making his way towards the exit. Although Laxus follows him almost immediately at the exact same pace or even faster, he can't seem to keep up with the other man's strides. As though they sensed something going on, the heads of all the mannequins snap into their direction, tilting their head at an annatural angle, to perpetuate the illusion of a curiousity they are not able to feel.

As the man throws the door open and Laxus is able to see the light at the end of a hall, the mannequins turn to him, enclosing him. Even when they're so close he can feel their cold mockeries of breaths running along his neck, he still can't make out their faces. A thing he can make out though, are the words they are whispering. "Do you enjoy dreaming?" they whisper as though rotten creatures of the night could ever be compared to a dream.

Usually he's the first one to leave the ballroom. He wonders if the other man had to deal with these creatures too, all those times he'd decided to ditch the party. He also wonders why on earth the other man would leave him to the wolves if he knew they would tear him apart.

Looking past the mannequins, he notices shadows travelling down the walls, enshrouding the room in pitchblack once more. Either these beings would get him or he'd get swallowed by the dark. Any other day, he would've laid waste to these dollike humanoids, but his fingers have no grip on them and magic dissipates into thin air. Resigned, he closes his eyes.

The colours dancing behind his closed eyelids alert him that there's a new source of light. Opening them, he sees the door being forced open and light streaming in. Without thinking, he grabs the outstretched hand and slams the door shut behind him. Once again, he follows the greenhaired man's lead, but instead of dancing, they're running for their dear life. Taking matters into his own hands, Laxus smashes a window and pulls the other man through. Finally, they leave the castle and underneath the glimmering of the stars, they both let out a breath they didn't know they had been holding.

"I didn't know soulmate dreams could be that terrifying", Laxus sighs and is surprised when he notices that he's allowed to talk. Immediately he takes the next leap and tries to tell the other his name. Unsurprisingly, it all comes jumbled and he accepts that that's one of the things he's not allowed to share.

"I knew", his partner shares with a pleasantly deep voice. Biting his lower lip and with his back hunched, he stares at his feet as though they are the most interesting thing around. "It's been like that since I got to know who you are in the realm outside this one. They try to persuade me to reveal my own identity and since I refuse to, they rip me apart in my dreams as doubt and conflicted feelings do throughout the day. It's a joyful experience, really and it follows me everywhere."

Although Laxus doesn't want to be insensitive by glossing over his story, there's also a thing he wants to know. "Then why did they aim for me right now?" His partner clicks tongue and looks at Laxus in a both very particular and familiar way. "You know why, you're a smart man, Laxus Dreyar", he chides and offers his hand. One that Laxus has pushed away before, thanks to his own cowardice and other people distracting him by being bothersome.

"Freed", he exhales and the man smiles sharply and tugs the strings of his mask loose. "Thank the heavens, this thing was getting bothersome. Now we can both wake up, stay friends and not speak with a soul about this awkward situation. I'm alright with being only friends."

"But it's not what you want", Laxus objects and Freed scoffs. "I'm not about to force you to do something you don't want to satisfy my own wants. I'm not a creep." After spitting out that last sentence, Freed gnaws on his bottom lip again, fists balled. Laxus wonders if Freed's heard the same whispers he himself had heard too (he should leave Laxus alone, he's too touchy, overly affectionate, he's bothersome. It had taken a lot of willpower to not go for the immediate kill and settling for decking them across the guildhall).

Somewhere along the line, these throwaway comments (combined with Laxus' incompetency with putting feelings into words) had chipped away at this man's pride and selfconfidence. Left bleeding by these chipped away shards, he'd decided to staunch the wounds by slapping a bandage on top of them and declaring them healed, while the blood still slipped from underneath it.

"It's not what I want either", he confesses and he continues before Freed's scepticism makes him leave. "For a long time now, I've put more attention to you than anyone else, but never where you actually wanted or needed it. I thought that if I allowed you closer to me, it would be pretty clear what my feelings towards you were without me having to say it. But that's selfish of me, isn't it? It's also damned stupid."

Freed's already wide eyes get even wider when Laxus offers him his handpalm, urging Freed to rest his hand there. While Freed does that, hand trembling with an out of character discomposure, Laxus doesn't move and provides him with a tender smile that seems to ease his nerves. Once Freed's hand is properly resting on top of his, Laxus tugs him closer, hand on the small of his back. Right atop his guildmark, Laxus presses a kiss and gets awarded with an exhale. "I love you", he confesses, directing his gaze to meet Freed's.

Those blue eyes are wide with shock and Laxus wonders if there's ever going to be a time where saying that will not be met with surprise. He decides to make a goal out of it. "Okay", Freed simply says and denies Laxus an outright answer. He doesn't really need one though, because he knows how the other man feels.

"I'm not about to say it for the first time in a simple dream of all places. I'd like to tell you in person, if you'd be willing to listen."

"I'd be just as willing to listen as I'd be to answer 'I love you too'. "

"My, aren't you quite the romantic?" A selfsatisfied grin suits Freed a thousand times better than doubt. Around them, the dream crumbles, but it's not torn apart by faceless creatures or drowned in black. The stars dissolve into a shower of light that engulfs the both of them. "Looks like we'll be going home", Freed remarks staring at the magnificent light before turning to Laxus. Pressing a kiss to his cheek, he whispers : "Good night and within a few more moments, good morning. I'll be looking forward to seeing you."

#fraxus #Freed Justine #Laxus Dreyar #freedxlaxus #fanfic #fairy tail #TheFairyWrites

[lucy-x-hannigan]

[ MADELAINE PETSCH, FEMALE, SHE / HER ] — If you’re strolling Derry today, you might see [ LUCILLE ROSE HANNIGAN ] along the way! The [ TWENTY-THREE ] year old has been in Derry for [ TWENTY-THREE YEARS ] and can usually be found at [ THE ROSE GARDEN, her family’s botanical shop ], when they aren’t busy with [ GARDENING or MAKING THINGS FOR HER SHOP ]. I hear they seem to be [ AMBITIOUS and PASSIONATE ], but they are also rumored to be [ BLUNT and HOT-TEMPERED ]. I’m sure they’d never admit it, but they’re terrified of [ RODENTS ]

- B A S I C - 

Full Name: Lucille Rose Hannigan Nickname(s): Lucy, Lu, Lulu Age: 23 Occupation: Owns \ Helps run The Rose Garden - a natural apothecary, also known as a botanical shop Birthday: January 11th Zodiac: Capricorn

- F A M I L Y -

Father: Hugo Hannigan Mother: Renee Hannigan Sibling(s): Older Brother Cousin: Chrissy Rhoades

 - P H Y S I C A L   A P P E A R A N C E -

Height: 5′6′’ Weight: 120 lbs Hair Color / Type: Red / Straight Eye Color: Dark Brown Piercings: Just once on both earlobes

- P E R S O N A L I T Y -

(+) Independent, Ambitious, Passionate, Hard-Working (-) Blunt, Hot-Tempered, Judgmental, Sarcastic

Lucy has always been hard-working and ambitious, especially when it came to the family business. It helped that it was what she loved to do, and that she was super passionate about it. Seriously, she’s not exactly the most social of people, but don’t get her started on a conversation about plants - she’ll definitely talk your ear off.

She’s pretty much always been independent, too. She’s needed very little guidance or direction in her life, as she’s known from the very beginning where she’s wanted her future to go. Which was helping her dad.

She can be quite friendly with most people, if they’re also kind and friendly in return. However, typical redhead, she can also be very hot-tempered when she is angry - and she can get angry pretty quickly, if her buttons get pushed too many times.

Lucy doesn’t have much of a filter, so she can be very bold and blunt on occasion, and sometimes she can come off as rude, but she doesn’t usually mean for it to come out that way. She’s just super honest and opinionated. And Judgmental, can’t forget that. Boy, can she be really judgy and too sarcastic sometimes. Easily her biggest flaws.

- H E R   B I G G E S T   F E A R -

Musophobia - the fear of rodents; particularly mice and rats. However, Lucy’s fear extends towards all types of rodent, except squirrels and chipmunks - she isn’t bothered by them as much.

- L I K E S   /   D I S L I K E S   /   H A B I T S

Loves gardening - she spends a great deal of her time in the dozen or so greenhouses that her father has put up on their property over the years - all of which house many of the plants that help supply their shop for things like herbs, teas, essential oils, etc..

Obviously, she's obsessed with plants. Her small one-bedroom apartment is filled to the brim with house plants, almost obsessively so. Thankfully most house plants are very forgiving when it comes to colder climates, so living up in Maine, where it’s usually always cold and rainy with very little sun, doesn’t affect them.

Working out and staying in shape. Goes to the gym three times a week, if she’s not super busy.

Keeping journals, as she finds her life easier to manage when she documents specific life events.

Heavily into plant photography. She keeps an online portfolios up on her online shop, listing all of the species of plants that her family grows and that they sell through their in-store and online shop.

Being social, despite feeling like, at times, she could be a bit awkward when it comes to actually starting a conversation with a stranger. Good thing Derry’s small and coming across a stranger is rather uncommon.

Is 100% vegan

She is a true artisan - she takes the most pleasure out of growing and making things from scratch and by hand. She dabbles in a lot of areas - from baking to cooking, to DIY arts & crafts, and especially to making and perfecting natural-based recipes for a lot of different things that she sells in her shop: lotions, soaps, lip balms, scrubs, essential oil blends, candles, tea blends, spice blends, etc. You name it, and Lucy’s very likely got her hands on it. 

She dries her own herbs and spices and tea leaves, and though it’s quite a tedious process, she LOVES doing it. She loves harvesting the leaves and bundling them in twine and hanging them to dry all around the shop. In her opinion, it’s totally aesthetically pleasing. That, and she very much enjoys doing things the old fashioned way. By hand. She’s got a total pioneer-like homestead mentality when it comes to how to does things.

Ever since she was a very young girl, Lucille’s always been more than willing to help her dad look after the greenhouses and she’d come into the shop whenever she could, helping him stock shelves and nothing’s really changed. Only now, she was selling a lot of her own products as well as the plants that come from both the Hannigan and Rhoades nurseries.

Enjoys baking and cooking, immensely - having been taught by her mother from a very early age. She uses her baking skills to make specialty breads and other baked goods to sell in The Rose Garden.

Is a self-taught pro at needlework - embroidery, knitting and sewing alike. A lot of her hand-made pieces can be seen hung up around her apartment and her shop.

- T H E   R O S E   G A R D E N -

“ Where the love for nature, baking and art meet “

It’s very much an artisan shop, heavily focused on home grown and hand-crafted products. A botanical shop / natural apothecary / produce market / bakery all in one.

See the overview list of things The Rose Garden sells here

- B I O G R A P H Y -

Is a native to Derry. She’s lived here her entire life, apart from the four years she left to go to New York for college.

Is of Irish / Welsh / Scottish descent, from both of her parents’ side

Has an older brother, whom she is very close with. He, too, helps out with the family shop when he can, but he’s usually off doing his own separate thing.

She is also close to her first cousin, Chrissy Rhoades (Lucy’s dad being the brother of Chrissy’s mother) who’s family owns their own plant nursery. The two families are greatly connected with one another, as the fresh produce from both nurseries and greenhouses are sold at The Rose Garden shop. Lucy also uses fresh ingredients supplied in bulk from both family’s crops to whip up large batches of her various handmade goods and body products.

While her brother preferred going off and doing his own thing, Lucy often stayed close to her parents, finding comfort and peace at their side verses being out-going and overly social. This lent to her growing a very strong attachment to both of her parents, since she was never very good at relating to other people as a whole and Hugo and Renee Hannigan were her whole world as a small child.

That being said, she’s always had a stronger connection with her father, with whom she shares a love for all things leafy and green, and the want to turn said leafy and green things into a variety of different things. They had the biggest green thumbs and most inventive minds of the family, and it was just something the two had always bonded over. That, and they were both highly anti-social and quirky individuals, preferring their plants for company rather than other people. Not that they weren’t friendly and welcoming to the other locals of Derry, they just didn’t know how to talk to people outside of business-talk. At least, not very well.

The two are insanely obsessed with the work they do for The Rose Garden, putting all of their time and passion into their shop and making sure their greenhouses and various equipment were running nicely.

So you could safely say that she was a daddy’s girl, through and through, from the very moment she came into the world. She took after him the most.

Her childhood was quite normal, all things considered. The Hannigans were a happy family with a pretty healthy family dynamic. All was great, or so Lucy thought. She was around 10 when her mother started acting peculiar. One minute she’d be fine, fixing dinner in the kitchen or cleaning and then the next she’d totally flip out and start screaming. At seemingly nothing. The episodes would send the entire house into chaos. Her father would shoo her and her brother up to their rooms or into the next room to keep them both safe and trying to keep them from witnessing the full extent of their mother’s mental breakdown. Which both children were more than fine with, as just listening to their mother’s blood curdling screams and subsequent emotional crying was more than scarring enough for them.

This went on for two years, the episodes unpredictable but never any less intense and frightening. The mental health of Lucy’s mother decreased significantly over that short amount of time, until it reached the point where Renee refused to get out of bed, and remained in a perpetual state of terror, leaving her essentially catatonic, apart from incoherent mutterings under her breath, and the godforsaken rocking. Not even the professionals could tell what was wrong with the woman or what had even triggered her mental decline, but they did eventually, very loosely label her condition as catatonic schizophrenia.

At age 12, her mother was taken to Juniper Hill Asylum, where she’s been ever since, still unresponsive to anyone’s presence apart from her own mental demons. She continues to mumble nonsense under her breath that nobody seems to be able to make out.

Adjusting to life without their mother was hard for both Hannigan children, and hard on their father, but despite his heart breaking at the loss of his wife, he made sure his kids were taken care of and loved and wanting for not. And yes, they did consider Renee’s absence as a loss, for though she wasn’t dead, her lack of presence in their life was greatly felt and just as devastating.

They still, to this day, visited her often, but every time was a very painful experience, resulting in lots of tears, mostly on Lucy’s end. She just couldn’t bare to see her mother in such a sad state.

The absence of her mother caused Lucy to cling tightly to her dad, and even her brother. The three of them became one another’s rock, bringing the remaining three Hannigans even closer as a family.

After high school, Lucy moved to New York City for four years and graduated from NYU at the age of 22 with a double bachelors degree in Horticulture and Botany. That had been her set goal from as early on in her life as she could remember; she’d always planned to go to school to study plants and grow her knowledge on the subject. Plant science - or Botany, as it was called - and how to properly cultivate different species - was something she had always been fascinated in. She already had quite the training, having been taught a ton by her dad growing up, but she wanted to be properly certified when she joined him full time at the shop.

#derrybio #this doesn't even scratch the surface with this girl #but here ya go #she's actually a VERY OLD muse of mine #i've been playing a variation of this girl for several years now #anyways - sorry if this bio got repetitive in places #i'm not good at writing bios

[courtneyyharper]

“Fake tan: a pigment of my imagination”

After finally completing all my final year deadlines and binging as many tv shows as possible (MTV’s Catfish is currently playing in the background, peaking the level of trashy) I’ve finally got over the trauma that essay writing brought and can finally get back to writing here! This article is a far cry from examining the fantastical elements of multiple fiction novels in the restoration to regency period in that we are here today to talk about… fake tan.

I am by no means a tanning connoisseur, having had a few spray tans for formals etc growing up and being scared of tan in a bottle for most of my teenage years I was quite simply just a pale wee girl for the majority of my life. In terms of natural tan, my skin doesn’t know what that means. I tried a sunbed once or twice at the recommendation of a dermatologist and it left my skin pretty irritated, they just were not for me which has eventually even led to fake tanning a few times on sunny holidays, needs must.

I guess this is more my tanning journey than a reviewing process but without further ado here’s my opinions on just a small section of this over-growing market. Oh, and I guess I should throw in a photo of myself here to show my tan? I guess?

So, as I mentioned I used to be so terrified of tan as I watched my cousins and friends go a sightly shade of tangerine at 15. A true steppingstone that is right up there with the blue eyeshadow trend. After trying out a spray tan for a 6th year formal and missing the colour once it faded, I needed something much easier than travelling to a salon and stripping down in front of a stranger before making the awkward trek home a bit damp and convinced everyone is staring at you. Thus, I turned to the bottle… bottled tan that is.

At the start tans like St Moriz scared me most. Surely, they were just a rip off of the St Tropez brands but at a fifth of the price. While I no longer believe this and actually think it’s a bargain, it’s not a tan I would reach for now because of the undertones. After trying out Bondi Sands (most likely ‘light’ because I was still scared) I realised that these tans didn’t really suit my skin tone. The thing with St Moriz, St Tropez and Bondi Sands tans is that I believe they have a green undertone to them, best suited to gals or guys that are more likely to get a true tan or more olive-toned people and they just didn’t compliment my skin well but if this sounds like you then these are the tans you should lean towards.

A more red toned tan I tried out was the Primark statement, Cocoa Brown, but the thick white foam didn’t really absorb well into my skin. I was in need of a tan that had a darker guide colour in the foam to see where I could apply it to avoid streaks etc and a thinner foam consistency to allow for easier application. I know many YouTubers and influencers rep this tan as an amazing bargain but there was something in the quality lacking for me and it lay in a clutter drawer never to be reused.

Probably like most girls I started with the good ol’ Rimmell Sun Shimmer Instant Tan, which looking back I’m sure it was giving me more streaks then it was a colour and I can only cringe at the idea of me getting caught in the rain on a night out and that tan completely running off me. This tan would run off the skin if you looked at it the wrong way, of course in the title ‘Instant Tan’, unfortunately it was instantly gone too. I’m sure this is still a big hit with my mum though.

But this did later lead me to trying the Rimmell Sun Shimmer Mousse. Keyword: mousse. This was a personal favourite for years. While using this I gradually shifted from a light shade to a hesitant ‘medium’. Then eventually I was applying two layers to get a darker and deeper tan. I liked the way this tan applied, a nice dark foam which would show you the exact colour you were gonna get. So, this remained to be my tan staple for a long time.

Then one day I asked my mum to pick it up for me in the chemist and she accidentally bought me the Rimmell Sun Shimmer Tanning Lotion with Chia Oil. Of course, this was a bit frustrating, I need to stick to what I know but, on a whim, and running out of time to get ready one night I stuck a bit of it on. Oh, it smelt great. And it brought life to what tan I already had on, only glow-y and darker. Of course, I think this has been discontinued and can only be sourced on the likes of Amazon and random chemists. It was by using this slightly darker tan that I then upped my mousse colour to the ‘dark’ shade and that’s when the frustration began. I kept putting on this lovely dark shade of tan, all even and gorg, going to bed and letting it develop for 8 hours and then jumping in the shower the next day… for it all to run off. Especially my shins and chest would become significantly paler and even two layers of ‘dark’ just weren’t getting me the tan I wanted.

So, I shopped around for a new tan and came upon the bPerfect 10-second strawberry scented tan. Um, yes pls. This stuff smells so good. The colour was great. Again, another staple for so long. I would still go back to this tan happily. My only worry was that it’s supposedly Limited Edition and I was still applying two layers of this ‘medium dark’ shade and so knowing that I loved the bPerfect 10-second tan formula I reached for the mango scented ‘ultra dark’ shade and decided that the bPerfect 10-second tans, with their fruity scents, were definitely a favourite. Still to this day. I’ve even just ordered the new strawberry scented lotion in dark and I am beyond excited.

(Also, as a side note I picked up the matching bPerfect self-tan eraser and honestly this is just something I don’t believe in. All you need is to moisturise your tanned skin so it fades evenly and finally just take a nice long soak, maybe two, and some exfoliating gloves and hop out and use a towel to rub those stubborn spots! But a tanning routine is a completely different post…)

Of course, if you know me, or ever had the displeasure of seeing me hungover or straight after I’ve tanned, you’ll not be able to avoid the image of my pale face. After spending a good few months of my life on Roaccutane and finally having some semblance of acne-free skin I was not about to stick this dark brown foam all up in my pores and jeopardise it. So yeah, this means I tan up to my neck and deal with the consequences, just matching a foundation colour to resolve this but I also don’t want to constantly be wearing make-up. On the recommendation of a YouTube video I purchased the Tan-Luxe face drops that, in hindsight, were really not value for their money considering every brand now has their own cheaper and basically identical version. With these I just pipette a few drops into my daily moisturiser and… they give me a bit of a glow, I guess. They do smell amazinggg… but they don’t smell like 30 quid amazing. Plus, any tan they were giving me was fading a bit splotchy and so I went back to a time old favourite, the Dove tinted moisturiser. Oh, this smell screams 2013 summer. All I’m going to say is to remember to blend this downnn the neck, into the ears and of course up into the hairline, just to avoid any mishaps… Also, if you’re not big into an obvious fake tan or just need a topper on top of natural or fake, a tinted moisturiser is always a good shout. (Please use a brush too or at least wash your hands after use!)

Finally, the main tan that is so similar to the bPerfect is of course, Molly Mae’s Filter. Now that I’ve finally travelled to the ‘ultra dark’ shades this is what I ordered straight away. For best results I follow the bottle’s instructions and wait an hour to apply a second coat and I love the outcome. This one is kind of like a luxury tan only because you have to order it online and can’t just run to the chemist to get it unfortunately so I have to plan ahead with it. Once again, the smell is incred. I’m pretty sure it’s the green tea extract. I love the colour, the finish, the application. In conclusion, big fan.

I find the bPerfect and Filter’s ‘ultra dark’ tans both have the same vibes and I like to switch between them regularly and even use bPerfect’s strawberry scented as a wee pick me up every once and a while just because it smells great and I’m very hopeful that Filter paired with bPerfect’s new strawberry lotion as a tan topper will be my final holy grail.

Pretty sure I’ll be stuck on this hype for the foreseeable future!

#tan #bperfect #filter #molly mae #youtube #fake tan #tanning #dove #tinted moisturiser #make up #beauty #blog #rimmel #tan luxe #cocoa brown #bondi sands #st tropez #st moriz #review

[retro-aesthe]

Sidelines (Part 4)

(Hi! I’ve had a bit of writer’s block... but here it is. Tho it’s kinda more like a filler chapter... kind’a long... and btw, i plan for this story to only have 5 parts so... one more to go! anywayyyyyyy there we go. Someone requested to be tagged, I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TUMBLR WORKS because before, I literally just reblog and favorite and that’s it. But I’ll try... I’m tryna do my best. AND thank you, all of you out there for the feedback my works had. it was surreal!!! okay enuf now. enjoyyy)

[ @fromthediariesofaoncer hi! ... and... um why can’t I tag you @yanginginthere ? hope u see this]

Alex Danvers x fem!reader

It hurt—the bright light behind your eyelids. It stung, and you wanted to groan so bad because of the bothering pain, but you ended up coughing softly because of the dryness of your throat. You moaned a little at the roughness the smallest cough you’ve ever heard cause you. Then you suddenly realized you’ve been hearing quietness, except for the constant beep and hum of machines.

“Y/n…?” You heard a hesitant voice ask. The immediate response your body made was to open your eyes, to look at the voice’s source. It was a dumb idea, considering how the bright light you were first complaining about surely have blinded you the moment you opened your eyes.

“… blind…” you managed to say. You heard footsteps overpowering the constant hums you’ve been hearing before. Then, there were what seem to be curtains moving—the distinct sound of metal sliding over metal. The light dimmed marginally, but it was significantly bearable compared before.

“Y/n…?” You heard the voice ask once again. You realized you were slowly succumbing to sleep’s enticement. You opened your eyes and Alex Danvers’s face came into view.

It was a horrifying moment of déjà vu, and suddenly you gasped as onslaught of memories attacked you. The earthquake. The woman… bleeding. You, bleeding.

“Lexie!” It was supposedly an exclamation, but you winced when your voice broke at the middle due to the sandpaper currently residing in your throat. You felt your best friend’s arm slightly push you up from your back, and the rim of a cold glass was gently placed on your lower lip.

“Take a sip,” Lexie whispered softly. It was then you noticed that she was the only one in the room aside from you. You cautiously took a sip of the warm water, then thanked god when it soothed the dryness of your throat.

“Lexie, I’m…” you trailed off when you settled back against the comfort of the bed. Your hand was touching the side of your head you remembered bleeding. You fingertips were met by a rough texture which your brain only classified as gauze. You suddenly became aware of everything around you: the gauze, the wires attached to you, the sound of machines, the room—you were in a hospital.

“Bleeding? Yeah, I’m aware. You’ve said that a thousand times already.” Lexie offered a small smile, the worry and concern evident in her eyes.

“What?” you dumbly asked. You were still trying to grasp everything—trying to grasp how the last thing you remembered was… telling Lexie you were bleeding, but it was in a cramped up room.

“You’ve woken up a couple of times in the past 36 hours… and telling me you’re bleeding was always the first thing you keep saying.” You followed Lexie with your eyes as she sat down on the chair beside your bed. You felt her warm hand gently hold yours, making your heartbeat faster… which only became worse when you heard how your heartbeat reflected on the machines. You swore you had an unhealthy red tint form on your cheeks. You turned your head away from your best friend as you’re definitely sure she didn’t miss the machine’s indication of your response to her touch. She went to medical school, for crying out loud!

Your face got even warmer when the hand holding yours squeezed lightly.

“The doctor said you’re expected to actually wake up today. Thank god you chose not to be dramatic for once,” Lexie softly said, making you smile a little. Then, you frowned.

“How long was I out?” you asked, finally registering the fact that you missed a couple of hours because you were unconscious.

“Two days.”

There was silence. Then, “You feel alright?” Lexie asked. You nodded your head slightly, cautious that you might get dizzy of any exaggerated movements. You were looking at her face intently, noting how new stress lines formed, and how Lexie could definitely use a few hours with her bed.

“I’m gonna alert them you’re awake now, okay?” You saw in your peripheral vision that she pressed a button. Silence once again filled the room.

When the doctor and nurses came in the room, the machines were checked and you were asked a few routine questions.

All you can think about the entire time was Lexie not letting go of your hand. It was warm, and though a small gesture, it was the best comfort you’ve ever had in your life.

▫️▫️▫️

“I’m gonna call the others…”

You hate how there was only silence in the room. For the past 10 minutes or so, you and Lexie just held hands, but did not talk about anything at all.

“Wait, Lexie,” you finally managed to say. She immediately looked into your eyes, searching for pain or any indicator that you’re anything besides fine. “Don’t you think we should… talk...? Whatever this is... you know, what’s happening.” You grew frustrated over the fact that you desperately wanted to point out the notable distance between you and your best friend, but can’t because you’re scared. You wanted for Lexie to get the hint, to understand what you were talking about without actually hearing it from you.

“I don’t want to stress you even more, Y/n. You were in surgery three days ago and you didn’t completely wake up for two days,” Lexie said. Your eyes widened at the word “surgery.” Of course, Y/n, your head practically faucet-dripped blood, why in the world wouldn’t you be in surgery?

The silence continued. Your heart aches as the obvious distance between you and Lexie seems to be slowly eating whatever relationship you had with her before. There was hollowness in Lexie’s voice which made you uncomfortable. You hate how everything seems to be changing and you can’t even keep up with its fast phase.

“I miss you,” you said in a low voice, looking at Lexie with pleading eyes. You saw how her posture suddenly went stiff. God damn it…

“You avoided me. For a week.” There was a slight edge in her tone. You winced, because frustrated Lexie is the worst Lexie. She took a deep breath, seemingly trying to calm herself at the sudden rouse of her frustration. You fearfully watched her. You know she wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, but when Lexie’s frustrated, she tends to let everything out, without filter, without breaks.

“You made me leave your apartment, Y/n. I tried to call you hundreds of times—but they all went straight to voicemail. Then I go to your apartment, and you weren’t there, and if it weren’t for Mrs. Lee, I wouldn’t have known that you just left your apartment… or—or something else. I just knew you made it a point to not be there when I could more likely visit you, since you know my schedule so well.

“Then… then next thing I know, you spread your arms wide open in the middle of danger. I had no idea where you were and—fuck—thank god Maggie found you. I had to fucking hear it from Kara that you were injured! You kept avoiding me, and I had no idea where you were and—what if, what if by any chance Maggie wasn’t there and nobody saw you and that woman—god, do you even have a clue how fucking terrified I was, huh, Y/n?”

You know well enough to not disrupt Lexie’s rants whenever she’s on one. You just watched as tears started to form on her eyes, when one fell down. It physically hurts you watching her chin tremble as she tried so hard to keep herself from crying. The grip on your hand became tighter, as if it was Lexie’s lifeline.

“You fell on the ground and I caught you and your head was bleeding so much. There was so much blood, Y/n. Much more than the woman under that damned car. Do you know how fucking scared I was when you wouldn’t wake up? The ambulance came and you still didn’t. Then we were in the ambulance and you did and all you told me was that you’re bleeding. God, Y/n, I was so fucking scared. I thought I was going to lose you… there was… there was so much blood and—and—“

A few tears leaked from your eyes as Lexie let go of your hand and curled down as sobs racked her form. You would have reached out, had it been possible for you to get up without help. You watched her helplessly, willing her with your eyes to look at you and hug you and lie down with you and just… lean on you.

“I’m so sorry, Lexie…” you said quietly, but your words were drowned out by her gasps and sniffs. After a minute or so, she straightened up and wiped her tears away. Tears were still streaming down her face but she looked at you with so much sorrow in her eyes.

Her left hand went on holding your free hand while her right hand reached out to wipe the few tears that escaped your eyes. The soft gesture made a few tears flow even more and you keep muttering “I’m sorry” to her. She was shaking her head then squeezed your hand tighter.

“I hate that I can’t blame anyone for what happened to you,” she admitted, her eyes training towards your bandaged head.

“I can’t lose you, Y/n,” she whispered, her voice coming out a plea. You offered a small smile to her, reveling in the comfort of her hand cradling your cheek.

“You won’t,” you said softly. The one week of avoiding Lexie gave you enough time to adjust to the situation. It was enough to prepare you for Maggie’s constant presence in your life, and the constant pain it will bring. The one week was enough to convince yourself to go back to what was before, to just ignore the kiss that happened and to not hope it will ever happen again.

Lexie will only just be your best friend.

▫️▫️▫️

The topic resurfaced on the third day after waking up. The whole gang was there, since it was Kara’s Earth birthday and she doesn’t want you to miss out on the celebration.

Cupcakes were everywhere, but they don’t beat Lexie’s gift to Kara—a mountain of potstickers. Kara was with you when Lexie arrived, carrying the huge gift she had. You taught Kara was going to solar flare with the excitement flowing from her every pore. Lexie had to physically restrain her from inhaling all of the potstickers in one sitting.

Eliza, J’onn, Winn, James, and Lena (since she definitely knows her girlfriend’s alter-ego) all came 30 minutes after Lexie. They were all creating noise, but you preferred the overlapping words and occasional loud laughter (definitely not Kara’s) over the reruns of Friends (though, you’ll forever love the show), documentaries, and constant hum of machines.

You still couldn’t sit up straight since the gash you had on your left torso was still healing. The bed was angled up slightly, so it could support you as you slightly sat up. Lexie was sitting on the chair beside you. You’ve seen more of her in the past three days than you had in the past three months. She was constantly on your side. Apparently, she chose to sow her invested day-offs just so she could take care of you. After a couple times of urging her to go to J’onn and request to go back to work, she managed to shut you up and just be appreciative of the gesture.

You watched Lexie laugh at something Winn said. She had three potstickers on her plate, and a slice of Eliza’s famous pie.

“So… um, isn’t Maggie part of the I-know-Kara-is-Supergirl squad? Where is she?” you asked lightly. You noticed how Lexie suddenly stopped smiling. You looked at the others. The whole room paused, all looking back at you. Their grave expressions made you think the worst.

“Oh my god,” you said, horrified. You looked at Lexie. “Was she… Is she hurt?” Lexie shook her head. Cold spread over your body. “Dead?!” You looked at the others in horror.

“God, no!” Lexie exclaimed. You looked at her for explanation. Well, what were they expecting? You weren’t a psychic like J’onn.

“Well then what?” you asked, frustrated.

“She broke up with me.” There was an awkward silence that settled in the room. You couldn’t help but notice how Lexie was staring intently at you, and there was just a hint of sadness in her face.

You know you were fucked up when hope practically burst right out of you.

#alex danvers #alex danvers x fem!reader #alex danvers x reader #alex danvers imagine #alex danvers fic #supergirl #supergirl fic #supergirl imagine #kara danvers #lena luthor #supercorp mention #maggie sawyer #sanvers #james olsen #winn schott #j’onn j’onzz #eliza danvers #superfriends! #reader insert #best friend au #hank henshaw #filler chapter #I HAD #WRITER’S BLOCK #AND THIS ISN’T THAT #GOOD

[istheresomebodywhocanimagine]

Tomorrow Never Came PT. 7

A direct continuation of Part 6, with a few hour’s jump. Now that you’ve become closer to Roger than ever, you start to see obstacles - not just Freddie, but real, legitimate obstacles that could threaten your safety, as well as Roger’s safety. Now that feelings are involved, you have a lot of choices to make, and they all need to be made quickly before things can get worse.

Read PT. 1 here | Read PT. 2 here | Read PT. 3 here | Read PT. 4 here | Read PT. 5 here | Read PT. 6 here

(a/n: this one is so convoluted and i didn’t get the chance to proofread hsksjdfkdsl sorry anyways here’s some fluff and angst and EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN besides smut srry. also thoroughly embarrassed bc my Cristalle imagine comes up on google images if you search through Roger Taylor images enough fml)

As much as Roger didn’t want Freddie to catch the two of you in the compromising situation you were currently in, he couldn’t seem to make himself leave you, much less wake you up. You were serene, unbothered, and truly at your most vulnerable state right now, still deep in sleep as the early morning light filtered in through the window. It was partially blocked by Roger’s shadow, but the light that did hit your face made your skin look ethereal, and before he could help himself, he was reaching out to cup your jaw, his thumb brushing over the bandaid on the side of your face once again.

From the back of your throat came a quiet confused noise as you blinked sleepily, not really sure where you were. But the smell of Roger’s cologne on his wrist was all-too-familiar, and you smiled softly as you kept your eyes closed, nuzzling into his hand. An affectionate smile crossed his face for a moment, which scared him more than anything, so he quickly erased it and put on a much more amused front as you yawned, covering your mouth. “Why are you touching my bandaid?” you murmured, nudging his wrist with your nose before slowly opening your eyes fully.

“Think you look kind of cute with it, honestly,” he replied softly, holding back a wide grin as your cheeks turned a light, rosy color. As he admired your bashful expression, he could feel the beginnings of a headache creeping on, but it wasn’t threateningly bad, so he ignored it for the most part.

“Glad my cuts and bruises are cute to you.” With that, you stretched, reaching over your head and using the headboard to stretch out completely. Roger shifted slightly and the blanket slid down so that your chest was revealed, the curve of your breasts and the soft expanse of skin also glowing under the soft morning light. Roger could hardly keep his eyes off of you, the female body still a marvel to him after all these years – and yours was even more marvelous, in his opinion.

“Suppose Freddie will be back soon?” Roger asked, wincing slightly as the sleepy demeanor wore off and you started to look worried. The few moments of otherworldly bliss were over, and it was back to reality again.

“What day is it?” you asked, sitting up and leaning over him to check the calendar across the room. He laid back to allow you, and you sighed in relief, slumping down into a laying position on Roger’s chest. “It’s my day off.”

“Day off. Good,” Roger repeated, moving a hand to your hair and pulling it over one shoulder as he hummed, mainly to himself. You relaxed into his touch, closing your eyes again and pressing your cheek against his torso. Almost dozing back off on him again, you draped your arm lazily across his abdomen, forgetting the whole world and your mission for the time being. Right now, you were living for yourself, and as selfish as it felt, you couldn’t feel too bad with Roger’s hand running through your hair.

When his hand moved to your back to rub it, you made another happy noise and moved your hand to his side, yawning again. “I suppose we have to get up sometime, yeah?”

“Sometime,” he confirmed, sighing at the thought. “Freddie’s going to kill me. And then he’ll probably disown you.”

“M’not afraid of Freddie,” you mumbled, although your voice betrayed you and showed at least some concern. So, Roger sat up, pulling you with him despite your reluctance, and he crawled out of bed, picking up his boxers and pulling them on as you watched. You were fully stretched out across the bed, laying on your side with your head propped up on arm, the other hand covering your mouth as you yawned.

Roger’s eyes wandered over your body for a moment before he came back to the bed, offering you his shirt, which you pulled on without a word as you stood up, stretching. After that, he listened as you padded back out to the lounge, your bare feet scuffing against the rough hardwood in the hallway before meeting the shag carpet again.

“Lord, help me,” Roger mumbled as he looked at himself in the mirror, recapping the night’s events in his head for a moment. What had he done? What if he’d scared you away, and you were going to move out and leave them hanging again? The thoughts of the repercussions for what he’d done were terrifying to him, but for some reason, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. Something akin to affection blossomed in his chest, and he struggled to choke it down as he ran a hand back through his hair, pulling it away from his face and revealing a glow that only young love (and a good shag) could supply.

As he joined you in the main part of the apartment, he found that you’d changed into your own pajamas, his shirt hanging over the back of a chair, and you were in the kitchen, making tea and pulling out some food to make for breakfast.

“Do you want bacon and eggs or sausage and eggs?” you asked when you heard him come in, and he stood in the doorway for a moment, staring at you with an odd smile when you turned to him. “Jesus, you look like the Joker. Bacon or sausage?”

“Bacon,” he finally replied, chuckling at the Joker comment. “Sorry, I was just admiring.”

“Admiring my-“

“Oh, fuck me!” you heard Freddie groan from the front hallway as he came crashing in, his fingers tangled into his hair as he nursed a headache. When he came around the corner into the kitchen, he nearly moaned in delight as he saw the kettle on the stove, and a package of bacon near it. “You’re a saint, Y/N.” When neither of you replied, Freddie sat down at the table, burying his face in his hands for a moment before looking up at Roger through his fingers, slightly narrowing his eyes. “Do you think Y/N wants to see you walking around with your cock out, Rog? Put some pants on.”

Freddie then resumed his face-buried-in-hands situation, and you held in a laugh as you looked at Roger, quickly glancing at his boxers and sending him a pointed look. He rolled his eyes, mouthing the word “Wanker” before he was off to his bedroom again, returning in a moment with some trackpants and his shirt on.

“Sorry you had to see that, dear,” Freddie apologized, and you turned your back to him as you hid a huge grin, wanting desperately to say something, but knowing Freddie would be livid if he knew. “Roger doesn’t have boundaries, obviously… Why is there a bandaid on your face?” You froze up a bit at the question, which you should have expected, and you felt both of their gazes burning into your back as you came up with a quick, lame excuse.

“Fell up the stairs,” you mumbled, pulling the kettle off the heat once it was whistling and biting your lip to subdue the grin that was peeking out while you put some tea in to steep. “How’s your head?” you asked, changing the subject as you brought the kettle and tea cups over to the table, sitting the kettle on a heat-resistant oven pad. When Roger came over with the sugar and cream, you thanked him with a small smile and sat them down on the table, his eyes following you when you headed back to the stove to make some bacon and eggs.

“Horrible,” Freddie muttered, starting to make his tea and sighing. “Left with Mary to go to the club, don’t remember getting to the club, and I don’t remember ending up at Brian’s.”

“You went to Brian’s?” Roger snorted, sitting across the table from Freddie and crossing his arms. “What, is Bri your new favorite now? You two can’t even be in the same room for more than two seconds without lunging at each other’s throats.”

“Oh, you’re one to talk!” Freddie shot back, flipping him off as he stirred his tea and tried to ignore the bright light now coming in through the window. “As much as you and Brian go at each other, you’d think you had a crush on the man.”

“Ugh, yeah, love Brian to pieces,” Roger remarked sarcastically, rolling his eyes as you shook your head and laughed, pulling down a couple of plates from the cupboard. “His skeleton build makes me harder than year 11 maths. Wonder if he notices me too.”

Freddie snorted into his tea, nearly spilling it and covering his face before grabbing Roger’s shirt that was hanging over the chair and wiping off the liquid that had hit his nose. Giggling softly, you finished the bacon and eggs, then brought them over to the table while the two of them went back and forth about the night before, Freddie finally asking where Roger ended up.

“I came back here,” Roger admitted, taking some of the bacon off of the plate and getting himself an egg as you sat between the two of them, giving Roger a questioning look. As Freddie focused on his bacon, Roger shook his head. “Passed out in my boxers. Thank god for Tylenol.”

“I know what you mean,” Freddie groaned, none the wiser, and then you were all eating, the room significantly quieting. The only sound came in from outside, people chattering cheerily on the sidewalk and dogs intermittently barking, the usual sounds that came with the area. But one of the sounds in particular made your blood run cold. The church bells started ringing, and you narrowed your eyes as you stared down at your plate, which was only half-eaten. The appetite you’d had moments ago vanished, and you got an intrigued look from Roger, but he said nothing of it.

When you got up to clear your place, Freddie was again oblivious to the secrecy surrounding you, but he did note that you were a bit off. When he raised his eyebrow in question, you sent him a small smile and shook your head. “Just not as hungry as I thought. I’m going to go out for a moment, need a smoke.”

With that, you took your plate to the sink and finished off your tea quickly, grabbing Roger’s cigarettes from the counter and making sure you grabbed the lighter from his room before you climbed out onto the fire escape just outside his window. Settling yourself in and sitting cross-legged in the far corner where Freddie or Roger wouldn’t be able to see you, you leaned back against the bars and just watched the church, flipping an unlit cigarette between your fingers absentmindedly.

Things were a whole lot more complicated now. You and Roger had sex, there was no denying it, no avoiding the truth. A painful realization was settling in, one that let you know you adored Roger to the point where you couldn’t see a future without him – his laugh, the way he smiled when he did so, those beautiful, inquisitive blue eyes, that maddening sense of intelligence that he masked with an innocent, jesting demeanor.

But this was your mom’s life you were talking about – you were at the helm of it, in charge of a decision that meant either prosperity or ruination for her, and you had to remember that you were here for her, not for your own selfish purposes. Roger’s attention was making you lose focus.

 You caught a glimpse of William and Ted, greeting people on the steps of the church, and a faint buzzing noise started taking over your hearing, steadily growing until it nearly drove you mad, like a hive of bees was inside your brain.

Injure them? Kill them? Gruesome images started conjuring themselves up in your brain, ones that ended in their death or hospitalization, and you were perplexed by these thoughts. But what could you do? Sit here, day after day, knowing that they were leering after your mom, planning an assault that would leave her scarred for the rest of her life?

And if you did kill them, as horrifying as it was, you could stay here. The thought was slowly occurring to you that you enjoyed your life here quite a bit more than you did your future. Sure, it was redundant sometimes, but you could enroll in school, or start helping with Queen – Lord knows they’d need a lot of help in a few year’s time. Besides, the past would be changed enough for your mom that she could maybe have a boy instead of you, or another girl that wouldn’t have to suffer the same fate as you, wouldn’t it? 

Your life back in 2018 was rough – beyond rough, actually – and maybe you’d done enough here to warrant just spending the rest of your life with Roger. Not seeing your mom anymore would be tough, but it would be enough to know that she was safe from those monsters and not living the nightmare she currently was day to day.

Currently? Could you even use that when you were here? Probably not.

“You alright?” Roger’s voice pervaded your thoughts, making you jump as you snapped out of the daze, looking up at him. He’d joined you on the fire escape, walking out so he was out of the shadows, and the sunlight caught his eyes just right so that he looked like an angel staring down at you. That angel joined you promptly, sitting by your side and nicking the cigarette out of your hand before putting it between his lips and lighting it. As he took a long drag, he looked forward, then exhaled slowly before looking over at you, where you were still just watching quietly. “I asked if you’re alright?”

“Oh, yeah,” you murmured, looking away bashfully and catching the tail end of the last person walking into the church. “Just a lot on my mind.”

“Me too,” he agreed, still watching you and taking intermittent drags out of his cigarette. He seemed introspective, almost, as he looked you over, watching the way your fingers gripped the metal bar to your left, the same fingers he’d had running through his hair last night. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed with that affectionate feeling in his chest again, and as much as he loathed it, he couldn’t suppress it anymore. When you looked over at him after a prolonged silence, his free hand took you by the nape of your neck, pulling you in for a dizzying kiss that tasted like cigarettes and breakfast food, an interesting combo that still managed to make you putty in his hands.

Within moments, you were kneeling between his legs, carefully avoiding his hand that still held the lit cigarette as you wrapped your arms around his neck, moving your lips in sync with his. His arm snaked around your waist, just lazily resting there as he made no attempt to deepen the kiss, so you held back too, content to just be in contact with him. And you pulled away first, after a minute or two of gentle, subdued kisses that weren’t meant to lead anywhere.

Roger’s nose brushed against yours as you pulled away, and he let go of your waist as you turned around to rest between his legs, leaning back against him and resting your head on his chest. You could hear him take a drag and hold it for a moment before releasing it, the smoke swirling around above your head and quickly getting caught up by the light breeze.

“You know, Freddie could catch us out here.” Roger was the first to break the silence, his chest rumbling against your ear as you closed your eyes, focusing on all your other senses. His voice was gentle, but there was a kind of warning tone to it that couldn’t be ignored. “He’s a hell of a grudge holder – he’d never let me live this down.”

“Just a few more minutes,” you mumbled, wrapping your arms around his torso and burying your face in his shirt. It smelled of him, the faint scent of his cologne and just a bit of body odor lingering on it. Curling up your fingers, you took ahold of the back of it, holding onto him like he was your lifeline. He only rested his free hand on your head in response, his thumb lazily rifling through your hair before rubbing small circles into your scalp, a reassuring presence that almost made tears come to your eyes as he spoke again.

“Why were you so upset last night?” Letting the question linger, you mulled over your options. If you were going to go through with your own attack, should you tell him? And even if you weren’t, what was the harm? You tried to recall any moment that Dan had spoke to you about revealing your identity, but couldn’t think of anything – most likely, he hadn’t gotten as close to Roger and Freddie as you had. But he was from the 70’s – wouldn’t it have been hard to disguise himself around all of those former friends? Still, your efforts were fruitless, and you just shrugged as you sat up, opening your eyes to meet his gaze, which was scrutinizing at best.

“I don’t know if I want to talk about it. But I’m okay now,” you murmured. Then, you diverted your attention down to the street, chewing on your lower lip. A queer feeling arose throughout your body, starting at the tips of your toes and rising all the way to the hairs on your head as you saw the church out of the corner of your eyes. You had to incapacitate them. It was the only way. “I’ve got to do something.”

Standing quickly, you left Roger in a bewildered state as you headed for the window. “I thought it was your day off?” he asked, but you were already crawling through, heading for the kitchen once you’d gotten into the apartment. In the kitchen, you grabbed a knife – this wasn’t you, usually, but you had no other focus besides hurting these men that had hurt your mom. They deserved every bit of pain that they caused her and more, and if that meant sticking a knife in their shoulder, then by God, you were going to do it. Then, you could be with Roger – that was, if you weren’t arrested first.

You could faintly hear Roger’s footsteps following you from far away, but you’d already shoved the knife into your waistband and headed for the hallway, deadset on the target, or targets, for that matter. Down the stairs, and then you were out on the street, crossing it, a stormy look on your face as you neared the church. And then, there he was.

Weston, on the steps of the church, staring you down with an intimidating look you’d never seen out of anyone before. “You again?” you almost spit, stopping on the sidewalk maybe ten feet in front of him as he rose to his feet, descending the stairs.

“God, it’s like I have to babysit you,” he muttered, shoving his hands in his pockets and glancing over your shoulder as Roger burst through the front door of your building, looking around wildly to find you. “You really don’t listen, do you? Go home. All of this? It’s dangerous. You’re playing with fire, and you’re going to get burned.”

“Y/N!” Roger called from across the street, finally having spotted you. When he realized you were talking to Weston, his eyebrows furrowed, and he cocked his head for a moment before starting to cross the street.

“Get out of my way,” you mumbled, pushing past Weston and starting to head up the stairs. When your hand rested on the doorknob of the church, you felt the cold metal of the knife press against your thigh, and then the sound of a car’s tires screeching and a horn honking made you whirl around and forget all about what you’d just been on the warpath for.

Weston had taken off down the street, giving you a look that said it all as Roger stood in the street, inches from a car that was laying on the horn while he stared in shock. Running back down the stairs, you cursed whatever omnipotent being responsible for this giant mess – the past was fighting back again, and this time, Roger was going to be the victim. This was a completely different ballgame altogether now.

When you got out to Roger, he was thoroughly apologizing to the driver of the car, but you cut him off in the middle of his rambling, dragging him over to the curb and back into the building as he took deep breaths, not sure what had just happen. “Jesus Christ, I just about bit the big one,” he muttered, mainly to himself, as you pulled him upstairs, trying to ignore the tears welling up in your eyes. Dan and Weston weren’t joking – now it was personal, and you had no one to blame but yourself. What were you thinking?

Once you finally got back to the apartment, Roger walked in as if in a daze while you followed, shutting the door behind the both of you and heading to the kitchen to put the knife back before Roger had the chance to see. When he rounded the corner slowly, you were already intercepting him, dragging him towards his bedroom and also shutting that door behind you before you wrapped your arms around Roger, pulling him into the tightest hug you’d ever given anyone before.

“Thank God, you’re alright.” He reciprocated the hug, burying his face in your hair, and you could tell that he was trembling just a bit, probably still on an adrenaline high as he embraced you tightly.

“I’m just glad it wasn’t you,” he mumbled, his voice still sounding as if he was in a daze of some sort, and when you pulled back from the hug a bit to look at him, the glazy look in his eyes confirmed your suspicion. Tears finally fell from the corner of your eyes, and you sucked your bottom lip in between your teeth as Roger’s eyes cleared, his eyebrows furrowing as he tried to wipe away your tears with his thumbs. “No, no, don’t cry, what’s wrong? I’m sorry, I should have looked both ways, I’m blind as a bat so I didn’t see-“

“God damn it, Roger, shut up,” you choked out, laughing a bit as you tried to keep your volume down so  Freddie wouldn’t come barging in. “Are you alright, really?” you asked, sighing as you took his face in your hands so you could study his reaction.

“Well, it was a bit scary,” he admitted, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling you close as he took a shuddering breath, apparently recounting the moment. His face was conflicted, a multitude of emotions crossing it including embarrassment, before it softened. “But I was more worried about you.”

You were dumbfounded for a moment – though you had an inkling of a suspicion as to what the answer was, you still asked the simple question. “Why?”

“Because... I fancy you a lot,” he mumbled, giving you a small smile as his face reddened just a bit. It took a lot of courage on his part to just openly admit such a sappy thing, but he was feeling emotional and sentimental, so you’d caught him at just the right time.

“Oh, Rog, I like you too,” you murmured, starting to cry again, which prompted a pout from him as he pulled you flush against his chest, kissing your head.

“Please don’t cry right after I’ve told you I like you,” he begged, making a pitiful giggle escape your lips as you shook your head, realizing that whatever reservations you’d had before about telling Roger the truth were obliterated. You couldn’t keep lying to him.

“I have so much to tell you.”

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#roger taylor #roger taylor x reader #roger taylor imagine #queen imagine #oliver queen #time travel #series

[cruzrogue]

Enter My World

This came to me after seeing the train wreck of what Robert Queen has done. Two powerful families of Starling/Star City have failed so many people including themselves. Anyways I decided to write a piece that is like Bizzaro World where The Merlyns and Queens didn’t screw everything up and actually were pillars of the community, and omg good parents past and future.

So, I was writing for the OFAE project and got stuck in the middle part so when that happens other stories pop in my head like this one. I need to write them down and maybe explore more in depth. I have no idea if anyone will want to read this… But its like therapy for writer’s block. I need to figure a piece out in my OFAE gift to push forward. I’m so close to being done once this hurdle is past.

Anyways if you like or not, I’m always open for criticism or whatnot. Thanks for reading my babbles.

Of course, I had to create an age graph. LOL

Now to the premise of an AU Olicity story... 

 The Merlyn household normally silent at two in the morning. Little pattering of feet stops at a large wooden door as little fingers wrap themselves around the antique knob and cracks the door open enough to fit through. With another thunderous clap and flashing light filtering through the large windows the little girl dashes to the bed hoping the occupant there will let her hide under the covers as the storm passes through. The older boy already sensing his visitor pushes the bedcovers up so she can slide in. His embrace calming them both as the rainstorm has them on alert. The shapes of the tree branches making shadowy monsters dancing upon the walls keeping him frozen in his bed with fear until what he deems as his younger sister bravely adventures into his room under such extreme circumstance. Grateful to hold her petrified body to his as they ride out this terrifying experience together.  

The latest clap of thunder makes both children jump as the door of Thomas Merlyn’s room opens up wide as heavy footsteps walk to make sure the blinds are drawn. The troublesome weather wasn’t broadcasted so no one had made sure to make the bedrooms’ scary proof for the young residents of this dwelling. As the blinds are fully enclosed the shadowy monsters disappear. As soon as the visual effects were tamed Tommy looks to the man in his room that he calls his father.

Malcolm doesn’t have to see to know that his son isn’t alone and a little girl who he considers a daughter is huddled under the covers with his son. Though with his wife now turning on the bedside lamp he can see the little lump and strands of honey brown hair poking out from under the covers where Felicity hides. Rebekah already sitting by the edge of the bed pushing down slightly to where she can see tear-stricken eyes.

Rebekah’s sweet voice already helping the little ones on the bed feel secure. “It’s okay we are here.”

Malcolm taking his seat by Tommy’s side as the boy looks for his dad for strength. “The storm is moving away soon.” He doesn’t need the question spoken as he answers. “I’m not going anywhere.” It’s enough of a response to invoke his boy to grab his dad and be held as his fears of the monsters are subdued once again. “It was just wild branches from a tree. You’re safe.” Malcolm holds his son until he can feel the boy truly calm down and lay back on the bed.

Rebekah has the girl wrapped in her arms as sweet nothings are spoken. As the storm truly dies down around them the woman looks at her husband as they contempt if Felicity should be placed back in her bed or let her fall asleep here where she sought comfort. With a shake of Malcolm’s head, the response of the little girl remaining here with her brother is answered.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just a few miles away at the Queen residence. As the storm is brewing the children of the household are held up in their own parent’s room. The large four-post wooden encase that holds an over abundant mattress usually beds the couple of the homestead. Shortly after the first crack over the large estate where the noise echoes over the large open rooms. Oliver is already on the move as he passes one of his younger sister’s rooms. He doesn’t need to open her door as little Emilia is already joining him with her stuffed bear as they head to their parent’s room quickly before the next boom in the sky happens.

They stop at the door; Oliver’s little knuckles swiftly hits the door in hurried successions knowing any moment another frightening thunderclap will scare the duo waiting to be rescued by their parents. As the large framed door opens up and they see their father they automatically run into his awaiting arms.

“Hush now, it’s going to be alright.” Robert says as he watches them both jump on the large bed as they both safely watch their mother trying to calm their baby sister Thea.

The one-year-old quiets down significantly now that she sees her siblings. Moira sports a soft smile as she can already feel the difference in her youngest as the trio are reunited safely in her room. Looking at Robert as he’s already wandered to their bed to join his children as the intense weather beats down against the brick and mortar of the family estate. Tonight, the room will be filled with two generations of Queens as they wait out the storm and find comfort in each other in sweet dreams rather than nightmares of loud bangs and the sporadic light show.

“Momma?” Emilia small voice says before adding, “Can we have pannycakes tomorrow?”

Moira autocorrecting, “Pancakes.” As she then says, “Sure, I see why not. Now go to sleep my darlings.”

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

5 years later…

“She is my sister man. You can’t just go and kiss her.”

“First of all, she kissed me.”

“Yea, but you liked it.” Tommy accused Oliver as he watches his friend be nonchalant about the whole thing. “What if I kissed Mila? Huh? You say you’d be okay with it?”

“No. I wouldn’t. But it’s different.”

“Really? Because she is your sister?”

“No. I know you don’t have those feelings for Emilia and Thea is like six so that be gross.”

“Fine, but all because you like Felicity doesn’t mean shit. She’s just twelve years old, and you know she’s making a big deal about training situation.”

“Their boobs Tommy, say breasts if you need to but its normal girlie stuff.”

Tommy makes a mumbling sound as his friend’s words are annoying him. “I don’t want to know about my sister’s boobs okay?”

Oliver rolls his eyes. He has two sisters and has spent enough time in Felicity’s orbit to know what the opposite sex talks about. Never mind the little remarks Aunt Reba and his mom that he overhears just like his friend who chooses to play dumb.

“Okay Tommy. We’ll both act like Felicity isn’t growing up.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“She still is the one to kiss me and I for one am not upset about it.”

That statement made Tommy blanch as another thought entered his mind.

“Tommy are you okay? You don’t look good.”

Tommy gives Oliver a deep stare as he says, “What… What if the other boys notice? They notice these things, right? I know I do. Oh my gosh my sister is going to be gawked at. What am I going to do?”

Oliver is worried that Tommy is way to freaked out. “Relax.”

“Relax? She’s my sister!” Tommy knows that Felicity is adopted but to him that is still his sister.

“She’s also very smart. Not only that but she has us.” Oliver pats his friends back as the boy begins to calm down. “Okay?” Adding to make Tommy feel better, “She’s my best-friend’s sister and also care about her. You know when we found out about the nut allergy and she was hospitalized I was there so you know how much I care.”

Tommy looks at Oliver with a nod. He knows how everyone important to him was there. Even with him going home with his dad he knows that Oliver stayed there when Felicity was scared to be alone even though his mom was also there. He’ll never will admit it out loud but seeing his best friend be so distraught over Felicity brought a comfort to him. He isn’t blind to the affection that is blossoming between those two. Though there is no way he will flame the fire and make it easy. That is his sister after all.

Oliver still worried asks, “Are we good? Are you okay?”

“Yea, I’m fine. But don’t you dare make it a habit. I’ll punch you in the face if you… you know.”

Oliver just nods there isn’t anything he can say. If he agrees to keep away, he’ll lose the closeness he has with her. He likes her near. If he says that out loud, he can create a distance with his best friend and he doesn’t want that either.

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

A week later…

“You haven’t been around. I thought we were going to watch…”

“Felicity, I’m sorry. Just busy I guess and there is a load of school work and my dad wants me to apply for the summer junior thing.”

“I just miss you.”

Oliver tries not looking her in the face as he creates a lie that will probably hurt her but after another conversation with Tommy, he relented saying he’d make an effort to keep her at bay. “There is this spring dance coming and well my mom thinks I should really put the effort in being able to dance so I’m really going to busy.”

“Oh.” Felicity has heard Tommy talking about it. He says he has his eye on a certain girl he is going to ask to go with him. Their mother prodded for more information and finding out it is a big deal. Hearing Oliver talk about it she wonders who he will ask to be his date. “Do you have someone in mind?”

“Ah! Sure, you wouldn’t know her.”

Felicity nods but like always she prods deeper, “Classmate, right? I bet she’s really something if you like her. Hope she can dance to.”

“I like her enough and she’s really pretty.”

“I guess this means you’ll be too busy for us.”

“Hey, I’ll always be around you are my best friend’s kid sister.”

She gives him a forced smile as she can feel the brush off. She’ll have to get use to this she thinks. He is sixteen now. Doesn’t mean she likes it. She isn’t too close to his sister Mila who kind of resents her close friendship with her brother and Thea is sweet but between her nanny and older sister Felicity doesn’t think she’ll spend as much time in the Queen home anymore.

“I guess I’ll see you around.” She turns around to walk away when she decides that if this is it. That he doesn’t like to spend time with her anymore she has to say her peace because she already knows in her heart what losing people does. It creates a void.

A car accident around her seventh birthday took her parents. She knows pain but she’s lucked out that with one tragedy it led to her finding another family who also rocked their own sad tragedy. She was a key for them to heal as their own love for her has mended some invisible walls of pain. “No. I don’t buy this Oliver!”

“What?” He says surprised.

“You were fine a week ago.” She looks at him trying to read the boy she cares more about than she willing wants to admit but she knows she cares for him. To her he is more than just a friend of Tommy’s he is her confident and they share their own little world. It is a world that holds possibilities but it simmers on some low fervor as being near one another gives the other an extension to feel something that has no words because their experiences in life are limited but they know. She isn’t willing to let it go. Not without a solid reason. “This… this is happening because I kissed you.” Realizing this she just shakes her head. “It was merely a one second kiss.”

“Felicity.”

“It was. Wasn’t it?”

“I’m really just busy…”

“Please… I’m not an outsider who doesn’t know you. I’m sorry if I freaked you out. I promise to never kiss you again. Just don’t ruin our friendship.”

Oliver sighs as he looks to the sky for answers. When he his face comes back down and he looks at the girl before him waiting for an answer and he finally spills the truth, “It’s not our friendship I’m worried about. Tommy is my best friend since forever and… and I feel like this…” He points between them. “Is something that is dangerous and…”

Her head tilts listening to him as she takes his answer and thinks its full of baloney and she calls him on it. “Dangerous? I’m freaking twelve years old Oliver. I have no idea what is in store for my future but I know here and now as I missed a week of listening to you being you. We’ve known each other for five years. Five years Oliver. You seriously want to throw it all away?”

“I’m not going anywhere. I just need to distance myself. Find myself I guess.”

“Without me? You mean. Because you aren’t pulling away from anyone else. Right?”

“I’m sixteen. I also don’t see you as my sister, so that kiss if just a second opened a floodgate with your brother. His reasons make sense and I’m older so I should know better. I’m doing this for what is best for the both of us.”

“I don’t understand. But then like you said I’m just a kid so what would I know.” She shakes her head as she says one more thing before leaving him to create this mess. “Somethings aren’t fixable.”

“Felicity? Felicity…” She is out of his sight and he wonders if he just made the biggest mistake that with time will be unfixable as they go their own ways but yet be close enough to see opportunities lost. They already don’t share the same circles. They are in each other’s orbit but he realizes she is too young even if they are only four years apart. She plays with dolls still and well he needs to remind himself of that as he wants to be more of an adult. He is doing what is best for the both of them. It’ll get easier…

#olicity #oliver queen #felicity smoak #arrow #thomas Merlyn #other arrow characters #enter my world

[akaluan]

bibliomatsuri replied to your post “kuroiwriting replied to your post: When All Is...”

but worldbuilding? shiny??? (unless u don't want to talk about it / unless spoilers, in which case ignore this)

Prequel | Prequel | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

*snerk* nothing is particularly spoilery, I don’t think, it’s mostly just fragments that aren’t really connected to much. So... let’s see here...

((This went a lot longer than I expected, lolol))

.

Being an Arrancar so suddenly, Ichigo can’t use Final Getsuga.

He still has Shiro and Zangetsu, though. Shiro is more prominent than before, of course, and Zangetsu is weakened due to being a Quincy manifestation in an Arrancar.

In this case, Ichigo goes for Resurrección, and then tries to figure out Segundo Etapa. He reaches the first, and gets an unstable version of the second during the dangai training.

Not that he’s certain that either is enough to beat Aizen. He’s actually pretty sure it isn’t. But what else can he do?

(He’s done what he can. Threw himself into learning everything Shiro would teach him. Everything Zangetsu reluctantly agreed to teach him. He’s done what he can and now he has to try.)

(Frankly, Isshin is a bit terrified of this new version of his son. He can see traces of the Hollow that nearly cost Masaki her soul in the Hollow traits his son is displaying. He wonders how much of that Hollow Ichigo has inherited.)

The fight with Aizen goes... not poorly, precisely, but not entirely well.

Ichigo’s still learning how to be an Arrancar. His instincts are all twisted up, and the tail he gains in Resurrección (and which lengthens in Segundo Etapa) is... frustrating.

Still, he’s got a pretty wicked high speed regeneration going on -- not nearly as good as Ulquiorra’s, but still visibly powerful -- and that combined with everything else means he can just... keep going.

(Like his bankai, Ichigo’s strengths are still focused on speed and stamina. He’s strong, of course, almost overwhelmingly so, but his speed still trumps everything else.)

Aizen isn’t actually prepared for the level of speed that Ichigo gains in Segundo Etapa. This is Aizen’s downfall.

(Frankly, Ichigo isn’t entirely prepared for his own speed either. He’s just very adaptable.)

Ichigo manages to win, and Aizen is sealed, and everyone goes home... sort of happy.

(Now comes the hard part. Adapting to life as an Arrancar in the living world.)

(Urahara has his hands full trying to figure out how to deal with this.)

No one initially realizes that Ichigo has poison. It’s not like he uses his claws during the rest of the invasion of Hueco Mundo or when he attacks Aizen.

Because no one realizes this, Ichigo doesn’t know he needs to be careful. He scratches Uryuu on accident, and no one thinks anything of it.

(Urahara wasn’t around to think anything of it, when it happened.)

Uryuu grimaces at the way the shallow marks feel like they’re freezing, but waves Orihime off -- the wounds are barely bleeding, she doesn’t need to waste her energy on healing him.

It’s only luck that has Uryuu around the others when the poison starts to overwhelm him. Orihime hastily summons her fairies and struggles to reject Uryuu becoming a Hollow.

(Urahara is here this time. He gets to watch as yet another Quincy struggles against the fate of becoming unmade. Except this time he knows the Quincy. This time it’s not just academic.)

Ichigo is horrified by this. By the knowledge that he caused this. He decides to leave ‘for everyone’s good’.

Uryuu is furious about this decision when he finally recovers and wakes up. He marches up to Urahara and demands the man help him drag Ichigo back to the Living World.

Urahara points out that so long as Uryuu and the others remain vulnerable, Ichigo’s never going to willingly return.

Uryuu gives Urahara a look and asks if the man’s reputation as an inventor and mad scientist is deserved or not.

(Urahara hadn’t expected Uryuu to be the one who approached him about this. He had spent time trying to create some sort of defense after he recovered traces of the poison from Masaki. He just... doesn’t entirely know if it will work.)

But when the others come to him, backing Uryuu up, Urahara sighs and goes forward with it.

(Besides, with Inoue around, things aren’t quite so dangerous.)

Urahara coaxes Ichigo back to the Living World, with a promise of figuring out how to make his friends immune, but that he needs Ichigo there to help him with that.

Everything actually turns out pretty well? At the very least, Sado and Inoue have no adverse effects from what Urahara has created, and introducing some of Ichigo’s poison to Sado afterward results in... nothing. Same with Inoue.

It’s Uryuu that has problems. He reacts poorly to the initial solution, requiring Inoue to heal him. And the next. And the next.

Uryuu is a Quincy, and every solution Urahara can produce is... harsh, relying on Hollow reiatsu or Hollow nature or some other Hollow-natured thing that makes Uryuu’s Quincy nature rebel.

The one solution that doesn’t is equally uncomfortable, and relies on Uryuu remaining close to hand: implanting an artificial filter in Uryuu’s soul that can handle both the Hollow reiatsu and the poison.

Except it doesn’t change the fact that Uryuu gets sick, and leaves him aching constantly. And Urahara needs to keep an eye on it, to make sure the filter remains operating correctly.

Eventually Urahara runs out of ideas except one. which he doesn’t want to use. But Uryuu is still insistent and Ichigo reluctantly agrees when Urahara proposes it to him.

(Urahara is going well beyond his own comfort, Living World science and medical knowledge mixed with Shinigami healing.)

(He’s never been a medic of either sort. This is a foolish endeavor, and yet...)

Inoue stays nearby during the entire event. Just in case.

Urahara takes a piece of Ichigo’s Quincy nature and implants it in Uryuu.

(He’s hoping that Uryuu’s soul doesn’t reject it. Hoping that Uryuu’s soul will ‘learn’ from Ichigo’s nature, and gain the resistance to Hollow nature that Ichigo grew up with because of his mixed heritage.)

Inoue is necessary.

Uryuu’s soul doesn’t take kindly to the intrusion. He’s been through too much, put himself through too many efforts in too short of an order, even with Inoue there to reject the damage.

Inoue... doesn’t want to see this continuing to happen. She doesn’t want Ichigo fleeing again, and she hates seeing Uryuu constantly in pain, constantly on the edge of serious illness or death--

Instead of rejecting what’s been done to him. She rejects what’s happening.

She rejects the way Uryuu’s soul reacts, keeping him under her shield while the piece of Ichigo’s soul integrates into Uryuu’s. While Uryuu’s nature slowly twists and takes on the darker edge that Ichigo has.

It takes days, and Ichigo retreats in shame. He’s done this to Uryuu. Done this to all of his friends and family. The only reason he doesn’t flee back to Hueco mundo is because he feels like he can’t while Uryuu is still suffering.

(Inoue drives herself to a thread, trying to keep Uryuu alive through the entire process. Urahara does what he can, but there’s very little he can do.)

(Urahara hates feeling so helpless.)

In the end, Uryuu survives. Tired and worn thin and barely able to stay awake for more than a couple hours at a time, but he survives. He’s out sick for over a month, trying to regain his strength and accustom himself to how his very nature has changed.

(His control is shot and his powers are unreliable. He’s given up his claim on being a true Quincy in favor of staying at Ichigo’s side without danger.)

(He’s not only gained a resistance to Hollow reiatsu, he’s gained Ichigo’s immunity to his own poison.)

(Despite everything, he can’t really say he regrets it.)

Of course, it takes months to convince Ichigo of that. Uryuu gets used to stalking into Hueco Mundo and keeping Ichigo company there until his friend finally agrees to come back home.

Uryuu isn’t good with words and he knows this. But actions? He can do that. He sticks by Ichigo no matter what, refusing to be chased off.

(He gets pretty good at fighting alongside his friend, beating off the Hollows in Hueco Mundo who think Ichigo and Uryuu would make a good meal.)

(He gets inured to the way his body is capable of surviving on free reishi for a time, instead of food.)

(He’s picked up a bit more from Ichigo’s nature than just poison immunity and resistance to Hollow reiatsu.)

By the time Ryuuken actually realizes what’s going on, everything is over and he’s faced with his son being... not entirely his son anymore.

Uryuu’s smiles are sharper and his nature is darker. He’s a Hollow-tainted Quincy, a thing that shouldn’t even be possible.

(Isshin really isn’t in any better position than Ryuuken. He and Karin and Yuzu got the same solution to Ichigo’s poison that Chad and Orihime got, though Ichigo usually only remains around them in the gigai that Urahara built for him.)

(Ichigo can’t return to his body anymore. The Arrancar change means his body can no longer support his soul.)

Uryuu’s body, too, slowly suffers from the constant change between kishi and reishi, on top of the way his soul has been altered. His Living body is still a bit too Quincy in nature, and his soul now permanently contains Hollow reiatsu.

Inoue does what she can, but the more she rejects the damage the more difficult it becomes to do so.

In the end, about the only thing they can do is to accept that Uryuu’s Living body can no longer support his soul either. Urahara reluctantly goes through with it -- Uryuu’s chain is already significantly corroded, and it doesn’t take much to see Uryuu Actually Dead.

(Again Ichigo feels heavy guilt. This is his fault.)

(This time, though, he stays at Uryuu’s side.)

Uryuu forces himself to struggle through, regaining his strength and control for a second (third) time.

(Ichigo doesn’t understand the lengths Uryuu is forcing himself through, just to stay at Ichigo’s side. He doesn’t understand, but he refuses to  push Uryuu away at this point.)

By the time the Wandenreich start poking around, Uryuu and Ichigo and pretty damn co-dependent.

Uryuu still goes with them, still infiltrates the enemy with the hope of exposing their weaknesses, but this time Ichigo is aware of what’s going on.

Uryuu tries to keep a lid on his Hollow nature. Tries to keep the other Quincy from realizing he’s anything more than a Gemischt.

Yhwach knows. He offers Uryuu a Schrift, with the promise that Yhwach’s gift will help Uryuu overcome the ‘unfortunate taint he has been cursed with’.

(Uryuu is infuriated. His nature is not a curse. He walked willingly into these changes, and given the chance he would do it all again.)

(Yet what can he do but accept Yhwach’s “Gift”? To refuse is to reveal himself for the traitor he is.)

Yhwach reveals Uryuu’s secret before the entire Wandenreich, while declaring Uryuu his successor. No matter how Yhwach spins it -- that Uryuu is the next evolution for Quincy, that his survival as both a child surviving Aushwalin and a teen surviving Hollow infection means that he will lead the Quincy to glory -- Uryuu is still an outsider, still tainted and impure.

The Wandenreich hate him, and Yhwach’s words do nothing to assuage that hate.

(Uryuu can’t wait to bring their empire toppling down around their ears.)

#bibliomatsuri #replies #drabbles #my fic #unedited #sorta #meta #basically some backstory for Nothing is Known #the more i wrote the more there was #apparently i have lots of ideas for the backstory of this that i don't know if i'll ever write #lulz #how did this get so out of hand