#and at the time seeing all the powdered colors flying everywhere at the end of the race reminded me of splatoon sm i was like raaaaah | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

love-takes-work · 3 years

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Off Colors Graduation Cake

Yes, nerds, I duplicated the four-tier graduation cake from Steven Universe Future: “Little Graduation.”

The process for this cake is pretty long, but it’s all there under that cut.

(I made this when the show ended, but am only posting the full recipe now.)

See more SU food tutorials!

Making the Off Colors Graduation Cake required some guesswork. For instance, we only get to see the inside of one tier.

Looks like two-layer chocolate cake with some complex fillings and a bunch of fun toppings!

This tutorial comes in 6 parts:

1. Four two-layer cakes: 10-inch, 8-inch, 6-inch, and 4-inch

2. Pink lemonade frosting filler

3. Creamy chocolate frosting filler

4. Vanilla buttercream frosting

5. Fondant figures and ribbon accents

6. Assembly

Let's get started because there's so much to do!

1. The Cakes

This delicious chocolate cake is partially based on a recipe blog created by Chelsey of chelsweets.com . I used the same one for the bottom layer of my Gem Harvest Cake.

Note: You will make this recipe TWICE.

Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 ½ cups granulated sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 ½ teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

4 large eggs, room temperature

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

1 cup hot water

1 cup buttermilk, room temperature

1 cup powdered cocoa

Equipment:

Stand mixer

Spatula

Measuring cups and spoons

A medium bowl

Whisk

Two 10-inch round cake pans

Two 8-inch round cake pans

Two 6-inch round cake pans

Two 4-inch round cake pans

Two heating cores

Parchment paper

Sifter

Non-stick spray or oil mister

Baking scale

Frosting knife or flexible, thin knife

Toothpicks

Cooling racks

I will make the 8-inch, 6-inch, and 4-inch cakes from one batch of batter, and then make another batch to make the 10-inch cakes.

To combine the ingredients:

First, use the mixer to whip together your butter and sugar on high for about a minute.

Once it starts to lighten, start adding the eggs. Whip one egg in, and when it’s combined completely, add the next egg.

You should finish this step by adding in the three small quantities: baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Mix them together on high for about one more minute.

Next, make chocolate milk! First you’ll mix up buttermilk and hot water (I like to use a buttermilk powder, reconstituted, so if you do the same, follow your package’s instructions to get one cup of buttermilk).

Then add in cocoa, in four installments. I recommend sifting it in to get clumps out.

When you’ve finished making the chocolate milk, add one cup of flour to your butter mix in the mixer and combine it with a spatula first, then whip it with the stand mixer. (If you just turn on the stand mixer, flour will probably fly everywhere.)

Next, add about half your chocolate milk to the big bowl on your mixer. Lift the beaters out and combine the liquid gently into the batter until it’s thick enough that you can return the beaters and mix again without spraying liquid everywhere. (The general rule: If it’s very dry or very wet, it’ll try to get out of the bowl, so mix it manually first!)

Then add another cup of flour. After that is combined the same way, add the rest of the chocolate milk, and combine the same way as above. Then finally, add the final cup of flour. Combine the same way and finish with a nice whipped chocolate mix.

To bake:

Set your oven to 350° F/ 175° C.

Get your pans set up. You want each to be lined with parchment paper, which you can buy in cake pan sizes or make yourself by tracing around the edge of the pan you’ll use and cutting out a parchment paper circle. You should use non-stick spray to squirt into the pan, lay the parchment circle down, and then spray the top of the paper.

Use a kitchen scale to weigh the batter. (You’ll probably need to put a bowl on the scale, zero the scale, and then dump the batter in to get a reading.) Mine was about 1500 grams. After the pans were set up for the 3 small sizes, I broke it down about like this:

• 8-inch pan: 450 g each - bake 25 min

• 6-inch pan: 325 g each - bake 25 min

• 4-inch pan: 100 g each - bake 17 min

Bake the pans at the amounts listed and set on a wire rack (in the pan) to cool when a toothpick comes out clean near the center.

(I baked one set at a time because I wanted to use the central rack.)

To cool and store:

When the cakes are finished baking, put them on wire racks to cool while still in the pans. Let them sit, cooling, for 10 minutes. Then use a frosting knife or flexible utensil to carefully run around the sides of the cake to make sure it is separated from the pan. Stick the cakes, still in the pans, into the freezer for 20 minutes.

When the cooling is complete, turn them out onto wire racks upside down, remove the parchment paper and discard.

If you are not immediately using the cake, now you should wrap the layers in plastic wrap, cover the plastic wrap in foil, and freeze. It should keep for 2 to 3 weeks.

For the 10-inch cake, I made the same recipe exactly again, but this time it's about 750 g per pan and it bakes for 32 minutes. I also used a heating core in the center to get even baking. Heating cores are pieces of metal with a base that you can use in the center of larger cakes to conduct some heat into the center and make sure they bake evenly. Usually a ten-inch cake will have trouble baking evenly because the inside will take long enough to cook through that the edges will burn before the center is done. Heating cores help! (You can also use a flower nail.)

And that's how you make 8 chocolate cakes! Now let's move on.

2. Pink Lemonade Frosting

Ingredients:

4 cups powdered sugar

1 cup butter

5 tablespoons of frozen pink lemonade concentrate (thawed)

Red food coloring

Directions:

Add powdered sugar to the mixing bowl. Put in your softened sticks of butter. Mix it in with a spatula first (because otherwise it'll spray a powdered sugar dust cloud freakin everywhere--try a dishtowel around the mixer when you first start the power). Beat with an electric mixer on low until the powdered sugar is incorporated. Then use medium-high speed. Scrape the sides and the bottom of the bowl with a spatula when needed. When it's all mixed, it'll still seem dry.

Add pink lemonade concentrate, a little at a time until it seems like the proper consistency for spreading. Please note that I mean CONCENTRATE, not lemonade after it's made! (You can make pink lemonade with the remainder after, though, I did.) Also, pink lemonade is not pink enough on its own to make the color vibrant, so please use red food coloring to make it pink to your liking.

3. Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

3 and 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

3 tablespoons heavy cream or milk

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

With a stand mixer, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy. It takes about 2 minutes. Add powdered sugar, cocoa powder, cream, salt, and vanilla. Beat on low speed for 30 seconds, then use high speed and beat for 1 minute. Add 1/4 cup more powdered sugar if the frosting seems too thin for spreading, or another tablespoon of cream if it looks too thick.

4. Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

2 cups unsalted butter, room temperature

8 cups powdered sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons heavy cream

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Directions:

Whip the butter on medium speed in your mixer for about 30 seconds. Add in the powdered sugar. Whip in about 1 cup at a time. Every time you add a cup, add a splash of cream. Add the vanilla and salt at the end and use low speed to whip it in.

5. Fondant Figures & Accents

The graduation cake has a number of decorations on it. In addition to cute diplomas and noisemakers or flowers (I can't tell which), it notably has a topper featuring the Off Colors themselves!

Fondant, a substance that can be colored, shaped, and added to cakes, is the best choice for detailed characters! And it kinda tastes like marshmallow.

I bought white fondant and colored it myself using food coloring. Gel coloring is recommended because it gets less moisture into the fondant, but I only had traditional, so I used the trick of rolling in powdered sugar to soak up excess wetness.

The colors can be hard to get right, but I persevered! Check out how I made my Fluorite:

The first image is me using a biscuit cutter a little smaller than the top tier cake to make sure the Off Colors will fit on the cake! I figured I could design for Fluorite's size and make everyone else in proportion.

I made graduation clothes for them and diplomas too!

There are also large diplomas on the sides of the cake. I made those out of rolled up fondant too, and while I was at it I made sparkly blue sprays with bangles. These are not edible, but that's common with some cake accents.

6. Cake Assembly

To assemble a cake as massive as this, you need these ingredients:

Your 8 cakes

Your 3 frostings

A cake leveler

A cutting board

A frosting knife

A bench scraper

A sharp precision knife

Cake boards in the 4 sizes

Cake drum

A rolling pin

Powdered sugar

A cake turntable

Cake tier supports

Scissors

Chocolate and yellow fondant

I will show step by step on the largest cake! Apply this set of instructions to each of the subsequent tiers.

Okay! I made a strange decision about the middle layer of the cake. If you look at how the cake looks inside, there is a thin strip of chocolate in between the two types of interior frosting. I did not want to take my chances creating a thin chocolate cake layer, so I decided to use chocolate fondant as a separator between the two frosting flavors. This is a non-traditional decision and you may choose a different option. But if you want to do it like me....

Use a cake board to measure the size of a fondant circle before you put your cake on it. Roll out the chocolate fondant and cut around the cake board to create a perfect circle.

Then put a little frosting on the cake board as an anchor. Put it on the turntable. Unwrap a cake layer. Use a cake leveler if necessary to make it flat. Plant your cake on the board.

Apply a liberal coat of chocolate frosting.

Apply the fondant circle using a spatula.

Slather that with pink lemonade frosting.

Put another (leveled) cake layer on top.

Begin covering it with the vanilla buttercream frosting.

Apply generously and use a bench scraper to smooth the sides while spinning the cake.

You may want to refrigerate it while you tackle the next cake.

I proceeded to complete this with the 8-inch cake, the 6-inch cake, and the 4-inch cake.

I ran out of chocolate fondant and decided the tiniest cake didn't need it. It's just a baby anyway. Just look at it, it is bab.

(Pictured above: finished 8-inch; leveling process on the 6-inch; frosting the 6-inch; assembling the cute 4-inch; finished 4-inch; cute handheld 4-inch. It's practically a cupcake!)

There's one more ingredient: Fondant ribbons. The cake in the show looks like it's wrapped up like a present, so you'll need wide ribbons of fondant, plus tiny curled ribbons for scattering. I was able to make these with a small package of store-bought yellow fondant rolled very thin and cut into strips.

Have these ready before you stack the cake.

To assemble, you can't just throw the cakes on each other. The weight is problematic, especially when it comes to tall cakes like this!! Because of this, you must use cake supports. I used sturdy cake straws that can be trimmed to the appropriate height. The tiers for this one should look like they're sitting on each other, so stick a straw in and measure three others by that height. Stick them in and stack the cake, adding fondant ribbons on each before stacking the next tier.

Note: I did not put ribbons on the top tier.

Finally, you're ready to add the final decorations!

Make little curls out of remaining fondant to make the confetti-style ribbons we see scattered on the front of the cake's bottom tier. You may need to re-roll the fondant after kneading it with damp hands so it won't be dried out and cracking. Scatter those ribbons!

Add the other decorations too. We need the side sprays and diplomas. I wound them around more support straws and used tape for stability.

And then, momentously, we put our Off Color fondant figures on their throne.

It's done!!!!!

Here are the success pictures.

So . . . yeah, I did that. Maybe someone else will do it too!

See more SU food tutorials!

#steven universe #steven universe future #little graduation #cake #food #steven universe recipes #myblog

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jean-does-not-have-a-horseface · 3 years

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Heaven in Hiding

Hello everyone, it's @sasageyowrites 's birthday today and this fic in my queue is dedicated to her and only her. This is my gift to you sweetheart, sweet 17 I love you dearly. On another note I used some line breakers here because I wanted to see how they worked don't mind me I might remove them later on

Pairing: Dabi/reader

Summary: Dabi finds himself unable to get out of your shadow and in despairate need to provide for your and your daughter's safety you confront him, forbidding him of ever being able to lay his eyes on you or your baby

Warnings: Stalking I guess, I mean typical Dabi stuff you know..

Dabi wasn’t a stalker. At least that was what he tried to tell himself in any case he’d come to believe that very statement.

The wind was chilling, blowing his hair anywhere on his face, much like the endless amount of tree leaves that swayed everywhere around him. He glanced around, noticing the first specs of snow had already started to fall down following the sudden harsh blow of air.

He huddled inside the neckline of his black hoodie, his face mask shifting obnoxiously over the metal staples that held the skin of his cheeks together. His black windbreaker jacket did almost nothing to cover him from the excessive cold wind that blew; not that he was any close to freezing -it was more of the opposite- but he’d always feel that tingling sensation of the frozen metal bars on his burned skin. They scorched on his burn even further that he could ever want to admit, but by now he was used to the pain.

Most of the trees around him were stripped off of their leaves, their thin boles put to display for him and any bystander. The clouds were covering most of the sky, only a few tiny specks of baby blue peaked form underneath them, yet they were quickly vanishing under the mellow snowy clouds. In that moment Dabi knew, the enormous sunglasses he wore to hide his undereyes only made him look more suspsicious.

Not that he didn’t look like a fly in a full glass of milk to begin with.

The glass doors before him opened automatically, the red motion monitor beeping in his eyes as the sound of a bell rang once he entered the convinience store. The medium height stalls laid neatly before him, the colors of the numerous products almost catching his attention. He shook his head as if wanting to come to his senses, his attention span traveling back to his person of interest, the person he followed all the way to this store.

Glancing around the store, his eyes quickly met with the security camera view screen. Teal orbs paced maniacally, traveling back and forth between the numerous small windows until they were met with what they were looking for. His feet marched before he could even think, mechanically even, pacing quickly towards the direction he had instantly memorised, much to his demise.

He had to stop himself from grunting just before his body movements came to an halt. Shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket he sank his face deeper into his hoodie, standing before the glass covered fridge isle, his eyes seemingly fixated on the multiple cartons of milk that lead before him.

When your hand went for the matte metallic handle of said door Dabi found himself mimicking your action, putting his best effort into trying not to raise any suspision. You didnt seem to pay him any mind; as your hand extended further you hesitantely grabbed onto a powder blue carton, carefully placing it into the wheeled basket that was standing down before you.

You probably didn’t care about anyone around you; Dabi figured out that much while noticing you hadn’t even threw a glance in his direction over all the time the had been watching you. Secretly he restented just how much you minded your own business, it came to the point you were naively ignoring your surroundings completely. He knew exactly what you were thinking about; no one cared to bother with a random bypasser like you, but at least he hoped that after your time with him you’d come to understand the way criminal minds worked.

He chuckled to himself as he thought about giving you the least some credit. This was a nice neighborhood, a very well lit part of the town, accentuated in beautiful cherry blossoms that bloomed in spring, filled with numerous families as well as residents of a few of the top ten heroes. This place seemed to be inaccessible to murderous, bloodlusty villains such as himself.

At first it had seemed unreal that you were alive, free of any mark. He had thought he'd gotten the wrong person, still stuck over the fact that he couldn't do much to save you, one of the few people he had cared about in this world, but he was soon convinced, as he witnessed your meeting with Midnight, that this was in fact you, alive and well.

Yet, here he was. Following you around for God knows how many days now, obsessed with the fact that it was you that lived a careless life before his very eyes. For the most part he had tried to deny it, to convince himself that he had gotten completely insane and delusional. And he had wanted for that assumption to be correct. Because he had, or rather, he had thought he had, watched you die a horrible death, engulfed in acid, screaming in agony as it burned through your skin and bones.

And as if that wasn't an earth shattering shocker, it had to be that you were always seeming to be carrying a child with you.

Dabi wasn't dense and he wasn't lucky either. The child was around a year or so, he had figured, adorned with a set of tealy baby blues and (h/c) hair, save for her front bangs and the hair above her ears and nape. As much as he'd like them to be any other color -because, truly, such fact could actually justify the disgusting and full of jealousy throbbing in his heart every time he laid his eyes on the two of you- they shone a bright fiery red.

(H/c) bangs curtained your face as you bowed your head down, giggling as you brought your forehead to bump into a smaller one. Dabi watched as your eyes creased and squinted as a big beam was plastered on your face, your nose coming to bump on the baby’s button one. He almost smiled, sincerely even, at the interaction, though a pinch inside his chest prevented him from doing so. He couldn’t help but stop and stare, unsure of whether he looked dumpfounded or not.

“We got your milk Saku, yay!” you cheered, receiving a small squeal in response from the infant.

His fingers idled with the carton that fell under his hand, a small pink and brown carton, marked with the enormous words of any irrelevant label. His eyes fixated on it, quivering as ever, his thoughts mocking him as to whether he could try and dare to take another glance in your direction. His gut though churned, burning his insides in what seemed like an endless torturous bloodlust. Taken aback, his gut chirped, his throat seemingly forming a loop, preventing him from being able to take another breath. And.if he were to be honest, in the moment he needed one.

The anxiety rushing through his veins worked its wonders on him, raging dangerously towards his face, burning everything in its way. That disgusting antic was back, the obnoxious nervous smile he couldn’t rid himself off formed on his face under his mask. He wanted to slap himself it, yet it was hard to do so before you, it could potentially blow his cover and cause a scene that he didn’t want to in the store. As much as he loved causing mayhem, this wasn’t the time for it.

As the baby chirped, fidgeting her small open fists through your hair, he came to officially convince himself on his involvement with her. Blue springles emitted from the tips of her fingers and immediatelly the discomforting odor of burnt hair filled the air. And damn, did Dabi hate that smell.

“Baby, don’t burn mommy’s hair.” you smiled, stealing a glance in Dabi’s direction as you spoke, taking him aback by the sudden action.

Why was his heart speeding up in such demonic pace though? You probably didn’t even do so on purpose. Thinking that you were actually aware of his presence around you shouldn't be as unsettling as it seemed in the moment, in the end you were bound to notice the black clothed figure following you everywhere like a second shadow, weren’t you? Did he really think you were that stupid?

Sighing to himself he turned on his feet, proceeding to walk in the opposite direction of the one which you walked towards. He couldn’t stand being in this store anymore, his blood boiled at the thought of what he was actually doing. It was safe to say that he really did despised what he had turned into, but there was no going back. Picking up his feet, he exited the store, the chocolate milk still in his hand, burried in the inside of his sleeve.

Damn, he needed to smoke a cigarette or ten.

Dabi didn't know how many hours he had spent in the park across your apartment building; frankly he had lost all track of time and albeit having witnessed the sun set, he was unable to pinpoint how long ago the phenomenon had take place.

Snow fell down in big white blotches, littering his black windbreaker before it melted down into the fabric, only to pushed back out of its surface in the form of steam. His body was churning, the burnt skin that was held by the staples in certain areas practically oozed in tiny specs of blue cremating fire, the fleece fabric of his hoodie protesting as it ceased to exist. At this point he knew he was going to burn his clothes down if he kept staring at your windows and this wasn't his fireproof villainous attire, nonetheless he didn't feel as if his legs could move according to what his brain commanded. Nor did he feel as if he could control his own self.

When he'd think about pushing a leg forward in order to take leaping step, you'd come to the window he had a good view on and stroll around the room, always accompanied by the silhouette of the infant in your embrace and all Dabi was left with consisted of his ability to hide inside his hood or rather, his inability to get himself out of the situation. He secretly liked the way you hadn't pulled the curtain all the way across the window, whether it was intentionally or not -he didn't care to know of- he just enjoyed that he could get that tiny glimpse of you and Saku -or at least, that was the only thing he'd ever hear you call her.

Dabi wished that it wasn't so quiet, he wished he hadn't been able to hear it, but now that he had, he couldn't help but feel a little swirling bulb of bitter jealousy forming in his lower stomach. Yet was what assuring for a second was terrifying in the next; he'd never seen him around your house, or rather, he'd never seen you and him interact in any way. The only thing he knew was that you probably had many gives and takes with the heroes, a thing that put his mind to work harder than it ever should have been.

For a fragment of a second teal eyes meet with obsidian ones, forrowed straight brows met taller thinner ones. Dabi felt belittled as he stared at the male across the street who seemingly stared right back at him but he held himself back from letting out a surprised whimper as a reaction to recognising the man.

Aizawa Shouta, Eraser Head, was standing underneath the main door of your apartment complex, his fingers lingering with what Dabi had memorized to be your doorbell. The ravenette watched as you perked up, your silhouette passing by the familiar window as you paced and only a few moments later the familiar buzz of your intercom rang through the air.

He was confused. Confused beyond a sane point. Maybe that's why he had decided to stick around. Maybe, as he told himself so, you were just a mystery he wanted to solve.

"Thanks for coming." You smiled as soon as you opened the door, your batting eyes falling into the ravenette's stoic ones.

"Don't bother thanking me," Aizawa raised his palm, closing his eyes as he softly signed you to stop "I saw him, you know."

"He hasn't left that spot in the park for hours actually." You confirmed.

A deep sigh left your chest, your brows furrowing as your face fell in a despairate and miserable expression. The corner of your lip twitched and your jaw quivered as your soft pieces of flesh pressed together, a series of actions that Aizawa didnt fail to notice, yet he idled in his spot, his feet bowing slightly as he proceeded to take his shoes off. Once done, his feet mechanically marched towards you, his hands hesitantly coming to cup the tops of your shoulders.

The anxiety in your stomach leaped, throwing hellish boulders in the walls of your intestines, trying to hurt you enough so that you could come to your senses. But your mind protested on what you had decided on, fighting back with every breath you took. Your heart throbbed inside your chest, begging to spill through your ribs in mushy gashes, your throat was dry was you stared at Aizawa with wide eyes.

"Don't worry. I'm here." He spoke, sternly and before you managed to utter a words, making you squint your eyes shut.

Your hands came to hug around your form, the intense cold from outside finally finding its way inside your apartment and setting you as a target. It was now or never, you thought. The last few months ahead taken an enormous toll on you, Dabi's presence always being in your shadow was driving you insanse, filling you with rage and remorse.

He had no right to come after you and intrude on your personal life, yet you didn't know if you could try and not do the same were you in his place. But perhaps that was just an excuse you were making because you resented yourself for ever being involved in the ways you had with him.

You looked up at Aizawa, the inches that separated you, giving you a good lower view of his face. His heavy eyebags resembled his in a way you couldn't explain, his obsidian eyes that stared into yours with assurance -that was the look of a hero who had come to your rescue- yet you couldn't help but compare it to Dabi's ominus, cold glare, damn even the long messy onyx hair screamed Dabi to you and you hated it.

You hated that you could see him anywhere. Whether it was your imagination, dreams or real life, Dabi was always there, hiding in the shadow in the most prominent, ironic way, mocking you for your past choices, staring at your daughter maniacally with eyes so wide that were raged with manic.

Every night you felt like pulling your hair off your scalp, you felt like clawing your face until you ripped your skin or screaming to the walls until they fell down and came apart; you could feel Dabi's eyes on you on whatever actively you were set to do, even sleeping and in occasional fear of being cremated on your sleep.

This was the time to take action and if anyone could help you not get burnt into ashed that was Aizawa Shouta.

"He probably won't try anything funny with you here Shouta. Sakura is asleep but you can have her relax in your arms if you fear that I'll take long." You said rushing to get your combat boots out of the shelf you had them stored.

"Out of all people, did you really have to have a child with Dabi, (y/n)?" Aizawa playfully remarked, yet you furrowed your eyebrows as his expression failed to match with his tone.

You simply sighed back to him, closing your eyes in embarrassing defeat, your chest was run by a sudden chill, causing your body to absurdly perk up and Aizawa huffed through his nose in determination.

"Maybe you should wear a coat." He suggested.

"It's fine," you spoke back playfully "I actually like being cold.

Your breath formed into fog as you exhaled and you watched it annihilate into thin freezing air, your eyes glimmering under the cold lights of the street lamps, your orbs quivering from the freezing cold. You unwrapped your hands from your form as you felt the cold take over you. It was absurdly refreshing, you thought, and immediately your brain protested over your irrational way of thinking, yet your gut was scorching and at least the snow falling on your hair and nose was providing you with some newfound comfort.

You wanted to pick up your pace, but your frozen legs ignored you, deciding to prolong your misery further, your toes going numb with each step you took closer to Dabi's direction. He didn't even flinch. Not even once. You wondered if you shall take another step towards him, the terror that run through you raged over the theory that Dabi was only trying to catch you off guard before he fried you alive.

Still, you focused your gaze on the small streak of smoke that bled out of his hoodie. Soon the smell of tobacco filled your almost too numb nostrils as the sound of Dabi's snarky breath filled your ears. It was criminally quiet tonight, though this street wasn't normally filled with people, many school kids would chose the park across your apartment to hang out after school or during the late hours of night, but seeing how bad the weather was tonight you could blame anyone for not chosing to freeze themselves to death.

Of course, Dabi and you were two of a kind.

"Care to share a cig with me?" You spoke with determination, managing to let out a small hint of teasing in your voice to mask your fear.

"You actually practiced that line or something?"

Dabi chuckled in your direction although you could listen to the dryness in his tone. His hood covered head didn't turn in your direction just yet but his hand reached for one of his pockets, then leaping into another, taking short anxious movements, perhaps, you though, to throw you off. You were though sure Dabi could practically smell fear and if that was true whatever he was doing, he was doing it to mess with you, you knew how he much loved corruption or how he enjoyed the reek of fear from a few of his victims.

"Don't twitch like that, I'm just looking for my pack."

There it was. Yeah. Of course he was messing with you. Great, he was going to kill you weren't he now?

Dabi shift uncomfortably in his eat on the snow drenched bench, his hip bones clashing with the hard wood beneath him but he pushed through the discomfort he was feeling because now he was facing you.

Your jaws were clashing furiously, the hoodie you were wearing was probably doing nothing to keep you warm and for a moment he seriously thought about removing his windbreaker and tossing it over your shoulders, but he knew you wouldn't accept it, so he set on saving himself from the embarrassment.

Picking a hand out of one pocket he presented you with the small carton that held a couple of cigarettes and you didn't miss a chance on grabbing one, not even giving it a second thought. Looking around, you realised there was no lighter in sight and you sighed as Dabi offered his pointer finger, the digit adorned with a sheer blue coowling crown and naively you bowed down, taking a drag as the fire touched the edge of the cigarette.

You didn't bother thanking him as a constipated expression masked your face, your hands coming to rest under your bust just in case you'd ever get tired of holding your cigarette with your lips.

"Care to sit down?" Dabi remarked and you absurdly turned your head in the opposite direction, taking a drag through the filter, the stinky taste of nicotine filling your tingling on your taste buds.

"No, Dabi. You know why I'm here. I can't deal this anymore."

"You can't deal living without me little mouse?" He snarled, his hands quickly working on replacing the smoked cigarette that hung from his lips with a fresh one.

"Dabi I'm serious." You said, squinting your eyes "This is driving me insane. Did you really think I wouldn't notice you?"

Despite your tone suggesting that your question wasn't rhetorical, Dabi made no effort to even part his mouth to reply.

"Care to tell me what you want from me?"

Silence. Dabi looked at you as if you were speaking in a language he couldn't recognise, as if your words fell deaf to his ears.

"Dabi, I'm not going to beg for my life if that's what you want, and I don't appreciate that you're trying to entertain your psychopathic kinks." You said, voice below your normal pitch, indicating the small hints of fear that came with your intuition.

"Is she mine?"

The question hit you like a truck. Shaking, you couldn't help but feel like a deer blinded by the headlights, your blood running cold in your veins. Could you truthfully answer that without setting yourself and your daughter in danger? Stealing a glimpse of your window you vaguely made out Aizawa's silhouette and your heart warmed at the soothing reassurance that came with the action.

"Would it matter for you to know? What would it change?"

"Wouldn't you want to know if you had a little bastard marching astray?" Dabi monotonously remarked, making your stomach growl with rage.

"Sakura isn't a dirty stray dog, you're in no place to talk about her like that, not when you don't know what I went through for her." You raged, your eyes glowing with anger as you burned holes in Dabi's teal orbs.

So that was the name you had given her- Sakura- a plain overused name with a beautiful meaning, Dabi could atone for the fact that he liked it. Nevertheless, he stared at you, his lips puckered together in a determined manner, his cigarette never leaving the right corner of his mouth.

"Hit a nerve, little mouse?"

"Stop calling me that Dabi." Upon snarling you stomped your foot to the ground.

"How should I call you? I don't think I caught your actual name."

Dabi was bitter and he had every right to be, or so he told himself, he felt enraged to look in your direction, yet so speak to you and to top it all his stupid, idiotic feet were shaking and he didn't feel like he could get up, he could only stand there and stare at you, but this was unlike any other time. This time you were staring right back at him (e/c) orbs burning holes into the back of his brain.

But he wasn't going to give in, despite whatever he felt, he wouldn't give in to how soft he viewed you as, he wasn't going to give in to how your familiar smell filled his nostrils or how his heart set at an orbit of its own due to your eyes in his. Anxiously, he took another drag of his cigarette before taking a look towards your window, making out Eraser Head's silhouette in the dim light.

"I won't try to kill you, by the way, you didn't have to bring your friend over."

Your expression hardened as Dabi mentioned Aizawa, your heart skipping a beat as your eyes immediately fell in his direction once again.

"You don't have to obsess over Shouta as well."

"Ah, already on first name basis? With a man that much older than you and here you are calling me Dabi?" He whined playfully, but still his feet wouldn't move.

"What I do in my life is none of your business, you don't have any right on me because you knocked me up-"

"So she is mine."

If you could, you'd wipe that smug look that was immediately plastered on his face, but you knew better and you hated that you did. You knew that he smiled like that when he was in discomfort, you knew that he couldn't move from the spot he was seated on, you could still see through him and it killed you, it killed you because on one hand you were utterly afraid of what he could do to you and on another you wanted to bring a palm to his face and call him by his name.

"Look Dabi," you sighed in defeat "to answer any of your questions, Sakura is your daughter and I brought Shouta here because I'm afraid you're here to kill us. How am I supposed to know you're not playing dumb with me because you want to kill me?"

Dabi quirked a brow at you, bringing his hand to the top of his hood and pulling it down, his hair tousling in the air. "Can't I just be amazed that you're living a careless life when you're supposed to be dead?"

You averted your eyes from his in shame, your body shivering slightly for a brief moment. "I was supposed to take down small nameless criminals Dabi. I fake my death so I could get out of there with my ass saved."

"I should kill you, you know, I've entrusted you with very significant information about me." Dabi growled, his fingers starting to springle in the tiniest specs of cobalt.

Despite watching them dance before you, your gut felt numb and you could thank the freezing cold for that, but you didn't feel the growling eruption of fearful anxiety grow inside you anymore.

"Well it was your fault that you trusted me enough to tell me your name and purpose, but I won't spill the beans on you. Unless..." You prompted, finally taking a seat next to Dabi, your thigh merely brushing against his own.

"Unless?" He inquired, intrigued as ever.

"Unless you leave us alone, Touya." You whispered the name below the sound of a breath, making sure no one around you could hear, yet Dabi quivered by the sound, his eyes glued on your lips. "The truth is, I don't want you associated with Sakura. How will the world treat her if they find out she's the daughter of a serial killer?"

"I... I just." He hesitated.

"You what? If your villain friends know about her they're going to come after us, being a single mother is fucking me up already, give a girl a fucking break Dabi."

You were dumbfounded by how bold you were getting and you only had yourself to blame, cornering the villain felt dangerous and endearing at the same time, his otherwise dominant behavior had crumbled in only a few tiny seconds and between them you had managed to call the shots and push all the right buttons, corrupting your way into the point you wanted to make.

It was true, during your time working undercover to take down small criminals you had indeed picked up on the way criminal minds worked. And in moments like these you used it to your advantage.

"Can I just see her once?"

His tone took you aback, sending your eyes to spread wide as a surprised expression masked your face. His voice was pleading and small, soft and intruding poking you to spare him with any pity you had in you. Shaking your head, you came to your senses, finally aware of the fact that your thigh was pushed against his.

With a shagged breath you made a move to get up but you were forced into the cold bench once again by Dabi's hand, the sound on shifting filling the air as you growled on your spot.

"You don't get to tell me what to do little mouse." He barked, his digits digging into the skin of your thigh almost painfully. "I want to see my daughter. How come that hobo of a man can see her when I can't."

"Dabi, I just explained why I don't want you around her."

"I have every right don't I?" He asked.

"Actually, you have no right, you're a serial killer Dabi, you shouldn't have any right, the only reason as to why I can't arrest you right now is because all I have are this stupid healing quirk and that I have no license to do anything to you. Now if you go in to my house, Shouta isn't going to go soft on you."

Dabi growled in his seat, his hand leaving your thigh as he maniacally went to light another cigarette, this time the small spec of fire dancing on his quivering finger.

"This is a warning, stop stalking us." You sighed and brought your palms over your knees with a slap before straightening them to stand up.

"Wait-" Dabi said as he watched you take a few steps away from him, his head extending to your direction. "If- if you heal me, will I be able to see her then?"

You didn't dare turn around to face him, instead you hugged your chest, taking in a deep breath as you lowered your head to stare at your shoes. The voice inside your head was hot and sweet and it bowed to your natural instinct as a healer, somewhere deep inside your chest you felt as if that in a way it could work. But even if you took away what made Touya Dabi then would he really ever atone for all his sins? You knew you wouldn't be able to sleep with both eyes closed if he were to be by your side, his ideals weren't just something he could give up just because he would leave his appearance behind.

"Look, Touya, I really like Shouta, please don't ruin this for me." you whispered, your voice raspy but you never managed to turn to him. Whether your statement was a lie or not was up to Dabi to decide.

"No wait."

You didn't respond to his call out. You simply hugged your chest tighter, pressing your breasts with your cubits as you took fast steps towards your apartment complex.

You chose to ignore the fittings that you heard behind you, the commotion he was causing coming second to the way your heartbeat annoyingly pulsed in your ears. When Dabi's palm hazed over you you heaped, your breath cutting short and consequentially being trapped inside your weary lungs.

"I'd never hurt a mother and a child." Dabi gulped, his fingers being moments away from brushing over your clothed skin.

But you didn't care, you simply lowered your shoulder, throwing your collarbone forward in an attempt to escape the upcoming contact of his body with yours. You set your feet to work, rapidly and uncarefuly sliding through the snow as you tried to get away.

And once again all Dabi could do was stop and stare. You didn't care about the churning in his gut, you didn't give a damn about the ashes of his heart either, there was no heaven in hiding for him, just this bitterweet taste of tobacco in the buds of his tongue, and the unbearable stinging in his eyes. All he was left with was his wish to see you and Sakura again.

And maybe he could do that. He just needed to become a silent shadow.

#dabi x reader #touya x reader #bnha #bnha x reader #dabi my hero academia #dabi x you #dabi is touya #dabi #mha #mha fanfiction #bnha fanfiction #x reader #dabi is hot #dabi is a todoroki #dabi is a little shit

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werezmastarbucks · 3 years

Text

malé

honeymoon masterlist

word count: 1709

music: fall away by twenty one pilots

You were dead set on teaching him to swim. You can’t have him drown every day: you were going over all the warm places now, exploring seas. You were getting really tired of neverending beaches, but Kai was fascinated with water like never before. You found you could entertain yourself by making him less afraid of it.

As you looked down at the water through the window of your own private plane piloted by the most unstable person you knew, the sea seemed like a picture. There was no end looking at it.

“Hello, this is your very attractive pilot speaking”, his voice flew over the little plane. You smiled like an idiot. This was a fairytale. The whole thing was getting better and better every day.

“In twenty minutes, we will be landing in that city which is the capital of the Maldives”.

“Malé!” you yelled.

There was radio noise.

“You realize I can’t hear you from here, right? Anyway, it’s a decent amount of degrees outside, and it’s high time to change into your bikini and please bring over some champagne because I’m thirsty”.

You sighed, getting up heavily from your seat. It’s been awhile since you flew on a plane, so headache was setting in your head. You had no idea what it took Kai to learn to fly an actual plane. How many times he has crashed before he figured out the airways. And how many fires he’s been in before he landed it safely.

Well, the worst case scenario, he crashes it on the runway and you both burn alive, and then wake up already in the city; not too bad. Life was good.

You did not change into your bikini before bringing him champagne into his ‘pilot room’ as he called it. For a person who knew how some complicated ass machinery works, he knew very little terminology, but then again, there were no people around to tell him.

“Get back. Go away, you’re distracting me”, he brushed you away with his hand. The pilot cabin was all flickering and whistling, and you were not sure that was how it was supposed to be. You went back to your seat and watched the hard land get closer. You closed your eyes as the chassis collided with the ground, and the plane shook and hopped a little. You realized you were laughing, grabbing on the armrest of your chair. The weather in the capital of Maldives was nice.

Kai hit the water with both hands sending splashes all around.

“Let’s just overlook the fact there’s reasonably nothing else to do here”, he chanted capriciously, “but actually die. It’s just white sand everywhere!”

You stood in the water, feeling the tips of your wet hair tickle your skin. The sun was now blazing directly onto the tops of your heads and you asked yourself once again why you get up so early.

One of the worst things about the prison world was the lack of tiredness of hangover in the morning. There was no specific reason for lazy long cuddles. Kai was getting up at ten the latest and ran into the kitchen, excited as fuck about the new breakfast plan. You’d lie in bed in dread, thinking, he can only come up with so many recipes, and what happens when he runs out of them?

“We’re here specifically to teach you to swim”, you shook your finger at him. He followed it with his gaze obediently.

“You’re really hot when you’re bossing me around in your swimsuit”, he muttered. “Alright, let’s do it, tiny bae”.

It was cute how he chose all the gentle nicknames when he grew grumpy. A part of him didn’t wish to talk at all, and the other part, the one that pushed him, helpless, off the cliff, forced him to reach for a kind of compromise.

He was a quick but a lazy learner. Kai was like that one kid in the class who’s positively bored of the idea of studying; he knows enough, and he’s gifted enough. But there’s violent video games, boombox music and skateboarding after school on his mind instead of the terrors of civil war or equations. So, that one smart bored kid gives you hell, unwilling to perceive anything, groans loudly while you speak, and occasionally produces some witty remarks that make you giggle and hate yourself a little.

“Float, float!“

There was no denial you came to like holding his sides and especially his belly as you held him in the water where it came up to your chest. There was something extremely, intimately endearing about the way he allowed you to touch his abdomen, to hold him as he tried to stay horizontal in the sea. If only all those who hated so actively and readily on him back at home could feel his smooth skin under the fingers like you did. He was very human, very vulnerable. He was so human you knew for sure there are organs inside of him, and his heart, a massive strong and stubborn organ, pumped quicker inder your palm as he learnt not to go down. He really was nervous about the sea. And when he finally managed to perform a simple trick of floating on his back, arms outstretched, face above, you felt actually, sincerely happy. You felt truly, purely happy for the first time here, like all the joy finally returned to you. You felt human, too, and standing there, your hands in the blue-pearl water, still and sleepy, tiny ripples for waves running along, you looked at him smiling at the sky. How does one love? That was a damn good question Kai has posed.

You were wearing a happy jungle-green bikini, and you liked the way it was working with your skin. You made long swim-ins into the depths of the sea when Kai got tired of wiggling in the water like a featherless hen. He sat on the shore, a remarkable sight - one single human silhouette against a gigantic beach, lonely, - and waited for you as if he was afraid you’d swim away from him into the open ocean.

“Move your hands! Flap them!” you commanded, “like a bird! Like a bird, come on!”

Kai slipped out of your hands and stood, catching you in the clutch of his arms instead.

“Do you even know anything about swimming?” he requested, “I’m starting to get suspicious the bird technique is not good for sea”.

“Maybe I should just push you off the pier”, you mused, “that’s how they teach kids to swim”.

“Great plan”, he nodded, “but there are no piers here. There’s nothing but water and palm trees. I hate it here”, he added, looking at the sun maliciously. The eclipse came, and the air went cold instantly. There wasn’t any wind here, but still, standing in water while the sun was blocked out by the dark circle, was quite uncomfortable. You stepped up to each other, swayed gently by the quiet waves, and you pulled up to Kai, trying to find solace in his embrace. He was like a snake: almost always cold-blooded. His hands were fine, but he only heated at night, and all other time, he was just lukewarm, like a reptile. And as disaffectionate. Even when he got playful, his eyes were observing.

“Once we get out”, he said, and you stared at his two birth marks on the neck. You recalled seeing them last night, when you woke up in the middle of the night, pulled by something. That still happened occasionally. Kai slept like a dead puppy, his throat pulsating quietly with the pump of his blood.

“I’ll never go at sea again”.

“You’re just upset because you’re failing”.

“I never fail”.

“Then, swim like a bird, Parker!”

You pushed him in the chest, and the water grabbed him.

In the evening, the sun usually sat right into the water. There were no clouds here; Kai was somewhat right about this empty place. But there was certain beauty to the minimalistic design of it. All the surfaces were flat and calm-colored. The pastel sea and the white sand. The even row of the bikini-green palm trees. The blue sky. And nothing else, in the whole world. The radiating burning ball set into the water, gliding over, and the light turned orange from white. At the end of the day, you usually collapsed on the sand, both exhausted and burnt to red in the sun. Sand in hair didn’t bother you much since you had a very good shower at the house you occupied not far away from the shore. On the brink of the city, there were some nice rich people dwellings.

The sand was silky, almost soft, definitely not like the hard grass lake shores of Mystic Falls, big grained, leveled beaches of California or stone coastlines of New Jersey. You wondered what the lakes were like back in Portland and whether Kai ever spent any time there with his family, or with his girlfriend, or even alone.

He’d lay at your side, drained with the honest work he put into exercise, his moderately muscular shoulders going up and down with breathing. The skin on his milky white forearms and the back was going red with the sunburn, but whatever sting he was going through would go away soon after the sun set.

He knew, as he said many times, that there was nobody else here, so he was relaxed. He didn’t have to pretend either, so you discovered Kai was quite capable of resting somberly by you, his fingers playing with the sand that was more like powder, as long as you played with his hair. The wetness of it, the sight of the back of his neck with short black hairs, his exposed neck with the silver chain under your wrist, was something you knew was one in a lifetime experience.

You were lying snuggled against each other on a huge, enormous empty surface of the earth, warming up in the evening light, your bodies sighing with the heaviness of close, but never coming summer. And nobody even knew.

I like it here with you.

#kai parker imagine #kai parker x reader #kai parker #vampire diaries imagine #tvd imagine #vampire diaries

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souljaems · 4 years

Text

[19:48PM] “Hey babe, I’m home!” Jaemin announces as he closes the door behind him. His first instinct is to look around for your presence, but all of the lights were off. “Babe? Are you home?” He asks a little bit louder as he takes his shoes off.

Seconds later, Bolt, the dog you two adopted two months ago, runs to Jaemin, leaving a cloud of what seems to be sugar behind him as he starts jumps around the blonde-haired boy.

“Hey, buddy!” Jaemin begins to sweet talk to him, bending down his body so he can caress the little guy. Bolt doesn’t hold back whenever he has a little tiny bit of attention, and the fact that he proceeds to bark from happiness only causes Jaemin to giggle at his cuteness. “What is this all about? Have you eaten all the sugar your mom hid from you again?” He questions with his eyes scrunched up, pretending to judge his little friend.

When again Bolt starts to run back to the kitchen, Jaemin finally pays attention to all the supposed sugar his little paws left behind.

“That doesn’t look like sugar.” Jaemin quietly whispers at himself, with worry lines forming on his forehead. “Oh boy, what have you eaten, huh?”

As he starts to get closer to the kitchen, his eyes can’t help but wide at the view of you, sitting on the floor, with your hair and the floor colored white by the wheat flour, and with Bolt running around you in circles like he's having the time of his life.

“Oh my God, are you okay?” Jaemin starts, motioning to come closer to you. “Wait, don’t come, you-” You quickly try to warn him about the chances of him to slip and fall just like happened to you, but before you can even end the sentence, Jaemin is already on the floor, being licked by Bolt as the wheat flour forms a big white cloud around you two.

“What the-” Jaemin begins, coughing in the middle of the sentence with all of that flour flying around him. “What the hell happened? Why is our kitchen covered with wheat flour?”

When all the flour finally stops flying around, you two stare deeply at each other's souls in silence, only to burst out laughing at Bolt being the last one to slip and fall onto the dirty floor.

“How did this happen, honey?” Jaemin chuckles as crawls carefully towards you, trying not to make the mess any bigger.

“It was supposed to be your favorite...” You lament with a little pout on your lips, running your hand through your hair, causing your pouting to grow even bigger after showing it full of wheat flour to Jaemin.

“Well, since everything can turn into my favorite thing in the world whenever you’re with me, I'd say this is my favorite mess of all times.” Jaemin blows all the powder away from your hand, placing a soft kiss on the back of it afterward.

“Ah, I’m a mess! I’m sorry, babe. Should we order a birthday cake instead?” You ask with the biggest smile on your face as you try to repress the urge to laugh at your own failure.

“Nah, we should take this little guy for a night walk and eat anywhere that let us in with a cute dog.” He states, causing Bolt to start jumping around the kitchen by the mention of the word “walk”. “See? He liked the idea. Go take a bath and change your clothes, I’ll try to clean Bolt.”

“But what about this mess? Shouldn’t we clean it before we leave?” You motion everywhere around you with a concerned look on your face as you realize that you pretty much ruined the whole kitchen

“And miss all the fun with the two most amazing companions on my birthday? Never.”

(Happy B-Day to our precious boy who makes the whole world go brighter whenever he smiles 🥺)

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whattimeisitintokyo · 3 years

Text

Somos Familia Ch 45: Shantytown

The flight wasn’t a long one given how surprisingly fast Frangipani was able to fly, and soon she descended down upon an ancient Aztec pyramid. Unlike the rest of the city, with its dazzling lights and colors, the pyramid was cold and void of anything magical. Pieces had chipped and crumbled off and there was an ominous presence in the air. For the first time since coming to the Land of the Dead, Héctor finally felt like he was in a place of devoid of life.

In a show of good grace Frangipani did not let Héctor make a fool of himself by trying to climb down her side since it was such a hassle getting up. Instead she slowly shrank herself like a deflating balloon until she was the size of housecat, prancing off between his and Leti’s legs with Dante happily trailing after and barking at his friend. Héctor was grateful for that, but Frangipani’s large mass had done it’s damage and he was left with a huge case of saddle soreness. He wobbled around bowlegged trying to work out the kinks in his legs, wincing and hissing with each step.

Hearing Leti giggle at his predicament, Héctor gave her a playful glare. “Don’t laugh. I’ve got old bones.”

Leti shook her head with a smile. “You’ve got old muscles. Once we get down to Shantytown, then you’ll really see some old bones.”

“Shantytown, eh?” Héctor asked warily, stretching his leg out one final time as he peered down into the dark shadows below. He could hear water splashing faintly against the rocks and could already smell the mildew from all the way up top. He raised an eyebrow at her. “Ernesto is down there?”

“Uh huh!” Leti nodded, “Every Dia de Muertos Tio Nesto always gives a portion of his offerings to the people of Shantytown. And he always makes a grand speech and visits with everyone. He’s definitely down there!”

Héctor remembered well how he could usually tell that his daughter was lying. She would always talk extra brightly, smile just a little too widely. This time was no exception, and her new skeletal grin just made her smile wore wider. Or rather, this time it was like a lie mixed with the truth. Apparently this would be something Ernesto would do; he was sometimes charitable in life. Not as much as he and Imelda were, but for Ernesto each charitable moment was a triumph in his opinion.

“Okay.” Héctor nodded, grimacing again at the bleak murkiness below. “Seems kind of shady though.”

“Oh, I’ve been here loads of times, Papá.” Leti reassured him. “It may look scary and depressing… well it is depressing, but the people here are more friendly than anyone else. You’ll see. And we’ll get down that way.”

Héctor looked over to where she was pointing and gave a soft ‘huh’ in surprise. There, situated at the top of this ancient pyramid, was an escalator. It stood out against it’s surrounding so badly that Héctor felt stupid for not noticing it sooner. Seeing her father’s confusion Leti explained. “Oh, Tio Nesto had that installed a few years ago. Comes in handy, especially those with brittle bones.”

Héctor was puzzled. “You can still get brittle bones after you’re dead?”

“Oh sure.” Leti said. “Brittle, broken, ground to powder, stolen, misplaced. Just depends on how long you’ve been dead of if you are being forgotten. But anyway, the escalator helps those kind of people in need. Come on!”

All four of them walked toward the top of the moving staircase, Frangipani shrinking even more to her initial tiny size before plopping down onto Leti’s shoulder. Before Leti could reach for the handrail, however, a high-pitched whine stopped them. Turning back around they saw Dante sitting several feet away from them, head lowered and eyes looking pitifully afraid. A click of the tongue could not get him to budge, nor did the gently nudge from behind when Héctor went to fetch him. Dante just kept looking wide-eyed at the grinding metal plates before him, just waiting to slice of sensitive pads of the feet.

“Aww, he’s afraid of the escalator Papá.” Leti cooed, and even Frangipani gave a simpering little toot of compassion. “Looks like you’re going to have to carry him the whole way down.”

“Wha-?” Héctor started to protest, but three pairs of huge pouting eyes stopped him from saying anymore. With a groan of disgust he reached down to pick up Dante, difficult to do due his bony limbs and squirming body, but finally was able to hold him in an awkward spooning position. “Happy now, pel��n?” he asked, and his answer was a happy slurp across the cheek.

It must have been a sight to see: A guitar-wielding old man carrying a dog like a small child, while with his skeleton daughter had an elephant on her shoulder, all riding down an escalator in awkward silence. It actually was pretty funny of one thought about it. Luckily, no one was there to see them, at least until midway down the giant pyramid. On the opposite escalator going up Héctor could see two figures emerging from the mist. Leti did too and with a gasp of surprise she started to wave. “Mama Chavela! Mama Rocío! Como estas?!”

“Hola, nieta!”

As the two parties drew closer together, Héctor saw that they were two skeletal old ladies. Both were dressed in faded gowns that looks as though they had been patched and mended several times over the years. Both were holding two baskets each that were overflowing with breads, fruits and vegetables and one lady had a small guitar strapped to her back.

Even closer still Héctor could see that these ladies were not like the skeletons he had already seen. Instead of the clean pearly white bones he had come accustomed to, these bones were dull and gray. And, just like Leti had said before, some places were chipped off and scratched. One woman even had part on her jaw broken off and held in place with a strand of wire. Héctor was slightly taken aback by the ladies run down looks, but Leti paid them no mind.

“Looks like you both got a good haul this year!” she said.

“Oh yes! We’re on our way to the trade show right now while the good items are still out.” One of the ladies said, shifting the baskets onto her hipbones for more support.

“Who’s your handsome young friend, Leticia?” The other asked.

“This is my Papá! He’s been cursed and we need to get a blessing from Tio Nesto or else he’ll die at sunrise.”

“Oh that’s nice dear.”

“Have fun tonight!”

“Adios!” Leti waved them goodbye as they finally passed each other up. Continuing down on their journey, Leti shrugged a little. “They’re a little batty, but still very nice. And Mama Rocío makes the best Shantytown ponche for Los Posadas.”

“Why did they call you nieta?” Héctor asked.

“Oh, heh. It’s just a term of endearment.” Leti said. “See, Shantytown is full of the nearly forgotten. They have no family, no ofrendas, no homes. So they all bundled together and made their own family with each other. And I’m an honorary member since I’m not forgotten yet, but I come here all the time.”

“So those ladies looked like that because they’re nearly forgotten.”

“Si. This whole place runs on memories, Papá. The more well remembered you are the longer you get to stay here. But, in the end, if no one remembers you… You just… go…”

The way Leti trailed off, so sad all of a sudden, didn’t sit well with Héctor at all. In fact he was starting to grow afraid. “Go where?” he was hesitant to ask.

“No one knows.” she said. “It’s called the Final Death.”

“Wait a minute! You can die again?!” Héctor was appalled. “No! I… I couldn’t watch you die again! I can’t.”

“Everyone gets forgotten eventually, Papá.” Leti reassured, and then actually had the nerve to get a little cocky. “Besides, I’m the tragic daughter lost from one of the richest families in Mexico. I’ll stick around for a while yet.”

It didn’t seem to make sense to Héctor at all, the way everyone was so nonchalant about the fact that they were dead and could die again at the drop of a hat. Even his own daughter was making jokes about it. If he were the one on the verge of being forgotten he would be an inconsolable mess, probably unable to do anything other than curl up in a ball and wait for the inevitable.

But as they reached the end of the escalator he was surprised to see that Shantytown didn’t look like the wretched, miserable place that it looked from above the mists. There was loud music playing, unfortunately, and laughter and all other sorts of rabble. Behind the giant stone arch there were bright lights shining through and Héctor could see papel picado hung up. Confetti and golden flower petals were strewn about all over the ground.

And there was one other thing.

Shantytown actually looked… nice.

It was on the water, which explained the musky smell, but the houses there were less like shanties and more like riverside condos. Several floors high and stacked as haphazardly as every other building in this realm, but much more sturdy. All painted a warm brown color and with beautiful murals on every other wall, high archways and clean clay tiles on the roofs.

The was a walkway that wove through the water and connected all of the houses together, made out of concrete and cobblestones with lamps illuminating the way down. All in all it looked like a very nice place to live and a realtor’s dream location.

Again, Héctor was confused. “Uh… Shanty-town?”

Leti nodded. “Yeah, the name has stuck but believe me that this place was worse years ago. Rotting wood and pallets, rusted sheet metal, garbage everywhere. It was a terrible place to spend the last few days before the Final Death. But Tio Nesto got several other celebrities and wealthy citizens to pitch in and completely remodel the place!”

“It’s very nice.” Héctor admitted as he put Dante down on the ground. As he released him Héctor grimaced when he looked at his hands. The were completely skeletal now and reaching well past the wrist.

Leti smiled appreciatively, but then sniffed the air like a snob. “Well, I still say it’s a work in progress.” And Héctor laughed at that.

Several skeletons wandered all over it, going to neighbors houses with arms full of the same offerings as the two old ladies. They all seemed to be converging onto one spot in the middle of town, though. It was a much larger area, but still too small to be considered a plaza, but big enough to hold a huge pile of offerings stacked as high as some of the buildings. An absolute mammoth amount of bread, vegetables and fruits, cooked meats and musical instruments piled in a somewhat strategic manner so that it didn’t topple into the water below. But it was clear that it had been slowly picked away as the minutes passed, and currently there were around a dozen other Shantytown skeletons situated around it passing out offerings.

“Oye, Paola. I managed to save you some grapefruit this time. I know you missed out on them last year.”

“Three guitars? What are you trying to do, Primo? Start a band? Have some more food instead.”

“Señor de la Cruz must hate bananas because we’ve got tons of them! Caramelize ‘em, mash ‘em, make ‘em into bread. A very versatile fruit, c’mon don’t be shy!”

‘He does hate bananas’ Héctor thought with a wry grin. ‘No wonder he’d give them all away-… Wait.’

“This is a lot of offerings.” Héctor said as he watched a small boy tuck in eagerly to the shiny red apple that was atop his own pile of goodies. “I’m surprised he’d just give it all away.”

“Nah, just a tiny bit.” Leti said. “But, in Tio Nesto’s case, a tiny bit means an entire mountain! Speaking of… Oye, Tío Jaime!”

One of the skeletons handing out offerings, who was no older than twenty but looked like he had osteoporosis in every visible bone, smiled as Leti came up to him. “Hola, Leti. You’re here awful early tonight. Did you already visit your family?”

“Si, but not as long as I would have liked. As you can see…” She gestured to Héctor, and when Jaime looked towards him his eyes bugged out a little. “…I have a bit of a problem.”

“Santa Maria…” Jaime breathed out, and soon every skeleton was looking at Héctor again astonishment. A couple of jaws even fell off and splashed into the water. Héctor just cringed out a smile and waved to them all. “Espera… Is that Héctor Rivera? Your papá?”

Leti walked to Héctor and grabbed him by the wrist to hold his hand up as high as she could, showing off the shiny white bones that were exposed. “My papá has been cursed, and he needs a blessing from Tio Nesto before sunrise. Is he still here?”

Jaime winced and shrugged his shoulder, making an unsettling crack and pop at the slight movement. “Sorry, Leti. He was here, but after he presented us with his offerings he left. That was about half an hour ago, so he’s probably off to the party at his mansion.”

Héctor felt his chest sink at the thought that the trip to Shantytown had been a complete waste of time and now he was more cursed than before. Rolling up his sleeve he groaned at the sight of his ulna and radius making an unwelcome appearance. Bending down to Leti’s height he whispered into her phantom ear. “Mija, the curse is spreading pretty quickly. Maybe we ought to hurry things up and-”

“Well shucks!” Leti placed her hands onto her hips and comically pouted. “Looks like he’s gone already! Isn’t that just the luck? Phooey!” Then she looked up and gave Héctor a cloyingly sweet smile with too many teeth. “Before we go though, can we go see a friend of mine?”

Héctor blinked in confusion, then held out his bare arm for Leti to see. “Leticia, I don’t have time to see anyone else. I need to see Ernesto.”

Grabbing his hand and already starting to tug him away from the pile, Leti just waved him off. “Sunrise isn’t for another five and a half hours, and this will only take a few minutes. While we’re here we might as well make the most of it. Kill two birds with one stone, si?

“Two birds? What’s the second bird? Wait a moment! Leticia!”

Despite the dangerous nature of the situation Héctor let himself be dragged a ways by Leti as well as pushed by Dante and Frangipani. Maybe it was because he had just been reunited with his long dead daughter and could refuse her nothing at the moment. Maybe he was slightly curious to see what other new discovery awaited him in this new and exciting environment. But the real reason, probably, was because Héctor was somewhat desperate for any excuse to not see Ernesto as soon as possible. He didn’t want to think what would happen if he did lay eyes on him.

As they continued on Héctor could see where the restoration of Shantytown had stopped. The pristine building transitioned to scaffolding, paint buckets and blocks of concrete with yellow warning tape wrapped around it. All abandoned in favor of the holiday, Héctor presumed.

And past that was the slum that Héctor had in mind.

It was just as Leti had said: Rotting wood and rusted metal. The only thing that had been completed and stood out like a sour thumb was the walkway they were on, but even then the shanties were connected to it by moldy, broken planks. Leti just shrugged up at Héctor. “I told you it was a work in progress.”

With a skip and a wobbly jump they all made it into one such shanty, Leti knocking on the wooden wall and pulling open a moth-eaten blanket that served as a divider to the one room home.

“Buenas noches, Nieve! I thought I might find you here!”

“Of course you found me here.” A sullen female voice said. “Where else would I be?”

Holding up one finger to tell Héctor to wait there, Leti walked further in with a giggle. “Well, you could be out there getting some of Tio Nesto’s offerings. You’d better hurry before all the grapes are gone. You love grapes.”

Now Héctor was really curious as to see who his daughter was talking to and why. Staying put he carefully pulled back the curtain slightly to peek out. Standing there with Leti was another young girl, a teenage one at that, standing by an open window looking out. She was wearing a tattered blue shirt, a gray skirt and a dingy straw hat. She was barefoot and a little dirty, but Héctor noticed that she didn’t seem as run down as everyone else in Shantytown. Her bones were still a nice cream color.

But her eyes. They looked so sad and angry all at once. And they held a wisdom in them that only came with either a rough life or, given her young stature the passage of time. Héctor knew that he was really looking at an old soul. An elderly woman trapped in the body of a child. She had been dead for quite a while.

“I don’t want any of that stuff, I just want to be alone tonight.” the girl, Nieve apparently, said. “Why are you here anyway? Why aren’t you with your family?”

Leti shuffled her shoes against the dirty floorboards and smiled. “Oh you know, some stuff happened. One thing led to another, that sort of thing. But I get it: You don’t want any of Tio Nesto’s offerings. But it is Dia de Muertos, and everyone deserves a little something, sooo… I brought you an offering of my own!”

Nieve then turned to her, and Héctor saw her look at Leti in anger. “You didn’t go to my ofrenda, did you? I told you I want nothing to do with that man or anything else he gives me.”

‘Ah, so that’s why she’s different.’ Héctor thought. ‘She’s not being forgotten. But then… why is she here?’

“No, no!” Leti reassured her. “I would never do that to you! No, but my offering is a man. Someone I know you’ve been dying to meet for years, figuratively speaking.” Walking back to the curtain Leti pulled it aside to show Héctor in full form. “Okay, you can come in now.”

Héctor walked slowly, not wanting to shock the poor girl with the sight of a living, fleshed out man. Nieve was slightly taken aback by his appearance at first, but then recognition kicked in and the girl’s eyes widened. She just stared at him in shock, not saying a word. Héctor shifted the guitar on his back awkwardly and gave a small grin. “Hola.”

She still said nothing. Just stared at him some more in amazement and a little fear.

“Nieve, let me introduce you to my Papá, Héctor Rivera.” Leti said as she pulled Héctor closer to Nieve. “Papá, this is Nieve Mendoza, and she is a very close friend of mine! And she’s always asking about you constantly!”

“Oh, I see.” “Héctor said. “Are you a fan?”

That seemed to jumpstart Nieve’s brain, and she croaked out. “N-no, I’m just… are you dead?”

“Nope, just cursed!” Leti said. “We have to get Tio Nesto’s blessing but sunrise or else he’ll be stuck here.” Raising up Héctor’s wrist again, she showed Nieve his bony hand. “See?”

Anger came back full force and Nieve hissed out, “You idiot! He’s on a timeclock and you waste his time by coming here. You need to get him to de la Cruz now before it’s too late!”

Leti was crushed. “But I thought you said you wanted to see him as soon as got here! Well now he’s here!”

“Never mind what I want! He needs to get a blessing now! So get out, both of you!”

“But don’t you want to talk to him?”

“No! I don’t!”

“Please, Abuelita! He’s your-”

“BASTA!”

……..

There was a silence that hung heavy in the air now, both girls panting softly and both looking at Héctor with trepidation. Héctor was now shocked into silence, his mind not quite working out what was happening in such a short amount of time. Nieve pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed harshly. “Leticia…”

“I’m so sorry, Nieve!” Leti said. “I didn’t mean to call you Abuelita. It just slipped out!”

Nieve glared hard at Leti. “Oh really? Because this is the first time in twenty years that you have ever called me Abuelita.”

“Oh, is it? Well then… oops?” Leti smiled widely, in that way Héctor remembered she used to do when caught in a lie.

“You little…” Nieve growled.

“Another term of endearment, mija?” Héctor asked.

Both girls looked at him, and Héctor grinned nervously. “Th-that’s what that was right? Because everyone in Shantytown is just one big family with different rolls and such… And it’s funny! Because you called her your grandmother even though she’s so young, right? I mean… Why else would you call her… that?”

Nieve didn’t look him in the eye anymore, couldn’t. She just stared down at the floor, looking sad and thoroughly ashamed. Leti bit her bottom lip and also couldn’t meet his eyes. Héctor still felt the smile on his face, but he could also feel the blood draining from it too. And suddenly it was hard to breathe.

“I’ll leave you two alone.” Leti whispered and rushed out of the shanty as fast as she could.

Héctor didn’t even notice. He just kept staring at this young girl in front of him, looking at every detail of her face to find… he didn’t exactly know what. Similarities? It was hard since she didn’t have any skin to look for dimples or curves of lips or anything like that.

She did have sharp cheekbones, though. Just like he did…

Finally Nieve looked up at him, her features schooled into a more neutral expression. Bending down she picked up an old wooden crate, walked over to him, and set it down in front of him. Then she turned back to the window and leaned against the railing. The exact same position that he first saw her in.

“Have a seat…”

#somos familia #coco fanfic #pixar coco #coco pixar

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doctorwhoformybestie · 4 years

Text

Anon asked,

hello, could you write something with eleven where he takes the reader to an amusement park or something of the like on another planet and they spend the day there? maybe aliens show up, I don’t know, up to you! thanks love :)

So here's my best shot! I hope you enjoy it!

11th Doctor x reader

Visiting Childhood Places

The Doctor takes y/n to his favorite place in the whole wide galaxy.

Word Count 2,018

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"Doctor, where are we going today?" You asked as you leaned your back against the railing.

"Oh I thought, we could go somewhere fun today!" He looked over to you smiling from the control panel.

Usually when the Doctor says, "fun" he means, "go to another planet and get accidently caught by aliens and sent to jail". So when you gave him a skeptical look he was not surprised to see it coming from you. Many times you were told places would be fun. Meeting Christopher Columbus was supposed to be fun and it was, until the doctor found out that Chris was just a clone who was part of some ancient alien race trying to take over the new colonie. Then that led to more danger and big spaceships. But in the end everyone was okay and ended up alive, and all of history was put back into place.

The Doctor just smiled at you, "trust me this one won't be as bad as the times before."

"I'll be the judge of that" you replied with a sly grin and a wink.

He laughed it off and started pulling levers and twisting knobs. The Tardis started making its iconic wooshing sound. You held onto the railing and was laughing as the Doctor jumped from here to there to get the spaceship to travel to wherever you were going.

As the Tardis settled down, the Doctor was ecstatic. He ran over to you with a happy smile, grabbed your hands and twirled you around.

You were astounded by his giddiness over one place. The last time he was this happy was when he learned to rollerskate. You had the biggest smile on your face as he twirled you around in a few more circles.

"Are you ready?" He asked as he stopped spinning you and took one of your hands.

You nodded your head and his eyes lit up. You followed the Doctor to the door of the Tardis.

"Now, when I say fun, this is what I mean. I haven't been here in hundreds of years!"

He swung open the door and stepped out with you right behind him.

"Welcome to the biggest amusement park on the planet Aerelia. Where all aliens can come together and have some fun!"

You looked at the place amazed. The whole place was like a human amusement park but 10 times bigger. There were rollercoasters, some with tracks some without. Food vendors everywhere, selling treats from all sorts of different planets around the galaxies. Aliens of all sorts were walking up and down the long walkways. Some of the aliens you could recognize were the ood, slitheen, adipose, and vinvocci, but there were a lot more that you did not know. Balloons and what looked to be cotton candy were being sold by some aliens walking around the park as well.

"Doctor this place! It's just incredible!" You exclaimed.

His eyes darted from one thing to the next like a child in a candy store. He started walking and you went along with him as both of your hands were glued to each other.

It was like walking in a wonderland filled with all sorts of delights and games, rides that you've never seen before that look quite scary.

"I was never fond of those ones" the Doctor would say as he pointed up to the huge roller coasters that floated above and around you. Some flipping people upside down while others just flashed before you like a speed of light.

"Are you telling me you're actually scared of something Doctor?"

"Well, not really. Just found other things around here to fill my time with." He smiled at you with eyes that were filled with kindness.

"Okay then Doctor. Show me what a normal day would be like here if you were a kid?"

His smile got much wider and he seemed to accept the challenge.

"One must first partake in the eating of a fried zigtobno."

"A what?"

"A fried zigtobno. It's quite delicious really! Somewhat of a funnel cake as they would call it on Earth."

You gave him a confused look as he led you down the aisle of food vendors, surrounding you on both sides. Many of the places had small lines, but the one the Doctor was leading you to had no line at all.

It was a small yellow shack that had a sign above it that said

~FRESH FRIED ZIGTOBNO~

The alien inside was a small creature with 4 tentacles running down its face. It looked like a small ood but with a shrimp like head with a human body. It had what seemed to be a thick layer of flour all over his apron, and when he moved the flour seemed to move with him like a ghost.

"Ahh Herbert my good pal! How's it been?" The Doctor flew his hand onto the counter and Herbet flew his hand on top of the Doctors. They did a very interesting hand shake that consisted of fistbumps, finger snaps, a pinky promise and at the end the Doctor made a bird call while the Shrimp man (or whatever he was) just put his hand up to his eyes and covered them.

After the complex ritual, Herbet and the Doctor started laughing.

"Good to see ya old pal! What can I get for you and your lovely misses today?"

You slightly blushed at the choice of words this Shrimp man had said.

"Just one fresh fried zigtobno please!"

Herbert smiled and whipped around to fix up a zigtobno. Although you couldn't see what exactly he was making it sure did smell good.

"How long have you known Herbert?" You asked out of curiosity.

"Oh just around 400 years or so. Great pal. He saved me from a trash can falling on me once. That's the day I fell in love with his food stand. Never wanted any other food than fresh fried zigtobno." He stood there with his eyes closed smelling the sweet smell that was coming from the little shed.

"One order for you Doctor."

The Doctor was reaching inside his pocket but before he could pull out anything Herbert just said, "Don't worry about it. This one's on me."

The Doctor smiled and patted Herbert on the arm. "Thanks friend. I owe you one!" He smiled and grabbed the zigtobno and walked over to a bench, sitting where you could look off at all the rides in the area.

The zigtobno was not what you were expecting. It had a cinnamon roll type texture but it was in one big heaping like an elephant ear. The powder that was on top of it consisted of pastel colors that luminated in the sunshine.

"Here you have the first bite." The Doctor said as he held the paper plate the food was on.

You tore off a piece and it was slightly gooey on the inside. Not sure if it was completely baked or it was supposed to be like that you took a bite anyways.

Your eyes light up like a million stars, as you tasted the pastry. The dough tasted as though a fresh warm baguette, with the powder as cool strawberries all mixed with a slight chocolate flavor hinting on the tip of your tounge.

"This is the best food I've ever had. Like better than Aunt Cindy's raspberry tart she makes for Christmas."

The Doctor laughed as you quickly reached for another piece and ate it quickly. He joined in as well and ate the simple pastry made by the Shrimp man Herbert.

Once you were both done eating, the Doctor continued to show you around a few more of his favorite places. Some of which were the center drama, where mini plays were put on throughout the day. The one you ended up watching was like a Romeo and Juliet spin-off. Instead of them both dying they just left Earth with some aliens and started a whole new colony. The Doctor thought it was fantastic while you on the other hand thought it could have been a little less cliche. But come on, it's Romeo and Juliet we're talking about.

He also showed you some of his favorite rides like the flying dragons, which you could control going up and down. And let's be honest the Doctor did most of the controls himself. Another ride was more like a simulation of whether you could get out in 10 minutes or not. And again he did most of the work for that one as well.

But as the day went on the night started to fall and it was getting quite late. You were getting slightly tired from all the fun you've been having, but the Doctor had one more thing purposefully planned put. (Apparently it's been planned for quite some time. But you know time travel and how that all works, and let's be honest he probably wandered off to run to the Tardis and do this because he just thought of it like 2 seconds ago)

The sky was almost fully dark and the stars were shining brightly. The Doctor led you to one last ride, a ferris wheel.

He checked his watch and started mumbling under his breath. "Right. Now just wait a few more ticks and then we should be good to go."

You kept giving him sideways glances as you walked up to the large ferris wheel.

"Did you know that this was built only 200 years ago, and it still runs to this day!" You could tell he was getting nervous. Spilling out random facts about random things was what he did when he got nervous. Yet you had no idea why he was so scared over one ride on the ferris wheel. Didn't he want to go on it? Was he that afraid of heights?

With a slight "hmm" the Doctor seemed to settle down a bit and slowly started to relax more.

When you reached the line the doctor handed the ticket taker 2 very old fashioned tickets. The ticket taker smiled and then winked at me as we entered the cart.

When the Doctor walked in he turned around to see what my reaction would be.

The cart was filled with fuzzy blankets, a tub of popcorn, and a giant zigtobno placed on the seats across from us. The Doctor smiled as he saw my eyes light up with joy.

"Did you do all of this?"

"Oh possibly. Maybe it was the past me, or the future me, hard to tell sometimes." He smiled and sat down on the right side of the cart. You joined him and then the wheel started turning up.

When the wheel was at the very tippy top it stopped. You could see the whole sky from up there. Galaxies and stars could be seen from up here.

Soon shooting stars started to light the sky.

"Doctor this is amazing!"

He smiled as the stars were passing the both you from up above.

"Tonight marks the 500th year anniversary of the legend of Mika and Woo. The ones the play were about."

Ahh yes the cringy Romeo and Juliet play that you watched earlier that day.

The Doctor slowly placed his arm around your shoulder as he continued talking.

"Legend has it that once that Mika and Woo landed on an abandoned planet they started their own colony. Representing peace for all alien races. That's what this place represents, peace for all to come together as one."

"That's just beautiful Doctor"

"I know isn't it?" He turned his head every so slightly to get a glimpse of your amazed face.

You slowly put your head down on his shoulder, the Doctor tensed up a bit not knowing what to do. But as minutes went on he started to relax.

About 10 mins later you were out asleep, from such a long day you had the Doctor did not blame you.

He gently placed a soft kiss on top of your head and then continued to fall asleep himself.

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A/N thanks so much for reading I hope you enjoyed it! If you have any requests please feel free to pop a question!

#matt smith #eleventh doctor #hottie #11th doctor #doctor who #tardis #time travel #11 doctor #best friend #hot model #doctor who imagine #doctor who fanfic #doctor who gifs #11th doctor x reader #reader insert #doctor who x reader #fanfic

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bngtanah · 4 years

Text

The Difference Between Boys & Girls | o1

summary: Sam & Erin are university students who share a cheap one bedroom apartment above a shitty takeaway restaurant. Due to the limited space, they’ve grown accustomed to sharing just about everything, including the occasional kiss. Despite the amount of time they spend together, their complete comfort in sharing a bed, etc, the pair continues to hold on to the idea that they are completely “platonic.” None of their friends believe this excuse, but as ridiculous as it sounds the unconventional living situation truly does seem to work for them.

Well, it used to anyway..

pairing: Jung Hoseok (Samuel Park) x Named OC characters: meet the cast.

word count: 10k+ genre: angst, smut, fluff

chapters: o1| o2| o3| o4| o5| o6| o7| o8| o9| 10| 11| 12| 13| 14

warning: boyfriend!hoseok, jealous!hoseok, friends to lovers trope, college au, angst, sexual themes, slow burn, ambw

a/n: i am a fool. I accidentally deleted my blog so this is me re-uploading EVERYTHING.

"You headed out?"

Erin's head whipped around in her roommates direction as he appeared in the doorway of their shared bedroom. He was shirtless, for no proper reason, jogging pants barely clinging to his hip bones. Sammy and Erin, to a certain extent, had stopped being shy being half-naked or completely naked around each other after a successful year of living together, and keeping things from becoming noticeably awkward between them. It was almost a tradition for them to freely walk around their tiny apartment space in the dead of winter or in the sweltering heat of summer in next to nothing.

She turned in her seat to fully face Sammy as he flashed her one of his infamous megawatt smiles. It always amazed Erin how he did that, going from smoldering and sexy one second to unexpectedly adorable the very next. It was a talent if she ever saw one. Erin inhaled and clenched the makeup brush in her hand with a tighter grip.

“Uh, yeah. Some girls from my study group invited me out for a drink” She nodded, tapping the fluffy end of her powder brush against her knee as she did her best to keep her eyes focused on his face and not his bare chest.

“I don’t really feel like going, but it beats lying around here doing nothing with you all night,” She shrugged.

Sammy rolled his eyes and drilled his toned shoulder into the doorjamb. "You make it sound like we don’t have any fun just lying around" He replied with a gentle pout.

"Oh, so much fun," Erin reassured with a hint of sarcasm. "But I’m sure they will kick me out of the group if I keep turning down their G.N.O’s."

"They sound like shitty friends; why would you want to go out with them anyway?"

"Well, there aren’t too many people falling over themselves to hang out with an English major, some of us have to take what we can get" Erin chuckled and turned back to face the mirror to finish constructing her 'I don’t really want to be here’ face. Minimal makeup and boring straight hair.

"I enjoy hanging out with you, am I not enough?" Samuel shot back.

Why were they debating this?

The question nearly fell from Erin’s lips because it almost sounded like her roommate was trying to convince her not to go. It was a stupid thought but one that had to be considered.

"Sammy," Erin sighed. "Are you bored or something? You're a big boy I'm sure you can find some way to entertain yourself when I'm not here," She craned her head to look at him again, "Maybe catch up on some of the 'anatomy' research I caught you doing in the living room last night?"

The slight frown that was forming on Sammy's lips disappeared into a broad grin in response to Erin's statement, making her stomach flutter just slightly. She always enjoyed seeing him laugh, especially when she was the cause.

With him partially distracted, Erin took the chance to subtly drink in every inch of his toned skin. He wasn't overtly muscular, more lean than anything but cut where he needed to be. Erin concluded that he had the years he spent dancing to thank for that. His face… Sam had a face that wouldn't seem like much at first glance but there was simply something about him that made you want to keep looking once he caught your eye. Strong jawline, straight nose, deep-set brown eyes that turned into half-moons whenever he smiled, which was often. It convinced Erin that he could make any person fall in love by doing something as simple as breathing, and you'd find yourself becoming jealous of the air that filled his lungs because it could touch him in places that you couldn't.

Not that she was in love with him, but she would be an idiot not to notice what a total hottie her roommate was.

“Whatever, noona.”

His voice snapped Erin out of her haze.

"Go out with your book nerds and paint the town beige," Sammy pushed away from the threshold, padded into the room and came to stand behind where Erin sat.

It should be noted that Erin wasn't entirely dressed either. She was in her robe, bare underneath, and silently willing her nipples not to get hard. The vanity mirror she set up cut Sammy off at the neck so all she could see was his torso just about pressed up against her back. He leaned down bringing his cheek close to her own.

She inhaled softly. The scent of his soap and cologne filled her nostrils and almost made her eyes flutter with satisfaction. She held it together though, no matter how much Erin harped on and on about not feeling anything but friendship for Samuel the past few months made it clear she wasn't sure what the hell she felt anymore.

They had been friends long before they decided to live together. Having seen each other through all the lows and highs of life since high school, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that they were more than just friends. They were basically family. Which was why Erin just couldn't bear to question exactly what had been going on between them lately. The closer than normal contact, him asking to share the bed with her because the pullout couch was messing with his back, all the goodbye kisses that seemed to linger for a second too long to be innocent. All signs pointed to the fact that he was feeling the same kind of attraction that she was, but even with all that evidence Erin just couldn't muster up the courage to call any attention to it.

Sammy brought a hand up and brushed it through gently through Erin's hair. Inwardly, her muscles tensed at his caress, and ripples of energy splintered everywhere. Erin's hair just happened to be an erogenous zone for her, but apparently only when Sammy touched it, which he did often enough.

"If you really want to go have some fun, then I'll stop bothering you," Sammy stated, twirling a strand around his index finger.

His voice sounded coarse like the words pained him to say out loud, that was probably just Erin's imagination.

Instead of responding Erin shrugged her shoulders and reached for her darkest tube of lipstick that wasn't actually black. Dreary colors usually did the trick to scare any guys planning to target her as an easy lay. To the weak of heart, they seemed to suggest hypersexuality, dabbling in witchcraft or both. Which meant whatever lame pickup line they had planned would not fly with her.

“Don't make it sound like I'm locking you in a cage here by yourself.” Erin said after a few seconds, biting into her lip when Sammy's hand smoothed down to her shoulder.

His brow scrunched, and his lips pulled down at the corners. “There's only so much I can do when you're not here.”

Erin snickered and began lining her lips in plum lipstick. “We have internet and a laptop, go nuts.”

“That's only fun when I think you're gonna catch me.”

Erin's eyebrow quirked, but she ignored that minor revelation “You're so gross.”

Sammy laughed again and that curious hand of his moved back up to Erin's neck, his thumb rubbing circles at her nape.

“You're distracting me,” She said through a soft breath.

“Ah, sorry,” Sammy dropped his hand, but he didn't move from his spot. His eyes zeroed in on her lips while she put on her lipstick. “Is that new? I really like that color on you noona.”

Capping the lipstick, Erin smiled gently and looked forward, her eyes connecting with Sammy's through his reflection in the mirror. “When exactly did I become noona, by the way? In the years we've known each other I can count on one hand the amount of times you've called me that.”

Sammy smirked and shrugged his shoulders, "You don't like it?"

It was quite the opposite, actually. If Erin had a smidgen of confidence, she would tell him she absolutely adored hearing him call her 'noona'. She was over the novelty of the age gap a year after moving to South Korea but there was just something about the way Sammy said it. It wasn't said condescendingly or begrudgingly but with genuine love and Erin could feel that.

"Nah, it makes me feel old."

"Well, that's too bad because I enjoy saying it to you-" Sammy lowered his frame until he rested on his haunches with is chin just about resting on Erin's shoulder. "Noona."

He was too low for her to elbow him like she wanted to so Erin settled for judgmental glare before returning to her makeup. "Keep this up and I'll be waking you up in the middle of the night just to gush all about all the guys I make out with tonight, with vivid detail."

Sammy cocked a lopsided grin. "I doubt that will happen. When you spend nights making out with guys you don't want to give it up to, I usually just hear you lock the door and bzzzzz." He replied, complete with sound effects and what could only be described as his imitation of a stroke victim having an orgasm.

"Out! Right now, that's enough out of you for the night" Erin exclaimed through a mixture of laughter and embarrassed groans, turning to smack him a few times on the shoulder.

Chuckling, Sammy rose to his feet.

"All right, all right I'll go but I do have one question for you," He said as he stared down at Erin, placing his hands on his hips, and wetting his bottom lip with his tongue. Erin dug all ten of her fingernails into her kneecaps to get a hold of herself.

"What's your question, Samuel?"

"Are you planning on bringing anyone home tonight?"

Erin paused, suspicion making her eyes squint gently. That was a question she'd never heard from him before. "Why?"

"Just answer the question, Erin."

"I....don't know, probably not. Why?"

"I just wanted to know if I'd have time to try out my new noise-cancelling headphones tonight."

With that Erin rolled her eyes and stood to face him, "I've had enough of you Sammy, get out. I need to get dressed and you’re just distracting me with foolishness." Sammy only chuckled then shuffled toward the door, whistling.

Just as quickly as he left Sammy's head popped up at the corner of the entrance again. Erin stared at him expectantly.

"Why don't I come out with you tonight? I know for a fact that you only tolerate those book club girls and I know Kasey won't be coming because I was eavesdropping earlier. Come on, I'll do you a favor. ,"

Erin's fingers strummed the vanity top as she contemplated her roommate's suggestion. The girls from her study group weren't exactly nuns, but they definitely weren't the most fun to hang with on a Friday night. They also probably wouldn't take too kindly to Erin inviting a guy to their 'Girl's Night Out'. However, having Sammy around all but guaranteed that she would have a good time tonight, even if it meant getting on their bad side.

It seemed worth it right?

"Can you promise to be on your best behavior?"

He shrugged. "Probably, but that depends on what you mean by 'best'."

"Like no challenging random people to a dance off, no hitting on any of my study group members..."

Sammy laughed. "Ooh, don't think I can agree to that last request, I've been on a kind of book smart, nerdy girl kick lately."

"Ugh, whatever just don't make it obvious" Erin replied, grabbing her cellphone. "I'll text Kim and tell her I have a....friend joining me."

Sammy beamed and immediately rushed over to envelop Erin in a smothering hug, making her blush like a silly schoolgirl in return. "We're gonna have a blast, noona."

Erin grinned and stroked the smooth skin on his back softly. "I wouldn't speak too soon."

The smile on Sammy's face faltered slightly, but he made no attempt at letting her go, his hands found their way into Erin's hair again and she shuddered slightly. A response that did not go unnoticed by Sammy since their bodies were practically sandwiched together. "You don't sound convinced."

"I don't control the future; we could get hit by a car on our way there. Go cover up your nips. We have to leave soon, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah" The lean boy replied as he slowly released Erin from his grasp and began making his way toward the door for the third time that night. He paused for a second once he was in the doorway and turned to glance at Erin who was combing through her hair, "Can I make a suggestion?"

"This better not be something silly."

"Wear your hair up."

Erin blinked a few times at her reflection before her eyebrow shot upward and she swiveled her head in Sammy's direction, waiting for him to elaborate on his random suggestion.

His expression was serious, and his eyes almost appeared to be darkened. "Your hair up, with that dark lipstick…? You look irresistible."

A pang of electricity sparked right through Erin's core, it took every amount of self-restraint in her not to cross the room and smear her perfectly applied lipstick all over his toned chest.

Instead, she chose to cover up her attraction with a pleasant smile while obediently complying with his request.

"Up it is."

#jung hoseok #hoseok angst #hoseok fanfic #bts hobi #hobi #hoseok smut #hoseok x reader #hoseok x oc #bts x woc #dbbg

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thenightling · 4 years

Text

Friends in the Dark (A Sandman fan fiction)

Friends in the Dark:

Disclaimer: This is a Sandman fan fiction. The Sandman belongs to Neil Gaiman and DC Comics.

This fan fiction is inspired by the currently circulating idea of Hob actually being the one to rescue Morpheus from his imprisonment after Morpheus misses their centennial meeting. In the new Netflix Sandman series Morpheus’ captivity has been extended from seventy-two-years to about a hundred and ten years. That means Morpheus would have missed his annual meeting with Hob Gadling.

Art work by @artwinsdraws

This fan fiction may be read as a pseudo-sequel to the fan fiction titled “Time will Crawl” however, this fan fiction can be read completely on its own without any difficulty.

The title is from a song that technically doesn’t exist yet except in the dreams of Aurelio Voltaire. The lyrics are currently housed in the library of The Dreaming but should reach The Waking World within the next year. I know them because I heard a short live version of the refrain on Youtube.

“You can sit in the cold dark night, And just hope for a spark. You might make your way in the day, But you’ll need friends in the dark.” – Lyrics by Voltaire.

Friends in the Dark

Chapter 1:

Friends will be friends:

“What do you mean you can’t find him?”

“I mean... If he is who I think he is, he will only be found if he wants to be found.” The old man replied in a tone that sounded like an effort at gentleness.

“I didn’t tell you he was anyone other than my friend.” Robert Gadling said in exasperation. He was tired and frustrated. The man he was talking to was supposed to be the best in his field.

“Look, the man you described… He’s not quite a man. He’s… How do I put this? He’s the Oneiromancer. He’s Morpheus. King of Dreams and Nightmares. And if you angered him-“

“I may have wounded his pride but I know him. I know he would have come.”

“How can you be so certain?”’

“I told you, he’s my friend.”

“Creatures like that don’t have any friends.”

“If you can’t help me just say so and stop wasting my time.” Robert said in annoyance.

The man sighed. “You don’t have anything that belongs to him. If you had something maybe we could cast a tracking spell, but he could obscure himself against things like that if he doesn’t want to be found.”

The man’s expression changed. It was subtle but it was troubling.

“What? What is it? There’s something you’re not telling me.” Robert said.

“No one’s seen The Sandman in over a century… There are rumors from The Underworld that something may have happened…”

Robert was growing impatient and now worried. Few things could really surprise him and right now he felt like he could be told anything and handle it in some stride. He reached into his old coat and pulled out the torn fabric of dark velvet Victorian Jacket.

“What is that?”

“I accidentally tore it from his coat when he was having his little tantrum the last time we spoke. Is that enough to track him with?”

“And you kept it all this time?”

“At the time I worried I’d never see him again. …I thought it might be the only memento, proof he was real…” He felt silly and sentimental.

“So there is a chance he’s deliberately avoiding you?”

Robert’s face was reddening. “Look, I haven’t survived seven-hundred-years purely on my good looks. I trust my instincts. If he doesn’t want to see me, fine, but I have to see him first. I have to know for sure.”

Saying something like that to anyone else might have looked completely insane but Robert Gadling knew the old magicks. He understood sorcery and he knew the old man was aware of his true age.

Robert (Hob) Gadling had been born in the fourteenth century of England. He looked like the average middle aged man but he had long ago decided not to die and had somehow succeeded in this endeavor, whether by sheer will, or the invention of Death herself, it was hard to say. But he believed it was by his own will that he refused to die. At least that was the explanation that enabled him to sleep easily at night. Death, on the other hand, knew better…

Currently Robert was clean shaven though he had worn facial hair in the past. He had light brown hair and brown eyes. He was light skinned as many English men of his original time were. He figured he was a little short by modern standards but that didn’t bother him. He had been tall by common standards in his own time. He wondered how strange he’d seem in other people the centuries to come.

Robert (or Hob as he was sometimes known by those old enough to remember Hob as a nickname for Robert) was wearing fairly mundane clothes. He had a plain button down shirt and blue jeans. The clothes were generic enough that he could have been wearing them in the nineteen sixties or nineteen nineties and no one would have questioned it as being out of place. You live long enough and you learn what fashions will survive multiple decades without too much scrutiny. And it becomes far, far easier to do simple clothing shopping.

During Hob’s last encounter with his friend, Hob had made the bold move of admitting to Morpheus that he knew the reason they met every century was because he (Morpheus) was lonely.

Morpheus had not taken that well at all. In fact Morpheus had taken offense to that notion. With his pride wounded, Morpheus had said “You dare? You dare imply I might befriend a mortal? That one of my kind might NEED companionship? You dare to call me lonely?”

Hob was not technically mortal. He had not been mortal in a very long time but his friend had a way of looking at anyone who had been born human (even if they became something else, or gained immortality) as “mortal.” His prejudice was showing along with wounded pride.

Hob had stood his ground. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

As Morpheus had stormed off in his anger Hob had called after him. “Tell you what. I’ll be here in a hundred years’ time. If you’re here then, too-- It’ll be because we’re friends. No other reason. Right? …Right?”

At the time he had feared Morpheus might not return for their centennial meeting. He hoped he would return. But Hob had also feared Morpheus would not.

Hob felt foolish and almost like a stalker in wanting to track him down now but his seven-hundred-year-old instincts were telling him that something was wrong. And if Morpheus was avoiding him he would apologize and they could go their separate ways once and for all but if there was another reason… He had to know for sure… He needed… closure at the very least.

The older looking man was starting to look thoughtful. “You keep things like this and out-right say the Lord of Dreams was having a temper tantrum?” The old wizard let out a wheezing laugh. Perhaps he was reading Hob’s thoughts, his very memory of the last time he and his friend had spoken and parted ways.

“If you’re not his friend you’ve got balls.” He shook his head. “Even if you are his friend you’ve got balls… Follow me.” He seemed to admire Hob on some level and this shifted into respect.

Hob and the old wizard walked from the dimly lit, and very cluttered, occult shoppe’s main room. They entered a private back room that served as a magical laboratory. The laboratory was no less cluttered than the main part of the shoppe. There were books in chaotic little stacks and piles. There were bottles of potions and powders on the shelves in a variety of colored jars and containers. Some glass, some modern plastic Tupperware and labeled with white tape or stickers with writing done in black, felt-tip, marker. There were odds and ends of magical trinkets and crystals. And on the far side of this room was a small “hot plate” device plugged into the wall with a rather large cooking pot on top of it. A make-shift modern cauldron.

The old man carried the torn, old, velvet over to the cauldron and took up a crystal that was wrapped in a black cord. He set to work on the tracking spell. The contents of the cauldron, which was murky and brown, began to bubble from the heat and then the bubbles began to rapidly and probably unnaturally increase. The crystal was spinning, spinning faster and faster as it dangled from the black cord.

Something was reaching its crescendo.

The old wizard set down the crystal on the edge of the cooking pot with the cord it was attached to.

He grabbed Hob’s arm. “GET DOWN!”

Hob had lived long enough to not question the command and instead, by pure reflex, descended into a crouch under the wooden table with the old man. There was a crashing sound as bits and pieces of crystal went flying everywhere.

“Gadzooks, Man! ...That’s not good, is it?” Hob asked, stating the obvious as he slowly lowered his arms from where they were over his head to protect against crystalline shrapnel.

The old man shook his head and politely seemed to ignore the near-comedic use of an archaic exclamation. “He’s either blocking the spell or-“

“Or someone’s blocking it for him…”

__________________________________________________

Chapter 2:

Time:

Time will crawl… And crawl, and crawl, and crawl…

Come! Come! Come!

Morpheus had felt the words as surely as he heard them, faint and echoing in the void. Old magick. It had felt it like a tugging at his very soul. He was too weak to resist the pulling that dragged him down, down, down… Forcibly pulling at his essence.

He had fallen forward and slammed into hard flooring. He had been disorientated at the sudden presence of gravity. He could feel the magick of the binding circle sealing him in, closing him off from all those who had a psychic link with him within his realm. He saw them, the mortal occultists, in their dark robes, as they moved to get a closer look at their prisoner. They moved like a swarm of insects. He blinked his completely-black eyes behind the tinted lenses of his helm. The tiny star pupils being the only hint that there was more than mere darkness to be seen in his eyes.

He lay there, stunned and …and so very tired… He had never felt so weary in his long life… He had struggled so hard against the summoning magick and after that he could barely keep his eyes open. Someone had grasped at the helm he wore. Someone grabbed at it with both hands. Someone tipped his head, against his will, to carefully remove the helm. They took full advantage of his weakness and disorientation. Someone pulled the helm free from his head. He had felt his own dark fall around his bone-white face. His cloak was taken. Without the cloak he actually felt the cool, damp of the cellar in English summer time. Never mind about the cloak. That could easily be replaced. He could conjure another… as soon as he was free he could conjure another...

He blinked. The ruby amulet was snatched and finally the pouch of infinite dream sand was snatched away. The pouch was something he loathed to be without. He felt more naked without that pouch than without raiment. That he could not allow. He summoned what strength he had left and sat up to reach for the pouch. He stopped as if there was an invisible wall in front of him. He could not pass the edge of the magical binding circle, which was on the ground around him, and he knew it. His belongings were just out of reach…

The attempt to cross the circle was as impossible as asking a mortal simply leap over a building. It was just impossible for him.

So tired… So very tired… The room was growing dim and the floor was strangely inviting. He fainted…

That was as close as he had ever gotten to true sleep. He did not, by nature, sleep…

Trapped. Observe. Threats. Patience. Patience… Patience…

It had been many years since that first night in nineteen sixteen…

When Roderick Burgess had died not much had changed for Morpheus. Roderick’s son, Alexander, was the one holding him captive now.

At some point, relatively recently, he had over-heard someone mention the year as being twenty nineteen.

Morpheus made no show of his feelings to his captors. He simply sat there on the floor of his crystalline cage, staring out at the two guards.

In nineteen sixteen The Dream Lord had been drawn down, summoned and trapped with their (as he saw it) “petty hedge-magicking.” What year was it now? Close to twenty-twenty, he suspected. It was hard to tell.

Mortals tend to have this naive fantasy that time moves differently for creatures such as himself, being ageless and (for all intents and purposes) immortal. Unfortunately that was not the case.

If only he could just blink and it would seem a century had passed. No. Sadly, this fantasy was merely that, a fantasy. As mortals age they perceive time differently from when they were children. In childhood summers would seem to go on and on. As adults, however, whole decades seemed too short and so they imagine that is how time must be for immortals, an ever increasing sense that this or that passage of time was too short and so nothing to them. If only that was the case…

No. He felt time. He felt time the way mortals do. Time moved no differently for his kind as it does for mortals. And in prison it crawled at a snail’s pace. Perhaps it was even worse for him because, as the living embodiment of dreams, he usually did not sleep. That meant the third of the day that human prisoners could escape their bonds by entering his realm, he could do no such thing. There was no relief.

Imprisoned time moved agonizingly slow, like the crawling of a snail. And unlike mortals he did not have that blessed release of sleep. He was, after all, the lord of Dreams. He never dreamed, himself…

No. He never dreamed. All he could do was remember…

He remembered his own wounded pride on the night he stormed off from his friend. How he longed to set that right.

He sat on the floor of the crystalline cage that they had long ago placed around him. The curved glass of his crystal prison reminded him of a fortune teller’s crystal ball only just big enough to hold a full-sized human man. How menacing the mortals managed to seem when looming over him, just outside of the crystal, where light and size were distorted from his quartz-crystal prison and shadows hung heavy over the glass.

Quartz crystal has innate power. It could contain and confine magick. It held him as surely as the binding circle around his cage- as firm and unyielding as stone or steel to a mortal’s prison.

The mortal captors had been clever to make his cage out of crystal. Everyone knows most mineral and glass come from sand. Burnt and reshaped sand. The thing that he used to sculpt dreams now worked to trap him.

The binding circle that they had drawn on the floor held his spiritual essence while the crystalline prison held his physical form. Both of these traps would need to be broken or opened for him to be able to truly escape.

He was hungry. They had never thought to feed him in all the years he had been their prisoner. They just assumed that he did not need food. And he did not need it per se. He would not die without food but he still felt hunger, nevertheless. A great and terrible, gnawing hunger. And he was not about to ask for food. He was far too proud for that. And he would not give them the satisfaction to show them that he suffered for not eating. It would not kill him but he still suffered for it.

He tried not to think about the hunger, that aching, hollow feeling chewing away within himself. Eager to eat just about anything. Even a baked potato would have been nice. Do the English still bake potatoes? He wondered.

He could imagine the taste. The potato’s skin cooked so thoroughly that it was like parchment around the soft white inside that could be crushed by the pressing of a fork. Flavored with salt, pepper, butter, sour cream. Perhaps some mild cheddar cheese and crushed bacon…

He wasn’t one for heavy meals but this simple one that he imagined seemed divine. He could practically taste it. No. He would go mad if he let himself think about the hunger too long. Try to think about something else…

He thought of Hob. He thought of the smell of the Kerosene lamps and the candle wax in the late Victorian pub. The strange sense of warmth and that feeling that was the direct opposite of being lonely. He missed that warmth. That sensation of… not-lonely.

He missed Hob…

He thought of his own wounded pride. The anger he had felt when Hob had suggested that they (Hob and Morpheus) were friends. How foolish he had been to not return to Hob sooner. Would he ever see his friend again?

He longed to set things right- to do or say something subtle to admit to Hob that he was right without actually saying the words that his pride did not want him to speak out loud. He thought of the clever ways he could perhaps acknowledge that yes, they were, in fact, friends without uttering an apology or acknowledgement of being wrong. He couldn’t dare admit, even to himself, that he was wrong. And it was Hob’s own fault, wasn’t it? He was the one who had to spoil things. He was the one who had to go and poke at the situation and demand confirmation. Why did he have to spoil it by making him have to call their situation a friendship?

He missed him so much…

Morpheus blinked. He was no longer in the pub, storming away from Hob. He could no longer taste the discarded wine still on his lips. His memories were as vivid and real to him as dreams are for most people. It was as close as he could get to dreaming… remembering…

He was back in his cage. Staring at the two guards just beyond the glass.

What time was it? Guessing from the two particular guards and the wrist watch that one of them wore, it was close to three in the afternoon. It was hard to tell from his little prison. He had not seen the sun (or stars) in over a century.

If only he could sleep as mortals sleep. If only he could experience that sweet, temporary release, just once. To simply know what it was like to lose oneself to a third of the day in The Dreaming… Mortals had no idea of the treasure that they had, the gift that he, himself, usually provided. A gift that he, himself, could never know… had never known… ________________________________________________

Chapter 3:

What Dreams may come:

Hob Gadling pulled to the side of the road, in the red nineteen seventy-three MGB convertible. He had owned this particular automobile since the days when it was new. Today he figured it would be considered a classic. Yeah, a classic, all right… Polished up nice but rusted in all the important areas and a serious petrol guzzler. The car looked nice but it was about as functional as any old jalopy or puddle jumper. He only chose it today because it was a car he wouldn’t mind abandoning in a field if he had to.

He was parked about a quarter of a mile from Fawny Rig in Wych Cross, Sussex England. The paperback copy of an occultist’s memoir sat on the passenger seat beside him. It was some self-published nonsense about The Order of Ancient Mysteries but it was Hob’s first real clue about what happened to his friend.

For over thirty years he had searched. And he had found one dead end after another, including a few attempted cons and scams from people who thought they could take advantage of a mad man trying to find a character from a faery tale.

The book had been the first major clue. It had been written by some dead occultist who had claimed that he and the rest of his order had succeeded in invoking and trapping the King of Dreams. The book had been vague and full of strange claims about archaic powers and curses and nonsensical and far-fetched boasts about demon invocations and boogeymen.

He would not have believed any of it until he had read the description of the creature they had caught. The bone-white flesh, the solid black eyes, the messy dark hair. It had to be him. It just had to be.

The book hadn’t said where they had captured the being (whom Hob angry noticed they kept calling “it” when referencing the capture) but Hob had learned that The Order of Ancient Mysteries was once run by a Magnus Roderick Burgess and this had been his home estate. It now belonged to his son, Alexander Burgess, whom he had fathered very late in life. Alexander would have been quite old by now, himself.

If they had him, his friend- if they had Morpheus- what were they going to do to him? Pass him along through the generations like some strange inherited pet? Who would get him next? The butler? As far as he knew Alexander Burgess had no children of his own. Would they seal up whatever dungeon they had him in and leave him to rot?

This was still a long shot but Hob had to know. If he was there he couldn’t just leave him at the mercy of these charlatans. And if Hob got arrested for this- well, breaking-and-entering was not the worst crime he had ever been arrested for. He could handle it.

Hob took the old colt revolver out of the glove compartment. This was also an antique and would have been difficult to smuggle into England today but he had brought it into the country in eighteen ninety-one, so it was long before modern firearm restrictions, and back when smuggling was far easier.

Hob had lead a very colorful and long life. At one point he had even been a slave trader, something that Morpheus, himself, had chastised him for. Hob regretted that now. He regretted that more than anything. He would spend the rest of eternity making reparations for that if he could. How could he have ever been so callous to another human life?

Morpheus had seemed so revolted. “You take pride in treating your fellow humans as less than animals?” he had him.

Hob had tried to shrug it off with “Like I said, it’s a living.”

But Morpheus would not let it be. “It is a poor thing, to enslave another. I would suggest you find yourself a different line of business.”

Morpheus was right. It was wrong to hold another like that. And if Morpheus was in there he had to get him out now.

Hob checked to make certain the colt revolver pistol was still loaded. Each chamber of the six shooter held an old bullet. He had tested it only the night before to make certain it still fired. He loathed the idea of having to use it but he knew it would be stupid to go in unarmed, especially since he didn’t practice magick, not really. All he could do was hope a pistol was enough.

_____________________________________________

Chapter 4:

Locked within the crystal ball:

It was early evening. It was hard to tell from where he sat on the floor of his cage but he knew it was early evening. One guard was reading a newspaper. The other had a Stephen King novel. Though Morpheus knew nothing of the technology, the men knew that their wifi devices would not work down there. The rural setting combined with the thick stone walls made it impossible to get a good signal in that dungeon of a cellar.

There was also the concern of the residual yet powerful magick in the air, which by its very nature, interfered with sensitive electronics and could even cause them to short out. They had been specifically ordered not to use their mobile devices down there and so they had to kill time through other means.

Morpheus watched them with cold contempt. He was measuring how long it took for the one with the novel to turn his page. The other occasionally fidgeted. Morpheus could tell by the man’s eye movements that the fidgeting one was not actually reading the newspaper.

The man was just seeking out a long word to play a childhood game of seeing how many smaller words he could make with the letters of the longer word he found. It was some kind of time-killer he had learned from spending too many childhood hours in doctor’s offices before wide-spread cellphone and Internet service.

Morpheus understood nothing of Internet, or mobile phones, but he understood the restlessness of a bored mortal. How often did these restless people eventually drift into his own realm when they got like that? He almost felt jealous of the bored mortal.

There was a noise from above. It was faint as the walls were designed to be soundproof but even in his magick resistant prison Morpheus could hear the scuffle.

“Hey! You’re not supposed to be here! What are you doing!?” Came one voice. There was a sound of crashing furniture.

“Someone get Maguire!”

The two guards finally realized something was amiss when the door to the hidden room opened with a heavy creaking sound.

The one set down his paper, the other- almost in unison-set down his novel. They stood up from their folding chairs.

At first Morpheus thought he had been psychically touched by his youngest sister, little Delirium, and madness was finally upon him or perhaps his memories were somehow seeping into reality, confusing past for present like psychic imprints and echoes of long ago events.

He stared in wonder at the familiar yet disheveled appearance of Hob Gadling.

Hob was wearing a casual suit and open, light colored blazer jacket. It was slightly rumpled, as if he had been wearing it for more than twenty-four-hours and rather restlessly.

Morpheus was not aware that the suit was over thirty-years-old and very likely the suit Hob had worn to the pub for their centennial meeting that he was now extremely late for.

Whether consciously or subconsciously, Hob had (on some level) chosen to wear this suit on purpose now.

Morpheus hadn’t even noticed that he, himself, had risen to his feet. The guards rushed toward the man who seemed both frightened yet determined.

_____________________

Chapter 5: The Rescue:

As Hob had raced down the stone staircase, hoping his gut instincts were right, he nearly couldn’t breathe once he entered the dimly lit room. He was panting for breath but then the shock of what he saw caused what air was there to get caught in his throat.

There were two men rising from folding chairs to meet and / or attack him- more likely the latter. And behind them, just barely in view… There he was! Naked and locked inside what looked like a ridiculously over-sized, novelty, snow globe paperweight.

Hob couldn’t hold back a gasp when he saw him. “Gadsbudikins!” He was glad no one was there to comment on the archaic exclamation that had worked its way into his, proudly modern, vocabulary.

He had never seen Morpheus in such a state. He knew his friend was skinny and pale but to see him like this was something all-together different.

Morpheus was emaciated. The ribs protruding so that he could see each one incased in milk-white skin. He was entirely naked. He knew his friend’s pride. He could only guess at the humiliation that, alone, must have brought to him. How long had he been in there? Whether a day or a century, ether was too damn long.

He was distracted briefly by the pitiful sight so he was caught off guard by the punch from the first guard. The other guard was trying to grab his arm.

Morpheus was barely aware he had placed a hand to the cold, crystalline, glass. When was the last time he had actually touched the wall of his cage? He didn’t leave any fingerprints as he did this.

In the struggle the first man, the one who had thrown the punch, pulled a knife. Morpheus’ own expression had shifted to one of genuine fear for Hob.

He watched helplessly as the knife pierced the belly of his friend.

There was a clanking sound as the bloodied weapon fell to the floor.

Hob doubled over in pain. For a brief moment Morpheus thought he was witnessing his friend’s corporeal end from this extended life- but no. His older sister, Death, had seen to this long ago.

Hob was in considerable pain but he struggled his way free and staggered back into the mouth of the entrance into the hidden chamber. One of his hands held his wounded belly, the shirt slowly becoming saturated in his red blood.

A well dressed, older looking, man was coming down the stairs, following the same path Hob had taken. The two guards were readying the next assault when Hob turned, and fumbling, he drew out his pistol. His hands were shaking but he managed to steady himself.

Paul Maguire (husband to Alexander Burgess, Morpheus’ owner…) raised his hands slightly and took a step back. “Sir, I don’t know what you want but the police have been called.” Paul bluffed.

“With what you’ve got down here? Yeah, right. Tell me another one. I’m taking him out of here. If anyone tries to make a move…”

Hob was improvising. He grabbed Paul and drew him close, holding the pistol to the side of Paul’s head, maneuvering to separate himself from the guards by using Paul as a shield. Hob had lived many lives, not all of them honorably, and this was not his first unfair fight.

“You’re going to open that… Whatever the Hell that is. And let my friend out.”

“Your friend…?” Paul asked in confusion.

“Did I stutter?!?” Hob had always wanted to deliver that line, or at least he had ever since he had seen it written on a meme on Facebook. “YOU HEARD ME! Now!”

Paul carefully, slowly, drew out an antique looking key from his pocket, moving very slowly to show he was not armed, and with trembling hand passed the key to the second guard. The one that had not punched or stabbed Hob.

Morpheus took a step back.

The guard walked to the crystalline cage and put the key into the discrete lock in the base. The crystalline glass slid away at a near invisible seam, creating an opening. Hob shoved Paul, forcibly, back against the first guard. He walked to the cage’s opening. He saw Morpheus just standing there. He took off his own jacket for modesty’s sake. “It’s all right. I’m getting you out of here. Come on.”

Hob’s foot lightly brushed over the binding circle. It was hard to tell if it was deliberate or not but the deed was done, the circle was breached.

Morpheus stepped toward him. And for the first time in over a century he spoke out loud. His voice partly psychic, heard in the mind and audible at the same time, seemed feeble and weak from lack of use. “Hob…? Hob Gadling?” he asked as if not entirely certain he was really there.

“Yeah. It’s gonna be all right. Come on.”

The two guards and Paul seemed uncertain of what to do next. They hadn’t exactly fully prepared for anything like this despite the years of meticulous care to make sure the prisoner did not escape.

As soon as Morpheus was out of the cage and past the edge of the binding circle, Hob draped his jacket over his narrow shoulders.

“Cheese and crust! What did they do to you?”

Morpheus opted against answering but he held the offered jacket tightly over himself.

Hob, holding the pistol in one hand, placed his other arm around Morpheus, escorting him up the stairs and outside the house, no one tried to stop them. Morpheus stumbled weakly but he steadied himself each time this happened.

As soon as they were off the Fawny Rig grounds, just past the old iron gate, Morpheus stopped in his tracks, barefoot and mostly naked, but oblivious to any chill.

He was staring up at the stars. He hadn’t seen them in over a century. Hob simply let him look. They certainly were beautiful. The stars gave the illusion of permanence. But for all the change that might happen there were still stars in the darkness, even if one burnt out and another was born, there they were- always and forever. Maybe that’s what immortality really was, the willingness to be ever-changing and yet ever constant, like the universe itself.

After some time Morpheus spoke, his voice still weak. “I have to… I have to return to…”

Hob looked down at the weak, semi-skeletal figure that he was supporting. “Return to where you originally came from?”

He nodded.

“Okay. How do we do that?”

“You must sleep.” He said simply, clutching the jacket around himself.

_____________________________________________

Chapter 6: Rest:

They walked for some distance. Every so often Morpheus lost his footing and almost toppled but each time he stumbled Hob caught him.

At one point he was certain Morpheus was looking at the blood on his shirt in concern at the stab wound.

“It’s nothing.” Hob assured him. “I’ve had worse. I don’t think they’re chasing us but we really need to keep moving. ”

When they finally reached the convertible, Morpheus stared at the automobile blankly.

“Oh, that’s just a horseless carriage. We call them cars now.”

“I see…”

Hob opened the passenger door for him and pushed the book off the seat. Morpheus understood to climb inside onto the seat. After he got in, Hob shut the door behind him.

Hob went to the driver’s side and climbed in, seating himself. After shutting his own door he started the engine (which took several tries, as the car looked pretty but lacked functionality) but soon they were on the road away from Fawny Rig.

Hob didn’t bother to tell his companion to put on a seat belt. Any sort of restraint seemed like a bad idea right now, as if it was something that could potentially trigger post traumatic stress. He already half-imagined that Morpheus would develop some kind of permanent claustrophobia after that long captivity and that seemed perfectly reasonable to him right now. So he didn’t ask him to put on a seat belt. And it was not likely either of them were about to die from a car crash.

After a quick stop at small convenience store they continued on the road for some distance and finally they reached the hotel parking field.

Hob looked at his friend, trying not to show the pity he felt. Instead he reached into the glove compartment and took out the small bag with the new bottle of extra strength Unisom sleeping pills he had just purchased at the convenience store.

He aligned the arrows on the child safety cap, removing the cap easily, and then punctured the seal with his thumb, taking out several small capsules into his hand.

He then removed the cap from the small bottled caffeine-free Coca-Cola he had also purchased and had been in the bag as well, with the bottle of Unisom sleeping pills.

“Well, bottom’s up.” He raised his bottle as if it was a wine glass and then gulped down the five or so pills he had in his fist with a healthy swig of the soda.

Hob wasn’t certain if the amount of sleep aid capsules he had just swallowed was enough to potentially harm an ordinary man, but he knew he was not an ordinary man. And his adrenaline was too high right now. There was no way in Hell he was going to sleep without chemical assistance.

“Hob?” Morpheus looked as if he wanted to say something.

“Not now.” Hob said. “I’ll never get to sleep if you start chatting. Save it for when we get you home.” He said this as if Morpheus had ever been the talkative one. He knew he wasn’t.

There was a trace of a smile on Morpheus’ face. “Thank you…”

“No problem. What are friends for?” He half expected the old tantrum to flare up but there was not the slightest hint of that now. Morpheus leaned back in his own seat to wait.

“I’ll… Turn on the radio while I wait for this stuff to kick in…” Hob said this to break the awkward silence that was threatening his drug-aided nap.

By some twisted irony the song Mr. Sandman by The Chordettes was playing. Hob gave an uneasy laugh. “Bet you hate that song, don’t you?”

The sudden music with vocal accompaniment seemed to startle Morpheus at first but his tension faded with Hob’s own nonchalantness about it. “Actually… I have never heard it before…”

“It’s about you… I think…”

“Is it really?”

_________________________________

Chapter 7:

Home:

The song wasn’t even over yet when Hob found himself standing in a dimly lit pub in the fourteenth century. And there was his friend, quite naked, and seemingly indifferent to his own nakedness. Hob figured Morpheus must have left the jacket in the car.

His friend was crouched in front of the fire place, tearing into a leg of mutton from someone else’s plate. Curiously the tavern was empty except for the two of them, and yet several tables were loaded with untouched drinks and dishes of food.

Some of the food didn’t really belong in this time period as they had not been invented yet- like chimichangas, New York style pizza, Kentucky fried chicken, and Twinkies. These anachronistic snacks and meals were the first give-away that he was dreaming.

Morpheus helped himself to the diverse array of strange foods. A little of this, a little of that, he was gobbling as much of it up as he could. He seemed famished, eating as much as he could, as fast as he could.

“Hey… Maybe you should take it easy?” Hob said in concern. “You know when humans are starved for a long stretch of time they have to slowly reintroduce their body to solid foods. Maybe start with some soup? …Or you could just eat the entire bucket of KFC… Sure. Why not?”

After he had his fill Morpheus stood and seemed to be concentrating. Slowly something swirled up around him like dust… or sand. Yeah, it was glittering, golden sand.

From that sand dark robes were taking form on his body. Seamless and not quite stylized in any particular way. Hob felt that at the moment the feebly conjured clothes vaguely resembled a black Snuggie.

With some cold determination Morpheus walked out the door of the pub and into a surprisingly beautiful night, with a sprawling nebula smeared overhead like oil paint.

Hob hastily gave chase “Hey! Hey, where you going?!”

Outside the pub there was a beach. Funny. There was never a beach so close to the pub before but then Hob remembered this was a dream. Morpheus was kneeling in the sand, gathering some of it.

“Hey, what are you doing?” He caught Morpheus’ wrist.

Morpheus did not shrug him off. “I have to get my revenge.”

“Revenge on who? Roderick Burgess and his crew are dead!”

“His son yet lives.”

“His son? You’re going to go after his son?!”

“You disapprove? His son could have freed me. I would have shown him mercy if he had let me go. Instead he kept me as his father had, threatened, insulted, and tormented me. He must pay.”

“He didn’t know! He didn’t know what to do and you probably scared him. I’m not justifying it but I’ve lived long enough to know revenge isn’t going to make you feel any better.”

“But I… I waited so long…” He sounded uncertain.

“You’re sick. You could barely stand. You’re still recovering. I’m pretty sure you don’t want to be wandering around in a half-finished Snuggie. You’re going to waste what little strength you have getting revenge on someone whose biggest crime was apathy and being a jerk?”

“What is a Snuggie?”

“Never mind that.” Hob said with a shake of his head. “Revenge isn’t worth it. You’ve got to forgive him. You know as well as I do revenge isn’t going to bring you any real satisfaction.”

“Who are you to tell me what will satisfy me or not?” Morpheus said angrily.

“The man who just saved your life! That’s who! You can listen to me or not, that’s up to you.” Hob let go of Morpheus’ wrist. “But the way I see it... You need rest. You need to recover. And you need to learn to forgive. Going after Burgess’ kid, who inherited you like a pet parrot, isn’t going to make you feel better. You’re weak and you need rest. Is there any where I can take you where you’ll be able to do that?”

“You’ll be waking up soon…”

“So hurry up then and tell me.”

Hob walked beside his friend, down the twisting. dark path, surrounded by gnarled old trees. Up ahead was an old house, probably eighteenth century or early Victorian. And next to that house was a graveyard beside a similar, somewhat larger house. “You sure this is where you want to go?” Hob asked.

Morpheus nodded.

“It looks like The Crypt Keeper lives here.”

“Something like that…”

It was the pudgy one, Abel, who opened the door to the house of Mystery. The thinner one in the pince-nez spectacles, Cain stood behind Abel. Both looked stunned at who was at the door.

Hob stood with the weakened Dream King leaning on him. Behind them was the dopey eyed, dog-like, big, green, gargoyle that had followed them as soon as they entered the gate.

“Can you two look after my friend? I think I’m starting to wake up….”

Before Hob could get an answer he found himself back in the driver’s seat of the parked car. He looked to the seat next to him. It was empty except for some glittering dust and his jacket.

He noticed something else too. The pain in his stomach, where he had been stabbed, was entirely gone. He would have healed on his own, mind you. A wound like that couldn’t kill him, but it took hours, if not days to recover from such an injury. Now it was as if the wound had never happened at all.

Morpheus had heeded him about not wasting his energy on futile and cruel revenge. Instead he had spent his energy on something far more important. He had used what little strength he had to heal his friend…

______________________________________

Chapter 8:

You’ll meet friends in the Dark:

The funny thing about having a friend who is the King of Dreams is it’s hard to tell when something really is just a dream. He worried that the part about delivering Morpheus to that old Haunted House to be tended to was just in his own mind, a fevered and addled dream from injury and over-the-counter sleeping pills.

Hob sat nervously at the pub. The meeting was now some decades late. He sincerely hoped the part of his recent adventure that took place in dreams was real. That sounded silly to him upon reflection: “the part that was in dreams was real...”

Nervously he sat, worried his friend was not coming. And then he saw him as if he had been there the whole time. Morpheus stood in a modern, long, leather jacket. His messy dark hair slightly more stylized. His skin still bone-white, his look still improbably slight, features still gaunt, and thin. The eyes were black but the tiny star-like pupils in the middle of that blackness seemed more alert, twinkling with old power.

“I- I wasn’t sure you’d be coming.” Hob said.

“Really?” Morpheus was smiling. It was a small smile but it was there just the same. “I have always heard it was impolite to keep one’s friends waiting. Would you like a drink?”

The End

#Friends in the Dark #Neil Gaiman's The Sandman: Fan Fiction #The Sandman #Morpheus #Dream of The Endless #Hob Gadling #Robert Gadling #Robert Hob Gadling

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etlunainmorte · 4 years

Text

❄❄❄

***

*The Best French Hot Chocolate*

Prep time: 2 minutes

Cook Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 12 minutes

*Ingredients

2 Cups Whole Milk

½ Cup Heavy Cream

1 Tablespoon Powdered Sugar

12 Ounce Dark Chocolate

Whipped cream

*Instructions

Add milk, powdered sugar and heavy cream to a saucepan and heat over medium - high heat until simmering, being careful not to scald or boil. While the milk mixture is heating, chop the dark chocolate ( For best flavor, use a good quality chocolate that's at least 60 - 70% cacao ). Once simmering and heated thoroughly, remove from the heat and add the chopped chocolate to the saucepan. Whisk until smooth. Pour into small mugs and serve immediately with whipped cream and a little extra chopped chocolate on top.

***

❄ Three Wishes ❄

***

VIII

***

"Weird, I never noticed the hole in the ceiling until now." You said to yourself as you looked up at the said hole in the cream - colored ceiling of your bedroom.

And you noticing even the smallest of cracks in the walls, and ceilings, of your bedroom? In the dark?

This insomnia really was taking a toll on your whole body and your mental health!

And now, as you lay on your bed staring at the gaping hole in the ceiling, you couldn't help but wonder: if you didn't get to be in a relationship with that guy, would you still have difficulty sleeping? Would you be able to fall asleep at approximately ten in the evening?

Would you be able to concentrate more in the morning because you were able to have ample, not just enough, rest?

You sighed. You, thinking about what ifs, when it's already half - past two in the morning?

You growled helplessly as you took your pillow from underneath your head and covered your face with it to muffle the sound, all the while kicking the super soft bedsheets and flailing your legs about. Then, you threw the thing halfway across the room and sat up, ruffling your already messy hair.

"You should not be blaming him, girl!" You scolded yourself for, like, the ndth consecutive night since breaking up with that narcissist. "You should NOT be blaming him!" You swung your legs to the edge of the bed, reached for your fluffy bunny slippers, and stood. You opened the lamp, switching it on for the third time that evening. "It's all my fault! It's. All. My. Freaking. Fault!"

Meanwhile, as you made your way downstairs to get yourself a glass of water, all the while mumbling to yourself how it was your fault you couldn't sleep, V, Griffon, and Shadow were listening just outside your room, waiting for the perfect opportunity to execute the plan.

"That girl is goin' cuckoo, V!" Griffon exclaimed as he flew back down after observing your erratic movements and surveying the room as stealthily as he could. "She's talkin' to herself."

"No." Shadow, who was calmly standing next to the poet, rebutted. "More like, she's blaming herself. But, why?"

"That,... we'll know very soon." V answered as he tapped the ground with his metal cane, signaling for his familiars to begin the mission. And when you finally entered your room and closed the door, you heard some weird tapping on your window.

At first, you thought it was only your over - active imagination but, when the tapping resumed and at a more rapid intensity, you couldn't help but grab the flower vase on your vanity table for protection. Wielding the porcelain ornament like a makeshift weapon, you cautiously stepped towards the window where the noise was coming from. You grabbed the heavy pink curtain with your free hand and hastily drew it, revealing a most curious winged - visitor flying just outside the window.

"Griffon?" You uttered, setting the vase down and immediately opening the glass window to let him in.

"Special delivery!" The bird gleefully announced as he drew back and waved his wing, showing the man standing just behind him.

The man,... standing just behind him,...

But, wait! You're on the second floor of the house!

"Did my heart love ‘till now?" The man greeted you, his smile ever so charming, his voice ever so soothing, his presence,... ever so calming. And with those mere words, you felt all the anxiety and weariness leave your entire system, hopefully for good. He,... only has such power over you. "Forswear it, sight! For I ne'er saw true beauty 'till this night."

"V?!" You couldn't help but shriek in fright as you leaned on the windowsill to see the man clearly and how he was able to come face to face with you. He looked and stood so confident! So proud! So majestically dark! And then, you finally noticed the thing he was standing on: a seemingly sentient swirling and curving set of jet - black stairs that glimmered and shone like a million diamonds against the moonlit, winter sky. It connected from the ground to where the poet's feet were, helping him balance.

How was he doing all this?!

"Wh - wha - ? H - how?!" You stammered as you gazed at the green - eyed man clad in a dark sweater before you.

The poet chuckled and took out a book from his black canvas bag, opened it, and took a deep breath. "She speaks!" V read with a clear and low voice that pierced through the silence of the night.

"W - well, of course! I - "

"Oh, speak again, bright angel, for thou art as glorious to this night, being o'er my head, as is a winged messenger of Heaven."

Is this man, you thought as you felt the sides of your lips curve up into a smile, reciting Romeo and Juliet?

V went on, seeing that his reading made you smile. "Unto the white upturned wondering eyes of mortals that fall back to gaze on him when he bestrides the lazy - puffing clouds and sails upon the bosom of the air." V closed the book shut, seemingly waiting for your response, and that's when you finally remembered!

He was emulating the famous balcony scene from the Shakespearean play!

"Your turn, my lady." V told you in a teasing tone and that devilish smirk of his.

How is no one seeing all this?! "Oh! I - ah, let me see, ah," You stammered as you tried to recall Juliet's words. You slapped your forehead when your messed up mind finally conjured up some incoherent words and tried to recite. "Oh, V - err, I mean, Romeo! Yes, Romeo, where,... art thou, oh Romeo. I - is that it?"

The poet hummed in agreement. He, then, crossed his arms and tilted his head to side, watching you closely and with clear interest. "Yes, go on."

"Okay! Umm," You mumbled, tapping your chin as you tried to recall more of Juliet's words. "Deny thy father and refuse thy name. Or - "

" ... or if thou will not be," V recited, helping you with the lines. " ... but sworn my love, and I'll no longer be,… a Sparda."

Wait, Sparda? "Oh, I'm not sure if it went like that. But, I don't really care! I'm not fond of that tragic play, anyway."

"Oh! Why is that?" V asked, seemingly surprised when he heard you say those words to him, outright.

"Call me stupid but, I prefer happy endings, thank you very much."

"Not stupid, no,..." V only uttered as he, once again, was made captive of your sweet smile. "I adore,... happy endings, as well,..."

"I'm glad to hear that." You answered. Feeling the cold creep up on your skin, you finally realized that the poet was practically standing on the cold outside your room! He must be freezing! "Oh, my God! I'm so sorry! Come in!" You opened your window wider and reached for his hand with your own, pulling it and helping him enter your room.

Soft, dainty hands clasped together with large, rough ones, your hands stayed joined a few more moments after letting the man into your room. Green and (E/C) eyes locked onto each other, you felt yourselves moving closer to chase that warmth and that gentleness. Two hearts beating in unison, you felt you were instantly connected to each other as he leaned down and -

"Ah, V," The two of you turned and noticed both Griffon and Shadow waiting for you. " ... we're gonna, uhh, make the thing now." Griffon said in a calm voice when, in fact, the cheese right in front of him was both killing him and making him giddy inside at the same time. Well, it was the first time he has seen his Master this happy. And for that, he was glad.

He was glad that his Master finally met you.

"Oh! Of course." V answered as he unwillingly let go of your hand. "Of course."

"The thing?" You asked, confused at the familiar's words and disappointed that the tender moment between you and V were cut short.

"Yes. Let them handle it." V replied, feeling confident of his trustworthy familiars. "For now, I have,... something for you."

"Really?" You said, your peripheral vision catching sight of the familiars opening the door and going outside to who knew where. "Like a surprise?"

"Yes. If you may,..."

A few moments later, you were back to your bed with your back against the propped up pillows and the lower part of your body covered with the soft and fragrant sheets to make you warm and comfortable. And as you wiggled your toes and watched the poet as he made himself comfortable on the chair next to your bed, you couldn't help but feel excited of what's to come. He, then, reached for his bag and took from it an old leather - bound book that seemed worn down and yet so beloved. With a flourish of his slender tattooed fingers, he opened the book and turned to a certain page, stealing a longing glance from you as he gently smiled to reassure you that everything will be fine.

"I will now tell you,... the story of how Love and Soul came to be." He spoke with that low, almost whisper - like voice of his that made the atmosphere even more relaxing and comfortable. He really knew what he was doing. "I will tell you,... the myth of Cupid and Psyche." His eyes going back to his old book, he began reading. "There was once a King who had three daughters, all lovely maidens, but the youngest, Psyche, excelled her sisters so greatly that,... beside them she seemed a very goddess consorting with mere mortals. The fame of her,... surpassing beauty spread over the earth, and everywhere men journeyed to gaze upon her with wonder and adoration and to do her homage,... as though she were in truth one of the immortals."

"She must be so beautiful, then!" You couldn't help but speak of your opinions regarding Psyche. And to V, it was a good thing. It meant that you're invested in the story. "And she's worshipped like a god!"

"I don't believe in gods," V answered with a smile. " ... for I only believe in one, true, beautiful goddess whose smile I always fervently pray to see everyday of my life."

His words making your heart swell and your body really warm, you settled back to your pillows, hugging a brown stuffed bear and keeping it close to your chest.

Then, V went on. "They would say that even Venus herself could not equal this mortal. As they thronged in ever - growing numbers to worship her loveliness no one any more gave a thought to Venus herself. Her temples were neglected, her altars foul with cold ashes, her favorite towns deserted and falling in ruins. All the honors once hers were now given to a mere girl destined some day to die. It may well be believed that,..."

Meanwhile, as V went on with his bedtime story, the familiars silently made their way towards the kitchen to do their Master's bidding, and that was to make you a nice cup of warm chocolate.

Except that they never made anything in their whole life aside from fried Empusa or skewered Hell Antenora, and that spelled trouble for the both of them.

"Ah, how do we do it again?" Griffon whispered, carefully trying to make his way towards the kitchen in the darkness of the house.

"Just boil some liquid and pour the chocolate in!" Shadow answered as she successfully located where the utensils were hidden.

"Ah, how do we do exactly that? And what liquid are we talkin' about here?"

Shadow stopped sniffing the neatly stacked utensils in the cupboard and stared at her companion with such dread in her own, red eyes.

"I don't know."

Griffon stared back at her with wide, golden eyes that made the situation seem worse. "Oh, fuck!"

"Didn't you read the instructions Master gave you?"

"What instructions?"

"You, imbecile! The paper that Master handed you earlier!"

"Oh! Is that the,... ahh,... instructions? Haha! Didn't know about that! Too bad, huh?!"

Shadow's eyes dangerously narrowed as she stalked towards Griffon like the dangerous predator that she was. "What did you do to the paper, Griffon?" She asked, a hint of that frightening growl escaping her throat.

Now, if demonic birds could even sweat, Griffon would probably be soaked and dripping wet as of that moment. "Ah, ah, I can explain! Listen to me very, very carefully, kitty - cat - "

"STOP CALLING ME A KITTY - CAT AND TELL ME WHAT YOU DID TO THE PAPER!" Shadow growled, the sound of her voice making the four corners of the old house tremble, its frightening noise reaching the second floor and making V stop reading.

"What was that?" You questioned, your eyebrows furrowed and your voice laced with worry and nervousness at the frightening noise you just heard.

"What do you mean by that, my dear?" V, on the other hand, pretended he did not hear anything.

"Ah, I thought I heard some noise downstairs,..."

"I C - CAN'T B - BREATH!" Wheezed Griffon, trying to escape Shadow's tail that went over his face, suffocating him. "H - HELP! AGHK! S – STOP! I BEG YA!”

"OF ALL THE THINGS YOU HAVE TO THROW AWAY, WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE THE INSTRUCTION MANUAL?! YOU, STUPID,... BIRD BRAIN!" Shadow growled, not caring at all whether Griffon would enter his stalemate state due to her ceaseless attack or just end up dead due to asphyxiation.

"I T - TOLD YA! I THOUGHT SHAKESPEARE WANTED ME TO BURN THE THING - SSSQQQUUUAAAWWWKKK!"

"YOU,... BURNED IT?! HOW DARE YOU?! HOW DARE - ?!"

"Who is in my house?!"

Both Shadow and Griffon gasped as they looked at Adelaide, who was still in her night gown and pointing her rolling pin at them. Luckily for the familiars, it was too dark for her to see them.

Carefully putting Griffon down, who finally breathed a sigh of relief, Shadow cautiously stepped away and cleared her throat. "We're not your enemies, Adelaide. Put your weapon down."

"Stupid cat!" Griffon whispered savagely at what the demonic cat just did.

"Shut up! She can't see us!"

"Oh! Ye're right,..."

"I'm one step away from calling 911!" Adelaide threatened as she tightened her grip on the rolling pin. "Reveal yourself!"

Shadow, who was mainly the cause of all the noise in the first place, made one last desperate move to deceive the old woman. Clearing her throat once more and hoping for the old woman to believe her ruse, she spoke. "Adelaide, my dear, I' am your mother."

"Mother?!" The old woman spat. "But my mother has been dead a long time ago!"

"Yes, I' am." Shadow answered as she gestured for Griffon to move away. "And I've come to visit you in your dream."

"Dream? I'm,... dreaming? This is a dream?"

"Why, yes, my dear! Otherwise, how could I speak with you like this?"

Both familiars breathing a sigh of relief, they watched as the old woman finally brought her guard down. Believing every word that the demonic feline just uttered, she said, "Mother, why have you come to visit me?"

"Go on!" Griffon whispered to Shadow as he hid behind one of the chairs.

"I was,... just checking whether you're doing fine." The feline went on with the lie.

"I'm fine but," Adelaide spoke, making the familiars nervous. How long would this go on? " ... it's my grandchild. I'm worried about her."

"Worried? Tell me why."

"It's about this man named V." The old woman answered, the mere mention of their Master's name making them even more cautious. And intrigued. "Tell me, mother: is he really the one for (Y/N)? I'm afraid. She was hurt by someone before. I,... don't want anyone to hurt her like that, anymore. I don't want to see her cry ever again. So, I want to know: is this man, V, really the one for her?"

Shadow took a deep breath. Standing on her hind legs, she placed one of her paws on the old woman's right shoulder, hoping to reassure her. "Tell me, is your grandchild crying now?"

"No."

"Then, does she look happy?"

"Why, yes! Yes, she is. She looks so happy,... whenever V visits her."

"And this V," Shadow went on. " ... does he look like a man who would make her cry?"

And to this, the woman became really emotional. Wiping away the tears that escaped her eyes, she said, "No. In fact, I knew it. I knew it in my bones that he would never do such a thing to her. I know he would make her happy and I know he would make her forget what happened to her in the past. I' am aware. I,... believe,... that V,... loves her. With all his heart."

"Then, keep on believing!" The familiar answered, putting her other paw on her left shoulder. "Believe that V would do everything you've said and more. He will make her,... the happiest woman on earth!"

"I understand!" Adelaide happily answered as she wiped her tears with the sleeves of her nightgown. "Thank you so much, mother! Oh, I missed you so much!"

"Oh!" Shadow was surprised when the old woman suddenly hugged her tightly. Adelaide, on the other hand, did not care ( or did not notice ), even for a second, that what she was feeling against her own body was thick, demon fur instead of actual human skin.

Shadow noticed Griffon pointing at something in the cupboard with his wing. And that's when a bright idea struck her head.

"I missed you too, dear child." Shadow cooed as she gently brushed Adelaide's silver gray hair with her large paw. "Now, if you may, I want you to do something for me, then I'll be off,..."

Meanwhile, back in your bedroom, the two familiars arrived just in time to see you giggling as you listened intently at V, who was now holding a large stuffed lamb that he took from your bed and making weird movements with it, like he was making a child laugh.

"The sheep were indeed very fierce, but if Psyche would wait until they came out of the bushes toward evening to rest beside the river," The poet read energetically as he noticed, at the corner of his eye, both Griffon and Shadow helping each other place the cup of the desired hot beverage on the table next to your bed. Nodding and humming in approval, he went on. " ... she could go into the thicket and find plenty of the golden wool hanging on the sharp briars."

You smiled as V threw the stuffed lamb and caught it in mid air, looking really engrossed in his story - telling.

It was getting really late, even Griffon and Shadow settled cozily next to you as you listened to the poet's tale. For a moment, you never noticed the time, or your own anxiety and insomnia, until V finally reached the ending of the story and the familiars’ soft snores reverberated inside the room.

" ... so all came to a most happy end. Love and the Soul had sought and, after sore trials, found each other, and that union could never be broken. For it is a difficult matter," V read in a whisper as he slowly closed the book. " ... to keep Love imprisoned. The end."

You couldn't take your eyes off him as if you were mesmerized by his words and his whole being. You clutched at the sheets and spoke softly, "It’s a beautiful story, V. Thank you so much,... for sharing it with me."

The poet smiled as he returned the book to his bag. "I'm glad you enjoyed it. Now, it is getting late, and - "

"Wait!" You interrupted him as you quickly grabbed the end of his sweater, preventing him from leaving.

He turned and looked down at you, his smile never leaving his kind features. "How can I be of service to you, my lady?"

"Will you listen to my story?" You asked him. "A different one."

"Well, of course. Let me," He uttered, lifting the sleeping Griffon and putting him on the chair he was sitting on. " ... just move this fellow so I could listen to you well." He, then, sat next to you.

You smiled, feeling safe and sound with the incredible warmth beside you. You couldn't believe it - V, sitting oh so close to you, inside your room, in the middle of the night,...

You almost chuckled at the thought of your grandma catching the two of you like this.

"Alright, let's hear it, your story." V whispered, his shoulder brushing against yours as he crossed his arms and made himself comfortable.

"Umm," You stammered, gulping down and clearing your throat to ease the nerves that suddenly overtook your senses. " ... it's fine, right? Me opening up to you?"

"As long as you're comfortable with it."

"Alright." You took a deep breath and looked once more at the hole in the ceiling. "I met this man, his name was Christopher Lancaster."

Of course, V thought as the feeling of dread filled his chest at the mere mention of the man who made you suffer in your former life through very frighteningly inhuman ways. It always has to be him,...

"For a time, we were very much in love. I was young, and I was very much in love with love." You confessed, scoffing right after at the mere absurdity of it all. "I honestly thought he was the one. He was young, and handsome, and talented, and, well, you could say he has everything in this world. But, I was wrong. He didn't have everything. He was asking for more." You looked down, fidgeting at the sheets. "He wanted to have me. You know what I'm saying?"

Oh, no, no, no, no, V thought helplessly as some unpleasant thoughts suddenly plagued his already overworked mind. Please, say you didn't! Please, say you didn't,...

"And you know what? I refused." You told him, and for a moment, V felt like he could already rest in peace, knowing that Lancaster was not able to lay a single finger on your skin. He turned and noticed you looking up at him with such wide and innocent eyes. "I refused him, V. And I didn't know why. I knew I loved him, he was everything I could ask for. But, I don't know why I did what I did.

"Then, he changed. He became violent and harsh. He humiliated me in front of others. He made fun of my family. He said I'm too domestic. Just because I refused to be intimate with him."

Those words back then. He said that, domestic.

So, that's what he meant!

For a while, V clutched angrily at the sheets of the bed, balling them into his left fist as he tried to control his anger. But, then again, he had to remind himself that he's not here to make matters worse.

He was here to make you feel better.

He was here to fulfill your wish.

"You know, I should've left him after that but, I was stupid enough to hold onto him. To hold onto the person who doesn't truly love me the way I loved him. I believed, for such a long time, that I could change his ways. That I could bring back the days when we were alright. Again, I was wrong. After everything I did for him, he still left me. He found another, someone who truly deserves him."

You were about to succumb to your weakness and let it all out in front of the one person you knew you could trust, when you heard him speak.

"You should be glad that he left you, then. A person,... who truly loves you,... would never, ever leave you for such a thing. There is a saying," V turned to you, brushing away, with his long fingers, the tears that your traitorous eyes let out. " ... love,... is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud." He, then, reached for your cheeks and brushed the remaining tears in them with his thumbs, making your face warm. "It is not rude, it is not self - seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs."

After that, he let go of your cheeks, only to pull you into his arms for an embrace you didn't know, didn't expect, you needed. And it made you even more emotional than ever before. Pulling him closer to you, you wrapped him in your arms, reciprocating the embrace, and buried your face in his chest, letting out the tears, and your burden, in him,...

... in the man you never knew would miraculously come into your life.

Feeling your trembling body against his, he tightened his embrace and buried his face in your fragrant hair. Rubbing your back and trying to soothe your tired body, he went on. "Love,... does not delight in evil,... but rejoices in the truth. It always protects,... always trusts,... always hopes,... always perseveres." V closed his eyes as he felt some tears of his own escaping him. I'm supposed to make you happy, not make you cry like this! "Seeing you happy,... is the only single thing in this world that keeps me going. So, please, smile," He removed his hands from you and cupped your cheeks once more. Looking deeply into your eyes, he gently laid his forehead against yours, the tender gesture finally making you smile despite all the tears. " ... and be happy. Don't ever blame yourself for what happened in the past. It was never your fault. Live for the people you love. Smile,... for there are people who truly loves you. And they would never leave you, no matter what. Don't forget about that."

With one last tear containing the remnants of your feelings for your former lover, you nodded and smiled, more than ready to do exactly what V has told you to do. He was right, there are people,... who truly loves you. There are people,... who would never leave you, no matter what.

There's always a special someone,...

.... who would stay with you,

... and love you,...

... no matter what life throws at you,...

... until the end of time.

You laid your hands against his, clutching them, and never letting them go. "So, I assume you would scold me if I say I was stupid for being so emotional?"

"I won't scold you." V answered, never taking his hands off your face. "We are all emotional beings, after all. Demon, or no."

"Stay with me, please. Until I fall asleep."

After finishing the chocolate drink that the familiars graciously made for you, you settled back to your bed, actually feeling sleepy. Tucking you in and stroking your hair, he laid down next to you and recited one last poem for the evening, hoping it would finally help you relax.

"O soft embalmer of the still midnight," he whispered, seeing you close your eyes and turn to him. " ... shutting, with careful fingers and benign,... our gloom - pleas'd eyes, embower'd from the light,... enshaded in forgetfulness divine." V's mouth opened in awe as your arm went around him, pulling him closer to your body. "O soothest sleep! If so it please thee,... close in midst of this thine hymn my willing eyes,... or wait the Amen, ere thy poppy throws around my bed its lulling charities. Then save me,... or the passed day will shine upon my pillow, breeding many woes." He closed his eyes, emulating your movements and pulling you close to his. "Save me from curious conscience,... that still lords its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole; turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,... and seal,... the hushed casket of my soul.

"Good night, my lady." He pressed his lips on your forehead, already hearing your soft breathing. "Parting is such sweet sorrow,... that I shall say good night 'till it be morrow. Let us meet,... in the land of dreams. In a beautiful garden,... somewhere only we know. See you soon, my love."

My love,...

Somehow, those words were the first things that came to your mind the moment you woke up. It's as if,... the gentle words were engraved on your mind, heart, and soul, making its presence known and not leaving you alone,...

Stretching your arms and yawning a lot, you realized that V was, of course, gone, and so were his familiars. And they didn't just leave, they even cleaned some of the mess from last night. The stuffed animals were carefully placed back to your shelves, the flower vase was back to your vanity table, even the curtain looked new.

You sighed, slightly feeling guilty that the night you spent with V has to end. You really enjoyed spending time with him, and you were able to relax and fall asleep without tossing and turning too much on your bed. You hoped that something like that would happen again, of V tapping into your window, in the middle of the night, and offering to read you stories once more as you sipped on the chocolate drink that Griffon and Shadow made for you. You hoped that he would stay with you and recite poems for you once more, until you fall asleep. You hoped that you could feel his arms around you again,...

As much as you wanted to stay in your bed and fondly think of the events that unfolded last night, the sun was already high up into the sky, and you still have lots of things to do. You swung your feet to the edge of the bed and reached for your neatly placed fluffy bunny slippers. You were about to make your way towards the bathroom to wash your face when you noticed something on the bedside table,...

***

❄ @la-vita , @dreaming-gamer , @clevermentalitybeliever , @birdgirl69 , and @v-vic . ❄

***

"Good morning, dearie!" Adelaide greeted you. "What do you want for - HEY!"

"I'll be back, gran!" You announced as you quickly made your way outside the house.

Still in your wool pajamas, you ran straight towards V's house and began knocking rapidly on his door. It was opened a few minutes later by the man, himself, who was still in his sleepwear and messy bed hair, as if he woke up just to answer you.

Fighting the urge to giggle at his unkempt, and yet adorable, appearance, you smiled at him and handed him a piece of paper. He took it and read it. The single word written in it still not registering in his mind, he asked you, " ... pardon?"

"You said, please, say yes." You excitedly informed him. "And I said, yes! I'm going to the New Year's Ball with you, V!"

It took the poet a full minute before he finally realized what you were talking about. And when he finally realized what your words truly meant, his eyes slowly widened and his mouth fell open in shock. He grabbed his messy hair with both hands and spoke, "That - that's your answer, right? You'll go to the Ball with me?"

"Hahaha! Of course, you silly poet!" You laughed as you threw yourself at him, hugging him and placing a tender kiss on his cheek. Oh, how sweet you smelled. What a nice morning, indeed! "See ya!"

And before V could even reciprocate with a kiss of his own, you took your hands off him, waved, and went back to your house.

Which was a good thing, seeing that he hasn't even gargled or brushed his teeth,...

***

❄❄❄

***

#devil may cry 5 #vitale sparda #three wishes #v x reader #v x you #chapter 8 #somewhere only we know #lily allen's somewhere only we know

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ladypyb · 4 years

Text

Snowballing Into The Heart

Rating: T (for a little bit of cursing)

Relationship/s: USUK, Brotherly AmeCan

Tags: hetaliaxmasevent, Cardverse, Meet-Cute (First Meetings), and a lot of snow XDD

Day 4 of HetaliaXmasEvent: Snowball fight | Skiing | Christmas without snow

|ao3|

(Ooohh man, it’s past midnight in my place. XDD I hope you enjoy it!!!)

In hindsight, Matthew shouldn't have gone to fetch a towel and leave him, the Prince of Spades, bored and alone near the Mages' Tower. He should have just called a servant.

Time passed onwards, as usual, its pace made Alfred wonder if they have the capability to change it. How curious it made him. And how desperate he was to hurry for the warmer days.

The prince liked winter. He didn't hate it. He didn't like like it, either. This was when the power of their kingdom had significant growth, after all. But Alfred didn't love the long cold nights in the season. He didn't outright adore the fact that he had to wear multiple, thick woolen jackets and heat-producing amulets that hinder his movement and stealth. Not to mention the tales about the cold season his mother told him in his childhood. Bad things happen to everyone in winter. Terribly bad things. Brrr!

He liked the powdery snow, though. Its color and often ethereal shine made the scenery look so pure. The dusting they made on the landscapes made him grin and jump into the freezing powder.

It itched him to jump in right now. Anything to go distract himself while Matthew began narrating to him the activities he had for the day. Often, he found his brother's tone monotonous when in duty. No, definitely not 'often' but 'always'. Yes, that's the right word.

"Remember not to touch anything, you might get a curse for even holding a pen that isn't yours. Don't stray away from the floating white lamps and proceed to the violets, the Head Mage told me the young fae tend to use play-magic there. Mother would kill both of us if you tried to pick a fight with one of the mages-"

Bla Bla Bla. The prince slumped against the cold brick of the wall, crossing his arms. What was the point of visiting the Magicians' Wing if they weren't even allowed to enter their laboratories? What was the goal of even doing biannual safety procedures with Alfred, the future King of Spades, if he wasn't the one doing the procedures?

In his head, his mother would definitely reply to him in her babytalk: "Aw, sugarplum, you are only needed to show your face and let the mages do the rest of the checking. It's theirs, after all. You wouldn't want to ruin their threshold and be painted as the villain, would you?"

... Yeah... Listening to Matthew's nagging would be better than their mother's overly-sweet babytalk. Both were sadistic in their own way but his brother's words were blunt, unlike the queen's underlying threats.

"-To stop... Are you listening to me, Al?"

He groaned in his head. "Yeah, I was." No, he definitely wasn't. "How about this tower?" Alfred gestured to the one behind him but kept his eyes on the soft, beckoning snow at their feet. Hmm... He looked up to his brother so quickly he felt his neck crack a bit. "Can we at least have permission to rest in somewhere warm rather than in their freezing gardens?" The garden wasn't biting in the least. He wore a heating amulet and multiple coats, Alfred was warm to the core and sweating inside his personal sauna.

Distract him, distract him, distract him. Alfred recited like a mantra in his head as he slowly crouched down to the soft ground, his eyes on his brother. As Matthew blinked at the tower's structure, the prince started to fist a ball of snow in his leather gloves.

Matthew studied the tower, contemplating. It was smaller than the other buildings on the property. The tower must be a storage room. The lights shining behind the elaborately framed windows stated otherwise, though.

"I don't know, Al. There might be someone important residing in the- Oomph!"

Something wooshed in the air! A cold and soft object hit the side of his jaw. Matthew paused and stared at the sitting and grinning person in front that was his brother. A snowball. Alfred hit him with a snowball. The prince guffawed heartily at his brother's expression of Thou-hast-betrayed-me-brother. Matthew's wide eyes turned into slits. This unbelievably childish tool-

Matthew bent low, scooped a handful of snow and-

"Hahahaha- Fwah!"

Bullseye into Alfred's mouth. Matthew smirked when the other began 'blech!'-ing and 'pswooh!'-ing out the melting snow out of his mouth. Heh, you aren't the only one who can throw snowballs, Alfred!

The blue-eyed prince stared at the violet-eyed ace with a sly look in his face. "You're on!"

Alfred scrambled onto the ground, embracing and creating a mound out of snow. He cupped a fistful and rotated it in his hands. He glanced back at his brother, crap, he's on his third ball! The prince started to quickly fist and cup the snow. The mound in front of him waned to his fear of losing.

No time! Alfred sprang to his feet and threw a snowball at his brother. On the face! Grunting, Matthew frowned and fired back at him. The prince dodged to the side as it almost hit his prized family jewels down below. Matthew cackled. Oh, man, this was war. A man doesn't aim for another guy's most sensitive area!

Then came the onslaught of the balls of snow. Missed and badly-aimed snowballs hit the walls, the hall near the entrance, and the plants carefully maintained in the garden. Bushes cracked and broke to the strength of their blows.

Passing servants and apprentices of mages paid them no mind as they passed by. It was no secret that both men in the royal family often behaved like children when they thought no one was looking. A few frowned at their display when they hit a third party, these occurrences were followed by a distracted 'Sorry!'.

Their roughhousing with the snow ended with a grand snowball from the prince to his brother on the stomach, sending poor Matthew falling on his back. Alfred fell to his knees, a goofy smile on his face in his triumph. He fell forward in exhaustion. Afterward, he moved to his side, panting.

Matthew managed to only hit him on his jaw and legs. Alfred hit him everywhere on his body with the help of his overzealous need to win every challenge and interest that crosses his path.

Matthew shuffled to stand, the other raised a brow at him, disbelieving. Alfred gave it all he had, ended up on the ground last and Matthew still stood up? What gives? He whined.

"Oh, don't be a baby. Stand up, you'll catch a cold." Matthew held his hand out to his brother which Alfred accepted. "Ugh," Matthew brushed off his clothes with his free hand, "I'm dripping. I'll never doubt these amulets, again."

Alfred flailed his arms like a dog, droplets flung everywhere. "Looks like it. Let's go ask for towels."

The older and logical of the two watched the other suspiciously. "No. You'll most likely slip away somewhere and get lost- "

"Impossible! I don't get lost."

"-Or cause some mischief on the way." Matthew crossed his arms, firm.

Alfred wiped his brow. "So are both just going to stand here? Baiting the cold and die of pneumonia?"

The ace pursed his lips. He clicked his tongue. "Fine," Alfred cheers at this, " But I'll fetch the towels. You," he gestured at Alfred, "Stay here."

The other pouted and kicked the accumulating snow below. Matthew enters into the open doors of the hallway. "Aww c'mon, Matt!"

"Don't. Go. Anywhere." The ace commanded as he eyed Alfred and continued down the hall.

Alfred clicked his tongue childishly. So what if he'd stray away from the directions sometimes, it wasn't like he'd easily die! The blessings from their clocks prevented that.

... He did oftentimes find himself suffering from a curse or two, managed to almost get assassinated, have been on the verge of death more than five times, and have been poisoned while eating street food. But Alfred survived!

He could almost hear Yao, the Jack, mumble beside his mother while tending his wounds or whatever harm he was inflicted, "With the amount of curiosity, and stubbornness you are born with, I could only pray to the Maker your rule would be as peaceful as it can be."

Alfred sighed, looking up he traced the flying bird overhead. The feathered animal circled the garden and perched atop a small roof of a window sill of the tower. He wished he was as free as the bird, free to go anywhere and able to do what he pleased.

He observed the little bird, bright orange stomach- A robin! How strange, robin birds weren't native to Spades, especially in one of Spades' northern areas. Alfred moved to spy under the windowsill, it was a few feet above his head but nothing could stop him.

When he craned his neck to observe the bird, he noticed a messy mop of golden hair near the windowpane. Someone was there- Oh Blessed Time!

Alfred ducked and made himself be one with the wall behind him. The windows opened with a clank! and the snow sprinkled on the prince's nose. His nostrils tickled. Ah- He wants to sneeze! Alfred pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth.

"-Damned pests. No wonder the potion did nothing! I should have known they'd place it in the wrong flask."

An accented voice of a man. It was so light and deep at the same time, it made Alfred wonder if the man swallowed a piccolo and a bass at the same time.

Light thumps and a resonating clink. "... What in the name of Time happened here?" The mystery man groaned. "Those freshmen! I can't believe- My roses!" The man stomped away from the window. The sound of heavy steps receded with a bang from a door.

The prince released a breath he was holding. That was so close. If the guy looked down, he'd see Alfred's nose and furred boots. He moved away from the wall. Finally able to ogle freely, he found two open flasks filled with mysterious liquids. One was changing colors rapidly while the other alternated between gold and silver.

The robin from before chirped and fluttered its wings. Oh no. Don't tell him the bird wants to- It glided down unto the windowsill with the two very open and unmistakably dangerous flasks.

"Oh, damn it!"

Alfred scrambled and raised his foot on the side of the brick wall. His gloved hands gripped the windowsill noisily, the robin squawked at him. The prince grunted as he set his elbows down near the flasks, he faced the bird's screeching. He shooed the orange robin with a dismissive hand.

It flapped its wings and nearly bit off his ears as it flew away from him and the flasks. He liked birds but he didn't like them mutated or dead.

Alfred banged his head and resisted to groan at the ridiculousness of his situation. His top half was rested atop a mage's windowsill in an effort to avoid an unwanted experiment. He didn't even know exactly why he ducked to be seen by one mage when didn't even bother to care for his image while playing in the snow with his brother.

He shifted an annoyed glance to the strange fluids. With their swirling and changing of colors, he thinks of them to be potions. They certainly resembled like potions. He sniffed at both of their opening; butter, lilies, and peach. Yep, definitely potions. There was no way liquids could change colors with just these ingredients.

"Hey! You there!" The same accented voice shouted below him. "What are you doing?"

There was disapproval in the voice. Alfred seemed reluctant to look at the man scolding him. He has had enough of it today! Alfred prevented a bird from destroying your potions. The prince turned his head to glare at the man, a scowl on his face.

Eh? His scorned expression dissipated into a daze.

Bright green eyes that were the shade of grass in summer framed by spun gold locks stood out from the man's white robe and soft snowy landscape. The guy had half of his face overrun with caterpillars- Wait, no. He just had large eyebrows. Surprisingly, it made the other look distinguished.

This guy must be the mage! The mage furrowed his brows and growled something Alfred couldn't hear. He raised his brow in confusion and held unto the sill with only an arm as the handsome man gestured his arm aimlessly... at Alfred?

What was he- Whack! Alfred's hold on the windowsill slipped.

"Aaaaaa- oof!" He crashed down on his back. Groaning, he placed his hand on his chest. Fragments of a snowball began melting to the power of the amulet under his coat. The dull pain that throbbed in his chest was nothing to the sharpness of blow to the side of his head. Did he hit his head when he fell...?

The mage's face swam into his blurry view. The expression of the mage full of concern was badly hidden through the annoyed curve of his lips. Alfred decided the guy was adorably handsome.

"... Are... kay... ?"

"Hn."

The green-eyed beauty touched his cheek. The prince moved into the chilled fingers. Aaah. He felt hot and cold at the same time.

"Hold... I... get... elp."

The angel's face blurred. Huh, did... Did Alfred lose his glasses when he fell?

He tried to focus on the other's fretting on him. Alfred's eyes closed, losing its strength to even move an eyelid. Darkness swallowed him and his consciousness.

Hm. It seems the Cupid from Hearts shot him in the chest with a snowball, instead of an arrow.

//end

#hetaliaxmasevent #hetalia #hetalia fanfiction #my fanfic #slightly usuk #usuk #brotherly bonding through fighting AmeCan #snowballs #a little magic #cardverse #meet cute #first meeting #APH America #hws america #APH England #hws england #APH Canada #hws canada #snowball fights

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random-imagines-blog · 5 years

Text

In Between Days {Kiernan Shipka x Platonic!Reader Oneshot}

Requested by: @h-a-j-i-m-e-ru Wordcount: 2422 Synopsis: Your best friend is away filming her hit Netflix show. You miss her and decide to do something about it.

Kiernan’s face finally came up, replacing the blue Skype loading screen. You could see your own face in the corner, much smaller than hers, and made yourself laugh by making a face at her. “And here I thought you were too busy out in Studio-land, earning your fortune.” You said, laying down on your bed. She rolled her eyes, shook her head and made a face back at you, making you laugh again. While she was distracted, you looked behind her to see a grey screen - she was probably in the middle of filming an interview or something, which made you feel a bit downhearted. “Are you ever coming home? Your mom misses you.”

“First of all, it’s Vancouver.” Kiernan said, tucking her blonde hair behind her ear. “Your hair looks cute, did you get it cut? And soon, I hope. There’s a couple more weeks of shooting left and then I can take a break.” You knew what she was doing - using the haircut thing to attempt to distract you from missing her. It never helped. Kiernan could act but she was never able to fool you. She smiled though, and that made you feel a bit better. She was happy - that’s all that really mattered.

“Kiernan, my hair always looks cute,” You joked, going along with her. You brought your legs up behind you, kicking at the air in the stereotypical female fashion. “You said break, that means you’re not going to be back for long, am I right?”

There was a pause as Kiernan looked past her phone at something, and then back to you. Icicles hung near your heart as you knew what her answer was going to be. You sighed before she even opened her mouth. “The break is only for two weeks...” She said nervously.

“You might as well start waving around a Canadian flag, you’re there enough. You know the national anthem yet? Lunch everyday is poutine and freedom? How is your igloo doing, is it warm enough?” You stuck your tongue out at her, making her roll her eyes.

“I think you’d actually like it up here. Vancouver is really nice - it’s a mix of city and nature, right on the water.” She said, enticing you. The thought was nice, actually. The fact that your best friend was working so far away made you realize that you were feeling stuck where you were at, and like your life wasn’t really moving anywhere. A plan started to hatch in your mind, and you had to turn your face to hide it from Kiernan.

“It sounds nice,” You said, rather flatly. You avoided looking into the webcam, and feigned like you heard something in the background. “You know, I think there’s someone at my door, and since I know it’s not you, it’s probably my dinner. You going to be around later?”

“I might be, text me first!” Kiernan said, leaning forward to look at you in her monitor, sensing that something was going on. “You aren’t very good at hiding things, I know all your tells.”

“Kiernan, I’m shocked and appalled that you think I would hide anything from you!” You acted dramatically, giving her your best Macauley Culken in Home Alone impression. You laughed afterwards, and hovered near the end call button. “Love you, talk to you later.”

You signed off of Skype, effectively getting rid of your friend for the next couple of hours. But you did open a couple of websites and started to do some researching.

“Kiernan...” Lucy Davis said, shuffling towards her young co-worker. After her came you, bent down low and hiding behind her dress, hand over your mouth to stiffle your giggles. It took all of your muscles not to burst out into laughter at the anticipation of seeing your best friend again. Kiernan was not expecting anything, as far as you knew, since you had skyped her the night before from your room, signing off just as your cab came up to take you to the airport so you could fly up to Canada for the next week. Much like Kiernan thought you would, you did find what you saw of Vancouver to be beautiful.

“Socks are a bit loose, they keep falling down,” You heard your friend telling the wardrobe woman. But she did eventually notice the woman who played her Aunt Hilda come into the room. “Morning, Lucy!” She said, cheerfully. “Your carrying a stowaway, I think.”

Your cue, you assumed. There was a moment of confusion when Lucy didn’t move out of the way quickly to expose you, so you stuck your head up over her shoulder and gave your friend the biggest grin that you could muster, and it was entirely real. The blonde gasped and jumped up from the chair where they were trying different length socks on her, in different colors, since apparently Sabrina is really into socks.

You shuffled past Lucy and gave your best friend a hug that took up most of your strength. This wasn’t very much since you were a bit jet-lagged and had to wake up early to take a cab to the studio and meet the people you talked to in order to let you onto the set in the first place.

You both wore the same perfume, and you could smell it on her while the two of you were so close. Kiernan was the first to pull away, look at you, shake her head, then hug you again. The wardrobe woman laughed and excused herself so that you two could have some time to catch up before the scene would begin to be shot, and Lucy left as well, claiming to need to go over her script again.

“You are actually here, in Vancouver?” Kiernan said, her expression a mixture of shock and happiness.

“There just so happened to be a couple of vacation days saved up, so I took them all now. Surprise!” That made Kiernan laugh and shake your arms to make sure that you really were there. “Later though, show me the set Miss Sabrina!” You insisted.

Forgetting about the socks, which were starting to fall down on her calfs and puddle around her ankles, Kiernan took your arm and started to show you around. There were plenty of people to meet, and things to see. It was a whirlwind adventure, being on a TV set like this. Too much was happening that it was hard to learn it all. You weren’t used to this hustle and bustle, even though your own job could be a bit busy at times.

“Your job is way cooler than mine,” You said, walking into Sabrina’s room. You made sure not to touch anything, because you figured that these people would be nitpicky about that. You whistled and settled your gaze back on your friend, who had her thinking face on. It was a face you recognized well, since her thinking got the two of you into trouble many times.

“They might let you be an extra, if you wanted to be. So you can maybe be in a school scene we’re shooting later!” It wasn’t a bad plan, and one that probably wouldn’t turn out to be troublesome so you eagerly agreed to it. It only took a second for Kiernan to grab your arm and drag you over to the director to ask them on your behalf.

It was soon time for your first scene. You weren’t a character that was even named, but you were put into a more trendy outfit and positioned down the hallway from where Kiernan’s character, and another girl you hadn’t been introduced to, were standing.

And then, it was go time. You started to walk down the hall, adjusting your backpack strap, doing your utmost not to look at the camera. The first half of it started off well, but when the camera went into the other actress’s face to get a clear look at her expression, Kiernan turned her head sharply to look at you, and made an ugly face. You attempted to keep your composure as you were walking, and you almost succeeded. Almost.

The bulky shoes that they put on your feet, some sort of heel because apparently people wore those everywhere these days, bumped into one another and you fell onto the floor, laughing in shock at the fall and in amusement at your friend’s face. You weren’t embarrassed or ashamed, but you did cross your eyes at Kiernan and blamed her for making you fall.

“Cut!” The director called out. “Tell me that it won’t happen again, we don’t need another long day.”

Kiernan was about to speak for you but you got onto your feet and smiled as sweetly as you could. “You got it boss!” You returned to where you were before walking onto the scene to get ready to do it again. You had no idea that just walking through a hallway in front of a camera could be so difficult. That it would play at your self-conscious like were you making an odd face, did you have a weird walk, were your shoes making squeaky sounds? Really, you had no idea how Kiernan did this so often.

You waited for the director to call action and walked out again. The scene went smoother this time, and you didn’t have to do a reshoot. Kiernan didn’t make any faces at you, or acknowledge you, though you could see that she angled her body so she would be able to see you walk past. Even that was nearly enough for you to start giggling but you held it all in, as painful as it was.

You had a couple of other scenes together, and were getting ready to film one of them now. It was during a party scene, so you could be more loose, you could smile and laugh. But you weren’t prepared for your best friend’s tricks.

“You better be on your best behavior.” The make-up artist said after sweeping a bit of powder onto your face to reduce any shine from the lights. “It annoys the director that you have more chemistry with Kiernan than any of her on-screen friends do.”

Kiernan and you really did have that connection. Which, of course, made it hard not to talk to her during shooting. She always seemed to catch your eye and you had to stop yourself from referencing a private joke or making one of the faces you knew would make her laugh. You knew it was probably hard for her too since the director always called her out on taking too many steps away from her co-stars towards you. Kiernan did her best to remain professional, since this was her career, but you quickly realized that acting wasn’t going to be in the cards for you after this.

The scene had to be re-shot five times before the Director finally pointed at you as you were talking in the background to one of the other extras, telling the story about the time that you and Kiernan went swimming when it was too chilly and ended up with blue lips. Kiernan had overheard what you were saying and laughed, which certainly was not in the script.

“You, you’re outta here.” You looked at the director to see that he was indeed pointing at you. The rest of the actors looked at you, and Kiernan whispered a sorry in your direction. In your defense, all you did was give a sheepish smile then made your way off of the set to get a cup of coffee. Helpful was the director’s assistant who came with you and explained that it wasn’t really your fault, but you did take responsibility anyhow. You were a distraction.

You met up with Kiernan in her trailer once she was done shooting the party scenes. The actress had all but run towards you, and wrapped her arms around you in a hug. “You didn’t deserve to get fired, I’m so sorry!” She rambled about how she was going to talk to the director tomorrow but you laughed and stopped her.

“You know me, I’m not great in front of cameras.” Your face scrunched up as you remembered some of the god-awful pictures that you two had taken together, which no one else in this world would ever see. “Kiernan, I came here to hang out with you, not to be on set. I’m totally fine with just hanging out with the wardrobe woman or making sure that everything catering makes is wonderful.”

“You sure?” Kiernan asked you, looking into your eyes to make sure that you were telling the truth. To be absolutely sure, she always knew exactly where to look.

“You know it,” You scoffed. Kiernan smiled, seeing that you were being honest with her, and hugged you again.

“It doesn’t mean that you can’t be around on set, you just can’t tell those embarrassing stories about me anymore.”

“It probably means that I can’t go on set since I’m ‘such a distraction’” You said the last three words in an imitation of the director that wasn’t entirely kind. “That’s okay though, I’ll just be surprised like everyone else when I binge your face on Netflix. Really though, it’s going to be so weird seeing me on TV.”

“You get used to it.” Kiernan laughed. “It gets less overwhelming over time. Are you sure you’re okay though?” She asked, still looking a little guilty.

“Psh,” You waved your hand. “This is just one of your many acting jobs. To be honest, there’s going to be so many directors out there who will love me and beg for me to do a scene with you, I might just overpower your career.” You joked, making Kiernan nudge you. She did smile though, which made you feel a bit better.

“You’re going to be my best friend forever, you know that?” She said, finally relaxing and sitting down on the bed of her trailer. Your legs followed hers and you sat down beside her, stretching out.

“You can’t get rid of me, duh.”

#Kiernan Shipka #Kiernan Shipka x reader #Kiernan Shipka oneshot #celebrity #celebrity oneshot #oneshot #oneshots #request #kiernans

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hailsuzalulu · 5 years

Text

The Cute Quirk Analyst

I took way too long to get anything at all out and I want to apologize to my Giftee @rvkiakuchiki, for having to deal with the fact that I am a horrible Santa. I’m hoping to make this a several parter because everything in life just seems to hate me. But so far this is what I have and I’m planning to update every chance I get the time

I am so so so so sorry for posting so late, but I hope you enjoy what I have.

“ I swear to god round-face, if you ask again about that damn secret santa i’m going to blast you sky high and not wait for you to float your ass down.” Bakugo growled, sending a signature glare to the shorter girl walking by his side.

“Don’t be such a stick in the mud Blasty, it’s a holiday tradition! There’s just something thrilling about not knowing who’s going to give you a present, it’s fun to see what people think about you.” Uraraka teased, jabbing her partner in the side with her elbow. Her grin could only be described as shit eating, to think she used to be the sweetest person that he knew. Being partners since UA really had changed her, maturing her from someone who was polite to everyone and overly bubbly, to someone who wasn’t afraid to throw sass and get tough when she needed to.

Bakugo huffed at the jab, focusing his attention on the scenery below him. People hustled around the streets, buying gifts for the holidays and going on window shopping dates. Snow slowly fell, a flake showing itself here or there. Ground Zero eyed the alley ways that were sure to be littered with villains just waiting for something sparkly to cross their paths. And today was their lucky day. A scream emanated from across the street where a jewelry store was getting robbed. The villain dashed out of the door, knocking people over as he ran down the street. A wicked grin spread across Bakugo’s face, the two heros shared a glance before taking of into action, jumping from roof to roof of the buildings, watching the movements of the villain. He was clearly an amature, his movements through the streets and alleyways were erratic, like he was making up where he ran on the fly. Ground Zero and Uravity followed him closely, hoping to trap him before he hurt anyone. They had practiced this maneuver several times, chasing low time villains throughout the abandoned alleyways until they reached a dead end. It minimized fighting, damage, and the possibility of civilians getting caught in the fray. He fell for it easily, skidding to a stop when Bakugo chased him to a wall, effectively trapping the villain.

“Geez, and I was really hoping for a real fight today.” Ground Zero spoke as he approached the villain, cracking his knuckles as he prepared to take the guy in. Uravity floated down beside him from the rooftop.

“Don’t be mean Zero.” Uravity sighed. If she was being honest she hoped for a fight too, but if that wasn’t the case then it meant far less paperwork, and that she was fine with. The villain took steps back as the heroes approached, the bag on his side jingling with the stolen jewelry. He was sweating buckets as the heroes came closer, distressed and cornered, he backed himself into the wall and then he froze. Now he had only one option, the one any cornered animal would use.

“Look out, he’s about to use his quirk.” A voice came over their coms, one that neither hero had heard before.

“Who the fuck-” Ground Zero began to ask, before he was cut off by being pulled violently toward the villain by his gauntlets. Instantly Bakugo set off explosions, splitting from the guy’s hold.

“His quirk is Magnetism. He can attract the metal in your gear.” The voice spoke again through the coms.

“Zero!” Uravity yelled as the guy pulled her towards him, her belt buckle the source of the magnetism, Bakugo leaped into action before she could fall into his hold, shooting forward with an explosion. He reared back to aim a punch at the villain, before getting stopped by the villain’s quirk. The metal of his gear was held in place by the magnet, stopping Bakugo from moving away to toward the villain.

“Ground Zero, distract him somehow. It’ll stop his quirk.” The voice said in his ear again. Bakugo let out a growl.

“I dunno who the fuck you are but you damn well better not be wrong about this.” He was out of options, not being able to move his body to attack left him with few options, the person on the other end of the communicator voicing the best option that came to mind. Ground Zero let off a loud explosion, catching the villain’s attention enough to break his concentration and let his quirk’s grip loose. Uravity used the chance to punch the villain and put him in cuffs. She stood up, the villain lying on the ground below her, and let out a relieved sigh. The heroes pulled the man to his feet, leading him down the alley towards the police sirens going off in the distance. After dealing with turning the villain into the police, the hero’s checked the time to realize their patrol shift was up. They both headed back to the agency, and unfortunately, had paperwork waiting for them both.

“Hey Bakubro, are you ready for the secret santa?” Kirishima asked, leaning his body weight against the hero sitting at his desk. Bakugo straightened his posture under the weight of who he could only call his best friend.

“I’m not doing it.” He grumbled, reading over his progress on the report before sighing and turning in his chair to face Kirishima, he needed a break anyways.

“How come? You gotta do it, it’s part of the holiday fun!” Kirishima exclaimed, his smile blinding.

“Because I don’t want to.” Bakugo responded nonchalantly. He reached back to pick up the coffee cup from his desk, a plain white mug with the words ‘Fuck off’ on the bottom, displaying his mood to any bitch that watched him take a sip. Bakugo downed the rest of the caffeinated liquid, scowling at the taste of cold coffee.

“Strange, I thought Uraraka told me that you were doing the secret santa this year.” Kirishima muttered, scratching the back of his head.

Bakugo’s back cracked as he stood and stretched, moving his head side to side to pop his stiff neck as well. “I need more coffee.” He groaned, heading for the employee lounge to make another cup. Hopefully one more would be enough to get him through the day.

“You should probably get something else man, that much caffeine will keep you up all night.” Kirishima insisted, following Bakugo through the office. It was late already, maybe an hour and a half before everyone started to go home. The sun outside the large office windows was close to beginning to set, the sky a nice yellow color.

Bakugo responded with a grunt, knowing that Kirishima was right, but he was too tired to care. Who would have thought that paperwork could make someone so tired, way more tired than the several small time villains he took down over the day. There weren’t even any damages or casualties for any of them! If that was the case the paperwork and reports would have doubled, maybe tripled in size. No one ever told him in UA that being a hero required so much awful desk work.

Tiredly Bakugo took the kettle off the stove and filled it with water, setting it back on the burner, he turned of the flames and leaned against the counter to wait for the shitting thing to go off. Damn office didn’t even have the good kind of coffee, not even a coffee maker, just that instant crap along with shitty powdered creamer. It was annoying, such a high time hero agency didn’t even spend the little bit of extra money on a fucking coffee maker? Fucking cheapskates. To the side he could hear Kirishima digging in the fridge for something, probably a snack that he brought that someone had taken or moved without his permission.

“Oh, Bakugo there you are!” A bubbly voice broke the mild silence in the room.

“What do you want 3D printer?” Bakugo asked, greeting Yaoyorozu as she walked into the room. She didn’t even react to the nickname, used to what Bakugo called everyone at this point.

“I’ve been looking for you everywhere! You need to pick your person for the secret santa.” She explained, a basket with folded pieces of paper in it.

“I’m not doing it.” Was his simple answer. The kettle began to scream, signaling the boiling of the water. Bakugo turned off the burner and poured the hot water into his mug, reaching for the coffee powder on the shelf above.

“Your name is in the drawing.” Yaoyorozu pointed out, holding the basket out to Bakugo.

“I didn’t put it in.” He growled, beginning to get pissed at how much people were asking him about this fucking event. Then it clicked, “Fucking round face.” Bakugo sighed and turned back to Momo. “I’m dropping out then.”

“You can’t, then that leaves someone without a gift.” Momo pushed the basket closer to Bakugo’s chest. “ Just do it Bakugo?” She pleaded, giving a small smile in hopes that it would get the temperamental hero in front of her to give in.

“Do it man! It’s fun!” Kirishima encouraged, holding up his own slip of paper between two fingers.

“Fine! I’ll fucking do it. A gift card should work just fine for anyone right.” Bakugo grumbled, shoving his hand into the basket and pulling out the first slip of paper he grabbed. Unfolding the slip revealed the name “Who the hell is Izuku Midoriya?”

“T-That would be me.” A small voice stuttered from the doorway, a mass of green hair and star like freckles making its mark on everyone in the room. Mostly Bakugo, because damn was he cute. Fuck! No! Stop thinking like that! You don’t even know him!

Uraraka peeked from behind the other, her face like the cat who caught the mouse. And Bakugo was the mouse, because he fell right into her clutches, and that pissed him off.

“When I get my hands on you, you’re gonna regret it.” He growled, but the threat was met by snickering from the bubble faced girl who knew she was won the fight for now.

“Oh c’mon Blasty. Put the aggression in your pocket and meet our new team member!” She exclaimed, patting the nervous looking man on the back.

“H-Hi.” Midoriya stuttered, smiling nervously and giving a little wave.

“He’s a quirk analyst! He’s the one that warned us during that one fight.” Uraraka smiled, pulling Midoriya closer to her in a friendly side hug. Midoriya flushed at the contact, fiddling with the name tag that hung around his neck. Several pens and pencils were clipped to the lanyard, along with a few hero buttons, among them being All Might, Ingenium, Froppy, and Ground Zero. This guy was a nerd wasn’t he. Bakugo turned to finish making his coffee, scowling at the water in his mug that had cooled significantly by this point. He glanced at the jar of coffee powder in his hand and finally decided against it, putting the jar back and instead grabbing some green tea. Cooling tea at least tasted better than cooling coffee, that shit just tasted nasty.

“What’s a quirk analyst?” Kirishima asked, confusion written all over his face.

“It’s someone who analyzes quirks and figures out how they work. Most of the time people in the profession have analyzing quirks that can help them better understand what’s going on in a person’s body when they use their quirks. I’ve actually been very eager to learn more about all of your quirks, more than I already have that is.” Midoriya explained, still playing with his name tag. He seemed a bit less nervous now, good, people who were constantly nervous got annoying real fast.

Bakugo took a sip of his tea, throwing out the used tea bag. Thank god the water was still warm, anything as disappointing as cold tea would throw off his already teetering mood even more.

“More than you already have?” Momo asked, setting the basket of names on the table and taking a seat in one of the uncomfortable chairs.

“Um, I’ve kinda already studied them quite a lot. I watch several news feeds and just about any footage of uses of your quirks that I can find and then I figure out whatever I can from those bits of information. I know the basics at least of how your quirks work.” Midoriya muttered in response.

“Oh! Oh! Do me! What do you know about me?” Kirishima jumped at the chance to see what Midoriya knew about him. Damn eager idiot.

“Let me see…” Midoriya trailed off, reaching behind him and pulling a worn notebook from his back pocket. He quickly flipped through the pages until he found the one titled “Red Riot, Quirk: Hardening. You can harden your body to withstand almost any attack, and very few singular attacks have knocked you off your feet in that state let alone got the chance to harm you. Prolonged use of your quirk weakens your ability to use it, and over time of taking multiple hard hits it will begin to fail. Your body becomes very sharp when you use your quirk and that itself can be used a weapon. Hand to hand combat has been growing better and better since UA and by now you’re a very hard hitter that can be useful in both defense, rescue, and attack positions as a hero.” Midoriya read off, drifting into a bit of a muttering state.

“Wow, you really do know your stuff!” Kirishima said, amazed at just how much this guy knew about his quirk.

“It’s not really much, I just observe what I can and write down what I see.” He flushed, closing the notebook and shoving it back into his back pocket. “ I hope that I can help all of you, especially when it comes to villains. Thank you for allowing me to work with you all.” Midoriya bowed, smiling before taking his leave.

“He seems cool.” Kirishima commented enthusiastically

“Seems like a nerd to me.” Bakugo retorted, taking another sip of his tea, using his other hand to rub his aching head.

“Well, you’re not wrong.” Uraraka interjected. “He’s so nice though, and super nice. You could learn a thing or two from him hot head.” She smirked. Her shitty bubbly face pissed him off, but he didn’t feel like doing anything about it now, he was way too tired.

“Shut up rosy cheeks.” Bakugo retorted, wanting nothing more than to be home right now. “I need to finish that last report, but mark my words, tomorrow I’m gonna kick your ass in sparring.” He passed a light glare at Uraraka as he passed her.

“Just try it Fireworks!” She called out the door toward Bakugo’s retreating form.

#bnha #boku no hero academia #bakudeku #bakugo katsuki #izuku midoriya #this is so bad!#i lowkey hate this

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turtle-steverogers · 5 years

Text

Snow Day

skeet skeet on the yeet Emelia and Andrew are back i love these kids

warnings: none

ship: ralbert

editing: no its kinda eh

Race and Albert laid tangled together under their warm blankets, watching quietly as snow fell in sheets outside the window. It was 9 am on a Tuesday, really they should be up by now, doing something productive. But Andrew and Emelia had the day off of school and Race wasn’t needed for work due to the weather, so they couldn’t seem to find the motivation to get up.

Albert tucked his chin further into Race’s neck, humming softly, “It’s really coming down out there,” He mumbled.

Race shifted so that Albert was laying across his chest instead and sighed, “Yeah, s’gonna be fun to shovel up.”

“Aye, we’ll make a game of it,” Albert said, lightly, “Have the kids help us. They’re six, that’s old enough to impart child labor onto, right?”

Race laughed, “Oh, for sure,” he paused when the sound of footsteps rumbled outside their door, “Speak of the devils.”

Their bedroom door burst open and Andrew and Emelia ran in, bounding onto the bed, “It’s snoooowing!” Both children shouted, jumping up and down and effectively breaking Albert and Race apart.

“It sure is, kiddos,” Race said, sitting up and reaching out to pull Emelia onto the bed in between him and Albert.

Albert snatched Andrew out of the air, mid-jump, and placed him on his lap, “You excited to have the day off?”

Andrew and Emelia nodded vigorously, grinning widely, revealing matching missing teeth.

“Can we build snowmen and drink hot cocoa and oh! Ride our sleds?” Emelia asked, enthusiastically.

“Absolutely, bug,” Race said, brushing some of her tangled hair out of her eyes, “But first, you two have to help Daddy and I shovel.”

Emelia and Andrew pouted, but surprisingly didn’t argue, “Okay, Papa,” Andrew said, crawling off of Albert’s lap and sitting cross legged next to Emelia, “But can you make pancakes for breakfast?”

Race and Albert exchanged glances, making a silent agreement. Albert smiled, already swinging his legs out of bed, “I think that can be arranged. Go with Daddy to get into your snow clothes first, though.”

Thirty minutes later, all four of them were fed and geared up, trudging out of the garage with shovels in hand. Emelia and Andrew were each holding colorful sand shovels they had bought the Summer previous when they went to the beach, and although they weren’t the most sufficient for shoveling snow, they worked. Albert and Race were planning on doing the brunt of the work, anyway.

“Andrew, you go start helping Papa at the end of the driveway, me and Em will work up here,” Albert said, already beginning to shovel snow off the pavement. Andrew nodded, hoisting his shovel over his shoulder to mirror Race. Race smirked at his son and the two of them trotted to the end of the driveway and began shoveling.

Twenty minutes passed with no noise other than the sound of shovels scraping ice. Race reached up to wipe some cold sweat off his forehead, feeling slightly spent. He always forgot how much work shoveling snow was. He stood up straighter, feeling his back crack from being slouched over so long, and watched as Andrew diligently shoveled small amounts of snow onto the grass.

“You’re being a trouper, bud,” He praised, earning a smile from Andrew.

“I know! I’m doing good, just like you,” Andrew piped back and Race grinned fondly at him.

“You sure are, dude, almost earned your hot-” He was cut off by snow hitting him in the back of the neck. He resisted the urge to curse as he stumbled forward from the impact and whipped around to see Albert, holding another snowball. He looked entirely too proud of himself and Emelia was doubled over giggling next to him.

“Oh, you are in for it,” Race warned him, reached down to pick up a handful of snow. He balled it up haphazardly and chucked it, hard, at Albert, who dodged it easily.

“That the best you got?” He challenged.

Race glared at him, “Andrew,” he said, not breaking eye contact with his husband, who was resisting the urge to laugh.

“What?” Andrew asked, looking between him and Albert innocently.

“Give me your shovel,” Andrew held the bright orange shovel out for him, which Race took wordlessly. He bent down, making a show of picking up a large amount of snow.

Albert furrowed his eyebrows, watching in confusion as Race strolled closer to him. His eyes widened as Race lifted the shovel behind him and he only had a moment to shield his head as Race launched the snow at him.

Albert staggered backwards, shaking snow furiously out of his hair. He lost balance, falling unceremoniously into the snow and Race laughed, Emelia and Andrew joining in.

“Daddy,” Emelia shrieked, “Papa got you good!”

“Mhmm, but now Papa’s in trouble,” Albert said, pushing himself onto his knees and lunging forward at Race, tackling him down into the snow. Race let out a shout of surprise and he reached out blindly to grab a small handful of snow, shoving it into Albert’s eyes.

Albert wiped the snow away hastily and scrambled off of Race, picking up Emelia and running behind one of the snow mounds they had made, yelling, “Snowball fight!”

Race grabbed Andrew, pulling him behind one of their mounds. They quickly produced a small pile of snowballs and ran out, making a beeline toward where Albert and Emelia were sheltered.

The four of them launched snowballs at the other team, until Andrew shouted, “Every man for himself!”

Snow was flying everywhere, dissolving into powder and seeping through jackets. They all fought until they were panting and laughing on the ground.

“Snow angels!” Emelia exclaimed, waving her arms and legs to create a lopsided angel. She stood to look at her work, “Look Daddy, Papa, look!”

Race and Albert lifted their heads from their places in the snow, “Looks awesome, darling.” Albert complimented.

“Papa,” Andrew whined, laying himself dramatically across Race’s stomach, “I’m cold!”

“Alright, man, let’s get you in,” Race said, wrapping his arms around his son and standing up, tossing Andrew over his shoulder.

Andrew laughed flailing his arms about wildly, “Daddy,” he yelped, reaching out for Albert, “Save me!”

“I gotcha, slugger,” Albert said, plucking him off of Race’s shoulder and propping him on his hip.

Emelia ran over to Race, raising her arms in question. Race picked her up, “Ready for hot cocoa, love?”

“Yeah!” She twisted around to look at her twin, “Andrew it’s hot cocoa time!”

Andrew cheered, as Albert put him down on the welcome mat inside the house.

“Papa’s gonna help you guys outta your wet clothes and into some cozy ones, while I make the hot cocoa, okay?”

“Okay!”

Race assisted the two of them in changing back into their pajamas, then sent them up to Albert while he threw their snow clothes into the dryer so that they could be used again later. When he got to the living room, he discovered Albert, Andrew, and Emelia already cuddled on the couch, sipping from mugs while they watched the beginning of The Polar Express. There was a mug waiting for him on the coffee table and he picked it up, settling next to Albert on the cushions.

He tucked his legs under him, sipping his hot cocoa as he nestled into Albert’s side, “Thanks for the cocoa, babe.”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Oh, and by the way,” Race whispered so Andrew and Emelia couldn’t hear, “I totally won that snowball fight.”

Albert let out an offended squawk, “You did not!”

“I did, too.”

they’re still literal children i stg

thanks for reading, chiefs

hmu to be added to my tag

TAG LIST: @bencookisagod @we-dont-sell-papes @suddenly-im-respecsable

@aw-jus-let-em-try @well-the-kids-do-too @spot-conlon-king-of-brooklyn @thatpoorguysheadisspinning @spec-s-pecs

@andthewoildwillknow @the-newsies-justice-for-zas-blog @sunshine-e-cigarettes @have-we-got-news-for-you @musical-shitposts @thebroadwayaesthetic

@thomasbeingthomas

@irondad-spiderson-duo

@snakesarenonexistent

@i-got-no-clue-what-im-doing

@kpop-kk

@mentallytiredgoat

@yxseminx

@be-more-chill-evan-hansen

@stopthe-presses

@elmers-half-a-cup

@and-i-lostmy-shoe

@spot-me50-papes

@honeynutpoptarts

#newsies fic #newsies #ralbert #racetrack higgins #albert dasilva #chaotic boys #chaotic dads

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oh-law-d-he-comin · 5 years

Text

DECK Prompts, Day 2

September, Year 1

Law is 11, and all morning one thought has been on his mind. Gryffindor. I'm gonna be in Gryffindor. It's there when he fumbles the barrier-crossing at King’s Cross and slams into a mere brick wall, making his first ride one in the staff car, getting his head checked for concussions. It's there when he blows his allowance on the food cart right before the Express reaches its destination, chocolates and jellybeans spilling from his arms as he hurries after the crowd. It's there when he gets scolded for the first time (but certainly not the last), chatting at a nearby student during the sorting ceremony. (It doesn't count, he assures himself. What are they gonna do, take points from a House he hasn't been placed in yet?)

It's nothing big, he just considers himself pretty brave, or foolhardy, or both, and to be honest that's the same as half the kids there already. His mother was a Gryffindor, a Head Girl in her time no less (though if push came to shove he wouldn't mind Ravenclaw, his father's house). Besides, really he just likes the colors. If he ended up anywhere else he'd have to switch his favorite scarf, and what's he supposed to do about his eyes?

“Law Kiyuu!” rings out the call, and he is so glad they didn't use his full name, enough that it overrides sorting excitement for a moment. Maybe coming here with the teachers was good luck? Most of them seem nice, if not exasperated, but he knows he has that effect on people, especially adults, which is weird because they should be smarter than the kids and why don't they appreciate his facts then? But the one lady was really nice about listening to his tirade on necromancy, which has been on his mind recently after Drav showed him that book and-

He's on the stage before he knows it, and now that he is, there's no time to waste. Law looks out into the crowd, beaming, and jams the Sorting Hat on so hard it covers half his face. He doesn't have to, though. The moment it even comes close to his head, the hat’s mind is made:

“SLYTHERIN!”

That's right, Gryffind- wait wait wait, excuse me? He pauses halfway through putting the hat down and slams it back on, flailing an arm out at the teacher trying to stop him. What, no deliberating? No, I don't know, taking my opinion into account? Ravenclaw I'd get, Hufflepuff maybe, but the snake emporium??? Was I thinking too much about Corvy? Do you have screws loose in your nonexistent head?

“If you have a stick of celery, half an onion, and one carrot, but a pile of tomatoes, what flavor is the soup going to end up?”

...What?

The hat huffs irritably. “You have dreams, yes? Like everyone else? The difference between them and you is simply that one day, young man, you will-”

And then the hat is ripped off his head, he gets a very stern warning, and Law has to find a new favorite scarf.

September, Year 2

Law is 12, and he's got a cat! A black kitten, the kind that suits him in both wizard and Muggle dress, a very nice kitty who's large and fluffy and follows him around everywhere he goes (and he always has been a sucker for aesthetics). His housemates attribute the unnerving upturn in mood to the fluffball bearing some weird Muggle name, and they're right: for the first two months back, he doesn't leave the cat behind for anything, not even Transfiguration.

Even for Hogwarts, the kid is kind of weird. There's whispers that his summer job is at the Ministry, that his fingers were lost while encountering a ghoul, that he likes Defense Against the Dark Arts so much because he can come up with ways to counter the counters. His best buddy is a purebred Slytherin, heir to a noble estate, a researcher of necromancy. Thrice he's been caught wandering into the forest, the castle ghosts avoid him lest he trap them in conversation again, he notices things too much and holds his tongue too little. Most of all, the shining silver and green scarf feels wrong on that smiling face. It's unnerving.

So he's friends with his cat, and his “vampire” (as he so kindly calls her), and his parents, who have gotten him a record for “most Howlers sent in a year”. And he never ever stops trying to be friends with the rest of the school.

January, Year 3

“If you put me on that broom I will die,” Law proudly asserts, digging his heels into the ground and scratching futilely at the wall in an attempt to hold on. He's 13 now, and this is shaping up to be the third year in a row he'll fail Flying—even now he's out after classes getting an unsuccessful bonus lesson. “There are sixty-one ways magical flight can go wrong and I'm not even talking about the individual kinds of injuries and sure, you'd think what's a little more to the guy who broke every limb in his body back in October then tripped down the stairs the moment he got out of the med bay but I draw the line at three things and they are brooms, bugs, and milk, which probably explains the broken bones but luckily they will not be broken today!”

“At this rate you'll never be accepted into an Apparition class, you know.” The flying teacher sighs and rubs her temples, letting go of the boy and watching as he instantly sinks to the ground with the broom he's been given. I don't get paid enough for this.

“Perfectly fine by me! Do you know how easily the human body can stop working? Leave an arm behind, that's one thing, but what if you splinch a lung or your cerebellum or half your blood and whoa, shazam, dead witchard on the floor! I was born with feet and they still work and I use them and I'll keep using them, all the more powder or brooms or whatever for the rest of-” He cuts off with a yelp as he’s levitated nearly ten feet in the air, making comically ineffective swimming motions in an attempt to get back down.

“Ma'am! Teach! I am begging you to let me down, this is a once in a lifetime plea, please for the love of all that is good and holy and you know what I'll also invoke the dark and unholy for this one, please!”

“Calm down, Mr. Kiyuu, you are perfectly safe. This is simply to get you used to being in the air, nothing more.” She's perfectly calm, but Law isn't—he drops the broom, replaces it in his hand with a wand, frantically whispers a series of words.

1) Law Kiyuu spends the next two weeks in the hospital wing recovering from no less than six fractured bones and a concussion, sustained in his fall from over five meters up.

2) A new effect of a failed Stunning Spell is recorded in the books, and flying lessons for the quarter are finished by a substitute teacher.

3) Slytherin never recovers from the points lost, and finishes the year dead last in the House Cup.

March, Year 4

Law is 14, and he is standing in the boy’s bathroom, and his wand is shooting sparks like a particularly rambunctious firework from where it is just about snapped in two. The fountain, two shower heads, and a whole row of sinks are busy covering the floor in water, having fought a valiant battle against the wand and lost. Draven and Tsubasa are shooting a mixture of disappointed and shocked glares at him from the entrance, and as far as he can tell it looks like they're debating whether or not to leave him for the wolves.

He needed a new wand anyways, he thinks. The old one didn't vibe with him.

The disappointment radiates off Ollivander in waves when the boy walks in, sheepishly placing two halves of a wand on the counter. “I, um! It's broken!” he announces in an uncharacteristically short statement.

“I can see that. What torture have you put your poor friend through?” the man asks, tracing one of the many scratches in the wood with a sigh.

“So before I say anything, it's not my fault, which is to say it's sort of my fault, but only sort of, mind you! And if it helps the other guy got it way worse- not a real guy either, which is a relief from an I-don't-wanna-go-to-prison standpoint, but perhaps not from a place of my pride, but neither of those are the point. I understand that this is a positively unforgivable crime, simple unbelievable, totally unacceptable, and yet! I implore a new wand from thee.”

Ollivander says nothing, simply lining a row of boxes up before Law with a look that says Next time you will be banned from the shop. Fluent in cold gazes by now, Law merely nods enthusiastically and begins going through his choices.

“Yes? Yeah? This one?”

“Certainly not.”

“It's gotta be this one, it's making noises, none of the other ones did, oh hey, is that smoke?”

“Noises of discomfort, Mr. Kiyuu. Next.”

“This one! I am so sorry about your table, but you saw the sparks, it's my best friend already!”

“...Black walnut… dragon heartstring… thirteen and a half inches… flexible… yes, I suppose it would work. Do that again, this time away from the flammable objects.”

Law concentrates on the wand and does the theatrical swishy motion he's been doing, letting out a stream of bright sparks. Look at it! It's got to be his, it already knows what he's going to be using it for! He glances back up.

“Dragon… like the last one, right? Is it still okay? Will this one blow up too, because that'd be a shame, it seems so smart and I can appreciate another brain even if it's not a physical brain brain because even without neurons I bet it's better than mine.”

“Yes, Hebridean Black to be precise. Quite frankly I cannot imagine any other core, ah, working with you.”

When he returns to the dorm, several coins lighter but weighed down with sweets and japery supplies galore, Draven lends him her book on wand materials as he recounts the day’s adventures. Dragon heartstrings are dramatic, suitable for flashy spells and temperamental wielders, it says. Oh.

November, Year 5

It's Defense Against the Dark Arts time, and Law is now 15, and he is so incredibly stoked to be learning about dementors. They're dark! They wear cool hooded cloaks! They kill people! The cure is chocolate! If it were a slightly different timeline, he might dare say kin. (He still would, his Muggleborn parents have nothing against the Internet, it's just that nobody would understand.)

The students line up to try and fire off a Patronus, and even as he throws off someone's happy thought with overexcited jumping about, Law is totally in his element. He all but pushes the student before him out of the way as they finish, pulling a memory of New Year's morning with family to the front of his mind and brandishing his wand with a shout (for good measure). A cat jumps from the tip, glowing silver like the other apparitions yet dark enough to obviously be a black one. It fizzles out partway across the room, but it's stunningly similar to Law’s own kitty, enough that for a moment he's worried Ryuk is dead and that was a ghost.

Expecto Patronum becomes his favorite spell, practiced late at night as his dormmates throw pillows at him to shut off the glow. “What's better than one cat but two cats?” is his reply every time he fires off another unnecessary burst of joyous thoughts and watches Ryuk’s confused sniffing at a light doppelgänger. He's got a lot of joyous thoughts, so this can go all night!

It actually goes three nights before Law gets bored. Which is good, because the dormmates were starting to pay attention during Herbology and Potions whenever poison came up.

February, Year 6

Law is 16, and it's Valentine’s Day, and all week long he has been waiting for chocolate time to roll around. So right now he should be drowning his nonexistent sorrows in cacao and caffeine and endless amounts of sugar, clearly.

Instead he is in the fucking Forbidden Forest, holding a fucking shovel, burying a fucking body with his best friends. What a great team bonding activity!

To make it clear, he did not kill this body. None of them killed this body. They simply… acquired it from Drav’s father, as a… Christmas gift? or something like that, and something was said and prides were insulted and mistakes were made and they have just witnessed (read: done) a deeply traumatic attempt at raising the dead. The details are hazy around the edges, and to be honest Law couldn't care less about how they got into this, only how they'll get out of it.

“Let's feed it to something,” he whines into his shovel, hands aching and the usually calming sounds of the forest only irritations to his ears. “Aren't there supposed to be spiders in this here woods? It's not like anyone comes in here often enough to matter, we could just leave it in a ditch and go heeeere spidey spidey and never have to touch another six foot hole ever again until we go graverobbing next time.”

“Excellent idea,” Tsubasa deadpans back. “Let's feed it to a something that would also see us as food.”

“C’mooooon, haven't you ever seen zombie movies? They always go for the weakest one, which is by default the literal dead guy, so we'd be home free before anything even thought about coming after us-”

A pebble thunks against his hand, thrown from inside the hole. “Less talking, more digging, Law. While this corpse may be under my possession, you had a hand in requiring this labor, I would hope you have enough responsibility to own up to it.”

Law groans, resumes poking at the dirt, and an hour later the deed is done. Mr. Corpse has been laid to rest, never to walk again.

Until three seconds later, when the soil starts shifting. Correction: Mr. Zombie. (Double correction: Mr. Inferius.)

All three manage not to scream at the sudden movement, but they do share looks conveying something along the lines of what the hell. “So, did you say, making Inferi might have a time lag or something along those lines did you say that Ms. Countess or is this a Bad Thing or is there a time lag and this is also coincidentally a bad thing…?”

“Indeed, I would presume this is a “bad thing”, as you put it.” A hand pokes up out of the recently overturned dirt, waving almost comically in the air. The children book it.

...It's probably okay! They haven't heard any tales of the walking dead recently—even if the teachers are starting to suspect things from their local serial trespasser staying a stone’s throw away from the forest no matter what.

September, Year 7

Law is 17 now, and it's his first year here, he thinks? Huh, that's weird, the doors won't open… and hey, those must be the other kids!

A strangely unthreatening, fuzzy mascot chortles from its spot atop the stage. “I'm your new headmaster now—and we're going to play a game!”

God FUCKING dammit.

#prompt week #!#ooc

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dr-gloom · 5 years

Text

The Makings of Greatness: Chapter 1

Imma try to schedule these so they’re posting within like 5 minutes of each other. Hopefully it isn’t too spam-y

Fandom: Sanders’ Sides

Pairing: platonic logince, platonic moxiety, platonic anxeit, familial ThVi

Tags/Warnings (for this chapter): breaking the law, slight father-son argument, aliens

Ko-fi

AO3

Masterlist

Prologue Ch 1 Ch 2 Ch 3 Ch 4 Ch 5 Ch 6 Ch 7 Ch 8 Ch 9 Ch 10 Ch 11 Ch 12 Ch 13 Ch 14 Ch 15 Ch 16 Ch 17

12 Years Later….

Virgil grinned as he sailed through the air, the wind whipping at his shirt, his jacket, his hair. He gripped the metal rail of his solar surfer tightly, taking in the ground rushing by under his feet, the gentle flapping of his hand-stitched solar sail.

He’d made his solar surfer a year or so ago from scrap metal and bits of scrap solar sails he found lying around. The body of the surfer itself was essentially a metal slab - well, several smaller slabs soldered together - shaped much like a surfboard with a solar powered thruster underneath, in the back. A joint mechanism connected the sail’s mast to the body, and a thinner railing curved along both sides of the sail horizontally for Virgil to hold and steer the direction of the surfer.

Light flickered throughout the hexagonal pattern of the sail, lighting the fabric and indicating its power. A breeze pulled the sail to the left and Virgil yanked it back into place with his guiding rail. The surfer dipped as Virgil left solid ground, sailing over a canyon. He steadied the craft, shifting his grip and taking a deep breath.

This is where he felt the most free, the most real. Here, sailing through the air at incredible speeds, he didn’t have to think about his life. He didn’t have to watch his dad run himself ragged trying to keep the Inn open. He didn’t have to mull over the fact that, as far as he knew, he and his dad were the only humans on Montressor, his home planet. He didn’t have to see the ghost of his pa everywhere he looked. He didn’t have to think. The soft roar of his solar surfer’s thruster and the wind rushing in his ears blocked out all thoughts, all negative feelings, until all there was left to focus on was the absolute freedom of flying. Being unbound from the struggles of daily life and hardships left unresolved.

Virgil took a hard turn, rising up into the clouds. He shot through the white fluff, coming out the other side with a smirk. He gave a brief glance to the ground far below and looked forward once again, making a split-second decision. Virgil shifted his right foot back, heel pressing into the button behind him that would collapse the solar sail. The sail’s post folds, bringing the cloth down with it to press against the surfer’s metal surface, and Virgil’s ascent stills. He throws his arms out as his body angles parallel to the ground, closing his eyes.

His body falls back and he crosses his arms over his chest, tucking them close to his body. He begins to rapidly descend from the sky, the wind twisting and flipping his body this way and that, the surfer hooked to his feet catching every gust and turning him. He flips end over end, spinning rapidly, with the brief reprieve of solid stillborn descent, before his surfer catches another gust and he’s sent spiraling again. His stomach fills with butterflies at the feeling, his chest feeling both light and constricted at once, his heart threatening to beat out of his chest.

He throws his arms out and his body flips to be righted once again, spinning through the air. He tucks his arms into his sides and lets his body be flipped upside down, spinning like a silver maple seed. The wind pulls aggressively at his body, his hair, his clothes. He can’t hear anything past the roaring gales his ears amplify the sound into and his own heartbeat. Virgil opens his eyes, seeing the ground fast approaching, and throws his arms out to right himself. Just as it seems like he’ll collide with the earth, he stomps on the button once again, igniting his thruster and unfurling his sail.

He pulls hard on the rail, turning the surfer until he’s nearly parallel with the ground, giving out a loud elated cry and extending his arm to ghost over the dirt below. He pulls up, narrowly avoiding colliding into the rock face of a split path by jerking himself to the right once again. He’s momentarily flipped upside down as the craft makes the harsh turn, his lips pulled into a wide grin. He straightens up just in time for his surfer to break through a wooden gate, setting off alarms.

He doesn’t hear the ringing screech past the wind in his ears, sailing quickly through some sort of facility. He pulls his guiding rail left, then right, twisting to avoid metal structures and pass through narrow gaps. He pulls down on the rail and the surfer meets the surface of a metal pipe, grinding along its surface. A loud metal screeching meets Virgil’s ears, sparks flying from where the bottom of his surfer meets the pipe’s surface. He’s practically bent backwards, the heat of the thruster warming his back, wind cooling the sweat on his brow. Virgil pulls off the pipe and grabs the surfer to haul it up, letting out an adrenaline-filled whoop.

He sails through the rest of the facility, coming up on some sort of spinning wheel-like structure. Virgil’s face sets into a determined grin. As he gets closer, he stomps on the button to collapse his sail once again and angles himself to pass through a gap in the wheel’s spokes. He zips through, passing just in time to avoid getting crushed as the gap closes. He pumps his fist with a wide smile. “Whoo!”

He hits the button again and grabs the guiding rail as the sail erects itself, rising up out of the canyon and into the sky. Virgil settles the solar surfer to fly straight, taking the reprieve to settle his racing heart and take in the view before him.

Then he notices the sirens.

Two robot officers rise up behind him, propelled upwards by their own thrusters, and he grimaces, rolling his eyes. “Great…”

A shabby Inn sits on a cliffside, the sign at the base of the walkway reading “Mind Palace Inn”. The roof is a composite of wood and metal, appearing in some places as if the metal was affixed to plug up leaks. Other than this strange fact, the building itself resembles a two-story cottage out of a fairytale. Inside, Mr. Shea spoons steaming meat into a serving bowl and sets it on a tray, picking the tray up to bring it out to the customers. As he turns to do so, a shrill voice calls out from his right.

“Mr. Shae!”

Thomas purses his lips before forcefully relaxing his face, turning to look at the old woman behind him. The cephalopodan woman holds an empty glass in one wrinkled tentacled hand, using the other to gesture to it. Mr. Shae sighs. “I know! Refill on the perp juice, coming right up Mrs. Dunwiddie!” He walks over to one of the tables where a family of anthropomorphic frog aliens sits waiting for their food. The father is reading a newspaper but sets it aside when Mr. Shae approaches, smiling lightly.

He puts on his best customer service smile and starts setting out their food. “Alright, four powdered spheroids,” he sets a plate of what looks to be colored donuts in front of the dad, “two solar eclipses,” he sets a plate of two sunny side up eggs with blue yolks in front of the mother. The son gags, making Thomas laugh, “and a bowl of Zorellian jelly worms, for the big boy!” he says, setting a large bowl of milky white insects in front of the boy. “Enjoy.”

He moves on to the next table as the boy starts shoveling the jelly worms into his mouth. Thomas rushes over to a man in the corner of the restaurant, sitting by the window with his face in a book.

“Sorry, Logan. It’s been crazy here all morning!”

Logan looks up from his book. He certainly wasn’t the strangest looking intergalactic customer Mr. Shae had, but he certainly wasn’t human. Instead of the normal human pinna on the sides of his head, he had bald, stout and floppy dog’s ears. A pair of spectacles sat at the base of his muzzle, and while he didn’t have sharp dog’s teeth per se, it seemed like he definitely could use the help of a pair of braces. He adjusts his glasses with stout, pudgy fingers and smiles kindly at Mr. Shae.

“It is not a problem, Thomas.” He sets his book on the table as Thomas walks away, taking a deep breath to take in the smell. “Ah, my Alponian chowder with the extra solara seed, fantastic.” He tucks a napkin into his shirt and grabs his spoon, beginning to eat. Just as he takes his first bite, an anthropomorphic frog girl with blond hair pulled into pigtails peeks over the edge of the table at him.

The girl had the green, vaguely slimy skin of a frog, along with the webbed fingers. She had two round eyes near the top of her head that blinked up at Logan frequently, fluttering her eyelashes. Her mouth was turned up into a small smile as she took a slight step back, brushing her hands down her pink dress and continuing to stare.

He looks down at her curiously, eyebrow raised. “Yes? Can I help you?” She just blinks at him. He rolls his eyes and goes back to eating.

The little frog girl straightens up, smiling up at him and watching him eat. Logan sighs, looking around. “Where are your parents?” After another silent blink, he frowns, starting to get annoyed. “Can you spe-” Suddenly her tongue shot out of her mouth, stealing the food off his spoon. He makes a disgusted noise and recoils as she smiles up at him then turns and skips off. Thomas walks up, a dishes-filled tray on his hip.

“Aren’t they just adorable at that age?”

Logan grimaces down at his spoon, setting it on the table. “Yes, deplorable. I mean- adorable.” He takes the napkin from his shirt collar and wipes his mouth, looking up at Thomas. “Speaking of which, how is Virgil?”

Mr. Shae sets the tray down at a vacant table with a sigh, looking tired as he picks up the dishes. “Much better. I know he’s had a… rough start, to this year, but I really think he’s turning a corner.” Just then, the front door opens, revealing two robot officers in blue and gold uniforms with Virgil, his head hung low, looking the very image of a dog caught misbehaving. “Mr. Shae.” A robotic voice calls.

Thomas turns around in surprise, dropping the dishes he’d been carrying and causing them to shatter. “Virgil!”

Logan looks down at his food. “Wrong turn,” he says dryly.

Virgil forces a grin, pushing a gloved metal hand off his shoulder and taking a step into the restaurant. “Okay, cool, thanks for the lift-”

“Not so fast.” The hand grips his shoulders again and the grin slips off his face. Shit. Another hand grips his opposite arm, hauling him further into the room and keeping him in place. “We found your son operating a solar vehicle in a restricted area.”

The other robot cop speaks up. “Moving violation nine-zero-four, section fifteen, paragraph…”

“Six?” Virgil mutters from between them.

“Thanks.”

Virgil rolls his eyes. “Don’t mention it.”

“Virgil.” His dad scolds. He looks away.

“As you are aware sir,” the first robot continues, “this is a violation of his probation.”

Virgil’s dad takes a step forward, holding his hands out placatingly. “Yes, yes, ah, I know. I- how about- could we just-?” He rubs the back of his neck in a flustered manner, his expression pleading.

Logan clears his throat, drawing the attention of the four in front of him as he stands, walking over to the officers. “Pardon me, if I could interject. I’m Doctor Logan Abbott, a noted astrophysicist.” This is met with silence. “No? I have a card-” Mr. Shae grimaces, biting his bottom lip.

“Are you the boy’s…. father?” One of the officers asks. Thomas pushes past Logan, standing in front of him.

“No!”

“Ah, wh-”

“No, no.”

“God, no.”

“I mean ew-”

Logan starts slightly, put off by Mr. Shae’s comment. He’s not that ugly, is he? I mean sure, his ears are a little floppy, and his nose isn’t human- he’s not human- but he’s not ugly.

“He’s just a friend of the family!”

Both officers bend over to get in Logan’s face, shouting. “Back off, sir!”

Logan huffs and turns, going back to his table. “See if I ever try to help again…”

Mr. Shae sighs.

“Due to repeated violations of statute fifteen-C, we have impounded the vehicle. Any further violations will result in a trip to juvenile hall.”

Mr. Shae nods. “I understand. Thank you, officers.” The robots let go of Virgil, pushing him forward where Mr. Shae takes his arm. Virgil refuses to look at him. “It won’t happen again.”

“We see his kind all the time, sir.”

“Wrong choices-”

“Dead-enders-”

“Losers.”

Virgil grimaces, hunching his shoulders.

The officer’s tone does a complete 180, calling out a cheery, “Take care now!”

“Let’s go.”

Both officers turn around and wheel out of the restaurant, leaving Virgil and his father alone, if you didn’t count the room full of customers staring at the pair in shock. Someone clears their throat and all the customers turn back to their food, the room quickly filling with chatter and the clinking of silverware and dishes. Mr. Shae looks down at Virgil, who looks at the floor.

“Virgil, this is… too much. It needs to stop. Do you want to go to juvenile hall? Is that it?”

Virgil purses his lips and turns away, hands shoved in the pockets of his hoodie. He looks around and grabs a nearby bus bin, silently moving to clear a vacant table of dishes.

“Virgil. Virgil, look at me, please.”

Virgil’s eyes burn. He refuses to look at his dad as he continues.

“It’s hard enough keeping this place afloat. I can’t handle you going off and-”

Virgil turns around, forcing a carefree smile. “Dad, it’s not a big deal. There was nobody around; those cops just have it out for me.” Mr. Shae crossed his arms and looks at his son disapprovingly, and Virgil’s smile fades.

“Forget it.” Virgil turns back to continue bussing the table, grabbing the bus bin and moving on to the next one.

“Mr. Shae!” Mrs. Dunwiddie’s shrill, shaky voice cuts across the restaurant, drawing Thomas’ attention. “My juice!” She waves the empty glass around in one tentacled hand and Thomas frowns, raising his hands in a placating manner. “I’ll be right there, Mrs. Dunwiddie!” He turns back to his son. “Virgil, I just don’t want to see you throw your future away.” His lips draw into a frown as he turns to finally get Mrs. Dunwiddie her juice, and Virgil shoulders the door to the kitchen open.

“What future…”

Taglist: @the5thcoy @dailysandersidesaudoodles @hungry-red-panda @neonb-fly @chemically-imbalanced-romance @punsterterry @dead4sevenyears @metaphoricalpluto2 @tanyatoloni1334

#sanders sides #sanders sides fanfiction #sanders sides fanfic #virgil sanders #thomas sanders #logan sanders #treasure planet au

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