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#and said 'what if luke is like the most powerful ghost ever' and it still cracks me up
luvhughes43 · 8 months
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all-american b!tch | hughes!sister
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guts masterlist🦋 - luvhughes43 masterlist🌙
summary: hughes!sister dealing with the success of her brothers, online hate, and her feelings of having to be strong all the time.
note: little bit of luca fantilli x reader
word count: 1.9k
and i am built like a mother and a total machine
i feel for your every little issue, i know just what you mean
and i make light of the darkness
i've got sun in my motherfuckin’ pocket, best believe
yeah, you know me
y/n hughes is the kindest girl you’d ever have the pleasure of meeting. as the youngest and only daughter of one of the most iconic hockey families, yn grew up in a turbulent world where she had learned to thrive. she plays the family sport, had to navigate through the hardships of being associated with her brothers, and she would be the first to tell you that her experiences had made her a better person. 
“okay trevor listen,” yn hughes or, as referred to by trevor, tiny tot, leaned in closer to the aforementioned boy. “it's quite simple… ghosting the girl will only make her trust you less. i know the podcasts have said that getting close to a girl then ghosting her will make them fall for you but seriously, that's such a bad idea” 
trevor nodded along to each word, pulling out his phone so he could draft a text to “the girl” in question. “okay so like… what should i say then?”
“hmm” yn loomed over the side of trevor's phone as she watched his fingers drift over the keys. once he had finished, he tilted his screen over to her so she could either approve or deny his message. 
there was a brief pause, “i can't tell if you're joking or not,” yn responds, causing jack to giggle as he paused to read the message over both yn and trevors shoulder. 
“I always wondered why you were better at meeting chicks at bars…” jack chuckles, “they never had to read one of your messages”
“its not that bad!” trevor whines loudly as he attempts to grab his phone back from you. 
you hold the phone away from him, swiftly raising your free hand to stop him from moving any closer towards the phone. “don't worry i can fix this,” you speak smoothly to which jack bursts into another round of giggles. 
“bro you cannot tell a girl that you-”
trevor clamped his hand over jacks mouth, effectively stopping him from reciting the awful text to the room full of their friends. “shush, the master is working” 
you rewriting trevors text was just one of the many things you did for the people you considered family. you would sit with luke for hours, letting him rant to you about his move to NJD back when he was still at michigan with you. you would have weekly recaps with your best friends and teammates about their lives, always making sure to help any of them out if needed. 
forgive and i forget
i know my age, and i act like it
got what you can’t resist
i’m a perfect all-american
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despite the positives, you got an overwhelming amount of hate for just… existing. you could be the most perfect person, and people who didn't know you would still come after you online. 
you would never admit to anyone that the hate and harassment bothered you but… it always stung. in the beginning, when you first “came into the public's eye” when you started playing on the umichs womens hockey team you couldn’t avoid the hatred. people from school had started using you for your connections to all the boys you knew, and before you had the time to go private on socials (you’re now public again), you would spend hours reading through hate and manually deleting all the messages. 
ynhughes86 posted 1 year ago
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liked by luca.fantilli, lhughes_06, edwards.73, and others
ynhughes86 welcome to the den🐺️🗣
tagged: umichwhockey, teammates,, and more
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teammate1 GO BLUE🗣🗣
lhughes_06 #goblue
jackhughes andddd everybody screamed!!
jackhughes number lookin fresh
liked by ynhughes86
_quinnhughes 〽️
trevorzegras tiny tot making moves🫡
ynhughes86 youve gotta let that go..
user03 the power of being a hughes💀💀
removed
user82 did daddy and mommy pay ur way in?
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user21 not surprised that shes playing for umich… lets be real no other team would take her. shes a hockey nepo baby fr
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user44 ??? have u even looked at her stats and plays? shes definitely good lol
user09 shes nowhere near her brothers levels lets be real
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user77 looks like she cares more about partying than she does about hockey... surprising.. not!😒🙄
removed
i am light as a feather, i’m fresh as the air
coca-cola bottles that i only use to curl my hair
i got class and integrity
just like a goddamn Kennedy, i swear
with love to spare
after a few months of going through hate comment deep dives, you promised yourself that you wouldn’t let them bother you anymore. In celebration, you made your instagram public again and paid absolutely no attention to any of the hateful people in your comments and dms. 
yhughes86 just posted !
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liked by jackhughes, umichwhockey, dylanduke25, and others
ynhughes86 just your average roadie🫡
tagged: teammate5, teammate2, and others
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ynhughes86 special shoutout to trevorzegras for losing our bet! without u i wouldn’t have been able to do what i do🙏 aka spend money at the mall
liked by trevorzegras
teammate5 we should never be let loose in the mall ever again
ynhughes86 we should never be allowed off the bus
lhughes_06 dub after dub
ynhughes86 oh u know it💯
luca.fantilli is this why you were teaching me about girl math? u were trying to justify your purchases?
ynhughes86 … no comment
user32 using trevors money… wow. so she's a gold digger too?
user91 u guys are so lame let a girl live
ynhughes86 just posted !
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liked by teammate, jackhughes, _quinnhughes, and others
ynhughes86 all the love at the banquet tonight
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teammate1 love uuu my forever girl
ynhughes86 love u more!! u looked so good tonight
luca.fantilli girl in the last pic is kinda cute idk
ynhughes86 kind of? 
luca.fantilli girl in the last pic is very cute im 100% sure of it
ynhughes86 the cute girl in the last pic thinks youre 100% cute too
lhughes_06 the guy in none of the pics thinks you guys are disgusting
user44 no style no game
user81 grow up loser
i’m a perfect all-american bitch
with perfect all-american lips
and perfect all-american hips
i know my place and this is it
ynhughes86 just posted !
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liked by luca.fantilli, colecaufield, _quinnhughes, and others
ynhughes86 perfect all-american or whatever olivia rodrigo said
tagged: luca.fantilli
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trevorzegras that's right no swearing for you tiny tot
ynhughes86 😐
user57 “or whatever olivia rodrigo said” yeah she hates women
user91 thats why she's so close to the guys but u didnt hear that from me!
user16 if u guys dont leave this girl alone…
teammate2 OHH BFF LOOKS SO HOT
teammate3 please marry me
luca.fantilli 🤤🤤
liked by ynhughes86
lhughes_06 nope. 
i don't get angry when i’m pissed
i'm the eternal optimist
i scream inside to deal with it
whenever something bothers you, you keep it in. you hold all of your troubles and worries so deep within you that eventually, they float away and come back to haunt you when you least expect it. you thought that if you ignored all of your problems, that they would somehow fix themselves without any intervention from anyone else. 
it wasn’t always helpful. 
all the time
i’m grateful all the time
i’m sexy and i’m kind
i’m pretty when i cry
“they only ask me about my brothers, lu” your sniffles were quieted by the fabric of lucas sweater as you pressed yourself against his chest. you had played possibly the best game of your career, and the post interview questions were all about your brothers and family. questions wondering about their training and practices and how that had impacted you, how their game influenced yours. it made you feel like you were irrelevant in your own career. 
“i am so grateful for my family and how they’ve helped me grow as a player,” you responded politely to the interviewers' inquiries. it's not like you weren’t grateful. you knew that your family had a huge impact on your skills and you were glad that they were there to help you. but nobody ever wondered what your individual experiences were. all your training had to be a direct reflection of your brothers. your playing style, even unrelated, had to do with your brothers. your wins were a direct result of their greatness. nothing you would ever do or succeed in would be solely yours. 
“i love them,” you sob, “i really do! i just want people to see me” 
lucas' arms tightened around you as he started brushing your hair away from your face. “i know, baby” he whispered into your ear, holding you close as he waited for your breathing to calm down. 
“i just wanna be me!” you slumped against lucas front, who carefully pulled you over to your bed so you could sit down on top of him. 
you could hear the loud pop music blaring from the speakers downstairs, and you listened in silence to the people trudging up and down the stairs as they no doubt looked for a bathroom. 
“have you talked to your brothers about this?” lucas' soft voice cuts into the silence. 
you pull away from him slightly so you could look at him in the eyes. “no…” you admitted quietly. “they wouldn’t understand,” you leaned your head against lucas shoulder as you cuddled into him. 
he hummed quietly to you, a hand running down your back to help further soothe you. “i think you might feel better if you open up to them,” luca hedged. both of you knew that your previous statement was a lie. 
“i don't want them to think of me like that…” 
“like what?” luca questioned, his hand never leaving your back as you continued to prop yourself against him. 
you sighed. “i just… they always come to me. i don't want that to stop or for them to think that im weak” your words were quiet as you finally admitted your true feelings to your boyfriend. 
“they could never think you're weak,” luca murmurs reassuringly. “luke talks all the time about how he thinks you're adjusting to life here better than he did,” you look up at luca inquisitively. “and quinn, he is so proud of you! he talks so highly of you all the time… and jack, i mean come on. they all love and support you so much. they won’t stop asking for advice or talking to you because you're having some troubles” luca explains. “also, there’s nothing wrong with being weak. you should let yourself be open with your brothers just like they are with you. you deserve that”
“have i ever told you that i love you?” you tearfully smile at the boy who was always so good at listening to you.
luca smiles back, “not enough” he jokes as he presses a soft kiss to your cheek. 
you brush a few strands of hair out of his face. “i'll call them tomorrow,” you add, reciprocating luca's kiss on the cheek. 
luca smiles, happy that you're no longer worked up and that you’ll finally tell your brothers your struggles. 
you spend the rest of the night hidden away from the raging party downstairs, wrapped up in your boyfriend's arms as you think about everything you try to hide. you didn’t have to be just one thing. you were allowed to be kind and to have complex emotions. you could be upset and angry without being a mean girl. perfect never existed, and you were glad that you were finally open to letting others see the cracks in your walls. 
lucas’ hair was soft as you ran your hands through his locks. “i love you,” luca mumbles. 
“i love you” you whisper to your boyfriend, placing a kiss on his shoulder as he shifts to lay his head on the middle of your chest. 
you easily fall asleep comforted by the fact that you were allowed to be flawed, and that no matter what, you’ll always have your people by your side.
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lovehotelreservation · 11 months
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Old School
Summary: You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, nor an aged fighter like Ryu how to text.
But he was willing to learn how to pleasure you best.
Rating: R
Pairing: Reader x Ryu
DICK REALLY BE MAKING U DO CRAZY SHIT LIKE. I’M LITERALLY LEARNING ABOUT SF6 ANIMATION CANCELS RN
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Clumsy.
It was the best way that you could describe the motion of Ryu’s fingers. Big, thick hands roughened by years of battle, blunt thumbs doing their best to press onto a tiny screen. Whereas his precision strike at an opponent was as accurate as could be, the same could not be said to his attempts at texting.
You would always giggle at the memory of firm yet flustered “No such thing would be needed” that one time you suggested that he try using a stylus.
The quiet awe in his stare when he saw Luke texting a caption for a selfie with one hand while lifting weights at the local gym was something you would cherish forever.
Bashful.
Leading up to the first time you were intimate together, he was as hot-faced as could be when the truth of him being a virgin became known. Initially, he was calm and composed when he remarked that his training and fending off the evils of Akuma took precedence over carnal bodily pleasure.
However, the moment you tilted your head to the side and innocently asked whether he had ever gotten a blowjob before had him glad that he was growing out his beard, the thick bristles of hair helping with covering the blush that soon spread across his face.
As the significantly older one in your relationship, he thought it was him who should lead once the two of you wandered over to his humble bed.
Yet it was with the wicked glint in your eyes as you eagerly straddled his hips while pushing him down onto the mattress that he realized he was outmatched. Your fingertips ghosting along his chiseled torso before dipping beneath the waistband of his training pants was him succumbing to you in defeat.
Determined.
Far be it from him to remain helpless and weakened to the tantalizing touch of your hands and lips every time the two of you were in bed together.
What he lacked in experience he made up tenfold in passion alone.
He could have fiercely fought through an entire tournament spent squaring off against the best of Metro City and still have the drive and energy to bury his face between your thighs, happily welcoming the pressure of your legs on either side of his head while he feasted away at your core.
Much like in any match where he knew which point that his opponent protected the most, as soon as he found which spots on your body were the most sensitive, he never failed to seek it out, whether by the curl of his fingers, the suckle of his lips, or the powerful swing of his hips.
From once a hapless yet loving trainee to a well-versed and dedicated master in the art of your body.
That was Ryu and he was yours.
And while his texts were slow, the astonished drops of his jaw whenever you sent any risqué pictures of yourself were priceless. He would get there eventually.
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buffshipper8490 · 2 months
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Rating Mature
Chapter Summary
Finn rallies the citizens of Coruscant's Underground; Luke Skywalker's spirit tries one last time to help Kylo Ren turn to the Light; Rey suffers a terrifying vision on her way to Exegol...
Excerpt
Kylo Ren stood on the wreck of the Second Death Star, gazing at the ocean, watching the tide gradually recede. The ocean was calm now, but Kylo’s mind was in turmoil. He dwelled on Rey, and the events of their latest encounter. He thought of how she had lost herself to the Dark Side in that dilapidated throne room, that he had given her the final push. She had become a feral animal, hellbent on killing him. He got what he wanted— or what he thought he wanted— and it almost cost him his life. No. It was his attachment to her that clouded his judgment and almost cost him his life. He had her beaten, and his hesitation in delivering the final blow allowed her to take advantage and defeat him with the lightning he was still too weak in the Dark Side to call upon. The truth was that he loved her, and that truth was holding him back from reaching his true potential in the darkness. He thought he had surpassed Darth Vader, but he was mistaken. Love. Sentiment. It was the same weakness that ultimately killed his grandfather.  It was that weakness that Rey took advantage of to get close enough to fool him with a kiss and steal the Wayfinder from him. She betrayed him again, just as she always did, and he didn't even stop her from leaving. Weakness. Weakness! Now she was on her way to Exegol to end the Sith or even join them-- the state of mind she was in. Either way, his plans were in serious jeopardy. If she managed to kill Palpatine, the secrets of the Sith would be lost. If she joined Palpatine, then Palpatine would most certainly use her to take over the First Order and the rule of the Empire that Kylo Ren had so ruthlessly restored to its former glory. Damn her! He should have killed her when he had the chance. He should have— "Hey, kid." A voice said suddenly from behind him. Luke Skywalker appeared, limned in ghostly light, almost transparent. He looked different than the way Kylo remembered him last—older, his dark goatee a full beard and his hair longer and grayer. He wore light-colored Jedi robes instead of the black he favored before. Immediately, Kylo roared and ignited his lightsaber to attack, intent on ridding himself of his uncle once and for all. Only when he swung the red beam, it was immediately caught in Luke’s gloved hand. Impossible! He was dead.  But Luke was very real in front of him, a strength his uncle shouldn’t have been capable of pushing the red beam of his saber back toward him. “No! You’re dead!" Kylo shouted. "The Jedi are nothing more than ghosts!” “The Dark Side has failed you, Ben, just like it failed my father,” Luke said in an infuriatingly calm voice. “Your father was weak!" snapped Kylo. “His love for his family saved him. If only you'd let it save you," countered Luke. "But you've chosen hate instead." "I chose power!" hissed Kylo. “I am more powerful than any Skywalker ever was!” "And where has that power left you?" countered Luke. "Look around! You've lost. Let Kylo Ren die, Ben." "NO!" Kylo tried to wrest his lightsaber free of Luke’s impossible grip. But Luke’s grip remained firm. "Can't you see? The Force has brought you to the same place Darth Vader fell and Anakin Skywalker rose. Join him in the Light." "It's too late," Kylo gritted out through his bared teeth. It was something Snoke had always said. It’s too late for you. They’ll never take you back. "It's not too late," assured Luke. "There's always another path. Follow that path home, Ben."
His uncle’s bright blue eyes bore into his very soul. Instead of finding the hatred and judgment he expected, Kylo instead found love in them. Acceptance. Just like his father. Kylo stared at his uncle, afraid to believe his words. Afraid of the truth of what he was now feeling...
New fanfic link! Likes ❤️ and Reblogs 🔁 are much appreciated!
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thebonggirll · 8 months
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chapter four
< previous: chapter three
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The next morning there was a lot of excitement at breakfast.
Well, around three in the morning, an Aethiopian drakon had been spotted at the borders of the camp. The magical boundaries had kept the monster out, but it prowled the hills, looking for weak spots in the defenses, and it didn't seem anxious to go away until Lee Fletcher from Apollo's cabin led a couple of his siblings in pursuit. After a few dozen arrows lodged in the chinks of the drakon's armor, it got the message and withdrew.
"It's still out there," Lee warned during announcements. "Twenty arrows in its hide, and we just made it mad. The thing was thirty feet long and bright green. It's eyes—" he shuddered.
"You did well, Lee," Chiron patted him on the shoulder. "Everyone stay alert, but stay calm. This has happened before."
"Aye," Quintus said from the head table. "And it will happen again. More and more frequently."
The campers murmured among themselves. Y/N turned to look at Harris, mouthing the words, "Did you know?" He nodded his head to accept. It seemed like she wasn't the only one who kept dreaming about the camp under attack all the time.  
Everyone knew the rumors: Luke and his army of monsters were planning an invasion of the camp. Most of them expected it to happen this summer, but no one knew how or when. It didn't help that their attendance was down. They only had about eighty campers. Three years ago, Y/N started, there had been more than a hundred. Some had died. Some had joined Luke. Some had just disappeared. 
"This is a good reason for new war games, "Quintus continued, a glint in his eyes. "We'll see how you all do with that tonight."
"Yes..." Chiron said. "Well, enough announcements. Let us bless this meal and eat." He raised his goblet, "To the gods."
All of them raised their glasses and repeated the blessing.
Y/N took her plate to the bronze brazier and scraped a portion of her food into the flames. "Apollo," she whispered, "Give me a sign of what I should do...."
There was so much to worry about, and she could've stood there all morning, but she headed back to the table. She couldn't just stand there ranting about her pathetic feelings and friends when there was no guarantee they would survive the prophecy. She wanted to be the bigger person and just forget any of those things ever happened. But easier said than done. One look at their faces and it felt like the day they confessed to her. Even with Grover in her mind, all she could feel after looking at their faces was irritation. 
Still...even after all this, her eyes still seemed to search for the seaweed brain. It was getting annoying at this point.
Once everyone was eating, Chiron and Grover came over to visit Percy. Grover was bleary-eyed. His shirt was inside out. He slid his plate onto the table and slumped next to him.
Tyson shifted uncomfortably. "I will go...um...polish my fish ponies." He lumbered off, leaving his breakfast half-eaten.
Chiron tried for a smile. He probably wanted to look reassuring, but in centaur form he towered over him, casting a shadow across the table. "Well, Percy, how did you sleep?"
"Uh, fine." Percy wondered why he asked that. Was it possible he knew something about the weird Iris-message he'd gotten? 
He saw Nico in it, and he was talking to a ghost. Nico was looking for a way to bring back his sister, which was almost impossible. Almost. The ghost seemed to know a way to bring her back, but just as they were about to discuss the plan, the message requested for another drachma. Unfortunately, he didn't have that and the message disappeared. The ghost also said something about how it helped Nico by saving him several times, leading him through a maze, and teaching him to use his powers. Well, he wasn't so focused on that.
"I brought Grover over," Chiron said, "because I thought you two might want to, ah, discuss matters. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some Iris-messages to send. I'll see you later in the day." He gave Grover a meaningful look, then trotted out of the pavilion."
"What's he talking about?" Percy asked Grover.
Grover chewed his eggs. He could tell he was distracted, because he bit the tines of his fork and chewed those down, too. "He wants you to convince me," he mumbled. Somebody else slid next to him on the bench: Annabeth. 
And almost instinctively his head shot towards the direction of the Apollo cabin's members. Oh...she wasn't looking. He didn't know whether to feel good or bad about the situation. It would make matters worse. Y/N would probably absolutely ignore their existence after this.
"I'll tell you what it's about," Annabeth said. "The Labyrinth."
It was hard to concentrate on what she was saying because everybody in the dining pavilion was stealing glances at them and whispering. And Annabeth was right next to him. With the amount of whispers, he was sure it would reach Y/N's ears. He didn't want her to hate him. 
But wait...shouldn't she be understanding about the situation too? Grover was here too, so maybe Y/N wouldn't mind all that much. And besides, after the commotion with Grover, she would absolutely understand if they held a discussion. 
Percy sighed. He knew how much of an insensitive jerk he sounded like, but...still, it's not like he said something illogical either. For now, he needed to shoo away the main culprit of the situation. 
"You're not supposed to be here," Percy said.
"We need to talk," she insisted.
"But the rules..."
She knew as well as everyone else, that campers weren't allowed to switch tables. Satyrs were different. They weren't really demigods. But the half-bloods had to sit with their cabins. I wasn't even sure what the punishment was for switching tables. He'd never seen it happen. If Mr. D had been here, he probably would've strangled Annabeth with magical grapevines or something, but Mr. D wasn't here. Chiron had already left the pavilion. Quintus looked over and raised an eyebrow, but he didn't say anything. 
"Maybe Annabeth deserves a punishment," Percy thought.
"Look," Annabeth said, "Grover is in trouble. There's only one way we can figure out how to help him. It's the Labyrinth. That's what Clarisse and I have been investigating."
He shifted his weight, trying to think clearly. "You mean the maze where they kept the Minotaur, back in the old days?"
"Exactly," Annabeth said.
"So...it's not under the king's palace in Crete anymore," he guessed. "The Labyrinth is under some building in America."
Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Under a building? Please, Percy. The Labyrinth is huge. It wouldn't fit under a single city, much less a single building."
He thought about my dream of Nico at the River Styx. "So...is the Labyrinth part of the Underworld?"
"No." Annabeth frowned. "Well, there may be passages from the Labyrinth down into the Underworld. I'm not sure. But the Underworld is way, way down. The Labyrinth is right under the surface of the mortal world, kind of like a second skin. It's been growing for thousands of years, lacing its way under Western cities, connecting everything together underground. You can get anywhere through the Labyrinth."
"If you don't get lost," Grover muttered. "And die a horrible death."
"Grover, there has to be a way," Annabeth said. He got the feeling they'd had this conversation before.
"Clarisse lived."
"Barely!"Grover said. "And the other guy—"
"He was driven insane. He didn't die."
"Oh, joy." Grover's lower lip quivered. "That makes me feel much better."
"Whoa," Percy said. "Back up. What's this about Clarisse and a crazy guy?"
Annabeth glanced over toward the Ares table. Clarisse was watching them like she knew what they were talking about, but then she fixed her eyes on her breakfast plate.
"Last year," Annabeth said, lowering her voice, "Clarisse went on a mission for Chiron."
"I remember," Percy said. "It was secret."
Annabeth nodded.
"It was secret," Annabeth agreed, "because she found Chris Rodriguez."
"The guy from the Hermes cabin?" he remembered him from two years ago. They'd eavesdropped on Chris Rodriguez aboard Luke's ship, the Princess Andromeda. Chris was one of the half-bloods who'd abandoned camp and joined the Titan Army.
"Yeah," Annabeth said. "Last summer he just appeared in Phoenix, Arizona, near Clarisse's mom's house."
"What do you mean he just appeared?"
"He was wandering around the desert, in a hundred and twenty degrees, in full Greek armor, babbling about string."
"String," he said.
"He'd been driven completely insane. Clarisse brought him back to her mom's house so the mortals wouldn't institutionalize him. She tried to nurse him back to health. Chiron came out and interviewed him, but it wasn't much good. The only thing they got out of him: Luke's men have been exploring the Labyrinth."
Percy shivered, though he wasn't exactly sure why. Poor Chris...he hadn't been a bad guy. What could've driven him mad? I looked at Grover, who was chewing up the rest of his fork.
"Okay," he asked. "Why were they exploring the Labyrinth?"
"We weren't sure," Annabeth said. "That's why Clarisse went on a scouting expedition. Chiron kept things hushed up because he didn't want anyone panicking. He got me involved because...well, the Labyrinth has always been one of my favorite subjects. The architecture involved—" Her expression turned a little dreamy. "The builder, Daedalus, was a genius. But the point is, the Labyrinth has entrances everywhere. If Luke could figure out how to navigate it, he could move his army around with incredible speed."
"Except it's a maze, right?"
"Full of horrible traps," Grover agreed."Dead ends. Illusions. Psychotic goat-killing monsters."
"But not if you had Ariadne's string," Annabeth said. "In the old days, Ariadne's string guided Theseus out of the maze. It was a navigation instrument of some kind, invented by Daedalus. And Chris Rodriguez was mumbling about string."
"So Luke is trying to find Ariadne's string," Percy said. "Why? What's he planning?"
Annabeth shook her head. "I don't know. I thought maybe he wanted to invade camp through the maze, but that doesn't make any sense. The closest entrances Clarisse found were in Manhattan, which wouldn't help Luke get past our borders. Clarisse explored a little way into the tunnels, but...it was very dangerous. She had some close calls. I researched everything I could find about Daedalus. I'm afraid it didn't help much. I don't understand exactly what Luke's planning, but I do know this: the Labyrinth might be the key to Grover's problem."
Percy blinked. "You think Pan is underground?"
"It would explain why he's been impossible to find."
Grover shuddered. "Satyrs hate going underground. No searcher would ever try going in that place. No flowers. No sunshine. No coffee shops!"
"But," Annabeth said, "the Labyrinth can lead you almost anywhere. It reads your thoughts. It was designed to fool you, trick you, and kill you; but if you can make the Labyrinth work for you—"
"It could lead you to the wild god," Percy said.
"I can't do it." Grover hugged his stomach. "Just thinking about it makes me want to throw up my silverware."
"Grover, it may be your last chance," Annabeth said. "The council is serious. One week or you learn to tap dance!"
Over at the head table, Quintus cleared his throat. Percy got the feeling he didn't want to make a scene, but Annabeth was really pushing it, sitting at his table for so long.
"And did you talk to Y/N?" she asked, eyes looking for some hope.
"I tried..but," he looked in her direction, "she won't listen and doesn't want to be involved."
"Clearly you don't know how to convince her," Annabeth said, eyes furrowed in irritation.
"Well, why don't you give it a try then?" Percy said, a little too loud. 
"Alright, we'll talk later," Annabeth squeezed his arm a little too hard. "Convince Grover and I'll convince her."
She returned to the Athena table, ignoring all the people who were staring at her. He didn't know what kind of confidence suddenly took over Annabeth, but he just hoped for it to work. She was good with words when it came to certain situations. He wished he had even a little bit of that talent, then maybe Y/N would've already been convinced. It felt like somehow it was becoming a competition between him and Annabeth of who is closer to her. 
And he didn't like the way all his paths were coming to a dead end.
Grover buried his head in his hands. "I can't do it, Percy. My searcher's license. Pan. I'm going to lose it all. I'll have to start a puppet theater."
"Don't say that! We'll figure something out."
"I have to leave," Grover said miserably. "Juniper's waiting for me. It's a good thing she finds cowards attractive."
After he was gone, Percy looked over at Quintus. He nodded gravely, like they were sharing some dark secret. Then he went back to cutting his sausage with a dagger.
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Around the afternoon, when Y/N was busy reading a book near Canoe Lake, she felt a presence behind her. A well-known presence she wanted to ignore. 
Annabeth sat beside her, which made her shift away a bit immediately. "We can't do this without you."
Sighing, Y/N closed her book and looked at her, "There are plenty of healers, you can just ask one of my siblings."
"You know it's not the same as going with you. We know how we work around each other in dangerous situations. Besides, it would...feel empty without you."
"Look, I don't want to be tossed around and used whenever you all feel like it. I don't trust you or him."
"I am sorry for what I did! I wasn't thinking straight. I...lost someone precious and I didn't know how to handle it!"
"Oh, and the only way you thought of handling it is by playing with his emotions and breaking my trust?"
"It wasn't intentional."
"It was though, Anne. You knew the way he looked at you and decided to take advantage of it. How would you feel if Luke asked me to join them, that he would date me if I wanted to get over both of you and I accepted it?"
"You wouldn't and I know it."
"See?" Y/N chuckled, "You don't even have to think twice about this. I didn't either. But after what you did, I don't think anything is impossible."
Annabeth stayed silent for a while and said, "You know, Percy is not at fault here. It was news to him too. So...maybe you should atleast-"
"You don't need to tell me that. I know. It's just...feels awful to know how he knew everything but continued to lead me on instead of turning me down."
"He was overwhelmed. It was a first-time situation and he didn't know what to do. You know that better than me," Annabeth sighed, "Please just talk to him."
"Fine, I will." Y/N said massaging her forehead,"....And what about Grover?"
"....So you're in, right?"
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Walking towards the Pegasus stables, she found Percy just as Annabeth said. Percy seemed to be talking to his friend Blackjack. She waited for him to finish. It didn't take much time as he shot his head to look in her direction after a while.
A group of younger campers came into the stables to start their riding lessons and started whispering amongst themselves. Clearly, the news of their fight was all over the camp. As Percy started walking towards her, she heard one of the campers say something along the lines of "he isn't even that good-looking." 
"Mind your own business," she spoke, looking over at them. Sure, she might be having a fight with him, doesn't mean they get to insult him in front of her. 
An action that made Percy smile a bit. He didn't know why but it made him feel giddy how Y/N was defending him. He observed her expression - how her ears were turning red in anger, and she scrunched her nose while furrowing her brows. 
How cute.
"Come on," she muttered, walking away from the stables.
As Percy started following her, he said, "I'm guessing you talked with Annabeth?"
"Yes, she filled me in about whatever happened," Y/N said and licked her lips. This is awkward. Knowing he knew about her feelings, it was getting difficult to talk to him about how she wanted to forget everything and start over the friendship.
Sighing, she mustered up the courage and said, "Look, I'm here because I feel like I'm not being fair to you. I know, you were hurt by Annabeth's action as much as I did. But I was too busy feeling betrayed to even hear you out. So...let's just forget everything and start over like nothing happened."
"Sure," he said, "And during breakfast Annabeth just came to my table to talk about the events and also, you. Nothing else...in case you are wondering." With the way the campers were talking, he didn't want her to misunderstand. He didn't know why but he wanted to make it clear as soon as possible. Annabeth was nothing more than just an awful friend. 
"Didn't ask, don't care," Y/N said. 
Percy looked at her demeanor. She looked...nervous. And she still wasn't looking at him. It still felt...awful. He wanted the old Y/N back. But, it did feel nice how she reached out first. Probably because of Grover's situation. He didn't exactly have the place to complain about it.  A small smirk took over his lips, as he put his arm around her shoulders and started walking towards the Canoe Lake. She looked like a deer in headlights. Maybe he did get some of the confidence Annabeth had.
Thinking back on his conversation with Y/N, he was a bit disturbed by the last line. Act like nothing happened? It might be a bit selfish of him but...he didn't want her to forget.
The feeling of getting her attention was starting to get addicting.
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next: chapter five >
book four: the battle of labyrinth
percy jackson x reader series
MASTERLIST
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dragonciphering · 10 months
Text
My teaser for my fic has become a big ass (in my terms) oneshot. So uhhhh here’s some incorrect quotes as compensation. Also most of these ones pertain to this series (the series of oneshots) I’m writing. But they are not in the exact words or in order of happening ;D
<***>
Anakin talking about Obi-Wan, Luke, Qui-gon, and Leia’s Force Ghosts who are watching this time travel fiasco: “Why do you not believe that Force Ghosts are real?”
Ferus, while siping on some tea: “Never seen one. Plus there are no records of any for thousands of years.”
Anakin: “Okay, I mean, there’s a lot of things that you can’t see that are real.”
Ferus: “Example?”
Anakin: “You can’t see gravity. That’s real.”
Ferus: “I can drop this tea cup.”
Anakin: “Kriff.”
<***>
Ferus: “This is a very powerful artifact. You’d be messing with some forces we don’t fully understand.”
Anakin: “That sounds like a dare to me.”
Ferus bringing his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose, inhaling and whispering: “For Force sake—”
<***>
Ferus trying to meditate while Anakin’s in the room: “Force, please give me patience.”
Anakin forgetting he’s not a Sith: “Isn’t it ‘Force give me strength’?”
Ferus, lightly chuckling and running on fumes: *Light chuckle* If the force gave me strength you’d be dead ☺️”
Anakin:
<***>
Anakin: “We had fun, didn’t we, Ferus?”
Ferus: “I have never been more stressed out in my entire life.”
<***>
Anakin: “Good morning. As you begin your day, remember that violence is always an option and often the answer.”
Ferus:
Anakin:
Ferus who knows that’s it’s 5-kriffing-am: “...How did you get into my room? And please, go back to bed.”
<***>
Ferus: “As the most senior padawan here, I say we find another route; it’s not safe for padawans who haven’t been on a mission before.”
Anakin: “That sounds like a challenge.”
Ferus: “I have to stress, that is not a challenge.”
Anakin who’s still trying to stop falling into his old Sith habits: “...That is exactly what you say to dissuade the weak of heart from accepting the challenge. Well, challenge accepted!”
Ferus: “There is no challenge!”
<***>
Anakin: “If you don't stop talking, I'm going to jump out of that window. “
Ferus: “...We're on the ground floor.”
Anakin: “I know but I want a dramatic exit.”
<***>
Anakin: Ferus, do you consider me your rival and a good person?”
Ferus: “Of course I do!”
Anakin: “Would you still if I did something bad?”
Ferus: “Well, of course I… would…”
Anakin: “I mean something really, really—”
Ferus: “Anakin…what did you do?”
<***>
Anakin: “Tell them to eat banthashit, Ferus.”
Ferus: “Tell them yourself.”
Anakin: “Eat banthashit, motherkriffer. Fall on your own lightsaber.”
<***>
Ferus: “That was the worst throw ever, probably of all time.”
Anakin: “Not my fault. Somebody put a wall in the way.”
<***>
Ferus: “Could I have some water?”
Anakin: *starts chugging their water bottle*
Anakin: *chokes from drinking too fast*
Anakin: *spills water all over himself*
Anakin, coughing: “I don't have any water.”
Ferus:
<***>
Ferus, injured: “Why is it that I always lose things as soon as I need them?”
Anakin being a smart ass: “Actually, it's not that you lose things when you need them. You lose them a while before. It's just that you LOOK for things when you need them.”
Ferus, sarcastically and still injured: “Okay yeah thanks Anakin, that's great but wHERE'S THE KRIFFING FIRST AID KIT!?”
<***>
(And a bonus for my mutual @t1nytinn who I now owe my first born child to, due to their sacrifice of doing a shit tone of math for my sake)
Ferus who’s on his last nerve: “When I was your age—”
Anakin, mockingly: “When I was your height!”
Ferus:
Anakin:
Ferus:
Anakin, realizing what he just said: “Wait, ah kriff, I didn’t mean that— *nervous laugh* Please don’t kill me—”
Ferus, in all his queer glory:
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<***>
Should I make more?
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faultyfox · 2 years
Text
I see a lot of variants on what Anakin/Vader said in that last confrontation, but since none of them have matched mine...
[Spoilers for Obi-Wan Kenobi]
So, 'I killed Anakin Skywalker,' yes, Anakin speaking to absolve Obi-Wan of his guilt, because he is a fully functioning human being, and knows that it was him that killed those children all those years ago. At the time he was crying, he knew what he was doing was wrong, he reasoned it out for the sake of his dying wife, but over time that horror hasn't changed. And speaking of himself as a different person to distance himself from those deeds he can't reconcile with so he can keep going, he made a wrong choice but has to stay the course because his guilt won't let him look for an alternative. Life as Vader is just as much a punishment for him as everyone else, and him freeing Obi-Wan from that punishment show how much he feels responsible for his crimes. He doesn't want someone else feeling guilty when it should only be him (when he isn't being catty and just trying to hurt someones feelings ahem) The man he is today, and has been since that moment, is the man that killed everything of Anakin Skywalker. It's not actually his fault necessarily, but he is taking responsibility for the choices and mistakes he made.
It's the 'I'll destroy you,' line that I feel has the most range in interpretation, and for me, despite people often placing Vader as some kind of alter, he's still Anakin. Vader isn't actually a divided person, it's just a name that denotes how separate Anakin is now from that good, honourable person he was before his crimes/turning. Ben isn't treated like an alter, even though they both take new names at the same time, because it's the same parallel. Obi-Wan no longer sees himself as the great and righteous Jedi Master Obi-Wan, and all the other things attached to that name. It's just Ben. They've lost the rights to use the names of the pure hearted and innocent people they were before.
So, no, I don't see the destroy line as a threat from an Anakin to Vader switch, it reads to me in the context of the two lines together, 'I killed Anakin and I'll destroy you too,' as a warning that if Obi-Wan holds on to him, and the guilt of Anakin's turn, then he will be destroyed. And that's exactly what we saw at the start of the series, Obi-Wans desolate, futile existence, depressed, plagued by nightmares of his past, and dread of the future (too fearful/depressed to help Nari or anyone else) he's so far from the light he couldn't access the force to dispell these feelings or see Qui-Gon. Post fight, he has closure, he says goodbye to Darth, because Anakin and him are one in the same, but Obi-Wan and he both know the weight of the past and things will never be as they were. Anakin will never be the man Obi-Wan once knew. Obi-Wan let's him go, and so he turns back to the light.
His guilt and obsession with Anakin would destroy him, "Darth Vader" wouldn't even have to kill him outright.
It even all ties into their final meeting in 'A New Hope'. Obi-Wan's line of, 'If you strike me down, I'll become more powerful than you could ever imagine' (at the time it was probs just force ghost related with him helping Luke but we're way past 'A certain point of view' retcons here) All Darth Vader has is hunting Kenobi, searching for him, imagining the day he finally wins, and that's what we see in ep5, Anakin's obsession with winning. And then what? Where does winning get you? Vader finally wins after all these years, finally wins a duel against Obi-Wan, but that was it. He didn't even win because he was the best, or had the highest moral grounds, nothing, Obi-Wan just let him, ceded the fight, robbing him of even that small glory. So in some ways Obi-Wan was warning him back in kind, without Obi-Wan, what does Vader have left to strive for, hope for? It was almost a kindness of Obi-Wan each time to not let Anakin win before, and considering he walks away each time so he doesn't have to face the moral imperative of killing Anakin, and ultimately save the day (because unfortunately Anakin is one of the major villains of the piece Obi-Wan) shows that what he does is heavily biased towards Anakin's favour.
Ultimately, they were each others greatest weaknesses and they each knew it?
Thanks for reading to the end!
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astaroth1357 · 3 years
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More undateables with a demigod hades mc???
By request, have yourself a part two!! 
Demigod MC Series: Hades Pt. 2 (Un)Dateables Edition!
I will ask that y’all please don't ask for continuations of other gods unless I say it’s okay to do again. This series already fills my inbox something fierce and this is a one-off that I allowed for during the request window.  If I have to make ideas for new gods while continuing a bunch of old MCs, it'll burn me out fast...
Demigod MC Series: Intro, Aphrodite, Hermes, Hades, Dionysus, Demeter, Athena, Hades Pt. 2
Diavolo
Oh, he has no problem at all hosting a child of the Underworld, hell he even throws them a welcome banquet when he finds out! Hades is a dear friend - and practically a parental figure to him growing up - so he's more than happy to take in one of his children for a year.
Diavolo is actually one of the few people that the MC can talk to about their home with any kind of fondness. Usually when they bring up things like the comforting wailing of the River Coctyus, the brothers will give them weird looks... but Diavolo knows where they're coming from!
He spent numerous summers in the Underworld growing up doing things like pestering Charon on the River Styx or playing games with Cerberus (the other one) in the Asphodel Meadows... His beach house is actually modeled after his childhood summer home in the Isles of Paradise! Really, it can be a lovely place if the gloom doesn't bother you!
So in the spirit of his fond memories, Diavolo really tried to make their time in the Devildom a fun one!... in his maybe trying a little too hard way…  
Poor MC found themselves offered pretty much everything under the moon… Tickets or exclusive passes to different cultural events/festivals, invitations to gala events, and tours of nearly every inch of Hell by the Prince himself - it was… it was a lot for the poor introverted thing…
It didn’t help that Diavolo would have a hard time gauging if they were having any fun due to their naturally melancholic nature, which only pushed him to try harder… He means well, he does. He’s just not the most in touch with what would make an anti-social doom child happy...
It took Barbatos and Lucifer stepping in for the mortal to actually start getting some much needed space and that improved their experience significantly. Sometimes less is more, Dia… Less is more. But they appreciate his efforts anyway.
Barbatos 
Also has a pretty amicable relationship with the Ruler of the Underworld, though his is much more professional compared to Diavolo’s. He actually has a good deal of appreciation for the man for taking good care of the Prince during his visits, so he sees this as an opportunity to return the favor.
Like Diavolo, he’s rather focused on making sure the MC is having a good stay in the Devildom, but he’s much more subtle about it. He’ll come by the House often to check up on them and make sure everything is to their liking... 
Even the brothers notice that he treats them like anothering visiting Lord/Lady in that way, which he would argue they very much are and should be respected as one. It’s the least the Devildom can offer their father at this point.
His visits may also be an excuse for keeping an eye on the brothers to make sure they don’t do anything to inconvenience their “young guest…” To be honest, the entire House is a little paranoid about that… Nobody wants to know the punishment for hurting MC if Barbs is the one dishing it out...
Apart from watching out for them, Barbatos tries to encourage the MC to accept the Young Lord’s gifts (while also actively advising Diavolo to go easier on them at the same time). It would be so disheartening to him if his Prince feels like he hasn’t offered them the best experience that he could… He’s sure they understand.
Any time that he invites the MC to tea, they usually end up talking about their father in some way. Barbs knows a surprising amount about the god… He’s been around about as long as Chronos - preceding the birth of Aether and Chaos themselves - so he has some stories to tell.
The MC did once ask him why he doesn’t just run everything if he’s really been around for so long... his answer was: “Kings and their kingdoms will rise and fall… Worlds upon worlds are born, then cease to be. But time is what brings about all changes… So, I think I’m perfectly content with the power I possess. Wouldn’t you be?” 
Annnd they never asked Barbs another question like that again… and people think death is scary… 
Simeon 
He was honestly a little worried for their new companion for quite a while… It’s not like there’s never any sadness in the Celestial Realm or anything, but they seem to have something else entirely…
He’s heard stories about the Underworld. He’s never been himself, that’s usually a job for the Seraphim due to the… dreary nature of the place - but he’s heard it would make the Devildom look downright festive…
If he were being honest, he had half expected the MC to be obsessed with skeletons, ghosts, and other elements of darkness but that wasn’t the case. They certainly knew a lot about those things, but they appeared to have a healthy interest in the afterlife in general, so they asked him a lot of questions about the Celestial Realm, angels, and how the souls of the blessed are treated up there… It was surprising to say the least.
Of course he did the same and, frankly, Simeon found it incredibly wasteful that so many Greek followers find themselves just wasting away in a field of nothing for so long… but that’s neither here nor there.
He was also surprised by how gentle of an influence the MC ended up being on Luke as well. He had always suspected that the little angel just needed a bridge between him and Devildom to start finding appreciation for it, and the MC fit that bill perfectly - nothing he was used to, but still approachable enough to make everything less frightening. He thanks them a great deal for that… but...
It’s just that… Well they’re just so… depressing sometimes…! He doesn’t want to blame them because it hardly seems like their fault! They’re a very kind person, it’s just an atmosphere around them… It brings him to tears if he isn’t careful…
He’s invited the MC to Purgatory Hall on multiple occasions to chat and try to make them smile… When they do, the gloom is dispelled - even just a little - and they’re a truly beautiful creature regardless. It’s just so unfortunate that their life brings so much sadness...
Even so, he actually likes the MC enough to consider basing a character on them if he ever wrote another book. Something about a gloomy but sweet protagonist at home in a world of darkness sounds appealing… doesn’t it?
Luke
He didn’t know how to feel about the MC when they met. At first, he actually thought they were just as unhappy as he was to be there due to how depressed they looked but when they told him that wasn't true, he was really confused...
The Devildom is a dark, brutish, and dangerous place. Why would anyone feel at home down here??
But… well… He would spend time with them at RAD between breaks (partially to help scare off their many, many demonic suitors) and it might be weird to say, but they really made the Devildom look beautiful… literally.
The world just looks better when they’re around! It’s really hard to describe because it’s not something you notice much until they leave, but when the MC is around everything looks more vibrant and inviting! The grass gets greener, flowers grow bigger, and butterflies/birds hover around wherever they are like they have their own gravity - the realm loves them!
It started getting hard for Luke to hang onto his disdain for the place when they made it look so appealing… And then they started talking to him about the Underworld and the creatures they’d befriended there… creatures a lot worse than any demons he’d seen there...
Like. If the MC can be good friends with a bunch of rude walking corpses, then he could probably make friends with a demon right? There’s nice ones… kind of… 
Beel. He can make friends with Beel.
Like Simeon, he does feel bad that they seem so sad all the time… but unlike the older angel, he’s a bit more understanding that this is just how they are and enjoys his time with them regardless. (It helps a lot that just being around this little bean of a boy can lift their spirits anyway).
And you know what’s even better for him? When Lord Diavolo gives the MC tickets to things that they don’t want to go to, sometimes they’ll invite him along or give them to him instead! 
He’s gone to the Devil’s Coast with MC and Simeon sooo many times by now and he loves it!! Maybe the Devildom isn’t so bad after all, I mean, it can be a lot of fun when you go to the right places, anyway.
Solomon
Oh, he finds them both deeply fascinating and utterly terrifying - so just his sort of test sub-er, person!
He kids (somewhat), Solomon isn’t that dumb/lacking in self-preservation instinct. Experimenting on a child of death in a land of the dead (even if it’s not their “home turf”) would be asking for trouble. They’d have more than enough ammunition to fight him off and if their father found out? Immortality wouldn’t even begin to save him...
That being said, questions aren’t necessarily experiments… and oh boy, does he have a lot of them.
If the MC isn’t being pestered by Diavolo or the brothers, then they’re probably having to put up with Solomon nipping at their heels trying to get them to use their powers or answer all sorts of “innocent” scientific questions…
“MC, reanimation of Greek dead requires a blood offering, correct? Do you have to sacrifice animals for that process or do you allow them to feast on your own?”
“MC, when you’re controlling a skeleton do you move the body as a whole or do you have to animate each individual bone due to their lack of ligaments?”
“Think fast!! Oh look, you just caught the skull of my good friend, Richard! Could you bring him back from that, or should I fetch the rest of him?” 🙂
They put up with it because, believe it or not, he’s not nearly the weirdest person they’ve ever met (a lot of crazy people drift in and out of the land of the dead…) and well… they’re a pretty lonely person too so it’s not like they have a lot of standards when it comes to friendships anyway.
But the second they breathe a word of this to Barbs or Diavolo, this boy is on his way to a royal restraining order… Where does he even get those skulls…?
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nevertheless-moving · 3 years
Note
Could you talk more about your gumbo jar jar au or the frog one? 🐸
hm on close review the frog promise draft is a now redundant drabble from this au. Here it is in its entirety:
“I will never join you,” Luke said with a sneer of disgust.
Palpatine, as well as the nearby politicians, Jedi masters, and reporters were taken aback. 
“I’m afraid I don’t understand your meaning, Master Jedi,” the Senator said incredulously. “Do you mean to tell me that you consider yourself separate from the Republic? I know the Jedi Council had disavowed recognizing you but I never could have imagined...” he trailed off, leaving the crowd to murmur in alarm.
“I mean I will never join the Sith,” the rogue master replied calmly. “I imagine you’re responsible for the traces of the dark side I felt amongst the trade federation leaders.”
“The Sith...I see.” Palpatine took a step back, deliberately reassuring tone and alarmed expression clearly indicated that he suspected the man before him of insanity. “It’s been a very long day and you clearly intended to do good by my humble home world. Perhaps your fellow Jedi can take you to the healers so you can-”
“Why are you working alongside a Sith Lord?” Luke cut off the Senator and addressed Grandmaster Yoda directly. 
“A Sith Lord, you say?” Master Yoda replied. “A most serious allegation, this is.”
Basically, Luke derails the Naboo Crisis by absolutely annihilating the trade federation army, only realizing after the fact when and where he is. This means that Padme turns right around from Tatooine and never voices her vote of no-confidence. Now, Palpatine probably had contingency plans in place, but the public accusation by a Jedi of being responsible for the crisis in the first place, despite absolutely no evidence, hurts his image enough that he’s not going to win a vote, because people will think it’s a power grab. 
And it’s funny cause it’s true but Luke only barely knows that! He’s just accusing Palpatine of being behind the first evil thing he sees and he fuckin happens to be right!!!
Anyway Luke doesn’t focus on Palpatine; there are like 10,000 other Jedi around. He commits himself first and foremost to completing his training with Master Yoda because sometime Yoda just dies and fades into thin air so, you know! He’s not going to procrastinate on that again!
He goes before the council and humbly asks to be taken on Yoda’s student (this is right before Qui-Gon can ask about Anakin- literally, Anakin and Qui-Gon are in the waiting room). He gives several extremely vague banthashit explanations of who he is ‘I’m a follower of the Force,’ where he comes from ‘the Force sent me,’ and why they should train him when he’s way too old ‘the Force willed it.’ Yoda is somewhat impressed because those are some real unhelpfully wise answers and- here’s the kicker- Luke actually believes them! 
He is really committed to being a Jedi! Is 110% all about being a luminous being! This is several years after return of the Jedi and Luke has pretty much just been hanging out in force temples meditating with ghosts so he has quintessential Jedi vibes, he just knows jackshit about anything!
What really clinches it for Yoda is the fact that his robe pocket starts squirming and he pulls out a live Nabooian Salt Frog. And hands it to Yoda like, “These are one of your favorites right? :) I saw it and I thought of you :)”
Now Yoda- let’s step back a second. Yoda is old. Yoda, in his youth, was a bit more feral. He’s a top level predator and the order has always celebrated diversity and being true to your origins! He’s hunted with Tortugans on Shili! He’s unhinged his jaw with Besalisks on Ojom! 
But as the Republic’s boundaries caved in on themselves, he was more and more put into contact with Core senators who tend to be unnerved by more, ah, carnivorous tendencies. And the more he was put into high level positions by virtue of being really frickin old, the more restrained he became in his public behavior. 
Decades passed and younglings who only ever knew his more ‘harmless-prank’ feral tendencies were increasingly shocked and scared to see him occasionally unhinge his jaw to eat a scrocodile whole. Some of the prey-origin younglings from that field trip actually avoided him for the rest of the their lives.
So. Yoda is still a carnivore- but- in private. With his padawans and his closest peers. But his closest peers age and die and his padawans get younger and smaller as the decades pass. He took on two herbivorous padawans in a row and as a result restrained himself from openly hunting with another soul for around for 50 years.
And then there’s Dooku. ‘Ah a human,’ he thinks. ‘They hunt sometimes. Well. They’re omnivores at least.’
And Dooku is- and I’m not saying this to shame Dooku- but he’s prissy. He likes...neatness. He’s not afraid of violence but force forbid it’s untidy. So when Yoda, excited to get his ambush predation on, takes 14 year old Dooku who’s barely ever left the sterile confines of Coruscant on a trip to a swamp world- yeaaahh it doesn’t go well. Dooku- he doesn’t mean to, honestly. How would he even know that Yoda might be sensitive about things? He’s Yoda. 
But Dooku sobbing openly and puking a little in a bush and running away from Yoda because his Master is terrifying and gross. It... kind of puts the nail in the coffin for Yoda being open about that side of himself. He doesn’t really have it in him to try again. People’s view of him is too fixed, they can’t handle him also being a flesh creature so he focuses on the luminous side of him which is and always was, genuinely, more important than him.
And that’s been the last 100 years or so. The thrill of a live kill is just a little piece of himself that he meditates away and that’s ok. He has the force. He has the order. He’s old anyway, a real hunt would probably hurt his joints. 
And then in comes Luke, radiating Light and earnestness and Jedi serenity while also holding out a very tasty looking live frog. And Yoda realizes Dooku’s not around, he’s surrounded by a council he trusts and respects and likes, none of whom are 14 year olds, all of whom have seen the galaxy and seen worse. He is almost seizing the moment but there’s a little part of him that shriveled up when Dooku cried that’s having a hard time accepting this.
“Want it for yourself, you do not?” Yoda cackles, playing off the offer.
Luke smiles sheepishly and pulls out another live frog. “I was saving it for later. Forgive me Master, your senses are keen as ever I see.”
And Yoda...it’s not about the bribe, really, so much as the symbolism, and it’s not about the flattery either, but darn is the kid really pulling out the stops to make himself likable. And he is a kid, to Yoda anyway. Everyone is these days. What does he care about numbers when there’s a boy smiling like his third padawan, an adorable Rodian who took great delight in their more amphibious and wild missions?
Yoda snatches one of the frogs and slowly raises it in a parody of a toast. Luke does the same. The rest of the council quietly watches in various shades of bewilderment and bemusement.
They’re not actually going to eat that right? Mace thinks. Ugh I hate frogs the skin is so slimy. Shaak Ti thinks. I cannot believe they’re not even offering me one. Yaddle thinks.
And Yoda bites the head off the frog in a quick snap of his jaws, the rest following rapidly. Luke does the same- a slight assist from the force helping his less specialized mandible tear through skin and bone in a well practiced move. He chews slower, but finishes the frog soon enough, the rest of the council looking on with deep uncertainty and a tiny bit of hunger, but no actual fear. They’re Jedi Masters; they’ve eaten everywhere, it’s just a little weird for a human to be eating a live animal and Yoda as far as anyone knew only ate stew and also they were in the middle of a council meeting.
Yoda belches and Luke smiles genially.
“Take you on as my padawan learner, I will. Much to learn you have, much to teach you, I do.”
Luke beams. The council looks on in shock. 
“Master Yoda,” Mace Windu says hesitantly, “He’s clearly in his late 20s, at the earliest. If this is about the... frog thing-”
“Was a pleasant surprise, the frog. The reason for my decision, it is not. Had some training already, he has. Know each other before this day, we do. Taking over for a Master passed into the force, I am merely. Our custom, this is.”
Luke bows lowly and an initiate is summoned to escort him to the quartermasters and then the long-empty padawan suite next to Yoda’s chambers. 
Qui-Gon and Anakin are brought in and. Well. It’s a little hard for them to simply reject the boy after Yoda just pulled that stunt. He’s sent to the initiates dorm, eventually. Mace Windu has a headache from the shatterpoints blinking in and out of existence. Shaak Ti is delighted to discuss a hunting trip with Master Yoda and his new padawan learner Luke Svader. 
The force dances.
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scribblingfangirl · 3 years
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WITH LOVE, THE GHOSTS | Julie and the Phantoms - Part One
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not my gif!
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Author’s Note: Gah… I'm such a procrastinating butterfly. I should be writing my Billy Russo series which I'm so excited about, but I just want to be able to read it already instead of having to write first + I'm currently writing each and every chapter instead of the next one (struggles of a fanfiction writer - am I right?). So, what do I do instead? I flew from one of my obsessions to another and got inspired by this week's @flashfictionfridayofficial​ prompt. 
Anyways... This fic will be a little to late for some of you guys, but still: Merry Christmas everyone! And if you do not celebrate Christmas I still hope you have a wonderful day and a rest of the year filled with love and happiness. You did it, you fought through it. I’m sure you had your own pair of himbo ghosts taking care of you.
word count: ~ 1k
summary (and basically background info): Y/N is Julie's & Flynn's friend who doesn’t know about the ghosts (let’s just say she believes that they’re holograms). The boys become attached to Y/N due to her kindness and positivity and do everything in their (ghostly) powers to keep her days sunny and bright, especially in winter.  Or: Two times Y/N is oblivious to the boys 'paranormal' activities and the one time she notices it
prompt: Comfort in the Cold by @flashfictionfridayofficial​
warnings: english is not my first language, therefore, typos
| Part Two | Part Three |
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#1: Luke
Slowly and quietly you made your way down the stairs of the Molina household, leaving Julie's and Flynn's sleeping forms behind. Even though you had just watched multiple Christmas movies and probably eaten double your weight in popcorn, your stomach was still asking for more. As Julie knew about your habits of needing a midnight snack and since Ray repeatedly told you to make yourself at home you weren't feeling bad about stealing some small bits and pieces out of their fridge or cupboards.
Which is why you were straining your ears to hear any sounds that might indicate that you had woken up either Carlos or Ray, but you were only met with silence. Releasing the breath you were holding you hastily hopped down the last few steps down to the living room, grabbed the stair railing and used the momentum of your movement to swiftly swing yourself in the direction of the kitchen, freezing at the sight that greeted you.
A quick glance at the clock told you it was 2 a.m. and the continuous silence indicated that nobody except you was awake and around. Yet, as you hesitantly took a view steps towards the kitchen counter, pulling your blanket like a shield tighter around your body, there was a perfectly fine peanut-butter/jelly sandwich waiting for you, a smiley made out of Nutella painted onto it. Your favourite midnight snack.
A small note peaked out from under the plate and it took you some time to decipher the chicken scratch. Can't have our favourite groupie going to bed hungry! 
Smiling and shaking your head, thinking that either Julie or Flynn must have sneaked out of the room sometime earlier to make you this sandwich you happily bit into it. 
If you'd known that there was a brown-haired ghost with hazel eyes sitting opposite to you and watching you with a smile, the sandwich would have probably gotten stuck in your throat.
#2: Alex 
Doing multiple Christmas movie marathons would be fun they said. No need to worry they said. Only Christmas cheer and joy they said. Well… long story short, even fun movies can make you bawl like a baby! 
A few days after the midnight snack incident, which you completely forgot about, you were once again sitting on Julie's bed. With her and Flynn to your left and right, you had been watching different movies on her computer. Currently, however, you were only trying. Tears were blurring your vision and your sniffles were the only sounds reaching your ear. 
Pressing the plushy's soul that Flynn had won you at a fair out of its body and sobbing into it, you felt Julie shift beside you and lay her head in your lap and mumbling something while Flynn was searching for a handkerchief.
"Whose idea was it again to watch this movie?" you tried to ask, but your voice came out all thick and full of emotion, so you weren't sure if they understood or heard you at all.
What you didn't know was that the boys were watching the movie, and now mostly you, with big eyes.
"Remember the day when Julie was crying in the garage and then Flynn came in crying too? Remember how I said that two girls crying are worse than one girl crying? This… this is way worse!" Luke pointed exaggeratedly at every single one of you and moved quickly out of Flynn's way when she left the room to get a box of tissues. 
"Dude… they're not actually crying crying. It's just a really sad movie," Alex said and sighed quietly when he heard Reggie whisper, "Do you think that's what Willie meant when he said Caleb floods the place during movie night?"
"That's... no, okay." Shaking his head Alex moved towards the bed and sat carefully at Flynn's place to not alert you of the shift beside you. Then he gently took a paw of the plushy that you weren't currently pressing into an embrace and lifted it to wipe away your tears and free your sight. 
You sniffled, too confused and full of emotion to realize what just happened and that it couldn't possibly have been Julie or Flynn, and whispered a small, "Thank you". 
Alex smiled, proud of his action.
#3: Reggie
You didn't even bother to take off your shoes or wipe away the residual snow still sticking to your hair as you flopped yourself down onto your bed, groaning into your pillow. Everything was already grey, wet or at least soggy anyway. To say your day had been bad was an understatement.
It's the most wonderful time of the year With the kids jingle belling And everyone telling you be of good cheer It's the most wonderful time of the year
Confused you lifted your head and starred at your computer who apparently decided to become sentient and cheer you up.
It's the hap-happiest season of all With those holiday greetings and gay happy meetings When friends come to call It's the hap-happiest season of all
The next thing that happened would forever be burned into your brain. Your favourite pen suddenly lifted itself up into the air and started to scribble down onto a nearby paper. Slowly and unsure you stood up and inched closer to your desk, but as soon as you were able to sneak a peak onto the paper the pen stopped and fell down.
Shaking your head you rubbed your eyes and turned back to your bed. "This is the weirdest lucid dream I ever had." The moment you flopped back down onto your bed you heard the familiar scratching of pen on paper again. Turning your head there it was again - the floating pen. "What?"
However, once again, as soon as you reached the desk the pen fell down, lifeless. “Alright... alright. I understand! Don’t worry, I won’t sneak a peak.”
"I am dreaming... right?" You weren't. Pinching yourself hurt, trying to breathe through a closed nose didn't work and your pointer finger would not move through the palm of your hand.
Shakily, yet weirdly motivated by the happy Christmas music still playing in the background, you picked up the note laying beside the now still pen. "Merry Christmas Y/N! Lots of love from Reggie, Alex and… Who?" 
"It told you, Luke… I should just have signed for us all."
"Shut it Reg, I know my handwriting sucks."
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asweetprologue · 3 years
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this is for @pencilscratchins​ who has been plaguing my dash with TFA era dinluke concepts. I did not think my first star wars fic would be about rey and luke but here we are! based on this post and more specifically a scene in rebecca’s google doc lmao
a·wak·en  to rouse (a feeling)
Rey finds him at the edge of the city, where the rough geometry of the buildings crack and fragment apart as they give way to dust. It’s one of the areas she’s avoided most intensely; the dense fog of loss lingers here, clawing for her attention. The more she opens herself up to the Force lately, the more she feels the echoes of the life it touched before. The land remembers, and the bones beneath them speak to her in sharp little bursts of time lost.
Beyond, the desert stretches out in its infinite, unforgiving ambivalence. Where the city is a roiling mass of lives long since passed, the ocean of sand before them is a void. No suffering, no pain, no agonized voices crying out. No joy, no love clinging to the rocky surface. There is Force there too, she knows, permeating the stone and air and even the smallest insects scuttling below the surface. No more or less pure than that found in the city, but quieter. She takes a moment to breathe it in, tasting it on the backs of her teeth.
He isn’t meditating. She can feel his disconnect from the Force like a wound, jaring and discordant. But here at the edge of what has become her home, the home he scraped together with the Mand’alor for a dying people, it doesn’t feel so abrasive. Rey hovers for a moment, unsure, before taking a seat beside him. When Luke says nothing, she tries to drop into meditation herself, but as always her mind fights her. She wonders what happened to cause such a great disruption in Luke’s psyche. Such resistance to opening himself to the Force. She thinks about trying to cut herself off from it, now that she has felt its presence in and around herself, and balks. It would be easier to cut off her own hand, she thinks.
She shifts slightly, looking for a more comfortable position, and Luke huffs. It’s an amused sound, and Rey’s eyes blink open to regard him curiously. Luke is looking at her, something bittersweet on his face. “What?” she demands.
“If you’re trying to meditate,” he replies, “you’re not doing a very good job of it. I can feel your mind going a parsec a minute.”
“Well I’ve not exactly had the best instruction,” she grumbles, relaxing from her more formal meditative stance.
Luke’s beard twitches, and though he’s smiling, she can sense his wariness in the air around them. No one hides in the Force. “What makes you think you’re ready?” he asks.
It’s a question that she’s been expecting, that she’s spent hours building arguments around. I’m strong, she had planned to say, or I can already do so much, or I have nothing. I have no one. Make me into something of use. But now looking into Luke Skywalker’s sad eyes, she only has one real answer. There is only one real thing that makes her feel like she must do this, one thing that makes her desperate for guidance. The truth that brought her here.
“There’s no one else,” she says, and for a moment the vast loneliness of the statement washes over her, smothering. It’s probably the most honest thing she’s said since her feet sunk into the sand of New Mandalore. “If it’s not me, there’s no one. So I’m ready. I have to be.”
Luke takes a breath, a glacial motion that seems to carry all the weight that she feels within it. He looks up at the sky above them, shoulders slumping. The moonlight reflects on the desert sand, turning it into a silver sea stretching out infinitely beyond them. The lights of the city are far behind them; the only creatures that keep them company here are the stars, and the ghosts.
“I can’t be a good teacher to you,” Luke says. His voice is clear and crisp; it offers no opportunity for rebuttal. “I failed before. I can’t be a father, or a mentor. I’m not even a Jedi anymore, not really. Maybe I never was.” He laughs, a harsh, cracked sound. “I barely knew my old masters. Most of the teachings of the Order are lost. I tried to rebuild it, and I just forced history to repeat itself.” He drops his chin down, meeting her gaze again. His eyes are very blue, she realizes, maybe for the first time. They’re younger than the rest of his face. The Force suddenly brushes against her consciousness, offering her a fizzling image of a young man with windswept blonde hair, in a desert so similar and yet so different from this one. The man is bright and shining, desperate for adventure, ready to be someone. So deeply, terrifically afraid of the burden the galaxy had placed on his shoulders. The image fades, Luke’s face aging before her, but his eyes are the same. Still bright, still scared.
Rey understands.
“You don’t need to be anything to me,” she says. This does not ring with the truth that she offered moments ago. “I haven’t had anyone, ever. I’ve been alone all my life. I can be what they need without you.” She pauses, takes a deep breath. Steadies herself, forces her rapid heart rate to settle, lets her emotions leak out into the Force until it washes back into her with all the calm of the wide open desert. “I don’t need you, Luke Skywalker. But your help would sure make my life kriffing easier.”
Luke laughs again, and this time it doesn’t seem so bitter. He shakes his head, gray hair flopping across his forehead. “Well, Din will be pleased,” he says lightly, and Rey feels a sense of relief wash through her that’s so powerful for a moment she can’t breathe with it. He’s going to do it. She’s got a teacher. She laughs too, feeling bright and shining and afraid.
They sit together at the edge of the world together, and in the face of the endless desert she finally feels something like hope
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rynnaaurelius · 3 years
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Titan’s Curse But Make It Time Loop: Nico di Angelo Edition
-Okay so I’m at work and not doing much and who wants to actually edit your shit drafts for your actual WIPs so that they’re less bad? No one, that’s who
-So I had an idea: The Titan’s Curse. Also known as the book where people start to die. It sucks to be a demigod in this book--for the first time in the original series, it really does.
-Not everything is fixed, not everyone is saved, and people start to have to make really tough decisions.
-So we fix it. Not by throwing Percy, or Annabeth, or Thalia, or, hell, even Bianca or Grover into the mix.
-Throwing the marginally more grown-up, more trained, and more knowledgeable demigods into the fire, who’d get everyone alive and safe by the third time ‘round? Nah.
-We’re making Nico fix this.
-Because here’s the thing about Nico di Angelo: Sure, he grows up to become a major badass, the Ghost King, so on and so forth. But not yet.
-For now, Nico is baby, a ten-year-old whose experience with any kind of fighting consists of one (1) Capture The Flag game and who’s still half-reliant on Mythomagic to explain what the fuck is happening.
-He’s also got the worst knowledge makeup possible! He knows he’s a son of Hades, which is bad, he knows to stick monsters with the pointy end of swords but nothing else, he knows that Percy Jackson and Thalia Grace are Very Big Deals (But also doesn’t know why beyond parents), and he’s, at best, vaguely aware that there’s some kind of bad prophecy hanging around.
-Also by the end of the book, he’s just been told his last immediate family who isn’t Hades is dead in one of the worst ways possible, and he--pretty irrationally IMO, but Nico’s a kid who has been through a lot recently, so we’re not holding that against him--blames Percy Jackson.
-Literally, you probably can’t pick an angstier or worse choice to run through the time travel trope. I love it.
-We’re making this kid save Bianca’s life via time loop, which happens due to. . .hmm, we’ll say the Fates did it.
-So, Loop 0 = Canon, only at the end of the day on December 21st, after the conversation with Percy, Nico falls asleep only gods know where only to wake up the day he meets Percy Jackson:
Loop 1:
-Nico doesn’t actually change anything meaningful at first.
-Spends most of it shellshocked and not unconvinced the last week (For him, anyway) wasn’t a horrible nightmare; shellshocked and staring at Percy Jackson, anyway.
-(Percy’s wondering what’s up with the silent kid his sister had talked up as a cheerful chatterbox)
-It’s only when Bianca agrees to join the quest for Artemis that he starts kicking up a fuss; demanding to go, screaming that she can’t leave him even more, not again.
-(Bianca hesitates; briefly, enough to remind Nico that she loves him. But she’s not their mother, and she needs this)
-Bianca still dies. Percy comes back pale and guilty. Nico doesn’t yell at him when he returns--he already knows. He accepts the Hades figurine so that he can throw it into the lake.
-He slinks off back into Cabin Eleven and falls asleep, hoping desperately that he gets a third chance.
Loop 2:
-He does.
Loop 3:
-After a very painful death at the hands of Dr. Thorn, Nico, generally being a straightforward person at this stage of life, takes the obvious path this time around: He tries to tell Bianca--who brushes it off as a dream.
-Annabeth still goes over the cliff when Nico takes the initiative of attaching himself and his sister to Percy Jackson and Thalia Grace at the dance. He tries to tell Percy and Thalia when Bianca still joins the Hunt, promising Nico that whatever he saw, she’ll be extra careful.
-(Bianca’s fearful of what Nico's saying, and thinks that if these sworn sisters can’t keep her safe, who can?)
-Artemis gives Nico a speculative look but agrees when he begs her to protect Bianca at all costs.
-He doesn’t get on the quest. Being a reasonable demigod of questionable parentage, he sneaks out of camp.
-He gets caught, because despite being aware of his awesome new powers, he doesn’t know how to use them, and is still a ten-year-old who can barely hold a sword the right way.
-He gives Percy the puppy dog eyes and shows off said awesome new powers. Percy forces him back.
-Nico follows him.
-Repeat until Percy dies saving Nico from the Nemean Lion in Washington, DC.
-Nico can’t find it in himself to be terribly sad--especially when he doesn’t make it much longer.
Loop 4:
-He’s really stuck like this, huh?
-Oh, Di Immortales.
-(Before Percy gets his chest ripped to shreds by a lion and Nico meets skeleton cats, he learned how to hold a sword properly and curse fluently in Greek. Percy probably only meant to teach him one of those things)
-In unrelated news: Having a big crush on a guy who thinks he’s only known you for a couple hours? Terrible.
-Trying to hate the guy who let your sister die when he’s that stupid and nice? Even worse.
-That stupid lion.
Loop 5, 6, 7, 8, 9:
-Nico repeats: That stupid lion.
-Somewhere in Loop 7 he starts to steal supplies out of the camp store when he follows Percy following the quest.
-They forcefeed the lion enough trail mix and frozen ice cream in Loop 9 that they don’t die this time.
-At least until someone called the General shows up and Nico’s dead before he can raise his sword.
Loop 10:
-Nico wakes up in his and Bianca’s room in Westover and starts crying. Bianca tells the headmaster they’re both sick and Nico lets her hold him all day.
-They fall asleep and Nico swears he won’t let her die again.
Loop 11, 12, 13:
-He wakes up and he still can’t get out of bed without feeling that blade cutting between his ribs, burning like it’s on fire.
-Gods, he’s so sorry, Bianca. Dispiace tanto.
Loop 14:
-He can get up without feeling like he’s about to die again. Bianca fusses but assumes it was just a bad dream.
-Nico is caught stealing and can’t follow Percy until it’s too late.
-Everyone assumes this means he’s a son of Hermes, however, and Nico can’t correct them without opening his mouth and letting the sobbing laughter out.
-Figuring he’s about to get another chance next round anyway, he takes Travis and Connor Stoll up on their offer to learn a thing or two so that he doesn’t get Cabin Eleven slapped with kitchen duty from now until Doomsday.
-He likes the Stolls. He spent most of the time, pre-looping, actively avoiding everyone at camp as he waited for Bianca and Percy to come back, but they’re not that bad.
-Percy comes back with the figurine and no sister and Nico remembers why he’s stuck.
Loop 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23:
-After Loop 12 and being killed in Washington DC again, Nico realizes: He needs to learn how to fight.
-Unless he gets killed early or refuses to leave Westover, the loop resets after seven days. So, he has seven days to train each time.
-He gets to camp, finds the arena, and meets Clarisse La Rue. He demands she teach him how to kill monsters.
-She laughs, and tells him that attitude in his size will make monsters easy to kill, they’ll laugh so hard.
-Clarisse teaches him how to swing a sword each time--but only after mocking his unamused face.
-Somehow, Percy coming back with news of Bianca’s death only hurts more each time.
Loop 24:
-Nico wakes up before Bianca this time. He looks over at her bed and knows. He’s got to try this time.
-It’s disturbingly easy making friends with Percy Jackson after the last loops.
-Bessie’s new. Cute, but new.
-Nico wonders just how much he’s missed in the past--he thinks of Annabeth Chase, and hopes she hasn’t been dying each time.
-Percy doesn’t even argue when Nico shows up in the stables with a bag slung over his shoulder, and the sword he’s been stealing out of the shed strapped to his hip.
-Nico suggests the ice cream--again--to Percy in DC before
-Nico might be getting the hang of this.
Loop 25:
-Nico is not getting the hang of this.
-Zoë Nightshade’s refusal to accept Percy and Nico on the quest--violating a prophecy, and gods, Nico’s curious if that prophecy ever mentioned this--has so far gotten them attacked and killed by spartoi once.
-And again. As Nico bleeds out on the floor, he watches a panicked blond man--a demigod--plead for mercy.
-Isn’t he on the other side?
Loop 26:
-His name is Luke Castellan and he apparently wants the gods dead.
-Nico can relate at this point.
-The General is Atlas, and Nico knows enough about Greek mythology, real and wrong, at this point to know that is bad.
Loop 27:
-Twenty-six tries, but they finally make it out of DC. Threatening the questers with Atlas killing them all is more than enough.
-For the first time, Nico doesn’t know what happens next. He glues himself to Bianca’s side and glares at anything suspicious.
-With help that Percy refuses to name, even when Nico tries his hardest, they go to New Mexico.
-There’s a boar and it’s so close, they make it to what the others are calling “the junkyard of the gods”.
-Nico sees the Hades figurine on the ground.
-Bianca grins in delight and picks it up, calling for him.
-He can’t help it.
-Nico starts screaming.
Loop 28:
-His sister’s murderer was never Percy Jackson.
-His sister’s murderer was a force of mechanics that makes Nico fully understand, for the first time, what the gods are, beyond stats on a card.
-Talos.
-Nico is going to destroy him.
Loop 29:
-She dies.
Loop 30:
-Again.
Loop 31:
-Again.
-Loop 32, 33, 34, 3536373839FortyFo r t y O n  e--:
-Again. Again. Again. Again again againagainagainagainAGAIN--
Loop 42:
-Nico gets out of bed. He finds Percy Jackson at the dance, hugs him, and tells him he’s sorry.
-Nico walks outside and waits for Dr. Thorn in the snow. He can feel the shadows curling at the edge of the wood like a sixth sense, now. Waiting for him to summon the restless dead out of them.
-So many attempts to save his sister, ranging from sacrificing himself to sacrificing Percy--not that Percy needs the push, Nico has found--to any and all members of the quest.
-She dies. Always, always dies. Whatever Nico does, that junkyard is full of the death of Bianca di Angelo.
-He tried avoiding it. Once. Loop 33. Nico threw such a fit he’s surprised he wasn’t sent back to Camp Half-Blood by the Hunters, but it kept them out of the junkyard.
-He tries not to remember how little was left of his sister’s body by the monsters that time.
-Son of Hades. After all this time, Nico’s beginning to wonder if this is what it means. Death and death and death.
-Dr. Thorn walks outside, and Nico can feel a ghoulish grin crossing his face that has no place on a ten-year-old.
-One of them is going to die, this loop. And Nico will not go to New Mexico.
Loop 43:
-Nico wonders if there was a past life of his he needs to remember. Who could he have made this angry?
-He lies to Bianca and they stay in Westover again this time. Better than death, anyway.
Loop 44:
-Nico tries a different tack this time. A more roundabout way of things.
-He takes Bianca and throws the two of them in the way of the battle with the manticore.
-After all this time, he still doesn’t know much about Annabeth Chase. She gets kidnapped and returned safely to Percy every time, to the best of his knowledge.
-Nico dies holding up the sky, but at least Bianca lives, under the protection of Artemis.
Loop 45:
-Nico looks in the mirror and studies the new grey streak with fascination. And, maybe, some hope.
-Things can change.
Loop 46, 47, 48, 49, 50:
-Nico gets kidnapped a few times. Once, he’s killed in a rage by a Titan with horns, but it’s quick. Mostly, he holds up the sky to get Artemis out.
-She looks at him strangely each time and Nico wonders if she can see what he’s done.
Loop 51:
-They figure out he’s a son of Hades. They offer him Olympus. Olympus and Bessie--the Ophiotaurus, rather.
-Nico says no.
Loop 52:
-Nico says yes.
Loop 53:
-Being on the verge of overthrowing the gods and keeping everyone he’s grown to care for--in the case of several Hunters, against his will; in Percy Jackson’s case, Nico loves him as much as he hates him at this point--doesn’t do much, apparently.
-Nico stays in Westover again. He resists the urge to tell Bianca that would-be destroyers of Olympus don’t need to brush their hair, whatever she says.
Loop 54:
-Nico goes over the edge of the cliff again, but with Percy Jackson.
-This isn’t the first time; in Loop 46, Percy had taken the sky for both the sake of Artemis and Nico until it killed him.
-What’s different, is Nico’s in the middle of what’s become the usual panic attack when he’s about to die for the hundredth time, and his powers react.
-Percy holds him close and calls him cousin. Tells him he’ll never leave Nico.
-You have no idea, Nico whispers. You can’t leave me.
-You think I want to? Percy whispers back. You’re not alone, Nico.
-Nico’s sobbing sounds like laughter.
Loop 55:
-Nico tells Percy the truth for the third time. This is the first time he hasn’t told Bianca first.
-They’ve just found the Erymanthian Boar, Thalia’s told Nico his goth needs work--whatever that means--and Nico’s bracing himself for the junkyard again.
-Getting kidnapped by the Titans really gets old after a while.
-He still has the grey streak, and no number of excuses will fully soothe his sister, but the Hunt’s a good distraction from it.
-Nico doesn’t blame Bianca anymore for it. He thinks.
-Nearly a year into this loop and Nico’s finding it hard to blame anyone for much of anything, anymore. Especially when he sees what she’s faced. Again. And again.
-For now, this time, Percy Jackson is staring at Nico with wide eyes at what Nico’s told him--through these loops, Nico’s starting to wonder if he now knows more about Percy than Percy’s own best friends--and says he believes him.
-Once, Nico would’ve exploded from joy. Now, he just sighs and nods.
-Percy tells him how to condense the conversation for the next loop. He advises Nico to research Talos, “like Annabeth would.”
-He advises Nico to warn Percy’s next loop self about Annabeth’s kidnapping. Nico wonders if he’s gone insane that he’s considering it.
-Bianca dies.
Loop 56:
-Nico makes the executive decision this time to try and befriend Annabeth Chase. As such, he takes Percy’s advice.
Loop 57:
-It takes him two tries to befriend Annabeth Chase and learn about Talos.
Loop 58:
-Three times.
-But the nail. The nail in the ankle of Talos.
Loop 59:
-He hangs back at camp again this time and meets Charles Beckendorf, head of Cabin Nine, and son of Hephaestus.
-Nico figures that short of finding the god himself and committing temporary suicide--not that it hasn’t crossed Nico’s mind--his son will have to do.
-(He’s tried his hand at summoning ghosts, but Daedalus refuses to show, for some reason)
-Beckendorf frowns and tells Nico he would have to see Talos himself.
-Nico hadn’t realized just how much cursing he had picked up off of Percy and Thalia until that moment.
Loop 60:
-Nico knows what the prophecy says. One shall be lost in the land without rain.
-He knows it’s why he’s been failing so much.
-The trouble is, he no longer cares.
Loop 61:
-It took him a try, but he gets Beckendorf on the quest, prepared to defeat the Talos prototype.
Loop 62:
-Strike that, two tries.
-Nico really hates the Nemean Lion.
Loop 63, 64:
-Nico has solved half a problem: How to defeat Talos without putting someone inside the robot.
-The other half of the problem is now that they are all electrocuted by a dying automaton for their efforts.
Loop 65:
-Beckendorf’s crush--girlfriend? crush, they’re both insisting--Silena Beauregard comes along this time. Nico won’t complain over the extra manpower, even if he’s positive that eight campers and Hunters are patent overkill for one quest.
-Silena pulls Bianca out of the wreckage. Nico’s heart stops.
-Silena’s crying when she mentions that if they had been a bit earlier, she could have been revived.
-Nico wonders if Thalia’s going to stab him as he starts whooping. And takes notes about where Talos falls.
Loop 66:
-Nico swears, if Percy Jackson tries to sacrifice himself for Annabeth Chase one more time--
Loop 67:
-Bianca.
-I found you, he sobs. I found you.
-Gods damn the Hoover Dam.
Loop 68:
-And again.
-Despite having the distinct inkling at this point that he doesn’t much like like girls, Nico could kiss Silena Beauregard and Thalia Grace when they manage to revive his sister each time.
-She’s shaky and leaning on him and was dead, he could see her soul floating away--
-But she’s there.
-Nico refuses to let his sister out of the sight at the Hoover Dam and Percy befriends the Naiads this time.
-At least, until the Titans--who Nico made the very big mistake of taunting at DC--sends monsters he can’t control.
Loop 69, 70, 71, 72, 73:
-They keep dying in various combinations at the Hoover Dam now that Nico’s figured out how to save Bianca.
-At least, until he gets separated from Percy in Loop 73 and he meets a redheaded girl with a penchant for calling Nico pint-size.
-Athena dislikes Percy, Nico, Bianca, and Thalia in equal measure. Having learned of the Great Prophecy in Loop 16 and Percy’s mooning over Annabeth in. . .well, every loop, Nico can’t quite blame her.
Loop 74:
-Her name is Rachel Elizabeth Dare and Nico likes her. She takes none of their shit and if it weren’t for the fact that they already have eight people on the quest, he’d want to take her along.
-Bianca gets in a fight with the Old Man of the Sea. Thalia electrocutes him when he throws Bianca in the bay.
Loop 75:
-Nico wakes up in Westover with the distinct feeling that he was drowned on dry land.
-He stays in bed shivering, that day.
Loop 76:
-Atlas is the father of Zoë Nightshade. Nico learned this around Loop 50. He had realized around five loops ago that this probably meant she was going to die “by a parent’s hand.”
-He hadn’t realized that it was going to hurt to watch.
Loop 77, 78, 79, 80, 81:
-Now that he’s figured things out to about San Francisco, it seems the world is out to get him. The number of fights or mistakes that he either makes himself or has to head off are ridiculous.
Loop 82:
-Nico is so very tired. And wishes he felt ten years old again.
Loop 83:
-If Thalia gets in one more fight with Nereus, Nico's going to walk into the sea.
Loop 84:
-He wanders off, in this one. Grover had been killed in Hoover Dam, so Nico’s waiting for the reset at this point.
-In the meantime, Nico figures there are worse things to do than enjoy a good afternoon in San Francisco. He even meets a boy in a purple shirt.
-His name is Jason and he has hair like the sun.
-If he ever fixes this, Nico wants to find him.
Loop 85:
-Nico’s not fast enough in the junkyard.
-In San Francisco, he tries to find the ugliest, biggest trouble he can find.
-He finds a pair of teenagers in armor who yell Latin at him instead.
Loop 86:
-There’s a dragon that will attack them in the Garden of the Hesperides if they make it angry enough and Nico is so tired.
Loop 87:
- Zoë Nightshade is dead. They’ve won.
-Funny definition of “win”, considering they’ve all almost died this loop about a dozen times each, and Nico can’t explain why he’s crying on the body of a Hunter he only met a week ago, in their eyes.
-She hates him, some loops. More loops, she looks at him with ghosts of old grief in her eyes and hands him a knife.
-The gods execute Bessie, and then, Nico watches as his father turns to him and Bianca with sorrowful eyes.
-Nico should’ve figured, after almost ninety loops.
Loop 88:
-Luke offers one of them the entrails of Bessie again.
-Nico takes them.
Loop 89:
-For all the good it does. Nico wakes up as he does every time now: Powerless, in bed, and with only a grey streak to show for his efforts.
Loop 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98:
-Nico doesn’t know how to save Zoë Nightshade. Bianca, he could trick and fight his way into it. Beckendorf and Silena and Percy and a loophole in lost could save his sister.
-Her, she just. . .dies. Sometimes in DC, sometimes in San Francisco, sometimes on the hills of Mt. Tamalpais. Always at the hands of Atlas.
-Always, being murdered by her father.
-It’s not as gutting as watching his sister die, but it aches more in his chest, somehow.
Loop 99:
-He sticks close to Zoë this time. Same as he’s done with Percy, Annabeth, his sister, Thalia, and Grover, time and time again. But not her, Nico is realizing. Not the clinging he’s achieving now.
-Hoping for. . .something.
-He knows better than to tell the immortal Lieutenant of Artemis the whole truth. The loneliness is enough.
-She’s less frosty to him from the start than to, say, Grover or Percy, after Annabeth goes over the cliff again. When he shows up in DC, she’s much less angry than he’s seen her.
-Along the way to New Mexico and then San Francisco, he listens. He’s grown better at it, this far in. When the others are asleep, when Bianca is being fussed over after Talos, when everyone but them is asleep by the fire, he listens.
-And she tells him about her sisters. About her father, when the world was young and Atlas had looked on every daughter of his with pride. She tells him, pride glistening in her eyes, of the battles she has seen, the hunts she has overseen at the command of a goddess, the monsters she has killed, and the epithets she has been given.
-He doesn’t ask anything of her. Not until they’re in the house of Annabeth’s father, drinking lemonade the night before the battle, and Nico knows she is about to die again.
-What do you want, he asks. You’ve done everything. What’s left?
-She stopped, ice seems to creep over her again, and Nico wondered if he’d hit some sore spot.
-He’s opened his mouth to make his apologies when she answers, so quiet and quick he thinks he’s imagined it.
-To be remembered. When my lady has taken another lieutenant, as she must, and I have gone to where all gods go when they die, I wish for my memory to remain. And. . .
-Nico waits, and ignores the sudden, terrifying thought that he no longer knows what he wants.
-I wish to see the stars again. I was born a nymph of the sunset; starlight is precious to me. I want to see it again.
-Nico dies to preserve the memory of Zoë Nightshade.
100:
-Nico di Angelo wakes up in Westover Hall. He hopes for the last time.
-He does everything right: Annabeth goes over the cliff, his sister joins the Hunt, Percy is soon his friend, and he convinces Silena and Beckendorf to join the quest.
-The Nemean Lion never stands a chance, and Nico is glad to be rid of it.
-His sister lives.
-Nico watches Percy watch Rachel Elizabeth Dare go, looking like he’s just taken a frying pan to the face, and fights the urge to snicker.
-Thalia doesn’t start a fight with Nereus, but Percy certainly does. Nico could’ve sworn he saw the boy with sun-hair again, watching with curiosity.
- Zoë Nightshade dies in the arms of Artemis and is made into the stars she loves so dearly. Nico promises her soul that he will remember.
-For, he has found, the dead have a tendency of remembering things they shouldn’t.
-Annabeth and Percy now have grey streaks to match Nico’s, and Nico can’t wait to spend the rest of his life trying to explain that.
-It’s closer than he would like, but much less close than other lives with Olympus. The Ophiotaurus is alive and safe, and they are all alive.
-As Nico walks out of the council, he looks off to the side. By the fire is the familiar girl with red eyes--the Lady Hestia, looking much closer to Nico’s age than that of the Olympian she is.
-Besides her are three old ladies. Nico’s heard about them from Percy, in Loops 26, 53, 61, and 62.
-One lady holds a ball of string that is the color of a warm umber. The other is knitting what looked suspicious like socks. The last. . .
-Scissors, in one hand. Just as expected. Nico swallowed.
-In the other, was a knot of burnt string, tied to the socks. Behind her, Nico could see discarded string of all colors: an electric blue, a stormy grey, a black that seems to glisten with the promise of a storm, string the soft, hopeful pink of love, yarn run through with bright copper.
-Glowing threads that Nico could only describe as the color of starlight.
-As he walked out, firmly between Percy Jackson and Thalia Grace, the Hunt of Artemis behind him, Nico hears one last promise:
It is done, Nico di Angelo.
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tangledstarlight · 3 years
Note
there’s people chasing us and i pulled you into the alley with me and wow you’re close" for Juke, but the people are fans??
lets all just pretend the whole start isn't so convoluted. i kinda forgot they needed to be running and kinda panicked lmao i distracted myself by starting it with an emperors new grove reference for some reason??? 😬 anyway!! hope you like it! 😊💜
1. there’s people chasing us and i pulled you into the alley with me and wow you’re close
50 cliche tropes and prompts!
Sometimes, Julie felt a little like her life was like the beginning of The Emperor's New Groove where Kuzco is pulling down slides and telling the audience how his life ended up like this. A sad llama in the rain.
Only she wasn’t a llama. And she wasn’t in the rain. And she definitely wasn’t sad.
But honestly, if someone was to ask her how she ended up in an alley, breathing heavily with her best friend and bandmate, Luke Patterson standing so close she can feel his breath on her cheeks, can see the flecks of gold in his eyes? She’s not sure how she’d explain it.
The day had started out so normal. They had a day off between tour stops and had decided to use their time wisely. To actually visit the city they were in. Reggie had made an itinerary and everything. They were going to be tourists and buy tacky keychain presents and try the world's best coffee that was advertised on a sign Alex had seen the night before.
The problem might have been the four of them forgetting that people recognised them now. That walking down the street was starting to become a problem. Especially when they were all together. And they’d always known that this was part of their dreams, that making music that connected with people meant that there would be, well, people.
But they’d never really been prepared for it.
One day they were no one. The next, they had crowds of people chasing them down the street asking for photos and autographs and wanting to touch her hair or feel Luke’s arms or wear Alex’s hat.
They’d stopped to take a photo with one girl outside the hotel, and had paused for a small conversation with a few fans near a music shop, and when they’d come out of the cafe with the world's best coffee there had been a small crowd waiting for them.
Being polite and patient only got them so far and when someone started getting a little aggressive with Reggie, the four of them did the only thing they could think of.
They started running.
Luke had grabbed her hand, tugging her through the crowd and running down the street as fast as they could. Hoping Alex and Reggie running in the opposite direction would give them all enough time to put some distance between them all.
“Where are we going!?” She pants, throwing a look over her shoulder as the sound of too many feet starts to follow them.
Luke squeezes her hand and she almost trips over a crack in the pavement when she looks back at him, his cheeks a little red as all he says is, “Trust me.”
And well, that she can do. She’s been trusting Luke since the day they met. Most people, mostly Flynn, would say she was crazy for trusting him so much, with so much. But Luke had never let her down and Julie didn’t think he ever would. Not intentionally at least.
So they run, Julie let’s Luke pull her down a street and across a road and around a store and down an alley.
It’s blocked off at the end by a metal fence and, as they hear more footsteps approaching, Luke pulls her behind a tower of old cardboard boxes. One of his hands is on her waist while his other is still holding hers, only now he has it pinned against the brick wall next to her head. They're both breathing heavily, from the running, from adrenaline, from how close they’re now standing.
Luke’s breath fans across her face, and she can smell the mint chewing gum that she’d passed around to them all after their breakfast. She can see the way his eyes are tracking over her face, the way blue mixes with green with grey and idly wonders if there’s even a way to describe the colour of his eyes accurately. She’d like to spend a few hours trying.
Julie knows they’ve stood this close before. That there’s been so many times over the years where it’s just been them, in their own little world of possibilities. But she knows they’ve never stood like this. That if breathes out her chest brushes against his, and if she leant just a little forward her lips would touch his chin.
“I think we lost ‘em,” Luke whispers and normally this is when her thoughts would stop. When the weird little bubble of intimacy they’d created would pop.
But it doesn’t. And Luke doesn’t let go of her hand, doesn’t step back, doesn’t stop looking at her.
“Power of cardboard boxes,” she says back, voice low and she wonders what he’s thinking as her breath ghosts across his lips. Wonders if maybe he’s thinking the same thing she is and his eyes dip down once.
“We should probably go find the boys.” But Luke still doesn’t make any move and neither does she.
“Luke,” she starts, and Julie doesn’t really know what she’s going to say. Doesn’t have a plan or even a thought to voice because all she can think about is what it would be like for him to close the gap between their bodies, for him to press her a little harder against the brick, for them to finally kiss.
It’s only when one of his brows ticks up slightly, his tongue darting out to wet his bottom lip and for his fingers to flex against her waist that Julie realises that she might have said all of that out loud. Though she can’t quite find it in herself to mind when Luke is leaning down and that last bit of distance is gone. It’s slow and soft, lips moving carefully together like both of them are afraid of something. And then Luke presses her a little hard against the wall and she lets out a moan against his mouth and things get a little rougher, a little messier.
Luke pulls away first, chest heaving as he sucks in a breath and Julie opens her eyes to see the wide smile on his face. She’s pretty sure her smile is just the same. Giddy and excited and just a little bit scared. Tilting her head back against the wall Julie closes her eyes and tries to regain her composure, not that Luke resting his forehead against hers is doing anything to help matters.
"We need to go," Julie mutters, lips brushing at the edge of his jaw and she almost lets out a whine of protest as he moves his head away from hers, though it merely turns into a sharp inhale as his lips trail down her neck.
“You’re standing on my foot,” she giggles, toes wiggling in her shoes against the sole of his foot, and Julie feels more than sees his smile.
So okay, maybe it wasn't such a complicated story of how she ended up in an alley with her back against a wall while Luke was sucking at her neck. Maybe she was just working shopping ideas on how to recount the story to Flynn later on. For a first, second, third kiss in a dirty alley next to boxes Julie thinks it’s pretty great.
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tyblackthornlovebot · 3 years
Text
End Up Here || Reggie Peters x Fem! Reader
Summary: Reggie seems to find you the coolest and most enthralling girl he has ever seen. He wishes he could find the way to your heart. The only problem? He is dead, you’re not.
Pairing: Reggie Peters x Fem! Reader.
Word count: 2k
Warning: None that I can think of. Maybe one mention of them being dead? Reggie being his clumsy cute self.
Requested?: Yes, thanks for requesting! “hey! what about a reggie x fem reader based on that 5sos song, “end up here”? with a fluffly ending if that’s possible? ty!”
A/N: This was my first fic so I hope you enjoy it! If you had something different in mind or want to request anything else, please feel free to do so. I had so much fun and loved writing this one!
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Once again Luke and Alex had told him to give up on you, that he had no chance. They didn't want to see how, without even knowing it, you ended up breaking his heart.
Once again Reggie had decided to ignore them and to go see you at high school. 
He knew they were only trying to protect him, save him from getting hurt. 
He even tried to fight those growing feelings but it didn’t seem to work so he resigned himself.
He was just too fascinated by the way you acted. The way you didn't seem to care what other people thought about you.
Like every morning since they showed up at Julie's garage he watched as the doors of high school opened. And among the crowd of students it wasn’t long until he located you. 
At first he went there because he was curious. After so many years without going to high school Reggie wanted to see how everything had changed.
Once he saw you there, so calm, so immersed in your own world, he knew that high school wouldn’t be the only thing that would change for him that day. 
From that moment on he discovered that never before, not even in his previous life, had he wanted to attend high school as much as he wanted now.
At the beginning it was nothing more than pure intrigue. Reggie felt attracted to you. There was no doubt you were the type of girl who would catch his attention. So he decided to do some research on his little crush, without telling anyone just yet. 
As the days went by he found himself following you to all of your classes. Marveling at the way you didn't seek attention, yet you always managed to catch it.
From the way you walked down the hallway, seemingly without a care in the world, with your headphones on. He wondered what kind of music would you be into.
To the way you always seemed to know the correct answer when asked, despite spending all your time drawing in your notebook. He found it to be so alluring, how clever you were without having to try too hard.
Soon his friends began to notice, seeing how he disappeared daily early in the morning. And how he would come back whenever Julie did. 
First they thought that perhaps he was beginning to catch feelings for their mutual friend, the only person that could see them. As they found out later when following him, that wasn’t the case. 
They asked him about you, how he felt towards you, what your name was, when did he start going to see you at high school. Endless questions that Reggie was more than willing to answer. A little embarrassed, but excited for being able to finally talk about you with his best friends.
Even if his crush was a little one-sided he thought they would be there to support him, just as he had done many times twenty-five years ago. 
Unfortunately for him he soon realized that he wouldn’t have the same luck. Luke and Alex, after listening to him, decided to list each and every reason why continuing to go see you was a terrible idea.
And maybe they were right. They were probably right. But Reggie didn't need anyone to tell him the truth, he needed them to be there for him and for them to be supportive. After all, he was old enough to make his own decisions. If he ended up getting hurt it would be his fault, because he decided so. Not because his friends told him what to do.
That was the reason why he was there once again, sitting on the empty seat behind yours in your mathematics class. 
Not that he was too interested on the subject, but he was entertained by watching you draw. 
When the bell rang, announcing the end of that class, Reggie said goodbye with a small sigh. He had to leave earlier that day, so he didn’t have time to accompany you to your last class. 
He hated having to leave you, even if you weren’t going to notice, but he had to go and get ready. That afternoon Julie would perform a song in front of the whole high school. As her friends they were going to be there to support her.
So this is how he found himself a few hours later, in the high school gym with his bandmates and Julie, watching a group called Dirty Candy perform.
Although he had to admit the choreography was good and the girls were talented, it couldn't be said he was too focused on them. He was busy looking for you. 
The whole high school was there, so you must be there too somewhere in the stands. 
He only stopped looking for you when he saw the principal begin to give her speech. The stands were completely silent and it was becoming a bit uncomfortable.
The three of them encouraged Julie to go up on stage. They knew this was her chance and they didn't want her to miss it.
Having finished the performances and the speech, Julie took the stage but the students in the audience also began to stand up. The three ghosts encouraged her so she would feel brave enough to start performing.
Luke had been helping her with the song, not wanting him nor Alex to see what both of them were working on. Now Reggie knew why, as he turned around to look at his friend, surprised. 
That was a Sunset Curve song with a few piano changes. One they hadn’t released.
Even if you couldn't see him maybe their music would end up making you feel something. That would be much better than nothing, Reggie thought, unable to prevent a huge smile from forming on his lips.
And then, suddenly, there they were. Up on stage with their instruments in their hands. 
Reggie couldn't say which of them was more surprised, but he couldn't miss the opportunity. Now that he knew you could see him he had to give his best, play like he had never done before. 
He looked for you again in the crowd with his eyes finally falling on you. 
His heart skipped a beat when he saw you cheer them on. At that moment he swears he could have started crying but he forced himself to maintain his composure. For the band’s and his image’s sake but also because he didn’t want you to think he was crazy.
On the other hand, you were thinking about how grateful you were that your best friend had convinced you to go with them. 
Before that you had come to wonder if it was worth attending, seeing as every year the principal gave the same speech. However that year nothing was the same. One second you were bored to death, wishing you had skipped it as you intended to do at the beginning. The next it seemed like you were in a concert, far away from your high school gym, as you cheered to the rhythm of the music.
Julie and you weren't close friends, but you shared some classes and you got along well enough. 
You were surprised and happy to see how she managed to get on that stage, overcoming that fear that until now prevented her from singing.
The fact that she was later joined by three mysterious boys made the performance even better. All three were handsome, that was undeniable. But your gaze was fixed on the boy in the plaid shirt and white t-shirt, unable to tear it away. 
There was something alluring about him, in the energy he gave off while playing his bass. And when he approached the boy in the beanie to sing with him, you were amazed. His voice, even if it wasn't as loud as the beanie boy’s, had the same power. A power that seemed not only to affect you, judging by how those who were around you reacted.
Besides, he knew how to connect so well with their public that it made you feel as if his gaze was fixed on you all the time, you thought.
Then suddenly and without warning they disappeared as soon as the song ended. 
Seeing how everyone gasped, puzzled, Julie decided to explain the situation. Those boys were holograms and the projector operation involved algorithms and science stuff.
Everyone seemed to agree with that explanation, bored by the technicalities of science. But Julie didn't count on the fact that someone would be very curious about the holograms and how they worked. That someone being you.
“Y/N, we should get going. As amazing as that was, everyone has started to leave.”
“I think I’m going to stay and ask Julie a few questions.” You told your best friend. 
“Like, c’mon. There’s a way you can connect with hot musicians and no one is interested in how to do that? Really, just me? Alright, then!” They smiled at your antics, shaking their head.
“You sure?” They asked, to make sure you would be fine going home alone.
“Positive.” You nodded your head, smiling back at them reassuringly.
It took you a couple more minutes, but you finally managed to get them to leave without them feeling guilty. By then the gym was already empty, except for the music teacher and the principal who were talking to Julie.
When they left you realized Flynn was there as well. She approached her best friend with a not so friendly expression. You preferred not to get in the way, stepping aside to give them privacy. 
It was hard not to hear their conversation. Thinking that there was no one left in the gym, they didn’t speak in a low tone, and the echo of that place increased the volume of their words. And still, you tried.
You were there when Flynn ran out, therefore when Julie ran after her. And you, without much choice, behind Julie. You would have felt really bad if after that scene you witnessed you hadn't tried to cheer her up. At least you wanted to apologise for overstepping and hearing their conversation. Even if you didn’t do that on purpose. 
You also had more questions than ever, that much was clear, but the main thing was to make sure Julie felt better after all that.
Dodging Nick you saw Julie in the distance, entering one of the classrooms. 
Accelerating your pace you managed to reach her. She was silent so you took that as the perfect opportunity to ask her if she was doing alright. 
But before you could step into the classroom she started screaming, scaring you to death and making you jump.
“You! Stop doing that! I’m serious.” You heard her say. You wondered who she would be talking to. That also made you decide that you wouldn't come out of your hide spot just yet. What if she had found Flynn and you ruined their moment? It would be better not to move, to avoid making any noise.
“Yeah, the whole school saw you. It’s kinda freaking me out.” She kept talking to apparently no one. Most likely with someone who spoke in a low voice, because from your hiding place you couldn’t hear any other voices. At that point you were pretty sure she wasn’t talking to Flynn. But still, you were in a compromising situation. If you came out of hiding, she would think you were spying on her. It would be better to just wait and hope she would end up leaving soon.
“Are you kidding? They loved us. That was a great song, Luke”. That’s when you realized she was talking to her hologram band.
You hoped you weren't interrupting anything important. But Julie seemed to be in a better mood and the facetime conversation you thought she was having could be the perfect ice breaker for your questions. Maybe you could even talk for a bit to the bassist who had caught your eye. It wasn’t every day that you had the opportunity to talk to three Swedish talented musicians. 
So you decided to pluck up your courage and entered the classroom.
“Julie…? Who are you talking to?” Reggie heard your voice fill with worry, as your eyes scanned the room. Then he thought about the big mess they were in. 
Julie tried to find a reasonable excuse, but you had heard too much. Both at the time and with the conversation she had had with Flynn, to know that she was lying to you.
“I’m sorry, it really isn’t any of my business. Just wanted to make sure you were alright. Had a few questions about that band of yours, as well. But again, none of my business, sorry.” You ended up shrugging your shoulders. Without looking for more answers. After all, it really wasn’t any of your business. And if she had fought her best friend for lying, you wouldn’t be the one to whom she ended up confessing. “But really, you doing alright?” You sounded concerned and they couldn’t help but feel some sympathy for you.
“Julie.” Reggie called her. “Could we… Maybe we can tell her?” He turned around to face his friends, with something that sounded similar to a plea in his voice.
“Dude, she’s so far out of your league.” Luke jokingly told him. “But if it makes you happy I say we tell her. What’s the worst thing that could happen?”
“Besides everything, you mean?” Alex asked rhetorically. “But I have the feeling that whatever I say you're not going to listen to me, so…”
Julie was listening to them talk, wondering what was the best decision to make.
As Reggie watched your puzzled face, he thought about the possible questions that might had been going through your mind. What was going on? Why the sudden silence?
“Well, Y/N. I think it’s better that I tell you the truth, seeing the insistence of some.” Finally, Julie decided to speak. You seemed more and more confused, even a little offended by that last comment, but decided to let her finish talking. “Come to my house tomorrow afternoon. I’ll show you what all of this is about.”
Reggie could read the curiosity on your face. After so many days watching you, it wasn’t difficult for him to distinguish your emotions. Although, honestly, he was also curious and really excited to know what Julie had planned.
The next day passed quickly for the phantoms, but not for you. 
It was the weekend, so Reggie hadn’t been able to see you yet. He had spent the whole morning rehearsing and doing some breathing exercises. His new friend Google had told him it was a good way to keep calm.
You, on the other hand, were so eager to know the answers to your questions that as soon as the time agreed with Julie arrived you were already knocking on her door. More punctual than ever.
It took her two minutes to open the door for you. Not that Reggie was counting… Well, alright, he was counting. But he was impatient.
Since Julie had told them her idea he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it, about you. He had even dressed up for the occasion, wearing a white t-shirt with the In Utero logo on it. One of his favorites that had been left in Julie’s garage. 
He had combined it with his black leather jacket and ripped black pants. Black shoes and his red flannel shirt tied at the waist. His pendant clinking every time he moved, in a rather attractive way.
Julie (and Reggie, even though you couldn't see him) went to greet you at the door, smiling as soon as she saw you. She was a bit nervous, but determined.
“Let's go to the garage, what I want to show you is there.” She told you, impatient to get there. But Reggie couldn't blame her, he was feeling the same or even worse. “But first, do you want something to drink?” The ghost snorted, which earned him a bad look from Julie. He knew it was polite to offer something to your guests, but this wait was going to be the death of him once more.
“Not really, thanks, I'm fine. Nervous, but fine.” You let out a nervous chuckle, which made Reggie look at you enrapturedly. Julie just smiled with amusement, without saying a word to either of you about it.
Then she made you follow her to the garage. You looked around with curiosity, trying to figure out what she would like to show you. There were two pianos and a sofa there. Interesting objects, but still not enough to find out what was going through Julie’s head.
“I know this might sound a little bit crazy, Y/N.” She started. With that she managed to peak your interest, you were all about crazy.  “But… you remember those guys that were playing with me yesterday?”
“The cute hologram musicians? Sure.” You nodded your head, while laughing. It was hard to forget them, especially a certain bass player.
"Yes, I suppose I am talking about them." Julie tried to suppress a laugh with your answer, as she watched Reggie's face flush completely, before continuing to speak. "Let's just say they're not exactly holograms. And that… they might be listening to you right now."
Your eyes widened, as you felt a little embarrassed. But immediately curiosity took hold of you and you went back to searching the entire garage, looking for a mobile phone or any reasonable device. Finding nothing, you frowned, confused.
“What do you mean by that, Julie? I can’t find anything and I have been looking since we entered your garage.” Now you were focusing on her. You felt like she was going to tell you everything, whatever that was, and you wanted to be ready. 
“They are… ghosts.” She said slowly, trying not to scare you. “They are here, but you can only see them when we play together.”
It sounded like another one of her lies, like the one she had tried to tell you the day before in that classroom. But this one sounded so crazy, you thought it might be fun to go along with it. After all, if she had invited you to go there, it must have been to tell you something important, not to lie to you again. That ghost part could wait, you just wanted some answers.
“So they are musician ghosts?” You asked, still playing along. Julie could tell from your tone that you didn't quite believe it. But it was a matter of time, she thought. 
“Well, they say they prefer to be called musician spirits. But technically, yes.” Then she turned to what seemed to be the void and talked. “All right, guys. You ready?” 
You stayed silent, staring at her like she had grown a second head.
“Actually, can you sit there? Reggie needs some space to rock out and he feels kinda weird walking through you.” You nodded as you went to sit on the sofa that you had previously spotted, still not saying a word. You were starting to get worried, seeing as she had even named the ghosts. “You must have already noticed that there’s no plug or equipment that will produce a hologram. But you can double check, if you want.”
You shook your head. You didn't need to check anything, there definitely wasn't. But you still weren't sure what Julie’s plan was. So you kept quiet, just focusing on what she was telling you.
“We're going to play Bright one more time. It will be just like in high school, but this time you'll know the truth as well.” Julie was explaining everything to you with a smile, but Reggie thought it wasn't going to be like in high school at all. There they were alone, singing exclusively to you. As he ran his hand through his hair, in a gesture of sheer nervousness, he prayed that everything would go well. “Hope you like it.”
While Julie started to sing and play the piano, Reggie felt as Luke squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. He turned to see Alex, who offered him a small smile. This time he took notice of how his friends supported him and that made him gain a little self-confidence. He was ready.
Y/N had to suppress a scream as the ghosts appeared in front of her with their instruments. Any doubts that she might have had thus far had disappeared with the appearance of the three boys. There was no way to fake that. There was no logical explanation, but there was also no evidence that denied what she was seeing.
It all seemed crazy, just as Julie had told her at the beginning, but she had always wondered what happened after death. Finally accepting that she was surrounded by three ghosts, it was her chance to ask them all the questions she could think of. 
Besides, if ghosts were real she could always have had a worse encounter. 
But young, talented and handsome musician spirits? It definitely could have been worse.
Once she was no longer frightened, almost halfway through the song, she was able to allow herself to enjoy the melodic voice of the ghost that had caught her attention and admire the delicate way in which he played his bass.
At that moment she decided that ghost or not, she would like to listen to their entire setlist if she continued to see and listen to his voice that way. Besides, she had always loved that style of music. 
Reggie approached her, cautiously not to scare her and Y/N greeted him with what she hoped would look like a captivating smile. It seemed to work, as he immediately blushed.
“Hi, I’m Reggie.” He introduced himself with a goofy smile, while failing to look cool. Not that he needed to do so. She already found him adorable and that was way better than looking cool.
“Y/N. Nice to meet you, Reggie.” Reggie loved the way she pronounced his name. An angelic sound to his ears. “Love the shirt, by the way. In Utero, one of their best albums.”
 Reggie had to remember not to stop playing and to grip the bass tightly, because he almost dropped it in surprise. Y/N liked Nirvana. Would she loudly snore at night? Would she eat strange food combinations? He wondered. There was no way such a perfect girl could exist. 
After that exchange of words the rest of the band introduced themselves. Reggie and her talked until it got dark, while the band kept playing different songs so that she wouldn’t stop seeing him. 
It was hard having to say goodbye. In a single afternoon they had both connected with each other as they had never managed to do with anyone else.
Reggie was afraid he would never see her again. Or rather, that she would never see him again. It was on her to decide whether she wanted to or not, and that was what Reggie feared the most.
He had had such an awesome afternoon with her that he hadn't even considered never seeing each other again. But when it was time to say goodbye, all the doubts and insecurities suddenly overwhelmed him. Had she had an afternoon as pleasant as he had? Would she like to see him again?
"See you tomorrow? I'll get my bass. You still have to teach me how to play Livin' On A Prayer, I love that song."
All his doubts were dispelled when she gave him that warm smile, with which only she managed to warm him up inside.
And with that Reggie knew that he would continue to accompany her to class, although this time she would know. And he would send her notes, as he had recently learned to do. 
They would also keep organizing small concerts for as long as she wanted, just so they could see each other. 
It might not be perfect, nor ideal, but it would be one day. Meanwhile they would figure ways to make it work.
At the moment Reggie was happier than ever. He never imagined that he would end up getting to know the girl of his dreams. Much less that she would also end up being interested in getting to know him.
As he grinned to himself, while walking her home, he couldn’t help himself but wonder: how did we end up here?
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julie-thefatones · 3 years
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Ghost of You || Luke X Reader || Part 1
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Hello everyone!! welcome to my first Fanfic pretty much.... im really nervous about posting it, and really hope you guys like it! Im going to warn you that there are some punctuation mistakes, and probably some misspelled words, and run on sentences... but nobodies perfect eh? lol anyways Enjoy! please let me know what you think, I am already writing part 2 so if this goes well ill post that soon :)
A/N: Your best friends with Julie, since the stamp was removed from the boys they are able to be seen by lifers at choice and can touch lifers at choice, but are still ghosts. You and Luke grow closer and closer starting to go from friends to more than that and everyone starts to notice, it just takes a little longer for you two to figure it out.
Word Count: 2,352
First day of school is always hard, especially senior year.... big deal or its supposed to be. You have always had a hard time with school because it was just hard for you to focus, you were always thinking about what you would rather be doing like painting, singing, taking a walk, and most recently learning guitar which Luke had been more than happy to help you with. Luke, Luke Patterson he was a member of your best friend Julies ghost band, Julie and The Phantoms, which included members Luke, Reggie, Alex, and of course Julie. You always knew they existed but it wasn't until recently that you were really able to get to know them your self because until recently only Julie could see them. Ever since they had that curse of a stamp removed from them, they pretty much can choose whenever they want to be seen or touch anything. It has been nice, because now you can really be apart of your best friends new world, you also got to make 3 new really fun and funny friends, they were just as chaotic as you and Julie. You and Luke really clicked from the moment you and him were able to actually see each other, well he has always been able to see you, but this way was much better. Since you and Luke hung out all the time, you found your self spending hours with him a day. In fact thats where you were before school, was with Luke, you guys had this little place by a lake you loved to hang out at, which caused you to be late for your first day.
So deep in your thoughts you didn't even realize you made it to your locker until you heard the all so familiar tone of your best friend calling out your name as she approached your locker "y/n!!! I didn't even see you pull in" Julie said as she now rested against the lockers next to you "Hey Jules! sorry I over slept and was late" Julie rolled her eyes "On your first day! man you really setting the bar high this year" she said laughing at you, You laugh too at the obvious sarcastic tone in her voice "alright, alright!! ms setting the bar high, we better get to class" you say punching Julie playfully in the arm before heading down the hallway to class.
As you sat in class, you started to feel really bad about lying to Julie about the real reason you were late to school today, you just didn't know how to explain how much you and Luke have been hanging out with out her asking a million questions, but its not like it was a big deal. Trying to get out of your head you try to focus on Mr. Berty who was describing the different factors of algebra which you never understood anyway, so you just write notes in hopes that when you study it later you'll understand it.... which never happens either. As you're writing notes you notice something in the window, in the corner of your eye, not really thinking anything of it until you notice that the thing is jumping up and down and no one else is noticing which could only mean one thing. You look to the side and you see Luke in his orange beanie and Rush tank top jumping up and down waving his arms in order to get your attention with the biggest smile on his face, you laugh to your self, and then realizing he must want something, looking at the clock you realized you still had 40 mins left in this class *Oh my gosh! for real its only been 20 minutes!* you thought to yourself; quickly looking from the clock to the window where Luke was still jumping, you raise your hand "Yes ms. Y/L/N" you bring your hand down faster than you want to, slightly hurting it on the desk "May I use the restroom please?" you ask hesitantly, eager to know what Luke wants, Mr. Berty sighed with annoyance "If you really need to, I suppose, but make it fast ms. Y/L/N" you stand up a little to excited "Thank you mr. Berty" you said as you scurried out the door.
When you made it outside Luke stopped jumping, but his smile remained. You loved his smile, it was contagious, you noticed you were smiling too "Luke! what are you doing here" you said punching his arm playfully, he laughed and grabbed his arm pretending that the punch hurt him "Wow the abuse Y/N" with a smirk he continued "Someone help!!! im being abused someone help!!!" you roll your eyes and smack your hand over his mouth "Not that anyone can hear you, but shut up! that did not hurt" you say with a small laugh, as he is laughing underneath your hand "What are you doing here Luke?" you say with your hand still on his mouth, you feel his smile grow bigger underneath your hand "Well, Y/N, Im here because I got something for you!! but you have to come with me to get it" he said with pure excitement, still with your hand on his mouth, then he licked your hand to get it off, you pull away in knee jerk reaction, he smiled "Sorry! as much as I love your hand on my mouth we need to go!" he said eagerly, you laughed and rolled your eyes "Luke, you do realize im at school right?" he grabbed your hand pulling you across the school field "Yeah! but if you really cared about that, you wouldn't have come outside would you" he said, still with the biggest smile on his face, you rolled your eyes even more and gave in knowing he was right "Alright! but where are you taking me" you exclaimed, speeding up to be side by side with him instead of him dragging you, he looked at you, and bit his lip still excited "aha! you'll just have to wait and see" he said and you both smiled. As you kept walking you realized never Luke never let go of your hand from when he was dragging you..... not that it meant anything, it felt nice though.
It took about 15 mins to walk to you and Lukes usual spot by the lake, still holding hands you approached the tree you guys likes to sit by, or sit in depending on if you wanted to climb, which about 90% of the time Luke did.. also doesn't help he can just teleport up there if he wants to, where as you had to do it the hard way while he just laugh at you trying to climb up. This time Luke wasn't going up the tree, he let go of your hand, which kind of made you sad, but then you saw the look on Lukes face, which was pure excitement "Stay right here Y/N!" he said firmly grasping your shoulders to make sure you stayed in place, as he hopped over to the tree "CLOSE YOUR EYES!" he yelled from behind the tree grabbing something, but you obeyed closing your eyes and before you knew it he was in front of you, you could feel it "Alright, you can open" he said softly, you opened your eyes, and there Luke was with the same smile, holding an acoustic guitar, you could tell it was a nice one, just from the shine on it and how pretty the strings looked, you didn't even realize your mouth was wide open until Luke laughed "Ya like it?" he exclaimed, and you just looked at it "Is that for me?" you asked shocked and excited, Luke laughed "Is that for me?" Luke mocked you "Yeah its for you! ya dork" he continued as he hopped over around you, to get behind you so he could place the guitar in front of you for you to hold, you could feel his arms brush against you... which you like as much as the hand holding but, a little more ... again it didn't mean anything, he was just a friend... and Julies band mate. Luke continued talking taking you out of your trance "Ya never answered me though, do you like it" He said still behind you, but now you were holding the guitar, you just looked at it in awe "Where did you get this Luke? How did you get this?" you asked still in shock, Luke just laughed "Don't worry about that!" he said with a mischievous tone, and then you got worried "Luke you didn't ?!... you didn't steal this right!" you asked with actual concern, you wouldn't put it past him, he just laughed and in a teasing tone said "Ouch! you think I would do that Y/N.... Im not that bad!" and then he continued but more serious this time "No! I didn't steal it, Since I have this new found power of choosing when to be seen and stuff, I picked up a small job at the music store downtown, thought why not earn some money.... and then when you asked me to teach you how to play guitar, I wanted to get you your own.... sooooo I have been saving up ever since" he said in a soft tone and then you felt him come closer to you from behind, but now he was putting his hands on the guitar softly playing a melody, while pretty much holding you, as he played the melody you could feel his breath on your neck.... you guys have never been this physically close before, right before you got to lost into your thought Luke continued talking "You! still haven't answered the question though!!! do you like it??" he exclaimed with a teasing tone once again, which caused you to laugh, and you turned around in his arms making the current position pretty much a hug but Lukes holding a guitar "Of course I like it you dork!!" you said excited and continued "This is the nicest thing anyone has done for me...." you looked into his eyes and with a soft tone said "Thank you" he smiled, a soft smile, and his whole face became soft as he relaxed the guitar down by both your sides and looked deeper into your eyes "Of course...." he said softly, both of you just looking deeper into each others eyes, you felt some kind of connection, and you felt like you both were getting closer and closer to each other and then a voice came from behind both of you, causing both of you to shake out of the trance you both shared "Hey! Y/N! Luke! what are you guys doing out here?
You and Luke both jump, moving away from each other as you see Reggie come out of the trees eating a meatball sub. You and Luke look at each other confused as crap as to why Reggie was there and how he knew about it "Hey Reg!" Luke said a little nervous putting his hand behind his head messing with this beanie, you looked flustered flashing your eyes from Luke to Reggie and back to Luke who continued talking "the real question is what are you doing out here buddy?" and Reggie just chuckled a little, while taking another bite off his sandwich "Well, I went to the school to see Kayla like I always do, we like to eat lunch together, then I saw you two run off and thought I would follow" Reggie said with a full mouth, you and Luke shared a look "So you have been here the whole time?" you asked, wondering how you guys didn't notice Reggie was behind you guys the whole time, Reggie smiled a meatball smile since his mouth was still full and he answered "Yeah!! but I wanted to eat my sandwich so I decided to sit down in those trees and eat it" Luke looked at Reggie with a confused look "But Reg, isn't that your sandwich?" Luke asked still confused, and Reggie looked at him, again with a meatball smile "No! this was supposed to be Kaylas sandwich but since I didn't see her, because I followed you guys... I decided to eat it!" You and Luke laughed and Luke stepped forward patting Reggie on the shoulder "Kayla is one lucky girl Reg!" Luke said teasing Reggie, you laughed in response, and then Reggie went back to his initial question "So what are you guys doing out here?" he asked taking yet another bite of the sandwich, in which Luke got nervous again and answered Reggie with a slightly nervous tone "Hey! shouldn't you be getting back to the school, Kayla is gonna be wondering where your at bud" Reggie stopped chewing and his eyes grew big and he looked at Luke "Youre right! awww man, im gonna have to go get another sandwich" Reggie answered in a high pitched nervous tone "Ill see ya guys later!" Reggie said while running away nearly tripping over his own feet. You and Luke sighed and looked at each other, Luke smiled "Well should we get you back to school as well?" Luke asked you with a soft tone added with a light chuckle at the end, you nodded "Yeah, Lunch is gonna be starting soon and Julie is gonna be wondering where I went" you responded, and then looked at your guitar and looked back at Luke "I love my guitar Luke, I really love it!" you said as you wrapped your arms around his neck and gave him a tight hug, he responded by wrapping his arms around your wait pulling you in tighter, when you guys released from the hug you shared another look, quickly shaking it off with Luke responding "I cant wait to teach you some more chords on it!" he said back to his excited state from when you first got there, skipping forward grabbing your hand again as you guys walked back to school together.
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caramelcal · 3 years
Text
Two Worlds Collide
In which ghosts are known, and there is a deep rooted rivalry between them and lifers.
Ship: Ghost!Luke x Alive!Reader
Warnings: This talks about deep-rooted rivalry and segregation. 
If this is good though, should I start a taglist?
Luke Patterson Tag: @rachmmb @phantompogues 
also, i started up a wattpad “rosemoonmist” if you could give that some love, i would be so grateful <3
Masterlist
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Night had long since fallen on the town, stars twinkly bright in the sky overhead, a soft breeze passing by that moved your hair ever so slightly. Your knees were up against your chest, chin leaning on them with your arms wrapped around them, trying to stay small to keep your body heat in. You sat in the shadows, on a random balcony at the top of the building, overlooking the town you had lived in your entire life.
The buildings on the side you were on were dingy and dull, high built buildings that were not pretty, and instead built for housing people. Your eyes drifted over to the other side of town, where luxurious houses stood, plants that were well cared for, streets that were free of trash. It angered you, that for simply being alive you had to live in such poor conditions, that you were looked down on by ghosts. You were forced into dingy housing, old and ripped clothes, just because they were untouchable.
It wasn't always like this, not until Caleb Covington took over. Ghosts and lifers used to work together, but when Caleb took over he created a barrier, made ghosts feel that they were superior to lifers and now you were stuck into this life. It sucked too, because Caleb somehow managed to make it so that he controlled who became a ghost, and so far, it was becoming more of an exclusive club that free choice.
It was illegal to pass over to their side of the town, because apparently lifers shouldn’t be allowed to walk on their soil unless they wanted you to, yet they could roam free here. Not that they would want to, this side of the town was a train wreck.
When you were a child, you didn’t understand why they would ever separate from each other, especially when they worked together only years before you were born. All the lifers were scared, what you didn’t know at that point was why. There were all these new rules implemented, and lifers couldn’t fight against them, not when everything was against them. The legal system was overrun with ghosts, from police officers to lawyers; everything.
Life was awful, for those with a heartbeat anyway, and life only seemed to get worse as the years got on. Slowly, ghosts and lifers could no longer go to the same school, then you couldn’t talk to each other, and it slowly got worse until any lifer that didn’t do what a ghost wanted was punished, severely.
You had only ever seen ghosts passing, and some nasty things that they did to lifers, but you tended to stay out of their business. You had never crossed over to their side of town, and you knew it was extremely dangerous to do so; you would get caught out, you knew that. Maye that’s why you hadn’t done so yet...
Luke knew that he shouldn’t have been on the other side of town, but he often found himself drawn to lifers. He wasn’t sure why honestly, they just seemed a lot more fun than the other ghosts. Ghosts were entitled and thought they were all better than each other. But Luke? He just wanted someone to hang out with. Sure, Alex, Reggie, and Bobby were cool, but he was used to them, he wanted to meet someone new, and the lifers were a lot more interesting than the other ghosts.
Maybe that’s why he found himself on the rooftop above the balcony you were on, feet dangling over the edge. You remained scarily silent, hoping that whoever it was would eventually go away, and you wouldn’t get in trouble for being on a random person’s balcony. However, it seemed that the person knew you were there, “Are you coming to join me or what?”
Silently, you found yourself climbing up the metal ladder and joining him on the balcony, awkwardly shifting to sit next to him, yet still staying several feet away. Your eyes caught onto him, the hood of his jumper sitting over his head and blocking his face from view.
You can tell a lot about the people from the way they’re dressed, that’s something you had been taught from a young age. You were taught to be able to notice ghosts straight off the bat, so you knew who to talk to and who not to. He wasn’t dressed as elegantly as ghosts were, and the number of layers he was wearing was a clear indication that he was a lifer. Lifers wore layers to combat the cold weather, weather that ghosts were easily protected from with their built-in heating systems in their houses and cars, and their weird powers that seemed to combat harsh conditions.  
“Sorry uh- I didn’t mean to intrude on your house I was just trying to get some peace and quiet,” You said, biting your lip as you turned back towards the night sky. Your legs dangled over the edge of the roof, shoelaces undone with your hands gripping on the edge of the building. It wasn’t the most comfortable seat, but it definitely did have the best view and you could tell exactly why this person sat up here.
A soft chuckle sounded from beside you, bringing a small and almost unnoticeable grin onto your face before he spoke, “It’s fine, I don’t live here either.”
“That’s great,” You replied, looking back over to the boy beside you who’s eyes remained on the landscape in front of you, “at least if we get caught, we’ll get caught together, right? Plus I don’t think they’ll care all too much.”
“Probably not,” The boy agreed, nodding his head before you both fell back into silence.
You found yourself often up on the rooftops of buildings that were near the ghost side of town, peering over and looking at their perfect little houses and picturing what could have been. How perfect your life could have been if you were a ghost, how much easier it would be. Ghosts didn’t even need to eat, yet they constantly had any food that they could have ever wanted simply for the pleasure of eating, whilst lifers were starving. It was crazy, yet it was how life unfairly worked.
Despite finding peace in fantasizing of another life alone, at that moment, with the boy beside you, you found peace in his company. You didn’t find yourself talking to others often, so the fact that you were sitting with a boy in your ‘escape place’ should have felt invasive, but you didn’t mind it.
“What are you doing up here anyway?” You asked, trying your best to start up a conversation with the boy beside you, turning your attention towards him, “I’m normally the only one up here.”
“I’ve never been up here before. It has a nice view though, I might start coming here more often.”
His eyes were on the ghost side of town as he said that, and you couldn’t help but nod as your eyes went back towards there too, “Yeah, it does have a nice view. Too bad we have to view it from this side of town, huh?”
He glanced over to you nervously, gulping slightly but you never realized, your eyes still on the scenery. Your hair is slightly messy, yet it’s still pretty, layers of clothes on to protect you from the cold of the night. In Luke’s hesitation, he figures out exactly who you think he is; a lifer.
“Yeah, those ghosts are really lucky,” He replied, his voice battling out the nervousness. He doesn’t know why he felt compelled to lie, but he knew that if you knew he was a ghost you would not be talking to him right now.
“Lucky is an understatement. Imagine living in one of those big houses, where you didn’t have to worry about being hungry. Bastards don’t even need to eat, but they have more food than any of us ever will,” You snorted lightly, but Luke can tell from your voice that you think it’s unfair. He frowned a little whilst he thinks about it, what you said is true, he knows that a lot of lifers have it bad, but just hearing about it from a lifer makes him sad. When you don’t get a reply from Luke, you sigh lightly, “Sorry, I don’t really think that’s what you want to be talking about when we first meet.”
“Nah it’s alright, you seem chill,” Luke sent you a smile and you smiled back. You could hardly see his face, the shadow from his hoodie’s hood covering the majority of his it, but you could see his mouth, and the smile he was giving you.
“Well,” You started, moving your legs up to the rooftop before standing up. You face towards the boy, holding up to fingers, and playfully salute him, “I need to get going, I’ll see you later, rooftop boy.”
Somehow, by the time Luke tried to look back at you, you were gone. It was like you disappeared from thin air but he knew you didn’t poof out as he could. He could hear the heartbeat in your chest, one that very clearly showed that you were a lifer.
It’s moments afterward when he realized he didn’t even catch your name, but it makes him even more curious about you. Right from the get-go, he had been taught that as a ghost he was better than the lifers, but you seemed interesting. You were the first lifer he had ever gotten to talk to, and you seemed interesting.
Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to come back to the rooftop tomorrow...
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fellintotartarus · 3 years
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midnight eyes (ralvez)
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(gif by the incredible @zhuzhubii <3 )
Summary: On a late night, Spencer thinks about Luke. 1.7k words.
A/N: Ralvez absolutely owns my ass thanks for coming
Warnings: I can’t think of any .. ? Lmk if you see anything please!
-
It’s late. They’re all exhausted beyond belief and it seemed even the plane made a tired landing, jolting them with unpleasant bouts of adrenaline in their sleepy states. Matt gently shakes Emily awake and they all trudge off the plane in the silence that only red-eye flights can produce.
Spencer’s head feels full of cotton as he clambers down the stairs and into FBI headquarters. It’s been days--even before the case started--since he’s gotten more than four hours of sleep in a row and he feels it strongly behind his eyes. The world feels dim and heavy as he walks the final few steps across the tarmac and into the building.
Then Luke passes from behind him, placing his hand gently on Spencer’s back as he navigates the tight hallway and Spencer suddenly doesn’t feel so tired. Luke glances back at him, flashing him a small smile before turning back and Spencer thinks he might not need sleep so urgently anymore. As long as he replays this moment in his head, he can make it home to pass out on his bed.
Luke remains a few steps ahead of him all the way to the sixth floor and into their offices, where everyone quickly throws down their case files and turns around to leave. Spencer drops into the chair at his desk, his head falling onto the surface. He knows he should get up, pick up his head and go home because he’s in imminent danger of falling asleep. He knows if he doesn’t get up now, the three AM jetlag will catch up to him quickly and--
He lifts his head. The whole office has gone, only the dim power-saving lights illuminating the personal effects and case files littering the numerous desks. Spencer looks around. It’s so peaceful. He knows, logically, what lies in all these case files, that it shouldn’t feel peaceful, but he can’t help but relax at the altered state of the room where he spends most of his life.
His eyes drift over to Luke’s desk, lingering on the single picture of Roxy that seems almost out of place on the clean-cut, nearly bare desk. He blushes at the thought of the man who occupies the desk, not even noticing a smile creep onto his face.
Luke was a breath of fresh air to the BAU. When he joined from the fugitive task force, everyone found solace in the newness he brought to the team. Spencer noticed people smiling more. Penelope found a new hobby in giving him a hard time. He was a change of pace for the tight-knit group of tired, jaded agents.
Spencer remembers the first time he noticed Luke, like, really noticed him. He was explaining something for a case. He was used to being brushed off--his quirks were conditional, only to be appreciated when he served a purpose. But as he sat there, explaining a tangent to a room full of people the rambling would be lost on, he turned his head and saw Luke. He was looking at Spencer with the utmost interest that Spencer’s speech sputtered and stalled like an old car. He hadn’t even noticed he had stopped talking until Luke had said “What were you saying, Dr. Reid?”
From that point on, Spencer had a hard time not noticing Luke. It never actively bothered him that people brushed him off and gave him a hard time. It was just a fact of life. But he supposed he never really knew how much he was missing. Now, whenever he found himself rambling past the point of no return, his eyes would drift over to Luke, who consistently looked delighted to hear more about whatever it was Spencer was talking about.
Spencer knew he was in trouble when he found himself rambling more and more just to see if Luke was really interested. In his head, there was no way Luke actually enjoyed Spencer and his infodumps. There had to be a breaking point.
But it never came. No matter how uninteresting or gross or frequent he made his speeches, Luke’s gaze never faltered. During one particularly terrible rant about flies and their reproductive cycle when Luke still looked at Spencer like he was revealing the secrets of life, Spencer thought he must be seeing things. It was only after Penelope gave him a knowing smile that Spencer came to realize it might not be in his head.
So he reveled in it. He let his eyes flit over to Luke’s clandestinely when he spoke, his breath always hitching imperceptibly at Luke’s returning gaze. He ignored Penelope’s pointed looks and settled for seeing Luke’s enraptured face when he closed his eyes at night.
A sound coming from the break room snaps Spencer out of his reverie. He turns to look at the offending noise with heavy eyes and finds the object of his thoughts stumbling sleepily out of the break room. He’s so tired it somehow surprises him when Luke walks over to him, almost as if he thought he would’ve been invisible.
Spencer jumps slightly in his seat and, to get rid of the nervous energy that suddenly overcomes him (and seems to everytime Luke approaches him), meaninglessly shuffles papers around on his desk. 
Luke smiles, pulling up a chair next to him, not knowing that just his proximity would give Spencer a giddiness that would last until next Friday.
“What are you still doing here, genius?” Luke asks, sighing and settling into his chair. He gives Spencer a warm smile when he clears his throat and shakes his head instead of answering.
What is Spencer still doing here? He’s been sitting at his desk for so long without even realizing it. Everyone else went home at least 10 minutes ago while Spencer sat at his desk daydreaming sleepily. About the man next to him.
Spencer is, and he knows this, terrible at having a crush. It practically consumes him. He acts so weird around them, spouting god-awful facts at terrible times, not picking up on any cues, and never doing absolutely anything about it.
So when Luke looks like he’s about to say something, Spencer jumps to fill the silence first. He shoots into a rant about the first thing his sleep-deprived brain can think of, standing in the process.
“You know, a study recently came out that showed that fist bumps transfer half the bacteria that handshakes do and that people should start employing that as a go-to greeting rather than--”
“I thought you were a proponent of kissing,” Luke jokes softly, rising from his chair.
Spencer blushes furiously. “Well, it’s not so much that I’m a proponent of kissing, it’s more that--”
He’s cut off by Luke’s face a mere inches from his, his breath ghosting Spencer’s face. Luke’s eyes land squarely on his, turning his brain absolutely useless. Even more surprising is the look on Luke’s face. A look Spencer had only seen in front of other people, at work, and that he (seemingly mistakenly) assumed had been a front.
“Not a proponent of kissing, huh?” Luke teases, his voice a mere breath.
Spencer’s voice is stuck in his throat. There is no way this is happening, he thinks, so he breathes lightly through his nose so Luke won’t disappear. He hopelessly stutters out a few syllables--none of them make sense--before Luke takes his hand in his.
A touch that would normally send him into mental hysterics now seems to ground him. Why had he never realized he was taller than Luke? Spencer’s eyes meet Luke’s and flicker down to his lips--the lips that were so soft-looking and pillowy he had found himself dreaming of kissing them more than once--before he realizes his mistake and quickly lowers his gaze to his feet.
“Spencer. Hey,” Luke says, using a finger to lift Spencer’s chin back up to a slightly mismatched gaze. Spencer can barely let the eye contact hold out of embarrassment; he’s sure Luke’s gonna tell him off or reject him before he’s ever said anything. He can feel himself tensing and freezing up.
“How many bacteria are transferred in a kiss?” Luke says softly, and Spencer finds himself relaxing at the opportunity to think about something else for a second. It takes him longer than usual, but he remembers the number fairly quickly. 
“80 million bacteria. More if it’s longer, less if it’s shorter, and, obviously one would have to take into account--”
He’s cut off by Luke’s lips pressing firmly against his. Spencer nearly falls over in shock, but once Luke’s bottom lip slides against his, he’s done for. The warmth in his stomach burns, his eyes flutter shut, and he melts into the floor, leaning down the slightest amount and sighing. Luke smiles against Spencer’s mouth and kisses back deeper, bringing his hand up to Spencer’s neck, leaving him stumbling over himself to get closer to Luke.
They remain like that for some time (honestly neither one of them could tell you how long if they tried) before Luke pulls away, out of breath and lips just barely swollen. Spencer almost doesn’t want to open his eyes to face the aftermath of what he’s sure is the best thing that’s happened to him, but the urge to see Luke’s eyes lit up wins over and slowly opens them, shyly creeping his gaze up to Luke’s face.
Luke’s beaming, running his fingers through the curls at the back of Spencer’s head. Spencer smiles back, letting his head fall to Luke’s shoulder.
“You know, for a genius, that sure took you a long time. I thought I would have to hit you over the head or something,” Luke said, his mouth pressed onto Spencer’s ear. 
Spencer feels his face heat against the fabric of Luke’s dress shirt. It took him a long time? Did that mean--
“I mean, I don’t know how many times I thought I had given myself away. When Garcia let it slip that she thought you liked me, I thought she was playing a prank on me because of how I looked at you,” he continued.
Spencer picked his head up. “No way,” he said softly.
Luke chuckled, “What, like it’s so hard to believe? Didn’t Morgan call you Pretty Boy?”
Spencer blushed redder and rolled his eyes.
“I just didn’t think… you know,” he replied.
Luke smiled. “Obviously.”
And, this time, Spencer kissed him.
tagged: @pretty-b0yy​ 
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