#before i was skeptical but the Evidence Is Stacking Up All Too Well.

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

come get yer juice (aka some 'stocks i never posted </3)

#throws this at you all and runs #IM WORKING ON NEW SCRIBBLES POST-UPDATE ITS JUST. SLOW GOING #spoons are gone you see! #wait actually. the repressed one i doodled last night #BUT OTHER THAN THAT ITS SLOW GOING #but ohhhhh im so ill. theyre so real. #before i was skeptical but the Evidence Is Stacking Up All Too Well. #might make a post about it bc there's. so much #scribble salad #laughingstock #barnaby x howdy #howdy x barnaby #ive been in the trenches for so long... so so long.... #AND I WILL CONTINUE TO BE HERE. #im still so insane about them yall dont even KNOW #by the time this posts i will be At and In My New Job #may these sillies keep me going through the day...

[pieroulette]

you can decide if this one is a request or just an ask, how would andteam react if they got caught by police? either being suspect for your disappearance, fought people that made them jealous, etc! i might be a good idea to not include the younger members...

- yandere anon

YANDERE! &TEAM HYUNG LINE — REACTION TO GETTING CAUGHT BY POLICE!

author"s note.. I'll take this as a yandere request then!

warning.. yandere behaviours 💁‍♀️

K

Being the sweet soft boy everyone rooted for, of course no one would suspects him for being the culprit of the case that has been circulating around the town—but when one evidence pointed right at his face, with that sugary smile never ceasing to exist, everyone has a change of heart.

That leads the boy himself to snickered behind the smiley deception as he was encaged within the officers' dead grip arms. It was a waste of time truly. He was dead sure he took all the appropriate and effective measures, that not a pair of eyes are presented. Looks like he'll need to play another cat and mouse game again.

Lapping his lower lip with his tongue, does he starts trembling as his orbs flooded with tears. "What have I done, Sir?!"

Fuma

An eerie air engulfed the presence of Fuma himself as he stood behind a man who don't know his place, trying to flirt with you. Truly horrendous as after a long month of putting you down, another uninvited guest has to come out—a pest it is, and ruin a perfect outing day, a perfect picnic, a perfect moment of his.

"Young sir, perhaps it would be best if you could leave?"

Of course, the pest itself would throw a fit of rage much to Fuma's displeasure, still he would simply keep his air-headed demeanour—leaning closer as he spew out threats. Nonetheless, how truly futile it was considering how his vision were consumed with crimson hues after his eyes landed on the pest's dirty touch on your skin.

Fuma didn't want to take this too far, but how could he? He needs to teach the pest a lesson, which got him into the officer's den much to his annoyance. But due to his well composed manners, the aura enveloping his form—the officers find it difficult to place the blame on him.

"So, how long would it take, sir? If I could, I would cooperate as much as you please but.." Fuma sighed dejectedly, "I couldn't bear to leave my pitiful wife all by her own."

Nicholas

Not gonna lie, being arrested wasn't that a huge deal for Nicholas as he got a long list of criminal record stacked up behind him. However it wasn't supposed to irk him this much, considering how his veins spewed out his neck and his dark grey orbs rattled in immense glitch as he observes you from behind the bars.

Your supposedly kind best friend, a male that is—caressing your arms in attempts to comfort your weeping form after Nicholas, himself—confronted you before your house. Confronted might be an underestimation, more like assault, that is.

Therefore, it leads Nicholas behind the bars as you and your bestfriend filed a restraining case against him.

"Restraining case?" He muttered to himself after the officer informed him. The boy's head hanging low, his bangs covering his menacing orbs as the corners of his chapped lips pulled up—exposing his teeth, akin to a starving predator. "Oh dear, what would that even do?"

EJ

Getting arrested wasn't part of EJ's plan, after all. Not when he intended to surprise you with bouquet of stewed cherry roses as it was Valentine's Day and simply wishes to spend his precious time with his darling. It was all due to his miscalculation that he accidentally found you on the couch with a man he wasn't familiar with. But was familiarity even the question when the girl he adores was right here, not on his arms but on a bastard?

It ended on a horrendous note, to say the least. However the officers were skeptical over who started the fight considering the scattering amount of wounds on a particular someone, EJ, himself.

EJ held the need to snicker, only flooding his orbs with glistened tears as he gained the sympathy of you and the officers, mumbling things like. "I j-just came to visit (Name)! I didn't knew he would—"

Of course, the so called friend of his darling protests back, the corners of his lips dripping with blood—astounded by the horrendous lies EJ emitted.

But EJ couldn't care any less, a single wrong step due to miscalculation are a rare occurrence for him but it would never be repeated twice. He was immensely pleased, to say the least, since he could turn over the tide by having you—his darling, to side with him and snap the friendship ties with the bastard he loathes. "S-sir, it hurts.."

「 talesofyuan on tumblr 2023 」 all rights reserved. do not copy or post without permission.

#andteam reactions #andteam #&team scenarios #&team x reader #&team k #&team fanfic #&team fuma #&team nicholas #&team ej #&team reactions #yandere &team #&team yandere #「 talesofyuan 」 fics

[starbuck09256]

The enigmatic Dr. Scully

Tagging @today-in-fic and @xffictober2023

It's been a while xf fam! But I'm trying to get back into the swing of things. Thank goodness for Fictober! Hope you enjoy this little slice I came up with.

Season one, Mulders thoughts on his new partner.

He hadn’t prepared himself as well as he thought. His research into his newly assigned partner had glossed over her brilliance, significantly. Her thesis resonated with him on an intellectual level that made Phoebe seem almost illiterate, which was most certainly not the case.  Most would assume he had a certain type of woman he liked, tall, dark hair with a classic old money look that can’t be faked by even the wealthiest of the new money. That wasn’t his type, not really, the problem was women who had come from backgrounds like his had something else in common. Education, yes education, you see men of wealth needed a companion who could hold their own in conversation. Who read the Times, the Wall Street Journal. These women were well-bred and educated in a way that previous generations of women would never imagine. Phoebe and her father’s connections, prestigious schools, even Diana and her senator of a father. 

His type wasn’t looks, and the fact that he sat here on his worn couch with a copy of Dr. Dana Scully's senior thesis with so many notes in the margins that he had 8 pages of additional addendums on a yellow legal pad gave him more than a pause for concern. Dana Scully could easily be his downfall. Her thesis and thoughts had plagued his mind for weeks since he first read it. While originally he believed she would be a skeptical scientist and discredit his work at every possible turn, her thesis pointed to a different person altogether. She was certainly pretty, which he had already discerned from her FBI photo. She outranked him in the shooting range and about 95% of the bureau. Might be a good thing to have a partner with a guaranteed good shot. Unless she was going to be shooting at him, another ripple of anxiety rolled through his mind.

Why put her on the X-Files? Why saddle her brilliance in the basement? She wanted to get into fieldwork, she had a reputation as being a well-liked, informative instructor at the academy. Of course, some of her classmates were proving they would do anything to climb the federal ladder, not at all unusual for new recruits. He tapped his pen against the pile of pages of math and theory that had him questioning his own marginal knowledge of the universe. 

He had mentioned he liked it. He more than liked it, and damn if he didn’t like her too. This was not the time to fall for a badly veiled ploy. He taps his pen more before tossing it on the stack of files as he rubs his face standing up to pace a bit trying to order his thoughts of her once again. He isn’t sure what to make of her. She had followed him out to Oregon, and while she didn’t agree with his theory, the way she had gathered extra evidence, as she had studied Billy Miles's feet. She understood. On some level she was just like him, searching for the truth in a litany of lies. She was far more open-minded than she let on. She was far more righteous and loyal than he had originally thought, and he has been desperate to talk to her since. 

While he is proud that he hasn’t called her again since he let her know that the reports they filed were gone, his mind is begging him to engage her in another mystery. He needs more time with her. More time to figure out the enigma that she is. His stellar reputation and education have provided him with a way to look through people dissecting their interests, their fears, and their motives. Has he become so complacent that this new partner of his, confounds his mind so easily? Or has something much worse occurred? Has he finally found a woman that leaves him in the intellectual dust? 

He pulls out a report of a missing test pilot in Idaho. What would the enigmatic Dr. Scully think of a missing test pilot? How far would she challenge a military command that her own father has been a part of for over 20 years? He wonders and his own damn curiosity about her allegiances and thoughts have him picking up the phone and dialing before he has a solid plan to engage her. 

She agrees to meet him tomorrow at a bar just down the street from the bureau. His mind finally catches up and again asks him how smart it is to meet the woman, who has been plaguing his mind incessantly for the last 4 days, at a bar. Thank god he suggested a 2pm meeting. Will he buy her a drink? That could be an easy test. If she is open to a drink, would it speak to her willingness to fall in line with the secret lynching the bureau has planned for his continual embarrassment? Or will she point out that it is 2pm and she has other work to do? He told her he had a case that he didn’t want to share at work. He has a feeling should they continue on this journey it will not be the last time they meet in secret someplace outside the walls and ears of bureaus halls. He sits back against the worn leather, a smile stretching across his face. At the very least he will get to see her again, and talk with her, and for now, just knowing that tomorrow his mind will need every fiber of fortitude to dance with the brilliance of Dr. Scully is enough. 

#mulder and scully #msr #xfiles #fanfic #myfic #fictober23 #xffictober23 #fictober 2023 #xf fictober23

[stay-midnight]

Royals. II

Hwang Hyunjin x Male Reader

W.C: 5.5K Words (😃)

Triggers: Explicit Smut, Mentions of Marriage, Mentions of Rejections/Stood up.

Things to be noted: Royalty AU, There’s some fluff at the aftercare, some angst too, Slight Seungmin x reader, Slight Jeonglix without context and Binsung with Han being a total flirt.

Kinks/Warnings: Top Hwang Hyunjin, Bottom Reader, Anal Sex, Anal Fingering, Edging, Degradation, Puppy Petname, There’s some drool-, Consensual, Safewords, Blowjobs (Reader receiving), Marks and Bruises, Slight Possessiveness, Aftercare (This is not a kink, it’s needed) Lubricated Sex, Unprotected Sex / No condoms (This is not promoting unprotected sex, use condoms irl !!), Palming, Slight Master Kink, Hyunjin has a big dick, Mouth Fingering, It’s so messy, Doggy Style and Hickeys (Lots of em)

a/n: Wowow, this is my longest fic yet and it’s a part 2 I— Anyways, I’m sorry for making you guys wait for so long for this~ HSHSHSHS, hopefully it’s good ! If I miss any warnings or triggers please inform me sksksk.

Hyunjin clenched his fist as he stared at the two princes laughing at the distance.

Why? He asks himself at why is he pressed about them, talking. Hyunjin wanted to rip the brown haired man away from you.

His jaw tightened in frustration in this feeling of his — was it jealousy? But he barely knew the guy in the first place, but noticing him at the corner of his eyes in the crowd at his speech makes his heart race.

He doesn’t believe in love in first sight — Heck, Hyunjin barely believes love exist. All those princesses were completely head over heels for him since he was young but never gave them attention as he knew that money or his looks is all they care about. It doesn’t sit right with him.

. . .

Hyunjin did nothing for the past thirty minutes but just stare at the face of the man who he seems attracted too.

He was also a bit salty at the fact that a prince was now giving head pats to you, he didn’t like that one bit. He accidentally let out a growl which did not stay unnoticed by his siblings.

“Jin?” A male voice snapped him out of his darkly clouded mind.

He snapped head towards the speaker, alarmed at the sudden call of his nickname, it was his older brother, the brother suddenly placed his arm on his shoulder, “You okay? You seemed distracted..—”

A laugh emerged from a woman near him,, her eyes twinkling with curiosity — Curious to why his brother, Hyunjin seemed a bit out of his head for a long time earlier.

“Yeji?” the eldest brother asked, turning his head slowly to her.

“What’s funny?” he continued, looking at her with a raised eyebrow, his lips frowning slightly.

“Nothing. Just wondering what’s gotten into Hyunjin...~ He was staring into the distance for a long time.” Yeji spoke, eyeing Hyunjin curiously — a hint of smirk playing at her lips.

Hyunjin froze.

“Uh, I was just watching what’s happening.” Hyunjin smiled as casual as he could, before grabbing the water from the near table to hydrate himself.

Yeji looked at him in question, not buying his response. “Whatever, birthday boy is being his boring self.” she shrugged off before standing up and going somewhere.

The eldest brother was very confused about what’s happening so he just sat back down and yawned.

“Hey! I’m older than you!” Hyunjin shouted before mumbling curses at her sister’s impudence before a bell suddenly rang.

. . .

The host stepped back upon the stage and bowed, “The ball will now begin, masks will be distributed in a little while, as requested by the prince — This will be a masquerade ball. Every one, enjoy your time at the palace !”

The male host smiled in content before leaving to the backstage.

You and Seungmin have been conversing for a while, unaware of the eyes that has been raking you from across the ball room.

. .

A lot of formally dressed occupants came out, holding stacks of differently designed half masks.

One of them suddenly approached you and handed you one. A white half mask, with gold lines and swirls remarkably designed by the maker.

The occupants handing out these masks have their own mask on also.

The giver of your mask had a smirk embedded on his lips before bowing.

You looked at Seungmin weirdly after that certain interaction with the masked guy, “Maybe just a creep?” he asks you in wonder.

You jabbed your elbow at him, “Don’t be silly, this is a castle. There is absolutely no way that someone without decency is here.”

“Hm, you never know Y/N.” he says in a serious tone making you stare at him in confusion before nodding.

. . .

Seungmin got his own mask — a dark blue colored one with sapphire crystals decorating the sides. He smiles at you before reaching for your hand, “Do you want to be my partner, Y/N?” he mumbles while you just nodded abruptly.

“Why me though? There’s many princesses out there?” you questioned suddenly, squeezing his hand pathetically.

“I have a more preference for men than women.” he stops and looks at you for any bad reactions before he continued;

“You seem fine and you’ve got good looks.” Seungmin complimented before taking you to the middle of the ball room where most people with partners are already gathered.

Slow and enchanting music started playing, the sensual melody was enough to calm your nerves and remove all thoughts of questioning Seungmin.

A hand was placed in your waist and in your shoulder, alerting you.... But, when you blink out of your own head, Seungmin was staring right at you with smile.

You placed your hands on his shoulder and waist as well, swaying through the music naturally.

While dancing you caught a glimpse through the crowd of a familiar red-head. He had a red half mask on with ruby crystals creating a spinning design on the eyes. A smirk formed his lips as he looked back at you, nodding twice. It was Jeongin dancing with a blonde haired man, his hair neatly sitting in a mullet. Felix.

You didn’t know if you wanted to curse him for leaving you or thank him for a new friend. You haven’t seen nor talked to Felix yet but maybe you will after this ceremony.

. . .

After dancing with Seungmin for a long while; a trumpet sounded which made you sigh as you look at Seungmin, knowing what it means.

Switch in partners.

“Good luck, Y/N~” he said with his signature cute smile that you’ve seen throughout the day.

You let out another sigh before gasping as someone took hold of your right wrist.

“Would you like to partner up with me?” A voice asked in a sexy voice, loosening the grip on your arm.

Swinging your head to the source of the attractive voice, you find yourself staring at a tall man with black hair — it was fairly long. He was wearing a black half mask adorned with dark flowers at the corners. He seems familiar, curiosity now took over your judgement as you nod courtly.

“May I ask for your name?” you looked at him, tilting your head to the side.

He looked up, thinking before looking back at you again with a smile, “Call me Hyun.” he breathed before taking your hand in his.

He then wrapped his other arm around your waist pulling you close to him. Chest to chest. You didn’t really mind because it was just a dance after all. Right?

You place your free hand on his shoulder, swaying to the music.

You stare up into his enticing eyes as if your were entranced by it. Slowly trailing your eyes to his big lips. Now you were extremely curious of what’s behind his mask. “From which kingdom are you?” You ask, mumbling your words.

His eyes peered down to your eyes in thought again, “I’ll answer all of your questions, when I get this mask off.” he whispers in your ear huskily causing you to shiver at his voice.

He didn’t come off to you suspicious or anything but his demeanor boasts arousal which wasn’t helping at the fact that you were slightly into his voice.

Okay maybe not slightly?—

. . .

Dancing across the ballroom and somehow not hitting any other partners was comforting since your own partner held you comfortably.

That is when you caught a familiar purple hair through the dancing figures, it was Changbin, dancing with....

Is that Han? You thought in shock as Changbin was practically being lead on by his partner. The partner suddenly lifted him up, princess style. Carrying him as if he was a feather.

Your partner noticed the constant staring just above his shoulder, “What is it?” he murmured to you, wanting to know what’s caught your attention. “Um, friends.”

He spun you around to get a good glimpse, suddenly a grin was evident on his face after you looked up at him staring into the distance — the direction you were looking at earlier.

No words spoken in between, he lifted you up, princess style — knocking the breath out of you, “Wha—”

You almost let out a shriek from being carried, “Put me down— oh my god, If you drop me, I fucking swear Hyun.” you hiss at him, wrapping your arms around his neck to keep yourself from falling.

“I won’t. Trust me.” he said as he carried you throughout the dance, you clutching him as if your life depended on it. Trust is not you have with a stranger, what the hell

. . .

Music stopped playing as the people stopped moving.

You sighed in pure relief, almost worried for your back to be broken. The man, named Hyun finally put you down and allowed you to take a breather.

“You still up for that offer of meeting me later to answer questions?” he asked smiling, to which you nodded in agreement. “Meet me at the gardens in 2 hours” He whispered to your ear, hot breath leaving his beautiful and sexy li—

“The royal gardens of the Hwangs?” You asked flushed from his teasing. The outside of this huge ballroom should be off-limits. “That isn’t allowed though right?” you took a small step back to reduce close proximity.

“I got permission from the Hwangs.”

You were a bit skeptical, “Well... If you say so...” you agreed nonetheless, not wanting to offend the other.

He nodded happily before walking away, waving his backhand at you.

You spot Felix at the corner and rushed over to him, wanting to talk to one of your best friends.

. . .

Atleast 2 hours had already passed and your energy was pretty much drained from conversing and watching Han flirt with Changbin or trying out Felix’s recommended shark meat. Jeongin was there too, pretty much being his evil self and saying stuff like: “Oooh, is it the Kim prince or that mystery guy, huh. Pick a lover, Y/N.”

Seungmin also kinda joined the friend group to with you introducing him to them, Jeongin had a mischievous smile during introduction and if you were to bury him 10 feet to the ground, you wouldn't mind. Ugh.

You realized that it was time to meet the masked man, so you excused your self from your friend group and sneakily rushed towards a door out of the room, remembering the structure of this place and where the garden is.

. . .

After some twist and turns in first floor hallway, you come face to face with a glass door, the sun that was setting was reflecting through it. You could see the tall and trimmed bushes outside as you step out. White roses were neatly sticking on the walls as the vines were all over it.

You hum as you walked around, “He didn’t exactly say where to meet him..” You scratched your head, trying to catch a shadow or a person. You eventually had to explore it a bit, sighing in annoyance as you saw a maze, “Hyun!” you shouted with all you could muster, knowing that most should be inside the party.

Birds fly out from tree at the heard noise...

Long minutes had already passed and not a single soul has been seen by your eyes.

You hung your head low and scanned the huge garden as a sigh escaped your lips, “Yeah... This is the worst.” you sulked slightly.

It’s worse to be stood up than rejected.. Atleast the person has the humility to show up when rejecting someone.

A shiver went through your spine as a cold gust of wind flew by, clutching your own arms. Disappointment was shown in your frown as you wanted to stay for a few minutes longer in hope.

. . .

You sighed, running your fingers over your scalp. As you were about to go inside, small footsteps were heard from the distance causing you to freeze in your steps and slowly turned your head to the miniscule noises.

A tall figure was walking towards you as you squinted your eyes to identify their face.

No way.. Is that...?

Fuck, it was the birthday boy — Prince Hwang Hyunjin, as if already admiring his face from earlier wasn’t enough, you had to see his pretty face again.

You were about to run inside when the Hwang shouted, “If you move, I will call the guards on you, Prince Y/N.”

Fuck.

Frozen dead in your tracks at his threat, you watched as he lurked closer, a hint of smirk dancing on those gorgeous lips.

“Prince Hyunjin, apologies but I thought someone was to meet me here..” you tried to reason out, hoping to not embarrass yourself any further by lying or trying to run.

You half-bowed to him, knowing that even though you were also a prince — He bears the name of Hwang, one of this continents, four largest kingdom.

As much as you wanted to keep your pride, it was disrespectful for a lower royal to not bow to a higher one.

He reached you and grasped your shoulder before pulling you up straight, he pulled you in by the waist causing a unintelligible sound to come out of your throat.

Familiar.

You looked at him, shocked, your mouth agape from the sudden distance change and his warmth. He held your waist tighter, pulling you impossibly closer.

Chest to chest.

Seeing your eyes he laughed, “So, what questions are you gonna ask?” he said, one of his eyebrow raised up in question.

Hyun.

. . . .

. . . .

“So, Prince Y/N. Care for hanging out with a Hwang?” He confidently asked with a smirk engraved on his lips, before he slowly reached and traced his thumb on your bottom lip. Relishing on the expressions you create.

Just a simple touch on your lips felt like a firestorm was raging inside, warmth spread across your body as heartstrings were pulled at his words.

. . .

“Sure...?” you whispered out unsure after a long silence as another gust of wind hit your back causing you to slightly shiver.

You still couldn't believe that he danced with you earlier, posing with a fake name. Though he said that it was because he didn't want to scare you off.

He was dangerous in a way, fooling with people on the higher end of the royal hierarchy is one dangerous feat.

But for some reason, you craved for his touch at this very moment, you didn’t know if it was because you maybe longed for him in that opening ceremony or that you barely have someone touch you intimately.

Hyunjin started feeling you up more while also undressing you with his eyes.

It started with light pecks to your jaw, transitioning into bodily touches like waist grabbing and slight groping. You were writhing because his touches — struggling to speak as every peck, every touch keeps your mind adrift away. You didn't even notice the bulge on your bottom garments starting to get noticeable.

“I—” you tried to catch your breath at his advances, “I d-dont think we should do this here, we might get caught..” you trailed off, tapping on his shoulder as a pleasured sigh left your mouth.

“Hm? So you want to do this? Here I thought, you were going to reject me.” He mumbles as he kissed your neck lightly.

“Don’t get the wrong idea, ah~ You are going to finish what you started..” You whispered out, moaning in the middle of the sentence when he suddenly palm your bulge with a bit of pressure.

He trailed his lips to your ears, “You’re a needy slut, huh? Don’t worry, I intend to finish what I started...~ And by the end of it? You’d want more of this.” He bit your earlobe while kneading your butt with his right hand.

You bit your lip, wanting to keep embarrassing noises from coming up your throat.

“We haven't even known each other that much, yet here you are. Presenting yourself to me like a whore.” he degraded with a smirk after pulling himself away from your ear.

You weren’t one to fuck around but Prince Hwang is one of a kind — extremely sexy and intoxicating.

You want more of him.

“Cat’s got your tongue, little pup?”

“Fuck, I don’t care — J-Just not here... Might get caught.” You hiss pathetically as he squeezed harder on your bulge, grinding into his hand.

“Hmm.. Okay.” he said, looking in to your eyes with his own bearing hints of burning lust. He took your hand, leading you back inside.

. . .

“Wouldn’t be people be worried, that you were gone from the party? And it’s your celebratio—” you breathed out as he pinned you to the wall suddenly, suprising you as you stare at him with wide eyes.

“I don’t care about that right now.. What I care about is you on my bed, all spread out and ready to be used by me, hmm?” he mumbles lowly, kissing you on the lips — with you yelping at the sudden warmth and softness on your lips.

You wrapped an arm around his neck while you pulled on his long hair with your free hand. He groaned against your mouth. “Room, Hyunjin— p-please..” you mumble against his lips, pulling away after a second.

After Hyunjin pulled away he opened a door at a short moment’s notice before grabbed you and pullled you in. You didn’t even manage to look at the room's structure or designs as he already started to remove articles of clothing from you one by one.

“You know, how hard it was — seeing you from the crowds earlier talking to another royal, one that flirted with you at best? Maybe I should remind him who you would belong to now huh?” he looked at your naked form, licking his lips before slowly pushed you towards and down the bed.

You moaned at his words, even though you know full well that Seungmin didn't flirt with you one bit but just talking about interest. His hint of possessiveness turned you on highly.

He slowly removed his royal wear, exposing his own milky skin, smiling at the way you examined his body with your mouth slightly watering at the mere sight of it, he was without a doubt one of the most — if not the sexiest man you’ve laid your eyes upon.

His eyes turned to one of the drawer of his nightstand, he reached over and took out a small vial. “What is that?” you ask, eyeing the vial suspiciously.

“It’s rose oil, to reduce the pain.” he answered, leaning down to press a small bite against your rib, laughing lowly when he heard your breath hitch.

He placed the vial, on the sheet — next to you.

“You know, I had doubted you with your fight with your own knight. Never thought that I would find you willing to spread your legs open for me.” He says, not holding back on his cockiness.

Which guiltily made your cock twitch to which he responded — by taking a hold of your throbbing length.

“My pup liked that huh?” He said a grin forming on his lips — teasing, riling you up more.

“Pathetic.” he said in a chilling tone — massaging your left pec with his free hand. He brushed a finger tip on your nipple, before he leaned down and bit a circle mark on your now puffy bud.

You bit your lip, holding off any sounds to not boost his already huge ego. Squirming underneath him, shallowly thrusting into his hand that was grasping your cock.

His own dick was hard too, you could feel it poking your thighs in the slightest, its tip barely brushing against your skin.

Hyunjin didn’t like the lack of sounds one bit, he used his now free hand to place it at your lip, you looked at him confused.

When your mouth suddenly opened, breathing against his fingers — he took the opportunity to insert his slender fingers in your mouth.

“Hold in your sounds again, and I’ll make you choke on my dick. Got that?” he threatened, eerily glaring at you — his eyes were burning holes into your own.

You nodded submissively, to which he then turned his head into your leaking and throbbing cock. He leaned down — taking your cock in his mouth, sucking earnestly and running his tongue on the veins at the side.

You thrusted up into his mouth — a mix of whining and whimpering against his fingers that he was shoving down your throat.

His teeth brushed a tiny bit against your sensitive head causing you to cry out, sounding muffled by his fingers.

“C-Close..” You gurgled against his digits, he removed his mouth instantly from your length, a trail of spit connecting his mouth from your slit, smirking at you.

You let out a whine and tried to close your legs but Hyunjin was faster, he immediately placed his knees between your legs, keeping it open and spread.

“Tsk, Sluts don’t get to cum.” he growled, “Especially pathetic ones like you.”

He slowly pulled out his fingers from your mouth, coated in your own spit coating around it. He wiped his fingers on your sheets.

He look down at you as if you were prey to him — a small cat in a lion’s den, his eyes were heavily clouded with lust. He was itching, excited to claim you and your body, especially since you were willingly serving to him yourself in a silver platter.

He flipped you on all fours so that he could have easier access to your entrance, He smiled seeing you in such a vulnerable state, “You want this?” he mumbles leaning down to mouth at your shoulder, you whimper pushing back against him as you felt his dripping and hard cock press against the side of your ass.

You nodded twice as an answer to his question, he gripped your hair tightly, pulling on it. “Answer me, pup.” he growled deeply.

“Y-Yes.... fuck me, my—” You cut yourself off with a moan as Hyunjin touched the head of your overstimulated cock roughly. “Your what, pup?”

Dizzy from pleasure, you said the first thing that popped into your mind, “M-Master?” you moaned shortly after as he squeezed your hardening length.

“Mm, I’m your master, and you’re my slutty puppy. Aren’t you?” he said in a teasing voice, removing his hand from your cock before he prodded at your rim with a dry thumb. Applying pressure but not enough to breach the soft skin.

You let out a whimper, pushing against his fingers multiple times like a bitch in heat.

It was pathetic really, at how much willing you just want to be fucked by him already, you wrapped your own hand around your leaking length to remove some pressure — only to be met by the harsh grip of Hyunjin’s palm, “Touch yourself and I’d make sure you won’t cum tonight for a second time.”

You whined at his words and slowly remove your hand as your pre-cum started to drip down and dirty the sheets.

He finally took the vial of rose oil that he sat aside, opening it with a pop sound — he poured a generous amount of it on his fingers before prodding your entrance with two fingers. “Say ‘Red’ if it gets too much, pup, okay?” he said, showing off a softer side of him.

You looked at him wide eyes at smiled lightly before nodding.

You let out a thrilled moan as two fingers, quickly made work to stretch you out, you saw his cock and it looked like it won't be an easy fit unless you get properly stretched.

. .

Two fingers slowly turned to four after awhile, increasing the sound you were making and decreasing Hyunjin’s patience. He just wanted to fuck you at this point on, but for safety of you — not yet.

Hyunjin was purposefully avoiding your prostate, he didn't want you to cum yet from his fingers especially since you were dripping a lot.

Hyunjin kept pumping his fingers inside of you, while also ravishing different parts of you, getting into work of marking every part he could find — from your shoulders down to your pretty thighs. Almost every mark is either a dark purple hue or bright red bite.

“I’m ready, fuck... Hwang just fuck me already.” you said impatiently at how long he dragged on the teasing. Hyunjin laughed at how vocal you now were, quite the contrast to the babbling mess you were earlier.

“Don’t be impatient.” he said, glaring at you and taking a firm grip on your ass, squeezing it tightly. You scoff at him, reaching back and sneakily taking ahold of his cock — it leaking slight pre-cum on it’s tip.

“Like you aren’t impatient.” you retorted back even with his fingers basically deep inside you.

He growled deeply and pulled his fingers out — you letting out a clear moan at the rough movement of his digits. Your hole clenched around nothing, it slightly gaping from being stretched around four of his fingers.

“Pups should learn their place.” he said coldly, getting the vial and pouring all of the remaining contents on his hand before slowly jerking himself off to slick up his dick.

.

You heard some shuffling before suddenly the air was knocked out of you, “Fuck. Fuck.” you chanted as Hyunjin moments ago fucked into you, his hands flew into your hips as he already started a harsh pace turning your mind hazy.

“You like this already, huh?” He mumbles, gripping your hips tighter, as he deeply thrusts into you. He was still avoiding your sensitive spot all this time.

“Such a good cocksleeve for me.” he hums with a smirk as he finally hit your prostate — known by you letting out the loudest moan yet.

Ah ah ah coming from your lips and his hips loudly slapping against your ass was the only thing you heard in the room, you were getting the best fuck of your life right here.

You could feel every vein — every ridge on his cock against your walls as he thrusts into you mercilessly, fucking the words out of you. It felt amazing and exciting at the same time.

Your body has given up trying to hoist itself up, so you collapse on the bed in a slumping position. He was still harshly gripping your hips, using your hole for his pleasure. You were whining against the sheets and messing it up with your drool. You were close as he hit your prostate a third time causing you to moan loudly.

“No more words to answer back, Y/N? Or are you already fucked that dumb?” he says, speeding up his pace, wanting to chase his release.

He was splitting you in half and you just nod slowly as your fists were squeezing the bedsheet, He let out a breathy laugh at that and continued his thrusts, relishing at your tired moans and pretty whines.

You pushed back against his thrusts, increasing the friction by alot.

He hit your prostate one last time and came undone untouched and without his permission. You moan loudly, barely getting muffled as you dig your head further into the pillow nearby. Your cock was getting milked for all it’s worth as he reached out to jerk you, wanting to make sure to get every last drop.

His thrusts were getting sloppier by the second, before moments later — he finally came with a groan, spilling himself into you and coating your walls with his white cum.

You whimpered as you felt him pull out, feeling some of the white substance drip into your thighs, “I-Inside, want you..” you mumble with him barely hearing it.

“Shh, I’ll clean you up first pup.” Hyunjin said, leaving and going into his bathroom to find a damp cloth.

While he left for the bathroom, you laid there on your chest — sighing.

What happened to the 'no fucking around' rule that you seem to follow, you promised yourself that ‘Y’ was the first and last. You rolled over to your side, wincing at how the cum drizzled out of your swollen hole. He had a lot of cum suprisingly.

. .

On a short moment’s notice, Hyunjin finally arrived to find you laying to your side, your eyes signaling that you were deep in thought.

“You okay? Did I go too hard?” He walked near you to which your eyes drifted to his face slowly to which you gave him a small smile.

“No.. I had fun time, thank you for taking good care of me, Prince Hyunjin.” you answered him, keeping the small smile before you turned to him.

He nods, “Just call me Hyunjin, no need for formality.” he moves closer to you, sitting down next to your back. He trailed the towel in his hand near your hole — removing the cum around your ring of muscles gently.

“One problem though...” you whispered, looking up at him with tired eyss before eyeing the bruises and marks on your body made by the dominant prince.

He grins sexily, “Keep it as a reminder to you ans to people who’d dare sleep with you.” He said, touching the marks softy after wiping your hole that was seeping with his cum.

You groaned in annoyance, “I’m serious, Hwang.” you shot back to him with an impatient glare. You click your tongue as no answer came out of his mouth.

He grabbed a small vial of ointment from his drawers to make sure your skin wouldn’t have any problems from his bruises and to make sure it would heal. He hummed while he applied it on the marks.

You sigh and allowed to treat you before he opened his lips to speak, “I’ll go over to your kingdom tomorrow.” he mumbles, wiping his hand on the sheet as he grabbed an underwear from his drawer.

You watched him put it on, looking away from him a bit shy, to which thank god that he didn't notice.

You looked up at him questioningly, “Hm? Why?” you tilted your head like a puppy to which he moved closer to pet you.

“I want your hand in marriage.” he said straightforwardly with a smile plastered in his face. He grabbed your chin making you look up at him, he leaned down and kissed you before you squeak embarrassingly.

You look at him dumbfounded and shocked beyond belief — your mouth hanging open with eyes wide, “Hwang, what? You’re going a bit too fast—”

He grabbed your hand suddenly and kissed the top of it before looking up at you, “Nothing’s too fast when I already like you and I want you.”

You groaned, knowing he won't let this go. Your parents should reject since they know that you’re not ready for marriage yet. Right? Hopefully, you prayed silently that your parents for once reject something so outrageous.

“We’ll talk about this tomorrow, I’m too tire—”

“HYUNJIN! IT’S TIME FOR YOUR END SPEECH, OH MY GOD, I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU LEFT YOUR OWN PARTY.” Someone with a female voice yelled while banging on the other side of the door. You froze at the sudden noise.

“Tch, my sister doesn’t know the meaning of staying calm half of the time.” he mumbles, brushing his hand across his long hair.

“I’ll come down in a few!” Hyunjin said loud enough for the lady give a last hit to the poor door before leaving.

He looked at you before grabbing his clothes from the party and slowly dressed himself up, “I’ll see you, Y/N.” he said after getting fully dressed, he looked back and winked at you before smiling a bright one.

You sigh as you get up from his bed and limped to collect your clothes around the room, sighing once more as you dressed yourself up. “Marriage... hm.” you were having troubling thoughts about this, sudden marriage proposal — especially with someone you just met like 3 hours ago.

“Time to go fetch the dumbass and leave, I wanna sleep.” You said annoyed, referring to that stupid knight of yours that went missing when the event started.

You look at the closet mirror and fixed your hair also trying to cover the visible marks but to no avail still failed to do so. You were gonna sneak out of here, and hopefully Hwang just forgets what he said earlier.

.

.

.

.

.

Extended Scene

“Lino, I swear why do you look like a weirdo right now.” you said, looking at him with your eyebrows furrowed in confusion. You were referring to how he looked like dumbstruck with love.

He hisses at you, “Shut up, why do you have hickeys then huh?” Minho answered you with another question as he looked over to you and rolled his eyes.

You huff, “I’m telling my parents that you were disrespecting me early in the party.”

He smirks and looks over to you with one of his eyebrows raised, “Then I guess you wouldn't mind what fun you did in the party, I mean with the limping and stuff.” he threatens back, chuckling.

“You little shi—”

#kpop x male reader #stray kids x male reader #kpop scenarios #kpop x reader #kpop imagines #skz smut #dom stray kids #sub male reader #mlm fic #lgbtq #stray kids x reader #skz #smut #han jisung #dom hwang hyunjin #kpop smut #hyunjin smut #hwang hyunjin x male reader #hyunjin x male reader

[biggest-stupidhead]

Bad Timing (Levi x reader) Part 6

Summary: How do you tell your friends that you’re falling for your big brother’s best friend? 

Word Count: 5.8K 

Warnings: none? (let me know if I missed something pls) 

November had seamlessly slipped into December, your small town was now decorated with wreathes of evergreen boughs instead of dried corn husks. A large Christmas tree had been set up in the small park off of main street, a crowd of enthusiastic citizens milling about to decorate the large evergreen. You turned your attention back to the hardware store where your older brother was purchasing a roll of wrapping paper and an armful of Christmas lights. Erwin thanked the cashier and pushed out of the store with his arms full of paper bags. You wordlessly relieved him of two of the bags, a smile on your face.

You had to admit, the town was doused in an ethereal winter glow, it was a Saturday afternoon and main street was bustling. The small coffee shop was decked out in Christmas decorations and people were flocking to get a cup of their holiday specials. The small boutiques were advertising the latest fashions, the hardware store was busier than usual, and the small breakfast joint was packed with families enjoying a quiet breakfast. The sidewalks were damp with melted snow, chunks of sidewalk salt crunching underfoot as you made your way to Erwin's minivan that was parked down the street.

"So movie night tonight..." Erwin cleared his throat and glanced down at you.

"Yeah, nothing too special just the usual crew." you shrugged indifferently.

"I figured as much." the blonde sighed as he fumbled for his keys in his pocket.

"Is there a problem?" you asked, a bit nervous that Erwin would change his mind and tell you that you couldn't host the movie night that you had planned.

"No, no of course not, I was just wondering if you were planning on seeing Levi off with Mom and I tomorrow morning." he hummed thoughtfully as you loaded the bags into the trunk of the van.

"I'll be there." you grunted as you settled into the front seat. Erwin nodded, pleased with your response and started the car.

-

When you arrived at your house you were surprised to see that Levi and Hange were both present. A glance at your brother told you that he also was not expecting them to be there either. You both made quick work of bringing in the groceries, you smiled softly at the sight of your mother and Hange fussing over some garland that you draped over the kitchen cabinets as decoration. Levi was hunched over the sink with his sleeves of his chunky knit sweater rolled up as he scrubbed relentlessly at a pan. Erwin bushed past you and into the living room to light the fireplace, you bit your lip to conceal a giggle as Hange got tangled in the itchy garland. Your mom immediately set to work on untangling her and you turned to put away the goods that you and Erwin had acquired.

Erwin waltzed back into the kitchen and set to work on drying the dishes that Levi had already washed, the two of them falling into an easy rhythm. You took the dried dishes and began to put them away, reveling in the domestic environment. You knew that this wouldn't last much longer, they were going to school, starting their lives. Instead of dwelling on the thought you decided to just enjoy the little time that you had left with them.

"Aw that looks amazing! Good work Hange!" your mom praised the brunette as she finished tacking up the garland over the cabinets.

"Thanks Angie!" Hange beamed, your mom chuckled and took the hammer and remaining nails from her to return to their rightful places. Hange turned to see the three of you finishing up the last of the dishes.

"Look at you guys getting along." she cooed, clutching her hands over the sleek black turtleneck that she wore tucked into her bright yellow checkered pants.

"Shut up and go grab me a fresh rag." Levi grunted as he shoved the dirty rag into Hange's hands. She turned and obediently made her way down the hall to the laundry room to fetch a fresh rag for Levi to wipe down the counters.

"What's Kenny planning on doing this year without you home?" Erwin prodded, as he watched Levi scrape a skeptical finger over the countertop.

"Gamble, drink himself to death, hell if I know." Levi scoffed as he wiped his hand off on a hand towel and stooped down to pull out the all purpose cleaner from under the sink.

"Is that what he usually does?" you asked carefully, Levi paused a thoughtful look passing over his usually stoic mien.

"I guess." Levi shrugged, his face falling back into one of indifference. You hummed thoughtfully, nobody deserved to spend Christmas alone, not even Levi's bum of an uncle. Hange jogged back into the kitchen sliding on the clean floors due to her thick cabin socks. She held the clean rag out proudly for Levi who then doused it with cleaner and began scrubbing the counters. Your mom returned from the garage, her cheeks flushed from the cold.

"Levi sweetie what have I told you about cleaning? You really don't have to do that." she scolded, Levi frowned but continued to wipe down the counters while Erwin busied himself with inspecting the new LED lights that he had purchased. Your mother reached up and ruffled Erwins hair affectionately as she passed and made her way towards the stairs. Hange chuckled and settled into one of the stools at the island.

"When will your buddies be arriving?" she hummed, a smirk curling onto her lips as she perched her chin on her intertwined fingers. You pursed your lips and glanced at the clock over the stove, it was only three o'clock, they shouldn't arrive until six.

"Sometime around six." you reported, pulling a holiday magazine out of the stack in the middle of the island. You idly flipped through the pages, ignoring the way Hange's glasses glinted in the light as she studied you thoughtfully. She inhaled, as if she were about to speak, but you quickly shut the tabloid and threw it back onto the pile and stood.

"Welp better go set things up." you stretched dramatically and before Hange or anyone else could get in another word you fled down stairs. Thankfully you had taken the time the night prior to clean out the basement and pull out decorations. You stacked piles of seasonal quilts and other knit blankets about on the couch and some on the floor as well. You lit some seasonal candles in the basement restroom and one on the T.V stand.

You had already set up a tangle of white LED lights at the base of the TV and some other small snowmen figurines as well as a small Christmas tree in the back corner for the group to decorate and place white elephant gifts beneath. The tree was already bundled up with rainbow lights and strands of shimmery tinsel. You deemed the basement as satisfactory and turned to begin preparing snacks and other treats.

You weren't surprised to find Hange and Levi at each others throats, Hange had a fistful of Levi's sweater, and he had her by the ponytail. Erwin was still engrossed by the lights as he attempted to untangle them, seemingly unbothered by his friends. You carefully stepped over the mess of lights and began by preheating the oven, you planned on making frozen pizzas and some of those cheap Pillsbury dough boy sugar cookies that you bought during the holidays.

"Admit it!" Hange snarled as she jostled Levi.

"You're being overdramatic four eyes." Levi hissed as she shook him relentlessly.

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

You rolled your eyes and did your best to ignore them. Their relationship never ceased to confuse you, the pair seemed to constantly be in a state of turmoil. One day they were perfectly content with each other, but the next they would be at each others throats as they were now. It gave you whiplash, especially on days when they flipped between these two states every few minutes. Realistically you knew that it was Hange who added the turmoil to their relationship, she was very chaotic by nature. You originally figured that Levi tolerated Hange's presence because Erwin and her were dating, but now that you had gotten to see the two of them interact you knew better. Somewhere deep down you knew Levi cared about the manic young scientist, and Hange openly voiced her affections for Levi.

You smiled at the sound of the two of them tussling, their staggering steps receding into the living room where they would have more room to rough one another up. You heard a body slam to the ground, which is when you turned to see Levi glaring down at Hange who was now sprawled out on the hardwood floor. Erwin frowned at his friends disapproval evident on his features. When he had first introduced the pair all they ever did was fight, but that was when they were younger, now he expected better from them. Also he was surprised that Hange still even attempted to best Levi in a fight, the raven haired male was surprisingly strong and had experience under his belt.

Hange hauled herself onto her feet as Levi stalked back towards the kitchen, his sweater now stretched out around the neck where Hange had tugged on the material. Just as he was about the sit down, Hange snagged him around the neck and locked him into a choke hold, a victorious bout of laughter leaving her lips as she dragged him back into the living room. Levi's socked feet attempted in vain to slow down the persistent brunette as she drug him backwards. You slid the pizza in the oven and turned to pull out the popcorn so that it would be ready for when the others arrived. Erwin scoffed and gathered the lights, which were now free of tangles and hauled them outside into the waning light.

You frowned after him, hoping that he didn't plan to put them up in the dark. Turning your attention back to the brawl in the living room you were impressed to see that Hange still had the upper hand. Levi had a hand placed on her jaw as he tried to push her face away from his, the two of them were on the ground, Hange underneath Levi who was trapped in a choke hold with Hange's legs wrapped around his waist. Levi snarled as he thrashed in Hange's hold, his sweater riding up as he struggled. Hange was laughing her head off, finally releasing Levi in favor of clutching her stomach as her laughter grew more intense. Levi seethed as he took a few healthy steps away from Hange and ran a hand through his hair in an attempt to straighten it. Hange stood up and wiped a tear from her eye before turning to face Levi.

"But seriously, you should do it." Hange's tone turned serious as she addressed Levi. He scoffed and curled his lip in disgust.

"Probably more trouble than it's worth." he retorted.

"Just give it a shot." Hange begged, her hands clasped together over her chest.

"I'll think about it." Levi snorted, he stalked out of the living room and back into the kitchen, his eyes sweeping over the room, clearly searching for Erwin.

"Outside." you jabbed a thumb in the direction of the front door, he said nothing as he trudged past. You knew better than to ask what they had been arguing about, they always just brushed you off. So instead you returned your focus on preparing for your movie marathon. You could already see a bruise forming on Hange's jaw from here Levi's fingers hand attempted to pry her off of him. You flinched, recalling his iron grip, you knew how it felt to be manhandled by him.

"So...what are you guys doing tonight?"  you questioned casually as you pulled the cookies from the oven. Your voice derailed Hange's train of thought, she whipper her head around and pursed her lips as she considered your question.

"Hm, I guess whatever Levi wants since it is his last night in the states for a whole month." she mused, rubbing her hand along her tender jaw. You nodded, this probably meant nothing, Levi wasn't much of an extrovert so it made sense that he wouldn't want many people present except for those he considered dearest to him to see him off.

"Well if you guys want you could join us, they won't be staying late." you were quick to tack on the last part, knowing that Levi probably wasn't ecstatic to spend his last night with underclassmen.

"I'll see what I can do." Hange winked before retreating towards the stairs and jogging up them, presumably to change into comfier clothes. You leaned against the counter and sighed heavily, things were changing and you hated it. You knew that at sooner or later your brother would go off and begin his life, but you did not expect it to come so quickly. You also didn't expect to grow so fond of his friends. Before you could totally bum yourself out your phone vibrated, startling you.

"Hello?" you asked, not bothering to check the caller id.

"(Y/n)?" Connie's familiar upbeat voice brought you back to earth.

"Yeah what's up?" you chuckled as you wedged your phone between your ear and shoulder to slide the pizza into the oven.

"I just wanted to let ya know that Sasha and I are on our way and we are bringing some snacks just like you asked!" he boasted, you could practically see the swell of his chest and the smug smirk on his lips as he spoke.

"Great! How far away are you?" you asked as you shut the oven.

"About five minutes." he affirmed.

"I'll see you soon." you hummed as you set the timer on the oven.

"Yep!" he beamed, after a moment you heard the familiar beep signaling that the call had been ended. You dropped your phone back onto the counter and glanced out the window behind the sink. The sun had began to sink below the trees, and still Erwin and Levi were outside, you hoped that they were not trying to tack up the lights. With a heavy sigh you trudged through the front of the house and slipped on a pair of Erwin's moccasins and pushed through the front door. You wrapped your arms around your chest and frowned when you didn't see the pair anywhere on the front yard. You cupped your hands over your mouth and inhaled sharply.

"Erwin!" you yelled, your voice echoing off the barren trees and the serene snowy scene. No response. Just as you were about to call again, a huge glob of snow fell off the roof right on to your head. You shrieked and turned to see Levi standing on the roof, the toes of his boot sticking over the newly uncovered patch of your roof. You glared up at him as you brushed the snow off of your shirt and shivered.

"Quit shouting." was all he said before turning and stalking back out of your line of sight.

"Are you guys almost finished? It's getting dark and I don't want to spend the night in the hospital." you whined as you took a few steps back to get a better view of the roof. You heard the distant sound of a hammer, but no response to your question. You rolled your eyes and took yet another step back. This time you could see Erwin hunched over the edge of the roof, Levi had returned to his side to hold him by his belt as he stood on the slippery surface. Not the smartest or safest way to hang up lights but hey if it works it works. After a few more swings Erwin leaned back on his haunches to admire his work, with a satisfied nod the two grabbed the remaining nails and began their descent.

"Hold that ladder for us would ya (Y/n)?" Erwin hollered down and pointed a finger to the old metal ladder that was perched against the side of the house. You nodded and waded through the snow to stabilize the ladder for the two of them to climb down. You only relaxed when both of them were safely on the ground, the three of you quickly gathered all of the tools that they used and folded the ladder back up before trudging through the snow to the side door that led into the garage. You stored all of the items and filed into the door that led into the kitchen, only to find Sasha and Connie milling about with Hange and your mother.

The kitchen was warm due to the heat of the oven and all of the people in the room. You tugged at the neck of your crewneck sweat shirt, your eyes drifted to where Connie was struggling to open a candy cane. Sasha was ripping open a bag of popcorn to place int the microwave. A short knock on the door alerted you that someone else had arrived, just as you rounded the corner to let in your guests, the door opened and Jean poked his head in.

"Hey!" he exclaimed as he pushed the rest of the way in, a paper bag cradled in the crook of his elbow.

"Hey, come on in!" you waved him in, a smile gracing your lips at the sight of Marco close behind him, a stack of old CDs in his grasp.

"Marco! I'm so glad you could make it." you gushed as you went to relieve Jean of the bag in his arms. Marco smiled a bit bashfully and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Yeah me too." he blushed, the red tint obscuring his freckled cheeks.

"Well you can go ahead and take those to the basement, Jean can you show him?" you asked as the three of you entered the chaotic kitchen. Jean nodded and grabbed Marco's bicep to steer him towards the basement, before you knew it the pair had disappeared down the stairs.

Your mom had given Connie a hand and opened his candy for him, and now he was sucking on the peppermint candy, the end of it gradually forming a point. Sasha was listening to Hange as she gestured wildly, something about the amount of chemicals and various pesticides used to grow corn. Levi was surprisingly still in the crowded kitchen, although it seemed he was purely there to supervise, Erwin was inspecting Hange and your mother's handy-work with the garland. Just as you managed to wedge yourself between Hange and Sasha to reach the oven, the sound of the doorbell made Sasha jump and push you back.

"I'll get it!" she cried out before making a break for the foyer and escaping Hange's rant. You rolled your eyes and pulled the pizza out of the oven. Hange bounced around the kitchen, stopping in front of Erwin, he pulled her into his embrace by her hips, Levi rolled his eyes before stalking away from the pair. He padded through the kitchen and into the living room where he dropped onto the sofa. You pursed your lips, the thought of joining him crossed your mind but before you could act on it Jean had you by your shoulders and was steering you towards the basement to follow the crowd downstairs.

You allowed him to guide you downstairs along with the others, Connie and Sasha were already in the basement, running circles around the couch chasing one another. Connie had Sasha on the run, periodically jabbing his sharpened candy cane at her whenever he got close enough. You cracked a smile at the pair as the others moved to sit on the couch, you took a moment to appreciate Mikasa's outfit, she had favored a festive red sweater that had a raindeer sewn onto the front instead of her usual goth get up. Eren had also worn a forrest green sweater with a Christmas tree, Armin wore a sky blue sweater with a cheeky snowman on the front. You beamed at their choices, all of them very fitting, Jean and Marco wore a matching set with two elves on the front of their green sweaters. Connie and Sasha also wore sweaters, Connie's had Rudolf with a nose that actually lit up while Sasha wore a white sweater with a turkey on the front.

Connie finally managed to catch Sasha, holding her in a chokehold and dragging her over to the sofa. Marco dropped down next to Armin and the two began to sift through the options, Mikasa watched the two converse while keeping an eye on Eren who was poking fun at Jean's sweater. You decided to let the pair work it out on their own for once and dropped down next to Mikasa. Marco had managed to bring quite the variety of movies, he had classics like Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer, A Christmas Story, Santa Clause, Home Alone, and more. You unanimously decided that A Christmas Story would be the perfect start, so you popped the disk in and all settled into your seats. Sasha and Connie had to sit on the ground, you had learned the hard way that they were messy eaters and it was much easier to clean the floor than the crevices in the couch. The movies went by quickly, and before long it was already 12 am, you finished the last few minutes before everyone began to fold blankets and pick up the dishes that they had used. You all climbed the stairs and dropped the dishes in the sink and the trash in the bin, you thanked them for coming and wished them safe travels as they all filed out the door. Jean lingered for a moment, a hand on your hip as the two of you stood on the threshold. The others had long since climbed into their cars, it was only Marco who was waiting for Jean.

"Thanks again for hosting tonight." Jean smirked as he pulled you flush against his chest, the scratchy sweater tickled your nose as you rested your head against him.

"It's really not that big of a deal, I like having all you guys over." you whispered against his chest as he rubbed a hand up and down the curve of your back. You were surprised when a flurry of butterflies fluttered in your stomach at his ministrations. His hand slid up your back and came to rest splayed between your shoulder blades for a moment before continuing to slide up and into your hair. Your heart pounded in your ears as he kept his steady gaze on your face, with a gentle tug he pulled your head back to look up at him. You blinked rapidly, as he slowly leaned in until his breath fanned across your lips.

"May I kiss you?" he murmured, his tongue flicking our over his bottom lip as he awaited your answer.

"Y-You may." you stuttered, that was all he needed. He closed the small gap and pressed his lips against your own, taking your bottom lip into his mouth and sucking. You kissed him back timidly, not quite sure how you felt about this interaction. It seemed as if the kiss lasted for hours, when in reality it was probably only about two minutes. Marco laid on the horn of Jean's car, startling the two of you. Jean smiled sheepishly at you before turning and jogging down the steps and over to his car. He turned and waved at you, even going as far as winking before climbing into his car and starting the engine. You couldn't stop your wandering fingers from tracing your wet lower lip as he drove off, he wasn't a half bad kisser. You stepped back into the foyer and closed the door and locked up. The house was quite, but you could hear Hange laughing upstairs, and your mom's TV in her room playing Grey's Anatomy. Since the others had been kind enough to aid you in cleaning up most of the mess, you decided to go get changed into pajamas. You tiptoed up the stairs and past Erwin's room, you could hear Hange, Levi, and Erwin behind the door, they seemed to be bickering as per usual.

You quickly threw on a sweatshirt and a pair of running shorts before wandering back to Erwin's door and rapping on the wood with the back of your knuckles. The voices fell quiet before Erwin pulled the door open just enough to peek through the crack, you frowned at him skeptically. He relaxed when he realized that it was only you and pulled the door open to allow you inside. Erwin's room was like most athletic teen males, messy. His desk was cluttered with papers and pens and the odd textbook. His bed was messed up, Hange was splayed across the comforter watching Levi scroll through his phone. The LED lights in Erwin's room were rotating through multiple colors, the floor was surprisingly clean, probably because Levi was in the room. Your eyes fell on his large beanbag that rested in its usual corner and you moved to fall onto the familiar seat but before you could collapse Hange called out to you.

"(Y/n)! come lay with me." she yawned as she beckoned you over. You sighed but decided to indulge her, you frowned at the small amount of space between her and Levi and opted for the foot of the bed. Erwin dropped down into his desk chair and hunched over his homework, seemingly uninterested in hanging out with you just yet. You sank down onto the foot of Erwin's queen sized bed, Hange frowned and patted the space between her and Levi. You grimaced but still crawled up the bed and pressed your self to Hange to avoid entering Levi's bubble. Hange draped her arm over your waist as you settled your back against her chest.

"Leviiiii let us see" Hange cooed, reaching to pull Levi's elbow so you could see his phone screen. Levi frowned but obliged, angling his wrist so all three of you could see his screen. He was on tiktok, watching a deep cleaning video. His for you page followed the trend of the first video, reviews on cleaning products, amazon reviews and unboxings, some aesthetic videos, mostly boring things. Before you knew it Hange's head slumped down onto your shoulder and you felt her steady breath on your skin, her arm that had been holding you in her iron grip had also gone slack. Levi glanced at the two of you and tried to engrave the image in his mind, the crushing reality of leaving his friends was beginning to sink in. Anyone else would think that he would be happy to leave this bumpkin town for Paris, but they would be wrong. His phone buzzed in his hand, forcing him to tear his gaze off of the two of you. He blinked at the banner that had appeared at the top of his screen, an unknown number.

"Have a safe trip tomorrow big bro! ❤️(red heart emoji)" Levi allowed the corner of his mouth to curl upwards as he read the message. However it was short lived when he realized that it was around 7am in Paris, what on earth was she doing up? He rolled his eyes and opened the message to shoot her a reply:

"Go back to sleep brat it's a Saturday."  he shut his phone off as soon as the message went through, feeling a bit better about his impending departure knowing that his sister was waiting for him. He hadn't seen them in almost 7 years now, he had left France with his uncle when he was only 11 years old when his uncle had gotten a new job. He was only able to return now because he had spent the last three years working odd jobs to save up enough cash to purchase a round trip to France for the holidays.

"Penny for your thoughts?" your muffled voice brought Levi back to the present. He scoffed, glancing down he noted that your eyes were closed and your face pressed into the pillows. He spared another glance to your brother who was now typing furiously on his laptop with a pair of cheap headphones pushed deep into his ears.

"Well?" you pressed, cracking an eye open to gauge his reaction.

"There's nothing to share." he huffed, sinking deeper into Erwin's bed dejectedly.

"So you admit that your head is filled with nothing but elevator music?" you jabbed, a sleepy smirk on your lips. Levi's nose scrunched at the comment, he rolled over onto his side, propping his head on his hand as he glared daggers down at you.

"At least tell me what song is playing in there." you giggled, reaching a hand up to tap you index finger on his temple. He blinked slowly as he allowed you to tease him, knowing that this would be the last time you would get the chance for a whole month. You frowned when he said nothing still and sighed heavily.

"You really won't tell me?" you pursed your lips when Levi's lip twitched, threatening to curl upwards. So that's how it's going to be.

"I was thinking about you." Levi professed, his tone surprisingly tender. Your eyes widened, now you were awake, you felt hot embarrassment rush up your neck and cover your cheeks.

"W-What?" you stammered, the confidence that had flowed so freely through your actions earlier long forgotten.

"You heard me."

"Could you be more specific?"

"Eh" Levi shrugged and rolled over so his back was to you. Astonished, you sat frozen still being crushed under a sleeping Hange. You sat up as much as you could to peek at Erwin, yup he was still grinding on that Economy project. Carefully you shrugged Hange's arm off of your waist and rolled out from under her head. She only snorted and rolled so her back was to you. You sat up fully and grabbed Levi's upper arm to shake him, after a few seconds of jostling, he rolled over and opened his mouth to hand you a snarky comment. His eyes widened slightly to see your finger pressed firmly against your lips. You jerked your head towards the door before you threw your legs over Levi's and slid off the bed and quietly let yourself out of the room. Levi frowned as he watched you leave, a bit confused on what was about to happen. Did you want him to fuck you? Maybe, most likely not but a guy can dream.

He frowned at Erwin who was totally engrossed in his work, even mumbling incoherently to himself as he typed. Perfect timing, he padded quietly across the room and slid out into the dark hallway, a purple glow illuminating the hall as he opened the door. You turned and gave Levi a small smile, but just as he was about to demand why you had summoned him you turned and slunk down the stairs. Now he was officially stumped, still he followed you down into the empty kitchen, you didn't stop there though, you continued down the stairs.Casting a brief glance over your shoulder to make sure that he was following you. Once you had reached the basement you dropped dramatically onto the couch and leaned back into the cushions.

"So are you excited to leave tomorrow?" you asked, turning your sleepy gaze to him as he settled down onto the cushions next to you.

"You could say that." he shrugged as he threw an arm over the back of the couch and tilted his head to gauge your reaction.

"I would be too, I mean those French girls must be smoking hot." you chuckled as you rolled to your side to face him, a wry smile on your lips. Levi scoffed and averted his gaze, once you had stopped giggling you sighed contently.

"It's getting late." you groaned as you glanced at your phone. Levi hummed in agreement as he watched you avoid his gaze.

"Why did you drag me down here?" Levi asked outright, you licked your lips as you attempted to put your feelings into words. But how could you do that when you didn't even know how to feel.

"I guess I just wanted to, I don't know have a moment with you before you leave." you muttered your eyes trained on your hands as you toyed with a ring on your finger. Levi said nothing as he watched you fidget.

"Well here we are." his cold eyes were locked on you as you turned to shoot him a glare.

"I know." you replied meekly, desperately wanting him to ease the awkward atmosphere, but you knew Levi and he wasn't very good at breaking the ice. So the two of you sat in silence for a moment, just staring at each other.

"Even though you're a massive dick, I'm going to miss you." you broke the thick silence.

"Quit being so dramatic, I'll be gone for a month not a year." Levi rolled his eyes and let his arm fall from the back of the couch to drape over your shoulders. You winced, surprised by his sudden action. He tightened  his grip and pulled you into his side, his face still void of emotion.

"It's not like that, I'll just miss you cleaning my house for me. Now I'm going to have to pick up the slack." you joked, a playful smile spreading across your face, but the happiness didn't quite seem to reach your eyes. This didn't escape Levi's watchful gaze, instead of commenting on your obvious uncertainty Levi only pulled you closer to him.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'll just be cleaning up after Isabel and Farlan." he spoke softly, his face still void of any expression in particular. You pursed your lips and nodded thoughtfully, you wondered if one day you would get the pleasure of meeting the pair. When you said nothing Levi tapped his finger against your bicep and inhaled sharply.

"Are you jealous?"

"Ha as if." you scoffed, throwing him a playful glance as you elbowed him sharply in his ribs. His lip quirked upwards, if you hadn't been paying attention you would have missed his small smile.Your chest swelled with pride, it was rare for someone to say something worthy of Levi smiling about, it was only recently that you had noticed that you had been able to coax a few brief smiles onto his face.

You wondered if you would be able to still make him smile when he comes back.

#snk levi #levi x reader #levi aot #levi x y/n #levi attack on titan #levi fanfiction #ao3 fanfic #aot fanfiction #aot fandom #levi ackerman fanfiction #levi ackerman #eren jeager #mikasa ackerman #armin arlert #eren mikasa armin #jean x you #jean kirschtein x reader #jean kirstein #sasha braus #connie springer #krista lenz #historia reiss #ymir aot #hange zoe #erwin smith #modern au #high school au #college au

[hualianff]

Smol XL

Modern AU where HX comes home around one in the morning after his night shift at a restaurant known for its exquisite fish dishes. Even after taking a dinner break during his shift, HX is starving.

It takes HX several tries to jam his key into the lock before successfully stepping into his apartment. His numb feet carry him through the foyer, heading straight to the fridge.

On his way to the kitchen, the open space to the living room grants HX a view of his roommate HC’s head turned to the television. Some sort of rom-com mixed with martial arts plays on the screen—not what HC typically watches, but HX doesn’t care enough to think too much of it.

With a large yawn, HX opens the fridge in hopes there is something moderately tasty to snack on. The sweet and tangy smell of pork hits HX’s nose, surprising him. HC must have cooked tonight because there was no pork in the fridge this afternoon when HX left for work.

HX reaches for the container sitting on the shelf at chest level, inspecting the overflowing contents of pork, veggies, and rice. He is momentarily skeptical. It’s strange for HC to leave so many leftovers after cooking. It seems HC has left enough that HX can snag a portion. When it comes to his roommate, HX certainly takes what he can get.

After glancing at the lid, HX spots a small sticky note with elegant hand-writing: He Xuan ♡

(HX: 🤨)

HX turns to the counter.

There’s another container with semi-burnt cookies in the middle of the island.

(HX: 😲 )

Begrudgingly, HX scoops the leftover food and some cookies into a bowl to take to his room. On his way, HX is forced to pass by the living room. This time he is afforded a side view of the couch.

Sure enough, HC’s boyfriend is tightly wedged between his legs, leaning back against HC’s chest. A purple velvet blanket covers them both, combining their forms into one huge blob.

The couple doesn’t notice HX. Or at least, HC side-eyes HX for a split second before leaning his chin on his boyfriend’s shoulder, eyes glued back to the television.

HX shakes his head, then scurries into his room.

Even if HC is going to have XL over for dates and permeate the air with romance when HX is home, at least they always save food for him.

***

When HX gets up at a quarter till seven to brew his morning coffee, he’s met with the sight of XL cheerfully mixing pancake batter in just boxers and a t-shirt that is clearly HC’s because of the way it slips off one shoulder.

HX rapidly blinks as his eyes immediately locate all the love bites littered on XL’s collarbone.

“He Xuan, hi! Good morning!” XL exclaims, turning to face the taller man.

“Morning,” HX greets with a nod of his head. To distract himself from the physical evidence that HC is a goddamn leech, he rounds the counter until he stands beside XL. Out of politeness, HX asks, “What are you making?”

“Pancakes! I’m trying this new recipe that my mother sent me. They’re supposed to be extra fluffy and savory, and I’m going to add blackberries since those are San Lang’s favorite,” XL explains distractedly. HX assesses the bowl of blackberries, bottle of syrup, and whipped cream on the island behind them. “And don’t worry, I’ve made enough servings for the three of us and possibly extra. But that depends how hungry you and San Lang are.”

HX stares wordlessly at XL’s side profile as XL turns the stove on with a brief click! The shorter man holds his palm over the pan, waiting for it to heat up.

It’s safe to say HX is thoroughly touched, though he would rather not admit it. Despite his snarky comments, HC cares for HX with little things like doing his laundry or buying HX’s favorite snacks on a spontaneous grocery run. Then there’s XL who goes out of his way to strike conversations with HX to ask about his days and of course, cook for HX.

The two of them make quite a pair.

So here HX is, helping XL flip the pancakes while XL himself decorates the stack designated for HC. Once enough pancakes for the three of them have been cooked–half the bowl of batter left–HX picks his plate up, standing behind XL to wait for the toppings.

HX is in the middle of telling XL about this one customer who eats at the restaurant every week just to request that the head chef, which is HX, surprise them for their dinner order. It baffles HX to no end. What was the point of going to a restaurant and relying on the chef to decide what you’re going to eat?

“How can a person be so bold?” HX asks in disbelief. He tugs at the collar of his black t-shirt, itching at an area on his shoulder where his uniform slightly chafed the skin. XL laughs lightly, followed by the sound of whipped cream splattering out.

“Well, they certainly have your attention, don’t they?” he teases, flashing HX a smile over his shoulder.

HX jerks back at that.

“What? No, they don’t. Not like what you’re thinking. No. Nope, not like that-” HX rambles, narrowing his eyes at the shorter man.

“What’s their name?”

“...”

XL merely raises his eyebrows. HX exhales sharply, breaking eye contact with the devil’s counterpart.

“How could I not know? Their name is always on the receipt. It’s not my fault I’ve memorized it from seeing it so many times.”

“I never said anything was your fault. But…” XL trails off. He turns back to sprinkle some chocolate shavings onto HC’s pancakes. “Are they hot?”

HX outwardly scoffs. Seriously, HC is a terrible influence on his boyfriend!

(Little does HX know, it goes both ways.)

“What- what kind of question is that? Completely irrelevant. I’m a chef who does their job. I don’t care about a customer’s looks; I care about their tastes and whether they are sufficed by the food we serve. Nothing more,” HX insists.

He is unknowingly babbling at this point. He doesn’t know why his big mouth makes its appearance whenever he’s with XL. It just happens. Which HX will regret within a few hours. But it’s okay because no matter what HX has to say, XL is the type of person who will always listen.

Having at the very least one person like this in his life is not something HX will take for granted.

“-and it seems to work because they always leave generous tips, which I’m not complaining about-”

A raspy dominant voice asserts itself in the middle of HX’s monologue.

“Why the fuck are you talking to yourself?”

HX pauses his rambling, eyes rolling to the ceiling. This dickhead-

But before HX can turn around to respond with a defensive “fuck off,” XL’s entire body straightens up. With the plate of neatly stacked pancakes piled with berries, whipped cream, and chocolate, XL peeks his head out to the side of HX’s figure.

“San Lang! I made pancakes-!”

A startled choking sound snags in HC’s throat.

“Gege!?”

HX, in the middle of such a comical scene, can barely contain his amused smirk.

***

Bonus:

HC internally screams as XL settles into his arms for their movie night. He loves squeezing XL against his body. Hugging him from behind. Tickling him. Really, anything to get his boyfriend’s attention. (As if he doesn’t already hog most of it.)

XL alike loves being in HC’s arms. He loves listening to HC’s heartbeat while leaning back against him; loves feeling HC’s laughs reverberate against his chest.

Towards the end of the first movie, HC playfully pokes XL on the cheek. When XL turns his head around with an indignant expression, HC grabs his chin and places loving pecks all over those soft cheeks. XL instantly smiles, eyes curving into crescents from the affection.

HC quickly gravitates towards XL’s lips, pressing his mouth firmly against XL’s. Within seconds, HC’s grip on XL’s jaw tightens as he kisses his boyfriend with urgency, swiping a tongue against his bottom lip.

XL, gasping out a breathless: “Hmmph-! San Lngg-!”

Twenty minutes into their makeout session, the smoke alarm goes off. The couple breaks apart from the blaring beeping.

XL: “MY COOKIES-“ *leaps off of HC*

HC, winded as XL uses him as a springboard to jump off the couch: “OOF-“ *wheezes*

Raws:

XL IS SHORT ENOUGH TO NOT BE SEEN FROM THE BACK OF THE COUCH. HC’S FRAME COMPLETELY SHIELDS HIM.

XL IS SMOL COMPARED TO HIS TOL BF

HX saw the food and was like “yep, Xie Lian is definitely over, even if I can’t currently see him”

(Special thanks to @no-one-says-hi for contributing/listening)

#tgcf #heavenly official's blessing #hualian #hualian au #modern au #he xuan #xie lian #hua cheng #cerdrabbles #smol XL hours: OPEN #fluff #slice of life #implied beefleaf

[potter-imagines]

George Weasley Dating Ravenclaw!Reader Would Include...

-       George loves to take photos of you

-       Like absolutely adores it

-       His side of his dorm has at least ten different pics of the two of you taped to the walls

-       Fred never misses an opportunity to taunt George for this

-       “Jesus, George, you’d think you’re an obsessive stalker with the amount of photos you have of Y/n. Kinda of concerning…”

-        George brings you home for Christmas break

-       Molly adores you- like is way more excited to see you walking through the front door, rather than her actual children. “Y/n! Oh, Y/n, dear, you look beautiful! Come inside! Out of the cold you go- I’ve got a warm cup of tea waiting for you, dear.”

-       Fred would walk in behind you rolling his eyes mumbling, “Good to see you too, birth giver. I missed you as well, love you too.”

-       Pulling all nighters with him

-       Some were for studying, some just to spend some more time with each other, and some because you two couldn’t seem to uh, ‘fall asleep’ or rather, keep your hands off one another

-       If you didn’t know how to already, George would teach you how to play Quidditch

-       You’re typically the little spoon and even though he’d never mention in aloud, he secretly loved when you were the big spoon

-       When you first started dating, George’s friends would tease him for being with a Ravenclaw

-       They classed you as a stereotypical Ravenclaw, before even speaking with you

-       Fred reassured them they’d like you but Ron was skeptical

-       Mostly because he couldn’t understand why a Ravenclaw was dating his brother

-       Although you were a true Ravenclaw at heart, that didn’t mean you were a bookworm ‘nerd’ who only cared about school and had your nose to the sky

-       Most Ravenclaws you knew were more honest that stuck up, you had a tendency to say exactly what you thought

-       And George loved this

-       He had never met a girl like you before- one who served it the teasing and flirtatious wilderness right back to him

-       He’d plan extravagant jokes with his twin to try an woo you

-       Your friends would giggle and whisper whenever George came around, all staring at you knowingly

-       They had all placed bets on how long it would take George Weasley, the jokester Gryffindor, to ask you, the clever and competitive Ravenclaw, out on a date

-       It only took about two weeks after that for him to make the first move

-       After Potions class, George would walk with you in towards the Great Hall, complimenting you the entire way

-       You two would sit together, much to your surprise and by the end of the meal, he would ask you out on a proper date for that weekend to Hogsmeade

-       He’d buy magical eternal flowers at Hogsmeade on your first date

-       Flirting doesn’t die down with George just because you’re a couple

-       If anything, he becomes cheekier and touchier

-       He isn’t huge on PDA, but he likes when you sit on his lap in the courtyard or either of your common rooms.

-       PDA for the two of you is more hand holding, forehead kisses, arm around your shoulder, small pecks, tight hugs before class, etc.

-       Snape had scolded the two of you more time than you could count “There will be no embracing of any sorts outside, or inside my class, Miss. Y/l/n and Mr. Weasley.” “Yes, professor. We’re sorry-” “No we’re-“ Having to drag George away before he gets you two into more trouble.

-       He’d call you sweet names like; love, darling, princess, and angel (His favorite name to use in the bedroom.).

-       But his absolute favorite nickname for you is “little Ravenclaw”

-       He loves buying you maroon presents

-       He likes to think he’s secretly converting you to a Gryffindor, but he knew you had too much pride for your house and would never fully switch to his side

-       You two will play childish games like hide and seek around the castle during the weekends

-       It’s more fun when you include your other friends

-       But when it’s just you and George playing

-       The game typically ends with the two of you half naked in an empty classroom

-       Walks behind you up the stairs so he can pinch your butt “George- knock it off!” “But it’s so cute and I wanna touch it.” “Not now.”

“So you’re saying there will be a later, right?”

-       Studying together

-       Despite common assumption, George Weasley is exceptionally brilliant

-       You two have competitions on who can score the highest mark

-       George was usually a point or two away from you but it didn’t stop you from gloating

-       “Ha, ha, Georgie. Take that! Now you owe me a back massage and a butterbeer this weekend!” “I can give you more than a backrub, darling.” “George!”

-       Sneaking him into the Ravenclaw towers past curfew

-       He loves that you are willing to break rules for him

-       It exhilarating to you both

-       You’re very close with his friends- especially Fred and Hermione

-       Fred and George would convince you to help them with pranks, little at a time

-       But soon enough

-       You’d basically becoming a trio

-       They’d find a way to drag you into planning and executing nearly all their pranks with them

-       It made you extremely nervous at first

-       You had never been in real trouble before, and it wasn’t something you desired

-       But George would reassure you constantly “Love, you don’t have to help if you don’t want to, we won’t be upset. But if you do, I won’t let anything happen to you or let you get caught. I promise, darling.”

-       And he never failed to keep his word

-       Until one day

-       There was one time, late winter of your final year

-       Fred and George were readying to leave Hogwarts to open their shop, Weasley Wizard Wheezes, and had invited you to join them

-       You contemplated the thought for a week before deciding to finish off the end of your year, then move in with George and his brother once summer came

-       The twins’ pranking antics had grown more intense since Umbridge arrived

-       Everyone despised her- well except the Slytherin’s who she favored

-       The twins’ landed themselves in detention with her on more than five occasions and they had enough

-       Late one Saturday in February, Fred and George had enchanted a portal swamp outside Umbridge’s office door, a spell you had taught them

-       Right as the swamp appeared, footsteps began to approach quickly from behind

-       Fred darted left and George took off after him, both assuming you’d follow

-       But panic hit and you ran in the opposite direction, smacking right into Filch, Umbridge emerging not long after from the other corridor

-       You were caught red handed, Umbridge took the wand in your grip as enough evidence to prosecute you

-       George had reached the end of the corridor when he turned around and realized you weren’t behind him but by the time he and Fred stealthily snuck back to Umbridge’s office

-       The door was swinging shut

-       And the once bubbling green swamp was gone

-       Not long passed before George could hear your voice and his chest stiffened at once

-       The twins hid behind a wall, until George ushered Fred off to monitor the hall leading towards their common room

-       Ten or so minutes passed until the door squeaked open and you quickly rushed off, salty tears threatening to spill over your eyes

-       George yanked you softly from behind a wall before you could make it up the first step of the shifting stairs

-       You hissed in pain when his fingers unknowingly wrapped around your fresh wound “Ow, my hand- George it hurts.”

-       His eyes would widen, then soften with comfort as he studies your hand “Darling, I’m so sorry. I should’ve taken the fall- I should’ve realized you weren’t following us and went back sooner. I’m so sorry, Y/n.”

-       You’d cry, not because you were mad at him or blame him but because of the never ending burning sensation in your bloodied hand

-       You’d reassure him and insist it was your own fault

“I froze, Georgie. I’m the only one to blame. I don’t know why I didn’t go the same way as you guys, I just got scared of getting caught… and now this happened cause I was dumb.” “You’re not dumb, darling, don’t say that. I promised to never let you get hurt because of one of our pranks and I broke that promise. Umbridge is a cold bitch, I can’t keep putting you in these risks situations and letting you get hurt.”

-       He’d sneak you into his dorm that night

-       None of his friends would oppose, especially after hearing about what happened

-       Fred and Lee slept on the large couches in the common room so the two of you could have the night alone

-       George is an amazing cuddling partner- like the best

-       You two would lay in his bed together, snuggled under a stack of blankets

-       He’d convince you to wear one of his Gryffindor shirts

-       Then take a picture of you in it when you weren’t paying attention to tease you with

-       “I’m going to show this to all your little Ravenclaw friends to show them that you’re really a Gryffindor!” “Am not! I’m a Ravenclaw-“ “I’m gonna put some Gryffindor inside of you tonight, princess.” “You dirty bastard! Don’t you say that in front of any of my friends, please, I’m begging you.” “I’m sure they already know, love. It’s not like they haven’t heard us before.”

-       You would get annoyed beyond beliefs after being with George for years and your friends still confusing him with Fred, or assuming they were the same person

-       You loved Fred, but you were in-love with George, and there were many differences between them besides your relationship status

-       Fred was the friend who could cheer you up, listen to you rant, help you get revenge on a professor for poor marks, hangout with you, give you advice, and all the great qualities that a best friend should have

-       But George Weasley

-       George was all of the above and more

-       He had a different thought process- slightly different mindset than his twin

-       You loved the deep, intellectual conversations you could have with George

-       One moment you two would be discussing the purpose of life and the origination of languages

-       Then the next you’d be debating over the worst flavor of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans

“George, how you can you even argue this? You know vomit and rotten egg are the two worst flavors!” “Vomit, yes. Rotten eggs, no. I’d take that over earthworm. Now that one is bloody disgusting!”

-       There was a connection- a magnetic pull that drew you and George together

-       He understood you on a more personal level than any other person you knew

-       There were secrets he’d share with you late at night that not even Fred knew

-       Like how he wanted to be a Mediwizard up until his fourth year

-       George would bring you books he’d read on break for you

-       You two liked to start a book together right before break, then finish over break and talk about it once you returned to each other

-       Fred would tease George relentlessly for reading over the holiday break “God, next thing I know you’re going to starting knitting sweaters with each other and painting your nails together.” “Jealous, Fred? A shame you can’t find an intelligent girl of your own but don’t be made that I have.”

-       George will write you letters when you’re away for each other

-       He’ll do cute little things like send a single dainty flower that he picked from his mom’s garden and seal it inside the envelope

-       His favorite to gift you are lilacs- the smell reminds him of you and is comforting when you’re gone

-       He’s always been a bit more in touch with his emotional side than his twin

-       But you loved those differences

-       You two hard a pretty serious relationship from the start but that didn’t mean you weren’t playful

-       You two hard a pretty serious relationship from the start but that didn’t mean you weren’t playful

-       Both George and you knew you wanted to spend forever together the first time you walked through Hogsmeade together

-       And neither of you wanted to waste anytime fooling around when you knew what you wanted

-       George is a honest gentleman, always putting your needs first

-       Even after you leave Hogwarts with the twins

-       With all his busy work and the booming business and success of the shop, you assumed your time together would be spared

-       It was in a way

-       But George always put in the extra effort to keep the spark alive

-       Before opening the shop, he’d usually try to set your alarm clock back three hours in hopes of you getting the extra sleep he knew you deserved

-       Sometimes it worked, but other times you’d meet him in the shop at open with a smug smile on your face “Love, you should be asleep! You’re too clever, little Ravenclaw.” “You still call me that, even after all this time?” “You’ll always be my little Ravenclaw. I could never love another.”

-       He’ll surprise you during work with random sweets, sentimental cards, picking you up lunch and a coffee/tea, and buying you flowers

-       George can be extremely sweet when he wants to and for you, there is never a moment where he doesn’t

-       The two of you would get married shortly after the second war ended, not that anyone was surprised.

#george weasley #george weasley one shot #George Weasley x reader imagine #george weasley imagine #george weasley x reader #george weasley imagine #Fred Wealsey #Fred and George Weasley #fred weasley oneshot #fred weasley imagines #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley #Fred and George #Fred Weasley x reader #hp #hp imagines #hp imagine #imagine #harry potter #Harry Potter imagines #Harry Potter imagine #Hermione grander #weasley #Weasley twins x reader #Weasley twins imagine #Weasley twins #hogwarts #ravenclaw #gryffindor

[ohmysparkle]

🔮 A New Arrival 🔮

✨ Spellbound: Prologue

Series Masterlist

✨ Pairing: Hyunjin x reader

✨ Length: 2.9k

✨ Warnings: none in this chapter

✨ Tag List: @xviternity @straykisz @97lovestay @aliceu @meow-minho @velvetand-roses

✧･ﾟ🌑: *✧🌙 . *⭐️:*✧✨* : ･ﾟ✧ *.🌑 ✧･ﾟ

A dainty young secretary in a stylish little skirted suit dashes down a hallway towards an office, holding a telephone receiver in her hand, careful that the wire doesn’t snag behind her lest her boss get upset. Afterall, he’s been waiting for this for quite some time.

Knock, knock, knock!

“Yes?” A sharp voice calls out on the other side of the heavy wooden doors. She opens one wide.

“Mr. Mayor! They’re on the line for you!” She urges.

“Damn time, Alyssa! Come in, hurry up and bring your notebook!” He shouts. The secretary dashes back to her desk and grabs her notepad, looking back to the Mayor’s office to see if he’s connected to the line before she hangs the receiver. She dashes back, little heels clicking on the glossy floor.

“Speaker.” She insists to the mayor, urging so that he presses the button in time for her to hear the person on the other line answer. His neat mustache wiggles before he gives a stern “Hello.” for whoever is on the line.

“Hello, this is the Old Zealand Office of Coordination for the Association of Guilds, Clans and other Specialists on Magical, Supernatural and Paranormal Affairs, also known as SMSPA Central. This is Ezra, Lead Coordinator, speaking. What may I help you with today?” Both the Mayor and his assistant quirk eyebrows at the upbeatness of the man's way of speaking, and the mayor clears his throat before his focus escapes him.

“Ezra, good man! This is Mayor Armand Brandywine speaking from Nocturne Town, from the League of Lake Towns… Uh, calling because, hmm… I believe Ezra, it’s been two months-“

“Nocturne, Nocturne, Nocturne… hmm?” Ezra ponders, measuring the familiarity of the name - “Oh yes! The Ponies! I saw your Towns in a travel magazine just last week! My wife has insisted we go over to the League for our anniversary, she says apparently the great lakes over there are crystal clear, and that there are hills full of flowers and quaint little towns pocketed beneath, and that you use the most darling trains and ferries to move about. And the semi-annual pony contest!”

“I - yes, well - we do. Listen Ezra, as I was saying… it’s been four months since we filed an official request to have a specialist come here to help with a witch problem…”

“A witch?!” Ezra exclaims in disbelief, “A witch way out there? No way, you’re not even close to any of our mildly risky areas… there’s hardly any magical activity on your continent. Are you sure it’s a ‘bad’ witch?”

“Yes, positive.”

“Like a ‘sold her soul’ to the devil kind of witch? Or ‘weird lady who lives in the woods and smokes a pipe that makes people sort of uncomfortable but is actually really harmless’ kind of witch?” He questions.

“The former.” Armand replies flatly, giving Alyssa a look.

“Bad?” Ezra confirms.

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“And to whom did you submit your request with this claim?” Ezra continues asking.

“To a mister…” Armand looks at Alyssa.

“Zachary Z.” Alyssa whispers, clearly mouthing out the name.

“It was addressed to a Mr. Zachary, I believe he was the liaison for this region.” Armand states.

“Oh no…” Ezra does not say anything after this exclamation, and again, Alyssa and Armand share a look throughout that moment of silence.

“Oh… no?” Armand asks after uncomfortably expecting Ezra’s reply..

“Yes, ‘oh no’... you see, Zack was on a field assignment a few months ago and… well, he died. He was assessing if a local pyromancer had become a danger worthy of sending a specialist.”

“Oh.” Armand mouths to Alyssa, with her silently making the same gesture.

“We wouldn’t have any record of his assignments - he had his suitcase with him when he burned.” Ezra continued.

“Oh!” Alyssa silently exclaimes, again, crossing wide eyes with her boss, both of their faces contorting into grimaces.

“Oh poor Zack… He burned, suitcase and all…” Ezra reminisces. Armand is at a loss of words in the awkwardness of it all until the man on the other end bounces back. “So anyways, tell me about this witch of yours to see if I can help. When were the first and last reported sightings? ” Ezra returns to his upbeat, almost musical tone of speaking, having not missed a beat despite the sorrowful interlude.

“Well, you see… no one’s actually seen here. But - “

“Invisibility, you say?! Now that’s something you don’t see often!” Ezra prematurely interrupts, not missing the opportunity for his pun.

“No, no! I mean we haven’t sighted her… yet!” He corrects.

“So you are… placing a request for a specialist… for a witch that is unconfirmed?” Ezra says rather skeptically.

“But, there have been signs! Items, I mean trinkets, of witchcraft appearing in people's homes, dead animals stuffed with tokens…” the Mayor explains.

“Don’t forget the symbols!” Alyssa urgently whispers.

“And symbols! Runes! Painted on people's doors and under their beds!” Just as if he were visiting a skeptical doctor, Mayor Brandywine made the symptoms seem as serious as he could in fear that he would not be taken seriously.

“Hmm… could just be a prankster… any other proof? Any bewitchings? Hexes? Evident signs of curses or dark magic?”

“Well… people have dreamt of the same faceless woman, but I’m afraid we can't prove anything.”

“Well, in that case, it might be difficult to process a request on the basis of a witch. Besides, if there really is a witch, and she’s not actively harming the population, it might be better to just… let her be.” Ezra muses.

“Let her be?!” Alysaa mouths to Armand, which he repeats verbatim to Ezra on the line with emphasis on his outrage.

“Well, yeah, I mean… ‘evil’ and ‘bad’ are both pretty wide scopes. Maybe, if you think about it, witches are almost still human. Just think of her as a bad neighbor. Sometimes it’s more bothersome to deal with them and confront them than to simply let them be” Ezra suggests.

“Wait! Hold on, hold on! Can’t you at least send us someone to evaluate the situation? Maybe one of those fancy Black Knights?”

“Ha! Black Knights, ha! Get a load of this guy Zelda, he wants a Black Knight for one witch!” Armand and Alyssa can hear several people laughing on the other end of the line, most likely seated in desks beside Ezra’s. “No way… have you not seen how things are over in Arcadia? Necromancers, lots of real witches that people actually see, all kinds of undead… ha! Good luck trying to find a Black Knight at this rate, they’re all boarded up in their own country. Simply no way. They won’t leave their little civil-war-issue-thingy over there unless it's something serious. Like bad bad bad black magic serious, not ‘maybe a witch’.”

“Fine!” Armand says with an eye roll, “What about an Other Brother, or a Ghost Buster?!”

“Listen to this guy! Are you honestly willing to go beg one of those associations for an unconfirmed witch?”

“Alright, alright… What about one of those Arctic Druids?”

“No! No! Simply no! We do not work with those people anymore, they are way too fond of human sacrifice. No!” He firmly refutes.

“Then who the hell can deal with a witch?” Armand asks in exasperation, still communicating with Alyssa in silent glances.

“Oh we’ve got a handful of people available… but not for your case, seeing how it is. Hmm… let me think… Are you maybe dealing with anything else?” Brandywine takes advantage of this question to put in complaints that have been more complicated to deal with.

“Yes! Werewolves - plenty of them, and I’m pretty sure someone has been sneaking some bloodusckers into town.” The mayor emphasizes this with a slammed palm on the table.

“Well, Mr. Brandywine, I’m seeing here that some of the towns in the League allow werewolves… hmm.” The sound of flipping papers and heavy slams of stack of folders is clear over the speaker. “But I see here in my records that Nocturne itself is not a ratifying member of the ‘Treatise on the Rights of Magically Affected’ of ‘78, yet I also see that werewolves residents are allowed so long as they adhere to specific medical protocol - which as I see, is being tended to by a Dr. Nemo…”

“Yes but they are a danger to the population! They - they…” the Mayor looks at Alyssa for guidance.

“Say they spend the full moon naked in the woods!” She whispers with fervent urgency and he nods. Bingo!

“They transform without any kind of restraint, running free through town. The woods are like a hunting ground for them, God forbid any innocent happen to roam near there at night. Near feral, I say!” Armand dramatically states.

“Hmm… Well, they should be following medical protocol under the supervision of a trained magical practitioner. I see you have someone assigned,,, a Dr. Nemo? And, these vampires, they are outlawed within your jurisdiction, is that correct? I don’t see any record of any vampiric trespassing, no reported cases or documentation here at all.” Armand worries at Ezra’s skeptical tone, concerned he’ll lose his request.

“It’s that damn Doctor, I tell you!” He finally exclaimes, “I’m sure she’s been bringing in all those vampys under the table. You know what we do to them, they must submit to the authorities to be defanged and treated - that is the law here. Some of those free loving magi hippies on the other Islands may think differently, but everything to the west of me is a Vampire Free Zone.”

“The sirens!” Alyssa quietly interjects.

“And do not get me started on the damn sirens! Zombies too!” Armand concludes.

“Hmm…” Ezra thinks, he has quite a dilemma. According to all records, Mayor Armand Brandywine and several other governors in the League of Lake Towns are quite ‘anti-magic’, not so much the practice of it, but the act of being magical. He isn’t a stranger to getting calls like these, trying to put much needed specialists in situations that are otherwise political, and quite frankly, he was quite clear on not having one of his guys go in to terrorize people.

Ezra considers some of Zachary’s old notes… scribbled on some files in a shared folder. “Mayor Brandywine - staunch anti magi-humanist” meaning, he did not consider magically affected peoples, such as vampires and werewolves, zombies and sirens, to be human at all but instead monsters. Ezra could not allocate a particularly special specialist such as a Black Knight for such a frivolous case. After all, there were greater urgencies elsewhere on his hemisphere. Besides, his organization did not treat such individuals as monsters, he could not give Brandywine what he seemed to suggest he wanted. Monsters, by the standards of the SMSPA, were non-human entities. Enchanted animals and whatnot, ghouls, definitely the incurable undead - so long as they were precisely incurable. He thinks of a possible solution until something catches his eye…

A sheet tucked neatly into the regional folder where Mayor Brandywine’s town’s information was, titled simply “Dr. Nemo - Practitioner of Magical Medicine and Professor of Magical Biology”. Most of the fields were blacked out with ink, a brief description stating that her office was in Nocturne Town, despite the stance of Brandywine, and that she taught a focus course in a magical academy on the other side of the League. Hmm, no picture either, and suspiciously young.

Ezra continued to study the sheet, finding something of particular interest. A stamped red seal that every coordinator in Central knew, but that he had only come across twice before in all of his years of service:

Do not intervene - Tier S approval. The licences assigned to this person were quite… advanced, and quite… obscure. And below… request submitted by the Armed Forces of the League of Lake Towns.

Ah yes, a centralized police and military force for all of the smaller cities and townships in the League. Must be messy, especially considering the polarized stances on magic from the different members on the lake. But why would a magical practitioner require such high level authorization? He’d only seen it used for instances involving Black Knights and the like… never for something as lowly as medical men.

This is definitely one of those hush hush situations, lots of the specialists in his region required anonymity, hid from persecution because of their skills, or ran from some of their previous targets… especially if those individuals worked in the same field as this so-called Dr. Nemo. But this person… he didn’t place them in Nocturne, or else he would have remembered. This must have come from higher up - one of those top secret cases that Zachary would occasionally manage.

It certainly was curious. He held the blacked out form in his hands, retracing the dented letters that pressed this curious name on the paper… Dr. Nemo. Sounded like something out of a book.

“I have… a possible solution.” Ezra finally states, after the Mayor and his assistant had been expectantly leaning into the speaker for some time. “Maybe, perhaps, I can send you someone… Zandor!” Ezra calls to someone who seems to be at a distance from him. “Have we got any newbies?”

“What field?” A voice calls back in the distance.

“Monster hunters.” Ezra specifies.

“We got a class of newbies from that place they sent us that last guy from - the one you sent after that undead bear.” Zandor answers back.

“Gimme!” Ezra orders with a couple of finger snaps, and soon enough Alyssa and Armand hear a heavy folder plop on his desk. “Let’s see here… hmm, quite a few available clansmen… eenie meenie miney mo! Aha! No, not this one… aha!”

Ezra studies the page. The picture is of a young man who looks a bit too young to be in the field. The boy is trained to deal with most issues passively, good references, a bit inexperienced. No reports of excessive force. Mayor Brandywine won't be able to do much harm with the kid’s stats, he thinks, and he’s got good training and just the right licences. Silence again, until Ezra resumes after having studied the file.

“Aha! I’ve got your man. Hmm, and he’s quite a looker! Hyunjin, Hwang Hyunjin. Recently licensed as a tier one monster hunter… deals with all kinds of threatening non-occult entities... authorized to identify threats that are of the occult or ‘other’ nature. Can dispel moderately complex dark magic… transfiguration, discretion, stealth. Sounds good. The boy won’t cost you as much as a Black Knight, that for sure. If you have a werewolf or vampire problem, he can deal, and if you do have a witch, he can send us the claim and we’ll scale it up. How does that sound?”

“Not ideal.” Armand replies with a sigh. “How much does he cost?”

“Hmm…” Ezra presses keys into some kind of machine, “two and ninety seven hundredths of Zealand Zeals per Rupee… fifteen point two Limnian Ponies per… He’s gonna cost you twenty thousand Ponies a month.”

“How much do we have?” Armand quickly whispers to Alyssa.

“We can go up to thirty grand.” She replies. He nods, knowing what part to play.

“Twenty thousand?! We don't have that kind of money!” the Mayor exclaims, putting on the best of his acts. “We can do fifteen!”

Ezra takes a good, long sigh before replying. “Fifteen… and you offer top quality room and board, full, two days a week off, and one day a week for him to take private jobs in the area. He works four days for scheduled items, but will be available 24/7 for emergencies pending his acknowledgment of it actually being an emergency.”

“Deal.” Brandywine quickly affirms, quietly snickering at his accomplishment.

“That being said… I see you only have one other magical specialist in the region, that being this Dr. Nemo. You will make sure Clansman Hwang has access to medical care in the case of any event, and you will make sure he is given a thorough briefing on the area he will service, in this case I am writing his permit to do his work in Nocturne Town, and authorizing him to take up private commissions and attend to emergencies throughout the entire League.”

“Done.”

“Very well Mister Brandywine - “

“Mayor.” He corrects.

“... Mayor Brandywine. You can expect your specialist to arrive in ten days, please be mindful of the documentation and permits he hands you, you will need to keep them safe. Payment instructions will be attached, we collect monthly. For any additional inquiries, feel free to call, and I’d greatly appreciate if you could stay on the line to answer a quick survey if you considered my services satisfactory this day. Thank you for calling Old Zealand Office of Coordination for the Association of Guilds, Clans and other Specialists on Magical, Supernatural and Paranormal Affairs, goodbye.” Ezra’s tone had become flatter, but in view of his dirty victory, Mayor Armand Brandywine did not notice.

The line soon goes dead.

“So… looks like we’ve got a fix to our little problems. Make sure to register the expenses as twenty thousand ponies. Understand?” He says to Alyssa.

“And if it’s not billed in the invoice? They said only fifteen.” She questions.

“Administrative expenses.”

#strange devotion skz collab #straykidsland #hyunjin imagines #hwang hyunjin #stray kids smut #hyunjin au #stray kids fantasy au #stray kids au #hyunjin smut

[perfectpaperbluebirds]

Prompt # 29: Motion Sickness 

@sicktember Alternate prompt # 1: Warm Soup

Title: Professional Touch

Fandom: Criminal Minds

Based on this post

Hotch is in the middle of a serious monologue when he interrupts himself by sneezing. The team takes care of him. 

A storm was brewing in Agent Hotchner’s office. Hotch was used to weathering storms of course, they all were, but this particular storm involved Chief Strauss, meaning it was harsher than most. The rest of the team kept glancing at the door to Hotch’s office anxiously. The section chief and unit chief had been shut in for over thirty minutes with the shades drawn. Every now and again raised voices could be heard, but it was impossible to make out what they were saying. 

"He had a cold when he came in today," Reid murmured to Prentiss at one point. "This can't be easy for him."

Finally, after the forty-five minute mark had come and gone, Chief Strauss emerged, looking defiant and haughty as ever. She made sure not to meet the eyes of anyone else as she strode to the elevator, disappearing inside it without a word. Hotch stood in the doorway of his office watching her go, his look inscrutable, aside from his closely drawn eyebrows. Once she was gone, he turned his attention to his team, who collectively gulped as they noted his stony expression. Yet the expression was less powerful than it normally would have been, because he was visibly ill, with flushed cheeks, a chapped nose, and dark circles under his eyes.

Still, he was their chief, so when he approached Reid and Prentiss, they sat up at attention. Hotch glanced at the haphazard stacks of files mixed with old takeout containers on Emily's desk with a frown. 

"I need you to tidy up your workspace, Prentiss. We need to present a good front for the Bureau at all times. You're also behind on submitting your reports. Work on that, please, right away." His tone was smooth but firm. There was no doubt how serious he was.

"Yes sir…." Emily said, looking confused.

"Reid, was there something I can help you with?" Hotch asked, since the doctor was staring at him intently.

No, I'm good--"

"Then back to work," Hotch said dismissively. Walking past Derek's desk, Hotch gave him a stern look, as the younger agent was flipping through paperwork with his feet propped up on his desk.

"Morgan, can we try to look somewhat professional? This isn't your living room."

Aaron didn't see the look of disbelief Morgan gave him as he pointedly looked away and continued through to the break room. 

JJ walked in at the tail end of that exchange. As Hotch disappeared, she nonchalantly made her way over to Reid and Prentiss. "What's up with him?" JJ whispered, shooting a furtive glance at the unit chief.

"Beats me. But I hope he gets over it soon, whatever it is," Emily murmured back, reluctantly starting to clear the trash from her desk. 

It was evident Hotch was still on the warpath when Garcia joined him in the break room moments later. She was dressed in her usual style of attire, wearing vibrant lime green and pink and compete with gaudy jewelry, fluffy pen and brightly colored folders. However, her purpose in leaving her office was not work-related today, but was evidently to bring over homemade cupcakes that were as brightly colored as her. Hotch watched her skeptically. Garcia, meanwhile, handed a cupcake to each team member, making friendly small talk as she did so. After a moment, Hotch approached her.

"What's the occasion for the cupcakes?" he asked.

"Nothing in particular. Just celebrating the lack of dead, mutilated bodies I've had to look at this week I suppose," she said cheerfully.

Hotch rubbed his nose gingerly. "Garcia, I feel I have to intervene here. You are aware you work for the FBI, yes?"

"Yes sir…?" she said, beginning to deflate immediately.

"And you're aware investigating homicides is what we're paid to do?"

"Yes…." 

"Then don't you think it's a bit inappropriate to celebrate the fact that we haven't taken any cases this week?"

"I'm sorry sir, I--"

"In fact, I've been meaning to address your general lack of professionalism. Your attire and attitude toward the work we do here is a problem."

Garcia had fallen silent, and was merely listening with wide eyes. Meanwhile Derek had leapt to his feet and was slowly approaching with fire in his eyes, ready to defend his girl. 

"As an integral part of this team, I expect you to behave appropriately for your role, along with everyone else. The lack of professionalism this whole team has been displaying lately needs to be corrected immediately. There is-- … Hehhht'sss-CHOO! tttsss'CHOOO! hnnxxt-CHOOOF!"

Shocked silence hung over the room at the unexpected interruption. Most of the team had never heard Hotch sneeze before.

Garcia was the first to break the spell. "Bless you, sir," she said quietly.

"Thank you," the chief mumbled in response, harshly rubbing his nose with a handkerchief. His face was visibly red, but whether from the violent sneezing or the embarrassment, it was hard to be sure.

"Are you ok, boss? You really aren't looking so good," the technical analyst said tentatively. 

Hotch was silent for a moment as he continued to tend to his nose. Finally he sighed heavily. "I suppose I'm not feeling the best today."

"C'mere for a sec," Garcia said, stepping closer to him, her tone soothing as she immediately shifted into caretaker mode. 

If Hotch noticed the change in how she addressed him, he made no indication, but allowed her to approach, looking at her expectantly.

 She reached up a hand to place it against the tall man's forehead, then clicked her tongue, giving him a sympathetic look. "You're burning up, mister. No wonder you're miserable."

"Jack has been sick all week," Hotch sighed. "I suppose I was bound to catch it."

"You should go home, man," Derek interjected. "Like she said, you look terrible."

"I'm actually… feeling a little strange all of a sudden. I think maybe I should rest in my office for a bit before I drive." He was indeed looking a bit wobbly, and the team instinctively drew closer to catch him if he fell.

"Let's go sit you down then," Garcia said gently. The group began to walk their leader back to his office. As soon as he reached his desk, Hotch collapsed into his chair with a groan and closed his eyes.

"Let me get you some medicine," Emily said, hurrying away. 

"Hotch, have you been getting any sleep?" JJ asked with concern, putting a hand on his shoulder. 

"Not as much as I should," he admitted, his head now resting on his hand. 

"Then you should really go home and rest…." she said.

"I can rest just as well here," he said, raising his eyes to meet hers. Emily returned just then with a bottle of medication, so JJ was saved from answering, though she couldn't keep the worried look from her face.

Hotch got no better as he "rested", but he didn't worsen either. Soon it was clear he had no intention of going home, ill though he clearly was, or even lying down on the couch. He was pale and dizzy, yet he insisted on staying at his desk and continuing to try and work. He was interrupted constantly with sneezing fits though, and soon he was shivering as well, much as he tried desperately to hide it. The team hung around, wanting to be helpful, but Hotch didn't want to be helped. He wanted to pretend nothing had happened.

However, Garcia was having none of that. She disappeared shortly after Hotch had relocated to his office, but reappeared some time later carrying a steaming bowl, which she placed in front of their boss.

"What's this?" Hotch asked, glancing down with a sniffle.

"Soup, silly. It's what you give to someone you care about when they're not feeling well."

"That wasn't necessary," he said.

"Yes it was. You're all shivery and sniffly and sick." 

Hotch was still for a moment, then he pulled the bowl toward himself almost hesitantly. Picking up the spoon, he took a mouthful, and then another, humming quietly in appreciation. "Thank you, Garcia," he said quietly. "This is exactly what I needed."

"You're very welcome," she said with a smile, turning to leave. 

"Garcia?" he called out.

She turned expectantly.

"I'm sorry for what I said earlier. You're wonderful exactly the way you are, and I don't want you to change. Strauss was digging into me earlier about professionalism on this team, but I shouldn't have passed that on to you. I apologize for that, and it won't happen again. Keep up the good work."

A sunny grin split her face. "Thank you sir. All is very much forgiven. There's plenty more Garcia sparkle to go around."

He almost smiled too. "Thank you. You're free to go."

"I'll get back to work. You take care of that fever though. We need you in tip top shape. This show doesn't run without you."

"Will do. Thank you again. For everything."

#sickfic #everyone is hotter with a fever #sicktember2021 #alt prompt 1

[heyitssmiller]

Clandestine: Chapter Three

The first mission doesn’t exactly go as planned. Also, Logan has a thing for glasses, apparently.

@lumosinlove Thank you for letting me run away with your characters! <3

Again, @donttouchmycarrots is my hero and the best proofreader ever! This fic wouldn’t be what it is without her.

Clandestine Masterlist

.

The bank was quiet, save for the soft murmurings of tellers and customers. Sunlight filtered through the windows of the storefront, light and hazy. The office plant by the front door was growing way too big for its pot. There were a few people waiting in line, absently scrolling through their phones. Others were sitting in the waiting area, mindlessly taking in their surroundings. It was calm, peaceful.

Or it was, until a redhead came sprinting out of the men’s restroom, screaming “Fire!” at the top of his lungs.

The bank then descended into madness.

A man watched from the driver’s seat of his car as people frantically streamed out of the building and onto the sidewalk. He sighed, taking a second to rest his forehead against the steering wheel. “Damnit, O’Hara. This wasn’t part of the plan.”

29 Hours Earlier

“Good morning, cubs!”

“Fuck you, Black.” Logan muttered into his cup of coffee. “It’s too early to be that excited.”

Leo smiled a little and set a paper bag on the table. Logan stared at it. Where had it come from? He hadn’t seen Leo carrying it into the briefing room, but it was too big to stuff into his pockets. He didn’t have a bag or anything – the only thing he was carrying with him was a notebook and a pen. How did he manage to smuggle it in?

Logan was so confused, and it was still too early.

“I brought muffins.” Leo explained, opening the bag and handing one to Finn. “They’re cinnamon swirl.”

“Nut, did you make these?” Finn asked, removing the wrapper and taking a big bite. Leo shrugged.

“I like to cook.”

Black looked up at him in awe. “These are amazing.” He cradled the muffin in his hand like it was something precious.

“I can give you the recipe, if you want.”

Logan grabbed a muffin, looking up quickly at Remus’ snort. “He can’t cook.”

“Neither can you.” Sirius shot back, a little more hostile than his usual teasing manner. Logan glanced back and forth between the pair, tearing off a piece of muffin and popping it into his mouth. Fuck, that was good.

His partners had clearly picked up on the tension, too, but neither of them brought it up. Leo twirled his pen around in his hand, eyes moving from the pair to Finn. He smiled as the redhead enthusiastically grabbed another muffin. Logan snapped his gaze back to Sirius. “Can we get started, please?” He asked pointedly. “If you make me get up this early, we’d better be doing something productive.”

Finn laughed at him, nose scrunching. “Are you always this grumpy in the morning?”

Green eyes rimmed with dark, dark lashes glared back at him. Logan didn’t say a word but took a long sip of coffee instead, refusing to break eye contact. Finn let himself stare a little longer than he probably should have. He wasn’t lying when he told Logan he was a sucker for green eyes.

Sirius finally broke the tension-filled staring competition between himself and Loops and looked down at his files. Remus started the projector without a word, only speaking up when he was ready to begin his presentation. “We’re starting you three off with the easiest flash drives to retrieve – the two in the banks.”

He moved to a picture of the layout of one of the banks, pointing at a small room tucked away in a corner of the building. “So the safe is back here in this room. You can’t get back there without permission or an escort, which makes it a little trickier. The security system is also very high-grade, so I don’t think trying to break in after hours is our best bet here. There’s too many little things we might miss.

“The plan is to go undercover. Leo and Finn, you’ll be infiltrating this bank. Logan, you’ll be lookout. Leo, you’re going to pretend to be a safe specialist. Tell them the make and model of the safe Riddle uses is faulty and the company sent you to see if this one needs to be replaced. I don’t really care what you say, just make it believable.”

“What kind of safe is it?” Leo asked.

Sirius looked down at his notes. “It’s a… Tigerking Digital Security safe. Does that mean anything to you?”

Leo grinned. “Makes my job a hell of a lot easier. They’ve got a weak spot.”

“What am I doing during all of this?” Finn asked through a mouthful of muffin, crumbs stuck to his mouth. He swiped at them with his tongue before speaking again, “Distraction?”

“Yeah. It’ll have to be big – big enough to get Leo alone with that safe. How long do you think it’ll take to crack, Knut?”

He shrugged. “Ten minutes, tops. It’s got this small hole at the back where bolts are fed through. I can get a stiff wire through that hole and hit the reset button. Then I can reset the code of the safe and open it without leaving a trace.”

Finn smiled, mischief in his eyes. “I think I can manage a ten-minute distraction.”

That… that didn’t sound good.

Finn took one look at Logan’s fearful face and laughed. “Relax, it’s nothing too dramatic. I’ll probably just ask for whoever takes Leo back to look at the safe and then throw a fit when they say he’s not available. And then I’ll drag out our conversation to give our dear Nut enough time. Simple.”

“That… actually works.”

Finn scoffed, giving Remus a look. “Why do you sound so surprised?”

“Because you’re Finn O’Hara.”

Finn thought about it for a second, then shrugged. “That’s fair.”

“Nut, when you open the safe you need to replace the real flash drive with this decoy.” Sirius said, holding up a blue flash drive. “This op might take weeks or months – if Riddle comes to check on this drive, he needs to see one instead of an empty safe. Now, if he actually checks the information on the flash drives… well, we’re screwed. Hopefully it won’t come to that. He doesn’t usually check the flash drives unless absolutely necessary – it’s too much of a hassle.”

“And I’ll loop the security camera footage when you get there, so there won’t be any evidence of you tampering with the safe.” Remus said. “Get in, get out. Not too hard, right? And we’ll both be with you every step of the way. You’ll have microphones and earpieces so that we can all communicate.”

Finn couldn’t tell if the bouncing of Leo’s leg was his normal restlessness or nerves. His face was a mask of calm that revealed nothing. For someone who didn’t have any previous experience in espionage or conning people, he sure was good at hiding how he was feeling.

Finn handed him another muffin anyways.

The dimpled smile he got in return was nothing but genuine.

***

Remus sat down on his couch with his dinner, sighing to himself as he stretched out his back. It had been a long day, but he finally felt ready for tomorrow. Their plan was solid, the cubs were as ready as they were ever going to be, he had his video loop for the security camera in the safe room, the rest of his tech had been checked over and deemed ready to go. There wasn’t much else he could do besides get a good night’s sleep if he could.

That would be easier said than done, though.

Sirius chose that moment to throw open the door and close it loudly behind him. Remus glared at him. “Is that really necessary?” He asked, but didn’t add anything else on as Sirius slammed down a stack of hand-written pages onto Remus’ coffee table. 

“You want me to open up? Fine. There’s all you need to know about me.”

Remus looked down at the pages and instantly felt guilty. How long had he been working on this? “You didn’t have to-”

“You said you couldn’t trust me.” Sirius interrupted coolly. “I can’t get my brother to safety if you guys don’t trust me.”

It appeared that his brother was his sole motivation. For all of this. Remus could understand that. He’d stop at nothing if the safety of his own brother was put into question.

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to do this.” Remus looked up at him, at the stiff set to his shoulders, the detached look in his eyes. He went too far the last time they’d talked about this, hadn’t he? “Look, we got along for over a week when you first got here. I think we can do that again, right?”

At Sirius’ skeptical face, he sighed. “This is on me just as much as you. I… I don’t trust easily.” He had to laugh at that massive understatement. “Perks of being a spy. But I feel like we can manage learning to trust each other the old-fashioned way.”

Sirius raised an eyebrow. “And what’s that?”

“Getting totally, outrageously drunk and sharing all our secrets.”

Sirius’ straight face only lasted for about a second before he busted out laughing. “You go from wanting my entire life story to wanting to get drunk together?”

“It’s a failproof way to gain someone’s trust.” Remus said solemnly, cracking a smile when Sirius laughed again, incredulous. “But not tonight. We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

“This Friday, then?”

He couldn’t help but notice the hopeful look on Sirius’ face. Had he ever done this with someone before? Did he have any friends besides his brother previously? He put up this excitable, outgoing façade, but Remus honestly had no idea what lay underneath. He nodded decisively. “This Friday.”

Sirius hesitated, then spoke again. “Do you think they’re ready?”

“I think so. And we’ll be there if something goes wrong.” Remus met his eyes, trying to instill confidence into the ex-Snake. “No matter what happens, we’re going to do our best to get your brother out safely.”

“And what if that’s not enough?” Sirius asked, eyes haunted.

That was exactly why Remus hadn’t made any strict promises. There was no way to guarantee that they would get Regulus back. If Remus was in Sirius’ shoes, if this this was Jules instead of Regulus, what would Remus most want to hear?

“We’re going to do everything we can, I promise.” He said, soft but firm. “I know that’s not enough, but it’s the best we can do as of right now.”

Sirius stared back, then nodded. “Thank you.” He looked down at Remus’ food. “What’s for dinner? I’m starving.”

Remus laughed, shoving him away. “Get your own, you leech. This is mine.”

“Leech?” Sirius demanded, dramatizing his offence. “I can’t believe you called me a leech. You were the one who offered to house me, after all.”

That was true. Even if he hated to admit it, Remus was lonely. He lived in this apartment all by himself, worked mostly on his own, and his family lived miles and miles away. And being a spy didn’t exactly make it easy to find friends. He was distrusting and cautious by nature, especially after... well. After he left fieldwork and transitioned to a desk job.

He didn’t know why he’d offered to let Sirius stay, honestly. He just got this gut feeling that it was the right thing to do.

And Remus Lupin always trusted his gut.

“Worst decision I’ve ever made.” He quipped, laughing as Sirius threw a pillow at him. Sirius was a horrible roommate. He left dishes in the sink, beard trimmings on the bathroom counter, and his shoes haphazardly strewn about the living room.

But he always had hot water on the stovetop in the mornings when Remus woke up, always let him pick what they watched on tv at nights, and always replaced anything he had used up without being asked. And, if Remus was being completely honest with himself, soft gray eyes paired with an even softer smile weren’t exactly a terrible thing to wake up to.

So far, this whole roommate business wasn’t too bad.

***

Logan hated nothing more than being lookout.

He watched on as Finn and Leo geared up, testing their mics and earpieces and making adjustments accordingly. He was supposed to be watching the entrance to make sure no Snakes entered the building. They were doing the first bank heist while Logan was stuck here, in the car parked on the street, where he couldn’t see what was going on or if his partners were in trouble.

Their first mission, and he was stuck outside.

Ugh.

“You ready for this?” Finn asked Leo as he discreetly tucked a wire under his collar and out of sight. Leo had his eyes trained on the building across from them, wrapped in his coat and a thick scarf, fingers drumming out a staccato beat on his thigh. He didn’t seem to have heard Finn.

“Nut?”

Leo swiveled his head to look back at them. “Hmm?”

“You ok?” Logan asked, watching the blond’s face for signs of nervousness or stress. But his gaze was steady, determined. For someone on their first mission, he was remarkably calm. Either that or a much better actor than Logan had given him credit for. But then his expression flickered and a shadow of doubt crept in.

“I’m fine.” He said, and Logan couldn’t tell if he was trying to convince them or himself. He reached out and gave the blond’s shoulder a squeeze, letting his hand linger before trailing it down his arm and pulling away.

“You’re fine.” Logan reassured with a smile and watched the resolve build back up in Leo’s eyes, causing the knot in Logan’s chest to ease up a little.

That was better.

Finn looked at him for a second, then took his glasses off. “Here, put these on. I feel like your cover story requires glasses.” He gently eased them onto the other boy’s face. Leo blinked rapidly, then squinted and widened his eyes to adjust to the lenses.

“Jesus, what prescription is this?”

“It’s not that bad.” Finn said, ruffling Leo’s hair in retaliation. He took a step back to see the finished product and whistled lowly. “Damn, maybe we should take those off again. We’re supposed to be unmemorable when we’re undercover. No one will be able to take their eyes off you with those on.”

Logan had to agree there. Soft blue eyes blinked back at them from behind tortoiseshell frames, looking larger than they normally did. Leo buried his nose in his scarf in an attempt to hide the blush caused by Finn’s flirtatious words.

The sight did strange things to Logan’s stomach.

Remus’ voice reached them through their com link, startling all three of them. “You guys ready to go?”

Leo took a deep, steadying breath. “Let’s do this.” He looked back at Logan, eyes fierce – a stark contrast to the soft look of only a few seconds ago. Logan sucked in a breath of his own. This kid sure was something.

“See you in a bit.”

“See you in a bit.” Logan echoed, grabbing the car keys out of his pocket and letting his lips twitch up into a smile at Finn’s cheery salute. He leaned against the car door and watched the pair make their way around the corner and towards the bank without glancing back.

He got back into the car and moved it around the same corner before putting it in park. His eyes shifted between the street in front of him and his rearview mirror, a book in his lap to keep from raising suspicions, and settled in to worry and wait.

***

Leo shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from fidgeting and made his way to the front desk. Ignoring his pounding heart as best he could, he locked eyes with the teller and smiled. “Hi there. Is your manager here?” He asked, dragging his accent out slow and sweet like molasses. “I’ve got a few questions about your safes.”

She smiled back. “Sure thing. I’ll go grab him.” Leo thanked her as she left, looking around while he waited and trying his hardest not to squint too much in Finn’s glasses. 

“Nut, between the accent and the glasses - plus your looks in general - I think that girl is half in love with you already.” Sirius’ voice teased, causing Leo to flinch slightly. He needed to get used to hearing the voices of people he couldn’t see during these missions.

“She is not.” He muttered back as he pretended to rub his nose, covering his mouth as he spoke so that no one else could see it. His hand absentmindedly played with the old, frayed bracelet on his wrist.

“You can do better, Nut.” Logan chimed in, voice a little gruff.

“How do you know?” Sirius asked. “You can’t even see her.”

“I’m using my imagination.”

Sirius barked out a laugh while Remus just sighed and requested that they all stay focused. Leo glanced around at the lobby again. Finn was standing in line behind him, looking at something on his phone. He forced himself not to look at his partner too long and kept scanning the rest of the lobby. It seemed to be a pretty quiet day - there weren’t too many people inside. A few people were seated in the waiting area and some were waiting in line behind Finn. Leo saw the teller and a short, balding man who must have been the bank manager making their way back towards him.

Leo stuck his hand out when they reached him, which the manager shook with a fake smile on his face.

“Hi, how are you doing?” Leo asked, withdrawing his hand. “I’m Fred Decker with Tigerking Digital Security. I have on record that you’re currently using one of our safes, is that correct?”

“Fred?” Sirius’ voice asked incredulously. “Of all the aliases you could use, you choose Fred? Nut, you should be ashamed of yourself.”

Remus hissed at him to shut up. Leo ignored it.

“Yes, that’s right.” The manager said, a bit stiff. “What’s this about?”

“There’s a recall on a few of our safes. I was wondering if I could take a look at yours and see if it needs to be replaced. Free of charge, of course. This is an error on our part, and we want to do all we can to fix it.”

The manager hesitated, then nodded. “This way.”

Leo followed the man through a set of doors into a hallway, spotting Finn out of the corner of his eye as he approached the front desk and sent Leo a quick wink. That, more than anything, calmed Leo’s nerves. If Finn was acting like this was just run-of-the-mill and not a big deal, then they must’ve been doing something right. The door closed behind Leo, blocking his vision of the lobby. He took a fortifying breath and followed the manager into the safe room, secluded from the rest of the bank.

“Here we are,” The manager said, then pointed to a safe wedged into the corner of the room. “And there’s your safe.”

“The camera in the safe room is already on a loop, Leo. You’re all set.” Remus’ voice said, steady and calm. Leo looked the safe over, stalling as he waited for Finn’s distraction.

“Fuck,” he heard through his earpiece. “Leo, you’re going to have to hang in there for a few more seconds. The planned distraction didn’t work.”

Leo swallowed, looking back up at the manager. “So there’s these holes in the back, see?” He said, figuring a sure-fire way for him to stall was to talk about the safe. He could keep up a conversation like this for hours. “They’re used to bolt the safes into the wall. A few of our older models have larger holes.”

He grabbed the stiff coil of wire out of his pocket. “Some thieves have learned that you can get to the reset button in these older models if you use a tough wire like this and insert it through one of the holes. Basically all I want to do today is see if a thief could potentially do that with this safe. Is that all right with you?”

“Yes, of course! If there’s a problem, our client would want that fixed immediately.”

“I’m sure they would.” Leo said absentmindedly as he started fiddling with the wire for as long as he possibly could. He straightened it out from it’s coil, looked down it’s length, and then pretended to straighten some kinks out.

Don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic-

Remus’ voice was a little more tense now. “Finn, where’s that distraction?”

Finn, who was in the men’s bathroom grabbing handful after handful of paper towels and shoving them into a trash can, grumbled, “I’m working on it, ok? Sirius was right - that teller definitely has a type, and it sure as hell isn’t me. I had to improvise.”

“What does that mean?” Logan asked warily. Finn could practically see him gripping the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip as he forced himself to stay put. “What are you doing?”

Finn grabbed the bottle of hand sanitizer on the bathroom sink and took the top off, dumping the contents into the trash can as well. He grabbed the lighter in his pocket (he liked to be prepared, thank you very much) and produced a small flame.

“Something stupid.”

He lowered the lighter to the trashcan and prepared to run.

Leo could hear the shouting from Finn’s distraction all the way back in the safe room. He looked up at the manager, pretending to be confused. “What’s going on?”

“I’m not sure.” The manager frowned, shifting from foot to foot nervously as he looked towards the commotion. “I’m going to check it out. I’ll be right back, ok?”

Leo waved him off with a reassuring smile. “I’ll be right here.” He messed around with the safe until the door closed, then hissed, “Finn, what the hell is going on out there?” He moved Finn’s glasses to perch on top of his head and shoved the wire through one hole in the back of the safe. He grabbed his flashlight to look through the hole on the other side, searching for a small red button.

“I might’ve started a fire in the men’s restroom.”

“You what?” Leo demanded, finally finding the reset button and moving the wire steadily closer to it. “You do realize that does the exact opposite of give me more time, right?” Sure enough, the fire alarm sounded, loud and clear.

“Fuck me.” Leo muttered as he jabbed the reset button with the wire. Someone - Leo thought it might be Finn, but he wasn’t sure - muttered something too soft and muffled to be picked up by their mic. Leo didn’t have the time to question it. The safe door opened with a soft click. He quickly switched the flash drive with the replica and closed the door again. The wire got recoiled and shoved back into his pocket, Finn’s glasses returned to resting on his nose. He climbed to his feet and made his way towards the lobby at a quick pace. “I’ve got it.”

“Nice work, Nut.” He heard Logan say, and couldn’t repress the jittery feeling he always got after a successful job. He exited the bank, looking around for the manager. He seemed busy as he talked to his employees in an attempt to get the situation under control. He caught Leo’s eyes and stepped towards him. “Mr. Decker! I was looking for you.”

Leo only just remembered to over-exaggerate his accent. “I heard the alarm and high-tailed it out here. Was it a prank?”

“No,” He said after a beat of hesitation, “Someone actually started a fire in the men’s bathroom. The fire department is on its way. Hopefully it won’t take too long and you can get back to looking at that safe.”

“No need, I already finished. The holes were too small for the wire, so y’all should be fine. Anything thinner than the wire I used will be too flimsy to press that reset button.” Leo glanced down at his watch. “I do have six more banks to visit today, though, so I’m afraid this is where I leave you. Thank you for being so cooperative.” He held out his hand for the manager to shake again and gave one last smile before walking back down the street towards their designated rendezvous, trying to look casual and not like he was running away from the scene of a theft.

Sure enough, a non-descript gray car was waiting for him, right where it was supposed to be. Without a word, he climbed into the back and sprawled across all three seats, throwing an arm over his eyes as Logan put the car into drive.

The three of them were silent for a few seconds before Leo cracked a smile and laughed. “The one thing – the one thing that could get me kicked out of that safe room too fast, and that’s what you decided would make a perfect distraction?”

Finn looked back at the back seat with a grin, which softened when he laid eyes on the blond. His hair shone in the late-morning sunlight, highlighting a streak of gray at his temple. Those long legs of his took up most of the back row, and even then he still had to bend his knees to fit all the way. His eyes were blocked by his arm, but Finn could’ve seen those dimples via satellite image from space. 

“Hey, cut me some slack. I was making it up as I went.” This sent Leo into another fit of laughter, causing Finn’s smile to broaden.

“Besides,” Logan added, “You’re quick with your hands. You didn’t need all ten minutes, you barely needed three.”

Leo shrugged, which looked really strange in his current position on his back. “Got lucky. Found that reset button faster than I usually do.” He adjusted Finn’s glasses, which were still resting on his nose. “Maybe I need glasses, too.”

“Shut up. Those glasses are a statement piece, thank you very much.”

Logan snorted, watching Leo’s hand reach over the center console to return the glasses to their rightful owner. “Maybe that’s why you’re a terrible marksman, O’Hara. When’s the last time you got that prescription checked?”

Finn gasped in offense. Logan glanced over briefly and noticed the tips of his ears getting red. Cute.

“How dare you! I am not a terrible marksman!”

“That’s not what your file says.”

“What?”

“The evidence doesn’t lie.” Logan said, struggling to bite back his grin. Finn was just so fun to tease.

“Screw debriefing. When we get back to the office, we’re going to the shooting range.” Finn crossed his arms over his chest sulkily. “Terrible marksman. How dare they. Nutter Butter, back me up here.”

Leo blinked at the new nickname, but he couldn’t say he minded it too much. Especially when Finn said it like that, with such unfiltered affection. He watched the redhead turn around in his seat to look at him with big Bambi eyes, only then remembering that he was looking for an answer from Leo.

He put on a show of thinking about it, then shrugged. “I dunno, Finn. The evidence doesn’t lie.”

“Et tu, Brute?” Finn whined. “Betrayed by both of my partners. Unbelievable.”

Leo wished there was another word for partner. Maybe he should refer to them as just coworkers now. The term partner was giving him ideas. 

Ideas he couldn’t afford to be having for the first and quite possibly the biggest op of his life.

“Also, you’re one to talk!” Leo looked back up at Finn when he realized he was talking to him. “Have you ever shot a gun before, rookie?” He stopped suddenly, then grinned broadly. “Oh man, please tell me you’ve shot a gator when you were back in Louisiana. That’s so badass.”

Leo arched an eyebrow.

“Just because there’s horror stories about gators doesn’t mean they deserve to be shot.” Logan said, switching his turn signal on and waiting for the left turn light to change from red to green. “They’re a big part of the ecosystem.”

“And they kill people.”

“Oh come on, when’s the last time you heard of someone being killed by a gator?”

“Literally last week, down in Florida.”

“Well, that’s Florida. Crazy stuff like that happens in Florida all the time.”

“Did you hear about that guy from Florida who made a beer run while holding a gator?”

Logan chuckled, glancing over at his partner in disbelief. “What?”

“You heard me! Apparently he walked in, looked around and asked ‘Y’all ain’t out of beer, are you?’ But then the story gets weirder!”

Leo just sat in the backseat and laughed at Finn’s dramatic retelling of Florida news as building after building flashed by outside their windows, feeling lighter than air. His first mission was a success. He grabbed the small, innocuous flash drive out of his pocket, twirling it in his hand. One down, six more to go. If all missions were like this, taking down the Snakes wouldn’t be so bad.

He should’ve knocked on wood after having that thought.

#lumosinlove #sweater weather #coast to coast #coops #sirius black #remus lupin #o'knutzy #finn o'hara #logan tremblay #leo knut #clandestine

[lokis-army-77]

If You Please

Chapter twelve

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Word Count: 2588

This is technically a reader insert but without the (y/n) and all that. She also has no name mentioned so feel free to imagine as you please.

Follow the reader through the events of the Captain America movies and experience her love for Bucky Barnes.

Warnings: none

Note: Normally I am the type of person to be date accurate when writing things and if you are too, I'm sorry. I messed up on the dates, so the battle of New York happens like a month after it should. This is also a short chapter because it's a filler and I'm trying to just get to the Winter Soldier but have everything make sense.

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Masterlist

A few days later I had received a small archivist job in the WWII department of the Smithsonian. Thankfully the made-up resume and a few fake SHIELD recommendations came in handy. I would officially start the following week after a few background checks were cleared. In my free time until then, I unpacked all the boxes in my apartment. It started to feel more homely and warm when all of my things filled up the space. When I didn’t feel like unpacking anything, I started taking long walks to the VFW building. I hadn’t joined in on any of the meetings yet, I just stood by the doorway and watched, listening to the stories people told.

One day that week as I stood back in the hallway after the meeting had ended, a man came up to me. He was a little taller than I was and had the brightest smile I had ever seen. I had watched him in the meetings before, he was usually the one hosting them, giving advice to all who needed it.

“I’ve seen you standing out here for the past three days, why don’t you come have a seat next time? It would be more comfortable than standing out here for an hour.” He said as he leaned his back against the wall right next to me.

“I have thought about it, but I tend to get here after you have started. I don’t want to interrupt anything by just barging in.” I said over my shoulder at him.

“You won't interrupt anything, just come on in next time, we’d be happy to have a new face around,” He pushed himself off the wall and walked down the hall.

After that, I ended up joining the meetings and even spoke a few times. I learned that the man who came up to me that day was Sam Wilson, pararescue, who had served two tours in Afghanistan. From the first day he came up and talked to me to now, we quickly became friends.

The days had turned into weeks and I was finally able to live relatively by my own means. The Smithsonian was great, in the archives, no one was really around and I could spend a whole day without any interruptions, which allowed me to just concentrate on what I was doing. After closing, I normally walked to meet Sam, who was usually way too excited to see me, even though we saw each other almost every day without fail.

“You’re late today.” I jumped, startled out of my thoughts at the sound of someone talking to me. I looked up, spying Sam standing next to one of the small trees outside the VFW building.

“What do you mean late?”

“I mean you usually get here at three-thirty. It's four right now.” He said looking down at his watch.

“Oh sorry, I didn’t realize. I've just been lost in my thoughts lately.” I sighed.

“I know we’ve only been friends for what? A month? But I already know when something is bothering you, What is it?”

“Nothing really, just my brother. Since moving here he's called at least twice a week to check up but it’s been radio silence for the past two weeks, he doesn't even answer when I try calling him. I'm just a little worried that something bad is going on, considering his job.”

“Well, maybe he’s just really busy at the moment, or he's somewhere he can't call you. You know how it is being out on those military missions.”

“I know, it’s just the last time we were apart on a mission,” I trailed off and looked up at Sam, he raised his eyebrows, quietly waiting for the end of the sentence. “Someone close to us passed. It’s still fresh in my mind like it happened yesterday. I was there that day and I was too far away to even know what had happened, now my brother and I aren’t even in the same vicinity as each other, there is no telling what could happen and it makes me nervous.”

He gave me a small apologetic smile and patted my shoulder before leading me from the tree where we stood to where his car was parked. “What do you say we hang out at mine and just watch some tv? Get your mind off things? Or we can talk about it, either way, it’s better than dealing with it alone.” I nodded my head and grabbed onto the car door handle as he unlocked it.

Walking through the front door after him I took a quick look around. It was cozy, way more decorated than I thought it would be for a man in his early thirties living alone.

“Make yourself at home. Do you want anything to drink?” He asked neck-deep in the fridge.

“Okay, I’ll just have some water,” I called out as I made my way further into the living room. The couch was backed up to the wall a few feet away from the dining room table. I sat down on it and scooted as close as I could to its right arm. A few moments later Sam came over with two glasses of water and a bag of chips. He handed me my drink before crashing down into his own seat. “Thank you,” I said before taking a long sip.

He nodded as he said “No problem.” Before he got himself really comfortable he searched around for the TV remote. As he pressed the ‘on’ button the TV came to life. “What in the world is that?” He sounded concerned so I quickly looked at the screen.

“Breaking: Attack on New York City. This afternoon at 2:15 several unidentified aircraft descended onto Earth's surface. Strange beings, some are calling aliens, Accompanied these ships and are causing havoc in Manhattan. Eyewitnesses have stated that they have seen Iron Man, and what seemed to be Captain America, leading a team of three others fighting back against the invaders. The battle seems to be over but updates are still coming in, let's take a look at some footage of the downtown destruction.” My eyes went wide and my heart stopped as I listened to what the reporter was saying. I kept my eyes glued to the screen as it changed to show a destroyed street. As the camera panned around I spotted Steve fighting against two of the creatures, before the clip quickly changed to show one of the large ships crashing into the New York skyline.

“Oh God Steve, what did you get into?” I murmured to myself.

“You say that like you know him personally.”

“Uhh.” I just gave him a wide-eyed look of surprise. “I do, he’s my brother.”

“Now really isn’t the time to be joking about things,” He gave me a pointed look.

“I swear I’m not joking, he really is my brother. I can explain later, I need to try and get a hold of him.” I pulled out the small flip phone from my pocket and dialed the number for Steve's cell phone, it rang and rang but no answer. I hung up quickly and dialed the number Fury gave me at the beginning of the month. After two rings he answered.

“I assume you are looking for Captain Rogers.”

“Where is he? Is he okay?” I tried to keep the worried tone from coming through in my voice.

“He’s fine. He is in the middle of a debriefing. I’ll tell him you called.”

“Okay, thank you.” As soon as the words left my mouth he gave a quick hum and then hung up. I looked over at Sam whose eyes hadn't left me at all. “Everything is fine, he's in a debrief so that means that whatever happened in New York is definitely over.”

“That’s good to hear, hopefully, those things don’t try to come back again.” He shook like a shiver ran down his spine. “Now please explain how Captain America, a man from the 1940s, is your brother.”

“I can hear the skepticism in your voice.”

He held his hands up in defense, “Hey, I'm not the one saying I'm the sister to a 90 something-year-old man.”

“Look, it’s a long story that I would rather not get into now but the short version is that I was born in 1921, Steve is my older brother, we both ended up taking the super-soldier serum and fought against HYDRA in the second world war. We ended up crashing a plane into some Ice in the Atlantic ocean and were found and unfrozen last October.” “If you are really Captain America’s sister, then why are you never mentioned in anything?” I looked at him and shook my head.

“Well for starters it was the forties and I was a woman fighting on the front lines. Credit is never given where it is due. But there is also the fact that I was a part of the SSR, which was very secretive, after I died.” I put my fingers up in air quotes, “They should have erased most, if not all the files on me, per protocol. The only reason Steve is well known is because of his time going cross country selling war bonds.” I paused for a second before quickly adding, “I’m sure if you look hard enough, you’ll find me in the history books somewhere.”

Sam just sat there not really saying anything. This was the first time I think he had ever been quiet for more than five seconds. I let out a deep sigh and stood, grabbing my bag from the floor. “Thanks for having me over, but I think I need to go. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He stood and walked me to the door.

“Don’t be late. I’ll see you.” Sam waved me off and I headed down the street.

About half a year later while sorting through some archive files, I came across Peggy Carter. I felt a pang in my heart as I stared at the photo of her standing next to Howard Stark. Other than Steve and Bucky, those two were my closest friends. I fell down a rabbit hole after that, finding any information on the two that I could find. They had both helped found SHIELD in 1965, they had both gotten married and had children of their own. Peggy's children had stayed out of the public eye, but in true Stark fashion, Howard’s son evidently took over the family business and was living the high life. I pulled out a newspaper from the stack I had on the table in front of me and was shocked at what I saw. The title read ‘Howard and Maria Stark Die in Car Accident’, I knew Howard most likely wasn’t alive anymore but seeing the photographs of the wrecked car in the newspaper cast a somber mood through the room.

I laid the paper down on the table and ruffled through more of the papers before determining that we had no information on if Peggy was alive or not. That sent me into a frenzy of looking through phone books to try and find her and calling every retirement home in DC that I could. The only lead I had to go off of was a small interview from a newspaper, talking to Peggy about the seventieth anniversary of V-E Day, stated that she was living in Washington, DC.

After eight failed calls, finally, on the ninth, I had finally found a home which had a Peggy Carter as a residence in room 204. I rushed to pack up my things and left my office early. I ran down the back hallways as fast as I could without drawing too much attention. When I made it out of the building I ran full speed to the road to hail a cab.

Amazingly the traffic was almost nonexistent and I made it to the retirement home in only ten minutes. I fumbled out of the cab and I raced through the front doors of the building. I must have startled the women at the front desk because as soon as I rounded the corner to the staircase, they were yelling after me. I took the steps three at a time in my haste to get to the second floor. I stopped running when I was outside of room 204. I couldn’t see anything clearly through the frosted window so I knocked hesitantly and slowly opened the door and stepped in.

There in the middle of the room, against the wall was a single bed. A woman laid there quietly with her eyes closed. The closer I came to her the more familiar she looked. I let out a relieved gush of breath. There she was, older now, but still the Peggy I once knew. I nervously grabbed one of the chairs in the corner of the room and brought it over to her bedside so I could sit. Gently I gave her a small tap on the hand before just holding it in mine. She stirred but her eyes never opened.

All of a sudden one of the nurses from downstairs came into the room, with an angry and shocked expression.

“Ma’am, You can't be in here. If you want to see a patient, you have to sign in.” I ignored her, my eyes trained on Peggy's face. The commotion of the woman barging into the room had made her open her eyes and look around. I just watched as she scanned the room, first to the door on the left, to the wall in front of her, past me sitting on her right, then to the window behind me.” Her brows raised and she lifted her hands to her eyes to rub. The shock on her face was evident as she turned her head to stare directly at me.

“Hey Carter, long time no see huh?” I gave her the biggest smile that I could.

“Is it really you?” She reached her hand out to mine and grabbed hold.

“It is, it’s really me.”

“Ma’am, I mean it, you can't be here.” The nurse tried again, this time Peggy shot her a glare.

“Ms. I’ll have you know this is one of my best friends and she can be in here if she wants to. Now leave us alone.” The young nurse nodded her head and rushed out, even in old age she could still put on that commanding tone that struck fear in every man. She slowly turned back to me, almost like if she looked back for me, I would be gone. “How? How are you here?”

“It’s a long story Peg, are you sure you want to hear it?”

“Look where I am, I have nothing but time.” She laughed out and I let out my own small laugh as I shook my head.

In addition to what I had been doing, like hanging out with Sam, after that first visit, I made it a priority to see Peggy once or twice every two weeks, depending on how she was doing. Dementia had put a lot of stress on her, and seeing me after almost seventy-five years and looking relatively the same as I had when frozen took out a giant toll on her.

And that's how the next 10 months went until Steve eventually moved into an apartment directly under me.

Tag List: @ginger-swag-rapunzel @underc0vercryptid-reads @geek-and-proud @intothesoul @leyannrae @starkleila

#james buchanan barnes #bucky x y/n #bucky barnes #bucky x reader #bucky x female reader #bucky fic #bucky fanfic #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x rogers!reader #winter solider x reader #marvel fic #marvel fanfiction

[hotpinkrathian]

Christmas Party

(Kyalin)

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Please..."

"Kya..."

"Lin it'll be fun." Kya promised.

"Games with the families are never fun. Do you want me to count how many times Su broke my nose playing pie in the face?"

"It wasn't that many."

"Four is a lot of times to break your nose, Kya."

"You got me there. But Lin, imagine, a big Christmas, on the island. Everyone is... happy,"

"Until we fight."

"And there's sweets at all hours of the day." Lin didn't look impressed.

"We can start drinking at 11."

"In the morning?" Kya nodded, causing Lin to raise an eyebrow.

"Go on," Lin said. Kya pursed her lips, placing a hand on Lin's waist, circling around the earth bender.

"And when everyone goes to bed, waiting for the morning, we go back to my room and celebrate like adults." Kya whispered the last line in Lin's ear, and Lin was blushing profoundly.

"Alright," Lin caved, "but I'm not babysitting for your brother." Kya stretched a hand out.

"Deal."

"Lin! Kya! So glad the two of you could make it!" Pema greeted. The temple was already buzzing with activity. Lin put her coat on the filled hanger next to the door observing the chaos behind Pema.

"Thank you for having us, Pema," Kya smiled, embracing her sister in law. Lin wasn't paying attention when she, too, was pulled into a hug. She raised an arm awkwardly around Pema, looking to Kya for help, instead just getting laughed at. When Pema pulled away, distracted by the sound of a clay pot crashing to floor, Kya sidled up to Lin.

"That was cute," Kya said.

"There wasn't even a warning. What did I do to deserve that?" Kya nudged her with an arm.

"You'll get used to it."

"Thats what scares me." Kya chuckled, walking over to Bumi who slammed a shot glass onto the table. Lin followed, impressed by Bumi's gusto, although, at this rate he'd be out by dinner.

"Bumi!" Kya called, "did you start without me?"

"Took to long, Kya, I'm already four ahead of you."

"That didn't help you last year, it certainly won't this year." Lin had vague memories of their sibling drinking contest. Tenzin only ever participated once, he lost so badly and was sick for a week after, he never did it again. Kya picked up a shot, lifting it to meet her brother's.

"To tradition!" She said.

"Tradition? To drinking!" Bumj corrected as they took the shot. Bumu turned to Bum-ju who squeaked behind him.

"See Lin," Kya started, "the secret to having a good pace, is waterbending." Kya explained, "manipulate a little alcohol out of the shot, replace it with water, and bam. Suddenly five shots feels like two."

"Thats cheating."

"We never set the rules, or if we did, we don't remember them. If he can find a way to manipulate his alcohol with airbending then he is free to so." Lin scoffed.

"Lets get something to drink, hmm?" Kya said, guiding them to the table in the living room the Avatar was dotting around.

"Beifong, Kya!" Korra said, raising her glass.

"Not too much of that," Lin said and Korra nodded.

"Absolutely Chief, I am relatively new to the world of alcohol I will absolutely pace myself." Lin side eyed her, as Kkrra grinned and shuffled over to Asami.

"Here," Kya said, passing Lin a drink.

"What is it?"

"Not sure, ran out of the first one so I mixed it with the next bottle." Lin looked at her skeptically, Kya just shrugged. Sje took a sip of the concoction, ignoring the bitter taste it left in her mouth. Kya must've seen it on her face, because she lifted an eyebrow, pressing a hand to Lin's jaw.

"Too bitter?" She asked.

"It's... fine, I guess. It'll do the job." Kya grinned, leaning close to Lin's ear.

"Later I'll do my job, and don't worry, what I have to offer is very sweet." Lin blushed as Kya took a nip at her ear, before swinging her long white ponytail in her face, and walking over to Pema. Lin watched her go, unsure of what she was supposed to do after that.

"Lin, its good to see you." A voice said from behind her. She turned to see Tenzin, standing there with a small grin to his lips. Lin nodded, extending her hand. He took it and they shook, Lin grinning.

"You too, airhead." He rubbed the back of his neck while he replied.

"Haven't heard that one in a while."

"I thought it was the perfect time to bring it back." He chuckled.

"So, how are things with you?" He asked. "I feel like we haven't talked much with all thats been going on with the refugee camps." Lin looked to Kya who met her eye, wasting no time in downing the shot in her hand, making sure to run her tongue all around the glass of the cup. Lin gulped returning her gaze to Tenzin, hoping her blush wasn't too noticeable.

"They've been good. I've been taking breaks." She said.

"Good, good. I'm glad, you deserve a break, Lin. Should you take it."

"Heh, you aren't getting rid of me that easy." He placed an arm on her shoulder,

"Of course not," he replied.

"Dinner is served!" Pema called out. Bolin and Korra tossed them selves over the sofa, racing for the first plate of the meal. Lin waited for everyone to settle before getting a plate of her own, sitting across from Kya at the large table that had been brought in by Asami to seat everyone.

"Should we say something?" Asami asked, before eating anything.

"Like what?" Korra asked, halting her fork full of meat inches from her mouth.

"I don't know. I guess I just..." the girl trailed off and Lin frowned. Of course, it was her first Christmas without her father.

Korra put her fork down, placing a hand on Asami's knee to comfort her.

"Go ahead," Korra said, "we'll wait." Everyone nodded, and Asami took a deep breath.

"Thank the spirits," Asami started, "for giving us the chance to have this season together. And for this great big family I inherited. I miss you dad," she finished. Everyone dipped their head. Asami cleared her throat, and with that, the feast began. It didn't take long for Lin to engage Senna in conversation, the Avatar's mother absolutely adored all of the Korra stories Lin had to share.

"She was arrested the first day she got here," Lin explained, "someone didn't get the memo that destroying things is against the law." Senna laughed, and Korra shrugged from down the table. Lin lifted her glass, she wasn't one for wine, but it fit the occasion. Before she could place it to her lips, however, she was kicked in the shin. She furrowed her brows, trying to look under the table. She landed her eyes on Kya, who sat across from her, staring intently at the metalbender. Kya but her bottom seductively, her leg brushing against Lin's under the table. Lin gave her a half-hearted warning look, and the waterbender winked.

   Lin volunteered for the game, solely to escape Kya's teasing for just a bit. The waterbender had been throwing her glances all night, and Lin wasn't sure how much more of it she could take before she pushed her against a bathroom wall and well... the rest is up to her imagination.

"Wait what do I have to do?" Korra asked for the third time.

"You... again! Just, drink the shots," Asami said, "I'll handle the rest." Lin watched as Bumi expertly poured three shots each,  before re taking his seat.

"Kya!" He called. Fabulous. "These count as part of the race." He declared.

"Seems like cheating to me," Kya said, placing a hand on her hip.

"Hey, a shot is a shot. Watch me of you feel so inclined." No please no-

"I will." Kya made an example of herself as she sat down, pulling her chair loudly to the table, right next to Lin. Lin didn't meet her eye, trying to stay focused on the task at hand. Kya's hand found its way to her thigh, her thin fingers sliding in between Lin's legs...

"Lets drink, shall we?" Lin said, downing her first one, starting the round. The game was simple, take a shot, flip through a deck of cards until you flipped an ace, first to three flipped aces, wins.

She began flipping her cards, well aware of Kya's hand gripping her thigh, her fingers hovering over the material of her pants.

"Go Bumi!" Kya cheered as her brother flipped his first ace. He downed his second just as Lin flipped her first ace. Korra was still flipping, her clumsy fingers getting a lot of help from Asami.

"Faster, Lin.' Kya said, almost mockingly. Lin gulped, feeling herself blush.

"Faster, Lin, Faster!" Lin ran a tongue over her lips. Focus.  She flipped her second ace, reaching for her final shot. She took it like it was the only thing keeping her alive. At that moment, Kya decided to really squeeze her thigh, and Lin spat the shot out in suprise. She covered her mouth with a hand and looked to Kya, who was evidently playing dumb.

"Too much for you, Chief?" Kya asked. "I know you hate those coconut ones."

"Done!" Bumi shouted, slamming his glass on the table and standing up in triumph.

"Sit down before you hurt yourself, Bum'" Kya said.

"Hah! This old man just beat Chief Beifong and the Avatat in a drinking game. I think you're lacking Kya." He smirked, gripping the edge of his coat. Kya's eyes narrowed, and Lin watched as the waterbender stood up, taking the can next to Asami. She held it horizontally in her hands, thinking it over, before cracking into it with her nails and drinking out of the torn aluminum. Lin watched, oddly turned on by the action. Kya kept her eyes on her brother who's jaw was agape. Kya threw the can on the floor wipednher mouth with her arm, also hot, and sat back down.

"Thats got to be... what, like three more shots? I think your lacking Bumi." Bumi crossed his arms, storming away. Korra looked thoroughly impressed as Kya's newfound talent, getting the healer to promise to teach her. When the kids left, the two of them were left at the table in silence. Lin cleared her throat, hoping Kya would say something.

"I must've impressed you, you have nothing to say." Kya grinned, taking the cards and returning them to their boxes.

"I didn't know you could chug like that." Kya scoffed, stacking the boxes of cards in the center of the pile.

"Yes you did," the waterbender finalized. Before Lin could say anything more, Pema interrupted, lifting a leaf over their heads.

"What are you doing?' Lin asked.

"Its a mistletoe, Lin." Pema explained. Lin looked to Pema in confusion.

"Am I supposed to know what that means?" Lin asked, crossing her arms gruffly.

"Oh Lin, don't be so grumpy, you kiss whoever is under the mistletoe." Lin looked to Kya, who was undressing her with her eyes. This again?

"Alright, alright, fine." Lin leaned in for a quick kiss, taken aback when Kya gripped her face, holding her lips hostage under the mistletoe. Kya's tongue breached her mouth and Lin almost hummed at the soft groan Kya released. Kya pulled away, licking her lips modestly as the crowd cheered and whistled. Lin pressed her fingers to her lips. Pema looked mildly insulted she likely hadn't meant for the two of them to make out out under the mistletoe. To be fair, Lin hadn't expected it either. Lin looked down at the floor with a blush, while Kya sat there, smirking at the results of her handy work. Someone whistled, likely Bolin and Lin was urged to stand up. With a dip of her head she retreated to the washroom, closing the door behind her.

As she expected, it wasn't long before a soft knock rapped on the door. Lin opened it, stepping aside to let Kya though.

"Did I embaress you?" Kya asked, looking to Lin. Lin scoffed.

"Yeah, but I think I'll be fine." Kya's lips stretched into a grin. Lin pursed her lips, leaning against the sink when Kya pressed her chest against hers.

"Ready to get out of here?" The waterbender asked. Lin nodded,

"I've been ready the whole night." Kya laughed.

"I know you have." Kya took Lin by the hand, the two of them snuck passed those who remained at the party and up the narrow stairs of the Air temple, celebrating by themselves for the rest of the night.

#legend of korra #kyalin #lin beifong #kyalin during the holidays #i know they dont have christmas and neither do i but I want to give it a shot #i love Kya teasing Lin its the most solid hc

[oumakokichi]

What's your opinion on Kaito and Maki! I don't know if anyone's ever asked this before (sorry if yes) Ur blog is epic btw!

This question is pretty recent, so I feel like this is a great one to kick off with getting back into writing full meta! I know in the past I’ve answered a few brief questions on how I feel about Momota and Maki respectively, as well as their relationship in-game, but I don’t know if I’ve ever written at length about the two of them.

I also don’t know whether you want my opinions on them both as individual characters or their relationship together, so I’ll probably touch on both aspects! This ask will obviously include spoilers for the whole game, so I’ll talk more under the cut!

Momota and Maki are definitely two of the most important characters in the game. Both their dynamic with each other, as well as their eventual friendship with Saihara, are pivotal plot points that come up again and again. Momota’s good intentions and attempts to help Maki come out of her shell and self-imposed isolation from everyone else are initially met by her with skepticism, distrust, and a feeling that he’s being incredibly overbearing and putting his nose where it doesn’t belong—but in the end, she does find herself pulled in by his unrelenting optimism and offers of friendship.

As Momota helps Saihara begin to overcome his anxiety and self-doubt by pushing him forward and reaffirming that he believes in him, Maki also begins to face some of her own demons. Like Saihara, her issues are rooted in deep-seated trauma from a young age, though hers is considerably more severe as it concerns both physical and mental child abuse, as well as a life filled with violence and murder.

It’s interesting, because both Saihara and Maki struggle with what I would call self-loathing, but go about showing it in completely different ways. They both doubt their own ability to do anything right and feel that they’ll only hurt people in the end, but where Saihara overcompensates for this by trying to please everyone and being afraid of saying no, Maki’s approach is much firmer: she tries to shut everyone out completely, keeping everyone at arm’s bay in order to prevent any attachments from forming in the first place. As someone who lost pretty much everything at such a young age, she’s clearly afraid of the same thing happening all over again, as well as wary of anyone who might try to get close to her, only to attempt to “take her out” in the same fashion that she’s had to kill people her entire life.

Momota’s persistence in striking up a friendship with her is therefore really, really interesting. It’s the first time in Maki’s life that anyone has ever been so adamant about wanting to get to know her. Considering how harsh and unfriendly she initially is, as well as the fact that her talent is revealed to everyone by the end of chapter 2, it would make complete sense if Momota wanted nothing to do with her, in her opinion. She’s used to being alone, and she’s already convinced herself by that point that it’s preferable to the alternative.

But Momota is a character who fundamentally refuses to take no for an answer. This is simultaneously both his best and worst trait, in my opinion: it’s literally right in his catch phrase, whenever he claims that he’s going to reach the stars someday. He runs purely on the idea of faith and belief. There’s no middle ground with him: either you trust someone implicitly, regardless of everything stacked against them, or you don’t. Shades of grey, especially at the beginning of the game, are virtually nil. It’s a very “shounen protagonist” sentiment that winds up being somewhat challenged for him as the game goes on.

He’s interested in Maki, and wants to know why she closes herself off in her research lab. When the finger is pointed at her in chapter 2 and she falls under suspicion of murdering Hoshi, he defends her even at the expense of making himself look worse, and even to the point of claiming that he would “bet everyone else’s lives” that she’s innocent (a line which was completely omitted in the localization and dub, but which you can still hear him say in the jp dialogue of the chapter 2 trial).

There’s absolutely no evidence to back Maki up or support her; Momota’s defense on her behalf stems more from the fact that he hates Ouma’s equally black-or-white “guilty until proven innocent” approach, and resents the attempts at mutual suspicion and paranoia that Ouma tries to force between them. Momota is, in a word, stubborn. He figures things out by “feel” or “intuition” and is extremely slow to change his opinions even when facts and evidence are presented before him.

Again, this can be a good trait: his loyalty means he’s the last person who would ever throw someone else under the bus, and it’s the main reason he succeeds in getting closer to someone as emotionally closed-off as Maki at all. It’s less of a good thing, however, in later chapters like chapter 4, where his stubborn refusal to look at the facts genuinely endangers everyone’s lives in the trial and results in a huge blow-out that threatens his friend group with Saihara especially, but really with the whole training trio.

It’s this stubbornness of his that really baffles Maki. Initially, she doesn’t know what to make of Momota’s attempts to befriend her. She assumes he must be reckless, or stupid, or both, to want to get close to someone as dangerous as she is. But as she gradually begins to let her walls down and starts opening up despite herself, it’s such a nice change to see her eventually starting to believe in herself and view herself more positively as a result of Momota’s own belief in her.

I think momoharu as a ship works really well and has potential specifically because of these themes of “self-love” and “believing in yourself” that come up in the main game’s narrative again and again. And unlike the dynamics between Momota and other characters, such as Saihara, I feel like Momota and Maki are on much more of an even footing, where the two of them can view each other as equals and aren’t afraid to challenge each other whenever one of them is in the wrong about something.

For example, Saihara and Momota have much more of an imbalanced, sometimes one-sided friendship. That’s not to say that they aren’t both extremely important friends to one another—but between Saihara’s inability to say no to people and Momota’s tendency to take charge and view himself as “the hero” while everyone else is his “sidekick,” their relationship becomes incredibly uneven very quickly.

Add to this Momota’s unspoken jealousy of Saihara’s talent and his pivotal importance to the rest of the group in trials, and it gets even messier. I’m reminded of the chapter 4 trial, when Saihara really goes against Momota’s opinion on something for the first time by proving that Gonta is the culprit, and Momota is livid. Even when all the proof is laid out before him, and even when he knows, logically, he feels so betrayed by Saihara’s lack of “belief” in him that his underlying jealousy bubbles up and he lashes out. The localization considerably dulled the impact of this, but in the original Japanese dialogue, Momota even stops referring to Saihara by his first name for a long time, referring to him much more coldly by his surname from the end of chapter 4 until the latter half of chapter 5.

Momota and Saihara never feel as though they’ve really escaped that “hero and sidekick” dynamic until the very end of chapter 5 when they say their farewells, and even then there’s a real hesitance with Saihara to call Momota out when he’s wrong or ask for an apology even when Momota owes him one. If the game had explored more of Momota’s jealousy and feelings of inadequacy compared to Saihara, I would have really loved that, and I feel like there would be real potential to explore how they could eventually be on even footing… but as it stands, in canon we don’t really get that, and most of Momota’s shortcomings and flaws are somewhat brushed aside after his death in favor of Saihara remembering him more fondly.

This isn’t to say that Momota doesn’t have any flaws when it comes to how he interacts with Maki, of course. His character has a lot of “toxic masculinity” baggage, including unironically believing really outdated things like “women shouldn’t be fighting, they should be raising children,” or thinking that women are inherently weaker physically and more fragile emotionally than men. Luckily though, Maki often consistently proves him wrong on all of these points: her ability to wipe the floor with him during their training sessions is of course part of it, but it’s worth noting that she’s also considerably more level-headed than Momota is in many ways.

Where Momota is superstitious and afraid of the occult to a comedic degree, Maki remains the rational, down-to-earth one who doesn’t believe in such things. Where Momota is prone to letting his pride and temper get the better of him and refuses to speak to Saihara or apologize for the things he said during their fight in chapter 4, Maki is the one who attempts to push them into interacting with each other again, and believes that Momota is being much too childish about the whole ordeal. Again and again, Maki proves Momota’s outdated and harmful stereotypes about women wrong, and isn’t afraid to poke fun at him or get exasperated with his bullshit whenever he’s being kind of a dick.

Her relationship with Momota works specifically because of how much it feels like the two of them are on a more even footing. Where Saihara somewhat meekly accepts the “sidekick” role, even when he thinks it’s unfair, Maki doesn’t really accept it or go along with it in the first place, beyond showing up for training sessions. And when she gradually begins to develop romantic feelings for him, it feels authentic—particularly because it ties back into the idea of Maki learning to believe in herself the same way that Momota has believed in her from the start.

Deep down, Maki is someone who fundamentally believes herself not only undeserving of, but borderline incapable of love. She feels as though any human emotions she might have once had were stomped out of her from a young age and that absolutely nothing remains, to the point where she says “even Kiibo is more human than she is.” This self-loathing and dehumanization are the main reasons she keeps people at arm’s length: she simply thinks she doesn’t deserve any kindness, and that even if it’s given to her, she doesn’t know how to reciprocate in turn.

Her entire character arc is about unlearning this, and gradually coming to accept that she does have the capacity to love, including love for herself and for others. I’ve seen some people who believe Tsumugi when she claims in the chapter 6 trial that she “gave Maki those feelings for Momota” for the sake of the show, but I feel that believing that at face value really doesn’t do justice to Maki’s autonomy as a character.

Even if Tsumugi somehow did insert those feelings there (which I highly doubt, especially considering how she blatantly lies about giving Momota his illness too despite pretty obviously not knowing he was sick prior to chapter 5), the whole point of Maki’s confession to Momota in chapter 5 and reaffirmation of those feelings in chapter 6 is that she eventually comes to believe that they’re her feelings, and no one else’s. As someone who was denied any free will or choice for her entire life, her coming to view Momota as someone precious to her, as well as herself as an individual capable of making decisions and loving other people, is an incredibly powerful arc of character growth. I honestly really love to see it.

And it’s clear that Maki coming to love and value herself as an individual is exactly what Momota wanted to see from her. We don’t really know if he reciprocated her romantic feelings or not since he dies without really giving her an answer. I personally think he spared her an answer because even if he had said he reciprocated, it only would’ve hurt her worse to see him die immediately afterward.

But what he does make really clear is that he fully believes that because she could come to love him, she could also eventually come to love herself. Whether it’s romantic or not, he clearly cherishes her a lot as a person and wants her to be happy. He wants her to live on as herself, and not any of the roles she’s had to take thus far in order to survive. She eventually does do this, and I think he would’ve been absolutely thrilled to see it happen.

All in all, I feel like momoharu has a lot of potential for character growth (both for Maki and Momota), as well as for cute moments, comic relief, and all around as a feel-good ship. Momota definitely has some issues to work out with misogyny and toxic masculinity, and while it’s certainly not Maki’s job to hold his hand and walk him through those things, she’s the type of person who doesn’t mind putting her foot down and telling him no when she feels like he’s crossed a line, which is exactly the type of dynamic I like to see in relationships.

Anyway, I’ll wind this up here. This was a really fun question to go into, thank you again anon! I had a lot of fun getting back into the swing of writing meta, and I’m glad I got a chance to write a little more about my thoughts on momoharu, and Momota and Maki as characters.

#ndrv3 #maki harukawa #kaito momota #momoharu #danganronpa #ask #anonymous #my meta #ndrv3 spoilers // #okay to reblog #tumblr almost ate this ask as soon as i tried to draft it #luckily i had my response still written up in word so i could repaste it but phew #tumblr being as functional as ever i see

[afinepricklypear]

Confessions & Deleted Scenes

I get a lot of anxiety when it comes to comments on my writing. When a story of mine starts to garner a lot of attention, replying to readers and continuing the work, becomes increasingly difficult. Maybe it’s a touch of Imposter Syndrome, but I get stage fright. Yet, if I got no comments, or I saw no increase in comments, I couldn’t continue either. It’s this strange “damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t” struggle. I used to get around it by starting new fanfiction accounts and starting over, rebuilding an audience in a new fandom, but I don’t want to do that anymore. I don’t want to run from my stories. But. I’m in that mental place right now, even looking at comments and trying to muster the werewithal to reply makes me sick to my stomach and want to break down. I can’t breathe and I start crying, the thoughts in my head: I’m not this person, I didn’t write this thing that you liked so much, it’s trash, it’s all trash, and if I did, it was a fluke, and I can’t recreate it. Then the paranoia sets in: the readers are leaving, they see that I can’t do this, they hate me, they hate my work, I knew all along it wasn’t good enough.

Ah. Well. I’m working on it. I want to move past this and feel confident and continue with the stories in my head without the fear that no one will like it or they’ll like it too much so that eventually I’ll disappoint them. The words are there, I just can’t get them on to paper right now in a way that is satisfactory. So I’ll try and I’ll fail and I’ll try and I’ll fail.

In the meantime, while I get my shit together, here’s the original chapter 1 from my first attempt at writing “Wake Up” for my BSD fanfiction series Release (posted here on AO3). I haven’t read it since I retconned it, so it’s not edited. I wonder if anyone will find this here.

*Chapter*

A cold gray frost coated the windows of every building along the dusky alleyway. Chuuya leaned back against a building’s brick wall, crouched low to the ground, head tipped to one side, and a heavy gray, linen coat draped over his shoulders. He tried not to think about the lingering scent of urine on the air, or the fact his thin shirt and jeans provided little protection from the severe drop in temperature that evening. The hair on his arms and back of neck prickled on end, his ability, For the Tainted Sorrow, was desperate to unleash and wreak havoc on the cityscape around them. But like the day before, and the day before that, and the day before that, he wouldn’t be using his ability that night.  

A week had passed since Chuuya was forced to join the Armed Detective Agency after his violent departure from the Port Mafia. The injuries he sustained from leaving the organization he’d called home for seven years, and the incident leading up to it out in Hiratsuka, were little more than dull aches and scars, now, thanks in part to the Agency doctor and her healing ability, but the memories lingered like bad dreams. He kept waking in the middle of the night, lost and disoriented, in a vaguely familiar bedroll that his instincts rejected as ‘home’. It was only Dazai’s slumbering embrace, unconsciously blanketing Chuuya with No Longer Human that kept Chuuya from doing damage to his surroundings on instinct with For the Tainted Sorrow.

On top of that, he was still adjusting to his change in employment, still settling into his decision and the concept that it could be right for him, even beneficial, to work with the Agency of detectives he’d called enemy a month ago, and even tried to kill on more than one occasion. Those facts, of course, were the reasoning behind the strict conditions of his joining the Agency, which included a moratorium on his ability use without ‘permission’ from the Boss, Agency President Fukuzawa, and a zero-tolerance policy of No-Killing, No-Torturing. To say sticking to these conditions proved difficult was an understatement but Chuuya was nothing if not willing to rise to any challenge. Even despite Dazai’s constant efforts to rile him up at the office, or Kunikida breathing down his neck, eager for him slip up so they could oust him like the Port Mafia. Every day he felt like a caged tiger, gawked at by zoo patrons, while pacing his confines, flexing his claws and unable to do anything with them.

Luckily, and speaking of caged tigers, Chuuya’s week with the Agency had been spent shadowing his new “mentor” in the Agency, Atsushi. He worked alongside the boy and the boy’s partner, another newcomer to the Agency from the Port Mafia, Kyouka. They were the greenest detectives in the Agency, so while the rest of the detectives took on any higher priority cases that walked through the door, Atsushi and his mentees were tasked with handling all of the smaller, more tedious, and lower risk ones. That night they were following up on a serial burglary case in a prominent neighborhood following a lead given to them by the Agency’s resident smug bastard detective, Ranpo. After hitting multiple dead-ends on their case all week, Atsushi finally took their case file to the “best detective in the world” and appealed to him with a box of candy to use his “Ultimate Deduction”. He recommended they stake out a particular convenience store in the targeted neighborhood that night – odd, because all of the burglaries had been at residences – and he warned that they were dealing with an ability user.

“As if we hadn’t already figured out we were dealing with an ability user,” Chuuya muttered under his breath. He hadn’t been impressed with Ranpo’s display. There had been no signs of a break-in, no forced entry, just items missing. The only clue was uncovered at one of the victimized houses, the back portion of a shoeprint cut in half by the house’s exterior wall. Chuuya shuddered again from a wintery breeze nipping at any exposed bit of his skin. He knew he should’ve brought a scarf, but he’d been too preoccupied about ensuring Dazai was properly packed and prepared for an overnight in Hiratsuka. Chuuya couldn’t decide if the other man was really so terrible at taking care of himself, or if he just got a kick out of Chuuya doting over him. Years of ‘hating’ one another had taught Chuuya the latter was more likely.

For the most part, the Agency was in limbo regarding their most recent case out in Hiratsuka that had revealed there was a mysterious organization kidnapping ability users for experimentation and using them to manufacture replica abilities. It was the kind of discovery that, according to everyone at the Agency, despite Chuuya’s skepticism, needed to be handed up the ladder to government officials for them to determine the next plans of action. Meanwhile, Dazai and his partner, Kunikida, were tasked with gathering any and all evidence left behind in Hiratsuka, as well as, maintaining relations with the leader of Hiratsuka’s syndicate, Lady Murasaki, who had hired Dazai to investigate the disappaereance of one of her employees, Fujiawra Sadaei, before the conspiracy was exposed.

It was Dazai who uncovered the entire plot, only to go missing himself, but not before setting up a series of cryptic messages to be sent to Chuuya. Chuuya had been ordered to ignore the messages and delete them from his phone, but he couldn’t turn his back on his former partner, and onetime Port Mafia traitor, regardless of the fact they’d spent the months prior sneaking off to play house together at a small house out in crater city, Suribachi. The decision, and a stack of intimate photographs from that Suribachi house that had been delivered unbeknownst to Chuuya to his former Boss, Mori Oogai, were the toppled pai gow pieces that led to his own fall from grace in the Port Mafia. He still didn’t know where the photographs had come from, but he narrowly escaped their fallout with his life.

Chuuya spotted Kyouka across the street at a park, sitting in a swing and fiddling with the phone she constantly wore around her neck. For all intents and purposes, she looked like a young, middle school aged girl, that was enjoying her winter break. Atsushi, Chuuya knew, was on the other side of the building keeping watch towards the backside. They all wore headpieces to keep in contact with one another.

“Was it supposed to be this cold tonight?” Atsushi’s voice crackled through the headset.

Chuuya frowned, letting his breath out in a puff of steam. He heard a crackle and pop from the metal dumpster beside him and, glancing to it, realized with a start that he could see the frost crystals growing, “I don’t think it’s ever supposed to be this cold, kid. Looks like an ice ability, user’s got to be nearby.”

“There’s movement,” Kyouka’s voice was soft, almost inaudible as a whip of wind roared from nowhere, but firm, “Above you. Third floor window.”

“I can walk up there, no problem,” Chuuya offered, itching for the excuse to defy gravity.

“No,” Atsushi quickly and sharply replied. Chuuya could feel the boy wince at the severity of his own reply through the headset, “I mean…what I mean is…I’ll go, Mr. Nakahara. You and Kyouka stay put, continue watching, in case anyone else shows up.”

Chuuya bit back his frustration, he knew Atsushi was only worried about him, as he said between grit teeth, “Fine. You’re in charge, kid.”

On the other side of the building, Atsushi activated his ability, Beast Under the Moonlight, partially transforming into a mystical white tiger form. He climbed up the wall in a few short jumps, and rounded the corner to investigate the movement Kyouka had seen. Chuuya tucked his gloved hands under his arms, his fingertips aching from the growing chill in the air around him. He stalked towards the back of the building to take up Atsushi’s post. After a couple minutes, Chuuya tapped his foot impatiently.

“You see anything interesting, kid?” he asked.

Silence.

“Atsushi? What’s going on up there?”

Still silence.

“Kyouka, you got eyes on Atsushi?” Chuuya said, pulling away from the backside of the building and hurrying back towards the front, spotting the little girl in her position at the park, dull gaze now fixed skyward, cell phone dangling from its chain around her neck.

“Yes,” she answered, her typical monotone trembling slightly, “He’s at the window. He hasn’t moved for many seconds.”

The sound of several gunshots erupted through the night, and before the ring of their report could finish, Chuuya was sprinting up the fire escape. One quick, last glance to the park to note Kyouka was gone from her post, as well, and without thought to his agreement in joining the Agency, Chuuya used his ability to lift the third-floor window, diving through its entry and rolling to his feet in a light fighting stance, hands loose at his side and senses on high alert. The hallway he’d landed in was empty and somehow cooler than outside, it felt like an ice box. Somewhere inside was the sound of soft sobs. He started forward through the dark apartment and nearly slipped backwards to the ground, catching himself on the wall and a hallway table, the framed pictures atop it quacking and falling over. He winced, but the sobbing didn’t stop, his carelessness hadn’t been heard. Breathing a sigh, his eyes dropped downward to find the wood floorboards were coated in permafrost.  

Delicately, Chuuya righted himself and took small, deliberate steps to slide with some semblance of control along the hall. He passed by dark, empty rooms towards a luminescent glow ahead in what, Chuuya assumed, would be the kitchen. He sidled up next to the entryway, listened for a moment. The sobbing, he surmised, was a woman. There were no other noises. He frowned, reached for the knife he kept strapped at his thigh and held it low against his side, out of sight but ready if he needed it. He stepped into the kitchen.

On the floor, there was a woman kneeling in a tattered gray bathrobe, a gun on the ground beside her. There was splintered wood around shallow bullet holes in the wall on the far side of the room where her gunshots had hit. Chuuya’s breath caught. Outside of the window was Atsushi, his skin pale and lips turning blue. His eyes were moving but the expression behind them was dull, as though staring through a fog, and, every so often, his breath steamed the window in wet puffs.

The floorboard creaked under Chuuya’s weight and the woman reached for her gun, spinning around to point the barrel at Chuuya. Her crisp green eyes were wide, her short, chestnut colored hair falling in greasy, uneven dregs around her tear-stained face. From the corner of his eye, he could see Kyouka’s demon ability hovering beside Atsushi outside, its hand on the ethereal sword at its hip.

“Whoa, let’s be reasonable about this, lady,” Chuuya said, loud enough for Kyouka to hear from wherever she was hiding, undoubtedly nearby. He slipped the knife back into its sheath and put his hands up in as unthreatening a manner as he could, his mind turning possible outcomes from this encounter around in his mind. Every ounce of his body and heart was screaming to kill her swiftly, but then there was the niggling voice in the back of his head, that sounded not unlike Kunikida, whispering, when you slip up…

“I…I didn’t mean to…” the woman cried, whimpering, more, fresh tears forming, turning to droplets of ice on her cheeks, “It wasn’t my fault…I swear…it wasn’t…I had no idea what he was…I had no idea. Please…”

“It’s okay,” Chuuya told her, having no idea what she was ranting about, he assured her, “I know you had nothing to do with it. Not your fault, right? We all make mistakes, put our trust in people that turn around and betray us. You’re just a victim in all of this, huh? Why don’t you put the gun down, Lady Winter, and unfreeze my friend outside, and we can talk about this like civilized people, alright?”

The woman glanced over her shoulder at Atsushi outside, spotted the Demon before it could duck out of sight, and her eyes widened with panic. She yelped, half-crab walking towards the far wall, stumbling to her feet and dropping the pin of the gun, she pointed it back and forth between the window and Chuuya, her hands visibly shaking, unable to hold the gun straight. At that rate, she was more likely to miss than hit if she fired off a shot. Chuuya sighed, and placed his hands in his pockets. He was not cut out for this negotiation crap.

“We’re not here to hurt you,” he said, “We would’ve done it already if we were.”

That made her hesitate. Her eyes flickered from him to the window.

“Why are you here, then?” she demanded.

“Still trying to figure that one out,” Chuuya admitted with a shrug, he glanced at the wall behind her, those bullet holes and furrowed his brow, darting a look back at Atsushi, “Maybe you could start by telling us who you were shooting at.”

“No-no way,” the woman whispered, jabbing the gun at Chuuya, “You tell me who you are first, I’m not just going to confess my life story to some stranger that broke into my home.”

Chuuya smirked, tilting his head to one side, “Fair enough. We’re detectives, investigating the burglaries from that nearby housing community. Someone told us this would be a good lead for solving the case. I’ve got an idea who you are too. You own the convenience store downstairs, nice set-up, only store like it in this city block. I bet you know everyone in this neighborhood. Which house they live in, where they work, what kind of money they make, how many people they’ve got living with them, and what everyone’s schedule is.”

Another trickle of tears that froze halfway down the woman’s face and peeled off like crystalline beads.

“You and a friend get the idea that you could make a little extra cash, on the side. So, you start putting that information to good use. It’s gone good for a while now, but one of you got greedy…or maybe cold-feet, thought the other was going to talk. My friend shows up peeking in the window and it looks like betrayal. Shots are fired and your friend took off,” Chuuya said, “How’d I do?”

“Burglaries…?” the woman faltered, shaking her head, a look of puzzlement crossing her features, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“No?” Chuuya scowled, “Everything made sense though…”

Admittedly, there were still missing pieces to the puzzle. There was no sign of break-in, so he assumed her partner had the ability that got them into the houses undetected. The question of where the stuff was could likely be answered by a thorough search downstairs. Still, where was the partner, why had she been firing off a gun, and what had she been blathering on about when he got there…something about not being her fault and some mysterious ‘he’ – likely the partner, but what didn’t she know about him? Was he working another angle behind her back? As if on cue, a flicker of movement caught Chuuya’s eye, a man stepping through the wall behind the woman, a glinting chef’s knife in hand, poised to stab the unsuspecting woman in the back.

“Hey, watch out,” Chuuya shouted, moving before the words had left his mouth.

The woman, stunned by his sudden lunge at her, fired off a couple shots that Chuuya deflected easily. The man with the knife grabbed the woman, she screamed, Chuuya’s hand brushed the man’s forearm as the blade began to bite into her backside, and Chuuya sent the man flying back towards the wall. He passed harmlessly through. Chuuya pulled the woman behind him, darted looks around the kitchen, jaw set and muscles tense, searching for movement.

“Oh god! He’s going to kill us. You can’t do anything against him. You can’t, he’s too powerful,” the woman blubbered.

“Lady, we just met. Seems too early for you to make that call, don’t you think?” Chuuya felt the ground give out beneath him, and he dropped his gaze to find his foot sinking through the floor, “What the hell?” He darted an anxious look to the woman, barking out commands rapid-fire, “Unfreeze my friend. Find the little girl. Get out of here with them.”

He felt a pinch at his calf, he was starting to solidify in the floor. He sent out a shudder of energy and the ground gave out under him in a hailstorm of plaster and wooden splinters. He picked himself up from the wreckage, coughing and dusting away the debris, finding the startled man standing across from him.

“Dammit, that’s twice now you’ve made me use my ability. I’m on parole,” Chuuya yelled, rushing at the momentarily stunned man and swinging a roundhouse to his head. Chuuya’s leg passed right through, but he didn’t let it slow him down, swinging and thrusting kicks and punches with deadly precision, all of which would have landed if the man wasn’t a fucking ghost. Chuuya fell back, trying to hide that he was a bit out of breath.

“My turn,” the man grinned and began his own assault. When Chuuya raised a block, the man’s strikes passed through unhindered only to solidify and land their hit. He cut across Chuuya’s cheek, jabbed into his side, and blasted him back with a kick to the chest that Chuuya caught himself on with For the Tainted Sorrow. He spit blood and fixed his stance.

“So, you’re the thief, huh? Why do you want the woman dead?” Chuuya said.

“What business is that of yours? You can die with her if you’d like, though,” the man threw a cross jab and, as predicted, his hand passed through Chuuya’s block, but the second it was close enough to Chuuya’s face, the man was dropped to the floor with an increased density. The man used his own ability, and passed through the floor. Chuuya stumbled around as the man reappeared behind him and shot out a fist into his stomach. Chuuya stared down in surprise, puzzled at what the point was, the man’s entire arm was sticking through Chuuya.

“Do you know what happens when an incorporeal object becomes corporeal inside of you?” the man taunted.

Chuuya’s eyes widened, using his ability to propel himself backwards at a breakneck pace, feeling a growing tug as he flew away from the man. He stumbled rather than landed gracefully back against the far wall, gasping in pain, and grasping at his stomach, fingers brushing along a hand sized hole in his shirt, underneath the flesh was damp and jagged. He dropped to his knees and coughed out a thick wad of blood. His eyes blurred, and he shuddered, feeling like he might vomit. There was a crunch of debris under foot as the man approached. Chuuya steeled himself, his thoughts tumbling towards a singular decision: if he was going down here, he’d take the man with him. When the man became solid, Chuuya would crush him to a bloody pulp.

On his way across the room the man swept up a broken pipe from the wreckage, whistling dramatically some off-key tune.

“Where should I put this, I wonder?” the man mused, tapping the pipe in his hand, then pointing it to Chuuya’s forehead, covered in a thin film of sweat, “Your brain?” He lowered it to point at Chuuya’s jugular, “Your throat?” The man’s lip curled up into a sinister grin, as he hovered the pipe in front of Chuuya’s chest, “Your heart.”

“Do it,” Chuuya bit out, “You die with me.”

The man’s pupils dilated with his murderous intent, and he drove the pipe towards Chuuya…only to find resistance. The man frowned, desperately pushing the pipe at Chuuya’s chest but the pipe remained solid, refusing to pass through. Chuuya perked a brow up at the man, and the man scowled, swatting distractedly at something brushing the back of his neck.

“Oy, careful now. I almost lost contact,” a familiar voice chirped in mock cheer, the finger that had been gingerly touching the man’s neck giving way to a bandaged palm wrapping firmly under the man’s chin. Dazai’s face appeared peeking over the man’s shoulder, his other hand pressing a gun into the man’s side, “Hi, Chuuya! This seems like a bad situation.”

“Idiot. I thought you were in Hiratsuka for the night,” Chuuya replied, partially choking on his own blood and the mix of emotions swelling through him at the welcome sight of the other man.

“What’s this? Did you miss me already?” Dazai mused, his lips pressed into a thin frown, his eyes wide with amusement, “I suppose that means I’ll have to give you extra attention tonight...”

The man took their conversation to mean Dazai was distracted, seizing his opportunity, he swung the pipe over his shoulder towards Dazai’s head, and Chuuya’s hand shot out to grab the man’s leg and send him flying, first to slam into the ceiling and then crashing back into the ground, which cratered under his body. He wheezed, blood pooling around him, seeping from his every orifice. Chuuya guessed all of the man’s bones were broken, ground into a fine powder from the impact not unlike falling from a thousand feet overhead, and the thought made Chuuya feel a tiny bit better about the gaping hole in his stomach. Dazai stared blankly at the dying man and blinked a few times.

“That was dramatic, Chuuya.”

“Yeah, well, he’s an asshole,” Chuuya said, words trembling, and his face flushed white, “Where’s the doctor?”

“I sent Kunikida to retrieve her, he took Atsushi and Kyouka with Miss Gould back to the Agency, as well. They should be returning with Yosano shortly,” Dazai knelt in front of Chuuya and smiled, careful not to touch as it was Chuuya’s ability alone holding his guts inside, and Dazai’s No Longer Human would nullify his one lifeline, “It’s a good thing Ranpo called or, it seems, I’d be coming home to a tiny pincushion. Ranpo said ‘Chuuya will definitely do something stupid tonight’. He’s never wrong, you know, so I had no choice but to come here.”

“We only showed Ranpo the file an hour and a half ago. There’s no way he called you with enough time for you to get back here from Hiratsuka. You never made it there, did you?” Chuuya replied.

“Hmm…what’s this? That’s very clever, Chuuya, to figure out on your own…Atsushi must be training you well. I’ll have to reward you later,” Dazai grinned from ear to ear, “A good dog deserves a good treat.”

Chuuya flustered and fell forward, Dazai scrambling back to avoid him as he slumped towards the floor.

“Hey, hey, slug, what are you doing? Taking a nap? I can’t reward a dog that doesn’t greet its master with energy,” Dazai cried out, concern laced beneath his otherwise lighthearted words. He sat down cross-legged on the floor, plopping his elbows on his knees and cupping his face in his hands, he began to explain, “Don’t you want to know that you’re right? We returned early from Hiratsuka. The government contacted President Fukuzawa. We have a meeting with them in the morning.”

“We, huh? You’ll actually show up to it, then?” Chuuya murmured reply, trying desperately to keep his eyes open as black, inky splotches exploded along the edge of his vision.

“Wha-at? You make it sound like I skip out on important work all the time,” Dazai complained, “That’s not very nice, Chuuya. You’re worse than Kunikida, you know.”

“…crossing…the line…” Chuuya murmured.

“It’s not polite to fall asleep when someone is talking to you,” Dazai said, worry now heavy in his words, “I have no choice but to show up. President Fukuzawa personally requested I be there. Ah…but there are really so many other places I’d rather be, more exciting things I could be doing.”

“…oh yeah…like where?”

“Where…hm…anywhere, really. A small country village with a cottage, cobbled streets and cafes. Vineyards and sweet-smelling pastry shops…” he sighed, his voice faraway, “Somewhere where there is a quiet room with an ocean view.”

“…sounds nice…” Chuuya was struggling to draw his breath in, “…should go…sometime…”

“Mmm…maybe. I wonder if someone will be waiting for me there,” Dazai whispered, and Chuuya couldn’t muster a reply. He felt the other man lean over him, breath tickling his ear, “Rest now, Chuuya. Kunikida’s car is here. I’ll take care of you tonight; you take care of me in the morning.”

Like hell, Chuuya tried to reply, but his energy left him all at once, and he leaned unconscious on the ground. It was a few hours later when Chuuya woke in the Agency clinic. He pushed himself up to sitting, found the doctor, Yosano, rearranging the medical supplies in her cabinet nearby. She spared him a glance over her shoulder when his bed creaked protest of his movement. On a nearby bed was laid the ghost man.

“Starting to think we should set you up a permanent bed here. It’s only your first week, but I’m sensing a pattern,” the doctor said, there was an edge to her words that let Chuuya know she hated the thought of him spending more time than necessary in her clinic as much as he did, but the comment was an attempt to meet halfway. They were far from being friends but they were co-workers now. As much as she despised saving his life, she’d continue to do it as long as he worked at the Agency, it was her weird way of saying he could trust her on that, at least. Chuuya gave her a wary look.

“You know, I never had nearly as many near-death experiences working at the Port Mafia as I have working with your Agency. I’m starting to think forcing me to join here was part of a grand ploy to torture me the rest of my life,” Chuuya replied. His throat was dry and his words came out rasped. He gave a nod to the man in the other bed, “You managed to save this tool, too, I see.”

“Despite your best efforts. Quite the number you did on him. I’ve seen the dead bodies of people who fell from hundred story buildings that had less concussive injury than this guy when you were done with him,” Yosano crossed over to the man’s bedside to check on an IV drip attached to his arm. She spotted Chuuya’s questioning look and explained, “Drug induced coma. His ability would make it difficult to keep him locked up, and this seemed like the better solution than forcing Dazai to hold his hand until we could transfer him to government custody.”

“Would’ve been a better punishment to trap him with the waste of bandages,” Chuuya muttered, inspecting the bloody hole in his t-shirt with a click of his tongue.

“Speaking from experience?” Yosano pointed to a bag on the chair beside Chuuya’s bed, “He brought you some clothes from home.”

Home. Home, with Dazai. Their home that they shared. Chuuya smirked, picking himself off the bed and making his way to the chair on unsteady legs, “Fine. Maybe it would’ve just been more entertaining for me. Dazai ‘loves’ holding hands with strange men.” He frowned. “Where’re the kids?”

“Outside, in the office, I presume. Drafting the report for your case tonight.”

She hesitated, pressed her lips into a thin line, examining Chuuya in a way that sent a tiny, self-conscious shiver down his spine. He ignored her staring, picked out the garments in the bag and busied himself with changing. She averted her gaze when he removed his ruined t-shirt, revealing a bandage over his stomach where the ghost-man had stuck his arm. Yosano had the ability to heal him completely, but she never did, only enough that he would live, leaving the rest for him to heal naturally. She thought of it as her own way of getting a bit of justice for Chuuya’s ‘victims’ during his time with the mafia, but from what he understood of how her ability worked, he decided she was really letting him off easy.

“Atsushi is alright, if you were worried. The woman had entombed him in ice, but the tiger kept him safe while he was trapped. His recovery after she unfroze him took no time,” Yosano leaned back against the cabinets and folded her arms across her chest.

Chuuya pulled the fresh shirt over his head and bagged up the tattered one, tossing it in a waste bin. He swept his hat off the chair where it has been propped up next to the change of clothes and strode to the door, leaving without another word. As the doctor surmised, Atsushi and Kyouka were out in the Agency’s main office area, hovered together over Atsushi’s computer. Ranpo was also there, sitting with his feet propped up on his desk, some flashy cartoon that looked to feature robots streaming on his computer screen and a box of caramel coated popcorn in his lap, he laughed uproariously between mouthfuls of the saccharine snack. Chuuya wrinkled his nose in disgust at the childish man and joined the kids.

“Mr. Nakahara, you’re awake. I’m so relieved,” Atsushi perked in his chair, looking sheepish, “I’m sorry…about what happened today…it’s my fault that…”

“Don’t stress it, kid, we were all caught off guard,” Chuuya shot Ranpo a scalding glare, Ranpo continued to watch his cartoon and showed no outward sign that he noticed the look, “Not that we couldn’t have been better prepared if someone had given us more to go off, but that’s not your fault.”

“Right…though I don’t know if any amount of preparation could’ve really prepared us for that. It’s a good thing Dazai showed up,” Atsushi said, and Chuuya bit back the reflexive bitter retort, reminding himself they were on the same side now, but it did little to sway the competitiveness he still felt towards the other man. He was doing just fine on his own, dammit, he didn’t need Dazai to rescue him, “We still haven’t pieced together everything, but it seems the woman’s name is Hannah Gould. She came to Yokohama from America to live as a refugee after her father died in the war. According to Miss Gould, the man’s name is Marcel Aymé but she doesn’t know anything about why he was at her place or why he was trying to kill her.”

“That doesn’t make sense. She said something about…something not being her fault and she mentioned a ‘him’ before that guy showed up. I was sure she was talking about this Aymé guy. She’s got to be lying,” Chuuya said.

“That’s what Dazai thought, Ranpo agreed but he told us she’s not lying about not knowing anything of the burglaries and Marcel is our burglar. We’ll be transferring his custody over to the Special Abilities Department in the morning when they come for that meeting,” Atsushi explained. He paused, his features furrowed. His eyes flickered away; his expression mildly guilty. Chuuya glanced at Kyouka but her face was lowered and features naturally blank.

“There’s more,” Chuuya decided, folding his arms over his chest and tapping his foot, “But you don’t want to tell me.”

“It’s not that,” Atsushi said quickly, his eyes shooting up to Chuuya’s, wide with emotion, “It’s just…”

There was the sound of a door opening and closing down the corridor where the Agency President’s office was located. Kunikida and Dazai’s voices preceded their entry into the main office area, bickering about something nonsensical. It seemed Dazai was trying to convince Kunikida that lemon juice mixed with a bit of clay was restorative when worn on the face and feet at night, President Fukuzawa trailed behind them. When they reached the office, Kunikida’s eyes swept over the room, deliberately avoiding Chuuya. He made a comment to the other two men, said in a gruff voice, “Atsushi, I expect your report on my desk in the morning,” and left for the exit.

“Nakahara. A word,” the Agency President said. Chuuya frowned, meeting Dazai’s eyes momentarily, but the other man gave nothing away.

“Sure thing, ‘Boss’,” Chuuya muttered, moving to follow President Fukuzawa back to his office.

“I’ll help Atsushi with his paperwork,” Dazai declared, cheerfully making his way to Atsushi’s desk.

“Shouldn’t you do your own paperwork…?” Atsushi pointed out to Dazai’s laughter.

“You’re so silly, Atsushi, if I did my paperwork, then what would Kunikida do?”

Once they were in the president’s office, Chuuya plopped down in the available chair and waited for Fukuzawa to pour out two cups of tea. Chuuya had only been in the office once before, when he delivered his choice as to what his post-Port Mafia fate should be. The feeling of that day, and the weight of that decision, came back to him as he settled back in the chair and braced himself for the inevitable fallout of his earlier fight with the ‘ghost’, Marcel. He’d used his ability multiple times, albeit the situation was life or death, and then did his best to kill Marcel.

“We’ve reached the end of your first week,” Fukuzawa began in a tone that Chuuya hadn’t expected. Fukuzawa set one tea cup in front of Chuuya, took his own to his seat. Chuuya glanced at the cup but said nothing. Fukuzawa fixed him with a cool stare, “How are you settling in?”

“Fine,” Chuuya replied, narrowing his eyes on the older man, scrutinizing him for the meaning behind his words. Mori could never be taken at face value, there was a plan in motion, and a plan underneath the plan, and a plan under that plan. No question, no matter how innocuous it may seem, was ever without some unseen intent. Working for Mori meant staying on guard, and being successful in the organization required looking under the layers to see the layers beyond, but also, understanding your place in those layers and, all the while, not questioning the parts you didn’t understand even as you were intended to predict their subtle meanings.

“You’re comfortable working with Atsushi and Kyouka?”

“Sure,” Chuuya shrugged, picking at a loose thread on the upholstery of his chair.

“And the other’s in the Agency? I know some have expressed a distaste in working with…”

“Can we cut the crap?” Chuuya interjected, eyeing Fukuzawa dangerously, “I know I screwed up tonight. I used my ability without your permission and I did my damndest to kill that Aymé guy. I’m not even going to pretend I’m happy he’s still alive, I would’ve squashed him into mush like the roach he is if I’d known the doc was on her way, made sure he was good and dead before she got there.”

“Is that what you truly want right now? Aymé to be dead?” Fukuzawa mused, “In the moment, it could be construed as self-defense, but to still feel so strongly after the fact…to kill him now might be called vengeance.”

“He stuck his arm right through my stomach and out my back. Call me crazy, but I kind of hold it against people when they stick things in my body without my permission,” Chuuya grumbled, slumping down in the chair and tapping his foot on the ground, “So what now, huh? What’s my punishment, ‘Boss’? Am I out?”

“I wonder, if you were given the chance now, left alone with Aymé, would you kill him?”

“Huh?” Chuuya wrinkled his brow, eyed the Agency President suspiciously, “What are you getting at?”

“Merely curious. Is there harm in answering, if you’re already ‘out’, as you say?”

“No. I guess I can’t get in any more trouble, can I?” Chuuya leaned his head back and frowned at the ceiling, “We’d be better off if he was dead. His power was difficult enough for me to take on, hell, he almost killed me, and it’s no secret, I’ve got the most power and skill here in a fight. Not to mention, the man walks through walls, how do you keep someone like that locked up short of sticking them in a permanent sleep or gluing him to Dazai?”

“He has certainly proved himself to be a danger to society.”

“Same is said about me, though, right? Kill what you can’t control. But that’s the government’s style, not mine,” Chuuya smirked wryly at Fukuzawa, reaching forward to take a sip of his tea, and feeling a strange nostalgia from the scene, flashing to a meld of memories of being a younger man seated on a tatami mat across from an oddly serene woman in a kimono, katana sheathed and laid flat beside her. Their conversations then had the same energy and Chuuya felt an inexplicable tranquility cast over him, as he realized, there’s no Mori-level hidden schemes here, Fukuzawa just wants to understand, “Like you said, in the moment, I would’ve killed him because I want to live and, besides, he pissed me off. Same for him, I got in his way, so he wanted me dead. Self-defense, if that’s what you want to call it. But now, I don’t know the whole story and I’d really like to know what the hell is going on. It’d be better to wait for him to wake up so I can ask him, rather than kill him in his sleep and never know, right?”

“And when you have your answers? Would you kill him then?”

“Not my choice, is it?” Chuuya said.

“If it was,” Fukuzawa prompted patiently.

“No,” Chuuya met Fukuzawa’s stare evenly, “If he wants to come for my life or my organization again, I’ll accept the challenge and I’ll make sure there aren’t enough pieces left for the doc to save, but what’s the point in killing him otherwise?”

“I understand.”

“So,” Chuuya crossed his legs at the knee and leaned back in the chair, smiling at Fukuzawa, “You still haven’t told me my punishment for breaking my parole.”

“Even though it went against restrictions imposed on you by our Agency when you joined, you acted in the only way that you could to protect your team and our organization’s interests. I wonder, in this type of circumstance, would Dr. Mori have punished you?” Fukuzawa said, folding his hands in his lap and looking at Chuuya with a stern intent.

Chuuya cleared his throat, shifted in his seat, thought it over a moment before carefully answering, “Mori always said that it’s okay to bend or break the rules sometimes if it’s for the greater good of the organization.”

“A reasonable concept. Why then do you believe that I should act less reasonably than him?”

Chuuya ran his fingers over his palm where he could sense, more than feel, under the fabric that aching scar left behind by Mori’s scalpel driven through his palm. Fukuzawa caught the action, the corner of his lip twitching downward.

“I’m not Dr. Mori, I have no ulterior motives,” Fukuzawa said, in a tone as cold and firm as granite. Chuuya’s eyes flickered to his hard expression and then lowered to the ground, “If we’re to work together, you need to understand that. I’ve conferred with Kunikida and Dazai, we’ve concluded your actions were reasonable given the situation. There is no punishment. Rest tonight, your presence is expected in the meeting with the government’s representative tomorrow.”

“Oh good, and here I thought you said there was no punishment,” Chuuya muttered. He rose from his chair and started to the door.

“Nakahara,” Fukuzawa called him to a halt, “Thank you for protecting Atsushi and Kyouka tonight.”

Chuuya nodded, feeling stiff and a thousand times more exhausted than after using Corruption as he exited the room, shutting the door softly behind him. He found Dazai seated atop Atsushi’s desk, his legs folded and his body entirely blocking the flabbergasted tiger boy and his bemused partner from the computer screen and, what Chuuya could only presume, was their unfinished report. Dazai was speaking excitedly about something or the other, his voice trailed off when Chuuya entered the room and he bounced to his feet.

“Excellent! It’s decided,” Dazai declared.

“Decided? What’s decided?” Chuuya furrowed his brow, certain he was going to regret asking that question. Atsushi and Kyouka looked just as puzzled, and Dazai puffed up, looking rather proud of himself.

“Atsushi and Kyouka will come over for dinner tonight and Chuuya will make us all a wonderful dinner.”

“Who the hell decided that?” Chuuya shouted, his cheeks flustering with the heat of his emotions, and his stomach flopped knowing the futility of his protest.

Dazai’s smile, of course, never faltered, “It is, after all, Chuuya’s fault that we’re all still here.”

“What? No, no, Mr. Nakahara, that’s not…” Atsushi quickly attempted to amend. Kyouka covered a smile, and Chuuya softened his expression on the two young detectives.

“Fine, but we’ll have to stop by the store for ingredients on the way home. I’m not feeding them canned crabmeat,” Chuuya said, leading the way out the door. It only took Dazai a few long strides with his long legs to catch up, resting his hand between Chuuya’s shoulder blades. Kyouka and Atsushi had to scramble to follow after.

At Atsushi’s request, and despite a bit of prodding, because that can’t be all you want, Chuuya prepped some chazuke for dinner that night, topping Dazai’s with crabmeat and Kyouka’s with some fresh tofu cubes, and seared salmon on his and Atsushi’s. He used dashi instead of the traditional green tea, and let Dazai serve the bowls while he plated up some dinner for the kitten winding circles around his ankles. Dazai was regaling the youngsters with a story from their mafia days, with an embarrassing amount of embellishments that Kyouka looked to be taking with a grain of salt and Atsushi devoured wide-eyed and overflowing with naïveté.

“…at that point, my part was done and once they had me chained up in the backroom, all I needed to do was wait for Chuuya to come ‘rescue’ me,” Dazai was saying, Chuuya poured himself a glass of wine, “Of course, Chuuya was late as always. He cleared out the enemy, we returned the hard-drive to Mori, and still had plenty of time for Chuuya to lose ten bets with me before the arcade closed!”

“Amazing! And he really figured out where you were and what you needed him to do just by your turning one book on his shelf backwards?” Atsushi beamed before his features crumpled a little, “I wonder…is it wrong to say that you two made a really impressive team…since the work was for the Mafia?”

“No way, don’t fill his head with that kind of praise, kid. Dazai doesn’t need any more of an ego,” Chuuya complained, making his way to the futon.

“Ah, just who has an ego, glorified hat rack?” Dazai replied haughtily.

“Unlike you, my superiority is real and earned,” Chuuya shot back, scowling down at Dazai with a hand on his hip.

“There’s one thing I don’t understand though,” Atsushi interjected before the two could become fully embroiled in their bickering, “Once you were inside of the enemy’s headquarters, Dazai, it seems like you could have cleared the guards and secured the drive on your own. I’ve seen you fight and if you’d had a gun…I guess I can’t help wondering why…”

“Why he called me into all of it? That’s easy to understand. It was more fun for him to drag me out of bed in the middle of the night and make me do all the hard work,” Chuuya sipped his wine and took the seat next to Dazai on the futon, “Also, back in those days, I never let Dazai have a gun when we worked together.”

“Really? Why is that? I’ve seen Dazai shoot a gun before, he’s a very good shot,” Atsushi furrowed his brow in confusion.

“That was the problem exactly. He is a good shooter and…a suicidal prick,” Chuuya cupped Dazai’s chin, pulling the bandaged man’s face down to press a kiss to his jaw, and Dazai smiled sweetly at him in return, “I couldn’t trust him not to shoot me or himself.”

“Oh, I guess that does make sense,” Atsushi murmured, happily spooning some chazuke into his mouth.

“Hmm…always taking care of me. Such a good dog,” Dazai grinned, slinking his arm about Chuuya.

They ate over light conversation and then Dazai saw the two young detectives to the door as Chuuya cleaned their dishes. He smiled when Dazai crossed the room into the kitchen, slipping his arms around Chuuya’s waist from behind and burying his face in Chuuya’s shoulder. Chuuya relaxed back into Dazai’s embrace, continuing to scrub clean the pot he used to cook their rice that night.

“Mmm…Chuuya…be my lover,” Dazai murmured against Chuuya’s neck, his words vibrating warmly against the skin there, soliciting several shivers of pleasure.

“No,” Chuuya replied softly, rinsing the soap from the pot and his hands, setting the pot on the drying rack beside the sink. He squirmed out of Dazai’s grasp, reaching for a towel and drying his hands. Dazai remained by the sink, head hanging and arms limp, empty and cold, by his sides. Chuuya went to stand in front of Dazai, reaching up to push the shaggy hair from Dazai’s face, curling the tendrils around his fingers and pulling Dazai to his eye level, “I know what you want to do with your lovers, sicko, and I’m not interested.”

“Ah…is that right. So, what are you interested in doing with me then?” Dazai said, grinning into the kiss Chuuya leaned up to his lips, his arms slunk around Chuuya’s body, squeezing out the space between them and deepening their connection. Chuuya ended it first, pressing his forehead to Dazai’s, heat of their kiss coloring his cheeks and smile breathless. He slid his hands down along Dazai’s arms to find Dazai’s wrists, untangling the hold Dazai had on Chuuya’s waist. Chuuya entwined their fingers and led the eager Dazai to their bedroom.

#bungou stray dogs #fanfiction #random thoughts #bsd fanfiction #soukoku #chuuya nakahara #dazai osamu #dazai x chuuya #deleted scenes #bsd release series #bsd fanfiction wake up

[buckybarnesthehotshot]

Hey love! Can you do a fic where the reader and Bucky are teens in the 1930s and they run around making mischief and cute fluffy stuffs?

Trinkets (bucky barnes x reader)

word count: 1520

warnings: just a guy being an ass

A/N: tysm for the request holy shit quaratine’s been really boring and hopefully this is what you requested :))

       “Buck, c’mon!” y/n, her eyes filled with excitement, intertwined her fingers with Bucky’s as she pulled him through the busy streets of Brooklyn.

       “Doll, what are you up to this time?” Bucky chuckled, wondering how she managed to pull him through crowds with the shoes she wore and the restricting blue skirt she wore.

       “Whatever I want to do, Buck. And this time, you are going to go along with it,” Y/N grinned, peering around the streets for something to do. When she told him, she wanted to go out for a walk, Bucky was skeptical. Y/N L/N just going out for a walk? He should have known she was up to something when she decided to drag him along with her.

       “I thought we were going out for a walk,” Bucky chuckled, admiring the look of determination on Y/N’s features as she looked for anything she could do. He chuckled, knowing damn well nothing good—for anyone who was not Y/N—would come from her antics, yet he allowed it.

       “We’re walking, aren’t we?” Y/N grinned, slowing her pace as she still searched the streets for something to do.

       He noticed the way her eyes lit up at the sight of a small boutique along the sides of the street. Like a lion finding its prey, Y/N ran to the boutique, her grip on Bucky’s hand tightening to make sure she didn’t lose him in the crowds.

       “You’re going shopping?” Bucky questioned, peering through the windows of the small store. Y/N nodded excitedly as she rushed into the store. For the umpteenth time of the day, Bucky smiled at Y/N’s antics as he followed her into the boutique.

       “Can you hold this for me?” Y/N flashed Bucky her best puppy dog eyes as she held out a stack of clothes in different colors. It had been mere seconds since she entered the boutique; how did she manage to pick out that many clothes?

       “You’re buying all this?” Bucky raised a brow at Y/N in shock. She chuckled, shaking her head.

       “I’ve been saving up, and I decided I wanted to help out in the community. These clothes? I’m donating them all after I buy them,” Y/N smiled proudly. This was one of the many reasons Bucky enjoyed Y/N’s company; the girl had a heart of gold. She made him want to be a better person.

       “You’re one hell of a gal, have I ever told you that?” Bucky smiled warmly, taking the stack of clothes into his arms.

       “Every single day, Buck,” Y/N chuckled, turning away from Bucky and picking out more clothes. Y/N’s father was a wealthy man and whatever she must have saved up from her allowance went into buying the clothes seeing as she happily picked things off the shelves.

       After a while in the boutique, Y/N eventually stopped picking articles of clothing off the shelves, and stood in place when she came across a glass display case, her mouth agape. Bucky could barely see what she it was that caught her interest because of the massive amount of clothes he held in his arms.

      “Whatcha looking at, doll?” Bucky questioned, still somehow balancing the stacks of clothes he had in his arms.

       “Oh, it’s nothing. I don’t think I’d have enough money to buy it anyways,” Y/N flashed him a sad smile before leading him to the counter where Y/N paid for everything she bought into large shopping bags, all looking full and heavy.

       Y/N picked up two of the bags, while Bucky held onto the rest of them. When they got out of the store, Bucky noticed a tinge of sadness in Y/N’s expression. She must have really wanted whatever it was she saw in the boutique, but he knew she was too selfless to spend more on herself than she had to. It was then an idea crossed his mind.

        “I think I left my cap inside. Would you mind if I go get it, doll?” Bucky questioned.

        “Buck, I don’t remember you wearing—” Y/N spoke confusedly, only to be cut off by Bucky once again.

       “I was wearing one when I went in. Wait right here, I’ll go look for it first,” Bucky sped off, barely leaving Y/N any time to respond. She mumbled a quick ‘I guess I’ll just sit here and do nothing’ to herself before making her way onto a wooden bench placed conveniently outside the boutique.

       When Bucky got inside, he rushed to the same spot Y/N stood in earlier, and looked through everything in the glass case.

       “Can I help you with anything, son?” a feminine voice came from behind the glass counter. He averted his gaze to see an older lady, clad in a uniform, smiling up at him.

       “The girl I was with, do you have any idea what she was looking at earlier?” Bucky questioned, his hands tapping nervously on the glass.

       “I believe she was looking at this,” the woman pulled out a small box, a shining silver locket. Bucky picked up the box and took in the intricate carvings on the heart-shaped locket.

       “I’ll take it,” Bucky smiled, pulling his wallet out his pocket. He didn’t dare ask for the price; he was willing to spend every penny he had to see Y/N happy.

       The lady took the box from his hands and she wrapped it in a delicate blue ribbon and handed Bucky the box, a smile on her face as he handed her the payment for the locket. He headed out the boutique, expecting to see Y/N waiting patiently for him. He should have known better.

       “I don’t care! With all due respect—which you clearly don’t deserve—I don’t owe you anything, sir!” a familiar female voice was the first thing he heard. He was then met with the sight of Y/N standing angrily in front of a man he’d never seen before.

       “I’m just saying, you shouldn’t be out spending your husband’s money this much,” the man snarled at Y/N.

       “I’m not married, prick!” Y/N yelled dropping the shopping bags onto the ground and taking her shoes off her feet as though getting ready to attack the man. It was an all too familiar sight.  

       “You should really fix that, then, eh?” the man, clearly disappointed upon hearing Y/N wasn’t married, snarked.

       “That’s none of your business,” Y/N chuckled darkly, taking off her other heel and getting ready to attack the man. Before she could move out of her spot, Bucky rushed to her side and held her back.

      “You better keep your girl in check, you’re clearly spoiling her, bud,” the man chuckled before walking away. Y/N was fuming and fought against Bucky’s grip but to no avail.

       “Bucky, let me go, please” Y/N spoke more calmly, all evidences of anger leaving her body.  She didn’t even bother to try wiggling out of his grip. Little did Bucky know it was his arms being around her that calmed her down.

       “Do you promise not to run after that man if I let you go?” Bucky raised a brow firmly.

       “Yes, yes, whatever. He isn’t worth it,” Y/N flashed a tight smile and Bucky chuckled before letting go of her. He went to pick up the paper bags she left on the sidewalk while Y/N put her shoes back on her feet with a dissatisfied grumble. She could have easily shut the man up herself.

       “I got something for you,” Bucky smiled widely, holding up the small box. Y/N’s eyes widened in shock; she wasn’t expecting to receive anything that day.

        “Buck, you shouldn’t have,” Y/N frowned as she stared blankly at the box.

       “Come on, I saw you staring earlier and I figured you deserve something nice for deciding to help out others,” Bucky insisted, handing Y/N the box. She reluctantly accepted the gift and unwrapped the ribbon, opened the box, and chuckled.

        “You’re pretty observant, but the only reason I was staring at the locket was because my mother had one like it. I borrowed it when we went to Coney Island last week and I dropped it when we were on the cyclone,” Y/N admitted shyly, her hands tracing over the patterns on the silver.

       “So, you were planning on buying this to replace the one you lost?” Bucky chuckled, combing his fingers through his hair.

       “Pretty much,” Y/N nodded, smiling shyly. Bucky nearly fell to the ground in a fit of laughter when the words left her mouth.

       “I think you should keep it as a reminder of the day we went to Coney Island, don’t you think?” Bucky suggested, pulling a smile from Y/N.

       “I already have you to remind me of that day, Buck, but sure, I’ll keep it,” Y/N smiled warmly, lockig Bucky in her embrace while the silver chain dangled in her hand. They stayed like that for a moment, blocking out the world until they heard a familiar voice utter very familiar words.

       “I could do this all day.” Bucky and Y/N gave each other knowing looks before rushing to the alley from which they heard the commotion.

TAGLIST: @spatium-viatorem /  @sxphiiwrld / @captainamerica-is-bae

#bucky #bucky barnes #james bucky barnes #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes au #bucky barnes imagine #winter solider imagine #winter solider x you #winter soldier #winter soldier x reader #winter soldier imagine

[pikapeppa]

Felassan/f!Lavellan: Paint

Chapter 26 of The Love That Grows From Violence (post-Trespasser Felassan x Tamaris Lavellan) is up!

In which Felassan reveals yet another hobby. 😂 Featuring gorgeous art this week by @elbenherzart​!!

~8100 words; read on AO3 instead.

The following days were a buzz of activity for Tamaris and Felassan. Gone was the lazy flow of leisurely-executed activities that had previously characterized their time; now, it almost felt to Tamaris like there weren’t enough hours in the day to do everything they wanted to do. 

Their morning sparring sessions were becoming longer and more strenuous as Felassan’s grasp of his magic grew. He switching between types of magic now in his attacks, transitioning from fire to lighting to ice to raw Fade strikes while using barriers to repel Tamaris’s blows, and by the time they finished their sparring these days, they were often too fatigued to fuck right afterwards like they’d been doing when his magical control was more modest.

Outside of their sparring sessions, Felassan kept working on his magic by himself. He tinkered with Dorian’s crystals and pored through the few tomes on magic that he’d found in the mansion’s library, as well as a few tomes that Varric had given him from the stock that was salvaged from the Gallows during the Kirkwall Uprising. Dorian was sending a selection of more complex books from Tevinter, and until they arrived, Felassan cheerfully made fun of the Chantry-based books he did have access to, even as he read them. 

While Felassan was working on his magic, Tamaris worked on getting herself back up to speed about current events happening in Thedas and what the other branches of the wolf hunt were doing. They sat together in the study, Felassan working at the desk while Tamaris spread her papers and reports across the couch and floor, and they frequently made snarky comments to each other about what they were reading. Although it wasn’t pleasant to be so busy again, Tamaris had to admit that it was nice to have a constant companion who was working just as hard as she. 

One day, Tamaris looked up from one of Leliana’s coded letters to find Felassan leaning back against the desk with his arms folded and a pensive frown on his face.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

He met her eye. “That piece of ironwood I gave you. Can I have it?”

Her eyes widened. He’d given her his piece of ironwood so long ago now that she’d been half-wondering if he’d forgotten about it. “Of course,” she said, and she stood from the couch. “What are you — are you going to make a staff with it?”

“I’m going to try,” he said.

“That’s great!” she exclaimed. “That’s – I’ll go get it right now.” She ran upstairs to her bedroom and pulled the short length of ironwood out of her dresser. 

It was wrapped in a fine silk scarf Josephine had given her. She carefully unwrapped it, then ran back downstairs and held it out to Felassan.

He smiled faintly as he took it. “Why do I get the impression that you’re more excited about this than I am?”

“It is exciting,” she insisted. “You’re going to… I mean, I don’t really know what you’re going to do, but you’re going to try and make this into a staff! That means you feel pretty confident that you can do it, right?”

“I’m reasonably confident that I won’t blow up the house while trying,” he said wryly.

She frowned. “Come on, Felassan, don’t be so down on yourself. You’ve got so much more control than you did a month ago.” Just this morning, they’d been discussing the possibility that he shouldn’t spar with her anymore out of concern that he might harm her, since his attacks were surpassing the bounds of her barriers to repel him.

“True,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean I am close to what I used to be.” He twirled the ironwood in his fingers and gave her a knowing look. “Using magic in this time truly is a matter of control and skill, you know. The feeling of magic being like a second seamless heartbeat really was an artifact of my time. Waking up in this time was like… like having to learn to speak again. Conscious manipulation of a skill I once took for granted.” He gestured at himself. “This relearning is like doing that all over again, but even more difficult since I can’t do what I intend to do.”

“You couldn’t before,” she said emphatically. “Now you can.”

He shrugged. “I can sometimes.”

She frowned more deeply. “Most of the time. You do what you mean to do three-quarters of the time now.”

He smirked. “Have you been keeping a ledger of my progress that I don’t know about?”

“I’m proud of you, okay?” she blurted.

He raised his eyebrows, and she hunched her shoulders defensively. “I’m just… You thought you might not recover anything when you first got here. You’ve come a long way.”

His expression softened with fondness. “I haven’t tried to do anything particularly complex. Certainly nothing as complex as making a staff.”

“That doesn’t matter,” she insisted. “Just try, and if you can’t do it right away, keep trying. You’ll get it.”

His smile widened. “Look at you, being all optimistic. If not for your scowl, I’d think you were trying to seduce me.”

She scoffed and gently shoved his chest. “Go make your staff, you brat. I’ve got reports to read.” She started back toward the couch, but Felassan grabbed her hand before she could get very far.

He pulled her close and stroked the metal joint of her left wrist. “Ise inor vhenan. Do you know what this means?”

Her heart skipped a beat. “‘Heart of fire’?” she said hesitantly.

“‘Fire in the heart,’ yes,” he said. “It’s an Elvhen term for someone who refuses to give up, even when the odds are stacked against them.” He smiled faintly. “Determination to the point of stubbornness.”

“Uh-huh,” she said flatly. “You’re calling me the stubborn one here, I guess?”

His smile widened. “I’m saying you are the fire in my heart, Tamaris. And I appreciate your stubborn reminders that I am, in fact, getting better.”

Her belly burst into giddy butterflies. The fire in my heart... 

She bit the inside of her cheek to stop a stupid grin from spreading across her face. She gave him a chiding look instead. “Now who’s trying to seduce whom?”

His smile curled with mischief, and he tipped her chin up with a gentle finger. “Not when you have so many fascinating reports to read,” he murmured. He placed a sweet kiss on her lips, and for a blissful moment, she melted helplessly into his kiss.

He leaned away from her with a smile, and Tamaris grinned goofily at him before tottering back to her spot on the couch. Felassan chuckled and returned to his desk, and it was with a light and happy heart that Tamaris returned to her pile of reports.

Their evenings were spent with Varric and Dorian discussing the ways they could use Felassan’s information to benefit the wolf hunt. Tamaris felt that getting in touch with the Grey Wardens’s commanders should be a top priority. “We should be telling them not to kill the last two archdemons, right?” she said one night as they gathered at the dining table with Dorian’s crystal. “They should know the archdemons might be guarding against the Blight, so if anything, the Wardens should be protecting the archdemons from being found by the darkspawn.” Based on the information that Felassan had outlined, they had come to the conclusion that events like the Fifth Blight happened when the darkspawn infected the archdemons, and not that the archdemons were galvanizing the darkspawn into action like everyone seemed to think.

Felassan shrugged. “It probably would be ideal for them to stop attacking the archdemons, yes.”

“But you don’t think they’ll stop,” Varric said.

Felassan smiled faintly. “I think they have several centuries’ worth of evidence that killing archdemons coincides with the end of a Blight event, and no reason to accept the hypothesis of a random elf.”

“Well, we still have to try,” Tamaris retorted.

“I am not saying not to try,” Felassan said. “But I also think it might be worth launching our own independent ventures to find the archdemons.”

Varric grimaced. “That’s a pretty ambitious undertaking, Jester.”

“True,” Felassan said casually. “You could also speak to individual lower-ranking Wardens rather than approaching their commanders.”

Dorian’s voice floated up from the crystal. “Why shouldn’t we try and approach the Warden-Commanders?”

“People in charge are usually disinclined to listen to strange ideas,” Felassan said. “They’re considerably more skeptical than the average person. The more experience they have, the more convinced in their rightness — and the more closed-off — they tend to be.”

Varric chuckled. “Not a fan of authority figures, are you?”

Felassan widened his eyes. “I respect authority figures deeply. That doesn’t mean I listen to them or follow what they say.”

Tamaris snorted with amusement. Felassan smiled at her, then casually waved his hand. “Anyway, we should start looking for stray lower-ranking Wardens. Not only might they be more open-minded, but they could lead us to Weisshaupt, if that’s still where you think the Wardens are gathering.”

Varric scribbled a memo in his notebook. “All right. More efforts to find the Wardens. Any other thoughts?”

 Dorian spoke up. “I was thinking about the fact that Solas has so much knowledge at his disposal now, with those two other souls piggybacking on his body. It certainly puts us at a disadvantage, but he’s not the only person we know whose head is stuffed with ancient knowledge.”

Tamaris nodded ruefully; she’d been thinking the same thing. “You mean Morrigan.”

 “Yes,” Dorian said. “We should try and get her assistance. There must be information from the Well of Sorrows that can benefit us.”

She ran her hand slowly through her hair. When Dorian spoke again, his voice was gentle, as though he could see her reluctance. “I know you wanted to let her raise Kieran in peace, but if Solas drops the Veil, there will be nowhere safe left for them to live. Or any of us, for that matter.”

“No, I know. You’re right.” Tamaris sighed and lowered her hand. “How should we even go about trying to find her? She doesn’t care about keeping in touch with anyone.”

Varric tapped his quill idly on his notebook. “The Hero of Ferelden would be a good bet. Nightingale said she and Morrigan were close back in the day.”

Tamaris frowned. “That was over ten years ago. And isn’t Mahariel already going off to spy on the qunari?”

“She’d have time to send a letter,” Varric said reasonably. 

“I guess,” Tamaris said, somewhat reluctantly. She still felt guilty about the Hero of Ferelden doing so many tasks for the wolf hunt after everything she’d already done for Ferelden, but no one seemed to have any choice about getting pulled into all of this. 

“Okay,” Varric said as he took another note. “Get the hero to write to the swamp witch.” He looked up at Felassan and Tamaris. “Any other ideas?”

“There’s something I’ve been thinking about, actually,” Tamaris said. She gave Felassan a critical look. “The Well of Sorrows. The fact that it even existed and that Mythal had warriors who were bound to her will. Don’t you think that’s fucked up?”

He pulled a little face. “It’s not a fate I would ever choose, that’s for certain.”

“So why did she make anyone choose it?” Tamaris demanded. “Why make anyone be bound to her will?”

“Remember that the Sentinel order arose around the time that the Evanuris were all starting to war with each other,” Felassan said. “In retrospect, I wonder if the rising of the Sentinels might have been the first sign that Mythal was worried she would be betrayed. An order of warriors who are bound to your will means they can’t betray you, not even if you die. Allegedly die, that is,” he added.

Tamaris folded her arms. In her opinion, that was no excuse. “What did Solas think of the Sentinels when Mythal started recruiting them?” she asked.

Felassan grimaced again. “He was… conflicted,” he said slowly. “On the one hand, Abelas and the others were willingly giving themselves into Mythal’s will, so technically they were submitting to her by choice. But by submitting to her, they were effectively making themselves her slaves.” Felassan twisted his lips ruefully. “It certainly kept him up at night, even if he didn’t speak against her outright.”

Tamaris relaxed slightly at this. “It didn’t seem to sit right with him when we were there, either.” 

Felassan nodded and gave her an appraising look. “You never considered drinking from the Well, did you?”

“I mean, sure, I considered it for a second,” she said. “Until Solas refused point-blank to drink from it. If he was saying no, then I sure as fuck wasn’t going to do it.”

Felassan snorted a laugh. “Wise of you to follow his example. It would be a very different Tamaris sitting before us now if you had drunk from the Vir’Abelasan.” He raised an eyebrow. “Or perhaps you wouldn’t be sitting here at all, if Solas really is hosting Mythal.”

Tamaris frowned, but Dorian filled in his unspoken thoughts. “Fasta vass. You think he would have taken control of Tamaris via Mythal?”

Tamaris’s guts went cold at the thought, and Felassan’s answer only discomfited her more. “It’s possible,” he said.

“So that means Morrigan could be in trouble now, then,” Tamaris said tensely. “And Kieran too.”

“Also possible,” Felassan said.

“Shit. Fuck.” She ran her hands through her hair, then gestured at Varric’s notebook. “Write that down. Trying to find her should be a priority.”

“Fen’Harel won’t kill them, if that’s what you’re concerned about,” Felassan said. 

Varric gave him a skeptical look. “If he’s willing to bring the Veil down on us, he’s probably not too concerned about killing one woman and her kid.”

“It’s not like that,” Tamaris said. “Solas doesn’t want to kill more people than he has to.” 

Varric looked at her in surprise, and Dorian sounded surprised as well when he replied. “That almost sounded like you’re defending him.”

“She’s not defending him,” Felassan said. “She’s just explaining him.”

She looked up to find Felassan smiling at her. But instead of smiling back, she frowned. “Can you explain something to me? Why did he trust her?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Who, Morrigan?”

She gave him a chiding look. “No. Mythal. She was so fucking shady. The dwarf stuff, the Well of Sorrows stuff, hiding her dragon without telling him so he thought she was dead, not to mention how smug and bitchy she was when I met her, and all the shitty things Morrigan said about being raised by her. How could Solas have trusted her?”

His smile began to melt into that look of anachronistic melancholy that made Tamaris’s heart twist. “I don’t know if it is possible to explain the strength of the ties that exist between them,” he said quietly. “Can any of us even imagine the depth of love that could develop between two beings who have known each other for several thousand years? Solas knew Mythal since he was barely more than a wisp. She was one of the main sources of pride that fed and fostered him before he became an elf. She shaped him in ways that none of us can fully understand. Even if he later realized that some of her proudest achievements were terrible mistakes, the depth of his devotion to her would have made him incapable of seeing her as truly flawed.”

Dorian hummed an acknowledgement. “Love is blind, hm?”

Varric grunted. “It’s a literary cliché for a reason.”

“It really is,” Felassan said. His tone was jocular, but his smile was wry and sad.

Tamaris reached over and squeezed his thigh. Then Varric snapped his fingers. “Hey, that reminds me. I was thinking about the whole Mythal-hiding-her-dragon thing the other day, and I thought, uh… well, what if Mythal’s dragon really is dead?”

Felassan straightened in his chair. “Interesting. Then how do you propose that she survived?”

Varric put his quill down. “Well, Hawke had this amulet that Flemeth told her to take to the Dalish. She took it to our friend Merrill’s clan, and Merrill did some kind of ritual, and Flemeth popped out of the amulet like… like, uh…”

“Like magic?” Dorian suggested wryly.

Varric laughed. “Yeah, I guess. Obviously.”

Dorian chuckled, but to Tamaris’s surprise, Felassan just stared at Varric without laughing.

“Felassan, what’s wrong?” she asked.

He continued to stare at Varric. “Why didn’t you mention this the other day when I was talking about the dragons?”

Varric shrugged. “I didn’t think of it then.”

“I wish you had,” Felassan said. “That changes everything. If Mythal’s dragon truly was killed, but she had another piece of her life essence stored in an amulet…” He trailed off, then snorted a sudden little laugh. “Amulets are far easier to hide than dragons, you know.”

Varric shrugged and picked up his quill. “I mean, I could be wrong. You can read The Tale of the Champion yourself and see what you think.”

“You should read it, actually,” Tamaris piped in. “There’s more detail in there about Merrill and her eluvian, too.” She turned to Varric. “It’s the same eluvian that gave the Hero of Ferelden the blight, right?”

“Yeah, that’s what Daisy said,” Varric replied.

Felassan looked at him sharply. “What do you mean, an eluvian gave the Hero of Ferelden the blight?” he said sharply.

Varric tilted his head in an equivocal gesture. “Well, maybe it didn’t directly give Mahariel the blight, especially if only living stuff can have the blight. But it was definitely involved, from what Daisy told us.” He narrowed his eyes. “Hey, eluvians aren’t alive, are they?”

“No, they’re… they’re not alive,” Felassan said numbly. He kept staring at Varric in a stunned sort of way that made Tamaris nervous.

She tapped his thigh. “Felassan, are you–?”

He suddenly burst out laughing — a distinctly hysterical-sounding laugh. Tamaris shifted closer to him and held out her hand, and he grabbed it as he dragged in a breath. 

She squeezed his fingers. “Just breathe,” she said soothingly.

He nodded, then burst out another uncontrolled laugh. “Just when I think I have a grasp on this time, I realize something enormously significant that I missed,” he wheezed.

“What do you think you missed?” Dorian asked.

Felassan giggled before dragging in another calming breath. “An eluvian that’s steeped somehow in the blight makes me think there is a specific place that it was keyed to access. A place that was so catastrophically affected by the blight that the eluvians connected to it might be growing red lyrium.”

Tamaris’s eyes widened. “Arlathan?” she breathed.

Felassan nodded and chuckled, and Tamaris sighed. “Fuck. So we should try and get Merrill somewhere safe too, then.”

Varric sighed. “I hate to tell you this, but I haven’t heard from Daisy in a while.”

Tamaris’s stomach went cold once more. “You think she’s working with Solas?”

Varric twisted his lips sadly. “She’d have good reason to, if he sweet-talked her with stories about the ancient elves.”

Felassan sighed. “That’s good.”

Tamaris frowned at him, affronted. “It’s good? What do you mean, it’s good? One more ally for Solas means one less for us!”

Felassan gave her a chiding look. “It would also mean that an eluvian leading straight to the Black City is under Solas’s control and not, for example, Tevinter’s. Neither is… ideal, but having that eluvian in Tevinter hands is probably worse.” He cocked his head. “Probably.”

“That hurts my feelings slightly,” Dorian said.

Felassan chuckled, then sighed and rubbed his forehead, and Tamaris studied him with a pang of sympathy. He looked so tired. 

She squeezed his hand once more. He gave her a little smile, then squeezed her hand in turn before kicking his feet up on the table. “In any case, I know what’s next on my reading list.” He shot Varric a smirk. “Maybe you should just give me an annotated bibliography of your work so I can catch up on everything I need to know about the last twenty years.”

Varric huffed in amusement. “I guess I could get you a copy of all my works. I am just a humble servant to my loyal readers, after all.”

Felassan smiled at him. “A sweet sentiment. That reminds me, how is your most loyal reader?”

Varric rolled his eyes. “Cassandra’s fine. Yes, I wrote her a smut scene. And no, you can’t read it.”

Dorian burst out laughing while Felassan complained playfully about not being allowed to read Varric’s smut, and Tamaris listened to the three of them faux-bickering with a bittersweet feeling in her chest. 

Later that evening, long after Dorian ended the call and Varric had gone home, Tamaris trudged gloomily back to the study to read some more reports. A minute later, Felassan sidled into the study as well.

He pushed some of her papers aside to sit down beside her, and Tamaris poked him in the arm. “Hey, don’t touch my mess. I have a system.”

He draped his arm over the back of the couch. “You’re not really going to continue working now, are you?”

She scratched her ear. “Well, I — there was one last report I was in the middle of reading, so I just want to finish it.”

“Finish it tomorrow,” he said. 

She gave him a chiding look. “You’re being a brat.”

“And you’re working far too hard for someone who doesn’t actually have anything to do.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Do you have to rub it in? I feel guilty enough already.”

He tilted his head. “You feel guilty staying in this house with me while my magic is too uncontrolled to travel?”

Her eyes widened in dismay. “Wha– no, that’s not what I mean at all!”

“Then why bother feeling guilty?” he asked.

She gazed at him in exasperation. “It’s — I can’t just turn it off, okay? Everyone else is working hard, including you. I need to do something.”

He shrugged. “You can help me with making my staff.”

Her irritation melted into surprise. “Really?”

“Yes,” he said. “You have full control of your magic. It will form a stabilizing influence to help me channel mine into the ironwood.”

She smiled at the thought of helping Felassan with something magical, then wilted slightly. “Are you sure you don’t want Dorian’s help instead? His mana reserves are way stronger than mine.”

Felassan smirked. “Jealous, are you?”

“No, for once,” she said snarkily. “Just being practical.”

His smile widened. “So you admit that you are jealous of my friendship with Dorian.”

She rolled her eyes and picked up her half-read report. “Fuck off and let me read my report, will you?”

He chuckled and plucked the papers from her hand. “To answer your question, no. I don’t want his help. Even if he could help via the sending crystal, which he can’t, I would still be asking for your help instead.”

“And why’s that?” she grumbled.

“Because I’ll enjoy feeling the hum of your magic in my fingers when I use the staff,” he replied.

She looked at him with fresh curiosity. “What do you mean?”

“You’ll leave a magical signature in the wood if you help me make my staff,” he explained. “It will be an enjoyable feeling when I’m blowing apart our enemies.” 

“Oh,” she said dumbly. His tone was casual, but she couldn’t help but feel oddly flattered that he would want to feel her magical signature during a fight. 

She shyly tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Well, um. Sure, I’d be happy to help.”

“Excellent,” he said cheerfully. “I’ll let you know when I need your hands.”

She blinked in confusion. “Oh, you – you don’t want to do this now?”

“Oh, no,” he said casually. “My experimentation today proved that I need more time to practice the spells for imbuing our signatures into the wood, not to mention tailoring it to the size-modulating spell I’ll be putting on the staff.” He lifted one eyebrow. “Besides, we’re not working anymore tonight.” 

“We’re not, huh?” she said wryly.

“No,” Felassan said. “We’re going to do something fun.”

His tone and the curl of his lips were mischievous, and Tamaris smirked. “Like what?” she said drolly.

His answer surprised her, though. “Like painting the walls.” 

She wilted. “You want to start painting the walls? Now?” She eyed the plain washed walls of the study with some resignation.

“Not those walls, and not that kind of paint,” he said. “Come.” He stood up and held out his hand.

Tamaris sighed and allowed him to pull her up from the couch. He led her to the foyer and jerked his thumb at the east-facing wall of the foyer, which they’d painted a deep peacock blue. “This bores me,” he said. “I think we should paint a mural.”

She balked slightly. “A mural?” Her mind instantly went to the murals Solas had painted on the walls of the rotunda: those huge, floor-to-ceiling works that he’d painted during the year he’d spent by her side — beautiful masterpieces that she’d once considered as tributes to his love for her, but which had later been too painful for her to look at, leading her to avoid the rotunda altogether. 

Felassan, as usual, picked up on her thoughts. He gave her a knowing look. “Not a mural like Fen’Harel’s. Something much simpler and much less planned.” 

Tamaris gave him a cautious look. “What did you have in mind?”

“Nothing in particular, really,” he said. He looked at the wall and thoughtfully rubbed his chin. “I usually just start painting and see where my hands take me.”

She gazed at him with growing confusion. “W-wait. You… do you know how to paint?”

He shrugged. “I have been known to paint sometimes.”

She gaped at him. “Seriously? Why didn’t you tell me?”

He quirked an eyebrow. “Maybe I didn’t want to be made fun of for having yet another hobby.”

She gently punched his arm. “Don’t be stupid! I would never make fun of you for being an artist! Would I have seen anything you painted? In the Vir Dirthara or any ancient temples or anything?” Her eyes widened. “Or — or even at Skyhold?”

He gave her a mischievous grin. “You flatter me by suggesting anything I paint would be worthy of such illustrious locations.”

She eyed him shrewdly. “That's not an answer.”

He chuckled. “You’re right. And you might have seen some of my work, though it would be hard to tell it apart from the work of others.”

“What do you mean?”

He let out a little huff of laughter and rubbed his mouth, as though he was thinking of a private joke. “Did you ever see quick, messy paintings of elven warriors going to battle on halla?”

“Yes, in many places,” she said. She paused, then double-taked at him. “Wait, those were by you?”

“Not just me,” Felassan said. “Fen’Harel’s rebels had a tendency to leave our mark in the places where we foiled our foes.”

Tamaris stared at him, then smiled. “You vandalized the Evanuris’s property while you were freeing their slaves?”

Felassan grinned. “I like to think we improved their decor, much like you and I are doing in this house. Now let’s see how we can improve this wall, why don’t we?” He started opening the pails of paint, then glanced up at Tamaris. “Can you bring some bowls so we can mix the colours?”

“Sure,” she said. She hurried to the kitchen and came back a minute later to find that Felassan had already laid some dropcloths on the floor along the base of the wall.

He gestured to the floor. “Set them here. You don’t mind ruining those bowls with paint, do you?”

“I don’t give a single fuck about these bowls,” she said.

He snickered. “I figured as much.” He poured together some red and yellow paint to make a deep orange shade, then looked up at her as he stirred the paint. “What colours are you in the mood for?”

She blinked in surprise. “Me?”

“Yes, you,” he said drolly. “What colours do you want to start with?”

She recoiled. “What? No. I’m not — I’ll just watch.”

He paused in his stirring. “That won’t do. You have to paint.”

She laughed at his bossy tone. “No I don’t. I’ll just watch.” She sat on the carpet and wrapped her arms around her knees, perfectly willing to watch Felassan the way she used to watch Solas during the long nights when he painted his murals.

Felassan gave her a chiding look, then gestured for her to come closer. “Come, avise. Paint with me. You’ll like it.”

She stubbornly shook her head. “I don’t know how to paint.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Do you think I knew how to paint before I started vandalizing the Evanuris’s walls?”

“I thought you were ‘improving their decor’, not vandalizing,” Tamaris retorted.

He grinned. “Silly me. Of course that’s what we were doing. Now come, I need your help to improve this wall. What colours do you want to add?”

She gave him a knowing look. “If I touch that wall, I’m going to fuck it up.”

“Anything you do will be an improvement over the wallpaper that was here before,” he said.

She snorted a laugh. “You know what, that’s true.”

He raised his eyebrows hopefully, and Tamaris finally gave in with a sigh. “Fine. How about…” She paused and gazed idly into his expectant violet eyes.

“Purple,” she said. “Mix me up some purple paint.” 

“Purple it is,” he said. He mixed together some red and blue paint and added some white to lighten the shade, then held out the bowl.

She stood up and took the bowl. “I need a brush.”

“Use your fingers,” he said.

She recoiled slightly. This would make an enormous mess if she painted with her hands. “Are you serious?”

“I never joke about vandalism,” he said. “I take it very seriously.”

He was grinning. His eyes were dancing with mischief and he looked so carefree and young, and Tamaris couldn’t help but smile in response to his joy. 

She blew out a breath. “All right, but if it looks really bad, we’re painting over it.” She dipped her fingers in the thick paint, then smeared some of it on the wall. 

She immediately regretted what she’d done. The paint began to run in slow drips, and Tamaris was forced to catch it with her fingers and smear it even more. Exasperated, she started rubbing the paint haphazardly onto the wall until it was a blobby patch of purple.

She threw Felassan an I-told-you-so look. “See? It looks like shit.”

He shook his head. “Keep going,” he said. He was still smiling, and Tamaris gazed at him with rising annoyance.

“Keep going with what?” she demanded. “It’s an ugly smudge.”

“You had something in mind when you started painting,” he said. “Keep going with it.” He picked up the bowl of orange paint, then padded over to the other end of the wall and began dashing the paint onto the wall in quick practiced strokes that clearly told her he’d done this a thousand times.

She sighed, then dipped her fingers in the paint again and kept slapping it haphazardly onto the wall in a series of vaguely rounded irregularly-sized blobs. A few minutes later, she set the bowl down and wiped her hand on the dropcloth before looking over at what Felassan was doing. 

Her eyebrows jumped up. Felassan was painting a series of what looked like stylized orange teardrops that varied in size and shape, but the shifting shades of orange and red and yellow were clearly meant to signify fire. 

She narrowed her eyes. The shifting colours in his painted flamedrops represented such a subtle blend. How was he managing to make the colours meld so seamlessly? He was holding the bowl of orange paint, but the buckets of yellow and red were sitting on the floor a good two metres away from him. 

She stepped away from the wall, and Felassan looked over at her. His gaze darted to the wall, and he smiled. “Clouds,” he said.

She grunted and rolled her eyes. “Really original, I know.”

He gave her a chiding look. “A wise woman once said you shouldn’t be so down on yourself.” He approached her end of the wall and examined her purple smudgy clouds for a second, then dipped his fingers into his bowl of orange paint and added a dash of orange to the underside of each cloud.

Tamaris raised her eyebrows. The orange underline gave the impression that each blobby cloud was lit from below by the setting sun. It was exactly what she’d been thinking of when she started to paint: sitting on the roof with Felassan while the fading light of day lit the clouds aglow from beneath.

She looked at him, and he raised his eyebrows. “Better? Worse?” He smiled faintly. “Did I ruin your artistic vision?” 

She swallowed hard, feeling oddly emotional by his addition. She shook her head. “You un-ruined it,” she said gruffly. 

His smile widened. “Oh good. I’d always dearly hoped to un-ruin something during the course of my life.” 

She scoffed, then nodded her chin at his drops of flame. “What are you doing over there?”

“Sketching,” he said. “Working out an idea.” He nodded at her clouds. “Keep going. Or paint something else.”

She nodded, but as Felassan returned to his side of the wall with his bowl of orange paint, she couldn’t help but watch him instead. He continued painting drops of flame on the wall, then eventually put the orange paint aside and picked up the bucket of green paint instead. He set the bucket on the floor by his feet and started scrawling green shapes on the wall that looked like stylized leaves, and Tamaris was once again awed — and bemused — by how seamlessly he seemed to be blending the orange of the flames into the green of the leaves. 

She watched him with unabashed interest, her own painting endeavours forgotten in favour of watching Felassan instead. He eventually paused and smiled at her. “If you’re going to stare, this really is your chance to paint a picture. The paints are open and everything.” 

She smiled at his cheeky remark. “I’d honestly rather watch,” she said. “I want to see what you come up with.”

He gave her a reproving look, and she waved dismissively. “I mean it. I’ll have more fun watching you than I will with actually painting.”

He frowned at her for a moment longer, then finally shrugged. “All right, but you’re going to start off the next mural. I insist on it.”

She wilted slightly. “The next one?”

He nodded. “We need to cover every wall of this house with filthy knife-ear art.”

Tamaris burst out a laugh. “That would be pretty good revenge for how aggressively Orlesian this house was before we got here.”

“It would, wouldn’t it?” he said complacently. “I have always enjoyed exacting petty revenge through the use of paint.”

She beamed at him. “You really are a vandal, you know that?”

He bowed politely to her. “Thank you, Tamaris. That warms my heart.”

She chuckled and settled on the carpet once more. She hadn’t been self-deprecating when she’d told Felassan she wanted to watch him instead of doing the painting. She’d always enjoyed watching artists working on their craft — and one of the artists she’d most enjoyed watching, unfortunately, was Solas.

She’d never seen an artist who worked the way Solas did. Watching him transform the rotunda walls from raw rock to smooth plaster to charcoal sketches and finally to fully-rendered murals had been, in her eyes, its own form of magic. Solas’s careful stepwise method had also been something to marvel at; he always started with a lovingly-crafted small-scale sketch of each design before translating the sketch to the walls in perfect proportion, and the actual painting of the mural was an all-night process that exemplified his focus and methodical devotion to the art. During those all-night painting sessions, Solas was intent and focused and almost completely silent, and Tamaris couldn’t remember a single time when he’d faltered or made a mistake in the execution of his spectacular works.

Watching Felassan paint, on the other hand... truly, it was nothing like watching Solas. Felassan hadn’t planned a thing, opting instead to experiment directly on the walls with his fingers instead of the sorts of fine brushes that Solas used to use. His movements were loose and relaxed and lacking in precision, and he kept jumping between the different elements of the scene he was creating: adding a bunch of those green leaf shapes, then adding some more flames, then swiping a streak of gold in a bold vertical arch through the cluster of flames before starting to add some violet clouds to his end of the mural. He hummed to himself as he worked and made little playful comments to her over his shoulder, and when the occasional drop of paint rolled slowly down the wall from his quick and messy application, he simply blended it back into the wall or painted over it with a new leaf or flame. 

She stared shamelessly at Felassan’s emerging work. His application method appeared slapdash and careless, but the effect was anything but; his work was striking and bold, and to Tamaris’s eye, very appealing. The lines varied from dark saturated lines to graceful faded streaks, giving his mural a dynamic and energetic feel that was more emotion than story, and Tamaris felt energized in turn as she watched him moving from one end of the wall to the other and back. 

The longer he worked, the less he spoke and the more focused he seemed to become, even as his movements remained loose and flowing. He looked incredibly graceful as he moved across the wall, and he was using both hands now to paint, and–

Wait. Both hands? she thought. And with a jolt, she realized that Felassan was no longer holding a bowl of paint in his hand. Even so, the colours continued to flow from his fingers as though he had dipped his fingers into the paint. But how…? 

She narrowed her eyes and watched him more carefully. And eventually, with a rising of wonder, she realized what he was doing. He kept gesturing in the direction of the paints and twisting his wrists as though he was dipping his hands into the paints, and the amount of paint in the buckets and the bowls was actually decreasing in accordance with the movements of his hands. 

It’s magic, she thought in amazement. He’s using magic to pull the paint to his hands and to blend the colours. Her heart was pounding now with excitement at his exquisitely controlled magical feat, but she continued to watch him in silence, unwilling to disturb his flow by commenting on what he was doing. 

He flicked his wrist at the bucket of gold paint, then dragged his fingers in a long horizontal line from the center of the vertical arch and back toward Tamaris’s end of the wall, and Tamaris finally recognized the shape that dominated most of the mural: a stylized bow and arrow, with a background of flames toward the front of the bow that blended into leaves toward the end. Enthralled by his design and by the magical way he was executing it, she wrapped her arms loosely around her knees and continued to watch as he added a silvery-white bowstring, then a purple-silvery arrowhead and purple-and-red fletching to the arrow. 

He stood back briefly to study the design before going over the golden bow and arrow again with a smattering of brown, making the bow and arrow look like a combination of wood and gold. 

He paused again and idly scratched the back of his neck, and Tamaris watched with a swelling of affection as he smeared some paint on his neck. 

He turned to face her then. “Look at me?” he said.

She lifted her eyes to his face, and her breath stalled in her chest; his beautiful amethyst eyes were bright with focus. He studied her face intently for a long second, then nodded and turned back to the wall. He flicked his wrist at the paints, then started painting over the leaves again with a slightly lighter shade of green that blended into a darker green at the edges. 

When he finished re-painting the leaves, he stood back once more and folded his arms as he surveyed his work, and Tamaris stared shamelessly at his handsome profile as he studied the wall. He carelessly flicked his wrist at the paint buckets, then flicked his fingers at the wall, and Tamaris watched as a fine blend of white and bright blue droplets appeared in misty-looking streaks near the upper edge of the bow — a fine blend that would have required painstaking care to paint by hand, but which Felassan’s magic had rendered quick and doable. His magic, which he was clearly gaining better control over with every passing day… 

Her heart throbbed again with an undeniable surge of pride. Felassan continued to flick streaks and curls of fine blue-and-white droplets across the mural, and Tamaris eventually realized that the streaks and curls looked like smoke, which made sense given the omnipresent stylized fire that dominated much of the right-hand side of the mural. 

He stepped away from the wall one more time to examine his work, then finally nodded in satisfaction. He turned to face her with a smile. “So? What do you think?”

“I love it. It’s beautiful,” she said. Then she immediately regretted her inane compliment. It sounded so paltry compared to the way her heart was pounding in her chest, as though it wanted to escape the confines of her ribcage and leap into his open hands.

He sat beside her with a satisfied sigh. “I’m glad you like it. It’s us, after all.”

She raised her eyebrows. “What?”

He gestured at the wall. “It’s us. A slow arrow dancing with flames. And a little bit of deep mushroom smoke, of course.” He smirked, then gently lifted her chin and studied her face. “I’m not convinced that I captured the shade of your eyes right, though.”

“My eyes?” she said stupidly.

“Yes, your eyes,” he said vaguely. He was still carefully examining her face. “Those green shapes on the left half of the wall.”

Those are my eyes? she thought. The green shapes he’d painted, then painstakingly repainted a second time to adjust their shade: those were meant to represent her eyes? 

He chuckled and lowered his hand. “Tell me the truth. You thought they were leaves, didn’t you?”

She stared wordlessly at him, overwhelmed by the perfection of this moment — the perfection of him. Her body was still buzzing with energy from watching him paint, and her heart was humming besottedly from the careful way he’d inspected the verdancy of her eyes. The memory of his loose and joyful movements danced across her mind as surely as his paint-slathered hands had danced across the wall, and gods, the laughter in his voice and in his smile… 

Her heart was pounding so loudly that she was shocked he couldn’t hear it. She swallowed hard and gazed at the mural once more — this mural that was them, that was her and Felassan together: a slow arrow dancing in flames, splashed boldly across the wall of this house for everyone to see. As Tamaris studied the bold jewel tones of the freshly-painted wall, it dawned on her that she had never seen any mural more beautiful than the one Felassan had just rendered with his magic and his own two hands. 

Tamaris tore her gaze away from the mural and met his bright violet eyes. “I love you,” she said.

A slow and brilliant smile lit his entire face, like a bursting of joy that rendered him even more painfully handsome than he already was. Tamaris stared gormlessly at him, her throat thickening with emotion as she took in the tenderness in his face. 

He cradled her neck in his palm. “I know, Tamaris,” he murmured.

Her heart squeezed with nerves. She swallowed hard, then smacked his chest. “You know? What do you mean, you know?”

His smile grew wider and softer at once. “I know you love me. I don’t need to hear you say it.”

Feeling slightly stung, she scoffed and tried to push him away. “You’re so fucking smug.”

He pulled her easily into his lap. “I don’t need to hear you say it, but I have been waiting for you to say it first.”

“Why?” she complained. “Why did I have to say it first?”

“I didn’t want you to feel obligated to say it back if I said it first,” he replied.

She darted him a cautious look. If he said it first? So that meant — did that mean…?

She cleared her throat and rubbed at the dent on her metal arm. “So… say it back, meaning…?”

He chuckled and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “It means that I love you too, felasil’ain. But I think you already knew that.” 

Her heart leapt into her throat, and she gazed silently into his glittering amethyst eyes. As usual, Felassan was right. He’d been right when he said that empty words couldn’t wipe her bitterness away. And now, in this moment, he was right when he said that mere words of love weren’t necessary. Just because he’d never said he loved her didn’t mean she didn’t know — and if she dug beneath the surface of her own stubborn insecurity, she could openly admit that she’d known all along.

She knew Felassan loved her; of course she knew, because it was infused into his every act. He made foods that he knew she would like and concocted herbal remedies for her withdrawal and her pain. He offered her massages and pulled her out of her terrible moods with his terrible jokes. He kissed her like there was nothing else he would rather do, and he fucked her like he was trying to wring every last shiver of pleasure from her body, and he was patient — almost unfathomably patient. He listened while she talked about Solas, and he’d tolerated the torture of their heated trysts until she was ready to have sex again, and he’d waited quietly while she held back the words of love that seemed to consume her more with every passing day.

No longer would she be consumed by those words. No longer would she be held hostage by them — especially not when his feelings for her were so patently obvious. 

She straddled him and cradled his paint-stained neck in her palms. “I love you,” she said huskily. “I — you’re right, okay? I wanted to say it for weeks but I felt — I don’t know, shy or something. I was being stupid.”

He squeezed her waist soothingly. “You were not being stupid. And there’s no need to explain. I told you, I don’t need you to say it.”

“Well, I need to say it,” she retorted. “And you deserve to hear it, okay? I fucking love you.”

He grinned at her, then broke into laughter. “How is it possible for someone to be affectionate and rude at once?”

She tsked and smacked his chest. “Shut the fuck up,” she said, and she kissed him. 

He wrapped his arms around her and stroked her tongue with his, and Tamaris happily capitulated to the heat of his kiss. When he broke away from her lips to laugh, she was helpless to do anything but laugh in turn.

They sat twined together on the floor, kissing and laughing and making fun of each other in husky murmured voices, and Tamaris basked shamelessly in the ample evidence of Felassan’s love. His lips pulled gently at hers and his hands moved carefully over her body, and there on the wall, looming benevolently over them in bright and brilliant strokes of colour, was the most visible sign of his love: a mural rendered by Felassan’s bare hands — a mural showing his slow arrow dancing fearlessly and boldly through the fire of her heart.

#felassan #save felassan #felassan romance #felassan/lavellan #felassan x lavellan #the love that grows from violence #pikapeppa writes #elbenherzart